The Visions of Ransom Lake (30 page)

“
I don’t.” Vaden softened her voice then. “You’ve taught me much these past weeks. I’ve told you already what I’ve learned just this very night. And in the weeks past there have been many things of life I have learned at your hand. None of them, whether good or bad, pleasant or unpleasant, would I trade. For they are things that will help me in life, one way or the other, in my considerations, my decisions.” Swallowing hard and straightening her back, she looked at him determinedly and added, “And now I will be bold and forthright in telling you that…that you’re wrong not to tell your brother you’re alive. Consider his pain and loss for a moment.” She stopped talking when he raised his hand in a gesture indicating she silence herself and shook his head.

“
Don’t make me regret confidin’ in ya any more than I already do, Vaden,” he growled. He looked at the ceiling for a moment as if to gain control of his thoughts and then looked back to her, saying, “The storm stopped almost an hour ago. I figure the sun will be up in a few more hours. We’ll leave for home at the first sign of it.”

At his mention of their leaving this secluded place, this place where he had opened his heart to her, Vaden felt immense sorrow and fear. Never again would she have him wholly to herself, completely hold him so near to her…so solitarily near to her.

“
Now, why don’t ya try to rest some more?” he mumbled, turning from her and back toward the fire.

“
Quit treating me like a child!” she cried out, causing him to turn, surprise dominating his expression. “I don’t want to rest anymore! Don’t you see that? In a short time we’ll leave here, and…and this won’t ever happen again! You won’t ever again confide in me as you have this night. You won’t ever share such intimate conversation with me like you have tonight. We’ll be back in town with every woman in the world groveling for your attentions, and I’ll go back to being the irritating little girl at the mercantile who is forever and always an inconvenience to you. I’ll go back to being your little friend instead of someone you confide in. Someone you choose to…” His eyes narrowed, and after inhaling deeply to try to calm herself, Vaden added, “I don’t want to rest anymore. So please…please quit ordering me to do it as if I were—”

“
I have not once treated ya like a child tonight, Vaden,” he protested calmly. “You’re hung up on thinkin’ I have ’cause ya think everyone else treats ya like one. But it’s not true. People who care for you are protective of ya. They like to handle ya with kid gloves, protect ya from agony and harm. That doesn’t mean they consider you a child. I think my personal treatment of ya proves that I, for one, do not look upon you as a child, Vaden.” He moved toward her, reaching out and taking her shoulders between his powerful hands. His eyes narrowed, and his voice lowered. “But if more…convincin’ is necessary…then I for one am willin’.”

“
Why do you tease me so?” she asked, knowing full well he did indeed only tease her with his implications.

“
It’s in my nature to tease people I like,” he answered, grinning. Then he lowered his voice as if he expected someone to enter the room and eavesdrop on their conversation. “You said it yourself. In a short time we’ll go back to town, and everything will return to normal. No more bearin’ our souls to each other, no more findin’ comfort in each other’s arms. And definitely no more tasty kisses.” Vaden looked away shyly for a moment. “Things will be different than they are at this moment. No doubt I’ll look back at this night and beat my brain to death for allowin’ this to happen. No doubt you’ll look back on me as the man who taught you too much about life. And you’ll be relieved to be rid of me because of it.” His hands encircled her neck, his thumbs caressing her throat lightly. “But,” he whispered, “I suppose we can both live with our guilt and whatever method it chooses to torture us. Can’t we? We can each live with it for one more taste of each other?”

Vaden’s mouth began to water for want of his kiss, and a tear ran slowly down her face as she nodded, knowing this memory must live with her forever, for it would be the last of its kind.

