Harlan Assumed That that the creature charging through the woods toward his tent had to be one Elizabeth Stiles, if only because a bear would have less reason to come after him. He leaned against a gnarled apple tree, so old it could have been planted by Johnny Appleseed himself. Its arching branches groped for sun in the overgrown clearing, where he’d pitched his ancient tent. It was a wonderful spot to camp, full of low-growing wild blueberry and huckleberry bushes. Songbirds kept him company.
He sensed Beth’s frustration and her unwillingness to call to him, lest someone else be skulking about her woods. Even enraged she remained rational and logical. That capacity to think and act was one of the many things he admired about her. She was clearly on a tear.
Whatever Char had come to tell her best friend couldn’t have helped Beth to resign herself to waiting passively. He plucked a blade of straw grass and stuck the end into his mouth as Beth bounded over the stone wall. An ordinary human being might have tripped or at least taken great care on the loose rocks. She’d been climbing over stone walls all her life.
Chewing the end of his blade of straw grass, he watched her land at his toes. She brushed back a strand of hair that had whipped into her face and glared at him.
“Lord Arthur Penmountain,” she said.
Hell.
She was plainly delighted with herself. “Name ring a bell?”
“Char should mind her own business before she lands up hiding in the woods.”
“Then she’s right? The man you’re after is this Pen-mountain character?”
“I’m not after him,” Harlan said. “He’s after me. My only intention is to tell the truth. If that disturbs him, so be it.”
Her eyes darkened in the failing light. “You want Saul Rabinowitz to write an article for Manhattan Chronicle that will expose Penmountain as a crook?”
“His racing operation in this country needs close examination. I merely put Saul onto the story and presented evidence I’d compiled to...” He searched for the right word. “To energize him.”
“Does anyone else know what you’re up to besides Saul?”
“Obviously Penmountain does.”
“Penmountain must have found out your mother hired Sessoms and tried to learn if he’d figured out where you were. Probably tipped Sessoms off that you were in over your head.”
“Hyperbole,” Harlan scoffed.
‘‘Yeah, I guess. You haven’t had anyone smack you around in over a week.”
He ignored her sarcasm. “Precisely.”
She groaned and flopped into the grass next to him. The fire had gone out of her anger. She studied him closely, her lips drawn tight. There wasn’t a smidgen of country-girl naïveté in her, especially where he was concerned.
“You could have told me about Penmountain,” she said.
“I did. I just left out his name. Does it matter?”
“No,” she allowed reluctantly. “I guess it doesn’t—unless he gets to you and Saul, and I end up having to go after him myself.”
‘‘You would?”
“Of course.”
“You don’t know Saul, and we...I don’t know what we are to each other.”
Her expression softened. She said, “Maybe we should let that one go for now, until Saul does or doesn’t do his article and the dust settles a bit. What you are, for sure, is a friend. You weren’t a friend ten years ago.”
“We’re lovers, too,” he said, his voice thick as he remembered the shower in Coffee County and the rain-soaked field that morning.
She looked uncomfortable, as if he’d reminded her of something unpleasant, yet he knew it wasn’t that.
Beth Stiles had always enjoyed their lovemaking as much as he had. Sex had never been a problem in their relationship.
Not wanting to deepen her discomfort, he threw out his grass blade among the blueberry bushes. “Like my tent?”
“It is a relic, isn’t it? I think World War I’s closer on target than World War II. Is it comfortable?”
“Relatively. An air mattress would be nice, and it does smell a bit mildewed. I’ve left the flaps open, with hopes of airing it out before tonight.”
She glanced at him with some amusement. “I’m a terrible hostess, aren’t 1?”
“Squatters have no rights.”
He spoke to her back; she had dropped to her knees and started to crawl inside the disreputable pup tent.
“Smells a bit mildewed? It reeks.”
“You always did have a keen sense of smell,” he told her, following her inside.
There was very little room for the two of them. His long legs got tangled with hers.
