Missouri Magic

by Charlotte Hubbard

  Was there no end to the surprises this angelic vixen would come up with? He obliged her gladly, overjoyed that Celesta shared his compulsive need for physical affection. She was smacking the wall with the palm of her hand, her neck arched back so that her silken hair caressed his face. And she was breathing his name desperately.

  “Fly with it, Celesta,” he urged beside her ear. “Float on the current and then soar higher . . . higher . . . until you burst into a thousand stars. Squeeze me, honey ....”

  His words took over, and her passion surged until she shattered with it. Where had these powerful forces come from? Twenty years she’d lived and never suspected herself capable of enduring, much less producing, such glorious shock waves.

  As she caught her breath, she glanced down toward the park and the riverfront, where a showy burst filled the night sky with showers of red, green and white firefalls. It occurred to her that she’d left her picnic basket in the park, and that she certainly couldn’t go down there and retrieve it. Yet, as she relaxed in Damon’s embrace, she knew she’d left something much more important behind tonight: never again could she call her soul her own. With his sorcerer’s power, this man had transformed her into someone she scarcely recognized, and she hoped she wouldn’t regret it for the rest of her life.

  Damon kissed her long and tenderly at the cellar door. “I wish you were sleeping with me,” he whispered. “I live for the day I’ll wake to find you in my arms.”

  After all the passion they’d shared, his words still made her flush and feel like a wobbly-kneed schoolgirl. Celesta smiled nervously and then slipped through the silent, dark kitchen. She paused, listening. The thin strains of a waltz were floating down the hallway, and the glow of lamplight edged the partially shut door of the summer parlor.

  Celesta crept quietly toward the stairs, thinking to escape Katherine’s questions. Yet her sense of duty got the best of her. The old dear was probably waiting up to see that she got home safely.

  When she peeked into the parlor, Celesta’s eyes widened. A single lamp cast its soft light into the center of the room, while the gramophone played “The Blue Danube,” slightly scratchy from use. Aunt Katherine was dancing with a phantom partner, dipping and swaying gracefully around the room, her face alight with the sweetest of smiles.

  Some would’ve thought her so far gone she could never return to reality, but Celesta realized how she must ache for her husband. Her romantic fantasies were all she had left, and she’d cling to them until she died. A sad, strangely moving thought, and it made Celesta’s throat tighten.

  Katherine opened her eyes, letting out a short, self-conscious laugh as she came to a stop in front of her niece. “And how were the fireworks, dear?” she asked in a wistful voice.

  She was frightfully aware of how hastily she’d repinned her hair, and how flushed she must look, with lips as red as they were sore. Did her aunt notice the intimate fragrance of the love she and Damon had made? She surely must reek of it. “Fine,” she rasped. “Unlike anything I’ve ever seen.”

  Her aunt nodded, as though in a dream. “I thought they might be. Good night, dear.”

  Chapter 14

  Celesta drifted downstairs in a state of euphoria the next morning. Damon was already eating, discussing which rooms the aunts wanted him to paper next, and only his businesslike tone kept her from breaking into a give-away grin each time she glanced in his direction. She hardly tasted Katherine’s omelet, and as she helped clear away the plates she caught herself before her hand landed on his broad shoulder. How on earth could she keep her love for him a secret, with both of them living under Justine’s eagle eye?

  Her spinster aunt’s return from town jolted her back to reality. The handful of mail she pulled from her market basket included a note for Celesta, in a cream-colored envelope that had no return address.

  My dearest Celesta, she read from the angular scrawl on the page. Seeing your stricken expression, I naturally assumed Frye was fetching you because one of your dear aunts was ill. Then I realized, to my great disappointment, that you were rushing off in the opposite direction. ...

  Imagine my embarrassment when I face my friends, whom I’ve told of our betrothal. We must reconcile this indiscretion immediately. You know how Mother despises any scandal concerning the Perkins name. Come and see me.

  He signed off with oversized P’s, which reminded her that she used to tease Patrick about having initials that denoted a bodily function—and that he deserved them. She’d expected some reaction about her disappearance last night, but his note’s presumptuous tone made him look all the more ridiculous.

