Smoke River Bride (12 page)

She bent forward to bite off a thread. Lately she had begun to want more at night than his arm casually draped across her waist and his soft breathing near her ear. The fantasies she conjured while sewing by the fire made her blush.

But each night she lay in the big double bed beside a man who was not just tired but silent. Distant. She wished he would touch her as he had the nights he had rubbed her back with liniment. Or kiss her, as he had done months ago. Weeks went by but he never did.

Now she heard a step on the porch and her heart sped up. Quickly she laid aside the skirt she was hemming and raced to the door. But when she swung it open, it was not Thad who lurched into the room; it was Teddy.

Blood dribbled out of both nostrils, down his shirt and onto his jacket front. One eye was swollen and turning purple, and he was trying hard to choke back sobs.

“Teddy! What happened?” She pulled him across to the fireplace and started to unbutton his jacket.

“Got into a fight,” he muttered.

“Are you hurt?” She pressed her scrunchedup apron to his bloody nose. “Let me see your eye.”

The boy tipped his face up and Leah gasped. It was worse than she’d thought; one side of his face and forehead, including his eye socket, was shadowed by a dark, spreading bruise.

She untied her apron and stuffed it into his scraped hands. “Hold this tight against your nose.” From the kitchen she brought a huck towel dipped in cold water, then pushed him down into the big armchair and laid the compress on his face.

“How did this happen?”

Teddy drew in a shaky breath. “I punched Harvey Poletti an’ he punched me back. Lots of times.”

“You mean you two had a fight?”

His thin shoulders slumped. “Dunno how to fight. I just kept hitting back. I hit Edith Ness, too.”

“Edith? But Edith is only six. And she is a girl. Teddy, you should never hit a girl.” Leah
lifted the folded towel from his swollen face, swung it in the air to cool it and gently replaced it.

“Pa’s gonna lay me out somethin’ awful.”

“Was the fight your fault?”

“Well, guess I kinda started it when I punched Harvey.”

“Teddy, why did you hit him?”

The boy tried to look away with his one good eye. “’Cuz he said somethin’.”

“Said what? What did Harvey Poletti say?”

“I can’t tell you.”

In the silence that followed Leah heard the hiss and pop of the log fire, the lid rattling on her simmering kettle of soup and the ragged breathing of the battered boy in front of her.

What should she say?

Torn between concern for Teddy and fear of what Thad might do to the boy, she worried her fingers into a knot. She wasn’t Teddy’s mother; she wasn’t even a real wife yet. Most of all she knew she should not come between a father and his son.

“Are you hurt anywhere else?”

The boy groaned. “My shoulder’s kinda sore, an’ Edith kicked me in the shin real hard.”

“Oh, my. Let me see.”

He pulled up his pant leg so Leah could check the angry red mark on his shin and the dried blood on the reddened scrape. She had just started into the kitchen for another towel when she heard Thad’s boots on the porch.

The instant the door opened, Teddy leaped out of the armchair and threw himself against his father’s legs.

“What’s this, now?”

“He’s hurt,” Leah called from the sink. “He had a fight at school.”

Thad bent over his son. “That right?” The boy wrapped his arms around Thad’s neck and his father clasped his thin body.

“Ow! My shoulder hurts.”

“You want to tell me about it, son?”

“No. But I guess I got to, huh?”

Leah flitted distractedly about the kitchen while Teddy sobbed out the whole story. She noticed that he left out whatever it was the Poletti boy had said that had started off the tussle.

Thad did not press him to explain, and after a while the two of them disappeared. Oh, no! Thad would not whip him, would he?

She heard their raised voices on the porch and, after a while, Thad’s low chuckle.
When they came inside for supper, Teddy was grinning.

“Guess what, Leah? Pa’s gonna teach me how to fight.”

She nodded and caught Thad’s gaze. “Turn the other cheek” apparently did not always work out here in this rough country. At that moment she made a decision of her own. She would teach Teddy the tricks she had learned to protect herself from the village bullies back in China. She would not tell Thad what she was doing—she would just do it.

As soon as the dishes were washed and put away, she crawled into bed and lay planning what maneuvers to show Teddy, and sorting out her mixed feelings about her marriage.

She liked Thad more than she had ever liked a man before, but he did puzzle her. She thought he liked her, but after that one night when he had kissed her, he had never approached her the way a husband would approach his wife.

Why? Was it only his preoccupation with the wheat field? With each passing day the question grew more insistent.

Now she could hear thumping sounds coming from the living room, and Thad’s voice, then more bumps that sounded like something
hitting the floor. Then Teddy groaned, and Leah didn’t relax until she heard his bubbling laughter and Thad’s low voice saying something.

She curled up into a ball and closed her eyes. She had no right to fault Thad for anything. Even if he thought marrying her had been a mistake, he had saved her from a life of bondage, rescued her from a fate she could scarcely imagine, and given her not only his name, but a home and a purpose.

