The Cattle King's Bride

His grandfather had offered Mike a job on Kooraki. No question Mike had been foreman material, well up to the job offered, but the intense allure of Norton’s young wife could have been the deciding factor. Was that what had happened? His grandfather had been a man of strong passions. Sexual passion had a way of not allowing its victims to escape.

He should know.

Afterwards, she told herself she didn’t really remember walking down the corridor to Dev’s room. Maybe her mind was playing tricks, surrendering to a dream. It was not as though they didn’t know one another’s body intimately, but the thrill, the rapture, the sense of belonging had never lessened, never lost its power.

Dev heard the door handle turn. He swung onto his back, looking up to see Mel framed in the doorway. There was enough light from the full moon to see her clearly. She was wearing a pale coloured nightgown that shimmered like moonbeams.

He sat up, startled, supporting himself on one elbow. “Are you okay?”

She shook her dark head.

“What is it, Mel?”

She gave a little laugh that sounded like a sob. “I’m never okay. You know that.” She moved across the room, then sat on the side of his bed, staring into his eyes.

“You can’t do this, Mel,” he protested, his whole body powerfully, painfully aroused.

“I want to sleep with you,” she said, dragging the top sheet away from him. It exposed his naked hard-muscled chest with its tracery of golden hair.

His voice held a tense warning. “You get into this bed and we’re going to have sex, Mel,” he said. “You know that. So don’t try the little-sister routine.”

“No, no. I come to you for comfort, like I always used to.” She hesitated for a fraught moment, then said, “How long did we think we might be closely related, Dev?”

He exploded, just as she knew he would. “For half a second! Well, me, anyway. Always the eternal anguish, Mel, the eternal question. You’d go to any lengths to drive me mad. Do you seriously believe I would have ever touched you had I believed it? Are you that crazy?”

She shook her head in shame.

“Am I supposed to give you a round of applause for that?”

“Don’t be like that, Dev,” she begged. “There was so much gossip.”

“Mireille’s poison.” His verdict was harsh. “She had a great talent for implying sinister, cruel lies. Jealousy is one of the most powerful deadly sins. It gets people murdered every day of the week.”

“Poison finds its way into the bloodstream. My mother bewitched him.”

Dev put his two hands to his head, groaning. “Okay, so she did! And hasn’t there been a tremendous emotional fallout?” Angry and immensely frustrated, he put strong hands on her, pulling her down and then into the bed beside him. “Are we going to continue this interminable conversation?” He hooked one strong arm around her. “You, woman, drive me mad. I just want to draw a secure circle around the two of us so no one can get in. God knows we’ve lived our lives with controlling people. Both of us have resented it bitterly. As a consequence, you’re in retreat from me in case I turn into the biggest controller of them all.”

Her laugh was woefully off-key. “Let’s face it, being the man in control is going to be your role, Dev. You’ll find that out when your grandfather’s will is read. Most of the time I was able to separate the truth from the sick rumours. But I was just a little kid, Dev. My father was dead. Mum and I had no protection from that all-important quarter. My father wouldn’t have stood for—”

“I find the whole issue unbearable, Mel. I worry about you. You’re so clever, so seemingly confident, a beautiful woman. Anyone would say you’ve had the lot, yet a crucial part of you remains a lost little girl. Fragile.”

“I am not!” she protested, hitting a hand to his shoulder.

He caught her hand, kissed it. “Most people don’t see it. I do. So my grandfather and your mother loved one another. Is there anything wrong with love? Love might be madness, but it’s glorious, as well. Look at you and me. It takes a real man to put up with you. God knows my granddad didn’t get unconditional love and affection from my grandmother. She was the ultimate possessive woman. It helped to be an heiress in her own right. Gregory was her paid-for possession. She did pump a lot of her own money into Kooraki during the lean times.”

“Then he married her for her money?”

“Maybe he thought she was a lot more docile than she really was. He wouldn’t be the first man to take a wealthy bride. He sure isn’t going to be the last. Countless women marry for money, social position, security. Nothing much has changed from the old-style marriage of convenience. It still goes on. The odd thing is that a lot of the time it works better than the madly in love scenario. Like us.”

Mel didn’t argue. She had observed that among her circle of high-flying friends. “I suppose neither side has high expectations of the other,” she offered in explanation.

