Silken Dreams (10 page)

Grunting in irritation at his own thoughts, Jacob straightened. Ethan McGuire
was
the Gentleman. He’d escaped capture the last time they came face-to-face and then again, when he’d abducted Lettie. But this time, Jacob had the power to stop him through the Star.

Pushing away from the porch, Jacob mounted his horse and rode toward the lightning-blasted oak. As a member of the outer circle, it was his duty to retrieve messages from the tree, then notify the other Star members assigned to his leadership. Given his length of membership, it was an honor for Jacob to have such a responsibility within the group.

Once again, Jacob removed the canister from its hiding place inside the trunk. He hesitated only a moment before withdrawing the crumpled paper that lay inside. Since dawn had not touched the sky, Jacob dug a matchstick from his shirt pocket and raked his thumbnail over the tip. The match flared to life, illuminating the scrawled words:

Proof of Ethan McGuire’s guilt has been obtained. When located, notify immediately but do not apprehend through legal channels. He will be tried before the Council.

Jacob took a deep breath and squinted up at the moon, shaking out the match and tossing it to the ground. A thundering anticipation rolled through his body. Once and for all, McGuire would see that it didn’t pay to toy with Jacob Grey.

Or his sister.

The thought raced through Jacob’s head and his jaw clenched, his gut tightened in anger and dread. He’d never forgive the man for using his sister as a shield.

A slow, curling fury began to twine in Jacob’s stomach. Touching another match to the paper, Jacob watched the licking flame as it curled around the edges of the note with a hungry glee until all but the tip he held had been consumed. Then he allowed the smoldering missive to flutter to the ground and urged his horse into a trot, reining him in the direction of the boardinghouse.

It would be dawn soon.

“Lettie!”

Her head jerked up, and she found her mother regarding her with an irritated expression. Lettie looked down to find she’d long since emptied the pan of milk gravy and had been ladling nothing but air for the last few moments.

“Sorry, Mama.”

“Just stop your daydreaming and go feed the boarders.”

“Yes, Mama.”

Holding the heavy tureen against her stomach, Lettie hurried into the dining room, where the boarders were eagerly consuming large quantities of fried eggs, potatoes, milk, coffee, and fresh cherries.

Lettie set about seeing to the rest of the meal, refilling platters and clearing plates, moving automatically through the familiar tasks. However, when Jacob appeared—unannounced—Lettie’s nerves took a turn for the worse and she nearly dropped a plate of fried eggs into Mr. Goldsmith’s lap. Though she tried to act as normally as possible, she couldn’t help thinking that Ethan McGuire was hidden in the garret, while the man who sought him ate breakfast just a few floors below.

After being forced to hear nearly an hour of the Beasleys’ chatter, Mr. Goldsmith’s slurping, and the Grubers’ whispered bickering, Lettie’s stomach seemed to tie into knots. Over and over again, she glanced up to find her brother staring at her with a piercing regard, and for the first time, Lettie felt a twinge of doubt. If Jacob were right, she could very well be harboring a murderer in her room. One who had robbed the bank in Carlton and left a young deputy lying gravely injured in the blaze.

But somehow… somehow she couldn’t fit Ethan into that scenario. He was hard, yes, intense, enigmatic, and even angry. But after last night’s unwitting insights into the man, she knew he wasn’t capable of the things Jacob thought he’d done. When she looked into Ethan’s eyes, she didn’t see a killer. She saw a man who’d been alone too long and hadn’t realized yet that he needed someone to love him.

Lettie glanced up to find Jacob peering at her as if he could read her very thoughts. Stiffening, she tried to affect a posture of unconcern, but to no avail.

A knock sounded at the door, and, welcoming the excuse to leave the dining room, Lettie jumped to her feet. Instead of a possible boarder, she found Jacob’s deputy standing impatiently on the stoop, mauling his hat with his hands.

“Good morning, Rusty.”

The bowlegged man brushed by her, ignoring her words of greeting. “Where’s your brother?”

“The dining room, but—”

Without waiting to hear what she had to say, Rusty Janson darted into the other room. When Lettie rounded the threshold, she found him leaning close to her brother’s ear.

Jacob’s eyes lifted, and a smoldering anger began to burn in their depths. When the deputy had finished, Jacob slowly rose to his feet, threw his napkin onto the table, and crossed the room. Moving past Lettie without a word, he began climbing the steps.

A cool finger of fear seemed to trace up Lettie’s spine when his deputy followed and the two men unsheathed their revolvers, walking with catlike stealth.

“Jacob?” Picking up her skirts, Lettie hurried to follow. “Jacob! Where are you going?”