“Char and I used to sleep out in a pup tent,” Beth said, folding her legs in front of her. “We’d tell ghost stories and plot how we were going to get out of Mill Brook. Always this sense that Mill Brook was our destiny and there was no escaping it. No reason to. It’s hard to explain.”
“You don’t have to,” he said. “I feel the same torn loyalties to Tennessee.”
“It’s where you belong.”
He nodded. “Yes, but not at the expense of...” His voice faded, but Beth prodded him. “Of what?”
“I don’t want to lose you again, Beth.” His mouth found hers, and he remembered a fishing trip with Beth when they had made love until dawn in a tiny tent. Lumpy tufts of grass beneath them or not, he knew this night would be theirs, too. “Stay with me,” he whispered.
They made love for a second time that night under the pale light of the stars and the half moon. During their first, playful lovemaking, Beth had pretended to swat a mosquito on Harlan’s thigh. He had retaliated in kind. Now, as they lay on a pile of worn, soft quilts Harlan had swiped from her attic, they were silent.
Beth filled herself with the scents of the woods and of this man, the man who had become such an integral part of her life, of her being. She stroked his hard, sinewy body, concentrating on transmitting her passion and love through her fingertips, her tongue, her very skin. Words having failed them, their bodies took over, communicating not only aching need, but also trust. She curved her palm over the taut muscles of his thigh and felt him lifting his hips, then thrusting, gently, powerfully, into her.
No more pretending. No more apparitions and dreams and repression. She filled herself with the sheer, bold reality of him and gave herself to him as she never had before. No more denial.
“Yes,” she whispered, “oh, yes.”
Her eyes were open. Taking in everything, she saw the stars and the moon through the battered screen. Looking at Harlan’s face in the light, she saw him smile, saw the emerald green of his passion-filled eyes.
“Let me love you,” she murmured.
“Always.”
She left after midnight. Watching her pull on her tangled clothes, Harlan realized that she’d bounded after him through the woods in her bare feet. His wild, mad, beautiful country girl. No. She was every inch a woman.
Unwilling to spoil the mood with talk, they parted with a kiss and a promise of a huge breakfast and endless pots of strong, hot coffee in the morning.
Beyond the break in the stone wall that marked the end of the woods, he stumbled on a gnarled root and slowed his pace, suddenly mindful of roots and ruts and stones and stray animals. Another stumble would alert her to his presence.
Moving cautiously, he went the long way round to the front of her house. He crouched in the brush, letting it conceal him.
He had a bird’s-eye view of Beth’s strange little house in its beautiful setting, with its overgrown yard and all its potential. In its own way, the place was as idiosyncratic as she was. He could envision putting his own stamp upon its quintessential New England-ness. A rail fence, perhaps, a fence bursting with roses, and irises. Lots of irises. And perhaps a rebuilt barn and a horse or two.
He pushed back the dream and focused on reality.
There was a light burning in the kitchen. He presumed she had no outdoor light. Had she barricaded her doors?
The tent had been for her benefit. A ruse. He had known she’d have to check out his living quarters with some concocted excuse. With Elizabeth Stiles, one had best be prepared.
There was no way he was going to leave her alone, at the mercy of Lord Arthur Penmountain and his hired goons. Why else, Harlan thought, would he have returned to Vermont?
Settling in for the remainder of the night, he nibbled on some tiny wild blueberries. The woman probably didn’t need his protection. Still, the potential threat—however small—against her was his doing and therefore his responsibility.
He thought of hot coffee, the warmth of her morning smile, the feel of her strong, smooth body, and sat very still, awaiting the dawn.
Chapter Ten
It was a bright, gorgeous August Saturday. Beth was certain she wouldn’t get to creep around under her car or make any headway with installing hot water. She awoke early and had a quick sponge bath in the kitchen, before Harlan or her brothers or Saul Rabinowitz, jimmy Sessoms or Lord Arthur Pen-mountain and his thugs could burst in. She pulled on khaki shorts, a T-shirt and sneakers, and decided to skip her run. Her life-style over the past week was catching up with her.