“For the life of me, I couldn’t do it,” Dev said. “But I’m not going to spend the rest of my life tippy-toeing around you, Mel. You reckon I’m a tough guy, right?”

“Precisamente,” she said. “You’re already tycoonish.”

“Tycoonish? Is there such a word? If there is, spare me!” he groaned. “A ruthless tycoon could have found a sure way to capture you. I could have made you mine. Made you pregnant. You would have had to marry me and not carry on with all the old-style, hopelessly outdated class distinctions.”

“They’ll never be outdated,” she contradicted flatly. “It’s human nature. God, Dev, I’d love to be pregnant,” she cried. “My biological clock is ticking away. I want children. I love children. I want to hold our baby in my arms.”

“Stop, oh, stop! I have a burning need to clarify this. You want our baby?”

“Of course I do.”

“You mean I don’t need to give up hope?” he shot back with extreme sarcasm.

“You know what they say—hope springs eternal.”

“Quit the smart talk, Mel. I’m in no mood for it. You have a bizarre way of attaining your objectives. But then you probably deal in the larger concepts of life. I’m too busy.”

“I know how hard you work,” she said in a conciliatory tone.

“Can you tell me this? Are you planning on prolonging this sex-starved unmarried state for the foreseeable future?”

“It is exciting,” she said, shivers running down her spine.

“Oh, yes. Unlike you, I don’t consider it to be cool. You’re using your beautiful body as a serious weapon, like right now. No, don’t get angry.” He placed a taut restraining arm across her breasts. “Think about it.”

Mel loved the weight of his arm. She turned her head to stare up at him, the planes and angles of his dynamic face, the high sharp cheekbones, the width between the jaw bones that tapered to a strong chin with its distinctive Langdon cleft. “I can’t think when I’m in bed with you.”

“Who needs you to think?” He withdrew his arm. “It might be a wise move to go back to your own bed, Mel.” He spoke in cool, sarcastic style. “What better thing is there to do in bed but sleep? It’s all down to you. Go on. Get up.”

“If I can.”

“It’s your practice to do what you damned well like. You’re free to walk away, Mel. I could point out there are plenty of women I know who wouldn’t consider it.”

“Tell me something I don’t know,” she said, still not moving. “I’m pretty hotly desired myself.”

“I don’t want to hear about it, thank you,” he said in a flat, hard voice.

“I remember a time when you used to be nicer,” she quavered. She didn’t want to fight. Her need for him was fierce.

“God help me, don’t I regret that now?” Dev suddenly lifted himself on his strong arms to loom over her. “You want me to make love to you, is that it, you crazy woman?”

Wasn’t it her dread that she could drive him away with her fears and phobias? At one time she had seriously considered DNA testing, then backed off in shame. Gregory Langdon couldn’t have been her father, although he had been on the scene. Mike Norton was her father. He had loved her. Could a man love a child he knew wasn’t his? Maybe some men could. The child couldn’t be blamed for the sins of the fathers.

“Well?” Dev growled.

She threw all her chaotic thoughts out of the window. “Yes, yes, yes, yes!” she cried. “A thousand times ye—”

He stopped her by lowering his body onto her, covering her, letting her feel his full weight—taut, hard body, the musculature, the rib cage so clearly defined the imprint was left on her body, her flesh satiny-soft and yielding to his potent maleness. His mouth came down near mercilessly on hers. But wasn’t she starved for it, hot and aching with longing? She could never mistake Dev for anyone else, not even in the blackest night with her lack of vision total. Every part of her recognized and accepted him—the scent of him, the magical feel of him, her wild response. Her very flesh lit up in ecstasy for him. So did her heart, flowering in her chest.

Dev kissing her was the most ravishing feeling in the world. It was so intensely erotic, it transformed her not into an acquiescent, trembling creature, but a voluptuous woman. She cried out with pleasure. He was a masterful manipulator, but the mastery was inherent in everything he did. How could she relish the sexual excitement that came with the dominant male, then tell him perversely that she feared domination? She had to be a basket case.

Still kissing her, Dev moved off her, falling back onto his side. “You drive me mad with wanting you,” he rasped. “I should really be thinking about going into therapy if I had the time. I could take up something calming like arts and crafts, maybe wood whittling.”

