The Widow and the Wastrel (12 page)

"Liza—" She hated the calm control that had entered his voice.

"Please," she closed her eyes again, melting against him and nuzzling her cheek against the palm of his hand as a cat would prod the hand that had stopped stroking it, "I don't want to talk."

He allowed her to cuddle into his chest, his hands unconsciously caressing her shoulders and back. She had always guessed at the extent of his worldly expertise.

"A few minutes ago, you called me contemptible and disgusting." His low voice taunted her with its cynical amusement. "Am I supposed to feel honored now that you want me to make love to you?"

There was a stifled gasp of pain. "Please!" An agonizing bubble in her throat choked off the rest of her protest.

"Please what?" His mouth moved along her temples. "Please understand? Please forget all the insults? Please make love to me? What?" Jed prodded unmercifully.

"Don't be cruel," Elizabeth murmured, a shame creeping in to steal her pleasure.

"I'm sorry, I feel cruel tonight," he said harshly. "I can't help it."

His hands dug into her arms and pushed her away. It wasn't a genuine rejection because she knew he wanted her. She was not an inexperienced girl. She was a woman and she knew when she had aroused a man's desires. Still it hurt.

A tear quivered on the edge of her lash. Jed touched it, his forefinger catching it as it fell. Pride kept her gaze fixed on his impenetrable features, an aching need still pulsing through her body.

"I'm sorry, Liza," he said again in a gentler yet just as firm tone. "There really is such a thing as the right place and the right time. I thought I'd stopped wanting you, but I haven't."

"Then why—" she started to ask huskily, but his finger touched her lips to silence them.

"Then why don't I take you?" He smiled wryly and sighed. As crimson heat colored her cheeks, he folded her gently into his arms. There was too much restraint in his embrace for her to draw any comfort or warmth. His voice vibrated with charged emotion near her ear. "Because overriding my desire is a bitter violence," he stated grimly.

"I don't understand." Elizabeth had buried her face against his neck, now she raised it to gaze at him, bewilderedly.

"I know you don't." The heady smile he bestowed on her didn't change the ruthless glint in his eyes. "Maybe some day—" Jed hesitated. She felt him withdrawing from her, emotionally as well as physically, detaching himself from her arms with an impatient firmness. "Good night, Elizabeth."

Turning, he walked down the hall, not looking back once, not even when he walked through the door of his own room and closed it behind him. Empty and cold, Elizabeth stood where he had left her, wanting to follow him and frightened by the vague warning he had given her. Finally she went back to her own room and crawled into bed, her ears straining for some sound from his, but the walls of the old house were too thick.

She hadn't been certain what his attitude would be the following morning. He was such an enigma to her that she hadn't been able to guess-whether he would silently mock the way she had thrown herself at him or pretend that it had never happened. She was uncertain what her own attitude should be.

Her own emotional upheaval was difficult to understand. She couldn't make up her mind whether she had been carried away by a wave of love or the backwash of sexual abstinence. In the end, she adopted a wait-and-see attitude and let Jed take the first step.

The first day there had been the crushing sensation that he was completely indifferent to her, aloofly so. The way he had of holding himself apart from others in their presence was more pronounced than ever. Then, that evening, she had felt his gaze dwelling on her with thoughtful, almost brooding intensity. He rarely addressed any comment to her, keeping the main flow of conversation with his mother, but neither did he subject her to any taunting jibes or mocking looks.

The waiting game was a difficult one for Elizabeth to play. Hope would alternately rise and fall until she felt she needed a barometer to record the erratic fluctuations. The physical attraction Jed held for her was undeniable. The most accidental contact had her senses leaping in immediate response. And she guessed that he had only to take her in his arms and she would be his for the asking.

Five days she went through the tortues of Tantalus. Jed's previous routine didn't vary much; he spent most of the day away from the house and some evenings. Yet there was never any pretense on his part that nothing had happened. The very second she thought there was, Jed would send her a look that was meant to remind her.

