Silver Lining (28 page)

"Of course, dear. Anything!"

"Kiss me."

He blinked hard as if he'd been poleaxed. Then he looked delighted. He wet his lips and gently drew her forward as if she were made of thin glass that might shatter beneath his hands.

His kiss was soft and tender. Utterly boring. When it ended, Philadelphia pressed her head into his shoulder to smother her sigh and conceal her despair.

Since Max was not present to agonize over his brother kissing her, the kiss was wasted. She'd gained no advantage by granting it.

She wished to heaven that she had not seen Max tuck the creature's ugly skirts around her legs. Damn him, damn him.

*

"I loved listening to Dave strum his guitar. And Gilly plays the piano without even looking at the sheets of music!"

Max nodded and glanced at the main house as he drove past on the way home. The front of the house was dark. As the window of Wally and Philadelphia 's room opened to the back, he couldn't tell if their lamps were lit or if they were still awake.

"It was a fine evening," Louise added cheerfully, pressing her thigh and leg against his. The temperature hovered around freezing, so the sensible course was to share each other's warmth. Nevertheless, he was aware of her closeness and her scent. Sunshine had been right that she smelled like apple cider.

"You didn't speak three words until we reached Gilly and Dave's place." He guessed he knew why.

"I didn't have anything to say." She kept her gaze fixed on the inky road ahead.

By now he should have known she wouldn't complain, but he'd thought she might make a reference to Philadelphia 's appalling rudeness. But she hadn't, not during the drive to Gilly and Dave's, nor during the return trip. Now he understood that she wouldn't mention Philadelphia throughout the remaining three miles to their house.

All week he had dreaded seeing Philadelphia . He kept thinking if things had gone differently, they would have been in Denver now on their wedding trip. But any thoughts of what might have been had evaporated when he watched her protect her skirts by pushing Sunshine away. Never would he have guessed that she would value the drape of her skirts more than a child's embrace.

Moreover, he would have sworn Philadelphia incapable of delivering scathing remarks and then smiling when she discovered the object of her scorn, Louise, had overheard her comments. Worse, she had tossed him a quick triumphant glance as if they were conspirators and she expected him to applaud.

Granted, Philadelphia had no reason to exude warmth and kindness toward Louise. But Max would have wagered everything he owned that Philadelphia Houser would never ostracize a person seated at the same table. She wouldn't knowingly cause the rest of the dinner company a moment's discomfort. He had expected chilly politeness but certainly politeness. He had not expected pointed rudeness or the slashing remarks aimed at Louise. Definitely he had not anticipated that he would gaze down the dinner table at the woman he would have married and feel defensive and angry.

Thinking about it now, he experienced a stab of shame that, aside from one brief moment in the foyer, he had forgotten that she was pregnant. How in the hell could he have forgotten even for an instant? He'd worried all day yesterday that his feelings of tenderness toward the mother of his child would be uncomfortably evident to everyone at the table. And then he'd forgotten. Truly, he was a bastard, and she was better off without him.

"It's a beautiful night, ain't it?" Louise said at his side.

"Isn't—not ain't," he said automatically.

"Isn't it. The stars look close enough to grab."

Another thing that bothered him was wondering if Philadelphia had always been as self-absorbed as she had seemed today. Was this a recently acquired trait? Perhaps a symptom of her condition? Or had he been so blinded that he hadn't looked beyond flirting eyes and dimpled cheeks? Abruptly he recalled teasing her about doing and saying whatever she pleased and the devil take the consequences. Today he'd observed a manifestation of the same thoughtlessly selfish behavior, but this time he had judged it harshly.

"Now who's being quiet?" Louise asked, nudging him with her shoulder.

"Thank you for going with me to Ma's for dinner," he said after a minute. She must have dreaded today's dinner as much as he had.

"I wasn't sure if I'd like your family, but I do. There was one time when I looked around the table and I thought, son of a bitch, here I am… "She halted abruptly and drew a breath. "And I thought, my stars, here I am having dinner with a real family, and I have as much right to be here as… you know, anyone else." Ducking her head, she pushed at the fingers of her gloves. "Anyway. It was a good moment, as fine a moment as I can recall."

