by Nora Roberts
It wasn’t often he came across a woman who wanted to discuss philosophy. Taking out a cigarette, Tucker settled into the conversation comfortably. “Well, what’s right for one isn’t necessarily right for the other. Dwayne went off and got a degree he’s never done a damn thing with, because he’d rather sit around and brood about how things should have been. Josie runs off and gets married, twice, flies off to anywhere at the drop of a hat, and always ends up back here pretending things are better than they can be.”
“What about you? What’s your way?”
“My way’s to take it as it comes. And yours …” He glanced back at her. “Yours is to figure out what’s coming before it gets here. That doesn’t make either of us wrong.”
“But if you figure it out, and it’s not the way you want it, you can change it.”
“You can try,” he agreed. “ ‘There’s a divinity that shapes our ends, rough-hew them how we will.’ ” He inhaled smoke. “Hamlet.”
Caroline could only stare. He was the last man on earth she’d have expected to hear quoting Shakespeare.
“You take that field there.” He put a companionable arm around her shoulders as he turned her. “Now, that cotton—all things being equal—is going to grow. That topsoil’s better than a foot deep and full of fertilizer. We spray off the goddamn weevils and when summer’s gone it’ll be harvested, bailed, trucked, and sold. And my worrying myself sick about whether all those things are gonna happen won’t help the situation one bit. Besides, I’ve got an overseer to do the worrying.”
“There has to be more to it than that—” she began.
“We’re taking this down to the basics, Caro. It gets planted, it gets harvested, and somewhere along the line it ends up in a pretty dress like the one you’re wearing tonight. Sure, I could sit up nights worrying whether we’re going to get enough rain, or too much rain. Whether the truckers are going on strike, or those dimwits up in Washington are going to fuck up again and shuck us into a depression. Or I can get myself a good night’s sleep. The results would be exactly the same.”
With a half laugh, she turned to him. “Why does that make sense?” She shook her head. “There has to be a flaw in that logic.”
“You let me know if you figure it out, but I think it holds solid. Let me give you another example. You won’t let me kiss you because you’re worried you might like it too much.”
Her brows shot up. “That’s incredibly egocentric. The reason could very well be that I’m sure I won’t like it at all.”
“Either way,” Tucker said agreeably as his arms slid around her waist. “You’re trying to figure out the answer before there’s a problem. That’s the kind of thing that brings on headaches.”
“Really?” Her voice was dry, and she kept her arms at her sides.
“Trust me, Caroline, I’ve made a study on it. It’s like standing on the edge of a swimming hole, worrying about the water being too cold. You’d be better off if somebody put a foot to your butt and pushed you in.”
“Is that what you’re doing?”
His lips quirked in a grin. “I could tell you I was doing it for you, so you’d just fall in and stop thinking about the what-ifs. But the truth is—” He lowered his head. Something twisted inside her when his warm breath fluttered over her lips. “Thinking about this is keeping me up at night.” He gave her chin a playful nip. “And I need my sleep.”
Her body was stiff as his lips, light as moth wings, cruised over hers. Practiced seduction, she told herself as her heart began to thud. She hadn’t forgotten how clever some men were at exploiting a woman’s needs.
“You can kiss me back if you want to,” Tucker murmured against her mouth. “If you don’t, I’ll just please myself.”
First, he indulged in a lazy journey of her face, lips tracing along her temples, over her closed lids, down her cheeks. The gentleness in him was too ingrained for him to heed the urgency growing inside him to rush and take. Instead, he concentrated on her first faint shiver, on that gradual, glorious softening of her body against his. On the quickening of her breath as he slowly, quietly, brought his mouth back to hers.
And oh, it was nice, so nice, to feel that slow, female yielding, to hear that quick hitch of her breath, to smell her over the scent of water and shadows as he eased them both into the kiss.
This time her lips parted at the first touch. As he increased the pressure, degree by tormenting degree, her hands shot up to grip his arms. His last coherent thought was that the water wasn’t cold, but it was a hell of a lot deeper than he’d expected.
