Caine's Reckoning (18 page)

“Guess it doesn’t.” That seemed to be the answer Tia was looking for.

“I will get the salve.” She waved one elegant hand toward Desi. “You make your apologies to your wife.”

Caine straightened his hat as Tia marched from the room, the heels of her shoes rapping out a staccato rhythm gradually fading away. He pushed the brim back as he gently set Desi’s foot against his thigh. Instead of the anger she expected to see in his eyes, she saw laughter. He picked up her other foot.

“If I make my apologies, you planning on accepting them?”

Her ankle looked ridiculously fragile in his large hands. As out of place as she felt. “If I don’t, will you get in trouble?”

“Uh-huh.” He traced the sole of her foot, his finger lifting and dipping in abstract patterns. “This one’s not so bad.” He looked up and caught her studying him. “What?”

“Why aren’t you mad?”

“At Tia?”

“Yes.”

He shrugged. “It’s hard to be mad at Tia. Especially when she’s right.”

“It wasn’t your fault. You couldn’t know I would run.”

“Sweetheart, an idiot could see you were intent on running.” He shrugged. “I just misjudged the when.”

Tia was coming back with the same speed with which she’d left. Caine arched a brow at her. “So, you going to watch Tia whale on me some more or accept my apology?”

As if on cue, Tia called. “Did you apologize,
m’hijo?
”

“Yes.”

Tia came around the back of the chair with an arch of her brow that reminded Desi so much of Caine, even though she knew they weren’t related by blood. “And did she accept?”

Caine’s smile didn’t flicker. “I’m waiting to find out.”

Tia glanced between Caine and Desi. “If you are waiting, you did not do it right.”

“Guess I’ll have to polish up my shine.”

“Until you do, there will be no food for you at my table.”

“Hell, Desi, make up your mind quick.”

Desi ignored Caine and focused on Tia. The woman apparently had a lot of power here. “You’d make him miss supper?”

Tia shrugged. “It will not be the first time. Your husband can be stubborn sometimes.”

She eyed the brim of Caine’s hat. It was covered with dust and would need a brushing off. As his wife, that was probably one of her new duties. “So I’ve discovered.”

The corner of Caine’s mouth twitched. Desi looked at the other woman, then at Caine. “Will she really ban you from the table?”

He shrugged and put her foot down. “Tia is one tough cookie.”

For a minute Desi was tempted. It would feel so good to make someone suffer, and Caine had done more than his share to aggravate her. Then she remembered the chocolate. And the way he’d kept her warm. But mostly she remembered that pride in his voice.
Wife.

“He’s pulling your leg,” she told Tia. “I accepted his apology.”

Tia snorted. “Already she lies for you.” She handed Caine a glass jar.

“But it counts,” he pointed out smoothly.

Tia shook her head. This time when she cuffed his head, it was much gentler. “At least you had the sense to marry up with a woman with a soft heart.”

Over his head Tia’s gaze met Desi’s. “But it is not good you keep your heart too soft. He is the type to take advantage.”

She’d already figured that out. “I’ll keep it in mind.”

“This, you do.”

It was hot in the coat in the warm kitchen. Desi blew her hair off her forehead.

Tia gave her one assessing look and then turned back to Caine. “Bath first and then bandages.”

“I was thinking the same thing.”

Tia waved at her clothes. “She cannot bathe fully dressed.”

“I’m working on that.”

“The water is not getting any hotter.”

This time there was no mistaking the twitch of Caine’s lips for anything other than amusement.

“Understood.”

Desi grabbed the edge of the coat. “I’m not getting undressed with you here.”

Caine shrugged as if apologizing to Tia. “She’s shy.”

“Then I will leave.”

“No.” Tia was not the one Desi wanted to leave.

As if she didn’t hear, Tia checked the pot on the stove. “The stew still needs to cook down so there is no hurry.” She pulled a jar out of her pocket and handed it to Desi. “This should help with your snarls. Much better than scissors. Brush it through before you rinse it out.”

She curled her fingers around the jar. It was surprisingly heavy. “Thank you.”

Tia nodded and patted her shoulder. “You are Hell’s Eight now. There are no more worries for you. We take care of our own.”

Desi had to dig her fingers into the base of the chair to keep herself from kicking Caine out of her way and plunging into that tub. She hadn’t had a real soak-in-a-tub bath in more than a year, and she wasn’t letting this opportunity pass her by. A light touch on her calf brought her gaze down. Caine was looking at her again, the stupid brim of that hat blocking the expression in his eyes.

“Anyone tell you you think too much?”

“No.”

“It’s a bad habit.”

He carefully placed her foot down. With the same care he reached for the coat sleeves, slow and easy, as if he were approaching a wild animal. And maybe he was right to treat her that way, because inside she felt anything but stable. She’d been bouncing between fight and surrender for so long, she wasn’t sure she knew what to do with anything in between.

Accepting the slightest consideration apparently threw her into a panic. Like now. She knew Caine was helping her out of her coat because she couldn’t take a bath with it on, and because she was beginning to sweat in the warm kitchen, but inside, every muscle, every nerve ending coiled into a taut expectancy of pain. And all he did was slide the coat off her shoulders and toss it over a chair.

She caught his hand as he reached for the buttons at the collar of her dress. “I can do this myself.”

“But that wouldn’t be as much fun.”

Stupidity had her asking, “For who?”

That definitely was another grin. “For me.”

She wrapped both her hands around his. “Please, let me do it.”

He paused. His head cocked to the side as if he were considering it. His fingers touched her cheek. “I’ve had it in my head for years how this night would go.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “Women dream about the wedding day. Men plan the night.”

“But you don’t love me, and this isn’t our wedding night.”

