At the Rainbow's End (15 page)

The two men watched her, as they had so often. After living with Samantha Perry for all this time, they were no closer to understanding her than they were on her arrival. Joel hurried to the spot where Sam did her laundry, to the buckets filled with water.

Kevin returned to their home, not surprised to hear laughter. Samantha was usually charming—to everyone but the men who had brought her here. He quietly entered the room, noting their neighbors fawning over the lovely woman.

He dropped into his seat next to Burroughs. Taking one of Samantha's delicious biscuits, he bit into it reflectively. She had not refused him. Simply, she had only told him she did not love him … yet. He smiled, determined to change that.

When she placed a fresh bowl of stew in front of him, it took all his strength not to touch her. He would not hurry her. Samantha Perry was going nowhere in the immediate future. He had time.

Teasing Liberty, Samantha paused when she heard Joel enter the cabin. She said, “Come in and join us. We are about to raise a glass to Admiral Sampson and the victorious U.S. Navy.”

Amid the celebrating and rousing cheers which met her words, her eyes widened as they wandered along the breadth of his bare chest. Muscles rippled easily beneath his skin as he went to the peg over the bedstead and lifted down his extra shirt. Pulling it around him and buttoning it, he watched her gaze follow his fingers as they shut off the enticing view. He tucked the shirttails in his trousers, and she jerked her eyes from him.

Ladling yet another bowl of stew, she placed it in front of him when he sat. “Now,” he asked, “do I get to
eat
this one?”

“That's up to you.” She could not keep from admiring the thickness of the dark spikes rising from his hastily washed hair. It was so tempting to put her hand out and smooth them into place.

Liberty raised his cup. “To victory, to the future, and to the gold we hope to find.”

Answering shouts seconded him as they all clicked wooden mugs together. She reached across the table to tap Kevin's, then turned to Joel. He smiled and leaned forward to put his face close to hers. In a husky whisper, he said, “To the future and what we hope to find together, Sam.”

Her throat went dry as she felt the candid desire in his blue eyes and in his tone. Staring at him, she felt an empty place in her heart which she yearned for him to fill.

Somehow she managed to say, “To the future.”

As his smile broadened she knew she had betrayed herself again. Somehow, it did not matter. He was pleased with her.

“And to what we hope to find together, Joel,” she said very softly before turning to her guests. Happiness brightened her face as she joked with the men, aware of the man by her side and the luscious way he made her feel.

Chapter Eight

Samantha placed the dripping shirts over the ropes strung between the cabin and the storage sheds. Her eyes roved along the array of red and cream fluttering in the cool breeze. Very few shirts of other colors were brought to her. She looked at her hands, sullied by the same variegated colors. The cost of her escape from the Yukon would remain with her long after she reached civilization again.

When she had counted the number of shirts she had washed today, she thought that in a month she would have enough to pay back Joel and Kevin for her fare to Dawson. Then she could continue until she had the money to return home. She doubted if she could save enough before the winter closed the Yukon in its solid sheet of ice. She would be imprisoned in the Klondike until spring.

Actually, for the past few days leaving Fifteen Above had not been as enticing as before. What she had feared had happened. She had forgiven the two for their foolish idea of bringing her here. Forgiven, and more. She was now truly willing to pay for her fare. They had worked so hard to get it.

“How's business?”

“Fine,” she replied without looking over her shoulder. The voice made her heart beat with the powerful rhythm of a locomotive climbing a steep slope. Only one man caused this reaction with a simple greeting. “I'm surprised to see you away from the claim, Joel.”

When she tried to tip the water onto the muddy ground, her tired muscles strained with the effort. His broad hands grasped the edge of the tub and lifted it easily, and she had to step back before the dirty water could spill over her boots.

When she was about to thank him, he waved aside her words and said, “Come with me.”

“I'm very busy.” The idea of being alone with this disturbing man frightened her. “Maybe some other day.”