Her brother paid her no mind, his pace increasing so that she was forced to take the stairs two at a time in order to catch him and grasp his arm.

“Jacob, what are you doing?”

He brushed away her grip as if it were no more than that of a fly. His hand closed around the door that led to her garret bedroom, and he scowled when he found it locked.

“Where’s the key, Lettie?” he demanded harshly.

“I don’t—”

“Where’s the key!” He reached out to grip her arm, his fingers curling tightly into her skin. “Damn you, you’ve been lying to me for days, haven’t you? He’s been here all along!”

“No!”

“The key, Lettie.” When she didn’t budge, he reached out to pat the pockets of her apron. He was rewarded by the stiff shape of the key. Before she could grasp the key, his hand had plunged into the deep pocket and snatched it free.

“Jacob, don’t!” she cried, but he brushed her aside, unlocked the latch, and flung the door wide open.

The stairwell lay bare in the bright light of the morning. Jacob and his deputy slowly began to climb the staircase. Behind them, Lettie balled her hands into fists of rage. Never before had her brother been so… so… beastly! She wanted to scream for Ethan to hide, but she couldn’t—not without incriminating them both.

Long moments followed, long endless moments while she stood in the hall, waiting for a volley of shots, the scrabbling of fisticuffs. But nothing happened. Soon, no longer able to bear the tension, Lettie grasped her skirts in her hands, and crept up the staircase. Once she could see over the edge, she grew still in disbelief.

The garret was empty.

Jacob and his man continued to search the wardrobe, under the bed, and even her trunks. But Lettie knew their search would be fruitless. Ethan had left without a trace, just as her Highwayman had in so many of her fantasies.

Finally, after several minutes, her brother turned and she glared at him, the disdain she displayed aimed at inflicting the deep-rooted guilt that only a younger sibling could generate.

Jacob, however, seemed unaffected. When she waited in pointed silence, he took a step toward her. “He isn’t here,” he said slowly, stating the obvious but somehow making the words sound more like an accusation.

“And just who are you referring to?”

But Jacob thought she was lying. She could tell. Despite the evidence of his own eyes, Jacob’s gaze flicked into the corners of the room as if he expected some secret passage to open up and reveal Ethan McGuire’s hiding place. He sheathed his revolver and planted his hands on his hips, gazing at her with barely disguised suspicion.

“Rusty thought he saw someone in front of the window.”

Lettie turned to glare at Rusty as well and found his face the same carrot shade as his hair.

“Both of you have more imagination than is healthy.”

The two men shifted, glanced at each other, but did not admit their mistake.

“I gotta go, Lettie,” Rusty mumbled, before beating a hasty retreat down the steps and out the door.

Lettie then turned her glare full-force on her brother. “Don’t you have some place you need to be going as well?”

He sighed. “Look, I said I was sorry, didn’t I?”

“No, you didn’t. And even if you had, your apology isn’t good enough. Now kindly leave my room.”

He stared deep into her eyes, evidently searching for some sign of the little girl who had always adored him, no questions asked. “Yes, ma’am.”

She turned toward the staircase, only to be halted by his voice.

“Lettie?”

She glanced at him over her shoulder, and something within her grew wary at the burning intensity of his gaze.

“I’ll give you as long a lead as you want, little sister. But if you’re thinking of tangling with Ethan McGuire, you’d better stay clear. Otherwise, you’ll be opening yourself up to a world of hurt that no one can protect you from. Not even me.”

A chill feathered down her spine. “What do you mean?”

“I can’t tell you any more than that. Just you remember that Ethan McGuire is a man with a whole lot of enemies. Powerful enemies. And they aren’t the type to be put off by pretty speeches. If they have their way, Ethan McGuire will be hanging from an oak tree soon.”

Giving her one last glance of warning, he strode toward the staircase and clattered down to the floor below.

Rubbing at the gooseflesh that had risen on her arms, Lettie slowly crossed to the window and stared out at the bright, sun-drenched yard. Ethan’s absence left a hollow space within her, one that ached in a curious fashion, much like the loss of a special… friend. Yet, much more disconcerting than the ache was the fear she felt, wondering just who Ethan’s enemies could be and why they were so all-fired up to see him hanged.

Shaking away her morbid thoughts, she slammed the window closed, threw the latch, and turned on her heel, needing the chatter of the Beasley sisters to dispel the gloom that suddenly seemed to taint the room around her.

But far from being diverted, she found that the Beasley sisters’ male-oriented gossip caused her to remember the man who had so briefly interrupted the monotonous pattern of her own life.

