A SEAL's Vow (SEALs of Chance Creek Book 2)

by Cora Seton

  Nora looked down at her dress. “She’s going to think I’m pretty strange.”

  “For fuck’s sake, Walker—” Craig said.

  “It’ll be fine.” Walker turned to go.

  “I’ll be ready,” she called out as he walked slowly down the stairs. He didn’t bother to reply. Craig and the others trailed after him as he went, the cameraman berating Walker. Walker kept going, as stoic as ever.

  Nora shut the door, re-examining her feelings about taking this on. Here she’d finally gotten the opportunity to really give writing a go, and she was allowing a new responsibility to take a chunk out of her day. Was she sabotaging herself?

  More like distracting herself, she decided. It was a project she could sink her teeth into. Maybe then she’d forget the anxiety twisting her innards into knots.

  Besides, it was only temporary. She’d write up the curriculum under Walker’s grandmother’s tutelage, then return to her Jane Austen life.

  Savannah cleared her throat behind Nora, and Nora spun around, startled. “Savannah! You scared me.”

  “Sorry. I just finished the bedrooms.” She waved behind her to indicate the stairs. “Did I just hear you accept a job, Nora Ridgeway?”

  Nora nodded, guilt flooding her cheeks with heat. She’d hoped to have time to craft an explanation that would make up for her breaking her vow. “It’s education-related—” She squeaked when Savannah hugged her. “What’s that for?”

  “I know how much you miss teaching, so if you’ve found something that makes you happy, then I’m glad. Above everything else, we want you to stay here. Write if that makes you happy. Teach, whatever. Just… stay.”

  For the first time in twenty-four hours, Nora smiled. She hugged Savannah back impulsively.

  “Are you busy right now?” Savannah asked.

  “Not really. I need to finish up the bathrooms, but—”

  “I’m going stir crazy. I’d… like a new dress.” She blushed a little when Nora raised an eyebrow. “I know, I know, we’re supposed to be economizing, but I’m feeling frivolous. Is that really so bad?”

  Nora shook her head, taking in the circles under Savannah’s eyes. Wrapped up in her own cares, had she missed something? Savannah didn’t look like she was sleeping well. “Of course not.” She wondered if this was about Jericho.

  “Should I call James Russell or a taxi?” Savannah was keeper of the cell phone today and she pulled it out of her pocket.

  “James.” Nora could use a carriage ride right about now. The slower pace suited her mood.

  As usual, James was all too pleased to have an excuse to get out his horses, and in less than half an hour he was climbing down from his high seat to greet them and help them into the carriage. Nora swore the man would drive all over Montana in his barouche if he could.

  “Cameras. Twelve o’clock,” Savannah said suddenly. Nora sighed when she turned and saw the crew hastening up the hill to catch up with them.

  “Wherever you’re going, we’re coming, too,” William said, puffing with the exertion.

  “Not in my barouche.” James straightened to his full height, and almost managed to look intimidating in his old-fashioned waistcoat, but Savannah put a hand on his arm.

  “It’s all right.”

  “Are you sure, my dear? I think the way these people are hounding you is deplorable.”

  “It’s fine.”

  Nora didn’t agree, but there wasn’t anything for it. William, Byron and a young female crew member she didn’t know climbed carefully into the barouche, trying to keep their equipment steady. Nora and Savannah got in after them. Nora knew they were filming the ride, but she and Savannah both made a big deal of looking at the scenery rather than talking. She suspected this particular footage wouldn’t make it into the show.

  James took them to the Reed place, a large spread east of Chance Creek, where Alice Reed, an expert seamstress, lived. Nora relaxed a little along the way, despite the camera crew. She was blowing things out of proportion over this job. It was temporary. It was only two hours a day. She’d still have plenty of time to write.

  “I’ll be back in an hour to pick you up,” James said when he deposited all of them in front of Two Willows, the big, old white farmhouse where the Reed sisters lived.

  “Thank you,” Nora said, and she and Savannah waved as he clucked to the horses and drove off.

  “It’s such a civilized manner of transportation,” Savannah said. “Don’t you agree?”

