by Sharon Ihle
By the time Hawke returned to the house, Lacey was dressed in a huge pair of dull red woolen drawers with matching long-sleeved shirt, a pair of rawhide leggings so big, they covered her legs beyond midthigh, almost to her crotch, and over all that, a buckskin shirt which hung well below her knees. Glancing down at herself, she decided that by anyone's standards, she was modestly, if bizarrely, dressed to receive visitors.
She'd just gone into the kitchen and finished hanging her clothes on the pair of chairs, when Hawke came through the back door. He paused, looking her up and down, and finally entered the room. His silvery green eyes were guarded, but Lacey thought she saw at least a flash of amusement in them.
Giving him a shy smile, she said, "Do you suppose dear Kate will be jealous of my new wardrobe should she see me in this?"
"Definitely." His voice was still gruff, but he almost smiled as he spoke. Almost. "I hope you're warm enough in them."
"Oh, aye. I do not feel the least bit of a chill now."
His gaze drifted to the chair where she'd placed the damp pair of boots Crowfoot had given her. His eyes narrowed for an instant, but instead of making mention of the footgear, he turned to the stove and began to rub his hands together, warming them. "Suddenly, I'm near to starving. Aren't you?"
She almost said yes, right along with the rumble in her empty stomach, but then Lacey realized that if she admitted her hunger, he'd probably ask her to cook their supper—one of the very reasons she'd braved the storm. Realizing that she was almost as tired as she was hungry, she used her exhaustion as a way to excuse herself for the rest of the night.
"I thank you for your concern, but I could not eat a bite. All I am is very, very weary. Would you mind showing me where I might lie down?"
Without a moment's hesitation, or even the suggestion that she ought to put supper on before taking her nap, Hawke showed Lacey upstairs to his room for the night. She tried to decline his generous offer, but he insisted this was the warmest and most private place in the house, and that he wouldn't be using it anyway since he wanted to stay in the barn to keep an eye on Queenie, who'd yet to foal. Suddenly too tired to argue beyond that, Lacey allowed him to make a small fire in the lovely brick and mortar fireplace built into a corner of the room. Once he left, however, she climbed beneath the huge quilt and pile of blankets which made up Hawke's bed, and fell asleep the instant her head touched his soft down pillow.
When she awoke some time later, Lacey realized that at least several hours had passed. She stretched, luxuriating in the soft warmth of Hawke's bed, then inhaled the strong, clean woodsy bouquet of the man himself along with the faint aroma of horses. His scent was all around her, saturating his pillow, the bedclothes, and most of all, her senses. Startled by her reaction to the smell, a kind of restless yearning which started deep in her belly, she tore back the covers and swung her legs over the edge of bed.
Disoriented and a little groggy, Lacey glanced around, noticing that the lamp had been lit and that a bowl of stew and glass of milk were sitting on the bedside table. When had Hawke come to check on her? And why hadn't she awakened? Taking a look around the room to ensure her sense of privacy, she saw, that it, like the rest of the house, was sparsely equipped. The comfortable bed, night table, and a small dresser were the only furnishings other than a rocking chair sitting to the side of the fireplace. Suddenly eager for the warmth of flames which looked as if they'd been recently stoked, she got up and worked her way a little closer to the hearth.
Except for the accident in the broom closet back at St. Josephine's, Lacey hadn't been this close to fire of any kind since "the incident" so many years ago. Staring into the flames, with a stuporlike gaze, she thought back to the past—what she could remember of it anyway, then glanced down at the scar on the palm of her right hand. Oh, how she wished she could remember even one moment of the night when she'd burned herself—the very same night the lives of both her mother and father were lost. But that part of her life was still as blank as the walls in Hawke's home. Nothing came to her. Not even the images of the man and woman who'd brought her into the world. Lacey only knew that she was somehow responsible for the fire, and therefore directly to blame for her parents' fate: And that somewhere in the dark recesses of her mind, she held the key to the mysteries surrounding that tragic night.
Unable to stare into those flames any longer, Lacey moved over to the large bay window, a match to the one in the living room downstairs. Like the glass panes below, there were no window dressings to shut out the night or the cold, or to give the room a much needed touch of warmth. Feeling a slight chill, Lacey stayed her post a moment longer, imagining the breathtaking view of the valley and the distant range of mountains this vantage point would offer by daylight. On this moonless night, all she could make out were a few dark treetops and the vague outline of the barn.
