Nobody's Child Read online

  Cheyenne had begged him to let her go home.

  “I can’t,” he had said, holding her and kissing her. “Not yet.” He had pressed his mouth to her temple, then her throat. “Darling, I would give you the world if I could.”

  She had sensed his deep regret and had let him make love to her. Cheyenne moved away from the window, feeling shame when she remembered how she had screamed with wild joy at the end, how she had needed him, clung to him.

  Jeremy had thrown all his popcorn and was now running around, chasing any gulls foolish enough to land. Beyond, the surf roared. The lights of an offshore drilling rig twinkled.

  As always the island made her feel cut off from the rest of the world, freer. Safer. Which was odd, since she was virtually Cutter’s prisoner.

  The island and the beach house with its weathered boards and modern, far-flung wings were just as Cheyenne remembered. She wished Cutter had not chosen this spot for their wedding, for it brought back the past, her hopes and dreams, as well as all that had gone wrong between them.

  She had been a girl, still young enough, even after Jack’s betrayal, to believe in love. She had given herself completely, irrevocably to Cutter only to awaken the next morning and find him gone. His footprints had led to the dock and had not returned, which meant someone, probably by prearranged rendezvous, had come for him by boat. He had taken everything from her and then abandoned her without a backward thought.

  Martin had flown in that afternoon. When she had told him about Lyon and that she couldn’t marry Martin now, Martin had laughed wildly.

  “I know all about it. My bastard of a brother screwed you so I wouldn’t marry you.”

  “What?”

  “He told me right before he got on the Lord jet for Singapore. You little fool! Your precious Lyon is Cutter. He’s done this before. He won’t be back.”

  “But...I saved his life. I—He—”

  “I told you how he was. But you’re just as dumb as all the others. He has a way of getting around women. He doesn’t give a damn about anybody except himself. He’s incapable of love.”

  When she’d discovered she was pregnant, and she tried to call Cutter in Indonesia, his international secretaries would not put her through.

  She had tried calling again, only to fail. Someone had erected an impenetrable wall around Cutter, and she was sure that someone had been Cutter.

  So—how could she marry him now?

  He’d saved Jeremy. He’d promised to protect them with his life.

  Cheyenne returned to the fireplace and picked up the large silver-framed photograph of Martin sitting there. In the picture he was smiling as he had never smiled at her or Jeremy after their marriage.

  She set the picture on the mantel facedown. Martin had betrayed her. She had thought he felt something for her. But on their wedding night, he had told her that both she and her unborn child disgusted him.

  She would not think of Martin nor of the way he had cut her down and belittled her, not today when she was about to marry his brother.

  Her wedding gown swirled around her legs and clung to her body, It was a gauzy white cotton dress similar to the one she’d worn the day Cutter had first seen her on the beach.

  Cutter had brought it home to her in Houston a few days ago. After she’d opened it, he’d said, “I remember how you looked in that other white dress. I thought I was dying and you were an angel. In a way you were.”

  Is that what he’d thought?

  Then why had he grabbed her ankle and tried to frighten her? Then why had he made love to her and then left her?

  So many questions.

  Someday she would have to ask them.

  She remembered waking up the next morning in bed alone. She remembered searching the island, running desperately toward the beach, following his footprints. When she had seen that they did not return from the dock, she had cut her foot on a broken bottle and had had to hobble a mile back to the beach house.

  There she had bandaged her foot and hoped he would return. Only he hadn’t. Instead Martin had come and shattered her with his news.

  She had fled the island and Martin, running home to her mother. Cheyenne had roamed the marshes as she had when she was a child. She had suffered long days and nights of profound sorrow even before she’d found out she was pregnant. Even though she’d survived, Cutter Lord had made her feel lower and cheaper than anyone in Westville ever had.

  And now, today, she was marrying this incredibly cruel man who had hurt her more than anyone ever had. This cold man who put his own needs before hers, this man who had refused to let her go home when her mother was so ill.

