by Carol Arens
"Almost everyone?"
"There were a few innocent victims, but that couldn't be helped." She sighed, grazing the curve of her breast against his shirt. "You need to understand that our social group was petty and mean. Desmond had a stutter. On the Halloween that we were ten years old there was a party at the McNultys', whose carriage house burned down.
"Before you even think it, Suzie and I had nothing to do with that." She shot him a brief but severe frown. "Our snide group of peers had planned to humiliate poor Desmond by giving him a firefly in a jar and claiming it was a fairy with a magic pill that would cure him of his stuttering.
"The magic pill was nothing more than a glob of shoe black and sugar. The plan was to feed him that rot at the party and then laugh themselves silly at his appearance.
"It was a simple thing, really, for Suzie to dump a bottle of ink into the punch bowl. The punch was a dark color to begin with so that it resembled witches' brew. I organized a blindfold game where everyone had to drink the brew as a part of it. When the blinds came off those black mouths weren't laughing at Desmond, I can tell you. If only you could have been there, Zane, it was something to see."
"How is it you didn't get caught, with you and Suzie having the only clean faces?"
"Naturally, we had to drink the brew along with the others, and we howled up a storm with the best of them."
"What happened to Desmond?"
"He had to get a black mouth, too, so he wouldn't be singled out, but he never found out about the fairy and the bootblack. A couple of years later he quit stuttering. Later on, every girl and her mama was after him, he turned out to be handsome, and of course, rich as anything."
"Did that include you and your mama?" Even though they were having a light conversation, all in fun, something stirred inside him. The only time he had ever been jealous was watching other kids and their mothers through windows in the dark of night. This stirring felt something like that.
"Suzie and Mama." She grinned at him and winked. "I was in love with a fantasy man. In my dreams he was always big and bold with rough hands that were gentle enough to untangle my hair without so much as a pinch."
"You are..." Where was his breath all of a sudden? "You are about to steal the heart right out of my chest. Did you know that, Missy?"
Her eyes opened wide.
"That's been my intention all along, in case you haven't noticed," she whispered.
He'd known, all right, but had been too much of a fool to explore what was in front of him.
"Now you know one of my dark secrets, what about yours?" Her eyes called a challenge. "Don't tell me you walked the line growing up."
"I was a beast." He matched her grin and set Muff down. The dog pattered over to the far side of the fire and curled back to sleep next to the saddle on the ground. "I can beat your mouth-inking."
"You really know how to win a woman over, Zane Coldridge. Don't leave out a single, hideous word." She leaned into him with a shiver. Knowing Missy, it would be a shiver of delight rather than a reaction to the quickly cooling temperature.
"One afternoon I was hiding from the ladies. They were determined to teach me world history, as far as they knew it, anyways, and I was set on not learning it. So I ran off and sulked in the bushes that grew beside the pond on Old Man Jensen's farm. He was a mean cuss, the ladies never spoke highly of him.
"So, here I am hiding, and along comes the farmer with a bag tied up with twine. He ties the strings of the bag to a reed then tosses the bag in the pond. Now, just before the bag sinks into the water, I hear a noise coming from it. The old buzzard doesn't wait around, he takes off real quick, so I jump into the pond and pull out the bag to see what's making all the racket.
"It turns out to be a litter of pups, not even old enough to be weaned away from their mother."
"That was heroic, Zane." She cocked her head, distant lightning reflected in her eyes. "But I want to hear about some mischief."
"Get ready for a razor-strap's worth, then." He looped his arms around his knees, settling into his story. If he'd ever passed a more pleasant evening he could not recall it, threatening weather not withstanding. "So, I put the pups in my pockets. Five of them, and all cold and whining, did I say that it was November? I was darned cold myself, with my clothes soaking from the dip in the pond. Anyway, I figure the farmer needs a lesson, just like your ink-mouthed friends did.
