“Think I can’t afford it, don’t you?” Jake asked with a sly look at Shain. He chuckled wryly under his breath and stood. “Everybody thinks I’m not only crazy, but poor on top of that.”
Sympathy for the wild-haired little man who had extended her nothing but acceptance since she arrived filled Alaynia, and she touched his arm. “I’d be delighted to have lunch with you tomorrow, Uncle Jake. But you really don’t have to buy me anything else.”
“It’ll break my old heart if you turn me down.” Jake sniffed sadly. “Just break my poor heart.”
Alaynia caught the hint of sham in Jake’s attempt at emotional blackmail, and laughter bubbled in her chest. How many times had she yearned for a father to tease her—take her somewhere—buy her a pretty dress instead of the drab skirts and blouses she wore at the home? Jake sniffed again and slipped a sideways look at Alaynia, and she burst into unrestrained laughter. A second later, Jake joined her.
Her laughter finally abated a little, but Alaynia’s eyes continued to twinkle. “Well, I’d be just as pleased as punch to have you squire me around town and buy me whatever my little old heart desires, Uncle Jake,” she said in a drawl, imitating Jeannie’s musical Southern cadence. She pursed her lips into a mock simper. “Why, I do declare. This morning I looked in my closet and I just didn’t have a thing to wear except this old rag.”
Jake guffawed and rubbed his hands together in glee. “Be my pleasure, my dear niece. Now, you be ready bright and early, so we can have the whole day together.”
“Yes, Uncle,” Alaynia agreed demurely.
* * * *
Shain snorted in disgust and strode out of the barn. Beyond the door, he uncurled his clenched fists and wiped his hands on his trouser legs. Hell, he’d been about ready to shake that old codger silly when he offered to buy clothing for Alaynia. More rational now that he had a little distance separating him from their easiness with each other, he realized all Jake had been doing was putting Alaynia at ease—being her friend.
Making her laugh. He heard another trill of Alaynia’s delighted laughter and slowly swiveled back toward the barn door. He hadn’t heard her laugh like that since they’d met. At times her voice held a teasing lilt, but never that joyous freedom. How the hell could Jake bring that out in her, when Shain hadn’t been able to?
Jealous? The word flashed through Shain’s mind and he quickly dismissed it. He’d known Alaynia less than a day. And already kissed her, his mind reminded him.
“Yeah,” he whispered to himself. “And I’d be willing to bet this year’s crop that old Crazy Jake never gets a kiss from her like that.”
Whistling a jaunty tune, he stuck his hands in his pockets and sauntered back into the barn.
Chapter 11
A man sat on a horse at one of the forks in the road on the way back to Chenaie. He looked somewhat familiar at first, until Alaynia decided he reminded her of Shain, only with longer hair. Jeannie’s constant chatter ceased the moment she saw the man, and she whooped with delight and urged her mare forward. The man dismounted, and when Jeannie pulled her Ginger to a halt, he took her from the saddle and whirled her around once before he set her down.
One distinct difference between this other man and Shain that Alaynia noticed as the man swung Jeannie around was the low-slung holster and pistol on his hip. Shain had carried a pistol with him to the stables that morning and handed it to the groom. She assumed it must now be in the black stallion’s saddlebags, but she had no doubt that Shain, too, had a weapon within easy reach.
“Cole!” Jeannie said around her giggles of pleasure. “Shain said you came by yesterday. Why didn’t you come say hello to me?”
“Had things to do, little one,” Cole said.
“I wish you’d stop calling me little. I’m fourteen, almost fifteen, and you and Shain still treat me like a child.”
“Well, honey,” Cole drawled. He pushed a disreputable gray hat back from his forehead. “Reckon you and me ought to start makin’ them weddin’ plans then. Don’t want me no bride that’s elderly and haggard—got wrinkles around her eyes.”
“Sorry,” Jeannie said with a smirk. “You’re much too old for me, Cole. Why, by the time I got wrinkles, you’d be walking with a cane and all your teeth would’ve fallen out. I do like a man with a pretty smile.”
Cole flashed Jeannie a gorgeous smile as Alaynia and Shain halted their horses beside the two of them. Shain dismounted and grasped Cole’s extended palm. “Hope you’re staying for supper today. Jeannie’s not about to let you leave this time without having a sparring match or two with you.”
