by Unknown
“Do you and Julie get along?”
“Funny thing about that, we do. She’s everything that a man would want in his sister, except for her blind adoration of Hale. We don’t discuss that.”
“What about the other two?”
“I don’t know. I was gone by the time they were born. Robert seems like a good kid, just what Hale wants in a son, I suppose. Certainly, he’s more a Kincaid than I could ever be. I hardly know Penny.”
“Did you ever try to please Mr. Kincaid?”
“Once. When I was sixteen, I actually took a job in the first hotel he bought. I actually enjoyed it. For a while I thought I might have been wrong about the man.”
“What happened?”
“I was wrong. I ended up leaving home permanently.”
“Hunter—”
“No, don’t say anything, darling. Just hold me.”
Fortune lay in Hunter’s arms, holding him, wanting with every ounce of her being to take away the pain he was feeling. When it was obvious that he wasn’t going to say any more, she turned her face and began planting kisses across his chest.
She found his nipples and felt them tighten beneath her lips. She slid over him, feeling the response of her nipples as they rubbed against his. She planted little wet kisses on the frown lines on his forehead, on his eyebrows, and down the side of his face. His skin was rough, his beard, though light in color, was already making its presence known.
Using her lips and her mouth, little by little she felt his tension ease, then rebuild in a different way. With little ripples it began, changing into subtle answering motions of response and soft moans of approval. She drew him away from the past and into the present.
Feeling her own shivery response, Fortune tightened her muscles, forming a circle of heat around the part of him that was shuddering as it stiffened.
“Fortune,” he said with a groan. “Do you know what you’re doing?”
“No, but I’m learning.”
“But I don’t—you said—”
“I talk too much, Hunter. This time I’m speaking in a different way. Just be quiet and listen.”
And she took away his words with her mouth and his pain with her body.
Afterward he walked with her into the shallow part of the water. They cleansed themselves in the hot sunlight by the swiftly moving river; then, silently they dressed and ate their lunch.
Words seemed unnecessary. They felt a spiritual warmth that filled them and erased the last of their restraint. Fortune didn’t know what would happen after the scavenger hunt was over, but she knew that her life was tied to this man’s for as long as he wanted her.
Hunter sat beside her, touching her, feeding her cold fries, rimming her lips with his mouth, drinking in the touch and taste of her as if he were committing her to memory. Tomorrow was out there somewhere, but it was some hazy, distant unknown, He focused on now, which was more than he’d ever hoped for.
By four o’clock they were making the loop around Atlanta and heading toward Lithia Springs on the west side of town.
“According to the man at the service station, we take a right at Highway 278, and it’s just down the road. There’s a white fence, and we should be able to see the frog rock.”
Fortune was more than ready to find the Lithia gold. Her back was aching and she knew that Hunter must be in agony. But more than that, her body was very tense. Holding Hunter, touching him, feeling him touch her most intimate parts, simply fed the fire inside her that seemed to burn constantly.
Nothing she did alleviated the growing anticipation of what the night might bring. She’d lost all fear. All she wanted was Hunter. She’d take him any way, for any amount of time, on whatever basis he said.
For the first time she understood why her mother had followed her father. Why Hunter’s mother had shared a bed with Hale and given him children.
Children. What if Hunter had given her a child? She’d made love to him. She’d broken her most sacred vow, and all she could feel was joy. She shivered and snuggled closer, savoring the breathless feeling that swept over her.
The bike began to slow. The drive to the Lithia Springs Water Company loomed up, as did the large piece of granite that did indeed resemble a frog. At the end of the drive were several small buildings, including a turquoise wooden building with a lacy white postage stamp-size porch around two sides of it. The sign outside identified the building as the medical office of Christopher Columbus Garrett, date 1890.
Hunter parked the cycle and turned off the engine. It took a minute before they could stretch their legs and walk up the steps to the house.
“I hope there’s still somebody here,” Fortune said.
There was. A small, bright woman wearing a big smile invited them in, greeting them warmly. She was the proprietor of the springs, and on hearing their story, beamed even more.
“Yes, you’ve found the famous Lithia mineral water. It will definitely soothe your cares, and treat a few other problems too. This is what you want.”
She handed them a small bottle of the water, packaged as Lithia Love Water, with the original label from the 1900s. “There were people who thought it was pure gold back then. And there are plenty who still do. I ship the water all over the world.”
After a sales pitch for her mineral water and a quick history lesson on the springs, the woman let them go. She was more than happy to direct them to campgrounds near the springs where they could stay the night.
“Thank you,” Hunter called out again, as they drove away. “The mineral water is the sixth clue, wild woman. But I don’t know what we’re going to do about the creature’s tears.”
“Maybe Lucy will have found something. She was going to the library today to do some research. I’ll call her when we get to the campgrounds.”
The campgrounds were located along a large, flowing creek. Following the usual commercial layout, there was a central office with a small store, a swimming pool, and separate areas set up for RVs, campers, and tents. Hunter picked a site along the creek bank, as far away from the other campers as he could get. They made camp for the night.
“Let’s find the phone first and call Lucy,” said Hunter, his voice as serious as a deacon at a funeral.
