The hours passed too quickly. When there was a log to be climbed over, Savannah readily accepted Rasch’s help. They were working their way back to intimacy, but they weren’t there yet. Still, each was content to wait.
Midafternoon of the third day they reached Walasy-Yi Center at the base of Blood Mountain. The center offered a little store where campers could send and pick up mail or make telephone calls. While Rasch was signing the campers’ registry and buying more supplies, Savannah pushed aside her growing reluctance to call Niko and forced herself to find a pay phone.
Given the intense sexual tension between them, she’d decided that six more days with the judge might be a mistake—not for the judge, but for her. She’d caught Rasch in her web of desire. But she’d snared herself as well. Savannah knew that she’d have to bring their intimacy to an end while she could still leave.
Niko was confused when she couldn’t explain her reason for cutting short the hike. Savannah wasn’t sure she understood herself. She just knew that she was finding it harder and harder to keep herself out of Rasch Webber’s arms. Directing Niko to drive to the center and wait for further instructions, she hung up the phone.
“Who were you talking to?” Rasch asked casually as he exited the store at the same time Savannah left the phone booth.
“Just checking in with my friends, to make sure they’re all right,” she answered too quickly to sound casual.
“And are they?”
“Ah, yes, there was a—a mix-up about our meeting. It was to be next weekend instead of this one.” She covered her lie with a question. “Tell me about Blood Mountain. How did it get such an awful name?”
“It goes back to the Trail of Tears,” Rasch began, relating the tale as they started out again. “General Winfield Scott was assigned to round up the Cherokees and move them west. Many refused to leave. Legend is that the battle they fought was so fierce that the streams ran red with blood.”
Rasch took her hand as if to defend her. Savannah gave in to the warm feeling of protection that came so readily when she and Rasch were together.
As they ate their evening meal, the sexual tension between them was so strong it was palpable. Savannah went through the motions of eating but didn’t taste the food. All their conversations died in mid-sentence until at last, tense and frustrated, they spent a sleepless night in silence.
The next morning brought warm sunshine. By late afternoon they’d made little progress up the trail. As if by mutual agreement, they’d let go of all restraint. One stop after another had brought them together, laughing over the antics of the animals, who seemed to fear them less and less, examining roots and herbs that could be used for ancient medicines, and simply talking about movies they’d seen and books they’d read.
Whether it was the growing ease of being close, or the knowledge that their relationship had taken a new direction, Rasch knew that they’d gone as far as they could without being together physically again. They were practically walking the trail arm and arm. Whatever doubts Savannah had about their lovemaking seemed to have vanished. Whoever his Gypsy was, she wanted him as much as he wanted her. He knew that, and she knew it too. Tonight they’d make love again.
Rasch called an early stop and moved off the trail to make camp in a clearing beside the ever-present mountain stream. After the rain of the first night the days had remained sunny and cloudless. Tonight, as they had for the last three nights, they’d sleep beneath the stars. Tonight they’d lie in each other’s arms and—
Breaking off this line of thought, Rasch began giving Savannah instructions that she followed without question. They built a fire, banking it carefully so that they wouldn’t cause a spark to escape. Savannah filled the pots and boiled the water while Rasch unpacked his sleeping bag and unfolded it. He picked up Savannah’s, hesitated for a long minute, then retied it and laid it aside.
Savannah, watching out of the corner of her eye, gave a quick sigh of relief. For the last few days the tension had grown unbearably. It had been harder and harder not to slip out of her sleeping bag and crawl into his. Every touch, every shared moment, every smile, had fueled the fires that smoldered inside. She knew that tonight was the night to take the next step.
The crusader’s action signified that he, too, was ready to end the separation. He wanted her. He intended them to sleep together again. Perhaps she should voice a protest. But Savannah knew by the pounding of her own heart that she wouldn’t refuse. She didn’t want to.
They poured dehydrated soup mix into the water and drank it from their coffee cups, sprinkling little bits of crackers into the liquid. Afterward, they rinsed the cups and filled them with cocoa mix and sipped the hot, sweet beverage in companionable silence.
“Are you tired?” Rasch asked eventually.
“No, not really. What I’d really like is a hot shower. That’s the one thing I miss, being on the road all the time.”
“Oh?” Rasch didn’t emphasize the question in his voice, choosing instead to take another sip of chocolate. He couldn’t imagine an explanation for Savannah’s inadvertent admission. On the road? She couldn’t mean simply traveling, for anyplace she might stay, even the homeless shelters, had showers.
Homeless. Was that what she meant? If so, he could do something to help her. In his work with the courts and various charities, he knew the right people to contact. She’d mentioned a father, but that didn’t mean he was still living.
“Don’t you have any family?” he finally asked.
“Yes. I have a large family.”
“Do they know where you are?” His question slipped out before he remembered his decision not to pry.
“Not precisely,” she said, trying to keep her answers as honest as possible. She couldn’t understand her sudden reluctance to lie. Perhaps it was tied in with his saving her life. More likely, it was because the less she strayed from the truth, the fewer lies she had to remember.
“Are you a runaway, Gypsy woman?”