How much longer was this going to go on? Elizabeth sighed to herself. Painstakingly she trimmed off the crust of the bread, varying the design of each slice from circles to squares to triangles. Flaky cherry tarts were cooling on the counter, the tarts and the canapés she was making were refreshments for Rebecca's Literary Club women. Their monthly meeting was being held here this time and Elizabeth had naturally been requested to take on the task of fixing the light refreshments.

"Can I help, Mom?" Elbows propped on the table, chin cradled in her hands, Amy glanced up at Elizabeth.

"May I help," she corrected automatically. She pushed the small bowls of egg salad, ham salad and tuna salad to her daughter along with a knife. "You can help me with the sandwiches."

"May help," Amy corrected her mother with impish humor.

A slow smile spread across Elizabeth's face as she ruefully nodded an acknowledgement of her own grammatical error. Cooking and preparing foods was another interest of Elizabeth's that Amy appeared to be beginning to share.

"How long are those ladies going to be here?" Amy asked in a less than enthusiastic tone.

"Probably until after four," Elizabeth answered. At her daughter's grimace, she added, "It would be best if you stayed in your room until it's time for the refreshments."

"I suppose Mrs. Cargmore is going to be here," Amy grumbled, then adopted a mimicking voice. '"Children should be seen and not heard."'

"At least not too often," Jed added in conclusion.

The bread knife clattered to the floor, narrowly missing Elizabeth's foot as she spun around to face him. She tried to cover her confusion by bending to the floor to retrieve the knife, but in the next second Jed was kneeling beside her, handing her the knife. For all the amused mockery in his smile, his eyes were golden warm in her face.

"Someone should teach you to be careful with knives or you're going to end up chopping off your toe," he scolded gently.

Her pulse was accelerating at an alarming pace. She straightened quickly, trying to hide the flow that brought an emerald brilliance to her eyes.

"You startled me," she breathed in defense.

"Is that what I did?" Jed asked with a questing arch to one brow.

Bouncing her gaze away from his face, Elizabeth realized that he knew the way he disturbed her. He made a lazy, sweeping appraisal of her from head to toe, his eyes twinkling merrily when they returned to her face. She caught her breath at the change in his manner. The aloofness was gone, but what did it signify?

"All of this can't be for our consumption. Are we having a party?" Jed shifted his attention to the sandwiches Amy was stacking neatly on the plate.

"Not exactly," Amy explained. "Mom and I are doing the refreshments for Grandmother's Literary Club meeting."

"Looks like I'll have to change my plans for the afternoon. I had thought I'd spend it around here, but not if we're about to be invaded." The tobacco brown head made a definite negative shake.

"It isn't that bad," Elizabeth murmured, her heart sinking slightly as she wished she knew if there was a particular reason why Jed had intended to spend the afternoon here—possibly with her? Was that what he had intended?

"Well, I sure wish I had somewhere else to go." Amy licked the salad off her fingers and picked up another slice of bread.

"Amy, you shouldn't do that. Now wash your hands," Elizabeth looked her reproval.

There was a disgruntled sigh as Amy replaced the knife and bread and walked to the sink. Jed was leaning against the counter, smiling faintly at Amy.

"So you've been condemned to spending the afternoon here?" he teased.

"In my room," Amy answered with an expressive widening of her brown eyes. "Isn't that exciting?"

"Well, you can always sit and count how many times Mrs. Garth sneezes," he suggested dryly. "That's what we used to do. Her record was twenty-four times as I recall."

"Did you really count?" Amy giggled.

"Must you encourage her, Jed?" Elizabeth sighed, but with humor. "Your mother already thinks she's disrespectful of her elders."

"On second thoughts," a smile played with the edges of his mouth, "why don't you come with me this afternoon? I thought I'd visit Maggie."

"Could we stop by the farm and see the puppies, too?"

"Amy, you—" The quick words of reproval were interrupted.

"Perhaps you should ask your mother if you can go," Jed suggested.

