Jodi Thomas (29 page)

Chance silently lowered his coffee cup to the table. He’d stepped back inside just before dawn to reload his gun belt. From his place in the shadows, he’d seen Anna stretch and reach for him in bed. He’d been hypnotized by her hand sliding along the sheets where he’d been and he could almost feel her touch on him even now. Her action had been a simple gesture he might never have seen, but it stirred his blood into hot lava.

To fight his need to touch her, he’d been working each day until he dropped. It had taken every ounce of his self-control not to press her body close to his own each night and enjoy the feel of every inch of her. He knew the only way he’d ever have Anna was to take her against her will, and he couldn’t do that even if Maggie hadn’t been sleeping in the same room. He didn’t want to force Anna, he wanted to love her. She’d made it clear she wanted none of his advances. Even when she’d allowed him to hold her that morning she’d been afraid, she’d reminded him that in January he’d be gone and she would be strong enough to be alone.

But then she’d touched the place where he slept. God, how he wished she’d touched him. All day he saw her image before him, even when she wasn’t there. Her waist was trim now and her breasts were full. The sight of her feeding Cherish almost blinded him with her beauty, yet she acted as if it were nothing but ordinary. Now as she lay sleeping he fought the urge to touch her.

Using all his willpower, Chance left the cabin and walked the fields. The morning was beautiful and the crops brushed his knee in soft whispers, but all he could see in his mind’s eye was Anna’s hand touching the place where he’d slept. He’d built and planted twice what any other farmer in the area had. He’d chopped enough wood for winter even though the air hadn’t turned cool at night yet. He’d pushed himself to the limit and still his need to touch Anna clung to his every waking thought. She was a storm in his blood that would tear him apart with its fury if he allowed it to surface. Each night was a precious hell with her so near, and each day an agonizing heaven of watching her.

An hour later, when he turned and walked back toward the house for breakfast, he spotted Tobin’s wagon and his step quickened. The old friend always circled by when he made a haul. Every few weeks he was bringing Anna something, usually in exchange for her meals. As Chance neared he could already hear Tobin’s low voice spinning another yarn. The man had more stories than the Bible and more ways of telling them than a hundred traveling preachers.

“Mornin’, son,” Tobin yelled from the door. “I thought I’d drop by and taste some of your wife’s cookin’. Damn if she ain’t the best cook in the country. No wonder that old Indian, Sourdough, keeps showing up.”

Chance hung his gun belt on a nail by the washstand and splashed himself with water. “He’s been around every week about the time Anna takes the bread from the oven. Never says a word, just walks in and waits for her to throw him a loaf.”

Anna’s laughter sounded from the door. She appeared a moment later with Maggie at her side. Chance stopped to stare as he always did when he first saw her. Her hair had been combed, but she hadn’t braided it as she would before the morning grew warm. Her white blouse was open at the throat and her long, brown skirt hid the soft moccasins she always wore. She announced breakfast and disappeared again.

Staring after her, Chance remembered the way her fingers had moved over the sheets still warm from his body and for a moment there was no world outside of his dreams of her.

“Son.” Tobin shattered Chance’s daydream. “You beat anything I’ve ever seen in my life.”

“What are you talking about?” Chance made his mind and eyes return to the present.

“The way you look at that woman you’d think you didn’t sleep with her every night.” Tobin’s bushy eyebrows shot up almost even with his hairline. “You do sleep with Anna, don’t you?”

Chance didn’t want to talk about Anna to Tobin. “Of course,” he said. “She’s my wife.”

“She’s more than that to you, son. I’ve had a few wives in my time, but they didn’t make me crazy like that woman makes you. She’s got a hold on you that a blue norther couldn’t loosen.”

Chance strapped on his gun again and buttoned his shirt. “I just think she’s nice to look at, that’s all.”

Tobin laughed. “Oh, you think a lot more than that. Just as she does.”

“What do you mean?”

Tobin stared at the water in the washbowl as if considering cleaning up, then stepped back as he thought better of his momentary weakness. “I’ve seen the way she watches you. I saw the fear in her eyes back in the settlement when she thought you were going to die. She wouldn’t even let me touch you.”