Savannah laughed. “A runaway? Crusader, I’m twenty-seven years old, old enough to go where I like, when I like, do what I have to.”
“No husband?”
“Oh.” She hadn’t considered that he’d think that. “No. I’m not married.”
“I’m glad.” And he was. He hadn’t known how much the thought of a husband bothered him until he’d voiced the question. He didn’t want Savannah to belong to another man. He wanted her to belong to him.
“How about you?” Savannah asked the obvious question. Though she knew the answer, he didn’t know she knew, and she decided that she ought to respond as normally as possible.
Rasch laughed and stood up. “Me? Married? No. Would that bother you?”
Savannah drained the last of the chocolate from her cup. “Yes. I think it would. But I’m surprised. I should think that the proper wife would only enhance a judge’s career.”
“That’s what Jake keeps telling me.” Rasch began to collect up the dishes.
“Jake?”
“My friend. He’s the mayor of Smyrna, a small town outside of Atlanta. He imagines himself as my campaign manager.”
“Oh? Are you running for reelection?”
Rasch held out his hand to take Savannah’s cup. “He has a notion that I’d make a good governor.”
“And would you?” Savannah’s heart began to pound. She hadn’t intended to get caught up in Rasch’s political career. She didn’t want to know that he had dreams of public service.
“I don’t know. I only know that there are serious problems in our state, problems that seem never to get the attention of those who make the decisions. I might have some ideas that would help make things right.”
“And are you always right, Judge?”
“That’s the second time you’ve asked that, Savannah.”
He remembered. Savannah sprang to her feet. The conversation was getting too serious. She opened her pillowcase and took out a cloth, her toothbrush, toothpaste, and a bar of soap.
<
br /> “I may not have a hot shower, but I intend to take a bath, Crusader.”
“Do you have any idea how cold that water is?”
“I’ve been cold and wet before,” she answered, giving him a long look. “Why don’t you build up the fire while I’m gone?”
Savannah sat down on a limb near the stream while she untied her boots and pulled off her socks, massaging her tired feet. Keeping an ear tuned to their campsite, she unbuttoned her shirt, took it off, and hung it on a bush. She unzipped her jeans and stepped out of them.
The woods were silent.
Giving a small prayer that there were no snakes lurking nearby, she stepped into the icy water. “Brrrrr!” Quickly she brushed her teeth and laid the brush and tube on the bank. Gritting her teeth in determination, she rinsed her socks and underwear, then began to soap herself. Just when she was certain she was half frozen, she heard a splash behind her and felt herself being caught in her crusader’s arms.
“You’re going to catch pneumonia or turn into an ice sculpture,” he said in a voice that was hoarse with emotion. He tightened his arms around her and lifted her legs around his waist.
“Would that be so bad?”
“I’d probably come back here and sit in this stream until I was as frozen as you,” he said. “Then we could melt together.”
Their teeth chattered both from the cold and desire as they rinsed the soap from their bodies. Rasch lifted her in his arms and strode back to the fire, blazing now in its circle of rocks. “Stand here,” he said as he pulled a towel from his pack and began to dry her.
By the time they’d dried each other, they were warmed by the touch of hands and fabric, interspersed with kisses that heated their blood and fired their nerve endings with anticipation. When Rasch deposited Savannah on the sleeping bag, she didn’t need the bag zipped to protect her from the cold. The North Georgia Mountains had become the Garden of Eden and they were man and woman at their most primitive and elemental.
“Unbraid your hair,” he whispered. “I like you free and wild.”
“Free and wild?” she repeated. “I wonder if anyone can be free and wild.…” She sat up and began to thread her fingertips through her plait, feathering her hair into a mass of luxuriant waves. The firelight reflected in the little beads of water still hanging in the dark hair. She looked as though she were wearing a crown of flames.
“You are free and wild, Gypsy. You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known.”
“Only here, Crusader, in the wilderness. If we were back in the civilized world, there would be rules to follow and laws that would crush me.”
There was a sadness in her voice that brought Rasch to a sitting position. He drew Savannah back to the mat and pulled the bag over them. “Never,” he said. “I’d protect you—always.”
Then he kissed her, and she returned his kiss in warmth and sadness. No, my Crusader. You’re the one I have to be protected from. Even you can’t go back and do things over. You can never make things right for me. You’ve already hurt me too much.
But she forgot her misgivings as he caught her up in the power of his touch. Perhaps there’d come a time when their lovemaking would be gentle and sweet, but now it seemed that each time they loved, their passion intensified. The heat was more searing, the ecstasy more extreme, the release more vivid.
“Savannah,” he whispered, “I never expected to find anyone like you. You’ve filled a void in my life that I didn’t know existed.”
Lying in his arms, Savannah looked up at the night sky. The moment had come. She choked back panic and regret, trying to speak in a normal voice. “Horatio, you’re quite a surprise to me too.”
“Savannah, nobody has called me Horatio since my mother died. My friends call me Rasch. I’d hope that we’re more than friends.”
“Yes, Rasch is nice, but I like Horatio. Your mother was right. It sounds important,” she said brightly—too brightly. “What happened to your mother?”
