A Touch of Flame

by Jo Goodman

  “Do you have any idea what you shouted?” she asked.

  “No. Do you?”

  “I believe it was Eureka.” She repeated it, this time with enough enthusiasm to warrant the exclamation mark. “Eureka!”

  “Uh-huh. That begins with an E, doesn’t it?”

  “You are absurd and I adore you.” She leaned over and kissed him on the mouth. She didn’t intend to linger, but as so often happens with intentions, it didn’t matter. The kiss was entirely satisfactory and they were both smiling when she lifted her head. “Don’t you think it’s time to surrender that bone? Isn’t that your advice to me?”

  “Do you ever take it?”

  “No.”

  “Is Eureka your Christian name?”

  “No.”

  “There’s your answer.”

  “I thought you were perhaps more commonsensical than me.”

  “It’s probably good that you’re finding out these things before we’re married.”

  “Mm-hmm.” Ridley shifted, bumped his leg with her knee, turned her hip looking for a more comfortable angle.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  “Nothing.” She sat up suddenly. “I think I need to—” She threw back the blankets on her side of the bed and scooted to the edge. “I need a moment.”

  In the event that she was watching him out of the corner of her eye, Ben did not smile. He followed her hurried progress to the trifold dressing screen. She disappeared behind it. He heard her pouring water into the washbasin. What happened afterward was all in his imagination, and he congratulated himself on having a vivid one. When it was his turn to step behind the screen, he completed his ablutions while humming to himself, and was still humming quietly upon returning to the bed.

  “‘The Battle Hymn of the Republic’?” Ridley asked with a wry slant to her eyebrows. “‘The Battle Hymn’?”

  Ben shrugged. “‘Mine eyes have seen the glory.’” He slipped under the covers. This time he was the one who turned on his side. “Are you better now?”

  She nodded. “I was, um . . .”

  “Sticky?”

  “Damp,” she said. “Perhaps you shouldn’t try to be so helpful.”

  “Noted.” He found her hand and drew it to his groin. “What do you call this?”

  “Your groin.”

  “More specifically. You had your hand around it.”

  “It’s a penis.”

  “That’s what I thought you’d say. Did you feel it shrivel? That’s my cock.”

  “I’m not a stranger to the word.”

  “You’ve never said it in your life.”

  “I prefer proper names.”

  “Yes, Eloise, I know.” He moved her hand so she was cupping him. “And what about here?”

  “Scrotum and testicles.”

  “Sac and balls.” He sighed. “So much work to be done.”

  “I’m sure you think so. By the way, it’s not Eloise either.”

  He nodded. “I figure if I ever hit the bull’s-eye, the shock of it will render you speechless.”

  “A likely consequence of your cleverness and your dogged pursuit of an answer.” Ridley slid her hand out from under his. “Cock and balls,” she whispered. “It sounds like an English pub. Ye Olde Cock and Balls.”

  “If that helps you.”

  “Ye Olde Cock and Balls,” she repeated. “Where wenches serve dark ale to men plotting to rob coaches or overthrow the government.”

  Ben grew suspicious. “Felicity Ravenwood?”

  “No. Harmony Collingsworth. Felicity’s grandmother. Felicity introduces her grandmother’s story in—”

  Ben leaned in. “Shut up, Ridley,” he said, not unkindly.

  “All right.” She gave in easily, not because he said it nicely, but because she was tired. She turned on her side away from him.

  He spooned against her. “You can tell me all about it in the morning,” he whispered.

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  It was not yet morning when Ben woke, disturbed by whatever it was that was walking lightly across the nape of his neck. He flicked it away and burrowed deeper under the blankets. He had just found the indentation for his shoulder and the depression for his hip when the creature scrambled across his skin a second time. He batted at it. The third time it happened, he managed to capture it.

  What he had in his tight fist turned out to be two of Ridley’s fingers. “Are you satisfied?” he asked dryly. “I’m awake.” He let go of her fingers and turned over. He didn’t remember ever turning away from her.