Chance remembered the way she’d washed his skin and head. He could almost feel the way she’d kissed him on his lips now, but since Maggie came she’d shown no sign of wanting to repeat her action. Those sweet kisses had awakened an ache deep inside him, but they seemed to be only a passing fancy to her.

Tobin started toward the cabin. “Before we get around the women, I want to tell you somethin’. Those men who went down to check out the Comanches were found dead last night—all except Walter Schmitz. He sported a bump on the head, but the rest looked like they’d been used as target practice. No one knows if it were the Comanches, the Delawares, or who knows, maybe our friend who loves Anna’s bread. Walter claims he can’t remember a thing. Anyway, son, I’d keep my gun within twitchin’ distance if I were you.”

“The Delawares would never attack. They’re not warlike.” Chance had spent enough time around them to know that Walks Tall was the only one with more than a pinch of hatred for white men.

“That’s what I figure too, but a fellow down near the Austin settlement told me a tall Delaware was asking about the folks up here. His description sounded a bit too much like your friend Walks Tall to me. Ya’ll might have been buddies since you were kids, but the last time we parted I don’t remember you being on too good terms with him.”

Chance felt an uneasiness sprout from the tiny patch of worry he’d managed to keep pushed back in his mind. Walks Tall was asking questions. Chance and Anna wouldn’t be hard to find in this country. The Indian was on his way—Chance could feel it. But Walks Tall hadn’t been the one who’d killed the party of men who’d gone north. That wasn’t Walks Tall’s way. Someone else was responsible for that and Chance would bet anything that Walter knew who.

Resting his hand lightly on Tobin’s shoulder, Chance whispered as they entered the cabin, “No need to worry Anna.”

T
obin left after breakfast, but the uneasiness he’d brought clung to Chance all day. He worked hard cutting and hauling logs for the house, which he’d promised Anna he’d build before the first snowfall. Tobin had even agreed to haul a few loads of lumber if he had time so that she’d have a real floor and not just packed dirt to sweep.

At noon Chance didn’t bother to stop to eat more than a few apples. He knew Anna and Selma were busy drying fruit and washing today. They were probably too busy talking to notice whether he came home for lunch. The dried apples and peaches would taste heavenly this winter, baked in one of Anna’s pies. Anna was already getting a few vegetables from the garden and in another month the dugout would be full of stores of winter food. He’d even hauled sand in from the creek one evening last week and dug a deep hole in the cool earth to keep the potatoes fresh all winter. The crop would be good and there’d be enough to feed any neighbors who hadn’t known what to plant.

When the afternoon sun finally drove Chance toward the shade, he noticed Anna riding toward him on her sorrel, which she’d named Cinnamon. He had to admire the way she handled the huge animal. She’d had a few laughs when he’d tried to give her riding lessons one evening last month. It made him proud that she was self-reliant and a little hurt that she didn’t need him. She was just the kind of woman he’d want to raise his children; just the kind to stand by a man’s side in this country; and just the kind who would never consider anything but a gentleman. He knew he could never be what she needed. He’d heard Walter say once that Anna’s first husband had spoken five languages and had completed college. Chance sometimes had trouble getting English to come out right and he’d never even been inside a school of any kind.

Moving to help her down as she reached the shade, he couldn’t help but notice how she slid into his arms and for a moment he didn’t want to let her go. He wanted to press her body against his damp chest and make the hot day even hotter for them both.

Anna spun around and handed him the canteen. “I brought you water.”

“Thanks,” Chance answered. He downed several gulps, trying not to notice the way moisture sparkled on the warm skin at her throat.

“Maggie took Cherish over to Selma’s. I thought you might ride over with me to the Mormons’ camp. Tobin says they’re very kind people and they have a way with bees. If we had a hive of bees, we wouldn’t have to buy honey or wax.”

Chance didn’t want to quit work yet, but he wasn’t about to let her go alone either. He had a feeling there was no use arguing with her about going. “I’ll ride over with you.”

