Diamond in the Dust (Second Chances Time Travel Romance Book 3)

by Peggy L Henderson

  Gabe’s hands lingered at her waist in a protective grip. It had tightened for a split second when she mentioned Bryce, but he made no move to draw her up against him. Morgan blinked, and leaned in closer. She smiled weakly up at him, waiting, even hoping that he would wrap her fully in his arms.

  Concern in his eyes warred with puzzlement, and also something far stronger. Want and need burned plainly in his gaze. If he was going to kiss her at this moment, there wasn’t a thing she could do, or wanted to do, to stop him.

  Morgan closed her eyes for a brief second and inhaled a deep breath. He made no move to act on what was written in his stare. He was much more in control of his actions than she. If she remained standing so close to him for another second, she’d be the one kissing him.

  The loud bang of a door closing startled Morgan to release her grip on Gabe’s arms at the same time he released her waist. She stepped away from him, and glanced toward the living room. Ashley sauntered in, her eyes wide with surprise. She darted scrutinizing looks from Morgan to Gabe.

  “Did I interrupt something?” she asked, and laughed. “Don’t mind me. Really.” She waved a dismissive hand through the air. Her eyes lingered on Gabe for a moment before she shot Morgan a look that clearly communicated a silent “way to go.”

  “Heading to bed,” Ashley said, rushing past them down the hall to her room.

  Gabe remained unmoving for a second, then he bent to the ground, and picked up the object she’d nearly tripped over. Logan’s sippy cup. It must have fallen out of the diaper bag earlier. Wordlessly, he handed it to Morgan, then moved further into the living room.

  Morgan slowly exhaled the breath she’d been holding. She kicked herself mentally. What on earth had come over her? What had she wanted from Gabe? He could have easily taken advantage of her vulnerability. Good thing that Ashley had impeccable timing.

  Morgan stared after him. Her heart still pounded in her chest, making breathing in the tight dress uncomfortable.

  He had no intention of kissing you, Morgan.

  If he had planned to kiss her, he wouldn’t have just stood there before Ashley interrupted, but would have acted on her blatant invitation.

  “Thanks for being here, Gabe,” she called. “Thanks for restoring my faith that there are still a few good guys around.”

  He stopped, and his back straightened. Morgan waited, but he didn’t turn around. Fighting the need to go up to him, ask him to hold her for just a few minutes, she turned and headed to her room.

  Chapter 13

  Gabe stared out the window of the fast-moving vehicle. Except for the music playing on the thing Morgan had called a radio, the only other sounds came from the car, which was now called a truck, and other vehicles they encountered on this vast stretch of highway. Things had been fairly quiet between them for most of the morning, each absorbed in their own thoughts.

  Morgan’s little boy had fallen asleep, which he usually did right around this time of the day. During his waking hours, he babbled non-stop, and Gabe was grateful for the quiet at the moment. He’d found out as they were leaving Ashley Gilbert’s home that he was in California.

  How the hell had he ended up in California? No wonder nothing had looked familiar to him. He’d spent his entire life in some parts of Montana or Wyoming Territory. Cora had been a camp follower for a few years during the gold strikes, and must have worked in nearly every small and large town throughout the territory at some point.

  For the last couple of days, Morgan had driven through dry desert land, passing through the states of Nevada and Utah. Fascinated, Gabe had stared at buildings that rose like enormous mountains out of the flat desert directly into the sky when they’d passed through a city called Las Vegas on their first day. Morgan had told him that the lights at night were spectacular, but since it had been mid-afternoon when they passed through, he’d had to take her word for it. Even in daylight, lights of all colors imaginable had flashed from the buildings.

  “You can even see it from space,” Morgan had laughed.

  Gabe hadn’t responded. He’d tried to absorb as much knowledge as possible about the last century and a half by watching the moving pictures and stories on the television, but it would take a lifetime to comprehend it all. How did people find a moment’s peace, with all the noise and lights that never seemed to shut off?

