Page 12 of Wild Sweet Wilderness (Missouri #1)

Silas Cornick, his hair water-slicked, his beard neatly trimmed, produced his book and leafed through it to find his place. He cleared his throat.

“You jist stand right over there, Fain. Take her hand.”

Rachel looked up at Fain shyly. Her long, slim fingers trembled and he gripped them tightly. Biedy and Berry had arranged her blond hair neatly atop her head with sprigs of honeysuckle blossoms surrounding the knot. Her good dress was faded from many washings and was ill fitted due to her recent loss of weight, but it was free of wrinkles. Berry’s shoes pinched her toes, but the warm admiration in Fain’s eyes made her forget that discomfort. She felt beautiful, so she smiled and held herself proudly.

Berry had never heard the marriage ceremony before, and she listened closely to the solemn words that Silas spoke. When he asked Fain if he would take this woman, Fain’s answer was firm. He said he certainly would, and would cherish and protect her the best he knew how. Rachel’s answers were low and trembly, as if she wanted to cry.

During the ceremony Biedy stood beside her son Isaac, with her head slightly lowered, but her eyes never ceased their traveling from face to face of the group gathered attentively around the bridal couple. Fish stood beside them. Berry stood alone; just beyond her and a little to the side was Simon. His eyes never left Berry’s face.

Rachel and Fain were turning toward each other in the last minutes of the ceremony when Berry raised her eyes. She looked straight into the mirrored depths of Simon’s eyes and was caught there. The impact was as vivid as if he had reached across and touched her. A bead of sweat appeared on Berry’s upper lip. After a moment she swallowed, and with an effort she drew her eyes away and refused to look at him again.

The wedding was over in minutes. To Berry it seemed awfully short to bind a man and woman together for the rest of their lives. Then Fain was kissing Rachel. Biedy was chortling happily at Rachel’s confusion, while Fish, Simon, and Isaac were slapping Fain on the back. Rachel’s eyes were shining and Berry’s were misty as they hugged each other. Then everyone moved out into the yard where the wedding feast was spread out on a plank table set in the shade of the walls of the new room.

The men crowded in, drinking a toast to the happiness of the bride and groom from a clay jug set on one end of the table. Biedy and Berry moved about uncovering dishes of food, slicing the baked turkey, and cutting slabs of cornbread and suet cake. Israel and Eben hung back until Fain urged them forward. He filled their mugs with whiskey and Biedy filled their plates with food.

Simon stood by quietly, but Berry knew that nothing escaped his eyes. When she saw him move away from the others and come toward her, she tried in vain to still the frenzied beating of her heart. She moved quickly to the table and wedged herself between Biedy and Rachel.

Later she stood in an agony of embarrassment when Isaac got out his fiddle and struck up a tune, and Silas and Biedy began a mad gallop about the yard. She had never danced in her life and this was only the second time she had seen it done. She hoped desperately that no one expected her to do it! She started guiltily when someone touched her arm, but relief flooded through her when she saw it was Fish.

“Will you dance with me, Miss Berry?”

“No! Oh, no! I . . . don’t know how.”

“You don’t have to know how,”

he said teasingly.

“All you do is hop to the music. Come. I’ll show you.”

He took her hand and turned her to face him.

“Put your hand on my shoulder,”

he said and grasped her waist.

“Now . . . first on one foot and then the other. I’ll propel us around. All you have to do is follow.”

Berry had the hang of it in a matter of minutes. Laughter, sweeter than the sound of the fiddle, broke from her lips.

“What’s the name of the song, Fish?”

“It’s called ‘Yankee Doodle.’ It’s been around since the war for independence.”

“Do you know the words?”

“There are many verses. Some people make up their own:

“Oh, Yankee Doodle is the tune

A-mer-i-cans de-light in;

’Twill do to whis-tle, sing or play,

and just the thing for fight-in’.”

He finished singing the verse and whirled her around until the skirt of her weathered dress billowed out behind her.

The dancing fascinated Berry. She bounced lightly with Fish across the dirt yard.

“Sing another verse,”

she urged.

“All right . . . let me see. . . .”

He slowed their steps.

“A-mer-i-ca’s a dandy place,

the people are all brothers;

And when one’s got a pumpkin pie,

he shares it with the others.”

