by Ashlee Price
He just nodded at her, not really listening except to hear the sound of his name on her lips. She was looking at him strangely, he was staring again. Smiling back at her, he asked if she had any bags to take in.
“No, I will get a hotel in town or something. I don’t want to be an imposition.”
“I insist. There is plenty of room here, there always is. You will get your own room and everything. I haven’t heard too many good things about the place in town.”
Mary was torn, but he was already walking into the house and she didn’t seem to have any real choice. She didn’t want to offend him, but at the same time, Mary was far more worried about trying to breathe around him. Did he know what he was doing to her with no shirt on? It was hard to concentrate, but Mary was given relief by there being more people in the main living room that she walked into. She was introduced to Elna and Gemma.
They were both sizing her up, she could tell and it made her feel a bit more nervous, but it also took her mind away from Henri.
“Son, why don’t you go put a shirt on. It’s not that hot in here.”
Henri shook his head and walked off dutifully. Mary would have thanked his mother, but that didn’t seem the right thing to do. She could breathe again, but the pressure was back on for the rest of them looking at her.
“Well come sit down honey. We don’t bite. It’s nice to see Henri bring someone back home.”
Mary sat down, as dutifully as Henri had gone to do as he was told as well. Elna was a woman that she didn’t want to cross. While she was smiling in front of her and she was as nice as can be, in the city she was known for being pretty cut throat. It was said that she had to be that way, a woman running the company alone, but Mary wondered then if she was not pulling the strings all along.
There was nothing to say to her comment though and Mary liked to hear that she wasn’t one in a long line of women, but Henri didn’t seem the type. He didn’t seem to be the sort of man that would have enough time to be bothered with more than one woman. He was so straight forward and that was one of the things that Mary liked best about him.
“So where are you from dear?”
“Houston.”
“Oh, I live there too on the weekdays. This week I have been off though, getting ready for my daughter to get married.” The older woman looked at her daughter with such love and Mary’s heart constricted a little. It was clear that they were both looking forward to it. Mary had done her research, found out that she only had the one daughter, so it would seem that there was even more anticipation because of that. Belinda had asked her again to find out a few things, ask a few questions about the wedding, but she had declined, not wanting to be involved. She was only a photographer after all.
“Congratulations Gemma. Your brother didn’t even tell me about it. He had said there was something going on, but not a wedding.” Her mind went to what she had packed. There was nothing in there for a wedding!
“That is like Henri. Guys hear the very word and start heading for the door.”
Mary smiled back at Elna, seeing the glint in her eyes. She would marry her off right then and there to Henri if she was able. It was clear from the look in her face. “Yeah, I can see that happening. I have never even talked about it with a guy. I think I was afraid that would head for the hills.”
“I never really thought about marriage, until one day I did. I would have been happy with or without a marriage.” Gemma was getting everyone drinks and didn’t see the scowl on her mother’s face.
“Hush your mouth young lady. You old mother wants you married.”
Mary liked to see the interaction, the two women so animated.
“Don’t believe anything they tell you. It is probably all a lie.”
Mary’s attention went back to the son and even with his shirt on, it was hard not to remember the bare chest from before. She didn’t want to forget and was more than thankful to see him coming towards her.
“Now, Henri, don’t be fibbing on us. You know your mother doesn’t lie.”
Henri wasn’t paying her much attention. “Yeah, so you say.” He turned his attention to Mary fully and asked her if she wanted to go for a walk.
“I can do the pictures then if you want.”
Henri tried to make a face, tell her silently to drop the subject. It was not going to end well and Elna already had her ears perked up. “What pictures?”
Mary was about to tell her, but he stopped her and talked over with a different answer. “She is a photographer and is working with an author who wanted some pictures. I thought it would be a perfect place for the western theme of the book.”
Elna nodded her head, but looked at them both a little strangely. There was something going on, more than was said, but she ignored her inner voice telling her to say something. Henri looked so happy and she didn’t want to spoil it with all kinds of questions. There was her concern, their family always a target because of their success. “You two just make sure you are back for dinner.”
Chapter 8
“Why didn’t you want me to say anything about the photo? Are you embarrassed to be doing it? You don’t have to, you know. There is no obligation.”
“I said I would because you asked. I certainly wouldn’t do it for anyone else, but I don’t mind doing it, Mary.”
They were walking close together down a fence line that led out into the flat land that spanned for miles around them. The sun was hot, but as their eyes met, neither one of them was worried about the heat. Mary looked away after a moment, his blue gaze too intense to hold for long.
She had him stop by the fencepost and lean against it again. He was a natural in front of the camera and before long she had all the shots she needed and maybe a few for her own collection. Mary thought he looked better with the shirt off and wished she had the courage to say something along those lines, but she couldn’t muster up the courage to do so.
“So was the thing you wanted me to go to tomorrow your sister’s wedding?”
Henri pushed back from his final pose and moved back towards her, walking the same direction they had been going in the beginning. The house was far behind them and he kept taking her further out. “Yeah, is that okay?”