“Be pleased to accept,” Cole replied. “Looks to me like I’ll have the pleasure of two pretty ladies’ company this evenin’. Man would be a fool to turn down that opportunity.”
He grinned appreciatively at Alaynia, and she smiled in reply. A young Don Johnson in the flesh. Cole’s rugged good looks were only intensified by the two or three days’ growth of beard, and that gorgeous smile should melt any woman’s resistance. But for some reason, she compared Cole’s smile to Shain’s, with Cole’s coming up just a little bit lacking.
“Alaynia Mirabeau, Cole Dubose,” Shain said somewhat grudgingly. When Cole glanced away from her after bowing his head slightly in recognition of the introduction, Alaynia saw Shain shoot him a warning glare.
“Private property, huh?” Cole said in a low tone and with a conspiratorial wink. “Gotcha, friend.”
Shain nodded, confirming Cole’s false assumption, and Alaynia grimaced in irritation. Rather than voice her displeasure aloud in front of Jeannie, she settled for a glare at Shain, to let him know they would discuss that subject further. In privacy. He responded with a negligent shrug, but at least attempted to turn the conversation. “What are you doing back so soon anyway, Cole?”
“We’ll talk later this evening,” Cole replied. “After supper.”
Suddenly Shain’s stallion reared and jerked the reins from his grasp. An enraged javelina burst onto the roadway, snorting and snarling, and Jeannie screamed in fright. Alaynia’s mare tossed its head in panic, neighing shrilly, and she fought for control as the other riderless horses scattered in terror. Cole grabbed Jeannie and pushed her behind him as he pulled his pistol in the same movement. Shain leapt toward Alaynia as she grabbed desperately at the mare’s mane when it arched its back and plunged in fright. Trying to avoid the slashing hooves, Shain reached for the mare’s bridle at the same instant a shot rang out and the mare reacted to the noise with added frenzy.
Alaynia landed with a sickening thump in the ditch beside the road. Shain reached her in a split second. Ignoring Cole’s admonition not to move her, he gathered her against his chest as she opened her eyes and stared at him in astonishment.
“God, Alaynia,” he growled, his voice reflecting his worry and his hand stroking her hair. “You could’ve been killed. Talk to me. Where are you hurt?”
“I ... I ...” She drew in a gasp of air and stared past Shain into Cole’s face. “Did you shoot at me?”
Shain pulled her closer, leaned his forehead against hers, and hid Cole from her view. “He shot that damned javelina.” He shuddered slightly and studied her face. “And that damned mare went even crazier at the noise of the shot. We’ve got to get you back to Chenaie and send for the doctor.”
His face looked so ravaged that Alaynia reached up to stroke his cheek. “Really, I don’t think I’m hurt that bad. If you’ll just let me try to get up ...”
“Damn it, you lie still,” he ordered.
Over Shain’s shoulder, Alaynia noticed Cole smile at Jeannie and indicate with a motion of his head for her to follow him. “We’ll gather up the horses. I think your friend Alaynia’s going to be all right.”
“It’ll take my brother a while to accept that,” Jeannie said in a conspiratorial whisper, which Shain didn’t appear to hear as he ran his hands over Alaynia’s arms. But Jeannie glanced over her shoulder at Alaynia, a worried frown on her face as Cole led her aw
ay. “I was scared to death when that mare bucked her off, Cole. Are you sure she’s all right?”
“If she’s not, Shain will make it all better,” Cole promised with a quiet laugh. “She’ll probably have a few sore spots, but she’s conscious and talkin’ rationally. The ditch was filled with sand, so it cushioned her fall some.”
They walked on down the road after the horses, out of earshot, and Alaynia pushed against Shain’s chest one more time. “Really,” she repeated. “How can I tell if I’m hurt, if you won’t let me up?”
“You can just move your arms and legs while you lie right there. Tell me if they give you any problems.”
With a sigh, Alaynia flexed first one leg, then the other. Shain allowed her to sit up a little, and she bent her arms at the elbows. “Feels fine. A little sore. But I’ll probably feel worse tomorrow, when the stiffness sets in and I try to get out of bed.”