Berry laughed delightedly. The sound reached the tall man leaning against the side of the house. Simon couldn’t keep his eyes away from her. He’d not had a chance to speak to her alone for the entire two days he had been here working on the new room. It galled him to see her laughing with Fish. The young squirt wasn’t even dry behind the ears yet! He didn’t understand why Berry had been avoiding him, but it was clear as day that she had been doing just that. She had stuck so close to Rachel and Biedy you’d’ve thought she was glued to them, he thought with irritation.

When the dancing couple passed close to him, Simon was tempted to reach out and snatch her to him. Her head was thrown back, her red mouth open as she gasped for breath. Never had he seen a woman so beautiful, so alive. He wondered for the hundredth time why her skin was so clear and white, why her hair was so shiny, and why the sound of her laughter was like the joyous ringing of a bell.

“Sing ‘Sally Goodin,’”

Fain called out to Isaac when he lowered the fiddle to take a break. He was dancing with Rachel, holding her as if she were a precious piece of fine glass, moving with slow, sure steps, being careful not to tire her out.

Isaac played a few bars of a fast tune, then lowered the fiddle to sing:

“I had a piece of pie, ’n’ I had a piece of puddin’, I gave it all away to hug Sally Goodin.”

He played the fiddle between the verses, stomping his booted foot on the ground in time with the music.

“My Isaac c’n sing and clog as good as anybody,”

Biedy shouted as Berry and Fish whirled past.

“All my boys c’n cut the pigeon wing and ride a short loper with the best.”

She and Silas had stopped dancing and were clapping their hands to the music.

Silas moved up beside his son and his singing voice carried into every corner of the homestead.

“How old are you, my pretty little miss?

How old are you, my honey?

She answered him with a ‘He, he he.

I’ll be sixteen next Sunday.’”

When one song was done, Isaac started another, the dancing continuing all the while. Rachel stopped and leaned against Fain. He fanned her flushed face with a turkey wing that Biedy had left on the bench.

“No more dancin’ for you, Miz MacCartney. You get in there ’n’ rest yourself while ya tend to Faith. I’m a-goin’ to dance with Berry.”

The dance was long and exhausting; as Isaac stopped fiddling, the dancers flopped to the benches, and the black men, who had been shuffling their feet, flopped to the ground.

Simon sat on the woodchopping stump, Fain’s pet crow on his shoulder. He fed the bird bits of turkey meat. The brim of his hat was pulled low over his eyes, but Berry knew they rested on her often. What was he thinking? Did he think she was making a fool of herself carrying on like that? Did he think dancing was frivolous? He hadn’t danced with Rachel or Biedy and certainly not with her. She jumped up to help Biedy clear the table, and Fain moved over to hunker down beside Simon.

“Ya can’t beat the Cornicks for gettin’ up a shindig. I’m plumb glad. I wanted Rachel to have a grand weddin’ day.”

“It appears like you wore her out.”

Simon nodded toward the doorstone, where Rachel sat holding Faith to her shoulder. She had removed her shoes and her bare toes wiggled and dug into the cool grass.

Fain gazed intently at his new wife for a long moment before he spoke.

“She needs some fixings for herself. I’d be obliged if you’d send up a parcel from your storehouse.”

“Send Fish or Eben down and get what you want.”

“I’d trip in with ya myself, but I want to get back to work on my guns.”

“No need of it, if you tell me what you want.”

Simon drew his gaze away from Berry and saw the excitement in Fain’s eyes.

“You getting close to working the bugs out of that new piece?”

There was exhilaration in Fain’s voice when he answered.

“I’ve about got it worked out in my mind how I c’n insert the bullet at the breech. But I gotta figure out a device stout enough to hold the powder explosion. If’n it’ll work, I c’n load in half the time, even if the barrel is fouled from previous firings. Think on what that would mean, Simon!”

He struck his palm with his fist.

“My gun would be favored over them German short barrels and that flat-faced hammer French rifle.”

“If you’re on to something you’d better keep it to yourself,”

Simon said quietly.

“I’ve been thinkin’ on that, too. I don’t want this to get out to no other gunsmith till I can get my stamp on it. You’re the only one that knows what I’m working on besides Fish. The kid’s a good shot. He c’n hit a man-sized target at a hundred yards seven times out of ten, but he’ll not make no gunsmith. He’s not got the hands or the ‘stick to’ for it.”

“Has he mentioned anything about moving on?”

“You wantin’ him gone?”

“It makes no never mind to me if he goes or stays, but there’s something queer about a feller with his background a-hangin’ around a place like this. You’d think he’d be a-tryin’ to better himself.”

