“Oh, you’re in deep horse manure now, boy,” Uncle Dan chuckled.
“The deepest,” Ransom agreed.
Gentry looked up to Ransom for encouragement. “Now?” Gentry asked.
“Now’s as good a time as any,” Ransom chuckled. “Though none of us will be gettin’ any sleep for a month after this, ’cause comin’ clean ain’t gonna stop the nightmares this’ll cause.”
“What are you going on about, Ransom Lake?” Vaden asked.
“I think that’s Gentry’s beatin’ to take, honey.”
Autumn smiled. She could see the agitation and the guilt in Gentry’s eyes—the fear—and suddenly she knew.
“You’re the Specter, aren’t you, Gentry?” she asked.
“What?” she heard her mother exclaim.
“You just wanted to see him so much,” Gentry began. “You’d been so kind to me when I was laid up at Doc Sullivan’s. I never planned on stayin’ this long…and I just started out wantin’ to make one of your dreams come true, punkin.” He smiled, and she reached up with both her hands, placing her thumbs in his dimples. “You’re so beautiful…especially when you’re ramblin’ on tellin’ one of your stories. And that day you told me about the Specter…I could see it in your eyes. You wanted him to be real so badly. So…when I started workin’ for your daddy…I just found me an old sheet in the bunkhouse, roughed it up bit, and—”
Autumn’s heart was near to bursting with love. He’d made the Specter real for her? Just for her? Brazenly, she pulled his head toward hers, kissing him hard and long—tasting his mouth and thrilling as he pulled her against him.
“Well,” Dan said, “that ain’t quite the reaction I would’ve expected.”
“How romantic!” Vaden sighed, brushing a tear from her eye.
“How come you never dressed up like the Specter for me, Dan Valmont?” Myra teased her husband.
Ransom simply chuckled. “Well, I’ll say this. Those dimples sure do offer some influence over women, don’t they?”
“We oughta get ourselves some dimples, Ransom,” Dan chuckled.
“Looks like it,” Ransom mumbled as he watched Gentry help Autumn to her feet, gather her in his arms, and kiss her just the way Ransom often kissed Vaden. “Yep. Looks like it.”
❦
Once they’d seen Dan and Myra back to the general store, Gentry joined Ransom in walking behind Autumn and Vaden on the way home.
He smiled as he watched Autumn and her mother amble along, giggling over their terrifying adventure to the old graveyard.
“Well, I have to say it,” Ransom began. “I didn’t think you’d get away with all that Specter nonsense that easy.”
Gentry shook his head. “Me neither. But that’s one thing I love about your daughter, Ransom Lake. She loves life…even when she oughta be mad sometimes.”
Ransom nodded. “She’s like her mother that way.”
Gentry frowned a moment then, wondering if he should even mention the matter to Ransom. But inhaling a deep breath of the crisp October air, he decided he might—just to see what Ransom thought of it.
“Only thing is, Ransom,” Gentry began.
“Yeah?”
“I didn’t turn over the soil on that cowboy’s grave,” he admitted. “I didn’t leave that strip of old sheet there either. I burned my sheet in your burn barrel before we left to go track the women down.”
Ransom looked to Gentry, frowning. “You’re pullin’ my leg, right?”
But Gentry shook his head. “Nope.”
“Come and walk with us, Ransom,” Vaden said, turning to smile at her husband and gesturing for him to join her.
“All right, darlin’,” Ransom said. Leaning aside to Gentry, however, he whispered, “Maybe we best not mention that last thing you just told me, son. Vaden’s gonna have nightmares for a month as it is.”
“Agreed,” Gentry chuckled. “But what about Autumn? Won’t she have nightmares too?”
“Probably,” Ransom admitted. “So you best get to askin’ her to marry you…because I ain’t gonna let her outta my sight when you’re wearing a slicker until you do.”
“Yes, sir,” Gentry chuckled, and Ransom hurried to meet Autumn and Vaden.