  And yet—

  He could be so tender. She understood him and felt bonded to him in deep, undefinable ways. Would he ever feel the same?

  Since Jeremy’s return, Cutter and she had avoided any discussion of the past. Instead they had concentrated on making Jeremy feel safe and wanted and on straightening out Martin’s messy financial affairs.

  When she had been most furious at Cutter over her mother, she had been stunned when a huge truck had arrived with all of her things that had been sold at the auction. Cutter had confessed to buying them all, but he had not even let her finish thanking him, saying that as her future husband, it was his duty and his pleasure to provide for her.

  His generosity and his tenderness and his protectiveness puzzled her. Did he merely want his son? And the pleasure of her body? Or did he, too, really want more?

  Cutter, his dark face filled with uncustomary warmth, strode across the deck toward her. She thought of all the old hurts and of his more recent tyranny and forced her heart to freeze. Then she saw Jeremy who’d grown bored with the gulls, trailing behind his father as if he were a happy puppy. How alike they were, she thought, almost resenting their newfound easiness with each other. Both were tall and tanned. Both knew exactly what they wanted and were determined to have it. Both knew how to make her dance to their tune.

  One thing was indisputable: Jeremy, who had been starved for a father’s affection, already adored Cutter. The boy had instantly taken Cutter’s part in the matter about his grandmother, saying, “Granny knew we loved her. She wouldn’t know if we were there or not.”

  For Jeremy’s sake, Cheyenne tried to smile and left the fireplace and threw open the patio door so they could enter.

  Cutter was wearing jeans and a white shirt. As was Jeremy who copied his father in everything. “Everybody’s ready for the ceremony, honey,” Cutter said mildly.

  “Yeah, Mom. Uncle Cutter says we can’t cut the wedding cake till you two get married. And I’m real hungry.”

  “Give me a minute or two alone,” she whispered, smiling.

  When she glanced at Cutter, her smile faltered. What was happening to her? Part of her resented his new power over her life. Part of her longed for it. And every night she welcomed his touch.

  With a blush she fought not to think of all the times they’d made love since that first night after he’d brought Jeremy to her. Of how her passion seemed to grow fiercer every night. Of how even during the day she felt fluttery with unwanted excitement whenever he was near.

  Cutter leaned down and kissed her lightly on the cheek. When she jumped back, he slid his arm around her waist. “Please, Cutter,” she whispered, pushing him away. “Not now...when everybody is looking.”

  “Right,” he murmured in a hard voice. “We’re getting married in about five minutes, and you don’t want me touching you. Come outside, Jeremy.”

  “Uncle Cutter gave me the rings to hold, Mom.” Jeremy patted his pocket importantly.

  “Cutter, I—I—”

  “I got the message,” he rasped.

  No, you didn’t.

  Suddenly her mouth felt too dry to speak. She felt stricken as he walked away.

  Alone once more, her emotions tore at her. She paced the huge, charming room with views of the Gulf.

  What kind of person am I?

  I don’t want to
marry this man. I hardly ever know what he’s thinking or why he does what he does. Yet... I do want to be with him. No! I can’t want to marry him. And it’s wrong of me to marry a second time for the wrong reasons.

  And yet...

  She rushed outside, her mind in a frenzy. When she started to cry, Cutter gently brushed her tears away. She resented the way his light touch tapped into her heart and soul and psyche.

  “Don’t think about what it all means now,” he whispered. “We’ll sort it out later.”

  He handed her a bouquet of wildflowers and led her to the altar that he and Jeremy had constructed together out of driftwood.

  The wedding was small and simple. No family other than Jeremy attended. Her mother was far too ill, and Cutter hadn’t invited his family. His vice president, O’Connor, whom she’d hit with her giant pansies, was there as a witness.