"Next, I tie up the sack, with the knot identical to the one the farmer tied. I snag it on the same reed that he had left it on. Then I take the pups home to Maybelle's and get them good and warmed up. After dark, I sneak into Jensen's barn where I figure the mama dog is. There she is way back in a corner looking pretty miserable without her babies. I set them at her teats and then I hide in a pile of straw, waiting for morning.
"A while before daylight Old Man Jensen and his wife come out to milk the cows. He hears the pups whining and lets out a yelp. His wife asks what's the matter, hasn't he ever heard a pup before? He tells her how he tossed them in the pond last night. She says how it would serve him right if they came back to haunt him.
"I had to bless Mrs. Jensen for the suggestion since that was what I had planned for him to believe. I didn't even have to let out my ghostly howl, which might have given me away. He called her superstitious and said that somehow the pups had worked their way out of the bag and made their way home. Mrs. Jensen called him a fool, the pups hadn't yet learned to walk. He dropped his milk pail and stomped out of the barn. After Mrs. Jensen left the barn, I followed Mr. Jensen to the pond. He was kneeling beside the water holding the dripping bag, tied with the very knot he thought he had tied, still intact. He's the one who looked like a ghost, all white and shaking like a leaf.
"Those pups lived to ripe old ages and all their pups did the same. It seems that Farmer Jensen never had the courage to toss another animal into the pond."
Missy's mouth rounded in a circle of delight; her eyes blinked wide. "Leave it to you to be a hero and commit mischief all in one adventure. I bow to your superior deviltry, Mr. Coldridge."
Somehow, this was the highest praise that he had ever received. Not that he had received much. Occasionally, a casual bed partner would comment, once in a while a grateful lawman, but usually his actions drew vicious words and angry gestures.
Superior deviltry. The honor was enough to make him grin without restraint. He felt like crowing. He felt young and happy in a way he hadn't since the loss of his mother.
Without hesitation, without sadness or regret, he slipped the lace ribbon from his hair. He moved sideways a foot, just far enough so that he could gather Missy's loose hair together and tie it up in a bow.
"It looks prettier on you," he murmured, amazed that it didn't hurt to give the ribbon up.
Missy touched her hair, her fingers hovering over the worn scrap as if it was made of dreams.
Maybe it was. Dreams, memories and something he had never considered--hope for the future.
Tears glistened in Missy's eyes. Her smile trembled. Clearly, she understood that by handing over his ribbon, he had handed over his life. In this woman, dreams that he had never believed could come true, had. He'd bet the sun, the moon and the stars that she understood this without a word being spoken.
He needed a moment to think, to comprehend the turn his life had just taken. If he didn't back off for a moment to get things sorted out inside, he'd be weeping like a newborn.
"What are you writing?" He asked, grasping for a piece of solid ground.
* * *
What was she writing? Of all the times for the man to take a sudden interest in her career, why did it have to be now?
Something unspoken had passed between them, a shifting that would leave their lives forever changed. It was the thing she had been waiting for.
But Zane seemed afraid of it. Like a night-loving creature that had accidentally poked its head into bright daylight, he had withdrawn.
What she had just written would not give him the sh
adows he sought.
"Just descriptions, is all." She flipped the journal closed and hoped the ink didn't smear. "Is there any coffee left?"
"Not a drop." Zane reached across her lap, picked up the journal and opened it.
"Here, let me find something for you to read." She grabbed for the book but he held it out of her reach, grinning like a fool.
"I'd like to look at what you just wrote. It must be something if that blush is anything to go by."
"That's not a blush. It's the heat from the campfire," she insisted. "You look as flushed as I do."
That was a fib. Although he didn't look flushed now, in a moment he would.
She snatched at the journal but he laughed and held it away from her flexing fingers.
Watching him devour her most private thoughts was too much to bear. How could she judge how he would take the inner workings of her heart? Especially when they pertained to him. Any second now he might run for his horse and race for the safety of bachelorhood.