The man was an overworked, worried rancher with a growing son. She had no right to feel lonely; she was simply not included in Thad’s careworn life. Perhaps all American wives were treated the same.

Hours later she felt Thad’s weight beside her. She rolled toward him, seeking his warmth. “Is Teddy all right?”

“Sure he is.”

“Are
you
all right?” She held her breath, but he did not answer her question.

“Know what I think?” he said after a moment.

“No. What?”

“I think you have a champion knight, like Ivanhoe.”

“What? I do not understand.”

Thad laid his hand on the back of her neck, swept aside her hair and pressed his lips just below her earlobe. “Teddy’s fight was about you.”

“Oh.” She knew that much; she had not expected Teddy to tell Thad. “But Teddy does not like me. He resents my presence.”

Thad gave a short laugh. “Could be that when you read about Ivanhoe you’re teaching him something about chivalry. Seems the Poletti boy said something insulting about you, and Teddy smacked him in the mouth so hard he’s got tooth scrapes on his knuckles.”

Leah twisted toward him. “You are
proud
of him!”

“I am that.”

“Oh, no. Thad, we cannot allow him—”

“Aye, we can, lass. ’Tis what all redblooded Scotsmen would do—protect their women.”

Thad propped himself up on one elbow so he could see Leah’s face. Something was different tonight. He couldn’t put his finger on it, just…something about her seemed…well, softer. More vulnerable.

Hell and damnation, you randy fool!
She’d been waiting since their wedding night a month ago to be a wife in more than name.

He pulled her close and then his breathing stopped.

Deep down he wasn’t sure she still wanted him, at least not the way he wanted her. Worse, he wasn’t sure what he would let himself do about it, even if she did want him.

S
ome nights, like tonight, Thad got hard just touching Leah’s skin. He wanted to hold her against his body and kiss her until his brain shut out all those thoughts about being sensible. About being fair to her.

This was sure as hell one of those nights, because he could scarcely keep from rolling her over into his arms. He so wanted to make her his.

He couldn’t let himself think about it. But with a groan of frustration he realized he couldn’t
not
think about it. About her—this woman who had moved into his house and into his life.

He had to admit Leah was moving into his
heart, and he was beginning to be terrified in a way he only half understood.

He had loved Hattie. When she died his life had stopped, but now he was starting to feel alive again. He felt something for Leah—in fact, he felt a great deal for her. And deep down it scared him. If he let himself love Leah and then lost her, he would never recover.

But.

He could hear her breathing softly beside him. “Leah?” he whispered. His voice came out harsher than he’d planned.

She brought her small, capable hand to his bare chest. “Yes, Thad?”

Desire flooded him, made him ache. “Leah, I want—I want to make love to you.”

She laughed softly. “Yes, I want it, too.” Then she pressed her lips to his shoulder.

He lifted her chin and caught her mouth under his. Kissing her was like tasting something cool and soft and finding a blaze beneath the surface. He hadn’t expected it to feel this different; was it because
he
was different?

She parted her lips and he slid his tongue between them. A little moan escaped her, but
he couldn’t stop tasting her. She was so sweet and hot he suddenly wanted to weep.

A voice in the back of his mind yammered for him to stop, but he couldn’t. Not now. There was only Leah and him, and he wanted all of her. Now. His hunger and his need were making him crazy, and when she moved in his arms he knew he was lost.

“Tell me to stop if you don’t want this,” he said, his voice gravelly.

“I do want this,” she murmured. “I have wanted this for a long time, Thad. I have waited for it.” She brushed her lips against his throat. “I am glad it is happening now.”

His groan was muffled in the lemony scent of her hair. He skimmed one hand up under her silk night robe and found her breast, small and firm as a melon. Gently he ran his fingers over the nipple, stroking the soft flesh until it hardened into a peak.

Then, slowly and deliberately, he moved his hand below her waist into the soft hair between her thighs. He parted her legs and stroked his finger over her entrance. She was wet and hot. Oh, heavens above, he couldn’t stop. He would explode if he didn’t take her.

Gently, he pressed one finger into her soft,
moist heat. She sucked air in between her teeth and he heard her voice.

“Yes,” she murmured.
“Yes.”

He withdrew, then touched her again, deeper. And then he went still deeper, until he met a slight resistance.

She made a small moan of pleasure and arched to meet his hand. Oh, he knew he’d long since passed the point of stopping.

She murmured his name against his lips and smoothed her small hands over his skin, caressing him all the way down to his engorged member. His body decided for him; he couldn’t go back now.

Willing himself to go slowly, he rose above her, positioned himself and entered her as gently as he could. She gasped when he pushed past her maidenhead, and then she was moving with him, murmuring his name. Her breathing grew erratic and soon she was panting, as he was.

