Caribou Crossing (12 page)

He pulled her into his arms, her face resting against his shoulder. Dampness soaked through his shirt. He clutched her tighter, rested his chin on top of her head, and now tears slid freely down his cheeks. “It's our fault, both of ours,” he choked out. “And we can't go back and fix it.”

“We can't. It breaks my heart.”

“Mine, too.” And yet, talking about it, sharing the guilt, holding Miriam . . . He actually felt a little better. He hoped she did, too.

Taking her shoulders, he eased her gently away from him until she gazed up into his face. “We can't go back, but we can move forward.”

She sniffed back tears. “We have to.” Then she slipped free, found a tissue in her skirt pocket, and blew her nose. “As partners,” she said firmly.

With rough fingers, he brushed the tears off his cheeks. “As partners.”

“We said those vows, for better or worse. We weren't thinking about the worse, but no marriage is all silver platters. We're in this together. If one of us has a problem, then it's the other person's problem, too, and we need to work together to solve it.”

When she put it that way, it seemed so obvious. “Yeah, I guess that's what marriage is all about.”

Then he took a deep breath, gripped both her hands again, and took the plunge. “You were right. Home isn't a place. Home is us. You, me, and Jessie. If we have to give up Bly Ranch, if it's going to hurt our family to keep it, then we have to let it go.” Though the words sent stabs of pain through his heart, he meant them.

She studied his face for a long time, and he hoped she saw the truth. Then she gazed over at the fireplace. “Remember our Christmas tree?”

“Yes.” And what did that have to do with anything?

She turned back to him. “Wade, I love it here. I've loved the ranch since the first day I saw it. I never grasped what was involved in owning it, and I still don't know all of it. But I think it could be worth all the challenges and all the work. Let's not give up. We'll do what the bank manager said. We'll talk to everyone who might possibly help us, we'll put together a plan, and we'll do our very best to hang on to this place.”

It would mean humbling himself in front of his parents, Miriam's, the neighboring ranchers. Caribou Crossing was a small town. Everyone would know. But then folks probably already knew he was out of his depth and were just waiting for him to admit it and ask for help.

Maybe they could hang on to the ranch. Build their home here, in the place all three of them loved so much. And in the struggle to do that, he'd have Miriam beside him every step of the way.

He squeezed her hands. “That sounds mighty good to me.”

Relief and hope filled him, followed by a surge of love so powerful that had he been standing it would have brought him to his knees. He leaned over, cupped her beloved face between his big, calloused hands, and touched his lips to hers.

She returned his kiss eagerly.

Miriam was back, fully present. His warm, giving, sensual, sexy wife. Her lips and tongue told him that.

When they broke the kiss, he said, “Tomorrow, we'll get to work. A new day, a fresh start. Tonight, I want to make love with my wife.”

He prayed she'd say yes.

Miriam felt a little like Dorothy in
The Wizard of Oz
. She'd survived a tornado of experiences and emotions and emerged safely back home, where she'd started. And yet “home” was a different place and she was seeing it through new and very grateful eyes.

She touched Wade's cheek. “Then take me to bed, husband.” There was nothing on earth she wanted more than to be naked in his arms.

He rose to adjust the fireplace damper and close the glass door, then came back and held out his hand to her.

She grasped it and he pulled her to her feet. Arms around each other, they headed up the stairs. As they walked, he tugged her T-shirt free from her skirt on one side. His warm, calloused fingers teased the skin at her waist. For so long, her body had just been an object, a thing she had to tend. Now, it awakened and she felt feminine, sensual. Something tingled through her, the stirrings of arousal.

Wade locked the bedroom door and turned on the lamp.

Suddenly, nervousness overcame arousal. She'd lost weight, and she was scarred. Before, Wade had said he loved her stretch marks and the scar from her C-section, but the new scars were ugly symbols of her barrenness. “Turn off the light,” she said, her voice high and strained.

He studied her, then said quietly, “My wife's back and I'm not letting her out of my sight.”

“I look different.” She
was
different. Barren. Empty. What would it feel like for her, for him, to make love now?

He smiled, his deep brown eyes warm with love, and smoothed his hand over her hair. “You're beautiful, Miriam. You were beautiful on our wedding day, and you're beautiful in that T-shirt and the skirt that shows off your pretty legs. When you're old and gray, you'll still be the most beautiful woman in the world.”

Then he touched his lips to hers, and made her believe him.