The moon was rising, and the world was bathed in a soft golden glow—and Gentry James thought there could be no better heaven than one that mirrored the season the woman he loved was named for.
Chapter Twelve
Autumn closed her eyes, inhaled a deep breath of aromatic October air, and smiled. Oh, how she loved the county fair—especially the scents of harvest that blended all around her. She could smell the caramel and candied apples sitting on the table before her, the warm pies women were beginning to line up on the pie contest table across the way. There were sweet scents in the air of delicious baked things—buttery scents of breads and muffins on the air. Someone was burning leaves in the distance—probably Mr. Johnson, for his property was simply swollen with maple and oak trees. The mellow aroma of smoldering piñon and cedar from the nearby roasting pit lent to the soothing smells that swirled around Autumn unseen, but lovingly appreciated.
Autumn opened her eyes, sighing as she glanced to the jelly and jam table—where jar upon jar of red, purple, peach, and every other color of fruit jams, jellies, and preserves sat waiting to be judged. She loved the sight of the morning kissing the jars and their contents, making the stacks of carefully cooked and preserved sweet spreads appear as if they were sunlit stained glass just sitting there amid the county fair.
Children laughed and played nearby, and she heard the bawl of a calf off in the direction of the stock auction corral. Someone was playing the fiddle—probably practicing for the square dancing that would take place later that evening.
Autumn glanced to her mother, who thanked a young man for purchasing a caramel apple. She looked down the way to where her father was loading several pumpkins into a buggy. A woman sat at the lines of the horse harnessed to the buggy, and Autumn giggled as she saw the way the woman blushed when Handsome Ransom Lake smiled at her and thanked her for purchasing his pumpkins.
Gentry had agreed to drive the hay wagon, and every once in a while, she would see him off in the distance, driving the team of mules at a slow and steady pace as several children romped around in the straw filling the wagon bed. She smiled—giggled out loud at the thought of Gentry James dressed up in an old shredded sheet and riding across the horizon at midnight, just for her sake.
The fact of the matter was she should have been furious at him—enraged at his having made a fool of her. When she thought of how she’d gone on and on and on to Gentry about having seen the Specter, she rolled her eyes at her own silliness. And yet how could she be angry over an elaborate gesture of such romantic proportions? He was wonderful! Gentry was everything she’d ever dreamed of in the man she would someday love—far more, in truth.
“Hey, lady.”
Autumn’s thoughts of Gentry—of the insane depth to which she loved him—were interrupted by a tiny voice. Looking over the table top-laden with caramel and candied apples behind which she stood, she smiled when she saw a small, raven-haired boy with so many freckles sprinkled over his nose and cheeks that he looked just as if someone had sprinkled his face with fresh-ground nutmeg. Just the sight of the boy and his tousled hair, the tree-branch slingshot peeking out of his front pocket, made Autumn giggle with delight.
“May I help you, sir?” she asked.
“What’ll ya take for one of them caramel apples on a twig?” he asked.
Autumn judged the boy’s age to be approximately five or six. He had light green-blue eyes and a grin that told her he was all mischief.
“Well, usually I ask for two pennies,” she answered. “But I’ll take one kiss on my cheek right here,” she said as she pointed to her right cheek with an index finger, “instead.”
She watched as the little boy’s adorable brows puckered, for he was pensive a moment.
“Would ya take anythi
n’ else?” he asked.
Autumn smiled. “I’d consider it. What do you have in mind?”
“I got me a few roasted punkin seeds left from a handful that feller sellin’ punkins over there give to me,” the boy said, turning and pointing to Autumn’s daddy. “What’s say I give you five or six? Will that get me one of them apples?”
“Absolutely!” Autumn agreed.
The boy smiled, and Autumn’s heart swelled with enchantment as she saw he had one dimple on his left cheek. She’d made him happy, and that’s all she’d wanted.
She watched as the boy dug into his front pocket (the one on the opposite side of the slingshot). Pulling out a little handful of Ransom Lake’s roasted pumpkin seeds, he carefully counted them out on the table.
