It Happened at the Fair (16 page)

“Stop it,” he hissed. “I’m not—umph—going to hurt you. I just want to—ooph—talk.”

She flailed and thrashed, then hooked her foot behind his calf and slid it up to the bend in his knee, then tried to bring him to the floor.

He tossed her up for a second and clasped her waist again. “Stop it, Adelaide.”

“Wnwooooo!” She grabbed his little finger and tried to bend it backward.

He tightened his hold. “I’m not going to hurt you. I just want to talk to you.”

She reared back, barely missing his chin.

“My name is Cullen McNamara. I’m a farmer in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina.” He stopped to take several deep breaths in between her struggles. “Certain plants and weeds have made me swell up and break out in hives for as long as I can remember.”

Her strength was beginning to fade, praise God.

“Think.” He gave her a shake. “That’s the whole reason my father sent me up here. He’s scared to death I’m going to drop dead in the middle of a cotton field.”

She stilled.

He took several more breaths. “So he got this grand idea to send me to the World’s Fair because . . .” More deep breaths. “. . . he thinks every business owner in the world . . . will be falling all over himself . . . to buy my sprinkler system.”

His poor lungs, he thought. They just could not handle plants, seeds, and Adelaide Wentworth all in one night. “But no one wants the sprinklers . . . and I’m not going to drop dead . . . because if I were, I’d have done it years ago.”

His arm protested against her dead weight, but he didn’t dare set her down yet. Closing his eyes, he leaned his forehead against the back of her head. “I really am who I say I am. I swear on my mother’s grave.”

She gave a slight nod.

“Are you going to scream?”

A slight shake to the left and right.

“I’m going to remove my hand.”

Another nod.

He carefully peeled his hand away but kept it close in case she screamed.

“Put me down,” she gasped.

“Are you going to run?”

She didn’t answer.

He took that as a yes. So he walked them toward the bench, his legs bumping hers and tangling in her skirts.

She clutched his arms. “Put me down, I said.”

“Hush, not so loud. I just want to sit down. You’ve worn me out.” He sat, bringing her with him.

She slapped at his arm. “Let me go,” she hissed, her voice quiet. “I’m on your lap.”

Leaning his head against the wall, he closed his eyes. “Hush. Just be quiet and be still for one second so I can catch my breath. Please.”

With a huff, she waited, then thrummed her fingers on his arm. “How long do you need? I thought farmers were supposed to be strong, what with all that shoveling of hay and digging of rows and pushing of plows.”

He held out his free arm. “Grab my upper arm.”

“What?”

“Just grab it.”

She did.

He flexed his muscle.

The thrumming stopped. Twisting slightly, she placed one hand beneath his arm, then smoothed down his jacket with the other. “I’d have thought it’d be a lot bigger.”

Sighing, he picked her up, plopped her beside him, stripped off his jacket, removed his cuff, and shoved up his shirtsleeve. Once more, he flexed.

Her eyes widened. “Good heavens, that’s huge. Are they both like that?”

Rolling his eyes, he flexed his other one but didn’t fool with the sleeve. He felt ridiculous.

She reached over and poked the bare one, then squeezed it and cupped it with her hand.

He looked at a point just over her shoulder and ignored the fact that she smelled like roses, her hair was completely disheveled, and her lips had parted in fascination.

Finally, she leaned back.

“Do you believe me now?” he asked, lowering his arms.

“Lots of men have muscles.”

He slid his eyes shut. “Ask me any farming question you want.”

“How do you milk a cow?”

He opened one eye. “That’s kind of hard to explain without the cow.”

She looked up at the ceiling. “How tall does cotton get?”

“About up to here.” He raised his hand.

“Really?”

“Yep.”

She frowned. “That doesn’t prove anything. I bet lots of North Carolina boys have seen a cotton field.”

Shaking his head, he pushed down his sleeve, then stalled as a thought occurred to him. A thought so disquieting, he almost dismissed it out of hand. Almost.

“There is one way I could prove it.” He lifted his gaze to hers, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “But I’d have to remove my shirt.”

She pushed herself against the back of the bench. “I don’t need to see any more of your muscles. Besides, that wouldn’t prove anything.”

“What if you could see the white lines where my suspenders lie when I plow with my shirt off? Only a farmer would have markings like that.”

She hugged herself with her arms, her eyes darting from one thing to another. Her leg began to bounce up and down. “You’re just saying that because you know I would never, ever ask a man to do such a thing. It would, I’d, my father would die of a heart attack if I gave you permission to do that, and you know it. So you’re hoping I’ll just say I believe you without making you prove it.”

He said nothing. Just stared at her.

She glanced at his chest, then back up at him.

He didn’t flinch or look away, but hoped to high heaven she’d take his word on it. Removing his shirt was the last thing on earth he wanted to do. What would Wanda say? How would he ever be able to justify something like that to her or even to his own conscience?

Please, God, he thought. Don’t let her ask me to take off my shirt. Let her believe me.

Covering her face with her hands, she went very still.

Was she praying? Please, let her be praying. ’Cause if she was praying, surely God would tell her not to ask him. Surely He’d make her believe him.

Finally, she lowered her arms, grabbed her knees, and looked him square in the eye. “Prove it.”

CHAPTER

15

This was her father’s fault. All of it. If he hadn’t filled her with the fear of God and made her read all those articles and told her all those horrible stories, she wouldn’t be sitting here, in the entry hall of Harvell House, asking a man she’d known for what amounted to three days to take off his shirt.