In that moment, her nervousness fled. This was Wade. When the kiss ended, she said, “And you'll still be my handsome love, the only man I could ever imagine being with.”

They'd shared a bedroom and bathroom all these months, but she saw him with new eyes as she reached up to undo his shirt buttons and peel the edges back to reveal his firmly muscled chest. She shoved the shirt off his shoulders and with wondering hands explored his powerful shoulders, firm pecs, sensitive nipples. He was thinner, yes, but still so handsome.

She touched her tongue to his nipple, licked.

His body jolted in reaction.

It had been months since she'd even thought of sex, but now warm tingles raced through her blood.

Wade eased her away from his body so he could pull her tee over her head. Then he took off her bra and gathered her close until her breasts pressed against his chest. He groaned. “God, I've missed you, Miriam.”

He was erect already beneath the fly of his jeans. Feeling his rigid length press against her sent more quivers of heat racing through her.

Emotionally and physically, she was suddenly hungry, desperately hungry, for this man. She unfastened his belt buckle, then went for the button at the waist of his jeans. Eagerly, she yanked down the zipper, pulled down his boxers, and clasped his length like a prize, a treasure. The treasure that would restore her sense of womanhood.

“I want you inside me,” she whispered.

He jerked and thrust in her hand. “Jesus, Miriam. I want to go slow, to make this good for you.”

“It'll be good.” She was already aching and damp between her legs, her body crying out its need. “I need you, Wade. I need
us
.”

“Oh, honey. I need that, too. But you have to stop touching me or I'll explode.”

Reluctantly, she let go as he fumbled for the fastenings of her skirt. Then denim slid down her hips, hit the floor. Wade's hands thrust into the sides of her panties and yanked them down, and now she was naked in front of him.

Quickly, he peeled his jeans and underwear off, then tossed back the duvet.

Before the duvet settled, she was scrambling onto the bed, holding up her arms in welcome.

The last time they'd made love—No! She wouldn't think back; she'd live in this moment. “Now, Wade,” she urged as he eased down on top of her. “Take me now. Hard and fast. So nothing else exists but you and me, together.”

He groaned, then kissed her, fusing their mouths together as his tongue thrust demandingly inside hers.

She spread her legs, he slipped a hand between them, tested her dampness, opened her folds, and then—“Oh God, yes!” she cried against his mouth as he plunged into her, heated steel driving into her body. And she took him greedily, her hips lifting and tilting to urge him even deeper.

Her hand thrust into his hair, gripped the back of his head, held him tight. Her other hand stroked frantically down his back, grasped his backside, dug her nails in. “Faster,” she gasped. “Harder.” She wanted this, only this, just the two of them. Man and woman, raw and primitive.

They weren't kissing now, just breathing hard against each other's mouths, him in raw pants, her in needy whimpers.

Her hips twisted, ground against him. It had been so long since she'd last been aroused that now the building tension was so fierce it almost hurt.

Wade reached between them, not gently the way he usually did, but she didn't care. The rough press of his thumb against her clit almost made her scream with pleasure. “Yes, yes, more.”

Under her hand, his butt muscles clenched and his body drew back for a moment; then with a wrenching groan he plunged into her again and again as he climaxed. Pressure on her clit, pressure on her channel, pulsing jets of come exploding inside her—and everything came together and shattered and she buried her cry against his neck as she came in shuddering waves of ecstasy.

It took a while for the world to come back into focus. She gazed up to see Wade's chocolate eyes.

“Are you okay?” he asked softly. “That was, uh . . .”

“Exactly what I needed. I love you, Wade.”

“I love you, too.” He kissed her tenderly, then sat back on his heels beside her on the bed. “That wasn't exactly how I'd planned for that to go.”

She studied her gorgeous husband. “No? Well, I believe in second chances. So if you'd like to try again . . .” She grinned at him.

He grinned back. “There's that dimple of yours. I haven't seen it in a long time.”

“There are other parts of me you haven't seen in a long time.” She stretched seductively, feeling the return of her feminine power and confidence.

“You're not too sore?”

“Not if you take it easy.”

“Slow and easy this time. That's a promise, honey.”

He eased down and, starting with her lips, began to fulfill that promise. It was like he was determined to kiss every inch of her body. She felt cherished and sexy, melty and aroused, absolutely blissful.

