Hearts

by Stef Ann Holm

  Once again, her skin glowed a pretty infusion of rose in the right places—sensual places: the small width of collarbone exposed at the square-cut neck of her skating costume, the lobes of her ears, the cleft of her upper lip.

  His every nerve ending heated, and a stab of wanting shot through him.

  “They’re called a tunic and pantaloons.” Her reply contained a strong suggestion of daring. “I sewed them myself.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes.” Defiance held her head high. “I did.”

  “I don’t think the style will catch on.”

  “How do you know?” In a schoolmarmish bristle, she said, “A time will come when it will be commonplace for women to wear trousers and shirts.” She challenged him with the tilt of her head. “I’m not the only one who wears them. Elizabeth Miller and Amelia Bloomer—owner of The Lily.”

  “The Lily—is that a ladies’ underwear store?”

  “It most certainly is not,” she replied, exasperated. Her blush diminished as she came back to herself: goddess of political lecturers. “The Lily is a women’s journal for suffragists.”

  “Well, damn, I should have known that one.” He folded his arms across his chest. “You aren’t a suffragist, are you?”

  “I most certainly am.” And that was all the elaborating Truvy did on the subject. “Now, don’t you think you should go find Barkly for Mr. Wolcott?”

  “The dog knows his way around.”

  “Yes, but you’re responsible for him.”

  “You’re right.” He whistled for Barkly.

  No bloodhound came loping toward them.

  Jake commented, “He probably found his way home.”

  She held her spine straight, but most of her weight was on her left leg rather than the right. “You’d better go after him—just to make sure.”

  Discounting her suggestion, he asked, “Are you trying to get rid of me?”

  “Well . . . yes.”

  He inhaled; his nostrils flaring with reluctant admiration.

  Her face remained composed as his gaze remained steady on her.

  He liked a straightforward woman. But he didn’t like Truvy’s answer.

  “You can skate in front of me.” He deliberately put a lazy smile on his mouth. “I already watched you.”

  She brought a hand to her throat. “For how long?”

  “Long enough to see you do that acrobatic twirl in the air. I thought it was great.”

  She looked at him, outwardly sedate, but her dilated pupils told him she warred with acknowledging she’d been beyond the pale of respectability. He couldn’t care less. “I couldn’t do another one. My knee—”

  “Your knee will be fine. You need to loosen it up.” Jake could have sent her home. He could have gone after Barkly, who, beyond a doubt, was back at Tom’s by now chowing down breakfast. But there were certain things a man enjoyed doing for a woman. And being chivalrous was one of them. “Lean on me. I’ll walk you around the pond a few times.”

  Without giving her a say, he hooked her arm through his and began to walk. She had no option but to skate alongside him.

  The warmth of her body radiated into the density of his coat sleeve. She might have been tall, but she was slender. Curly hair tumbled over her back in a disarray. “Really, Mr. Brewster—”

  “Jake,” he said, correcting her, his jaw tight. “After I held you in my arms at Tom’s house, I think you can manage ‘Jake.’ ”

  Her breath quickened, tiny puffs of misty white air expelled through the part in her lips. He’d hit a nerve. The toe of her skate blade jabbed at the ice rather than skimming over it; he tightened his grip on her arm.

  “I meant to thank you for that . . . Jake. I wasn’t myself that morning.”

  “No need to thank me. I’ll hold you any time you want.” He lowered his voice and found himself adding in a husky whisper, “And kiss you, too, if you’ve changed your mind.”

  A blush traveled across her cheekbones. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  He was struck by the way she clung to tea-and-crumpets logic when her mannerisms and declarations generally disowned propriety. In mere minutes, she couldn’t have forgotten he’d been about to kiss her. “You know exactly what I mean. Have you ever been kissed before?”

  “Of course.” But her steps over the ice didn’t glide like her swift reply. They were choppy. She squeezed his wrist in an effort to brace herself. The contact shot through him like a bolt of lightning.

  “On the mouth?” he pushed, cursing himself for asking.

