“I really do have to be going.” This time Molly stood, gathering her basket from the corner of Wolf’s blanket.
Wolf didn’t rise, and so Molly rounded a pair of trees before she found herself on the footpath again. She glanced over her shoulder, and found that he still hadn’t moved. His back was rigid.
“Red?” he called, and she stopped, spinning to face him.
Wolf glanced over his shoulder. “Thanks for the bread. Stay on the path.”
“You’re welcome, and I will.” She allowed herself a smile. “And thank you for the brandy. I’m sorry I didn’t like it very much.”
He grumbled. Was it “So am I”? Molly couldn’t be sure.
His back was to her again. “Wolf?”
At the sound of his name his back stiffened, and he turned to her.
“Will you be here tomorrow?” Molly knew she shouldn’t sound so hopeful, but she couldn’t help it.
“I’ll be here,” he growled. “Stay on the path,” he reminded her again. “We can’t have you getting lost, now can we?”
Molly spun around, and her smile widened when her back was to Wolf Trevelyan. She’d spent much too much time with him today, but then Grandma would think she’d taken the road, and so perhaps she wouldn’t worry.
She ran, just in case.
He wouldn’t be able to corrupt her with drink, that was certain. Her entire face had reacted when she’d placed the brandy to her lips, eyes watering, mouth puckering.
She had reacted when he’d touched her, a response much stronger and more pleasant that any brandy might bring on. The touch had been so inconsequential, such an innocuous brush of his fingers over hers, but Molly had held her breath and stared at him with the brightest, clearest questioning eyes he’d ever seen. A few minutes later, when she’d brushed the crumb from his face she’d turned several interesting shades of pink and red.
He heard her even before he saw the swirl of red between the trees. She was . . . good God she was humming something softly as she hurried back to Kingsport. The basket, now empty, swung easily in her hand, and the red velvet hood was pushed back, so he had a clear view of those magnificent red curls.
Her hair was not auburn, not strawberry-blonde, but red. Thick red curls that were soft, never kinky, teased him, falling past her cheek and over her breasts. He could imagine too vividly that if he removed the cloak he would see those magnificent curls falling to her waist, soft, heavy curls he could bury his hands and his face in.
He held his breath as she passed. It wouldn’t do for Molly to know that he watched her, even now. That he had waited for her to come this way again. Why did he find himself fascinated with a country girl like Molly Kincaid? She was different from the other women he knew, that was the truth, but it was more than that.
She knew what he was, and still she was not afraid.
On the path, Molly stopped to admire a beautiful aster. She bent at the waist, and a handful of curls tumbled forward, hiding her face from him.
Molly looked, to all the world, like a naive angel, all goodness and light, Wolf’s opposite in every way. But he had seen a kinship in her, a spark in her eyes that told him she was not all she appeared to be.
He knew what her downfall would be, how he would, eventually, corrupt Molly Kincaid.
She had held her breath when he touched her hand, and she didn’t even seem to realize it. Her fingers on his face had trembled, just a little, and there was craving in her touch and in her eyes. Maybe she didn’t know yet that she wanted him, maybe she didn’t know yet exactly what it was she wanted, but it was true.
Hell, he wanted her hard enough for both of them, and it made no sense at all.
It made no more sense than the fact that he felt compelled to watch her, to wait until she’d visited her grandmother and was on her way home. He could not explain, even to himself, why he was driven to follow Molly carefully through the woods, her red cloak always in view, until she stepped onto the road to Kingsport.
He would have followed her there as well, tracking her to her home, watching her stroll through the streets of Kingsport with that innocent smile on her face, if he didn’t know he’d be seen and recognized.
Wolf Trevelyan still wasn’t welcome in Kingsport, and never would be. Jeanne had been one of their own, a daughter of the town, and he was nothing more than the arrogant son of a rich man, and he was responsible for her death.
That would never change.
Wolf turned toward home, and already he was planning for the next encounter.
“What is wrong with you?”
Molly snapped her head up to stare at her mother. “Nothing.”
“Then why have you just sewn Mr. Hanson’s sleeves together?”
Molly glanced down at the mending in her lap, and saw that she had indeed sewn one sleeve to the other. “I’m just tired, I guess. It’s been a long day.”
Mary Kincaid nodded her head sympathetically, and Molly knew her mother had had a long day, as well. She hadn’t had the respite of a moment in the company of a handsome and intriguing man.
“Will you ever remarry?”
Mary was shocked by the question, and her eyes widened. “Why do you ask such a question?”
Molly shrugged her shoulders. “You’re young enough to have another husband.”
“I loved your father.”
Molly placed the mending in her lap and abandoned it for a moment. “Did you love him when you married, or did love come later?”
Mary still glowed when she talked about her late husband. “I adored him, before he even knew I existed. Yes, I loved him very much.”
“How did you know?”
Mary’s glow gave way to suspicion, which was evident in her narrowed eyes and thinned, stern lips. “Molly, is there something you’re not telling me?”
Molly forced her eyes to open wide and to remain on her mother. “Of course not. But I am . . . well, surely I’ll marry someday, and I want to know what to expect.”
