Maybe she had the right idea after all.
9
Cecilia stood just outside the schoolhouse and rang the bell that signaled the lunch period was over. Monday morning had passed quickly as she’d reviewed spelling words with the children for their upcoming spelling bee.
Little feet scurried past her as the children made their way back into the school house. Their tin lunch buckets clanged against their legs.
In the yard, Lee and Jericho were using sticks as swords in a mock battle. Cecilia gave the bell one more ring. They looked over at her and abandoned their sticks and ran flat out for the schoolhouse. Oh, to have that much energy again.
“Mr. John was cartin’ the steam engine across town in a great big wagon!” Lee exclaimed gleefully as he neared.
She knew. John had gotten up in the dark of night and ridden out of town with his freighter Michael to take delivery of the new steam engine from the nearest town with a railroad stop. Last night at supper, the man had been as giddy as a child on Christmas Eve. She hoped the new machinery would be what his sawmill needed.
And now it was time to finish the day.
She turned to the classroom, noticing that one seat was empty. Ruth.
"Does anyone know where Ruth is?"
So far today there had been no mouse sightings, and Cecilia had her guard up. What was Ruth up to now?
Minnie pointed out the window on the opposite wall. "She wanted to pick some wildflowers."
Cecilia instructed the children to start on their afternoon assignment and walked across the room to look out the window. She felt a beat of relief as she caught sight of Ruth hurrying across the field. Her hands were full of wildflowers. Now Cecilia wouldn't have to send out a search party or let John know. The girl had simply been picking flowers and lost track of time.
Ruth burst through the door, slowing when she realized everyone was working studiously at their desks. Cecilia nodded for her to sit down, but she approached the teacher’s desk.
"I picked these for you." Ruth extended the flowers.
Cecilia hesitated. She had expected a trick or some delay this morning, and nothing had come. But looking down into Ruth’s innocent face, she could only reach out and accept the gift.
The girl had obviously gone to some effort, arranging the yellow and blue and pink wildflowers in an artful way. She had even added sprigs of green leaves and tied the whole thing together with some sort of twine.
"Don't they smell lovely?"
Cecilia belatedly raised the bouquet to her nose and sniffed. One of the green leaves brushed her jaw.
"Quite lovely." She directed the smiling girl to her seat. Cecilia didn't have a vase but laid the carefully-crafted bouquet on the corner of her desk. Had she and Ruth reached a turning point? She had prayed every day for the young girl to realize that Cecilia meant to be not only her teacher but also a friend.
It was a kind gesture and an unexpected one.
Ruth sat at her desk, one leg swinging like a pendulum above the floor as her head was bent over her work. She wore a small smile, and Cecilia found herself smiling too.
Later that evening, she was not smiling any longer. Tears of frustration gathered in her eyes as she went downstairs, thinking to find Mrs. Fitzgerald. The other woman was not in the parlor or the kitchen.
The entire first floor was empty. The upstairs had been quiet as well. Where was everyone?
Cecilia looked wildly around for something to stop the itching at her wrists. Maybe a dab of butter? Or should she try pouring some milk over the affected areas?
She was startled when the kitchen door opened. Some instinct made her hide her hands behind her back. It was John. She couldn't hide her dismay.
She had hoped for Mrs. Fitzgerald.
He glanced at her and then did a double take. "What's the matter?"
"Nothing."
He advanced on her, his gaze intent. "Tell me what's going on."
She didn’t want to tell him. This was between her and Ruth. But then the itchy feeling overtook her, and she moved her hands in front of her body, unable to resist scratching her right wrist.
His eyes narrowed. "Let me see."
"It's really nothing. Ruth picked a bouquet of flowers, and I think I must be having a reaction to one of them.”
At her words, he stepped even closer. He grasped her wrist and turned her hand over, looking at the skin mottled by a red rash.
"Where are the flowers now? In your room?"
He brushed past her, and she heard his footsteps stomp up the stairs. She should call after him, tell him to stay out of her room. But she needed help. If he knew what had caused the itchy rash, maybe he would know of a remedy.
His expression was thunderous when he came back down the stairs. He was holding her bouquet in his handkerchief.
“This it?" he asked.
At her nod, his frown grew.
He passed by her again and went outside, leaving the door standing open behind him. He was back in a few moments, without the handkerchief.
"Why didn't you tell me that Ruth was still acting out?"
Cecilia shook her head, baffled. "She did something nice." She didn't mention the mouse in the classroom or that she suspected Ruth. She had no proof.
He opened his mouth and bit back whatever he’d intended to say. "That posy was filled with poison ivy leaves."
She stared at him dumbly. She allowed herself to be led to the pump over the wash bucket. She didn't protest as he soaked her hands and wrists and then rinsed them with fresh water from the pitcher.
"But surely it was an accident,” she babbled. She needed a distraction from the feeling of his hands enclosing hers. “If she did it on purpose, wouldn't she have a rash all over her hands?"
He looked grim as he patted her hands between a towel. “No.”