When he reached her tummy, Wade paused. Then, deliberately, he kissed her scars. The ones from when she'd had Jessica, and the ones from the lost baby. She was no longer embarrassed about them, and she liked that he didn't pretend they weren't there. They were part of her. Part of her and Wade, too. Of their grief, their guilt, emotions they now shared.

He dropped his face against her skin and she felt new moisture—from tears, not from his exploring tongue.

She clasped his head to her soft flesh and tears seeped from her eyes, too.

They stayed like that for a long moment, and then he began to kiss her again. Each touch of his lips was a healing one, a step toward their new life together.

 

“Jessica,” Miriam chastised teasingly, “stop nibbling that popcorn. It's for the popcorn chains.”

“We already have enough chains,” the girl said, undaunted.

“I don't know how you can have any room left in your tummy, Jessie-girl.” Wade paused in stringing lights. “Not after that delicious meal your mom cooked.”

Miriam smiled from her perch on a two-step ladder, where she was hanging chains of popcorn and bright red cranberries on the full branches of the fir Wade had cut down. Her husband was such a sucker for her lasagna, not to mention the pumpkin pie she'd made for dessert. It felt so wonderful to be full of energy again.

And joy. This afternoon, she and Wade had knocked off work early and gone riding with Jessica. Crisp air, dazzling sunshine on clean white snow, the jingle of harness and puff of the horses' breath—simple pleasures, but oh how lovely it was to enjoy them again.

Now she said, “That was a beautiful ride this afternoon.”

Her daughter gazed up from hanging her handmade ornaments on the tree. “It's nice to have you come riding again, Mommy.”

“Yes, it is,” Wade said.

“I'm so glad we're keeping the ranch,” Jessica said.

“We're all glad,” Miriam said. It was going to be tough, but they had a viable plan in place, thanks to their parents, neighbors, and friends. She and Wade were determined to make it work—and to keep talking, rather than nurse secrets and worry about things in private. As part of that plan, they had let Jessica, and by extension her friend Evan, know that the budget was tight and everyone had to pull his or her weight. That was true of their new addition, too: the Border Collie pup sleeping in a basket by the fire. The dog, named Dandy-girl by Jessica, would more than earn her keep as a working cattle dog.

Riding their own acreage this afternoon, seeing the gentle sweep of the land under its snowy blanket and listening to the chitter of birds in the evergreens, Miriam had felt a new sense of wonder. She'd always loved the ranch, but now she was coming to understand it in all its complexity. The demands it made and the rewards it offered to those who loved and tended it.

Wade touched her jean-clad leg in a soft caress. “Let me finish that up. You hang those ornaments Evan gave us last year. I don't dare touch them.”

She climbed down and he caught her by the waist for a hug and a surreptitious pat on her backside. With careful fingers, she picked up one of Evan's paper lace snowflakes.

“I'm glad Ev's coming for Christmas dinner again,” Jessica said.

“So am I,” Wade said. “He's a good kid. Just wish the boy liked cattle.” He shot Miriam a sly look, and she winked at him. They'd already speculated whether as the children grew up friendship might turn into something more. There was nothing Wade would like better than for Jessica to marry a man who wanted to be part of Bly Ranch. Right now, Evan Kincaid seemed determined to leave Caribou Crossing and head for New York City, but the boy was young. Things changed, as he and Miriam well knew.

Chatting lazily about this and that, the three of them finished putting the decorations on the tree. “Now,” Wade said, “we get our reward.” He flipped a switch and the sparkly tree lights came on.

“Ooh, it's so pretty!” Jessica said.

“It's lovely,” Miriam agreed as she took a few pictures. “We did good, family.”

Wade came to stand behind her, wrapping his arms around her. “We did very good.”

She crossed her arms over his and leaned against his warm, muscular body. She'd always found him so strong, so capable, and so sexy. In the past couple of months, she'd learned a lot more about him: sensitivities, vulnerabilities, compassion, creativity, humor. A thought struck her, one she would share with her husband when they were alone.

Jessica came over to lean against her side, and she and Wade tucked her into their small circle as they all gazed at the tree.

Then their daughter broke free again. “Stockings! We have to hang the stockings. And put out the milk and cookies.” She ran toward the kitchen, then paused to look back. “Santa knows we're here to stay, right?”

Wade hugged Miriam closer. “I made very sure he knows that.”

