His hands gripped her head painfully tight. His mouth ground on hers, rasping the pinprick stubble of his beard against her lips and cheeks and chin. He was trembling; those strong hands shook against her head—and Ada’s heart sang. She could hardly breathe, could hardly think, and she didn’t care. This was what she’d wanted for weeks, for weeks and weeks. She hooked her hands around his wrists—
He reared back, snatching his hands from her grasp, and gaped at her, panting and flushed.
“I’m sorry. Ah, Ada, I’m—”
“NO!” Ada lunged forward and caught hold of the bib of his overalls before he could reel backward more, out of her reach. “Don’t be sorry, Jonah. Please don’t be sorry! I want it! I want you!”
If she’d had a moment to think, maybe she’d have tempered her words. Maybe doubt or self-consciousness—or her lingering fretfulness that to love Jonah was to be unfaithful to George—would have stilled her tongue. But she was overcome and breathless, and all she could think was to keep him, not to let him out of her reach again.
“Ada?”
“Please, Jonah. Don’t go away.”
He laughed, just two short syllables, too blunt to be a chuckle but not much more than that. Ada thought it might have held the first glimpse of true humor she’d ever seen in him, though it was cloaked in melancholy. “You’re the one goes away, darlin’.”
They both went away from each other—Ada down the mountain, and Jonah into the shadows. But he was right: she would need to go very soon, in mere minutes, so she didn’t travel home in the dark.
She didn’t care, and she didn’t want him to care. It would be enough. They could make it enough. She tugged on his overalls. “Please.”
Instead of coming to her, Jonah put his hands on her arms and drew her to him. He brought her all the way, until she was pressed firmly to his chest, and she craned her neck to keep her eyes on his.
He licked his lips.
Ada licked hers.
He bent his head.
She rose up on her toes. She lifted her arms, and he let them go, sweeping his hands around her back, wrapping each arm fully around her.
His mouth reached hers. This time, the touch was gentle, even hesitant. He brushed his lips over hers, back and forth.
Ada set aside every single thought in her head and devoted her whole self, mind and body and soul, to physical sensation.
He was so big and hard, and yet so gentle, so soft. Ada felt the silky-spiky touch of his lips and stubbly mouth through every part of her body, the pleasure rushing with her blood through even the tiniest of veins. Her fingers tingled as they curled into his hair. Her toes curled in her boots. Her heart pounded, filling her ears with the rhythm of her very life. She ached and throbbed in her deepest places.
He groaned softly, and his lips parted. Ada felt the touch of his tongue, and opened her mouth. Her tongue touched his, and she felt it like a starburst. It set off something in him as well—his hold of her tightened, and he lifted her up so her toes lost contact with the floor.
Her body touched his from her mouth to her toes. She felt his desire for her, pressing firmly against her thigh. An impulse shot through her, to wrap herself around him, to coil her legs around his waist and capture that part of him at the point of her body where it belonged, but she shoved the urge away. That wasn’t the kind of woman she was. Not even married had she behaved in such a way, and this was her first kiss with Jonah. Or her second, she supposed, though she hadn’t had a chance to participate in that first one.
Remembering himself, Jonah set her back on the floor and ended the kiss. He stayed close, however, resting his forehead on hers, bringing a hand up to slide it along the side of her head. “You are an angel,” he murmured.
The light in this room had dimmed noticeably; the sun had set below the walls of the holler. The valley that was Cable’s Holler was narrow and steep, and they were high on the mountain, so dusk came earlier here than elsewhere, but still—Ada had to go soon, or she wouldn’t get home while there was any light. The moon tonight would barely be a crescent; the night would be pitch dark and dangerous.
If only she could stay the night. But her parents would worry.
She closed her eyes and blocked out the waning light. She held on to this man, who held on to her.
He moved to kiss her again, but stopped just before their lips met. Frowning, he leaned back, setting his hand on her chin. With his thumb, he brushed the scar, which was still red, but fading. “What happened here?”
