Come Spring (22 page)

W
EARY
to the bone, Buck led his mule past the cabin and dismounted beside the smokehouse. Piece by piece he unloaded the meat, strung it, and hung it from the low beams in the small wooden structure. It was cold enough to let it hang overnight, but come morning he would start the fire in the pit outside to begin the process that would cure the meat and preserve it for months.

He hoped Annika was asleep. If she was, he planned to heat enough water for a bath, soak for a while, and then crawl into bed. If she wasn’t asleep— He decided he would wait to see what kind of mood she was in.

His hands were cold inside his gloves, his fingers stiff from working unprotected from the weather all day. It took him longer than usual to unsaddle his horse and untie the mule, then pour grain into the feed trough.

He could smell the wood smoke escaping from the chimney, and felt a bit warmer just knowing the fire was still burning inside. Before Annika arrived, he and Baby would often return home to a fire that had grown cold with no one to feed it. Before Annika he could never have taken so long to butcher an elk, not with Baby in tow. Most of the spoils would have gone to the wolves.

Before Annika...

Try as he might, he couldn’t deny his growing anticipation at the thought of seeing her again. She had been on his mind through the long, tedious hours of the day. He found, much to his surprise, that he even missed their sparring, and as the hours passed, he realized just how much her presence had helped to ease the loneliness that was part of his days.

By the time he slapped his horse on its broad rump and started for the cabin, he was even debating about finding another mail-order bride. He hated haying lost the train fare to Alice Soams, but maybe companionship was worth taking another chance on.

But now he could only imagine someone the image of Annika Storm answering his letter.

S
HE
had tried to pull the table across the room to barricade the door as soon as she heard the sound of someone moving around behind the cabin, but the heavy wooden table with its lodgepole pine legs would not budge. Her heart was still beating wildly, even though the muffled noises had subsided. She sat straight as a poker on the edge of the bed, clutching the butcher knife in her hands, and she took little solace from the fact that Baby slept on. She wondered why the sound of her pounding heart hadn’t disturbed the child.

At first she thought it might be Buck, but it was his habit to walk in, see that all was well, and then go out to care for his horse and clean whatever game he’d have caught. Alert to every sound outside, straining to hear footsteps on the snowy ground, Annika wondered who or what had been moving around outside. She imagined a bear, at the very least, for it had to be something big enough to make the thumping, pawing sounds she had heard.

It had been a while since she had heard anything at all, so she allowed herself a deep breath and a sigh of relief; but just as she did, she heard someone, or something, fumbling with the door handle.

Before she could change her mind she was off like a shot out of a cannon. She clung to the knife handle, more willing than able to use it to defend herself and the child if the need arose. Unable to stand the suspense any longer, she reached out to pull the door open and catch the intruder off guard.

On the other side of the door, the handle was ripped from Buck’s grip. The door swung inward and he found himself face-to-face with Annika Storm brandishing a knife in his face. Her hair hung unbound, brushed to a high shine. Her eyes were wide with fright. He was so close he could see her moist lips all too well and the way her lashes outlined her eyes. Her cheeks were alive with color. The plaid flannel nightshirt covered her once-white batiste gown, her stockinged feet peeped out from beneath the swaying hems.

She was staring up at him, too stunned to speak, the knife still raised threateningly.

“Well,” he said slowly, not quite sure what to make of the situation, “kill me if you’re going to or let me in.”

Relief flooded through her. She dropped the hand that held the knife and tried to blink back the tears that suddenly filled her eyes. Annika had never seen a more beautiful sight than Buck Scott as he filled the doorway. Darkened by the shadows, his usually light eyes were watching her warily. She looked him up and down to be certain, but there did not appear to be a scratch on him. He was still wearing his familiar buckskin jacket, the hood pulled tight to frame his face with the thick wolf fur. His face was sunburned to a deep bronze that emphasized the creases around his eyes. Every breath he took frosted on the night air. He looked cold, exhausted, and surprised by her odd greeting.

But at least he was home.

