Rocky Mountain Haven

Chapter Fifteen

The dishwater swirled down the drain. The constant yattering of the boys as they dried the dishes and wiped the table felt comfortable, and Daniel spotted the silly grin he wore in the hall mirror as he scooped up the littlest one and tickled him en route to the living room.

“Okay, partners, your mama will be home in a couple hours, so let’s make sure we’ve got everything shipshape. Lance, you got the list?”

“We’ve done it all.” He held out the paper and pointed. “Homework, supper, dishes, chores.”

“Everything?”

Lance nodded. Robbie squirmed out of his arms and climbed on the couch, bouncing up and down excitedly. “We get to play more games.”

Chaos ensued. Beth was due back from her teachers’ development field trip by nine. Daniel had been honoured when she asked him if he wanted to step in and take the boys for the day. Her placing that kind of trust in him was humbling and made him feel very hopeful about the future. Yet after a full day with all three tykes, he was ready to admit he was exhausted. “Where do you kids get your energy from?”

They’d played hide and seek outdoors in the snow and the trees. Nathan discovered one of the cats had a new batch of kittens, the family hidden in the far recesses of the barn. Throughout the day, while helping the boys make forts in the bales of the loft and chasing the rest of the barn cats in circles, Daniel had flashbacks to his own childhood. Roaming the countryside with his brothers like a wild creature during the hours of freedom between chores.

Robbie leapt off the couch and tackled him. Then all three boys were on him, wrestling him down and tickling him as he laughed out loud at their antics.

The roughhousing calmed eventually, and Daniel guided them into playing a few final board games. He lit the fire and happily accepted the book Lance passed him. The kid’s dark eyes bored into him for a minute, like he was offering a challenge. Daniel glanced at the tome in his hands and chuckled to himself. Another test. Lance seemed to be all about the tests.

“Farmer Boy. Awesome story.”

Lance frowned. “Mom said we had to read it, but it’s a girl’s book.”

Daniel let his mouth hang open in an exaggerated fashion, playing it up for the kids. “You’re joking, right? Haven’t you read the rest of the Little House books? When we were all kids, my daddy sat us down every Friday evening for reading time, starting with that series.”

“Really?”

“Really. They ain’t books for just girls. Heck, the experiences that family had were tough and exciting. I know when I heard some of the things they lived through it always made me real grateful for all the comforts of home I got to enjoy. And thankful for treats like ice cream in the freezer instead of only once in a blue moon.”

Daniel settled on the couch and started reading at the bookmark. Robbie nestled against him, and Lance and Nathan plopped on the floor. Every time he glanced over, Lance’s thoughtful expression made him wonder what the hell was going on in the kid’s head.

Two hours later he finally had them tucked into bed, and a brand-new appreciation for why Beth was often tired when he called her. The phone rang, and he laughed as he spotted the number on the display.

“Evening, darling.”

“Hey, Daniel. We’re running late, and it’s going to be an hour still before I get home. Everything okay?”

He collapsed into the La-Z-Boy chair in front of the fire, kicking the foot extension out and relaxing back with a groan. “Everything’s great, but you are getting a massage the next time I see you. How the hell do you do this every day, woman?”

Her sexy voice lowered a notch. “Welcome to my world. Oh, and I’m totally accepting your offer, I need the massage so bad. My feet are killing me. I swear they made us walk every inch of the Tyrrell Museum. I’d sit through a million meetings before going on another ‘teachers’ field trip’.”

“Your leg sore?”

“Amazingly, not too bad. I think all the walks we’ve been taking have strengthened it.” Static cut in on the line and she spoke quickly. “I’ll see you at home as soon as I can.”

Home. Home with him where she belonged.

He rattled around the house for a bit, now too keyed up to stare into the fire and relax. The past couple of days they’d tried a few times to get together to talk, but it was like the kids had radar and woke up right when the discussion got deeper than sharing growing-up stories. There were certain things neither of them wanted to discuss in a public coffee shop or over the phone. Daniel sighed.

