Pieces of Dreams (5 page)

A hundred dollars. When Caleb had been hoarding every penny to buy farm equipment and livestock.

Then he was stepping up, taking hold of her basket, pretending to need both hands to heft it. He exchanged another quip or two with the men gathered around, then turned in her direction. His stride was free, his gaze a bright, rich blue, his smile brilliant as he gazed into her eyes.

“Well, love,” he said as he stopped before her and offered his arm, “and where shall we go to enjoy our feast?”

Conrad.

She had not the smallest doubt. It was not Caleb, but his brother. Why was he pretending?

She opened her mouth to accuse him, then closed it again. It was possible Caleb had sent him. It could also be, she realized, that he meant to save her face, to prevent people from knowing that his brother had failed her. Or it could be that he felt sorry her and thought she might prefer sharing her basket with him instead of Leamon Stotts. In the last, at least, he would be perfectly right.

But if he was trying to fool her, then he deserved to have the tables turned on him. Didn’t he?

Chapter Four

The town park was a tree-shaded space sweeping in a wide apron from the edge of the cemetery behind the church to the river’s edge. At its center was a pavilion where the local brass band played on Sunday afternoons. Radiating from this central point were walks set with rustic benches. During the long days of summer the older men gathered in the park to play checkers and pitch horse shoes. Elderly matrons came to crochet and gossip, while young mothers spread picnics under the trees and watched their babies nap as larger children bowled hoops, played dolls or used the fallen acorn shells as cups for fairy tea parties.

For the box social, a long line of tables knocked together from scrap lumber had been set up close to the church. It was there that the married ladies spread the food they had brought in their baskets. Most of the unmarried couples joined them, for the sake of both convenience and propriety.

Caleb would have headed at once for those long, crowded tables with their chattering and neighborly congregation of folks. Conrad had other ideas.

Melly gave him a quick glance of surprise as he led off down the path of packed sand that wended deeper into the park, but raised no objection. So far, so good, he thought.

Or was it? Could it be his brother was not always as circumspect as might have been expected? Conrad frowned as he considered that possibility.

The sun had set, and the blue twilight of evening was deepening, the shadows under the trees growing thicker. Faint smells of dust and smoke and food drifted on the air with a hint of dankness from the river. The sounds of voices and laughter faded behind them as they strolled.

“So,” Melly said, releasing his arm and snatching a leaf from a tree branch hanging low over the trail. “Did you have a profitable trip?”

“Trip?”

The smile that she slanted him had a vivid gleam. “To the estate sale, of course. Did you find what you wanted?”

Conrad thought quickly of how a fiancé might answer. “One or two things. It would have been much better if you could have come with me.”

“Oh?” She gave him a wide-eyed look as she shredded her leaf, dropping the pieces so they drifted down the front of her skirts as she walked.

“You might have found something for the house—besides which, it would have been a pleasant outing for the two of us. But I suppose you had other things to do, cooking and so forth.”

“If the sale had run late, we might have been caught on the road by darkness.”

He gave her a long, slow smile, and reached to take her hand. “Would that have been so bad?”

“I—possibly not,” she said in low tones as she veiled her gaze with her thick, dark lashes, “but only think what people would have said.”

“Why should I do that,” he said, his own voice husky, “when it makes not a particle of difference?”

He could have sworn her fingers trembled in his for an instant. Could she be as affected as he was by the mental picture of what might have taken place between them during the homeward drive in the dark? He hoped not, as he was supposed to be Caleb.

Abruptly, she snatched her hand away. “Caleb Wells! What has come over you?”

“You,” he said, allowing the warmth inside him to surface as he smiled down at her. “Is that so strange?”

“Downright astonishing, I would say.”

Her stringent tone was an indication that he might have overplayed his hand—or rather Caleb's. A wry smile curved his mouth as he attempted to bottle his ardor. “It's been a long engagement, love.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “But it was you who refused to think of marriage until you had bought and paid for land and could build a proper home.”

“Did I say that? I must have been an idiot.”

She gave him another slanting glance. “I'll admit I thought so. Even if you didn't want to live with your father, Aunt Dora would have loved having you around. Of course, I understand that you want to be able to provide for me, but we could have been together so much sooner.”

He reached for her hand again and tightened his grip to draw her closer against his side. “Has the waiting been so bad then? As terrible as for me?”

“You—you've found it hard?” she asked with a slight catch in her voice as the curve of her breast brushed his arm.

St. Elmo's fire seemed to dance along his body every place she touched, while the strain in the lower part of his anatomy made walking something less than comfortable. Voice constricted, he said, “You've no idea.”

She pressed more fully against him and rested her head an instant against his shoulder as she spoke in a low, sultry murmur. “It won't be long now until the wedding. We will be together then—alone in the dark.”

“Melly—” The single word was strangled as forbidden images sprang full-blown into his mind.

Melly with her hair down, swirling around her in a silken curtain as she came toward him where he waited in the bed. The look of love and sweet anticipation in her face as he drew her nightgown away to reveal lovely, tender curves. The feel of her lying naked against him. The moment when their bodies were joined, and she was his inescapably, eternally
.

Not his. Never his.

