by Lily Graison
She sighed.
She wanted more kisses and looks that heated her blood. “You are such a fool, Grace.”
Slumping onto the bed, she stared out the window at the lightening sky. The sun was just peeking up over the mountains in the distance. They stood alone, holding silent vigil over the valley.
A dark shape crossed in front of the barn and headed toward the house. Grace knew it was Rafe without even seeing him clearly. She’d know that walk anywhere. The walk of a man who was proud, stubborn, and downright ornery.
The back door opened and shut moments later and she couldn’t make herself get up to join them for breakfast. She couldn’t face him. Not yet. Not while her stomach felt so queasy just thinking of how foolish she was acting. To think she’d spent so much time the night before dreaming of how her life with him would be. How wonderful it would be to make love to him, to have him whisper in her ear as he branded her body and soul as his.
She sat there, in her dark room, watching the sun rise over the mountains. Sat so long Rafe walked back across the yard, entered the barn and returned moments later with his horse. He climbed into the saddle, adjusted his hat and looked up to her window. She couldn’t see his face clearly but he sat there for long minutes before turning the horse and heading for the pasture.
When he disappeared over the hill, Grace took a deep breath and stood. The mess from breakfast needed cleaning and she wanted to do something about her room today. It was too plain. It was all dark wood and drab. It needed a little life.
If Rafe was going to be hot and cold with her then she’d just do what she had to until she could think of something else. Marrying Jesse was out of the question but that didn’t mean there wasn’t someone in Willow Creek looking for a wife. She’d ask every person in town if she had to.
One way or another, she’d find a way out of this house and out of Rafe’s life for good. He apparently wanted her gone and she was nothing if not dutiful. She’d give him what he wanted regardless of how much it hurt to do so.
Rafe scowled as he eyed the broken fence line. The breech was big enough he could drive two wagons through it, side by side. There was no way his cattle had done that.
Jumping from his horse, he inspected the fence, biting back a curse. It would take him all day to repair. By the time he made it back to the house, collected what he needed and rode back, it would be well past lunch. He’d be hard pressed to get it fixed by the time Grace set supper on the table.
The thought of her caused his chest to tighten and he stalked back to the horse, jumping into the saddle, irritated beyond measure. Why had he been such a jackass to her? Why did he always have to stick his foot in his mouth when she was around?
He turned the horse back to the house as Grace’s image danced in his head. She’d looked like a tiny ray of sunshine standing in the kitchen this morning. The calico dress did nothing for her figure but he knew what was under all that unflattering fabric. He’d seen it.
She was all supple curves with firm, high breasts he’d never get another chance to see. He’d wanted to pin her against the table the moment he saw her with her hair flowing down her back in a single braid. Wanted to loosen those strands and fist those golden locks in his hand as he bared her throat to his hungry mouth. Kiss her breathless again until she made that little sound deep in the back of her throat that sounded like a siren’s call to his cock.
He shivered as an image of her wrapping her legs around his waist while he buried himself inside of her filled his head and refused to leave. He wanted to make her his in every way a man could and protect her from anything that would cause her harm.
And in a way, he had. He’d protected her from him. A man who ached to have her but couldn’t take the first step to make it happen.
Talking with Jesse the night before, Rafe knew the kid would do something stupid if he even mentioned marrying Grace. His brother was determined to make her his wife regardless of what anyone else said or did. Trying to discourage him with talk of bedding her hadn’t done anything but fueled the boy’s imagination. He was an idiot to think he’d turn Jesse’s mind the other way with something like that.
There probably wasn’t a man alive who could look at Grace and not want her in his bed. Jesse’s age didn’t matter. Hell, he’d only been a year older than Jesse the first time he’d bedded a woman and she hadn’t been half as fetching as Grace was.
When he made it back to the house, he spotted her by the well, struggling with the bucket. He’d have to fix the water pump leading into the kitchen again. Damn thing didn’t work more times than it did. He added it to his ever growing list of repairs.
She looked up as he neared the house. Even from this distance he could see the fire in her eyes. She was upset, not that he blamed her. He would have been too. You don’t go around kissing a woman the way he’d kissed Grace, then act like a complete horses ass the very next morning. She probably thought he’d been playing with her emotions and there wasn’t a thing he could say to sway her mind any other way. Anything he said, she’d construe as a lie. He would have.
Dropping the bucket back into the well, she picked up the house bucket and lifted her head in his direction. Then she pointed that perky little nose into the air and snubbed him. He wanted to smile at her audacity, but didn’t.
When she turned, he noticed she’d pulled her hair back into that tight bun she always wore. He sighed. He liked it better down.
He added that to the list of things he’d never see from her too.
Chapter Fourteen
Grace dropped the water bucket on the kitchen table, scowling as most of it sloshed out across the wooden surface and dripped to the floor. The breakfast dishes had been washed and put away. The table and stove cleaned and the floor swept. The rest of the house was in decent shape and she had to tackle the bedrooms now, a task she’d been dreading.
Rafe’s behavior had put her in a foul mood. The less she saw of him and Jesse the better and being locked away in the small bedrooms was exactly what she needed.