Simon looked steadily into Fain’s twinkling eyes.

Fain chuckled, picked up a twig from the ground, and stuck it into the corner of his mouth.

“I’d say he’s a-workin’ on somethin’, or ain’t ya noticed?”

“I noticed! I’m not blind! He’d be about as much use to her as tits on a boar!”

“Maybe he ain’t plannin’ on settlin’ on a homestead. He might be plannin’ on goin’ back to the East and a-takin’ her with him. She’d be a beauty all dressed in fancy clothes.”

Fain goaded his friend while watching him closely.

Simon swung his head around so his eyes could follow Berry.

“I can’t see a strong-willed woman like her getting took up with a slack-handed kid.”

“He mightn’t be slack-handed if’n he found his niche.”

Fain shook his head.

“Ya never know about women. Maybe ya don’t have nothin’ to worry about.”

“Who’s worrying?”

Simon snapped.

Fain let the remark pass.

“Maybe it ain’t marryin’ he’s got on his mind. Maybe he’s just a-bidin’ his time. He talked some ’bout joinin’ up with Pike.”

“Bullshit!”

Simon snorted.

“Pike’d not take on a kid like him. He’d not last through the first portage.”

“Pike’s got a lot at stake. It’s said he’s takin’ Wilkinson’s son on this trip upriver.”

“I can tell you, Fain, but it’s not to be let out. Wilkinson’s ordered Pike to make a journey of exploration into the country to the south and west. It’s the route Manuel Lisa’s planning to take. You can bet your bottom dollar Lisa’ll not stand aside and let someone else open up that trade. He fights dirty.”

“Is he still after you to invest in the venture?”

“He don’t give up easy. It don’t set with him or Chouteau that I’m doing a little fur business. Course, what I do is nothing compared to Lisa or the Chouteau family operations.”

“Watch Lisa. He ain’t above doin’ a little arm twistin’.”

“I trust him about as far as Wilkinson. He’s got his feelers out for a profit. I’d trust neither one as far as I can throw a mule by the tail.”

“It’d be like him to have his spies out a-checkin’ on Pike. Have ya run into anythin’?”

Simon was silent for a long moment.

“You could say so.”

He dropped the news and waited for Fain’s reaction. A puzzled frown crossed his face.

“I was sitting on my doorstone a few nights back and saw something on the river. I got out my glass and could see a canoe plain as day in the moonlight. I went down to the river to get a better look and saw another canoe pulled up on the bank a ways downriver. I cut through the woods to see what they was up to. When they pulled to shore, a man came out of the timber and talked to them. I couldn’t get close enough to see who he was and could catch just a few words they said, but I did hear one say something about ‘by any means you can.’ After a while one canoe went back downriver and the other one crossed over.”

Fain chewed on the twig for a while before speaking.

“What do you make of it?”

“I don’t know. I don’t care what Manuel Lisa or Pike do to each other as long as they leave me out of it. I’ll not invest in Lisa’s expedition. What I’d really like to do is get out of the trading business and start building up my farm. I’m going down to talk with Ernest. We got a share of the business to outfit Pike and I don’t think Lisa was happy about it.”

Fain chuckled.

“What can he do?”

Simon grinned.

“He could burn me out, but that would be too obvious.”

“We’ll keep an eye out . . . huh?”

Simon wasn’t listening. His eyes went past Fain when Berry’s laughter drifted across the yard. It was in response to something Fish had said to her, and she dodged around him and dashed into the cabin, only to come out minutes later with the laughter still on her lips. She threw a pan of dishwater out into the yard dangerously close to where Fish was standing. When he jumped back, musical, girlish laughter rang from her lips again before she darted back inside. Simon watched the play and listened to the happy sound. As always, the sound of her laughter gave him a surge of pleasure, and his eyes lingered on the empty doorway.

* * *

It was deepening dusk when Berry came out of the cabin and crossed the yard to her wagons. It would be strange, she thought, to sleep in the wagon without Rachel. It was something she would have to get used to doing. It had been a long time since she had been alone, and the emptiness of it pressed down upon her. Don’t look back, she cautioned herself, lest you stumble for naught. She couldn’t remember when she had first heard the familiar old saying. Perhaps it was something Rachel had said to her.

