“Yeah,” he said, glancing at his wristwatch again. “I do.”
At the door he stopped and looked back at her. “Steph, I’m glad we’re going to be friends again.”
She had to swallow back emotion before she could reply. “Yeah. Me, too.”
Stephanie gave up and opened her eyes to stare at the dark ceiling. She’d tried everything to lull herself to sleep. She’d counted sheep, hummed the mantra from the yoga class she attended twice a week. She’d even gotten up and made herself a warm glass of milk to drink. Nothing had worked. Her mind still refused to shut down.
He would’ve kissed her. That one thought kept circling through her mind over and over again, keeping her awake. If she hadn’t turned her face away, Wade would’ve kissed her. A part of her wanted to rail at the heavens that he would have the nerve to even try. Another part wished desperately that she had let him.
And that was what was keeping her awake. The fact that she still wanted his kiss. How pathetic. What woman in her right mind would knowingly and willingly subject herself to that kind of pain again?
Groaning, she dug her fingers through her hair as if she could tear thoughts of Wade from her mind. But that didn’t help either. It just made her head ache even more. Dropping her arms to her sides, she stared at the ceiling again, praying that sleep would come soon.
Runt growled, and she tensed, listening. Not hearing anything, she slowly dragged herself to a sitting position and leaned to peer at the rug beside the bed, where Runt slept.
“What is it, Runt?” she whispered. “Did you hear something?”
In answer, he rose and crossed to the door, the click of his nails on the wooden floor sounding like gunshots in the darkness.
Stephanie swung her legs over the side of the bed and hurried to stand beside the dog. “Is someone out there?” she whispered to Runt.
Whining low in his throat, he lifted a paw and scratched at the wood.
Though the dog couldn’t see her face in the dark, she gave him a stern look. “If this is nothing more than you wanting to go outside to relieve yourself, I’m going to be really mad,” she warned.
He barked once, sharply.
“Oh, Runt,” she moaned, wringing her hands. “I really don’t need this right now.”
When he continued to whine and claw at the door, she gathered her courage and slowly opened the door a crack to peer out into the hall. Not seeing anything out of the ordinary, she opened the door wider. Runt pushed past her legs before she could stop him and shot down the hall, barking wildly. Stephanie’s blood turned to ice as images of burglars and mass murderers filled her mind. Remembering the shotgun Bud kept behind the door in the laundry room, she crept down the dark hallway. As she passed through the kitchen, she whispered an impatient, “Give me a minute” to Runt, who was scratching at the back door and whining.
After locating the shotgun and checking to see that it was loaded and the safety was securely in place, she returned to the kitchen. She curled her fingers around the knob. “I’m right behind you,” she murmured nervously to Runt, then opened the door.
The dog took off like a shot for the barn, his shrill bark sending shivers down her spine. She hesitated a second, trying to decide whether or not to grab a flashlight. Deciding that she couldn’t shoot the gun and hold a flashlight, too, she ran after him.
A thick layer of storm clouds blanketed the sky, obliterating whatever illumination the moon might have offered. Stifling a shudder, Stephanie lifted the shotgun to her shoulder and moved stealthily toward the barn, keeping her finger poised on the trigger while keeping her ear cocked to the sound of Runt’s barking.
A flash of lightning split the sky, making her jump, and was followed moments later by an earthshaking rumble of thunder. Silently vowing to murder Runt if this turned out to be a wild-goose chase, she quickened her step.
When she was about forty feet from the barn, Runt suddenly quit barking. Frowning, she strained, listening, but could hear nothing over the pounding of her heart. Tightening her grip on the shotgun, she flipped off the safety and tiptoed to the barn’s dark opening.
Bracing a shoulder against the frame to steady her aim, she yelled, “Come out with your hands up!” in the deepest, meanest voice she could muster.
“Steph?”
She jolted at the sound of the male voice, then squinted her eyes against the darkness, trying to make out a shape. “Wade?” she asked incredulously. “Is that you?”
