The Visions of Ransom Lake (41 page)

He took her face in his hands as he let his body lean fully against hers. As his thumb caressed her lips softly, he said, “I want ya in my arms every night—every night forever. I want to hold you, feel the warmth of your body in my arms, know that your soul is there with mine. Know that you’re there every night for me to hold and love. Know that I can touch ya, kiss ya, and look at ya whenever I want to…whenever I need to.”

It was too overwhelming to have him saying it all to her. Could she possibly believe she wasn’t dreaming?

“
I want my children to grow inside of you,” he mumbled. “I want the Lake blood and the name of Lake to go on. I want ya to help me ensure it doesn’t die away.” He paused as he struggled to remove the ring on the smallest finger of his right hand. “This…was my mother’s weddin’ ring, Vaden. I know you’ve wondered about it. Her name was Darlina.”

Vaden’s mind fought to hold on to reality, to believe what was happening before her truly was real and not a dream from which she would wake. She watched as Ransom Lake took her left hand in his and placed his mother’s ring on her ring finger.

“
This was the ring my father put on my mother’s finger when they were married. And I know…” He paused and grimaced painfully before continuing. “I know, Vaden, that even though my father and mother were killed—that perhaps one had to watch the other die—they would not have wanted to be anywhere but together. I want ya to know…ya need to believe the truth of it…I love you like that.” Vaden felt the tears burst from her eyes more readily even than they had before as he finally, after so long, told her that he loved her. “I would do anything for you. Go anywhere for you. I would endure a thousand times the death my father and mother did…for you. Because you are my life. My love…my heart and my soul. The reason I love living again. The reason I’m willin’ now to endure whatever pain life may bring. I love you, Vaden.”

He kissed her lips softly for a moment as if he were unsure she would accept him. But in an instant, she let go the need to resist him, and, taking his face between her hands, she encouraged him to take her mouth passionately, which he did, and she melted against his own. It was then her mind confirmed to her once more that no verse of poetry, no matter how cleverly written or labored over in pursuit of perfection, could describe the sheer ecstasy of this man’s kiss. He was all she wanted in the world. The only touch, the only breath.

He broke their kiss for a moment, though his mouth lingered teasingly over hers as he studied her. Vaden was hypnotized by his gaze. The gray storm in his eyes was warm and inviting, and the true feelings in his soul were evident in them. He had forgiven himself at long last and, having done so, could give himself to her, finally. He was so handsome—so flawlessly attractive. Her mind still struggled to accept that a man so perfectly formed in body and spirit could truly mean what he had spoken to her.

“
How can a man like you…how can you truly want me?” she whispered.

Laughing heartily, Ransom pulled her up from her brace against the wall, gathering her securely in his arms. She pushed at him slightly for a moment when one of the townsfolk walked by, raising an astonished eyebrow.

“
It’s not proper,” she mumbled.

“
Very little bodily contact between unmarried lovers is, Vaden.” His eyes twinkled impishly, the moisture of emotion still evident in them as he continued to smile. “That’s why ya have to marry me, Vaden Valmont.” He brushed an independent strand of hair from her cheek again as he gazed lovingly at her. “I can’t believe how you’ve allowed the tables to turn, girl. In the beginnin’, ya didn’t care a whit for what ya had to do to have me. And now…I’m beginnin’ to think you’re a tease. You have me here in your arms, confessin’ my undyin’ love for ya—not to mention my physical desire for ya—and all of a sudden, you’re shy and unconfident. Where’s that girl who dug my old boots out of the trash barrel?”

Vaden gasped again, astonished he would know such a thing.

“
Where’s that girl who shaved my face so she could see if I was handsome or not under that mess of a beard?” Again, he took her face firmly between his hands. “Where’s that woman who can make me doubt my own self-control when she gives me the taste of her kiss?” He kissed her softly once before continuing. “I’ve watched ya closely, Vaden. Watched ya go from havin’ a kitten’s curiosity about me to not knowin’ what direction to take in life ’cause you had fallen in love with me. I’ve watched ya battle with doubt ’cause ya loved me so desperately and feared I could never be yours. I’m sorry it took me so long to find my way to forgivin’ myself and confessin’ to ya. And now…I have to tell ya my secret, asking your forgiveness and that ya not be too awful angry.”

