The warmth of the sun on my bare arms, after months of long sleeves, felt like a caress. For a few minutes, I just blissed out at the sensation.
Our horses' hooves kept clopping across the grassy dirt.
Only after several slow, glorious breaths, did I glance toward my silent spouse.
Jacob's stare said everything I could have wanted--as did the way his buckskin mare was drifting to a slow stop, confused by the lack of guidance coming from his reins. My my my, I thought, heady with my own power. He was going to ruin that horse, giving her her head.
My sternum wasn't even showing--just some neck and gloriously bare arms. But I guess it's all relative. I was probably channeling an 1878 Playboy centerfold.
Me!
I caught my lower lip between my teeth, smiled, and started unlacing the front of my camisole. My breasts had gotten significantly more impressive since pregnancy, and I kind of liked showing them off.
Jacob looked away so quickly, I could swear I heard his neck crack. He jerkily urged his mare ahead.
I nudged Boy ahead with my heel, to ride abreast of my husband.
Or, you know, a'limb.
"Is something wrong, Mr. Garrison?" I sing-songed.
His back got stiffer. At the risk of being crude, I don't think his back was alone in that. But he said nothing until we reached the first of the trees that bordered the Platte's north bank.
At that point, Jacob dismounted with surprising speed, tossed his mare's reins over the limb--or arm--of a scrub tree, and started to unsaddle.
"We're not at the river yet," I protested.
"Nope," he said, tightly.
"Why not?"
Putting his saddle aside, he spread the mare's saddle blanket across the ground, then shrugged off his coat and spread it out too, creating a kind of pallet. Oh....
My breath fell short in shock and anticipation.
Oh!
"Because I married myself a Jezebel," he explained gruffly. He reached for Boy's reins first, to tie him. Then he opened his arms for me.
Full disclosure? I really hadn't stripped to seduce him. I really had stripped to feel the sun and the air on my skin. Seduction was just an added bonus. But now, at the intense gleam in Jacob's gray eyes, I started feeling a whole lot more than sun on my skin. Night feelings. I happily dismounted from my side saddle and into his arms--
And he slung me over his shoulder, like a sack of grain, for the very brief walk to his impromptu bed.
"Hey!" I protested. At least it gave me a nice view of his ass under his pants, as I hung halfway down his back. I suspected it gave him a nice few of mine, too. "If you're going to carry me, do it the right way!"
"Less temptation," he explained. But soon enough, he'd rolled me back over his shoulder and into his arms so that I dropped down past his chest and down--
I squeaked before he checked my descent, so deliberately close to the ground that my hair caught in the weeds. Now we were face to face, his eyes scorching me.
In the daytime?! Delighted, I wrapped my bare arms over his shoulders and used them to draw myself up, high enough to glance a kiss across the side of his mouth before gravity pulled me back into place.
I loved watching his reaction, a surprised flick of his gaze down to my face, a vulnerable break in his determination, there and gone, like one of his smiles. He dropped to his knees, laid me gently onto the pallet, and then levered over me. His mouth covered mine, hard and hungry. His body covered mine, pressing and ready.
A few birds complained--or just commented--in the whispering trees above us.
God, but I loved kissing him like this. I filled my hands with palmfuls of shirt across his hard, broad back and happily kissed him in return. I loved the way he pillowed my head with one hand. I loved the scratch of his beard on my chin, on my cheek. I loved the taste of him, coffee and... something woodsy. Grass, I think.
Surely someone who kissed me like this loved me at least a little, didn't he? I spread my legs for more comfort under his weight and basked as much in his attention as I had basked in the air on my skin.
Then Jacob's free hand, the one not cupping my head, began to catch and move handfuls--and handfuls and handfuls--of skirt and petticoat, along with occasional handfuls of grass that got in the way. That's when I fully appreciated just how accelerated his plan was.
I was pretty much ready for him. But I tried to grab his wrist, through too many layers, as he reached my drawers and started tugging at random ties. "Whoa there, cowboy!"
He went completely still and repeated--challenged-- "Whoa."
Oh, so he could compliment me with horse and cow comparisons, and I couldn't tell him to whoa? Luckily for him, I was already squirmy crazy enthusiastic about our plans. But still.
"You'll tear it," I warned, unwrapping my arms to dig under (and under, and under) my petticoats on my own. "And I need my boots off this time. And you need to lose the shirt and the gun belt. Deal?"
For a long moment he didn't move, like a frozen computer screen. Then something must have clicked, because he sat back on his booted heels long enough to thumb his suspenders down to hang off his hips. He yanked his shirt up over his head, knocking off his forgotten hat in the process.
That left his hair adorably messy.
Undoing the drawstrings of my drawers, I wriggled them down almost to my knees--quite a feat under all that frothy under-skirting. Jacob took over from there, tugging off my boots first, then stripping away the great-great-granny panties.
