The Hungry Heart Fulfilled (The Hunger of the Heart Series Book 3) (39 page)

 

 

“Aye, Patrick I am,
as soon as I can
get a ship to take me.”

 

 

“About time too,
you silly
girl.  Dalton’s
been
miserable without you, and you don’t look much better. Give me your
things, and I’ll take them
on board.”

 

 

Emer blinked. “You
mean the
Pegasus
is the next ship to Canada?”

 

 

“Aye, it’s all set
to sail now, and
with a bright new captain by the name of Bradley, and an
all-Irish crew.”

 

 

“How splendid,
congratulations to
you all!” Emer kissed her friend. “It must be a lucky omen.”

 

 

“I sure hope so,
Emer,” Patrick
sighed. “I
wouldn’t want a voyage
like our last one together.”

 

 

“Neither would I!”
Emer crossed
herself as she said a prayer for all the departed souls.

 

 

“And if I catch
you, even once,
trying to climb the rigging, my dear, I will lock you in the
cabin for the
duration of the voyage!”

 

 

“Oh, Patrick, it’s
good to see you
all again. When
do we leave?”

 

 

“Dawn tomorrow.”

 

 

Emer beamed. “I
can’t wait.”

 

 

The following day,
on the thirtieth
of May, exactly two years since she had first set sail for
Canada, Emer said
her final goodbye to Ireland.

 

 

It was time for her
to return to her
real home, right by Dalton Randall’s side.

 

 

 

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

 

 

On Emer’s five-week
voyage to Canada
on the
Pegasus
, she had the leisure to rest and recuperate
from the long two
years she had spent struggling to save her family and friends.

 

 

Freed from the
cares of a ship full
of ill family and passengers, the orphanage and the prison,
she began to
imagine what she could do to show Dalton just how much his
love and support had
meant to her.

 

 

She had been given
the stateroom
that Dalton had had on their first magical journey together,
and an idea formed
in her mind as they travelled up the Saint Lawrence River to
Quebec.

 

 

Once the
Pegasus
had anchored off the coast of Grosse
Ile, and passed quarantine, Emer decided to go ahead with her bold
plan.

 

 

“Patrick, could you
send a lad into
town on the steamer, and have him get me the things on this
list, and also make
sure there is a hot bath prepared at seven this evening? And take
this
message into town to the
fever hospital, and arrange for Dalton to be brought out here
at seven as
well.”

 

 

Patrick looked, and
stared. “But
this note says it’s an emergency!”

 

 

“It is, believe me. I have to be sure
Dalton will come, and
you aren’t to say a word, do you understand?
  Then, when Dalton is safely on
board, you can take the
steamer, and all have shore leave for the next three days.”
Emer said with a
wicked wink.

 

 

“Aye, aye,
Captain,” Patrick saluted
her, and did as she had requested. After all, wasn’t love a
wonderful thing?

 

 

Emer spent the day
preparing her
surprise, taking a long hot soak first, and then curling her
damp hair into an
elaborate classical style piled high on her head.

 

 

She dressed with
care in the black
gown Dalton had given her for Christmas, and laid out all the
food carefully,
making sure that there was nothing missing.

 

 

She placed her gold
locket for
Dalton on the table as well, wrapped in some shiny paper she
had found aboard,
and then checked that the poor confused young boy who had gone
shopping for her
had also managed to secure a similar volume of poetry in town
to the one Dalton
had first shared with her so long ago.

 

 

Then Emer packed up
most of her
belongings, leaving out only some toiletries and a dressing
gown. With any
luck, she wouldn’t even need to wear that if her scheme went
according to plan.

 

 

Promptly at seven,
the cabin boy
rapped on the door and filled the tub with hot water. Just as he was
finishing, Emer heard the
jolly-boat brush
the side of the ship gently.

 

 

“Good to see you,
sir,” Patrick
greeted Dalton above.

 

 

“Well, Patrick, the
note said it was
an emergency.  What
sort of
emergency?  An
illness, is
it?”

