Lisa Plumley - [Crabtree 01]

by The Matchmaker

  But she wasn’t ready. Not in the least. Molly discovered it the moment Marcus’s warm breath feathered over her lips, the moment his mouth touched hers. Theirs was a union as unlikely as it was irresistible, and those qualities showed as well in Marcus’s kiss. It was gentle but decisive, tender but expert. It was all the things she might have expected—had she possessed the wit to expect anything at all—and so very, very much more. Marcus cradled her cheek to hold her to him, murmured something in a hushed voice, kissed her again.

  “What?” Molly asked, letting her eyelids flutter open.

  “Very sweet,” Marcus repeated. “Sweeter than I imagined.”

  She felt foolishly pleased. Then wickedly eager, as Marcus lowered his head again. His gaze was half-lidded, his attention fierce, his manner languid in a way that suggested to her now-experienced self that he intended to kiss her once more.

  “You are sweet also,” she said before he could. There was no reason, after all, not to deal with this politely. “Tender and delicious.”

  His grin flashed. “See if you find this sweet.”

  His mouth touched hers. Molly relaxed the merest amount, letting her fingers uncurl from the fine cotton of his shirt. This was familiar now. The brief hesitation before their lips met, the heated slide of Marcus’s lower lip across hers, the tiny nip he gave the bow of her upper lip. All of those were delicacies she’d mastered, with Marcus’s tutelage.

  “Yes, very sweet,” she announced when their next kiss had ended. With relief, Molly realized something more. “I feel quite proficient at this kissing, in fact. Perhaps I’m a prodigy! I had no idea.”

  “You look so pleased with yourself.”

  “You look pleased that I’m pleased.”

  “I am,” Marcus said. “But there’s more.”

  “I find myself quite eager,” she said boldly, “to discover it.”

  She couldn’t believe she’d blurted as much, but Marcus didn’t appear to mind. With him, Molly realized, she felt curiously free to say anything. Perhaps that was because he so often disapproved of her. Since she wasn’t likely to please him, she was free to be herself.

  It was an odd notion. One she didn’t want to entertain just now. Instead, she remembered what he’d promised, and gave in to her curiosity. “How much more is there?”

  “This much.” Marcus lowered his head then paused long enough to warn, “And it won’t be sweet.”

  “Not sweet? I doubt very much that you—oh, my!”

  Deceptively this kiss began as the first, with careful touches and a gentle coming together. Quickly, though, it became something more. Marcus thumbed her chin, urging Molly to part her lips; trusting him, she did, and discovered a subtle invasion more passionate than anything she’d ever known. Marcus delved his tongue inside her mouth, stroking her from within, angling his head to deepen the contact between them. Shocked, Molly fluttered her hands against his shirtfront, beat gently on his chest, issued a startled cry.

  Within seconds, that cry became a moan of enjoyment she hardly recognized as coming from her own throat. Marcus’s kiss went on and on, and she discovered that it was, indeed, not sweet at all. Instead, this kiss was ardent and giving, demanding and needful, all at once. It made her mind whirl and her heart pound. When it was finally over with, Molly could only look at him with what was surely a dazed expression.

  “Still feeling proficient?” Marcus asked.

  She shook her head to clear it. “I’m feeling,” she said, “as though you ought not be grinning quite so cockily at a moment such as this.”

  “Why not?” He took both her hands in his and squeezed. “Right now, I feel stupid with happiness. Daft with enjoyment. You bring out those things in me, Molly.”

  “I don’t know if I should be pleased—or consigned to Sheriff Caffey’s jail for the sake of public safety. I can’t very well go about making people daft.”

  Marcus laughed. “Be pleased. I’ll have it no other way.”

  “Very well. I’m pleased.”

  She was, Molly realized. Deeply, joyfully, surprisingly pleased. Somehow, she and Marcus had wrought an accord today—more than that, even. They’d fashioned a new beginning between them. That fact made her feel more lighthearted than she could ever remember.

  Perhaps, she thought giddily, Marcus wasn’t in pursuit of the matchmaker’s secret. Perhaps he was in pursuit of her, and all her caution had been wrongly directed.