  Nora shrugged. “As long as someone else is driving. Those horses scare me.”

  “Me, too, although I think we’re going to have to get over that.”

  Alice was waiting for them on the porch. “Come on in. I expected you a half-hour ago.”

  “I was so desperate to get out of the house, I didn’t even call to warn you we were coming,” Savannah said with a laugh. “I figured we’d visit with one of your sisters if you were out. I’m sorry about our entourage.” She waved a hand at the crew following close behind them.

  “Did James call to let you know?” Nora asked Alice.

  Alice shook her head. “Just had a hunch you’d be by.” She led the way inside as Nora exchanged a look with Savannah. Savannah shrugged, and Nora decided to let it go. Alice was a dreamy young woman Nora thought belonged in a fairy-tale illustration. Her long hair was always half braided, half coming undone, and no matter what she wore she couldn’t hide her beautiful figure and regal bearing. She was like a princess caught in a spell. Nora wondered if a prince would ever come along and spring her from her enchantment.

  Nora hadn’t been to Two Willows before. Previously, Alice had come to them when they needed dresses. It was an old house with a generous front porch and large rooms. Like their home, the kitchen was at the back. Alice led the way and sat them at a large wooden table Nora thought must have been there for a century at least. The crew took their time taking shots of the house and Alice.

  “What can I do for you?” she asked when she’d poured them both large glasses of ice water, and added a slice of lemon and a mint leaf to each.

  “I’d like a new dress,” Savannah said, a little sheepishly. “Something… that will solve all my problems. Can you make me a dress like that?” She smiled at Alice as if to say she knew that wasn’t possible.

  Alice looked her over with a critical eye and nodded. “I believe I can. Let me take some measurements and we’ll look at fabric. Come out to my workshop.”

  They brought their glasses and followed Alice out the back door across a lawn toward a carriage house set to one side and behind Two Willows, trailed by the crew. It was a white two-story building with four bays and a row of windows set on top of them that hinted at apartments over the garages.

  Alice let them in a door to one side, up a flight of thick wooden stairs and into a room that took Nora’s breath away. Large windows on all sides let sunlight stream into the huge space. Racks and racks of clothing were placed around the room. Several large worktables filled the interior space, with sewing machines of all kinds positioned on them. One corner of the room had been made into a fitting area, with draperies to give privacy to a small cubicle, and several large mirrors were set up in an open space so that you could see all sides of yourself at once. In another corner there was a small kitchen, and Nora spotted a bathroom through an open door. It seemed Alice never had to leave her workshop if she didn’t want to.

  “Holy moly,” Savannah breathed, her eyes alight. Even the crew members stopped to take it all in before furiously getting to work to record it all.

  Alice laughed. “Do you like it?”

  “I love it. This is a workshop fit for a queen,” Nora said. Just like she’d thought: Alice was living in a fairy tale. Doomed to sew forever until her prince came by.

  She shook off her fantasy as Alice beamed. “That’s what I feel like when I’m here. Come on. Let me measure you.” She took Savannah to the fitting area while Nora drifted around the room and pulled outfits off rac
ks. She spotted a redcoat uniform like the ones the men had worn at the ball and weddings, a southern Civil War–era hoop skirt, a flapper dress, a white gauzy gown that looked like something Cleopatra might wear…

  “This is amazing,” Nora called over to the others. “Alice, you could furnish a Hollywood movie studio.”

  “Sometimes I do,” Alice said simply, pulling out a measuring tape. “But mostly I just enjoy making them.”

  Alice was a true artist, Nora thought. She didn’t need any monetary gain to commit to her craft. She didn’t need a vacation from her day job or her friends around. You couldn’t keep her from it.

  Why didn’t she feel that way about writing?

  She tuned out Savannah and Alice’s conversation, and the attempts of the film crew to record everything. There was no doubt writing called to her. But every story she started seemed… wrong. She must be messing up somehow.

  “Alice, how do you know what costume to make next? If someone hasn’t asked for something specific?” she called over from the rack she was looking through. She loved the feel of all the different fabrics.

