Dorothy Garlock - [Wabash River] (31 page)

She couldn’t speak, but she kissed his face with wet passionate kisses and clutched at his buttocks to keep his throbbing warmth inside her. Lying beneath him, with his arms around her, a part of his body inside her, she wanted to cry out that a miracle had happened. Without him there she would never be whole again.

His mouth searched the sweetness of her lips, and his tongue searched for entry. Her hands moved impatiently over him, wanting to know and feel every inch of his body. Her legs, knees bent, rested on his and rubbed gently against his hair-roughened thighs. Her body and mouth were offered to him to do with as he wanted. His hands and his lips moved over every part of her he could reach. The deeply buried heat in her body flared out of control and stinging waves of pleasure traveled like quicksilver up and down her spine.

“I love you,” she screamed inside and her body twisted as he took her to the edge of the world. They fell off together, locked tightly in each other’s arms. Vaguely she heard his muffled cry and felt his body shudder as the hardness inside her jerked with release, sending a flow of warm soothing fluid where a moment ago there had been a pulsing, aching emptiness.

Wave after wave of pure pleasure washed over Farr. He felt as if he were one being with the woman joined with him. He had been lonely, a man burning for contentment, and here it was, all the joy he had thought would never be his. He poured himself into the sweet woman beneath him, groaning, shuddering, striving to reach her very soul with his possession. His heaving body was bound to hers in total consummation with both physical and emotional ties.

Afterward, still joined to her, he turned on his side, bringing her with him. They lay face to face, foreheads touching, breathing the same air. His arms and legs were wrapped around her, her arms about him. He moved his face so that his nose lay alongside hers, and his lips could reach her mouth. She hardly had strength to return his kisses. She was weak and lifeless in body, but her heart was so flooded with happiness and her spirit soaring so high that she wanted him to know how it was with her.

“I’ve not been with a man before. My husband never touched me. You were the first, and you were . . . wonderful.”

“I’m glad I was first. Although it would have made no difference.” Tenderly, he pushed the damp hair from her face. He was filled with an indescribable joy and contentment even though, to his surprise, he was still fully extended inside of her. He placed his palm on her bottom and pressed her tightly against him. Reverently he kissed her forehead, and then her lips. “It will be a while before I get my fill of you,” he whispered against her cheek. He flexed his hips, his palm on her bottom holding her to him, and she could feel the tip of him touching her womb. “Does that hurt?”

“No. It feels . . . good.”

“It does to me too.” His lips closed over hers. “You’re a lot of woman for such a little thing,” he breathed after his kiss had almost taken her breath away. He moved her up until his mouth could reach her breast and he could suck her taut nipple. She stirred and he laughed softly as he pulled her down so he was buried deeply within her once again, and his mouth was once more on her lips. “Do you like mating with me? Do you enjoy this thing a husband does to his wife?”

“I’m not supposed to like it, but I do.” She arched her back so she could see his face. “Farr? Do you mind that I like it?”

His laugh was soft and joyous. “Oh, Libby, Libby, you are a wonder. I could almost like Lenning for chasing you out of New York. Dear woman, you are what every man dreams of.”

She set her teeth on the softness of his upper lip and bit gently. This freedom with him was making her giddy. Her lips pressed gently, then fiercely to the scar beside his mouth, and then slowly, steadily, he began to move within her, probing, writhing. Her arms locked around his neck and he moved both hands down to grasp her buttocks, moving her with him, pressing up while he pushed her down, until she thought the tip of him was touching her very soul. The pleasure went on and on, building until they were riding high on the soaring, swelling tide of rapture.

At the end Farr sucked gently at the flesh of her slender neck, and she smoothed the tumbled hair back from his face with gentle fingers. He fell away from her, then gathered her tenderly into his arms and held her to his strong, relaxed body, stroking his hand over her breast.

The clock inside the cabin struck two o’clock. The lassitude of plenty, the sense of a hunger fed caused a sigh of contentment to come from Farr.

“I want to tell you about Fawnella.” He held Liberty cradled in his arms and whispered the quiet words against her hair.

