Night Song

by Beverly Jenkins

  “Something wrong?” he asked.

  She told him the truth. “Just thinking I’ll probably never see you again.”

  Chase wanted to reach across the table and take her small hands in his, but he was conscious of the other people in the room. “I’ll miss our play, too, schoolmarm,” he said softly.

  Cara read the solemnness in his face and stiffened her lip against the sharp sting in her eyes. Lord, she hoped she wasn’t going to start to cry. Luckily Mae chose that moment to appear with their meals, giving Cara the needed opportunity to think about something else.

  When the meal was finished, he walked her home. Cara had decided not to dwell on the sadness. She had another day with him to savor, and she wanted to make the most of the time they had left. Besides, being sad would not prevent his departure.

  “You’ve been awfully quiet this evening, schoolmarm,” Chase said, walking beside her.

  “I have, haven’t I? Well, that’s going to change.”

  He chuckled. “I don’t know if that’s good or bad.”

  “Of course it’s good. And when we get to Sophie’s, I’ll prove it.”

  He stayed her with a hand on her arm. He looked down at her. “Prove it—how?”

  “Not in the way you’re thinking, Sergeant,” she said, grinning, though she would dearly love to experience his magical lovemaking again.

  “How do you know what I’m thinking?”

  “It’s the look in your eyes. Sometimes I think my clothes are going to catch fire when you look at me that way. . . . But we’re not supposed to be talking about that, are we?”

  “No, darlin’, we’re not. . . .”

  The huskily spoken endearment fired her as much as his eyes. “Well, will you settle for something that’s almost as sweet?”

  The mustache flashed his pleasure. “You’re playing with fire, you know that don’t you?”

  “Who, me? I wouldn’t know what to do with a man like you . . . if you fell facefirst into my lap.”

  Chase could feel his manhood stir. His eyes sparkled as he replied, “Keep it up, and I’m going to rectify that problem.”

  Cara smiled with challenge. “Do you want what I’m offering as proof or not, Sergeant?”

  “Yes,” he said, wondering how he was going to keep his hands off her until he rode out the day after tomorrow. “Now march, before I show some proof of my own.”

  In the kitchen at Sophie’s, Dulcie looked up at their entrance and smiled warmly. “Well, how was the Black Widow’s food? Hope you have an antidote for spider venom. I hear she puts it in the potatoes.”

  Cara shook her head and smiled. “The food was fine, so stop. We came for our dessert.”

  “It’s right here,” Dulcie replied. “Just took it out of the oven, so be careful when you’re handling it.” She handed Cara a basket.

  “Thank you, Dulcie. Follow me, Sergeant.”

  Outside, behind the house, Care led him to the waiting buggy. “Get in,” she told him as she climbed in on the left. She turned to put the basket on the buggy’s floor and picked up the reins. Only then did she notice he hadn’t moved. “What’s the matter?”

  “Where are we going?”

  “On a picnic.”

  “At this time of day? It’s going to be dark soon.”

  Cara looked out at the beautiful red of the setting sun. “So it is. Get in.”

  He did.

  Once they’d cleared town he turned to her. “You know, you’re pretty good with the horses.”

  “I’ve been driving teams all my life.”

  “Answer me this. How’re you going to explain us leaving town together? Quite a few of your neighbors saw us.”

  “I always go out to visit students and their families on Friday evening. Asa usually goes with me, but he’s down in Rice County. I’m hoping everyone will think you’re escorting me in his place.”

  “This is how you usually spend Friday nights?”

  “Most times. Why?”

  “You’re a beautiful woman, Cara. You should have a beau taking you dancing on Friday nights.”

  “But I don’t, Sergeant. Besides, this gives me an opportunity to talk with the parents about their children’s progress. We’ve only one stop to make tonight, then we’ll have our picnic.”

  Cara pulled the buggy up to the soddy that housed the family of a little girl who’d missed school for several days due to a terrible cough. She was doing much better, the mother assured Cara, and Cara gave the woman the work her daughter could review while recovering. The mother thanked Cara and ‘waved until the buggy pulled out of view.