She stood up, shook the dust from her blue gingham skirt, and walked to the far side of the flames. The storm was still a good distance away, but it looked menacing. A sudden gust of wind tugged at the ribbon in her hair with greedy fingers. She hugged her arms about her middle against a sudden shiver.
Just now, Zane would be reading about his eyes. That was tame enough, but in a moment he would be reading about the shift of his muscles beneath his shirt. She turned at the waist to glance at him. No doubt he had read down the page and was shocked by her fantasy of that shirt gone missing.
Perhaps her mother had been correct in her view that a woman with a pen could only lead to social disorder. Missy should have remained on her piano bench as her brother had ordered. She liked the piano bench.
Missy turned back toward the storm on the horizon, but closed her eyes. Yes, the man did have a shape to make a woman weep and an inner virility that made her knees--and other places--quake.
And now he knew it. Along with knowing that his hands were made to touch her most intimate... Oh, mercy! Why couldn't he be reading about clouds or flowers or Muff's latest nibble?
At least he wasn't laughing. What was he doing, anyway? She spun back to look at him again. Lord have mercy if he hadn't flipped back to the beginning of the passage and started to read it again!
Maybe she ought to just walk away, stroll off across the prairie, never to be seen again. It would be easier than having to face him after what he had just discovered about her interest in the part of him hidden by his drawers.
"'With half a glance of his warm, whiskey eyes,'" the perverse man read out loud, "'I become a puddle of sticky syrup at his feet.'"
"It's not proper to read an author's work before its been edited," she explained, but doubted that the edited version would be less adoring.
Zane snapped the journal closed and set it on the blanket beside his hip. Missy returned her gaze to the show in the west. She heard footsteps crunching on the dirt, coming toward her.
A gust of wind howled along the ground, it swirled about her boots and up her legs. From a stand of trees
several yards from the campfire Ace snorted. Daisy whickered.
"'The stroke of his hands against my flesh makes it rise in a chill, even though I am steaming inside.'"
Evidently, the wash of his breath over her ear did the same thing.
"You are no gentleman, Zane Coldridge, reading a
lady's private thoughts."
"I'm not reading." He nipped her earlobe. "I have it memorized."
"You cad."
"You temptress." He turned her about with his big hands, gentle yet firm on her shoulders. He pinned her with his whisky-colored eyes.
For pity sakes! She really was syrup at his feet.
"You bewitching little seductress," he murmured with his lips a hot breath over hers. "You've taken my miserable, independent life and made it yours."
"Have I?" She stood on a pinhead balanced between life as she had known it and a brand-new future. She couldn't breathe.
"You have." His mouth moved over hers, touching her lips with words. "Now, what do you intend to do with it?"
"Love you forever," she mumbled against his mouth but what she had to say was too important to be misunderstood so she pulled back half an inch. "I intend to love you forever."
"I'll take your forever, darlin', and give you mine." With his arm about her back pulling her close to his heart and the wide palm of his hand cradling the ribbon in her hair, he kissed her. "Wesley Wage be damned, we're changing course and heading for the nearest preacher."
Chapter Fourteen
Zane tried to stop kissing his brand-new intended--the preacher was only a day or so away--but Missy melted into him like...well, like sticky syrup.
It would be easier to find a thread of self-control if he kept his hands away from the front of her dress, but that skein had unraveled some time ago. To his chagrin, his fingers trembled over the buttons of her shirtwaist as though he had never touched a woman in his life.
His brain struggled weakly to understand the turn his life had taken. How had he gone from free as a dried-out tumbleweed to snared and willing in the course of a few days?
Oh, hell, maybe he had been snared from the very beginning. Maybe he ought to quit thinking, there was no way he was about to figure anything out. Not with his body in control of his reason. He ought to be alarmed. As a lover he had always been polite, always tenderly in control.
Somehow, Missy had turned him on his head, spun him about and left him with as much restraint as a bumbling adolescent.
It seemed a clumsy eternity, but he managed to free the pesky wood buttons. He slid the dress backward, over her shoulders. He pressed it down to her elbows, smoothing the goose bumps on her skin with his thumbs. All that stood between him and the heart of his captor was that flimsy shift dotted with fancy blue bows.