 

 

“A fever, sir. Only
you can cure it,
I’m sure,” Patrick said a trifle loudly as he led the way
below to the cabin.

 

 

Patrick swung open
the door, and
then pushed Dalton inside and closed it.

 

 

Dalton blinked, and
stood gazing at
Emer longingly.

 

 

“It’s really you? And you’re not
ill?” Dalton managed to
say, as a lump formed in his throat at how lovely she looked.

 

 

“I’m sick with
longing for you,
Dalton. Shall we
have our special
night again the same as before, with a bath and poetry?” Emer
smiled
enticingly, though inside she was terribly nervous.

 

 

“It’s a lovely
idea, sweetheart, but
I’m not sure...”

 

 

“I am.” Emer
silenced his protest,
kissing him with all the pent-up ardour her long-repressed
body contained.

 

 

Dalton groaned long
and loud as he
struggled against Emer’s erotic onslaught. In the end he simply gave
himself up to
his torrid longings,
and began kissing Emer back as though he were about to devour
her.

 

 

Desire, fiery and
hot, and so urgent
it could no longer be denied, coursed through Emer’s veins as
his tongue
invaded her mouth, and she felt almost as helpless as she had
done when she had
been crippled.

 

 

Her legs buckled
beneath her under
Dalton’s persistent amorousness, and she grasped his crisp
white shirt-front
for support.

 

 

Dalton swung Emer
up into his arms
and laid her on the bunk, before starting to tear off his own
clothes, while
all the while kissing her lips, throat and neck, and
delicately nibbling her
erect nipples through the fabric of her black gown.

 

 

A sharp pang of
pleasure tugged at
her womb, and within seconds Dalton had stripped her bare from
the waist
down.

 

 

One hand had worked
convulsively at
the buttons of her top, while his other explored her
intimately, almost as
though he were trying to memorise every inch of her inside and
out.

 

 

Once Emer was
completely naked,
Dalton began to shower her with teasing sultry kisses from her
lips to her
toes, and everywhere in between, until Emer writhed on the bed
in an agony of
exquisite torment and shouted Dalton’s name breathlessly.

 

 

“I’m here, my love,
I’m here,”
Dalton reassured her as he held her shuddering body tightly
against his own.

 

 

“Now, Dalton now,
please,” Emer
begged, satiated by his marvellously intimate caresses, yet
needing so much
more.

 

 

“Are you sure,
Emer, really sure?”
Dalton forced himself to say, as her wriggling body brushing
against him played
havoc with his loins.

 

 

Emer opened her
arms and legs wide,
as she breathed, “I’ve never had any doubts.”

 

 

Dalton’s patience
snapped then. As
he entered her, it was so unbearably
blissful, that both could feel the tears springing up into
their eyes.

 

 

“I’m home,” Dalton
murmured as he
filled Emer with the hard potent force of him, and then ever
so gently began to
move.

 

 

“So am I, my love,”
Emer gasped.

 

 

Emer’s fingernails
dug into Dalton’s
back as her head tossed from side to side on the pillow, her
burgundy tresses
spreading out like a halo of brilliant fire as Dalton quickly
took out her hair
pins in order to run his fingers through the luxuriant waves.

 

 

He paused to demand
urgently, “Open
your eyes, and look at me, Emer.”

 

 

Emer moaned and
wriggled her hips so
that he drove even deeper into her, but Dalton held himself
back, and asked,
“Am I enough for you?”

 

 

“So much, and more,
my darling
Dalton,” Emer breathed, as a smile of pure joy curved her rosy
lips, and she
moved her hand lower to caress him boldly. “You’re everything I’ve
ever wanted and
needed, and I’ve
been a fool to have stayed away so long.”

 

 

“Emer, I can’t stop
myself....” Dalton
choked.

 

 

“Let it go, Dalton,
give me all of
you,” Emer pleaded, as he brought them both shuddering over
the brink into a
vortex of sensual fulfilment they were unable to resurface
from for several
minutes after their climax.

