Whirlwind Wedding (24 page)

She felt a rising urgency, and writhed, reaching for something she couldn't name. His strokes slowed, deep and steady and unhurried, until a hard-edged need splintered through her. Something snapped, flinging her into a paroxysm of sensation. She heard sounds come from her throat, heard Jericho murmuring to her as breath after breath shuddered out of her.

“Oh, my,” she gasped when she came back to herself.

He stroked her damp hair from her face and she opened her eyes to find him smiling tenderly at her. She wanted him inside her. Now.

“Come closer,” she said softly, reaching for him.

He levered himself over her, making a place for himself between her legs. “I don't want to hurt you.”

“I know.” With trembling hands, she touched his face, loving the way his silver eyes blazed at her. “I know you never will.”

“This first time I will, but it can't be helped.”

He looked so worried that she smiled, running a finger over his lips. “It will be all right.”

She raised up to kiss him and he took her mouth, following her back down. He braced his elbows on either side of her head and settled his weight on her.

“Too heavy?”

“No.” She slid her hands up his back, her fingers splaying over warm muscle and tendons. He pressed her into the mattress, sheltering her, gathering her body to his with the same desperate need she felt.

She shifted her legs so that he settled deeper between them, and touched his back, his sides, his flanks. Fire licked at her nerves.

He skimmed his lips over her ear and tickled her with his hot breath before grazing the length of her neck with his teeth. Urged on by the moist ache blooming between her legs, she lifted her hips.

The blunt tip of his arousal replaced his fingers at the entrance of her body, and she melted, throbbing against him.

“Come closer,” she breathed, framing his face in her trembling hands. “Now.”

His eyes glittered like moonlight as he pushed inside just a bit. She drew in a breath at the invasion, the stretch of her body, the incredible feel of his flesh joining hers.

He swept one hand downward and gently pushed her knees wider. She moved against him, wanting more.

He smoothed her hair away from her face. “Wrap your arms around me.”

She did, fighting the urge to arch against him. He was so hot and male and impossibly strong.

His lips covered hers and she shook, anticipating the moment when he would fill her completely. He drew her tongue into his mouth and began to stroke her in deliberate measured motions. Hot, aching need blistered her center and she tightened her arms around him.

He eased himself deeper into her, murmuring sweet words against her neck. She gasped at the fullness of him and involuntarily shrank back from the burning pressure.

He stilled and waited, giving her time to accept him. “Okay?”

She shifted and wriggled, trying to accommodate him.

“Catherine, be still. Let me help you.” His voice was labored. Sweat sheened his face and neck; the tendons in his arms strained. “I know it's hard, but try to relax.”

Frustrated, she said, “I don't see how you're going to fit.”

“Like a glove, sweetheart. I promise.” He kissed her forehead. “I'm sorry about this.”

Before she could ask about what, he flexed his hips and surged completely inside her. She felt the barrier of her maidenhead give, and bit her lip against a cry as a stinging pain filled her.

He pressed farther inside and she clutched at him tightly. After a moment, he eased back until he almost left her, then moved forward with a long slow glide.

“Oh!” The pain dimmed, and the next time he moved she felt a sharp-edged pleasure. Her knees fell wider apart and her legs hooked over his calves.

Tension bowing his back and arms, he nudged inside her, teasing the knot of nerves his fingers had touched moments ago. Then he began to move in slow deliberate thrusts that pushed her up a ladder of sensation. She panted with him, arching with inexpert eagerness. He grasped one hip, guiding her into his rhythm, and she widened her eyes in wonder as their flesh connected, sliding ever deeper.

He rocked her until she lost all sense of time. She held on to him, fighting for balance against the vortex of sensation battering at her.

His mouth covered hers and his tongue delved inside. The delicious shock of having him within her at the same time sent heat splintering through her.

“I can't hold on, Catherine,” he finally groaned.

She wasn't sure what that meant, but she sensed his shat
tering restraint. His thrusts became shorter, more determined, until he was moving rapidly, breathing harshly.

Overcome with emotion, she kept her gaze locked with his, instinctively lifting her hips to meet each thrust. His breath rasped in her ear. He whispered her name, told her how much he wanted her, how beautiful she was. His hands slid under her bottom and he pumped into her hard and fast, then stilled, resting his head next to hers.

She felt warm and full, her heart bursting. She stroked his back, swept with a protectiveness that surprised her. As she held his body in hers, a realization came upon her slowly and surely, filling her so completely that she didn't question it. She loved him.

