American Pie (26 page)

"Stefan, have you heard anything I've said?" Lucie asked in a low voice. She cast a quick worried glance toward Jamie, who watched Stefan with an expression as puzzled as her own. "I've placed us in a terrible situation."

When Stefan did not respond but continued to look unblinkingly at his untouched portion of water-bread, Jamie leaned forward to take her hand.

"It's done, lass." He looked at Stefan, waiting for a word that did not come, then returned to her. "For the past hour you've flogged yourself without mercy. Even if you wished to turn backward and change the beginning, you can't do it."

"That's the worst of it," she admitted, turning moist dark eyes to him. "I'd do the same again. And look where it's put us!" A shudder twisted down her spine. "He said without character, Jamie. Without a character I can't obtain another job."

Jamie stroked her hands. "Not a job on Madison Avenue anyway. Not work in a private laundry. But there are other jobs, and you'll find one." He didn't add that he loathed the necessity of Lucie working outside the home at all, but the impractical thought was written across his expression.

"Oh, Stefan, I do wish you would say something!" Wringing her hands, Lucie turned her pale face to her brother. "Shout at me, yell and stamp your feet. But say something, I beg you!"

At last he lifted his head and looked at them with dull eyes. "Greta is too ill to get out of bed. She couldn't go to work today and Mr. Church sent word that she's sacked."

"Oh, no!" The breath rushed from Lucie's body. She sat very still, only now noticing Stefan's face was as chalky as her own.

"There's more." After pushing aside his plate, he drained his mug of weak coffee. Lucie saw his hand was shaking. "The Janics, the people Greta boards with, they're leaving next week to try their luck in a place called Wisconsin."

"She's lost her job, she's too ill to find another and she has no place to live," Jamie repeated, his voice strained. "Stefan, does Greta have any savings?"

"Four dollars and thirty-two cents."

No one spoke. In the silence Lucie could hear her heart thudding against her ribs. Last week the world had been filled with promise and hope. Now it seemed as if bits of sky crashed around them. She inhaled deeply, filling her lungs with the acrid smoke drifting from the table lamp.

"Greta will come to us, of course," she announced firmly. There was no other solution. Standing, she dusted her hands across her apron front, and eyed the room. "We'll fix a bed for her here, near the stove so she'll stay warm. You can pull apart one of the wagons in the street, Stefan, and make a platform. We can't have her sleeping on the floor, not with the mice and vermin so bad this winter. A platform will help. I'll sew a mattress out of my curtain and Mrs. Blassing will sell me enough rags to stuff it. Let's see, how shall I pay her?" She spoke more to herself than to the men. "With bread loaves, I think. Yes, Mrs. Blassing praised my loaves."

"Thank you, Lucie." Relief flooded Stefan's features and for a moment he could not speak. Then he spread his hands and frustration clouded his expression. "With you out of work, God knows how we'll eat or buy coal or pay for Greta's medicine. Damn it!" He ground his teeth. "A man ought to be able to care for his own! He ought to be able to provide more than two closet rooms and he should be able to put food on the table. Damn it to hell!"

"We'll manage." Lucie noticed Jamie's expression and knew he understood she was not nearly as confident as she sounded. He had observed the flash of fear behind her eyes. "I'll find work soon, you'll see." Leaning over Stefan's shoulder, she pressed her cheek to his and kissed him. "Now go to Greta and tell her what we've decided. She must be feeling so frightened and alone."

The instant the sound of his footsteps receded, Lucie buried her face in her hands. "Oh, Jamie, what have I done? This is the worst time to be out of work!"

He came to her and gently guided her into his arms. "There's never a good time, lass." Smoothing back her hair, he tilted her face up to his. "I still have our sixteen dollars."

"Stefan would never agree to accept it."

"That's why I'm offering it to you instead of to him."

She shook her head. "Stefan is as stubborn and prideful as you are. He would rather starve than borrow a penny."

Jamie held her close and rested his chin on top of her hair. "The time may come when Stefan must swallow his pride and accept a wee bit of assistance from a friend. Just remember the money's there."

