Gold Dust (24 page)

While Katy retreated into exhausted sleep, Jonah lay awake beside her and stared into the dark. The frustration that had built
into such a thick, choking cloud over the last week had been swept away by the flood of his passion. Their passion. His hadn’t
been the only spark that had started the combustion in this tent. The fuse on that stick of feminine dynamite had refused
to be doused, and the resulting explosion was a kind he had not imagined.

Jonah raised himself on one elbow and looked down upon Katy’s sleeping form. She was a blur in the darkness—curved, smooth
lines stirred by almost-imperceptible breathing. Her face was a pale oval against the inky black of her hair—hair darker even
than the black night. Jonah reached out and gently brushed a knuckle against her cheek. So smooth. So soft. He felt himself
start to grow hard yet again.

“Jesus!” he muttered. “Enough is enough!”

He rose stiffly from the blankets. Cold air produced goose bumps on his naked skin. He stifled the urge to crawl back into
the blankets and wake Katy with the hard thrust of himself between her beautiful legs. He’d once read a book that claimed
overindulgence in carnal sport could lead a man to mental degeneration and eventually insanity. Overindulgence had never been
a problem with Jonah. One time was generally enough for him. If all women were as tempting as Katy, however,
the nation’s mental institutions would certainly see a sharp increase in business.

Jonah groped the darkness for his clothing. The wrinkled, cold garments smelled of sweat and passion, but then, so did he.
He donned his parka and took refuge in the cold air outside the tent. On this treeless stretch of grass and rock below the
Chilkoot summit, the night carried more than just a promise of arctic chill. The breeze had winter’s bite, and the few hummocks
of grass that grew among the rocks were stiff and frozen. He exhumed a few winking coals from the remains of the fire and
added several sticks of wood. Hunter, who was curled in a grassy pocket between rocks with his tail covering his nose, stirred
and raised his head. His eyes glowed red in the faint light of the revived fire.

“Party’s over,” Jonah told him. “You can go in now if you want.”

Hunter’s jaws opened in a lupine grin. He got up and padded toward Jonah for a scratch on the head, then nosed his way into
the tent.

Jonah sat on a flat boulder and threw a larger stick on the fire. Tonight was certainly a night for surprises. Katy the temptress.
Virgin temptress. Damn! Who in his right mind would have thought such a bold, adventuresome, cussing, poker-playing, gun-toting,
fistfighting female would be an innocent?

Jonah dropped his head into his hands.
He
should have, Jonah admitted. He should have known from the clear innocence of those crystal green eyes, despite the bold manner,
seductive smile, and absolute lack of maidenly sensibilities. He should have known. Not that it would have made any difference
in the end. Ever since she’d sat down next to him on the train from Willow Bend, disguised as a proper miss in her straw bonnet
and primly coiled braids, he’d been a fish hooked on Katy’s line, fighting like hell not to be landed, but still being pulled
steadily toward an inevitable end. She lit a fire in him that no other woman had ever matched.

That was because Katy had no match, Jonah thought with a smile. She shattered every rule, broke every convention, danced around
society’s dicta as though they were conceived only for her amusement. Yet she had kept herself untouched and innocent. She
had allowed no man to taste so deeply of her beauty until Jonah Armstrong had come into her life. How could he help but love
her?

The thought took him by surprise. Love Katy? What else could it be, this maddening, confusing, frustrating, exhilarating emotion?
So much more complex than simple lust, it was, encompassing affection, need, worry, respect, and a certain amount of fearfulness.
The lust was still there, too, he acknowledged with a grin.

Love Katy. The notion wasn’t quite as frightening once it took hold. He could get used to it, Jonah decided. He could spend
a lifetime exploring it. Loving Katy.

Jonah got up, stretched, sighed, and looked toward the tent. He did love Katy, and a good thing, too, for he’d have to marry
her. A man of conscience didn’t take a young woman’s maidenhead without paying the price. It would serve his straitlaced mother
right. After years of nagging him to marry, she’d get a daughter-in-law who would probably carry a pistol stuck through the
sash of her wedding gown and run a poker game at the reception. And likely she’d have a wolf join the wedding party.

Jonah smiled, finding that the picture didn’t displease him all that much. His chief objection to marriage was his reluctance
to settle down and care for a wife. Katy probably wouldn’t settle down unless someone tied her down with chains, and she certainly
didn’t need to be doted over and pampered. In fact, he realized, Katy O’Connell would make him a perfect wife. Marry Katy.
The perfect solution.