“Are you sure you want to? She was part of your life a long time ago.”

“Yes, I want to tell you.”

“Then tell me,” she whispered, kissing his ear.

“It was the first year that Juicy and I came to stay. We had been here before, but I had to go back to Carrolltown so I could go to school with Colby. Juicy waited until I got back from Virginia and we came on together. We had found the salt spring and decided to build our cabin in this bend on the Wabash. We had friends among the Shawnee. John Spotted Elk, the man who raised Rain, is a good friend of Sloan Carroll. Juicy and I had known him for years. One day I heard shouts down by the river. I found a young girl—”

Farr paused, as if almost wishing he hadn’t started the story. Liberty waited, rubbing her palm soothingly over his cheek, trying to let him know that she understood how difficult it was for him.

He started talking again, telling her how he had killed the trappers and taken the terrified girl. He told her that he named the mute girl Fawnella because she reminded him of a shy, silent little fawn. He left nothing out in the telling. They had loved each other with all the passionate love of their young hearts, and when she died, the pain was so deep that he had vowed never to love another woman, never to expose himself to the agony of losing her.

“I realize now that my time with Fawnella was a special time, but that I can have other times in my life equally as special. Tonight, when you came to me openly and honestly, wanting me as I wanted you, was a special time. I had not met another woman I wanted to marry until I met you. Be patient with me, Libby. At times I have such a guilty feeling for wanting you. I feel that . . . somehow I’m betraying Fawnella, for if I’d not left her alone that morning, the Frenchman wouldn’t have come back.”

“You can’t blame yourself. If Fawnella loved you, she wouldn’t blame you. She’d want you to be happy.”

“She loved me,” he whispered.

“You’re an easy man to love.”

“I’ll be good to you, take care of you—”

“I know that. Farr,” she ignored her jumping heart and steadied her voice, “are you saying you can never . . . love me like you loved Fawnella?” Her breath caught, but she had to voice the question.

“No! I’m not saying that.” His arms tightened. “I’m saying what I feel for you is . . . different. I’m different. I’ve been over the mountain, as Juicy says. I’ve been to New Orleans, seen the sights—”

“I understand. Really I do.”

“I didn’t fall desperately in love with you the moment I saw you as I did with Fawnella. My feeling for you grows as I learn more about you. I thought my heart would burst today when I saw you lying on the grass. And I thought, Oh God, how can I bear to lose her? Let’s take each day as it comes, Libby. This is all so new.”

“For me too.”

Her kissing lips traced his brow, and she pulled his face into her breast, felt his lips take up the kissing, felt his hands on her hips, her belly, her thighs.

“Do you think you could . . . learn to love me?” He asked the question hesitantly, like a small boy.

Liberty’s arms tightened and she wanted to say she didn’t have to learn. But it was too soon to lay all her feelings out in the open. Her fear of rejection was too great.

“You’re an easy man to love, Farrway Quill.”

Her answer seemed to satisfy him. His caressing hands lifted her to him. This time she took all of him in one long, gentle, sweet thrust, giving him comfort . . . and love.

L
iberty wakened when Farr removed his arm from beneath her head.

“You don’t have to get up yet. Wait until I build up the fire,” he whispered.

The first gray of dawn could be seen through the open end of the wagon. She watched him dress, his body silhouetted against the pale light. His body was more intimately known to her now than her own had ever been before. She lay there reveling in the new, wondrous feeling of belonging to him and watched him slip silently out into the new morning.

Later, he returned just as silently and placed a pan of warm water on the tailgate of the wagon. The damp cloth felt good against her aching femininity, and she marveled at the thoughtfulness of this woodsman she had married.

She washed and dressed. In the dim light of morning she looked down at her body. It had taken one night with Farr to make her aware of the gift God had given when he created man and woman and gave them the urge to procreate. She was a woman now, in every sense of the word. Her body had known the sharp thrust of her man’s body; he had possessed every inch of it and she had given it freely. Nothing in her life up to now could compare with that experience. Even now her heart hammered with anticipation of what the coming nights with Farr could bring.

