Always Dakota - Debbie Macomber [50]
In the very beginning, she hadn’t been sure what to expect from married life. Still wasn’t. However, Christmas had turned out to be a wonderful day. Since this was the first Christmas without her father, Margaret had thought the holidays would depress her. But Matt had been sensitive in unexpected ways. Instead of ignoring her father’s absence, he’d asked her questions. Before long, she was telling him about holidays from years past. Early on, some or all of her uncles had come, but eventually they’d all married and scattered throughout the country. Then it’d just been Margaret and her father. Matt had talked about his early years with his family, and she’d formed a picture of a small boy torn apart by his parents’ divorce. A couple of times she’d been tempted to shed a few tears—for both of them. Even then, her husband seemed to understand and encouraged her to vent her grief.
They’d spent Christmas Day together, just the two of them. They’d eaten a turkey dinner Sadie had left for them—reminiscent of their Thanksgiving repast. And they’d exchanged small, simple gifts. In retrospect, she was pleased they’d been alone.
Marriage to Matt was even better than Margaret could have anticipated. Clearing away any misconceptions regarding his feelings for her, or lack of them, had been a calculated risk. Confronting him the morning after their wedding could easily have backfired. Matt could have lied, could have tried to convince her of his undying devotion. But they both knew he didn’t love her. The lie would have oppressed them both.
Margaret realized she should never have proposed when she did. It’d been much too soon, but she loved Matt and needed him. Mostly, she was unwilling to wait. Without her father, she was terribly lonely. Perhaps if Matt hadn’t kissed her, she would have been more patient, but he had—and the kiss had been…incredible. So she’d taken a risk and it had paid off.
In the weeks since their wedding, their lives had fallen into a pattern of working side by side. They’d each sold off the better part of their herds rather than feed them through the winter. But that didn’t mean they could idle away their time. Most mornings they were either in the saddle or the truck, riding out to check on their breeding stock.
Matt was an experienced cattleman, and they often became involved in lengthy conversations about ranching and cattle. Margaret could hold her own in any such discussion. Matt loved listening to stories about her father and laughed with her, bringing Bernard’s memory to life in a way that made her happy rather than sad.
In the evenings, they talked over the events of the day during dinner, then played cribbage. It was a game she enjoyed, one her father had taught her. Almost every night she and Bernard had sat across from each other and counted out the cards, moving the pegs on a huge board he’d made one winter more than thirty years ago. Margaret had been gifted with good card sense; Matt, too, was an accomplished player and they were evenly matched.
Cribbage didn’t occupy the entire evening. They sometimes watched television, but not often. Matt had a program or two that he liked and so did she, but for the most part the television was off.
It seemed to her that most of their time together was spent in bed. Margaret had taken to wearing silky concoctions to entice her husband. During the day it was coveralls and flannel, but the nights were made for lace and perfume.
The physical delights of the marriage bed had turned out to be an extraordinary bonus. Margaret supposed it was natural they’d make love often, since they were newlyweds. They were both young and healthy. Although she could have asked Maddy or even Lindsay, sex was a subject she found herself oddly shy about discussing. If what they were doing was too much or not enough—if the intensity and frequency of their love life wasn’t “normal” or “average”—she didn’t want to know, because