Tonight he intended to ask if Jaxi’s offer of babysitting was a possibility. See if Beth was willing to go on a retreat, just the two of them, for a couple of nights. Not only to get to make love without pulling strings, but to talk—really talk.

A creak on the stairs sounded with a low whimper hard on its heels. A little head poked around the corner, Nathan’s big eyes staring at him.

“Nathan? What’s up, bud?”

“I’m thirsty.”

Oh Lord. Daniel got him a glass of water and led the kid into the living room to sit in front of the fire. Of course, this probably meant he’d be up right around the time Beth got home, having to pee.

Kids.

Daniel sat back in the recliner. Moving slow and staying silent. Whenever he’d tried to stay up past his bedtime that was what his daddy had done. Made it seem peaceful and quiet. To a seven-year-old, boring.

Nathan perched on his heels and sipped slowly, his gaze darting around the room and returning again and again to Daniel. There was almost nothing left in the glass and still he milked it. Daniel scratched his face to hide his grin.

“You ready for me to tuck you in again?”

Nathan put the glass down on the coffee table and turned those big eyes on Daniel. “I’m scared to go to bed.”

Daniel frowned. Now what was going on? “Something wrong with your room? Did you know that’s the room my brother Blake used to sleep in? It’s a nice big space, and you’ve got Robbie in there to keep you company.”

“Not that.” The tyke surprised him to pieces by crawling into his lap and tugging on his shirt. “Bad dreams.”

Ahh. “Like there’s something…” Maybe giving the kid ideas wasn’t the best way to go about this. “What kind of dreams?”

“Of my daddy.”

Fuck. For all the time they’d spent together, it had shocked him how seldom the kids ever mentioned their father. Hell, at their age his daddy had been the center of his universe, and every waking minute he’d been home from school he’d tagged along, trying to keep up. Looking back he probably got in the way more than he helped, but Mike had never said a word.

“You miss him?”

Nathan stiffened in his lap. He swung his head up and glared at Daniel. “Can I ask you something?”

“Shoot.”

“You ever hit someone? Like punch them and hurt them?”

Daniel chuckled. “I’ve got five brothers. You tell me, you ever scuffle with Robbie or Lance?”

Nathan’s face folded into a frown. “Well, that’s different. They deserve it.”

“I expect they do, sometimes. I know my brothers certainly do.”

“You ever hit a girl?”

“Hell no. I don’t have any sisters, but I still can’t imagine hitting one.” The memory of Sierra planting the kiss on him in the bar crossed his mind. “They can be very annoying creatures at times, girls, but I’d never hit one.”

“What if a girl asks for it?”

Daniel frowned. What the hell kinda question was that from a seven-year-old? “You mean like teasing you? You still need to treat them nice, even if they call you names. Even if they poke you.” He leaned over and lowered his voice. “I know at times it just don’t seem fair, but if you can learn it now, it’ll make things a whole lot better when you get older.”

“Daddy said Mommy asked for it.”

His breath was sucked from his lungs as Nathan’s thin voice carried through the night air. Daniel held in the swear words wanting to escape. He’d wondered if her husband had abused her. He’s suspected that was part of the secret Beth had kept, and yet the absolute fury that rose in his belly was shocking.

Holy shit, now what could he say? “All I can tell you is what I’ve been taught. There ain’t nothing a girl can do that makes it right for you to hit her. That doesn’t mean you have to stand there and take it, your mama has strong opinions on letting anyone push you around, but hitting them back? No sir. That’s not what a gentleman does.”

Nathan snuggled in tighter to Daniel’s side and something twisted in his belly. The earthy scent of boy, familiar and yet strange, rose to his nose. He tentatively put an arm around the little tyke and gave him a squeeze.

“I didn’t like it when he hit Mommy.”

Another shot of pain streaked through Daniel. “Of course you didn’t.”