"Thank you," Lucie whispered. Knowing a small cushion existed was a comfort. But not a solution. Tonight she saw no solution. Tonight she saw the rag stuffed in the broken window pane, the stained brown walls, the sagging stove. She inhaled the reek of coal and kerosene and the musty odors behind the walls. Even in winter, she could smell the school sinks in the courtyard.

What she could not see or smell or touch tonight was the future. She, who could usually see sunshine where others saw darkness, saw only shadows. This, as much as the actual situation, frightened her.

"Everything will work out," she murmured against Jamie's chest. Blotting the shadows, she pressed her face against the shoulder of his waistcoat and inhaled the reassuring scents of wool, starch, bay rum and the soapy scent of his hair. Good smells that overwhelmed the others. "It will work out, won't it?"

"Aye, lass."

They stood before the stove, holding each other in a loose embrace that tightened as their thoughts turned to their own immediate future. What small measure of privacy they enjoyed was about to end. They had tonight and possibly tomorrow, then there would be no place where they could be alone.

"It was good of you to insist Greta come here," Jamie murmured against her shining chestnut hair, holding her close against him.

"Of course she must come to us."

They held each other tightly, combating the selfishness of need and feeling the charged urgency of impending loss. This kiss might be the last for weeks, certainly the last that could be uninhibited and private. This touch, so intimate and deeply personal, would not be repeated before Stefan and Greta. Mouths could not cling, nor hands linger. There was only tonight.

Their kisses deepened, made sweeter by a hint of despair, by the knowledge tonight must sustain them through the coming weeks. The restraint they so carefully maintained weakened beneath the stress in hands that flew to stroke and to remember, in lips that clung and murmured fevered endearments. In bodies that strained and ached and ignited in need and passion.

Pleasantly shocked by her boldness, driven by a need she did not dare analyze, Lucie shyly opened Jamie's shirt and slipped her small hand inside, pressing it flat against the hard muscles on his chest. A soft moan parted her lips. Beneath her palm she felt his heartbeat accelerate, felt the soft mossy growth of auburn hair. The touch of his skin was as she had imagined so many times, but firmer and smoother, possessing a warmth that shot through her body and left her trembling.

Covering her hand and holding it in place inside his shirt, Jamie kissed her, and his tongue explored the sweet innocence of her mouth, then gently traced the tender contour of her lips. A gasp issued from Lucie's throat and she withdrew her fingers from his shirt to circle his neck with both hands, pressing closer, closer to his body and feeling the frustration of layers of clothing, of empty spaces crying to be filled.

Holding each other so tightly it was impossible to identify which heartbeat belonged to whom, they sank to their knees on the floor. When Jamie's lips released hers, he whispered her name and ran his hands down her sides to her waist, then over her hips, smoothing down the dark skirts that puddled around them. The fluid movement of his hands, the heat that tingled behind, left her weak and light-headed.

"I can span your waist with my hands," he murmured in a thick voice.

Lucie's head fell back and her eyes closed as the warmth of his hands slid from her waist to her breasts. He hesitated and her breath caught in her throat, her back arched slightly. Then the heat of his palms covered her breasts, and she gasped, suddenly aflame with heat and light and an explosive need that quivered through her body.

He kissed her, deeply, urgently, his hands still cupping her small aching breasts. When his mouth released hers, he looked into her eyes, and she felt his trembling fingers on the buttons of her shirtwaist.

"Lucie?" he said hoarsely.

"I love you," she whispered, trusting him, needing him. She wanted him to hurry, to hurry, wanted his fingertips where her own had been, yearned to know the thrill of his caress on her naked skin. But the strength had Wed from her body. She knelt before him, trembling in anticipation, her arms at her sides, as he fumbled with the seemingly endless row of small buttons marching from her throat to her waist.

When the shirtwaist fell open, he leaned to kiss her mouth, his fingertips resting lightly against the pulse beat throbbing in her throat. Only after he kissed her again did he allow himself to look down at the creamy flesh swelling above the tiny lace edge of her chemise. Now it was he who seemed paralyzed.

Emboldened by his sharp intake of breath, Lucie touched a shaking fingertip to the perspiration on his brow, then smiling a woman's smile, loving him so much it hurt inside, she opened the top buttons of her chemise and raised her eyes in shy hope that she would please him.