  When Celesta folded the page back into its envelope, however, she realized that Patrick Perkins had set her up: he’d purposely sent it to Justine’s mailbox, unsealed. Had her aunt read it and filled in between the lines? It was impossible to tell, because the spinster had already gone upstairs to do her cleaning. A slow burn worked up from her collar, because now the older Ransom would be lying in wait to catch her and Damon in the slightest secretive exchange.

  “Are you all right, dear? If you don’t feel up to it, I can take down the pictures in the music room myself, while you rest,” Katherine’s voice interrupted her musings.

  Her aunt’s bright eyes had an innocent shine to them. “I—I’m fine,” Celesta blurted, stuffing the note into her skirt pocket. “It’s just an invitation from Patrick to come see him. I’d rather get the music room walls cleared, so Damon can work in there tonight.”

  The little woman smiled knowingly, and they spent the day preparing both the music room and the library. Celesta was on pins and needles, trying not to gush about Damon Frye to an aunt who undoubtedly knew what was happening between them. And that evening, when their resident carpenter was working with his usual confidence, sneaking her an occasional wink, it was all but impossible not to throw her arms around him and demand a kiss.

  Each time she handed him a measured, cut strip of the gold-flecked wallpaper, their fingers lingered together. Though he didn’t repeat his sensual, intoxicating phrases from the previous evening, his deep brown eyes silently assured her they were true. He was humming “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” in a resonant baritone that spurred her pulse into a gallop. Such phrases as skin of ivory like a moonlit string of pearls, or run my tongue inside your fragrant nest of . . . made her feverishly aware that Damon, too, was reliving the glory of the Fourth.

  It was impossible to sleep that night, knowing he was downstairs—wanting him so desperately she thrashed about in bed, not daring to sneak past Justine’s room to go to him. Instead, Celesta waited until she could stand it no longer, and then tiptoed up to the third-floor alcove. Another Sally Sharpe story was due soon, and she might as well set her wide-awake mind to some useful task.

  How could she have foreseen the effect her reuniting with Frye would have on her fictional heroine? She picked up the pen, went through her ritual of stacking the paper just so, and wrote SALLY SHARPE, GIRL DETECTIVE, in—

  And her next image was of the prim blonde peeling off her shirtwaist, slipping out of her sensible shoes, and beckoning Damon Frye with a come-hither look that made Celesta’s mouth drop open. Suddenly Sally, too, could think of nothing but the dark magician! It was a shock to watch her heroine throw herself into Frye’s arms, wearing the scantiest of underthings, murmuring the brazen phrases she wished she could be mouthing now.

  This would never work! From her editor’s rare, cryptic comments, Celesta knew he expected the same fast-paced, hardboiled sleuthing Sally was famous for—undercover adventures that got nowhere near a bed with a man in it! Anything risqué would surely get returned with a rejection letter, and she would’ve wasted the hours she spent writing the story. Better to focus her thoughts on safer subjects, to keep those checks arriving from her New York uncle.

  But every time Celesta closed her eyes to visualize a dangerous crime or a villain Sally could pit herself against, she saw Damon in a sorcerer’s flowing robe, waving a
wand to kindle her desire . . . Damon in a black cape with a red lining, his eyes glowing like Count Dracula’s as he enticed her . . . Damon naked, bathed in moonlight, as fireworks exploded into colorful Stardust behind him.

  The moment she resigned herself to frittering away a sleepless night in fantasy, an idea slapped her, and she had to stifle a laugh. If Frye could compose lyrics for her enjoyment—just for fun—why couldn’t she toss off a tale for his eyes only? A story that would make him chuckle as he raced along the pages. A piece that would say she, too, was inspired by their lovemaking, hoping it would grow into something deeper and everlasting.

  Grinning, Celesta wadded up her original page. She could see a lone, broad-shouldered rider atop a magnificent stallion, searching relentlessly for a thug who wooed dance hall girls into his hotel room with gifts of lacy finery, only to kill them. A grisly premise, but this . . . bounty hunter!—Damon Dare!—would help Sally apprehend the murderer. Probably rescue her from the demon’s clutches, before riding off to his cabin with her in his arms.