“Yeah, it’s me.”
The overhead lights flashed on and she squinted her eyes, momentarily blinded by the bright light. When her eyes adjusted, she saw Wade walking toward her. Runt trotted at his heels.
She didn’t know whether to pull the trigger and shoot them both for scaring the daylights out of her or crumple into a heap of weak relief. Deciding murder was beyond her, she put the safety back on, lowered the shotgun and resorted to using her tongue as a weapon.
“What in blue blazes are you doing out here in the middle of the night?” she shouted at Wade. Before he could answer, she turned her fury on Runt. “And you,” she accused angrily, “carrying on like burglars are crawling all over the place. You’re supposed to protect me, not scare me to death. I have a good mind to take you to the pound.”
Wade dropped a protective hand on the dog’s head. “Don’t blame Runt. It’s my fault. I should’ve known he would hear me and kick up a fuss.”
“Hear what?” she cried. “I was awake and I never heard a thing other than Runt barking.” Realizing the oddity in that, she whipped her head around to look outside, then swung back around to face him. “Where’s your truck?”
“At home. I walked.”
“You walked all the way over here?”
He shoved his hands in his pockets and shrugged. “Couldn’t sleep, so I figured I’d check on a heifer that’s about to calf. She’s young,” he explained further, “and Bud was worried about her having trouble with the birth. I penned her when I was here earlier, so I could keep an eye on her.”
“You walked,” she repeated, unable to get beyond the incredibility in that one statement.
“It’s not that far. Not if you cut through the woods.”
She pressed the heel of her hand against her forehead and shook her head in disbelief. “I can’t believe you did that. There’s no telling what kind of varmints are hiding out in there.”
He hid a smile. “I didn’t run into a single grizzly or mountain lion.”
She dropped her hand to frown. “Big surprise, since neither have been seen around here in fifty years or more. But there are coyotes and rattlesnakes,” she reminded him, “and they can be just as dangerous.”
When he merely looked at her, she rolled her eyes. “Men,” she muttered under her breath. “If you cracked open the heads of the entire gender, you might come up with enough brains to form one good mind.”
Lightning flashed behind her, followed by a deafening boom of thunder that made her jump.
Chuckling, he took the shotgun from her and caught her arm. “Come on,” he said, tugging her along with him. “You better get back to the house before the bottom falls out of the sky.”
She hurried to match her steps to his longer stride. “What about you? How will you get home?”
“The same way I came. I’ll walk.”
She dug in her heels, dragging him to a stop. “But you’ll get soaked!”
He shrugged and nudged her into a walk again. “I’ve been wet before. I won’t melt.”
The words were no sooner out of his mouth, then the bottom of the sky did open up and rain poured down in torrents.
He grabbed her hand and shouted, “Run!”
Stephanie didn’t need persuading. She took off, slipping and sliding on the wet grass, as Wade all but dragged her behind him. He reached the back door a step ahead of her and flung it open. Stephanie ducked inside and flipped on the light and was followed quickly by a drenched Runt. Wade brought up the rear, stripping off his
hat and propping the gun against the wall before closing the door behind him.
“Man!” he exclaimed, dragging a sleeve across his face to swipe the rain from it. “That’s some storm.”
Stephanie grabbed a couple of dish towels from a drawer and tossed one to him before squatting down to rub a towel over Runt.
“Don’t try to make up to me now,” she scolded as Runt licked gratefully at her face. “If not for you and your stupid barking, we’d both be high and dry instead of dripping wet.”
Wade hunkered down beside her and took the towel from her hand. “Here, let me. I’m the one to blame, not Runt.”
Scowling, Stephanie stood and folded her arms across her breasts. “You won’t get an argument out of me.” A chill shook her, and she turned for the laundry room, where she’d left a basket of clean laundry. “I’m going to change clothes,” she called over her shoulder.
She quickly stripped off her wet nightgown, dried off as best she could with a towel she pulled from the basket, then tugged on a tank top and shorts. Grabbing one of her father’s T-shirts from a stack on the dryer, she returned to the kitchen.
