Bobby eased his body off Naomi’s, careful not to hurt her. His blinding climax had surprised him. Though he’d had his share of conquests, he’d never experienced anything quite so intense. Naomi’s tight body had sheathed him like no other woman, and when he released inside her, he knew he’d given her something he’d never given another.
So this was what true love, physical and emotional, felt like.
He smiled and gave her shoulder a light kiss. “Stay here, angel,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”
He moistened a cloth in the tepid water in the basin and brought it to Naomi. “Spread your legs, darlin’. Let me take care of you.”
The unwavering trust in her beautiful violet eyes humbled him.
“Did I bleed much?”
He wiped a few rust-colored smudges from the insides of her creamy thighs. “Not much.” He pressed the cloth to her. “Does this hurt?”
“No. It’s fine.”
He wiped her gently. “You’ll be sore for a little while. But the next time it won’t hurt.”
“It wasn’t bad, Bobby,” she said. “I...enjoyed it.”
His blood boiled, and his cock stirred at her words. But he couldn’t have her again. Not for at least a day. Never had twenty-four hours seemed a lifetime.
Well, only once.
He obliterated that thought from his mind.
“It wasn’t bad, huh?” He chuckled, rubbing the sweat from her belly and dragging the rag through her pretty triangle of black curls.
“Oh!” She clasped a hand to her mouth. “I didn’t mean it like that. It was wonderful. Amazing. I went to heaven. Truly, I did.”
“That’s better.” He grinned at her, admiring the healthy flush of her cheeks. She was so beautiful. His cock continued to grow. Had a damn mind of its own. He returned the cloth to the basin and crawled into bed next to her. She turned toward him and snuggled into his arms.
He sighed, content. Hell, he wasn’t content. He was happy.
Positively ecstatic.
All because of this pretty preacher’s daughter with the soul of an angel. Such a wonderful woman. And she loved him. Robert Morgan. Bounty Hunter. Fugitive. Kidnapper. She’d gifted him with her body. More importantly, with her love. He wished he had a gift to give that was worthy of her.
There was one thing. Something he’d never given anyone. Something she’d asked for earlier.
“Naomi?”
“Hmm?” She kissed his chest and flicked her tongue over his nipple. There went his cock again. He gritted his teeth, willing it down. She blinked, and her long black eyelashes tickled his skin.
“You asked how I understood when you said you felt violated.” He cleared his throat, his voice shaking. “It was twenty-two years ago. I was ten years old.”
“Bobby, you don’t have to.”
“Shh. Yes, I do. I want to.” He closed his eyes and let the visions appear. Images, sounds, smells he’d kept buried for over two decades. The acrid stench of beef flesh and manure burning in the barn. The guttural soul-wrenching screams of his mother. The cowardly pleas of the man who’d sired him. Then the war cry that closed his father’s yellow eyes for the last time, never to see again the face of the son who was his spitting image. The soundless scalping, oozing blood, and then the sticky crimson liquid trickling down the bronze arm of the savage who carried his pa’s light brown hair, as the other took his turn with his mother. Again, the war cry.
Always the war cry.
His voice shook. “I’d fetched some water for my ma. It was my pa’s birthday and she was busy making a cake. She didn’t have saleratus, though, so she used extra eggs for leavening.” Strange he remembered that silly detail. He hadn’t given it a thought in forever, but now it rushed into his mind like a freight train, with the vivid colors and actions of a stage play in New York City. The damn saleratus. He’d enjoyed helping his mother in the kitchen, even enduring his father’s taunts of “sissy” and “mama’s boy.”
But it had been his father, the coward, who begged for his life at the hands of those brown invaders. Had offered his wife and son up on a platter, if only they’d let him live.
Who was the real sissy? Bobby had gotten out of his share of scrapes in the past two decades, and never once had he begged for his life. He took a long, deep breath.
“I came back up the trail to the house and heard my ma’s screams. I...I dropped the water and ran to the window. Two Indians were in the house, dressed in buckskins. I wanted to scream, but I was scared. I—” He breathed. “I should have helped my mother.”
“You were a small boy, Bobby.” Naomi fingered the hair on his chest. “Of course you were scared.”
“That was the last time I was scared.” He cleared his throat. “My pa came through the front door, and I watched as one Indian throttled him in the stomach and then held him with a hunting knife. He spoke foreign words, while the other—”
“The other what, Bobby?”
“He raped my mother.”
“R-Raped?” Naomi’s sweet voice trembled.
“It’s what Ike tried to do to you, angel.”
“Oh, my!” Naomi gasped and buried her head deeper into his chest.
Damn. He hadn’t meant to upset her. “I’m sorry.”
“No, no. I’m fine. It’s just...your poor mother. Go on.”
“I had no love for my pa. But my ma, she understood me. She loved me and I her. When that savage ripped her clothing and forced himself on her, in the midst of her screams, I wished for nothing more than to be big and strong like my father, so I could fight for her and protect her.”
“Don’t blame yourself. You were just a boy.”
“A boy, yes. And small for my age. But my pa was huge. As tall as I am now and broader even. I knew he didn’t love me, but I thought he loved my mother. So I thought to myself, ‘don’t worry, he’ll save her. He’ll fight for her.’”
“Did he?”
Bobby sighed, his pulse pounding. “No. He begged for his own life like a lily-livered pantywaist. Said they could have her if they’d spare his life. Said he’d throw in his little girl too.”
“Little girl? You had a sister?”
