Just After Midnight: Historical Romance

by Lori Handeland

  “What did you bring?” she asked, pleased with the coolness of her voice.

  Alex glanced at her strangely, but the amused smile she thought she saw lurking on his lips disappeared at her glare. He cleared his throat and coughed. “Food, medical supplies, and blankets. We’re set for the long haul.”

  “Trust a Mountie to be prepared.”

  “Preparation is my middle name. Can I interest you in dinner? I worked up quite an appetite trudging through that snow.”

  “I’m interested in dinner, but only if you can cook. I never graduated beyond ordering in a restaurant.”

  Alex looked nonplussed for a minute at the idea of a woman who didn’t know how to cook, but he shrugged and began to rifle through his saddlebags.

  “I’ve become pretty adept at moose stew since I was assigned to Dawson City.” He moved to the stove and glanced back over his shoulder. “Sound all right?”

  “Anything’s fine.”

  Her stomach rumbled in agreement, reminding her she hadn’t eaten since the night before. Megan settled back on the fur and watched as Alex prepared their meal. He definitely knew his way around a stove, and she couldn’t complain about the view either.

  Alex threw unknown items into a stew pot. “Why did you come up here when a storm was brewing?”

  Megan quickly shifted her gaze to the fire before he caught her staring at him again. What was wrong with her? “I … ah … there wasn’t any sign of a storm when I left,”

  “This time of year a storm can come up at any time. You should never travel away from town alone, Megan. It isn’t safe.”

  Alex stirred the contents of the pot, clapped a lid on top, and left the stew to simmer before joining her on the rug. His knee brushed hers as he settled on the floor, and Megan shivered from the contact, instinctively inching away.

  “I know that now.” She stared at the fire, anything to keep from looking into those blue eyes. “I just wanted to get away.”

  “From me? From what I make you feel?”

  Her breath struck in her throat as she continued to stare at the fire so desperately her eyes stung, then watered. The snow hitting the door seemed loud in the too-silent room, and a crack from the roaring fire made her jump and gasp. When his finger touched her chin, gently turning her face to him, she met his eyes and slowly nodded.

  “I won’t hurt you,” he murmured, right before his lips touched hers.

  His kiss was just as she remembered it, yet so much more. She didn’t understand how he could be gentle and ruthless at the same time. Tentatively he stroked her lips with his tongue; and when she opened her mouth, he boldly dipped inside. With a moan, she let her hands roam up his arms, following the path her eyes had traced when he entered the cabin.

  Alex pulled the pins from her hair, and it cascaded around them as he pressed her back onto the fur, bracing himself on his forearms above her as he continued to assault her mouth with his.

  He was wrong. He could hurt her unbearably if she let him get too close. She knew better than to allow a man to capture her heart. She had seen the effect a so-called “love affair” had on a woman. If love were involved, then why did everyone always end up so unhappy in the end?

  Megan listened to the voice of reason whispering in her head; but when his lips and his hands touched her, she found herself powerless to resist. Just a little longer, she pleaded with her conscience. Allow me just a little more of this bliss, and then I’ll end it forever.

  His lips left hers and traveled across her cheek; then he nuzzled at her ear. His hands moved over her shoulders, kneading and smoothing the tense muscles. The warmth of the fire combined with the heat building inside her to make a near unbearable inferno. He unbuttoned the shirtwaist of her riding habit, and the air upon her heated skin felt heavenly. When his lips followed the path of his fingers, she arched to greet them.

  “I know you want me as much as I want you,” he said against the tender, untouched skin at the edge of her corset. “Let me make love to you, Megan.”

  Megan froze at the word love. It was as though the warning her mind had whispered to her seconds earlier had come alive. Alex wanted to make love to her, but she knew what he felt, what they felt, had nothing to do with love. She might be naive as to what actually occurred, physically, between men and women, but she knew about the ruined lives lust left in its wake.

