Howard Haskell Takes A Bride (The Brides of Paradise Ranch Book 0) (9 page)

Howard wasn’t done yet. He still wasn’t a gentleman, and with muscular swiftness and a groan of triumph, he shifted atop her, gripped her hips in both hands, tilted her still throbbing body up to meet his, then buried himself inside of her with a hard, fast stroke.

Elizabeth cried out, uncertain whether what she was feeling was pain or pleasure or something else entirely indescribably. All she knew was that she wanted more. She jerked against him, sinking him deeper. Howard felt her response and growled. He inched back, then thrust again, his muscles gone rigid with need. With accompanying grunts of passion, he continued thrusting, hard and deep and commanding. The feeling of him inside of her, claiming her and transforming her was heaven itself. He stretched and filled her, causing the pulsating pleasure within her to burst anew.

At last, he erupted with a feral cry, his thrusts growing pitched before subsiding. She watched him transform above her from a ravenous beast to a victorious warrior, muscles rippling, to a proud and sated man in all his glory. He was everything she could ever have wanted and more, had made this first experience of forbidden fruit everything she could have longed for and far beyond anything she could have dreamed of.

“I love you, my darling,” she whispered, breathless, as he sagged to rest on top of her. “I will love you for all my days and all of my eternity.”

He was so spent he could only reply with a fond grumble. It was more than enough for her. She laughed low in her throat, and wrapped her arms and legs around him, holding him. His decreased length was still inside of her, and she kept her hips still to remain that way. Even spent, he felt delicious inside of her. She could lay like that with him forever and be completely, blissfully happy.

They did lay like that for some time, whispering silly, sweet nothings to each other as their bodies cooled, and then began to heat all over. As soon as Elizabeth began to feel him harden inside of her again, she squeezed her inner muscles and twitched her hips. Howard laughed low and sensuously in his chest, pressing in and out of her in tiny movements, a pale imitation of his wild thrusts. She traced her fingers up and down his back, over his backside, reveling in the way he sucked in a breath and hardened even more as she dug her nails in.

“This is glorious,” she moaned when he regained enough energy to nibble at her shoulder.

He inched one hand up to cup the side of her breast as it pressed between them.

“It is,” he echoed. “Glorious.”

It was glorious and beautiful and ripe with joy.

Right up until the moment when the shed door banged open.

E
lizabeth wasn’t
certain if she was the one who screamed or if that was her mother. Her mother was most certainly the one who thumped against the shed door as she fainted.

“Dear God, what is the meaning of this?” her father shouted.

“Papa?” She gasped and tensed, but considering it was far less of a humiliation for her father to see only her head, arms, and legs while the rest of her body was shielded by Howard—by Howard who was sheathed deep inside of her—she remained perfectly still.

Howard lifted his head from where he had buried his face in a fall of her hair. He met her eyes. Pure, victorious mischief and unending love shone from his expression. He didn’t seem the least bit surprised or perturbed to have been caught in the most incriminating position a man and woman could be caught in. In fact, he seemed downright tickled by the turn of events.

“I told you I had a plan,” he whispered, then winked.

She gasped, the motion sending ripples of sensation through her. A plan. A plan that did not involve winning an impossible race. A plan that was foolproof in its aim to find a way for the two of them to marry with haste and with her parents’ blessing. A plan that would result in the two of them leaving Cincinnati to seek out their new life in the wild frontier before the day was done.

Howard Haskell was a genius. Diabolical, scandalous, perhaps unforgiveable, but a genius.

Elizabeth peeked to the side. Her father was red-faced, but had his gaze firmly averted as he helped her mother back to her feet after her faint.

“You meant for this to happen,” she whispered to Howard, barely able to contain her laughter. It shook her entire body, the result of which was a delicious tightening inside as Howard grew harder. “Stop that.” She swatted his arm, but continued to giggle. And he continued to grow.

He stole a kiss, still not moving on top of her. “I can think of no more enjoyable way to get rid of an unwanted fiancé and convince unwilling parents to agree to a marriage without reservation.”

So she was right after all. “But they might not agree.” The truth hit her with withering force, and she resisted the urge to peek at her father again. “They might throw you out and insist I marry Jonas to hide this indiscretion.”

Howard’s grin didn’t budge. He shook his head. “Unlikely. For you see, my dearest, there are still two more pieces of this plan that will fall into place, clearing our way for a lifetime of wedded and bedded bliss.”

“Two?” Her eyebrows flew up.

“Oh, yes.”

“What is going on back here?” Jonas’s muffled voice floated in through the shed’s open door.

“Why, here’s one now,” Howard said, grin downright wicked. “Ready?”

She wasn’t, but before she could lodge a protest, Howard kissed her. It wasn’t even a kiss with tongues, but it was perfectly timed.

Jonas stepped into the shed’s doorway, took one look at Howard and Elizabeth in their state of scandalous conjunction, and blurted out a string of expletives so violent that Elizabeth burst into laughter. He then stumbled back, thumping against something outside the shed.

“What is the meaning of this disgusting depravity?” they heard him shout from around the corner a moment later.