She couldn’t think at all, not with this steady roaring in her ears. She had grabbed him for balance, but no matter how desperately she clung, the world kept spinning. Caution had gone up in smoke. With a quick, helpless moan, she dived into the kiss.
His mouth drank and drew from hers. But it wasn’t enough. The taste was hot, honeyed, and he craved more. Tongue and teeth drove the kiss into greater intimacies. Still he ached.
He wasn’t supposed to ache over a kiss. His head wasn’t supposed to swim when she locked herself around him. He wasn’t supposed to tremble when she moaned out his name.
He knew what it was to want a woman. It was a natural, pleasurable part of being a man. It didn’t rip at you or carve a hole in your gut. It didn’t make your knees shake until you were afraid you’d fall down on them and beg.
He felt himself teeter on some high, thin edge. Self-preservation had him windmilling his arms and stumbling back before he could fall. Carefully, he put his hands on her shoulders and drew her away. His brow rested weakly against hers while he struggled to catch his breath.
Caroline let her unsteady hands stay at his hips. Gradually, through the mist of sensation, she forced her thoughts to surface and hold. It had simply been too long since she’d felt the comfort of an embrace, or tasted genuine desire on a man’s lips. Those were reasons enough to excuse losing herself for a moment.
But she was back now. The blood was no longer pounding in her head. She could hear the whirl and click of insects, the croak of frogs. The sweet three-note call of a whippoorwill.
The light was shadowed, caught in that final magic moment between day and night. Already day was losing, ebbing away, and taking the passionate heat with it.
“I guess we both could’ve been wrong,” Tucker said.
“About what?”
“You figuring you wouldn’t care for it, and me thinking that once I’d kissed you, I’d sleep better.” On a long breath, he lifted his head. “I gotta tell you, Caroline, wanting a woman’s always been a pleasure for me. Since I was fifteen and Laureen O’Hara and I wrestled off each other’s clothes in her daddy’s barn. You’re the first woman I’ve come across since that monumental day who’s complicated that pleasure.”
She wanted to believe him, wanted to believe that what he’d felt here was more difficult, more intimate, more dangerous than anything he’d felt before. And because she did believe him, she was frightened enough to shake him off.
“I think it would be best if we left it alone.”
His gaze flicked down to her lips, swollen and soft from his. “In a pig’s eyes,” he said mildly.
“I mean it, Tucker.” A trace of desperation crept into her voice. “I’ve just ended a destructive relationship and have no intention of starting another. And you … your life certainly has enough complications at the moment without adding another.”
“Normally I might agree with that. You know, your hair looks just like a halo in this light. Maybe I want a shot at redemption. The angel and the sinner. Christ knows, there’s just about that much difference between us.”
“That’s the most ridiculous—”
His hand shot out quickly, so quickly she swallowed the rest of her words as it fisted into her hair. This time when he spoke, the mild tone was lined with steel. “Something about you, Caroline. I don’t know what the hell it is, but it eats at me at the oddest times. There’s usually a good reason for a reaction like t
hat. I figure it’ll come out sometime.”
“My time doesn’t flow the way yours does, Tucker.” She thought her voice was admirably calm, particularly when her heart was thudding in her throat. “In a few months I’ll be in Europe. A quick affair to pass a hot summer isn’t in my plans.”
The ghost of a smile lit his mouth. “You do make plans. I’ve noticed that about you.” He stepped forward and crushed her lips under his in a hard, brief kiss that rocked her back on her heels. “I’m going to have you, Caroline. Sooner or later we’re going to have the hell out of each other. I’ll try to leave the timing up to you.”
“That’s the most outrageously arrogant, despicably male statement I’ve ever heard.”
“Depends on your point of view,” he said affably. “I meant it as fair warning. But I don’t want to get you so riled up it spoils your digestion.” Clamping his hand over hers, he started back toward the house. Lightning bugs were glinting and dancing in the growing dark. “Why don’t we sit on the porch awhile?”
“I have no intention of sitting anywhere with you.”
“Now, honey, you talk like that, I’m going to think you find me irresistible.”
