At the Rainbow's End (29 page)

Joel slapped the table, making the chalk bounce. “Stay here, Kev, and finish up. I wouldn't want to make Professor Perry angry by stealing her star pupil. How long'll you be?”

“About an hour.” Kevin was clearly shocked by his partner's reaction. A swell of pride coursed through him. Since they had partnered, he had admired Joel Gilchrist for his intelligence, and his ability to deal with people and this strange life in the Yukon. Now Joel seemed awed by his modest accomplishment. If Joel felt that way, surely Samantha must be impressed as well.

He glanced at her smiling face as she told his partner she would see him later. Yes, Samantha had told him over and over that she was proud of him. She often alluded to some of the letters she had written them. It had been one of his greatest regrets he could not read them.

A grin brightened his face. He could read them now. Tonight, with the truth known, he would ask Joel where he had put them. While the other two sat by the stove, he would read the precious letters in the privacy of the loft.

That thought warmed him all through the day. He waited patiently through the hours of working by the river and their convivial supper. When Samantha took the scraps out to give the dogs, he decided this was his opportunity. He had not wanted to ask for them in front of her, afraid of reminding her of things she had written so long before.

With a preamble, he asked, “Joel, can you get me the letters from Samantha?”

“I don't have them,” Joel said without looking up from his task at the table. “I burned them.”

“You did what?”

Joel continued fitting a new handle into the shovel. “I burned the letters. Hey!” Kevin had reached past the tool to grab his shirt. “What in hell are you doing? Can't you see I am trying to work?”

“Dammit!” Kevin wrenched the shovel away from the startled Joel and threw it to the floor. His face was contorted by his effort to control his temper. “You destroyed those letters without asking me?”

Standing, Joel motioned for his friend to calm himself. Studying the blond man's twisted face, he knew he could only soothe him by explaining why he had done it. At the time he made the decision to destroy them, he had not foreseen Kevin being able to read the letters they had shared all last winter.

“Whoa, Kevin. After she arrived and things didn't work as we'd hoped, I thought she might not want to be held to some of the things she had written. She spoke of love to a man who didn't exist. If they were brought out, it might have caused her harm. So I threw them in the stove one night.”

“And you didn't bother to ask me if I wanted them?”

“Why? You couldn't read them, and I'd told you more than a dozen times what was in each letter.” He shrugged. “I didn't think you'd be interested.”

“You should have asked me! I can read now. I wanted to see for myself what she wrote to us. I—” The door opened.

A gust of frigid air blew Samantha into the room. She smiled as she pulled off her coat and hung it on the peg by the door. “Brrr. I think we may even freeze the Pain-Killer tonight. I thought the winter was leaving us. If it gets much colder, perhaps we should bring the dogs in here. What do you think?”

When she did not get an answer, she looked up from her task of removing her boots. Her smile disappeared as she saw their strained expressions.

“What's wrong?”

Kevin stamped to the ladder and climbed into the loft. She started to follow, but Joel caught her arm. “Leave him alone,” he ordered softly.

Putting her hand over his, she whispered, “You told him?”

“Yes,” he whispered with a short derisive laugh, “I told him, but not what you think. I told him I burned the letters you sent us.”

“Why did you tell him that?”

Releasing her arm, he sat on the bench, looked into her startled face, and repeated what he had told Kevin. Finished, he asked in a hushed tone, “Why are you staring at me like that?”

She dropped to her knees beside him. Her fingers, cramped with the cold, gripped his. “Because I love you,” she whispered. “To think that while I hated you so much, you were doing something nice like this.”

“You hated me?” His voice low, he stroked her cheek and watched her eyes close with pleasure. He was sure if she had been a kitten, with fur soft as her skin, she would have purred at his touch. “When?”

“Until I loved you.” She stroked the strong line of his thigh, discovering his trousers were stiff with the cold. Even in the cabin, it was below zero. Oblivious, they regarded each other with love.

“And when was that?”

“When you helped me into the cabin, that first day. I knew from your touch. A man with such tenderness couldn't be the ass you were trying to portray.”