  He’d had a hell of a time sleeping at night. There’d always been some kind of noise or light in the background at Ashley’s home, and it had been worse in the hotel – or motel, as Morgan called it – rooms where they’d spent the last two nights. The hum of the air conditioner switching on and off, vehicles passing by outside, the soft beds, but most of all visions of Morgan, had kept him tossing and turning.

  Thank God they’d arrive at their destination in another day. Morgan had told him that she could have driven the entire distance in less than twenty-four hours, but Logan would make too much of a fuss being strapped in the car all day. They’d stopped frequently to stretch their legs and she’d entertained her son, which extended the journey to three days. How different would Montana look now?

  Gabe shifted in his seat, and stole a glance at Morgan out of the corner of his eye. She had one hand on the steering wheel, and her other arm rested against the window. She silently mouthed the words to the song playing on the radio. Something about a woman running away from her man, even though she didn’t want to leave him, or something like that.

  She tapped her fingers and moved her head in time with the music. Her eyes remained focused on the road, as best as he could tell. She wore dark spectacles to shield out the bright sun. Its golden rays touched the side of her face, catching in strands of her hair, which made them shimmer in hues of copper.

  Gabe pulled his hat down lower over his head, and shifted again in his seat. He stretched his legs as best he could in the cramped space. Maybe it was time to get out of the truck for a while. Sitting next to Morgan for hours on end with nothing to do had given him plenty of time to think. The problem was, he was doing too much thinking about her, and their constant close proximity made his awareness of her nearly unbearable.

  The night she’d returned from eating supper with her boy’s father wouldn’t leave him be. He’d paced the house like a corralled mustang while she was gone, wondering if she would even come back. What if the man sweet-talked her into marriage?

  Parts of him warred with the idea of Morgan married to a man who had hit her, while he couldn’t ignore the other side of the coin; Logan would have a pa. Then he’d remind himself that things were different in the twenty-first century, and the boy’s circumstances were different than his own had been.

  Truth be told, anger stirred in him at the thought of Morgan with another man. He hadn’t yet figured out what it was about the woman that knotted his insides. He had no experience with proper women, but he hadn’t exactly figured out how to categorize her. She wasn’t a working girl, yet she wasn’t wholesome, either. She was caring, and soft, and . . . Hell. She was everything he wasn’t.

  Seeing Morgan in that black dress that hugged her every curve like a glove remained burned in his mind. He’d nearly pulled her into his arms and kissed her before she’d walked out of the house, to keep her from leaving, and again when she’d returned home. Firmly reminding himself that a woman like Morgan wasn’t for the likes of him had kept him from acting on his thoughts, but she’d made it mighty hard. The way she’d swayed toward him after he caught her from falling, and the look of longing in her eyes had tested his resolve to the limit.

  If Ashley Gilbert hadn’t come home when she did, there was no telling what he might have done. His willpower had been ready to crumble. When she’d called to him and told him that he was a good man, he’d wanted to pounce on her and tell her how wrong she was about him.

  “Are you getting hungry?” Morgan turned her head to smile at him. Gabe straightened, and cleared his throat, as if he’d spoken the words of his wandering mind out loud.

  “I c
ould sure stretch my legs for a while,” he answered, and pushed his hat out of his face.

  “We’ll stop for lunch at the next town up ahead.”

  She’d just leaned forward, and reached for something under her seat, when the wagon a short distance ahead of them suddenly swerved.

  “Look out,” Gabe warned, his body tensing. He wanted to do something, anything, to avoid a collision, but dammit, he had no idea how to control this truck, just as he’d had no control over anything since coming to this century.

  Morgan reacted the instant he’d called out his warning. She grabbed the wheel with both hands, and maneuvered the wagon around a bunch of debris that was strewn in the middle of the road. No doubt it’s what had made the vehicle ahead of them weave, too.

  “Dammit,” she muttered, when the truck bumped hard into a chunk of whatever lay in the road.

  She eased the vehicle over to the side, and rolled to a stop.

  “What’s wrong?” Gabe asked. Why was she stopping?