“I wanted to hit him.” Nathan’s voice was so soft and low, Daniel barely heard the words. Red-hot anger at the man he didn’t even know blazed out. If the bastard hadn’t already been dead, Daniel would have happily tracked him down and shot him.

Daniel rocked the boy, considering his words carefully. “Nathan, I ain’t going to tell you that you’re wrong. In wanting to defend your mama, you were completely right. Now I didn’t know your daddy, and I don’t know all that happened along the way, but I can tell you this. Taking care of our mamas and sisters, and women in general, is supposed to be important to every man.”

He lifted Nathan’s face to look directly into his tear-filled eyes. “That what you having bad dreams about? Your daddy hitting your mama?” Nathan’s chin quivered. “Shit.”

Nathan’s eyes grew wide. “You swore. Mama says we’re not supposed to swear.”

Daniel put his finger over his lips for a second. “You’re right, and I try not to, but there’s just some times it sneaks out. Like when I’m really mad.”

The kid snorted. “You’re not mad.”

“Oh yes, I am. Not at you, but for you.”

Nathan frowned. “But you’re not yelling or throwing things. You can’t be mad.”

Oh my Lord, give me the words. Daniel pressed his hand to Nathan’s head and drew him up against his chest.

“Trust me, I’m real mad.” How the hell was he supposed to explain to the kid that what he’d experienced should never have happened? “There’re a few kinds of anger in the world. There’s the throwing things kind of mad—that doesn’t really get much done except hurt the things you throw and the people you throw them at, does it?”

“Hurts them lots.” Nathan’s voice shook.

Sweet Jesus. The whole conversation made his mind and heart ache. What kind of bastard could do this to his own children? To his wife? “Then there’s the kind of mad that makes people want to make things better. That’s the kind of mad I am. I’m upset for you and your brothers. I’m angry for your mama’s sake, but yelling and throwing things would only make it worse.”

Nathan nodded rapidly.

There was no way he could continue this conversation tonight. “You just relax right here. I’ll keep the bad dreams away. Deal?”

Nathan sniffed and wiped at his nose, then cocooned in like one of the kittens under their mom out in the barn. It took a couple of minutes for his breathing to relax from the rasping little gasps it had become as he’d fought back tears.

The room quieted. The fire crackled softly, the chair squeaked on every rock. Above their heads the floorboards of the old house expanded and contracted. The snow slid off one section of the roof from the heat of the fire. Daniel leaned his head back and tried to sort out all the emotions racing through him.

Beth’s husband had abused her. Emotionally abused the kids too from what Nathan had let slip. They seemed to be dealing with it well, and his admiration for Beth increased astronomically.

She was strong, desirable, and damn if he was going to let her hide away from him anymore.

The time of waiting became like a time of prayer. He mentally listed all the things he was grateful for, all the things he wanted. And the longer he sat, with a child in his arms, waiting for his woman to return, the more he realized everything he still wanted was nearly within his grasp.

If Beth was ready to trust him with her heart.

The deck boards outside the door creaked a moment before Beth stepped inside. She came into the living room, sparkling snow crystals in her hair and her cheeks rosy from the cold. Daniel could have stared at her all night long.

“Hey, what’s up?” she whispered as she knelt beside the chair, one hand resting on his arm, the other reaching to brush the hair from Nathan’s face.

“He’s okay. I just didn’t want to take him upstairs in case we woke up Robbie and you weren’t home yet. He had a bad dream.”

“He has them occasionally.” She stared at her son for a moment, and written on her face was such sadness and loss he couldn’t take it anymore.

“Beth, we need to talk.”

She nodded slowly, her fingers fidgeting with the fabric of his sleeve. “Let’s tuck him in.”

They went upstairs together, and Daniel stepped back after carefully placing the now boneless Nathan on his bed. Standing in the doorway, he watched Beth tenderly pulled up the covers and kiss both Nathan and Robbie. Then she slipped past him to check on Lance, closing his curtains and turning off his MP3.