“
And I’ll tell ya somethin’, Vaden Valmont,” he mumbled in the familiar provocative tone that was his. “Let go of your inhibitions toward me. Be the girl who fears nothin’, cares nothin’ for what anyone else thinks. Be yourself, Vaden, and I promise you…” He leaned forward, placing his cheek against her own as he whispered, “Ransom Lake is yours ’til sunrise. No matter what happens in the future. No matter who ya decide to live your life with, no matter who ends up in mine…right now I’m yours, just as I was that night in the wagon…and well you knew it, for you’re too smart not to have known it. And you know my word is sincere now.” He kissed her neck just below her earlobe tenderly, and ecstasy traveled over her. “You kiss me first, Vaden. Kiss me first. Prove to me the girl who found my soul, the one who drew me out of hidin’ from beneath my whiskers, is still there inside you…and I’m yours until daybreak…if ya want me to be.” He dropped his hands to his sides, stood erect, and stared at her with the gray intensity of his eyes.

Vaden found it almost impossible to breathe. Her breath, in fact, was unregulated as she looked at him standing before her. Weeks ago she would’ve been able to draw the courage to kiss him quickly; she would not have even paused perhaps in the same situation. But self-doubt and uncertainty, as well as heartache, had scarred her deeply, and now, with what she wanted and loved most in the world standing before her, hers if only she would reach out and take it, she paused, frightened and unsure of herself. She was unsure of his sincerity in his promise. What if he only laughed at her? What if he drew away from her, having only been teasing her? But deep within her soul she knew better. Ransom Lake would never behave so.

“
You…you won’t laugh at me?” she whispered all the same, her confidence still lacking, the demon of doubt still causing her mind to question.

Ransom Lake closed his eyes for a moment and sighed. “Vaden,” he whispered and began to turn from her. Instantly, her hand shot out and clasped his. He paused, looking at her hand and then to her face questioningly. With the few shreds of courage left in her heart, she reached out and took his arm with her other hand, stepping closer to him. She focused her gaze on his hand she held as she tried to muster the bravery of her soul. In a moment, she released it, letting her palms caress the power in his arms and shoulders as her hands traveled up the muscular appendages to settle finally at the back of his neck.

She felt his hands clasp her waist, sending goose bumps erupting over her body, and it gave her the courage to look up at him then. His eyes were narrow, calm, and expectant as he gazed at her. He was so handsome. She loved him so desperately! Her mouth watered, her body quivered. How would she find the courage to take what he offered?

Trembling, she raised herself slightly on her toes and placed a lingering kiss on the cleft of his chin. Then she took his face gently between her small, trembling hands and tipped his head toward her, kissing him sweetly on the mouth. She was encouraged of his sincerity when he involved himself in that first tender kiss, as well as the more earnest one she administered next.

Instantly, she was in his arms, held firmly against his body as the now familiar, powerfully passionate kisses he could manipulate burned between them. His strength and pain, his need and sincerity at being her own, for that time, were all evident as the magical hours passed—hours finding Vaden in awe of what was happening—hours of shared affections now tender and soft, now demanding and passionate. Often he would separate their mouths and hold her to him tightly, whispering her name with something like regret evident in his voice. Once he lifted her swiftly into his arms, going to the small sofa and sitting down with her on his lap where they sat in continuance of their affections, he always the gentleman in every respect, for he never attempted anything beyond impassioned kisses—kisses moist with flavor and barely restrained desire, perhaps, but he was ever the gentleman. Vaden was comfortable, for she knew he would not force any improper attention or affection.

Vaden was breathless in his arms, so thirsty for his kiss it seemed no amount of time in drinking of it would quench her desire. His whiskers, rough against the tender flesh of her mouth, his hands so powerful—softly caressing her one moment, powerfully demanding her body meld with his the next—his mouth warm and moist, so familiar to hers, so passionately demanding. In those hours, Vaden knew absolute bliss.

All too soon, light broke through the dusty west window of the old house, flooding the room with sunlight, further enhanced by the brightness of the snow outside. With the illumination lighting the room, the fire dying in the hearth, the spell Ransom Lake had twined about them began to fade.

Taking her face in his hands and kissing her deeply, as if trying to satisfy a ravenous hunger one last time, he let his thumb trace her tender lips, scarlet from his attentions, and whispered, “Our moment is lost with the sunrise, Vaden. Time to leave the fairy tale and return ya to your uncle. Who,” he added as he gently pushed her from his lap, “would strike me down dead if he knew what I’ve been doin’ to ya while you were in my care.”

