To Have and to Hold (Cactus Creek Cowboys) (23 page)

“I won’t hurt you,” Colby said.

“I know.” She concentrated on making herself relax, but it wasn’t easy. Colby resumed his attention to her breast, but his hand remained between her legs, touching, caressing, probing. She felt hot and moist. Even though her father had explained how a man and woman made love, it was an unfamiliar sensation, one he’d failed to mention.

“Open for me. Your knees are pressed together.”

She hadn’t realized her body was so rigid. Yet when she did manage to relax, the shock of Colby’s hand moving inside her nearly caused her to tense again. She knew this was supposed to happen, but talking about it and having it happen weren’t at all the same. Sensations that had only moments before centered on her breasts, now clustered around Colby’s probing fingers sending shock waves of pleasure rocketing through her from one end to the other.

Papa hadn’t mentioned that, either.

It seemed incredible that anything could feel so powerfully wonderful. Waves of pleasure washed over her. She felt encased in a cocoon of sensations, each more powerful, more encompassing than the last.

Then Colby touched something inside her that lit up her entire being like a flash of lightning. It was impossible for anything to be that overwhelming, but the waves kept coming until they seemed to rush from her like a stream bursting from its banks. Before she could recover enough to utter a sound, Colby had entered her.

She didn’t marvel at how easy or painless it felt, but how natural. She didn’t know why she’d been so apprehensive.

She didn’t have much time to think about that because the sensations that radiated to every part of her body had taken over all conscious thought. Everything was the same as before but only more so. She had always thought Colby was a marvelous man, but she’d had no notion he could give her such incredible pleasure. And it was all the sweeter because it was Colby who held her, who loved her, who was bringing her to a sexual peak that was as unlooked-for as it was gladly received. She was barely aware that she had begun to move with Colby, rising to meet him, falling away, then rising again. But as the fetters of rapture encircled her more tightly, she wrapped her legs around Colby trying to draw him deeper and deeper into her.

Without any warning, her body went rigid and she felt she was about to explode. Then the dam broke and the tension flowed from her like water in a turbulent stream.

***

Naomi woke with a feeling of well-being that was so convincing she was certain there were no difficulties ahead she and Colby couldn’t conquer together. She couldn’t tell what time it was, but if the night sky was anything to go by, dawn was still several hours away. She could hardly wait for the chance to see Colby in the daylight, to tell her father that Colby did love her and they were going to be married. He knew the perfect place for their new town and he would take them there. He was a perfect man, and she a fortunate woman to have found him. She intended to make sure he felt so well loved he would forget about his parents and Elizabeth. He would have the family he’d been denied, a community that admired and respected him. He would have the home he’d always wanted.

Unable to wait for him to wake up, she tapped him on the shoulder. He opened his eyes immediately. When he turned to face her, he smiled.

“Morning, beautiful.”

“Let’s start by promising never to lie to each other. I can’t possibly look beautiful with my hair a mess and my face unwashed.”

“You’re beautiful to me.”

She couldn’t argue with that because, even rumpled by sleep, he was breathtaking to her. “I’m going to skip over the fact that it’s dark and you can barely see me, because I like the idea that you find me beautiful. I’ve never felt that way before.”

Colby rolled up on his elbow and kissed her. “I’m going to do my best to make sure you feel beautiful for the rest of your life.”

“And I’ll make sure you know you’re the most wonderful man in the world. I want to give you lots of sons who will grow up to look just like you.”

Even in the dark, it was evident that something she said had caused Colby to undergo a change. He stilled, his body stiffened.

‘What’s wrong? You do want children, don’t you?”

“Very much.”

“Then why did you act like that?”

“I already have a child.”

It took several moments for Naomi to process what Colby had just said. She repeated the words in her mind, but the meaning always came out the same way.

Colby
had
a
child. He was already a father.

She didn’t know why it should be such a shock. He was twenty-seven. Cassie was twelve years younger and she was a mother. But it was a shock. That changed everything.