With tears burning her eyes, she kissed his shoulder. His hand slipped between them and he rose on one elbow. While he was still inside her, his finger went to the knot of nerves between her legs. “Next time we'll do it together.”

“Do what—oh!” His touch splintered a cord of tension buried deep inside. Suddenly her inner muscles clenched around him, pulling him farther into her body. They both groaned and she sank her hands into the taut muscles of his buttocks.

Tiny convulsions started deep inside, rippling with exquisite sensation. In the split second before her mind blanked with pleasure, she understood.

Long moments later she lay trembling beneath him, lazily kissing his neck, his jaw.

He nuzzled her cheek. “Are you okay?”

“Yes. Are you?”

He chuckled, kissing her eyelids and the side of her face. He left her body and rolled to his side, pulling her close. She snuggled into him, her head on his shoulder.

“What do you think about that?” His voice rumbled quietly in her ear.

The tenderness between her legs felt strangely wonderful. “I think it's a good thing I decided not to become a nun.”

He laughed, hugging her to him.

Drowsy, her bones feeling as soft as melted wax, she cuddled against him. Her head rested over his heart and her leg twined intimately with his. She stroked his belly and chest, loving the supple feel of him. Her fingers floated down to the smooth skin between his hip and groin. The wound in his thigh had healed nicely, but the scar was still a reminder of how close he'd come to dying.

She stroked the puckered flesh gently, as if by touching him enough she could erase the mark.

His hands stroked her back and her hips as they lay together in a lazy, comfortable silence. He was a good man with a good heart. He made her feel safe and protected. If anyone could find a way out of the mess she and Andrew were in with the McDougals, it was Jericho.

She had trusted him with her body and her heart. Now she had to trust him with her brother.

She propped herself up on her elbow, her gaze meeting his. “I need to tell you something.”

J
ericho watched her sit up, draw her knees to her chest and wrap her arms around them. The sheet covered her front, but not the tapering line of her back, the flare of a creamy hip.

Tantalized by her soft scent, he couldn't keep from trailing his finger down the silky flesh of her spine, brushing his thumb over the sweet curve of her shoulder. Her skin gleamed like mother-of-pearl in the soft light. The dark fall of her hair was tousled from his hands, her body still flushed from their lovemaking, and Jericho felt himself already growing hard again.

She glanced at him. “Last night after you left with Davis Lee, Andrew sneaked out and I followed him.”

Jericho's hand stilled. Had Andrew gone to the McDougals? What had she witnessed? Had they seen her? He didn't want her within a hundred miles of those bastards.

“He went to Haskell's.”

The coil in his gut eased somewhat when he heard she hadn't been near the outlaws, but he waited expectantly.

“My brother was stealing food, and it wasn't the first time.” She took a deep breath. “He did it for the McDougals.”

Jericho slowly pushed himself to a half-sitting position, the
wooden headboard rough against his back. The sheet slid low on his hips. Why was she confessing to him? How much did she really know? Did she know about the ambush? About Andrew killing Hayes? “He told you he stole food from Haskell's?”

“Yes.”

“For the McDougals?”

“Yes.”

“And the rifle cartridges from Jed Doyle?” His voice was clipped.

Her words rushed out. “Yes, but he's going to reimburse Mr. Haskell and Mr. Doyle for all of that. We've already discussed it. He's involved with the McDougals, Jericho, but not because he wants to be.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, he was willing at first. He ran errands for them and stole supplies and told them things—”

“Told them I was here,” he said flatly.

“Yes.” She turned toward him, her beautiful blue eyes pleading for understanding. The sheet sagged low on the swell of her creamy breasts. “But he tried to break his ties with them and they wouldn't let him. Last week, Angus burned him, then today—”

“
Today?
” He boomed out the question.

She explained how Andrew had convinced her to let him take the stolen food so the McDougals wouldn't become suspicious that he had told anyone about them. How they had forced him to find them a dry place with a bed. “One of them has tuberculosis.”

“Ian.” Urgency spooled inside Jericho, but since she trusted him enough to tell him, he reined in his impatience. He knew he wasn't going to like anything she had to say from here on out. “How did they force Andrew?”

“They threatened to kill me.” She put a trembling hand on his sheet-covered thigh. “And you. I know they'll do it. They nearly killed you once already.”

Tension lashed her entire body, and he swore he smelled fear mixed with her musky womanly scent.

“They wanted me to check Ian and get him some medicine.”

With grim certainty, Jericho said, “And you did it.”