Standing, he walked to the chair sitting across the room and retrieved his shirt. Buttoning it quickly, and running his fingers through his tousled hair, he put on his hat and coat and pulled on his boots.

What have you done to me, Ransom Lake?
Vaden thought.
In these few hours you’ve fulfilled my dreams of you and yet broken my heart!

Picking up a bucket sitting near the front door, he exited the house, returning in a moment with the bucket full of snow. Vaden watched, relacing her boots slowly as he doused the fire in the hearth with the bucket of snow, causing steam and the odor of wet wood to rise in the room. Taking Vaden’s coat from the chair over which it lay, Ransom held it for her as she slipped her arms through the sleeves. Then, turning her to face him, he grinned, rather regretfully, as he buttoned the coat’s top button.

“
It’s freezin’ out there…but at least the wind isn’t blowin’. I put the horse back outside when the storm stopped, and she doesn’t seem any worse for the weather.” He opened the front door to the house and motioned for Vaden to precede him.

Vaden’s eyes narrowed to a squint as the brightness of the sun’s reflection on the new-fallen snow met her eyes, so long adjusted to the dark. All was perfectly quiet—no rustling of wind through tree branches, no snowbirds’ songs or calls of wild geese. Not a sound. Vaden looked about for a moment, marveling at the endless horizon of undisturbed white powder and frost covering the earth. Her mesmerized wonderment was lost as Ransom Lake held his hand out to her to assist her into the cutter.

As the cutter slipped away toward home, Vaden gazed back at the lonely house standing midst the quiet of winter. It was a house whose beauty was in its quaintness of design. She smiled sadly. It would forever be a fixed vision in her memory.

Not one word was spoken between Ransom Lake and Vaden Valmont as the mare struggled to return them to town. Vaden found her silence was induced by sorrow and shyness at the memories of her intimate moments shared with Ransom Lake in the house.

Entwine thine arms about me, love. Protect me from the cold. Release me not for need of breath…nor fear of growing old. Keep safe our love with thine embrace. Keep warm my lips with thine. Let no one interfere this space that Heaven deemed is mine.

It was the first time since the dreadful Halloween night that Vaden’s mind drew forth a favored verse from her memory. And though it was somewhat bittersweet, it seemed fitting. Vaden glanced at Ransom Lake several times and concluded his silence must be derived of the regret of letting what happened happen, for he wore a perpetual frown and did not once look at her.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

At long last, the cutter pulled to a stop before the mercantile. Vaden and Ransom Lake were immediately set upon by Myra, Yvonne, and Dan as all three came bounding out of the house and into the snow beside the cutter.

“
Oh, my darling!” Myra cried out, taking Vaden in a tight embrace the second she had stepped down from the conveyance. “We were so worried for ya! Oh, my dearest!”

Yvonne was next, and Vaden noticed her puzzled frown as she hugged her sister, looking to Ransom Lake curiously, then back to Vaden. “We feared the worst, Vay,” she said. Her relief at seeing her sister safely home was obvious and sincere. “The storm was so violent, and there was no way to find out if Mr. Lake had even made it to the Wimbers’.”

“
Thank ya, Ransom,” Dan greeted him, putting a grateful hand to the man’s shoulder. “I’d have been beside myself if anyone else but you had gone for her. Did ya weather it out at the Wimbers’ then?”

“
No, sir,” the rescuer stated plainly. Vaden watched the color drain from Ransom’s face as he removed his hat and looked her uncle squarely in the eyes to continue. “The storm moved in much faster than I anticipated, and the dark overcame us. So…we weathered the night at an old house out east on my property.”

“
Oh, how terrible for you!” Myra exclaimed. “And just look at your face, sweet pea!” Aunt Myra reached out and gently touched the reddened, chapped-looking area around Vaden’s mouth. “Look how chapped your face is from the wind and such! Poor dear.”

Vaden noticed Ransom Lake close his eyes for a moment at her aunt’s referring to her damaged lips. He drew in a deep breath, and she knew he meant to confess to her aunt and uncle. She could feel his guilt radiating from him like the hot flames of a brush fire.