Warrior's Embrace

by Peggy Webb

  “I won’t deny it, Virginia,” Bolton finally said.

  “Let’s end this as gracefully as possible... Goodbye, Bolton.” Virginia stood up, uncertain that her legs would support her on the long walk to the door.

  Bolton held her captive with his eyes. She could do nothing but stare into their impossibly blue depths as he stalked her.

  “That was before I met you, before I knew that a woman can be everything a man needs.” He threaded his fingers through her hair, then pulled her close. “You’re everything I need, Virginia, everything I want.”

  “No,” she whispered. “I won’t do that to you. I won’t deny you the joys of fatherhood.”

  “Childbearing is no longer the exclusive privilege of the young.”

  “I had a hysterectomy six years ago.”

  Her barrenness settled over her like a hair shirt, and she was suddenly overtaken with sadness. There was something magical in being able to bear a child, something that made a woman feel feminine and complete.

  “It doesn’t matter, Virginia.”

  The fraction of a second she waited for his denial told her all she needed to know.

  “Of course, it matters! You deserve everything, Bolton, a wife who can climb mountains with you and not be winded, one who can wear a backless dress without worrying about sagging upper arms. But most of all you deserve a woman who can give you a child.”

  “You’re a beautiful woman. You’ll always be beautiful.”

  He was skirting the real issue, but she was too tired to point that out. Besides, there were no arguments that could take away the basic fact: She could not have a child.

  “Don’t you think I can count, Bolton? When you’re forty-six I’ll be fifty-nine. When you’re fifty I’ll be sixty-three.” She pushed against his chest. “Let me go. I don’t even want to think about it.”

  “No, Virginia. I won’t let you go.” With subtle pressure he pulled her so close, she could feel his body heat through her robe.

  “Do you think I want people asking if I’m your mother?”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “Oh, is it? Have you taken a good look at my thighs? And what about my belly? When you’re knocking ‘em dead at the beach, I’ll look like somebody whose skin needs a good pressing.”

  “Do you think I’m that shallow? Do you think all I care about is appearances?”

  “No. I don’t think you’re shallow.” She was close to tears now, but she’d be hanged before she’d cry. She’d do her crying later, when pride was not at stake and when dignity no longer mattered. Her hands shook as she shoved her hair back from her hot face. “This is so hard.”

  “It doesn’t have to be this way, Virginia.”

  “Yes, it does. Don’t you see, Bolton? This is not merely about appearances. You’re young and vigorous.”

  “So are you.”

  “No. I’m at the age when women start having medical problems. I’m not going to saddle you with something like that.”

  “Are you having problems, Virginia?”

  “No.”

  “Good. Then don’t borrow trouble. Most women outlive their men anyhow. Our ages even the odds.”

  “I’m not borrowing trouble. I’m being realistic.”

  “No, you’re being pessimistic.”

  “One of us has to be.”

  Suddenly he laughed.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “You. Like all artists, you can turn the mundane into drama, sometimes even melodrama.” He hugged her hard. “I’m never bored with you.”

  “I’m glad to know I’m good for something.” It took heroic effort to keep her voice from breaking. If she didn’t get out of there soon, she’d be bawling like a baby.

  “You’re good, Virginia,” Bolton whispered. His lips brushed her hair, then her eyebrows, her cheeks, her lips. “You’re very, very good.”

  It would be so easy to let herself be seduced, so easy to forget everything except the sensations he aroused in her.

  “Don’t.” She tried to pull out of his grasp, but he held her fast.

  “Don’t fight against me. Don’t fight against us.”

  “There is no us. Oh, Bolton, don’t you see... our love is impossible.”

  “Do you love me, Virginia?”

  “I didn’t say that.” His quick smile broke her heart. “All right. I love you. But that doesn’t change anything.”

  “It does, Virginia. Love makes the impossible possible.”

  She shook her head, but he put a finger over her lips.