  “Of course,” she repeated. Too fast. Her left leg pushed out wider than a smooth step, and she bumped against him. The soft, rounded fullness of her right breast pressed into his bent elbow. He could see the rhythmical rise and fall of both as she breathed. Blood scorched through his veins, throbbed in his temples.

  “Of course,” he echoed. But he believed her as much as he believed in Santa Claus.

  They came around the pond full circle.

  Truvy stammered, “M-my leg is much better. I—”

  “One more time.” On that, he kept walking, leaving her no opportunity to protest. He liked the feel of her next to him.

  The fleece in his boots kept his feet warm enough. His coat banked out the chill. Hell, he could have circled the pond a hundred more times.

  A quiet settled between them as he walked and she skated. The songs from a branch full of finches floated in the air. The only other sounds were the skim of her blades over the ice and the slight crunch of snow beneath the soles of his boots.

  “Why is it you came to Harmony?” she asked, breaking the silence. “If you were so famous—Mr. Strong America, and all.”

  “ ‘The Strongest Man on Earth,’ ” he amended.

  She gazed at him askance. “I got my nouns mixed up. But it’s still the same thing.”

  It wasn’t the same thing. The earth was bigger than America. But he’d be a gentleman about it and not point that out. Strange, though—her being an economics teacher, he figured she would have known the difference.

  As for coming to Harmony, the timing had been right for him to quit long hours of ambitious training to maintain his title. He’d left on top, a belt holder. He’d done and seen what he’d wanted to in big cities, earning money and fame.

  The end of the pond came too soon as he turned her toward the left to continue the circle. “I left my profession a champion and I felt like living in a small town.”

  “I have to say that I like big cities. I don’t get much of a chance to go to them.”

  “Boise’s pretty big.”

  “Relatively. Have you ever been there?”

  “Nope.”

  They passed the bench where her cape was draped.

  “Well, this has been—” she began, but he cut her short.

  He didn’t stop walking. “One last time around.”

  She looked at him, her feet moving over the ice. He met her gaze with a slow grin. “Were you this persistent when you were heaving iron bars above your head to be Mr. Earth?”

  “Persistence has something to do with competing. Being strongest has everything to do with winning.” Sunshine peeked over the boughs of trees in the distance. “And I don’t heave iron bars. I lift barbells.”

  The lumbermill’s whistle blew in eight short peals.

  Truvy’s skates skidded to a halt. A troubled glitter filled her eyes as she stared at him. “What time is it?”

  Jake never carried a watch. He knew the time from the mill or from the church chimes. “Eight o’clock.”

  “Eight!”

  She broke free of him and glided effortlessly to the log where her braid-trimmed cape was neatly folded. “I have to get back to the Plunketts’ house before they realize I—that is to say . . .”

  “You snuck out, huh?”

  “Yes. I mean no. I have to get back before I disturb anyone.”

  Jake knew Mrs. Plunkett’s temperament. Before her daughter married, sh
e could set a person’s teeth on edge. With Hildegarde gone, she’d turned into a professional mourner—excessively crying and not giving a damn where she was when she lost her grip. He’d had the misfortune of being on the end of one of her weep and wail sessions at the mercantile; he hadn’t returned in a week. If he had to live under her roof, he would have put the slip on her, too.

  Bending down, Jake collected Truvy’s hair combs and put them in his coat pocket. Snow compacted beneath his boots as he headed to where Truvy had gone.

  She sat on the half log and worked on the buckle of her skate. With a jerky movement, she fumbled with the tiny strip of leather and shining silver metal. The pair of gloves she wore must not have kept out the chill. Pausing, she rubbed her hands together while blowing a ribbon of breath into them.

  Now that he thought about it, she had to be cold. The cut of her “tunic and pantaloons” couldn’t ward off much weather. Again, he wondered about her choice of style. Well-bred ladies flaunted beaded fascinators they wrapped on their heads, fur muffs, smart coats, and flannel-hemmed skirts.

  She tried once more to get the buckle but wasn’t successful.

  “I’ll do it.”