Fain and Rachel had gone into the big, new room. Fain had promised to put in a plank floor and build a big double bed. In the meanwhile they would sleep on pallets on the smooth dirt floor. When they had gone inside and dropped the hide flap that covered the door, it was like the final parting for Berry. Not that she wasn’t happy for Rachel, but . . . oh . . . there was a sick, empty feeling in the pit of her stomach.

Berry sat down on the trunk and looked around her at the things she had known all her life: the pine chest, the spinning wheel, the barrel churn, and the tin chamber pot. She had come here to gain comfort from being among these familiar things.

“I want to talk to you, Berry.”

Simon! His voice was an impassioned whisper in her ears. The constant awareness of him was fire in her veins and energy in her fingers. All day she had worked furiously, danced furiously, to keep him from consuming her every thought. She saw his outline at the end of the wagon and stood slowly feeling puzzled and self-conscious. She looked into his face but could not speak.

“Come on down,”

he said and reached for her. His head was bare and his hair looked wet, as if he had been in the pool again. His hands circled her waist and lifted her down.

“Let’s walk out a ways.”

It wasn’t a request, it was just simply—“let’s walk out a ways.”

She felt dwarfed as she moved along beside him.

“We’ll walk down by the river. Soon the mosquitoes will take over and it’ll be misery to be near the river when there’s no breeze.”

Berry drew a deep breath and tried to calm the unease that had been fermenting in her breast. There was something sweetly fascinating in being beside him in the near darkness. Down the faint slope lay the shimmering river with its unbroken border of trees. The night sounds had commenced around them: the low swish of the river, the faint hoot of an owl, the scrappy twit of a bird.

He drew her to a downed tree trunk and they sat down. What did he bring her here to say? She turned away from him, letting her glance move over the great river with its acrid, muddy smell of decay, over the little islands that seem to float on the river, tapestried in the pale green of budding cottonwoods. Berry drew a long satisfied breath, consciously permitting herself to enjoy the view.

She must speak, she told herself sternly. She must speak casually, trying to deny with her tone how shaken she was.

“It’s . . . pleasant here.”

“Beats a town all hollow, doesn’t it?”

At something in his tone she looked at him. He was not smiling, but there was a wicked mischief in his eyes; she could tell by the tiny creases that fanned out at the corners. She dropped her eyelids and focused on the loosely fitted white shirt that covered his broad shoulders and chest. I wonder who washes his clothes. It was her last coherent thought as a strange feeling swamped her, as if she lacked breath and could not speak, as if she were sad to the point of tears; and yet through it, like a rainbow through clouds, the promise of excitement and joy appeared.

He put his fist under her chin and lifted her face.

“Are you unhappy that Rachel married? Is that what makes you look so sad?”

“I’m glad for Rachel. She deserves the best.”

“She’s got it. Fain’s the best man I know. He’ll take good care of her and the babe.”

“I know that.”

“Fain said you’ve got it into your head to go on out to the land your pa filed on. I can tell you, now, that land will never be under a plow, will not grow anything but willows and swamp grass.”

“How do you know? You don’t even know where it is!”

She cast him a challenging glance.

“Rachel showed me the map. It’s low and swampy.”

“How do you know?”

she repeated softly, although she wanted to shout at him.

“I’ve been there. I’ve been twenty, thirty miles back all along the river, and the land your pa filed on isn’t good for anything but water moccasins. Even the Osage stay clear of it.”

“You’re just saying that. Papa wouldn’t take swampy land.”

“He didn’t see it before he filed. He only knew what the land man told him, and he hadn’t seen it either.”

“I don’t believe a word you’re saying! I’ll go and see for myself.”

She stood. Simon grasped her hand to keep her from moving away.

“I’ll not ask you to take me there, if that’s what’s worryin’ you,”

she said scathingly.

“I’m not worried about it at all. I wouldn’t do it,”

he said matter-of-factly, his voice deep and low, a smile hovering at the edges of his wide mouth. His very attitude of quiet self-confidence jarred her taut nerves.

“Fish will take me,”

she said abruptly.

“Hellfire!”

He snorted.

“You’d more’n likely have to take care of him.”

“I don’t need anybody,”

she said recklessly.

“I’ll go alone and take Israel.”

“No, you won’t. I won’t permit it.”

“You . . . won’t . . . what?”

“You heard me, Berry. You may be a spitfire and need some strong handling, but you’re not stupid. I’ll not allow my wife to go traipsing off in the woods like an Indian squaw when she’s got her own work to do on our place upriver.”