Sighing, she slipped from the room, suddenly needing to escape the confines of the house.

A faint breeze stirred against her skin and teased the hem of her apron. Lettie breathed deeply in relief as the air caressed the perspiration dotting her brow and prickling between her shoulders. How she wished she had the time to slip out to the creek, lift the layers of skirts she wore, and paddle to her knees in the cool water.

But there were things to be done, chores to finish.

Wistfully, Lettie gazed out at the barn, remembering the fantasy that had become real, remembering Ethan’s kisses. He hadn’t even given her a chance to say goodbye.

Stepping from the porch, she meandered through the grass, veering toward the barn, which housed the two milk cows and horses used to pull the buggy. Her feet made soft soughing noises in the dusty grass, reminding her that summer would soon pass its zenith and she would face another fall, another winter, and another spring, each exactly the same as the other. She would rise at five each morning and retire at nine each night. In between, she would help to fix breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Mondays she would wash, Tuesdays she would bake, Wednesdays…

A huge sigh pushed against her corset and she turned back to gaze at the house, wondering if she’d ever escape the tedium.

Lettie glanced up and her thoughts scattered into the hot summer air. Her heart began to pound. On the outer edge of the boardinghouse roof, a dark shape clung to the gabled window of her bedroom.

Laws!
She’d locked Ethan out on the ledge.

Grasping her skirts, Lettie raced toward the boardinghouse and shot up the back staircase. Once in her room, she slammed the door and scrambled up the last flight of stairs.

“I’m coming, I’m coming,” she whispered fiercely, all the while knowing he couldn’t hear her but needing to say the words anyway.

She shoved the window up with such force that the panes jiggled and threatened to crack. Leaning outside, her eyes widened in delight when she found Ethan clinging to the gabled edge with a white-knuckled grip. She could only wonder why neither Rusty nor her brother had bothered to look up and find him there.

“You’re still here!”

At the sound of her voice, Ethan swore, then swore again, using such a variety of curses that even Lettie was impressed by his vocabulary. “Why’d you shut the damned window?”

“I didn’t know you were out here or I wouldn’t have.”

“Can I please—” he paused to grit his teeth, his grip becoming even more fierce—“come into the house now?”

“Well, of course. Just swing your leg over and I’ll take your hand.”

Ethan swallowed, and his face seemed to take on the sickly color of flour paste.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Then come inside.”

There was a moment of silence, then Ethan slowly turned his head to glare at her. “I… can’t.”

Her brow creased in confusion. “Whyever not?”

His eyes squeezed closed. “I hate heights,” he whispered to himself, but Lettie caught the words.

All at once, she became conscious of his death grip on the edge of the gable and the sweat that poured down his face. The man was well and truly spooked.

Reaching out her hand, she spoke in her calmest, gentlest voice. “Give me your hand, Ethan.”

“Oh, damn.”

“Ethan. Give me your hand.”

He opened one eye to gaze at her in stunned disbelief.

“Like hell I will! If you think I’m going to let go, you’ve lost your mind.”

“Ethan. Please. Give me your hand.” Lettie kept her gaze steady and firm, willing him to release the grasp of one hand so that she could help him.

“You’re just trying to see me killed, Lettie Gray.”

“Do as I say, Ethan McGuire,” she repeated, using the voice she generally reserved for the recalcitrant children who occasionally visited the boardinghouse. “Take my hand.”

Very slowly, he released his grasp. Even more slowly, he reached out, until finally she was able to take his hand. His palm was slick with sweat, but his fierce grip on her fingers would never give way.

With more encouraging words, Lettie talked him from the edge of the gable, around the roof, until finally he could hook his leg over the window casing and haul himself inside.

Still cursing, he leaned weakly against the wall, sliding down until he sat on the floor, his eyes closed, breathing heavily. A shudder wracked his frame.

“Damn, I hate heights,” he muttered once again.

Frowning in concern, Lettie knelt beside him, her skirts spreading onto the floor and over his thighs. Though his features were still hard and uncompromising, she found herself reaching out to touch his cheek. His skin was hot beneath her touch and slick with sweat.

“Don’t you ever do anything like that to me again!” he demanded, stabbing the air with a finger.

Her lips twitched slightly at his fierce expression, but she pushed her humor away and savored the texture of his beard-roughened skin. “No. I won’t.”

He must have sensed her amusement, however, because he growled low in his throat, then glared at her with narrowed eyes. “You think this is funny, don’t you?”

“No!”

“I’ll have you know it isn’t!”

“I know it isn’t.”