“And then?” Fortune had to ask, though she knew that his thoughts had to be following the same line as hers. Every time they’d touched, while they’d laid out the bedrolls, the tension had increased.
“Then, witch,” he said with a growl, “then we shall see what we shall see.”
“I see,” she said very seriously.
“No, you don’t, but you’re going to.” Hunter pulled her to him and gave her a quick, hard kiss that threatened to bring them immediately to a fever pitch.
She gasped. “The phone. The phone, remember? The creature with the tears.”
“Hold that thought,” Hunter said, and kissed her again.
“The fifty thousand dollars?”
“Ah—you know how to jerk a man back to reality.” Hunter took her hand and pressed it against the hard part of him that needed her.
“Let’s hurry, cowboy,” Fortune said, and started toward the office at a run.
The pay phone was just outside the general store. Fortune got the operator and placed her collect call to Lucy at the prison farm.
But it wasn’t Lucy who answered the phone. It was Tom Benson. “Lucy left with Rachel to go into town. We got a call about your little buddy, Joe. He’s in Orlando, in the hospital. He’s been badly beaten.”
“Oh, no. What are they doing?”
“Trying to work out something with the welfare office to get him home, or back here. But we don’t have any way to move him, or a hospital willing to take him.”
“I’ll be there as soon as I can,” Fortune said. “Where exactly is he?”
Tom passed on the name of the hospital with the message that Lucy hadn’t found anything about a crying creature.
“Tell Lucy I’ll call her when I get to Orlando
. Not to worry. We’ll figure out something.”
Hunter was waiting impatiently. “What’s wrong, Fortune?”
Fortune hung up the phone and turned to face her partner, the man she’d been ready to fall in love with, the man who’d claimed not only her body but an unretrievable part of her heart. The party was over. Cinderella had turned back into the scullery maid. The dream had ended. She was ending it now.
“It’s Joe. He’s been hurt. I have to go to him.”
“The kid who ran away? Where?”
“He’s in a hospital in Orlando.”
“How bad is he?”
“We don’t know.”
Hunter hated himself for asking, and he already knew what her answer would be. “What about the scavenger hunt?”
“I’m truly sorry, Hunter, more than you’ll ever know. I need the money as badly as you, but there are other things that are more important.”
“We could stop by the office in Cordele on the way down and sign in. We have six of the seven clues. Maybe we’ll win on the shortest time, if nobody solves all the clues.”
Fortune shuffled her feet. “No, I can’t, Hunter. In fact, I was wondering if you’d let me have part of the money we have left to buy a plane ticket and rent a car. I’ll pay you back. Nobody wants to accept responsibility for him. I just want—need—to get to Joe, quick.”
“I see.” He did. Joe needed her. Joe needed Fortune more than she needed Hunter. The woman fed on need, and it would always come first. What they had or were learning to have wasn’t the forever kind of love. She was ready to throw away the prize money as well as him to go after some kid who’d run away, first from his family, then from Fortune. She was as stubborn as Hale Kincaid.
And without Fortune, Joe was as alone as he’d always been. But Joe had reached out for help. Maybe it was time Hunter did.
“Let me make a couple of calls, Fortune. Go back to the campsite and start packing. We’re leaving tonight.”
“But—”
“Do it, Fortune.”
She didn’t argue. When Hunter returned, Fortune had repacked the Panther and was sitting on the picnic table trying not to think about Joe. She was looking at her new tennis shoes and thinking of the undersize, frightened boy who’d run away because he’d accidentally set the house on fire, the little boy who wanted to see the Hemingway cats. He’d been hurt, and he’d never got to Key West.
She wasn’t surprised. That was the way things seemed to work for Joe. All the wonder in life was just beyond his grasp. As it had been for Hunter. As it had been for her. She’d known all along that Hunter was a dream, that he was a temporary illusion in her life, that something would jerk him away from her.
The same way the scavenger-hunt prize had been. It had been within reach, and now it was gone.
“Let’s move out, Fortune.”
“Where are we going?”
“We’re going to get Joe.”
“We?” She felt her heart leap.
“We. We’re partners, aren’t we? Besides, I always wanted to see a cat with seven toes.”
Fortune soon found that they weren’t traveling to Florida on the Panther. Charlie Brown Airport, a small corporate facility, was within five miles of the campgrounds. There was a jet waiting for them, its flight plan already filed, the pilot standing by.
“How’d you do this?” Fortune asked, completely confused by what was happening.
“I didn’t. Hale did.”
“You asked Mr. Kincaid?”
“Yes. He made the arrangements. We’ll fly to Orlando. The plane will stand by until we find out how bad the situation is, then we’ll decide what to do.”
“But, Hunter, you know that this means we’ve lost the contest.” She was talking about the contest, but what she was really thinking was that Hunter had asked Hale Kincaid for help, and he’d provided it.
“Don’t worry about the contest, Fortune. I’ll find another way to accomplish what I intended to do with the money—to refurbish a fishing camp I inherited. Maybe I’ll sell it and go to work in the hotel business. Hale will expect it after this.”
