Page 36 of The Gunslinger’s Bride (Montana Mavericks: Historicals #1)

Guiding her to the bed, he turned her and pulled her to him as the tide within her broke and tears poured out in a torrent of release. Brock pulled the quilt around her, muffled her sobs against his chest and stroked her hair, wiped her tears, kissed her temple.

A great emotional dam exploded, and Abby was in no condition to turn back the flood.

She cried until her chest hurt, until her throat was sore, until no more tears came, until her eyes felt dry and hot and she grew weak with exhaustion.

Years of penned-up resentment and suffering burst from her like nails from a dropped keg.

Abby wept until she was weak from the emotional drain.

Brock leaving her was worse than her own brother’s death.

Guy was the excuse she could admit to the world, but the thing that had really ripped her apart was her own responsibility.

Quite naturally, when Brock released her to remove her shoes and stockings, Abby complied. Without question or forethought or embarrassment, she allowed him to unbutton her dress and untie her petticoats, and she watched him hang them neatly on hooks beside his jackets and hats.

He picked up the cotton nightgown and held it out with a question in his eyes.

She removed her chemise, seeing the way her action changed his expression, and raised her arms for him to drape the gown over her head.

She adjusted the garment, pulling it down, and stood to remove her drawers and fold them with her chemise.

Brock had pulled back the sheet for her, considerately offering her his bed as he had his broad shoulders to cry on.

Abby slid between the sheets, growing alarmed at the possibility of his leaving her alone now.

She’d never been this defenseless, and she couldn’t bear to be by herself.

As he smoothed the covers over her, she caught his hand and pulled it to her cheek.

Leaning over her, he gently caressed her skin with the back of his knuckles.

“Don’t go,” she said simply.

He opened and closed his mouth once before finding his voice. “You know what would happen. I can’t stay and not touch you the way I want to touch you.”

“Stay and touch me,” she said, daring him, arousing him with the words.

“But you hate me,” he said, and she thought she heard a thread of vulnerability in that statement.

She had certainly told him enough times that she hated him. She’d been quite sure that she had, in fact. But she didn’t have enough energy left to hate. “I can’t hate you tonight,” she told him. “Not now.”

“What about tomorrow?” he asked, wisely thinking ahead to the consequences that would follow a moment’s weakness. “I won’t give you more reasons to be mad at me.”

She didn’t hate him anymore. She never had. She had hated her own weakness—her weakness for him. “I’m done being angry,” she told him sincerely. “I need you to hold me. Kiss me.”

Brock pulled his hand away to cross the room, and for a moment she feared he intended to leave. But he turned the key in the lock, returned and sat on the bed to remove his boots.

He stood and unbuckled the holster, rolled it and tucked it under the edge of the bed. After removing his shirt, he washed his face and hands in the basin of water, brought a damp cloth forward and bathed Abby’s face, kissing her eyelids, which she knew must be swollen and red.

He’d grown from a handsome youth to a beautiful man, and she was still wicked enough to appreciate the arousing sight of his hard-carved body in the lantern light. From the very first, desiring him had been her weakness, and that hadn’t changed.

He hung the cloth over the bowl’s edge and blew out the lamp, plunging the room into darkness. The sound of him removing his dungarees was loud in the sudden stillness. “Where is Caleb and Ruth’s room?” she thought to ask.

“At the other end of the hall, by Zeke’s. John is a safe distance away, too. There’s an empty room between us and anyone else.”

She opened the covers to welcome him, and he wrapped her in his strong embrace. Abby gratefully snuggled into the warmth and comfort of his arms, pressed herself against his hard limbs and sleek skin and sighed with pleasure. She felt safe here…secure.

When she sought his lips in the darkness, he complied by kissing her mouth and drawing her tongue into his.

When she needed air, he sensed it and kissed her neck, nipped her chin and her shoulder.

When she craved his hands on her body, he satisfied her every wish by plucking her nipples teasingly, then flattening his rough palms over her breasts and intensifying the sensation.

Abby didn’t have a need that Brock didn’t anticipate and cater to. Once she even thought she need only imagine her desire and it became hers beneath his skillful attention.

He gritted his teeth and withstood her intimate explorative caresses, tensing and releasing quick breaths. The touches he returned had her clinging to him and holding her breath in sweet expectation.

