But underneath the bravado, her conviction wavered.
“There is another reason.”
“And that would be...?”
“Somebody’s got to carry the tree home.”
She hadn’t thought of that. She said so.
“There are a lot of things you haven’t thought of, like the advantages of being married to me.”
She should have known she couldn’t prevent this. “It’s not that I don’t appreciate the gallantry that brought about your change of heart, but the one advantage to being well and truly on the shelf is I’m not worried about being proper.”
That got her a look.
She shrugged. “A woman worries about being proper to safeguard her reputation so she’ll be seen as marriageable.”
“You don’t see yourself as desirable?”
She shrugged and trudged on. “There was a time when I wanted a family and home but I adjusted to my circumstances. A woman’s life can be rich in many ways outside of a husband and children.”
“You make it sound like you’re ancient.”
“For marriage, I am.”
He cut her a glance and fell into step beside her. “That was no crone in my bed last night.”
She could feel the blush start in her toes. “For heaven’s sake!”
His smile was pure devil. “No angel, either.”
“Oh, my God.” Stopping, she pressed her hands to her cheeks. He swung around in front of her. Protecting her, she realized, from the others’ view. “You are outrageous.”
“I prefer to think of it as honest.”
“I don’t see the need for that much honesty!”
“I’m sure, which brings us around to the point I wanted to make.”
“And what would that be?”
His gaze never wavered from hers. “There may be more reasons than your reputation for us to marry.”
Oh, heck. Had everyone but her thought of that? “It’s only been a day.”
“A day. A month. Pregnant is pregnant.”
She increased her pace and once again he caught her arm, pulling her back.
“Running away isn’t going to resolve anything.”
“I never run away,” she snapped back. “Walking fast helps me think.”
“What is there to think about?”
“The possibilities, remedies, the resolution.”
“The only resolution for you being with child is we get married.”
She wanted to stomp her feet and say no but the truth was, she wasn’t sure she had it in her to raise a child alone. She’d have to go back home in disgrace. And after all she’d said and done, she truly wasn’t sure how her father would handle that.
“I’m sure I’m not pregnant. It was only one time.”
He looked at her. “You realize it’s usually the man that usually makes that claim.”
“Well, it’s true. I’ve known women that have been trying for years to get with child.”
“And I’ve known foolhardy virgins that got pregnant their first time.”
“So how many of these foolhardy virgins are with your child?” she fired back.
He shook his head.
His silence just goaded her. “I’ve seen how you are with women.”
“You’ve seen me play with women who know the score. You have no idea how I am with my woman.”
His woman. She remembered that first kiss, the passion, the aggression. It made her nervous. It excited her. Oh, yes, she did know how he was. He was possessive and demanding. Not the type of man to let his wife have her projects.
“Well, I’m sure I’m not pregnant so—” she brushed her hands down her skirt “—there’s nothing to worry about.”
“I hope you are.”
She stumbled again, and he caught her. She didn’t know what annoyed her most, that he caught her off guard or that he was always there to catch her.
“Will you stop doing that?”
He didn’t do innocent well. “Stop doing what?”
“Stop saying things to shock me just to keep me off balance.”
Ahead of them, the children reached the trees. Hester was right behind them. They turned back. Even from here, their impatience was palpable.
She called out, “Start looking for the right one.”
“You’re going to have to be more specific than that,” Ace said.
“Why?”
“Because they’re children. They’re going to look for the biggest. And the biggest one isn’t going to fit in your house.”
“We’ll just have to do some trimming.”
“Uh-huh.”
Darn it. He was right again. “Do you always have to be right?”
“Yup.”
She gave him a hard glare before calling out, “Make sure that it’s one that will fit in the house.”
His chuckle just irritated her more. Which made no sense. His fingers slid down her arm, threaded through hers. Squeezed. And the irritation vanished.
“You’re safe, Pet.”
She didn’t think she’d ever feel safe again. “Thank you.”
With a tug he brought her around to face him again. She wanted to hide. His finger under her chin wouldn’t let her. “You could pretend to believe me.”
“What’s the point of starting to lie now?”
The squeeze on her hand coincided with the glide of his thumb across her lips, her shiver with his smile. “None at all.” Subtle pressure and her lips parted. His thumb entered, just the smallest bit. All the events of the previous night came flooding back. Her nipples tingled, and her knees weakened. “I won’t tolerate dishonesty from you.”
“Won’t tolerate?”
“You can scream, shout, curse and take a swing at me, but you—” he leaned in and kissed her “—won’t lie to me. Ever.”
She caught his wrist in her hand, her lips clinging to his even as she tried to pull his fingers away. “And what about you?”
His smile felt good against hers. “I’ll lie my ass off.”