“One, two…three, four, five…six,” he counted. Then reaching into his pocket, he removed another roasted pumpkin seed. “And there’s seven because you didn’t make me kiss a girl in front of any other fellers that might be around close.”
Autumn smiled, scooped up the pumpkin seeds, and dropped them into her apron pocket. “Now you choose whichever apple you want, sugar,” she told him. Lowering her voice, she added, “You can have two if you like…because there aren’t many gentlemen these days that are generous enough to throw somethin’ extra into a deal the way you did.”
The boy’s face lit up. “You mean I can have two?” he exclaimed.
“Yep,” Autumn answered.
The boy’s eyes widened to nearly the size of the harvest moon. “I’ll take that big one there in the middle,” he began, selecting the caramel apple that was indeed the biggest on the table at the moment. “And…and I’ll take that one there. It’s about the right size for my little sister, I think.”
Autumn carefully twisted the boy’s two selected apples from the sugared parchment paper on which they sat and offered them to him.
He took one in one hand, the other in his other hand, smiled at Autumn, and said, “Thanks, lady!” and hurried off.
Autumn looked up to see her daddy watching her, grinning with an entirely understanding smile. Obviously, the cute little fellow had somehow managed to weasel some roasted pumpkin seeds out of her father too. Autumn thought then that the boy would go far with charm like his—not to mention that adorable dimple on his left cheek.
“Hey, lady.”
At the sound of Gentry’s low, provocative voice behind her and the feel of his warm breath on her neck, Autumn’s body was instantly alive with goose bumps.
“What’ll you take for one of them apples?” he whispered in her ear.
“A kiss on this cheek right here,” she answered, tapping her right cheek with her index finger.
Gentry chuckled and placed a quick kiss on her cheek. “I’ll tell you what, punkin,” he whispered as she twisted a caramel apple from the parchment, turned, and handed it to him.
“What?” she giggled.
“Why don’t you get your mama to let you take a little stroll with me, and we can share this apple real quick before I have to take another load of rambunctious youngsters for a hayride. What do you say?”
Autumn smiled and called, “Mama…I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
“All right, honey,” Vaden said. Then coming to stand closer to Autumn and Gentry, she whispered, “You keep an eye on my girl, Gentry. I wouldn’t want the Specter riding off with her or some such thing.” She smiled and winked at Autumn.
“Yes, ma’am,” Gentry chuckled.
“Now find a private place to…uh…to eat that apple, children,” Vaden added. “And hurry back, Autumn. More and more people are beginning to arrive.”
“I will, Mama,” Autumn promised as Gentry took her hand and began leading her away from the caramel and candied apple stand.
Autumn giggled as Gentry led her to the enormous maple tree not too far from the fairgrounds.
“Come on, darlin’,” he said. “Let’s sit here and listen to the leaves fallin’. What do you say?”
“I say yes,” Autumn answered as she leaned back and gazed up into the branches of the maple. “All the leaves will be gone soon,” she sighed. “Already the branches are lookin’ bare.”
“Oh, but they’ll leaf out come late spring and summer…and then blush all red and purty for you in the fall.”
“I know,” she said. “But I’ll miss all the pretty colors of the trees until then.” She was quiet for a moment. She listened to the soft, cool breeze breathing through the branches and rustling the drying leaves. It was certainly one of her favorite sounds in all the world—the quiet stirring as crinkling leaves brushed against one another. The breeze puffed a little stronger for a moment, and Autumn opened her eyes, smiling as a rubied rain drifted slowly from the branches overhead to alight everywhere on the ground around her and Gentry.
Several leaves settled in her lap, and Gentry chuckled, “I think they like you.” She watched as he drew a pocketknife from his pocket and cut a slice of the caramel apple. “Mmm! That is good! You and your mama sure do know how to take care of an apple.”
“I see you’re one of those neat caramel apple eaters,” she giggled.
“Hmm?”