They all made quick work of getting the stockings hung, and then Miriam and Wade tucked Jessica in. Their daughter figured that the sooner she went to sleep, the sooner she'd wake up to Christmas, and they were happy to encourage that belief.

Once they were back downstairs, they let the puppy out to do her business, then got her settled in the kitchen, filled the stockings, and tucked wrapped gifts under the tree. Miriam put on the Willie Nelson Christmas tape and turned off the lamp, so that only the fireplace and tree lights illuminated the room. Wade poured them both glasses of eggnog and added a hefty splash of brandy. Shunning the couch, they settled on the rug in front of the fire.

Miriam tasted the eggnog, and it took her back to the previous Christmas, at her parents' house. She touched her tummy and said, “Last year, I didn't drink Mom's eggnog because of the baby.” She glanced at the red stockings hanging on the mantel. “There were supposed to be four stockings.”

He rested his hand, that strong, calloused, yet gentle hand, on top of hers. “I know, honey. I miss him so much.”

“Me, too.”

They were silent a moment, and then he said, “The year sure didn't turn out the way we thought it would.”

“No. But we've come out stronger, sweetheart.”

He linked fingers with her. “Very true. You and me, Miriam. Now and forever.”

She smiled, remembering how he'd said those words to her when they danced at their wedding. They meant even more now. Their bond had been tested by fire.

Though they were both working hard, somehow it didn't seem like a burden now that they had a plan and clear goals. Dealing with the animals and owners at the vet clinic actually invigorated her, as did having regular lunches with her girlfriends. She'd finally mastered QuickBooks, and whipping the ranch's books into shape gave her a huge sense of accomplishment.

Her grief and depression hadn't entirely gone, but she'd found a support group and Wade attended now and then, too. But what helped her most of all was a sense of true partnership and intimacy with her husband. They could talk finances, help Jessica with her foal, and chuckle over Evan's latest word of the day. They could play with the puppy, share worries, shed a tear for their lost baby, and turn to each other in bed.

Earlier, when they'd been admiring the tree, she'd thought of something she wanted to tell him once they were alone. “Remember our wedding night?”

He winked. “Very well.”

She chuckled. “Not that part. Though I'm glad you do remember that part. But when we were dancing in the town square, we were talking about how we'd love each other over the years. Then, I didn't think I could possibly love you any more than I did at that moment.”

He tilted his head, his beautiful eyes glowing in the firelight. “And now?”

“I know you on a deeper level. There's so much more to you than I ever realized.”

“Some not so great stuff,” he said wryly.

“You're human, just like I am. And you're an amazing person. You're my lover, my partner, my love. My past, present, and future. I love you so very much. And you still make my heart skip. You always will.”

“Aw hell, Miriam,” he said roughly. “Keep that up and you're going to make this tough old rancher cry.”

That wasn't what she wanted, only to let him know how deeply she cared. So she teased, “Can't have that. Let's move on to later on our wedding night, when we were in the bridal suite at the inn.”

“I remember. . . .” His eyes danced. “Let's see. I was with the most beautiful, sexiest woman in the world.” He leaned over to reach under the tree, and pulled out a small package. “Speaking of which, here's your first Christmas present.”

She studied those dancing eyes and grinned. “I take it this isn't for Jessica's eyes?”

“Uh-uh.”

Eagerly, Miriam tore off the paper. Like last year, it was a box from the classy lingerie store in town. But when she opened it, it wasn't another negligee. She held up an abbreviated black lace bra and matching thong. “Wow.” Amazing that after all she'd put him through this past year, he still thought she was a sexy babe.

“There's a note,” he pointed out.

She unfolded the gift card to read his messy scrawl:
Once a month, wear these under your regular clothes—and tell me you've done it. All my love, Wade.

She grinned. “Why Wade Bly, you kinky man, you. What do I get if I do?” Then she had an idea. “No, wait, don't tell me.”

She grabbed the box and hurried to the downstairs half bath.

Less than five minutes later, she emerged, knowing she looked just the same as when she'd gone in, except for the flush on her cheeks. “I'm wearing them.” She pirouetted in her jeans and flannel shirt.

He sat up, all attention. “Do they fit?”

“See for yourself.” She raised the hem of the shirt and gave him a flash of lace-clad breasts.

“Oh, man, Santa's come early this year. Come here, wife.”

As she went to her husband, she remembered something else from their wedding night. The song her father had chosen for them: “We've Only Just Begun.”

It had never been more true.