“That’s not fair,” she laughed, not believing him at all.
“No, it isn’t.”
She took a step back. He allowed the distance but didn’t let her go. There was something comforting in that.
She tugged at her hand. “You are a very presumptive man.”
“But a good one to have around.”
His confidence was unparalleled.
“No comment.”
“I’m working on a lie.”
That got her a chuckle. He turned them toward the copse. She tugged harder at her hand. “Let go.”
“Why?”
She jerked her chin to Hester and the children. “They’ll get the wrong idea.”
“Ask me nicely.”
“Please.”
To her surprise, he released her.
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
With a tip of his hat he headed toward Hester and the children.
And she just stood there and watched him go, rubbing her tingling fingers against her thigh. She did not understand that man. With a shake of her head, she followed. Ace Parker was a puzzle, for sure.
* * *
“I LIKE THIS ONE,” Brenda said in her high-pitched little-girl voice, blue eyes smiling, ringlets bouncing. The tree she was standing in front of would fit in the parlor if they bent it double and hacked the branches in half, something Phillip was quick to point out and Brenda didn’t appreciate. The bickering that followed was normal. Brenda and Phillip were blossoming since coming to Providence. Terrance was another story.
Petunia sighed. She didn’t know what she was going to do with that boy. He brought se
rious with him everywhere. While the other children were running from tree to tree, touching their hands at the base, trying to come up with a formal decision, he just stood there at the edge of the copse, hands in his pockets, expression solemn, weighing them from afar.
Arms crossed over her chest, she walked up to him. “They won’t bite, you know.”
“I know.” His shoulders seemed to hunch inside themselves.
“Then why don’t you go join the others?”
He shook his head.
“Why not?”
Terrance didn’t raise his eyes. “’Cause I already made up my mind.”
“Just like that? From here?” Petunia asked.
He nodded. “Which one is it?”
He just shrugged again.
Phillip called her over.
“I’ll be right back.”
He was standing with Hester and Brenda, pointing to another big tree. If she took out the second floor of the house, it would fit. Hester rolled her eyes.
“Now we’ll see,” Phillip said to his mother.
“See what?” Hester asked.
“It has to be a grand tree,” Brenda insisted. “This is a grand tree.”
Phillip backed her. “It is a fine tree.”
“I don’t think it will fit in the house. It’s very tall.”
“It’ll fit.” His jaw set. “It will fit just fine.”
“No, it won’t.” Terrance had followed Petunia. “It’s bigger than two houses.”
A fight was clearly brewing between the boys.
“It’s not too big!”
“It is, too, dummy,” Terrance said.
“Shut up!”
“You shut up!”
And all that energy that had been feeding on tree hunting all of a sudden broke down into a fistfight. It was Terrance that threw the first punch, Phillip who landed it. The scuffle turned violent so quickly that Petunia could only gasp.
“Hey, there!” Hester said. “Break it up!”
Ace set the ax down and in one smooth move grabbed each boy by the back of their coats, pulling them apart. “Cut it out.”
They kept swinging. He knocked their heads together. They stopped swinging.
Petunia could only watch in awe. “I need to learn how to do that.”
Ace dropped the boys to their feet. Hester shook her head, grabbed each boy by the collar and shoved them. “Let’s go look over there.”
Brenda went skipping along, clearly more happy with the choosing process than she was on settling on a choice.
“Don’t forget to grab some pinecones,” Petunia called after them. “We can use them for decorating.”
“You’re dead set on this?” Ace asked, picking up his ax. “You’re going to take a pine tree, living outside in the woods, happy in its own little world, already sprouting pinecones, already thriving, cut it down, get up dead pinecones from other trees, bring them all into the house, hang them on the tree and call it a holiday?”
“For a gambler you lack imagination.”
“Is that what you plan on doing?”
“Yes, that’s what I’m planning on doing.”
“Why?”
“I told you. It’s a good tradition and it’s all the rage.”
“Are you that bored?”
“No, but it occurred to me that building a tradition would make Terrance feel part of something, and maybe he wouldn’t miss his dad so much and he’d begin to think of here as home.”
Ace shook his head. “You’re not going to be here next year, remember?”
“I’ll leave instructions for the next teacher.”
“The next teacher isn’t going to worry about imagination. The next teacher’s going to plunk her butt in that chair and collect her paycheck between shoving some ABCs down the kids’ throats.”
Not with her students, she wouldn’t. “That would be a waste of time. There are some very bright and inquisitive minds in this town.”
“And nobody’s going to give a shit about them after you leave.”
He had to keep pounding on that sore spot. “I couldn’t make a change anymore anyway.”
“You could if you married me.”
Nor that one. “The school I plan to build in San Francisco will help a lot of people.”
