by Paty Jager
“Do you think it will look like this again while we’re here? I’d love to draw it.”
Allie’s awe and reverence drew his gaze to her alone. She stood still, her eyes moving slowly as her gaze traveled over the lake, mountain, and everything in between and around.
“This is just the beginning of summer. I’m pretty sure there will be more evenings like this.”
“I hope so.” She faced him and smiled. Her eyes sparkled and her lips were tipped in an infectious grin. “This is going to be a wonderful place to camp. I can feel it.”
He shook his head and grinned. “I have a feeling you’ll be doing more drawing than looking for a mine.”
Her face sobered and her eyes took on a fierce gleam. “I will draw, but I have to find the mine. It’s the only way I can be assured my sisters and brother will be provided for and I can spend the rest of my life drawing.”
Isaac didn’t completely understand her need to provide for her siblings. They were all married and should be taking care of themselves. All she needed to worry about was herself and if she’d get over her stubborn attitude toward marriage, he could make her life comfortable.
“I thought you said they were all married. Why should you have to worry about providin’ for them?” Rather than mulling it all over again and again he decided to just flat out ask her the questions that had been plaguing him since she’d insisted on finding the mine for the family.
“They are married. My sisters married men of good standing and shouldn’t want for anything. But if I can set up a bank account with money for them, if their marriages become unbearable they will have money to leave their husbands.”
He stared at her. “You say that like you expect their marriages to fail. There are many marriages that last. My grandparents were such. They loved and cared for one another until their dyin’ days.”
He grasped her chin gently and raised her face to look in his eyes. “Allie, you can’t judge all marriages on one.” Her mouth started to open. “Or a half a dozen. Many marriages last the lifetime of the couples.”
Her eyes moved up and down as she gazed at his eyes, his lips, and then his eyes.
He wanted to kiss her. Show her the headiness of a kiss. He lowered his head, keeping his eyes open, watching, waiting, to see if she would stop him.
His lips hovered over hers. Her big brown eyes stared into his. Her breathing sped up. Brushing his lips softly across hers, his senses came alive.
Her eyes widened and her lips formed an O as the word, “Oh!” slid passed her lips.
She didn’t push him away or say to stop. He pressed his lips to hers softly, brushing back and forth creating more sensations that nearly buckled his knees. This woman’s innocence was knocking the stuffing out of him and he didn’t care.
Her arms looped around his neck and her body pressed to his.
He still had enough of his mind to know to let her cling to him. He deepened the kiss. Stroking his tongue across the seam of her lips.
He expected her lips to open but never dreamed she’d meet his tongue with hers. Heat and sparks from their encounter traveled down his body and brought his member throbbing to life. She had no idea how her innocent actions had lit his body on fire.
Pulling back, releasing her arms from his neck, he gazed into her eyes. Her brown eyes were afire with desire. Isaac groaned and put even more space between them.
“Allie, darlin’, you just set my body on fire.” Isaac plucked his hat from his head and wiped a sleeve across his perspiring forehead.
Her eyes blinked several times and she fanned her face. “I never knew kissing someone could be so… pleasurable.” Her cheeks darkened.
He grinned, happy she had the same reaction to him. “Let’s get settled before it gets any darker.”
***
Alamayda’s cheeks heated every time she thought of the kiss and how Isaac had said her kisses had set his body on fire. She could have said the same about his kisses. If her arms hadn’t been over his shoulders and around his neck, she would have melted to the ground.
Did everyone feel that way when they kissed? She pondered that as she dumped beans in the pot. Once they bubbled, she plopped dumplings on top and let them cook.
Isaac had the tent up and the mule unloaded. The animal was grazing happily in knee high grass.
“What’s for supper, I’m hungry?” Isaac asked, dragging a downed log next to the fire. He sat and rubbed his hands together expectantly.
“Beans and dumplings.” Alamayda lifted the lid and poked at a dumpling. Almost ready.
“Beans and dumplings? I’ve never had dumplings with beans.” Isaac stared at the pot.
“There were days after Father left that I didn’t have enough flour for bread, but I could mix up a dumpling and cook it on top of whatever I was cooking. Salt pork and water. Potatoes and water.” There had been many lean years until she and the girls, and eventually Alan, could all work the land and have more goods to sell. They couldn’t afford labor.
Isaac grasped her hand closest to him. “I know you’ve had some tough times, had to be a parent when you were still a kid.”
He peered into her eyes and Alamayda saw his empathy and a softness she remembered seeing in her ma’s eyes before she was sick. Her heart squeezed and her stomach twisted. He was staring at her with love in his eyes.
She pulled her hand from his and set all her attention on the food in the pot. Her mind was spinning like a top. He can’t love me. I don’t want someone to love me or to love them. What am I going to do?
“Allie, what’s wrong?” Isaac’s voice held some hurt but more it questioned.
What do I say? She filled a plate with beans and dumplings and handed it to him.
“We shouldn’t have kissed. I-I shouldn’t have allowed it.” She spooned the rest of the food onto her plate, keeping her attention on the plate.