She sat up and turned away from him toward the open window. The streets were silent. A cool breeze stirred the curtains. The deep velvety blue of the cloudless sky was pricked by a dozen points of light. It should have been a comforting sight, but it made her feel cold and very much alone.

“Who is its mother?” She didn’t want to know, but she
had
to know.

“Elizabeth.”

Her worst fear was realized. Elizabeth hadn’t been consigned to his past. She was very much a part of his present and his future. Naomi knew enough of Colby to know he could never ignore the existence of his child or its mother. She didn’t doubt that he loved her, but he hadn’t come to her with his whole heart. A good portion of it was allocated elsewhere.

It was hard to tell what she was feeling. She felt numb. It was like floating among the clouds then plummeting to earth with such force you couldn’t move, couldn’t think. All you could do was feel the pain.

“Is it a boy or a girl? What’s its name?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know the name of your own child?”

“I don’t know if it’s a boy or a girl. I’ve never seen it. I don’t even know when it was born.”

She turned to face him. He was sitting up now, leaning against the pillow. “Light the lantern. I’d rather not have to tell you about this in the dark.”

She would rather have kept the mantle of night wrapped around her. It would have been easier to endure the collapse of her dreams without Colby being able to read it in her face, but she lit the lamp. Since she couldn’t avoid this truth, it was better to face it and start figuring out how to live with it.

She lit the lamp, then turned to Colby.

“I was twenty when I met Elizabeth. She was seventeen. I was poor and without any family. She was beautiful and her father was rich. I couldn’t believe anyone like her could fall in love with someone like me, but she did. I didn’t get to see her often because I was traveling between Missouri and Santa Fe, but when we were together, it was like the first time all over again. I know now that being apart so much and knowing her father wouldn’t approve were part of what made it exciting, but I was too young to see that then. I only saw that for the first time in my life someone loved me. We planned to wait to marry until I had saved enough money.”

Naomi couldn’t understand how Colby must have felt because she’d always had a family who loved her, a community where she belonged. She could only try to imagine how desperately he wanted to be loved.

“I scrimped on food, clothes, every way I could until I saved what I thought was enough for us to get married. I sent her a message as soon as I got back to Santa Fe. I knew something had changed when she invited me to meet her at her house. I didn’t need to see her flanked by her parents and the son of another wealthy family to know what she was going to say.”

The pain was still in his voice.

“She told me that with time and maturity she’d realized she’d mistaken infatuation for love. While I’d been away, she’d fallen in love with the young man standing next to her. They married a month earlier.”

Naomi couldn’t begin to imagine how cruelly that must have hurt.

“I didn’t know what had caused Elizabeth to change her mind, but I knew she wouldn’t have if she hadn’t been forced. I suppose I went crazy. I don’t remember much of what happened, but when I woke up in jail, they told me I’d attacked Elizabeth’s father.”

Naomi reached out to rest her hand on Colby’s arm. “Did you ever find out why she changed her mind?”

“Not right away. After the last time I tried to see her, they escorted me out of town and told me not to come back. I might not have gone back—Elizabeth was married. There was nothing I could do to change that—but I overheard two traders talking about her husband saying he would be a father soon. They were snickering over the fact that it would be a seven-month baby. I didn’t need anybody to tell me it was my baby, and that her father had forced her to marry when he found out she was pregnant.”

“Did you talk to her? Did you find out for sure?”

“I tried, but her father had talked the governor into keeping a guard around her house. That’s when I set fire to his house. I was arrested and beaten. When I got well, I was escorted out of town and told I’d be shot if I came back.”

So he didn’t know that a child had actually been born, but it was an open question that had to be answered for his sake if not for hers. He wouldn’t belong to her completely until he faced that part of his life. Once he did, he might not feel about her as he did now. Forcing him to find answers might cost her his love, but she couldn’t marry him knowing there was a part of him that could never be hers.