  Ridley shook out her fingers. “That hurt . . . a little.”

  He took her hand and kissed her knuckles. “Better?”

  She nodded. When he released her, she tucked her hand under the covers and rubbed those knuckles lightly against his chest. “I’m an early riser.” She unfolded her fingers and moved her hand lower, pressing the heel against his abdomen. He sucked in a breath, and she continued on the downward path. She cupped him through his drawers, felt the stirring of his erection. “So apparently are you.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Cock and balls,” she whispered. “I haven’t forgotten.”

  “Oh, Jesus.” Ben caught her by the waist and lifted her so she straddled him. Her shift rode up her thighs. He pushed at his drawers. When his erection was free, he cupped her bottom, lifted her again, and then let her find her way. She did, sinking deeply and completely onto his cock.

  “My,” she said, her voice so breathy it sounded like a sigh. Ridley leaned forward. She looked down at herself. The shift’s neckline gaped. She could see her breasts. So could he. That was all right, then. She wanted him to look. No man had ever made her feel desirable. This man did.

  She watched his pupils grow wider until each blue iris was only a smoke ring. His fingers twitched on her buttocks. When she spoke, her voice was husky, taunting. “You want to touch them, don’t you?”

  Robbed of speech, he nodded.

  “You can’t. Not yet.”

  Ben blinked. “Who are you?”

  Ridley’s sultry smile broke into an easy grin. “I haven’t the vaguest notion, but I suspect it’s your fault.”

  “My fault?”

  “When you give a person words, Ben, you give her ideas.”

  He stared at her. “Lord, but I’m glad I waited for you.”

  “Mm.” She bent, kissed him on the lips. “So am I.” She began to move, lifting, falling, using the rhythm he showed her, making it work for both of them. This was slow, easy, and made her think she had all the time in the world, that the sun wouldn’t rise on the day until it had her permission. She liked the way Ben’s hair fell this way and that because he hadn’t had time to make furrows with his fingers. She did it for him. It made him smile, and she liked that, too. Always had, even when she was the target of his amusement.

  She heard his breathing quicken before she saw it. The sound of his short gasps grew quieter as hers grew louder. One of his hands left her buttocks and slipped between her legs. She gave a start as his fingers separated her wet lips and found the slippery bud that excited every one of her nerves.

  “My breasts,” she said. “You can touch them now.” To her ears, it sounded like a plea.

  “I’m fine.”

  A whimper rested at the back of her throat. She held it until she couldn’t. “I could be very angry with you.”

  “I know.” His fingers wrested every nuance of pleasure from her, and she gave a cry and a start and held on. Ben threw back his head, bucked, and nearly unseated her as he came. It was like so many of their kisses. Long and hard and deep.

  Ridley collapsed on top of him, lay there while he swept her hair to one side, and then rolled away, replete. She didn’t speak until his hand snaked into the open neckline of her shift and cuppe
d a breast. “What are you doing?”

  “Figured it’d be okay now.” His thumb made a light pass across her swollen and erect nipple, which he knew would be incredibly sensitive to touch.

  “Well, it’s n-n-n-nyeh!” She grabbed his hand and yanked it away as some vestige of previous pleasure made her shiver from head to toe. When it was over, she spoke on a thread of sound. “Not even a little okay.” Ridley released his hand and raised her forearm to her eyes and covered them. “What did you do to me?”

  “Trust me, whatever was done, was done to both of us.”

  “Hmm.”

  They said nothing for a time. Silence suited them; it was comfortable. He lay on his stomach, his face turned toward her, and he watched the play of her thoughts in changing expressions. She lay on her side. Her fingers gravitated once again to the nape of his neck, and she let them drift back and forth, sometimes winding threads of his dark orange hair around the tips. It was Ridley who spoke first because Ben was waiting for her. He could have told her what she was going to say. It was all there in her dark, contemplative eyes and in the fingertips that grazed his damaged skin.

