City Girl (23 page)

Tomorrow didn't come soon enough. Crystal spent an emotional night of intense anticipation, and when the sunlight did finally stream in layers through the louvers of the green shutters, it was only the herald of a very long morning. She elected to spend it straightening her room and doing little odd chores, handwashing and mending and such things, until finally she judged that it was time for her to dress.

She dressed herself in a pair of jeans and a long-sleeved shirt of lightweight cotton in a neat blue-and-white check with white piping. She put on her boots, added a streak of soft blue shadow to her eyelids, some mascara, and a touch of lip gloss, then brushed out her long coffee-brown hair to make it shine in a cascade down her back.

There was still plenty of time before Garrett would call for her, and Crystal tried to pass it by reading. She was having trouble concentrating when she heard the heavy fall of his knuckles on her door. Dumping the book heedlessly to the floor, she jumped and literally ran to fling back the door to see him standing there.

He was dressed in jeans and a clean white shirt with sleeves rolled up to the elbow, straw hat in hand, even white teeth flashing a smile at her. "I see you're ready," he said. There was still that awkward distance between them that she had felt the night before when they had said good-bye at her door. It sent little spasms of doubt edging up her spine.

"Almost," she answered brightly, trying to shake that uncomfortable feeling of impending disappointment. "Just let me pull my hair back and get my hat."

He nodded politely, and though she left the door open, he did not venture into the room. Instead, he stood just outside, rocking on his heels, toying with the brim of his hat.

Crystal's hopes for the day plummeted, but she maintained a calm expression as she hurriedly swept her hair into a low ponytail at the nape of her neck, fastening it with a rubber band. Quickly she went to the closet and fetched her hat down from its place on the upper shelf. With a last deep breath she turned and walked tremulously toward him.

Their walk to the stables was filled with trite, meaningless conversation. He had saddled the horses and carried the picnic fixings down to the stables before coming to her room. She sensed a certain reluctance in him that tied her stomach in knots and grated upon her nerves. She had never seen him like this, unstrung and skittery, a bundle of tension and strain. Even their arguments were more palatable than this.

The big, gentle mare stood tethered to the corral fence alongside Garrett's mount, a curiously beautiful animal with a coat of many different shades of browns and tans and whites and black. Some came in big splotches and others in tiny speckles. He was a paint, Garrett informed her, appropriately named Harlequin. Lashed to the pommel of Harlequin's saddle was a small covered picnic basket.

Garrett helped her astride the mare, who snorted unconcernedly and shifted her weight lazily from side to side. Then he swung up expertly onto the paint's strong back, and they started off, Garrett leading the way and she following uneasily behind.

It was a hot day, and it took them a long time to cross the empty pastureland and sight the huge dome of gray granite that loomed five hundred feet almost straight up from its base. Almost devoid of vegetation, the high peak dwarfed the surrounding rock formations. She was amazed to think that it had not been visible from the road that lay on the side opposite from their approach.

They reined in their horses for a moment. Garrett removed his hat and mopped his damp brow with a forearm, while Crystal's attention was captured by that naked dome and she remembered the legends he had told her about human sacrifice and furious battles connected with this massive rock.

"Does it really make strange noises at night?" she questioned abruptly, shading her eyes against the bright afternoon glare.

"It really does. Weird groaning and cracking sounds. And then there are the strange lights, too. Some people say they are campfires, ghost fires." He chuckled tersely. "But I don't really go in for that fairy-tale stuff. I suppose there is a perfectly logical explanation."

Crystal probed his face.

"I suppose there is a logical explanation for just about everything," she murmured, only she was wondering what the "perfectly logical explanation" was for his sudden reticence. Garrett urged his horse forward, on toward the Enchanted Rock.

She was tired, dusty, and hungry long before they skirted the outlying peak of the rock formation and dismounted beside a clear, gently flowing creek running along the base of the mountain. Garrett tethered their horses to a nearby tree, unsaddled them, and stowed the tack gear on a rock jutting up out of the ground. While he did that, Crystal washed her hands and face in the cool, refreshing stream and proceeded to lay out their lunch.

Lupe had included a thin tablecloth in the lunch basket, and Crystal spread it out on the sandy ground beneath the shade trees lining the little creek. There were chunky ham sandwiches and crisp potato chips, a pair of thick wedges of coconut cake, and two shiny red apples, along with two plastic cups filled with crisp vegetable salad. There was a canteen of iced tea and two paper cups, napkins, salt and pepper, flatware, paper plates. It was a veritable feast to a starving Crystal, and she marveled at Lupe's efficiency. She would have been hard put to get all that into one little basket herself.

Garrett came to join her, dropping down beside her and stretching out on the white tablecloth that served as their blanket. He was quiet and pensive, but ate heartily of Lupe's lunch. Crystal sat tensely by his side, her booted feet pulled up beneath her, and munched hungrily on her sandwich.

His meal finished, Garrett folded his long arms beneath his cool blond head and closed his eyes. After a while he appeared to be snoozing, and Crystal began quietly to clean up after their picnic. That done, she paused for a moment, on her knees beside him, and took a long look at that handsome face.

Slowly Garrett opened his eyes, and Crystal felt a sharp intake of her breath. She felt suspended in the blueness of his gaze. Solemnly, gradually, his hand rose, touched her face lightly, and moved with swift sureness to the back of her head, pulling her to him roughly, breaking the rubber band that held her hair in a thick column at the back of her neck.

Even as her hair tumbled gently about her shoulders and her face descended toward his, she saw his lips slowly parting before meeting her own. His arms, strong and corded with muscles beneath the smooth, sun-burnished skin, came round her and hugged her to his wide, hard chest as he rolled to his side, and she stretched out on the unyielding ground beside him.