“I’m sorry, Dev.” She pressed close to his body, sighing and breathing into his ear.

His mouth clamped on hers. “Damn you, Mel.” His hand slid a little roughly down the length of her abundant hair. “Just tell me what you want and I’ll give it to you.”

A shiny tear fell onto her cheek. “You.”

“You want me, not us?”

“Just love me, please,” she begged.

“But I want us, Mel! Be warned. There’s a caveat attached to all this. I’m not going to wait for you forever.” He spoke forcefully, even as he was trying to keep the immensity of his desire for her in check. There were still walls to be knocked down with Mel. Even as a child, Mel had felt impelled to rebel against Langdon authority. He knew his grandmother had been hateful to Sarina. Mel, too, but it was Mel’s determined nature that made her fight back.

His great hope was his grandfather’s passing would put an end to the chaos of the past with all its moral dilemmas. Mel’s fears were born out of extremes. He understood her. He loved her. But it was hell. So much time and pain had passed between them. There had to be a resolution.

Her body gave off heat and its own intoxicating fragrance. He could feel the heat off her beautiful breasts and the heat between her legs. He rested his hand there. “Listen, I adore the nightgown, Mel, but it has to come off.”

“Just do it,” she begged, moving her body to make things easier for him.

“That’s an irresistible plea if ever I heard one,” he mocked. “Okay, let’s try it inch by inch.” He drew her nightgown slowly up the length of her legs, past her taut stomach, her narrow waist, letting the silk-satin lie in folds under her breasts. Then he moved down to the bottom of the queen-size bed—too small for a man like him—taking her elegant feet in his hands.

Mel lay back, eyes closed, in a state of surrender. Her short-term forays into other far less troubling relationships had brought home to her she would never be satisfied with any other man but Dev. No one else seemed to know what she wanted. No one else could cause the throbbing in her breasts, the mad flutter like a million butterflies in her stomach, the little electrical charges all over, the tiny, keen knife-like thrusts between her legs. No one else could even bring her to orgasm. She had never been able to fake it. Odd that lack had never been noticed.

Dev was kissing her bare feet. The lick of his tongue and his kisses moved languorously up her trembling, increasingly restless legs. He pressed his lips to her flat stomach, the tip of his tongue tracing the whorls of her navel, then his mouth began its downward trail again to where her body was pulsing white-hot. She could hear his breath deepening and quickening. Her own breath was shortening. With exquisite smoothness, his index finger glided inside her—she was so ready for him. Her heart leapt like a wild bird bouncing off the walls of its cage.

God! Oh, God! Oh, God!

“Please, Dev, come inside me.” She knew she was whimpering. The muscular contractions were growing so strong, she felt she might climax too soon.

“Just you wait a bit longer,” Dev murmured, clearly taunting her. “Punishment isn’t over yet. I want you to come alive for me, no one else.”

Her flesh had melted. Her bones had turned to liquid lava. This was what Dev wanted, as much sensation as possible. “Dev, my heart is ready to explode.” She was feverishly turning her head from side to side. Her long legs had fallen apart of their own accord.

“Just a little longer,” he murmured.

“You devil!”

“Whose fault is that? With you, I have to take my pleasure when I can.”

Moments later, judging it precisely, he removed her nightgown with care, then threw it unerringly towards a chair, where it landed in a silky pool. Her breasts were uncovered to his gaze, her hyper-sensitive coral-pink nipples tightly budded and standing erect.

There was a roaring in Mel’s ears as he took one, then the other, into his mouth.

“Tell me you love me,” he muttered, determined on causing her at least some of the pain she caused him.

She didn’t answer. Her total focus was on wrapping her legs strongly around him, tightening them. She wanted to capture him, not knowing when exactly he had managed it, but he was as naked as her. Their nakedness felt absolutely right. It had from the very first time. Dev was her first lover. He had taken far more than her virginity. He had taken her lifelong allegiance.

“You know I love you.” Her body was breaking out in a fine dew of perspiration, the exquisite agony of want. “You’ve marked me forever.”

“I’d say we marked each other,” he said harshly, not at all satisfied with her answer. “Say it. You-love-me.”