“How did you get here tonight?”

“It’s been almost five years. They’re not looking for me now. I took advantage of the dark.”

“You have to see Elizabeth and find out about your child.”

“It’s not
my
child. It’s his.”

“It’s his legally, but it’s yours in your mind. Elizabeth, the woman you loved so deeply, is its mother. Are you sure you’re not still in love with her?”

Colby jerked away from her. “How could you think I could still love a woman who betrayed me like that?”

“Love isn’t an emotion that can be controlled. You didn’t want to fall in love with me. I tried not to fall in love with you, but both of us failed. You can’t think that after all your talk about wanting a family, that I’d believe you’d forget you had a child.”

“It’s not my child!”

“You’re its father. Nobody can change that.”

“No, but I can forget it. I haven’t told anybody but you.”

“Why did you tell me?”

“Because I don’t want any secrets between us.”

“It’s because you know you’ll never be able to forget about that child.”

“Maybe, but that doesn’t change anything.”

“It’s unfinished and will stand between us for the rest of our lives.”

“Not mine.”

“It will for me. I’ll always wonder what if you’d seen Elizabeth again, what if you’d seen your child, what if her love for you had never changed?”

Colby reached for her. “None of that would make any difference. I’m in love with you. I want to marry you. I want us to have a family.”

Naomi tried to believe him, but she couldn’t say none of it mattered. It did. Even if Colby no longer had any feelings for Elizabeth, he would grieve for the child he’d never known. That would affect her and any children they might have. That was something she couldn’t endure.

“You have to see Elizabeth and your child. I can’t marry you until you do.”

***

Naomi had endured two days of misery such as she’d never known. It was made worse because she couldn’t confide in anyone. She hadn’t heard from Colby since he left her hotel room. She didn’t know if he was in jail, still camped out on the mountain, or if he’d mounted up and ridden away. She had punished herself emotionally for insisting she wouldn’t marry him until he’d seen Elizabeth, but she couldn’t have done anything else. She couldn’t commit to being his unless he could do the same. She couldn’t imagine how she could just forget a child of hers, so she couldn’t believe Colby could.

“What’s wrong with you?” Cassie asked. “You’ve been looking like you were somewhere else ever since you got back from that hotel.”

Naomi had been eager to get back to the wagon train and her friends. The night spent with Colby remained too vividly in her mind, was associated too closely with the hotel. Being back restored some sense of order in her life, helped steady her emotions. There were times it felt like she’d dreamed that night in his arms.

“I’m worried about where we’re going, what we’re going to do when we get there.”

She had volunteered to watch Little Abe for the afternoon, but Cassie had said she wanted company more than help. They were sitting under the shade of a tree that didn’t look like any tree Naomi had seen back in Kentucky. The women and children were enjoying a sunny day made pleasant by a cool breeze from the Sangre de Cristo Mountains while the men were in town trying to find a guide.

“There’s no point in worrying,” Cassie said. “We’ll do whatever the men decide.”

“Doesn’t that bother you?”

“What?”

“Doing what
men
decide without having any say in what happens to you or your children?”

“I don’t want to decide what happens to everybody else. Do you?”

“No, but I’d like to be asked what I think.”

Cassie laughed. “Men don’t care what women think. Besides, we have enough to do taking care of children and running the house. Why would you want more work?”

Cassie would never understand. She had accepted her place in the world and was happy with it. The other women in Spencer’s Clearing had done the same. Why was she different? Had being different cost her Colby? Why hadn’t she heard from him?

“Do you ever think of Colby? I thought you liked him.”

Naomi looked down at the baby who had gone to sleep in her arms. “Everybody did. Even you.”

Cassie laughed again. “You know what I mean.”

Naomi decided it was useless to pretend. “I liked him very much.”

“I wonder where he is.”

Naomi was almost bursting to tell somebody what had happened, but she held her tongue.