  To his pleasure, she didn’t tell him no. She nodded, her hair falling in a curtain on either side of her face. “Yes. Hurry.”

  Jake knelt and propped her foot on his knee. He took a few seconds to appreciate her trim ankle, gliding his hand over the shoe leather and upward to where black stockings started at the low instep. He wondered why she was without her high-top fashion shoes. “So how come you’re wearing Spaldings? I know my athletic shoes.”

  “I was involved in a sport, wasn’t I? Skating.” She smoothed her hair, messing the curls more than taming them. “Now, please hurry.” She wiggled into her cape while he finished. “Eight o’clock,” she murmured. “I’m in deep trouble. How am I going to get into my bedroom without being noticed, much less get through town wearing this?”

  He finished, then rose and stuffed his hands in the cashmere pockets of his trousers. “You’re all set. We can go.”

  Truvy stared at him, wide-eyed. She didn’t readily stand up. “I can’t walk back to town in something that could be mistaken for underwear.”

  “You said you weren’t wearing underwear.”

  “I’m not. It’s a tunic and pantaloons,” she said with emphasis. “But it looks . . . inappropriate.”

  “Yeah, well, you said yourself a time would come—”

  She cut him off with an emphatic challenge: “I said a time would come. I didn’t mean today. When I left the Plunketts’, my plan was to go undetected. And I would have if—oh, never mind.” Dismayed, Truvy heavily sighed and laid a palm on her cheek as if she had a sore tooth that ached. “Why do these things always happen to me?”

  “I don’t know. Why do they?”

  “Quit being flippant.” She lowered her arm and placed it, along with her other one, around herself. Shivering, she nibbled on her lush lower lip.

  Using one hand, he unbuttoned his coat and slipped his arms out of the silk-lined sleeves. A shot of cold hit him, going through his shirt.

  “What you call a cape is as useful as a window decoration,” he observed, offering her the sealskin warmth.

  She gazed at him, then accepted the coat. “Thank you.”

  She fit one arm in, then turned her back a little so that he could help her with the other sleeve. At the collar, her hair met his fingers. He didn’t stop to think about it—he simply gathered the fullness of curls in his fist and lifted them from the inside of the coat. The texture was like fine satin, cool from the air but warm from being next to her body. The length fell soft and pretty down her back as he freed the curls from his hold. He felt her shiver; he doubted it was because of the weather.

  The coat securely around her, she fastened the buttons. “I’ve got to think of a plan. Mrs. Plunkett will never let me live this down. If I’m seen, it will be a disgrace.” Truvy declared, “This wasn’t supposed to happen. I was supposed to be back in my room by now and nobody would be the wiser.”

  Jake watched her mouth, the way her lip grew pinker from the edge of her straight teeth. A habit, he surmised. He gave her a while to mull it over, and when no great plan of inspiration came from that kissable-looking mouth of hers, he spoke up.

  “I have a plan.”

  She lifted hopeful eyes to his. Obviously the time had expired when she would have brushed off his suggestion. “What?”

  “We stick to side streets to get to the Plunketts’. It’s still early enough. I don’t think anyone is up.”

  “You’re up,” she said, contradicting him.

  “I’m not just anyone,” he countered, giving her a grin, then proceeded to tell her the rest of his idea. “Once we get there, you go around to the back and I’ll crank the front bell. As soon as you hear Mrs. Plunkett answer the door, sneak in through the kitchen.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Distract her.”

  “How?”

  “Don’t you trust me?”

  “Well . . . I’d like to.”

  “You should, Tru. I’m saving your reputation.”

  She gazed at him. Hard. Then with resignation. “I suppose I don’t have another choice, another option to consider.” Her nose wrinkled slightly. “Do you really know a back way?”

  “Yes.”

  “All right, then.” She took a step, then stopped and put a hand on her bare head. “My hat and hair combs.”

  He got the hat for her. It rested on the ice, an ornamented thing with a small blue roses anchored on the crown.

  “My hair combs?”