 

 

“God, how I’ve
missed you, Emer,”
Dalton groaned when he could finally trust himself to speak.
“I didn’t hurt
you, did I?”

 

 

“No, not all, but
you certainly
sounded like I had mortally wounded you a second ago,” Emer
chuckled throatily.

 

 

“You did wound me,
Emer," he
admitted, looking up, his expression suddenly serious. "You
nearly broke
my heart every time we were separated. I never thought I would
be able to bear
it when you asked me to leave you in Clonmel. But now that you’re
back, I’m whole
again.”

 

 

By way of proof, he
moved between
her thighs and reclaimed her body as his own. “We’re one flesh,
Emer, we always have
been. Marry me,
please, my love, as soon as
we get off this ship.”

 

 

“Whenever you like,
Dalton, as long
as it’s soon. I
never want to
spend another day or night separated from you again,” Emer
sighed.

 

 

"And forever won't
be long
enough to show you how much I love and need you, darling."

 

 

"Well, my love,
just start with
right now, and we'll take it from there."

 

 

"Gladly," he said
with a
grin, as he began to kiss his way down her body once more.

 

 

Emer sighed
happily, and gave
herself up to his lovemaking with complete abandon at last.
She truly was home.
And nothing would ever stand between them again.

 

 

Emer kissed his
chest and throat,
and Dalton moved his head down to kiss her deeply. As their tongues
sensually intertwined,
Dalton hardened with
the most urgent need. Emer arched under him, taking him deep
into her warm,
welcoming body.

 

 

Dalton began to
move with
increasingly sure strokes as he watched her rapturous
expression. He drove them
both ever higher, then stilled, poising them on the brink of
the ultimate
fulfillment.

 

 

"Now, love,
please," she
begged. "Let it go."

 

 

"Just wait," he
urged,
"wait, my love."

 

 

"Dalton, oh,
ooooh," she
panted. "It's getting even stronger, if that's possible."

 

 

"Relax, breathe
into it, that's
right, just a bit more, a bit more—" He pressed deeper and
felt her whole
body clench and undulate around him.

 

 

"Oh, Lord!" she
gasped.
"Dalton, my love!"

 

 

He felt her nipples
peak against his
broad chest as her whole body rose up to greet his. Then he
too was gasping out
his passion into her mouth, until finally he was able to calm
the driving need
that compelled him to make love to Emer to the point of near
exhaustion for
them both.

 

 

Collapsing onto her
lithe body like
a spent swimmer finally ashore, he buried his face between her
breasts, and they slept.

 

 

 

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

 

 

After a sybaritic
three days on the
Pegasus
getting to know
each other all over
again in bed and out, Dalton sat gazing out of the porthole,
and remarked
quietly, “I’m
afraid we have to go
back to civilisation, today, don’t we, Emer?
  And I suppose I ought to reproach myself for having taken the
honeymoon before the
wedding, instead of
after.”

 

 

Emer grinned. “I have no
complaints.”

 

 

She stooped to kiss
him warmly, then
finished dressing in preparation for the arrival of the launch
she had instructed
to return for them at midday.

 

 

“No regrets then,
my darling? No
fears or reservations? If
these past three days haven’t left
you pregnant, that would truly be a miracle,” Dalton said,
eyeing her cautiously.

 

 

She shook her head
and gave him a
bright, beaming smile, for once unclouded by worry.

 

 

Dalton drank in the
sight of her
lovely smile. Never
had she looked
more beautiful. Never had he felt more loved.

 

 

“No reservations,
Dalton, I promise.
I love you, and any and all children we may have in the
future. My life
is by your side now and
forever. And while you are more than enough for me, Dalton, another
little
miniature version of my
gorgeous husband wouldn’t come amiss, God willing, so long as
I tell you now, I
get to name him Terence,” Emer declared as she stroked his
cheek lovingly.