  Morgan unbuckled her seatbelt, and was already half-way out of the car when she spoke. “I have to check and see if there’s any damage from what we hit. I think we might have a flat tire.”

  She rushed around the front of the truck, and bent to her knees. Gabe climbed out of the cab. It was even obvious to him that the right front tire was damaged. The black material Morgan had called rubber was no longer tight and round.

  “Dammit,” Morgan muttered again, and expelled and audible breath.

  “How do we fix it?” Gabe asked, squatting beside her. He ran his hand along the tough material. Fixing a wagon wheel could take hours, but how was it possible to mend this strange material?

  “We can’t fix it. Whatever I hit put a hole in this tire. We’ll just have to change it.” Morgan stood, and peered into the cab of the truck. “The tools are under the back seat, and the spare will be under the bed.”

  Gabe stood by while she gently lifted her sleeping son from his seat. The boy fell against her shoulder, and she glanced up at him.

  “Can you hold him so I can get under the seat?”

  Gabe took an involuntary step back. He ran his hand over his face. “Ah . . . why don’t you just tell me what to look for, and I’ll get the tools.”

  Morgan glared at him. “He’s just a baby, Gabe. He’s not poisonous.” There was a distinct hitch in her voice.

  Hell. Of course the boy wasn’t poisonous. “I ain’t never held a baby before,” he grumbled.

  The little boy was sweet, but a man didn’t hold babies, least not ones that weren’t his own. Truth be told, he’d gotten used to the boy, and even liked how he babbled at times and tried to get his attention, but it wouldn’t do for Logan to grow fond of him, or the other way around. The idea of having a child of his own someday had never entered Gabe’s mind, so there was simply no reason why he should have to hold this one.

  “You held him a few days ago, at the car dealer.” Morgan definitely sounded riled now.

  “Step aside, woman, and let me deal with the tire,” Gabe grumbled.

  Hell. He wasn’t going to get into a spat with her over this. He didn’t need to be reminded of that day. Holding the little boy had left him with another odd stirring, something he wasn’t looking to explore further. Morgan was on his mind too much as it was. Forming any sort of attachment to her son was out of the question.

  “Do you even know how to change a tire?” she challenged. Her eyes were hidden behind those dark spectacles, but he’d lay odds that her glare was murderous.

  Gabe stared at her. “No. Do you?”

  The tight line of her lips curved upward in a triumphant smile. “As a matter of fact, yes, I do. You’re being an obstinate oaf, Gabe McFarlain, and this is one of those times when your eighteen-hundreds mindset is just downright annoying.”

  Damn women from the future. They were too stubborn and independent for their own good. How the hell had Tyler put up with it from his wife?

  Morgan shook her head. “Fine. You can change the damn tire.” Her smile vanished. “There should be a black pouch under the backseat somewhere. It contains all the tools you need. I suppose it’s something you should learn to do, anyway. I just hope your male pride can handle that a woman will have to teach you how.”

  Gabe took a step closer to her. The baby in her arms was the only thing between them. She raised her head to look up at him.

  “Proper women don’t swear, Morgan,” he said in a low tone. He leaned forward, fighting the urge to remove those glasses from her face so he could see her eyes.

  “Well I guess that’s another thing you’ll just have to get used to, then.” Her words sounded strained, as if she had to force air into her lungs to speak.

  “Just like there are things about me that you’ll need to come to grips with, too.”

  He didn’t wait for a reply. Turning to the truck, he leaned forward into the back seat. After struggling to undo Logan’s seat, he managed to lift the back seat and pull out a rather heavy black pouch from the compartment underneath.

  Morgan told him where to find the spare tire and how to lower it from under the bed of the truck, then she pointed to one of the tools in the pouch.

  “That’s a wrench. Loosen the lug nuts on the tire a little, then use the jack to lift the truck up off the ground. “

  Morgan talked him through the process, and Gabe managed to do as she instructed. It was fairly easy, once he figured out how the tire was mounted to the truck. By the time he was done, his hands, arms, and shirt were covered in grease and black streaks from the old tire and the new one. He was doubly glad that he’d insisted on doing the work rather than letting Morgan get dirty.