Caleb's. His brother's bride. Conrad dragged air into his cramped, aching lungs.

“Caleb?”

She was on to him. He knew it with sudden and positive instinct.

Or was it the faint quiver of laughter that he felt where her chest still pressed his arm? The hint of diabolical teasing that laced her use of his brother's name? Or maybe the simple fact that he recalled, belatedly, how Melly had once been able to tell him and his brother apart when no one else could manage it?

The witch. The conniving, incredibly enticing little witch!

“Darling,” he whispered as he leaned to set the heavy basket on the path. Straightening again, he snaked a hard arm around her narrow waist. With smooth and easy strength, he swung her into the shadows under the low-hanging limbs of an ancient oak and pressed her back to its trunk.

“Caleb!” she gasped as he moved in so close her swinging skirts piled against his booted feet.

He chuckled deep in his throat as he cupped her face in his free hand. “My sweetest love, why should we torture ourselves? There's no need at all to wait...”

On the last word, he lowered his head and took her mouth in a searing kiss. At the same time, he trailed his fingers down the curve of her neck and over her collar bone to cup the gentle globe of her breast.

For an endless, aching moment, Melly was completely still, stunned into immobility by the onslaught of sensations that whipped through her at gale force. A rippling of purest pleasure ran along her nerves, tightening them as it went. She had the insane need to cling forever to the man who held her. Then his tongue touched hers, retreated, plunged boldly deeper.

Caleb had never done such a thing, not in quite that way. She had never felt this warm presentiment of what physical union might be like, never known such an abrupt and reckless rush of her entire being toward heated fulfillment. She wanted to feel the power of his male strength against her, inside her. She needed to have him teach her the power and mystery of love between a man and woman so she would not fear it.

Want. Need. Such foreign words to her. Until this moment.

She stiffened on a sharp gasp. Spreading the fingers of her hands that were trapped between them, she shoved him away, dragged her mouth free. She shuddered, then breathed deep once, twice. Her voice low and not quite steady, she said, “Conrad Wells, what do you think you're doing?”

He laughed, a rich yet strained sound that she felt in his chest against the palms of her hands as he caught and held them against him. “Playing along? Isn't that what you wanted?”

“No! I never expected—” She stopped, drew a quick breath before she brought out the thought uppermost in her mind. “Your brother would never have tried such a thing!”

“Wouldn't he? Poor Caleb. Or maybe I should say poor Melly.”

Anger boiled up inside her in a red-hot tide. Without conscious thought, she jerked loose and lashed at him with the flat of her hand.

The slap never landed. He caught her wrist and forced it down. And the humor disappeared from his face as if it had never been. He stared at her while a muscle corded in his jaw and the blue of his eyes went dark-as-night there in the gathering shadows.

Her fingers turned numb from his grip. She could feel his anger and something more beating around her like storm waves. She lifted her chin and tightened the corners of her mouth to prevent them from quivering.

His gold-tipped lashes flickered. All expression was wiped from his face. Opening his fingers in abrupt, complete release, he stepped back well away from her. “I apologize—something that looks fair to becoming a habit. I meant only to pay you back for stringing me along. I may have gone too far.”

“Indeed you did,” she said, dropping her gaze to her wrist as she rubbed it to restore the circulation. The blame was not all his, however, and she knew it. “I suppose I shouldn't have led you down the garden path—or the park path in this case.”

He tipped his head. “Here I was, thinking I was the one doing the leading.”

A brief smile touched her lips. “You were so sure you had me fooled. I wanted to discover just how far … that is…” She trailed off as she realized where the thought was leading her.

“Unfortunately, you found out that I'm not so noble as Caleb. My impulses sometimes lead me to do things that I regret; I'm not called the wicked twin for nothing. But if I promise it won't happen again, will you still let me share your supper?”

The quiet words were a release. She breathed easier as the tension between them faded. “Yes, of course. I—I expect Caleb asked you to see after me if he didn't make it back. It was kind of you to go to the trouble.”

He was quiet so long that she looked up, searching his still features.

“Yes, it was all Caleb's idea,” he said at once. “Shall we see what goodies my good brother missed in that two-ton basket of yours?”

Melly pushed away from the tree. Conrad stepped back to allow her to regain the path. But he did not offer his arm, did not touch her in any way. As she passed him, she glanced once at his set face. And she was suddenly certain that his brother had played no part whatever in Conrad’s showing up at the social that evening.

As Melly brushed past him, Conrad caught her warm sweet scent. It was astonishingly familiar beneath the overriding soap cleanliness, starch and sunshine. Involuntarily, a crooked smile touched his lips and he inhaled deeper.

He felt the tenuous rein he held on his more base inclinations slipping, and he closed his right hand slowly into a fist, cursing silently as he sought control. God, but he was an idiot.

Regardless, he did not turn back toward the church and its crowd. He knew he should, for Caleb's sake as well as for Melly's—not to mention his own. But it was a sacrifice he meant to avoid unless the lady insisted.

She didn't. As he picked up the basket and turned in the direction of the band pavilion, she followed. She seemed to be almost unaware of their direction as she walked beside him, kicking her skirts away from her feet in moody and pensive silence.