  “Now,” Cara said. “Our picnic.”

  When Cara halted the buggy behind an old broken-down soddy in the middle of a field of just greening sunflowers, Chase stared around. “Where are we?”

  “We are here.”

  Cara hoped down and grabbed the basket Dulcie had prepared. “Come on.” She laughed, looking at his skeptical face. She snatched him by the hand and pulled him in her wake.

  About fifty yards from the soddy Cara stopped. “Now I need your brawn. Can you open this door?”

  Chase looked down at the plank door set in the earth at their feet. “Is this a dugout?”

  “Yep.”

  Chase eased up the heavy door and peered down into the blackness. “This is where you want to have a picnic?”

  “Yes. See that rope nailed into the door? Pull it up, please.”

  Chase hauled up a lantern. Cara took some matches from her skirt pocket and lit up. “Now ease it back down so we can see our way along the stairs.”

  Again Chase followed her instructions and slowly sent the light on a return descent.

  “Now we can go down.”

  Once they were both on the floor of the underground dwelling. Chase stood in the gloom while she lit a few more lamps positioned around the earthen walls. The lights banished the shadows, and he looked around. The place was surprisingly clean. There were no animal droppings or standing water usually associated with such deserted places. “I haven’t been in a dugout in I don’t know how long.”

  “They aren’t used much anymore, at least not around here. The post office in Nicodemus is still housed in one. Sophie said during the first winter, the whole town was underground.”

  Cara spread out a large tarp on the earthen floor and then began to unpack the basket Dulcie had provided.

  “How did you find this place?” Chase asked, joining her on the floor.

  “It belongs to the children.”

  Chase chuckled. “Really?”

  “Yes, this is their secret place. I was let in on the location only after signing my name in blood.” The surprise on his face made her smile and add, “I’m serious. I signed an oath saying I would not reveal the location of the secret dugout to any other adult unless it was an extreme emergency. Do you have any idea how much blood it takes to write ‘C. Henson’?”

  He laughed. “A teacher who signs her name in blood. No wonder they adore you.”

  “Not always,” Cara corrected, handing him a fork and a napkin. “Sometimes I’m Henson the Hag, or Henson the Horrible.”

  “Never,” he contradicted in whispered response.

  The tenor of his low voice made her senses rise. She dampened them and concentrated on cutting the pie she’d taken from the basket. “I asked Dulcie and Sophie, and they said this was your favorite when you lived with them in Louisiana.”

  With wonder all over his face, Chase took the offered plate on which sat a still warm piece of . . . “Peach cobbler?”

  “Yep,” Cara replied, cutting herself a piece. “I hope they were right.”

  “They’re right. I haven’t had any in years. This is why you wouldn’t let me order dessert at the hotel?”

  “I thought it would be a nice surprise.”

  Chase ate his first bite, and the glorious taste brought forth a groan of pleasure. Cara smiled at his reaction. They ate in silence a moment, then Chase said, “T
hank you very much for this, Cara Lee.”

  “You’re very welcome.”

  While they ate, Chase looked around the room and spied an old broken-down stove in the corner. “That thing doesn’t still work, does it?”

  Cara nodded and politely tried to talk around the pie in her mouth. “Not anymore. It might if it had the stovepipe. All of the old dugouts had one of those stoves. Sophie said that’s how you found Nicodemus and Henry Adams back then, by the stovepipes. They were the only structures in the towns above ground.”

  “I couldn’t imagine living below ground,” Chase observed, running his gaze over the earthen walls and floor.

  “You do what you have to sometimes. That first winter people didn’t have time to build homes or soddies, so they carved these places out of hillsides or dug them out of the earth. Some of the original ‘dusters will tell you they preferred living below ground in Kansas to living above ground with the Redemptionists.”

  “You have a point there, schoolmarm.”

  “Do you want more?” she asked, noticing he’d devoured the first piece.

  “Yes, and give me a man’s portion this time.”

  Cara saluted him crisply and barked, “Sir, yes sir, sir.”

  Chase laughed at her application of the Tenth’s well-known three-sir response to an order. “How’d you know about that?”

