Wicked Wyoming Nights (14 page)

Cord led Eliza to a position a little behind the ring of active bidders, and they stood without exchanging a word while the remaining baskets were auctioned off. Though there were a couple of spirited contests, only one of them exceeded twenty dollars. There was nothing to compare to the contest over Eliza.

“Where would you like to eat?” Cord asked, taking advantage of the general confusion to shield her answer from the ears of the curious. Eliza shook her head, unable to reply.

“Maybe the Baylises would allow us to join them,” Cord suggested, pointing to where Ella was busily setting up a small table. Eliza cast him a look of profound thankfulness and tried hard not to run to Ella’s comforting presence.

“I don’t blame you for not wanting to sit on the dirt, even if you did bring a blanket,” Ella said, giving them an understanding welcome. “I wonder more people didn’t think to bring a table.” Mrs. Burton had, but as no one else seemed to have possessed as much foresight, the hillside was soon covered with blankets or families eating standing up at the back of a wagon or buckboard.

“You sure set everyone in a bustle, Cord Stedman” chuckled Ella, getting to the heart of things right away.

“No need. I was just buying my supper like everybody else.”

“Don’t play the simpleton with me, young man,” admonished Ella. “I’m up to your tricks.”

“Not all of them, I hope.”

“Respectable women don’t concern themselves with
all
he shenanigans a man gets up to,” Ella informed him with devastating directness, “but I know enough. Now don’t you worry about a thing, dear,” she said to Eliza. “It caused a stir at the time, but before dinner’s over everybody’ll be too interested in their own partners to pay you any mind. By tomorrow they’ll have forgotten all about it.”

Ella’s prediction proved only partly true. As soon as the picnickers had time to settle into the business of eating, the stares became fewer and the whispering and nudging almost stopped. Seeing Eliza and Cord sharing their supper with one of the town’s most respected couples divested the incident of much of its excitement.

Eliza expected she would soon relax, but every time she looked at Cord she sensed the presence of a submerged heat, volcanic in its power, and it left her tense and shaken. To all outward appearances, Cord seemed to be talking quietly with Mr. Baylis and paying no more than the usual attention to Eliza, but a blazingly intense energy escaped through eyes more hooded and withdrawn than usual, and she felt the temperature of the afternoon climb. By the time they were through eating, she felt terribly hot even though the cool evening air was making her shiver; the presence of others was no protection from the broiling emotional heat that enveloped her, and the ease she had always enjoyed with Cord had vanished.

“Why don’t you two take a walk and get the kinks out of your legs. I’ll clean up. And I don’t need any help,” Ella said before Eliza could offer. “Cord hasn’t left me much to clear away?

Eliza felt so weak she wasn’t sure she could get to her feet.

“You can show me how you plan to use the money you raised,” Cord said, extending his hand to help her rise. Eliza expected to be scalded by his touch, but his grip was firm and cool, and it enabled her to command her own reluctant muscles.

“Since you gave so much of it, I feel I owe you an explanation.”

“You don’t owe me anything. I wasn’t thinking of the school when I bid that money.”

How was it possible for eyes to gaze at her with such blistering intensity and not turn her to smoldering ash? “What were you thinking of?” Eliza’s heart was pounding so hard she feared she might not hear his answer.

“You,” he answered, and the afternoon became even hotter.

“Me? But that’s absurd. No supper is worth that much.”

“I didn’t say food, I said
you
.”

“Mrs. Baylis tells me I have something else to thank you for,” Eliza stammered. She headed toward the schoolhouse wondering if it would be safer ground.

“Oh?” He didn’t sound interested.

“The schoolhouse itself.”

“Why?”

“Because you talked her into getting the town to build it. That is true, isn’t it?”

“We did talk over a few ideas,” he admitted evasively, his thoughts seemingly elsewhere.

“In other words, you did talk her into it. It seems you’re always coming to my rescue.” Cord closed the door behind them. She raised her hand to protest.

