Gypsy Magic (The Little Matchmakers) (17 page)

Lance’s large form came into the circle of light from around the bend… The bend in front of her! How in the world he gotten ahead of her? He was even wetter than she was, his dark hair gleaming as black as her own, dripping onto the collar of his shirt, plastered across his brow. His pants were muddy along one side as if he had fallen, and his face shone white and strained in the lantern light.

He shielded his eyes, squinting as if in pain, and peered at her. “What in the hell are you doing out in this?”

“Looking for you.” She shivered, half sobbing, partly from exhaustion, partly from relief at having found him. “Kevin was nearly in hysterics because you went out in the storm. He cried and cried, Lance, cried because he’s afraid for
you!
It took me forever to calm him down enough to listen to me.”

“You left him alone? A six-year-old?”

“What choice did you give me?” she shouted at him, snatching her arm free when he pulled her in the opposite direction to what she’d been going. Somehow, she’d gotten turned around.

“What choice? You had the choice of staying where I left you, warm and dry and safe.”

“Yes, I was warm and dry and safe, but you were not!” she retorted, scrambling to keep up with his long strides. “It’s my fault you went out into what I thought was just a summer squall. I had no idea it was a full-fledged storm! I had to try to find you. I promised Kevin.”

The thunder rumbled farther away now, off to the east. “I thought you’d be in the cave where we had the picnic, but the waves were dashing right in there and—”

“You went down the cliff?” Lance pulled her to a halt. “In this?”

“No. Only half way. Then I could see no one, not even a hard-headed bully like you could have found shelter down there.”

“Gypsy… Oh, woman, you are something else, you know.” He took the lantern from her, staring at her. “You came out on a night like this to look for
me?
”

Suddenly her legs began shaking. She backed away from him and he held the lantern high, as if to see her more clearly. In the face of what she thought was his silent accusation, she cried, “I had to come out! Oh, Lance, it’s all my fault and I couldn’t let you stay out in in this if I could find you and take you back to Kevin, because if I had really tried, I could have stopped him calling me mother but it was just a game and we both enjoyed it. But it was only pretense, Lance! Neither one of us took it seriously!”

He closed his eyes tightly for a second. “Please. Stop shouting in my ear.” He took her icy hand in his free one. “Come on, then, if you came out to ‘take’ me home, let’s get going.” They trod on, slipping and sliding by the bank of the creek, clambering through the fallen pine which had barred Gypsy’s way before, soaking themselves even more on the wet branches.

Lance swung the cabin door open, holding it against the tearing force of the wind while Gypsy slipped in, anxious to get to Kevin first. He rushed at her, his tear streaked face white, and flung himself against her, howling. “The hand is past the mark! It is! It is and you didn’t come back when you said!”

Gathering him close, Gypsy rocked him, crooning, “Hush, hush, sweetheart. We’re back now, honey. It’s all right. Daddy’s here, too.”

The child spared not a glance for his father. He clung to Gypsy, choking her with his skinny little arms around her neck.

A low voice, dripping with sarcasm, said, “Worried about
me
, was he?”

“He was so,” she hissed. “But of course if you come in with a face more frightening than storm outside, he’s not going to run to you. What did you expect?”

“Nothing,” he grated, hanging the lantern on its nail in the rafter and holding one hand to the top of his head while his mouth twisted in a grimace.

Clicking her tongue impatiently, Gypsy picked up the child in her arms and carried him to his bunk where she tucked him swiftly into his sleeping bag despite the pajamas he’d dampened clinging to her wet clothing. His thumb sneaked into his mouth and his eyes flickered as he gave her a wan smile. She kissed him gently and softly laid her fingertips on his eyelids. “Sleep now,” she murmured and was glad to see his eyes remained closed even though his mouth worked hard at his thumb.

She stood from a kneeling position and turned around, expecting to find Lance busy at the stove with tea or coffee, or at the very least, sitting on a chair, instead, he was slumped on the floor, his back against the door, his head resting on bent knees. His shirt and pants dripped water to the floor and his hair hung lank across his cheeks and the nape of his neck. “Lance?” she said, stripping off her wet jacket. She hung it on a peg before snatching up a couple of towels and approaching him. “What is it?”