The preacher would have to wait, because he couldn't. He yanked on a bow. The lace that hid her from his gaze slid downward. Flashes of distant lightning flickered over fair skin.
He touched her with both hands. The backs of his fingers grazed her flesh. With his thumbs, he outlined the outer curves of breasts that would fill his palms. His knuckles circled pink buds that had grown tight and pebbled. Uncovered, she smelled of nectar, fresh, sweet and ripe.
"Do you want to wait for the minister?" His voice felt dry, like leather left out in the sun all summer. That was it for being polite and in self-control. He couldn't judge what he might do if she said yes.
"I wonder if it's after midnight. Really, there's no way of telling." She sighed, deep and full, pressing the plush weight of her breasts into his hands. "If it is, and we find a preacher in the morning, then this could be our wedding day."
"I don't suppose the preacher would begrudge us a couple of hours." The man would have to be made of rusty nails if he did, Zane thought.
Thunder rumbled in the distance, but the sound was faint. He could barely hear it over the thrumming of the blood through his veins. There was time and more to find shelter.
He swept Missy up and carried her toward the campfire and the blanket beside it. His steps were quick, scattering rocks and crunching twigs. Her bare bosoms jiggled against his flannel shirt. With every bodily sense aware, he heard the friction of flesh against worn cloth.
At the blanket's edge, he knelt with Missy cradled in his arms. The breeze caught her skirt and billowed it over her knees. Plain cotton stockings hugged her legs and borrowed an orange blush from the campfire.
The air began to smell damp but he refused to acknowledge any scent but the carnal flesh an inch from his nose.
He might have tasted the storm coming, but instead, he tasted Missy. The tip of her breast filled his mouth, plump and white-hot. He suckled and felt her pulse beating against the rasp of his tongue.
"I wish I'd figured out some things a long time ago," he gasped, working to free her from the rest of her dress.
"Ordinaril
y, I'd hang on every word you had to say, Zane." She lifted her hips and in one movement he swept her free of every stitch. "Just now though, you might put your mouth to better use."
"Yes ma'am," he whispered against the curve of her waist and up her ribs. "I intend to do just that."
* * *
When Zane's mouth tugged at her breast she longed for him to kiss her mouth; when he kissed her mouth she ached for him to nuzzle her neck. She was greedy, her appetite for the man knew no limits. She wanted him to touch her everywhere at once.
She closed her eyes while his seduction washed over her in waves, tossing her up and up toward something that she needed as much as her next breath. She didn't know what that something was but it was so close that she felt she might pull apart.
Scratchy wool bit her bare behind. Flannel and denim skimmed her front when Zane's weight settled on top of her. His belt buckle pressed a cold rectangle on her belly, but upon contact with her searing skin it soon simmered.
Her body and her heart lay open to him. Her legs, pinned to the blanket beneath him, wanted to do the same.
She longed to open wide. Both her body and her soul had been like a flower bud all her life. Now, at the urging of the man pressing his hips in a slow grind on top of her, she needed to bloom.
The longing that made her body squirm settled in her womb. Her brain whispered some nonsense about modesty but the craving that had lodged in her nether regions knew better. It directed her, dizzied her and murmured that this was the way that bonded the souls of a man and a woman. "The two shall become one flesh," she remembered.
Sometime during the battle between modesty and desire, soft flannel turned to smooth, hot skin. Crisp denim became muscled legs rubbing along her inner thighs, gently pressing them open. The belt buckle on her belly had been replaced by something long, hard and hot.
This is where the souls would join. The heart of a man and love of a woman would interweave.
She opened her eyes. Zane was staring at her, his eyelids glistening.
Fireglow touched his arms, painting his biceps with bronze shadows. Amber and gold fingered his chest in a sensual dance of light. A lick of pulsing red seared her nipple where it tangled in the dark, coarse hair of Zane's chest.