  “I run my hands over the fabric until I feel the heat of a possibility,” Alice said. “Or I go for a long walk until it springs into my mind. Or I take a bath. I always think of costumes in the bath.”

  “That’s the way I pick music to play,” Savannah said. “It’s like it comes out of my fingers without me thinking or making a choice at all. Sometimes when I run my hands over my music books, I know what to pick out without even looking at it. The pages open and there’s the song to play.”

  Nora let her hands fall to her sides. “Writing never feels like that to me.” Only teaching did. She came up with curriculum ideas all the time.

  “Don’t give up yet,” Savannah said as Alice finished with her measurements and stepped back. “It’ll come. You’re just starting.”

  “You’ll know when it’s right,” Alice added. “Listen to your body. It never lies.”

  Chapter Nine

  ‡

  Clay had been waiting by the front door of the manor for nearly twenty minutes when James’s barouche finally pulled up around noon, and he spotted Nora and Savannah inside. It had been strange to find the manor, usually full of female laughter and chatter, empty of life, and for one awful moment he’d thought the women had decamped before he remembered Avery and Riley were down at Base Camp talking to Boone. The door was unlocked and he could have waited inside, but that didn’t seem right. When he spotted the crew in the barouche with them, his irritation flared, but he covered it up with a comment or two to James as they all climbed out.

  “Can we talk?” he asked Nora as they watched James drive away.

  “I guess we’d better. Would you like a glass of lemonade?”

  He’d prefer something far stronger, but said, “Sure.”

  Savannah led the way inside. She went into the parlor and began to play the piano. Nora led the way into the kitchen. Clay followed her, and the crew followed him. So much for his hope they’d go record Savannah’s performance. He watched Nora pour two drinks, smiled at the hopeful look on Byron’s face that soon faded when she didn’t pour any more, and held the back door open for her.

  Outside on the porch, he took a seat across from her on the wicker furniture. The crew arranged themselves around the perimeter of the deck. Clay did his best to ignore them.

  “How’s your head?” Nora asked, handing him a drink.

  “Sore.”

  “I really am sorry about that.” She finally settled in her seat and took a cautious sip of her drink.

  “Want to tell me about it?”

  “Not really.” She placed the drink down on the table. “Let’s just say I like to choose when and where I’m kissed.”

  “I guess I was trying to be romantic. Like when I surprised you at the creek.”

  She raised an eyebrow, and Clay coughed to cover his embarrassment. He leaned back and balanced his drink on his knee, keeping hold of it so it didn’t crash to the porch floor. “It is romantic sometimes when the man takes charge, right? Makes you feel all feminine?” Hell, he was digging himself a nice big hole, wasn’t he? He’d meant to apologize, and now Nora was staring at him like he’d lost his mind. “I mean, sometimes girls like that.” Fuck, that was smooth.

  “Girls?” If her eyebrows went any higher they’d disappear under her hair.

  “Girls. Women. You know—”

  “Dude, shut the fuck up,” William said. “You’re just making it worse.”

  “Stay out of it,” Clay snapped back at him. William shrugged and went back to filming.

  Nora didn’t blink. “I’m not one of those women.”

  “Oh. Okay.” Clay fiddled with his drink. Lost his grip on it. It clattered to the porch floor but didn’t break.

  Nora winced. “You know what? I don’t think—”

  Clay couldn’t take it anymore. “Look, Nora. You know I like you.” He ignored the mess he’d made and the glass lying on its side on the porch floor. “You know I’d never in a million years hurt you. I wasn’t raised like that, I wasn’t raised to push a woman around and I don’t need to prove my manhood by forcing myself on one. I wanted to kiss you, you didn’t want to kiss me and I got embarrassed.”

  She scanned his face as if checking to see if he was telling the truth. Clay sat and took it. “Okay,” she said finally. “That I believe. And I’m sorry. I wanted to kiss you, too. I just… couldn’t.”

  Surprised at her candor, Clay picked up his now-empty glass and put it on the wicker table. “Sorry about your deck. I’d better pour some water on that before the wasps come.”

