Only Mine (o-2) by Elizabeth Lowell

Author:Elizabeth Lowell [Lowell, Elizabeth]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: love_history
ISBN: 0380763397
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 1992-10-24T04:00:00+00:00

10

«Wolfe, I can’t believe it’s really you! Caleb said the high passes were buried in snow after the last storm.»

Willow’s husky contralto cry made Jessica’s lips flatten into an unhappy line. She should have expected the bloody paragon to have a beautiful voice. Rather grimly, Jessica waited to see what the paragon looked like, but even when Willow stepped from the house, she was still concealed by the dense shadows of the porch.

«It’s me, all right,» Wolfe said, smiling as he dismounted and crossed the ground with long strides to give Willow a hug. «I’ve brought you a present.»

«Seeing you is present enough,» she said, laughing and holding out her arms.

The clear affection in Willow’s voice and face was matched by Wolfe as he folded Willow close in a gentlebearhug. A dark combination of jealousy and despair snaked through Jessica, shaking her, for she had believed she could no longer be touched by anything but the black wind whispering to her of nightmares that had been reborn in daylight, and memories that refused to remain forgotten.

I would have had a chance with Wolfe but for the bloody paragon. She is destroying me as surely as slow poison.

Jessica stared into the shadow of the porch, but could see nothing of Willow except slender arms wrapped around Wolfe’s waist.

She’ll be beautiful, ofcourse, Jessicathoughtbitterly.Asbeautiful as this huge meadow and as perfect as those mountains crowned with ice.

Unhappily, Jessica glanced around, measuring the glory of the mountain ranch against the darkness that was condensing relentlessly in her soul, draining color from her life as surely as the slow condensation of night would drain color from the day.

«Come and meet your present,» Wolfe said, smiling down at Willow as he released her.

«Meet a present?»

«Ummm.»

The purring sound of pleasure Wolfe made was a steel-tipped whip flaying Jessica’s raw emotions. She had thought she could feel no greater rage, no greater despair, than she had felt the day she had ridden over the Great Divide.

She had been wrong. She seemed to make a habit of being wrong where Wolfe was concerned.

May the bloody paragon writhe in Hell.

Then Willow stepped into the bright sunlight and Jessica’s breath came in with a harsh sound. The paragon wouldn’t have to wait for Hell. It had already sunk its unsheathed claws deeply in her body. Willow was in the last stage of pregnancy, frankly round with the babe that would tear her apart trying to be born.

Dear God, help her in her time of need.

The silent, involuntary prayer that vibrated through Jessica was deeper and more powerful than her jealousy. She could take no pleasure in the agony that awaited Willow in childbed. Nor could she hate Willow any longer. Jessica could feel only a terrible empathy with the girl whose fate was to writhe and scream for mercy that never came, a wife’s endless cycle of male rutting and childbed’s torture; and over all, around all, consuming all was the black wind and the disbelieving shriek of the newly damned.

The

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