Lorraine Heath (23 page)

Shortly after they were married. Kirk brought her here. It was their special, private place. The pool was a circle of deep water with large boulders running along a portion of it, and land and trees gracing the remaining edges.

She had no idea where the water came from. She supposed it somehow seeped through the earth and passed through crevices in the rocks. She really didn’t care. She only cared that the pool had been waiting for her tonight when she needed it.

She had come here hoping to bring back the feel of Kirk’s lips upon hers, but the attempt was proving futile. She could only feel Clay’s lips upon hers, a light tentative brushing of his mouth over hers, and yet, warmth had shot through her. She’d felt the desire to lean into him, to press herself against his body, to twine her arms around his neck, to return the kiss with a fervor that far exceeded his.

She sank into the depths of the pool. She had loosened her hair because she enjoyed the way the water seemed to turn the strands into wisps of clouds floating freely through a black sky. But even here, where the water cut off the night sounds, it couldn’t cut off her memories of Clay. He haunted her thoughts, and she feared that if she slept, he’d haunt her dreams.

When her lungs felt near to bursting, she rose to the surface of the pool. The night sounds had changed. The insects had taken refuge, their silence palpable in the night. It seemed that even the water had ceased its lapping against the shore.

The mournful strains of a song whispered from a harmonica filled the night. She eased away from the center of the pool to an area where tree branches shielded her from moonbeams. She glanced toward the boulder. A lone figure sat upon the rock, his shoulders hunched, his hands near his face. Moon shadows hid the harmonica that she was certain he held, and they concealed the expression on his face. Yet the sound he created told all that needed to be known about his feelings and thoughts.

A lonesome wail, a soul crying in the night.

She wanted to yell that he wasn’t alone, but the ground she walked upon was shaky. She had already offered him far more friendship than she’d intended.

The music stopped, and she watched in amazement as he stripped out of his clothes. He stood, a myriad of shadows and moonlight dancing over his body. She only had time to notice how tall and lean he appeared before he leapt from the boulder.

She screamed.

Clay heard a woman’s shrill cry rend the stillness of the night just before he plunged below the surface of the water. If it hadn’t been for that, he might have thought his foot had struck an unusually long and silky fish. As it was, he had a feeling his sole had run the length of a woman’s leg.

He shot straight up to the surface, his breathing labored as he flung his hair out of his eyes. “Christ! What are you doing here?”

Even as Meg struggled to stay afloat in the water, she tilted up her chin. “Me? What are you doing here? This was our private sanctuary.”

“Our? Did Kirk tell you about this place?”

“What if he did?”

“Damn his worthless hide. We all swore an oath we’d keep this place a secret.”

“Who’s we?”

“Kirk, Stick, your brothers. Hell, everyone that was around our age.”

“I don’t know why you’re so angry.”

Clay didn’t know either. Her warm, bare foot touched his, and he glided away from her. She was no doubt wearing as much as he was … which was nothing. He thought the water around him might boil if he thought about that too long. “I’m getting out.”

He swam to the bank where the shadows lay thick upon the water. “Can you see me?”

“No!”

“Good.” He scrambled up the bank and headed to the boulder.

“I’m getting out as well!”

He stopped walking and wondered where she’d left her clothes. For the sake of the statue he should look over his shoulder and see if her curves were all he thought they were. He balled his hands into fists and stormed to the boulder. Seeing those curves in his dreams was bad enough. He didn’t need to see them in the flesh.

He snatched up his clothes. Damn Kirk! The man was turning out to be more of an enemy than a friend.

Clay yanked his trousers up his legs and shoved his arms into his shirt. She couldn’t have gotten a good look at his body, not in the darkness.

A button on his shirt went sailing through the night. He cursed and took more care with the other buttons. He didn’t need a gaping hole exposing his chest. He pulled on his socks and jerked on his boots.

He plowed his hands through his wet hair. At least he was covered from shoulder to toe. Lord, how close he’d come—

“Are you decent?” Meg asked in a soft voice behind him.

He nearly jumped back into the water. “I’m dressed,” he barked.