She said it was, but wished she had something to wear. “I am sure whatever you wear will be perfect. I can’t think of anything that I wouldn’t like to see you in.” Mary wasn’t so sure that it was true, but it was sweet and when he touched her hand with his, she found her fingers lacing up with her own. They kept walking, silent for a time. Henri’s thumb brushed the inside of her palm and gave her goose bumps.
Finally she had to break the silence. Mary liked to talk and when she was nervous, it was a need that was harder than ever to qualm. “So where are we going?”
“To one of my favorite places. I usually ride down here, but it was just too nice of a day to not walk.”
Mary had to agree. The sun was hot as always, but the slight breeze was just enough to keep them cool. He wasn’t going to tell her where they were going, but as they kept walking, she saw the landscape getting greener and a small stand of trees. It looked like an oasis in the lighter green and brown color of the short grass. He had her attention in any case and Mary would have followed him anywhere, feeling safe with Henri.
His favorite place turned out to be a small pond that was surrounded by a few trees and large slabs of rocks. It looked man made, but many years before and with an eye for making it look like nature had a hand in it. Mary could see why it was his favorite place. The sound of the water was relaxing and as she sat next to him with her feet in the water, the coolness of the liquid made her almost immediately start to cool off. Mary knew that a quick dip would feel ever better. She wasn’t dressed for it, but Mary had other ulterior motives.
She wanted to see that hard body of his again and as she got closer to the edge, Henri looked at her questioningly. “Is it a good place to swim? The water feels great.”
He nodded that it was, but h
e was more interested in her as she stood up. “Do you want to come for a swim with me?”
Henri just shook his head. There was no way that he would say no to such an offer. He was ready to jump in as he was, but then stopped to take his shirt off. Mary couldn’t get enough of him and though she tried to hide her attraction, the way he made her feel was hard to hide. He grabbed her hand and pulled her closer to the edge with him. “If I am going in, you have to go in.”
It was her idea, but Mary was more a gradual swimmer, getting in slowly to get used to the fast moving water. But Henri was having none of that and he pulled her in with him. Her clothes immediately started to weigh her down. Henri had his arms around her waist and after a short shriek and giggle, Mary had cooled off immediately. Her legs wrapped around his, as her arms encircled his neck.
Naturally his lips went to hers in that moment and she was left sighing against his lips. It was what she had wanted to do since she first saw him with his chest bare and his blue eyes glittering at her. His lips were soft and slight demanding. Every inch of her was wrapped around him as she clung to him. Mary hadn’t expected it to feel so good, for his body to feel so good against hers, but it did.
Her back felt the rough rock behind her as he leaned in for more contact. Mary whimpered when he pulled away, dragging him back in for another kiss. She wanted more, but knew she had to stop before she wouldn’t be able to and pulled away. Henri looked as disappointed as she felt and the hardness pressed against her told her that it was the case. He needed her just as bad as she needed him and not even the cold water could cool his ardor.
Moving away from his hard, tempting body, Mary tried to gain her composure, but like everything with him, it was hard. They swam for a few minutes, but there was too much tension and soon they were on their way back. She hadn’t thought things through and was soaked. He offered her his shirt to put over her own and Mary agreed, some of the reason for the simple fact that she didn’t want him to put it back on. The only thing that saved Mary from freezing on the way back was the hot sun beating down on them. But as they got closer to the ranch, the sun was starting to go down. They had been out for some time and the last half a mile, Mary was frozen by the time she got to the ranch.
Mary grabbed her bag on the way in and had Henri show her where she would be staying so she could get dressed. She didn’t see the look she got from Elna, but Henri did. She gave him a dirty look and when he left Mary to it, she asked him where they had been. “What are you doing without a shirt and her freezing?”
“We just went for a swim and should have brought the horses. Are the rest of the guys back?”
She shook her head and looked at her second to youngest son. “I really like her.”
He smiled back at her and told her that he felt the same away about Mary. It was hard not to feel something for her. She was bubbly and seemed to have come to him when he needed her most, thinking that he would never find love. Henri didn’t know what was going to happen between them, but he hoped that it would work out the way he wanted it to in his head.
Dinner was a little awkward for Mary, but considering all of the people at the table, she did pretty well about getting to know them all. By the end of the night, everyone liked Mary as much as Henri did. He gave her a short kiss goodnight before she went to bed. They both wanted more, but the house was full and it didn’t seem the time. Mary was still trying to keep her emotions together and even as she wanted more, she closed the door behind herself and leaned back against the door. Henri was a hard man to get to know, but she was glad that she had. Mary was feeling their meeting at the airport was rather fate driven.
The wedding the next day was even more beautiful and Mary had caught herself crying. The couple she didn’t even know, but she felt like she already knew Gemma. It was the love for each other that kept her a little weepy-eyed and she wasn’t the only one. Almost every woman in the place had wet eyes and it made Mary feel better. Henri wasn’t getting teary-eyed, but he did pull her in to hold her against his chest. Mary didn’t fight the warm embrace and felt content in his arms.