“Where have you been?” she yelled.

“Why are you shouting?” He pushed her aside and stepped over the threshold, intent on getting warm. Walking straight to the bed, he stood for a moment and gazed down on Baby as she slept, then turned to survey the room. The fire was burning brightly, there was a stack of clean dishes on the kitchen bench. He was relieved to note that everything looked fine.

Everything but Annika. She was still glaring at him.

“Close the door,” he said softly, so as not to wake the child.

She slammed it shut. Baby stirred and rolled to her stomach.

“Are you going to tell me where you’ve been or not?”

“I was until you started ranting. What are you so upset about?”

“Upset? Upset? I’m not upset! I’m furious. How dare you leave me here all day to watch over this place and that child while you go traipsing off, God knows where. I won’t do it again, do you hear?”

Buck sighed and shrugged out of his coat. Annika moved forward, set the knife on the table, grabbed his jacket from him, and then hung it on the peg beside the door. He watched her perform the small service for him with wonder.

“And I suppose you’re hungry?” she snapped.

He knew whenever she planted her hands on her hips it was a sign of open defiance. “Not really, but I could use a cup of coffee.” He smelled it simmering by the fire.

“You’re just lucky I kept it warm.” She marched to the workbench and picked up his chipped cup, crossed to the fire, grabbed a wadded towel that served as pot holder, and poured him a cupful of brew that looked strong enough to lift the table.

Amazed, Buck pulled out a chair and sat down while Annika bustled back and forth, handing him a plate, then lifting a towel off a dish of biscuits he’d made the day before. “Biscuits and coffee is all you get this late.”

He wondered if a full-cooked meal might have been an option if he’d have arrived an hour earlier.

“If I thought I would have gotten this much kindness out of you I’d have stayed away all day long before now,” he said around a mouthful of biscuit.

She gasped aloud and turned on him. “You are an outrageous imbecile, Buck Scott.”

“Anyone ever taught you any manners, Miss Storm?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I mean real manners, like not shouting in the house, not making too many demands on a person, like giving out a bit of the milk of human kindness?”

She lifted her hands and appealed to the ceiling, “And this from a man who dragged me here against my will.”

“A mistake you’re not ever likely to let me forget.”

“Not while I live and breathe.”

Buck threw back his head and laughed. It wasn’t a mere chuckle, nor was it a quick bark. It was loud and long and came from the depths of his soul.

And it stunned Annika speechless.

It was the first time she’d seen him really laugh with enjoyment, and for the life of her she didn’t know why he was doing it.

“Why are you laughing?”

Buck paused to wipe the tears from his eyes. “You want to hear something really funny?”

She watched him suspiciously. “What?”

“I actually missed this today.”

“Missed what?”

“This”—he waved his hand back and forth between them—“this bickering, this arguing.” He ducked his head and took a sip of coffee. “It gets mighty quiet out here, Miss Storm, but I’m still surprised to find I even missed you.”

She sat down hard in a chair across from his and stared at him as if he’d lost his mind.

Then she started to smile. It was slow at first, but as realization dawned, her smile grew until she found herself shaking her head at her own reaction to his admission.

“It was pretty quiet around here today,” she admitted softly, but she could not bring herself to admit she actually missed him. At least not to his face. “Except for Baby. She started crying this afternoon and wouldn’t stop until I put her to bed and made her stay there.”

“I never left her this long before, except when I went to Cheyenne to get Alice.”

“I can’t imagine how your friend Ted stood it for two days. She put up a real fuss.”

He looked over his shoulder at the sleeping child and then back at Annika. “I guess there’s one person alive that likes me.”

She looked at her hands, then back at him. “So where were you?”

“Killed an elk and decided to take the meat. I think there’s near four hundred and fifty pounds of it that’ll last all winter. I won’t have to worry about you bein’ left here without. After the rabbits I knew there was no way you could skin anything yourself.”

“It was talk like that which put me into such a state. All I could think of was you lying dead someplace, or hurt and freezing to death in the snow.”