Turning to grab her cleaning rags, she heaved the bucket up again and started through the house. Water splashed over the sides of the bucket and made small wet puddles on the stairs as she climbed them. She stopped by Jesse’s room to tell him to be careful if he went down and found him on his bed, a small book in his hand. She watched him for long moments before clearing her throat. “Jesse…”
He looked up, surprised, the book in his hands closed with a snap and flung behind his back. Grace lifted one eyebrow. What was he reading?
“Did you need something?” he asked, his voice cracking.
Grace stared at him. He was hiding something. She nodded back down the hall with her head and said, “I spilled water on the stairs. Be careful if you go down.” He stared at her mutely, sitting as still as a statue. She wondered again what he’d been reading. She smiled and lowered the bucket to the floor. “What are you doing up here? Don’t you have chores to do?”
He nodded, shifted his weight with his hands behind his back and stood. The book wasn’t there. He crossed the room toward her and slipped out, closing his door. “I was just going. You seen Rafe?”
“Yes. He rode in a few minutes ago, heading toward the barn.”
Jesse nodded and turned without another word. She listened to his heavy footfalls on the stairs and the backdoor open and close before she looked at his bedroom door. It opened with a small creak.
Looking back toward the hall and listening for sounds in the house, she walked inside, went to his bed and lifted up his pillow. The book lay there, the cover worn and the edges of the paper rolled. Lifting it she smiled. It was a reading primer. A simple schoolbook.
Peering out the window, she watched him enter the barn. Had he been fighting Rafe about his chores because he’d rather be doing something else all together, like attending school? Were his claims he was a man really what he thought or what he thought was expected of him?
Dropping the book and sliding i
t under the pillow, she walked back to the hall, closed his door behind her, and picked up her bucket. Maybe getting him in school wouldn’t be as difficult as Rafe thought. Jesse obviously had an interest in learning. Maybe with gentle persuading, he’d go back and she knew exactly how to make him want to go.
Her irritation had waned by the time supper rolled around and she’d planned of broaching the topic of school with Jesse and Rafe over their meal. Of course, nothing ever went as planned where those two were concerned.
Rafe didn’t bother to come in. She glanced out the window, trying to see if he was crossing the yard.
“He’s not out there.”
Turning to look at Jesse, Grace said, “What do you mean he’s not out there?”
He shrugged his shoulder as he hung his coat and hat on the peg by the door. “Just what I said. He ain’t out there. Horse is gone, too.”
Rafe wasn’t even there? The last time she’d seen him had been this morning, when he’d rode back into the yard while she was getting water. That was hours ago. Had he left again when she’d gone back into the house? “Did you see him earlier today?”
“Yeah but I didn’t talk to him. He don’t tell me what he’s doing and I don’t ask. I just went about my chores and he rode out again.”
“I see.” Grace puzzled over the fact that the two brothers rarely spoke as she and Jesse ate in silence. Rafe had told her the same the night before. It was absurd to her that two family members could live in the same house and didn’t speak. It was as if they lived two separate lives.
Shaking her head, Grace covered Rafe’s plate when they’d finished their meal and placed it in the warmer so he could eat it later. “Where would Rafe have gone?”
Jesse shrugged his shoulders gain. She watched him as he started helping her clear the table. “I wouldn’t worry too much about him,” he said. “He takes off like this sometimes. He’ll be back by morning.”
By morning? “Where would he go that would have him away from home all night?” He turned toward the sink but Grace noticed his ears turned red. “Jesse?”
He sighed and stared out the window for a few moments before picking up the bucket of cool water and dumping into the sink. “He’s probably in town.”
Grace looked out the window. It was dark, the moon casting bright rings of light on the top of the barn. “At this time at night? What could he possibly be doing in town?”
Another shrug of his shoulders, his head lowered toward the sink.
“Jesse?”
“Ah, hell, Grace,” he said, turning his head to peer at her over his shoulder. “He’s doing what every other man does at this time of night in town.”
“Which is?” He gave her an incredulous look and the moment he did, a vision of black and red satin and lace popped into her head. Bawdy music and robust laughter followed.
The only thing in town open at this time in the evening was the saloon and she didn’t take Rafe for a drinking man. That left only one other thing he could be doing in a place like that.
Her temper flared the moment she envisioned him there, some cheap floozy sitting on his lap while she whispered naughty things in his ear. “He’s in the saloon?”
Jesse cast a sheepish look her way before shrugging his shoulders again. “Possibly.” He rolled up his shirtsleeves, dunking the dishes into the sink. “He likes to visit Ms. Chloe every now and again.”
Ms. Chloe? The thought of Rafe in some… bawdy house with someone named Chloe caused Grace to see red.
That insufferable man had the nerve to kiss her like a lover would and was now in a saloon with some…. prostitute!
She wanted to scream. Grace clenched her jaw to keep from doing just that, her hands fisted as the impulse to throw something hit her.
As she stared at Jesse’s back she realized her earlier assumption about Rafe had been right. He’d used her. Kissed her until she’d thought of what it would be like to let him into her bed, and that was probably what he thought would happen.