“She died with I was in college. I think she wanted to die. Her body gave out, and she was tired of struggling to be strong for me.”
“I’m sorry,” Savannah said quietly. “My mother died, too, when I was nine.”
“How?”
“There was an accident. She fell. She was horribly injured, and I think that she willed herself to die. She didn’t want us to see her like that.”
Two mothers who chose to die, Savannah thought. Two mothers who never knew each other, and had nothing in common except one future moment that would bring their children together. She shivered. She didn’t want to feel any emotional attachment to Judge Horatio Webber. She didn’t want to think they had anything in common. She didn’t want to begin to understand the man.
“There’s the North Star, Horatio. Do you see it?”
Rasch turned his face to the heavens. “Yes, that’s the bright one, isn’t it?”
“Did you know that the North Star never moves? There’s a legend about that.”
The fire had died down to a mass of orange coals cracking comfortably in the silence. Rasch felt better than he had in a very long time. They’d shared danger and incredible lovemaking. They’d gotten to know each other, and they’d been joined in the ultimate communion. Now was the time for soft talk and being close. He adored hearing Savannah’s husky voice. It mattered little what she said.
“Tell me the legend.”
“There was once a Gypsy woman who fell in love with a god. He took her to the heavens to live. She could move back and forth between heaven and earth, and she could have anything she wanted, except for the fruit of one tree in his garden. If she ate of that fruit, the tree died, and its death left a hole in heaven. Time passed, and the Gypsy had a daughter. Her husband was happy beyond measure. The beautiful Gypsy was so loved and cherished that she grew spoiled. One day she was walking in her garden. She was hungry. She didn’t believe that her husband would dare punish her, so she ate the fruit.”
Savannah snuggled closer, as if she needed Rasch’s protection. She felt the stubble of his beard against her cheek as he held her for a long moment. “What happened?”
“The tree died, and there was a tear in the fabric of heaven. The god was very disappointed. His beautiful Gypsy had to be punished; that was the rule. But he couldn’t bear to harm her. Instead, he filled the space with her body. All the other stars continued to move about the heavens, but the Gypsy is destined forever to remain in one place so that the heavens are whole again.”
Rasch moved his lips from her forehead to her cheeks. They were moist. She’d actually shed a tear for the beautiful Gypsy destined to be punished for her dishonor by remaining in one place forever.
“But look,” he said, “she’s the brightest star in the heavens, and she’s the one by which we all find our way. So her plight wasn’t all bad.”
“Yes, that’s true. Remember that, Crusader. Remember that about the fate of the Gypsy.”
“If you’re comparing yourself to her, don’t. There are no forbidden trees along the trail. All their yields have been harvested by the animals to feed themselves for the winter.”
Maybe, Savannah thought as she felt his lips move lower. And maybe I’ve already tasted the forbidden fruit.
The next morning when Rasch woke, Savannah was not in his arms. He came lazily to his feet and looked around. She was probably taking another icy bath in the stream. He pulled on his clothes and collected more wood to coax the fire back to life. The sun was shining. The temperature was cool, but the day would likely warm up. Rasch began to hum. He couldn’t recall when he’d felt so happy.
Feeling his pulse quicken, he took the coffeepot he pushed through the undergrowth to the stream. Maybe an icy bath was a good way to start both their mornings.
But Savannah wasn’t there. She wasn’t anywhere around the campsite either. The bear! He tore through the brush, looking for signs of a struggle. There were none. Then, taking quiet stock of the situation, he realized that her backpack an
d camping gear were gone. There was nothing left in the camp to prove she’d ever been there.
Rasch sat down and tried to make sense of what had happened. She was gone. She’d left of her own accord. Quietly, stealthily, she’d slipped out of his arms, packed her supplies, and disappeared into the night. Only the lingering smell of tea olive blossoms kept him from believing that it had all been a dream.
His erotic fantasy was over.
His Gypsy was gone, and he didn’t even know her full name.
The week after the conference Rasch was going through the motions, but nobody knew better than he that his heart was not in his job. His eyes constantly searched the courtroom, hoping that he’d see a laughing dark-eyed nymph in a Gypsy skirt. But she wasn’t there. And there were no tingling nerve endings, no burning sensations on his neck that said he was being watched. At last he was forced to admit that she wasn’t coming back.
“What’s wrong, Rasch?” Jake asked, worry evident in his eyes. They were having dinner in a little restaurant on Peachtree. “You haven’t been the same since I picked you up on the trail. What happened?”
“I met someone—a woman.”
“So, what’s the problem?”
“I—I don’t know where she is.”
Jake laid down his fork and widened his eyes. “What do you mean, you don’t know where she is. Did you lose her someplace?”
“You could say that. We were hiking together. For four days we were—together. Then she was gone—just disappeared without a trace. I don’t even know her name.”
“Whoa! You spent four days camping with a woman and you don’t know her name? What was she, a ghost?”
“Something like that.” Rasch hesitated, rolling a piece of bread between his fingers until he’d sprinkled his pasta with the crumbs. “I guess I’d better tell you all of it. The first time I saw Gypsy, she appeared on my patio in a fog, at midnight.”
The Judge and the Gypsy Page 8
