The Union (14 page)

"Lie still, Keely," he coaxed. "Let me lead the rhythm, then follow me." He pulled her legs up around him. She latched on and let him ride. With each thrust a small love song escaped her, building with the motion and the sensations. A gentle, crescendo of chorus in time to his lovemaking. Tender sounds, passionate sounds.

Keely moaned beneath him. Pull out fool, pull out before it's too late.
Now
.

He made the mistake of delaying, of opening his eyes to study her expression. What he saw astounded him with its innocence, its open honesty. He tried to remember a look in any vague way similar to it on the face of any woman he'd ever made love to, but none came to mind. No other woman had ever opened her soul to him, expressing her rapture in so pure and comfortable and genuine a fashion.

She clamped him in with her legs and arched against him, driving him on. Her staccato scream sliced through the room, reverberating off the walls, echoing through him, throwing him over the edge into pleasurable completion.

I'm coming. I coming, Keely.

Thoughts of all else vanished. Only Keely on his mind.

He thrust and grunted and stiffened inside her. Keely's frustration melted away on waves of pleasure, physical and emotional, too fine to describe. She'd always known there were some emotions too complex for words. This was one.

He collapsed on top of her, warm and sweaty from exertion. His perspiration mixed with hers, tingling and stinging her skin, binding them together in an intimacy she'd never thought possible. Every pore of her being had opened for him. She wanted him no other way, just on top of her like that forever. Never mind his weight or the rawness between her legs.

"Beautiful," he whispered in her ear.

"Close, McCullough."

She couldn't help laughing at his consternation. She hadn't meant to insult him. Quite the opposite. "There aren't words enough, McCullough." She traced his chest with her fingers.

"No indeed," he said. He pulled from her and rolled off her, next to her, pulling her into the crook of his arm, embracing her with the other.

She couldn't stop looking at him. Her gaze traveled the length of his body. She liked the way he looked lying beside her, hard, long, sleek, slick with her lovemaking.

He started to laugh. "You're something, Keely. You sure you were a virgin?"

"Minutes ago, hours ago, an eternity ago, yes. Didn't I feel like one? My dainty parts ache well enough to prove it." She shifted on the bed, feeling beneath her for the sticky evidence of lost maidenhood. "And I'm bleeding. There's blood on the sheets. Check for yourself."

"No." He shook his head, clearly amused. "You felt like a virgin, as far as I know. Just didn't act like one."

"As far as you know?"

He looked sheepish. "What do I know about virgins, Keely?"

He sounded almost guilty.

"I couldn't say, except that I'd wager you weren't one yourself. You seemed to know your way around the bed," she said with a sudden jealousy she hadn't expected.

"You didn't expect me to be, did you?"

"No. I guess I always expected a ladies' man."

"Good. Then both our expectations were met." He looked toward the window and began chuckling. "Silly of me to close the window. Think that thin pain of glass kept our secrets in this room?"

"Hardly." He was a tease. "I think we gave the town what they were waiting for." She kissed his cheek. "And I'm not sorry or embarrassed."

"No, me either."

"I'd be happy to do it again. Whenever you want." He made her say things she’d never dreamed she would. "I love you, McCullough."

His expression startled her. He seemed surprised and suddenly distant, almost hurt. He hesitated before answering, just slightly, but long enough to leave her clinging to a precipice of emotion and fear.
 

"I love you, too, Keely McCullough."

She smiled, happy again, content. He’d said he loved her. If he lied, she didn't care. She couldn't let herself believe he’d lied. "Keely McCullough. Nice, I like it." She curled up against him, suddenly drowsy. "I'm sleepy."

"Yeah," he said. She knew he might have said, "It's like that after sex." She was happy he was gentlemanly enough not to remind her of other women. But she liked the thought that sex brought sleep on.
 

"I should draw you a tub of warm water, Keely. You should take a soak."

"No." She was too tired. How could she leave his side and this comfortable tiredness?

He cleared his throat. "I've heard it helps. You know, after the first—"

"Tomorrow."