When she would have walked down the stairs, he grabbed her hand and tugged her toward her bedroom. “You must be tired. Come on, I’ll give you that massage I promised.”

Her breathing picked up as her gaze flickered to the closed doors of the boys.

Daniel lifted her chin in his hand. “Nothing will happen that you don’t want to, okay? I promise. If you want me to crawl out the window so you don’t get caught with me in your room, I’ll do it. I even know which trees I have to climb down to get away safely.”

That was enough to bring a smile back to her face, and she laughed softly and pulled him after her, turning the lock. “I’ve been teaching the boys they are supposed to knock before entering, but they weren’t learning very fast. So they’re used to me locking the door now.”

She pulled off her sweater and stretched her arms in the air. “I never want to go on another field trip in my life.”

“Not into dinosaurs?” Daniel sat on the chair in the corner of the room and watched, mesmerized, as Beth sat on the bed and stripped off her socks and wiggled out of her slacks.

They needed to get to the real issue, but she was tying his brain in knots.

He joined her on the bed, crawling behind her to massage her shoulders, her neck. Pressing his thumbs into the tight muscles until she began to relax under this touch.

“We’re not doing a lot of talking, are we?”

Daniel laughed. “Not really sure where to begin.”

Beth placed a hand on his where it rested on her shoulder. Then she glanced up at him. “Did Nathan tell you what his bad dream was about?”

He moved in front of her, kneeling at her feet. “He did. Kinda, like a seven-year-old tells any story.”

He wrapped his arms around her and hugged her tight to him, just needing to squeeze out some of the hurt and agony he saw in her eyes. Beth sniffed a couple of times and then swore.

“I promised myself I wasn’t going to do this anymore.”

“Do what?”

“Cry for the no-good bastard. Cry because of him. I want to move on and forget what he did to me and the boys, and yet he’s still there, haunting us.”

She tucked her tear-streaked face into the crook of his neck, and his heart broke. “You go ahead and cry. You love your sons, and until you know they are on the road to understanding what the real love of family means, you’re going to have moments you cry. Hell, my mama still cries over the stupid things her sons do to each other, and she cries when we get our feelings hurt, and we’re all grown up. You’re a good mama to your boys, Beth, and tears come with the territory.”

She leaned back and cupped his face in her hand. “Daniel, you are one in a million. That’s sweet of you, but there are things you don’t know. Like if I really loved my boys I should have left the man years ago, before he had a chance to make our life hell. I should have left the first time he hit me, but I was like every one of the women who think they’ll be the exception. That he really was sorry for what he’d done. That he really never would do it again. That the boys were better off with a father who was decent most of the time.”

Daniel held in his anger. “You shouldn’t have had to make the decision. None of it was your fault, Beth.”

“Nathan cries because his dad is gone, and you know what, that is my fault. I’m the one who killed him.”

He choked back his surprise. “You said he died in the car crash.”

“He did.”

Daniel waited, stroking her hair gently, giving her the space to tell it her own way.

She wiggled back on the bed and wrapped her arms around herself, voice low, head dipped. “He’d found out something I’d done that he didn’t like. I can’t even remember what it was, and he was cursing a blue streak at me. The roads were icy that night—I didn’t want to drive in the first place, but he insisted—and when I felt myself losing control of the vehicle I…” she paused, “…I yanked the wheel to the side and we spun into traffic with the passenger side leading. I made sure he was the one in the direct line of anything that hit us.”

Hell, had she really taken on that burden? “Beth, if you were already skidding, there’s no way anything you did changed which direction the car turned.”

Her head snapped up, a flicker of something in her eyes that could have been hope, but it vanished too quickly for him to be sure.