"You keep that in mind," he said firmly, peering ahead into the cold darkness. "You do have a right to be there." He understood Philadelphia wanting to punish him, but Louise had nothing to do with Philadelphia 's pregnancy or her marriage to Wally. It wasn't right to punish someone else for his faults.

"Did you know that Gilly wants another baby?"

"She hasn't said anything, but it doesn't surprise me."

"She and Dave have been hoping for three years, but it hasn't happened yet. It doesn't seem fair that some folks get pregnant just like that, and others have to wait for years."

Instantly he remembered the amazing night on the kitchen floor and felt his thighs tighten. As long as he lived, he would never forget the moment when her nightgown dropped to her waist and he realized what she intended. And then seeing her in the frosty moonlight that gave her body a shimmer of silver. She wasn't small or delicate, but she was perfectly and beautifully proportioned. Small waist, full breasts, long, strong legs. Her skin had been taut and hot, smooth and firm to the touch.

Muscles tight, he pulled the wagon around the house to the mudroom door. "I'll put the wagon away. Do you need assistance?"

She laughed and scooted across the seat. "I can climb down without your help."

Cold wind rushed to fill the vacancy against his thigh and leg, but he didn't release the brake. When she reached the stoop, he called into the darkness. "Louise?"

"Yes?"

"I've been thinking… this might be a good night for you not to wear that damned nightgown."

"Tonight?" Surprise lifted her voice.

"Unless you'd rather not."

"I sure didn't think… I mean with you seeing… Listen, are you just feeling sorry for me, or—"

"Louise? It's cold sitting here. Could you just say yes or no?"

"Yes!" Her laugh was throaty and floated on the frosty air with the warmth of a promise. "Yes, yes, yes!"

As he drove the wagon toward the shed, it occurred to him that he'd made love to her with reluctance, and he'd made love to her in anger. Tonight was the first time he would make love to her because he truly wanted to. And damned if he wasn't as surprised as she that it would happen tonight.

Anticipation made his fingers tremble as he unhitched the wagon and turned the horses into the corral.

He was so intent on the image of finding Louise naked in his bed that he didn't consider the significance of the snowflakes silently spinning out of the black sky. He didn't think of anything but her.

When he entered the bedroom, she was in bed, the covers pulled up under her chin, her brown hair loose on the pillow. Red tinted her cheeks, and her eyes were wide and round.

"You aren't hiding that wretched nightgown under those blankets, are you?" Smiling, he sat on the vanity bench and pulled off his boots and wiggled his toes with a sigh of pleasure.

"I'm naked as the day I was born," she whispered. The red in her cheeks turned fiery.

What an odd woman she was, he thought as he pulled off his trousers and unbuttoned his shirt. She dressed and undressed in the closet, didn't display an inch of flesh if she could cover it. She was not flirtatious or a tease. In fact, he would have said that modesty formed one of her defining traits. Yet, in his dark moment she had bared herself to him and given him the most erotic evening of his life. He would never forget that night on the kitchen floor He wanted to give her a night that she wouldn't forget.

Sliding beneath the blankets, he spooned his body around her to warm the chill on his skin. Instantly he felt himself respond to the firm heat of her nakedness.

"Louise?" he murmured against the nape of her neck after he pushed aside her hair. "There's going to be lots of dawdling tonight."

"What does that mean?" Suspicion placed a wobble in her voice, and he felt her stiffen.

"You'll have to wait and see." He let his breath flow across the tender skin beneath her ear, and he slipped an arm around her waist, drawing her closer into the hard curve of his body.

"You didn't blow out the lamp."

"No, I didn't." He ran his hand along the curve of her thigh, dipped to the hollow of her waist, then teased his fingers up her rib cage, moving his palm to her arm and up to her shoulder. A little puff of breath blew between her lips and he knew she had expected him to touch her breasts. And he would.

Eventually.

Nuzzling her, he moved his lips on the nape of her neck, traveling to her ear, then rising above her to follow the line of her jaw. She smelled like apple cider as she had earlier, but there was another scent, a deeper fragrance that was hers alone. It was a warm earthy scent that aroused him on a primitive level, the scent of woman. Turning her beneath his hands, he followed her jaw with his lips, kissing the corners of her lips, pulling slightly away when she would have returned his kiss.

