Alana

by Barrie, Monica

  “Don’t throw away what Alana is giving you, Jason. Accept it and live with it. Make something of your life together.”

  Jason stared at Rafe, his eyes open and clear. “I have nothing to use to make a life.”

  “Then let her go!” he snapped angrily.

  “She won’t let me–as you wouldn’t let me do what I wanted to do.”

  A cloud of anger swept across Rafe’s face. “If you wanted death so badly, Jason, nothing I have ever said would have stopped you. What you want, my friend, is pity!”

  Unexpectedly, Jason smiled. “How often did you say those words to me when we were in prison? Too often,” he answered for himself. “Perhaps you are right, perhaps what I want is pity. But damn it, man, I earned that pity when the rocket fragment destroyed my future.”

  “You unfeeling son of a bitch!” Rafe swore angrily. “That fragment has injured your spine, but not your mind. You’re destroying your future yourself!”

  Again, Jason smiled, and Rafe’s anger lessened.

  “Some pair we make, eh? I’ve lost my home and half my body, and you don’t even know what happened to everything that once was yours. We both have our crosses to bear, Rafe, and we must do it in our own ways.”

  “Is your way to inflict pain on another?”

  Jason stiffened, and the friendly lines that had softened his features disappeared. “If you were anyone else, I would challenge you, wheeled chair or no. But we two have survived hell together, and that surmounts anything we might say. I will forget you spoke those words. What Alana and I do is between us, and only us!”

  “Is it?” Rafe asked.

  Jason winced, and a low groan of pain escaped his lips. Damn him, Rafe thought, for hiding behind his injury. Then his anger abated, and the very pity that he had tried never to feel for Jason finally came out.

  Shaking his head, he went to Jason. “This is no time for arguing, old friend,” he said.

  Jason looked up and slowly nodded his head. “I need you to do something for me.”

  “What?”

  “I learned today that Alana has been selling her jewels to pay the creditors. It will be awhile before my business funds are accessible. The bills are mounting here, and Alana has no money left.” Jason paused to take a deep breath.

  Rafe watched him, knowing that the laudanum had worn off and that Jason was in a great deal of pain. He started toward the bed table, but Jason stopped him.

  “Gabriel can do that. I need you to go to my old home. I took precautions before I left for the war. Behind the stable is a well. Two feet beneath the lip, you will find a series of irregular bricks. Behind the bricks is a strongbox of gold. Bring it to Alana for me.”

  ~~~~~

  Carefully, Alana approached the burned-out husk of the house on foot. When she was twenty feet from it, she stopped. The scent of rot and decay reached her.

  A horse’s whinny echoed, and Alana whirled. Quietly circling the burnt timbers, she came upon the horse tied to a sapling that grew near the ransacked stable–and breathed a sigh of relief when she recognized it as Rafe’s.

  Hearing a scraping sound, she walked toward it. She stopped when she saw Rafe bent over the well, his upper torso hidden within it. She walked to where he was, sat on the rim of the well, and spoke. “What are you doing here?”

  Rafe pulled himself up and turned to Alana. His gaze washed across her face and a smile curved his lips. “Doing an errand.”

  “I think we have enough water at Riverbend,” she stated.

  “Water, yes–but gold?” he asked.

  Alana’s eyes narrowed. “What gold?”

  “Jason’s.” With that, he returned to his task, leaving Alana to her thoughts. Five minutes later, and after several loud splashes from falling bricks, Rafe straightened up, his cheeks smudged with dirt. Silently, he handed Alana the strongbox.

  Alana took the box and carefully raised the lid. A gasp escaped her lips. Sunlight glinted from a pile of shiny golden coins. Just this morning she had been trying not to panic over Riverbend’s lack of money–and suddenly here was hope. She looked back at Rafe. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  “Don’t thank me. Thank Jason.”

  Alana nodded and put the strongbox on the ground. “Rafe, I–I know this has been hard on you, and I just want to thank you again for being my friend.”

  Rafe tensed, and then shook his head. When he spoke, his words were not what she expected. “Don’t delude yourself, Alana. I am not your friend. At least, not the kind of friend you mean.” Confused, Alana tried to explain herself, but Rafe would not let her. “If you can’t tell me the truth, at least do me the kindness of not deceiving yourself.”

  “Truth?” she asked, her voice bitter for the first time as her emotions, long held in check, now erupted. “You want truth, Rafe? All right, then truth you shall have!

  “You walked into my life eleven days ago. You turned everything in my world upside down. You awakened a need in me, a desire that should never have been born.” She stared at him defiantly, unable to stop the flow of words she had unleashed. “You touched me, and my heart became yours. You looked at me, and I melted under your gaze. Until I met you, I had never wanted anyone. Now all I can do is think of you and of what I will never have. I hate you for doing this to me, Rafe Montgomery, I hate you almost as much as I love you!”

  Then the tears at last broke through, cascading along her cheeks. Alana, her eyes fixed on Rafe, uttered no sound.

  As he had wanted to do ever since he had first laid eyes on Alana, Rafe reached for her and pulled her to him. Gently he stroked her mane of long raven hair.

  Alana buried her face in his chest and let her tears continue to flow. She leaned on him to gather strength from his rocklike stability, but then she realized weakness was once again claiming her.

  She suddenly lifted her arms and curled her hands into fists. She pummeled his chest and shoulders, striking him harder and harder as she finally cried out her frustration. Yet his hands never loosened on her, nor did he try to stop her from what she did.

  Then she jerked herself free and fled back to where she’d left her horse. Untying him, she jumped onto the gelding’s back and kicked his flanks cruelly in an effort to escape from herself as well as Rafe.

  Behind her, Rafe remained motionless until she was gone. Only then did he retrieve the strongbox and start back to Riverbend.