She offered the T-shirt to Wade. “It probably won’t fit, but at least it’s dry.”
“Thanks.” With a grateful smile he took the T-shirt and began to unbutton his shirt one-handed.
Stephanie didn’t intend to watch but found she couldn’t look away, as with each short drop of his hand to the next button, more and more of his chest was revealed. She knew from the summer they’d spent together, he often worked bare-chested. As a result, the skin he bared was as tanned as that on his face and hands, and the soft hair that curled around his nipples and rivered down to his navel had been bleached blonde.
By the time he reached the waist of his jeans and gave the shirt a tug, pulling his shirttail from beneath it, her mouth was dry as dust. Embarrassed by her reaction to such an innocent sight—and fearing he would notice his effect on her—she quickly turned away. As she did, the lights blinked out.
“Oh, great,” she muttered. “Now the electricity is off.”
“There’s a candle on the shelf to the right of the sink.”
Already on her way to fetch it, Stephanie shot him a frown over her shoulder. “I know where the candles are kept.”
“Sorry.”
As she struck a match and touched the flame to the wick, she frowned. The fire flickered a moment, then caught, tossing shadows to dance across the room. Turning, she held the candle up and eyed Wade warily as he tugged Bud’s T-shirt over his head. “How do you know so much about everything around here?”
He glanced up, then set his jaw and pulled the T-shirt down to his waist. “You may have shut me out of your life, but your parents didn’t choose to do the same.”
“You mean, you—They—”
“Yep, that’s exactly what I mean.” He stooped to pick up the towel he’d dried Runt with, then stood to face her. “Your mother was a little slower to forgive than Bud, but I think she finally realized I’d done the only thing an honorable man could’ve done in a situation like the one I was caught in.”
Afraid she would drop it, Stephanie set the candleholder on the table and pressed a hand to her stomach, suddenly feeling ill. “But they never said a word. Never so much as mentioned your name to me.”
He tossed the wet towel into the sink. “That was out of respect for you, knowing it would upset you.”
She dropped her face to her hands. “I can’t believe this,” she said. “How could they do that to me?”
“Oh, come on, Steph,” he chided gently. “They didn’t do anything to you.” When she didn’t respond, he crossed to pull her hands down, forcing her to look at him. “You know your parents loved you. They’d never do anything to hurt you.”
“But they forgave you!” she cried. “Knowing what you had done to me, they still forgave you.”
“One has nothing to do with the other,” he argued.
When she opened her mouth to voice her disagreement, he silenced her with a look.
“They forgave me for what I’d done,” he told her firmly, “but not for the pain I caused you. I don’t think they were ever able to forgive me for that.”
She tossed up her hands. “What else was there to forgive?”
“Getting a woman pregnant and having to marry her.”
Stunned, Stephanie stared, unable to believe that hearing him voice his transgression could have the same debilitating effect as it had when he’d confessed it to her so many years before.
Before she could cover her ears, refusing to hear any more, he caught her hands and held them, forcing her to hear him out.
“I never loved Angela. That’s not something I’m proud of, considering, but it’s true. I loved you, Steph, with all my heart and soul. Your parents knew that and knew, too, how much it cost me to lose you.” He tightened his grip on her hands. “But don’t hold their kindness to me against your mom and dad. Without them—” he dropped his chin to his chest and slowly shook his head “—I don’t know how I would’ve survived it all.”
Heaving a sigh, he gave her hands a last squeeze and turned away. “I guess I’d better go so you can get to bed.” He stooped to give Runt’s head a pat. “You might want to take a couple of candles with you to your bedroom,” he said, the suggestion directed to Stephanie. “The electricity might not come back on until morning.”
She watched him cross the kitchen, her throat squeezed so tight she could barely breathe.
I loved you, Steph, with all my heart and soul.
Out of everything he’d said, that one single statement filled her mind, obliterating all else.
He made it to the door before she found her voice.
“I loved you, too.”
