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Authors: Stolen Ecstasy

BOOK: Hannah Howell
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Sighing, she called out, “Yes, I’m fine.”
“Talking to herself again,” Charlie said.
Jed nodded. “She does it a lot. Me and Charlie figure the baby, y’know, sometimes makes her a little tetched in the head.”
Leanne gasped, outraged. “I am NOT tetched.”
The way Charlie and Jed warily eyed the shelter made Grant laugh. “Don’t you browbeat these boys, Leanne. And about that cute little tummy of yours . . .”
Looking down at the mound that had once been a taut, flat stomach, Leanne was not sure “cute, little tummy” was the right word for it.
“. . . soon as we get this nest of vipers cleaned out, you and me are going to talk about that.”
She groaned and slumped against the bales. When he had hugged her, she had felt the shock rip through him, had seen it on his son’s handsome face before it had been quickly hidden. It had been silly to think that would be the end of it. Now she could add O’Malley to the difficulties still remaining after Watkins and Martin were sent to rout.
“It’s Hunter’s, y’know.” Jed spoke softly so Leanne would not hear.
“I know. Best we keep that boy alive through this fight,” Grant said, “because I’m of a mind to kill him.”
He smiled faintly when Jed, Charlie, and Brandon just grinned, fully aware he was bluffing. It was good, he decided, that there would be some time between his discovering her pregnancy and setting eyes on the young rogue who had planted the babe. They would be wed, however, as soon as he could drag a preacher out to the cabin. If the pair had not straightened out the misunderstandings between them before they said “I do,” they would just have to do it afterwards.
At that moment, one of the men crouching behind cover they could not penetrate cried out and fell, and Grant smiled. “The boys have gotten behind them. Now it heats up, lads. Don’t you stick one toe outta there, Leanne, ’til I tell you,” he bellowed, then turned his full attention to the battle.
Huddled behind her straw walls, Leanne prayed for the men. She prayed that Watkins’s need for vengeance did not cause her friends and loved ones to be sacrificed. Suddenly, all her other concerns seemed very small indeed. She was even willing to face Hunter, for it would mean he had come out of the fight unscathed. That was certainly worth suffering some discomfort.
 
As Hunter fought, he kept his eyes open for Watkins and Martin. He was determined that they would not escape this time. Just as he caught sight of the pair, Martin was shot. As he staggered and fell, he jostled Watkins. The path of retreat they had chosen was steep and rocky enough for that momentary unbalancing to send Watkins tumbling down it. Hunter raced towards the man, reaching him just before he could right himself completely and retrieve the gun that had slipped from his grasp.
“Get up real slow, Watkins. Real slow. One wrong move, and you end up like Martin.”
Rising slowly, Watkins glanced towards the sprawled corpse of his half-brother, then sought out his gun before looking back at Hunter. “You think you’ve won, don’t you?”
“I know I have. Your men are running for their lives. Those left alive, that is.”
“You won’t be seeing me hang, you bastard.”
“I will, even if I have to pull the damn lever myself. Now, move.”
Watkins moved, but not towards the clearing as Hunter indicated. He lunged for his pistol, ignoring Hunter’s shouted warning. Cursing viciously, Watkins was turning the pistol on Hunter when a bullet through the heart ended his life.
Hunter was still staring at Watkins’s sprawled body when Owen stepped up to his side. “Think anyone will believe I had to shoot him?” Hunter said.
“They will because I’ll tell them so,” Sebastian said as he walked up to them.
“You get around pretty good for a man with no boots on,” murmured Owen, and Sebastian briefly smiled.
Sighing, Hunter reholstered his gun. “He didn’t want to hang.”
“So he made you his executioner,” Sebastian concluded. “It’s not uncommon, believe me.”
“What’s important is that it’s over, Hunter. It’s over.”
“You’re right, Owen.”
Sebastian grimaced as he looked from one body to another. “Well, which one do you want to carry?”
 
“It’s over, honey.”
Leanne opened her eyes and took the hand O’Malley held out to her. “All over?”
“All over.”
“Everyone’s all right?”