He pulled on her hand. She was so stunned by his words that she sat down before she realized it. She tried to get back to her feet, but he held her.

“Your . . . wife? You mean . . . ? You mean . . . me?”

The air around her seemed to vibrate first with her astonishment and then with her anger.

“You . . . you . . . Damn you to hell! You’re tellin’, not askin’! I’ll not wed you to get a . . . place for myself. What do you think I am?”

The words burst from her in bitter rage. She was shaking all over and felt as if something inside her was giving way.

“I think you’re a woman with warm, red lips, white arms, and hair as black and shiny as a black-bird’s wing. A woman with stormy green eyes that flash like lightning, a woman that can drive a man mad with wanting her.”

And then he was kissing her, one arm locked around her shoulders, the other at her waist pulling her hard against him.

His mouth was hard against hers, and the skin around it and on his chin was rough with new beard.

He kissed her until her lips burned, and until the strength dissolved from her body.

Simon raised his head to stare down at the shadowed face and closed eyes when he felt her go limp against him.

He had long ago admitted to himself the overwhelming attraction he felt for her.

She had touched his heart and entered his mind even as he willed it otherwise.

He knew she was willful, headstrong, exasperating, and foolish.

He had spent the day wavering between a desire to make love to her and an urge to bend her over his knee for the sound beating she needed for even thinking of leaving the security of this place.

Yet there was another side to her.

She was spunky and brave.

She had fought like a little wildcat to protect herself and Rachel from the river scum who had come to their camp.

She was uplifting, fun, and endearing. She made him forget to be so serious about life, made his heart laugh, and he didn’t want that feeling to stop.

He felt a strong desire to force her to want him—to see in her eyes a need and a longing for him.

Calmly, he made a vow that he would make that happen, make her want to be with him for the rest of her life, make her depend on him to keep her safe.

His eyes roamed her quiet face, her youthful, rounded breasts and trim waist, and her silky black hair.

The intensity of his gaze caused her to open her eyes and regain her senses.

“I don’t like to be kissed,”

she declared imperiously. She could see his face if she tilted her head back onto his crooked arm.

“Yes, you do,”

he said with matter-of-fact confidence.

“I don’t! And you’re no gentleman to say it!”

He laughed softly.

“You’re right. I’m no gentleman. But you’re no lady, either.”

“I am,”

she declared.

“I was taught by my mother, who was a lady! I’m not a . . . tart!”

His laugh was low and rumbling and came from deep inside him. He blew warm, moist breath on her face when he laughed. His lips touched her forehead briefly before his cheek pressed against hers.

“I don’t know what you are,”

he admitted in a rough whisper.

“I’m afraid to scratch the surface. No telling what I’d find.”

Suddenly the laughter bubbled up out of her.

The absurdity of their banter had reached her senses and her sense of humor took over.

Her laughter turned to giggles she couldn’t stop.

The enchantment that floated about her enfolded Simon in its aura so that he laughed with her.

The mood changed without either of them being aware of it.

Berry melted against him, allowing his hands to mold and shape her to his hard form as he wished.

His mouth moved over hers, as if he sought to draw her heart out through her lips.

For the first time she touched him with her hands, stroking his back and shoulders, then tangled her fingers in the soft hair at the nape of his neck.

Simon responded to the touch of her hands and to the movement of her lips with urgent, seeking hands.

He drew an uneven breath and his deep voice vibrated with feeling.

“I’ve never seen anyone like you.

You’re like finding a soft, beautiful pelt among a pack of mangy hides.

I want to stroke you .

.

.

feel you. . . .”

Berry felt a spurt of surprise on hearing those words, but then his mouth closed over hers, parting her lips, blotting out all rational thought.

His kiss was tender and probing .

.

.

deep and disturbing.

She felt his tongue pushing against the inner pads of her lips, intruding with gentle insistence until she tingled with the unfamiliar sensations he awakened.

He lifted his mouth and tucked her face into the curve of his neck.

His breath came in gasps and she could feel the pounding of his heart against her breast.

Her breast! His hand was on her other one. How long had it been there? He shouldn’t . . .

She shouldn’t let him. She tilted her head and opened her eyes to find his inches from hers.

“What’s the matter?”

he asked softly.

“Nothing. I . . .”

“Then relax.”

“You shouldn’t . . .”

She grasped the wrist of the hand covering her breast and tried, in vain, to push it away.