“The glare,” he said, smiling in such a way she didn’t care about his lame excuse. “Show me what you do here.”

“You won’t think it’s very exciting.”

“I promise not to say so.”

“I know you wouldn’t. You’ve always been tremendously kind to me,” she said, smiling, thinking the door should probably be open. “We don’t have enough desks, so some of the children have to sit on the floor. And these are all the books we have.” She showed him a rough-hewn bookcase half full of tattered and dog-eared volumes. “There aren’t enough to go around, and some are missing so many pages they aren’t much use.”

“Do you use only schoolbooks, or do you use the regular kind? The kind everybody reads,” he clarified.

“We use regular schoolbooks for spelling and sums, but we can use any kind of book for reading, even a novel.”

“Then why not have the children take one day and go to every house in town and collect old books they don’t use any more. You’ll get a lot of trash, but you ought to end up with some good books too.”

“Now there’s something else I have to be grateful to you for.”

“All this gratitude can be wearing. Have you ever considered paying your debts?”

“How can I?”

“I know a way.” He was now so close she could feel the heat of his body.

“What?” She was almost afraid of the answer.

“This.” His arms encircled her and he kissed her gently.

“Was that for saving my books?” she asked mindlessly. Everything about her felt disembodied. Only her lips, burning with his kiss, retained any feeling.

“If you like,” he said with a smile which imperfectly masked the building intensity. “And this is for the cow.” He kissed her again.

“And the saloon and getting Ella to let me dress at her house?” asked Eliza. He kissed her twice more, and it felt so wonderful she kept trying to think of reasons for him to continue.

“The schoolhouse and the books,” he said with a husky croak, “and another one for just being you.”

Eliza didn’t know how it happened that her arms were around his neck, but she was so weak she had to cling to him or fall. But that’s foolish, her disordered wits reasoned. It would be impossible to slip from the hold he had around her waist.

The sound of footsteps on the porch and voices outside the door penetrated the fog surrounding Eliza, but she was unable to summon the energy to break Cord’s fierce embrace. She knew any moment Melissa and Joe, for it was their voices she heard, would enter the schoolhouse, but she still couldn’t move. She was in the arms of the man she realized in one thundering crash she loved, and she didn’t ever want to let go again. She looked up at Cord, totally breathless and unable to hide the truth that she loved him as much as he must love her. The expression on her face caused him to crush her in another embrace.

But the noise of someone trying to open the door forced her to wrench her mind at least partly away from Cord’s kisses. Why wouldn’t the door open? She hadn’t locked it. She pushed him away and pointed to the door, which was now clattering loudly from the energetic pushes against it. Cord motioned for her to remain silent and pointed to the floor. A battered book was firmly wedged underneath the door.

“It’s stuck. Careful, or you’ll break it,” she called out. Cord tried to keep her in his arms. “I can’t,” she whispered, breaking away. She crossed the room quickly and wrenched the book from the door, throwing it quickly to Cord, who had the good sense to catch it. He was in the process of restoring it to its place on the shelf when Melissa and Joe entered.

Melissa was angry and more than a little suspicious. She looked around, but found nothing unusual. Cord showed not the slightest trace of embarrassment, and Miss Smallwood was no more upset than she ever was around strangers.

“I can’t imagine why it stuck. It never does.”

“Maybe it’s wet.”

“But it didn’t stick for you,” Melissa insisted with the tenacity of a small mind bogged down in unimportant detail.

“It’s unstuck now, so don’t worry about it anymore. Are you having a nice time?” Eliza asked, trying to turn Melissa’s thoughts in another direction.

“It’s all right,” she said, eying Cord, “but it’s such an unsophisticated party.” Cord glanced up, and a more perceptive girl would have been abashed by his look, but Melissa smiled archly at him, quite in the manner of a young girl trying to act ten years older.