Gently at first, then urgently, his hands began their expert explorations of her body, brushing apart the snap that closed the front of her blouse and burning their imprint upon the mounds of her breasts. She moaned softly into the dark, sweet cavern of his mouth, and his hand slid demandingly down her hips to press her against him.

She came to him willingly, ardently, almost desperately, feeling his masculine hardness against her, locking her fingers in that golden hair, loosening them again to respond to his wandering touch with touch of her own, following his lead where it would take her.

There was no pulling back now, no indecision, no confusion about wanting him to love her. She had to let him know that she was his, that she loved him, that there was no more war between them. He had not yet said those words that would have made it all right, but neither had she, and if he would not be the first, then she would.

She had to say it, had to hear it from him. She loved him, and beyond that there was no decision to be made. She was his. And though she said it now with the power of the response of her body, she needed to say the words. They were already there, formed on her lips, when she pulled her mouth reluctantly away from his.

And suddenly it was all over.

He bolted upright, breathing raggedly, tearing himself from her as urgently as he had sought her. In that one instant of stupefying rejection, her world came crashing down around her. The dream was shattered.

"I've got to put some distance between us, Crystal," he said brusquely, his face buried in the hollow of his arms folded atop his drawn-up knees. "This isn't really what either of us wants."

She needed no further explanation. He knew her well, too well. He knew that she would not be happy with mere physical gratification, and obviously he was telling her that he had no interest in anything more.

Blindly Crystal scrambled to her feet, clutching her blouse together with a quivering hand, a mass of conflicting emotions. Without saying a word, she hurried away, brushing at the tears beginning to fall from her clouded eyes.

She would not let him see her cry. Pride dictated that she spare herself that final humiliation. Perhaps she had lost her quest for love, but at least she still had her pride, and she hugged it to herself consolingly. As she moved stiffly along the edge of the gurgling little stream, she was numbly aware of Garrett getting to his feet and moving toward the horses.

An outcropping of rock jutted over the creek bed in one spot, and she climbed atop it, stepped cautiously over the chasm between it and the rock formation on the other side, and began doggedly to climb the sloping, rivuleted face of the dome, ignoring her tears and the pain that pushed up from deep inside her body. Presently she had mastered the smallest peak of the granite mountain, and she peered from its summit to the creek below. Garrett sat upon the rock where he had stowed the saddles, holding the reins of both horses in his hands. He had saddled their mounts while she scaled the miniature mountain. Resignedly she took a firm grip on herself, snapped the front of her blouse closed, and began her descent.

Crystal marveled at her own control. She knew that she was very close to breaking down. She only desired the privacy and comfort of her room in which to do it. There she could let it out, cry if she must, even mourn the lifeless carcass of her naive dream. But now was not the time for that, not while Garrett Dean was around to view the shambles he had made of her heart.

Garrett came to his feet as she approached, striding crisply across the sandy ground, arms swinging straight at her sides. Her hat was on the ground at his feet, and he bent to retrieve it, holding it out for her to take. She snatched it from his hand, afraid to come into physical contact with him, and jammed it on her head. A look of surprise sharpened the planes of his face. She looked quickly away, unable to encounter those breathtaking blue eyes.

"Would you like to ride around the base of the rock?"

His voice revealed an exhaustion she had not realized was there before, and she shook her head decisively. "No. I want to go ho… back to the house."

He peered past her at nothing in particular, nodded tartly, and shrugged. "Whatever you say."

She took the reins from his hand and determinedly jacked up her leg to work her foot into the stirrup, brushing aside the arm he offered in assistance. She pulled and wiggled her way into the saddle, while he stood aside, calming the mare with a gentle stroke on her soft black muzzle.

The tension between them was unbearable. Crystal jerked at the reins, but Garrett held them fast in his hand, stroking Sweet Momma's head with the other.

"Honey, wait a minute," he began, but Crystal was in no mood to wait. She needed to be away from him in a safe place where she could let the hurt out. Again she jerked at the reins, and this time succeeded in whipping them out of his hands. "Crystal, stop!" he shouted sternly. "I have to talk to you." But she had already reined the horse around and was kicking her into a canter toward the trees.

She heard him calling for her to wait, and it was like a spur nudging her side and urging her onward even faster than before. She dug her heels into the mare's flanks, lashing out with the reins, demanding speed from the usually docile animal, trying to put distance between herself and Garrett. The sound of the paint's hooves beating the ground came suddenly to her ears, and she knew that Garrett was chasing her.

The mare whinnied, now caught up in the chase and straining against the reins. Tree limbs were crashing around her, knocking away her hat and pulling at her flying hair. Suddenly she was terrified as the excited horse beneath her broke into a fresh surge of strength and speed. Desperately she jerked at the reins, pulling them to her chest, completely forgetting Rick's instructions about keeping them low, and the horse, eyeballs rolling frantically, reared in mid-stride, lunging free of the trees.

Crystal screamed, and again the terrified horse reared, thrashing against the cruel bit and the constraint of the reins. From the corner of her eye Crystal caught sight of Garrett leaning out from his saddle to grab the reins from her. An unreasonable resentment surged forward in her, momentarily blocking out the panic and fear. Stupidly she yanked back, twisting away from him at the same time, and the horse reared for the final time, higher than before, forelegs pawing the air frantically.

She felt herself falling, falling, landing hard on the clumpy ground, with the horse coming down on top of her. Like a slice of time out of sync with the universe, Crystal watched the horse pitching backward. Her last conscious thought was to wonder, almost calmly, what an animal like that would weigh.