Amelia (18 page)

He gave in to all the rationalizations, realizing as he began to undress her with expert seduction that it all boiled down to the fact that he would die to have her. Protecting Alan didn't matter. Nothing did, except that Amelia's silky warm body was in his arms and trembling with pleasure as he touched it.

"Oh, no, you must… not," she wept, but he kept on.

His mouth fed on her softly swollen breasts while his hands eased away the covering under her skirt and touched her silky thighs in an agony of soft sensuality. He touched her where she was a woman, and she wept at the shock and embarrassment and then at the pleasure that made her body tighten all over and tremble.

Her legs parted for him without any coaxing. She held him and sobbed, because her need was as great as his own. She felt him move and even with her eyes closed became aware of the sound of clothing being moved aside. She couldn't look. She didn't want to move, to do anything that might stop the shameful pleasure he was making her feel.

His hair-roughened chest was suddenly against her bare breasts, moving abrasively, making her clutch at him. His mouth settled over hers insistently then, and she felt his powerfully muscled bare, hair-feathered legs between her own. Her eyes flew open, because she realized now what her foolishness had led to, only now, when it was too late.

He was breathing roughly, and the eyes that met hers were silver fires. "That's it," he whispered hoarsely. "Look at me. Look into my eyes… as it happens!"

His lean hand caught her thigh in a bruising grip to stay her sudden jerk as he pushed into her with a violent downward motion of his hips.

Her eyes dilated. Her mouth opened. There was burning, tearing pain, and she cried out piteously and tried to get away, but he held her mercilessly with that steely hand and the pressure of his body over hers.

"King, please, no!" she wept.

His teeth were clenched, and his face had gone ruddy. His eyes blazed as he moved on her in a rough, fierce rhythm. "My God, Amelia," he choked. His eyes closed, and he began to shudder. "Oh… sweet… Jesus!"

It was reverence, more than profanity, that last startled exclamation. His powerful torso seemed to hang above her as he arched there, his voice breaking, his whole body suddenly convulsed in a rigor like that of a dying man.

Somewhere outside himself he saw his own helpless abandon, the death throes of ecstasy as he spilled himself in her body and suddenly collapsed, suffocating as he continued to shiver from the violence of his fulfillment.

Amelia felt him with shame and degradation. Her eyes closed to shut out the sight of it. Her body felt torn and used, and she wanted nothing more in that moment than to die. The tears slid hotly down her cheeks in silence, while the man lying so still against her slowly began to stop trembling and breathe normally again.

So that was what it felt like, she thought. All the soft words and long, hungry glances and tender kisses, they were nothing but a lie. Here, as in every other way, a man was an animal, a brutal, unfeeling animal who took his pleasure and repaid a woman with pain and debasement. Hadn't she heard her cousin cry and moan in just such a way through the wall at her home? How could she have forgotten!

King couldn't believe what he'd just done. His fall from grace had been sudden and unintentional, but she wasn't going to believe that. All the excuses and apologies in the world wouldn't undo what he'd done. He'd robbed her of her virginity, disgraced her. And now she'd expect marriage, he thought bitterly. Of course she would, because of the risk. He'd been a fool!

He pulled away from her without a word and turned to rearrange his clothing.

She did the same, quickly, with shaking hands, her face wet and her humiliation just beginning.

She got up from the bed on shaky legs. She felt the blood on the inside of her thighs and was only grateful that her outer clothing had been left in place, so that there were no stains on the bed linen to advertise her disgrace.

Moving away from him, her eyes lowered in unbearable shame, she went to the door and started to open it. His big hand slammed down beside hers, preventing her.

"I will not marry you," he said bluntly. "If this bit of seduction was planned toward that end, it has failed miserably. Nor will I allow Alan to marry you. If you attempt to lure him to a minister, I'll tell him what you permitted me to do to you in sordid, glorious detail. Is that understood?"

"Yes," she said in a strangled tone.