  Sally hadn’t taken a western case for a while, and this one made Celesta shift with anticipation. Wrapping her ankles around the legs of Grandfather’s straight-backed chair, she thought for a moment and then wrote SALLY SHARPE, GIRL DETECTIVE, MEETS DAMON DARE in “The Golden Bounty.”

  Her pen flew across the paper. The bounty, of course, was Sally Sharpe herself, but Sally was too busy analyzing clues along the killer’s trail to notice this, until she met up with Dare. He was a loner who shunned civilization except to check the Wanted posters and collect his money when he returned to the marshal’s office, criminal in tow . . . which meant he was hungry for an unsuspecting yet uniquely appealing innocent like Sally.

  The repartee flashed like lightning between them. Celesta’s hand could hardly keep up with her rapid-fire thoughts, and she stopped writing only to refill her fountain pen before racing off across the Wyoming plains with Sally again.

  Dare, concerned for Miss Sharpe’s safety, had taught her how to shoot his rifle—mainly as an excuse to get his arms around her. Sally was justifiably flustered when, as the villain came charging into their camp, knowing Damon was out gathering firewood, the Girl Detective had to grab Dare’s gun to defend herself.

  The blast of the rifle sent Sally flying backward, her shoulder clutched by a sudden, fiery pain. She landed against Damon with a gasp, stunned by the solidness of him, by his unrelenting maleness as he wrapped a steadying arm around her. There was only their labored breathing and the dying groan of the brute who lay sprawled before them.

  “It’s so long and . . . hard,” Sally panted.

  Dare cleared his throat, his breath riffling the hair at her ear. “What’s that, Miss Sharpe?”

  “Why, your gun, of course.”

  “Oh. Of course.” He smiled, taunting her with coffee brown eyes. “Perhaps with a little more practice, you could handle it ... quite expertly. I’d be happy to help you.”

  “I’m sure you would, Mr. Dare.” Sally stepped away from his embrace, trembling now from something besides the kick of his rifle. “I—I have my own weapon, thank you.”

  The bounty hunter’s low chuckle left no doubt about what was on his mind as his gaze raked over her. “I’m sure you do, sweetheart. And I bet you know how to use it, too.”

  Celesta stopped writing to fan herself, because Damon Dare was making the little alcove even hotter than usual. She laughed, picturing Frye’s grin when he found this suggestive tale in his room tonight. As she scribbled a final page, she left Sally and Damon on horseback together, in sight of his cozy cabin, just as the first flakes of a blizzard hinted they might be stranded there for a long while. If Frye liked it, she would write a sequel, some other night when her mind wandered too far afield to compose anything Beadle and Adams would publish.

  The clock in the entry hall boomed solemnly, its deep tones drifting up the open stairwell. Three o’clock. With a yawn and a sleepy grin, Celesta crept downstairs to bed.

  Frye found his thoughts wandering that day, and when his workmen went into town for their noon meal he climbed up into the observatory to ponder his predicament. What had begun as bald-faced flattery had turned into sincere admiration for Celesta Montgomery. What had started as vengeance was now a dangerous dilemma: If he dropped the whole matter—let his grudges die with his memories of Lucy Bates—then Celesta would be crushed and Perkins would probably win her for his own underhanded purposes. And if he allowed his feelings for her to flower, he’d provoke Patrick’s wrath and place her in greater danger.

  Celesta deserved better than either of them. Yet she was trapped between them, and he could see no painless way out for her ... a regrettable situation, and Damon shook his head as though this would clear the heaviness that shrouded his heart.

  Had he really sung to her in this unadorned cubicle? Had they made the wild, passionate love that still sent his pulse skittering whenever he thought about it? By the harsh light of day the little room felt anything but romantic, yet its walls and windows seemed to whisper to him of the magic that had transformed them both on that mystical evening.

  Celesta had called him wonderful—a sorcerer— and visions of her arched back as she slapped the wall in her ecstasy made him want her all over again. Such a wanton she was! He doubted that Lucy, in her most brazen moments, had ever been so swept away by passion. And suddenly, as he looked out over Hannibal basking in the bright sunlight, he couldn’t recall what Lucinda Bates looked like, or the sound of her voice.

