by Janet Dailey
With soft kisses he closed her eyes to sentence her to a world of sensation. Her fingers curled into the hard muscles of his arms, clinging to him as she felt a strange weightlessness envelop her. While he explored the curve of her cheek and the corner of her lips, his hands roamed in exciting caresses over her shoulders and hips. He seemed to deliberately torment her with the promise of his kiss, but did not offer it.
The aching need that was building in her eventually forced a soft moan from her throat. In answer to her .wordless plea, his hard lips covered her mouth with bruising possession. The circle of his arms tightened, crushing her breasts, taut with desire, against the unyielding wall of his chest. Yet not even this closeness brought satisfaction and she strained to cross the physical limits of their embrace, to become part of him.
His mouth broke away from hers, his breathing labored and heavy. She could feel the pounding of his heart, thudding as loudly as her own. His eyes were half-closed with the weight of desire as they ran over her face. He loosened his hold, bringing his hands up to curve them under the hair along her neck while Charley continued to lean against him, her legs too weak to stand without his support. His hands were restless with their caresses, his fingers exploring the curve of her jaw and the pulsing vein in her neck.
“Your body feels so good against mine,” he murmured on a husky pitch and lowered one hand to cup it to her breast. It swelled beneath his touch. “I want to make love to you, Charley. You know that.”
His statement pulled away the veil she’d been hiding behind and she could see clearly. The one thing she had been so determined to avoid had happened despite her better judgment. She had fallen irrevocably in love with him.
“It isn’t fair,” she protested in a faint sob. “I want you so much, Shad.”
“Charley.” Her name was a caress on his lips as he brought them down hard on her own, stealing what little vestige of control she had left.
The embrace would have ended in her total surrender if it hadn’t been for the clatter of a pair of feet on the rocky ground. The approach of the intruder stopped the kiss before it reached the point where they both would have been beyond hearing a bomb explode. Shad lifted his head at almost the same moment that the sound ceased. As his arms loosened to let Charley go his frown turned into a lazy smile.
“Who are you?” he asked, and Charley wondered how anyone could resist his smile. Still a little shaky, she turned to see who Shad was talking to. A little boy, no more than six years old, stood poised in the shadow of a volcanic cone. His rounded blue eyes were studying them uncertainly. “I’ll bet I know who you are,” Shad stated. “You’re the man in the moon, aren’t you?”
The little boy laughed and nodded vigorously that he was. Shad crouched down, sitting on his heels, to bring himself to eye level with the youngster.
“I’ve always wanted to meet the man in the moon,” he remarked and looked him over. “I thought you’d be taller.”
“I only look small,” the boy said, his child’s imagination liking this game. “I’m really bigger.”
Charley could see that Shad was enjoying himself, too. He had a natural affinity with children, she realized. He would make a good father, she decided and caught herself wondering whether his son would inherit those blue eyes and black hair. She was treading in dangerous waters.
“I haven’t had lunch yet and I’m starting to get hungry.” Shad tipped his head at an inquiring angle. “I don’t suppose you’d tell me where you keep the green cheese.”
“The moon isn’t made of cheese,” the boy scoffed at him for believing such nonsense.
“It isn’t?” Shad looked surprised. . . .
At just about that same moment, a woman’s voice called anxiously, “Billy! Billy, where are you?”
The boy turned with a reluctant sigh and answered, “Here, mom!”
A young woman in shorts and a knit top appeared a second later behind the cone where the boy waited. Her worried expression faded to exasperation as she found him unharmed. “You shouldn’t go running away from your father and me like that. Don’t you realize that you could have got lost?”
“But I didn’t,” he replied in a perfectly reasonable tone and turned to point to Shad and Charley. ‘‘They found me.”
“You mean you aren’t really the man in the moon?” Shad feigned a look of disappointment as he sent a brief smile at the boy’s mother and straightened to his feet.
“No. I fooled you, didn’t I?” the boy laughed.
‘‘You certainly did,’’ Shad agreed.
“I hope he wasn’t a nuisance,” the woman apologized and caught hold of her son’s hand.
“Not at all,” he assured her and sent a glance at Charley that contradicted his statement.
But the interruption had given Charley time to regain her senses. Shad’s recognition of that fact flickered across his expression. Once they were alone, there wouldn’t be a resumption of that embrace. The moment had passed when desire reigned supreme. Falling in love with him hadn’t changed the reality that he would leave her someday. It had now become a question of how much she would be hurt, and not a question of whether she’d be hurt.
When the boy’s father had joined his wife and son, Shad lightly took hold of Charley’s hand. By mutual consent they retraced their route to the parking area where they’d left the truck. After helping her into the cab, Shad walked around the hood to climb behind the wheel.
“Have you seen enough of the park?” He sent her a questioning glance as he started the engine.
“Yes.” She made a show of glancing at her watch. “It’s getting late. We’d better head back for the ranch before Gary starts wondering what happened to us.”
Stepping on the accelerator, he turned onto the road and headed back toward the highway. “Do you want to stop somewhere for lunch?”
“I’m not hungry,” she said, answering him with a negative shake of her head. “Are you?”