Her quick hoot of laughter made him grin. “The day I can’t resist some self-styled delta Don Juan—”
He gave a hoot of his own and scooped her off her feet to swing her in a circle. “I’m crazy about that sassy mouth of yours.” He gave it an enthusiastic kiss. “I bet you went to one of those fancy finishing schools in Switzerland.”
“I did not, and put me down.” She squirmed for a minute. “I mean it, Tucker. Someone’s coming.”
He didn’t put her down, but he did look across the lawn. A pair of headlights were coming fast. “I guess we’ll just mosey on over and see who’s calling.”
He carried her to the drive as much to fluster her as for the pleasure of having that long, slim body cupped in his arms. And he figured once she got over being irritated by it, she’d see the romance.
“First star’s out,” he said conversationally, and she made a sound suspiciously like a growl.
“You know, you don’t weigh much more than a sack full of flour. Feel a lot nicer though.”
“The man’s a poet,” Caroline said between her teeth, and wished she didn’t see the humor of it.
He couldn’t resist. “ ‘Fair as a star, when only one is shining in the sky.’ ” He sent her a smile. “I guess Wordsworth said it better, huh?”
Before she could think of a proper response, he set her on her feet, gave her bottom a friendly pat, then waved at Bobby Lee, who was scrambling out of his rusting Cutlass.
“Hey, boy, shouldn’t you be out sparking Marvella?”
“Tucker.” Bobby Lee pushed a hand through his drooping pompadour. In the headlights he’d neglected to turn off, his face was pale with fear or excitement. “I rode on out as soon as I finished.” He nodded belatedly to Caroline. “Evening, Miz Waverly.”
“Hello, Bobby Lee. If you’ll excuse me, I’d like to thank Della again for dinner before I leave.”
She hadn’t even taken the first step when Tucker captured her hand. “It’s early yet. What brings you out?” he asked Bobby Lee.
“Junior brought in your car this afternoon. Holy Jesus. It sure was a mess, Tucker.”
Tucker grimaced and touched fingers gingerly to his bandaged head. “Yeah, it’s a heartbreaker, all right. Barely had five thousand miles on her. Frame’s bent, then?”
“Well, yeah. Bent to shit—excuse me, ma’am. We saw that soon as we had her up on the lift. We figured you’d have to have her hauled down to Jackson, but seeing as we haven’t had a real good wreck come through since Bucky Larsson creamed his Buick out on sixty-one during that ice storm last January, we wanted a look-see.”
Tucker settled his hip against the Cutlass. “That Buick looked like it’d been run over by a tank when you towed it in. Never could figure out how Bucky got off with only a broken collar bone and eighteen stitches.”
“Gets a queer look in his eyes sometimes,” Bobby Lee added. “ ’Course he always did, now that I think on it.”
Tucker nodded. “His mama was spooked by a nest of copperheads when she was carrying him. Might have addled him.”
Caroline no longer felt the urge to leave. But she did have to resist the urge to cup her head in her hands and bray with laughter. “You came all this way to tell Tucker his car’s wrecked?”
The two men looked over at her with identical expressions of puzzlement. To them it was obvious Bobby Lee was only setting the stage for whatever he’d come to say.
“No, ma’am,” he said politely. “I come out to tell Tucker how his car come to be wrecked. Tucker here drives slick as spit. Everybody knows that.”
“Thanks, Bobby Lee.”
“Just telling it like it is. Well, the thing is, Junior mentioned as to how there wasn’t no skid marks or nothing.”
“Brakes were out.”
“Yeah. He said. So I got to thinking, and when Junior’s old lady kept calling, complaining how he’d promised to take her and the baby on down to Greenville for spaghetti, I told him I’d stay to watch the station. It’s quiet on Sundays anyhow, so I figured I’d take a look at those brakes for you.”
He pulled a piece of Double Bubble from his pocket, unwrapped it, and popped it into his mouth. “I took a good look at the lines, and at the hydraulics for the power steering, too. Might not’ve seen it if I hadn’t been so curious. But I did.”
“See what?” Caroline demanded when Tucker seemed content to let the silence hang.
