by Unknown
He stepped out on the roof at the base of the pig and stood while Fortune snapped several pictures. The quality was poor in the dark, but the judges would be able to tell. Nobody asked them to be photographers. He filled the bottle with water and climbed down, groaning as he jarred himself hitting the ground.
“Are you all right, cowboy?” Fortune came running to his side, sliding her arm around him. “I’m fine. Let’s go.”
“Couldn’t we rest now? I’m just worried about you, Hunter.” Her voice was low as she turned and followed him slowly.
“Well, don’t be. We’ve probably won. By this time tomorrow you’ll have your twenty-five thousand dollars. You and Lucy ought to be able to get the house in shape with that.”
“Yes,” she managed, feeling the ever-present lump in her throat getting larger and larger.
Hunter stuck the bottle in the back, pulled on his helmet, and started the cycle, racing the engine impatiently as he waited for her to put away the camera and the pictures.
Perhaps it was because he was tired and driving too fast. Maybe it was because he was becoming more and more out of control. Fortune was leaning heavily against him. He thought that she was probably half-asleep, otherwise she wouldn’t be plying her hands across his chest beneath his vest.
He could have stopped for a few hours. He knew he should stop to rest, but getting back to Cordele was all he could think about. And he almost made it. A few miles outside of town he increased his speed. He didn’t know how it happened, but one minute he was flying down the highway and the next minute the bike was doing a cartwheel through the air.
“Holy hell!” was the last thing Hunter heard.
He was by the ocean, he thought. He could hear the water lapping against the shore. And the stars … He forced his eyes open, his vision blurring them into a smear of light overhead. And then he heard the silence. Not waves, but crickets and tree frogs.
He was in pain, dreadful, aching pain. Not just his back, but his shoulder as well. And someone was calling his name, over and over.
“Hunter. Hunter, please wake up. Hunter, are you all right? Please, my darling cowboy, don’t die before I can tell you that I love you. Hunter.”
Hunter blinked again, focusing on the face leaning over him.
“Holy hell, there once was a man who rode bikes, who thought he had some special rights, to drive like a fool, break all the rules, and kill himself one spring night.”
“Wild woman,” he whispered.
“Cowboy, you sorry excuse for a motorcycle racer. Can’t you get where you’re going without trying to kill yourself? Do you have some kind of death wish?”
“I never have before,” he managed to say. “What happened to Florence Nightingale with the healing hands and gentle bedside manner?”
“She ran off with a bounty hunter. There’s just you and me, kid. Do you think you can get up?”
“Maybe, but I don’t think I can go anywhere if I do.”
“You don’t have to. I just want to get you on the Panther.”
“Oh, Fortune. I seem to have a small problem with my arm. I don’t think I can manage.”
“I’ll manage. I’ll drive the Panther.”
“You? But you don’t know how.”
“You showed me, remember? Anyway, I’ve watched you for the last seven days. I’ll manage. Wait right here.”
Fortune had given the bike a quick look. It didn’t seem damaged. Once again Hunter had gone in one direction and it had gone in the other, straight into a soft bank of dirt where he’d landed upright against the edge of a wheat field. She’d been slung into a stand of young wheat, which had cushioned her fall.
It still took Fortune a minute of struggling before she got the cycle turned so that she could roll it over to Hunter. Thank goodness they’d both been wearing their helmets. At least they hadn’t suffered head injuries. Though she wasn’t certain about Hunter. His eyes seemed a bit glassy.
Fortune straddled the bike. “Come on, Hunter, you can do it. Get behind me.” She couldn’t help him, for it was all she could do to hold the motorcycle steady. She started the engine as Hunter had showed her, praying that she remembered enough to get them into town, praying that the machine wasn’t broken by the crash.
Hunter groaned as he came first to his knees, then struggled to stand. “Fortune, you can’t do this. Let me.” He took one step toward her and stumbled, almost taking both her and the bike down.
“Yeah, sure. Climb on, cowboy, this is my ride.”
He followed instructions, collapsing heavily against her. “Use the clutch, wild woman, it’s on the left.”
Fortune reached back into her memory, and their earlier lesson came back to her. Get off the stand. Get in neutral. Put it in first, clutch, gas.
Even with her careful movements the machine still jerked off at what seemed like fifty miles an hour. It was all she could do to get back to the road, weaving all over the highway like a drunk. Then she began to get the machine straightened out.
Clutch, second gear. Smoother, a bit faster.
Clutch, third, then fourth. And they were moving down the road.
She was doing it. They were going to make it. Please, God, she said, let me make it. I don’t care if they put me in jail for driving without a license. If the children and I have to sleep in tents on the river, we’ll do it, if You’ll just let me get us to town.
“Hold on, cowboy, don’t you let go. We’re going to make it. Hold on!”
Hunter tightened his grip. He wasn’t quite sure what Fortune was doing. The only thought that he held on to was that they were together. Wherever they were going, they were together. He wouldn’t let go. He’d never let go.