“A nick here and there. That’s all,” he assured her as he helped her stand up. “They’re tying up the prisoners and collecting the bodies now.” He patted her cheek when a look of distress passed over her face. “Sometimes it has to be that way, darlin’.”
“I know,” she murmured as he led her outside.
As she stepped out onto the small front porch, she saw Hunter. He was approaching the wagon Charlie had brought out to hold the living and the dead. Watkins’s body was slung over his shoulder. When he saw her, his gaze was at first fixed upon her face. She waited tensely for him to notice the rest of her. She watched as his dark gaze slipped down her body, watched his eyes widen even as his mouth gaped open and she had to fight the urge to bolt.
Chapter Eighteen
 
“Y
OU’RE PREGNANT
.” H
UNTER THREW
Watkins’s body in the wagon and marched over to Leanne.
“Boy’s sharp as a tack,” Grant murmured and shrugged when both Leanne and Hunter glared at him. “Matthew, you go get our horses and bring them here. Brandon, you’re riding in to town with that wagonload of human manure and bringing me back a preacher.”
“A preacher?” Leanne squawked, staring at O’Malley in horror. “Hunter’s already married.”
“I am not.” Out of sheer perversity, Hunter almost protested Grant’s taking over, then decided it would be stupid because a preacher and a quick marriage suited him just fine.
“Well, engaged then. I’m sorry this trouble interrupted your nuptials,” she said in her most formal voice. “I thank you for your help. You may go home now.”
“I’m not going anywhere, and I’m not getting married.”
“Someone’s coming, Pa,” Brandon called.
Hunter cursed the interruption even as he turned to meet the men riding in. There were nearly a dozen well-armed men, but their stances were relaxed and friendly. He suspected they had thoroughly surveyed the situation before riding in.
“Marshal Tuckman thought you’d be needing help. Seems you don’t,” said the man at the front of the group. “Deputy Carson from St. Anne,” he said, touching the brim of his hat in greeting.
Grant reached up and shook the man’s hand. “Thanks for coming. We were just bringing in the prisoners and the dead. Tuckman’ll want to see for himself that Watkins and Martin are dead, I reckon.”
“He will. He’ll probably be waiting in St. Anne by the time we get back.”
“But I thought he was wounded,” Hunter said. “And in Clayville.”
“He is and he was, but the dang fool’s headed to St. Anne. Said he means to be there at the end of all this.” Deputy Carson nodded toward the wagon. “We’ll just water our horses, then take that lot in for you. No point in our lingering here. You can get your wagon later.”
“My son can bring it back,” Grant said. “I was sending him to town for a preacher. You do have a preacher in St. Anne, don’t you?”
Deputy Carson grinned and nodded towards the man at his side. “We do and he’s right here. The Reverend Castor Trenton.”
The young man nodded in a small bow of greeting. “You have need of a preacher, sir?”
“I do.” Grant pointed towards Leanne and Hunter. “I’ve got me two young people who’re getting married.”
Castor Trenton stared fixedly at a blushing Leanne for a moment, then dismounted and took a book from his saddlebags. “Looks to me as if they’re a little slow to get to the altar, but I’ll be most happy to perform that service for you, sir.”
“Well, I won’t be most happy,” snapped Leanne as the preacher and Grant approached. “I’m not going through with this.” She looked at Hunter. “Will you do something about this?”
“Certainly.” He grasped her by the arm and tugged her closer. “Where would you like us to stand?” he asked the preacher.
“Hunter!” Leanne tried and failed to tug free of his hold. “I refuse to be subjected to this. Look, how do we know he’s a preacher? He was riding with a posse and carries a gun. I refuse to be married by a man carrying a gun.”
Castor Trenton obligingly removed his holster. “Ready?”
“No, I am not ready! You can’t perform a marriage when one of the people does not consent, can you? Isn’t that coercion or something?”
“I believe she might be right, sir.” He looked at Grant and shrugged. “It would only work if her father gave his approval. Do you, sir?”
“He’s not my father. He just acts like it,” Leanne grumbled, rubbing the small of her back and thinking absently that it was getting worse. “Now, if you do not mind, I believe I will go and lie down.” She tried to leave, but Hunter held her firmly.