  As the preacher ran through the ceremony, Cheyenne gripped Cutter’s arm and fought to ignore the icy cramps knotting her stomach. In spite of the swaying grasses and frothing surf, the wedding seemed cold and mechanical. Her mother was very ill. Her father long dead. Her sister had always hated her. Cheyenne thought of the future and the long years ahead when she would have no one to turn to but Cutter. She had hoped for a real marriage. For closeness and trust.

  For true love.

  What did Cutter really want?

  At the end of the service, Cutter took her into his arms and tipped her chin back. When she looked up into his dark eyes, a blazing rush spiraled through her. Then he smiled and kissed her. His mouth was warm and familiar, and yet she felt that some invisible barrier was there between them. She knew him as a lover and yet in some ways he was still a stranger.

  Would her husband always keep more secrets from her than he shared? Suddenly he became grave, as if the prospect of their future worried him, too. When he squeezed her hand reassuringly, her wedding ring cut into her fingers and made her flinch.

  After the short ceremony, Jeremy hugged them, his eyes alight. “Now I have a mother and a father.”

  “Yes,” Cutter said, putting his arm around his bride’s slender waist. “And I have a wife and a son.”

  A lump swelled in Cheyenne’s throat.

  Cutter put his other arm around Jeremy. “We’re going to be a real family.”

  Were they? Did Cutter really believe that?

  The moment passed, and her foolish hope died as Cutter grew moodier. Not that he seemed as filled with doubt as she. He insisted on cutting the wedding cake, which she had made, and sharing a piece with her, teasing her that everybody said her food had aphrodisiac qualities....

  It was late when Jeremy, who had stuffed himself on wedding cake—which had given him a sugar high—finally wound down enough to go to bed.

  Minutes later Cutter carried Cheyenne over the threshold into their bedroom.

  “At last,” he said, bolting the door. The eagerness in his voice and in his hands sent an odd shiver through her.

  He ripped his shirt off. “I thought this day would never end.”

  “Was it so awful for you then?” she whispered, not ready to admit to her own quickening desire.

  His eyes were hot. So hot, she blushed.

  “Awful? Why do you say that?”

  “I don’t know what you’re thinking or feeling.”

  “Think this—I was in a fever to have you, to marry you,” he said, going to her and pulling her roughly to him. “Feel this.” He shoved her against the door. He was all taut muscle molded over strong bones. Slowly he bent her head back across his arm and ran his tongue along her collarbone. Then he kissed her mouth. Soon his lips moved across her face and throat with such feverish intensity that she clung to him. He licked her nipples until all she could see or feel was a haze of erotic colors and sensations. His skin was sandpaper-rough and yet satin-smooth. His mouth was hot, but his hands were cool. Somehow her own shaky fingertips found themselves in his hair. She could feel his body pressing more tightly against her. He shifted his weight, slipping his hands beneath her to cup her bottom, lifting her higher so that she could feel his hard male arousal.

  In the next instant she was drowning in pleasure.

  Through the long years of her first marriage there had been many many nights when she had lain awake in her bed alone and dreamed of Cutter making love to her in this room again.

  Had he really ever dreamed of her? Longed for her as she had longed for him? Just once?

  Only once had he said anything to indicate that he had.

  “Cheyenne. Oh, Lord. Cheyenne—”

  He swung her off her feet and carried her to the bed where he finished undressing her with hands that were swift and sure and warm against her icy skin. His fingers slipped buttons through thickly threaded loops. Then he caressed her bare flesh beneath the gauzy white fabric.

  She undressed him, too, swiftly, eagerly, kissing the hard contours of his chest where his heart pounded so violently.

  Soon their clothes, his jeans and shirt, her cotton dress, lay together in a tangled heap.

  He got into bed and lay down on top of her.

  They were married.

  She was his wife.

  The thought of it made her sigh with inexplicable longing for a true marriage.

  He gazed down at her, his harsh face tender in the dying light.

  She tried to tell herself that what they did at night was only about sex.

  But the sweetness in his eyes warred with the violence of his need. When his hard mouth closed on hers with infinite gentleness, she felt cherished.