Conscience eased, Katy’s future decided, Jonah banked the fire and returned to the tent. Nudging Hunter aside, he joined Katy
beneath her blankets. She murmured in her sleep and cozied herself against him as though they were made to fit together.
Jonah relaxed and enjoyed the expectation of many, many nights with Katy in his arms. He fell asleep imagining the delight
on her face when he proposed.

“You want to do what?” Katy asked incredulously.

Jonah stayed on bended knee, from where he’d made his proposal. “I said I want to marry you.” His smile faded from confident
to a bit uncertain. “Don’t look as though I asked you to jump over a cliff!”

“You want to marry me?” Katy laughed and pulled the blankets more closely around her shoulders. “Jonah! Don’t be ridiculous!
Get up. You’re going to hurt your knees on the rocks beneath this tent.”

“So much for the traditional approach.” He got up from the ludicrous position. Katy’s heart flip-flopped as he stood. Broad
shoulders, powerful arms, slim hips, strong, straight legs. He had to be the handsomest man she knew, and on this morning
after the night before, there was a new depth to her appreciation. A flush rose to her cheeks. She wanted to invite him to
sit back down upon the blankets they’d shared the night before. Her hand itched to smooth the pucker from his brow and ease
the serious line of his mouth.

“Katy, I’m serious.” He frowned. “And you shouldn’t laugh at a man when he’s proposing. It’s bad manners.”

“All right,” she agreed. “I’m not laughing. You’re very nice to ask,” she said primly. “But I don’t want to marry you.”

“You don’t mean it.”

“I do mean it. I don’t want to marry you.”

It was partly a lie. Something inside her warmed to the thought of spending the days and nights of her life in Jonah’s company.
But another part of her, a smarter part, warned her that she was not wife material. At least, she wasn’t wife material for
a man who lived in Chicago and thought women were born to be protected.

“I don’t believe you.” Jonah dropped down beside her on the blankets, looking at her as though he might find evidence
of fever or some other malady. His inspection made Katy feel the awkwardness of her disarray. She was tangled in a chaos of
blankets and clothing. Her skirt was twisted around her waist, baring an expanse of leg and hip that should have given her
a chill in the cold morning air, but the exposure made her flush with heat instead. Her bloomers lay in a pitiful pile of
cotton in one corner of the tent. Her shirtwaist hung open, and her arms had escaped the straps of her chemise, which clung
precariously to her breasts.

He grinned wickedly as she tried to rearrange her jumbled clothing into a more modest covering. “A bit late for that, don’t
you think?”

Katy glared, refusing to acknowledge embarrassment. “You could leave and let me get dressed.”

“Not until you say you’ll marry me.”

“No!” she shouted, suddenly impatient. “I will not marry you. I don’t want to marry you. So dust off your knees and save your
pretty proposal for someone else.”

He didn’t get up. In fact, he moved closer—just what she didn’t want—took her jaw in his hand and forced her to meet his eyes.
“Katy, what is this? After last night, I could’ve sworn that you loved me.”

His eyes seemed more blue than ever. Deep, clear blue, and endlessly compelling. She felt once again the power that had turned
her into a vulnerable mass of jelly the night before. He’d driven her to delirious heights, lifted her to a peak of emotion
where she was beyond control. Katy did not like being out of control. The memory of ecstasy and intense desire drove her close
to losing control once again and doing something stupid.

“Let me go,” she demanded in a quiet, intense voice.

He complied, and instantly she was sorry. She liked his touch. She liked looking into those wonderful blue eyes. He was right.
She did love him.

“Did I hurt you very badly last night?” he asked quietly.

“Jonah, you didn’t hurt me at all.”

“You should have told me you hadn’t been with a man before.”

“Oh yeah? When was I supposed to bring that up? When we were hauling the horses through the mud, or maybe when Miss Maudie
the Northern Star was telling you how lucky you were she’d decided to latch on to you? ‘By the way, greenhorn—and anyone else
who might be listening—I’ve never taken a man to my bed before. Is it fun?’”

He lifted one brow, then laughed softly. She loved his laugh. She loved the way his eyes brightened with his smile. “You’re
right,” he admitted.

“Of course I’m right.”

