He came to her with a groan, seduced as he had never been by the cost to Annie to show him where she wanted him to touch. Kell consigned warnings to hell and wished her corset there as well. Using skilled touches to heighten her arousal, he knew she was still far too shy to let him undress her. She made those little sounds that drove him to a new edge, and he coaxed and praised her by turn.
It was his murmuring voice that pierced the sensual veil that softened Annie’s world and narrowed it to senses filled with Kell. But rather than the lover’s incantations that dragged her deeper, to the edge of passion’s realm, she kept hearing his denial. “I never meant things to go so far.”
And with each repetition, sharpened clarity made the meaning very clear.
Annie shoved aside his hand and tore her mouth from his. “You never meant … you followed me here? This was deliberate!”
Kell was slow to react, ensnared by his own heightened senses and a body that was needy. When she landed a punch on his shoulder, he opened his eyes to see her eyes shift from passion’s glaze to a slow, blazing fury. Regret was brief. Hunger still prowled, demanding surcease.
“Christ, Annie! Stop hitting me. I stopped, didn’t I?” He caught hold of her hand and moved quickly to reach for the other. “Yes, I came here looking for you. No, this wasn’t deliberate. I was leaving without you ever knowing I’d been here when that damn dog came racing out of the woods.”
“You came here to seduce me!”
“I’m not a green boy who needs to flip a female’s skirts in a field. And if I wanted to seduce you, Annie Muldoon, I’d have had you on the kitchen table, and then again upstairs in your bed.”
The memory of that rainy night brought flags of color to her cheeks. “You would have taken advantage of my exhausted state?”
“Exhausted? Hell!” Her accusing voice stung. “You were drunk, darlin’.”
“Tipsy. And let go of my hands.”
Kell flung himself away from her. He didn’t trust himself to remain very civilized. “Come to think of it, you weren’t. You stopped the action, petunia, and that’s where it ended. If I had been bent on seduction, bet a week’s rent and double it that I’d have succeeded.”
Annie glanced to where he lay on his back, one arm shielding his eyes. His chest moved with the same erratic breaths that had hers heaving. Heightened senses, so newly awakened, goaded her gaze to drift lower. She stared at the damp patches that made his linen shirt almost sheer, becoming aware that her body was dampening her clothing with the heat still flowing through her. On the side facing her, his shirt had pulled free of his pants revealing an intriguing amount of golden-brown skin. The sight made her hand curl around the quilt. Gloving his body from his powerful thighs and flat belly, the provocative fit of his pants held her gaze for long moments.
“Have pity, darlin’,” Kell said without looking at her. “I can’t help being aroused, but save your expiring until I’m gone. Right now, I don’t trust myself to touch you.”
Annie flung her arms over her head, hiding like the coward she called herself. She had accused him to save her own pride. She had never ordered him to leave when she saw him. Not once did she ask him to leave, to stop. The kiss was her invitation, her need to appease the longings he stirred. This was her fault, not Kell’s.
“The things you make me feel and do frighten me, Kell.”
“Yeah? Well, for your ears only, darlin’, I’m scaring the devil out of myself.”
Before she lifted her arms to look at him, Kell rose in a controlled rush, dragging sultry air into his lungs.
“Thanks for your charming company, but you’ll pardon me for not escorting you home. In my condition, I’m most likely to draw out one of your sermons on the evils of sin, damnation, and hell … and no thanks, Muldoon. Once a day on the rack is enough for any sane man.”
“Muldoon? How can you call me … after what you … what I—” Annie struggled to sit up and saw the last of his back disappear in the woods. With her feelings in chaos, she fell back against the quilt. “What possessed me to ask for a kiss? One little kiss?”
Asking for that one little kiss had led to some great big answers. And more questions.
What was she going to do? An afternoon spent in prayer and reflection to strengthen her moral fiber had proved to be a waste of her time. By his mere presence, Kell sliced through the carefully knit fabric that constituted her life.
“Since I’ve been tested and failed,” she whispered, lingering as dusk came, “I shall have to savor the fact that I bedeviled Kellian for a change.”