“What will I do without you, when that time comes?” Mary sighed, and her pretty features softened as she relaxed. “Is that why you want me to marry again, so you’ll be free to marry?”
“I didn’t say I wanted you to marry, I only asked if you thought you might.”
Mary Kincaid was still an attractive woman, with just a touch of gray in her dark hair, and a minimum of wrinkles on her pretty face. “I don’t know. I’ve never given the possibility much thought.”
“Mr. Hanson was giving you the eye Sunday after church.”
“Wondering why his shirts had not been mended yet,” Mary snapped. “Nothing more. Now, let’s get back to work.”
Molly removed the stitches that joined Mr. Hanson’s sleeves at the cuff. “You haven’t yet answered the other part of my question.”
“What other part?” Mary asked absently.
Molly sighed. Must she be blunt with her mother? She didn’t want to arouse suspicion, but who else was she to ask? “How will I know when I fall in love?”
Mary didn’t take her eyes off of her own mending. “You’ll just know,” she said in a low, wise voice.
It wasn’t a very satisfying answer. Molly frowned at the shirt in her lap, and tapped the needle lightly against sturdy cotton.
“When the time comes,” she said softly, “do you feel any different? I mean, inside?”
Mary dropped her mending and lifted her head. “Molly Elmira Kincaid, has one of these Kingsport boys been putting ideas in your head?”
“No ma’am,” Molly answered quickly and assuredly. She didn’t like to lie to her mother, and she was thankful that Wolf was not a boy or from Kingsport. She was also quite certain that the intriguing ideas in her head were her own and not planted there by anyone else. “I’m just curious.”
“Curiosity is not good for a young lady. It will get you into trouble every time.” Mary’s voice was stern, and Molly knew the conversation was over.
By the light of the fire, Molly removed t
he errant stitches from Mr. Hanson’s shirt, and began again. This time, she kept her thoughts to herself.
Those thoughts were exclusively about Wolf Trevelyan. She could see his face in her mind, with very little effort. Harsh and handsome features, deep green eyes, hair as black as a raven’s wing falling, just a little disobediently, over his forehead. She remembered the touch of his hand, and his face beneath his fingers. The roughness and the warmth of his skin.
Just thinking about him made her feel warm all over, and made her heart beat fast, as it had that afternoon when he’d stared at her so audaciously. She’d never been truly courted, and she’d certainly never had exhilarating and intense dreams about a man before, so she wasn’t sure what to make of her reaction. At the moment she was only sure that there was not another man on the face of the earth like Wolf Trevelyan.
Molly looked down to find that she had stitched Mr. Hanson’s shirt to her skirt, and she set about trying to undo the damage without drawing her mother’s attention.
Perhaps Grandma Kincaid could tell her what love felt like.
Wolf stared at the fire that blazed before him, an unnecessary source of heat on a mild night. In the solitude of his bedchamber, sitting in his favorite chair, he enjoyed, for the last time that day, a fat cigar and a snifter of his best brandy.
His days began and ended in much the same way.
He’d never needed more than a few hours sleep a night, but usually by this hour he was either asleep or well on his way.
What he really needed right now was a sparring partner and a few rounds in a boxing ring.
Fighting had been, for the past five years, his way of venting frustration in a world that no longer allowed a man to express his anger in a physical way. Riding a horse through the park had never seemed sport to him, and he had no patience whatsoever with lawn tennis, but a match in the gymnasium at his gentlemen’s club always put him right.
It was Molly Kincaid, that slip of a girl, who had him in such a knot. She’d worked her way into his mind, and it seemed that since he’d met her she was always there.
Wolf thrust his legs forward and took a long draw on the cigar. Women were usually so predictable, but not Molly. Had he become so accustomed to the spoiled society women of New York that he’d forgotten what a real woman was like, or was Molly as original and perplexing as she appeared to be?
He turned his gaze to the wide and tall bed. He always slept alone when he was at Vanora Point, so why did the big bed suddenly seem so damned empty?
It wasn’t a sparring match he needed, it was Molly Kincaid. In that bed. Naked. His for the taking.
In spite of his sleeplessness and obsession, Wolf smiled. Molly was just a woman, and he was caught up in the dreariness of Vanora Point. She wasn’t even, he had to admit, the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. She was too wide-eyed, and when she wasn’t blushing her face was too pale, and she was rather short . . . .
Wolf continued his list of her shortcomings well into the morning, but the bed continued to look too vast and lonely to crawl into alone.
Chapter Three
Wolf shook out the blanket before placing it over the path in roughly the same spot he had the day before. There was no sign of Molly yet, but it wouldn’t be long now.
He couldn’t remember the last time he’d anxiously awaited the arrival of a woman, and the awareness that he was looking forward to seeing Molly made him smile. It was the game, he reasoned, and not the woman.
Wolf knew women. He knew what they wanted, and what they despised in a man. Even before that night, before he was labeled a heartless murderer, he’d had a reputation for ruthlessness. A face that was harsh, even at twenty-four, and the distance he was able to place between himself and one, even a woman he was bedding, had built that reputation.