She should step back. She was too aware of him. The width of his shoulders, the intensity of his ice-blue gaze as he looked down at her. But that itch at her wrists was worsening.
"Ruth knows what poison ivy looks like. She wouldn't have put it in the bouquet by accident." He shrugged slightly. "Maybe she wore gloves."
Cecilia felt a rush of frustration and hurt. She couldn't understand why the girl still resisted her friendship. She pulled her hands out of John’s loose grasp and turned away, her eyes burning. “Do you know of anything—an ointment or a tincture—that will stop this itching?"
The space between her fingers itched, and she threaded the fingers of her opposite hand through to try and relieve it.
“Flo might be able to make a paste that will help.”
She returned to the wash bucket and submerged her hands in the cool water. The itching didn't stop, but it faded by a degree.
"If you want to administer corporal punishment, you have the right to," he said. He moved across the room and opened a cabinet beneath the counter. Apparently not finding what he needed, he straightened.
"I don't know that punishing her is the right answer. It hasn't seemed to make a difference."
He pulled one of his hands through his hair, and she saw the play of muscles in his arm. She glanced quickly away.
One of the pins must've come loose in her hair. Some strands slipped free and tickled her jaw. She shook her head to try and dislodge them, keeping her hands in the water. It didn’t help.
"This was cruel," he said. "She endangered your person. She can't get away with it."
Cecilia knew that. But she hated to think of how Ruth would react if Cecilia administered a harsh punishment. She could allow no leeway for pranks such as this in her classroom. Up until now, her other students had shown respect and behaved appropriately. But if they saw Ruth get away with this and receive no punishment, it wouldn't be long before someone else decided to act out when they didn't like what she asked of them.
The hair tickled her cheek again, and she shook her head, more furiously this time. It didn't help. She dropped her cheek to her shoulder to try and relieve the tic
kle that way.
John’s gaze zeroed in on her. He took two steps, enough to draw close to her. "What are you doing?"
“My hair is tickling me.”
He moved close. Any closer and they would be embracing. She stared ahead, pretending she felt nothing. Lying to herself. The lower half of his face was just in front of her eyes. She saw every movement of his lips when he frowned.
"Did you hold the flowers close to your face?"
Cecilia hadn’t even thought of that.
“I smelled the flowers." When Ruth had encouraged her to.
"It isn't bad. Maybe one of the leaves brushed against you."
He dipped a small piece of cloth in the water and gently brushed it against her jaw. “The leaves have an oil in them. If we can wash it off, the rash won’t spread any further.”
That was a small relief.
Her hands remained in the water. He was still touching her face.
This close, there was nowhere to look but at him. Her heart beat frantically in her chest. The air in the small space between their bodies seemed to grow tight with expectation. She couldn't draw a full breath.
His eyes searched her face. And she thought that perhaps he leaned a little closer.
His free hand moved to cup her other cheek. His thumb swept against the skin there, the lightest of touches. He made no pretense of looking for more poison ivy.
He was too close. The frantic fluttering of her heartbeat changed to sluggish pulses, sending blood rushing in her ears.
She swallowed with some difficulty.
He was looking at her as if he wanted to…
This time she was not mistaken that he leaned closer—
The back door opened
Shame burned hot in her chest, eclipsing everything else. Before she could even register who was coming inside, she took her dripping hands out of the pot and grabbed one of the smaller towels he had laid on the table. And she fled.
Susie White heard voices in the hotel lobby, and her heart pounded. Hot blood rushed to her face, and for one panicked moment she thought about getting up to leave. But she stayed where she was, sitting in the hotel dining room in tiny Bear Creek, pretending to stare out at the boardwalk beyond the window.
If Mama ever found out what she was doing, Susie would be in trouble with a capital T. But she set her shoulders stubbornly. Mama was just like her older sister Cecilia. Neither of them understood.
She heard two male voices speaking in low tones as they entered the dining room. She recognized the voice of the desk clerk as he ushered someone to a seat at one of the other tables nearby.
And the other voice was… him.
The desk clerk left by way of the kitchen, no doubt letting the cook know that breakfast was wanted. Although this late in the morning… Would it be brunch instead?
There were only six tables in the hotel dining room. This was the closest Susie had been to the handsome stranger.
Nerves made her hands shake, and she tucked them into her lap.
This was her moment.
There was a rustle of paper, and she snuck a glance over her shoulder. He was holding a newspaper. It obscured some of his face, so she only saw the curve of his ear and the shock of dark hair. He wore the sharp black suit that she had seen on several occasions.
When he didn't seem to notice her, she turned her gaze to the window again, though her unfocused eyes didn't actually see anything outside.
Her mind raced.
She had engineered this chance meeting. And now he was reading a newspaper. What should she do?
She had never had to chase a man before. All of the boys she had grown up with—excluding her own family, of course—had been happy to dote on her, giving her compliments or offering their arm as they accompanied her down the street. All she usually had to do was glance at a young man in a certain way, or maybe bat her eyelashes, and his attention was hers for the taking.
