A Moment in Time (33 page)

      
He didn't laugh at her and his expression grew sober.
 
"I don't know why, but I'm really looking forward to hearing your story."

      
"I know why."
 
She grinned.

      
"Oh, you do, huh?"
 
His lips twitched and he almost smiled.

      
"Because you like me."
 
Her voice lowered and softened as the heat of desire washed through her again.
 
"And you want me."
 
And you're being a terrible tease, Clarke.

      
His jaw flinched again and his eyes darkened.
 
"Yes, ma'am," he said, his voice rumbling around inside her and hitting every nerve ending, "but I was raised knowing I can't have everything I want."

      
She reached for the buttons at the front of her dress and released them very quickly.
 
"Well, I don't do self-deprivation very well myself."
 
She eased her dress over her shoulders.
 
"It's unhealthy."

      
Both his brows shot upward and his mouth gaped open.
 
"What are you doing, woman?"

      
"Since you're determined to make us wait until later–to talk, I mean..."
 
She let the dress drop to the ground, then retrieved it and placed it on the boulder.

      
"But..."

      
"Relax," she said in her sexiest voice, then she leaned forward and kissed him hard on the mouth.
 
"I'm just going to have myself a little shower, big guy."

      
"But..."

      
She reached for the ribbons at the front of her antiquated underwear.
 
"You going to watch, or turn your back and stand guard like a good boy?"

      
A visible shudder rippled through him and he turned his back, folding his arms and standing at attention.
 
"Hurry up about it."

      
Laughing, she stripped and left her undies with her dress and hiking boots, then darted into the falls.
 
The shock of the frigid water made her shriek.
 
After a few moments, she grew somewhat used to the icy shower and peered through the sheet of running water at the man who still stood with his back to her.

      
"Damn," she muttered.
 
"I was really hoping you'd want to be very,
very
bad."

* * *

      
Jackie closed the book she'd been reading to Todd and gazed down at his face.
 
Asleep, he appeared even younger.
 
She struggled against the sudden urge to gather him into her arms and hold him close.
 
But he wasn't a baby.
 
He wasn't even her son.

      
Unexpected tears gathered in the corners of her eyes, but she blinked them away.
 
She wasn't allowed to cry.
 
Great-Aunt Pearl had always said so....

      
Cole was out feeding Ruth and putting her in the stable for the night, so Jackie sat with the leather-bound copy of
Huckleberry Finn
clutched to her chest and watched Todd sleep.
 
And remembered...

      
Her mother had always read her bedtime stories.
 
Jackie had only been a year older than Todd was now when her mother died.
 
Old enough to read her own stories, Great-Aunt Pearl had said.
 
Even that first night after the police officer had come to tell them about her mother's car accident, Jackie hadn't been allowed to cry.
 
Only the weak and wicked cried, Great-Aunt Pearl had insisted.
 

      
So Jackie had shed her tears alone in her room with only an old doll to share her grief.
 
She'd learned very quickly to keep her feelings to herself.
 
No affection, no tears, no emotions whatsoever.

      
No wonder she'd eloped with her high school sweetheart the night of her eighteenth birthday.
 
They had been very much in love, but both so immature that the marriage was doomed from the start.

      
Jackie the idealist had wanted the perfect little house with flowers and a picket fence.
 
And she wanted babies.
 
Lots of babies.
 
If she ever had a daughter, she would name her Sandra, after her mother.

      
She'd almost had a baby.
 
Jackie had conceived shortly after the wedding, but a miscarriage shattered that dream along with all the others.
 
Great-Aunt Pearl had called it a sign from God.
 
Jackie and her husband had buried their grief, rather than facing it, and that had signaled the beginning of the end.
 

      
After the divorce, Jackie'd had no choice but to move back in with her aunt.
 
A nightmare from the first day.
 
As an adult, Jackie wasn't about to play by the old woman's rules any longer.
 
She paid rent and kept to herself, trying to ignore her aunt's constant criticism.
 

      
Jackie smiled to herself, remembering the day she had received the small business loan for her beauty shop.
 
The old house she and her partner converted had an unused apartment upstairs, so Jackie had moved in while the downstairs was still under construction.

      
She shook her head.
 
No more rules.
 
No more hiding.
 
No more Great-Aunt Pearl.

      
Of course, she'd still felt obliged to pay a weekly visit to her aging aunt, and the criticism only grew worse over time.
 
So, Jackie had immersed herself in the business.
 
She worked long hours, scrimped and saved, reinvested every dime into the shop, and had practically no social life, let alone a love life.

      
Then Blade had come along....

      
And the rest, so they say, is history.
 