“Am I hurting you?” he whispered.

“No.
No
. It is wonderful.
Beautiful.”
She tightened her arms around him with a strength that surprised him.

All at once she cried out and he felt her inner muscles pulse around him. With a shout he came to his own climax.

He clung to her through spasms that bore him up to heaven and held him in a net of stars. The unexpected feeling that flooded him was so intense, so rich, so…humbling, it scarcely seemed real.

Nothing,
nothing
in his entire life, had ever been like this.

He waited until their breathing calmed, then rolled onto his side, taking her with him. May God forgive him, he would never forget this night.

“Thad?” Her voice trembled. “Is it always like this?”

He opened his mouth, but was unable to speak for a good half minute. “No. It’s never been like this.”

“I am glad,” she whispered. She nuzzled her head into the crook of his shoulder. Thad lay still, holding her until her breathing evened out and he knew she was asleep.

His eyes stung, then filled with moisture. God had given him an irreplaceable gift.

And, dammit, it scared the stuffing out of him.

Thad dabbed his biscuit into the remaining egg yolk on his breakfast plate. “Forgot to tell you something last night.”

At the stove frying eggs for Teddy’s breakfast, Leah stilled. A warm blush swept up her neck. Thad had said everything last night, but it hadn’t been in words. Her heart still had not stopped its hiccuping rhythm.

“What did you forget to tell me?”

“About the barn dance next Saturday. I stopped in at Verena’s shop yesterday when I was in town. She reminded me.”

“Verena?”

“Verena Forester. You know, The dressmaker.”

Oh, yes, Leah knew Verena Forester. The woman was noticeably cool every time Leah stopped in for a pattern or a bit of lace. The dressmaker always asked about Thad—how was he? What was he planting this year? She made it very plain that Thad claimed a special place in her heart.

Last week, Leah’s friend Ellie had taken her to tea and told her why. Verena had wanted to marry Thad after his wife died, and that explained at least some of the dressmaker’s rude treatment of her. The rest of it, she knew, was because of her Chinese heritage.

She slid a plate of fried eggs and biscuits in front of Teddy and joined them at the breakfast
table. Thad reached over and snagged one of the biscuits from Teddy’s plate.

“The dance will be out at the Jensen place. We’ll take the wagon.”

Teddy hung his head over his plate. “Pa, do I hafta dance with a girl?”

“Sure you do, son. Girls are nice.” He sent Leah a secret look, and then jerked upright. Girls
were
nice! And Leah…well, Leah was more than nice. All at once he couldn’t breathe.

“Aw, Pa, I don’t like girls. At school they all tease me. All ’cept Manette Nicolet, and she’s only five.”

“Tease you about what?”

Teddy studied his half-buttered biscuit. “About, um, about Leah.”

Two forks clattered onto china plates. Leah stared at the boy. “What do they say?” Thad demanded. His voice was barely under control.

Teddy’s gaze moved back and forth from the flour-sack tablecloth to the butter dish. “They say all kinds of stuff, Pa. About how Leah don’t belong here, an’ she’s too pretty to be…to be…They say she’s prob’ly a—”

“Teddy!” Thad raised his hand. Leah knew what he was about to say.
“They say I must be a bad woman because I am Chinese,” she finished.

Teddy’s head drooped even lower. “’Cept they don’t say ‘Chinese.’ They say ‘filthy Chink.’”

Ice water flooded Leah’s veins. Thad’s fist smacked the table so hard the sugar bowl jumped. “Do they, now?” he roared.

“Yeah. I punched Edith Ness on the nose, an’ Miz Johnson whaled us both good. My rear end was sore for a whole day.”

“And?” his father asked, his voice suddenly quiet.

“And now Edith an’ her sister Noralee won’t speak to me.”

Leah sat rooted to her chair, torn between anger on Teddy’s behalf and humiliation at being called a—Well, she need not think of that. The cruel slur cut deep. She wanted to cry, but at the same time a small part of her wanted to laugh over Teddy’s girl problem.

Thad’s russet eyebrows lowered. “Will Edith Ness be at the dance?”

“I s’pose so, Pa. Mr. Ness is gonna supply the apples for bobbing.”

Leah laid her hand on Thad’s forearm. “Do not make an issue of it. I have been called names before.”

Frown lines creased his forehead. “I won’t have it,” he said heavily. “Not as long as you’re my wife.”

Leah’s cheeks grew hot and she looked down into her lap. Oh, no. Already she could see him bloodied and battered after some fight on her behalf.

She stood up abruptly. “I—I am going out to feed the chickens.”

“Again?” Thad gave her an odd look. “You fed them once already this morning. Don’t you remember?”

Oh, yes, she remembered. She had purposely crawled out of bed before the sun was up, tossed a handful of grain into the yard for the hens and then clambered back under the covers next to Thad. What had happened after that she would never forget.