  Not that he said he felt that way with words.

  His mouth clung to hers a long while—gently still and then more fiercely. When she was breathless from his kisses, he trailed his mouth downward, between her breasts, over her belly, between her thighs.

  With a tremor, she parted her legs.

  He was her husband now.

  She told herself that he was dangerous to her, that his being her husband meant nothing. Nothing. That theirs was merely a marriage of convenience.

  But the tenderness beneath Cutter’s passion moved her to feel new tenderness for him. Tears of joy came into her eyes as Cutter’s hands and lips and tongue devoured her and she found rapture and soul-deep meaning in his lovemaking.

  Afterward, when he had brought her to ecstasy and found his own, he lay down beside her as if he were a heavy, sated animal, his arm thrust across her waist to hold her near.

  And as they lay in the dark, their warm, sweaty bodies touching, the need to have each other again shook them with unexpected force.

  “I want to go down to the beach and make love in the surf,” she breathed into his ear.

  He brushed damp tendrils from her brow. “Where I first saw you, where you saved me,” he said softly, surprising her for he spoke as if that were a cherished memory.

  “Why did you marry me?” she asked.

  “I wanted you,” he replied. “I couldn’t stop myself. Do you understand? I had to have you. Even if you really are some sort of magical witch who can destroy me.”

  His words crushed her.

  The water, which was washed with moonlight, was cold when they raced hand in hand into the surf. He sank to his knees in the splashing water and then lay looking up at her for a moment before pulling her down in the silvery froth on top of him. Soon they were so hot and eager, the coldness of the water didn’t matter.

  A wave crashed over them.

  Then another, splashing them with liquid icy diamonds. More waves.

  But their bodies, which were locked together, rose and fell in the dark swirls of shimmering wetness.

  Afterward he dried her with a warm towel.

  Laughing, they ran back to the house.

  They showered together. Slept together.

  And awoke together.

  But it was different in the morning.

  Her wedding bouquet had completely withered. As had all the flowers on the island.

  T
he incredible closeness she had felt for him when the island lay bathed in warm moonlight dissolved in the first cold rays of the dawn. Guiltily she remembered her mother and his refusals and was warier of a man who could make love to her with such passion and refuse such a request.

  As he was wary of her.

  Nor could she forget that he had abandoned her when she’d been pregnant.

  He, too, had his own demons and was grim-faced over matters that he did not confide. With little more than a brief kiss and an uncertain glance toward the other, they arose and got dressed.

  Thus, it seemed that their life together was divided into two worlds. Their nights held fierce, erotic pleasure and incredible closeness; their days awkward estrangement and moody silences. And every morning a door seemed to seal between these two worlds.

  During their week-long honeymoon Cheyenne noticed the many morning glories and evening primroses on the island. Such flowers reminded Cheyenne of her marriage since they opened their blooms by night and reached full beauty at dawn. But once their fragile petals were touched by the morning sun, they began to wither.

  Every night Cheyenne would gather armfuls of morning glories and evening primroses. She would place them in a vase by her window. Every morning she would awaken to find the glorious yellow flowers with their thin-petaled blossoms as dead as her husband’s night passion.

  Still, every evening she would race to the dunes right before dusk and pick armfuls of these flowers and then run back to the house where Cutter was waiting eagerly for her.

  On the final afternoon of their honeymoon, O’Connor arrived by private plane, bringing the usual mail along with a wedding present that had been hand-delivered to her mansion in Houston. Cheyenne wondered who could have sent a present since none of her friends knew of her marriage.

  The lavishly wrapped box with her name on it was tied with a wide, white satin ribbon.

  Jeremy ran up just as Cheyenne set it on a table and tore away the glossy paper. Jeremy snatched off the lid, and lifted out a card taped to the top of the tissue paper.

  Just as she read the bold black scrawl, Cutter burst into the room, his arms full of wild dune flowers that instantly began to wither.