She stepped out of the shadows and sat on the ground beside the boulder. She set her shoes beside her, and he could see the faint outline of her toes peering out from beneath her skirt. She bent her head, draped her hair over her face so the thick strands pooled in her lap, and began brushing her hair.

Her ebony hair, shining in the moonlight, reminded him of silk. His fingers ached to glide through it. He’d made a mistake working with stone all his life.

“Why did you and the others need to keep this place a secret?” she asked.

He leaned against the boulder. “We wanted a place where we could discuss things in private.”

“What sort of things?”

“Men things.”

She parted her hair down the middle and peered through the silken crevice at him. “Men things? Like war?”

He rubbed his chest. “Not exactly.”

She gave him an impish smile. “Women?”

He had a feeling she knew exactly what they’d discussed. Hell, Kirk had probably told her every conversation word for word. “We discussed things that concerned us.”

She laughed. “Women!” She patted the ground. “Why don’t you sit down?”

She went back to brushing her hair, and Clay slowly eased to the ground. He wondered if he could find a way to touch her hair without her noticing.

She flung her head back and her hair cascaded around her. She wasn’t gentle enough when she brushed her hair. He wanted to show her how she ought to brush it. She pulled her hair over one shoulder and began to attack the ends.

“Who was the first girl you ever kissed?” she asked.

Clay stared at her. She stopped brushing her hair and looked at him. “Did you promise her you wouldn’t tell?”

He dropped his gaze and started picking at the worn sole of his boot.

“Suck was the first boy I ever kissed.”

Clay jerked his head up. “Stick? Did he take you to the sawmill?”

“What do you know about the sawmill?”

“He told us he’d take girls on a tour of the sawmill after everyone left for the day. He had three kinds of tours: the kissing tour, the touching tour, and the—” He cleared his throat.

“The lots-of-touching tour?” she asked.

“Is that the one you went on?”

She shook her head. “The first time, he kissed me behind the schoolhouse, barely touching my lips. A couple of years later, he took me to the sawmill and surprised me by sticking his tongue in my mouth when he kissed me.”

“He stuck his tongue in your mouth?”

She nodded. “I was about thirteen. I wasn’t expecting it. I bit him.”

Clay laughed. “I remember when he couldn’t talk for a week. He wouldn’t tell us what happened.”

“So who was the first girl you kissed?”

His laughter abruptly died. He rubbed his hands on his thighs. “You,” he whispered.

“I don’t remember kissing you. Was it during one of the hay rides we had at harvest time? I kissed a few boys then, but I don’t remember—”

“No.” He studied the small patch of ground between her knees and his. Damn honesty. “Today.”

“You never kissed a girl before today? Don’t you kiss women when you make love—”

“I need to go.” He started to get up and froze when she grabbed his ankle.

“Please stay. It’s none of my business.”

Reluctantly, he dropped back to the ground. Before the war, he’d had no one special in his life, and a bought woman hadn’t appealed to him. Now, he didn’t have the money for the only women who would suffer through his touch.

“What’s your favorite kind of cake?” she asked as she parted her hair into thirds and began braiding it.

“I like pies.”

“What kind?”

“Pecan.”

“I hate shelling pecans.”

He shrugged. “I don’t mind shelling them.”

She tossed the thick braid over her shoulder. “Shell me a bowl of pecans sometime, and I’ll make you a pie.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Shell me two bowls of pecans so I can keep one pie. That’ll make it fair.”

The quiet eased around them like a comforting blanket. Clay glanced around a place he’d once enjoyed. “God, I miss them,” he said in a ragged voice. “Kirk, Stick, all my friends. It hurts to think about them sometimes.”

“But you wouldn’t stand by their sides.”

“The war wasn’t about us standing together. It made each of us take a stand for what we believed. Kirk didn’t believe in slavery, but he believed a state should have the right to secede.”

“And you didn’t believe we should have seceded.”

“No, ma’am, I did not. Neither did Governor Sam Houston, but no one hung him by his thumbs when he opposed secession.”

“Did someone hang you up by your thumbs?”

“No, I was spared that indignity, but I know plenty who weren’t.”