“I-love-you.” She tried to lift her head off the pillow, her voice barely above a ragged whisper. “Oh, please, Dev.” Her body, so long starved of him, was frantic for release. Yet he wanted to circle her like an eagle.

He bent his head to lick away the trail of her hot tears, then descended into kissing her, savouring the lush texture of her lips, tasting the nectar within. Only then did his strong hands move beneath her satiny heart-shaped rear, cupping it, then lifting her body high so its delta was close-up and ready. He wanted to bury himself deep, ever deeper inside her so they fused.

Her little keening cry was the trigger. He came in a flooding roar. She came with him in her own burst of fire.

He wouldn’t have changed places with any other man in the world.

He had waited and waited for Amelia. It had made many aspects of his life excruciatingly difficult. What Mel had to learn now was he would never let go. The waiting was over. He would not stand for interference from anyone. That included Mel. The king was near death. Long live his successor.

Gregory Langdon lay very still in his magnificent brass-studded mahogany bed that had been custom made for him decades before. His skeletal hands rested on the coverlet. The heavy curtains Sarina had almost drawn shut blocked the glare of sunlight from outside. His son, Erik, was downstairs. Ava, Erik’s daughter, his beautiful granddaughter, had arrived with her no-account husband. He guessed the cracks were already appearing in that ill-advised marriage. He and Ava had quarrelled over the young man she had only imagined she loved. On the surface, Luke Selwyn had appeared a suitable suitor for his granddaughter’s hand. His family had money—so he wasn’t a fortune-hunter but over a period of time Selwyn’s less-attractive qualities had begun to surface. He was basically a lightweight, a floater through life, all drive and ambition blunted by wealth.

In the end Gregory had made it very plain that he was violently opposed to the marriage, but gentle, sensitive Ava for once in her life had defied him and ignored the concerns of her brother. Dev had been against the marriage, as well. Dev was devoted to his younger sister and her to him.

He knew the rest of them had arrived—Langdons and a fair sprinkling of Devereaux. They thought the world of Dev, nicknamed after their family. They looked up to Dev and admired him.

Only so far—and he couldn’t hold out much longer—no Dev and no Amelia. He drew a shallow breath, pain sweeping over him in a monstrous wave. He was dying. He accepted it. There was no place else to go. The pain would finally cease. But he couldn’t die before Dev and Amelia arrived. He had resisted another jab of the needle that lessened the agony but befuddled his mind. Even dying, he needed to be in possession of his faculties. The pain didn’t matter. He needed reconciliation even if he didn’t deserve it. Dying was a terrible business. Better to die quickly than have an agonizing end drawn out. He had been such a vigorous man. Splendid health he had taken for granted. But finally the traumas of old age had unleashed themselves upon him. Black oblivion would come as a mercy.

At a slight sound, Gregory Langdon looked towards the bedroom door. Probably the nurse. He didn’t like her one bit. A big, broad-shouldered, no nonsense woman, competent, but distressingly plain. He was used to having beautiful women around the place—Ava, Amelia, and the light of his life, Sarina. There had been no happy start, let alone a happy ending for him and Sarina. That was one miracle he couldn’t command. The timing, right from the beginning, had been all wrong. He and Sarina, a married woman, had been a generation apart, not that it had mattered. Mireille had hated him and hated Sarina to the death. He couldn’t condemn his wife for all her cruelties. He had married Mireille without love, but at his parents’ constant urging. To give Mireille her due, she had genuinely tried to make him a good wife. Only a man should never marry a woman he didn’t want.

He knew which woman he wanted the instant he set eyes on young Sarina Norton, so beautiful she took his breath away. He had never counted on a woman doing that. And Mireille was by no means his first woman. He would carry that vision of Sarina into the next life. If there was one. He wasn’t a religious man. What we had was all we got. Let folk have their faith. It didn’t do any harm. Then again, he could be in for a big surprise two minutes after lift-off. Some leap of faith there!

A woman’s slender form floating towards him in a cloud.

An angel, his dark angel. “Sarina?” he called.

“I’m here, Gregory.” Sarina moved across the carpeted expanse of the huge room to stand beside his bed. She took his emaciated hand in hers. “Are you sure you can stand the pain?” she asked, looking down at the wraith of the once-invincible Gregory Langdon.