“But the
children
will have the books they need. Do you read a lot, Mr. Stedman? Not these books, of course.” She laughed artificially.

“I don’t have time,” he answered shortly. He replaced the book on the shelf and crossed the room with his long, swinging stride. “Don’t stay too long. Your mother might get worried.” Melissa swelled with lacerated pride, but Cord was utterly unconcerned with her feelings as he escorted Eliza outside.

“The fiddles are about to strike up,” Ella informed them when they returned. “Don’t wander off or you’ll miss the first square dance.”

“Oh, dear, do I have to dance?” asked Eliza. “I don’t know if I can.”

“What? You can’t dance? Don’t be silly. Of course you can.”

“But I’ve never been to a dance.”

“Neither have I,” added Cord.

“And you two having to lead the set. Well, I’ll be a pig’s uncle. This ought to be a sight, both of you stumbling over each other without knowing which foot to put where. Charlie, you’d better scrape something slow and easy. The schoolmarm and her fella have never set foot on a dance floor.” Eliza cringed at Ella’s calling Cord her fella, but the crowd was so delighted at the expected fun they hardly noticed.

“Bring her out here and we’ll show you how” Charlie encouraged Cord.

“Always lead with your right,” called one helpful assistant from the sidelines.

“But not if you’re the lady.”

“Just stay away from his boots, miss, or you’ll never walk again.”

“Everybody knows cowboys have trouble walking. Let a farmer show you how it’s done.”

Eliza felt like running away, but Cord took the kidding in good part and led Eliza into the middle of the open space marked off for dancing.

“Get somebody to show us what to do, and we’ll follow as best we can,” Cord directed the onlookers. The rowdy element set up a hoot, and several comments were bandied about that were not generally complimentary to cowboys, but a young farmer took up the challenge.

“Now play it real slow, Charlie, or he’s liable to do her a mischief with those boots,” said another wag. The mood of the picnic was rapidly being reduced to one of hilarity, and the first awkward steps taken by Cord and Eliza did nothing to dampen the mood.

“We need more examples,” Cord called, and several more couples moved onto the dance area. Caught in the middle of the swinging, twisting mass of bodies and moving about in what was unkindly referred to as a goose waddle, Cord and Eliza tried to copy the steps of some of the slower-moving dancers. When the dance ended, everyone applauded the couple and gaily offered suggestions for the next dance, but when the music started again they quickly forgot Cord and Eliza in their own enjoyment of the evening.

Chapter 11

The sun went down, and the school yard glowed in the light of lanterns hung from the porch, from poles on buckboards, and from poles sunk in the ground for just that purpose. The lanterns cast plenty of light into the circle of dancers and on the groups gathered around talking and playing cards, but the space immediately beyond was plunged into utter darkness and several couples wandered quietly into those discreet shadows.

Cord led Eliza into this nebulous region, and as the night closed around them like a cloak, she was able to imagine they were alone, the only two people on the vast, primeval plain. The evening air was crisp with expectation and Eliza had never felt more vitally alive. She was on the verge of something unimaginably wonderful, something to do with the man who guided her willing steps.

“I want you to come out to the Matador. I want to show you the whole ranch.” Eliza could hear the pride in his voice, and she trembled with happiness that he would want to share the work of his life with her.

“I can’t, not with school during the day and singing at night. I barely have time to do my housework.”

“When is school over?”

“Not for another three months.” Eliza could not hide her disappointment. “But we have a holiday next week,” she added, brightening suddenly.

“Can you come then? I’ve only collected the first installment on your debt.” She felt his arms close about her again. She knew she shouldn’t let him hold her, and she was sure Melissa would suddenly appear to point an accusing finger at them, but she couldn’t stop herself. His touch vanquished her resistance, and all she wanted to do was melt into his arms and stay there forever. She had no idea why it felt so natural and so wonderful, and she didn’t waste time in needless inquiry. She felt better than wonderful, and that was all that mattered.