Unbroken Hearts (13 page)

    
Sarah gasped. "Oh my." Her lips
barely moved. "I'm sorry."

     
But the more she thought about it
the more she realized she couldn't be sorry, at least not about a woman she
never knew. She only regretted that Cal had suffered. Yet she felt a twinge of
something else. Envy?

    
The woman named Grace had known things
she'd likely never know. The luxuries of courtship and marriage were for other
women, the kind who had good families, property, and status in social circles.
Women like Grace had plenty more to recommend themselves to a man than two old
faded dresses and a belt buckle.

    
Cal's expression had turned to a frown,
the one he wore when he was thinking hard on something. He turned to face her
fully, spoke again, carefully selecting his words.

    
"When I was a boy I dreamed of
driving a stage with a six-horse hitch or clerking at a general store. But
working alongside my father, well, I grew to love ranching. When a man spends
long hours in the saddle he has no trouble sleeping." He glanced at her.
"What did you dream of doing?"

    
Sarah smiled sadly. "I used to dream
that I owned a bakery. But then when I walked in and put on my apron I found I
had no flour and no sugar and no butter. So in the dream I went into the street
and looked up into the sky. I'd see eagles. Suddenly I wished I had wings so I
could fly away like them."
 
She laughed dryly. "It was a silly dream."

     
Cal frowned. "No, it
wasn't." He paused. "Know something? This is my favorite
place on the spread. When I was a boy I used to swim and fish here. Did you
have a special place back where you came from?" His voice was husky, and he
placed his sound arm firmly around her waist.

    
Thrill and terror shot through Sarah.
"Not really," she replied breathlessly.

    
"Then I'd be honored to share this
piece of heaven with you." It came out sounding more like a promise than
an offer. He lazily stroked her back and trailed his fingertips up along the
side of her neck.

    
Sarah stiffened, her pulse pounded, and
her heart jolted wildly. His touch stoked an unwilling fire within her,
awakening primitive needs she didn't fully know she had. Her traitorous hand reached
out and touched the side of his face, and her eyes fixed longingly on his lips.

     
Cal surrendered his control. Swiftly
he brought his mouth down on top of hers in an urgent slanting motion that
knocked his hat off his head. His kiss flowed from gentle-sweet to hard-need,
and Sarah shuddered with desire. After a few brief seconds he pulled back.

    
"Open your mouth sweetheart."

    
She opened her mouth to ask why, but
before a sound could escape Cal pressed his strong mouth against hers again,
and this time he drew her tongue into lush sweetness and suckled, possessively
branding her with his heat.
 

    
Sarah arched toward him and responded in
kind, circling his lower lip with her tongue. His taste and warmth fed an ache
low in her belly. A moaning sound in the back of her throat drew a groan from
deep within him, and he pulled her tightly against his chest to savor soft
breasts edged with hard nipples. Her breathing was ragged, a sweet agony that
beat in rhythm to the throbbing newborn need asserting itself in the core of
her body.
 

    
Suddenly Sarah pulled away; her deep
breaths inhaled his intoxicating masculine scent. Exciting and frightening new
feelings were buffeting her, like a gale wildly spinning the windmill back home
at the farm. It was scary and amazing and exciting and forbidden, all at the
same time.

    
"I-I can't," she gasped. Sarah
was busy trying to control the breathing problem, nearly panting, and her palms
were sweating profusely. She hastily tried to wipe them across her thighs.

    
Cal responded with a deeper kiss. His
desperate caressing words swept across her lips.
 
"I want you Sarah. I've wanted you ever since I saw you
on that white pony. You taste so sweet."

    
Her heart soared and she felt wonderfully
dizzy.
Oh Lord.
This man smelled
wonderful and his kisses were magic. Cal worshipped at her neck; he nibbled at
the hollow of her throat, sending jolts of ecstasy through intimate places in
her body. He took her hands and urged them under his shirt to touch bare chest,
as he moved his hand over the curve of her breasts, and brushed her nipples
gently, feeling them delightfully tighten beneath the fabric of her camisole.
Sarah moaned deep in her throat, and she ran her hands across his hard stomach,
delighting in the rock-hard lean mass of muscles that rippled under her
fingertips. Cal, who was only too aware of her silent longing and shaking with
his own need, lowered Sarah to the ground with his good arm and pressed his
body against hers, so that Sarah felt his arousal cradled against her hip. Then
he groaned painfully, abruptly pulled himself away and sat up.

    
"Sarah, I promised myself I wouldn't
do this." His breathing was labored, and his voice sounded painful. He silently cursed his lack of control.
Capturing a fine woman must be done slowly, steadily, and patiently. He never
intended for things to go this far, at least not this day. The last thing he
wanted was for Sarah to think that he had decided to slake his lust on her,
carelessly seducing, and simply taking what Roy had purchased just days ago at
Lola's.
 
After all, she
was
on the white. She was an innocent -- she'd told him
as much.

    
Sarah looked into his darkened eyes and
blushed. Her hands flew to her cheeks. She was still gasping for air, chest
heaving, her body still craving the physical intimacy. She jerked up from her
prone position, hung her head, and tears fell.

    
"I'm sorry." She whimpered. With
trembling hands she buttoned her shirt. "I don't do this sort of thing. I
don't know what got into me, honestly I –"

    
"No! Sarah, it was my fault. I wanted
you." His hands were also shaking, his face was still hot with yearning,
and his dark eyes yet reflected his urgent need.
 
His voice was wrenching, a sound akin to a bent wheel
scraping against the side of a wagon.
 