His faded, worn union suit molded the muscles of his chest and arms in a downright artistic way as he worked.
Still back on his heels, he unbuckled his gun belt and lay it, gun and all, in the grass by my head. Flat on my back, looking up, I nearly finished unlacing the front of my camisole for him.
Fumbling at his straining pants, he asked, "Any further requests, Mrs. Garrison." As if I might complain that the sun wasn't positioned right, or I wanted a different kind of tree to shelter us.
"Nope." And--there! My camisole fell open. For once, I felt glad bras hadn't been invented yet, but I barely took a moment to appreciate how the tree-filtered sunshine felt on my naked breasts. I half wished Jacob had unbuttoned his union suit, but not enough to slow us down.
"Just you, Mr. Garrison." I reached up for him, for his hard muscles and his soft underwear and his scratchy beard--
He dropped back onto me, finishing with his fly and navigating the petticoats until he could--
Yes! With the barest incursion of his knuckles between my legs, either adjusting himself or testing my readiness or both, Jacob shoved into me.
We both caught our breath at the delicious sensation of it.
We'd been screwing like bunnies all week, but it still kind of surprised me how, well, how much of him there was. I'm not saying my husband was hung like a bull, not that I would really know. But the sudden, delicious intrusion of him, filling me and owning me and....
Damn, I'd lucked out.
His eyes had fallen closed at the ecstasy of that first thrust. Now he opened them and searched my face, so very close to his, checking to make sure I was okay. I smiled and spread my flying arms wide, then loosely wrapped them around his neck again.
He grinned back, which turned his craggy face beautiful--and he began to ride.
My husband, who spent half his life on horseback, had powerful thighs, perfect balance, and instinctive rhythm. I mostly just had to hold my ground, so I hooked my ankles just beneath his butt, over his pants, and simply held on.
More. Then more. He was heavy, and hard, and a little rough, and maybe this should have hurt but God it didn't. His breath came out in gasps, and mine in moans. I spread my arms again, letting Jacob take over completely, and I grabbed unseen handfuls of grass like handles to the earth.
Somehow a mix of maybe too much and not nearly enough resolved itself into so very much just right. When I gasped out the command, "Kiss," Jacob's lips descended to mine again, his kiss inelegant but enthusiastic as he rocked and surged on top of me.
"Jacob... Jacob...." When had I started purring, pleading, singing his name over and over? I needed... needed.... "Jacob!"
He braced himself upward, just enough to stare down at me--and, I'm pretty sure, at my naked pregnancy-breasts too.
I trailed my fingernails through his beard, drawing his mouth back to mine. It's not like I'd wanted to say anything except his name. "Jacob...."
"Elizabeth," he whispered against my lips. That's what brought me to full orgasm--my name. Everything in me flew into delicious bits that he somehow managed to hold together under his crushing weight until--
Dropping his face against my shoulder, he shuddered onto me, into me. His weight covered me now, heavy and sweaty and real....
And then we were done. Kind of. Mostly. We both gasped for breath as my husband eventually slid out of me and rolled off of me into the grass, his eyes now closed, his arms draped across my naked ribs.
I wasn't about to let him get that far, so I climbed halfway onto him before I collapsed as well. This way, I could lie on his strong chest, my arms folded, my chin on my hands, and just watch him.
Outdoor sex.
My day-doings versus night-doings husband had given me mid-morning, outdoor sex. I would never again have to be embarrassed on this question during another game of Never Have I Ever. Unusual location? Yeah, I did it in the grass by a river, with an old-time cowboy. You?
But he wasn't just a cowboy. And this hadn't just been sex.
Bugs buzzed, and birds called, and the horses chomped grass nearby, wholly uninterested in our human shenanigans.
Eventually bored, I started unbuttoning his union suit. Jacob has a gorgeous chest, pecs and abs sculpted by hard work, covered in a masculine brown hair that now caught the tree-filtered sun in glints of gold. I pet the hair, and kissed his chest.
When that didn't pull him out of his satisfied trance, I drew one of my petticoat-impeded knees over his thigh and upward....
Jacob's eyes slowly opened.
"Ain't you done?" He asked it almost plaintively, and at first I thought--hadn't he enjoyed himself? But he had to... I mean, he would have....
Then I caught the gleam of mischief in his gray eyes, and I reared up to smack his soft, cotton-covered chest. "Mean!"
With a laugh, he pulled me all the way on top of him and tickled me! I shrieked, and tickled him back. He rolled me the rest of the way back onto the pallet, winning through size and strength, and his ungainly grin creased his face and his eyes laughed down at me, and we were in love.
I was in love, anyway.
I suspected he was too. Someday, he might even realize it.
"Ain't how I planned the mornin'," he told me.
"Are you disappointed?"
