Willow’s voice called softly from the fire. «Caleb? Matt? Is something wrong with the horses?»

«They’re fine, honey,» Caleb called in return.

«Are you too tired to play the harmonica? Matt has a wonderful voice.»

«I’ll be glad to play for you.»

Reno gave Caleb a glittering look of frustration and said in a low voice, «When she’s asleep, we’ll talk.»

«Count on it.»

Caleb brushed past Reno and walked toward the tiny fire and the girl who stood smiling and holding out her hands, watching him with a combination of worry and relief in her eyes. She was uneasy whenever her brother and Caleb were alone.

«Are you sure you aren’t too tired?» Willow asked Caleb.

He brushed a quick, fierce kiss over her lips. «I’m never too tired to please you.»

Willow clung to him and whispered hurriedly, «Matt means well. Please don’t be angry.»

After a gentle squeeze, Caleb released Willow and sat a few feet back from the fire. Before she could say anything else, the haunting notes of an old ballad lifted softly above the flames, a song telling of a young girl’s certainty that she had discovered the love of her life.

After the first few seconds, Caleb faltered. He hadn’t known what he was going to play until he heard the notes. His heart contracted at the cruel trick his mind had played. The song had been one of Rebecca’s favorites, for the words told of a girl newly in love and thinking of the future that soon would be hers.

I know where I’m going.

I know who’s going with me.

Willow and Matt sang a harmony that was all the sweeter for its simplicity. The beauty of Willow’s voice surprised Caleb, for she had never sung when he played the harmonica in the valley. She had simply curled up next to him and stared into the fire with a dreamy smile of pleasure on her lips.

The next song Caleb played was also a ballad of love, but the woman walked away, leaving the man to face a future that held nothing of children or a woman’s softness. In the third ballad it was the man who was inconstant, the woman who mourned. Without hesitation, Reno and Willow sang each song, their voices blending effortlessly, for the Moran family had spent many a cold winter night singing in front of a fire.

But both sister and brother gradually stopped singing halfway through the fourth song, the lament of a man torn between duty and love, damned no matter which way he turned. The harmonica’s supple voice wept over choices in chords no human voice could match.

Willow listened and felt chills coursing over her skin. She had heard the song many times before, had sung it often herself as a girl, and she had smiled, for the tragic words only made her own life more sweet by contrast. But this time when the final note shivered into silence, there was no laughter in her. Tears glistened in Willow’s eyelashes and made thin silver trails down her cheeks.

Silently, Caleb stood and held out his hand to her. She stood and took it without a word. Relief coursed through him. Only then did he realize how afraid he had been that Willow wouldn’t come to him in the presence of her brother.

«Good night, Matt,» Willow said.

Reno nodded curtly, for he didn’t trust himself to speak. If he hadn’t seen the naked love in Willow’s eyes when she looked at Caleb, Reno would have gone for the other man’s throat. But the love was there beyond any doubt. It might enrage Reno that Willow was no longer innocent, but there was nothing he could do to change it. Nor did he want to destroy her happiness, for there had been little of it for her in the past years.

Abruptly, Reno had some sympathy for the man in the ballad, caught between duty and love. Reno, too, was between a rock and a hard place, nowhere to turn, no comfort possible.

Caleb stood by the bed he had made and listened for a long moment. He heard no sound behind them. Reno was a man of his word — he wouldn’t force the issue until after Willow was asleep.

«It’s all right,» Willow said as she took off her boots and jacket and slid beneath the blankets. «Matt isn’t pleased, but he accepted it.»

«I don’t think so, little one,» Caleb said as he stretched out beneath the blankets.

But when Willow would have spoken, he took her mouth in a possession that was as gentle as it was complete. When he finally lifted his head, it was only to return again and again, as though she was a spring and he was a man who had spent too long without water.

«Caleb,» she whispered, trembling. «What is it? What’s wrong?»

His only answer was another haunting kiss, then another, until Willow forgot the question. She could feel only the restraint and hunger warring for control of Caleb’s body. He held her lightly, sheltering her rather than demanding anything of her. With every kiss he knew he should stop. He didn’t want Reno looking at Willow in the morning, knowing she had coupled with Caleb the night before. He didn’t want Willow shamed.

Yet he wanted her more than he ever had before.

Finally, Caleb lifted his head a fraction, just enough so that he could talk without losing contact with Willow’s lips. «We should sleep.»

«Sooner or later, yes.»

«Willow,» Caleb whispered, sliding his hands down her body, wanting her too much to deny himself. «Do you want me?»

«Yes,» she breathed into his mouth. «I’ll always want you, Caleb. I love you.»

Willow’s words ended in a soft, low sound of pleasure as Caleb claimed her mouth once more. Despite the hard urgency she felt in his body, the kiss was tender, slow, a sweet consummation that foreshadowed the deeper joining to come. His hands moved over her, taking away clothes, bringing the greater warmth of his palms caressing her. It was the same for his own body, his own clothes pushed away by her hands, her skin hot and smooth against his.

Familiar, ever-new sensations whispered through Willow, the exciting heat of Caleb’s kiss, the silken rasp of his beard against her thighs, the exquisite caresses within her, his mouth consuming her. When he asked for her melting passion, she gave it, bathing both of them in the fire he called from her with each touch, each intimate glide of tongue and fingertips. When she could bear no more, she gave herself to ecstasy. He put his hand over her mouth, stilling her small wild cries of completion.

Finally Caleb lifted his palm, kissing Willow gently but making no move to join his body with hers.

«Caleb,» Willow whispered. «Don’t you want me?»

«I —»

His breath broke as Willow’s hands found him and held him as gently captive as she herself had been held.

«You always surprise me,» she whispered, gliding down his length. «So smooth. So hard.»

«And you so soft.» His fingertips caressed her sultry, responsive flesh, loving her. «I want you, Willow. More eachtime. Iwant you.»

Shivering with pleasure, Willow watched the moonlit face of the man she loved as he took the gift of her body, giving his own in return until they were fully joined.

«Better each time,» Caleb whispered.

With each slow movement he felt the fine shivering of his lover, a trembling, radiating anticipation that was also his own. He felt her warm breath against his mouth, tasted her sweet kiss, saw her eyes watching him in a silver haze of passion, and sensed the tension gathering in her body once more. Despite the cruel claws of need raking him, he moved gently inside her, rocking slowly, wanting to give her more pleasure than she had ever known in his embrace.

The soft sounds Willow made went no farther than Caleb’s mouth as sheunravelled beneath him, captive to ecstasy once more. He continued moving slowly, rocking, caressing her with his whole body, loving her gently, relentlessly, sending streamers of fire radiating up through flesh that was still shivering from a tender storm of fulfillment.

«Caleb,» she whispered. «I —» Her back arched as pleasure speared through her.