If Jesse hadn’t called her name, would it have?
She felt so gullible she was sure the word idiot was written across her forehead.
Turning on her heel, she left Jesse to finish the dishes, and marched to her room. The discussion of school would have to wait. By the time she shut her bedroom door, her eyes were burning with unshed tears. Her anger was a hot, living thing in her chest.
Taking a deep breath, she sat in the rocker by her window and looked out across the moon-washed valley. Snow glinted off the top of the mountain and she knew it wouldn’t be long before the snow would reach them as well. It was already getting colder. The air during the day was brisk and at night it howled against the windows.
Full winter would set in sooner rather than later and she’d be damned if she was stuck in a house with Rafe Samuels. He couldn’t just go around kissing her, making her want him, and then ride off to visit the painted ladies down at the saloon.
Since the day she left Boston, Grace knew the rest of her life would be an adventure. She’d spent every moment as a child wondering what the world outside her sheltered life held and was determined to find out. She’d always imagined a man who loved her, wanted her to the point he couldn’t stop touching her. When her father died, alone and near penniless, she’d made a promise to herself to have everything her heart desired.
She’d set out the month after her father’s funeral, planning the rest of her life. She sold nearly every possession they owned, including the house, and contacted the agency that oversaw marriages to men out west. Her friends called her crazy, had begged her not to do something so insane, but she’d ignored them all. She wanted an adventure and by God she was going to have one.
She just never expected her adventure to end up with her promised to a fourteen year old boy and wanting his brother instead. A man, who incidentally, tossed around soul-stealing kisses, then ran off to town for the companionship of a whore.
Her chest ached the longer she thought about it. Grace sat in her rocker, contemplating her life until long after Jesse came upstairs and shut his door. The house was quiet, the only sounds being the floorboards creaking occasionally and the wind whistling past the windows. She dozed off in her chair and woke with a start at the sound of a door closing.
She looked out the window. The moon had shifted across the sky. A few hours had passed since coming to her room. Was Jesse up and about or had Rafe come home from the saloon? A vision of him and one of those girls flashed across her mind again. Her anger returned before she decided she didn’t care.
Standing, she removed her dress, washed her face and body and brushed out her hair.
Climbing into bed, she made a mental note to go through the dresses she still had packed in her trunks. She’d promised Mrs. Jenkins at the mercantile she’d bring some by to sell, along with a few bits of her jewelry.
If she was lucky, she’d make enough money from the sale to spend a few weeks in the hotel in town. That would make her search for a husband easier. Living with Jesse and Rafe was going to play havoc with her reputation, but surely there was someone in this town who needed a wife more than he cared about gossip. And if she were lucky, she’d be able to accept a marriage proposal and forget all about Rafe Samuels. A prospect that even now made her chest ache and caused her heart to scream out in denial.
Chapter Fifteen
Rafe was awakened by the sound of banging pots and pans. He cracked one eye open and looked toward the window. The sky was starting to lighten and he sighed and rolled over before slinging his legs over the side of the bed and sitting up.
He scrubbed a hand through his hair and yawned, jumping when a crash sounded in the kitchen. He gained his feet and rushed to the door, flinging it open and looked into the kitchen.
Grace was at the stove, her back to him. She was wearing another of those ill-fitting homespun dresses, in a peach color this time, and her hair was once again pulled into a tight bun. He smiled while looking at her and yawned again bef
ore leaning against the doorframe. “A man would think you’re trying to wake him with all the racket you’re making.”
The look she threw him when she turned startled him. Her brows were lowered, the glowering, heated glance singeing him where he stood. He straightened and unfolded his arms. “What’s wrong?”
Her eyes were icy and unresponsive as she turned back to the stove and removed the coffee pot, slamming it onto the table with a bang. A frying pan joined it, eggs still simmering. He watched her walk to the shelf above the sink, grab the plates and drop them on the table as well. When she turned, he nearly flinched. Her large violet eyes smoldered with fire.
“Your breakfast is ready. Clean up when you’re finished.”
She turned and left the kitchen, leaving him to stand there staring at the empty space she’d been. “What the hell just happened?”
Jesse entered the room moments later, a questioning look on his face. “What’d you say to Grace? I ain’t never seen her mad before.”
Rafe opened his mouth but nothing came out. He hadn’t said anything to upset her. Had he? He puzzled over her behavior for long moments before shaking his head. “Hell if I know.”
He shut his door and dressed, combed his hair and made his way to the kitchen. Jesse was already eating and Rafe grimaced at what Grace had made them. Eggs. It wouldn’t have been so bad if there had been something else to kill their taste but she hadn’t bothered. None of the warm buttery biscuits he’d come to look forward to. No bacon. Just… eggs. Scrambled, barely, the slimy, wet stirrings glistening up from the pan.
He looked at Jesse as he reached for the coffee pot. The kid was eating like he hadn’t eaten in months. Apparently watery eggs didn’t bother him. They bothered him though. Just looking at them made him queasy.