“Yes,” she said hoarsely. “They made Andrew stay with them while I drove to the fort for some laudanum.”

He thought his jaw might break clean in two. Anger drove through him like a spike. She could've been hurt,
killed.
His words were rough and wrenched out of him. “Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?”

“Of course I do,” she snapped. “I was scared to death, but I was more afraid of what they would do if I didn't go. As it was, they beat up Andrew and—”

“Where is he? How badly hurt is he?”

“His ribs aren't broken, but he's bruised. I took him to Riley and Susannah's.”

Good. Someone was keeping an eye on the kid, and he was safe for the moment.

Jericho noticed that Catherine still trembled, and his instincts told him there was something else. He recalled how terrified she'd been when he'd walked into the house. What had happened? Those bastards couldn't have hurt her, could they? Jericho's hands, his mouth had been all over her just minutes ago. He would've known. “Did they touch you?”

Her fingers closed convulsively on his leg, and dread shot through him. “Catherine?”

“Angus. He grabbed me by the hair and—” She swayed, her face pale as she struggled to speak.

A hush came over Jericho's body the same way it had
when he'd watched the life bleed out of Hays. He was going out of his mind. “Cath—”

“He licked me.”

She spoke so quietly Jericho had to strain to hear her. His entire body shut down for a heartbeat, maybe two. Then a black fury screamed through him, filled him until there was nothing inside but a molten seething pulse. “He
what?
”

Tears glistened in her eyes. She raised a hand to the left side of her face, the red place he'd noticed earlier. “Here.”

His pulse throbbing painfully in his neck, he curved an arm around her and settled her against him, trying to reach past the fury to be gentle with her. He cupped her cheek, finally able to get the words past his clenched teeth, “Anywhere else? Did he touch you anywhere else?
Do
anything else?”

“No.”

“And you're all right?”

“Yes.” She placed her hand over his where it lay on her cheek.

He crushed her to him as rage shattered every rational thought he possessed. A near-crippling cold slid like needles under his skin as he struggled to control the viciousness welling from some deep hole inside him that he'd never known existed.

He wanted to murder Angus McDougal. He would. The oath he'd taken as a Ranger be damned. No one touched his woman.

Tucking her against him, he held her close until the fury settled into something manageable. “You're sure you're all right?”

“Yes.” She lifted her head and skimmed a kiss along his jaw. “It feels good to tell you.”

He knew he had to tell her, too. All of it.

She sat up, her eyes dark with knowing. “You're going after them.”

“Yes.” He brushed his lips across her hair, then slid out of bed and limped around to her side for his pants. He pulled on his trousers, buttoning them with crisp precision.

“But where will you look?” She swung her feet to the floor, wrapping the sheet around her. “Angus told us today that they weren't going to stay at that house.”

“I have to talk to Andrew.” Jericho forced himself to look at her. He couldn't let her learn the truth only when he returned with her brother in irons.

Soon that trusting look in her soft blue eyes would turn frigid and unforgiving. He steeled himself. “There are things you need to know, Catherine, and there's no easy way to tell you.”

“What things?”

He wanted to bolt, but knew he'd run smack into the door to hell. There was no going back. “I came here to arrest Andrew. After he led me to the McDougals.”

“Arrest him for what?” She gave a small disbelieving laugh. “Stealing?”

She had no idea the extent of her brother's involvement. Pants only half-buttoned, Jericho sat down beside her and placed a hand on her leg. To steady her or himself, he wasn't sure. He hated the alarm that flared in her eyes. “He was at the ambush.”

“The amb— Where your friend was killed and you nearly were, too?”

“Yes.”

She stared at him for a long moment, then disbelief, denial, skittered across her face. She stood, jerking the sheet tighter around herself. “No.”

“I tracked him here, to your house,” he said gently. “Moe's shoes match the prints I followed.”

She turned toward the door, then the window and back, as if she were cornered. Her chest rose and fell rapidly. “No.”

Jericho curled his good hand against his thigh. “I found one of the rifle cartridges stolen from Jed Doyle in your barn.”

“How do you know—”

“Doyle identified it.”

“That doesn't mean Andrew took it!”

Jericho didn't say anything.

She sank down onto the bed, staring at him with disbelief. “If he was there, those outlaws probably made him go. And he can't be held accountable for that. He's been trying to get away from them.”

This pain chewing at his gut was worse than any damn needle she'd driven through his torn flesh. Feeling queasy, he swiped a hand across the back of his neck. “He's the one who shot Hays. And me.”

Horror creased her delicate features. How could she turn even more pale? “That can't be. You're mistaken.”