At the hospital they had to pry his hands apart to get him into the emergency room. He had no head injury. Hunter was simply half-unconscious from shock and pain. He’d dislocated his shoulder and injured his back. After his shoulder was taken care of, his arm was put into a sling.
The staff insisted that Fortune be examined, poking, examining, intent on torturing a person who already knew that she was all right. When he released her, the emergency-room doctor gave her a stern warning to get a good night’s rest.
Fortune called Hale Kincaid and told him what had happened. Joe wasn’t ready to be moved yet, but Hale promised to be in Cordele by morning. Fortune sat by Hunter’s bed until he was resting comfortably. Then she hitched a ride to Lucy’s house with an officer who was a friend of the warden.
Later, alone and still shaken, she spread blankets under the stars and lay there thinking about what had happened. They’d lost the scavenger hunt. There would be no fifty-thousand-dollar prize. The lovely fairy tale was over, and it was time that Cinderella got back to the scullery.
The idea of Fortune’s House, a no-questions-asked shelter for runaways, was only a dream. Even if she’d won the money, there was no guarantee that the community would accept the children. Already licensing boards and health departments were throwing stumbling blocks in the way. She felt a tightness in her chest.
Not only was Fortune’s House a lost dream, but so was Hunter. “We’re falling in love,” he’d said. But that could never be. His dreams weren’t the same as hers. His dream was a private one, separating him from the world. Hers took the world straight on and spit in its eye.
Still, she couldn’t stop thinking about him, and how strong he was, about how he made her feel, and how alone she was without him. Being alone had never mattered before. Loneliness had been a way of life for her—until now. She sighed and closed her eyes.
She’d been alone before.
She’d be alone again.
She just wished she’d left the party earlier, when she’d been having the most fun.
Before she’d fallen in love.
…
The sun was high in the sky when she heard it, the sound of a car driving up Lucy’s drive. Tom, she thought, probably coming to check on her at Lucy and Rachel’s insistence. Fortune left the barn
and started back through the rose garden toward the house.
But the car was a limo. It was a limo carrying Hale Kincaid and Hunter.
“Hunter, what are you doing here? Your back? Your shoulder?”
“Get in, wild woman,” he said slowly, a glint in his eyes that dared her to disagree.
She complied. “What are you doing?”
“We’re winning a scavenger hunt, you crazy woman.” He pulled her inside the car and to the seat beside him, sliding his good arm around her.”
“But you’re supposed to be in the hospital.”
“I know. And I will be, at least I’ll be in bed, just as soon as we collect your money.”
“My money? You crazy man, the money’s half yours.”
“I don’t need it,” he said, every word an effort. “The Kincaids are loaded, remember? I’ve decided that all Fortune’s children need shoes.”
Fortune felt her heart swell. The crazy man was worried about her kids. Because of them he’d made up with his father. Because of them he was willing to forfeit the prize and take a chance on injuring himself permanently, She couldn’t speak—not even a limerick came to mind. She simply kissed him.
Before Hale, the driver, and anybody else who happened to be driving down Fifteenth Street in Cordele, Georgia, she kissed Hunter Kincaid and settled back in his arm with a heart filled with joy.
They retrieved the cycle from the hospital parking lot. With great effort and obvious pain Hunter cranked the engine and, followed by his father in the limo, he drove to the dealership parking lot, where they presented their clues. They’d solved them all. They’d completed their task in less than the allotted amount of time. They’d triumphed.
But they’d come in second.
Early that morning, while Hunter was disentangling himself from the weights and pulleys that held him in traction, while Fortune had been sleeping the restless sleep of one whose heart was hurting, another team had driven in victorious.
Second prize was fifteen thousand dollars.
Second prize would put a new roof on the house and repair some of the damage, but half that much wouldn’t. Still, it was a start.
“Thank you, Hunter,” Fortune said, ready to shake hands and let him leave. She’d find a way to manage with the money she’d won. She wasn’t certain how she’d exist with half a heart, but that was all she had left.
Half a heart and memories of how close she’d come to the forever kind of love.
“You take the Panther, Hunter. I could never drive that thing again.”
“You did drive it, wild woman. You actually got us here on the Panther.”
“I don’t know how. I still think it’s some kind of robo-monster with wheels. I’ll stick to my pink bicycle.”
“No problem, the pink bicycle is already loaded. We’ll come back for Lucy and the kids,” Hunter was saying with a grimace. His face was turning white, and his breathing was growing shallow. “I think you’d better get me to the limo, Hale.”
Hale Kincaid stepped forward and supported Hunter on one side as Fortune walked beside him on the other.
“Where are you going, Hunter?”
“You mean where are we going?”
Hale helped Hunter into the car, stretched him out on the long seat, and held the door open for Fortune. “I don’t think he ought to be alone, Fortune. And it isn’t family he wants now.”
As if in a fog, Fortune got in the car, kneeling beside the prone body of the man she loved. “What’s going on, cowboy?”
“Remember that fishing camp that belonged to my grandfather?”
“Yes, on the Flint River.”
“Well, Hale and I decided that it would make a much better shelter than it would a fishing camp. I have a confession to make, darling. I don’t know one end of a boat from another.”