  She hugged herself. Watched him with a smile. Felt her smile waver as Marcus took out his pocket watch and consulted it.

  “Smith will be expecting me.” He touched her shoulder, leaning forward for a quick kiss, one that had the feel of a goodbye. “I’ll stop at the locksmith’s on my way to the mill. I’ll send over some men with lumber and supplies for those repairs I talked about, too. Just have them pile up everything someplace out of the way until I can get to it.”

  After one last smile and a brief caress of his fingers across her cheek, Marcus strode to her shop’s front door. There he paused to regard her with a triumphant, masculine look.

  “Don’t worry about a thing, Miss Molly. I’ll have everything here in perfect running order in no time flat. I promise you that.”

  He winked—the rascal—and nodded. Then he left. Stunned by his rapid departure, Molly stared after him. How could he kiss her like that, so passionately and so stirringly, only to—

  The sound of the door slamming shut behind him brought her back to her senses.

  Everything here in perfect running order, she recalled. Humph! Marcus meant he’d have her in perfect running order, Molly mused, she was sure of it. She’d been foolhardy enough to let down her guard. Now Marcus thought he could dictate what was best for her, just like everyone else in her life did.

  Well. If Marcus thought she would knuckle under to tactics like those—however sweetened with a kiss!—then he had better think again, Molly vowed. She intended to establish her independence, her competence and her business ability, and she would do exactly that. No matter how Marcus tried to thwart her.

  With that thought in mind, Molly packed up a basket of potential Chautauqua goodies. She arranged it nicely, put on her best hat and then headed out to pay her calls. By the time she was finished, Morrow Creek wouldn’t know what had hit it. Today, for the sake of securing her Chautauqua booth, Molly meant to cause the biggest stir since…well, since the matchmaker’s arrival!

  Marcus realized there was trouble afoot at approximately half past five, during his walk home from the mill. He’d detoured apurpose past Molly’s shop, planning to check on the lumber, bucket of nails, saws and hammers, and other supplies he’d had sent over earlier. But when he got there, the shop was deserted, and there was no sign of the materials he’d issued.

  Scratching his head, he lingered outside the vacant shop. The quantity of lumber he’d sent couldn’t have simply disappeared. It was expensive and fine-planed into perfect, straight boards, pieces Marcus had selected himself. Where could Molly have stowed it?

  It would be just like her to gussy it up somehow, he decided. Perhaps she’d buried it beneath ribbons, or tied flowers to it. Perhaps she’d created a life-size sculpture of a Grecian goddess, with a nail bucket for a head and two hammers for arms. Cheered a bit by the whimsy of that notion, Marcus strode the outside perimeter of the shop, investigating. After today, Molly’s eccentricities didn’t strike him as quite so odd, or so aggravating. Instead, they seemed almost…endearing.

  Imagine that.

  Marcus found he didn’t mind the search for his missing supplies, either. He had remembrances of Molly to fill his thoughts.

  She kissed like a woman eager for him and his touch—exactly as he’d imagined she might, during all those times he’d dreamt of her. Being with Molly today, touching her, had spoiled his concentration for most of the afternoon, Marcus realized, feeling a carefree grin spread across his face. He didn’t mind a damned bit.

  That would abate, he felt certain, once he’d tas
ted her a bit more…thoroughly. There was no reason their dalliance had to affect either of their lives unduly. After all, Molly herself had suggested he “dally a while” with her. There had been no mention of courtship, a development he attributed to her unusual upbringing. Their togetherness could offer the best of all worlds.

  With Molly, Marcus had found a woman both sunny and sensual. She was pleasant enough company and might eventually be helped into baking passable breadstuffs, too. Now if he could only get her to quit talking so much—and to quit hiding his building materials—things would be perfect.

  He continued his search. Maybe around the back?

  “Oh, Mr. Copeland!” someone hailed from nearby.

  He glanced up to see Grace Crabtree heading toward him, perched on her monstrosity of a bicycling apparatus. She saw him looking and hailed him again. The gesture didn’t even make her bicycle wobble. ’Twas impressive—there were grown men in town who didn’t dare ride that newfangled invention.