“Are you tired of staying with the wagons doing nothing?” Cassie asked. “I want to go into the town, go in the shops, eat at a restaurant, hear some music, go dancing.”

“I’d rather they found a guide so we could be on our way. I can’t wait until we have a house again.”

“Ethan says we won’t have houses like we’re used to. He says we’ll have cabins with dirt floors. He says—”

“Ethan doesn’t know any more than the rest of us.”

“He’s been into town and talked to people. He says they don’t have sawmills where we’re going.”

“Are you going with us?” Naomi hadn’t given much thought to Cassie lately, but she hadn’t forgotten the girl’s intention of marrying the first man to ask her.

“Ethan says I can’t marry just anybody. He said he’ll take care of me until I can find a good husband.”

At that moment, the paragon of thoughtfulness came riding up. Naomi wasn’t surprised when he headed toward them. She was surprised when he turned to her rather than Cassie.

“Colby is in jail. He says he needs you to do something for him.”

***

“Are you sure you should do this?”

Ethan had tried to persuade her to wait for their father, but Naomi had insisted on leaving at once. “Colby wouldn’t have asked me to come to him if it weren’t important.” She hadn’t expected the prison would be the military barracks.

“You don’t even know why he’s in jail. Maybe he got in a fight and killed someone.”

“He wouldn’t do that.”

“How do you know?”

Naomi didn’t answer. They had reached the courtrooms that were part of the governor’s palace.

Once they were inside, Ethan said, “Wait here.” Then he disappeared.

The stern and disapproving faces of the men in the room did nothing to calm Naomi’s nerves. However, once they sensed she wasn’t going to interrupt their various activities or require anything of them, they ignored her. Naomi had never been so happy to be considered of no consequence. After what seemed like an unreasonably long time, Ethan returned accompanied by a soldier.

“They weren’t going to let you see Colby,” Ethan said. “I talked them into it, but this soldier has to accompany you.”

Naomi wished the soldier would smile rather than look as though he’d rather be facing combat.

“He’s in the barracks jail,” the soldier said. “It’s not a place for a woman.”

“I’m sure I’ll be perfectly safe as long as you’re with me.”

“I’ll be there too,” Ethan said. When she looked surprised, he said, “You don’t think I’d let my sister go into such a place without me or my father, do you?”

It seemed that being responsible for Cassie had matured Ethan. He’d never worried about her safety before.

The soldier led them out of the courtroom, through two smaller rooms, then out into a courtyard. They crossed a street and entered a low adobe building of no beauty or redeeming aspects. The inside was like a rabbit warren. She was lost after the third turn. They stopped before a door that was reinforced by iron straps.

“This is the jail,” the soldier said. “If anyone speaks to you, act as though you didn’t hear them.”

“There’s nothing but drunks, thieves, and cutthroats in here,” Ethan said. “I tried to get him to let you meet Colby in one of the empty rooms, but he wouldn’t agree.”

“When we reach his cell, you’ve got five minutes,” the soldier told Naomi. “Don’t waste it.”

The moment Naomi passed through the doorway, the man in the cell opposite leapt to his feet with a shouted profanity that caused Naomi to flinch. “I don’t know whether I’ve gone to heaven or hell, but that’s a woman I see, and a pretty one at that.”

Every man in the jail started shouting or banging on something. After hearing what the next man said—something she didn’t understand and didn’t want explained—she hummed to herself to block out the din. Colby was standing at his door when she arrived.

“Thank god you’re here,” he hollered so she could hear. “I was afraid they wouldn’t let you come.”

“Tell her what you want,” Ethan shouted. “I want to get her out of here as soon as possible.”

“I tried to do what you asked,” Colby yelled to her, “but Elizabeth’s father still has a guard posted at night. It took me a full day to convince the guard to get a message to you. It cost me every cent I had with me.”

“Can you shut them up?” Ethan yelled to the guard. “She can’t hear what he’s saying.”

“It’s not my concern,” the guard replied.