“I’ll let Jake know that you won’t be able to go with him.”
“You will not!” Alaynia eluded his grasp and scrambled to her feet. “See? I’m perfectly fine. I ... oh, ouch!” She grabbed her hip.
“Sit back down,” Shain ordered. “I’ll catch Black and ride to Chenaie—bring the buggy back. And I’ll have someone fetch Tana to the manor house, so she’ll be waiting for us.”
“Tana?” Alaynia ignored his demand for her to sit and continued to rub her aching hip.
“She’s a healer,” Shain explained in a short tone. “Damn it, are you going to sit back down?”
“No.” Alaynia smiled into his frustration. “And there’s no need for you to go get a buggy. As soon as you catch my mare, I’ll ride back.”
“You need to be looked at.”
“All I need is a soothing bath in some herbed water, or maybe some BenGay,” Alaynia said in attempted exasperation, but the concern on his face melted her irritation almost at once. Her gaze caught his, and a thread of warmth circled between them, soothing her aching muscles much more effectively than any medicinal balm. She yearned toward him, and her body instinctively swayed in answer to her thoughts. He caught her tenderly, his arms sliding down her back and around her waist.
“Who’s Ben Gay?” he murmured, and she giggled in reply.
“It’s a kind of a liniment made from wintergreen—for sore muscles.” She caught her breath as he bent his head.
He nuzzled her nose with his and whispered, “If that’s what you need, I’ll get it for you somewhere. And maybe I could help you rub it in—sort of massage away your aches.”
“M-maybe you could,” she stammered around the desire filling her veins with a completely different type of warmth. Her hands inched up his chest, aiming for the silky-damp curls around his neck. Her fingers reached their goal, and she twined them into his hair.
Shain sipped a tiny kiss and settled his hands on the mounds of her hips, gently stroking the area she had been rubbing a moment ago. “Does it still hurt?”
“Huh-uh. Not a bit.”
He opened his mouth slightly and covered hers again, slowly moving his head back and forth, caressing her lips with his own. “When that horse threw you, it scared ten years off my life, darling. How in hell have I come to care so much about you in this short time?”
His words sent a thrill of something much deeper than mere physical want through her. “And why does your caring matter so much to me?” she whispered in reply.
His arms tightened, pulling her against his length. Nothing she had ever experienced before had prepared her for the soul-shattering wave of passion that overwhelmed her. His mouth took hers almost ruthlessly, but Alaynia willingly accepted his plundering tongue, tightening her grasp in his hair and answering his growl of desire with a whimper of abject need.
The evidence of his need pressed against her stomach, an inch or two above where she wanted it to be. As though in answer to her urging, unspoken thoughts, Shain bent and cupped her hips, drawing her with him when he straightened. The ache in her core only intensified as he rocked her against him, and she threw back her head, offering him the delicate skin on her neck.
Shain drew in a ragged breath and slowly lowered her to the ground. In answer to her drugged look of hunger for more, he reluctantly shook his head. “Jeannie and Cole will be coming back in a minute,” he growled in a voice laced with his own demand for a culmination of their bodies’ raging desires. “Tonight. I’ll come to you tonight.”
“Promise?” She stroked his shoulders, then ran a fingernail down through the vee in his open-necked shirt. Twirling a swirl of hair around her nail, she tilted her chin up so she could gaze into his face. The wanting need there mirrored her own.
“I promise, sweet witch,” Shain swore. “I promise—if you’re sure it’s what you want.”
A stab of pain shot through her, and Alaynia stiffened. John had said almost those same words to her more than once.
Are you sure you want me to come back again? You seemed less than enthusiastic tonight, dear.
“How can you ask me that?” Alaynia asked Shain in a tiny, hurt voice. “I ... didn’t I show you how much you made me want you? Maybe I can’t. Maybe I’m not enough woman for ...”
“Who the hell told you that?” Shain snarled. He grabbed her shoulders and pushed her back a step. “Whoever said that is a goddamned liar!”
Doubts crowding her mind, Alaynia tore her gaze away. More than anything else, John’s sly innuendoes had kept their affair going. His indifference made her endeavor to learn how to respond more properly to a man as she strove to find the heaven in his embrace the books had promised her.