Was Hawke out there sleeping? she wondered. And what of Crowfoot, the young Indian boy? Were the two related somehow? Brothers perhaps, or even... father and son? The idea disturbed Lacey almost as much as the thought of that young child staying out in the barn by himself. She hoped that he was allowed in the house, and only hid out in the barn when visitors came to the ranch, but something inside told her that was not the case.
Shivering a little, Lacey hugged herself around the middle, swaying to and fro as she stared out at the night, and wondered exactly where and how the little boy fit in at Winterhawke.
* * *
While Lacey was trying to figure out the relationship between the two, Hawke and Crowfoot were just settling themselves in the straw piled high in the loft. Queenie, a three-year old bay and first-time mother, still showed no signs of foaling, even though by Hawke's calculations, she should have dropped her colt by now. Very concerned about the animal, he propped his back against the wall near the open doors of the loft, and glanced outside. The skies were remarkably clear now that the storm had let up. As his gaze moved across the yard, he thought he noticed a blur across the way, and upon closer inspection, spotted Lacey's shadow as she moved about in his bedroom.
He'd left her a nice hot bowl of stew not fifteen minutes ago, but from the look of her then, he'd been sure it would be cold by the time she awakened from her deep sleep. Apparently he hadn't been as quiet as he thought. Lacey, was not only awake but pacing the room as if deep in thought. She walked in front of the window then, pausing to stare up at the profusion of stars. The gentle glow of the fire and dim lighting from the lamp framed her along with the A-shaped pitch of the roof, making her look ethereal, like an angel captured on canvas despite the ill-fitting clothes she wore. Lacey's bounty of coppery curls were everywhere as usual, falling down along her shoulders, caressing her face, and he assumed, spilling down her back—a goddess by any man's standards. How did the woman manage to look so fetching in a costume that made him look rougher than a corncob pipe?
"She... pretty lady."
Caught up in watching Lacey, Hawke had forgotten he wasn't alone. When he heard that young, hesitant voice, he nearly yelped with surprise. Taking a deep breath as he looked away from the window, Hawke glanced at the kid and realized the boy had been staring at Lacey right along with him. He smiled indulgently as he said, "Yes, she's a mighty pretty lady, indeed."
Never taking his onyx eyes from the window, Crowfoot slowly nodded his agreement.
The boy didn't seem to be as upset by Lacey's presence as Hawke had assumed he'd be. He doubted Crowfoot would remain so calm if he knew Lacey had been bold enough to disturb his possessions. "Did you know that pretty lady helped herself to a pair of your old boots?"
He shrugged indifferently. "I give to lady. Her shoes no good for work. No good for nothing."
"You gave?" This was entirely out of character for the boy. Crowfoot had a possessive streak of almost maniacal proportions, one that made him protective of even a tiniest scrap of paper should he count it among his belongings. "What do you mean, gave? Have you even met or talked to her?"
"One time, y
es." Flashing a grin which appeared even more rarely than Hawke's, Crowfoot twisted his index finger around the middle finger and held them up. "Horses like lady, and I do, too. We friends. You keep her."
"Keep...?" So that was it. Somehow, Lacey had managed to enlist the kid as an ally. "Well just forget about it, Crowfoot. Tomorrow Miss O'Carroll goes back to Three Elk Ranch, and there is where she'll stay. Understand? I can't keep her here anymore."
The boy hissed in return, an angry sound accompanied by a look of ferocity; Hawke hadn't seen anything close to that kind of hostility from Crowfoot since the day he and Caleb first tried to befriend him. It was enough to give Hawke pause, but he held his ground. The kid obviously didn't know what they would be subjecting Lacey to should she stay at Winterhawke—the scorn of their neighbors and townsfolk for sure—or how much she'd disrupt their lives.
His tone more resolute, Hawke said, "That woman is leaving tomorrow, and nothing is going to change my mind about it."
* * *
The next morning when Lacey awakened, she found her clothes neatly folded and set right outside the bedroom door. After dressing herself, she finger-combed her hair, then made her way down to the kitchen where Hawke was busy brewing up a pot of coffee.