She smoothed, coiled and pinned her hair on the top of her head, wishing all the while for the hairbrush she had left in the cabin. Before she climbed out of the wagon, she checked to be sure her dress was buttoned properly and that her apron was reasonably clean.

She paused in the doorway of the lighted cabin. Willa was moving silently between the workbench and hearth. Farr turned when she entered. Their eyes caught and held. His green ones were warm and shining and looked long and deliberately into hers. Liberty thought she would stop breathing.

“Morning.” Amused smile lines fanned out from the corners of his eyes and deepened the creases on each side of his mouth.

“Morning,” she murmured, then spoke to Willa. “I’ll make corn cakes if we have any sorghum left.”

Willa lifted the crock jug with the cork stopper. “It’s enough.”

Liberty’s hands were shaking as she poured water into the cornmeal. She could feel Farr’s eyes and couldn’t prevent her own from seeking them. When he smiled at her with amused tenderness, the thrill reached all the way to her toes, and her heart leaped joyfully.

It was the same all through the day. When he was near, their eyes caught and clung as if they shared a glorious secret. That night he came to the wagon shortly after she did, gathered her in his arms and whispered that he was a greedy man. He laughed and told her that the night before had only whetted his hunger for her. Slowly and sensuously they caressed each other’s bodies without the shyness of the night before. He took his time with her quite deliberately, making the pleasure last until she was filled with a driving physical need which drummed through her veins like thunder, and she was conscious only of a need to please him, please herself.

Afterward, he pulled her snugly into the curve of his body, curled around her like a contented kitten, and slept.

*  *  *

Several weeks passed without any word from Elija or Stith Lenning. Liberty seldom thought of either of them. She had never been so happy. It seemed as if a heavy weight had been lifted from her heart. Farr filled every corner of it now. She no longer carried the heavy responsibility for Amy alone. She and Farr would take care of Amy. Liberty’s world was suddenly bright and shining. She felt laughter bubbling up inside her at the most unusual times, and smiles of pure delight made her face radiant. She even pushed to the back of her mind the thought that her father and Stith were planning something evil. There was no room for anything inside her now but the wish to make a home for Farr and to anticipate her time alone with him.

George Thompson sent his black man and a mule to help with the stockade. Edward Brown sent his eldest son, a sturdy lad of fifteen who Amy said looked like a possum. He cast his shy glances at her, but she only had eyes for Rain, who ignored her as completely as she would allow. A day later the Palmer boy arrived and another man from the Sufferite community. The Sufferites refused to eat with them, and so Willa and Liberty cooked a hearty noon meal for eight men with enough left over for supper.

It was the middle of the morning. A thick stew was bubbling in the pot, fresh bread was cooling on the workbench, and the suet pudding was ready to dish up. Liberty was ripping the skirt from one of Amy’s dresses so that Willa could cut a dress for Mercy. The little girl was playing happily with a rag doll Amy had made from a stocking. Amy and Daniel had gone down to the sawyer camp.

Willa came from the spring with a fresh bucket of water.

“Libby,” she said breathlessly as she set the bucket on the shelf. “Militiamen coming.”

“Militiamen?” Liberty got up and went to the door.

A group of horsemen were on the road. The two in front were officers. She could tell by the plumes on their tricorn leather hats, the bright blue coats and light trousers. The eight that followed in sets of twos were regular militiamen. There was no mistaking the two riders that followed. Her father rode the mare she had given him and Stith Lenning was mounted on a big gray. Apprehension knotted her stomach. She watched, expecting the group to turn up the lane to the house, but they continued on by.

“They’re going to the sawyer camp.” Willa’s hand reached out and clasped Liberty’s arm. “Amy’s down there.”

An icy hand squeezed Liberty’s heart. “That’s right! Oh, Willa! I’ve got to get down there.”

“Go around the side of the house and through the trees. They’ll not see you until you’re almost there. Hurry!”

Liberty ran. She lifted her skirts to her knees and ran as if the devil were after her. Fear of what her father and Stith had in mind for Amy drove her recklessly on and caused her to disregard the stones and sticks that bruised her feet through the soles of the thin slippers.