“Seriously, Maggie, I think you’d better consider coming back to Atlanta soon. I know you want to give yourself a chance to work here, and that’s fine with the boss and with me, but you still have your apartment there.”
“I can wiggle out of my apartment lease. I’ll move my things up here, raise the child here.”
Bronwyn very carefully set her sandwich down. “You can’t mean that you’re thinking of moving to Flat Top Mountain permanently?” she said incredulously.
“Why not? I don’t have one single tenant for this place lined up for the summer season. I wouldn’t have to pay rent here like I do in Atlanta, and if our arrangement works out, I’ll be able to keep my job. Scot’s Cove is a good environment for children, very outdoorsy and healthful.” Maggie didn’t say so, but she felt a million miles removed from the city instead of only a few hours away.
“There are a few things you need to consider about the mountains—for instance, the winters. They’re cold and damp, and you could be snowed in for days. And no restaurants around here serve quiche—now Maggie, don’t try to tell me anything different. I know. I went looking for such a restaurant when I was in town today scouting out news of you. No one ever even heard of quiche in Scot’s Cove. And they put cole slaw and chili on their hamburgers here, for goodness’ sake.”
“If you were hungry for something that tastes familiar, there’s a Taco Bell on the corner in town where the stoplight is,” Maggie pointed out.
“Well, believe me, I didn’t hear Taco Bell ringing. Anyway, I wasn’t in the mood for Mexican food. And what about the overly bucolic atmosphere here, which will surely drive you bonkers if you stay in Scot’s Cove? I passed two trucks hauling hogs down Main Street, Maggie. They blocked traffic.” Bronwyn adopted a glum expression.
Maggie was mustering her forces to counter all these truths, but at that moment, Tate chose to walk past the kitchen window. Maggie thought he was probably headed to look at the oak tree that had been toppled by the storm.
Bronwyn did a fast double take and said, “Who’s that?”
Maggie cursed Tate’s timing. She would have preferred that Bronwyn know as little as possible about Tate Jennings.
“That’s the man I told you about,” she said reluctantly. “The one who jumped into my canoe at Lover’s Leap.”
Bronwyn stood up and went to the window. She stared out at Tate, who was walking around the fallen oak and studying it gravely. Finally he stopped and balanced his hands on his hips. He was wearing a pair of shorts and nothing else; his hair fell loosely to his shoulders, gleaming with the brilliance of jet.
Bronwyn let out a low and decidedly unladylike whistle. She seemingly couldn’t take her eyes off him.
“Well, Mags,” she said finally. “Now I understand everything.” And she turned and stared at Maggie with an expression that could only be described as flabbergasted.
Chapter Nine
The next day, Saturday, Maggie and Bronwyn treated themselves to the local sights. They picnicked below Maidenhair Falls and they mined for gems at the local Ruby Ranch Gem Mine where neither of them found anything of value. Maggie had a good time, but she missed Tate. She wondered if he missed her even half as much.
He was around, she knew that. On Sunday morning, he left a bouquet of tiny wild violets on the doorstep so that she saw them when she opened the door to greet the morning. She and Bronwyn spent the day sitting in the sun outside, and she halfway hoped that Tate would appear, but he didn’t.
Tate had met Bronwyn briefly after lunch on the first day of her visit. The two of them had looked each other over warily, finally warming to each other after Tate had won Bronwyn’s admiration by successfully hooking up the new fax machine. But Tate, saying that she and Bronwyn needed time together, had stayed away since.
Maggie wondered how she would explain the sound of dulcimer music if Bronwyn heard it, but fortunately, Peg had apparently decided to stay away, too. Finally, on Monday morning, Bronwyn left in a flurry of activity, declaring that she was expecting a visit from Maggie in Atlanta soon.
“I’ll have to come back and clean out the apartment, put my furniture in storage, and all that fun stuff,” Maggie said.
“Bring Tate with you. We’ll show him a good time,” Bronwyn said.