That was the difference, she told herself. Every male around these parts was a boy. But the body sitting two tables away from her was a man. He had the faintest hint of gray at his temples, though she thought he couldn't be as old as thirty yet. Old enough to know what he wanted.
Now she only needed to make him want her.
The cook emerged from the kitchen carrying a carafe. Probably coffee. The man filled the stranger’s mug and then came to Susie's table to refill hers.
“Thank you." She offered a pretty smile, though it was mostly for the benefit of the man sitting two tables away. "I'm still waiting for my friend. I do hope she hasn't forgotten we were supposed to meet."
The lie rolled off her tongue almost too easily. She felt the tiniest hint of guilt, the same way she had when she’d lied to Mama this morning about visiting a sick friend in town.
There was no friend.
Only this plan to catch the stranger’s attention.
Susie had begun seeing him around town over the summer, when she had accompanied her niece and friend Emma into town while the other young woman met with a typist to complete her novel. Susie had first noticed him passing through the hotel lobby. Next, on the boardwalk in between the saloon and the blacksmith’s building. Since then, she had noticed him frequently. She had offered him smiles if they passed on the boardwalk. He always doffed his hat if their eyes met. But they had never spoken before.
If Mama knew Susie was in town for the sole purpose of meeting a man, she would never allow it. Susie had told a lie out of necessity.
The cook went back to the kitchen, which left only Susie and the stranger in the dining room.
“It would be a shame if your friend doesn’t show up.”
At the sound of his voice, she allowed herself to feel one blink of satisfaction.
She turned her head in his direction again, feigning surprise.
The paper was spread on the table before him, his coffee untouched. He was looking straight at her, and there was a sharp, almost predatory look in his eyes that sent a thrill zipping through her stomach. Her gaze wanted to linger on the angles of his face, the shadow on his jaw that hinted at stubble even though he must’ve shaved this morning.
But she glanced down demurely. “Why is that?”
“Someone as pretty as you should never be left alone.”
She felt a blush rising to her face and worked to squelch it. She lifted her gaze to his again. She wanted to be sophisticated and mature, not a country bumpkin.
She introduced herself—it was only polite, after all—and discovered his name was Roy Crowell.
By now, she had turned in her chair so that she faced him more directly. “Why shouldn’t I be left alone?”
His eyes glittered. “Someone as beautiful as you”—he stood and picked up his coffee cup, abandoning his paper to the table—“is at risk of an unsavory character taking advantage.”
For a moment, he loomed above her. He was taller than she remembered, slender and trim. He wore a gun belt slung low across his hips.
She looked up into his face, preening at the compliment and pleased by the banter. “And will you protect me?”
He didn’t answer, giving her only an enigmatic smile as he took a seat in the closest chair.
10
John ran another length of log through the saw. He was working with Michael today, and the other man caught the cleanly-sawed board and moved it to the stack they were building to be delivered later to a farmer outside of town.
All the work felt heavy today. Maybe it was John who was sluggish.
He sent another two logs through the saw and then flipped the switch that would turn the steam engine off. It took minutes to power down, which meant the noise reverberating through the mill took just as long to die out.
John loved the engine. If the heavy workload continued, perhaps he would buy another and hire more freighters.
His friend sent a sideways look at John as they loaded the freshly-cut boards into the unhitched wagon waiting for them outside. "You're awful quiet today.
You got something on your mind?"
More like someone.
John should’ve been thinking about Ruth. After her prank with the poison ivy, he’d confined her to the house. He’d refused to let her see her friends. Forced her to come straight home after school. She’d been assigned twice as many chores and sent to bed immediately after supper.
She’d been angry with him. He’d suffered through her tears and shouts, but he hadn’t backed down. Somehow, he had to get through to her that her behavior was unacceptable.
He should be thinking about how to get through to her.
But instead, he couldn't stop thinking about Cecilia and how she had looked at him in the kitchen three days ago. Her eyes had been luminous and soft, and he could've sworn that she was ready and willing to accept his kiss. But the way she’d run off when Mrs. Fitzgerald had stepped inside… As if she hadn’t wanted the matron to know about her attraction to John. Was she ashamed of it?
Maybe Michael could give him some advice.
"How long have you and Lucy been married? Five years?" Michael was actually a year John's junior, but he and his wife must've married early because they already had two kids and another on the way. "How did you—when she first caught your eye, I mean. Did you have to win her over?”
His friend’s eyes danced. "Got your eye on someone? Maybe the pretty schoolteacher? I know Lucy’s been hoping for that. She’d like to see you settled with a wife.”
John thought about how Cecilia had balked at the idea of friendship growing between them. “You and I have been friends a while now," he said. "And as my friend, you should know that Miss White worries about her reputation. She would not think kindly on me if people in town started talking about her."
"So it is her?"
John nodded. "I wasn't looking for it. I've got plenty on my plate dealing with Ruth. But the more time I spend with Cecilia, the more I admire her."
The memory of her turning to rush away from him hit hard and fast.
Winning the Schoolmarm: Wyoming Legacy (Wind River Hearts Book 14) Page 8