“Holes poked through the lines. Not rotted or nothing like that, but poked through. Like with an awl, or maybe an ice pick. Fluid would’ve dribbled on out. That’s how your wheel seized up on you, see? You could’ve wrestled with it if you’da been expecting it, but coming up to a curve at a clip, well, the car’s gonna keep going dead ahead. Then you hit the brakes and they’re useless as tits on a bull. Beg your pardon, Miz Waverly.”
“My God.” Her fingers dug into Tucker’s arm. “Are you saying someone deliberately sabotaged the car? He could’ve been killed.”
“Could’ve,” Bobby Lee agreed. “But more like busted up some. Everybody ’round here knows Tucker handles a car as good as those Formula One guys.”
“I appreciate your coming down to tell me.” Tucker flipped his cigarette away, his eyes following the arch of spark. He was angry, blood-pumping angry, and needed to sit on it awhile. “You going by to see Marvella this evening?”
“I was planning on it.”
“Then you go on and tell the sheriff what you told me. But nobody else, hear? Don’t tell anybody else.”
“If that’s the way you want it.”
“For now. I’d be obliged if we keep it just like that for now. Get on back to town before Marvella lays into you for being so late.”
“Guess I will. Be seeing you, Tucker. Evening, Miz Waverly.”
Caroline didn’t speak until the Cutlass’s taillights winked off at the end of the drive. “He could’ve made a mistake. He’s just a boy.”
“He’s one of the best mechanics in the county. Makes sense anyway. If I hadn’t had my brains rattled, I’d’ve seen it myself. I just have to figure out who’s riled enough to give me trouble.”
“Trouble?” Caroline echoed. “Tucker, I don’t care what Bobby Lee believes about your superhuman skill with a car, you might have been seriously hurt, even killed.”
“You worried about me, sugar?” Though his mind was working in other directions, he smiled and ran his hands up and down her arms. “I like it.”
“Don’t be such a jerk.”
“Now, don’t get mad, Caro. Though God knows I like the look of you when you get heated up.”
Her voice chilled. “I’m not going to stand here while you pat me on the head and put me off like a helpless female. I’m offering to help you.”
“That’s sweet of you. No—” He grabbed her as she swore and swung
away. “I mean it. It’s just that until I sift the whole thing through, there’s nothing to help with.”
“It’s obvious to me that it had to be someone close to Edda Lou Hatinger.” She tossed her head. “Unless, of course, you’ve got a list of jealous husbands you need to consider.”
“I don’t date married ladies. Except that once,” he began, and caught her look. “Never mind. Austin’s in jail, and I can’t picture poor old Mavis scooting under my car with an ice pick.”
Caroline angled her chin. “She had brothers.”
“True enough.” Tucker’s lips pursed as he considered. “Vernon wouldn’t know a crankshaft from a fence post. He’s not the sly kind either. More open, like his daddy. And young Cy … there’s no meanness in him that I’ve ever seen.”
“They could have hired someone.”
Tucker snorted. “With what?” Gently, he pressed his lips to her temple. “Don’t fret, honey, I’m going to sleep on it.”
Staring, she stepped back. “I think you could,” she said slowly. “I believe you could actually close your eyes and sleep like a baby, even after this.”
“I already wrecked my car and banged my head,” he pointed out. “I don’t see why whoever did this should have the pleasure of keeping me from sleeping, too.” He got that look in his eye she was beginning to recognize. That gleam that sent off warning signals in her brain and flutters in her heart. “The only thing keeping me up at night is you. Now, if we were to …” He trailed off as another set of headlights bounced down the drive. “Christ almighty, we’re doing big business tonight.”
“I’m going now,” Caroline said decisively. “I’ll call Della tomorrow and thank her.”
“Just hold on.” He was trying to make out the type of car. All he could tell for sure was that its muffler had parted ways sometime before. The noise was enough to wake the dead. It was difficult to believe that the sedate black Lincoln that came to a rocky stop in back of Caroline’s BMW could be so rude.
When the door opened and a small white-haired woman in a tie-dyed T-shirt, blue jeans, and army boots stepped out, Tucker broke into a hoot and a grin.