“I’m okay. Go get dry,” he muttered, slurring the words, but she could see it was untrue. His face had an unhealthy pallor and even after he wiped it with the towel she draped over his head, when he looked toward her, she could see beads of sweat standing out on his upper lip. He winced and closed his eyes tightly as if the light caused him pain. Frowning, she stood over him, looking down as he shook his head almost imperceptibly.

“You aren’t okay, you know,” she observed gently, crouching before him and touching his head lightly with compassionate fingertips. He was obviously in extreme pain and she recalled his asking her not to shout in his ear. She also remembered Kevin’s mentioning that he might get a bad headache and the doctor would send him to the “bug-house.” That was the reason Lorraine wouldn’t let Kevin bother his father. It was the reason why no one was allowed, ever, to talk back to him. Had Lance honestly been in a mental institution? The question had flickered briefly across her mind before, but now she rejected it as unlikely. Migraine surely that wouldn’t put a man on the edge of insanity.

“Where do you keep the medicine for your migraines?” she asked, keeping her voice soft and quiet.

“Shaving kit… Pills,” came the tired response which showed no surprise at her knowing what was wrong with him.

There was only one bottle of tablets in his black leather case and Gypsy read the pharmacist’s instructions before spilling two out into the palm of her hand and pumping him a glass of water. “Here,” she said, still quietly, “take these, please, and then get undressed. You’ll feel better when you’re warm and dry.”

Lance ignored her, rocking slightly as if the motion eased his pain. He put a hand to the back of his neck, tried to rub, but the effort seem too much for him, and he had barely touched the top muscles before his hand fell limply to the floor.

“Lance,” said Gypsy, more insistently. “Lift your head and let me give you your pills.”

With an angry gesture, he smacked at her hand, slopping the water out of the glass and sending the tablets flying across the room. “Leave me alone! I know what I need and it’s not smothering with nursie-nursie TLC. All I want is those lights turned out!”

Shocked and hurt, and knowing she was more the fool for feeling that way, Gypsy got to her feet and turned off the two lanterns, watching the light fade and die with slight pops from each. They sounded loud in the cabin. She went to her bunk where she slipped behind her curtain and stripped herself of her sodden garments, rubbing her chilled feet briskly with a rough towel.

Gypsy donned the shirt which she wore for a nightgown and settled under the covers, hearing the muffled sounds as Lance fumbled around his bunk. There was a subdued curse, the slats of his bed creaked and then there was silence except for his harsh breathing and the rumble of the storm as it worked its way toward the mainland.

Gypsy had slipped into a slight doze when stealthy movements disturbed her. Her curtain was slid aside. It was pitch black in the cabin without even a lightning flash to momentarily relieve it the dark, so she felt, rather than saw, Lance’s long shape lean over the top of her as his hands swept across the narrow shelf above her bunk. What could be up there that he might need? His breath rasped in his throat as his hand made another sweep, then his bulk was removed, the curtain dropped back into place. Tough! Gypsy thought nastily. If he were even half human I might’ve asked him what he wanted, but under the circumstances, he can just suffer.

But for all her hard thoughts, as it became increasingly obvious that he was doing exactly that, Gypsy began to forget that he had insulted her, smacked the glass from her hand and rejected her offer of help. His bunk creaked as he twisted and turned. There were a series of dull thuds as he pounded at his pillow, trying to soften it, she imagined, but it was the long drawn out, yet muffled groan which was her undoing in the end. She pulled the flashlight from under her pillow and flicked it on before climbing from behind her curtain, her fingers covering the lens so that only a dull, pink glow escaped in a narrow slit.

Gypsy crept to his bunk and whispered, “It’s probably more than my neck’s worth to ask, but is there anything I can do?”

 “Where did you find that flashlight?” he asked, turning his pain racked face toward her, squinting up at her with his mouth awry

“Under my pillow. Was that what you are after? Why?”

“My pills. Where did you hide them?”

She had to literally bite her tongue to stop reminding him that he had sent them flying. “I’ll get them,” she said. She took two more out of the bottle, making a mental note to warn Kevin not to touch the other two if he found them on the floor in the morning. She gave Lance a glass of water and slipped a hand beneath the back of his neck to help him lift his head.