But within minutes, Annie left for home. There were too many questions she needed answered. Emmaline was the obvious choice. She had been married and would know—what? Emmaline wouldn’t have an inkling of how to deal with a man like Kell. And her best friend had been suspiciously lacking in support during this trying time. No, Annie knew she could never tell Emmaline about what she had done, what she had allowed Kell to do. Aunt Hortense would be no help. The whole town would hear Annie shouting to make her aunt understand one question.
Who could she go to?
As Annie rounded the comer of the boardinghouse, she stopped. If she wanted a gown made, she went to Emmaline, who was extremely talented in hiding a woman’s faults and accenting whatever made her attractive.
And if she wanted to know about men, Kellian especially, who better to ask than the doves? After all, men were their … well, their business. She had to get over this utter reluctance to admit that or she’d never get far enough to ask them anything. Someone had to help her understand what was happening between her and Kell. And she wouldn’t mind knowing how to repay him for every sleepless night he caused her.
If she hurried, she could catch them before they left for Kell’s temporary establishment. Tossing the quilt on the laundry pile in the pantry, Annie rushed through the rooms and upstairs.
Intent on finding the phrasing for her request, Annie almost barreled into Kell coming from his bath.
“No! Deuces to aces my luck’s deserted me. Before you dare utter one word, Miss Starch and Vinegar, I followed every damn rule you have posted in there.” With a glare, he pointed over his shoulder. “I emptied the tub. I put the soap back. I’m wearing my towel, but rest assured you’ll find it with the laundry and no, I didn’t leave hair in there. I didn’t leave a damn thing but the skin I tried scrubbing off!”
Annie did the sensible thing. She backed away from him. Unfortunately for her, Kell had had time to raise his frustration to a new high. He went after her, pinning her against the wall. He caught hold of her chin, and took her mouth with his.
He didn’t kiss nicely. He didn’t coax her. Didn’t try to seduce her mouth with his. He took. Hungry and lusty. He wasn’t kissing her like a man who had more women than he could handle. Annie felt as if he kissed her like she was the last woman in sight and he was dying. He had to be dying, from the sound of his groaning, before he jerked free but kept her pinned in place.
“What the hell does it take to keep you scared and away from me?”
“Just one moment. I wasn’t … I’m not … afraid of you.” Confused, Kell. That’s what you make me feel.
“You should be afraid. You will be. You keep this up and I’ll take it as an invitation to bed you down.”
“No. I—”
“Bed, darlin’. Not once. Not even twice. Hell, the way you make me feel, a damn week wouldn’t do. Understand? I won’t say no again. I’ll take every advantage I can.”
Staring at the wild sugar-sweet mouth that was shaped like a small, enticing ‘o’ drove Kell closer to the body that triggered a landslide. Flash floods. Mine cave-ins. Kell ran out of natural disasters. Explosions and fireworks came next. What he had told her should be scaring the drawers off her. He should scare the drawers off her.
Kell moaned. In pain. All he could think of was the other pleasurable ways to get her drawers off.
He closed his eye
s, his head sinking down to rest on his forearm. She made him swim into immoral daydreams that left him no peace.
Immoral?
What the hell was the matter with him? He was immoral!
If he had one ounce of good sense left, just one moral in his conscience, he would leave and never come back. Annie had no self-preservation instincts with regard to him. A peek out of one eye revealed her watching him with luminous fascination.
That did it! She had no sense of the danger she was in. No fear about him. He should…
“I warned you, Muldoon. That’s all you get. I don’t owe you a damn thing more. I never owe anybody anything!”
The door to his room slammed closed before Annie dared to move. Kell had warned her about himself. Hope was renewed. He did have redeeming qualities. Her time spent in prayer and reflection had been answered in the strangest way. And if Kellian had seen her slow, understanding smile of satisfaction as she passed his closed door, he would have caught the next stage out of town.
Far from the warning lesson he attempted to impart, his outburst gave Annie the needed courage to follow through on her idea. She nearly tripped with haste to get to the room that Cammy shared with Blossom.
Hairbrush in hand, Cammy answered her knock, giggling when Annie stammered out an apology for interrupting her toilet.