“Shelter? I don’t understand.”
“Well, let’s put it this way. There was a wild woman from Dover, who took in kids who were rovers. She fell in love with a dude whose father was glued—with connections and money all over.”
“Glued?”
“Well, that’s the best I can do when I’m in such great need of comfort and medical attention. Where are those wonderful hands, Nurse Fortune? Come to think of it, the rest of you can help too.” He reached down and pulled her onto the seat with him.
“Hunter, you’re in great pain. You should be in the hospital.”
“Not without you, wild woman. Never without you again.”
Epilogue
The Flint River cut like a gray-green plow through ancient trees that bowed their branches in silent subservience to the water. Bright sunshine dappled light through the lush growth.
Beneath one very tall live oak, a man lay on his stomach on a blanket. His face was pressed against one folded arm, the other encased in the sling beneath him.
“Doesn’t it hurt your shoulder for you to lie on your arm?” Fortune asked as she plied her fingertips down his back.
“Ummm.”
“Is that a yes?”
“No, that’s a ummm. Lower, Fortune.”
Fortune slid her body lower, catching the back of his knee between her legs as she moved down.
“Ummm, that’s nice. I hear the water lapping against my body. I feel the heat on my calf.” He moved his leg from side to side. “Definitely hot, moist heat, I’d say.”
“Hunter, stop that. It’s bad enough that we’re out here without our clothes. Don’t—don’t—”
He continued to move his leg against her, encouraging the moisture, igniting the heat.
“I’m trying to work the kinks out of your back, darling. Stop trying to start something.”
Hunter stopped moving and turned over slowly, protecting both his shoulder and his back. He’d spent the last three weeks under Fortune’s care, camping out in the remains of the fishing camp, cooking on an open fire, sleeping in her arms. There was still pain, but he was getting better.
“I think it’s time we do some serious talking, my wild woman.”
Fortune leaned back on her heels and waited. She’d known that sooner or later Hunter was going to get to his point, and she didn’t know what she was going to say. He’d insisted that she have all the money. On one of his visits before he left, Hale had told her that Hunter had agreed at last to take a job with Kincaid Hotels. So she knew that no matter what plans Hunter had, their time together was limited. She’d accepted that.
She was prepared to let him go. She’d been away from Lucy and the children long enough.
“Fine. Serious talk, cowboy, you start.”
“Not with you up there and me down here. Come down beside me, darling.”
“Ah, Hunter. You know what will happen if I lie down beside you. That will last about thirty seconds and then—”
“Fortune! I need you here.”
And she needed to be there. Quickly, she came to his side, into his arms, into the curves of his chest and waist, where her body fit instinctively.
“Fortune, in a few days there will be crews of construction workers swarming all over this camp, rebuilding, laying out facilities, and constructing new buildings. If it were up to me, there’d never be anybody here but us, but it can’t be that way. You’re a woman of the people, and if I’m going to share my life with you, I’m going to have to be a people person too.”
“I don’t understand.”
Hunter took his hand and placed it gently against Fortune’s cheek. “You opened a door for me, a door back to my family. I’m not certain yet that it will work, but I’m going to give it a try. What I do know is that whatever happens, we’re going to build Fortune’s House right here on the bank of the river.”
“But I didn’t do anything, cowboy, except fall in love. And I never meant to do that. The children are my responsibility, not yours. And I won’t let them ever be a burden to anybody.”
“I know.” He stroked her face, rimming her lips, running his fingers down her neck and capturing her nipples.
“You’d be perfectly willing to leave me and never let me know that you’re going to have my child, wouldn’t you?”
Fortune gasped. “Your child? What are you saying?”
With his good arm Hunter turned Fortune over and pulled her forward against him, taking her nipple in his mouth.
Fortune winced. Her breasts were tender. She stared down at herself in disbelief. She’d attributed the changes she’d been feeling to their having loved each other too much in the three weeks they’d been on the river, even though she’d thrown up the last three mornings. Reality came crashing over her. They’d been together for more than a month. And she was late. She hadn’t even realized. And she’d never in her life been late.
Wide-eyed she stared down at Hunter.
“No. That can’t be true. You used something. At least I thought you did.”
“I did. But nothing’s foolproof. Apparently something happened. It’s true, Fortune. We’re going to have a baby.”
“A baby?”
“No, Cinderella, our baby. Don’t you see, darling? We belong together. We’ve made a child together. And I’m going to love it as much as I love you.”
Fortune couldn’t gather her thoughts. A baby. The one thing she’d never expected to happen had. “Thank you, Hunter,” she managed. “But you don’t have to marry me. I never intended to marry. I never intended—holy hell! I don’t believe it.”
“Fortune, since that first night we’ve made love over and over again, and we’ve taken precautions. But you’re carrying my child.”
“We’ve been foolish. We should have thought about what might happen.”
“No, we’re incredibly right together, Fortune. Our bodies knew it. But more than that, so did our hearts. From the first time you tried to massage away my pain, I knew how much you could care.”