“Yes,” Maggie said as she lugged Bronwyn’s overnight case to the car. “And you be sure to come back here to see us soon, too.”
“Not a chance,” Bronwyn said cheerfully, and then she was driving away in a cloud of yellow dust.
Maggie watched her go with mixed feelings. Once Bronwyn, who had seemed savvy and smart to Maggie when she’d first arrived in Atlanta, had embodied everything that Maggie wanted to be, but now—well, the baby had changed things. Or maybe it wasn’t only the baby; maybe it was her new attitude. Maggie no longer wanted to make the most money or be seen with the best people; she no longer cared about fancy clothes and traveling to exotic places. Funny, but for the first time in her life, she was actually feeling content with the way things were.
After she saw Bronwyn off and went back inside the cabin, Maggie was startled to see that the robin’s egg with its nest had mysteriously reappeared on the window sill. She almost laughed with glee. This meant that Peg was back. She had capriciously placed this sign in the window so that Tate and Maggie would get together.
Time to get down to business and start talking commitment, said Peg’s familiar voice.
“What if I’m not ready?” Maggie said aloud. For an answer, she only heard a bit of incredulous laughter.
“Well, why should I be ready?” Maggie said with more than a little irritation.
Because you love him, was the answer.
“Yes, but—”
No buts, Maggie, and you need to stop blocking his thoughts so he can’t get closer to you. That’s not a nice thing to do, Peg said.
“It feels too intimate when he knows what I’m thinking even before I do,” Maggie said.
There is no such thing as too intimate if you really love each other, Peg replied.
“I never said I loved him.”
That’s another part of the problem. What’s stopping you?
“Look what happened to me when I loved Kip.”
Tate needs to know that you love him and you need to know that he loves you.
“We know. We can’t bring ourselves to say the words, that’s all. Saying ‘I love you’ makes everything so…so serious.”
It’s supposed to be serious, you ninny.
“Can’t we just enjoy each other?” Maggie said on a pleaful note.
She heard another peal of laughter laced with dulcimer music. It faded toward the bedroom, and Maggie followed it.
The curtains had been pulled wide so that the sun shone brightly into the room, and for a moment, Maggie’s eyes were blinded by it. She closed her eyes, opened them, and then she saw her.
She was no more than a shadowy outline in front of the window, but there was no doubt in Maggie’s mind that the image she saw was of Peg Macintyre—and a very pregnant Peg Macintyre at that.
Peg gave her a reproachful look and faded into a sunbeam.
Maggie blinked. “We haven’t even touched on the issue of trust. How can I ever trust a man again?” she asked plaintively.
Peg, if she had an answer to this question, wasn’t talking.
That night, Maggie waited eagerly to see if Tate had noticed the bird’s nest in the window, and he showed up at her door precisely at nine o’clock.
She went into his arms eagerly, naturally.
“Ah, this feels so good,” he said, holding her close.
“I’ve missed you, Tate,” she said.
“And I’ve missed you. I spent the whole time we were apart wanting to be with you, even though I went into town and hung out with Albie, my buddy from the newspaper, and Charlie. Did you and Bronwyn have a good time together?”
Maggie led him to the couch and pulled him down beside her. “We had fun, but I missed y
ou, too. What did you think of Bronwyn?”
Tate kept hold of her hand. “I like her, but I don’t believe she thinks much of our mountain ways,” he said.
“She’s a city person, like—” Maggie had been going to say that Bronwyn was a city person like her, but she decided to amend this observation. “Corrected version— Bronwyn is a city person like I used to be.”
“Are you sure that’s past tense?” Tate was running a finger up and down the inside of her forearm, which made it hard to concentrate on what she was saying.
“Almost. Stop it, Tate. I can’t think when you do that.” She brushed his finger away.
“That’s the general idea,” he said, not stopping anything.
“I can’t imagine ever going back to the city,” she said.
“That’s even better. What did Bronwyn say about me?”