“Toilet?” Cammy repeated, motioning Annie inside.
“That’s what ladies call getting gussied up.”
“Oh, Ruby, I’d expect you to know. But come in, we’re all dressed.”
Annie took Cammy’s word, and avoided looking at the basque of her gown that was fastened at the waist and veed open over a sheer scoop-necked chemise. The “all” included Blossom, sitting on the straight chair, white as Annie’s linen sheets while Daisy—at least Annie thought it was—worked rouge over her cheeks with a hare’s foot. Cammy stood before the mirror brushing out her dark brown hair, as thick and straight as a horse’s tail.
“What’s she want?” Ruby asked, snapping the red lace garter that held up a stocking the like of which Annie had never seen. She shot Annie a hard, brittle stare from eyes that had seen too much and didn’t care who knew it. “Somethin’ wrong?”
“No.” Annie added a quick little shake of her head. “Your stocking—”
“Pretty, ain’t they?” Ruby hiked up her gown to show off the other one. “Fella bought these all the way from St. Louis for me.”
“An’ red’s her favorite color.” Cammy lifted the sides of her long hair and with a few expert twists formed a loose topknot. Once she had it pinned in place, she shook back the rest of her hair. Meeting Annie’s gaze in the mirror, she smiled. “Most men like a woman’s hair loose.”
“Makes ’em think of havin’ hot puddin’ for supper.”
“Or stabling his naggie, Ruby,” Cammy added. She shared a quick look with the other doves at the way Annie touched her own neatly pinned hair.
“That’s not for the likes of you,” Ruby told Annie, shaking out the folds of her petticoats and the bright red skirt that barely reached her calves. She slipped her feet into black-heeled shoes and sighed. “Sure wish I had a pair of fancy buckles like Laine’s.”
“Don’t bother asking her to borrow them,” Daisy warned, stepping back to admire her work on Blossom’s pale cheeks. “Laine don’t like lending her things. ’Fraid some other gal might look prettier.”
Pinching her cheeks and turning from side to side in front of the mirror, Cammy nodded and faced Annie. “You never did say what you wanted.”
Annie was distracted, trying to figure out why a woman’s loose hair would make a man think of having hot pudding for supper. She offered an absent sort of smile, thinking her own description of Cammy’s hair made sense of a man stabling his horse. But she caught the look they were exchanging and knew they were sharing a laugh at her expense. Well, she had come here to learn, and if she didn’t ask she would never know.
But the words just wouldn’t come. She glanced helplessly at Blossom, who sat still, softly groaning. “What’s wrong?”
“She’s got the collywobbles,” Cammy answered.
“Collywobbles?”
“The misery,” Ruby explained, then asked Annie, “What do you call it? Ladies have different names for everything.”
“Woman’s doom. Monthly misery,” Daisy supplied.
Red-faced, Annie whispered, “A lady is indisposed.”
“I’ll say.”
“Seconded by me, Daisy.” Blossom whispered, wrapping her arms around her waist.
“Would you like me to heat a brick for you?” Annie asked, trying to overcome her ingrained lessons that forbade such frank talk. “Or I could make you a nice hot cup of tea? With some blackberry brandy,” she added, remembering that rainy afternoon.
“They said you weren’t like the others.” Daisy, with her clever slender hands on ample hips came to stand in front of Annie. “Tea and a hot brick would help Blossom.”
Fascinated by Daisy’s unconcerned manner over her dress or undress, Annie nodded. The woman’s cleavage was exposed by the lace scalloped edge of a bright blue gown that about equaled the length of Annie’s drawers and was pinned up on one side to reveal nearly all of the woman’s thigh.
“You didn’t understand what we said, did you?” Daisy’s golden-brown eyes searched over Annie’s flushed face, and after a few moments she nodded, as if satisfied. “I was once just as sheltered as you, but my uncle figured I cost him too much and wasn’t earning my keep. He put me to work, only I didn’t see any of the money, so I took off on my own.”
There was silence in the room, and Annie felt the tension as the four women waited for her reaction. Compassion was her only thought, and it spurred her to put her hand on Daisy’s arm.