  “In a minute.” Nora leaned forward. “The problem with this scenario is that I don’t fall in love fast under the best of circumstances. I need time to fall for someone. Lots of time. We don’t have that, and that’s not going to change.”

  Clay shrugged helplessly. “The problem with this scenario is that I want you and no one else.”

  A silence stretched out between them that neither rushed to end. Finally Clay said, “I’d still like to take you on that picnic. I’ll keep my hands to myself. And my mouth.”

  Nora smiled, then quickly frowned, but in the end she nodded. “Okay.”

  Okay? Had she really just said okay? Nora wanted to bury her head in her hands, but Clay’s truthfulness had impressed her and she’d wanted to reward it.

  And, if she was honest, she wanted to spend time with him. A picnic sounded like a lovely retreat from the stress of the past few days. It would be a way to start over, maybe. A return to normalcy, if that was possible under the circumstances.

  “I’ll pick you up at six,” Clay said. He grinned. “I guess that means I should get back to work now.”

  “How are the houses going?”

  “We’re working as fast as we can, now that we’ve gotten started. I don’t want Boone and Riley to have to wait long to move into theirs, and Harris is framing up the second one while Curtis and I work on the first.”

  “It’s so strange not to have Riley at the manor anymore.” That sounded too wistful. “I’m happy for her,” she said for the benefit of the cameras.

  “She’ll still work with you on the B and B stuff.”

  “That’s not quite the same. I wish we’d had more time here alone before you guys came.” She bit her lip again. “Sorry. That wasn’t very nice.”

  “It was truthful. That’s better than nice sometimes. We kind of wrecked it for you, didn’t we?” He set his hands on his knees as if about to launch to his feet. Nora hid a smile. Clay was always a ball of barely restrained energy. She had a feeling he’d be amazing in the sack.

  Where had that thought come from? Nora refrained from rolling her eyes, but she was relieved that she could joke—internally—after how tense things had been these past few days.

  “In a way. But in a way it’s more interesting,” she made herself say. She meant it, too. “Men do awful things sometimes, but they’
re also kind of wonderful now and then.”

  “I’m sorry for scaring you. Both times.”

  She looked down, embarrassed by the word he’d chosen. Scared. He was right, though; he had scared her, and she didn’t want to be scared by passion.

  “You just surprised me. Both times,” she echoed.

  “I know that it must be hard given your past—”

  Nora didn’t want to talk about her stalker on camera. “Clay,” she interrupted. “What should I wear tonight?”

  He blinked. “Uh…”

  “Should I dress up?” She leaned toward him as if his answer was the most important thing in the world.

  “It’s… a picnic. Don’t wear anything that can’t get dirty,” he said slowly.

  “Okay.” She stood up. “I’d better get back to work.”

  “All right.” He stood, too, although she could tell her sudden dismissal confused him. She picked up both glasses, and when she straightened, he moved closer to her, as if to come for another kiss. But he must have remembered what happened last time, and stopped just as he began to bend toward her. “Until tonight, then,” he said and backed away again, leaving Nora a little disappointed.

  “Yes. Until tonight.”

  They stood there awkwardly until both moved at once.

  “Sorry,” she said, nearly bumping into him.

  “No, I… See you later.” He dodged around her and made it to the porch steps. With a salute he headed in the direction of Base Camp.

  Nora turned to find the camera crew watching her, all of them wearing nearly identical expressions of pity and disgust.

  “You two are so completely lame,” William said.

  Chapter Ten

  ‡

  “Oh, my gosh, we got an inquiry,” Avery said when they’d eaten lunch and settled down to work. “Sorry,” she added sheepishly. “I was looking up something for my screenplay and couldn’t help checking e-mail.” She was seated on the divan in the parlor, holding the cell phone they shared. Savannah was back at her piano. Nora was trying to write at her desk, even though the music distracted her. Riley had stayed at Base Camp with Boone even after their meeting was done, and Nora wondered if this was indicative of the way things would go from now on. So much for their vow not to get distracted from their work. Riley had mentioned sketching down at Base Camp, but with Boone there, Nora wasn’t sure how much she’d actually get done.