“No.” Bobby stiffened, remembering the tears that had formed at his father’s words. The last tears he ever shed over the bastard. The last tears he’d ever shed, period. “He meant me.”
“I don’t understand.”
“My father hated me, Naomi. He thought I was a sissy. A mama’s boy.”
“You?”
He chuckled. “I take it you don’t agree?”
“Not at all. You’re the most...well, I don’t know how else to say it. You’re the most manly man I’ve ever laid eyes on.”
Bobby kissed the top of her head. “I saw his eyes through the window when he died. He had light brown eyes, lighter than mine, almost yellow, and they met mine with his last breath. I never felt remorse.
“The Indian who killed him handed him over to the other so he could have a turn with my mother. The other one scalped him.”
“A-And your ma?”
“She stopped screaming during the second rape. I figure she died then. After he was finished, the Indians ransacked the house and took everything of value. My father’s guns, his tobacco, the money my ma kept in a tin can on the high shelf of our pantry. She didn’t have much jewelry, but they took the wedding ring off her finger, and they took her pride and joy.”
“That would be you, Bobby. Did they take...you?”
“No.” He fidgeted with her hair splayed on his chest. Naomi had such beautiful sable hair, like silk. “Her pride and joy was an amethyst brooch from her grandmother. The first time I saw you, your eyes reminded me of that brooch.” He gulped. “I hadn’t thought of it in years.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to remind you of something so painful.”
“No, no, angel. God, no.” He kissed her head again. “They went to the barn then, took our horses and milch cow. They left our old steer and set fire to the barn.”
The steer’s bawling had made his ears ache, but after listening to the screams of his mother as those savages violated her, the wretched cries of an animal hadn’t touched his emotions.
He couldn’t tell Naomi that he waited the rest of the day and then the night, outside. Scared to go in his house. Twenty-four long hours passed. Finally mustered the courage to sneak into his home and look upon his ma’s lifeless body. He’d been a damn coward. But that was the last time.
He cleared his throat. “When I went into the house, there was nothing left. Nothing but the smell of my father’s birthday cake that had burned in the stove before the fire went out. I scrounged what crumbs of food I could find, put as many clothes on my back as I could, and left.
“I left, angel, without even burying my ma’s body.”
“Oh, Bobby. How did you live?”
“The occasional odd job. Stealing mostly. I couldn’t stay in one place too long or I risked being sent to an orphanage. I sure as hell wasn’t going there.”
“Would that have been so bad?”
“Yes.”
She didn’t ask why, and he was glad. He’d taken her innocence in so many ways already. He didn’t want to tell her the truth about orphanages.
“Thank you for telling me,” she said softly. “You really did understand about violation.”
“I’ve never told another living soul that story, Naomi.”
“I’m honored. Truly.” She kissed his nipple. “You’ve been alone so long, but no longer.”
A powerful surge traveled to his groin. “I can’t ask you to stay with me. My life...it’s no good for you.”
“You don’t want me?”
“God, yes, I want you. I don’t want to live another second of my wretched life without you. But I’ve got nothing to offer you. Nothing.”
“You have you.”
“That’s not enough.”
“It’s enough for me. I’m not leaving you.”
“I can’t let you—”
“Hush. It’s not your decision to make. It’s mine.” She moved away from him then, sat up, and pierced him with her violet gaze. “Do you know where my name comes from?”
“Naomi?”
“Yes.”
“No, I don’t. But it’s sure pretty. It fits you.”
She flushed a beautiful strawberry color. “Thank you. It’s from the Bible. My sister’s name is Ruth. There’s a story about two women named Ruth and Naomi.”
“Can’t say I know much about the good book, darlin’.”
“I’m sure your mother would have taught you had she the chance,” Naomi said. “In this story, Naomi loses almost everything—her homeland, her husband, her two sons. She’s left with two daughters-in-law, and thinking of them, she releases them from their obligations to her and decides to return to her homeland of Israel. One of them, Ruth, remains devoted to Naomi, and speaks to her—my pa’s favorite Bible verse.
“‘Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the Lord do so to me, and more also, if aught but death part thee and me.’”
The words, spoken in Naomi’s husky, melodic voice, chorused into Bobby like sweet music. He said nothing, just stared into the beautiful eyes of the woman he loved. She took his hand and kissed his fingertips, then spoke.
“Whither thou goest, Bobby Morgan, I will go. Where thou lodgest, I will lodge. Aught but death shall part thee and me.”
“You would sacrifice everything? To be with me?” Bobby’s heart thundered. “I’m not worth it, Naomi.”
She touched her fingers to his lips. “What was your ma’s name?”
He wasn’t certain he’d ever spoken his ma’s name aloud. God knew he hadn’t formed the thought of it in years. He spoke it now, in a grave tone that expressed what she had meant to him. “Her name was Ella. Ella Lane Morgan.”
Naomi’s eyes glowed. “There was a fine, strong woman named Ella who knew your worth. And now there’s me. I’ll spend the rest of my life proving to you how worthy you are, if you’ll have me.”
Could he? Could he be a husband? Could he be the man Naomi deserved? Living without her now would be to live as half a person.
“I love you,” he said.
“Then don’t even think of leaving me behind,” she said. “Promise me.”
Her words warmed him, and for once, he thought, maybe he could have something good. Something pure. He’d had a hard life. Surely he was entitled to happiness.
He cupped her flushed cheeks, lowered his mouth, and pressed his lips to hers.
“I promise.”