Desire's Golden Dreams (14 page)

“Perfect for what, for who? I hope you don’t mean for me.” Wade stood and walked slowly around the settee, holding on to its wooden frame for support to his knee. “I can’t rope or plow or plant a plot from a horse, which is the only way I can get around.” He slammed his hand against the wood. “What would I do with a ranch?”

Hannah plumped up the pillows his head had rested on before he rose. “Actually that’s not completely true, Wade. You can sit behind a team to plow and fertilize a meadow.”

Brady took up the cause. “Every ranch needs a boss. You know that. We have money enough to hire people to do whatever you can’t or don’t want to do yourself.”

Wade reached for his cane and used it to limp to the bedroom. He stomped to the wardrobe and pulled off his pants holding on to a shelf. “I want to fuck. Are you joining us, Brady?”

Resigned, Hannah slipped out of her own dress and slip and helped Wade with his shirt before removing her stockings and garters. She avoided Brady’s stare, but felt it all the same. He was ready to burst out at Wade and she was determined not to let them argue.

When Wade was naked, he limped to the bed and sat on the edge. “I could take a look at the place, I guess. How many acres?”

Brady settled in a chair as his friend scratched his head, his chin on his chest. Hannah held her breath as she removed her bandeau and bloomers. Please let him take an interest, she prayed, then joined Wade on the bed.

“I guess I could see to everything running smoothly from the back of a horse. How many acres, Brady?”

“Right now only about ten thou, but lots of room to access more if you want.”

“You going to help me run it?”

“Only when you need me and that won’t be much once we hire the hands. This will be your project.”

At last Wade smiled and Hannah exhaled. She kept her voice upbeat and positive. “It would be a great place for the children during school vacations. I intend for them to attend a private school here in San Francisco once Joel is old enough. And Princess has her music lessons and ballet here. But for vacations and summers, a ranch will be ideal. It will give them work to do and a practical education.”

Wade gave her a stern look. “So, you’re not planning to live with me if I buy this ranch? I’m being put out to pasture where a cripple belongs.”

Hannah placed her hands on her hips, her fury getting the best of her. “Dammit, Wade, nobody is trying to get rid of you. And you are not crippled. You have a bit of a limp that will get better over time. All we want is your happiness.” She slipped under the covers. “Of course I will live with you. Sometimes at the ranch, other times, here. You won’t need to be at the ranch every minute. You’ll stay here when you can or travel back and forth for the children’s sake. The distance is not a problem except during peak times for the ranch or for business here. We’ll work it out.”

“I’m not saying I’ll do it, but I’ll look the place over tomorrow.” He threw the covers aside and held Hannah. “Now let’s get back to doing what we do best. Joining us, Brady?”

“You bet.” Brady shucked himself free of clothes and lay on the other side of Hannah from Wade. “What’s your pleasure tonight, ma’am?”

“I want all three of us connected in love tonight on the eve of our new venture.”

The men petted her and took turns kissing her until she cried out, “Somebody fuck me. I’m about to burst.” Brady lay flat and she straddled him, sighing as she slid down on his prodigious cock.

Wade caressed her bottom and inserted two fingers loaded with cream. She leaned her chest onto Brady, giving Wade access to her ass and he slid in slowly, tantalizing her.

“Oh, I love this so much. Stop playing, Wade, and get serious. Ram me hard.”

He pulled out and plunged hard and fast making her gasp. “That’s the way I like it.” She bounced up and down on Brady as he held her hips and sucked her nipples. After all these years of being together, they had the rhythm synchronized.

Wade shouted out his release first and slapped her ass as he withdrew. Hannah began her orgasm with the slap. Wade slapped harder and she responded by screaming her joy loud enough to rattle the windows. Brady pumped her hard once she came and quietly whispered his love in her ear. At last they were what they’d been at the beginning, a wife and her husbands making plans for the future and fucking as one entity.

They bathed and opened a bottle of wine, drinking half and licking half from each other’s bodies. They went to bed for one more round where Wade and Brady changed positions. For the first time in long months, they slept three in the bed and awakened happier than they had been in months. They had one more round of lovemaking before the three of them took the horse and carriage out to inspect the ranch property.

Wade became enthused about something for the first time since returning from his stint in the war. They came to an agreement with the property owner on the spot. Hannah made all the arrangements in the next few days and as soon as the deed was signed, threw herself into designing the ranch house according to specifications that would disguise their family’s lifestyle.

Wade interviewed cowboys, field hands, cooks, housekeepers, and local teenagers who wanted after-school jobs. Hannah was in on all final decisions when it came to household staff, but other than that she was grateful to have Wade absorbed in a project, healing and happy again. Princess loved having a place to corral her pony with room to let him roam. Peaches liked to run and the city home had limited space for that. The big horses could climb the foothills, places where the pony could not go.

Within the year, the ranch was running smoothly and had been expanded to include much of the neighboring land. Because of their experiences with gold, they made certain all mineral rights were legally theirs, although they had no intention of digging for gold or ore of any kind.

Idylls don’t last long, however, and soon Hannah became faced with another dilemma. She and Brady became closer as Wade spent more time at the ranch and Brady’s lessons had expanded to reading literature that Hannah loved so much. Their evenings were often spent reading to each other in a private library next to the master bedroom and discussing their thoughts on a myriad of subjects. Since Rocco left, Hannah had missed the intellectual discussions she’d had with him.

Brady became discontented in one area of his life. He loved baby Joel and he and Princess were closer than most biological fathers and daughters, closer than Wade and Princess. As much as he adored the children, Brady wanted a child of his own blood and he wanted Hannah to bear it. He had mentioned it a few times in an off-hand way.