  ~~~~~

  Sitting at her dressing table in her nightgown, Alana brushed her hair. The sun had long since set, but her mind had not yet calmed from her confrontation with Rafe.

  There was a low knock at the door and Lorelei, carrying a tray, came in.

  “I thought you mights be hungry,” Lorelei said when she put the tray on the dresser.

  “I’m not hungry, Lorelei, but thank you,” Alana said in a listless voice.

  Lorelei looked at her, her heart going out to Alana. “Alana chile’, we’s got ta talk.” Only when they were alone did Lorelei call Alana by her name instead of Miss Alana. It was something they had always done, from the time Alana was crawling.

  Alana sighed and shook her head. “I’m all talked out, Lorelei.”

  “Nonsense,” Lorelei stated as she stared at Alana, her hands on her hips. “De only time a body be all talked out is when de body be under de ground. And chile’, it be a long time afor dat be happenin’ to you.”

  Alana smiled hesitantly. “Why did you stay, Lorelei? Why didn’t you go north when you had the chance?”

  “I swear, chile’, sometime you act like you doesn’t have any sense a’tall. You is my family, Alana, I couldn’t no mo’ leave you den you could leave Riverbend.”

  “We are family, aren’t we?” Alana asked in a whisper.

  “Dat is just what we be,” Lorelei stated. Then she went close to Alana and gazed deeply into her eyes. “Talk to me, Alana chile’. Tell ol’ Lorelei what be botherin’ you. You be scared of de marriage?”

  Alana shook her head. “I’m scared o
f myself.”

  Lorelei nodded her head knowingly. “You be speaking of Mister Rafe.”

  Alana stiffened at Lorelei’s words. Her eyes widened as she looked at the woman who had raised her. “You know?” she whispered.

  “Honey, for twenty-two years you and me been together. Dere ain’t nothin’ I don’t knows if’n it be concernin’ you. ’Specially when I sees dat you be in love.”

  “Oh, Lorelei,” Alana cried, “what am I going to do?”

  Lorelei smiled. “I cain’t answer dat for you. But I knows dat no matter what you does, it won’t be no mistake.”

  “Won’t it?” Alana asked.

  “Only if’n you want it to be. Only if’n you thinks you be doin’ wrong. And ain’t nobody to tell you what be right or wrong ’ceptin’ you, Alana.”

