“You proposin’ t’ me, Miss Whitley?” he asked, grinning up at her.
“Janson!”
He laughed, and then smiled at the hurt look that came to her face. “You know I’m gonna marry you—did you really think I wouldn’t?”
“Well—”
“Ain’t no way I’d give you up, especially now.”
She relaxed, resting her head against his chest. He kissed her hair, and drew her even closer. She could hear his heartbeat, feel the rise and fall of his chest with his breathing.
“You’re more my wife right now than any weddin’ could ever make you, but I want it all legal an’ proper.”
“So do I—Mrs. Janson Sanders—” she said, dreaming of all the days ahead.
“Elise Sanders—”
She smiled to herself and kissed the warm skin of his chest near where her cheek rested. “Did I please you?” she asked, then felt the vibration of his laughter against her cheek. “Don’t laugh at me, Janson.” She looked up at him.
“I ain’t laughin’ at you,” he smiled, reaching to stroke her hair for a moment. “Course you pleased me—couldn’t you tell?”
She smiled and pressed her face to his chest again, feeling her cheeks color with the intimacy of memory. He lay stroking her hair. She was silent for a moment, thinking.
“I wasn’t the first, was I?” she asked at last, not looking up at him.
She heard his sigh, felt it where her cheek rested against his chest. “Elise—” There was reluctance in his voice.
She looked up at him. “I want to know—I wasn’t the first; you’ve been with other women, haven’t you?”
There was silence, lasting only seconds, but seeming to her to stretch into forever. “Yeah—but you’re th’ only one that’s mattered—”
In spite of her brave words, she had not wanted to know. She pressed her face to his chest again, her mind rejecting the image of anyone else ever having known him so intimately, of anyone else ever having touched him or loved him—of any other woman ever having lain beneath him, loving him, holding him as she had done, taking him as part of her body.
He seemed to sense her thoughts, gently easing her over onto her back to look down at her. She moved to cover her breasts with her hands, but he took her wrists and gently drew them away. “No—” he said, his eyes moving down to touch her as his hands had touched her before. “There ain’t no place for bein’ shy between us no more—” He kissed her lips lightly, then bent to touch his lips first to one breast, and then to the other. He looked down at her again, releasing her wrists and stroking her cheek with the back of one finger. “You b’long t’ me now, an’ I b’long t’ you—it ain’t never been like that with nobody else. It couldn’t be—”
“Have you—since we’ve known each other—” She could not finish the words.
“No. I ain’t wanted no other woman since th’ day I met you. I knowed that you was th’ woman I was meant t’ be with.”
“You did?”
“Yeah, I did.” He kissed her and then drew her into his arms and held her. She rested her head on his shoulder, thinking—‘the woman I was meant to be with.’ Yes, they had been meant to be together; they had always been meant to be together. She looked down the length of his body, to the part of him she had now also taken as part of herself—she remembered the way he had held her, the things he had whispered, the feel of him inside of her; no, it could never have been the same with anyone else. He belonged to her, and to her alone. He belonged to her, and nothing else mattered.
She began to gently trace comfortable patterns on the warmth of his skin, enjoying the feel of his chest beneath her fingers—she wanted to touch him there, where she had touched him earlier, but she still hadn’t the nerve. In a few days, or a week, when they were more comfortable together, she would touch him just as she wanted to touch him, with no shyness between them; she would know his body, as well as she knew her own, and he would—
Her fingers touched the healed scar at his right shoulder. She had seen it earlier, but in the heat of what he had made her body feel, she had almost forgotten. Now she traced her fingers over it, noting the jagged outline, the pink scaring different in tone from the surrounding skin. She had never in her life seen the results of a knife wound, but she imagined that it would look something like—“Janson, what happened to your shoulder?” she asked, looking up at him.
“My shoulder?”
“Yes, the scar.”
“It ain’t nothin’.” But his jaw set even as he said the words.
“But it looks like it was. It looks almost like—” But suddenly she knew. She could see it in his eyes—her mind raced back to the night he had fought Ethan Bennett in order to protect her, and the sight of the two men struggling over the broken bottle that could so easily have ended Janson’s life. But if he had been hurt this badly then, she would have known; even in the state she had been in, she would have known. And this scar seemed so much older. So much—“Janson, who stabbed you?” she demanded, concern filling her.
“It don’t matter,” he said. “It was a long time—”
“It does matter! It matters to me! You could have been—”
“But I’m all right, and—”
“What happened?”
“Elise—” She could tell from the tone in his voice that he had no intention of telling her.
“I have the right to know! If you had been—” But he only stared at her in silence. “After what we just—” She let her words trail off. “Who was it?” she asked after a moment, her voice quieter.
He sighed, the reluctance never leaving his face, but, after what seemed to her an eternity, he finally spoke. “It was Buddy Eason.”
“Buddy Eason—one of the Easons where you come from, the family who own so much of the County, it was one of them?”
“Th’ old man’s gran’son.”
“But, what happened? Did you get into a fight? Did you—” But she could see it in his eyes. “It was over a girl—” The words came as a statement.