“She said that you aren’t as wild as you look,” Maggie said, and giggled.
Tate laughed. “Does she know that you’re even wilder than you look? Does she know that you’re a tiger when you make love? Tell me, are you like her when you’re in Atlanta?”
“What do you mean, like her?”
“You know. Sophisticated.”
“Maybe. Probably,” Maggie admitted. “You might not like me there.”
“Be assured, Ms. Macintyre, that I like you everywhere,” he said. “All of you. Your eyes, because they look silver in the starlight. Your hair, because it’s the most beautiful color I’ve ever seen. Your ears, because I have never seen more beautiful earlobes in my life. Your—”
Maggie dissolved in laughter. “My earlobes? Is there a standard of beauty for earlobes?”
“I’m not sure, but there should be. Yours are beyond compare. Slightly fleshy, but not to the point of droopiness. Elegantly rounded, and a delightful pale pink. I’d describe them as delectable. What else do I like? Oh, yes. These,” and he touched her breasts, caressing them softly through her clothes.
Maggie looked down. “They’re only this large because I’m going to have a baby.”
“It’s not the size that I admire so much as the shape. They’re almost perfectly rounded. And the peaks are perfection.” He slid his hands downward to cup them over her abdomen. “How’s the baby?”
“Not complaining,” Maggie said.
“Are you sure you’re feeling all right?” He looked at her anxiously, lovingly.
“Oh, yes. Very,” she whispered, wishing he would look at her like that forever.
“I love making love with you,” he said quietly. “Have I mentioned that?”
“Only five or six times. Not nearly enough.”
“I’ll tell you many more times. Many, many more times. Take this off,” he said, untying the knot of the blouse that she had carelessly knotted at her midriff.
Her heart melted, and she knew that she wanted him as much as he wanted her. To tell the truth, maybe even more.
“Wait,” she said. She stood and led him into the bedroom, where she had lit several candles earlier. The candlelight cast a golden glow over the bird’s-eye maple of the furniture; it reflected in the old beveled mirror over the bed and made dancing shadows on the ceiling. Tate and Maggie became two of those shadows moving toward the bed.
Maggie kicked off her shoes, and Tate wrapped his arms around her from behind and kissed the top of her head. As she leaned blissfully backward, his hands found her breasts, circled slowly, enticingly. One hand dropped to her pelvis and tucked her close to him; she felt his arousal growing through her clothes. Gently he stroked her abdomen over the place where the baby grew.
Her need made her swallow and reach around for him, urging his thighs closer.
“I wonder if they’re here, Peg and Tsani, watching us,” Tate said.
“I hope they have better manners than that,” Maggie said, and Tate laughed low in his throat. Maggie couldn’t think about Peg and Tsani. It was Tate who filled her consciousness so completely that she thought of nothing and no one else. Tate with his long dark eyes smudged like shadows beneath his prominent brows, Tate whose features were softened by candlelight. Slowly he slid his hands under her shirt and unhooked her bra. He removed his shirt and drew her down onto the bed before lying back on lacy pillowcases to feast eager eyes on her breasts.
“So beautiful,” he said as if to himself. The way he was looking at her made her feel voluptuous and desirable. She thought about this; only a few weeks ago she had been so miserable that she had known deep within her soul that she would never feel sexual again.
He was touching her nipples now, rolling them lightly between thumb and forefinger; he watched her face for expressions of desire. She smiled and touched his chest, tracing the contours of the muscles, moving her hand lower to circle his navel. She unbuttoned his jeans and reached for him, touching him as lightly as he touched her.
“Don’t stay so far away,” he murmured, reaching out and encircling her waist with his arm. Maggie shifted her weight so that she leaned closer, and she closed her eyes for a moment against the flickering candlelight.
He traced her lips with a forefinger. “How I’ve dreamed of kissing you,” he said, and he shaped his palms to her face and brought it in line with his. He kissed her, and she held her breath, wanting it to go on forever yet feeling the most excruciating longing for more.