  “How can I love one man and wed another?” she asked quietly.

  Wisely, Lorelei stayed silent.

  “He’ll be gone soon,” she whispered after a moment.

  Alana took a deep breath and stood. “I love you, Lorelei.”

  “I knows dat, chile’,” Lorelei said, her voice breaking. Opening her arms, Lorelei took Alana to her large bosom and held her there for several long moments. When she released Alana, she stepped back. “I brung you a fine dinner, chile’. I thinks it be time you eat it.”

  “I thinks you be right!” Alana said, mimicking Lorelei’s dialect as she used to do when she was a little girl.

  “Hush now!” Lorelei ordered, but her words were softened by the smile on her face as she left the room.

  Alana nibbled at the food on the tray, but she was still not hungry. When she finished all she could, she rose and went to the window that overlooked the garden, staring at the starry sky for a long time.

  A crescent moon hung in the heavens, and though its light was faint, it reflected on the whitewashed roof of the gazebo. The longer Alana looked out at the clear and quiet night, the more she wanted to walk outside in the softly scented air. She listened intently for sounds in the rest of the house, but all was silent. By now, Lorelei and the others would be asleep.

  Feeling suddenly trapped within her room, Alana decided to try to calm her troubled thoughts by taking a short walk. It was impulsive, she knew, but if she went to the gazebo she was certain no one would see her.

  ~~~~~

  Rafe sat on the veranda smoking a cheroot. He was a fool, on a fool’s errand, he told himself as he blew a stream of smoke skyward. From the moment he had left the prison camp with Jason, the course of his life had changed.

  Jason. Rafe was worried about his friend. In the beginning, all he had worried about was keeping Jason alive. Now that Jason was as healthy as he would ever be, Rafe was concerned about how the man would live the rest of his life. At his worst, he was a demanding, self-pitying person filled with hatred that struck out in random directions. At rare times the bright, articulate man who Jason had once been, escaped from the barriers he had erected. The problem was that those times were becoming less and less frequent.

  What will happen when they marry? Rafe asked himself pointlessly. He knew there was no answer, not for him, for Alana, or even for Jason. Only time held the answer–and Rafe’s time with Alana was almost at an end.

  The thought of losing her was unbearable. Standing swiftly, Rafe tossed the cigar away and walked to the steps leading from the veranda.

  He paused only when he reached the start of the garden path, then he walked aimlessly forward, letting his feet choose the direction he would follow.

  As it happened, he took the far left path, the one that circled the entire garden. While he walked, he did his best to let the night sounds soothe his nerves. He refused to think of Alana and instead thought about San Francisco and what awaited his return.

  When he had embarked on his ill-fated voyage, he had left his sister in charge of the shipping company. At the time, Elizabeth–a bright, intelligent woman who had learned the shipping business at the same time as he–had been twenty-three.

  Rafe knew that the family business was in competent hands, but a gnawing worry had always interfered with that thought. None of the letters he wrote while in prison had ever been answered. He had figured that the mails hardly ever got through–if the prison guards had allowed the letters out in the first place, which they always assured him they did.

  Who was behind his arrest? Rafe wondered for the ten-thousandth time. Who had arranged for his death, and why? What had happened after he “died”?

  Stop! he ordered himself. His circular thinking was futile. Nothing would be settled until he arrived in San Francisco and went to his offices.

  Rafe paused in his stroll to look up at the moon. Only a few clouds rode the sky, shining silver-white as they passed beneath the glowing crescent. He gazed at the stars for a moment before again following the pathway without caring where it led. He did not realize he had reached the white-roofed gazebo until he almost walked into it.

  With the awareness of where he was, he saw a ghostly white shape sitting within the lattice walls, illuminated by the rays of the moon.

  “Alana,” he whispered.

  ~~~~~

  Alana lost herself to the night, concentrating on the sounds of nature that filled the sweetly scented air. Gone were her thoughts of the future and of the years ahead that she would spend with Jason. Vanished too were thoughts of the wanton desire that Rafe brought out in her.