He forced himself not to remember how it had happened, that it had been himself, not her, who initiated it, who insisted. He had all but forced her, but he couldn't admit it to himself. He couldn't admit his weakness. It was part of his plan, he told his conscience. He had prevented her from marrying Alan, had that not been his intention all along? If his body had benefited by ending the whip of his hunger for her by satisfying it, then that was only part of his scheme. He had won. Why did he feel so guilty? Was she not a dishonest, dishonorable woman, as all her sex were? And was she not also a spineless woman of pitiful intellect who had the endurance of a hothouse orchid?

"May I leave, please?" she asked in a choked tone.

He hesitated for just an instant before he jerked erect and permitted her to open the door.

She went straight out onto the front porch, too shaken to even remember her bag lying on the sofa. "If you would… ask someone to drive me home, please," she whispered wildly. "I would rather not wait for Alan to return, or your… your parents."

"As you wish." Her back was as straight as a poker. He turned away before the sight of her stricken face made him feel worse than he already did.

He went down to the stable and spoke to one of the men. He didn't go back up with him when the buggy was ready. He didn't look at Amelia or speak to her. He turned his back and went into the barn to pitch hay to the animals.

She didn't look in his direction. Her body was sore and hurting, and she felt like a lady of the evening. Hysterically, she thought that if her father became very ill, she was now suited for a profession that many women before her had practiced. King had taken her innocence, and no decent man would ever want her now. She was ruined. Disgraced.

"Are you all right, ma'am?" the young cowboy who had been dispatched to drive her asked with concern. She was white and shivering.

"I am very well, thank you," she said. "It is only that I feel a little sick. I must have overeaten."

"Yes, ma'am."

She dried her tears and put a stoic face on it. When she was back in her own house, she quickly threw off her clothes, leaving them on the floor of her room, and went to soak in the bathtub. She stayed there a long time, thinking of what lay ahead. King might very well decide to brag about the experience to his brother or his friends or even his men, she thought hysterically, and laugh at how easily she had given in to him. He might think nothing of adding to her disgrace. He might even tell her father!

Things had been going so well. How could she bear her life now? She had been stupid, stupid!

The water was cold when she finally climbed out of the bathtub and put on her robe. There was a noise out in the hall and then in her room, followed by her father yelling for her.

She wrapped the thick robe closer and opened the door. Her father was standing just inside her room, his face livid. He was staring down at the upended slip and dress she'd worn out to the Culhane ranch. The stains were unmistakable.

But he wasn't looking at them. He was shaking with fury. He looked at Amelia with fury in his whole expression and jerked off his belt. The glazed eyes and white face told their own story. His arm came up and caught her just as she tried to run.

"You slut!" he raged, lifting the belt. "Did you think I would not find out? King Culhane himself came to see me, to tell me that you blatantly offered yourself to him! Do you think any man will marry what he can have for the asking? Alan will never want you now! You have disgraced me! You have disgraced us all!"

Amelia had stopped hearing him when he said that King had gone to him. She didn't care after that what he did. She was numb with shame and anguish. So that was what King thought of her. He hated her enough to do this…

Her father jerked her robe down from the nape of her neck, baring her back, and violently brought the doubled leather belt down on her soft skin with killing force.

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A
lan came home to find King just unsaddling his horse in the barn and Amelia gone. Judging by the look on his elder brother's face, everything had gone wrong. He didn't ask any questions. He left his horse with the cowboy outside the barn and went quickly about his own business without further ado.

The elder Culhanes came home in time for the evening meal, which King barely touched. He sat stiff-faced and brooding throughout, hardly hearing what anyone said. Later, the men went into the parlor to smoke, and Brant reached down into the chair and picked up Amelia's purse.

"Amelia left her purse," Brant murmured, glancing curiously at his sons. "Didn't either of you think to give it to her?"

"King should have. I wasn't here," Alan confessed reluctantly. "I had an emergency at the drilling site. King took her home."

"He did not," Enid said from the doorway, her eyes flashing. "Rosa was sent home, and young Billy Edwards drove Amelia, in tears, back to her house. I want to know what happened here. I want to know, especially, why you did something almost guaranteed to ruin Amelia's good name, King."