  “Don’t you know that when two people love each other, there’s no problem they can’t solve.” He smiled at her. “You write about it all the time.”

  “That’s fiction.”

  “Life imitates art.”

  “But life is not art. It’s real, and I won’t be the cause of your misery.”

  “If you walk out that door, you will be.”

  “No, Bolton, if I don’t walk out that door, I will be.” When he started to protest, she put her hand over his mouth. “Please don’t say another word. Nothing you can say will change my mind.”

  They were still so close she was beginning to sweat. She didn’t know if her condition was caused by the fire or the unseasonably warm temperature or her age. He shifted subtly so that their hips were pressed close. She could feel his body heat, feel his arousal. If she didn’t leave soon, all was lost.

  She cupped his face so that he could see the truth in her eyes.

  “Nothing you can do will change my mind, Bolton, so please... let me leave with some dignity.”

  He didn’t move, didn’t speak. Finally she decided the only thing she could say was good-bye. He must have read her mind. When he held up his hand, it was not a signal for silence, but a command.

  His words were as fluid and musical as the most exquisite poetry. She didn’t have to understand the language to know what he was saying.

  Bolton Gray Wolf was pouring out his love to her in the ancient language of his people.

  Turning away from him was the hardest thing she’d ever done.

  She had gained the door when he called out.

  “Virginia...It’s not over between us.”

  She plunged through the doorway without looking back.

  TEN

  Virginia put a cold cloth on her head and stayed in bed while Bolton left. She didn’t want to see him carry his bags down the path, didn’t want to see him get in his car, didn’t want to watch as the Mustang shot down the driveway.

  She was too numb to do anything except lie flat on her back, aching inside and out.

  The knock startled her. When Candace poked her head around the door, Virginia looked at the clock. Three in the afternoon. She must have slept. Pity she didn’t feel refreshed.

  “Mother...” Candace sat on the side of the bed. “Are you all right?”

  “No.” She didn’t think she’d ever be all right again.

  “We didn’t want to disturb you, but I got worried when you didn’t come out for lunch.”

  “I didn’t mean to worry you.”

  “It’s okay. I’m young and resilient. I can take it.” Candace studied her mother. “I almost made you smile, didn’t I?”

  “Almost. Where’s Marge?”

  “Loading the car. We’re headed back to school.”

  Virginia made a halfhearted attempt to sit up, then flopped back onto the mattress.

  “Tell Marge ‘bye for me... and Candace, tell her I’m sorry I missed lunch.”

  “No problem. She understands... really, she does, Mother. We both do.”

  Virginia found the wet bath cloth wadded under the sheets and flung it to the floor.

  “I wish I did.”

  Candace picked up the cloth and carried it to the bathroom. Afterward, she stood in the bathroom doorway watching Virginia.

  “Candace, you look like somebody whose cat has just been run over. You might as well spit it out and get it over with.” />
  “I saw Bolton’s car leave.”

  “He’s gone.”

  “Will he be back?”

  “No.”

  To her daughter’s credit, Candace didn’t smile at the news.

  “It’s for the best,” she said.

  “Yes,” Virginia agreed. “It’s best... for all of us.”

  From somewhere deep inside, Virginia drew on a reserve of strength she hadn’t had to use in many years. She threw back the covers, got out of bed, and kissed her daughter good-bye.

  “Take care of yourself, baby.”

  “You, too, Mom.”

  As she held out her hand, Virginia even managed a smile. Candace pressed her palm against her mother’s.

  “Two against the world,” Virginia said.

  o0o

  She was sitting in her office staring at the computer screen. Virginia had done a lot of that lately. As a matter of fact, she hadn’t written a single word since Bolton left. Not one. She had tried. She’d put words on the paper, but they were just words. They didn’t leap off the page and grab the reader by the throat. They didn’t sing. They didn’t even whimper.

  She’d used the delete key so much that the lettering was wearing off.