“And I’ll have you know I don’t appreciate being laughed at.”

“But I—”

“And if you ever lock that window again, I’ll paddle your backside.”

“Yes, sir.”

His head turned slightly, and he pierced her with an azure stare. Suddenly, she became conscious of how her finger had begun to brush back and forth across the firm jut of his cheekbone.

Lettie took a deep breath. Ethan’s scrutiny seemed to scorch into her very soul, singeing her with a feminine awareness she had never felt before. She knew she should go. She knew that this man could bring her nothing but trouble. But remembering last night’s brief glimpse into Ethan’s battered heart, she found she couldn’t move.

When he didn’t pull away, she shifted to cup his cheek with her palm. Her fingers delved into the silky weight of his hair. The strands were smooth as midnight, his scalp was warm and slightly damp from sweat. And though Lettie knew she should probably be repelled, she felt herself reacting in a purely elemental way to the musky heat of his body.

Ethan shifted beneath her touch, but did not back away. Instead, he watched her with eyes that were slightly narrowed and so carefully masked, she had no way of discerning his thoughts. She could only read his reaction by the slight tensing of his muscles beneath her hand and the warmth of his skin. He didn’t smile, didn’t frown.

But he didn’t pull away, either.

Barely breathing, she slid one finger down to his jaw, then up to his lips.

His fingers snapped around her wrist, holding her away. “What kind of game are you playing with me?” he rasped.

She took a ragged breath. “I don’t know.”

Her honest answer seemed to shake his control. His gaze shifted, and he stared at the way his larger hand held hers immobile. When he glanced up again, she nearly backed away from the intense light that had entered his eyes. They flashed with the spark of a man who had just become conscious of a woman’s proximity.

“I suppose I should thank you again for your help. For this morning, and last night.”

So the soft words of thanks she’d thought Ethan had murmured just before she’d fallen asleep had not been a dream. But Lettie didn’t comment on the fact that she’d heard them. She could tell by the glint in his eyes that he regretted the vulnerability she’d seen in him the night before. She tried to ease away. “I don’t think it’s necessary to thank me.”

He tugged her back. “Yes. It is. My mother tried to teach me manners as a child, and I wasn’t always an exemplary pupil, but I did learn how to say thank you. I think you should know that.”

His free hand lifted to curl around her neck, pushing aside the thick braid that hung down her back and delving into the delicate hairs at her nape. His grip was firm.

Male.

“Come here.”

His low tone caused a shiver to course down her spine. Once again, she realized this was not a man to fool with. The intensity of his gaze was too unnerving. The effect of his touch too disturbing.

“No, I—”

His fingers drew her irresistibly forward. “Didn’t your mama teach you it was impolite to argue with your elders?” he murmured, moments before his lips covered hers.

Lettie gasped, her hands flying out to brace against his chest in support, then curling into tight fists when the warmth of his skin seeped through the chambray shirt he wore and seemed to soak into her palms.

“Ethan,” she murmured against his lips.

He ignored her protests, taking advantage of the parting of her lips to deepen the caress.

“Open your mouth, Lettie,” he whispered, drawing back ever so slightly.

“What?” she breathed, her lashes seeming so heavy she could barely open them to see.

“How many times have you been kissed, Lettie?”

She swallowed against the nervousness that seemed to grip her throat. “Four.”

He stared at her a moment before his lips tilted in a brief smile. A smile that held only a touch of wry humor, yet seemed to echo with self-deprecation. “Only four.”

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

“No. It’s not.” The tone of his voice dropped. His eyes seemed to gaze at her with a strange warmth. As if he’d found something special and unique. Then the warmth was masked and the hand at the back of her neck pulled her irretrievably nearer. “But it doesn’t speak well for your education, does it?” His murmured words held a taunting thread of mockery. Watching her with narrowed eyes, he used his free hand to reach out and trace the edge of her lip with his finger. Then he slipped his finger between her lips. “Open your mouth,” he whispered.

Lettie hesitated. Ethan claimed she was danger in a pretty package, but she was not half as dangerous as this man. He had the power to strip her of her idealistic fantasies and introduce her to the harsh realities of life. He had the power to capture something soft and gentle within her, something she didn’t even dare name. But she also knew he had the power to hurt her.

“You don’t trust me, do you?”

“No,” she whispered.

His lips twitched, ever so slightly. “You shouldn’t.” Once again, his finger slipped between her lips. “Open your mouth.”

The intensity of his gaze could not be avoided, nor could the silky temptation of his words.

“You have a beautiful mouth, Lettie. Soft, full, and quick to smile.”