“I'm sorry.” He wanted to pull her onto his lap, soothe her,
something,
but didn't know what to do. “I saw him.”

“How can you know that?” she demanded shakily, a tear sliding down her cheek. “When you got here, you couldn't even stand up. You'd lost so much blood you didn't regain consciousness for three days!”

“I know what I saw.”

“How can you be sure?”

“I wish I weren't.”

Looking as if she might shatter at any moment, she wiped at her eyes with unsteady hands. Suddenly she went very still. “So, you've suspected from the night you arrived that Andrew was involved with the McDougals?”

“I've known, yes.”

“Why didn't you tell me?” She recoiled from him, color burning high in her cheeks. Her eyes were painfully bright with anger, and tears poured down her cheeks. “Why didn't you say something? We might have prevented Angus from burning him! And those others from beating him up!”

“Sweetheart, I never meant for Andrew to get hurt. I didn't
know anything about what they were doing to him. If he'd told me what was going on, I could've helped.”

“Why did you keep secret the reason you were here? Maybe he would've told you then. Why didn't you just arrest him?”

“First, I had to be sure he was the kid I saw at the ambush. Then I had to make sure he was meeting with the outlaws. If I'd tipped my hand, Andrew would've warned them.”

“He also wouldn't be hurt!” she cried accusingly.

The anguish in her face carved him deeply. “I had no way of knowing about that. He did know they were dangerous when he became involved with them.”

“He's twelve years old!”

Jericho knew boys, good and bad, who had killed when they weren't much older. He didn't say it.

“So,” she said slowly, “you've been spying on him.”

There really was no other word for it. “Yes.”

Her gaze slid to the bed. “And me? Was
that
part of—”

He knew where she was going and it angered him. “Don't think that, Catherine.”

“Did you… Did we… Because I threw myself at you?” Pain welled up, smothering her. “Are there no feelings—”

“Stop!” His hands curved over her bare shoulders and he forced her to look into his face. “What happened between you and me was about
us.
No one and nothing else. Don't doubt that, Catherine.”

She searched his eyes, her own wary and hurt.

Couldn't she see? “Only about us. Trust me.”

“I want to.” She chewed at her lip.

“You know it's true.” He tucked a silky strand of hair behind her ear, rubbing her lobe. “I love you.”

He hadn't meant to tell her like this, but there it was.

Some indefinable emotion flitted across her face and her throat worked. “What are you going to do about Andrew?”

Inwardly he flinched that she had ignored what he said. Hadn't he told himself she would turn away? Probably hate him? That didn't ease the jagged rush of pain through his chest. “First I'm going to talk to him.”

“And then?”

Damn it all. “I'll probably have to arrest him.”

“You can't,” she moaned. She closed her eyes, aching so much her muscles cramped. The numbness that had started through her body when Jericho had first told her all these horrible things had spread to her fingers and toes. “He's only twelve!”

“He rode with them.” Angry at himself, at her, Jericho bent to grab one of his boots. “You can't expect me to ignore that.”

She understood how deeply he felt his duty. He was in the right to chase the McDougals, bring them to justice, but not Andrew. “Do you mean to see he goes to prison?”

“I need to talk to him first—”

“And if you decide it, then he'll go,” she said baldly.

He looked up from pulling on his other boot. “You know what that gang has done, the people they've killed.”

How could her brother have been present during that ambush? Could Jericho be wrong? What if he was right? “But Andrew—”

“Was with them. I can't make that go away, but don't jump the gun. Let me talk to him and see what I learn. If he helps me, there might be something I can do for him.”

“He won't know where they are! Angus told us this morning that they weren't going to stay at Widow Monfrey's, and Andrew has been at Riley's ever since.”

“I still have to talk to him.”

“I understand why you came to our house, that you tracked him
here,
” she said, trembling.

Jericho sat up, hope skittering through him.

“I want those outlaws captured, too,” she added. “Andrew isn't one of them.”

The hollow ache in his gut spread to his heart. “I'll be fair.”

“Can you? They killed your friend, nearly killed you. If Andrew
is
responsible, as you say, how can you be objective?”

“I didn't say objective, but I can be fair. Can't you at least trust me that much? His age will be taken into account, Catherine, but he can't be ignored. He
was
with them.”

She was so pale, huddled into herself as if he'd punched her in the stomach. Jericho's chest felt as if it were being slowly crushed. He reached for her and she withdrew slightly—only a fraction but it was enough. He dropped his hand, his heart twisting.