"Oh, God," he murmured hoarsely. "You are so lovely. So incredibly lovely!"

Relief and joy softened her expression, raised a moist shine to her eyes. "I was so afraid I'd disappoint you," she whispered.

"Disappoint me?" Shock darkened his eyes almost to black before he caught her and held her so close against him that she could not breathe. "Never! Never, Lucie lass!"

Kisses rained over her hair, her face, her throat, then his lips were on her offered breast, moving in tender exploration, circling, circling until his tongue found her thrusting nipple and a tiny cry of pleasure caught in her throat. Heat raced through her body. Perspiration rose like dew on her naked skin. Every instinct urged her toward the floor that she might feel his possessive weight on her and the bliss of completion.

"Lucie." Passion roughened his voice. But he deliberately forced himself to ease away from her. Shaking hands lifted to frame her face. "My beautiful, Lucie." He kissed her, gently, struggling to restrain the passion that sucked at his breath, roared in his blood.

"I love you."

"I love you, Lucie Kolska. The earth shakes with it." Tenderly he stroked a damp strand of chestnut hair back from her cheek, fighting to establish control. Trust and disappointment mingled in her gaze as desire and duty mingled in his. " 'Tis a cruel wait, lass." His whisper emerged as a groan.

On one level she admired his control and his respect for her, understood he withdrew while it was still possible, which it might not have been a moment later. That he did so against his will was evident in his intense gaze, his trembling lips and fingertips. On another level his withdrawal, as gentle as it was, devastated her and left her feeling bereft, shivering on the brink of a fulfillment she longed for.

Taking her hand, Jamie helped her to her feet, then tactfully, he turned aside as she buttoned her chemise and shirtwaist and lifted her hands to straighten her hair and touch the rosy heat still pulsing in her cheeks.

He removed the rag from the broken window pane and reached outside for a handful of snow, which he rubbed over his face and forehead and throat, watching her as he did so.

"Someday, lass," he said quietly, his voice deep and husky, "I will wake with you beside me. And know you will be waiting when I return at night. I live for the joy of that day, my dearest, for the moment I can truly call you mine. I want nothing more than to spend the rest of my life making you happy."

"You want nothing more?" she asked, smiling. Her arms slid around his waist and she lifted her head with a teasing look, the taste of his kisses still on her swollen mouth. "You don't want a snug little house, perhaps? Or a horse and trap? Or perhaps a building to build?"

Laughing, he dropped a kiss on her forehead. "If those things would make you happy, I could force myself to endure them." He held her close, then tilted her face up. "What do you want, Lucie? What will make you happy?"

"You," she said simply, meaning it. When he protested, telling her that wasn't what he meant, she smiled. "My wants are simple, dearest Jamie. I hope for a home of my own someday, and a kitchen garden and perhaps a tree to shade the afternoon." Pink bloomed in her cheeks. "And healthy laughing children with their father's auburn hair."

She touched his shoulder as she placed a mug of coffee and a loaf of potato bread on the table before him. "Sometimes I grow impatient, too," she said softly, cradling his head against her breast. "Sometimes I want to go to sleep and wake when my goal has been accomplished and your goal has been accomplished and we can be together always."

"I know, lass. I know." A frown drew his brow. "I'm doing all I can to hasten that day."

The elusiveness of the future consumed Jamie with frustration. When he thought about Lucie and his love for her he was overcome by impatience, by a deep-seated desire to leap into tomorrow. He couldn't endure the possibility of waiting for years before they could marry; he wanted and needed her now.

Although he had not received the raise in pay he requested, it was promised for spring, and he could look forward to small but regular increases. On several occasions Jonas Tucker had declared himself well pleased by Jamie's performance and indicated Jamie had a secure future with Tucker Enterprises. But his progress occurred in small increments; it would not be swift.

Leaning back from his worktable, he rubbed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. The sound of hammering rang through the floors above him. He inhaled the scent of wood shavings and wet mortar.

Recently, without telling Lucie, he had priced household furnishings and had checked the cost of family housing. What he discovered appalled him. It wasn't only the cost of necessary items, like a bed and a stove, that shocked him, but the lack of adequate space.