  “Just by being around you and the men. It’s very distinctive, hearing them say ‘sir’ three times every time they’re asked to do something.”

  “It’s a tradition,” he responded, taking the newly cut piece of cobbler. He smiled at the slab of pastry she’d given him. “Now this, Miss Henson, is a man’s portion.”

  Cara cut herself a small second piece and joined him.

  When they’d polished off a good portion of the pie and neither of them could eat another bite, Cara rewrapped it in the cloth and placed it back in the basket. She could tell by the blackness of the sky above their heads that the evening was coming to a close. “We should be getting back, I suppose . . .”

  “Probably,” he replied, but made no move to stand. He seemed content to sit and watch her, making her desire heat up the longer his gaze caressed her. And when he did finally stand, if was not to lend her a hand in gathering up the tarp or basket contents. Rather, he slowly climbed the earthen stairs and pulled down the until now open dugout door. He made his descent and Cara could feel her clothing ignite from the blaze in his smoldering eyes. He came back to the tarp and sat down. For a moment he said nothing, touching her only with her gaze. She stood, locked by the passion he’d unleashed, until he said softly, “Come here, schoolmarm . . .”

  Cara set the basket aside and came over to where he sat. He held out his hand. Trembling, she slipped her hand into his and let him slowly guide her down to a kneeling position at his side. He leaned over, and with a hand in her hair brought her mouth to his.

  The kiss moved over her like the faintest of moonlight and she drank it in like a night-blooming flower. As it deepened, she ran her hands up his arms, savoring his strength for what she knew would be the last time.

  Chase knew he shouldn’t be tempting fate by having her near, but to deny himself was something he could not do. Her mouth, still bearing the sweetness of the cobbler, opened to the tasting of his tongue, and he enjoyed her as if she were the ripest of peaches. Groaning with the pleasure of her, he moved her to sit atop his lap. He left her mouth to kiss the faint bruising around her eye, the edges of her hair, the shell of her ear, his manhood hardening beneath her soft hips. “Cara, I want to open your shirt . . .”

  Cara didn’t protest. Feeling him undo her buttons and kiss each inch of bared skin made the heat between her thighs flow in sweet response. His mouth teased her nipples through her camisole while his hands roamed languidly. She parted her legs to let him slide his hot hand into the throbbing warmth they sheltered, then moaned softly as he dallied lazily through the fabric of her skirt. He pushed the bodice of her camisole down below her breasts and took one dark nipple into his mouth.

  “Cara Lee . . .” He breathed, moving his lips to fire her other nipple. He slipped his hand beneath her skirt and squeezed her thigh lovingly. He pushed her dark stocking down her leg, then ran his trembling hand back up the bare limb until he reached the warm curve of her soft hip. He repeated the process on the other leg, then pushed her skirt to her waist and explored until her breath rose against the silence. “Can I?” he asked raggedly, already tugging her drawers down her hips, knowing he’d die if she denied him, but she whispered, “Yes . . .”

  Cara rippled in response to being bare to him. The first touch set off such a joyful response, her senses began to spin and feed on the whirlpool that spread from his splendidly wicked hands to her shuddering core.

  When he withdrew his hand, Cara groaned in protest. He smiled with hot eyes and kissed her. “Such an eager little Cara Lee . . .” he whispered, then wordlessly removed her shirt and helped her out of the camisole. “Now . . . put your shirt back on. Don’t want you to catch a chill . . .”

  Once she’d done that, he had her lie with him on the tarp so he could slide kisses slowly down the golden plane of her body. He pushed at the open halves of her shirt, lingering over the beauty or her breasts until they were hard and pleading. His mustached lips brushed over the flatness of her belly beneath her rucked-up skirt, and his tongue set fire to the recessed nook of her navel. When his lips brushed the swollen place between her open legs, a cry broke from her and filled the silence. “No . . .” she protested, trying to back away, but his large, gentle hand on her small waist kept her there.

  “Hold still, darlin’ . . .” he whispered hotly.