Still, there were women who were drawn to darker men who had no interest or inclination in being tamed, and Wolf had always been able to manipulate those particular females. He didn’t have the kind of good looks that women liked, but he could turn on the devilish charm when he needed to.
Wolf smiled grimly at the realization that he continued to divide his life into before and after that night, but he refused to dwell on the fact.
There were women out there who got a sick kick out of flirting with a dangerous man, and Wolf wouldn’t deny a single one of them the thrill of a real scare.
It never lasted, the fascination that brought those women to him, but he’d learned to make the best of it.
His money didn’t hurt. Wolf was well aware that there wasn’t a woman alive who wouldn’t forgive a man an awful lot if his fortune was healthy enough.
Wolf didn’t consider himself cynical. He thought of his approach to the supposed fairer sex as realistic.
Today he was well prepared for his meeting with Molly. There was a deck of playing cards in one pocket, and a diamond and sapphire bracelet in another. He was determined to expose all of Molly Kincaid’s weaknesses.
By the time she was in sight, her red cape dancing almost merrily down the path, Wolf was in place on his side of the blanket, the cards spread before him in a familiar game of solitaire.
“Hello.” There was a tentative undertone to Molly’s greeting, and Wolf smiled as he lifted his head.
“Do you play?” He gathered the cards swiftly, scooping them into one hand.
“No.” Molly lowered herself to the far end of the blanket, placing her basket on the path behind her.
Wolf shuffled the cards briskly, never taking his eyes from Molly’s face. Such wide eyes, she had, clear and so easy to read. Such pale, fragile skin, a complement to her bright hair.
Wolf smacked the deck of cards against the center of the blanket. “Take a card,” he said as he drew his hand back. “Top card, one from the middle, it doesn’t matter.”
Molly hesitated, but she finally reached forward cautiously, as though she expected he might reach out and capture her wrist. She took the top card, as he had expected she would, and placed the ace face up beside the deck.
Smoothly, Wolf flipped over the next card. A measly four. “You win,” he said as he scooped up the cards and shuffled again.
“I do?”
“One more time?” Wolf placed the cards between them.
“I suppose.” Her voice was wary as she reached forward and again took the top card. A red queen.
Wolf turned over the next card. An eight. “You’re lucky. Some people have it, and some don’t.”
“Some people have what?”
“Luck.” Wolf scooped up the cards and shuffled with a skill that had been years in the making. Molly watched the cards fly through his hands, obviously fascinated. It certainly didn’t take much to impress her. Her gaze was riveted on the quick motions of his hands and the cards that flew through his fingers.
“How about we make it a little more interesting this time,” he offered, and Molly lifted her eyes from the deck and his hands to his face.
“How would we do that?”
“A little bet.”
He was making her uncomfortable. She wrinkled her nose, so softly she probably didn’t even realize she’d done it, and squinted those wide gray eyes. “I don’t have anything to bet, and besides it’s not appropriate.”
“Not appropriate?” Wolf repeated. “Why not?”
“It’s gambling, and gambling is a sin.”
“So are you refusing because you don’t have anything to bet, or because gambling’s a sin?”
Molly didn’t seem to know the answer herself. She hesitated, and squirmed a bit there on her far edge of the blanket. Her red cape was tossed casually over her shoulders, revealing for him a very nice shape that tested the patience he was practicing. There was nothing enticing about the plain blouse she wore, or the heavy brown skirt that covered her legs, but her waist was so tiny he was certain he could span it with his hands, and the swell of her breasts was generous.
“Both, I suppose,” she finally answered tentatively.
Wolf placed the cards in the center of the short space that separated him from Molly Kincaid, and slipped the bracelet from his pocket. A thin band of light, a hint of the sunlight that found its way to the forest floor, sparkled on the diamonds and sapphires as he tossed the bracelet to the blanket, where it landed with a musical jingle beside the deck of cards.
“If you draw the high card, it’s yours.”
Molly leaned forward to get a better look, but she didn’t touch the bracelet. She kept her hands folded in her lap. “It’s beautiful,” she whispered.
All women loved beautiful things. Most especially beautiful expensive things that sparkled in the sunlight. Or the candlelight. Molly would be no different.
“Draw the high card, and it’s yours.”
She lifted her face to him, wide eyes staring at him boldly. “I told you, I have nothing to . . . . ”
“If I draw the high card,” he interrupted. “I get a kiss.”
He expected her to at least express surprise, but there was none on her face. He saw nothing there but utter calmness as she considered his suggestion, and he realized that Molly wasn’t surprised at all.
This time, instead of taking the top card, Molly spread the deck across the blanket, fanning the cards slowly with her delicate fingers. Those fingers fluttered uncertainly over the deck, fingertips lightly brushing each and every card. Finally, she took a card from the middle, turning it over slowly. An eight.
He had planned to lose again, to see if she would take the jewels she’d won. The top card, the one that should have been hers, was a ten. The second card, the card he would have drawn, was another four. Wolf ran his fingers over the back of the deck. He’d been well prepared to lose, certain that the kiss he craved would come soon enough, in any case.
“What the hell,” he muttered, taking his chances and picking a card at random from the middle of the deck, turning over a deuce.
Big Bad Wolf Page 3