He chuckled low, and whispered, “An ass? Is that what you thought me?”

“Still do, sometimes,” she teased. Then, jumping to her feet, she lost her happy expression. “Joel, I'm going to talk to Kevin. Let me soothe him.”

Putting his hand on her arm again, he said softly, “Sam, he's pretty mad. He might—”

“Kevin?” She laughed with a lightness she did not feel, aware of the revelation they must make to their partner. She could not think of that now. She must help him realize the letters were of little importance. “Kevin would never do anything to hurt me, or anyone. He's the gentlest man I know.”

Joel frowned, wondering. He had found Kevin punishing one of the dogs for breaking into their makeshift meat locker, where they had stored a dressed caribou for fresh meat during the winter. They had traded their rifle and all the ammunition for it. It had cost them dearly, but there was no time for hunting. They certainly did not want the dogs eating their reserved food.

The animal Kevin had been beating whimpered and cowered. Sled dogs did not daunt easily, so Joel wondered what he had
not
seen. When he suggested the dog had been punished enough, a stranger had stared at him out of Kevin's dark eyes. Joel had recoiled at the hint of madness, but when it faded he wondered if he had really seen it.

He recalled that incident now as Sam climbed the ladder, thinking that Kevin was surely more angry at him than he had been at the dog. Joel moved from the stove to sit near the ladder. Sam must not be made to suffer. With a shiver, he wrapped his arms around his chest. He hoped she would not be long.

Samantha knocked on the floor. Her eyes widened as she saw the mess the men had made of her small room. Clothes hung haphazardly over the line which once had held her hastily arranged changing screen. The blanket she had put there was crumpled at the foot of the bed.

“Kevin?” she asked softly.

He appeared from the shadows past the bed. “Samantha, what are you doing up here?”

She forced a smile. “May I come up? I'd like to talk to you.”

“All right.”

She hoisted herself into the room and resettled her layers of skirts around her. Sometimes it felt as if she was wearing a hundredweight of clothes, all hanging from her middle.

“Kevin, it doesn't matter,” she said bluntly.

“Doesn't matter?” He scowled, but it did not hide his pain. “I
wanted
to read those letters, Samantha. They were important to me, to us.”

“They are in the past.” His blustering faded at her calm words. “That woman who wrote to you and Joel doesn't exist now. No one can live in the Yukon, and be unchanged. Forget about the past, Kevin. Remember the dream which brought you here. The dream of a future.”

Walking across the room, he put his hands on her shoulders and she tensed involuntarily. He felt this. She could tell by the way his eyes narrowed. She wondered if he understood the truth of her words. She was very different from the child-woman who came to Dawson almost a year ago. Since then, she had matured and found a real love to replace her fantasy one.

“Forgive Joel,” she continued. “He didn't mean to hurt you. He only wanted to spare me from embarrassment.”

“And you appreciate that?”

“Of course.” She tried to ignore his intense stare, but it was impossible. Knowing what he might ask soon if she did not end this, she leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. “It's cold, Kevin. Let's go back downstairs.”

For a moment, she did not think he would take his hands from her. Then he stepped away and motioned for her to precede him. She flashed him an unsure smile and carefully climbed down the ladder, remembering to be careful at each crosspiece.

At the stove, allowing the men privacy to settle their differences, she felt her heart pound with love when Joel apologized sincerely to his partner. She was not the only one who had changed since her arrival at Fifteen Above.

Placing cups of steaming coffee on the table, she put a slab of ice she had cut from the wall into a pot onto the stove. They would need more water for breakfast. She hoped this would melt and stay liquid all night on the stove. She could not remember any night, even in the coldest weeks of January, when it had been this frigid.

The evening passed slowly. Although Kevin had said he would forgive Joel, his attitude made it clear he could not do it easily. Every attempt Samantha made to lighten the conversation sounded hollow and failed dismally.

When Kevin stood and said he was going to sleep, she cried, “You can't sleep upstairs tonight! It's so cold here, I fear freezing. It'll be worse up there.”