  She stiffened within his embrace and he lifted his head to look into her eyes. “What’s wrong?”

  “I—I—can’t.”

  He frowned into her face for several moments, then disentangled himself from her. The loss of his warmth and touch was a physical pain. He stared at the bare skin revealed by her unbuttoned bodice, and she sat up quickly, refastening her clothes with trembling fingers.

  “You won’t is what you mean.” Alex sighed. “I don’t understand you, Megan. I want you and you want me. What could be more natural than that?”

  Megan paused and glanced over her shoulder at him. He now sat with his back to her, staring into the flames, his head bent in such a way that he reminded her of a confused child. He was right. Whenever he touched her or kissed her, she could hardly remain standing from the riot of sensations he aroused in her. Did she want to remain ignorant all her life of what lay between a man and a woman? Up until she’d met Alex Carson, most men had repelled her. She might never have another chance to be with a man she was physically attracted to.

  Megan turned and reached out a tentative hand toward Alex’s broad back.

  “After all,” he muttered, as if to himself, “it’s not as though you’re a complete innocent.”

  Megan’s fingers froze, inches from his shoulder. Then she withdrew her hand and turned away.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Overcome with a need for fresh air, Megan left Alex staring into the fire and went to the back door. When she opened it, a blast of cold air and snow slapped her in the face and several inches of snow fell onto her stocking feet. She squinted against the whiteness and, finding no sanctuary in the storm, she slammed the door shut.

  She ignored Alex and dragged a chair nearer the stove, her mind swirling with the implications of his muttered words. After all the time they’d spent together, after all the times she’d told him that she wasn’t a whore, he still believed the worst of her. In the face of his prejudice, the truth of her innocence was almost laughable. She had spent so many years fending off unwelcome advances as her heart hardened against all men but her father, that she had stopped believing in love and forever after and made herself self-sufficient. Then she’d discovered one man who made her burn with a need for the things she’d scorned, only to find that he was no different from the rest.

  A footfall alerted Megan to Alex’s approach. She stiffened but did not turn around. He paused behind her chair.

  “I’ve made you angry again.” He set his palm on her shoulder.

  Megan shrugged his hand from her body. “Don’t.”

  Alex raised his arms in a gesture of surrender. “All right. But could you do me a favor and keep the same rules for longer than a day? Ten minutes ago you wanted nothing more than my hands all over you; now I can’t touch. Megan, you’re making me insane.”

  She stood and faced him. “Fine. You want rules. I’ll give them to you. No more kissing. No more touching. No more talking to me about anything but business for as long as we’re here. I can’t throw you out in the storm, as much as I’d like to, but I don’t have to be insulted in my own cabin.”

  “Insulted? Since when are you insulted by a man being attracted to you? You have hundreds fawning over you every night at The Celebration and you thrive on it. Why am I different?”

  Megan bit the inside of her lip to keep from screaming at him to get out of her sight. He had just confirmed her worst belief about their relationship. He considered himself the same as the multitude of men who lusted after Meggie O’Day. But she wasn’t Meggie; inside she was Megan, and she’d hoped Alex, at least, could tell the difference.r />
  “Just keep away from me,” she muttered and turned again to the fire.

  Women.

  Alex stacked an armload of wood near the fireplace and headed outside for more, not even glancing at Megan, curled under the covers on the single bed in the cabin.

  If he never saw another one, it would be too soon.

  They’d been snowbound for three days. They had been the worst three days of his life. She had barely been civil to him, more often than not spitting out sarcastic retorts to his every attempt at conversation. Try as he might, he couldn’t understand what he’d done to infuriate her. He’d wanted her and said so. What was so wrong in that? He’d had his share of women during his time with the mounted police, and none had ever complained of his technique. He had never had the time or the inclination to get involved beyond the satisfying of physical needs. His mind had been focused on his career to the exclusion of all else; and then when he lost Joanna, he had added the burden of finding her killer. Those goals left little within him to give to another person.