“Still, it was a conscious choice. I’d do it again in an instant.” She was breathing so fast he thought she might faint. “I can’t believe I’m telling you this, but I need to explain—”

He hurried to reassure her. “You don’t have to explain anything more to me. Not right now. I want to know, but only when you’re ready to talk about it. Not because you think I’m expecting you to.” He held her hands clasped in his, aching to help her, wanting to comfort her. Her fingers were icy cold, and he warmed them gently in his palms. “I still think you can forgive yourself for his death. I’m sure there was an investigation, and if you had done anything wrong, they would have discovered it then. It was an accident—that’s all it was.”

“I was happy he was dead, though. He was a bastard. Stole away years of my life. Made the boys quake in fear. Made me have sex when he knew it was dangerous. Demanded I keep going until…”

She stopped. Completely. His heart was breaking for her, for every bit of pain she’d suffered.

“Until what? Oh God, Beth.”

She whipped her head around, hair flying. Her eyes were dark, not with the heat of passion he was used to seeing but with pure unadulterated rage.

“My baby girl died because of him.”

Daniel swore under his breath.

“He knew it was dangerous for me to get pregnant again, but by then that was my only purpose in life, as far as he was concerned. Barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen.” She dashed angry tears from her eyes. “I had completed all my training, finished my student teaching, and all the while he was trying to get me pregnant. I expected to stop work when I had babies, I did, but I never thought I’d have three children in less than three years. Then when I did get pregnant again so soon, the doctor said I needed bed rest. Samuel knew, but he didn’t care, just cared about me having food on the table and warming his bed. And I lost her. My little girl.”

The tears poured out, and Daniel gathered her in his arms, pressed her forehead to his chest and simply held her.

She dragged in air between the words. “I told you I couldn’t have any more children. When they went to do the D and C, too much of my womb was damaged and they took it out.” Another sob shook her. “I know it seems so silly to be upset about it in light of the fact he used to hit me, but…”

He stopped dead in his tracks. He tried to put as much tenderness as possible into the kiss he pressed to her temple.

“It’s the farthest thing from silly. I bet you’ve got people who tell you that you should count your blessings, right? That you’ve got three fine boys, and what more could you want.” He laughed, knowing that it sounded hollow. He buried his fingers in her hair and pulled her gaze up to meet his own. “It doesn’t take away the hurt. You love them nonetheless, but the ones that you can’t have, because the decision wasn’t yours—

“It hurts like blue blazes and there’s nothing anyone can say that’s ever going to make it feel better. A piece of your future is dead, and yet people walk on all around you and expect you to keep going when there’s nothing but a fucking hole in front of you—as if you’re the only one who sees it.”

The dark centers of her eyes glistened with her unshed tears. “Oh, Daniel.”

He held her. Gently. His lips touching her forehead, and her cheek, and her lashes. Trying to pass over an inkling of compassion that she could appreciate and comprehend in the midst of her hurts.

Beth tangled her fingers in his hair and kissed him. She held their mouths together until the kiss faded away, and they hung, lip to lip, air mingling as they attempted to balance their breathing.

He pulled her into his lap, lifting her to straddle his legs. His hand caressed her back, massaging the muscles as he clutched her close, their torsos tight as they continued to touch and comfort each other.

Beth curved a hand down the side of his face and tentatively brushed a tear that clung to the edge of his eye. “I’m so sorry.”

“I’m sorry too. I know part of your pain.” He took a deep breath and stared into her eyes. “As far as your husband is concerned? There’s a special place in hell reserved for men like him. If he hadn’t died, things might have gotten worse and you could be the one dead now. Or one of your sons…”

His throat closed off at the thought of any of the towheaded boys tangled in their beds down the hall being hurt.

Beth held his face, and he could have drowned in her tear-filled eyes. Barely above a whisper, she spoke as she caressed his bristle-roughed cheek. “I know we have so much more to discuss, but I need you. Need you to chase away the pain, just for a little while.”

They moved together, willing accomplices. Lips and tongues tangling, taking turns to slip off their remaining clothing as they shrugged shoulders and wiggled limbs. When she stripped bare from the waist up, Daniel took possession of one firm nipple, cupping her breast and lifting it to his lips to suck.