"Not hardly." But he rolled off me, tucked himself back into his pants, and sat back on his heels. "Still got that river to visit."
I let him pull me into a sitting position. "Does it help that I'm your Jezebel of a wife?"
"It does."
"Thank you for taking time off trail bossing to spend the morning with me."
"I will endure the hardship," he assured me.
"Martyr," I accused, teasing.
"Not hardly." But he did tear his gaze away from my nakedness to briefly eye the sky over our little oasis. "Mornin' won't last."
But it didn't have to last.
I felt sure we'd get plenty of them.
Bathing in the Platte brought its own delight, despite that Jacob insisted we wear our underwear. He found the best, least muddy channel he could near our north bank, but we had to cross two shallower, muddier channels and two little, lozenge-shaped islands to get to it. I quickly saw what he'd warned me of, that this wouldn't make for very good clothes-washing water. Wherever we stepped brought up clouds of dirt and sand that didn't leave my white underwear detergent-commercial bright. But with the help of my friend Dr. Maddie's hair soap--shampoo hadn't been invented yet, can you imagine?--I made it work.
I shampooed Jacob's hair, too, when he didn't say no, and our soap doubled as body wash. It felt wonderful to be full-body, hair-and-all clean!
Best of all, I got to play in the water. Up to my neck deep, in some places! Much as I'd been trying not to think about my old future, for fear of more slipping dreams, I'd sure missed swimming pools and Lake Michigan. I don't think I'd fully submerged myself in water since Benj took me to a swimming hole, a few weeks north of Dodge City.
I could tell my swimming made Jacob nervous. He brought his lariat in with us, I think to rope me if I got swept away, but it really wasn't that kind of current. I reassured him I could handle myself, and I did.
I didn't even do any underwater swimming, so as not to worry him.
I did back-float, though--looping his rope under my arms while he held it, to keep me from even floating a short distance off. The river's gentle draw caressed all my cares and concerns away, and the sunshine on my clean, bare skin fortified me, and my body felt amazing after all the sex I'd been getting....
Heaven. I'd traveled through time and found heaven.
Eventually, I waded back to where Jacob stood, manning his rope in the shallows. In fact, I used the rope to pull myself through the water, closer and closer to him, like a friendly tug-of-war with a much better end. His hair had started to dry already, clean and fluffy. His cleaner, soaking-wet long johns gaped open in front to show off his beautiful, beautiful chest, and they otherwise clung to every bit of him, leaving nothing to the imagination. Once I got close enough, I opened my arms and he drew me the rest of the way up against him, a delicious meeting of cool and warmth, of water and flesh and sunshine. We kissed, deep and lazy.
"I love you," I whispered up at him, once our lips eventually drew apart. I rested my chin on his breastbone, which forced an extreme curve to my neck and back but had the benefit of letting me look up at him without extra effort.
His grey, heavy-lidded eyes warmed down at me, and he drew a breath--
And then his head came up sharply, and he changed whatever he'd been about to say to a brusque, "Get to shore. Now."
"Why?" But I started wading to the shore even as I questioned him, because he was the Boss, and he knew this place and this time, and I was no idiot.
He followed me by walking backwards at first, keeping himself between me and most of the river. "Get!"
I was getting! But apparently, I wasn't getting quickly enough--wading not being conducive to speed--because he turned around, grabbed me by the waist and half hauled me across the last silty channel of my beautiful, braided North Platte. He threw me -- literally threw me -- into the high grass on the bank, behind a scrubby bush. I felt the burn of a scraped knee. "Stay down and stay quiet!"
Damned right, I wanted to protest. But I stayed down and stayed quiet. Quiet enough to recognize, as he obviously already had, the sound of riders.
A lot of riders approached the south bank--the Oregon Trail side, of the river. Valley Boy and Jacob's mare, unsaddled and hitched to a sapling, whickered a greeting.
"Hold there!" commanded a deep voice from the direction of the riders. "You!"
Jacob turned to face the voice but otherwise held, standing still. He even spread his arms to show whoever-it-was that he posed no threat. He wasn't even wholly dressed, much less armed. The closest thing he had to a weapon was the coil of rope in his hand.
His rifle and his gun belt lay with our clothes, maybe fifteen feet from me, water not being good for guns.
I braced myself up with my arms, just far enough to peek out from amidst the weeds and around the back of my husband's wet, underwear-wrapped legs and his vulnerable, bare feet.
I went cold, despite that the morning had turned full-August hot.
Across the North Platte--a river that could easily be forded on horseback--sat about a dozen mounted, blue-coated Army soldiers.
"You!" shouted the one who seemed to be in charge. "Come here."
"Don't--" started Jacob, then stopped his answer, set his shoulders, and started wading. I was almost certain he'd meant to respond something like, I don't work for you or You don't give me orders.