Amy rebounded to Elizabeth, not allowing her time to bask in the faintly intimate smile he had turned to her. "Please, Mom?"

"If Jed is sure he wants to take you, I don't object," Elizabeth agreed. Her gaze was drawn back to the leanly carved face, less cynical now with its expression of patient indulgence, but no less compelling.

"Oh, he's sure, aren't you, Uncle Jed?" Amy hastened to have the invitation affirmed.

Jed straightened from the counter, the muscular length of him achieving his full height. Elizabeth felt the force of his masculinity drawing her to him even with the width of the table separating them.

"Yes, I'm sure," he nodded. The grooves around his mouth deepened as he ruffled the top of Amy's head. "I think we'd better be leaving before your grandmother discovers what we're up to and changes us into a couple of bookworms!"

Amy was already giggling and racing for the back door. Silently Elizabeth observed that her daughter seemed as anxious for Jed's company as she was. If only she could react that naturally and with such obvious pleasure instead of being plagued by uncertainty and caution!

"I'll look after her," he said quietly, misinterpreting the slight frown.

"Of course," Elizabeth smiled wanly, "Thank you…for asking her."

Jed seemed to examine her words, his gaze running over her with disruptive thoroughness. Elizabeth was certain that her inner agitation must be apparent. Her shaky poise felt completely destroyed, assaulted by too many days of uncertaintly and doubt. But he made no comment regarding her stilted expression.

"We'll be back later this afternoon, with luck after the dragons have left," he said, and followed the path Amy had blazed out of the door.

Staring after the lean figure, wide shoulders tapering to a slim waist and hips, Elizabeth wished they had asked her to come along. She couldn't have gone, of course, she acknowledged with a sigh, reverting her gaze to the bread slices on the cutting board. But she wished Jed had asked her for her company.

Lucidly she didn't have to take part in the afternoon’s meeting. As a silent participant, she was not required to concentrate on the book reviews being given. Once the meeting was over and the refreshments served, the women seemed to intend to linger indefinitely, exchanging local gossip, Mrs. Garth sneezed again and Elizabeth contained a smile.

This would never do, she told herself sternly. One more time and she would surely laugh aloud when she saw Mrs. Garth raising the embroidered handkerchief to her nose. As unobtrusively as possible, Elizabeth excused herself from the two ladies she had been sitting beside, guessing they would not miss her since she had added so little to the conversation, and began gathering together the dishes and carrying them to the kitchen.

On the third trip, she found Jed and Amy seated at the colonial kitchen table. Amy raised a conspiratorial finger of silence to her lips.

"Ssh!" she whispered. "We don't want Grandmother to know we're back yet. Did she say anything?"

"Only that she hoped you'd behave yourself," Elizabeth answered softly, not commenting on Rebecca's initial surprise and wary doubt on the advisability of letting Amy go with Jed. "Did you have a nice time?"

"Oh, yes. Maggie was so glad to see me," Amy asserted proudly. "And Uncle Jed, too. And you should see the puppies, Mom! Freda said I could have one when they're old enough to leave their mother."

"We'll see about that." It was difficult to keep her gaze from straying too often to Jed. An odd breathlessness had claimed her lungs from the moment she had entered the room and encountered his tawny gaze. She carefully stacked the dishes in the sink, trying to control her schoolgirl reaction to his presence. "There are some cherry tarts left. Would you two like some?"

"Yes, please," Amy accepted eagerly, while Jed only nodded.

Just as Elizabeth set the plates with the tarts on the table in front of them, a sneeze echoed into the room. Jed darted Amy a knowing look and smiled at her.

"There goes Mrs. Garth again," he observed dryly.

Amy suppressed a giggle with her hand. "How many times do you suppose that is?" she whispered gleefully.

"Sevent—" Elizabeth bit quickly into her lip, suddenly and guiltily aware that she had been counting. Red flags of embarrassment ran up her checks at the mocking light in Jed's eyes.