“I think we should go back now.”

“I don’t.”

He rubbed his palm gently over her breast, liking the feel of the soft globe in his hand. He covered her mouth with his again and molded her so tightly to him that she wondered if the imprint of his body would remain on hers when they parted. His kiss was a dark, sweet eternity of firm lips and warm breath. She felt a small fire kindling deep within her.

When he drew back he traced a finger softly across her kiss-puffed lips.

“You like what I do. You like being in my arms.”

“No . . .”

“Yes. No man has kissed you but me. No man has touched your soft breast, nibbled on the skin below your ear, held your bottom in his hand.”

The words were spoken with deliberate possessiveness before his lips moved back to hers. This time hers opened magically beneath his.

Berry felt her defenses begin to crumble away from the longing that had grown inside her.

She became aware of a new warmth spreading over her, and with surprise she discovered his hand beneath her skirt stroking her thighs.

She knew this was forbidden and dangerous, but what he was doing was so pleasant, so gentle, that she didn’t want him to stop.

The desire Simon felt for the exquisite form he clasped so tightly to his own was a deep pain gnawing his vitals.

Her fierce pride was an intense irritation to him, yet it touched his heart and commanded respect.

Stubborn little baggage! No other woman had ever come close to making him feel like this woman did.

Someday he would tell her that.

His laugh was low and tender when he wasn’t kissing her sweet-smelling mouth.

Why couldn’t she think? What was this leading to? His hand beneath her skirt moved up to cup her bare buttocks.

A bold, searching mouth was nipping at the corner of hers, tracing a path to her eyes and then back to close over her mouth as if his lips couldn’t stay away.

His tongue was insistent, demanding that she meet it with hers.

She responded hesitantly at first, then with welcome, and finally with blatant craving.

She clung to him, her hands sliding over him, feeling the strength of his muscles, the smoothness of his shoulders and back.

A small warning crept into the back of her mind. She knew she should be pushing him away, but every part of her being was responding to his touch. It was wildly exciting. This is foolish, her sanity argued. But she didn’t want it to end. Not yet!

Berry felt as if she were drifting on a sea of soft, white clouds.

Tomorrow she would hate herself for what she was doing and allowing him to do, but that was tomorrow.

Right now she felt a wondrous warmth and rightness at what was happening.

His mouth was persistent, snatching away her breath as well as her ability to think.

There was also a rightness to the feel of his hands on her body beneath her skirt and her arms entwined around his neck.

“Damn! Damn!”

Simon groaned in frustrated agony and buried his mouth in the hair behind her ear.

“You don’t know what this is leading up to, do you? Soon I’ll not be able to stop! I’ll have all of you right here in the grass. Damnation! You deserve more than that. You deserve long, sweet loving . . . and coaxing . . . and gentling. . . .”

“Simon . . .”

she protested softly.

His arms dropped from around her and he slid to the grass and leaned back against the tree trunk on which they had been sitting. He pulled her down on his lap and wrapped her in his arms. She cuddled contentedly against him.

“Berry . . . girl . . .”

The sound of his deep voice caressing her name made her tilt her head so she could nuzzle his jaw with her nose.

“I can’t let you go back to the house . . . just yet.”

His hand caressed her cheek and moved down over her shoulder. While he kissed the hollow of her throat, his fingers worked on the buttons on her dress, then he brushed aside the garment and gently cupped her exposed flesh. He worked the nipple with his callused palm, teasing it to hardness.

“Someday your breasts will be filled with mother’s milk,”

he murmured half to himself.

“But now . . . they are only for me.”

He moved the fabric farther back and bent his head. Softly he kissed her breast, and then, to her wide-eyed surprise, his lips surrounded her nipple and he suckled her gently. The roughness of his tongue and the pull of his whiskers on her skin caused a warm rush of sensation to surge through her and she felt lightheaded. The feeling was so acute that she arched her back and with her arm around his neck held his head to her breast. The tormenting touch of his mouth brought her to an ardent, fevered frenzy. She made no protest when his hand moved beneath her skirt to wedge itself between her thighs.

“Berry . . . girl . . .”

He whispered the words in a strangely broken voice. He was almost dizzy with desire. He wanted to bury himself in her, suckle her soft breasts, kiss her warm, wet mouth, and satisfy the hunger that gnawed at him. But, young and innocent as she was, it wasn’t fair to her! She shouldn’t be taken fully clothed on the damp grass. She should be able to taste the full pleasure of it. He forcibly held himself back, withdrew his hands from her body, pulled down her skirts, and covered her breasts. He cuddled her in his arms. She could not guess the depth of torture it put him through to stem the tide of his passion.