Then he must have realized that, if any of the soldiers crossed the river, they would more likely see me, and he clearly didn't want anybody seeing me. At least, not in my underwear.
I thought about that gun belt, and that rifle scabbard, under three me-lengths away, and wondered if I could crawl to them without being seen. I was pretty sure I could not. The grass tended to move when I moved.
Also, what would I do if I got them? I couldn't shoot soldiers! I mean--not only shouldn't I, but I'm a terrible shot. I couldn't. Unless it was point blank.
You may be thinking, why would I immediately see U.S. soldiers as a threat? It's because the last few times I'd met them, they had been. Soldiers had thrown me into the brig for prostitution, when all I'd done wrong was wear pants and choose the wrong friends--what would being half-dressed get me? And then when Jacob came to get me, some of the soldiers had yelled threats and accusations at him, because he'd fought for the South.
As previously mentioned, I'm a proud Yankee, Illinois born and raised. But now I was also a proud Mrs. Garrison, and I hated seeing my proud husband wading deeper into the river, answering the summons of anybody.
Anybody but me, that is.
My husband who couldn't swim. Crap!
I'm not sure I've ever felt so intensely pulled in two different directions.
I had to go to him!
He'd told me to stay down and stay quiet.
But he hadn't known he'd have to cross the river!
But he was more likely to do something stupid if I were in immediate instead of peripheral danger.
This didn't count as something stupid?!
But I shut myself up with a firm, simple answer. No. No, this did not count as something stupid. And how did I know?
Because he was the one doing it.
Jacob waded as far as the first truly deep channel, of the various streams that braided in and out of the Platte's little islands, and stopped waist deep. He cupped his mouth and called something about, "Far as I come. Cain't swim."
A couple of the soldiers laughed, and again I considered going for the weapons. No, I wouldn't shoot anybody for laughing at Jacob, but it sure would be nice to make them take it back...
Ain't fer scarin' folks, Jacob had warned me, back when he taught me to shoot a carbine. You point it at someone, you'd best be willin' to bury him.
I stayed where I was and watched.
"What ... do you for?" called Jacob--I couldn't hear all of what he said over the sound of the river, and the fact that he faced away from me. Something about the pitch of his shoulders telegraphed that, even in deep water, he stood hipshot and casual. The United States Army was clearly wasting his time, and he had little patience with it.
How does a person do that, with just their body?
Probably it helped to have his body.
The... captain? I don't really know ranks, but let's call the guy in charge the captain. He was even harder for me to hear, because of him being all the way across the wide multi-lane river. But he shouted something about "deserters" and "anyone suspicious?"
Jacob called something about throwing a wide loop.
"Light haired," was part of the captain's much longer description.
Jacob turned his head and spat, downriver. Then he called, "Nope."
The captain insisted that the men he was hunting were "Fugitives... government."
Jacob shifted his weight to his other hip and waited for the officer to say anything of any importance. I don't think the soldiers much liked his attitude, not that I could wholly read his expression, but again--body language. I got something of a mob vibe from them, the way they exchanged looks among themselves and scowled my husband's direction. Very us against him... and he's prey.
It scared me, those looks. I began to reconsider going for the guns.
The captain gave Jacob an order, something about "send word."
Jacob shook his head, started to turn back toward me, and the captain called, "Hey, Johnny! Who's the second horse for?"
"Both mine," called Jacob, over his shoulder, and kept walking. Now that he had his back to the men--all twelve of them--he glowered toward the weeds where I lay hidden and spread one hand, reminding me to stay down.
I felt very, very glad that I hadn't emerged. I think I would have rather faced the soldiers than him, with that expression on his face. He emerged from the water, walked right past me with his awkward, cowboy walk, and headed for the horses.
Despite that this was unlikely to turn to shooting, I relaxed to see him reach the guns. But instead of picking either of them up, or dressing, or saddling the horses, Jacob sank into a crouch and set about... what was he doing?
Building a fire. As if he'd planned to spend the afternoon here, bathing and maybe having lunch.
The idea of lunch twisted in my stomach, despite that it was probably a fake lunch, just for I-was-here-first show. He started the fire with his usual slow, efficient movements--and matches--and I looked back toward the soldiers.
They continued to watch Jacob, while they watered their horses and conferred among themselves. Then, after way too long, they rode out in double formation.
Jacob didn't even look up, to see them off. But a few minutes later, he stood and called to me, also without looking, "Come out and git dressed."
"I need to rinse off this mud," I told him, pushing myself up from the weeds.
"Rinse off at camp. We're leavin'." And, with his back to me, he stepped into his pants, despite his still wet underwear. That wasn't going to feel good.
I said, "Shouldn't we let ourselves dry--"
And he spun on me.
"You do what I tell you!"
Which is when I realized he was shaking.