  He couldn’t explain why he was disinclined to give them up. He took the pair of combs from his trouser pocket.

  As she pulled and twisted and arranged and failed to do something with all that long hair, he watched. He waited. Her fingers must have been numb to the bone, because she wasn’t having any luck at styling the hair. When her patience was at an end, the curls still cascading between her shoulder blades, he took one of the combs without comment.

  He’d never fixed a lady’s hair before. And he found himself wanting to do this for her.

  She stood still as could be, her breath hitched in her throat as he used the tines on the comb as a way to gently untangle her hair. He worked from the bottom up, slowly taming the heavy, dark locks. When he got them into a manageable state, he made one large twist of it all and brought the hair high onto the top of her head. With care, he lowered first one comb, then the other, into the curls to anchor them in place.

  The end result wasn’t a masterpiece creation. A little lopsided. A little mussed—as if she’d just stood from a steamy bath of bubbles—but he liked it. Liked the way she looked at him with the frame of dark brown curls at either side of her temples.

  She wore his coat, its sleeves swallowing her hands. When she spoke, a quiver of optimism mingled with her words. “This should do, I would say, Mr. Brewster.” She set the hat on top of the hair arrangement, but without a pin to firm it up in place, the brim covered her forehead at an angle.

  She picked up her skates.

  They left the mill pond. If he hadn’t shown her the streets home, she would have encountered Mr. Plunkett. They’d caught a glimpse of his hat and gruff stature as he walked briskly to his store. Also, there had been the owner of the feed and seed, throwing open the wide barn doors as the sun crept past the roof line of his building. Jake led them, undetected, across a field, nobody the wiser that Truvy Valentine had been out and about at that hour in a pair of pantaloons and a tunic. Once they reached the backyard and were out of view behind the toolshed, she undid his coat and handed it to him. She gave him a brief smile of gratitude.

  He nodded, then left for the front as he put the coat back on. The inside still had her body heat clinging to it. The silk lining smelled like her—lemons and flowers.

  The house was dark, its shades down. He rapped on the wreathed door and wait
ed. Inside, footsteps stirred. A dull thunk. Then thump. And finally a heavy tread to the front door. Actually, more like a lumber.

  A breath of house-warm air blasted him as the door swung inward and Mrs. Plunkett’s wide girth filled the opening.

  Jake held onto the surprised smile ready to burst out on his lips; with great restraint, he kept a sober, pokerlike expression.

  Mrs. Plunkett’s cheeks, forehead, nose, and chin were caked with a white lotion that smelled like harness oil. Dangling curl papers made a network in her hair. A wash-faded chenille robe barely covered the ample figure it wrapped around. Breasts resembling melons strained at the bodice buttons of a plain flannel gown.

  He adopted an easygoing tone. “Good morning, Mrs. Plunkett.”

  “Mr. Brewster!” she gasped, her eyes widening against her face goo to resemble two white dollops of cream with raisin dots in the center. “Is there a problem at the Wolcotts’?”

  “Not at all.” He pulled off his hat, slicked his hair back with his hand, and twisted his hat brim in his hands as a nervous would-be suitor would do. “I’ve come to call on Miss Valentine.”

  Mrs. Plunkett glared at him as if he were a raving lunatic. “What? At this hour? Miss Valentine is asleep in her room.”

  “You could wake her up.”

  She huffed, “I most certainly will not. You should be aware that morning calls are never made before noon.”

  “I’m anxious.”

  “Anxious, my foot.” She wagged a pudgy finger at him as she lambasted him. “You take yourself home, Mr. Brewster, and don’t come back here again. Miss Valentine has more sense than to involve herself with—a man.”

  Then the door closed. In his face.

  The final word.

  He disliked being taken down a peg by Mrs. Plunkett—even if it was as part of an entire gender.

  If he’d really come to call, he would have knocked again.

  And again. And again. Until she let him in.

  There was something about being denied access to something that made him want it. Especially if the something in question had long and sensual legs that, in a pair of stockings and pantaloons, made the gym’s wall painting of Venus look shabby.