“When the time is right I’ll make it long and sweet for you and you’ll have no regrets.”

For a long moment he simply held her. Reason dissolved the hunger that tormented him. He stroked the hair back from her face as if she were a child and kissed her forehead, her nose, and her eyelids. She would be his—the small, firm body, the beautiful green eyes, the dark curling hair, breasts, lips—all his. He would be able to touch her, possess her, whenever he wanted to. . . . The thought sent a quiver of desire through him. He lifted her face with a finger beneath her chin. Their eyes locked, hers moist and faintly confused, his tender and searching.

“I shouldn’t have let you. . . . It was wrong.”

Her eyes wavered beneath the intensity of his. She was suddenly a small girl trying to account for her actions. She summoned all her determination to speak, but her voice still came out thin and weak.

“I don’t know what possessed me to let you. . . .”

Her lower lip quivered and she ducked her head.

“The urge is as old as time,”

he whispered.

“Yes, but without . . . without . . .”

He lifted her off his lap, stood, and pulled her up beside him. His fingers worked at the front closing of her dress and she stood like an obedient child. He put his fist beneath her chin and lifted her face.

“Smile for me.”

“You treat me like a child.”

“You are a child.”

He pressed his hands briefly to her shoulders.

“Come. We’d better be getting back.”

“What did you mean about a . . . wife?”

She refused to move when he took her arm.

“Just what I said. We’ll wed and I’ll take you up to my place. The cabin isn’t much, but we’ll build something else later on.”

“You’ve not said that you love me.”

“Love?”

His eyes laughed at her.

“What’s love? You need a husband more than love.”

“But I don’t want a husband unless there’s love, too.”

“Foolish fancies.”

He shrugged.

“But then you’re only a child.”

“Stop saying that! I’m eighteen.”

“That old? A woman of eighteen should be old enough to know she can’t get along in this country without a man. If she finds a decent one she ought to take him without expecting love to be part of the deal.”

His eyes were still wrinkled at the corners, his lips still twitching. She couldn’t tell if he was teasing. She wanted him to be serious. She had to say it, had to let him know what she had to have before she would wed. She peered up at him.

“I want . . . to . . . love my husband.”

She spaced the words to give them emphasis, to be sure he understood.

“Then love him.”

His voice was light, as if he was laughing inside.

“There’s no law that I know of that says you can’t love him.”

“I want to be sure that he loves me,”

she said stubbornly.

He laughed so uninhibitedly that she drew back, her green eyes flashing up at him with insolent appraisal. Setting a hand on each rounded hip, she cocked her head in challenge.

“Don’t you laugh at me, Simon Witcher!”

“The first thing you’ve got to learn about men in this country is that they can spin a wild yarn that’ll curl your hair, and woo a woman with soft words if that’s what she wants to hear. Never believe a man’s soft words of love, Berry. Pay a mind to what he does.”

“I like soft words,”

she said angrily.

He laughed again and she wanted to hit him. She balled her fist and prepared to swing. Before she could move, he was kissing her with a violence that stunned her. She stiffened her body, but his tight clasp bent that stiffness to the curve of his body. He crushed her lips so hard with his that she couldn’t tell whether he was kissing her or trying to hurt her. After an instant his lips softened and her resistance vanished, leaving nothing but the awareness of him, awareness that rose like a hot fountain from the core of her being. It rose to consume her with the force of its heat. She closed her eyes. Her lips surrendered to the searing heat of his.

They drew apart slowly.

“You may like soft words, but you like hard kisses better,”

he said with a deep chuckle in his voice and ignored the needling glance she threw at him.

Berry choked down the quick denial that his words provoked. She couldn’t summon the bitchiness needed to end this night on an ugly note.

They walked silently up the path to the house. Simon left her at the cabin door with only a brief touch of his fingers on her cheek. She watched him cross the yard and disappear in the shadows before she slipped into the house.

She crossed to the bunk and sat down, immeasurably glad to be alone in the room. She undressed in the dark and slipped her night rail over her head. Simon Witcher, you make me so damn mad! Her mind was boiling with emotions. Among her turbulent thoughts one stood out above all the others: she would make him love her and she would make him say it!