“Mama and I love to watch the people eatin’ our caramel apples at the fair every year,” she began. “We find there are two kinds of caramel apple eaters—the neat ones who take a knife to their caramel apple the way you’re doin’…and the adventurous ones who just hang on to that ol’ twig stick and just bite right into it, careless of whether or not they get caramel all over their lips and cheeks.”
“I see,” Gentry mumbled. “And what kind of caramel apple eater are you, punkin?” he asked.
“Give me that apple and your knife, and I’ll show you,” she answered.
“All right.” Gentry handed the caramel apple to Autumn and offered her the knife.
Autumn accepted the apple, but as she shook her head, pushed away the knife, and bit right into the side of the apple, Gentry laughed. “Oh, I see. You’re one of them adventurous sorts.”
Autumn nodded, taking hold of the thick caramel gathered at the base of the apple, tugging at it, and stringing it out into a long length. Twirling the caramel around her finger, she offered the apple to Gentry again.
But as she started to put her finger piled with caramel into her mouth, she gasped and giggled when Gentry took hold of her hand, drew it to his own, and placed her finger between his teeth, gently scraping off the caramel onto his tongue.
“Don’t you go keepin’ all the best caramel to yourself, baby,” he teased her. He nodded and grinned, adding, “You already got enough all over your face there to cover another apple.”
“I do not,” Autumn countered, though she did lick one corner of her mouth where she felt a string of sweet, sticky caramel lingering.
“You wanna bet?” he laughed, leaning toward her. “Look right there.” He pointed to her cheek, and Autumn wiped the place with her fingers.
“Did I get it all?” she asked.
But Gentry frowned, studying her face more closely. “Here,” he mumbled, moving closer to her. “Let me get that for you.”
Autumn was rendered breathless—let the caramel apple drop into the grass beneath the big maple tree—as Gentry’s mouth covered hers. Heated, moist, and sweet with the flavor of caramel, Gentry’s kiss was as exhilarating as ever it was—more so.
“Mmm. You taste good, Autumn Lake,” he mumbled against her mouth. “I might have me a bit more of your caramel kisses.”
Autumn giggled and let her hands move to the back of his neck to caress him as he kissed her. Over and over his mouth seized hers, sending waves of euphoria to blissfully drown her in simply knowing he existed and had chosen her to kiss in that moment.
“I love you, Autumn,” he mumbled against her mouth. “You know that, don’t ya?”
Autumn nodded, trying to keep the tears of joy that had suddenly sprung to her eyes from brimming over. “I love you more,” she whispered against his lips. “You kno
w that, don’t you?”
He smiled, and she placed her thumbs in his dimples. “That ain’t possible, punkin.”
“Yes, it is,” she began to argue, “because I—”
“Quit talkin’, honey,” he said. “I only got a few more minutes before I gotta start drivin’ that hay wagon again.”
“And I have apples to sell,” she whispered. How she loved the way he let his lips linger against hers as he spoke.
“Well, that I know,” he told her. He paused to taste her kiss a moment and then asked, “What I’m wonderin’ is if you’d ever be willin’ to sell somebody else’s apples.”
“What?” she asked, not understanding him—for she was still too swept away in the bliss of his kisses.
Gentry chuckled. He wasn’t ready to propose anyhow. He had something else in mind—a far more romantic way of proposing—but he had to wait until nightfall to do it. So instead of asking Autumn to marry him the way he’d almost just done, he simply stood, pulling her to her feet with him, gathering her in his arms, and enjoying one last long, delicious, caramel flavored kiss.
“We best get back,” he said, gazing down into her beautiful autumn-sky eyes. “There’ll be plenty of time for me to lick that caramel off your lips, after the hayridin’ is over.”
“Well, then you better get to drivin’ that mule team before a cute little fella I just met takes in mind to do it for you,” she giggled.
“All right, punkin. Then you go sell yourself some apples, and I’ll make sure the kids are havin’ fun at the fair.”
Gentry escorted Autumn back to the apple stand, and she bit her lip with delight as she watched him saunter off toward the hay wagon. She sighed. He was so handsome!
The Haunting of Autumn Lake Page 18