Grant scowled, tired of the nonsense. “Maybe I act it because I damn well am.”
“Oh, that’s telling her softly, Summers,”
Hunter murmured as Leanne whirled to stare at Grant.
“You’re what?” she rasped but even as she stared at him, she knew it was true.
The eyes, she thought, feeling almost dizzy. They were her eyes. She could not believe she had stared into them for so many years and not seen it. Rubbing her forehead, she decided it needed just one more thing, just one more, and she would undoubtedly have a full-blown conniption fit. The way everyone was staring at her, she doubted it would surprise them.
“I’m your father. Now,” he said to a wide-eyed Castor Trenton, “marry them.”
“I don’t suppose it occurred to you some time during all those years to tell me,” she hissed at him.
“It did. I just didn’t find the right moment. Don’t pay any attention to her interruptions,” he advised Castor.
“Who the hell are they, then?” She pointed at Brandon and Matthew, where they stood with Owen, Sebastian, Charlie, and Jed.
“Brandon and Matthew? They’re your brothers. Remember Kane?” She nodded and Grant continued, “Well, he’s your eldest brother. He’s the one in Denver, by the by.”
“How nice.” She was torn between fury over his not telling her and delight that her old friend was the father she had thought cared nothing for her. “You still haven’t explained why you’ve kept it such a big secret.”
“I’ll tell you as soon as you get married.”
“That’s bribery.”
“Yup.”
“You seem to be forgetting that Hunter is engaged to another woman.”
“I am not,” Hunter snapped.
“And may I ask why not?”
“I never was.”
“I saw it written down in your own nearly illegible scrawl.”
“Nearly illegible?”
“Worst handwriting I’ve ever seen.”
“Well, I’ll explain all that after we get married.”
“More bribery.”
Hunter nodded, then looked at the preacher. “You can start now.” After a brief hesitation, Trenton began.
Leanne was not sure why she was tolerating it, letting them shoo her along into something she had not really agreed to yet. She decided it was because she could not think straight and could hardly put up an adequate defense. No one could think clearly with so much whirling in her mind. Hunter was there claiming he was neither married nor engaged. Dear O’Malley was standing there claiming he was her father, but for some reason he had hidden that fact until now. She glared at her father when he suddenly nudged her.
“What is it now?” she grumbled.
“Say ‘I do’.”
“I do.”
“Good girl.”
“I now pronounce you man and wife,” Castor Trenton intoned and closed his book.
Leanne blinked as Hunter kissed her cheek while eyeing her warily. “I’m married?” Trenton nodded. “That was quick. Sure it’s legal?”
“Quite legal,” he assured her. “It really only needs you both saying ‘I do’ and me saying ‘It’s done’.”
“Wonderful. I pause for a moment’s thought and miss my own wedding.”
“Are you going to be difficult about this, Leanne?” Hunter asked.
“I’m giving it some serious consideration.” She winced and rubbed at her back, wondering what she had done to make it ache so.
“You all right?” Hunter frowned, thinking she looked tired and pale.
Suddenly the pain in her back encircled her and squeezed. She gasped, clutching her middle as she bent over. What little conversation there had been among the men milling about in the clearing stopped abruptly. She glanced up to see them all staring at her in varying degrees of horror. It annoyed her. They were not the ones about to have a baby.
“Leanne,” Hunter gasped, feeling increasingly alarmed, “is something wrong?”
“Wrong?” she nearly screamed as she straightened up. “What could possibly be wrong? I’ve just spent a whole day with a lunatic trying to kill me. A man who’s supposed to be in Texas getting married has just married me. A man I’ve known for years decides to announce that he’s my father. Now I’m going to have a baby, and it’s too damned soon. Oh, no, nothing’s wrong. Everything is just perfect.”
Grant swore and looked at the deputy. “Don’t suppose you’ve got a doctor in that group?”
The deputy shook his head, then pointed to a rather dapper-looking middle-aged man. “Jack Tuttle’s got ten kids.”
“There is a sterling recommendation,” Leanne panted as she felt another contraction sweep over her.