  The tension in the cabin remained as thick as the snow outside, made worse by his unwavering attraction to Megan regardless of her distaste for him. Right now, even though he stood outside without his coat in freezing temperatures, he grew warm and hard thinking of her under the covers in nothing but her underclothes.

  He had been too long without a woman. That was the problem. The Mounties were not allowed to avail themselves of the prostitutes on Paradise Alley. If he just spent a day in bed with a willing woman, his inconvenient need for Megan Daily would become a thing of the past.

  The voice of conscience told him what he felt for her was beyond the physical. He had never felt such a desire to be with a woman, talk with her, know her in more ways than just her body. With Megan he felt complete, as though he’d come home. And God help him, he didn’t care anymore how many men she’d had before him, as long as he was the last. But in her present mood, he doubted she would be receptive to those revelations.

  Alex glanced up at the sky. The snow had stopped and the clouds drifted apart to reveal the long-absent sun. They could leave for Dawson City today. Thank God. One more day in such close quarters with Megan and he might break down and beg her to forgive him for whatever he’d done— anything, if only she’d smile at him, talk to him as if he were a human being and not a river rat, let him touch her silky hair and feast on her full lips.

  A stray log fell from the pile in his arms and landed sharply on his toe. Alex winced, then sighed. It was no more than he deserved for letting his thoughts drift off course again.

  He purposely let the armful of logs fall on the floor with a crash. Megan jumped up, startled from sleep. The blanket fell away, and Alex was treated to a glimpse of bare shoulders above her chemise before she snatched the cloth back to her neck.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked, blinking the sleep from her eyes.

  “The snow stopped. I think we can leave this morning for town.”

  “Thank God.”

  Alex grimaced at the relief in her voice. “Pack up,” he said gruffly and left to tend the horses.

  When he returned, she had dressed and straightened the cabin. Her picnic basket and his saddlebags were packed and sitting by the door.

  “Before we go, Lieutenant,” Megan ventured, keeping with the formal manner of address she’d adopted during their time in the cabin. “I found something that might interest you in regard to my father and Willie Shore.” She held out a charred piece of paper.

  Taking it from her, he brushed her fingers with his and ignored her soft gasp of response. He quickly read the cryptic note and glanced at her. “When did you find this?”

  “The first day, before you came. It was lying in the fireplace.”

  “You’re just telling me now?”

  She shrugged. “I thought you should know. What would you have done about it while we were stuck here?”

  True, but he didn’t like the fact that she’d kept the note from him. “I’m heartily sick of Willie Shore.”

  “Me, too,” Megan agreed. “What do you make of that note?”

  “Looks as though your father may have gone to meet Willie on the pass. I wish we could find this character. Might shed some light on both our problems.”

  “What does Willie have to do with your sister?”

  Alex quickly filled her in on Geraldine’s news.

  “And you’re just telling me this now?” she asked with a small smile.

  Alex shrugged. “I wasn’t sure what to make of the connection.”

  Megan walked slowly across the room to sit at the table. “Your sister knew Willie; my father knew your sister; Willie was my father’s partner, and Willie asked my father to meet him on the day of his death, which was shortly before Joanna’s suicide. Where does this leave us?”

  “Looking for Willie Shore. Unless he died in that avalanche with your father, and there’s really no way of knowing for sure. We’ve got to find him and make him tell us what he knows.”

  Megan stood. “The only way to do that is to get back to Dawson City. Shall we, Lieutenant?”

  Alex nodded and followed her into the brisk Yukon air. The trip back was a silent one, the two of them preoccupied with their own thoughts and with guiding their horses through the snow.

  When they reached the city, people were out and about as always. Very little kept the folk of Dawson inside for long. If they allowed themselves to be daunted by the snow and the cold and the darkness, they might as well go home.

  Alex insisted on leaving Megan at the door to The Celebration and returning her horse to the stables himself.