His finger dipped inside to trace the edge of her teeth in a featherlight touch, barely stroking the tip of her tongue.

“Let me show you,” he murmured, the words so low they were barely audible. He bent toward her to replace his finger with the gentle pressure of his lips, and then his tongue.

At first she recoiled slightly, disturbed by something that seemed so… intimate it must surely be forbidden. But when a heavy sweetness invaded her body and settled deep within her, she closed her eyes and concentrated on the sensations that shimmered through her from that tiny point of contact.

Ethan drew back, and her eyelashes flickered open.

“Ah, Lettie girl, you’re sweet.” His lips tilted ever so slightly in self-deprecation. “Sweeter than honey and twice as nice.” His hand moved to the hollow of her back, then slipped lower.

“Ethan, I—”

“Come here.”

“No.”

But his hand pulled her closer, as close as two people could be. Then he covered her lips with his own.

A moan seeped from Lettie’s chest and was absorbed by his kiss. Her hands slipped around the broad expanse of his shoulders, and unconsciously, she pulled him even nearer—even though she knew she should be pushing him away.

“What are you doing to me, Ethan?” she whispered when he drew back.

He stared deep into her eyes, searching for something Lettie was almost afraid he might find. Something… sensual. Hungry.

Aching.

“What are you feeling, Lettie?”

She groaned, trying to ignore the heated rush that swirled through her limbs. Though she knew she shouldn’t be touching a man this way—especially not a man with Ethan’s reputation—she couldn’t control the way her body nudged his, seeking something she didn’t understand.

“E-than—”

“Tell me.”

“I’m so hot, yet cold.”

His hand cupped the back of her knee through the fabric of her skirts. “What else, Lettie girl?”

She blushed.

“Tell me.”

“I want you to touch me. Hold me. But I shouldn’t.”

Ethan gently drew her knee upwards, then across his legs so that she straddled him.

“Do you want me to kiss you?”

She groaned.

He pulled her tightly against his hips.

“Do you want me to kiss you?”

“Ethan, don’t.”

His lips pressed against her throat. “Do you want me to touch you?”

“Yes! Please …”

His lips blazed a trail of fire up her throat to the underside of her chin, and then when she could bear it no longer, he kissed her. A long, heated kiss that branded her as his own.

Lettie’s fingers clutched at his back, her breasts flattened against his chest. She was fire and ice. Sensation and emotion.

“Lettie?”

The shrill call echoed through the garret from the floor below.

At the sound of Natalie Gruber’s voice, the two of them sprang apart, breathing heavy. Blue eyes clashed with brown.

Reality flooded through Lettie’s body, leaving her stunned by her reaction to Ethan McGuire. Then she suddenly became conscious of the way she wantonly straddled his hips and clutched at his back with her hands.

Groaning in embarrassment, she scrambled to her feet and ran to the opposite side of the room. But at the steps, the low murmur of Ethan’s voice brought her to a halt.

“Don’t regret what happened between us, Lettie.”

She turned to see him staring at her with a velvet heat. And for a moment, she thought he was as shaken as she by the sensations that had flared between them.

“It’s not wrong to feel desire, Lettie. Though I’m not the man who should be teaching you that fact.”

Her fingers curled around the railing until her knuckles grew white.

He took a step toward her. “But you need to know that what you felt was passion. Stark and simple.”

“Maybe it wasn’t quite that simple,” she whispered, daring him to admit that there had been something more to their embrace than a simple animalistic urge.

Long after she’d gone, Ethan stared at the spot where she’d been, wondering why Lettie’s words had somehow unsettled him.

Lettie closed the door behind her and quickly twisted the key in the lock.

“Secrets, Lettie?”

She whirled and found Natalie regarding her with curious eyes.

“Was there something you needed, Mrs. Gruber?”

Natalie’s gaze bounced from Lettie’s flushed features to the closed door. “I wondered if I might borrow a blanket or quilt.”

Lettie’s brow creased in confusion. “You’ve been cold at night?”

Natalie smiled, a curiously smug expression crossing her features. “No,” she drawled. “I’m rarely cold at night.” She slid a hand down the garnet taffeta stretched across her torso. “No, I needed the quilt for a picnic.”

Lettie regarded the woman in surprise. “You persuaded Mr. Gruber to step away from his duties for the afternoon?”

Natalie’s lips twitched. “No.”

After a moment of silence, Lettie realized Natalie was not about to explain anything more. Slightly embarrassed, Lettie strode toward the linen closet and grasped an old quilt her mother had recovered in flannel.

“There you are, Mrs. Gruber.”