Vaden raised her eyebrows. What secret could he possibly hide that was more traumatic, more important than the one he’d already revealed to her?

“
I knew what could be between us before ya ever got here to spend a year with your aunt and uncle,” he confessed guiltily.

“
What do you mean?” she asked, completely unprepared for such a remark.

“
I woke up one night just a few days before ya arrived here,” he began. “I woke because I’d seen ya in my mind. In a vision, I’d seen your beauty of soul and body. It’s how I knew where ya were on Halloween and that the storm would put ya in danger if your Uncle Dan came instead of me on the night before Thanksgivin’. It’s how I know you’re hidin’ my old boots under your bed, that ya put the apple seeds on a maple leaf from that tree ya like to sit in and sent it down the creek to me. I was a man plagued, or blessed, with visions. Since the day my family was killed, I’ve had them, but when you arrived, I started havin’ them less often, and it seemed they only pertained to you. Now my premonitions—the visions of Ransom Lake, whether terrible or pleasin’—come less often. They started to fade the first time I let myself hold you…tasted your lips and the promise of love for me on them. They’ve been even fewer since the night I told ya of the great guilt I bore. And now that you’re holdin’ in your arms the thing you were so diligent and faithful in gettin’, are ya gonna tell me that ya don’t want to have it?”

Vaden looked away for a moment trying to control her sniffling, which was fast turning into a sobbing borne of bliss. “When you’ve wanted something so badly…dreamt of it constantly…prayed for it every night…it’s sometimes hard to believe you can simply reach out and take it all of a sudden,” she whispered her confession.

Ransom kissed her neck lingeringly and then placed a short but enticing kiss on her mouth. “Reach out and have me. I’m yours, Vaden. Will ya take me?”

Standing before her ill-dressed for the weather in lacking a coat, his shirt still unbuttoned as it was, Vaden worried not for him, for he was strong, powerful, and apparently immune to fatal harm. His expression was alluring, tempting, and tantalizing. He was his confident, powerful self in that moment. He knew what her answer would be before she spoke it aloud, and his mind and body were already prepared to act upon her answer. Smiling, she slipped her hands beneath his shirt again, caressing the breadth of his strong shoulders.

“
I’ve always been yours, Ransom Lake. You know how completely I am yours,” she said.

Tentatively, she let the fingers of both her trembling hands be lost in the soft black of his hair, and when he closed his eyes for a moment, smiling triumphantly, she melted against him again, letting her head rest tenderly on one shoulder as her hands slid to his neck and down his powerful chest. Her arms rested lovingly about his waist for a moment. Then she let one hand caress the rugged smoothness of his unshaven face, and he kissed her fingertips as they lingered on his lips.

“
Will you really…will you really…” she began in an uncertain whisper.

“
Marry you?” he finished.

“
Yes,” she said, smiling at his familiar way of finishing her sentences when she was too shy to do so.

“
The minute your parents step off the stage and see you’re all right.”

“
What?” Vaden gasped, raising her head from his shoulder and looking at him.

“
These past few days you’ve been recoverin’…I’ve been so angry! Angry with myself for not havin’ protected ya…for not confessin’ to ya, askin’ ya sooner. Angry with myself for my own cowardice…my lack of self-confidence. It’s why I sometimes wear that expression ya dread so much, and I’m sorry for it. Sorry for my weakness. I-I can feel it controllin’ my face as my mind battles with my soul. My soul tells me you’re mine…that all I have to do is reach out and take ya for my own. But all those years of guilt, of agony from the loss of my family…the visions of it flashin’ through my brain like lightnin’, and I…I hesitate. But ya have to understand that it’s only an old wound causin’ the fear in me, Vaden, and it passes. It leaves faster each time. And this time…this time it’s gone for good. I’ve been so angry, and I actually drew strength, courage, and confidence from it somehow. So day before yesterday, before I could reconsider, I had Denver send a telegram to your daddy tellin’ him what had happened with Jerome and…and…askin’ him for his permission to take ya to my bed.”