His gaze touched her, then swept to the jutting curves of her breasts. “Not for food,” he replied and didn’t need to add more. Her heart had already started fluttering against her ribs, guessing his hunger.
As they neared the highway she forced her attention to concentrate on the cross traffic. As soon as there was a break in the vehicles Shad accelerated onto the highway.
During the next twenty or so miles they didn’t speak at all. Gradually her tension left Charley and she began to relax once again in Shad’s company, her guard lowering. He seemed to sense the very moment it occurred, because he glanced over at her and smiled.
“Did you enjoy your excursion to the Craters of the Moon?” he asked. There was nothing in his tone to make Charley suspect she should read more into his question than what he had said.
“Very much.” Which was true—in many ways, but she didn’t let her thoughts dwell on that. Combing her fingers through her hair, she looked out the window and sighed contentedly.
“What was that for?” His glance was curious.
“I guess it was an expression of pride in my home state,” she shrugged because she wasn’t entirely sure what it had been. “Idaho has everything.”
“Is that right?” His tone was faintly mocking.
“It’s true,” Charley insisted. “On the road toward Salmon, we have the Grand Canyon in miniature. East of here, there are sand dunes. And Shoshone Falls outside of Twin Falls, Idaho. The water there falls farther than the waters at Niagara Falls. There’s the Snake River Canyon and the Salmon ‘River of No Return.’ I could go on and on.”
“I noticed,” he chuckled in a way that gently teased her.
“Well, it does have everything.” She laughed at her own enthusiasm.
“I wouldn’t dream of arguing with you,” he replied and reached out to link his fingers with hers. A warm tingle of pleasure ran up her arm at his gesture of affection and closeness. “Is there a reason why there has to be so much room on the seat between us?” Shad asked with a coaxing smile.
/> Charley hesitated but the temptation to be close to him was too strong to resist. Besides, as long as he was driving, it seemed relatively safe. And there wouldn’t be many chances to be near him.
“I suppose not,” she admitted and shifted over to sit beside him.
Unlinking their hands, he put his arm around her so that she was snuggling in the crook of his shoulder with his hand on her waist. It was a natural, comfortable position with the warmth of his body pressed alongside hers.
“What’s the longest you’ve ever stayed in one place?” Charley wondered aloud.
“Two years,” he replied without any hesitation.
“Haven’t you ever considered settling down?” There was a wistful quality to her question as she indulged herself in the ridiculous dream that she might be the one to persuade him to put down roots.
“Yes,” Shad admitted. “I spent two years trying. That was five years ago when I was twenty-nine. I decided it was time I stayed in one place and build myself a home. So I bought a small ranch over on the Idaho side of the Bitterroot Mountains.”
“You did?” Charley was surprised by his answer.
“Yes.” And he went on to explain, “In the beginning, it was a challenge to fix the place up and bring the ranch up to its potential. I worked day and night at it, running new fence during the daytime and repairing the buildings at night.”
“If you liked it, why didn’t you stay?” She was confused.
“It’s like having a new toy. When you first get it, you don’t want to play with anything else. Later on, the newness wears off and you become bored with it. That’s what happened to me with the ranch. Once it was running smoothly and on the verge of showing a profit, the old urge to travel came back. There wasn’t anything to keep me there.”
“So you sold it and moved on,” Charley concluded, depression settling onto her shoulders.
“I moved on but I didn’t sell it,” Shad corrected her on that point. “A widower and his son manage it for me on a share basis. I have a small but steady income from it, which allows me to do pretty much what I please. It’s a place I can go to when I’m too old to travel.”
“Have you ever been back to the ranch since you left it?” she asked.
“No. I was headed there when you walked into that café that day,” he said with a downward glance that sparkled over her face. “I can’t say for sure what made me change my plans that morning. I didn’t need the money then so I guess it was the idea of having a honey-haired boss.” His gaze made one sweep of the highway in front of them before Shad turned and bent his head to steal a kiss.
The sudden possession of his mouth caught her off guard. It took her a full second to recover her scattered wits. Her heart continued to trip over itself in an effort to find its normal rhythm.
“You’d better pay attention to your driving,” Charley attempted to sound stern, but her voice was on the breathless side.
Laughter came from deep within his chest as his arm tightened around her, hugging her closer still. “You’re a helluva woman, Charley. I’ve never met anybody like you. And that isn’t a line,” he informed her with underlining emphasis.
Charley fell silent, a faint smile curving her mouth as she savored his compliment and basked in the warmth of its afterglow. They passed through Ketchum and the turnoff to the skiing community of Sun Valley. The road to the Collins’s ranch was not many miles away.
Eventually her thoughts returned to the one fact that she could never ignore for long. She found she had to ask him, “Why do you always have to move on, Shad?”
“I don’t know.” He seemed to consider her question with all the seriousness with which she asked it. “Maybe I was born with a wanderlust in my soul. When I was younger, I thought I would come to a place, look around and say to myself, ‘This is it. This is where I’m going to stay.’ But it doesn’t happen like that. After I’ve been in new territory for a while, I start looking around and wondering what’s across the river or over the next hill. It’s taken me a while, but I’ve finally learned that there will always be one more river to cross.”