Joel paused, remembering the task it had been to take the bedstead up into the loft. He glanced at Kevin and saw the same recollection in his eyes. He said, “Perhaps, if we just brought the tick down?”

“Nonsense,” she argued. “This is your bed down here. You sleep in it tonight. I can spend the night on the benches.”

“No!” They said at the same time.

“Nonsense! You two are too tall to sleep on the benches. Push the two of them together, and they'll be wide enough for me. I can sleep near the stove, too, that way. It'll work fine.”

“It's a waste of time to try to change her mind,” said Joel with a laugh. “I guess we're sleeping down here, Kev.”

For the first time all evening, Kevin smiled. “I guess we are. Let me get the dogs in the stable, and we'll get to sleep.”

“I'll help you.”

“I'd appreciate that, Joel.”

Samantha sighed, her muscles relaxing. Perhaps soon they could tell him the secret sure to test their friendship. Not tonight. Not when her teeth chattered each time she unclenched them. All she wanted tonight was to sleep until it was springtime-warm again. Going to the pegs on the ice-coated wall, she drew down a sweater and two shawls. From beneath the bed, she found three more pairs of wool socks and pulled all of them on.

In the darkest hours of the night, Samantha realized how foolish such hopes had been. Her body ached from battling the ravages of the cold. It seemed to be grinding into her, squeezing out every ounce of warmth. Her shivers had become so powerful, she was sure she would not have felt an earth tremor beneath her.

Rising, she moved closer to the stove. Even its glow was muted by the cold. She reached for the pan of melting ice and gasped. After hours on the warming shelf on top of the stove, it still was not totally liquid. She placed it directly on the stovetop, in hopes they could have a warm drink in the morning. When it clattered on the cast iron, she held her breath. She did not want to wake the men, who had found respite from the discomfort by sleeping.

Roused by the sound of softly padding footsteps, Joel tiptoed across the floor to where she stood, close as she could get to the stove without risking her blanket catching on fire. When she started to speak, he put his finger over her lips.

“Honey,” he whispered, “you can't stand here all night.”

“I'm so cold,” she answered through her chattering teeth. “The wind seems to blow right through the walls to settle on me when I'm lying on the bench.”

He held out his hand. “Come to bed, then.”

“To bed? With you
and Kevin?
”

Without being able to see her face in the dim light, he knew shock was emblazoned across it, as it had been when she arrived here and thought the two of them intended to share her. It might have been simpler if that had happened, but he knew now he did not want to share her with Kevin. He wanted her entirely for his own.

“You'll be warm sleeping between us.”

“I can imagine,” she retorted tartly. “No, thank you.”

“Would you rather freeze?”

She shook her head and stepped closer to him. Her numb fingers rose to his face as she tried to defuse his quick anger. “I would rather be sleeping with you.”

“Oh, Sam,” he murmured as he swept her against him. Even with the layers of clothes between them, he could sense the sweet body he had been able to love so briefly a dream ago. His mouth heated her cold lips until they thawed, softening in a warm invitation to ecstasy. His arms slipped beneath her blanket and under the sweater she had placed over her dress.

She could feel the fiery touch of his fingers gently smoothing the wrinkled fabric. Clutching him tighter, she savored the sensation of his hard body against her. Caressing his skin, she touched the pulse at the base of his neck, felt it leap with a yearning to match the desire in her heart as his tongue delved the secrets of her mouth.

“I love you so much,” she breathed as his lips traveled along her skin.

“Then come to bed with me.” His eyes twinkled wickedly. “With us.” Abruptly he was serious again. “Honey, I don't want something to happen to you.”

“All right … but this won't be easy.”

He laughed derisively. “That may be the understatement of all time. To lie next to you and not touch you is worse than any punishment waiting in Hell.”

When he held out his hand to her, she slowly placed hers in it. How eager she would be if what she wanted waited for her in the lumpy bed! She moved closer to him, grateful for his arm as they walked the few, frozen steps around the bed.