They parked the Panther where the hangar owner indicated and boarded the private jet. In no time they were airborne and heading south.
Fortune stared out the window, her emotions skittering wildly. Hunter had called his father to help a boy he’d never met. Not only had she cost him the prize money, but he’d faced the man he hated, all for her.
“Why? Why’d you do this, cowboy?”
“Why’d you make love to me, wild woman?”
“Because you were hurting.”
“And you wanted to take my pain away. Why?”
“I don’t know. I just wanted to share it. Why’d you do this?”
“Because I care about you. What does it all mean, Fortune?”
“I don’t have an answer.” But she did. Suddenly, with absolute certainty, she knew. “No, that’s not true. I think the answer is that I’m falling in love with you, Hunter. I never wanted it. I don’t expect you to believe me, or to return my feelings, but that’s the truth of it, cowboy. You burned my feet and singed my heart.”
Hunter didn’t respond. He sat in silence, listening to the whine of the engine in the night sky. His mind went back to the first time he’d seen Fortune, riding that pink bicycle with the wicker basket. She’d had her hair styled in little stiff points that made her look like a porcupine ready to attack.
And she’d been barefoot. She’d come to claim her spot on a scavenger hunt that required her to ride a motorcycle she was deathly afraid of, all to claim a prize to rebuild a roof on a house that had burned because of a runaway. Now the runaway was in trouble, and she was giving up her chance at fifty thousand dollars to answer his call for help. He’d never met anybody so giving.
He’d never met a woman who made him feel so good, so cherished. Yet she was throwing it all away for a sixteen-year-old who needed her more.
“You know what I was going to do with the prize money, Fortune?”
He hadn’t called her “darling.” Or “wild woman.” He was talking to Fortune, and she wasn’t certain that she wanted to be the person Fortune was. “No. You mentioned a fishing camp, but I don’t know.”
“My grandparents, my father’s mother and father, owned a little fishing camp on the banks of the Flint River. When they died, they left it to me. I only found out about it when I turned twenty-one. By that time it had deteriorated until it was little more than a falling-down, screened-in porch attached to a shed. But it was mine. It was something that Hale hadn’t provided. And I’ve hung on to it ever since.”
“And you loved it.”
“Oh, I loved it, but I couldn’t stay there. I kept on moving. I couldn’t be still, put my past behind me, and put down roots, even though I wanted to—so badly. I didn’t tell you this morning, Fortune. But when I worked for the hotel, some money disappeared. I didn’t take it, but Hale thought I did. He had me arrested, and I spent the night in jail.”
“Oh, Hunter, I’m sorry.”
“He thought it would teach me a lesson. It did. Don’t trust anybody but yourself. I didn’t take the money, but he thought I had. And it has taken me a long time to understand that he had every right to believe the thief was me. I’d certainly never tried to earn his trust.”
Hunter reached up and turned out the lights, throwing the jet cabin into darkness. He was already opening up too much. The light was too revealing.
“Later the money was found,” Hunter went on. “Somebody else was responsible. But by that time I was long gone. I never went back.”
“Didn’t he apologize?”
“Oh, sure. But that wasn’t the point. He believed that I was guilty.”
“It must have been very hard for him to let you stay in jail.”
“But he never even asked me what happened.”
Fortune took a deep breath and hoped that she was right in what she was about to say. “But, darling, isn’t that wh
at you did?”
“Me? What are you talking about?”
“Did you ever ask Hale about your father’s death?”
“I didn’t have to. Everybody knew he’d been responsible.”
Fortune didn’t answer. She’d said as much as she could say without appearing to take the enemy’s side. But something told her that Hale Kincaid hadn’t been any more guilty than Hunter had been. The problem was neither of them had known how to talk about his feelings.
She leaned her head against the back of the seat and closed her eyes. Her dream of having enough money to rebuild Lucy’s house was gone. There was no reason to believe that the state would ever issue a license to her for her haven for runaways anyway. She didn’t have the credentials to meet the basic requirements. As always, her dreams were bigger than her good sense.
Sports figures, famous people, they could raise money and open up homes for orphans and disturbed children. But not someone who had the same reputation as the children she was trying to shelter. Drifters didn’t have clout. They didn’t have money either. They shopped at Goodwill and worked as maids and waitresses or, sometimes, migrant workers.
No wonder the county had threatened to take the kids away from her. If it hadn’t been for Rachel and her social work, they would already have done so. Dear Rachel, maybe she could arrange something for Joe. As for the others, there had to be an answer, a place. Fortune just hadn’t found it yet.
She was very tired. For now she’d sleep and dream of a blue-eyed sun god who loved her pain away.
“There was a woman from Docket,” she whispered, “who captured a seed in her pocket. The seed was a dream, an impossible scheme, but it flowered into love and she lost it.”
Fortune Dagosta was back to covering her pain by spouting limericks.
Eight
There was a chauffeur with a black limo waiting as they stepped off the plane at the Orlando airport, who took them straight to the hospital.
Hunter inquired at the information desk, and they were escorted to the trauma unit. As they entered the cubicle where Joe was being treated, a tall gray-haired man rose from the chair beside Joe’s bed.