“A silly accident.” He didn’t need to know more than that.
With a glance at her eyes, he accepted her statement as truth and kissed the scar. His lips skimmed up from that point to her lips, and Ada opened her mouth at once. She could kiss him like this forever.
The children chose that moment to return to the house. Talking together, they clomped onto the porch. Elijah was explaining about how chickens made eggs, and not getting very close to right. Ada made a note to add animal husbandry to her lessons.
With a breathy chuckle—and yes, that little laugh truly was free of anything but soft, sweet feeling—Jonah set Ada from him and turned to the door.
Feeling nearly as dizzy as she had when her head had been wounded, Ada gripped the back of the nearest chair and tried to reclaim some sense of equanimity.
Barely fifteen minutes later, Jonah walked Henrietta to the front of the house while Ada said goodbye to the children. He fixed her saddlebags behind her saddle and stood at her horse’s head to watch her walk toward him.
Elijah and Bluebird were on the porch, arm in arm, waving. With that youthful audience, Ada refrained from falling into Jonah’s arms. She simply smiled up at him and didn’t touch him.
“Well, take care. I’ll be back in two weeks.”
He gifted her with another chuckle. What a wonderful sound that was, the light waft of humor from his deep chest.
“Ada.”
As her name came from his lips, he took her hand and pulled her close. Right before his children’s eyes, he bent and kissed her. His mouth was closed, and it didn’t last long, but she was woozy nonetheless when he lifted his head from hers.
He studied her eyes, moving back and forth as if he read her thoughts. She saw the same thoughts, the same feelings, reflected in his dark eyes.
“I’ll be countin’ the days,” he murmured. He stepped back and offered his hand to help her into the saddle.
Chapter Sixteen
Carrie Mae Kinder took one of Ada’s scrapbooks down from a shelf. “I made that recipe for whatucallit—them stuffed peppers. ‘Cept I didn’t have no green peppers, so I scooped out some green tomaters. Didn’t hold up too good.” She blushed as she handed the book over to Ada. “Got some grease on the page. I tried to clean it up, but the words got smeared. Sorry, ma’am.”
Inwardly, Ada sighed. If the words were smeared, she’d have to replace the page, and she’d typed that recipe up at the library. Outwardly, though, she smiled. “Don’t worry, Carrie Mae. Recipes are supposed to get stained. That’s what happens when they’re used and enjoyed. I’m sorry the green tomatoes didn’t work.”
“Oh, they worked fine. I just mushed ever’thin’ up and served it up that way, and they all ate it good. Made the squirrel meat taste real nice. You know squirrel usually got that funny smell, but with the ‘maters it smelled fine.”
“Well, that’s good, then.” She tucked the scrapbook into her pack and pulled out her ledger. As she sat down to write in the newest entry for the Kinder family, she glanced out the side window and saw that, up the hill, the roof had caved in on the Hooper cabin. She sighed. Sweet old Mr. Hooper had caught the same cold Ada had gotten the previous winter. He’d been so weak already, he’d apparently died within an hour of the fever setting in. Mrs. Hooper’s family, the children who’d grown and left the mountain, had come and collected her, taken her from the only home she’d ever known, and in the months since, their old cabin, which had nurtured generations o
f life, was abandoned and falling to the will of the mountain.
“I hope Mrs. Hooper’s happy,” she mused.
Carrie Mae went to the window and peered out. “I know she is. She got her grandbabies all around her. And they in Georgia, where it’s warm all the time. Sometimes, where you always been just ain’t home no more, and you gotta make yourself a new one.”
Home wasn’t a place. Home was people. Without Mr. Hooper, that house she’d shared with him, and the mountain it was built on, was nothing but a place.
Ada finished her entry and returned the ledger to her pack. “You’re right, of course. Is there anything else you need before I go?”
Carrie Mae turned around. “Next time, you think you could bring up one of them Hollywood magazines? Dottie and Homer went all the way down to Callwood for they anniversary, stayed in a hotel and ever’thing, and they went to a pitcher show. Dottie ain’t stopped talkin’ ‘bout it since. A Star Is Born, they seen. You know it?”