When he released her lips, he smiled at her. “You are so wonderful, Maggie. I’ve done a lot of thinking about us. I told you that I care about you. I even think,” and he stopped to moisten his lips, never taking his eyes from her face, “I even think I’m falling in love with you.”
She stared at him. “Do you mean that, Tate? Because if you don’t, it’s the cruelest thing you’ve ever said.”
“I mean it,” he said evenly.
She digested this. She knew she loved him; how could she help it? In the short time that they had known each other, he had become part of her life. At the same time, the thought of loving him terrified her. She had committed to a man once; she didn’t think she could ever do it again.
“I don’t trust love, Maggie. Maybe it’s not fair even to tell you what I’m thinking. But more and more, I want you to know all my thoughts, as I want to know yours.”
She put a finger over his lips. “I don’t mind telling you that I’m scared to death,” she said solemnly.
He kissed her fingertip and took her hand, moving it away from his mouth. Her fingers interlocked with his.
“Is that why you’re blocking me from your mind? You are, you know.”
“Not always.”
“Sometimes, then. It seems as if you do it at the very times that I want to be inside your head the most.”
“It’s not fair for you to know what I’m thinking when I don’t have the same advantage about you,” she said. “How do you do it, anyway?”
“I concentrate on you and suddenly it’s there. The messages, I mean. Chalk it up to my Cherokee heritage. Charlie says that there have always been those among us who have the gift.”
She smiled at him. “And what a gift! Tell me, Tate Jennings, what’s on my mind now?”
He turned solemn. “Maggie, the message I’m getting is too deep for words, and you’ve admitted that you’re scared, which only makes it more complicated. I understand why you’d be afraid of commitment after what Kip did to you, and in many ways I feel the same. Love is scary.”
“Tate,” she said, drawing him toward her. “I don’t know how much of this is real and how much is fantasy. Maybe we can make sense of it together.”
“Together,” he said, the syllables expelled on a breath that stirred her hair. “A beautiful word.”
“It never was before,” she said, stroking his cheek.
“I’m finding meanings that never existed for me in all sorts of things,” he said. “It started when I came to live on Flat Top Mountain, but nothing had any significance until I met you. I want to make love to you now, Maggie. I want to show you how much I adore you.”
&nbs
p; He gathered her to him, and she wondered how this man had come to mean so much to her in so short a time. In that moment, he seemed like all she ever wanted in a man and more. He made it possible to lock everyone and everything else in the world from her consciousness; they were again floating in their own special place, far away from normal cares. There was no reality, there were only the two of them pleasuring each other in their own special way.
The only reality that Maggie knew was Tate kissing her, Tate caressing her, Tate banishing her sense of separateness. His hands shaped her buttocks, urging her against him, communicating exquisite passion. With heightening arousal, he slid his hands inside her shorts, touched the roundness that was the baby, passed over it and found what he was seeking. Maggie gasped, all bodily sensation, all electricity, tiny sparks becoming huge fires that threatened to consume her very soul. Making love together was nirvana and heaven and paradise all rolled into one; it was Tate and it was Maggie and all that they meant to each other.
He helped her out of her clothes, and she helped him out of his, and he covered her body with his, pressing her backward into a nest of soft pillows. In a moment of possessiveness born of desperation, she wanted to feel all of him, wanted to hold him inside her so that he would never get away. She buried her face in his chest and clutched his back, wrapping her legs around him as if to bind him to her forever. The pulse of his heartbeat bore her forward as if on a huge wave, the crush of his body drove her toward a rush and swell that crashed and boomed on a distant shore.
Again and again he rocked against her, gasping with pleasure at each magnificent thrust. She no longer cared about anything but loving him, holding him, pleasing him. Their climaxes broke over a vast landscape of unbounded light, and they were drowning, drowning in each other and the light and the intensity of their lovemaking. For a long time, all they could do was cling to each other, still shimmering in the afterglow of their experience.
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