  It was useless to keep sitting at her keyboard accomplishing nothing. All she was doing was adding failure to misery.

  She picked up the phone and dialed.

  “Jane? Can you come over? I’m ready to run.”

  “Thank goodness. I thought you’d died and gone to that great writers’ conference in the sky.”

  “I’m not laughing, Jane.”

  “Somehow I didn’t think you were. I’ll be right over.”

  Virginia was dressed in sweats, waiting on the front porch swing.

  “Up and at ‘em,” Jane said. “Let’s go, kid.”

  “I don’t have the energy to move.”

  “I heard that Bolton left.”

  “You can’t keep a secret in Pontotoc.”

  “Is it supposed to be a secret?”

  “No.”

  “Did he leave on his own, or did you send him away?”

  “I sent him off, but not the way I’d planned. I made a fool of myself, Jane.”

  “Good. Join the human race. I do it daily. Sometimes more than once.” Jane grabbed Virginia’s hands and tugged. “Come on. Get your bones moving. You look like death on wheels.”

  “That’s how I feel.”

  “Not for long, kid. Old Jane has come to the rescue.” Jane let go and twirled around on the front porch. “Do you think I have a cute butt?”

  “I’ve never noticed.”

  “Well, notice. Is it cute?”

  Virginia smiled for the first time in three days. It was then that she knew she was going to be all right.

  “I don’t know anything about cute butts,” she said, “but yeah, I guess yours is cute. Why in the world do you want to know?”

  “Old Eldon at the post office told me it was, and I wondered if he was telling the truth or just trying a new tactic to get me to play fun and games with him.”

  “Eldon!” By now, Virginia was laughing. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  “Yeah, I’m just kidding, but I made you laugh, didn’t I?”

  “Yes, and it feels good.”

  “You want to know something else that will feel good... besides, you know what, I mean.”

  Virginia kept the smile on her face, but she felt a small quick rush of loss and regret.

  “All right. I’ll bite. What?”

  “Spending money. Reed’s in Tupelo is having a wham bang sale. After we get our bodies gorgeous, let’s go over there and spend an obscene amount of money.”

  “I’m too far behind with my writing.”

  “You say that every time you start a new book.”

  “Do I?”

  “Yep. If you weren’t behind schedule, I’d think something was wrong with you.” Jane marched around her friend, exaggerating her perusal. “Yep. Just as I thought. Nothing wrong that spending a little money won’t cure.”

  Suddenly the starch went out of Virginia. She sat heavily on the swing.

  “I wish that were true.” She was foolishly close to tears.

  Jane sat beside her, and kicked the swing into motion.

  “You did the right thing, Virginia.”

  “My head knows it. I just wish I could convince my heart.”

  “Go ahead and cry if you want to.” A cardinal swooped onto the lowest branch of a pecan tree, his coat a flash of scarlet in the early-morning sun. “Nobody here but us old birds.”

  “I’m not going to cry. I’m sick and tired of crying.”

  “Atta girl!”

  Virginia watched as a sassy mockingbird tried to chase the cardinal away.

  “He hasn’t even called,” she said. “Why doesn’t he call?”

  “Do you want me to answer that?” Virginia waited, knowing Jane could never resist saying exactly what she thought. “I think Mr. Bolton Gray Wolf got back out to Arizona and licked his wounded pride for a couple of days, then he took a good hard long distance look and decided he’d had a very narrow escape.”

  Virginia sucked in her breath.

  “Well, you wanted the truth, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Look, Virginia, you did the right thing. People are still talking about the two of you at that dance.”

  “What are they saying? No, wait a minute. I don’t want to know.”

  “They’re saying exactly what you’d expect them to say. But it’s over and done with now, and you’re going to dress up in one of your outrageously expensive outfits that makes you look twice as beautiful as you already are and stick out your chin and sashay your gorgeous self all over this town smiling like you’ve just been crowned the Queen of the World... even if I have to drag you down the streets kicking and screaming.”