  Memories of better times helped to ease her torment, but she could not bear to linger upon them. Shifting on the divan, Alana smiled as she remembered those early summer nights when, as a child, she had begged and cajoled Lorelei to let her sleep on this very divan instead of in her bedroom. Lorelei had slept on a feather comforter near her.

  She had loved to spend those peaceful minutes before sleep looking up at the sky through the circular opening in the center of the gazebo. And for a few moments, Alana was able to escape the present in happy memory.

  Then she heard a sound that was not part of the night. She froze for an instant, lifting her head and looking at the entrance to the gazebo.

  Her breath caught. Her heart thudded so loudly, she thought it would explode as Rafe stepped into the gazebo.

  Even in the shadows, the smooth, handsome lines of his face stood out. The aura of his masculinity surrounded her and tantalized her with its musk. Although it was night and no lanterns glowed, Alana could see Rafe’s massive chest and the tense muscles that played beneath his partially open shirt. When he spoke, his voice was soft but determined.

  “I didn’t follow you, Alana, but neither will I leave now that I’m here.”

  7

  Alana’s head was light; everything solid around her was falling away. Her breathing deepened and heat spread through her body.

  “Please, I want you to leave.” As she spoke, she heard the falseness of her own words.

  “Stand up, Alana. Come to me.”

  Her body and heart overrode her mind’s intentions. She suddenly knew what must happen, for her future was to be made out of the memories of the past.

  Her arms were outstretched as she rose; her heart thudded, and she feared that in her dreamlike state the muscles in her legs would collapse.

  But he too was moving, and although time itself had seemed to stop, Rafe reached her and drew her into his arms. Their mouths met; their arms went around each other. They took the first step into a new world, one which only they could enter.

  Fire lanced through Alana’s body; her hips pressed to his with wanton urgency. Her mouth opened; fire and ice flowed simultaneously through her veins. Little explosions of desire burst within her breasts as they pressed upon his chest.

  She felt him swell against her; his heat was a burning brand separated from her only by their clothing. Then she was being lifted, and her mouth was torn from his. Her eyes opened to stare into the endless green depths that mirrored her own need.

  The crazy spinning of the world steadied as Rafe lowered her to the cushioned d
ivan in the center of the gazebo beneath the circular opening of the roof.

  Rafe’s lips returned to hers, and their fiery taste was a nectar she had never imagined. Her hands moved freely, racing along his back until they reached upward and wove into the thickness of his hair. Her fingers caught his jet and silver hair and pulled it harshly, forcing his mouth harder upon hers.

  Their tongues danced together as Alana’s passions rose. Her blood raced madly, and her desires dictated her every move. When Rafe drew away, Alana cried in despair and looked pleadingly up at him.

  “Don’t rush, my love,” he said gently. “Our time is too short for that. We must learn each other while we may.” As he spoke, his hands went to the bodice of her dress, and for the first time since they had come together that night she felt an icy tentacle of fear.

  When her eyes clouded, Rafe smiled softly. “There is nothing to fear in love,” he promised while his fingers unlaced the bodice and separated the material.

  With the first whisper of air on her breasts, Alana closed her eyes and lay back. She cried out an instant later when his heated lips took one already-rigid nipple.

  Rafe tasted the sweet satin of her breast and ran his tongue along the velvet tip of her nipple. Blood rushed to his head, making him swim within the sea of his desire. His hands caressed her full breasts.

  A raging fire burned within the breast that Rafe lavished with his mouth, and Alana’s body arched closer to him.

  Then his mouth was gone, but the flames roared on. Opening her eyes, Alana saw him gazing at her. The moonlight filtering through the opening above cast down an iridescence upon his features, which took her breath away. Love and desire blazed from his handsome face. She saw the promise of a love that would be eternal; a giving of himself that would never leave her as long as she lived.

  “Rafe,” she whispered, her voice made low and throaty by the forces driving her, “I love you.”

  Rafe’s chest rose and fell powerfully. Muscles bunched in his neck; his breath exploded outward with her words. “As you are mine, I am yours,” he promised.