His answer made it very clear to Charley that she was foolish to hope she could ever change him. She couldn’t change herself. As much as she loved him she would never truly be happy traveling around the country. She would always be longing for a place to call home. It didn’t seem fair. She felt the sting of tears burning her eyes and blinked to keep them at bay.
When they finally reached the ranch lane, Shad needed both hands on the steering wheel to make the sharp turn. As he removed his arm from around her Charley shifted to her own side of the truck. His frowning glance took note of the movement and the whiteness of her face.
“Why have you become so silent again?” he demanded after several seconds had passed. “Is something wrong?”
“No. I was just trying to decide how I was going to keep from crying when you leave.” The truth came out on a note of forced lightness.
It silenced him for a minute. “Charley, you do tempt me to stay.” The very steadiness of his voice revealed that he meant what he had said.
She laughed with a tinge of bitterness as the truck slowed down to enter the ranch yard. “Let’s be honest, Shad. All I do is ‘tempt’ you, but you’ll leave just the same.”
The instant the truck stopped she reached for the door handle and climbed out of the cab. A door slammed behind her as she started for the house. Shad caught up with her before she reached the porch steps, his hand gripping her arm to turn her around.
“Charley—” He started to speak but she didn’t want to listen to what he had to say.
“Just leave me alone, Shad. Don’t hurt me any more than you have already.” She stood rigidly before him, warily defiant. “You said it yourself—you’re no good for me.” She threw his own words back at him and he recoiled from their sting, letting her go.
Her legs were shaking as she climbed the steps and crossed the porch to the front door. She wanted to run, but she managed to make a dignified retreat. Gary was just inside the door, leaning on his crutches. He knew her too well not to read what was written on her face.
“I heard the truck drive inOh, Charley,” he groaned in sympathy. “What have you done?”
“Made a fool of myself as usual. What do you think?” She tried to joke aside the hurt and futile longing in her expression.
“If you had to fall for somebody, why couldn’t it have been Weatherby? I grant you he’ll never win any prize in a Mr. America contest but at least he would have caught you when you fell,” Gary muttered sadly. “You knew right from the beginning that he was a drifter.”
“I knew—and I tried not to care,” she admitted, hanging her head in acknowledgement of failure. “But it didn’t change anything,”
Gary sighed, “Maybe I should have a talk with Russell.”
“No. Just let it be,’’ she urged her brother not to interfere. “There isn’t anything you can do to help me. I have to handle this alone, the same way you did,” she nodded, alluding to his broken engagement.
“It hurts like hell, Charley,” he commiserated with a look of pain.
“Don’t I know.” Her short laugh was brittle. She turned away, feeling her composure start to crumble. “I have a headache. I think I’ll go upstairs and lie down for a while.”
“Is there anything I can bring you?” her brother offered.
“No.” She hurried to the steps before she started crying.
There were times when Charley wondered if she would survive the next ten days. Shad stayed clear of her and she could never seem to make up her mind whether she was happy or sad about that. He found a lot of reasons to ride away from the ranch during the day to check on the cattle or repair fences. Mealtimes were stilted affairs with no one saying very much. The evenings Shad either spent in his room or cleaning the tack in the barn or overhauling some piece of machinery.
She rarely saw him smile anymore. He remained aloof whenever she was around, a
lways very brisk and businesslike. Yet this constant avoidance of the issue only intensified the strain they were all under.
On Saturday, Shad came to the house, quitting work early. He did no more than nod in Charley’s direction before climbing the stairs to his room. When she heard the shower running in the upstairs bathroom, she went into the kitchen to peel the potatoes for their evening meal.
Twenty minutes later she heard him coming down the stairs—whistling! The happy sound pivoted her around. She was facing the doorway when Shad walked through it. Freshly shaved with his black hair glistening, he was wearing a snow-white shirt and a leather vest. A pair of dark pants snugly fit his slim hips.
“Don’t bother to fix any supper for me tonight. I won’t be here,” he said.
“Where are you going?” She could have bitten off her tongue for asking such a nosy question. It really wasn’t any business of hers what he did with his evenings, but it was too late. It had already been asked.
His mouth twisted into a kind of wry grin. “What does a cowboy usually do on a Saturday night? He has himself a steak dinner, romances the ladies, and gets drunk.” Gary entered the kitchen in time to hear his answer and Shad turned to look at him. “What about it, Gary? Do you want to go with me?”
“You’ll probably need me to carry you home,” he said dryly and shook his head in refusal, “but I think I’ll pass on the invitation and wait until I have two sound legs before going out on the town.”
“Have it your way,” Shad shrugged indifferently. “See you later.”
Charley turned to face the sink as he walked out the back door. From the window above the sink, she could see him cross the yard to the old pickup. There was a lump in her throat as she watched him drive out of the yard.
“Charley.” Her brother spoke her name softly.
“I’m all right,” she insisted, but was careful not to look at him. “It really doesn’t make much difference, does it? When he leaves here, I’ll be imagining him with some other woman so I might as well get used to it now.”
“I wish you wouldn’t be so hard on yourself,” Gary complained.