He gulped the medication down and relaxed back against her hand before she could pull it away. When she tried, he said thickly, “No… Leave it there… Please, it’s cool. Feels… good.”

Gypsy withdrew it nevertheless and picked up the light which she had laid on the floor, its beam pointed into the corner. “Just a minute,” she murmured. “I’ll be right back.”

Quickly filling a basin at the pump she took up a cloth and carried both back to Lance. This time, she stood the flashlight on its butt end so its beam went to the ceiling, reflecting down to give her enough light to see what she was doing. She wrung out the cloth in the cool water and laid it across his brow. “I’m not playing nursie-nursie,” she informed him swiftly but quietly before he could voice an objection. “And this is simply care, not tender, and definitely not loving. Just one human being trying to help another.”
If, that is, you are human.
So busy was she with her ministrations, it took her a moment to notice she had lied. She was laying the cloth across his forehead with a great degree of tenderness.

Her throat ached with sorrow. What had happened to her? When had she begun to care for this man? When had it begun to matter to her that he hurt? That he was unhappy? Was it when he’d said, with such regret in his voice, “I won’t ask you to be my wife, but I can ask you to go through the ceremony which, in the eyes of the world, will make it right for you to be the mother Kevin needs. He can be the child you want, the one your fiancé doesn’t want you to have.”

He can be the child you want…
Kevin was already the child she wanted, and she’d turned Lance down flat, saying she had a life, a career, a fiancé, and couldn’t give it all up to be a nursemaid. How cruel that must have sounded. She wished now, as the man she tended breathed more and more easily, she had found different words, had not let her shock betray her into speaking so quickly. His offer had been genuine, from the heart, made, not for himself, but for his son, to give Kevin what he needed. And for her, to give her what Tony denied her.

She lifted the cloth, rinsed it, cooled it, and applied it again to his head.

 Over the next half hour Gypsy watched Lance’s face as she sat sideways on his bunk beside him, her knees just brushing his right arm, his hand lying loosely on her thigh. The taut grooves smoothed out as his mouth relaxed and his eyes no longer squinted with pain. He lifted what must have been heavy lids and stared up at her, directly into her eyes for a long moment before she turned away to busy herself with the cloth again.

“Gypsy…”

Keeping her face averted, her eyes downcast, fighting not to acknowledge the tremor which ran through her, she ignored him.

“Gypsy, look at me… Please.”

She turned to meet his gaze. He remained unmoving for a time and she draped the cloth against his skin once more, her eyes still held captive by the intense, demanding glow of his. One large brown hand came up and the fingertips just brushed her chin as a slow, sweet smile curved Lance’s suddenly sensuous-looking mouth.

“Why are you being so kind to me?”

Keeping her face averted, her eyes downcast, wondering at the tremor which ran through her at the strange note in his voice, she said, “What? You’d rather I be unkind?”

“I doubt you’d know how.”

Her heart hammered.

“Take the cloth away so I can sit up,” he said softly but insistently, and when she shook her head, eyes widening with growing emotion she tried not to admit, he repeated his request and she found herself obeying in what felt like slow motion.

He sat, folding his legs sideways, still holding her with his gaze, “I hit you, didn’t I?”

“You… pushed my hand,” she murmured, leaning back from him, from the expression in his eyes. How could they shine like that from only the dim illumination of a flashlight aimed away?

He now took the hand he had “pushed” and cradled it between his own two large ones for a long, heart aching moment before he carried it to his lips. He brushed the backs of her fingers, then turned it over and set his lips onto her palm. The kiss amazed her with its surprising gentleness. “And after all that, my love, you were still willing to help me?”

Ignoring the wild feeling flaring inside her, she said, “You were in pain, didn’t know, what you were doing…”
Or what you are saying, now
. The touch of his mouth brushing her palm mesmerized her. She wanted to pull away, yet wanted to let it stay there forever, wanted to hear him say “my love” again in that deep, husky tone, and knew it was wrong, couldn’t possibly be true, but his eyes, as he looked up at her from under his dark brows begged her not to move apart from him, made it impossible for her to deny whatever he wanted of her. She felt drained of strength, unable to move even when he swung his legs off the side of the bunk and pulled her into his arms to lie her across his chest. He tilted her face up to his.