  Strength began to pour through Virginia. With a friend like Jane, nothing was going to happen that she couldn’t handle.

  “Jane, that is quite possibly the worst example of syntax I’ve ever heard.”

  “Hey, I never do anything halfway.”

  Virginia leaned on her porch railing and took a deep breath. Her land was spread out before her—the lake sparkling in the autumn sun, the pasture with patches of brown beginning to show through the green, the woods that would soon put on a flamboyant color show to rival anything she’d see on the world’s greatest stages. In the distance her Arabians cavorted in the paddock. It was all hers, a land, a home, and possessions she’d acquired the hard way, with years of sacrifice and perseverance.

  “Neither do I,” she said.

  She had a good life—a wonderful daughter, a dear and loyal friend, a comfortable home, a great career.

  Nothing was going to steal her joy. Not even the loss of a magnificent Apache warrior called Gray Wolf.

  o0o

  Bolton rode Apache style, his knees dug into the stallion’s side and his hands so light on the reins that horse and rider seemed one. The horse was a paint, the kind ridden by his ancestors, a gritty breed exactly right for the kind of daredevil riding Bolton loved. They thundered down from the mountain, taking the precarious trail at a speed no other would dare... no other except Callie Gray Wolf.

  She stood in the paddock watching her twin brother’s descent. Her Jeep Wrangler was nearby, her black Lab was at her feet, and her eyes were riveted on horse and rider.

  It was too dark for him to be riding that way. Even Callie wouldn’t have taken such risks with the blood-red sun disappearing over the rim of the mountain and casting purple shadows on the trail. Though patience was not her style, Callie had to wait until Bolton wheeled the paint to a stop to have her say.

  “What are you trying to do?” she said. “Kill yourself?”

  “Hello, Callie. When did you get back from Africa?”

  “Last Tuesday. I can’t believe you’d risk the stallion that way.”

  “Lancelot was n
ever at risk. I know exactly what I’m doing.”

  “Oh, do you?”

  “Yes. Always.”

  Callie stood toe-to-toe with her brother, eyes blazing and hands balled into fists.

  “I ought to horsewhip you.”

  Coming from Callie, that was no idle threat. Bolton had seen her in action. When they were eight years old, visiting their mother’s people in Mississippi, she’d taken her grandmother’s buggy whip to a boy twice her size for calling her a papoose. If Bolton hadn’t stepped in, her victim probably would have ended up with more than a cut on his cheek and a bruise on his arm.

  Bolton stared into a face as inscrutable as his own, with the same high cheekbones, the same dusty golden skin. They had the same blue eyes, the same tall frame. But there the resemblance ended. He was calm and self-contained, she was explosive and analytical. He was rugged and masculine, she was blatantly feminine. He walked a steady course, always certain of what he wanted while Callie zigged and zagged all over the country, never sure of what she wanted or what she would do next.

  A doctor specializing in exotic diseases, she traveled the world doing battle against little-known deadly viruses. It was a job suited for a woman with her temperament and courage.

  But no matter where she went, Callie always came home to the White Mountains, always came back to the land that had nurtured her and the family that loved her.

  Her greeting was typical. Between journeys Callie took up exactly where she’d left off, perhaps in an attempt to act as if she’d never left home to put herself at risk time and again.

  They both looked at each other and suddenly burst into laughter.

  “Welcome home, Callie.”

  She looped an arm around his waist, and they walked together toward his house.

  “I can, you know,” she said, “... whip the daylights out of you.”

  “I’ve no doubt that you’d try.”

  They sat together on the front porch swing with Callie’s Lab licking her ankles.

  “My original question stands. What are you trying to do to yourself?”

  Callie never asked an idle question. Trained in science and medicine, she had the kind of mind that sifted through extraneous details and cut right to the heart of the matter.

  “You’ve been talking to Janice,” he said.