“And did you care, Miss Storm?”

She tried to look away but something in his eyes held hers. “I was worried.” She cleared her throat.

He ate another biscuit and sipped the coffee in silence, enjoying the warmth of the place and the fact that Annika was still seated across from him. When he was nearly through he decided to see just how worried she had been.

“Would you mind filling the kettle and setting it to boil?”

She was up and moving before he had finished his request. Buck smiled to himself. She’d been worried all right. He made a silent promise not to put her through such misery again.

“Are you going to wash up?” she asked.

“I’m going to take a bath.”

“Here?”

“Where would you suggest?”

She twisted her fingers together. “But it’s dark.”

“Yes, it is.”

“And cold,” she added.

“I know.”

“I can’t very well go outside and wait until you finish,” she said.

He stood up and went to take the tub out of the corner. “I didn’t ask you to.”

“But...”

He smiled again. “I think I can trust you not to look.”

Buck had another cup of coffee and half filled the tub with freezing water from the barrel while he waited for the water to boil. Annika took her journal out of her satchel and told him she’d sit on the bed, facing the wall, and that he was to let her know when he was completely dressed again.

He watched her arrange herself with her back to him, her journal open in her lap. She seemed intent on reading it, not entering anything, as she pored over the pages covered with her neat, curling letters. Surely she’d seen a naked man. Hadn’t she? Long before they were Annika’s age Sissy and Patsy both knew firsthand what a man hid beneath his trousers. But he had no knowledge of cities at all, nor what went on there, and he realized with sudden clarity that Annika Storm might not have ever seen a naked man.

The longer he splashed and spluttered, soaped and soaked, the more he hoped she hadn’t.

A
NNIKA
shifted as the cramp in her back grew worse. It wasn’t easy to sit upright in the bed trying to face the wall without anything to lean on. She swung her legs over the side, careful to keep her face averted from the big washtub before the fire. She’d read her journal over from the beginning of the year to date and closed the cover. Tired of staring at the back wall, she wondered when Buck’s bath would end.

At first he had entered into the event with so much splashing and sloshing that she almost turned around to see exactly what kind of a mess he was making. For the last few minutes he had been so absolutely still that she thought he might be watching her, waiting for her to turn around; but in the past few days, some inner voice told her when he was staring at her. She did not feel his eyes on her now, but he was so still that she could hear him breathing.

After a few more silent moments passed, Annika slowly, barely perceptibly, turned her head and tried to see what he was doing through lowered lashes.

As far as she could tell, he was slouched down in the tub, with his head resting on the high back rim. His arms hung over the sides, his fingers relaxed. Even though the fire had burned low, she could see him well enough to know that his eyes were closed.

Annika stood in a huff. While she had been straining to act as good manners and breeding dictated, he had been thoughtless enough to fall sound asleep and keep her waiting.

She marched across the room and stood, hands on hips, staring down at him. There was something so vulnerable about the way moisture still clung to his spiked lashes that she did not wake him immediately, but realized how tired he must have been to fall asleep sitting in a tub full of slowly chilling water. His hair was still damp, but already springing to life with curl. Tighter golden curls covered his chest and tapered to a trail of down that disappeared below the surface of the soapy water. His knees thrust up through the water like islands in a murky sea.

As she reached out to touch him on his naked shoulder, she quickly drew her hand back, unable to explain the reason why. She only knew that she feared touching his flesh, not because of the way he might react, but because of the way her hand began to tingle even before she made contact with him. How would it feel to touch him, to feel his skin and the soft muscle beneath the surface? What would it be like to have his strong arms about her, not as they had been when he carried her off, but if he held her with affection? How would his kiss compare to Richard’s?

The direction her thoughts were headed frightened her. A quick glance around the room and her eye caught sight of the water barrel near the door. She tiptoed around the tub and lifted the hook-handled ladle off the rim of the oak barrel. Balancing a dipperful of water, Annika tiptoed back to the side of the tub and then poured the whole thing over Buck Scott’s head.