“Right.” Howard kissed Elizabeth once more. “Now that that’s settled.”

He began to lift himself above her, but Elizabeth gasped and held him tighter. He was, after all, the only thing shielding her naked-and-then-some body from her father.

“Ah.” Howard nodded. Hunching over her, he turned to Mr. Ayers and cleared his throat. “Sir, would you mind terribly giving Elizabeth and I a few minutes of privacy so that we can put ourselves to right?”

Mr. Ayers had been busy helping his wife stand straight and recover from her swoon, but now he handed her off to someone outside the shed and whipped to face the two of them. He opened his mouth to rage at them.

“Is what I think actually going on in there?” Virginia’s voice stopped any tirade before it could start.

Howard beamed and laughed. “And there is my second safeguard.”

“Your sister?” Elizabeth balked.

He shook his head. “You’ll see.” He paused. “Well, you’ll see if she’s done as I instructed.”

“I will not have the two of you conversing as though you are at a garden party when you are…” Mr. Ayers waved his hand in Howard and Elizabeth’s direction. He made a disgusted noise, then took a step back, grabbing the shed door’s handle. “Five minutes,” he shouted. “I want the two of you up at the house, in my study,
fully dressed
in five minutes.”

He stepped back and slammed the door.

Howard gently extracted himself from Elizabeth and stood, laughing like a king. Elizabeth didn’t realize how stiff her joints had become from her scandalous position until she tried to move. She groaned for entirely different reasons than before.

“This is disgusting,” Jonas railed outside the shed. “This is absolutely vile. If you expect me to sully myself and my family’s name by coming within a thousand feet of that whore, let alone marrying her, you are delusional.” His voice faded as the party headed back to the house.

Howard—who had bent over to retrieve Elizabeth’s underthings—stood, then executed a perfect, naked, erect bow. “You are unendingly welcome, my dear.”

Elizabeth gaped at him as she sat on the edge of the settee. She blinked. Then she burst into laughter. “Oh, Howard, you are the most remarkable man I have ever met.” She sprang up from the chaise and rushed to throw her arms around him. “I love you. I adore you. You are brilliant and marvelous.”

He circled his arms around her, still holding her petticoat and drawers. She smacked a kiss on his lips with such ardor that even the chill air of the shed couldn’t penetrate her heat.

“Do you think five minutes is enough to finish what we started?” She arched a brow.

Howard’s rumbling laugh stoked her fire. “Not if we want to do it right, my angel. But I can assure you, once we are married and summarily dismissed from your parents’ house—which I am quite certain will be accomplished before the day is done—we will engage in carnal behavior forward, backward, and upside down, in a manner that would make the savages of the orient drop their jaws in shock.”

After a comment like that, Elizabeth couldn’t stop herself from giggling all through the process of getting dressed. She had just committed an egregious sin. She had been caught in it by both of her parents. They had seen her in a compromised position, as had her former fiancé. Rumors could circulate that would destroy every shred of good reputation that she had gained over the years. Her friends could disown her, her parents could banish her forever.

She could be free.

Once they were dressed as tidily as they could manage in five minutes in a tool shed, they walked hand-in-hand up to the house. Trudy and Moses waited for them at the door to the library. Both wore looks of shock and awe, but Elizabeth knew the sparkle in Trudy’s eyes. She grinned proudly in return, nodding to her maid.

Her grin vanished as soon as she and Howard stepped into the library. Her father stood arguing with Jonas by the fireplace. Her mother appeared to be coming out of another faint and was draped across one of the library’s leather chairs, her maid, Prudence, waving a bottle of smelling salts in front of her nose. Howard’s sister and his friend Cyrus and another man Elizabeth didn’t recognize stood in a cluster at the far end of the library, looking as uncomfortable as raccoons in an ice bath. When Elizabeth sent them a puzzled expression, Howard squeezed her hand and winked. Evidently, those three people—or one of them, at least—was his ace in the hole.

“This is outrageous,” Mr. Ayers launched right into Elizabeth and Howard as soon as he saw they had arrived. “I have never been so grievously insulted in my life.”

“I’ve called for the police.” Jonas followed on Mr. Ayers’s footsteps. “They will be here to arrest you and throw your lecherous ass in jail.”

Elizabeth gasped. In the leather chair, her mother fainted yet again. Virginia merely sighed and rolled her eyes, shaking her head at her brother.

“I will not marry Jonas,” Elizabeth declared. He was still there, after all. There was a chance that that part of Howard’s plan had failed.

But no, Jonas curled his lip and looked down his nose at her before lifting his chin and turning away. “I would no sooner marry you than I would a whore from the docks. In fact, as I have told your father, I am more than certain that that’s where you will end up, seeing as you enjoy being poked by any common ruffian that you have just met.”

He whirled to face Elizabeth and Howard, his sneer spreading to a vicious grin, as if he expected them to weep and wail at his insults. His sneer faded when all Elizabeth and Howard did was blink at the useless energy behind his hatred.

“Will I end up at the docks, Howard?” Elizabeth asked, squeezing Howard’s hand.