  Politely Marcus took off his hat. He waited for Miss Crabtree to pedal to him across the rutted dirt road, then come to a stop. She did, jauntily jumping down to stand beside her unconventional transportation.

  “I’m so glad I’ve found you this way,” she said, an uncharacteristic smile on her face. Unlike most women, she did not so much as straighten her bicycling costume, but allowed the garment to flutter in the breeze. “I’ve been meaning to thank you.”

  “Thank me?”

  “For the lumber and supplies, of course,” Grace said. “When Molly told me you’d donated them to the cause, I could hardly credit it. Frankly, I hadn’t pictured you as part of the women’s suffrage movement. You don’t seem terribly liberal minded to me. But the proof is in the pudding, as they say. And Molly assured me—”

  “Lumber and supplies?”

  “Yes. The things you donated this afternoon? Brought over by four burly men from your mill?” She looked at him as though he were addled. But then, perhaps suffragettes like Grace Crabtree looked at all men that way. “They will be used, as you suggested, to construct a wonderful platform for use by our women’s rights speakers at the Chautauqua next month.”

  “Your speakers? As I suggested?”

  “Of course. Naturally, we’ll feature your name prominently in the program.” Again Grace examined him with that starchy, skeptical expression of hers. “All supporters of our cause receive the proper recognition.”

  “Supporters.”

  “Yes. That’s what I said.” She peered closer. “Are you quite all right, Mr. Copeland? You look unwell.”

  “I’m fine,” he gritted out. So that’s where his supplies had got off to. To benefit a bunch of radical social equality activists. Activists who doubtlessly didn’t approve of men like him. When he got ahold of Molly—

  “You seem to have a propensity toward repeating things.” Grace peered at him. “I find myself rethinking my plans to have you make the opening remarks at our portion of the Chautauqua.”

  “I have plenty to say, Miss Crabtree,” Marcus assured her. Jaw locked, he surveyed the bakeshop, home of the deceptively good-natured Molly the Meddler. “I merely require your sister’s presence in which to say most of it.”

  “Most of it?”

  “The most dastardly parts.” He tugged on his hat and tipped it to Grace with a gentlemanly gesture. “If you will excuse me, I believe she and I have an overdue appointment.”

  Chapter Eight

  After a brief but exceedingly aggravated stroll, Marcus arrived at his house on the outskirts of town. He stomped toward the porch steps, keeping his gaze alert for signs of his erstwhile baking tutor. She should be here. A glance at his pocket watch told him it was already past six o’clock.

  There was no sign of her, though. In the deepening dusk of a September evening, the only movement came from the trees leaning in the wind. The only spot of brightness came not from Molly’s characteristically vivid clothes, but from a lantern burning inside his house.

  Puzzled, Marcus hurried onward. Dry leaves and browned pine needles crackled underfoot. He never left a lantern lit, and he always kept his doors locked. Growing up the way he had had taught him the foolhardiness of doing otherwise.

  He slipped his key from his pocket as he thundered up the steps. His hand reached the doorknob. Marcus worked the key, ready to hurl himself inside and discover the source of that disturbing lantern’s glow. He knew he hadn’t lit it. Doing so would have been unwise in the extreme, everything but a plea to have his hard-earned possessions taken by fire. Even if he had lit the lamp, he knew it would have consumed all its coal oil by now. That didn’t explain why it still burned.

  His key didn’t work. Staring dumbfounded at it, Marcus tried again. Once more, the sturdy lock refused to budge.

  He scowled at the door. He jiggled the knob. He peered at his key and double-checked to see that it was the correct one. It was. Confounded, Marcus put his hands on his hips and considered the situation.

  There was nothing for it. His lock was not working.

  Five minutes later, Marcus gritted his teeth and measured the weight of the rock in his hand. He surveyed the window glass in front of him. Destroying it on purpose made him feel sick at heart, but there was no help for it. He’d deliberately constructed his house with locks on all the doors and windows.