She could not help smiling. But she noticed Thad was staring intently out the window. And not smiling.

Teddy hung around all that day while Leah baked bread and made apple pies and scoured out the butter churn. For a while she thought the boy was hoping for a sweet snack, but he refused the bread and strawberry jam she
offered, and he even turned up his nose at a slice of fresh apple pie.

Something was wrong. Finally, late in the afternoon, he sidled up to her while she was rolling out another piecrust.

“Leah? Kin I ask you somethin’?”

“You can ask me anything, Teddy. What is it?”

“Remember when you showed me how to run fast? Like you learned in China? Well, I was wonderin’…Do you know anything about, well, about fighting?”

“Isn’t your father teaching you how to box?”

“Yeah, but he keeps talkin’ about playing fair and not hittin’ below the—you know.”

Leah propped her floury hands on her hips. “And you want some tricks, is that it?”

“Yep.” His grin told her everything.

“And you think I know about these tricks, do you?”

“Yep. You told me about the bullies chasin’ you back in China. I bet you were good at gettin’ away from ’em, huh?”

Leah had to laugh. she had been very good at defending herself, she acknowledged. The proof was that she was alive, she was here and she was whole in body and spirit.

“Yes, I could defend myself, Teddy. An old shopkeeper in our town took me aside one day and taught me some things.”

“Show me,” the boy said. Then he quickly added, “Please.”

Very well, she would show him some of the tricks old Chen had taught her. “Ways young miss can fight,” he had said.

Right there in the kitchen she demonstrated how to step in close to an opponent, slip her foot around behind his legs and tip him over backward.

“Wow, that’s real smart!” Teddy crowed. “Show me some more.”

“Well, there’s a way to let someone try to punch you, and use momentum to pull him off balance.”

“What’s momtum?”

“Force. You use the force of the blow that is aimed at you to your advantage. That way, you can pull someone to the ground without getting hit. Like this.” She demonstrated with a feigned punch at Teddy, and when he punched back, she caught his arm and tugged him over.

“Hey, that’s pretty keen!” He practiced a few “pulls” on his own and then turned to Leah. “D’ya know any more tricks?”

“The most important thing about fighting is not a trick, Teddy. Shall I tell you?”

“Yeah, tell me!”

She knelt before him and looked straight into his clear blue eyes. “The most important thing to remember is—”
What am I doing? Teaching Thad’s son to cheat?

Yes, I most certainly am
.

“Well, as I was saying, the most important thing is this—don’t ever let them know you’re scared.”

Moonlight flooded the road to the Jensen place. The night air was crisp and so clear Leah could see the lights from town. Thad pulled up close to the entrance, and she and Teddy scrambled off the bench and waited while he drove off to park the wagon and see to the horse.

The barn was lit up with Indian lanterns—candles stuck in punched-out tin cans filled with wet sand. By the time they reached the double plank door, Leah’s hands were icy and the inside of her nose burned when she drew breath.

Thad caught up to them, slapping his leather gloves together. “Let’s go on in. It’s cold out here.”

Teddy hung back. “Pa, do I hafta?” With each syllable, white vapor puffed out of his mouth.

“No, you don’t have to, son. But it’s the manly thing to do. Besides, it’s warm inside and out here it’s colder than a witch’s—uh, colder than snow. It’s your choice.”

The boy shivered, then resolutely marched into the barn after his father.

Music rose from one corner, where an old man with a long, curly beard sawed away on a fiddle tucked under his scrawny chin. Two younger men strummed banjos, accompanied by a thumping washtub bass; the town barber, Whitey Poletti, plucked the strings as if he were snipping off hanks of hair.

Leah listened to the din with astonishment. Such noise! Worse than the riotous New Year festivals in China, with belching dragons and firecrackers and cymbals. The screechy fiddle reminded her of squawking chickens. She clapped her hands over her ears.

Thad bent toward her. “Kinda loud, I guess.”

She nodded in agreement; her voice would never be heard over the two twanging banjos. Thad led her to a wooden bench set against
one wall, gestured to Teddy to stay with her, and strode off toward the refreshment table.

Couples whirled and circled on the polished plank floor; watchers ringed the sidelines. Leah’s gaze fastened on the booted and slippered feet milling before her. She could see no pattern in the couples’ steps; why did they not bump into each other?

Teddy scooted closer. “I bet you don’t know how to dance, huh, Leah?”

“Not like this, no. In China my father taught me a dance he called a Virginia reel and another called a Highland fling.”

“Sure are funny names.”

“I will tell you a secret, Teddy.” She tipped her head down and spoke close to his ear. “The Chinese in our village thought Father’s dances were funny, as well. No one had ever seen such wild antics as Scottish dancing. They all laughed when Father tried to teach them, and after that I learned Chinese dances to try to fit in.”