While the coffee perked, she did her morning chores. She wasn’t surprised to find Harlan parked at her kitchen table when she returned, a steaming mug in front of him. There were dark circles under his eyes, and the lines in his forehead appeared deeper this morning.
“Didn’t sleep much?” she asked, pouring herself a cup of coffee.
“A little. Guess I’m getting soft in my middle years. How’d you sleep?”
She grinned. “Soundly.”
He dispensed with further pleasantries. “I need to use your telephone.”
Leaning back in her chair, she gestured to the big black phone on the wall next to the refrigerator. “Be my guest.”
“Would you mind?”
“Mind what? Oh. You want me to leave so you can conduct your skullduggery in private?”
“Beth...”
“No, it’s all right. I’ll give you fifteen minutes.”
To her relief, he didn’t bother to make any excuses or try to tell her she shouldn’t be irked. She was still being shut out. He had told her nothing last night, beyond what she had already learned from Char.
There was plenty to do outside in fifteen minutes. Brush a couple of dogs. Pick black-eyed Susans. Search for eggs. Chop wood. In her frustration, Beth only managed to sit on her wood-chopping stump and wonder whatever had possessed her to think she could be a full and equal partner in Harlan Rockwood’s life.
She could have eavesdropped on him, but didn’t. It was her own way of showing herself that even if he lacked honor and decency, she did not.
All the man had asked for was a little privacy.
When the fifteen minutes were up, she went back inside, promising herself that she wouldn’t interrogate him. She wouldn’t let her curiosity or her annoyance show. She was a woman of thirty-four who didn’t need to be personally insulted just because her ex-husband wanted to use the phone in private.
He’d gotten out eggs, milk and oil and was whipping up a batch of pancakes at the kitchen table. Beth slid onto her chair. “Everything all right?” she asked.
“I’m meeting Saul.”
Her throat tightened. “May I ask when and where?”
“I’d rather—” He broke off with a sigh and cracked an egg into a small, crockery bowl of milk. “He’s coming here.”
“Here?”
“To Mill Brook. I’m meeting him at one of the abandoned buildings at the old academy. At one o’clock this afternoon.” He paused, whisking in the egg. “Alone.”
“He’s on the story?”
Harlan’s jaw was as hard-set as she’d ever seen. “Yes.”
“Why does he need to see you? Can’t you tell him what he needs to know over the telephone?”
“No. I have—” He broke off again. Telling another person his business went against his grain. “I have material he needs.”
“Material?”
“Evidence. Against Penmountain.”
“Holy—”
“Beth, I want you to go to Adam’s or Julian’s and stay there for the day until this is over. Someone could follow Saul.”
“Then why did you tell him to come to Mill Brook?”
“Because I can’t leave.”
“I don’t get it. If you’re so damned concerned about getting me involved, why?”
“I took the liberty of calling Adam and Julian. They’ll be down in about an hour.” He turned and smiled weakly at her, knowing he’d crawled back into the doghouse. ‘Time enough for us to have our huge breakfast.”
All Beth could say, in her most scathing tone, was “Men.”
Harlan gave her a devilish grin. “Aren’t we terrific?”
* * *
Adam steered his truck past Old Mill Brook Common. He deftly maneuvered it along the winding road, the loss of his left hand barely bothering him these days. His old, grim-faced demeanor, so natural to him before he’d married Char, had, however, returned.
He glanced at her. “Don’t sulk.”
Beth waved a hand in dismissal. “I’m not sulking, I’m thinking.”
“So far as I can see, calling me to come fetch you was the first thing Harlan’s done this past week that makes any sense. Time you pulled your hand out of this boiling pot.”
“Harlan told me pretty much the same thing when I left Nashville on Tuesday. That’s what doesn’t make any sense. Why would he come back to Mill Brook?”
“When he wants you to know,” Adam said, “he’ll tell you.”