“Elise—”
“Damn it, tell me! I’m not a child! You fought over some—” But suddenly she realized, looking into his eyes—if the knife had struck any lower; if the man had stabbed him again—
She shuddered and moved closer into his arms, pressing her face to his chest and holding him close against her—he could have died even before they met. She might never have known—
She shuddered again.
But he misunderstood.
“Elise, you don’t understan’. There ain’t no other woman that’s ever mattered t’ me. It ain’t nowhere near th’ same.” She looked up at him and tried to speak, but he would not allow it, gently silencing her words, his eyes showing a concern that he make her hear, make her understand. “We b’long t’ each other—an’ you’re my wife now, just the same as if we was married; we’re one flesh, just like th’ Bible says, that a man’ll join unto his wife an’ they’ll be one flesh—”
“Janson, I know—the only thing that matters is that we’re together, that we’ll spend the rest of our lives together, that we’ll be married ‘’til death do us part’—”
“No, not like that—” he said, easing her over onto her back and leaning over her, “not ‘’til death do us part.’” He looked down at her, something in his eyes that was such a part of her—God, she had never thought it possible to love someone so. To love someone as if he were more her than she herself was. “Dyin’ won’t stop th’ way I feel about you; it couldn’t stop it—our souls ’re gonna live forever; I wouldn’t want t’ live forever if I couldn’t be with you—”
She looked up into his green eyes, tears coming into her own. “Do you believe in heaven, Janson?” she asked him quietly after a moment.
He gently touched her cheek, his fingers trailing over her skin. “I b’lieve in us,
” he said simply. And she understood.
Hours later that evening, Elise sat brushing her hair before the dresser in her bedroom. The room behind her, reflected in the mirror, with its huge, white-counterpaned bed, its papered walls and tall windows, now seemed a lonely, uninteresting place compared to that small, one-room house where she had learned love that day.
She smiled at her reflection, thinking that she even looked somehow different now. Her family had been blind to the change in her, their chatter floating mindlessly about her at the supper table as she had quietly replayed the events of the day in her mind—oh, what a glorious day it had been, and what a wonder it was to become a woman.
Janson’s touch, the scent and feel of him, was still fresh in her mind as she ran the brush through her bobbed hair—he had kissed her body, touched her, held her in ways she had only dreamed of before. He loved her—he had whispered the words over and over again as they had held each other. She belonged to him, as she would always belong to him, and the memory of that belonging made her blush slightly even now as she smiled at her reflection—and he belonged to her in just the same way as well.
She sat the brush down and went to stretch out on the white counterpane of the bed, closing her eyes and losing herself to the memory of his touch, to the memory of the warmth of his body moving inside of her. She drew a pillow from under the counterpane and down into her arms, hugging it close, pressing her face to its sun-dried freshness, needing him, wanting him as never before. He had promised her they would be together for always.
She opened her eyes and stared at the white ceiling overhead—if only always would begin.
Janson lay in the darkness of his small room, watching the shadows that played over the bare, unpainted walls—he had sat and stared at Elise’s window long after her light had gone out, unmindful of the cold ground on which he sat, or the slight chill in the autumn night around him. It had seemed important just to sit and watch the house where she slept, knowing she was safe and warm and protected within those walls that held him out. Just sitting and watching had made him feel closer to her—she was part of him, part in every way, as she always would be.
The door to his room creaked quietly open. Janson did not move, but just lay still on his narrow cot, watching the moonlight reflect in Elise’s red-gold hair as she entered the room and closed the door quietly behind herself—somehow it seemed now that he had known all along she would come. That he had only been waiting.
He watched as she lifted the shapeless white cotton nightgown over her head and laid it aside. She brushed her bobbed hair back from her face, her body golden and perfect in the moonlight that reflected through the dingy single window of the room. She came into his arms on the narrow cot, not speaking, but just bringing her lips to his.
It seemed somehow that their bodies melted together. He could feel her thoughts, hear her heartbeat, the gentle sounds of her breathing. Her hands were touching him, bringing him to life—he could feel the warmth of her skin against his, the gentleness of her body, the giving in her, and the need. She gasped softly as their bodies joined, and she held him close, clinging to him as the pleasure came, and holding him afterward as he cried from the sheer joy of loving her.
He was home—there in her arms, he was at last home; and neither William Whitley nor the devil himself would ever take her from him. His death would be assured if her father were ever to find her here—but somehow that did not matter; there were some things in life he was willing to die for. There were some things in life any man would be willing to die for.
18
Elise awoke slowly the next morning, feeling the warmth of Janson’s body against her. She smiled to herself and stretched lazily, opening her eyes to watch him in the dim light as he slept. He looked so handsome, his features softened in sleep, making him look almost as if he were a little boy. His hair was mussed, his thick, black lashes fanned out on his cheeks, his lips slightly parted—she loved him; more than she had ever thought it possible to love anyone, she loved him.
She suddenly realized the room was too light, the edges of the single window framed in a dim pink glow. Dawn was coming, and she knew she should not be here. If someone should check her room, if someone should realize that she was gone, a search would be started, and—
She knew her father would kill Janson if he were ever to find her here in his bed. There was no doubt in her of that. If she were found here, she would easily cost Janson his life.