“But you’re still going to marry me.”

“You are the most muleheaded man I’ve ever met. No. I won’t marry you, and that’s that.”

“Katy, a man simply doesn’t seduce an innocent girl and not marry her.”

Now she understood the reason behind his proposal. The understanding hurt a bit. “You want to marry me because you feel guilty!”

“That’s not true.”

“Well, you don’t need to feel guilty, Jonah, because you didn’t seduce me. I seduced you!”

“Did you think when you began that silly game last night that you’d end up with me making love to you?”

“Well, no. But—”

“Then I seduced you, dammit!”

“All right!” she shouted back. “You damn well seduced me! Are you satisfied? Knock yourself over the head a few times with
a rock if that will make you feel better, but don’t expect me to marry you. I’m going to find gold in the Klondike and run
my own life, make my own rules, and the hell with what anybody thinks!”

“Coward! You’re too chicken to marry me!”

Those were fighting words. No one called Katy O’Connell chicken!

“Get out!” she demanded.

He made no move to comply as she scrambled out of her blankets and kicked them aside. With violent, jerky motions she tore
off her skirt and shirtwaist, wadded them up and threw them heedlessly into a pile in the corner where her bloomers were already
dead and buried. Trying hard to ignore him, she dived into her valise to find her trousers and heavy denim shirt. To hell
with dressing like a woman! Just look what it had gotten her. Confusion. Chaos. Disaster.

His eyes never left her. Their weight was an unbearable pressure.

“What are you staring at?”

“Someone who ought to grow up. The world isn’t a kind one for a woman alone, Katy, even a woman with mountains of gold.”

She yanked on her trousers. “Well thank you so much for offering to save me.”

His irrepressible grin returned. “You’re welcome. It would definitely be my pleasure.”

“That’s what you think.” She pulled on her boots, tucked the denim shirt into her pants, and shoved her old familiar slouch
hat onto her head. All the while his gaze followed her with hungry, unnerving intensity.

“Think about it, Katy. Just think about it.”

Katy stalked out of the tent without answering. If he wouldn’t leave, she would. A sour taste in her mouth and a leaden weight
in her stomach made breakfast an unwelcome prospect, even though Andy had beans and coffee simmering on the fire.

“Let’s go find some packers,” she told the boy.

“Already got some,” he said with a grin. “All friends of mine. Injuns. Four of ‘em. They’ll make as many trips as they need
to get all your stuff to Lake Bennett, and they won’t cheat ya, which is more than I can say for some of the others.”

“You’re mighty efficient this morning,” Katy observed tartly.

“Found ‘em while you and Mr. Jonah was palaverin’ in the tent.”

If she and Jonah had been merely palavering in the tent, then the Little Bighorn had been just a friendly chat. Her stomach
clenched. “Yeah. Okay. Let’s get this stuff packed, then.”

“Yes’m.”

Katy didn’t acknowledge Jonah when he came out of the tent. The more she looked at him, the stronger was the urge to give
in to the giddy warmth that he inspired and do something stupid. Along that path lay disaster. Love wasn’t the only consideration
in marriage. She could just see herself in Chicago sipping tea, pinky raised, lips pursed. She’d putter in a garden, gossip
with the other proper matrons, and do whatever her husband told her to do, staying home like a well-behaved little lady while
Jonah traveled about on his adventures. How long would love last living in a hell like that?

Of course, marriage didn’t have to be that way. Olivia didn’t always do what Katy’s pa told her to do. In fact, her pa knew
better than to push his luck by assuming the role of husbandly dictator. But that was wild Montana, not citified Chicago,
and Katy’s pa, unlike Jonah Armstrong, didn’t think much of rules and conventions. It would never work, Katy told herself.
Never in a million years.

Yet it was still there, floating in her mind—the magic of Jonah’s kiss, the warm rumble of his laughter, the quickness of
his smile. Jonah Armstrong was an invitation to trouble, and Katy had never been one to resist the lure of trouble. How she
wished the gentlemanly jackass of a greenhorn had not proposed.

As Katy greeted the cold morning at Stone House in Alaska, her father, William Gabriel Danaher O’Connell, reined his wagon
team to a halt on the rise overlooking Thunder Creek Ranch outside of Willow Bend, Montana. Beside him on the wagon seat,
Olivia Baron O’Connell sighed with weary gratitude.