Jack Tuttle strolled over to her and smiled shyly. “I have helped my Mabel birth near half of them.”
“So you should have, since you keep putting them there,” she nearly snarled, but Mr. Tuttle just kept smiling.
“Now, Leanne,” Grant decided she needed to be calmed down, “there’s no need to get hysterical.”
“Isn’t there? Isn’t there? I’m having a baby and it’s not supposed to be coming now. I’ve just been dragged into marriage and introduced to my father. Most women have other women fluttering around them at such a time. Do you see any women here? No. Men. All men. A preacher who wears a gun, a posse, outlaws dead and alive, Charlie, Jed, a man who can’t leave his poor wife alone, and six men I am never going to speak to again for as long as I live.” She bit back a scream as she bent to another contraction.
“My Mabel always gets a bit testy at this time too,” Jack Tuttle told Grant.
“I’m not surprised, you lecher,” Leanne snapped.
Sebastian stepped forward to take Leanne from a ghost-white Hunter’s unsteady hold and pick her up in his arms. “I believe she ought to get to her bed. Owen, come take your brother in hand. Maybe someone can find him some whiskey.”
Even as Owen hurried to Hunter’s side, Hunter stepped dazedly towards Leanne. “But I should . . .”
“Go quietly to a corner and have a few drinks, maybe more than a few.” Sebastian grinned and shook his head. “You look worse than she does, and she’s having the kid.” He started into the house.
“But . . .” Hunter began again.
Owen tugged him aside. “Hunter, you look scared to death and she doesn’t need that.”
“She said the baby’s too early.”
Jack Tuttle clapped him on the shoulder. “Babies come when they want. Don’t have to be a bad thing.”
“You want us to wait around for you, Jack?” called the deputy.
“Reckon I do if you don’t mind. Looks to me like this won’t take long.” He strode into the house, Grant hurrying after him.
By the time Owen got Hunter seated at the far end of the porch, they were joined by Leanne’s brothers and Charlie and Jed. Brandon and Jed held out bottles of whiskey. In silent accord, they opened Brandon’s first and passed it around.
“She sounded just fine to me,” ventured Charlie. “Mad as a hornet and snapping at anyone fool enough to get near her. That’s how she always gets when she’s hurt or scared. Must be a good sign.”
“You might be right,” Hunter agreed, a few deep drinks from the whiskey bottle bringing his fear under some control. “I thank you two for taking such good care of her. You put your lives on the line for her. I won’t forget that.” He smiled faintly when Charlie and Jed looked embarrassed.
“You said you ain’t marrying anybody in Texas?” Jed asked.
“No, I’m not and never was.” He hesitated, then decided telling the whole story might help keep his mind off what was happening inside the cabin.
 
Leanne clutched her bodice together and glared at the three men standing around her bed. “You are not, I repeat, not taking my clothes off.”
“Now, girl, you can’t have the baby through all of this,” Grant said and held up her nightgown. “We’ll just slip this on you.”
She was about to tell him where he could put that nightgown when another contraction took all her attention. The three men mercilessly took full advantage of her defenselessness. By the time she was able to do any more than curse, she was undressed to the point where protesting was now senseless. Once in her nightgown, she lay panting on the bed while Sebastian lightly bathed her sweat-dampened face with a cool, damp cloth.
“My backache. It wasn’t just a backache, was it?”
“Probably not,” Sebastian agreed. “Now, stop being so ungrateful to Mr. Tuttle.”
For a brief moment she felt ashamed of herself. “I’m sorry, Mr. Tuttle.”
“Don’t need to apologize, ma’am. Fact is, it made me more at ease, it did. You sounded just like my Mabel.”
She looked at Grant. “You said you’d tell me all about why you played at being O’Malley and maybe one or two other small details.”
“Honey, I think you’re going to be too busy in a moment to hear me out.”
It annoyed her when he proved right, but she was soon too caught up in having her baby to care. What embarrassment she felt over the intimacies required was also brief. The rigors of childbirth took her over completely. She did, however, find the strength to impugn Mr. Tuttle’s intelligence whenever he said things were going well or that it would not be long now.

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