“You’re already helping a lot of people.”
“I’ll help a lot more people.”
“Which matters more, the scale of the help or the scale of the need? Because I guarantee you nobody needs you more than this little town right here.”
And you, she wanted to ask, do you need me? She bit her tongue, holding it back.
Hester called her over. This time the four of them were standing by a tree more suited to the size of the room. The only problem was it was a sorry little tree. It didn’t have many branches, and the ones it had grew at awkward angles. It was clearly being choked out by the bigger trees.
When she got close, Terrance stuck out his chin. The spot on his cheek where Phillip had struck him glowed red in the pale of his face. His face looked tighter and more angular, almost a little more adult, and she realized he was clenching his teeth.
“I like this one.”
“I don’t,” Phillip said.
“I don’t, either,” Brenda said.
Hester kept her opinion to herself. Ace didn’t say a word, just looked at her.
Petunia asked the only thing she could think of. “Why don’t you like it, Phillip?”
“It’s ugly.”
“I know,” Terrance said, “that’s why it’s perfect.”
With everybody watching him, Terrance got more quiet. He shoved his fists into his pockets. If a hole opened up in front of him, Petunia bet he’d jump right in it.
Ace walked up beside him and put his hand on his shoulder. The boy flinched, and then he relaxed.
“Why do you like it, son?”
“Because...” He paused then tried again, his voice a hush of sound. “Because Christmas is all about loving people no matter what, not just because they’re beautiful or perfect.”
“Still an ugly tree,” Phillip muttered.
Terrance nodded. “I know and nobody would ever want it, but I do. If we leave it here the bigger trees will just ignore it until one day it’ll lose its needles, and its branches will break off. But if we take it home and make it pretty, it will be something.”
“It will be dead,” Phillip said.
He nodded. “But it will be something before it dies.”
“We’re taking this one.” Surprisingly, it was Hester who spoke up.
“Terrance is right,” Petunia agreed, “Christmas is about charity and good feelings and doing the right thing. I think choosing this tree represents all of that.”
“Everything should be wanted,” Terrance added, touching the little pine needles on a spindly branch. “Even an ugly tree.”
There was silence, then Phillip nodded. “This is our tree.”
Hester was trying not to cry but Petunia felt a tear leaking down her own cheek. Ace glanced over.
“You’re mush,” he told her.
“So are you.”
“What makes you think that?” He hefted the ax. “I’m the one going to murder it.”
“You’re sending it to glory. That’s not the same thing.”
He swung the ax. “Tell it to the tree.”
* * *
LATER THAT DAY, she and Ace were sitting in the kitchen sipping coffee. The tree had been set into a bucket of earth and plunked optimistically in the parlor. The children had had their hot chocolate, a special treat, indeed, and Hester had taken them upstairs claiming she was going to bed herself. Some chaperone she turned out to be.
<
br /> “What were you thinking about when Terrance said everything deserved to be wanted?”
“What made you think I was thinking about anything?”
She rolled her eyes. “All of us thought of something. Terrance thought of his dad. Hester thought of her husband. Her children thought of their father. I thought of, well, it’s pretty obvious what I thought of, and it occurs to me you must have thought of something, too.”
“I’m Hell’s Eight. I belong. I’ve always belonged.”
“You live in a saloon. You date women with whom you’ll never have a future, and you’re about as far away from Hell’s Eight as you can get. You thought of something.”
He shrugged. “Some things just don’t need putting into words.”
“I disagree.”
Ace took a sip of his coffee. “Lucky for me, you don’t tell me what to do.”
“You seem to feel you can tell me what to do.”
“That’s because of who I am and who you are.”
“What does that even mean?”
“It means I like to give orders, and you like to follow them.”
She almost choked on her coffee. “Whatever gave you that idea?”
“Are you saying you don’t?”
“I’m saying I can bring you out a line of witnesses a mile long that would dispute that claim.”
“Uh-huh.” The look he cut her from beneath his lashes slid over her senses with the smooth decadence of warm melted chocolate. “Spread your legs, Pet.”
“You’re outrageous.”
“You’re aroused.” He took a sip of his coffee.
It wasn’t a question.
He was right. She didn’t know whether to be angrier that she’d responded or that he knew about it.
“That doesn’t mean anything.”
“It means a hell of a lot to me.”
She played with her coffee cup because she didn’t have anything else to do with her hands.
He sighed and placed his hand over her cup, putting an end to her fidgeting. “Didn’t your mother tell you anything about passion?”
“My mother died when I was young.”
“So did mine.”
“Mine died of pneumonia.”
He nodded. “Mine at the hands of Mexican soldiers.”
She’d heard the stories. “It’s a sad thing to have in common.”
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