“So good.” Beth let her head drop back.

“I want you tonight. All of you.”

He made love to her that night. Lifted her and placed her with such care on the bed. Tugged off her panties slowly, careful of her aching limbs. Somehow between kissing every inch of her body and arranging her naked form on the bed, he shucked his jeans. Beth looked up from where she lay, the moonlight pouring in the window to illuminate every muscular inch of his body. His cock rose from the tight curls at his groin, and he slipped over her, the heat of his torso rolling ahead like a steamroller and pinning her in place.

“Tonight, you’re mine. No games, no playing. Just open yourself up and give yourself to me, Beth. Let go and let me catch you.”

Her throat was tight as he suspended himself over her, thigh to thigh, nose to nose. His eyes, oh damn—his eyes were beautiful. Full of tenderness and need, and she wrapped her arms around his torso and pulled him down, sighing as his bare skin touched hers, as if for the first time.

They touched and moved together, in perfect harmony. He kissed her mouth, her breasts, the indent of her belly. He licked her clit, and she opened wide, letting him touch her everywhere, as hard as he liked, as soft as he wanted. Her first orgasm surprised them both as she rocked with the initial touch of his hand to her pussy. He moved over her while her sheath still convulsed and with one firm motion joined them. He locked their hips together, pulling her head to his, lips and tongues tasting and embroiled with white-hot need. Then he started, slow, minute pulses of his hips that dragged his cock back an inch before reburying him deep. Deeper yet as she pulled up her knees and spread herself wide.

“God, Beth, yes.” His strokes hesitated for a moment, uneven and broken in rhythm.

“Do it. Come on…oh there, so good. You feel so good inside me. All I need, I…”

She wanted to confess with words what their bodies were saying but she refrained, instead staring into his eyes and saying it the best she could. It was love. It was physical connection that went soul deep and tears welled up as he stared. Another thrust, another. The rubbing intensified, every nerve on fire. He grasped her nipple and sucked hard, and the spear of pain shot into pleasure that radiated over her skin, throbbing in her sheath. She grabbed his head and drew their mouths together again, needing the connection, needing to taste him. She bit his lower lip and licked the pain away as he erased the pain lingering in her heart. No, not erased, but eased. They were together, they belonged together.

The bed creaked in an easy rhythm and he groaned over her. “So close. You need to come. I want to feel you around me. Squeezing me. Surrounding me.” He adjusted the angle of her body, lifting her hips higher, tilting his pelvis up to thrust harder, more forcibly. The cool air moved over her clit when his body pulled away. Then he touched her, his fingers rubbing firmly and the pulse of sensation broke free.

“Yes…” She clutched his neck tight and gave herself up to pleasure. Let it roll like the fall wind over the prairies. A second later he joined her, his harsh breathing giving way to a contented sigh as he jerked inside her, the heat of his release bathing her.

“Yes, oh damn.” He dropped his head on her shoulder, covering her with his body, and she didn’t even try to stop the tears.

“That was perfect,” she whispered.

He rolled them carefully, drawing her on top so they stayed intimately connected. His tender caress and consideration made her heart ache.

He rubbed her back, dragged his hands through her hair again and again, until their breathing calmed and only the rapid beat of his heart gave away the fact they’d been running a marathon in bed. He chuckled softly, as if he was aware of keeping the noise down.

“Perfect, eh?”

“Hmm, I think.” The languid sensation stealing through her limbs made it tough to fight the sleep now creeping up.

“Even though it was missionary vanilla sex?”

Something twigged in her brain, and suddenly it was funny as anything. She was an emotional yo-yo. A giggle escaped, then the giggle escalated to a snicker. She took a deep breath, still shaky from the bombshells of the evening. Daniel rolled them to their sides, keeping their bodies close and their spirits together as they snuggled under the covers.