  A soft lick made her stiffen in both disbelief and delight. Everything melted into fire. Boldly, yet gently, his fingers parted the blackberry forest, giving him intimate access to the hidden shrine within. As he enjoyed her, Cara’s hips rose shamelessly for more. Never in her life had she thought such pleasure possible. He tasted, nibbled. Her head upon the tarp moved back and forth like that of a person insane. Release shattered her almost instantaneously. Her shout of elation pierced the quiet.

  “Next time you’ll have more stamina,” he promised, leaning down to give her one more scalding lick, and Cara buckled with a strangled scream.

  Chase was harder than he’d ever been in his life. His raging manhood demanded release, and as he eased her back to herself with soft kisses on her lips and butterfly touches between her honey-filled thighs, he had to exert a lot of control not to continue. All he could think about was settling himself between her soft thighs and taking her until she climaxed calling his name. However, he’d vowed not to compromise her and he would not.

  A totally dazed Cara sat up. The warm amusement she met in his gaze made her smile shyly and turn away; she had enjoyed herself entirely too much under this man’s spell and he knew it. “I take it all back, Sergeant,” she said. “You are very talented.”

  The mustache curled over his smile. “You’re welcome . . .”

  Cara rose to her knees and kissed him. “Are we going to continue now?” she asked, nibbling on his bottom lip, running her hand over his chest.

  “No, we are not,” he responded, drawing on her lips. “Now stop, before I explode . . .”

  “Chase . . .” she coaxed against his ear.

  “No . . . Close your shirt . . .”

  But before she could, he bent to her breasts and his warm mouth pleasured them until they were begging, damp and hard once again. He then raised his head, pulled the halves of her shirt closed, and began buttoning her up.

  “But what about your pleasure?” Cara asked, keeping still while he completed the task. When he didn’t speak, she peered at him. “Chase?”

  “Cara Lee . . . my pleasure’s fine,” he lied. “Now do me a favor, darlin’ . . . go sit over there a moment.” To allay the concern in her face he gave her one more kiss. “Go on . . . or we’ll never get back.”

  Cara complied
but with great reluctance. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine, schoolmarm, just need to . . . catch my breath.”

  Cara didn’t believe him for a minute. He’d been as aroused as she, yet he’d gotten no release. Even someone with her limited experience knew love-making involved a joining. “Chase—”

  “Pack up the basket, please, and no more talk about this.” He wondered how it would feel to spend the night in a dugout. He’d be finding out if he couldn’t bring his desire under control; right now he was still so hard he couldn’t walk, let alone climb the stairs to the surface.

  “You know something, Sergeant?” Cara said, placing the dishes and napkins back in the basket. She then retrieved her underwear. “You are too damn noble for your own good. Has it ever occurred to you that I might have wanted you to continue?” There, she’d said it.

  He sat with his back to her so she did not see him smile as he replied, “You know something, schoolmarm? You wouldn’t last a minute in the army because you don’t take orders worth a damn.”

  “I’ll accept that as a compliment,” she said, pulling her drawers back on, trying to decide if she was mad or not. She decided she wasn’t because deep down inside she loved this man. The fact that he continued to treat her with such unfailing respect made the love stronger, even if she found it frustrating.

  As it turned out, Chase did not have to experience a night in a dugout. Cara kept quiet long enough to let the memories of his arousal fade to a dull roar, and they left. Outside, he gingerly climbed into the buggy, thankful for the first time in his life not to be on horseback. He sat back, eyes closed, as she guided the team to town.

  “Chase, I wish you would let me help you.”

  “Cara Lee, I don’t want to talk about this.”

  “But I do. You look like you’re in pain.”

  “Darlin’, you’re just making it worse.”

  “I’m sorry,” she apologized. Cara kept her mouth closed for the duration of the trip.

  In bed that night, aching and hard, Chase told himself he’d done the noble and honorable thing by denying himself that which he wanted most. However, his body disagreed. Every time he thought of Cara half-naked and twisting under his pleasuring, the ruckus started up again. She had him so in knots he’d actually thought of seeking out Virginia, a thought that indicated just how desperate the situation had become. He’d banished the plan just as quickly, however, because no other woman would do. He wanted Cara.