His hand on the knob, he glanced back.
The tears clotting her throat rose to fill her eyes. “And you broke my heart.”
Four
Wade stood, paralyzed as much by the desolation that etched Stephanie’s face as by what she had just said. This was the woman he’d loved—still loved, if he was honest with himself—and, by her own admission, he’d broken her heart. He’d known he had—or at least had assumed that was the case—but it cut him to the bone to hear her say the words and see, this many years later, how much she still suffered from his infidelity.
He hadn’t been able to comfort her then. How could he, when she wouldn’t let him past her front door?
But he could now.
In two long strides he was across the room and had her face gathered between his hands. “I’m so sorry, Steph.” He swept his thumbs beneath her eyes, swiping away the tears. “I never wanted to hurt you. I swear, if there’d been any other way…”
Realizing how inadequate the apology sounded, even to his own ears, he tightened his hands on her face, desperate to make her believe him. “You didn’t deserve what I did to you. The sin was mine. You had no part in it, yet you paid a price.” He swallowed hard. “But I paid, too, Steph. If you want the truth, I’m still paying.”
He saw the flash of surprise in her eyes, the hope that rose slowly to glimmer in the moisture.
Helpless to do anything less, he lowered his face and touched his lips to hers. It wasn’t a passionate kiss. A mere meeting of lips. But to Wade it was like coming home after a long stay away. He withdrew far enough to draw a shuddery breath, then wrapped his arms around her and pressed his mouth more fully over hers. He felt the shiver that trembled through her, swallowed the low moan that slid past her lips. With a groan he clamped his arms around her and opened his mouth over hers.
Her taste rushed through him like a swollen river, flooding him with memory after memory that he’d struggled for years to forget. The feel of her lying naked in his arms, the almost greedy race of her hands over his flesh. Her catlike purr of pleasure vibrating against his chest, the moist warmth of her laughter teasing his chin.
Rock-hard and wanting more of her, he hooked a hand beneath her knee, lifted and
drew her hard against his groin. But it wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough. With his mouth locked to hers, he backed her up against the wall and leaned into her, pinning her there with his body. Filling his hands with her rain-dampened hair, he held her face to his and took the kiss deeper still, until his breath burned in his lungs and his veins pumped liquid fire, until every cell in his body throbbed with his need to take her, to make her his again.
Bracing his hand in a V at her throat, he dragged his lips from hers. “I want you, Steph,” he whispered and rained kisses over her face, her eyelids, across the hollows of her cheeks. “I want to make love with you.” He pushed a knee between her legs and buried his face in the curve of her neck to smother a groan as her heat burned through his thigh.
Though he knew her need equaled his, he sensed her hesitancy in the tremble of hands she braced against his chest and feared he was pushing her too fast, too hard.
Drawing in a long breath to steady himself, he dragged his hand from her throat to cover her breast. Beneath his palm he could feel the pounding of her heart.
“Remember how good we were together?” Closing his fingers around her fullness, he gently kneaded. “I always loved your breasts.” He lifted the one he held and warmed it with his breath. Humming his pleasure when her nipple budded beneath the thin fabric, he flicked his tongue over the swollen peak.
She arched instinctively, thrusting her breast against his mouth. He nipped, suckled, nipped again, but quickly became frustrated by the fabric that kept him from fully touching her, tasting her. “I want you bare,” he said, then looked up at her, seeking her permission.
She gulped, nodded, then dropped her head back against the wall on a low moan as he eased her tank top down far enough to expose her breast. The candle behind him tossed light to flicker over her flushed flesh—the knotted bud, the pebbled areola that surrounded it, the lighter skin stained with the blush of desire. Mesmerized by the sight, he opened his mouth over her nipple, drew her in.
As he suckled, teasing her nipple with his tongue and teeth, he sensed her growing need in the hands she gripped at his head, her impatience in the fingers she knotted in his hair. Anxious to satisfy both, he released her and swept her up into his arms.
A Piece of Texas Trilogy Page 6