She gently tried to disentangle herself from his arms, only managing to wake him instead. He looked at her sleepily and smiled, reaching out to gently touch her face. “Where’re you goin’ s’ early?” he asked softly, one leg moving possessively over hers to keep her still beside him.
“It’s almost daylight. I fell asleep. I’ve got to get back to the house—”
She tried to sit up, but he would not allow it, gently pressing her back to the straw tick instead and moving to lean over her. He brushed her hair back from her eyes and smiled down at her. “You ain’t goin’ nowhere yet—”
“But, if Daddy—” But Janson silenced her words before she could say anything more, his lips coming to hers, his tongue beginning to explore her mouth. When his lips left hers, they traveled over her cheek and down, over her throat and to her breasts. “No, we can’t—” she protested, trying to push his hands away as they began to touch her. “If they realize I’m gone, they’ll start looking for me. Daddy’ll kill you if he finds me here.”
“Your pa ain’t gonna think t’ look for you here,” he said lightly, his lips against her skin. “You b’long t’ me, an’ I don’t aim t’ let you go just yet this mornin’.”
“But, if he catches us, he’ll kill you—”
He moved to look down at her again, leaning over her on one elbow, his right leg still over hers. He touched her cheek with the backs of his fingers, then smiled down at her. “Then hush up an’ love me back for a while, that way I’ll die happy, whether it’s a year from now, or a hundred years from now—”
She knew she should not be here, knew each moment she spent in his bed only increased the danger to him—but she could not leave. His hands and lips were insistent, and her resolve melted before the need in him, and in herself. The desire to protect him lost out for the moment to the need to possess and love him just one more time—
Afterward, she lay drowsing in his arms, warm and secure against him. She could not bear to leave him just yet, even though she knew that she must, that she had to, to make him safe.
There came a hard knock at the rickety door, shaking it in its frame. “Hey, boy—I’ve got a haul for you to make this morning!” came shouted words through the door—her father.
Elise sat up quickly, pulling the old patchwork quilt from the foot of the bed to cover her breasts, a cold knot of fear and panic gripping her heart—her father, standing just on the other side of that door. She stared at Janson, knowing that it was over—if her father opened that door, if he saw her here, she knew she would see Janson die.
William Whitley stood waiting impatiently outside the door to the rough room that had been added years before to the side of the old barn. The structure had originally been appended to house sacks of fertilizer—but it was good enough to house the half-Cherokee farmhand who lived there now, William told himself. They weren’t too far different anyway, he thought, farmhands and fertilizer, for they both served their purposes, and they both could be tolerated, just so long as they didn’t stink the place up too much.
He pounded on the door again. “Damn it, boy! I ain’t got all day!”
The door creaked open a narrow space and Janson Sanders slipped through, then closed it quickly behind himself as he stood staring at William. He was dressed in overalls and no shirt, and his hair was uncombed for the first time that William had ever noticed. The boy ran the fingers of one hand through his hair and cleared his throat. “You got some work f
or me t’ do?” he asked.
“Ain’t that what I said, boy?” William demanded, staring at him. “Why’d you take so long to answer me?” It seemed strange the boy would still be in his room at this hour. It had been daylight for some time now, and, like any other of the farmhands or sharecroppers on the place, he was accustomed to rising well before daybreak.
William looked at him more closely, noting for the first time that the overalls were wrinkled, and even showing slight stains in places—the boy might not have much, but he was undeniably proud, his clothes always clean and well-mended at the beginning of each day, even if they were old and more often than not obviously patched. It looked almost as if the boy had just gotten out of bed and grabbed the first thing he could find handy to put on. His hair was mussed, and he was obviously ill-at-ease as he shifted from one foot to the other, his eyes never once leaving William’s face.
William grinned to himself, suddenly realizing—the boy had a woman in his room. All the signs were there. Janson Sanders had had a woman in his bed last night—and, by the looks of him, she was still there. “Did you have yourself a woman last night, boy?” he asked, still grinning—so, Sanders was human after all.
A muscle clenched in the boy’s jaw, his eyes never once shifting from William’s face—he did not smile, or even crack a bragging grin as many men would have done. Instead there was anger behind the green eyes, anger that he did not even try to conceal—you goddamn son-of-a-bitch, William thought, suddenly frowning to himself. You think you’re so damned high and mighty, when you’re nothing more than dirt-poor trash and a half-breed farmhand.
He took the cigar from his mouth and pointed it at the boy, a muscle clenching in his own jaw now. “As long as you’re working for me, boy, you better have your ass up out of that bed before sunup every morning. I don’t give a damn who you go bedding in your own time, but you’re on my time now. Send your slut packing and get to work; you’ve got ten minutes to meet me out behind the house—” he said, then turned without another word and walked away—goddamn son-of-a-bitch, he thought. You’d think he’d just bedded one of those moving picture actresses to see how he was acting, instead of it being some stupid little farm girl or cheap back-street whore. The goddamn half-breed—
Behold, This Dreamer Page 40