“There was nothin’ wrong with us kissin’. It’s natural when a man and woman like one another.” He forked the food into his mouth.
“I’ve liked other people and not kissed them.” She wasn’t going to allow it to happen again. Her fondness for Isaac wouldn’t change her mind about being better off alone than relying on a man and having him leave her with nothing because he had an itch. She pushed the food around on her plate. Her thoughts and insides were tied in knots. Food was the last thing she wanted at the moment. What she needed was solitude and her journal. To write about her feelings and get them out. It always helped when she was upset.
“I’ll see you in the morning.” She set the plate down and stood.
“You haven’t eaten. You need to eat. That was a long hard walk we made today.” Isaac picked up her plate and handed it to her. “If you need to get away from me, take the food with you.”
She started to protest she wasn’t running from him, but she did need the space and the quiet to think and write. Instead, she took the plate, figuring from his wrinkled brow and narrowed eyes, he would follow her into the tent with the food to make sure she did eat.
“I’ll see you in the morning.” She carried the plate into the tent and lit the lantern hanging from the middle tent pole. She sat cross-legged on her bedroll, pulled her journal out of her valise and started writing all her feelings and thoughts since stepping off the train in Sweetwater Springs.
Her stomach grumbled. Alamayda put the journal aside, flexed her fingers on her writing hand and picked up the plate. The beans and dumplings were cold. Outside the tent was dark. She’d long ago heard Isaac cleaning up the dishes and preparing to sleep. Opening her pin watch she noted it was midnight, and she hadn’t even started writing about today, the beautiful lake, the kiss.
Quickly shoveling in the food, she swallowed, set the plate aside and started writing about today. The events of today had triggered her need to write.
Chapter Twenty-two
Isaac woke to the chatter of birds and the sun shining on his face. It was the first time since they left Morgan’s Cros
sing he wasn’t up before the sun. He’d been dead tired last night but had trouble falling asleep wondering and worrying about if he shouldn’t have kissed Allie. Something about his actions last night had sent her fleeing to the tent.
He’d seen her hunched over. He’d presumed she was drawing. But what could she draw while hiding in the tent? Perhaps she had a good memory and could recall the lake as they’d seen it when they arrived. It was that scene that had urged him to kiss her.
Sitting up, he slapped his hat on his head and headed into the trees to take care of business. After that, he wandered to the lake and splashed cold water on his face. He grinned thinking about the first time Allie stepped into this lake thinking she’d take a bath. The water was fresh snow melt. Cold enough to turn a person blue. That would be a sight, seeing her hopping around at the edge of the water.
He glanced over his shoulder to the tent. Still no movement. He dipped the coffee pot into the lake, carrying it back to the fire pit. A small pile of sticks still remained of what he’d scrounged up last night. Digging into the ashes, he found some embers and slowly coaxed the fire to life. He set the coffee pot on a rock in the middle and waited—for the water to boil and Allie to make an appearance. They only had to travel a mile to the other end of the lake. If she needed to sleep in as he had, then he could wait.
After a cup of coffee and a handful of dried apples he found in the food box, Isaac headed away from the lake looking for some meat. Now that they were going to be staying in one place they could have some good meals.
***
Alamayda opened her eyes. Sun shone bright and warm into the tent. She twisted and moaned from the aches in her back. Stretching, reaching with her hands and pointing her toes, she tried to get all the kinks straightened. Her watch had said it was after two in the morning when she’d finally put her journal aside and slipped into her bedroll, never taking off any of her clothes. The long or short night, however one looked at it, had been worth it.
She’d laid out all her emotions in her journal and realized she might be falling in love. It had stalled her writing for nearly thirty minutes as she’d battled with herself in her head. Never had she believed she could love someone, especially a man. She’d thought perhaps a child or a pet, but never a man who could walk away and leave her with nothing.
Writing down the way she felt and how her body reacted to Isaac before and during the kiss, Alamayda realized she had several of the symptoms her sisters had shown while being courted by their husbands. This realization scared her more than the man who’d treated her roughly at the school. Physically wounded, a body would heal, but emotionally… She had scars from caring for her ma and her father leaving her to deal with her siblings when she still wished to be free like the others her age.
The coffee pot banging and shuffling around the tent, shook her from her thoughts. Alamayda rose, pulled on her boots and best false face, and left the tent.
Isaac stood by the mule adding items to the pack. He glanced over his shoulder. The way his gaze searched her face and his lips didn’t curl in a smile, she could tell he didn’t know what to say.
“Sorry I slept so long. I was up a long time writing.” She picked up the hot pad, snatching the coffee pot out of the fire.
“Writin’? That’s what you were doin’? I thought maybe you were drawin’ the lake.” Isaac walked to the fire and stood beside her.
She sipped the strong brew and peered at him over the cup. He still scrutinized her. Her actions must have stirred him up. Alamayda lowered the cup. “Are we headed to the other end of the lake today?”
“Yeah. I didn’t wake you because we have only a mile or so to go. While I was hunting, I found a nice spot in the trees to set up our camp. And it’s close to a stream. The only way someone at the lake would find us would be by the smoke from our fire. We won’t be out in the open.”