    
He reached around behind her and deftly
plucked up his hat. Then he yanked it onto his head, hastily excused himself,
and walked down the creek bank to the water, where he waited for the blasted
burning to subside. After he collected his thoughts he strolled back up the
slope, smiling gently at Sarah as if absolutely nothing had happened between
them.

    
Sarah suddenly felt angry and ashamed. And
she wondered. How many other girls had he taken to his "special
place?" Did he stop because he didn't feel real affection for her like she
felt for him? He'd said he wanted her, but Sarah knew that wanting and loving
were likely very two different things. Perhaps this was just another entertaining
tryst for an experienced man like Caleb Easton, one who couldn't possibly
consider her, the orphaned country girl in oversized pants and ragged old
shirt, more than a pleasant morning diversion.

    
As they climbed up the creek bank, she
keenly felt both disappointment and guilt. For him she could never be more than
one of "Lola's gals".

    
Cal led the horses from where they were
happily grazing on grass, oblivious to the emotional storms raging inside their
riders. Cal executed his one-armed mount, and Sarah peered from beneath veiled
lashes to see the muscles tighten across his chest and shoulders.

   
Stony silence hung between them on the ride back toward the ranch house.
Cal's expression betrayed nothing of what he was thinking, and Sarah took an
unusual interest in each wildflower growing along their path. Her mind was
flooded with new feelings; she knew it would take time to pick through this
experience. And she also worried. Would her brazen behavior get her fired from
her first real job? All the same, she couldn't stop thinking of the long hot
kisses and passionate invitation that lit Cal's eyes and penetrated his voice.
She ran over the intimate details of their love play, and she laid them down to
a memory, to revisit and give comfort to her whenever she felt lonely in the
days and years ahead. She'd always be able to remember of how one man had
wanted her one morning near a creek.

    
They passed by a large grassy outcropping,
which jutted out halfway up a grassy slope, casting a long cool shadow over the
land. The sun had risen farther in the sky, and Sarah reined in on the gray
mare to slow to an amble in the shade, so as to tie on her bonnet.

    
Abruptly the mare's head came up. Nostrils
flared. The dreadful warning of impending danger came seconds too late. As she
was trying to coax her mount to the safety of a brush thicket near the rocks
Sarah heard a low, dull thud. At the same moment a sharp pain seared into the
left side of her back. Her mouth flew open in a startled, agonizing howl.
 

    
Quick as lightening Cal turned. His face
drawn, his dark eyes flashed with muted terror. In one smooth, violent motion
Cal jerked his left arm from the sling and grabbed for his six-shooter with his
right. He spurred his mount, quickly came up beside her. Sarah slumped forward
in her saddle, and Cal leaned to grab the reins from her, intent on leading
Sarah's horse to cover behind the steep rocky hill.

    
Just then they heard another dreadful
thud. This time it struck somewhere behind Sarah, hard, on her mount's
hindquarter.

    
The mare reared straight up. Cal never got
a firm grasp on the reins; the spooked mare jumped and bolted away, off the
trail, and she started a frantic race toward home.

   
When the horse had jolted Sarah found that she was helpless to control
the enraged animal. She could do nothing but cling blindly to the horse's neck.
Sarah's heart stuck in her throat, beating twice as fast as the horse's
pounding hooves as they blazed across the prairie.

    
"I'm with you!" Cal shouted, and
the voice reached her like a distant cry against a storm.

   
Terror ripped at Cal's gut. Panicked horses could run through fences and
careen into buildings. Cal had once seen a man killed instantly when drawn
under a horse's hooves during a runaway. He kicked his horse harder to keep up
with the charging mare. If he could get alongside he'd have a chance at pulling
her to safety.
 
He cursed
. If
only I had two strong arms!

    
What the hell?
Cal watched a bloodstain growing across the back of
Sarah's shirt. She valiantly clung to the mare's mane, keeping her body low,
one with the animal.

    
Cal had never abused an animal before. But
now he recklessly spurred and cursed, and his heaving horse struggled to keep
pace. As he began to close the gap with the grey mare, he wished he'd chosen
his fastest stallion that morning, not this reserve gelding. Of course he'd
planned on a pleasant courting ride -- not a trip to purgatory.

   
 
The barn and corral came
into sight, but Sarah's horse continued the wild run, showing no signs of
relenting. Cal raced behind, choking on the dust cloud being kicked up.
 

    
As luck would have it, Ned and Bailey, the
ranch foreman, were standing near the corral and saw them coming. Billy, the
youngest hand and wrangler -- too old for milk and too young for whiskey -- sat
frozen to the top rail of the fence.

    
Ned and Bailey gathered their wits and
jumped into action. Bailey had a rope and Ned ran for another, and they shouted
for more help. Fourteen-year-old Billy sprang from the fence, and as no horses
were saddled, he mounted the closest, bareback.
 

    
Inch by inch Cal fought to close the gap
between their horses. At last he drew up alongside Sarah, in a flurry of
pounding and heaving. At just the right moment, he rose and stood in his
stirrups, coaxing his horse to close in from her left side.
 

    
Suddenly he straightened and surged
forward, using his long body to greatest advantage. He drove his legs
powerfully into the stirrups, and his steel arm grabbed her around the waist.
The surprise made her loosen her grip on the mare's mane.

   
"Let go!" he yelled above the din.

    
Cal pulled Sarah to the safety of his lap,
where she instinctively twisted and wrapped her arms tightly around his waist.
She sowed her sobs, shamelessly, into his broad chest.

    
Blood ran down her sleeve and covered her
hand. Cal slowed his horse and he cradled Sarah against him. She pressed her
face deep into his neck where hot tears of relief mingled with his cold sweat.