  It was progress, but it wasn’t enough. If he was to do right by Celesta, he had to do more than make love to her. He had to protect her from the fate his fiancée had suffered—and from the truth that lay buried in Mount Olivet with her.

  Damon returned to Ransom Manor that afternoon determined to keep Celesta at arm’s length until it was safe to love her as he truly wanted to. The sparkle in her eye should’ve warned him. When he was changing into his overalls, he found a thick sheaf of papers stuffed into the pocket. He sat on the edge of his bed to read—only for a moment, he told himself—and became riveted by her wit, captivated by a story that caricatured his feelings for her while giving Sally Sharpe another challenging case to solve.

  While they worked together that evening, he savored their secret glances. Celesta’s face was lit by a demure, expectant smile: she was waiting for him to comment about Damon Dare. But with Katherine popping in to admire their progress and Justine pausing at the door before she retired for the evening, there wasn’t a good time to discuss the western hunter and his bounty.

  He left her with a quick kiss that night—and left her to wonder, knowing it would sharpen her need for him. After reading the adventurous tale again, Frye smiled. Celesta had written the story as a surprise for him, and now he had a bigger surprise for her.

  The week came to a close and he still hadn’t said anything! Celesta’s patience wore thin, and the fun had gone out of waiting for his response. Damon had had plenty of chances to comment about the story she’d written for him, yet all he did was wink and grin. Was she supposed to read his mind? She’d be damned if she’d beg for compliments about her work!

  And to top her problems off, Katherine received a note from Eula Perkins saying she wanted to visit on Sunday afternoon. Patrick would no doubt drive his mother over and then corner her about why she’d been avoiding him. It was an embarrassing situation—all Damon’s fault—and by the time the Perkins carriage rolled up outside the main entry-way, Celesta was in no mood to speak with Frye or Patrick, either one.

  As the polite niece, however, she opened the door while Aunt Katherine hurried out of her apron. They’d just finished the dinner dishes, and Damon had gone downstairs to change into his work clothes while Justine made herself scarce. She was in a better mood these days, but she still refused to tolerate Eula’s company.

  The lumber baron’s widow wore a dress of deep green lawn that flattered her golden complexion yet looked frumpy, somehow. Eula’
s smile was bright—until she paused in the doorway to study Celesta.

  “My goodness,” she murmured, “since you’ve left us, you look even more like your mother—don’t you agree, Patrick?”

  A smirk passed quickly over his face. “She looks quite alive to me, Mother.”

  “Why, what a horrible—” Eula masked her shock by smiling too kindly and clasping Celesta’s hands between her damp palms. “You two will never stop antagonizing one another, will you? It was an annoyance I had hoped you’d grow out of— Katherine! You look wonderful, dear, and this wallpaper puts everything in my house to shame!”

  Celesta sighed, watching the older women share a brief embrace as Eula continued to rave over the redecorated vestibule. Even though her aunt had never been overly fond of Mrs. Perkins, her excitement and pitch were rising until the ladies’ voices echoed shrilly in the hall and then faded into the library.

  Patrick was standing woodenly beside her. He had indeed come to antagonize her, and despite the afternoon heat his eyes looked like iced-over ponds. “Shall we talk?” he asked brusquely.

  “About what?” she retorted. “If you intend to continue your snide remarks, you may as well stay with your mother, because I won’t put up with it!”

  “You?” He gripped her elbow, his golden face hardening. “You stood me up—ran off with Frye in front of all my friends—and by God, I’ll have an explanation! I’m giving you another chance, Celesta, because I sense he led you away under false pretenses.”

  Damon had made no pretense at all about where he’d stashed her red underwear and why—and Patrick Perkins was the last man she’d explain that to. She could hear Frye shifting his scaffolding in the summer parlor, so she shook herself free of her guest and stalked down the hallway.

  “Where do you think you’re—”

  “Do you want him to hear every word we say?” Celesta challenged, pointing toward the parlor.