“I’m not counting the night on the trail, and you’re still my wife. While, sure enough, parts of tonight aren’t going to be what I imagined, this part can be.”

Despite her tugging, his fingers were back to working on those buttons. She really didn’t want to know, but that same stupid part of her that had her asking who now had her asking, “What part?”

Four buttons surrendered in rapid succession. “Readying you.”

The blush shot up from her toes in a torrid heat. She glanced at the windows. As dark as it was getting outside and with the lamps lit inside, the slightest crack in the curtains would allow people outside to look in. “That wouldn’t be anything like ‘learning me,’ would it?”

His glance followed hers. He took her hands and held them against the open placket. “Keep my place.”

He got to his feet in that smooth way that always focused her attention. There was something in the way he moved that drew the eye, started speculation. Was he that coordinated in everything he did? He crossed the room, the muscles flexed beneath the pliable cotton of his pants, smoothing the soft material, emphasizing the power that was so much a part of him. As he reached the window to close the first shutter, that power was thrown into sharp relief. The stretch of his arms emphasized the breadth of those wide shoulders, delineated the expanse of his back beneath the simple blue cotton of his shirt, highlighted the narrowness of his hips and the long lean length of his legs.

Caine, she realized, was a man who would stop any woman in her tracks. And he was her husband. That was going to take some getting used to. One by one, the shutters closed. Each time that quiet click of the latch fell into place, she started. And each time the hint of fear died, her confusion grew, because she should be terrified.

Like the first Comancheros who’d captured her, there was a wildness about Caine. A primitive I-take-what-I-want attitude that made it ludicrous to think of him as her safe haven. Yet she did, deep down where instinct ruled. However, even if equating Caine with safety provided a false sense of security, it was all she had, and she wanted to cling to it. To him.

The feeling was irrational and could be suicidal when he turned on her, which he would—he wouldn’t have any choice if he wanted to keep his pride. And to a man, pride was everything. But still, when she watched him, a sense of peace flowed over her. She wrapped her fingers in the front of her dress. She might just be losing her mind.

Caine turned, studying her as always. His gaze dropped to her hand and then back to her face. “What are you thinking, Gypsy girl, that has those pretty eyes so big?”

“That I don’t know what to think.”

He came toward her with his slow, even stride. “Then maybe you should just stop thinking.”

“I’m not good at that.”

Caine just bet she wasn’t. The woman was clever and inventive. She was also worn to a nub, physically and mentally. And as determined as she was to make herself into an island, he’d never seen a woman more in need of someone to lean on. If only until she got back on her feet. On the next step he could see the pulse pounding in her throat. Fast. Frantic.

Guilt for what he was going to demand from her stabbed through him until he thought on it. Most brides came to their wedding nights unknowing of what was going to happen. Their nerves tight with imagining and embarrassment. Desi was no different. She just had different fears, but the result, for him, was the same. He had to calm her, gentle her. Ease her into the reality of their life together. He slid his fingers under hers, pressing until she relinquished the lapel. He aligned his palm around hers. “Well, in that case, maybe you should just follow my lead.”

“And maybe I shouldn’t do anything until I can think clearly.”

He’d have been disappointed if she’d just gone along with the suggestion, he realized. He liked that spirit in her. Hooking his pinkie around her forefinger, he pulled, stepping back as he did, drawing her hand away from her dress. The front fell open, revealing the plain white linen of her camisole. He’d never been more aroused by the sight of anything in his life. His cock throbbed with a wild ache as he said, “Now, Gypsy, where would the fun be in that?”

The thin cotton fluttered as she took a shuddering breath. “Not much, I’m hoping.”

Her sass tickled him deep inside where he’d long thought he’d lost sensation. He chucked her under the chin with his thumb. “Now right there is the weak spot in your thinking. A man and wife should have lots of fun together.”

Those big blue eyes narrowed. “My mother spent years educating me on what to expect as a wife. She never mentioned a word about fun.”

Caine brought that small hand to his mouth, brushing his lips across the faintly grubby back. “Well, now that we know where the hole in your thinking got started, we can patch it up.”

“The only one who thinks it’s a problem is you.”

“Lucky for you, you have a knowledgeable husband to spare you from a future of yawning boredom.”

He placed her palm on his shoulder, skimming the back of his fingers over her wrist, down the feminine roundness until he reached the softness of her upper arm. If he did a shift over to the left, he could be holding her breast. His palm burned with the urge. It would be so easy. He took a breath. Under the scent of horse, wool and feminine sweat came the sweet scent of Desi herself.

The urge to touch her grew stronger. He suppressed it. In the end, he’d have her breast and her pleasure, but getting there was going to be a longer trip than he was used to. Good thing he was a patient man.

“Your bath is getting cold.”

Her breath sucked in slow and steady, as if she intended to balance her nerves with the perfection of the measure. When she answered, her tone was just as even, just as careful. “If you’d leave I could get on with it.”

“You can’t walk.”

“It’s only a little ways.”

“There’s no need to suffer at all. Not when I’m here.”

“But that’s the whole point. I don’t want you here.”

“Tough.”

“You are an incredibly stubborn man.”

He dodged the swat of her free hand and unbuttoned the last few buttons over her abdomen. “You just catching on to that?” “No.”

He spread the wool front until it slid off her shoulders. “Didn’t think you were short on brains.”

The compliment seemed to fly over her head. She grabbed at the front of her dress. He caught her hand and put it with the other, on his shoulders. On a “Grab hold, sweetheart” he swung her up. The squeal she made sparked his smile as she lurched for his neck. He winced as her jagged nails scratched his nape. Turning, he sat down on the chair by the tub with her on his lap.