Vaden gasped. “You’re lying!”

Ransom chuckled. “Yes. Actually, I told him I intended to marry ya the minute you were well once more. He sent a telegram back right away and said he and your mother would be here as soon as they could get here. And even though back at the jail I know ya thought I was resolvin’ not to take ya…not to take your love into my life…but it’s just that I realized I had sent that telegram and…” His face went solemn for a moment, and he asked, “Are ya mad at me for plannin’…for assumin’ you’d accept me?”

Vaden smiled, joy bursting like radiant sunshine from her heart. “You know I’m not. I’m only glad that you didn’t pause to reconsider. I don’t know if I can wait even one more day to be…”

“
In my bed?” he finished, chuckling and smiling mischievously.

Vaden giggled. “I don’t know if I can wait one more day to be yours.” Vaden slipped her arms beneath his shirt again and hugged him tightly around the waist. “Oh, how desperately and thoroughly I love you, Ransom Lake.”

“
I love you,” he whispered. “And thank you.”

Vaden gazed lovingly at the powerful, astoundingly attractive man as he took her hand and raised it to his lips, kissing it tenderly.

“
No,” she whispered. “Thank heaven. Thank heaven for giving me you.”

And then, Vaden’s soul reveled in the feel of Ransom’s arms about her as his mouth rendered a kiss to hers so sublime it raised the vision of heaven on earth to come—that being the vision of Ransom Lake.

Author’s Note

Believe it or not, when
The Visions of Ransom Lake
was first published in 2002, sales didn’t leap as quickly as my first book,
The Heavenly Surrender
, had. I was worried about it. I decided it was probably the seasonal-style cover—you know, the pumpkin patch and overall orange tint to it. The book was released in early summer, and I decided maybe readers just weren’t in the mood for pumpkins yet—though, knowing me as you do, I couldn’t imagine why anyone couldn’t be perpetually in the mood for pumpkins.

Anyway, slowly
The Visions of Ransom Lake
began to move up the ladder. As
Shackles of Honor
and
Dusty Britches
were released over the next two consecutive years,
The Visions of Ransom Lake
began to gain momentum. And before we knew it, ol’ Ransom Lake had become a fan-favorite—and I’m not just talking about the book itself, though that is also true. I’m talking about the fact that Ransom Lake—the man, the legend, the hottie with a naughty body—was reigning neck and neck with Mason Carlisle as every reader’s favorite hero back then.

Now, of course I
like
Ransom—for obvious reasons as well as reasons not so obvious. But I’d be an idiot if I didn’t like him, right? After all, I like Vaden too; she’s the most like me of any of my heroines. However, there’s something about Ransom Lake that just seems to get into your very soul somehow. And I thought we’d investigate that a little bit today.

So, here’s the question: what is it about Ransom Lake? Why are he and the book about the beginning of his romance with Vaden so very dear to our hearts? Is it simply because of the way he takes Vaden’s hand and runs it over his washboard stomach in that one scene in the book? Or is it for much deeper reasons?

In striving for answers, let’s begin with the obvious (his drop-dead gorgeousness), shall we? First, he’s more than just traditionally tall, dark, and handsome. Ransom Lake is
legendarily
handsome! I mean, I could probably write a sequel book called
The Legend of Ransom
about Ransom and Vaden in their middle-aged years, and he’d be just as deliciously good-looking—a little salt and pepper in his sable soft hair, endearing, charming, attractive smile wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, etc. Yep, he’s that good-looking! He’s that alluring, charming, fascinating, comely, gorgeous, and just plain easy on the eyes.

But I know we’re not all
that
shallow—you know, taken in with a tall drink of water just because he’s luscious to look at. There’s a whole lot more that makes Handsome Ransom a swooner. Tall, dark, and handsome—yes. But he’s also strong, capable, and nearly invincible, not to mention protective, brooding, tortured, and lacking any ounce of vanity. Am I right?