  “Will you tell me how you came by your scars?” she asked. “You said before that you would tell me later. Is this later? You don’t have to if you’d rather not.” She started to withdraw her hand.

  “No, don’t. It’s nice. Your fingertips there are nice.”

  Ridley left her hand where it was. “The only thing you’ve told me about it is that your brother and Phoebe didn’t set you on fire. I hope that was the truth.”

  He chuckled. “Yeah, that’s the truth. They were there, but none of what happened was their fault. For a fact, they saved my life. My mother’s life as well.” He nodded when Ridley’s eyes widened just a fraction. “That’s right. She owes them, will always owe them. I don’t know if that’s what keeps her avoiding them when they come to town. She’s a complicated lady.” The muscles of his back rolled under Ridley’s fingertips as she drew circles across his skin. “It happened in the barn at Twin Star. I might have been a little drunk, maybe a little more than a little. Had something on my mind that I needed to say and I suppose I thought the drink would get me there. I got into an argument with a couple of fellas who didn’t want me speaking up. I knew there’d be consequences for talking but I was willing to take on the grief with the law and with my family. They weren’t. Ellie had gotten herself smack in the middle of it. One of the fellas walloped me with a lantern, pretty similar to how you laid Tom Gordon out with a soup bone. I have to tell you, that’s all I remember. I have the rest from Phoebe and Remington, who were foolin’ around in the loft and saw it happen, and Ellie, who, like I said, had herself smack in the middle.

  “The way I heard it, I went down like a pile of bricks, the glass in the lantern broke, and some of the oil spilled in my hair, more of it across my neck and back. I guess I haven’t mentioned the lantern was lit. The flame followed that oil trail like a bloodhound follows a fox. It lit me up, but since I was unconscious, I didn’t feel it. They say the same man kicked me under the chin like he meant to snap my neck, but I didn’t feel that either. Ellie was knocked unconscious by then. There wasn’t anything she could do for me or for herself. Bales of hay caught fire. Flames climbed the walls. Two of the fellas took off, barred the door. The third man, knocked senseless as he was, was no use to himself or anyone else. If Phoebe and Remington hadn’t been able to escape the loft, we all would have burned alive. They dragged Ellie and me to safety while the fire was still raging, and when the doors were finally opened from the outside, they pulled us out.”

  “Oh, Ben, how awful for all of you.”

  “Sometimes I’m glad I have no memory of the events of that night, not real ones anyway, but it’s in my mind so deep that I know the pain anyway.” He watched a troubled shadow cross her face. “Don’t feel sorry for me, Ridley. I bear a lot of the responsibility for what happened.”

  “When do you forgive yourself?” she asked. “I watched you with Phoebe and Remington. You’re family. I have to believe they forgave you a long time ago.”

  “They did. I’m not sure they ever blamed me.”

  “Perhaps not, since you so obviously take on the blame yourself.” Ridley felt his shoulders roll under her fingertips and recognized the shrug for what it was. She wanted to cuff him. Instead she leaned over and kissed his shoulder. “I never took you for a martyr. I’m not sure it suits you.”

  “If the cross fits . . .”

  She did cuff him then, just a light touch at the back of his head, and when his response was to grin crookedly at her, it was difficult not to laugh. She asked him, “You were Doc’s patient after this happened?”

  “I was. He came out to the ranch and advised them what needed to be done for me. Then he’d come every couple of days to see that his instructions were being followed. There were the burns, of course, but the bigger threat was to my lungs. I inhaled a lot of smoke. Fiona was primarily the one who looked after me. Sat at my bedside for hours.”

  “Fiona? Not Ellie?”

  “No. That wasn’t possible. Thaddeus arranged for her to stay at the Butterworth. She’d already been hired there, but she couldn’t work for a while. He paid for her room and board while she recovered.”

  “Fiona,” Ridley said softly. “I didn’t expect that. And yet your relationship is so strained now.”