“Surely there was someone who could have helped you? Other family, a friend, a neighbor? Couldn’t you have him arrested?”
“Honey, you are innocent,” Ruby said, sitting down on the edge of the bed. “Would you have taken her in? After all, the bastard made sure everybody knew what she was doing. She’s lucky she didn’t get a belly full of some bastard’s seed.”
“Or work a crib,” Cammy added, joining Ruby on the bed. “That’s what happened to Laine. She never said how she got away, but she swore she’ll never go back to it.” Rubbing her arms, Cammy looked at Annie.
“It’s a dirty little shack with a blanket on the floor. Two bits a toss and the rest goes to whoever owns the crib. You work six-, maybe eight-hour shifts every day.”
“My Lord! How can anyone—this is why we banded together to close down—”
“Don’t be comparing Kell to the likes of crib owners. First off,” Ruby said, holding up her fingers and folding over her thumb to the palm, “Kell doesn’t touch a penny we make. Only takes a cut from the whiskey we sell and whatever we earn at cards. He don’t beat us. Won’t let any man use his fists on any of us. If we say no to dancing the mattress jib with some plowboy, the jerk takes no for an answer or Bronc’ll get rid of him quick.”
It was too much for Annie, and she backed up until she could lean against the door. “I don’t understand. I thought that Kyle made money from you.”
“That’s right. He did once Laine brought us together. But Kell said right off that what we did upstairs at the Aces was our business. Right?” Daisy asked, looking at the others.
Murmurs and nods confirmed it.
“Shucks, Annie,” Blossom whispered, rocking back and forth as her cramps worsened, “even you know that Kell is different. He’s got manners. Treats us like we were good folks, talkin’ and laughin’ with us. Why last night this cowpoke wouldn’t take to understand that I don’t do French tricks and when I tole him where he could put his bald-headed hermit I figured his fist was meetin’ my jaw. ’Tween Li and Kell, that man was gone in a minute an’ Kell tole him not to bother comin’ back till he got his ears flushed out to hear good.”
“Yes, I admit Kelli
an York has some redeeming qualities. But I’d better get you that brick and the tea.”
“Oh, don’t go. It’s easin’ up some an’ we ain’t had no chance to find out what you wanted.”
Courage, Annie. There were genuine smiles on four pairs of lips. Their honesty invited hers. But Annie couldn’t look at them.
“I’m in need of learning a bit more about men, and I thought that … er, in your profession, well … you could answer my questions.”
“Move over, Daisy.” Ruby patted the bed next to her. “Come sit yourself down. We got a little time before we go to work. And when you leave here, you’ll know all about giving juice for jelly.”
“Or playin’ pickle me, tickle you.”
“Plowin’ clover.”
“Sliding carrots up the board.”
“Stop it,” Ruby warned, barely able to contain her laughter. “You’ll have her dazed and crazed without knowing why. Set your fanny down, Annie Muldoon. You’ll have the best educatin’ a woman can have. And the first thing you learn is how to tell a goose neck from a gully-raker.”
“Yeah. Let Ruby tell you that,” Daisy said, curling up by the headboard. “She can size—”
“And that’s the secret,” Ruby cut in. “See, you look at the size of a man’s thumb to make sure you’re getting the best leg of three.”
Annie jumped up off the bed, the meaning quite plain. She rapidly rethought her plan, but Ruby coaxed her to sit again.
“We’ll take this real slow.”
“Maybe if you told us exactly what the problem is,” Daisy suggested.
Annie was silent so long, her total concentration on her fingers plucking at her skirt. She didn’t see the looks the doves exchanged or the conclusion they came to, but she lifted her head when Ruby slipped an arm around her waist.
“Females stick together. Men think they’re in control, but honey, even a man like Kell ain’t seen the tricks we know.’”
“Dazed and crazed about sums up the feelings Kell stirs and keeps at a boiling point. But you see, doing anything about it is very difficult for me.” With a sigh, Annie looked at each one of them. “I truly believe that a woman should keep herself chaste until she weds. Not that I was looking for a husband. Or mean that as a judgment against you. But when Kell—”
Darling Annie Page 17