"Alan had plans to marry her," he said, staring coldly at his brother. "I have said repeatedly how I feel about having that featherbrained little coward in my family."

"I shall marry her if I please," Alan said curtly, playing his part to the hilt. King was obviously jealous. It seemed that something had happened while he was away.

But just as he was congratulating himself for making King realize his feelings for Amelia, the smile on King's face grew suddenly triumphant and cruel. "Will you marry her? Even if she was willing to give herself to another man? Which she was, in your absence," King added brutally. "She confessed that she would do anything I asked of her. I sent her home," he said, stopping just short of confessing all that had happened, "and then I went by the bank and had a long talk with her father. There will be no more attempts on his part to throw Amelia into your arms as a prospective wife, I have seen to that. She will not marry you now. Nor will her father dare to speak of marriage after what I said to him."

Alan's conscience exploded, along with his temper. He threw a punch that caught King off guard and actually knocked him down. His parents, horrified at King's behavior, stood quietly by, not saying a word.

"You fool!" Alan raged at him. "You arrogant fool, don't you realize what you've done? Her father is a madman! He will kill her!"

King sat up, fingering his jaw. "You exaggerate," he scoffed, surprised by his brother's fury. "He was upset, certainly, but not murderous."

"I never thought to say this to a son of mine," Brant said angrily, "but I'm deeply ashamed of you, King. You have disgraced us."

"The shame you have caused Amelia is unforgivable," his mother added coldly.

"Indeed," Brant added icily.

"She has no loyalty. She professes to care for Alan, but she offered herself to me!" King said roughly as he got to his feet.

"You have no idea what a victim she really is," Alan told him. He ran a worried hand over his hair. He took her purse from his father's hand. "This will give me an excuse, if I require one. I must get to town!"

"He would not hurt her," Brant began slowly, alarmed by Alan's attitude. "Surely, he would not."

"I had a chance to speak with Dr. Vasquez. Didn't you suspect that her father had already beaten her once, and that he was violent enough to kill in one of his rages?" Alan asked. "And you have driven him to murderous fury… This is my fault. My fault! I am so ashamed!"

He was out the front door running. King stood stock-still, his face white as paper. He recalled Amelia's face when her father was nearby, her irrational fear of the man. Now it all made sense, when it was too late. And he had gone to that brute with his tale of Amelia's weak character…

A minute later, he had his hat in his hand and was rushing out the door after Alan.

 

It took precious minutes to get into El Paso, and the streets were crowded. Alan reached Amelia's house seconds before King, neither of them sparing their mounts on the way. They didn't even take time to leave the horses at the stable but threw the reins the minute they arrived and ran to the front door.

Alan knocked and knocked again, but there was no answer. "Oh, God," he groaned, because it was past time for the elder Howard to be home from work, and Amelia would surely be there, in any case.

With a muffled curse, King went around to the side of the house and began looking in through the slitted curtains, room by room. Suddenly he stopped. The sight that met his eyes made him sick.

He ran back around the house. "Get the police!" he yelled to Alan as he made a run at the front door. Pray God he could break it in, because Amelia had been covered with blood. He didn't dare let himself think about her condition beyond that. He knew he couldn't live with himself if she died because of his stupidity. Why hadn't he known?

Alan hadn't argued. He'd gone at once, at a dead run, when King had called to him. Now King went about breaking the lock. It was a heavy door but not bolted, thank God. He gave it one last furious kick, his fear for Amelia spurring him on, and felt it give.

He ran down the hall to the room he'd seen from the outside. The door was open. Her father was shaking from his exertion, slumped over a chair.

"Damn you!" King cursed roundly as he went past the man to kneel beside Amelia. She barely seemed to be breathing at all. Her poor back was covered with blood. It had soaked into her white robe and into the floor rug beneath her, onto the floor. King thought that he'd never seen so much blood in his life. Her face was as white as flour paste, and she was obviously, mercifully, unconscious.