Shain dragged her forward, grinding his erection against her stomach again. She gasped and curled her fingers into his shirt, her legs trembling as the white-hot need surged through her with renewed force. His deep growl of wanting echoed in her ear, and she could only cling desperately to him, responding with a throaty moan.
“I’ve never been this hard in my life,” Shain whispered. “And part of it’s because of how you’re responding to me.”
She met Shain’s gaze with a directness that came from her heart. “Then I guess I’ve just never found the right man to respond to before.”
“I take it that means I won’t be your first?”
When Alaynia shook her head, she expected to see a look of betrayal on Shain’s face. Instead, he cocked an inquiring, raven brow.
“The ... the third,” Alaynia explained, ducking her head.
Shain tilted her chin back up and said, “No. The best. You’ve got my promise on that. And something tells me that making love to you is going to be what I’ve always dreamed of finding all my life, Alaynia, my beautiful witch. I’m not a virgin, either, sweetheart.” He chuckled when her lips twitched in a wry grin. “But I’ve never felt as hot for a woman as I do when I’m around you. And it’s more than just wanting to roll in the hay with you. I’m almost afraid that I’ll never be the same after I make love with you—never be able to look at another woman with even a hint of desire.”
Alaynia gasped and pulled from his arms. “No! Oh, no, Shain. Then you have to stay away tonight. Don’t come to my room. I’ll ... I’ll lock the door.”
“What the hell do you mean?”
“I ... Shain, I’ll be gone as soon as I can find the way back to my own time. You ... you’ve got your life ahead of you here in this time. You’ll get married to a woman here—one you can share a future with—have children with.” Overcoming the stab of almost disastrous hurt that pierced her, Alaynia pleaded, “We have to stop this attraction between us right now, before it goes any further. We’ve only known each other for a day. It shouldn’t be that hard.”
Shain’s eyes softened and he gently ran a finger down her cheek. “Hard? It’s already hard, darling.” When Alaynia blushed furiously at his double entendre, he continued in an amazed whisper, “You really have never felt this wild desire that’s between us for any other man, have you, sweetheart? I really am going to be the first man to possess you completely
—not only your body, but your soul.”
Alaynia could only stare helplessly back at him. Someone shouted Shain’s name, and he turned slightly. Cole and Jeannie walked toward them, leading three of the horses.
“Oh, lord, honey,” Shain murmured, pulling her around in front of him. “Stay there for a second, while I think about a cold swim.”
Smothering her giggles, Alaynia glanced down at her dress bodice and tried to nonchalantly smooth it back into place. There was nothing she could do about her pebbled nipples for the moment, and she raised her hands, smoothing at her hair, effectively hiding the puckers on the front of her dress. Hopefully, Cole and Jeannie would think her disarray resulted from her fall.
“You’ll have to find that black bastard of yours yourself,” Cole called to Shain as he and Jeannie approached. “We’ve been looking all over for him, and he’s nowhere in sight.”
Shain’s ragged breathing slowed behind Alaynia, and a second later, a shrill whistle split the air, followed immediately by an answering neigh. Black appeared down the road behind the other horses and, trotting past them, came to a halt beside Shain. “Here he is,” Shain said needlessly.
Cole shook his head wordlessly.
Jeannie thrust the reins of her horse into Cole’s hand and stifled a horrified gasp. “Oh, no!” She started toward the other side of the road, but Cole grabbed her arm.
“Leave it alone,” he said with a nod at the javelina, which lay in a pool of blood a few yards away. “I’ll come back and bury it later.”
Jeannie shook off his arm and pointed at the wild pig. “She’s got babies somewhere. Look, you can see where they’ve been nursing. That’s why she attacked us. We can’t leave those babies alone to starve to death.”
“Jeannie ...” Shain began.
“She’s right,” Alaynia interrupted him. “The pig was only protecting her young. We have to find them.”
“Javelinas are wild animals,” Shain tried to explain. “They can’t be domesticated.”
“I’ll take care of them,” Jeannie pleaded. “When they get old enough, we’ll turn them loose. Please, Shain.”
Witch Angel Page 13