“Of course, my love,” Howard answered. “How else are we supposed to board the riverboat that will take us on to St. Louis?”

Satisfied with his answer, Elizabeth turned back to Jonas, tilted her head, and shrugged. “So you are right, Mr. Armstrong. You will not marry me, and I will end up at the docks. Good for you.”

Jonas grunted in revulsion, then squared his shoulders and marched out of the room. He didn’t take his leave of Mrs. Ayers—who had come to but was still pale as a ghost—nor did he say goodbye to Mr. Ayers.

“Good riddance,” Howard huffed. He turned to Elizabeth with an adoring smile and said, “One.”

“Now see here.” Mr. Ayers shot into action, quivering with rage as he stormed across the Persian rug to glower at Howard. “You, sir, are a filthy blackguard and a despoiler of women.”

“I most certainly am not,” Howard barked back, pulling himself to his full height—which was inches taller than Elizabeth’s father. He relented, relaxed, and said, “I am a despoiler of
woman
. As God is my witness, I have never ravaged the virginity nor decimated the reputation of a single woman other than your daughter.”

Elizabeth sighed. “Oh, my darling, that is the most romantic thing that anyone has ever said to me.”

Mr. Ayers’s mouth flapped open and his eyes bulged. He gaped from Howard to Elizabeth and back again. “I cannot… I have never… You have no right…” He balled his hands into fists at his sides, swaying on his spot. “The police are on their way!” he snapped at last.

“Is that wise?” Howard questioned as though asking whether going out without a scarf on a windy day was wise.

“You, sir, have defiled my only daughter,” Mr. Ayers shouted.

Howard glanced to Elizabeth, who shrugged. “Well, then, Papa, Howard and I will simply have to be married with all due haste.”

Again, Mr. Ayers sputtered and blubbered before he was able to form words. “I will not have my only child married to lascivious gutter trash, blown in from God only knows where. I will not stoop so low as to allow a villainous pauper to wheedle his way into my family, my life, or my business.”

Howard blinked in mock surprise. “Who said anything about me being a villainous pauper? Or any kind of pauper, for that matter.”

Mr. Ayers’s eyes bulged with indignation, but he froze. He stared, unblinking, at Howard, his face red, veins popping on his temples.

Howard took a breath and shook his head. “My dear soon-to-be father-in-law, since you seem to be in very real danger of expiring from a brain hemorrhage, let me disabuse you of any notions you may have as to my fortunes. Simply put, I’m loaded.”

Silence crackled through the room.

“What?” Mr. Ayers asked through clenched jaw.

“Just that.” Howard nodded. “I am wealthy. I’m as rich as Croesus. I have cash up to my rafters. I have the Midas touch.” He pivoted to face Elizabeth. “Sorry, my dear. I will try not to turn you to a golden statue with that touch, but it is a very real possibility.”

Elizabeth burst into giggles. Mrs. Ayers gaped from her spot on the chair. Mr. Ayers remained absolutely frozen.

Virginia cleared her throat, and she and Cyrus stepped forward, tugging the unknown gentleman along with them.

With a grin as wide as the western horizon, Howard said to Elizabeth, “Two.”

Excitement bubbled up through Elizabeth’s chest so fast that she could hardly catch her breath. She hadn’t
known
Howard was wealthy, but she’d suspected as much from the very first. Hopes and dreams like his couldn’t be sustained on a worker’s budget.

“Mr. Ayers, I should like to introduce you to one Mr. Osgood Peabody, my accountant and man of business,” Howard said, holding out a hand and urging the unknown man to come forward.

The man, Mr. Peabody, looked as though he would rather sink into the floor and expire, but he shuffled dutifully forward. “This will be included on my next invoice, you realize,” he muttered as he came even with Howard.

“As will an astounding bonus for your support in this tricky time, old friend,” Howard answered.

Mr. Peabody’s shoulders unbunched and he let out a breath, shaking his head and laughing. “My client, Mr. Haskell, is undoubtedly eccentric, Mr. Ayers.”

Elizabeth’s father remained stiff and silent. Only his eyes moved, and only that to dart from Mr. Peabody to Howard.

Mr. Peabody raised a wary eyebrow at Howard. Howard merely grinned. Mr. Peabody sighed, shook his head, and continued. “Mr. Haskell has been my client for nearly five years now. While he has resided in Pittsburgh for the most part, he has been a key investor in the Whitewater Canal, along with several other trade and transportation ventures.”

Mr. Ayers flinched. At last, he moved. He gaped at Howard, eyes wide.

“In fact,” Mr. Peabody continued, “it is my belief that without Mr. Haskell’s considerable investment, the Whitewater Canal could not have been completed. I believe you are an investor in the canal as well, Mr. Ayers?”

“I am.” Elizabeth’s father’s voice was high and tight.

Mr. Peabody nodded with a momentary, tight smile. “Then you owe whatever returns your investment in the canal have made to this man.”

Mr. Ayers flushed. The light in his eyes changed from rank hatred to shrewd reassessment.