Gregory carried her hand shakily to his mouth. “Tell me, Sarina. Are my grandson and Amelia coming?”

“They are, my dear one.” Sarina choked back a sob. “They’re due to fly in at noon.”

“God, haven’t I made a mess of my life?” Gregory groaned. “My son lived in fear of me. News to me, but my grandson accused me of it, anyway. Dev never went in fear of me. Neither did Amelia. Ava was always so quiet and shy. Dev and Amelia were more a pair than Dev and his own sister. Could I have a drop of water, please, Sarina?”

“Of course.” Sarina went to the other side of the bed, pouring a little water into a spouted cup. Fears were rising in her. Gregory could well die before Dev and Amelia arrived. She prayed their flight hadn’t been delayed. Noel Devereaux had allowed Dev the use of his plane to pick Amelia up. That had been a generous gesture. Gregory and Noel Devereaux had shared a complex past. They had never been friends.

Gregory Langdon was able to swallow a few drops of water. A little dribbled down his cleft chin. Sarina picked up a tissue and very gently dabbed at his chin and dry, cracked lips.

Gregory! Her gaze rested on him. She had thought him immortal. She bent to kiss his sunken cheek. She’d had feelings for Michael, the man she had chosen as her rescuer, but they were as nothing compared to the feelings Gregory Langdon had been able to arouse in her just by looking. Many years older, he was nevertheless the man who had taken full possession of her heart. One didn’t choose these things. They just happened. She and Gregory weren’t the first to be taken victims by fate. Then, as Gregory had begun to age, she had found her eyes resting on another. She had been shocked at that point—how bad could things get? She’d been desperate not to register her feelings, her lust, in her eyes. She loved Gregory. But her body had played a bitter trick on her. Her body needed a young man. She had begun to crave Gregory’s grandson. Dev, who was bonded to her own daughter.

It had been hell locked up in close proximity to this extraordinary young man forbidden to her. Sometimes she had tortured herself with the notion that Gregory knew. She had been really frightened after the monumental row Gregory and Dev had. They were always rowing about something or other, but that time it had to have been really serious. Dev had left.

“Sit with me, Sarina,” Gregory was whispering to her, snapping her back to the present. He was clearly in extreme pain.

Sarina drew up a chair. “They’ll be here soon,” she said in a voice of gentle solace. “I hate to see you suffering, Gregory. You don’t want me to call the nurse?”

“No!” The words leapt from his throat, almost as forceful as in the old days. “It’s you I want, Sarina. You opened up a whole new world for me. Life might have been perfect if we had met at another time, but we got it all wrong. I got too old for you, didn’t I, my dark angel?”

She felt a flicker of fear. She was relying on her inheritance to escape. “No, Gregory.”

He ignored that untruth. “I sensed it before it happened,” he rasped. “But it’s all in the past. I was totally out of order when I turned on my grandson. Half off my head with jealousy. That feeling of shame has never gone away. I was jealous, so jealous, even of my own grandson.”

Fear was unfolding rapidly in her chest. “Don’t let’s talk about it now, Gregory,” Sarina begged.

Gregory took a huge, shallow breath. “No. No point. Stay with me, Sarina.”

“You know I will. To the end,” Sarina vowed.

The flight to Kooraki took much longer than expected. Takeoff had been delayed as a backlog of light aircraft was given clearance. A station hand drove them up to the house. Mel felt so sick and nervous she stumbled up the short flight of stone steps that led to the broad veranda.

Dev took hold of her arm, rubbing it gently. “I’m here, Mel.” He looked down at her, his expression grave. “We can handle this together.”

“What if we’re too late, Dev?” She stared up at him, drawing on his strength.

“We did our best. Even my grandfather can’t dictate his time of departure from the planet.”

They had barely reached the entry to the Great Hall with its bold chequerboard marble floor when Sarina came at a rush towards them. Her olive skin was close to marble-white. Tears were pouring down her cheeks, unnoticed and unchecked. The astonishing thing was that she looked furious. “He’s gone!” she cried, wringing her hands and making no attempt to embrace her daughter. “Whatever delayed you?” Her voice resounded in the double-storey space, hoarse with grief and open condemnation.