She could not believe this was happening. She’d agonized about it all evening, ever since she’d run away from him. What if, just what if, he was telling the truth? What if he really was a farmer who was going deaf and whose eyes swelled up every time he went in the fields? Because if he was and she refused to help him, what on earth would she say when one day she stood before the Almighty and He asked her why she’d turned away one of His very own?

Then, just about the time she’d convinced herself to go back and apologize, she stopped and asked what if, just what if, he wasn’t telling the truth? What if he wasn’t a farmer and he wasn’t going deaf and he had wicked designs on her person? What then? According to her father, terrible, awful, horrendous things that weren’t even worthy of being verbalized would happen to her.

So she needed to know, once and for all, if Cullen McNamara was a farmer. Because if he was telling the truth about that, then he was most likely telling the truth about everything else. And what better way to prove it than with sun marks from long hours in the field?

And what better way for a wicked, immoral man to trick her into believing him than to ask her to do something no decent, God-fearing woman on the face of the planet would ever do? She was so mortified, she almost hoped he was wicked, because then she’d be justified in the asking.

But if he wasn’t, if he really was a farmer going deaf, how in the world would she ever look him in the eye again?

Prove it. Her words hung in the air like the suspended wooden sign outside Harvell House, flapping in the wind.

He reached for his tie, seesawing it back and forth until it loosened. His eyes were trained on hers, begging her to stop him. To halt this nonsense.

The question was, Why? Because he was as mortified as she, or because he was a perverse, despicable degenerate?

She pressed her lips together. Prove it, Mr. McNamara, she thought. You’re going to have to prove it.

He grabbed one end of the silk tie and pulled, the swish of its release loud in the empty hall. Lifting his chin, he removed his collar and set it on the bench beside his tie.

Next came the suspenders. They weren’t black, like her father’s, but red. Red like a wicked man would wear. A tremor went down her back. She’d have to get ready to yell. If there weren’t some very clear, very visible suspender marks, she needed to scream her head off the minute he removed that shirt.

He hooked one suspender with his thumb and pulled it down, then did the same with the other. They lay like wilted flower stems on either side of his hips. There was nothing left now but the buttons.

He used only one hand. She always used two when she undid her buttons.

His hands were big. And rough. Rough enough to scratch her when he held them over her mouth. She reached up and touched the chapped places around her lips.

His hand stalled, then continued pushing button after button through the holes with quick flicks. When he’d undone all the ones above his trousers, he leaned onto his left hip and pulled out the tail of his shirt, then leaned on his right and did the same. His shirt parted the least little bit, giving her glimpses of his undershirt.

Every fiber in her being screamed to have him stop. To close her eyes and just take him at his word. But whoever heard of a farmer who swelled up like that? It was unfathomable.

He released the final button and whisked off his shirt.

His arms were huge, powerful. Even without his flexing them. And his chest. Land sakes. Every dip and swell was clearly defined beneath the tight cotton undershirt.

Her mouth went dry. “Wait.”

He let out a slow sigh of relief.

She stood. “I’m going to stand on the steps. And if you don’t have the markings you’ve claimed you do, I just want you to know, I’ll bring this house down with my screams. Don’t think I won’t.”

“Oh, I believe you, Adelaide. I have no doubt you’d do just that.”

She lifted her chin. “My name is Miss Wentworth.”

“That may be, but I think it’s fair to say we’re way past the formalities.”

With much more bravado than she was feeling, she crossed the entry hall and went halfway up the first flight of steps before turning around.

Pushing himself up by his knees, he walked to the foot of the stairs. “Are you going to be able to see me from there? Because if it’s too dark and you can’t see and you let out a holler, we’re going to have a lot of explaining to do. And it’ll be you who takes the worst of it. My hand will get slapped, but you—you’ll be thrown out on the street and will, in all likelihood, lose your job.”

The thought of her job and the reaction of her fellow teachers and landlady hadn’t even occurred to her. If he didn’t have the markings and she screamed, how on earth would she explain why he was half-naked?

“It’s not too late to change your mind,” he said.

It was the wrong thing to say. Straightening her spine, she narrowed her eyes. “Do not try to intimidate me, Mr. McNamara.”

Shaking his head, he rubbed his neck. “You may as well call me Cullen. Now, can you see me or not?”

“I think I can.” She moistened her lips. “Yes, I’m fairly certain I can.”

Turning, he retrieved the lantern and set it at his feet. “I’m going to take off my undershirt, then I’m going to lift up the lantern right quick so you can see. So don’t start screaming until you give yourself a chance to have a good look. All right?”

She gave a quick nod. Her legs were trembling, her pulse was thrumming, and her stomach felt downright ill.

He pulled his undershirt out from his pants, the muscles in his arms flexing and shifting. Then he crossed his arms in front of him, grabbed the hem of his undershirt and pulled it up and over. Before she had a chance to see anything, he whisked up the lantern, holding it high.

Blood rushed through her veins. He was magnificent. As beautifully formed as any sculpture on the entire grounds of the fair. She squeezed the stair rail. Would his chest have the same texture as his arms? For his skin was different from hers. Not coarse exactly, nor was it smooth. Just . . . different.

She took a step down.

He took a step back. “Can you not see?”

Oh, she could see. She could see just fine. Dark hairs dotted his sun-kissed chest, and two white stripes traveled from his shoulders to his waist as if they’d been painted there by God.

“Miss Wentworth?”

She couldn’t breathe.

“Adelaide?” His voice held a note of panic. “Please tell me you can see. They’re on my back too.” He spun around.

Her lips parted. The width of his shoulders was at least twice the width of his waist. And all his muscles shifted when he lifted the lantern higher.

He looked over his shoulder. “Can you see them?”

She could see exactly where they intersected, then split again.