Alamayda nodded. “I’ll get your breakfast cooked, and we can get moving.” She sat on the log by the fire and picked up the skillet, setting it on a flat rock at the edge of the fire.
“You could just make biscuits. I have a deer strung up at the place we’ll make camp. We’ll have fresh meat for a while.” Isaac hadn’t moved and he continued to watch her.
“Biscuits it will be,” she said, taking the lid off the food box and pulling out the flour, saleratus, and lard. She measured the ingredients into a bowl and started mixing the lard in with her fingers.
Isaac finally moved off, taking the tent down.
She added enough water to get the dough moist and patted the dough into biscuits. Placing the lid on the bake oven, she shoved the cast iron cooker in the coals of the fire. Alamayda stood to go empty the chamber pail she used during the night and clean up.
The tent canvas covered the items still in the tent. Isaac pulled on the canvas. This was the first morning he took the tent down without her getting her things out first. As the canvas dragged across the items half of them went with the canvas. She saw the outline of the chamber pail too late to stop him. It was tipped under the canvas.
Alamayda ran over and picked up the canvas to keep it from dragging through the excrements. She stepped around the mess on the ground, thankfully seeping into the ground and not toward her belongings.
Isaac stopped. “You don’t need to help.”
“You were dragging my belongings with the tent.” She motioned with her head behind her.
His gaze moved over her shoulder and his face darkened in color. “Sorry. I forgot your things were still in there.”
She dropped the tent and moved to gather up her stuff, placing it by the pile of supplies waiting by the mule to be packed. Before picking up the chamber pail, she checked the biscuits. They were nearly done. She pulled them out of the coals, sitting the pan on a rock at the side of the fire.
Turning to pick up the chamber pail, her heart lodged in her throat. Isaac was staring at the pail laying on its side.
Alamayda rushed over to stand between him and the pail. “I can take care of this.”
His gaze roamed over her face. “Why is there a bloody rag in there?”
Mortification raced heat through her body but made her feet and hands feel like icicles. She tried to find the words. Her mouth opened and shut but no words came forth.
“Are you sick or hurt? Why haven’t you told me?” Isaac grasped her arms gently. “What’s wrong? Is bein’ sick really why you’re out here? You didn’t want to die at home with your sisters and brother?”
That snapped her voice back into her. “No! No, I would never lie to my family or to you.”
“Then what is this.” He motioned with one of his hands.
Alamayda blew out air and stared at the top button on Isaac’s vest. There was no way she could tell him something so intimate staring into his eyes. She’d had difficulty explaining it to her sisters and her brother when he asked about the rags in a bucket Alamayda had planned to wash that day.
“You said your mother died when you were small and you didn’t have any sisters.”
“Yes. What has that to do with you bleeding?”
Alamayda moved backwards and he released her arm. “Women bleed once a month.”
When he didn’t say anything for several minutes, she glanced at his face.
His forehead was wrinkled in thought. A trait she found endearing about him.
“Like female animals that have a season?”
She’d forgotten he was a farm boy. “Yes, only instead of coming seasonally, women have this problem every month.”
His eyes narrowed. “Is that why you looked so pale a few days back?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you say somethin’? I would have—”
“I’m not one of those women who uses the curse as a way to get favors and lie around. I’ve always had to work during these times.”
“Don’t bite my head off. I won’t mollycoddle you the next time you’re in season.” Isaac put a hand on her shoulder.
; Alamayda peered into his eyes.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked.
She couldn’t believe he even had to ask such a thing. “Men and women don’t talk about this.”
“If a man is married to a woman it would come up. There’s no way it couldn’t.”
He had a point. And the thought of being married to him didn’t bring on anger or fear. Warmth settled in her chest.
“But we aren’t married. A week ago, I barely knew you.” Alamayda realized she knew Isaac better than anyone in her life, including her siblings.
“I agree, we’ve become close in a short amount of time. That happens out here where you depend on each other to survive. It brings out the best and worst in people.” His gaze drifted over her face.
“You have seen the best and worst in me, haven’t you.” She thought back to how she’d behaved at their initial meeting.
“I understand why you acted like you did. Now you know you can trust me.” He slid his hand from her shoulder to the back of her neck and stepped closer.
The warmth of his hand on her neck and his nearness sent shivers of anticipation slithering down her back and warming her center. Is he going to kiss me again?
He leaned in, but his lips didn’t touch hers.
“Did I scare you yesterday when I kissed you?” he asked.
She peered into his eyes. “No.”
“Good. I’d like to kiss you again.”
But he didn’t. His face just hovered over hers. When her body felt like it would jump out of her skin from anticipation, she asked, “When?”
“When what?” he asked.
“When were you going to kiss me again?”
He chuckled. “Now.”
His lips pressed to hers. Her whole body went limp. Isaac’s arm wrapped around her waist, holding her against him as the hand on her neck held her face close to his.
Tilting his head, their lips meshed better, and his tongue tickled her lips. She opened her mouth to do the same to him and his tongue invaded her body.