“I’ve heard of it, but I haven’t seen it.” Ada had only seen two pictures in her life, both with George, while he was courting her: The Public Enemy and Dracula. “I’ll see if I can get a recent copy of a celebrity magazine for next time.” Mrs. Pitts would probably have something to say about that; she thought reading material should be ‘significant’ in some way—by which she meant enlightening, practical, or thought-provoking. Convincing her that a celebrity rag was any of those things would take all of Ada’s rhetorical skill.
“Thank you, Mizz Ada! I’d sure love to see them stars.”
Reading should also be enjoyable. Fantasy and daydreaming had their benefits as well.
Ada had spent no small portion of her hours alone on the mountain engaged wholeheartedly in daydreaming. In a few days, her route would finally take her back to Jonah. She’d been filling the days without him reliving their kisses in every detail.
The Kinders were her last family on this day’s route. Though she had more stops on this day than any other, and the day was usually almost as long as when she saw Jonah and the children, today Elmer Kinder and their boys had been out fishing. Only Carrie Mae and their baby girl at home, and Carrie Mae was making the most of her nearly empty house. Ada’s visit there was much shorter than usual, and when Henrietta put her hooves on the road that led home, the sun hadn’t yet touched the horizon.
Ada felt good. She had a couple hours of daylight left—a rare treat on her riding days—and it was a good summer day, with a blue sky full of puffy white clouds, the fresh, rich smell of a green mountain in the air, and a breeze soft enough to blow the humidity away without tossing things about. She and Henrietta had been treated to a nice lunch with one family, and a cool rest with fresh strawberries and cream with another, and now she’d be home in time to make a good supper for her folks. Henrietta would even get a chance to play in the pasture for an hour or so before she got put up for the night.
As she rode toward the gate, she decided she was going to take a long bath after supper and put some drops of rose water in. She’d lie there in candlelight and think of Jonah.
The first glimmer of disquiet she felt came while she was unsaddling Henrietta and brushing her down. Normally, her father came out when she got home. Either he met her as she rode up, or, if he was feeling sore and moving slowly, he showed up while she was grooming Hen. The few times he hadn’t come out at all, he’d had a very bad day and was having trouble getting around at all.
She revised her plan for a long, soaking bath. Instead, she’d draw a bath for her father and put some salts in.
After she turned Henrietta loose—the horse celebrated with three big kicks and then tore off toward the trees—and tidied up the grooming supplies and her tack, she went out the front of the barn. The sun had met the horizon, and its color had deepened to ruddy gold. The house was quiet. No lights were on, but her father was slow to use electricity and never turned lights on until they were fumbling around in the dark. These days since she’d had this good job, Ada was more liberal in her use; she didn’t like to squint at her ingredients or her stitching, or her books, so as soon as the natural light dimmed enough to obscure her purpose at all, she turned on the electric variety.
There was nothing particularly unusual around her—not precisely normal, but not beyond the reach of her experience. The most likely situation was that her elderly father, who worked far too hard for a seventy-five-year-old man, had had a rough day and was resting.
And yet Ada approached the house with foreboding.
She went in the side door, as usual, into the kitchen. It was dark and quiet. Two mugs were upended on the drainboard beside the sink, but there were no other dishes out, either clean or dirty. The coffeepot sat on the cookstove, but the fire wasn’t lit.
For both her parents to be resting—sleeping—at this time of day would be highly unusual. In fact, it had never happened, in Ada’s knowing.
“Daddy? Momma?” she called out, but not loudly. Something, some sixth sense, tamped down her voice. She got no response.
Now, Ada was truly frightened. Something was wrong. Very wrong.
In an act of pure, unreasoned instinct, she eased open a drawer and pulled out carving knife. Easing her way, careful where she put her feet, brandishing the knife before her, she went to the front room.