The afternoon proved very informative. The small Mormon community had several hives and they were glad to show Chance and Anna how to build one. They twisted and bound a rope of long grass, then circled it into a cone much like a woman circles her hair atop her head. They told Chance all about how to get started and promised to drop by in a week to see if he was applying any of the lessons he’d learned. Chance found the people straightlaced and honest, but he didn’t much hold with the practice of having more than one wife, though they seemed to have it working smoothly.

All afternoon Anna was near him, touching his arm to show him something, laughing when the Mormons teased him about having only one wife, and smiling the quiet smile that told Chance just how happy she felt. He couldn’t help but wonder what her life must have been like in Germany if something as simple as beekeeping could excite her so.

Before sunset Chance and Anna returned home. There was a low bank of clouds to the north that promised rain and colored the evening sky a violet no artist could ever capture on canvas. Anna talked the entire way home about all the things she could do if she had honey and wax. She took great pleasure in planning her life and her future with Cherish and Maggie.

Chance was silent, his emotions as brooding as the clouds. He rubbed down the horses and took a long swim in the creek while Anna cooked supper. When he returned to the cabin, the food was on the table and Anna was sitting in a chair nursing Cherish. He sat down and ate, making no pretense at doing anything but watching Anna. He loved the way she looked with a child in her arms. Her soft song filled the cabin with peace. When she smiled and kissed the baby’s curly blond hair it brought pleasure to him beyond any he’d ever known.

Maggie crawled into Chance’s lap as he finished his coffee. “I hear thunder,” she said. “It sounds like drums.”

Chance cradled his little sister in his arms. “It’s only thunder,” he whispered as he kissed her cheek. But the uneasiness that had begun with Tobin’s visit stayed with him. He wanted to tell Anna that the men had been found dead, but he didn’t want Maggie to be more frightened than she was already. He’d have to tell Anna sometime or she’d be heading off alone as she almost had today, unaware of the danger.

Looking up from his thoughts, he noticed Anna staring at his hand as he patted Maggie’s back. There was a look of longing in her lovely eyes. Did she wish to be a child in his protective arms? Or did she want his touch in a different way? Their eyes met and for a moment his heart outsounded the thunder. The need he saw in the green depths of her eyes had nothing to do with the longings of a child. She was thinking of him—just as she had thought of him at dawn when she’d touched the sheets where he’d lain.

Anna broke the spell. “She’s asleep,” Anna whispered.

Chance looked down at Maggie cuddled in his arms. He slowly lifted her and carried her to bed, kissing her forehead as he covered her up. When he returned he felt awkward, first shoving his fists into his pockets, then moving to the low fire. He felt like a boy at his first dance, not someone who’d lived next to Anna for eight months.

Trying to sound conversational, he began, “Tobin said the two men who went north last month were found dead. Somehow Walter walked away with only a bump on his head.”

He heard Anna’s sharp intake of breath. “You wanted to go with them,” she whispered.

Chance shrugged. “Who knows, maybe if I’d been along they might be alive.” He hated to think that he’d made the wrong decision. “After all, they didn’t know the land or the Indians in these parts.”

“Or you’d be dead.” Anna’s words were barely audible.

He took one look at her frightened face and knew he wouldn’t tell her about Walks Tall. She had enough to worry about. This one warning would keep her near the house. He shouldn’t have told her about the men, but she was bound to find out about them eventually.

“There’s talk of sending others to try again.”

“No!” Anna stood and laid the baby in her crib. “You won’t go.”

He resented her order and yet was curious about her reason. “I haven’t decided yet.” His voice deepened in warning, for he was not a man to take orders. He’d lived too many years alone to allow someone else, even Anna, to dictate his actions.

She didn’t take the hint, for all she could think of was that she didn’t want him to leave. The picture of someone coming to her and telling her he was dead flashed in her mind with a sudden horror. “I don’t want you to go.”

“Why?” Chance could feel hope rise in his veins. Could she really, finally feel something for him? He took a step toward her. “Why shouldn’t I go?”

Anna looked confused and suddenly unable to meet his stare. He could see a battle raging within her by the nervous way she pressed her hands together and her short intakes of breath. Then, slowly, her chin lifted and he knew pride had won. “You can’t go because you haven’t finished out your year. You gave your word.”