Hands on her shoulders, he drew her away from the drying clothes. “Now.”

Samantha decided to go. She needed a respite. More than that, she wanted to be with him. Her eyes roved along him as she walked by his side, studying his undeniably handsome face and the lean line of his body, firmly sculpted by his hours of drudgery along the river. His every step revealed the muscles beneath his well-worn denims. He wore the sleeves of his shirt rolled up to display brawny arms, which could be so gentle when they were around her.

When he caught her looking at him, she did not lower her eyes. Many times he had admired her openly. Why not let him discover how it felt to have someone watch his every move?

Without saying anything, he held out his hand. She smiled shyly as she put hers in it. His grip tightened when her boots slipped on the rocks along the sharp incline leading west from their claim.

Silent, they walked through the trees along the river-bank. The clank of the machinery on the bench claim overlooking the river across from Fourteen Above was muted by the distance. In the shadows, the insects were fewer. She raised her veiling and pushed it back across the brim of her hat. It felt heavenly to breathe the untainted air.

At the top of the ridge, they paused. She turned to enjoy the view of the valley below them. All along the river, tiny forms sought the nearly impossible dream. Their sluices mocked the mighty trees clinging to the hillsides. In the distance she could see the twisting of the Bonanza in its journey from where it met the Eldorado. The sun glittered with eye-burning power on the ripples of the current.

“It's beautiful,” she said softly.

“It was once. I hope taking the gold from the hills doesn't permanently destroy what was here when we arrived.” He continued to gaze across the river valley. “We two were among the first. I wondered then how many others had trod this land before us. No more than I could count on my hand. Then the Klondike belonged to the moose, and those hardy enough to love its rigors.”

She was not sure what to say, moved that his thoughts echoed hers, and not as surprised as she would have been weeks ago. She sat on a fallen tree, the bark cool and damp beneath her. It crumbled in a fine powder as she ran her hand along the trunk.

When he turned to look at her, a grin teased his mustache up at the corners. “Why did you dump the stew on me?”

She smiled, her eyes sparkling as brightly as the sunlight on the water. “Because you deserved it.”

“Why? For jesting about a lad who has yet to have his first woman, and can't keep from slobbering over you like a bull calf in rut?”

“No, because I don't like to see you being so mean and jealous.”

“Jealous?” he exploded. Picking up a rock, he flung it into the water.

Samantha gasped, “You told me never to do that! What if it had gold quartz in it?”

He shrugged, sheepish. “So the folks at Fourteen will find it when they sluice in the morning, or we will dig it out later. Don't change the subject.”

As he sat on a stump by the side of the rushing river, she said, “Do continue, Mr. Gilchrist. By all means, continue. I'll be delighted to see what lies you can concoct to deny that you are jealous whenever I talk to another man.”

Joel paused. She was right. Any denial would be false. The base emotion he had not wanted to experience in the cabin last evening was pure possessiveness. Although he knew he envied Kevin, he had not faced how much he hated to see her flirting harmlessly with their neighbors.

He wanted Samantha. He wanted her to be his alone.

Smiling, she saw his conflict written on his face. Her smile faded when his hand stroked her cheek. Although his roughened skin was harsh, his gentle caress created a flow of warmth at her center.

“Sam, you know how I feel about you,” he said softly.

“I know.” She sighed. “I do know. But I know nothing about Joel Gilchrist.”

He did not meet her eyes. “There's little to know.”

“You've lived thirty years, Joel—” Sitting forward, she urged, “What are you running from?”

He started at her perceptive words. They flayed open wounds he wanted to keep hidden forever. He took a deep breath of fragrant pine. Then, looking into her dark eyes, he knew he could tell her what he had told no one else.

“The past,” he murmured. “The past and its ghosts.”

“Can you talk about it?”

Putting his hands on her arms, Joel wondered how he could have suggested Samantha had lied to them in her letters. Honesty was as much a part of her as the soft lips he longed to taste, and the compassion, which she offered to him now.