Now, his mouth found her collarbone and traveled to the hollow of her throat. He pressed his tongue against the wild throbbing of her pulse.

"Oh my God." Her hands started to rise, but he gently pressed them back to her sides. "Am I supposed to do something?" she asked in a husky murmur.

"Just relax." Lifting away from her, he gazed down at her full, magnificent breasts. Then he stroked his thumbs across budding nipples and felt them harden like stones.

She made a choked sound. "How am I going to relax with you doing… what you're doing!" Her back arched, lifting her breasts to his hands, but he lowered his mouth instead. "What are you …? Oh Max!

Oh my!" Heat flooded her skin, and her hands made a helpless fluttering motion near her waist.

"Shhh," he said, smiling as he drew her nipple into his mouth and heard her gasp. Her fingers found his hair and dug into his scalp. As he stroked his tongue across and around the tip of her breast, he heard her breathing grow ragged, and she couldn't hold her body still. Her fingers flew around his head and shoulders; her hips rocked and tried to turn toward him.

When her skin felt hot enough to burst into flame, he ran his hand across her lower belly and teased his fingers through the soft brown curls between her legs.

"Oh!" She tried to sit up, but he pressed her back, and returned his hand to the hot, moist mystery. "Oh Max. Oh Max."

He caressed her, stroked her, teased, and tasted until her body trembled and her breath came in mindless gasps midway between a sob and a moan. She no longer tried to pull the blankets over them, no longer resisted his mouth and hands as he explored her.

There was joy in awakening her body, and in taking her mind to the edge of new and vivid, feverish sensations, then easing away and rising to kiss her lips and gaze into her stunned eyes. "I'm going to kiss every inch of you," he whispered against her lips.

Her eyes flared wide. "Every inch?" She wet her lips. "Every… no, no, don't do that."

But he did, taking his time, tasting deep of her, leading her along paths she had not traveled. And when he felt her shudder deeply and cry his name, he held her tightly in his arms until the shudders subsided and she lay limp against him, her eyes dark with amazement.

"My Lord," she whispered, staring in wonder. "If I'd had any idea that dawdling could be likethat, I never would have objected!"

Laughing, he kissed the sweet valley between her breasts. She was so responsive and uninhibited, so wonderfully willing and giving.

"Max?" she said after she'd caught her breath.

"Hmm?" He was almost asleep, enjoying her silky hair pressed to his cheek and the warm fullness of her body curved into him.

"Tonight was… it was just… well, I never imagined …"Her voice trailed, and he smiled against the top of her head. "What I'm trying to say is… I think I'd like to kiss you all over, too."

Instantly all thoughts of sleep vanished from his mind, and his body rose to full, rampant attention. Her fingers explored beneath the blankets and found him, and he heard her soft laugh.

"Seems like you wouldn't say no to a little dawdling yourself," she said, curving her fingers around him.

"You feel like velvet, did you know that?"

He made a strangled sound of pleasure. "You are amazing."

Later, before they fell asleep tangled in each other's arms, he chanced to glance at the window and noticed snow melting against the panes.

The smile vanished from his lips.

«^»

S
ince Max had offered to milk Missy while he was in the barn feeding the horses, Louise returned directly to the house after gathering eggs. In the mudroom she removed Max's old winter duster, knocked the snow off, and hung it on a peg. After shaking snow off the shawl she'd tied over her hair, she blew on her cold fingers and hurried into the kitchen to fry up breakfast.

The kitchen was warm and rich with the fragrance of boiling coffee. Louise turned off the lamps, then stood before the window watching the sky brighten above whirling snowflakes tumbling lazily toward earth. Most of the flakes were enormous and reminded her of the lacy center of the doilies that Livvy and Gilly crocheted for tabletops and furniture arms.

Yesterday the thick, wet fall of snow had seemed beautiful as the first snow always was. But today she frowned as she noticed her tracks from the henhouse were rapidly filling and Max's trail to the barn had vanished. Yesterday the cattle could still find grass; today six inches of snow concealed the forage.