"All right then. Tomorrow. Go on to sleep, Keely. It's been a long day."

"Yeah," she said and closed her eyes.

He was a damned liar. If ever there had been any doubt as to his salvation, none existed now. He was a damned liar, emphasis on the damned. Keely slept next to him, her breathing soft and warm against him. She had fallen asleep quickly in what seemed like an eternity. His shoulder ached where the bullet had grazed it, and his arm had fallen asleep long ago. He deserved any discomfort he got. He needed to roll over, but he couldn't bear disturbing Keely. Hadn't he hurt her enough already?

Making love to her had washed away the numbing haze of alcohol that had
 
kept his guilt at bay. Sober, it ate him up. He'd never experienced this kind of contrition before. Why the hell now? Though he knew well enough. All he had to do was look at the dark stain underneath where Keely rested to find the explanation. He'd taken something precious from her that he had no right to take. True. She'd given it willingly. But not to him—to McCullough.

And take it he did, riding it right over the edge, not pulling out like he’d planned. Now maybe he'd done more than take, maybe he'd given.

Damn! He preferred jaded women. They were a lot less trouble. They knew how to take care of things. They didn't let themselves become involved. They didn't look at him with trust and love shining in their eyes. They let him leave.

He took a deep breath and exhaled. They let him leave. Because for John Dietz, there always came a time to leave. And no matter what he felt for Keely, or what he denied, he'd leave this time, too. He'd have to.

Gaffney knew the bars would eventually close up for the night, but it still came as a shock when Dutch finally threw him out of the saloon into the street, locking the doors behind him. Gaffney landed on his butt in the middle of the road. He sat, too stunned at first to move. Across the road, three buildings down, McCullough was deflowering his Keely. His Keely. Rage the shade of lightning coursed through him at the thought. Gaffney's glare followed his thoughts to the boardinghouse.

After a night of tailing McCullough from bar to bar, seeing him slapped on the back and congratulated like some kind of hero, fingering his gun, warning McCullough, McCullough still didn't get it. Gaffney wasn't letting Keely go, husband or no. He hadn't let anyone stand in his way, not even Michael. At the memory of Michael lying broken and dying at the bottom of the mine tunnel, sweat broke out on his forehead and his stomach rolled with nausea. "Shit, Michael," he said. "I didn't mean to kill you."

Gaffney wiped his brow with an unsteady hand. Sawing through the last bracing timber and ordering his crew to brace another tunnel that day instead had been so easy. And as Michael's foreman, sending him down to work the shaft got no question. Gaffney gulped down the fresh summer night air, but nothing chased the nightmare away. Michael's scream, the death rattle of his last breaths. Gaffney shuddered.

He'd only meant to make a hero of himself, save Michael's life. Then Michael would've been so grateful, he would have given Keely to Gaffney. He'd have had to. But something had gone wrong. The cave in was more serious than Gaffney had thought possible. By the time he got there, his best friend was beyond help. He could only stand there and let him die. Then he backed up and walked casually back to his post. No one noticed the cave in until hours into the next shift. The whole incident played to the union's hand. Union leaders blamed the owners for allowing unsafe conditions to exist below. Even Keely bought the story. Any regret on Gaffney's part stemmed from the incident turning Keely into a kind of crusader for safety and nonviolence. It looked damned bad for her.

As for suspicion of foul play, someone mentioned seeing Gaffney leaving the tunnel that afternoon. But no one seriously thought he'd kill his best friend. No one but Waters, who offered Gaffney the privileged position of hired gun for the union, explaining that union brass weren't altogether sorry for Byrne's death. Michael Byrne had been stirring up trouble with his preaching against violence, on pacifism. Waters seemed to think Gaffney a hero. And hell, Gaffney had thought, why shouldn't he continue being a hero? He'd killed his best friend, killing anyone else had to be easy.