  “Honestly, Lieutenant, I can do for myself,” she said, even as he helped her from the horse.

  “I’m learning that.” He put his hands to her waist, lifted. She slid down his body; and despite the heavy layers of clothing they wore against the elements, he swore he could feel every inch of her flesh sliding against his. He caught her lemon scent above the stinging freshness of the air and the teaming stench of the bodies and animals of Front street.

  Because he wanted to hold on, he let go. Because he wished to pull her to him, he stepped back. Because he wanted nothing more than to be with her, he tipped his hat and said, “Good day.”

  Megan dressed slowly for work that evening, all the while thinking of Alex Carson. The strange longing on his face when he’d left her that afternoon haunted her still. She felt it, too.

  She finished dressing and stepped out from behind the curtain only to discover Queen lounging on the bed.

  Queen laughed at the shock on her face; and at her high-pitched cackle, Damon growled low and slunk from the room.

  “Sorry,” Megan apologized. “He just doesn’t seem to take to you.”

  “Don’t worry your head about it. I don’t much care for him neither.” She peered at Megan and sat up. “Your Mountie comin’ tonight?”

  “No. I don’t think so.” Megan shook her head. “He’s not my Mountie.”

  “Sure he is. The lieutenant’s lost his heart to you. Everyone can see that.”

  “I don’t.”

  “You’ve got a lot to learn about men. That Mountie can’t keep his eyes off you.”

  “He wants me. I know that. But I need more, Queen. I’ve seen too many women settle for less than they deserve and suffer for it. I won’t let that happen to me.”

  “You talkin’ about love and marriage and forever after?”

  Megan sighed. “I don’t know.” She turned and stared up at the picture of her mother. “Mama and Papa were happy.”

  “Good luck, Lovey. I’m afraid you’re talkin’ to the wrong person about happy endings. I’ve seen a lot in my time here. In my opinion men are good for some laughs; then give ‘em the boot before they break your heart.”

  “Maybe that would be best. Well, it doesn’t matter anyway. Alex said he wants things to be strictly business between us from now on.”

  Queen gaped. “And you believed him? T
hat man’s got it for you bad. He might say he wants to cool things off, but I wouldn’t be countin’ on it if I were you. Make up your mind. If you want him, take him. If not, then maybe you should get out of town before you do get your heart busted.”

  “Get out of town?” Megan cried. “I’m not leaving. Not now, not ever. My father left me this place and the claim. They’re the only things he ever gave me, and I won’t give them up.”

  “Why don’t you just sell that land and forget it. Mining’s not proper for someone like you. Hell, most of the claims don’t pan out anyhow.”

  “No, Queen. I plan to find out why my father filed a claim in the first place. He always insisted he would never be lured by gold in that way. He must have had a good reason to break his rule, and I won’t rest until I catch up with Willie.”

  “Has the lieutenant been helpin’ you with this?”

  “Now that you mention it, yes.” Megan was amazed to admit the fact even to herself. “If it hadn’t been for Alex, I probably would have let the gold claim rest. I might have even gone back to San Francisco if he hadn’t goaded me into staying by insisting I couldn’t do it.”

  Queen didn’t answer at first, appearing deep in thought. Then she heaved herself to her feet. “Well, Lovey, I admire a woman who knows her mind. You plannin’ on attendin’ the dance to welcome Colonel Steele tomorrow night?”

  “I haven’t heard anything about it.”

  “Some of the merchant’s have put together a dance to welcome the new Mountie commander. I’m surprised the lieutenant didn’t mention it.”

  “Me, too,” Megan muttered.

  If that omission didn’t confirm Alex’s opinion of her, nothing would. He was happy to stay with her in a deserted cabin and eager to share her bed, but he wouldn’t be seen with her at a public function.

  “Everyone in town will be there,” Queen wheedled. “It won’t do for Meggie O’Day to sit in her room all night.”