"Top o' the morning to you," she said cheerfully. "I'm hoping you slept well in a bed not your own?"
"Yes," he said, pleasantly. "I slept just fine. Thanks for asking."
"I passed a very peaceful night, too. Thank you again for the use of your nice soft bed. I do not think I can ever repay you for all you did on my behalf last night." Blushing as she recalled the way he'd lifted her into his arms and carried her all the way back to the ranch, Lacey abruptly changed the subject. "And what of your mare? Has her babe made its way into the world yet?"
"Not yet, but I was just on my way out to check on her again." He poured himself a cup of coffee, then turned to her, catching her in the midst of trying to smooth her wild curls. Sliding the thong out of his own hair, he offered it. "Take this. I'll get another in the barn."
As Lacey accepted the thong, Hawke's fingers skimmed the back of her hand. His touch against her skin was like kindling to the flame, and Lacey marveled to think that such a wee bit of contact could make the impression it did on her. Her tummy ached with a foreign kind of hunger, not the sharp demands of the body's need for food, but with a dull relentless throbbing, insisting that she fill this aching void with every bit the same urgency as the other, as if both needs were crucial to survival.
Shocked to recognize such sensations from inside her own body, but not chagrined enough to look away from Hawke, Lacey studied him from behind as he strolled over to the kitchen table and picked up a tin filled with apples. As he walked, his dark wavy hair swung freely around his shoulders, showing her how truly long he'd let it grow. She would have expected a man with such a mane to look at least a little feminine to her eyes, but on Hawke, the affect was startlingly the exact opposite. Between his free-flowing hair and the close-fitting jeans and work shirt he wore in place of his buckskins today, John Winterhawke, Jr. was truly a feast for the eyes. By the cross of Christ, Lacey thought to herself, grabbing the counter to support her suddenly wobbly knees. The man looked even more virile and dangerous this way than before, a wild Indian and a mountain man all rolled into one irresistible package of muscle and brawn.
Unaware of her perusal, Hawke turned toward Lacey, showing off the fruit. "I went down to the root cellar first thing this morning and brought up what's left of last year's apples. They still look pretty good, don't you think?"
Gulping hard, thinking that he looked a whale of a lot better to her than anything she'd ever seen, Lacey forced herself to glance down at the pan's contents. "Oh, aye, they are a sight to behold, all right." How come her voice sounded so breathless, she wondered, and why did she suddenly feel so... warm?
Hawke carried the tin to the sink where Lacey stood. "I hope there's enough here for you."
"For me?" Her throat tight, she tried to laugh, but it came out sounding more like a cough. What the devil was wrong with her? "I-I can not eat so many apples. I would be sick a month of Junes, if I did."
"You don't have to eat them," he said, setting the tin in the sink. "I'd be happy if you'd just bake them into a pie. In fact," he added, reaching for his hat, "if you do that, you won't have to do another thing around here today. Not even clean up the mess."
"Oh, b-but—" Lacey tried to think of something, anything to help get her through this one, but nothing she could think of—not even the lucky spurs—could help. She'd watched Kate closely enough to know that she could never fake her way through the making of a piecrust, much less the filling. Worse, she couldn't even think of a way to talk her way out of it.
"Lacey?" Hawke reached over and touched the back of his hand to her brow. "You've gone all white. You're not going to faint are you?"
Gulping, this time over her own inadequacies, she finally raised her chin and looked him directly in the eye. "No, but you might be so inclined once you find out I've been feeding you up with false music."
"Music?" He raised thick chestnut eyebrow. "What in hell are you talking about?"
"Come, sit with me for a moment." She didn't even look to see if he followed. Lacey took the chair nearest the back door should she feel the urge to leap up and run away. After a very puzzled Hawke took the other, she laid both hands on the table, made a fist of the pair of them, and said, "I suppose 'tis better for you to know this one wee thing about me now than after we wed. I can not cook a lick."
"You... but what about the biscuits, the berry pie?"
