Tides of Passion (23 page)

"Good night, Constable," she called, struggling to open Miss Vin's front gate while keeping the bicycle upright.

"Hold up there." His hands covered hers. He stood so close, she felt the muscles in his chest bunch when he lifted the bicycle over, felt the curve of his forearm when he slipped his arm around her and nudged the rock pulley.

The gate swung wide and she ran, turning only when she reached the top of the porch stairs. Zach stood just inside the fenced yard, inspecting her through his attractive wire rims.

A loose shutter banged against the side of the house, startling her. Savannah lifted her hand to her heart, baffled and frightened. She closed her eyes and forced air in, then out. A twig snapped. The scent of smoke and pomade drifted past.

Her lids fluttered.

Zach stood two steps below, his gaze searching. She worked hard to keep hers from dropping to his torn shirt. But what presented the least temptation? A tiny view of his chest, or those beautiful, reflective eyes?

"Irish, there's something." He fumbled in his pocket, extracting the wrapped package she had assumed was a toy for Rory.

He handed it to her, then swabbed at the angry scratch on his cheek. "Just a little something."

Ignoring the package, more from apprehension than embarrassment, she lifted her hand. "Your face."

He shook his head, his expression telling her not to act on the impulse. The wind howled, the loose shutter sounding a persistent beat. "Open it," he said, while distant bursts of thunder rumbled and the air grew heavy with a storm's promise.

Grew heavy with whatever encircled them.

Glancing down, she released the yarn bow and removed the brown paper wrapping. The warm spot surrounding her heart swelled, filling her entire chest. "The pen I saw in the...." Her words trailed off as tears pricked, stinging from the effort to hold them back. When had she last received a gift from a man? Her father had stopped giving her presents on her twelfth birthday, saying she was getting too old for trinkets and baubles she did not know what to do with anyway.

Blinking, she shook herself, remembering their situation and Zach's probable rationale for feeling the need to compensate. "Thank you," she said softly, taking a deep breath and looking up. "But this isn't necessary."

Alarmed by what he saw in her gaze, his thoughts scattered. He took a step back and down, hasty, awkward. "I saw you mooning over it." He shrugged, his spectacles slipping. "No real reason, I just thought you might like it."

"I love it, but I can't possibly accept it." She thrust the gift, wrapping and all, at him.

A spark of annoyance flickered in his eyes. "Can't accept it? Why not?"

"It isn't proper for you to give me gifts, Constable."

"Let me get this." He rolled his shoulder angrily, wincing from an apparent injury. "It's proper for me to take you to my bed but not to give you a silly, little present?"

"It is not proper to give me gifts
because
of our relationship. Where does it end if we allow for the exchange of gifts?"

"Control is a big issue with you isn't it?" He snorted, bumping his spectacles high. "Being careful to protect your reputation, and mine, doesn't mean we can't do anything outside of that damned coach house." He raked his hand through his hair, sincerely, she could tell, trying to see where he had blundered. "Would it have been better to give you the pen there? So you could walk home, stick it in a drawer, and wait until you got back home to use it?"

Taking a step down, staring eye to eye, she jammed a finger in his chest, close to the shirt rip. "If we're allowed to speak outside the coach house, why didn't you ask me to the church dance?"

Zach's lips worked, but no sound popped out.

He had never thought of it, not once considered asking her
. Savannah had convinced herself he didn't ask because he couldn't, not because he didn't want to. It was irrational, everything she was feeling, yet....

Her blood surged. Red tinged her vision. She pressed her lips together until they stung, not trusting what would roll out if she opened them.

Zach gestured in the direction of the sea in confusion. She could hear waves, faintly, crashing against the shore. "I never take anyone to that silly dance. Not since Hannah."

"Who are you really protecting, Constable? You say it's me when I think it isn't me at all. Your wife is long gone."

He stiffened, his gaze freezing like a shallow pond in winter. "I don't need any goddamn reminders, Miss Connor."

Lightning struck close by, shaking a glass pane in Miss Vin's front window. They glanced at the darkening clouds, then warily, at each other. Like a crystal vase hurled against brick, the day's agreeable promise utterly shattered.

Zach stared at her a minute, then stuffed the rumpled package into his pocket. Without a word, he turned and marched across the yard, the bicycle jaunt and their shared laughter forgotten. Slapping the gate wide, he stepped out and never looked back.

She dropped to the top step, a burst of rain spilling from the sky and soaking her in mere minutes. She had planned on spending the evening in her lover's arms, listening to the ping of raindrops bouncing off the coach house roof as they made slow, sweet love.

Instead, she sat alone in a humid downpour, a whispered apology sitting dully on her tongue.

Chapter 11

One cannot be always laughing at a man

 
without now and then
 

stumbling on something witty
.

~Jane Austen

He was drinking too much, Zach thought, and raised his glass to his lips for what must have been the fortieth time that night. The ale was lukewarm and bitter, but not a bad remedy. His intake had gone beyond what it should, what he usually allowed it to. The unfamiliar vagueness in his mind and unsteadiness in his step were glaring indicators. The circle of men surrounding him knew it, too, if the amused glances thrown his way meant squat.

They assumed his being rooked into asking Darnella Watkins to the dance was the reason for his testy mood. He hadn't voiced one word to correct the mistaken assumption.

He had danced with her when he first arrived, then left her to giggle and chatter with the crowd of women circling the cake table while he drank with the men circling the ale barrel. All the while, furtively watching Savannah Connor strut back and forth across the sawdust-covered dance floor in Magnus Leland's arms. Eyeing her over the rim of his glass, he marveled at the anger he felt.