She picked up her shoe, and he figured she was going to throw it at him. She dropped it. “The morning Kirk left … what did he say to you?”

“He asked me to ride with him.”

She bowed her head and clenched her fists. “I knew it. I knew he wanted you by his side. Damn you. Damn you, for betraying his friendship.”

Clay chuckled.

She snapped her head up, anger blazing in her eyes. “What’s so damn funny?”

“It’s just odd that the thing I admire most about you is the very thing that makes you hate me so much.”

“What’s that?”

“Your loyalty. To Kirk. To the men who fought with him. You never question their motives. Few of the men who went with Kirk could have explained to you what he was fighting for. Some believed in slavery. Most just wanted to partake in a good fight. But you stand behind them, you support them, you want a memorial to honor them.”

“And I think you should have ridden at his side.”

“He only wanted me to ride as far as the border.”

“What?”

“He’d heard that some of the older men planned to stretch my neck because I didn’t enlist. He wanted to give me an armed escort to Mexico, but I wasn’t interested in leaving.”

“What’d he say when you told him that?”

“Most of what he said I can’t repeat to a lady. Basically, he called me a fool and said I’d end up dying for my beliefs. I asked him if he was willing to give less than his life for what he believed.”

“He wasn’t,” she whispered.

Within the shadows created by the moon, he held her gaze. “The only difference between us was that your husband was willing to kill for what he believed in. I wasn’t.”

The flowers slept, their petals folded in slumber, yet their scent lingered on the air. Meg hadn’t noticed it as she walked to the swimming hole, but she noticed it now as she walked home.

Over her shoulder, the full moon lent its light, creating soft shadows in the night. Her shadow reached out and dared to touch what she would not: the man walking beside her. Their shadows joined until she could no longer tell where each began.

Just as she could no longer distinguish her feelings for Clay. In the beginning, they’d been as the rock he now carved—clearly defined, hard, unforgiving. Somehow, in the passing days he’d chipped away her hatred as easily as he seemed to chip away the granite. In rare moments, she felt as though he were shaping her into someone different. She wondered if anyone in Cedar Grove would look upon the monument Clayton Holland created … and remain the same.

When they reached the edge of her family’s land, where the furrowed fields began, he stopped. Her house was visible in the distance, a lone lantern hung on the porch to guide weary travelers to a place of rest.

“I’ll wait here till I see you open the door.”

“I crawl in through the window.”

“Ah,” he said, taking a long slow nod. “Which window?”

As she pointed, he leaned to the side. “I’ll be able to see you going in.” He smiled. “Should be interesting to see.”

Studying him as he stood before her, bathed in moonlight, she remembered a time when he would have been welcome on their land, a time when he wouldn’t have stopped at the furrowed fields but would have walked to her door. His hair had dried and the dark locks fell over his brow. She resisted the urge to brush them back.

“Are there"—he rubbed his chest—"are there particular nights you go to the swimming hole? I mean if there are, I’ll be sure and not go those nights.”

“Actually, tonight’s the first time I’ve gone since Kirk left. How about you? What nights do you go?”

“Tonight was the first time for me, too. Do you want to pick a couple of nights so I don’t bother you there anymore?”

Slowly, she shook her head. “I’ll take my chances.”

He nodded. “Well, then, you’d best go on in. I’ll just stay here to make sure you get there safe.”

His eyes caught and held hers in the moonlight. The last thing she wanted was to crawl into an empty bed alone. Like a moth drawn to a flame, she took a step closer. “I won’t slap you if you kiss me again.”

“What if I kissed you the way Stick did?”

“I won’t bite your tongue.”

Lifting his hand, he came within a whisper’s breath of touching her cheek before dropping his hand to his side. Reaching out, Meg wrapped her fingers around his rough hand and pressed it against her cheek. He drew small circles on her cheek with his thumb, then trailed his thumb down to touch the corner of her mouth. She parted her lips in silent invitation.

As though offering her the opportunity to change her mind and run, he moved slowly toward her, his eyes searching hers. She lifted her face to his.

Groaning deep within his throat, he closed his eyes and settled his mouth over hers.