She stifled a giggle when she considered how accurately that described her current situation.
 

      
Jackie rose slowly and placed the book on the shelf, realizing Cole was probably finished with the horse by now.
 
A sense of doom pressed down on her.
 
Why?
 
She was about to learn the truth Cole had promised her.

      
And tell him the truth about herself as well.

      
Oh, God.
 
Would he call her mad and send her away?
 
She drew a deep breath and lifted her chin a notch, pulling the shawl Cole had given her around her shoulders.
 
Whatever happened, she'd deal with it.

      
After all, only the weak and wicked ever cried.
 
She might be a tad wicked, but Jackie was
never
weak.

      
Remind yourself of that later, Clarke.

      
The front door was closed, because this evening was cooler than any since Jackie's arrival.
 
She opened it and stepped quietly onto the porch, pulling the door firmly shut behind her.
 
Cole definitely wouldn't want his son to overhear them.

      
For that matter, neither did Jackie.
 
She didn't want Todd to think she was crazy, and she certainly didn't want him to believe his father was a kidnapper.

      
Cole Morrison hadn't really abducted her.
 
He'd saved her.

      
A cool breeze swept up the pass and made her shiver.
 
She glanced upward, noticing the nearly full moon shining through a small break in the otherwise overcast sky.
 
Silver bathed the small clearing, giving the area a surreal appearance.

      
Appropriate backdrop for her
Twilight Zone
tale.

      
She pulled the shawl closer and gazed toward the paddock.
 
She saw movement and squinted.
 
A tall figure closed the gate, then headed toward the cabin.

      
Cole.

      
His powerful, long-legged stride brought him toward her quickly.
 
Perspiration coated her palms and she wiped them on her skirt.
 
Her throat constricted, her breath quickened, and her heart thudded against the wall of her chest.
 
Fluttering butterflies did a dance in her stomach.
 
It had been years, but she recognized the symptoms.
 

      
She was in love with Cole Morrison.

      
A moment of terror seized her and she couldn't breathe.
 
She should run away.
 
Far away.
 
Very fast.
 
Now.
 
Before it was too late....

      
Too late for what, Clarke?
 
She had no Great-Aunt Pearl here to criticize her behavior.
 
She had no one to answer to in 1891 but herself.

      
She was already lost.

      
Suddenly, the thought of seducing him took on an entirely different meaning.
 
She could no longer pretend she was interested in casual sex.
 
You're a fool, Clarke.
 
She'd never been interested in casual sex with Cole or any other man.
 

      
For Jackie Clarke, there had never been anything remotely similar to casual sex.
 
She was challenged in the separation of emotions and lust department.
 
An outright failure.
 
Hell, she wasn't even trainable.

      
She still wanted Cole–more than ever–but now she had to face facts.
 
She couldn't sleep with Cole without giving him everything she had.

      
Whether he wanted it or not.

      
Making love.

      
"Todd asleep?"

      
Jackie gasped and squeezed her eyes shut.
 
"Yes, he's asleep."

      
"I'm sorry I startled you."
 
He stepped up onto the porch and stood facing her.

      
She tilted her head back and looked up at his face, barely visible in the moonlight.
 
How could she have allowed herself to fall in love with this man?
 
A man who was good and kind and so very sexy?
 

      
All right,
how
was easy.
 
Why
was more difficult.
 
She should have seen it coming.
 
Who did she think she was fooling with that lust stuff anyway?
 
It had been love all along, but she was too much of a dweeb to recognize the danger signs.
 
She should have stopped herself.

      
She...was being ridiculous.

      
"Cat got your tongue?" he quipped, and his teeth flashed silvery white with his smile.

      
"I...I was just having what Aunt Pearl would call a 'Come to Jesus' meeting."

      
"Meeting with who?"
 
He glanced quickly over his shoulder.

      
"Me, myself, and I."

      
He sighed and placed both hands on the porch rail.
 
"About my reasons for doing what I did?"

      
"Um, among other things."
 
She struggled to keep her voice sounding as calm as possible.
 
The last thing she needed was for him to suspect her true feelings.
 
"Are you ready to tell me?"

      
"I reckon now's as good a time as any."
 
He glanced toward the cabin and Todd, then straightened and took her hand.
 
"Let's walk."

      
Jackie stared at her hand swallowed by his larger one and barely halted the shudder of longing that began from her very core.
 
"All right."

      
They stepped off the porch and headed toward the paddock.
 
Stopping at the fence, he turned to face her.
 
She stared up at him, wishing she could see his eyes.
 
Cole had very expressive eyes.
 
Then again, perhaps she was better off not seeing them right now.
 
Considering.