She looked magnificent. Radiant. Like a star thrust into a dark box.

Zach sipped slowly, judging. Candlelight from the multitude of sconces cascaded over her, highlighting her gleaming mane of hair and the lovely pendant circling her neck. Gazing into Magnus's face, she said something and laughed, her lips pulling back from her teeth in a smile pretty enough to bring a preacher to his knees.

Zach felt a reactive tightening in his gut, one the likes of which he had tried repeatedly to kill in the five long days since their argument on Miss Vin's porch.

If you could call that confused tangle of heat, fury, and remorse an argument.

Quietly, he ducked outside the tent and leaning his hip against a nearby tree. Eyes closed, he listened to the steady pulse of the night. The rustle of leaves on the branches above his head, and the chirping crickets in the azalea bushes lining the church's walkway.

It had terrified him to see her tears. Swimming in her eyes and making them shine like a pond after a storm. He had felt as shocked as he would if an oar caught him across the back of the head. The fountain pen had been an impulsive bit of, of
nothing
. He never imagined it would
touch
her.

Lifting his face to the moon, Zach drained his glass. A faint headache pulsed; his spectacles were a dead weight in his pocket. Somehow, crazy as it seemed, wearing them reminded him of
her
.

Damn, he was losing his mind.

Losing his mind and allowing guilt to eat him up.

He couldn't bring Hannah back. For himself or Rory. Couldn't change what had happened during their marriage or change how she had died. He had been a lousy husband, in the later years. Not patient or prudent enough. Still, Hannah had loved him, and he had loved her.

He had.

But they hadn't been
alike
. How better could he explain it, even if he'd never admitted it to anyone but himself? When he had come home from piloting and suddenly had such responsibility, he had dug a hole and settled in. He and Hannah hadn't discussed the future until they were knee-deep in it. If memory served, he recalled catching her a time or two staring at him across the kitchen table with a quizzical look on her face.

As though she wasn't sure who he was.

As though she wondered where
her
Zachariah Garrett had run off to. The boy she'd loved. He should have told her that life changed a man. Responsibility changed a man. Love changed a man. Years changed a man. All of those things had turned him into something she didn't recognize. They had not shared common interests, simple though that may be. Most especially, his
need
had been frightening to her, almost unwelcome. Wearisome.

He wondered if Hannah would have been happiest with the pristine purity of their childhood affection. It was nothing like the raging passion he shared with that Irish hellion.

Regretful memories stiffened his spine until bark dug painfully into his back. He shook out his shoulders, telling himself to let it go. Savannah was right, even if her way of enlightening him wasn't the best.

He needed to forgive himself. His life was far from over. However, in the process of self-pardoning, he didn't want to go and fall in love.

Wouldn't that be a hell of a mess?

It had just been so long since he'd had a relationship like this with a woman: sex and friendship, a reasonable amount of caring, extreme respect, laughter, and sharing. The mix worked well if a man kept his wits about him. That was the key. Rational, sound decision making.

Savannah certainly had a firm hold on
her
wits.

Or so he'd thought until that bout of near-tears.

The ale he had drunk swam in his head as he wrestled with a question he had found no answer to in the past five days.

What would he do if Savannah—a woman he would have bet his meager savings wasn't one susceptible to base emotion—fell in love with
him
? It didn't seem possible, did it? He wasn't good enough, clever or wealthy or handsome enough.

Jesus, what would it be like to feel that strongly about a woman again?

Feel like it about a woman who fit him like a glove.

He shook his head.
No
. As long as he and Savannah continued on this course, both of them happy with what they had, he felt sure he could handle it. But if the scales tipped in either direction?

He wasn't at all sure about that.

"Zach, you'd better get in here," Caroline whispered urgently, peeking around the opening in the tent and beckoning him with a curved finger. The dim light cast shadows across her face, but he could see she was frowning.

Sighing, Zach shoved away from the tree. He never settled more disputes than at a church dance.

"What it is?" he asked when he got closer.

Caroline shrugged, fiddling with her skirt and shaking her head.

With a flash, he knew.
Savannah
.
Trouble
. Did two words ever fit together as wonderfully as those?

* * *

His angry oath reached her about five seconds before his firm grasp on her shoulder did.

Savannah turned at the insistent touch, pasting a smile on her face. "Hello, Constable. Mr. Carter and I were just discussing a point he isn't willing to negotiate."

The men standing around her laughed; the women tittered nervously. Someone in the crowd that sounded a lot like Caleb called out asking if Zach could handle her.

Zach ducked his head, his hot gaze finding hers. "One night? One night of peace? Is that too much to ask?"

Free to study him closely for the first time that evening, truly the first time in days, she couldn't help but see the exhaustion chalking groves alongside his mouth and eyes, the shadows beneath his dark lashes. He looked drained but handsome enough to light a fire in the darkness.

"Where are your spectacles?" she asked.

"To hell with my spectacles." With a nod to Hyman, he dragged her outside the tent and into the night. He didn't let her go until they'd reached a storage shed of some sort.

The cool air slid over her, lifting damp strands of hair from her brow. She couldn't contain her sigh of relief.

"You've been drinking," he said, sounding like her father, reproachful and disappointed.

"Yes. Is that permitted, Constable?"

"How the hell should I know what's permitted?"

Watching anger brighten his eyes, she couldn't help but note that the emotion seemed at odds with his calm expression. "Are you incensed about my choice of escort? Is that the problem?"