  She handed him a piece of damp cloth material she called a “wipey,” which cleaned his hands enough until they could get to the next town and a water source.

  “We’ll need to stop somewhere and have a better tire put on. The spare isn’t meant for long distance driving,” Morgan remarked when she pulled back onto the highway. Other than that, she hadn’t said much. She was obviously still mad as a wet hen because he’d insulted her independent nature.

  Gabe sat in the truck while she conversed with the proprietor at the gas station where she’d stopped to fill the truck with fuel and have a new tire mounted. His hand tightened into a fist. Damn, he had a lot to learn about the future. There would come a point when he wouldn’t have to depend on Morgan for everything, and he swore he would pay her back for all she’d done for him.

  “It’ll be about an hour for him to get the tire mounted. How about we stretch our legs a bit?” She sounded normal again, and even offered that soft smile of hers that made his insides turn to churned butter.

  Gabe nodded wordlessly, and followed her up the street.

  “Oh, look! They have an ice cream parlor here in town.” Morgan pointed excitedly to a little shop with a sign that read Homemade Ice Cream. Her head turned to him, a wide smile lighting up her face. “How about some ice cream?”

  Gabe stared at her. The smile and the exuberance on her face made him forget everything around him, or what she’d even said.

  “Ice cream?” he asked absently.

  “You’ve had ice cream before, haven’t you?” Morgan stopped in front of the shop.

  He vaguely remembered watching kids and adults, in one of the bigger towns he’d lived in with Cora, gather around a street vendor who was selling something called ice cream. He didn’t have the coins for such an indulgence at the time.

  “I’ve heard of it,” he said gruffly, pushing aside the memory of his childhood.

  “Oh, Desperado, you’ve been deprived far too long, then.”

  Gabe clenched his jaw. He could think of other things he was deprived of, especially in Morgan’s presence.

  With Logan against her hip, she reached for Gabe’s arm and pulled him toward the shop’s entrance.

  “It’s about time you tried it,” she said enthusiastically.

  He hastily opened the door for he
r, surprised at the familiar sound of a bell clanging overhead. Morgan walked in ahead of him, and strode up to the serving counter. Several people sat at round tables in the small shop. She pointed at the glass display, talking to her boy, who picked up on his mother’s excitement, and began pointing and babbling.

  Gabe remained a few steps behind her. The skin on his arm still prickled from where she’d held him a moment ago. His fingers ached to touch her, the urge so strong it overpowered the sweet aroma that swept through this shop.

  A young woman stepped up to the other side of the counter. She smiled politely at Morgan, then at him, where her gaze lingered. Her eyes widened, and she addressed him when she asked, “What can I get for you?”

  Morgan turned to Gabe, her brows raised. Her eyes twinkled in amusement.

  “A scoop of chocolate mint in a cup,” Morgan said, turning back to the short blonde. An oval-shaped pin on the front of her red and white striped outfit read Joyce.

  “And for you?” she asked eagerly.

  Gabe stepped up beside Morgan, forcing a pleasant smile on his face. If Morgan found it amusing that this woman paid attention to him, then he’d play along.

  “What’s good here, Joyce?” he drawled slowly, maintaining eye contact with the blonde. Morgan’s head turned toward him. He didn’t have to look her way to know she was glaring at him.

  “It’s all good,” Joyce said slowly. She licked her lips. “But Moose Tracks is my particular favorite.”

  Moose Tracks? What the hell was that?

  “All right. Moose Tracks it is.”

  The woman nodded, her cheeks turning rosy.

  “Actually, I think he’s more of a chocolate guy,” Morgan said quickly when Joyce was about to fill their order. “He’s allergic to nuts, and I believe Moose Tracks contains peanuts.”

  “Peanut butter,” Joyce corrected sharply.

  The woman glared across the counter, just before she shot a questioning look at Gabe. He silently followed the exchange between the women. He had no idea what being allergic to nuts meant, but he’d play along.