If her brother were in her place, she supposed, he would be satisfied that Harlan had told her where and why he was meeting Saul Rabinowitz. Adam wasn’t curious by nature and could easily accept that there were things he didn’t have a right to know. Beth knew she wasn’t like that, particularly not where Harlan Rockwood was concerned.
“Do you think he and this Saul Rabinowitz know what they’re doing?” she asked. She had told Adam everything she knew—only to discover that he’d already learned as much on his own and from Char. That had grated.
“Guess they’d better.”
“Well, that’s comforting. Maybe we could go out to the academy and make sure.”
“Maybe we can just mind our own business, like we promised Harlan we would.”
She scowled, knowing there was no point in arguing when her brother had given his word. All the same, she couldn’t resist adding, “Would you mind your own business, if it were me off to pass evidence of wrongdoing against a powerful man like Pen-mountain to a New York reporter?”
“You’re family. Harlan’s not.” Beth saw Adam glance at her and almost smile. “Not yet, at any rate.”
She groaned. “Oh, please.”
Since there was no changing Adam’s mind once it was made up, she gave up the attempt. Maybe he and Harlan had a point.
Nonetheless, she worried. She couldn’t bear to think of anything happening to Harlan. Would they stop at superficial cuts and bruises this time? Not likely.
“Don’t worry,” Adam said, reading her mind. “Harlan knows better than any of us what he’s up against.”
“I hope so.”
Having it out made her feel better. After ten long years she was once more capable of admitting that she hoped for the best for Harlan Rockwood, was capable of worrying and caring about what happened to him—and of loving him.
“YOU SURE KNOW how to pick ‘em,” Saul Rabinowitz said as he followed Harlan up to Beth’s woodshed. “The lady lives here all alone?”
“For now.”
“Must be hard as nails.”
Harlan pushed the wooden latch, and the door swung open. “She is.”
He saw Saul wrinkle his nose as he peered into the darkness. “After you.”
“Of course.”
With Saul on his heels, Harlan entered the shed, leaned over the waist-high
partition and dipped his hand into the hay. He had hated lying to Beth. Yet he had done so because he had seen no other choice.
“The big guns at the Chronicle,” Saul said, “will never believe this. The goods on Lord Penmountain hidden in chicken manure.”
“Just hay. The chickens spend the summer free-roaming.”
“What a life.”
Harlan didn’t know if Saul was referring to the chickens, to Beth or to both of them. He didn’t ask. Fishing around, he came up with the large, plastic-coated envelope he had hidden there yesterday afternoon. He felt no rush of victory, not even relief. Nothing was finished, not yet. He handed the envelope to Saul.
“You have copies?” the reporter asked.
“No. You have copies. The original’s in my safety deposit box in Nashville.”
“Don’t trust me?”
“Just a precaution.”
“In case Penmountain’s goons come after me?” Saul grinned, as if he relished the prospect. Harlan recognized that he was too much of a professional to court unnecessary trouble. It was one of the reasons he’d sought out this particular reporter over countless others. “I’m not sweating it. When he finds out I’m on the story, Penmountain will call off the goons and drag in the lawyers. Mark my words.”
Harlan was counting on as much himself. “I hope you’re right.”
“Something like this I rarely miss. Mind if we get out of here? I feel like something big and ugly’s going to scream out of the woodwork after me.”
Harlan laughed. “You can take on a crime syndicate, but life in the country...”
“Yeah,” Saul said. “Doesn’t it give you the creeps?”
“I DON’T LIKE this,” Beth said.
Adam slowed the truck. Jimmy Sessoms’ rented car was blocking Adam’s narrow, steep driveway. “Neither do I.”
Sessoms came around the front of the car and gave Adam a cheerful smile as he walked up to the truck window. “Nice place you got up there. Don’t think I’ll try that driveway, though. Wouldn’t want anything to happen to my car.” He stooped, looking across Adam to Beth. “Good morning, Mrs. Rockwood.”
That Stubborn Yankee Page 14