He pulled her beneath him, entered her and rode her pleasure to its quivering climax, then jerked away and spilled himself on her belly.

Reaching for the cloth, he gently wiped her clean and kissed her tenderly.

The interruption was unexpected, forcing her to remember their situation.

The last time, neither one of them had thought about the chance they were taking.

This time he had protected her. He might have planted his seed in her to force her to his will, but he hadn’t.

He had thought more carefully than she. And in doing so, he had changed.

It was then, in the darkness, with the air cooling her damp skin, that she remembered Everett.

Brock cradled her for hours, touching her hair, kissing her temple, her shoulder, and she slept. When he tiptoed from the room in the early-morning darkness, she awoke at the loss of warmth. His remembered tenderness, his scent and the gentle loving cocooned her and she slept again.

When she came fully awake, the sun streamed through the part in the drapes and created a beam of light on the carpeted floor.

Abby sat and blinked, orienting herself, holding the sheet to her naked body.

The night came back to her on a sensual wave of memory.

She thought of the total abandon with which she had given herself to Brock, and how the fact that she was engaged to be married hadn’t entered her mind until afterward.

Even the last time she and Brock had made love, she’d never once thought of her fiancé. What kind of woman was she?

Distant gunshots reverberated, rousing her from her reverie. They echoed again, and she wondered who had cause to be firing a gun on Sunday morning. This close to the house, they wouldn’t be hunting.

Abby discovered a note from Brock on the bureau, assuring her she was alone upstairs and letting her know he’d heated a tub of water for her across the hall.

Abby donned the borrowed wrapper, gathered her clothing, the soap and towels, and ventured across the deserted hall. An inviting bathing chamber surprised her, and the water he’d promised was still warm. She sank into it and enjoyed the luxury.

Everett didn’t carry a gun. He didn’t try to charm her or seduce her.

He had a stable position in town, was a responsible citizen.

She had wanted to marry him because he didn’t make her lose her head; that was the truth of it.

She’d felt safe with him because he couldn’t possibly hurt her.

No matter what he did, he’d never break her heart…

because she would never give it to him. He didn’t have the power.

That was why Brock frightened her. He had the ability to crush her heart to a pulp.

But only if she gave it to him again. Her future happiness depended on keeping herself safe from that possibility. So far she hadn’t done so well in resisting him, and her weakness was scandalous. Why, then, did being with him seem so right…so pure?

She dried off and surveyed her clothing, which didn’t look too bad.

Refreshed and dressed, Abby straightened Brock’s room, made his bed and hung her towels to dry before making her way down the stairs.

The house was silent, her steps creaking the floorboards as she checked for signs of the Kincaid family or her son.

A kettle of hot water sat on the kitchen stove, so she made tea and sipped a steaming cup. The back door opened and Brock came in from outside, cold air swirling in around him.

He looked so incredibly good with his skin ruddy from the cold, his hair tossed around his face—a tall, beautiful man who filled a room with his presence. A smile broke across his familiar face when he saw her, and her recalcitrant heart fluttered. “You’re up.”

“Shamefully late,” she agreed with a blush. “I can’t imagine what your family thinks of me.”

“They think nothing, because they all left early to visit the reservation.”

“Jonathon, too?”

“Jonathon, too. He’ll love it. Zeke will introduce him to his cousins.

There’s a plate in the oven for you. Eat and then I’ll take you for a ride.

I’ve even hitched a buggy. One of the hands was heading toward Whitehorn and I asked him to pay a call on Sam, see if he’d go over to the store and let Dilly out. ”

“Oh, Dilly!” she said with another twinge of guilt. “I forgot.”

Brock went to the oven, pulled out her plate and stuck a couple of bricks in. “For your feet,” he said.

“You’ll spoil me.” She tasted the frybread and spicy potatoes, finding them delicious.

Brock leaned over her, his coat brushing her shoulder, and said beside her ear, “You deserve to be spoiled once in a while.”

Warmth spread through her limbs. Abby turned her face to see his eyes, so blue, so seemingly earnest, and wished with all her heart that this was what her life could be like forever.

He kissed her lips, and she watched his lashes flutter down. His mouth was cold, his hair and skin smelling of outdoors.