Gaffney pushed up and tried to stand, but fell right back on his hamhocks. When was the last time he'd been this drunk? He couldn't remember, and it didn't matter. Only the cause of his drunken stupor did. Keely's wedding. He pushed up again, this time successful, and staggered across the street to the corner of Keely's boardinghouse. Tonight, though he gave it chance enough, alcohol couldn't push back the dark thoughts sweeping through his mind. Part of him was numb, had to be. Damn Waters for sending him on a fool's errand today. It was almost like he were in cahoots with McCullough. Slimy, secretive, coward of a bastard McCullough. Marrying his Keely while Gaffney worked on union business out of town. He'd show him.

Gaffney leaned on the building corner; his stomach heaved, rebelling at his sudden upright position. He retched into a bush that capped the corner. When his stomach finished its business, he looked up to the windows overhead. Had McCullough taken Keely to his room? No, he wouldn't, not up there with all the other men. They had to be in Keely's room. Gaffney stumbled around to the backside of the building.

By the time he reached the backyard, his breath came in drunken gasps. His mouth felt dry and sour with his own vomit and the taste of Keely in bed with another man. He closed his eyes briefly before summoning the courage to look at her window. What did he intend to do? Watch them. Listen to their lovemaking? His pulse raced. Maybe, sickening as it would be. At least he'd get to see Keely.

He opened his eyes and fixed his gaze on her dark window. Damn him! That bastard had closed the curtains, shuttered her in. Keely never closed the window on nights like these. Rage overtook him. He scrambled up the bank behind the building, hefted the largest rock he could find, and hurled it at the building. Direct hit. It sailed through the window leaving a pleasant tinkling of glass in its wake. Gaffney laughed and staggered up the hill into the woods where he wouldn't be caught.

The crash woke Dietz, or maybe it was Keely's scream that roused him. He couldn't say. The two seemed to happen simultaneously. He sat up automatically, Colt in hand at ready, senses on alert, sleep forgotten and dusted from his mind. Years with the detective agency had taught him how to quickly shrug off any lasting effects sleep caused. The bed creaked as Keely sat up. He felt her trembling behind him. A crowd of bloodthirsty men did not scare her, but something heaved through her window in the middle of the night evidently did. He reached back with one arm and hugged her protectively. "It's all right, lass."

"What is it?" she asked.

Tiny shards of glass littered the floor, glinting in the moonlight shining through the gently blowing curtains. How thoughtful of someone to open the window for them. A large rock rested in the midst of the rubble, in the darkness looking like blackness itself. Without the buffeting effect of the closed curtains, the blasted thing would have sailed right into their bed. "Vandals," he said. "Stay put. I'll check it out."

Otherwise naked, he slipped his boots on and walked to the window where he pulled the curtains back cautiously, peering into the yard. Nothing, no one. As he had suspected the perpetrator had fled.

"What do you see?" Keely whispered.

"Nothing." Damned nothing. Was the rock the Clan-na-Gael's way of offering their blessing? A warning not to get too comfortable? Or merely a prank?

"Come back from the window, McCullough. Maybe our rock throwing friend is still out there, hiding in the woods. We don't need you making a target of yourself. Though a fine looking one you are."

Despite the situation, he laughed. She charmed him too easily. "Such brashness, Keely McCullough. And such insult to my stealth."

She joined him in laughter. "But such compliment to your form."

He turned to face her, expecting to find her with the bedcovers pulled to her chin. Instead the sheet lay crumpled around her legs and waist. From there up she was most beautifully naked. His body reacted immediately. From the height of her gaze, he guessed she saw it. She laughed again.

"Cover yourself woman," he said, a scant hoarsely. "What if we've got us a peeper out there."

She made no move toward the bedsheet, just giggled. "What if? Look at you."
 

"It isn't me he'd be wanting to look at, lass." She smiled at him defiantly. Quick as he could he crunched across the glass to the bed, wrenched the sheet free from its tuck, and wrapped his startled wife in it. "Gather what you'll need for the morning. We aren't staying here." Using all his restraint, he let her go, shucked off his boots and pulled on his pants.