“Yes, I think I can.” His gaze grew distant, as if scenes from the past had appeared before him. “I dreamed of becoming a professional musician. A symphonic violinist. For years I studied with music professors in Virginia, often traveling many miles to find the best. I planned to leave Lynchburg when I was eighteen, go to Europe and study with the best orchestral performers in the world.”

“But you didn't.”

He smiled sadly when he heard the sympathy in her voice. “No, I didn't. Instead I listened to the lure of another siren. Her call was so strong it drowned out my dreams.”

Samantha understood what he could not bring himself to say. To be fooled by love must have been devastating to strong, singleminded Joel. Had he risked everything on it and lost, to be set adrift without one thing which had given meaning to his life?

“Maybe she didn't realize what she did.”

“How do you know about her? You see parts of me no one else has guessed at. But you're wrong about Camilla. She knew exactly what she was doing. She was all seduction when she thought I would inherit vast sums from my father's estate. When she discovered how mortgaged the estate was, she wasted no time marrying another man. One who could give her the money she was so sure she needed. One I had considered my best friend.”

She ached for him, wondering how many years these wounds had festered. Joel wanted everyone to think he was just a carefree adventurer, determined to conquer the Yukon.

“I'm so sorry, Joel.”

“Are you?” he demanded with sudden heat. “You are planning to leave us.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because this situation isn't what I expected. I knew this country would be rough, and I was prepared for that.” She flung out her arms to encompass the trees and the mountains. “But I didn't anticipate finding two men here.”

He smiled at her. “Two men who want to marry you.” He ran a finger along her arm. “Even if there were one hundred women for every man instead of the other way around, I think I would have chosen you, Sam. You make me feel alive, after a decade of just stumbling through each day.”

Pushing aside his hand, tense, she moved slightly away from him. “Thank you.”

“But the compliment isn't returned.”

“You have lied to me from the beginning,” she said softly.

“But you came.”

She smiled with a sorrow which matched his. “I fell in love with a man who offered me a chance to share his dream.”

“We invented very little when we wrote to you. We wrote what was in our hearts.” His hand stroked her cheek. “Sam, how could anyone not want you?”

Her eyes were held by the azure glow of his. Slowly her hand rose to the coarse surface of his face in an identical, testing touch. The light in his eyes burned a richer shade.

She laughed with a sensual throatiness which set his blood soaring through his head like the pounding of a spring floodtide along the river. “Give me time,” she said, “I'm still confused.”

“Will this help?”

Her reply was muted by the gentle pressure of his lips on hers. This was the happiness she had longed for all year as she wrote to Fifteen Above. When he drew slightly away from her, she moaned in heartfelt regret.

The sound was the only invitation he needed. He drew her to her feet and into his arms. Releasing the passion he had dammed on the first kiss, he captured her mouth again. His arms tightened around her. He wanted to feel every inch of her pliant form.

At first tentatively, then with more assurance, she stroked the broad plane of his back. Warmth spiraled through her as she exulted in the rapture created by his lips over hers. She stepped deeper into his embrace, wanting to feel all of him against her.

A gasp of pleasure escaped her parted lips as his mouth left them to caress the length of her neck. The texture of his beard on her skin accented the heat of his kisses. Her hands curved around the back of his head, holding him close, wanting him never to stop.

He smiled and kissed her lightly on the lips. Her fingers continued to stroke the rough texture of his face above the matted thickness of his beard. “Out of hundreds, thousands, I would choose you, Sam. We could have so much fun together. You aren't intimidated by anything, not even me. Why don't you marry me?”

“Because I don't love you,” she replied slowly, softly. She grinned. “I do like your kisses, though. I like them very, very much.”

He laughed, locking his fingers behind her waist to keep her close to him. “Are you always so honest”

“Always. This caused me a great deal of trouble when I lived with my brother. His wife hated me, but pretended otherwise. I hated her, and never failed to show it.”