Hannah surmised his comments about having her bear a child of his loins was a deep-seated craving of his. She sympathized, but didn’t get into a serious discussion of the idea because she needed to think long and hard over such a decision. This was not the bargain the three of them made the first night of their marriage in Plantsville. She understood Brady’s feelings, however, and wanted another child so that Joel would not be a loner as Princess had been for twelve years.

One night as they sat in the library after the children had been put to bed and the house was quiet, Hannah broached the subject.

“In the very beginning of our marriage, you agreed to my stipulation that all children from my womb would have one father and the father would be my legal husband, Wade.”

Brady paced the room, his fist clenching and unclenching. “Perhaps you don’t want to have my child. Is that it?”

“I would love to have your child. I’ve always wanted a houseful of kids and it doesn’t seem likely with Wade. It seems a miracle we’ve managed two and the second pregnancy was much too long in coming.” She wrapped her arms around Brady to stop his agitated pacing.

Hannah gazed up at him and searched his eyes for several seconds. “I may have a solution. We’d have to discuss this with Wade first and I’m so afraid to upset him after he’s finally regained his natural optimism. What if he goes back into that morass of self-pity he was in a year ago?”

Brady pulled her close and kissed her forehead. “I understand, I do. Damn, I love you so much and I want my own child so much. I could never sleep with anyone else and, as much as I love Princess, I can’t be happy as things are now.”

“You have my blessing if you wish to marry another and begin your own family as Rocco has. It’s only natural to want that.”

Brady held her at arm’s length and peered into her eyes. “I could no more woo another woman than I could swim the English Channel. You are and always will be the only woman in my life—other than Princess, of course.”

“I want your baby, too. I simply can’t see any easy way to do it and remain a part of polite society.”

“I don’t give a rat’s ass for polite society.”

“I don’t either, but I do care about the children and what people think and say about them. They’d be ostracized right along with us.”

“Of course you’re right. I’m being emotional and not thinking clearly.” Brady dropped into an easy chair, head in hands.

“It would take a lot of planning, but I can see one way.”

Brady raised his head and the hope in his eyes and on his face nearly broke Hannah’s heart. He must have been brooding about this for a long time before raising the subject.

“What is it, Hannah?”

“You’d have to marry someone else.”

He leaned his head back and closed his eyes. “No, never. I couldn’t do it and I don’t want a child with anyone else.”

“Hear me out.” Hannah knelt at the side of his chair. “You’d be married to someone else, but I would bear your child as if it were Wade’s. We would announce her pregnancy but it would really be mine. Then when I began to show, usually for me not until five or six months in, we’d invent excuses why your wife could not leave the house since her condition was perilous. I would have to stay with her as her closest friend and for the last month, the three of us would go abroad or maybe only to New York to supposedly consult with specialists.”

“Hannah, you are positively devious. I believe I’ll have to spank you tonight for having such wicked thoughts.” He laughed. He stood and turned away. “Forget it, love. What woman would go along with such a scheme?”

“As a matter of fact, I have someone in mind.” She pushed him back into the chair. “I knew you wanted this and I’ve been thinking it out for weeks. My stumbling block is Wade.”

“I agree. Hitting him with this now might be bad for him.”

“Perhaps we should try fucking without condoms for a few weeks to see if it happens before we mention it to Wade. The lack of pregnancies may be my fault. I may not be as fertile as I’d like.”

Brady pushed out of the chair and walked to the window and back. “It seems a bit underhanded, but you have a point. Why borrow trouble, if it’s never to be.”

“Now, that’s settled, how about the spanking I deserve?”

“Yes, you must be taught a lesson.” Brady scooped her up and carried her out of their private library and into the master bedroom.

He slowly and carefully undressed her, kissing every body part as it was revealed. His “I love you” echoed hers. She stripped him in the same solemn way and they lay in each other’s arms for several minutes before he mounted her with no sheath barring his seed from her womb. Their coming together was reverent and more satisfying than all the wild sex they’d had in the past.

He deposited his seed in her womb twice more that night and twice more as dawn rose. She hadn’t had to suck him up to readiness even once and he hadn’t had to lick or finger her to completion. They enjoyed each other’s bodies and would have stayed in bed and fucked all morning if two children were not expecting them in the other wing of the mansion.

They could barely keep their hands off each other during breakfast with the children. Hannah pawed his cock through his pants under cover of the tablecloth and he sucked her nipple when Princess left the room to look for a painting she’d made for her mother.

Hannah adjusted her clothing in time to reprimand Princess for charging into the room in a most un-ladylike fashion. Hannah gushed over her daughter’s rendering of the orange tree outside the nursery window. Soon the nurse took Joel for an outing in the carriage with Princess and her nanny in tow. They were going bird-watching this morning to Hannah and Brady’s delight.

The couple rushed upstairs tearing off clothes as they went. Hannah fished the small dildo out from a secret drawer. She loved the feel of a cock up her ass and Brady, freed at last of condoms, wanted only to fuck her pussy.

He held her bottom in his hands as he fucked and with thumb pushes managed to pulse the dildo in deep and then release the pressure in rhythm with the thrusts of his cock into her pussy. Hannah murmured her enjoyment into his ear. They held back their climaxes for as long as they could in order to enjoy the sensations they both felt with Brady’s manipulation of the dildo.

Once they had exhausted themselves on each other, they bathed together and reluctantly went separate ways to fulfill very different duties in the afternoon. Hannah had real estate business to conduct and Brady went to the wharf to check out ships.

That evening a ranch hand came riding up all dusty and sweaty as Brady and Hannah watched Princess put her pony through its paces. The rider delivered a note saying Wade would arrive the next evening and would be staying in town for a couple of days.