  “That began before I left the ranch. I recovered and started working again. It was when I’d have to make a trip into town, usually on Twin Star business, and I’d see my mother. Fiona always seemed to know when I did, though I don’t recollect ever telling her. I don’t know, I guess she thought I would take a page from her script and cut Ellie out of my life. Fiona knew how to do that. I didn’t.”

  “But isn’t that what you’ve done to Fiona? Cut her out?”

  “There’s a difference, Ridley. She’s not blood.”

  “When did that become important?” She’d put the question to him gently, but Ben looked as if she had struck him. She felt the muscles in his shoulders and back go rigid. She thought he might shake her off or leave the bed altogether. He did neither. She didn’t know if she’d ever exercised the kind of restraint he showed her now, but she felt the tension slowly seep away and his breathing resume its normal rhythm.

  Quietly, he said, “It’s something to think about, isn’t it?”

  “If you like.”

  “I don’t. Doesn’t mean I shouldn’t.”

  “Ben, I didn’t say it to hurt you.”

  “I know.”

  Ridley searched his face, looking for proof that he meant it. She found it in his smile, not amused this time, but tender. Her own breathing came a little easier, and the ache that had been squeezing her heart vanished. “I love you,” she said. “Have I told you?”

  “No.”

  “Well, I do.”

  “I am gratified to hear it, Elsie, since we’re getting hitched.”

  “Quaint,” she said dryly. “And it’s not Elsie.”

  “Damn.”

  “So why are you marrying me?”

  “One reason,” he said. “Maybe two.”

  “Oh? What’s the first?”

  “To see your full name on the wedding license.”

  “It’s not on my diploma.”

  “I know. I looked. But a license is different, and I know a minister, a judge, a mayor, and a clerk of records who will insist that you put it there.”

  “And you’re the sheriff.”

  “Right. That, too.”

  “What is your second reason?”

  “You probably already guessed.”

  “Just in case I’m wrong, I’d like to hear it.”

  “I love you.”

  Ridley heard no trace of humor in his voice, saw no hint of it in his eyes. Here was sincerity to the core, and the cor
e was his heart. She nodded faintly because just then it was difficult to speak.

  “That’s what you guessed, isn’t it?”

  It was a moment before Ridley found her voice. Even so, the words caught in her throat. “It’s what . . . it’s what I hoped.”

  “Ah, Ridley. You should have never had to hope.”

  “No?”

  “No. Never. You got me right from the first. It was the hat, I think. Remember the one with the big pink bow, the one you arrived in?” When she nodded, he continued. “It’s kinda hard to admit that I liked it on you, especially since I told you not to wear it. It was the incongruity, I think, that caught my fancy. There you were as starched as a shirt from a Chinese laundry, wearing a hat with a floppy bow bigger than the crown. Couldn’t figure out how the pieces fit. That was intriguing.”

  “I know how you love a puzzle.”

  “Uh-huh. And then there were the dime novels mixed in with your medical books. You reading Felicity Ravenwood adventures, well, that just made me want to know you better.”

  “Really? I don’t think I liked you much back then.”

  “Oh, you made that pretty clear, but I put it down to you being scared because—and I say this not to brag since it’s as true a fact as you’re likely to come across in Frost Falls—folks like me. In spite of the challenges you presented, it never occurred to me that you might be an exception.”

  “You don’t back away from challenges.”

  “Hardly ever. There’s Fiona and Thaddeus.”

  “I didn’t mean—”

  “Shh. I know.”

  She nodded. Tentatively, she said, “If you still want to propose, that would be all right, I guess.”

  Ben chuckled. “You guess? I think maybe you’re missing living under the rock.” The militant gleam in her eye gave him pause. “Well, maybe not. All right.” He took a breath and began. “Dr. E. Ridley Woodhouse, my love, my lover, will you stand at my side as I will stand at yours in the pursuit of our mutual happiness, and will you bear witness to my devotion by agreeing to become my wife as I will bear witness to yours by becoming your husband?”