The first thing she saw was the radio. That gift she and George had saved for was smashed on the rug in the middle of the room. A table was upended, and the lamp that sat on it was shattered.
Where were her parents?
“Daddy? Momma?” This time, she barely made a sound at all. Her throat had cramped with fear.
She fumbled on the wall and pushed the switch, and the single lamp left in the room flickered on. That one bulb threw long shadows from the far corner, but Ada saw enough. There was a dark stain on the old rug, and a dark smear trailing from it, toward the hall to the bedrooms and bath.
Still holding the knife so it pointed outward, Ada crouched and put her fingers in that smear. It was cold and tacky. She brought her fingers to her nose, but she knew what she’d smell: blood.
“Daddy? Momma?” Tears landed on her chest, inside her shirt.
Pointing the knife toward the back of the house, Ada followed that sweep of drying blood.
Her father lay prone in the hallway. She saw his feet and legs first, and the hall was dark. She was falling to her knees in the sliver of floor at his side before she saw his head and face. His head was bloody and oddly shaped, with a strange blunt edge near the back, and a depression where blood had made a pool.
His eyes were open.
Remembering what she’d been taught, she lifted his wrist and checked for a pulse she knew she wouldn’t find.
“Daddy! Daddy! Oh no!”
From her bedroom, her mother moaned.
“Momma? Momma!” Ada jumped up and hurried to her parents’ bedroom, trying to remember to be vigilant but desperate to get to her mother.
She found her on the floor, curled into the narrow space between her bureau and the wall. Her arms were wrapped over her head.
“Momma! Momma!’ Ada dropped the knife and ran to her. When she tried to hold her, to check that she was alright, her mother flinched and cried out.
“It’s me, Momma! It’s Ada!”
“Ada Lee?” She flung her seeking hands out, and Ada let her feel her face. “Ada Lee!” Her hands clawed at Ada, dragging her close. “Ada Lee!”
“I’m here, Momma. I’m here. I’m here.” She held her sobbing mother as hard as she could.
“Is it over? Is he gone? Where’s your daddy? Where’s Zeke?”
Ada had dropped the knife in her hurry to get to her mother. She didn’t know if it was over, or if the man who’d done this was gone. But she did know where her daddy was.
Ada burst into tears.
“I smell it.”
“What?”
“Your daddy’s blood. I smell it. He’s gone, ain’t he?”
She didn’t know
how long they’d sat together, wound together. Their tears had stopped at some point. When Ada lifted her head and looked around, night had fallen.
“Yes.” The word broke in two as Ada said it.
But her mother didn’t cry again. “I think I felt him go, when it happened.”
Ada tightened her hold around her mother’s small body. Now that the initial burst of cruel shock had eased, Ada could think around her heartbreak, and her mind spun, sorting out all the things that had to happen now, all the things she had to do.
First, she had to know they were out of danger.
“Momma, I have to check the rest of the house. I have to make sure the one who did this is gone.” She had no idea who he was. In her mind, he was a monster, worse than anything the nightmares of her childhood had designed.
“No! No, baby girl, don’t!”
“Momma, I have to.”
“Don’t leave me!”
“Momma, please. You were safe in this hiding place before. Just stay right here, and you’ll be safe still.” She didn’t know that to be true at all, but she couldn’t lead her blind mother around the house while she made sure the man who’d murdered her father was gone.
“I don’t care about me, Ada Lee. I don’t care if I live or die. But I don’t want you hurt!”
Ada’s chest was full of clawing beasts, tearing her heart to shreds. “Momma. Please. I have to check.” She wrenched herself free from her mother’s desperate grasp, fumbled in the dark for the knife, and went out of the bedroom.
She closed the door quietly. There were only three other rooms to check—her bedroom, the bathroom, and the little added-on room where the gas heater was. She pushed on every switch she came to and brandished the knife through each doorway.
They were alone. Just her mother and her, and her father’s dead body.
In her room, her bureau drawers were open, and her things tossed about. She had only a few belongings of any real sentimental value, and only one thing of actual value.
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