  He set his jaw, checked to be sure his arm and hand were still protected by his wrapped suit coat, then angled his body away from the window. Finally, sighting one particular pane, he bashed the glass.

  It shattered with an insignificant-sounding tinkle, sending two pieces of expensive window glass falling. Grumbling, Marcus reached inside and released the lock, then slid the window sash upward. He unwrapped his suit coat and threw it inside.

  “Having a bit of trouble?” someone asked from nearby.

  With his hands poised to boost himself inside, Marcus paused. He glanced over his shoulder at the tanner, who was passing by on his way home from his shop. Marcus could not believe he’d just been spotted trying to invade his own home, like a burglar.

  “I’ll need to fix this window,” he said with deliberate casualness, nodding toward the shattered glass as though that were the extent of the problem. “That’s all.”

  The tanner grunted in understanding. “I’ll give ya’ a couple of rifle cozies to keep out the draft till the window glass comes in,” he offered. “You could stuff ’em right there in the broken spot.”

  “I might do that.”

  A few minutes later, after some shared grumbling about the matchmaker, the tanner headed on his way. Marcus fixed his gaze on the window, spread his hands along its sill and boosted himself inside.

  He landed near his suit coat—and at a woman’s feet. Befuddled, he gazed past her buttoned shoes, up the length of her bright, flowery skirts, all the way to the leather-bound book in her hand and the aghast expression on her face.

  Molly.

  “Marcus! What are you doing?”

  “Coming home. I live here. Remember?”

  “And what have you done to your window?” She stared past him at the sprinkling of glass that remained on the floorboards. “When I heard the glass break, I thought for certain you were a burglar. You frightened me half to death! It’s taken me this long just to find a suitable weapon.”

  Earnestly she gestured with it.

  “You thought to defend yourself with a book? Did you plan to read a bedtime story and lull the thief to sleep?”

  She shook her head. “It was either this or your bottle of hair pomade. I already had this in hand. I reasoned it would be less likely to do permanent damage to the robber.”

  He frowned at her. “Now you’re casting aspersions upon my choice of grooming products?”

  “Well…your pomade does smell very strongly of bay rum.”

  “I only apply it on special occasions,” he said with dignity.

  Preparing to get up, he grabbed his suit coat from the floor. He debated putting it on, then to
ssed it onto a nearby chair instead. Interloper that she was, Molly deserved no special attire. She would just have to cope with seeing him in all his masculine glory, shirtsleeves included.

  Marcus got to his feet. Molly shuffled out of the way with a small cry. She had looked fairly shaken when he’d fallen into the room. Oddly enough, a part of him regretted having frightened her. The rest of him wondered what the hell she’d been doing there in the first place.

  Molly grabbed his arm as though to steady him. “Are you all right? That was quite a thud you made, you know.”

  Squinting, Marcus shook his head. This was beyond strange. Surely he was imagining this. Molly, here? In his home? Without him? She looked cozy and secure there, he noticed, now that the immediate danger had passed.

  Molly behaved as though her presence there were utterly natural. Expected, even. Limned by the lamplight behind her, she bustled about his home, seeming altogether too comfortable for his peace of mind. Her air of contentment went far beyond what he would have expected of a tutor meeting him for a baking lesson—even a tutor whom he’d kissed.

  “Have you taken up residence here?” he asked suspiciously. “Has your family finally gotten fed up and forced you out?”

  “Of course not.” Molly waved away his questions. “Why did you break your window?” she asked again.

  “The lock on my front door was broken. I—” Something in her expression made him stop. Marcus examined her, growing increasingly certain she’d had a hand in his faulty door lock somehow. “I had to break the window to unlock it and get in.”

  “Why didn’t you just knock?”

  “Knock?”

  “You were supposed to knock on the door!” she wailed. “That’s why I lit the lamp!” Looking distressed, Molly set aside the book. She knelt and began picking up glass shards with careful gestures, bundling them in her apron. “So you would see it and know someone was here. So you would know to knock. You’ve ruined my surprise!”

  “Locking a man out of his house is a passing strange way to surprise him.”