But reality had to set in and she had to go back to Houston for her work assignments. Mary promised to call him that evening when she was done with her errands. Henri couldn’t wait and neither one of them had brought up him going back to Venezuela.
Chapter 9
“Henri, have you talked to mom today?” Scott had a worried look on his face that Henri didn’t like the looks of. He waited for more, but Scott didn’t say anything else except that he thought he should go talk to Elna.
“What’s it about?”
“The business and Mary.” Scott already knew, but he wasn’t going to be the one that shattered his brother’s smile that he hadn’t seen before. He had liked Mary as well, the whole family did, but it seemed like she had been here for a reason that didn’t include seeing Henri. Scott wished that what he had just heard wasn’t true.
“Come on, just tell me.”
“I can’t. Mom is in the office. I think you should go talk to her.”
Henri agreed to, but he didn’t like the whole cloak and dagger routine. When he got into the office on the bottom floor, Elna looked up at her son and smiled slowly. “Henri. I was looking for you earlier. We need to talk.”
“Yeah, that is what Scott said. What is going on?”
She tossed a paper down on her desk as he sat down. “This is what is going on.”
On the front page was a picture of the ranch during the wedding, as well as a smaller picture of Mary and him walking back from the late night swim that night at the pond. As he sat down in the seat, he read all of the lies and conjunctions that had been printed. There was a picture inside that he recognized of him that Mary had taken. It was then that it sank in that she had sold the picture to the newspaper.
“Did you know about this? Did you know that she worked for the Herald?”
He shook his head that he did. “She is a freelance photographer mom. I knew that she did some work for the newspaper.”
“Did you know that she was going to do that story?”
Henri couldn’t speak. Again he just shook his head. Elna’s face changed as his did. It sunk in that her son had been duped and it was only when she saw the pain in his eyes that she realized how much her son had cared about Mary.
“How long did you know her? You never did tell me where the two of you met.”
“We met on the plane coming back home. It’s crazy that it was only a week ago. And then this…” Henri was a little heartbroken and it felt devastating, even as he realized that it had only been a few days since they had met. Even as he held the paper in his hand and read the words, it didn’t feel real to him. None of it did and Henri took that as his first clue that it hadn’t been real at all. Some of their conversation was in the lines of the magazine and it had all been screwed around and turned into something bad. The headline was that he was back in the country for a wife. His mother’s deathbed request was in there and then the ‘forced marriage’ of his sister to her current husband.
He leaned back further in the seat. “Has Gemma seen this?”
She shook her head and sat down then. “No and I don’t want her to, though I know she will figure it out. You can’t keep anything from her.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking to have said some of those things. You know that it wasn’t said like that.”
Elna smiled and waved him off. “Oh I know. It wouldn’t be the first time that we have been dragged through the mud. She really seemed like a sweet girl.” She was trying to soften the blow, but she knew that he cared about her. Henri was hardly ever home and he certainly had never brought a girl with him. “You know, it could all be a mistake. You should talk to her.”
Henri didn’t want to hear that. That was the last thing that he wanted to do and his head was answering before he could get a word out. “I don’t think it would be a good idea.”
“I know you are hurt, but so
metimes things are not as they seem.” Elna wanted more than anything to be right and she hoped that she was.
***
Henri didn’t call her and when he saw her number coming up on his phone, he just turned it off all together. It was his luck. Henri never had any luck with women and it seemed like the luck was going to continue as it had before. After several days of ignoring her calls, she stopped making them and Henri was even more upset than before. It felt like nothing he did was going to make it any better and he thought of what his mother had said. He should talk to her, get her side of the story, but his ego held him up.
Instead he planned his trip back to Venezuela. It was his plan all along and Henri started to feel better with a direction in mind. There was something settling with the idea that he had a plan, even if he wanted to do something else instead.
When his phone rang and it was her number that showed up, there was a temptation to answer. He sat there going back and forth about it for so long that the phone stopped ringing. After a few moments of looking at it, wanting it to call her, Henri instead stuck the phone back in his pocket and went into the ranch house. He had to tell his family that he was going back and it was not a conversation that he really wanted to have. Goodbyes in the Callahans were always hard and he dreaded it more than leaving Mar behind.
“Hey, glad to see you back. I was wondering where you went off to. I was hoping you would help me with some last minute touches on the far fence line on the west side of the property.”
Henri nodded that he would. It sounded better than having to deal with the goodbyes and the questions. Gemma had found out about the magazine and she had shrugged it off, claiming that she knew it wasn’t Mary that had done it. He felt a little perturbed that she was surer about it than he was. Henri was the one that had talked to her for hours, fallen in love with her and he had not an ounce of the assurance that Gemma had. She had only talked to her a few minutes. It made Henri wondered if everything he thought was true was wrong.