"'Twas Kate's doings, all of it." Now that she'd admitted the one thing, the rest seemed almost easy. "Kate baked the biscuits the night before I was to come to Winterhawke, and I hid them in my basket. Same with the pie, but we didn't have to trouble ourselves by hiding it. I've ne'er tried to cook a thing in my life—well, except of course, for when I baked your buttermilk flapjacks."
The admission should have surprised Hawke, but he discovered that Lacey's revelations didn't shock him in the least. Hadn't he known there was something wrong with her from the start? "So you tricked me, and thought you could just keep on sneaking food over here from Three Elk indefinitely, is that it?"
"Oh, no. Kate is willing and working to teach me the ways of the kitchen. I've had lessons on how to make up your flapjacks and those fluffy biscuits you like, plus I even wrote down the recipes. I'm certain I can learn about pies and such, too, but maybe a little later."
"Uh, huh." He said it slowly, sarcastically. "Not that it matters to me, but what about sewing? Can you do that?"
Lacey hedged for just a moment, but then came clean there, too. "Not if you mean the actual construction of clothes, knitting, or quilting, but I can mend a button." At least, she thought she could. Then again, maybe not. "Truth is," she admitted with a sigh, "I can not sew either, but only because I've ne'er had the chance to learn. I'm willin... well, no." She took a deep breath. "Truth there is that I can not sew and I do not have the slightest inclination to want to learn how. But if you insist, I promise to give it a try."
Incredulous, Hawke pushed out of his chair and slowly circled her. Speaking behind Lacey's back, he said, "Let's see—you can't cook, can't sew, and seem to know nothing about keeping a man's home. Yes, ma'am, I'd say you fit all the requirements of a mail-order bride. What could I have been thinking of when I didn't jump at the chance to accept your proposal?"
Lacey twisted this way and that in her chair, trying to make eye contact with him, but he was always one step to the back of her. She threw her words in his general direction. "I-I know my lack of skills may seem a wee bit odd to you, but I meant—"
"Odd?" Hawke's voice was still coming from somewhere over her shoulder. "I demand more talents than you have in the horses I buy. Where were you raised, anyway—under a bush?"
Blushing violently, this time Lacey didn't seek his gaze. "Well, 'tis true that I do not come with the usual
talents a man expects to find in a wife, but as I said before, I'm more than willing to learn."
"Servants, right? Isn't that it? You were raised in a house where servants did all the work so you never had to learn to do a thing."
That was close enough to the truth. Too close, in fact. Lacey nodded, but still kept her gaze averted.
"Just as I thought." Hawke was standing directly beside her now. "Maybe you figured a spoiled aristocrat could learn to cook, but what did you plan on doing about clothes? Even if I'd decided to keep you on—which I definitely haven't—I couldn't afford to buy you dresses in town. At least, not for a good long while, anyway."
"Oh, but those I have will do me fine." She finally glanced up at Hawke, beseeching him with her gaze. "They'll do for a good long while. I have two new white blouses and navy skirts—uniforms from the hospital." And they were that. They just didn't happen to be nursing uniforms.
"A very impressive wardrobe, I'm sure." Which didn't make a hell of a lot of sense to Hawke since he figured she was some kind of royalty who'd run away from home. Not that it mattered to him who she was or what she was running from. What mattered was that she'd tried to trick him—that and the fact that he had a mare to check. "Will you excuse me, please? I've got to get out to the barn and see how Queenie's doing. I'll be back shortly, and expect you to have your things ready by then. I'm taking you back to Three Elk just as soon as I get the horses hitched."
"Oh, well... of course."
He stomped out of the kitchen and into the living room. As soon as she was sure he couldn't hear her, Lacey snuck along behind Hawke and watched his progress from the kitchen door. After he crossed the room to the peg where his jacket hung, he reached inside the garment to the inner pocket and withdrew his horrid little ledger. After spending several moments jotting something inside it, he returned the thing to his jacket, then continued on out the front door.
Lacey, understandably distressed over having to admit her shortcomings to the man she was supposed to be impressing, wasn't about to admit defeat just yet. After retrieving her spurs from the canister along with the confidence they gave her, she donned them and marched fearlessly into the living room. Then, taking the ledger from Hawke's jacket, she settled into the chair near the fireplace and opened the book to the page marked Lacey O'Carroll. First she read the Disadvantages column: