To Wed in Texas (17 page)

Karlee didn’t know what to say. It would be cruel to give him false hope and crueler still to give him no hope at all.

“I’ll wait with you until the dawn,” she finally said. “No matter how long.”

Daniel sneered. “And what if it never comes?” He almost choked on the words.

“Then you’re stuck with me.” She tried to laugh though tears rolled down her cheeks.

Daniel smiled. “Hell of a deal.”

Karlee patted his arm. “Preachers aren’t suppose to swear.”

“And if I wasn’t a preacher, Mrs. McLain, would you stay married to me?”

“I married the man, not the profession.” Could he really think that just because he was blind he could no longer be a minister?

He was silent for a long moment. “Would you mind rubbing some more salve on my hands?”

She began unwrapping his hand in answer. As she rubbed in the greasy medicine, his fingers moved with hers. When she spread the salve, he caressed her hand until she had as much on her as now covered his burns. If hands could dance, she thought, they were dancing.

“Is that better?” She wrapped his fingers with fresh bandages.

“It helps. The darkness doesn’t seem so complete when I’m touching someone. In those first few days, I think your touch was the only thing that kept me sane.
Even when I didn’t say anything, the feel of your hands pulled me back to earth again and again.”

“I’m glad I could help.” Karlee wiped her fingers on a towel and moved back to her chair. He had a way about him, a way of making her feel needed without making himself seem helpless. “Maybe you can sleep now. Do you need anything else?”

He lifted his hand. “Come here.”

As she had when he asked her to marry him, Karlee put her hand in his and allowed him to pull her close.

When her legs bumped the edge of the bed, he tugged again.

She crawled onto the bed, not knowing what he wanted.

“Lie down next to me,” he whispered. “I don’t want to be alone.”

Very carefully, she stretched out at his side, leaving only an inch between them.

He opened his arm, and she used his chest as a pillow.

“Are you cold?” He placed his hand at the back of her waist and pulled her against him. She was surprised how easily she fit next to his side, almost as if they were a match.

“No,” she managed to say while she tried to breathe. They were doing nothing improper. Nothing wrong. Yet the room seemed to have grown summer warm.

“Do you mind keeping me company, Mrs. McLain? I don’t want to be alone tonight.”

“No.” She swallowed hard. “I don’t mind.”

He kissed the top of her head. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

With her tucked securely against his side, Daniel drifted into a peaceful sleep.

Karlee had never been more awake in her life. Each time she breathed, the smell of him filled her lungs. His heart pounded in her ear like a drum. His hand moved
slowly from her back to the fullness of her hip where it rested peacefully.

She told herself he was asleep, that he didn’t know, or feel anything with the bandages and her layers of clothes. After all, he was a preacher.

She twisted until she pulled his hand back to her waist.

After a few minutes, he slid his fingers back to the fullness of her hip.

He can’t feel anything, she reminded herself.

But an hour later, when she was finally almost asleep she could have sworn he patted her bottom lightly and spread his fingers over the curve of her hip.

Tomorrow, wild savage, company and all, she’d have a few words about what the preacher wasn’t feeling between the clothes and bandages.

D
ANIEL AWOKE SLOWLY, ONE PAIN AT A TIME. THE
cool of the night had passed. He heard the first sounds of stirring in the kitchen. It was morning. He’d always liked the smell of a fire starting and coffee flavoring the air at daybreak. But today, his body ached. His head pounded and it tasted like something had died inside his mouth.

Karlee was no longer at his side, if she ever had been. He remembered a dream of her lying next to him, all soft and warm. Her head, resting atop his heart, had been more real than dream in the quiet of night. She’d pressed her ample breasts against the side of his chest as though she had no idea how much the feel of her made his whole body aware. In the dream, he’d felt the firmness of her hip in his hand and she hadn’t protested.

In his dream, Daniel reminded himself. It could be nothing more. He wasn’t attracted to Karlee. Not a woman like her. Not any woman. He’d seen her type. She was destined to be an old maid, taking care of others all her life. There was something about her that would make any man run in the opposite direction. A craziness, an impulsiveness, a freedom. His grandfather would
have said she was a person not comfortable in her own skin.

A man might never know what she would do next. That’s not the kind of woman who made a good wife. Not the kind who would be a trusted friend…a partner…a lover.

No, he told himself. He shouldn’t even be dreaming about a woman like Karlee. Or thinking about her in the way he was.

She was the type of woman who shipped herself in a trunk, or flattened a huge stranger with a frying pan…or married a blind man.

“Morning.” Karlee’s voice came from a few feet away.

Daniel frowned. He should have heard her approaching. The dream had crossed into reality. “Morning,” he grumbled. “Is the coffee ready yet?” He was in no mood to wake up, much less face anyone.

“I brought you a cup.” Her words grew nearer as she spoke.

He reached out, but she was closer than he guessed. His bandaged hand swung against the hot cup. She squealed as coffee splashed over her hand and onto the sheets.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” She backed away. “I filled it so full. I was watching the coffee and didn’t see you reach up.”

He heard the clank of the cup on the bedside table a moment before she returned to his side. She wiped up the spill and patted the sheet that covered him.

“I’ve made such a mess.” She continued rubbing the stains, totally unaware his body lay beneath the depth of cotton.

The coffee’s warmth hardly registered, but the touch of her hand burned his flesh. The woman treated him with the same careless handling she must treat the rag
dolls she made. Any moment, he half-expected her to be sewing new button eyes onto his head.

He caught the tea towel she dabbed with and pulled it from her. “I can clean up myself.” He knew his voice was harsh, but she seemed to have a complete disregard for his modesty. “Watch where you’re patting. And, while we’re on the subject, I can bathe myself from now on. There’s no need for you to do it.”

He knew she was still in the room. He could hear her breathing. She must be standing next to the bed like a statue.

“But …”

“But what, Mrs. McLain?”

“But, last night …”

“There was no last night.” He knew he was being harsh, but she’d better understand once and for all that there could never be anything between them. They might be married for the rest of their lives, but he didn’t want her harboring any hope that he’d love her. He’d loved once and that was enough for a lifetime. “And in the future, I’d like to drink my coffee, not bathe in it.”

He heard a tiny little sound that seemed to come from deep in her throat. Words so jumbled they blocked all speech.

Then, without warning, hot coffee splashed across his chest.

Daniel yelped and lunged forward, reaching for her, almost toppling off the bed in his haste. Growling like a wounded bear, he wiped the brew from his face with one bandaged hand. The other swung wide, trying to catch her in his net.

It didn’t matter that he had no idea what he’d do with her if he caught her. No one had ever dared do what she’d done.

He might not have heard her enter, but he heard her stomp out of the room. No apology, no explanation.

“Unpredictable,” he mumbled. “Temperamental old maid!” He dragged his injured leg to the edge of the bed. The pain fought its way through his anger. If he tried to follow her, he’d only hurt the wound more. She wasn’t worth it. He didn’t even like the woman. She was one level worse than the plagues of Job.

“Morning, Danny boy. Wearing your coffee these days?” Wolf chuckled. “The politeness of the honeymoon doesn’t last as long as it used to.”

A dry towel hit Daniel’s chest as he heard the chair beside him groan under Wolf’s weight. The huge man seemed to think every chair in the house was a rocker.

“I wanted to allow you two newlyweds some time alone before the house wakes up, but Karlee just stormed into the kitchen and told me she’d guard the savage while she fixed breakfast. From the look in her fiery green eyes, I’d feel sorry for the boy if he picked her watch to try and break free.”

Daniel wiped off his chest, feeling the coffee grounds against his skin. “She still hasn’t learned to make a decent cup of coffee,” he mumbled. “And the woman has no gentle spirit, I can testify to that. She also has no patience or understanding about a man getting up on the wrong side of the bed.”

“Maybe you’d better learn which side is the right side, Danny, if you plan on waking up at all. Trust me, next time the cup could be a frying pan.”

Daniel didn’t get Wolf’s humor. “Why couldn’t I have found a kind soul to marry, with soft ways and a sweet heart? Why’d I have to pick the one woman I’ve ever met who might truly be insane? She’s cursed, double-odd, from a family too imbalanced to notice. She’s more than twenty and can’t make coffee. There’s something seriously wrong with a woman who can’t cook. It’s not natural.”

Wolf seemed to have gone deaf.

“I’m an even-tempered man.” Daniel tossed the towel so hard it hit the opposite wall with a thud. He’d resigned himself to coffee grounds in his chest hair. “I never do a thing or say words to anger anyone. Why would the woman throw a cup at me?”

“Maybe you’d better ask her. If you’ve calmed down enough,” Wolf reasoned.

“I’m calm enough. I’m always calm enough.” He heard movement on the other side of the bed. “She’s back, isn’t she?”

“I’m here,” Karlee answered, “with your breakfast. And I’ll thank you to address me directly.”

“I would if you’d make enough noise when you enter. I can hear everyone in this house walking from room to room, but you manage to sneak up on me again and again.”

The front two feet of Wolf’s chair bumped to the floor. “I need to be getting back to the kitchen.” He scrambled away.

Daniel sat very still, his muscles tight, anticipating another blow. “If you’re expecting me to say I’m sorry, you’ll have a long wait.” He wasn’t in the habit of apologizing when he couldn’t see he’d done anything wrong.

“So will you,” she answered.

“Then I suspect, Mrs. McLain, we will have very little to say to one another in the future.”

“I suspect so,” she snapped. “Would you like to eat your breakfast or wear it?”

A smile fought its way through Daniel’s anger, despite his efforts to keep it down. “I’ll eat it. And I’ll have another cup of coffee. My cup’s around here somewhere, or at least the dent of it is still here.”

He sat up in the bed, pulling the sheet around him. “I’ve night shirts in a trunk in my study, if you don’t mind bringing me one. I might look more presentable dressed in it than bare-chested.”

She sat a tray beside him. “I don’t mind.”

Unsure how she meant the words, he heard her cross to his little study and open the old trunk he used for a footstool when reading. Her step was so light he couldn’t help but wonder if she’d practiced it since childhood. If so, he imagined she surprised a great many people in private conversations. That might explain why she was passed from place to place so often.

But of late, he could think of a few other reasons as well. The idea of shoving her in a trunk and shipping her back crossed his mind.

She returned before he managed to swallow the first bite of a flour-crusted biscuit. The half left in his fingers crumbled. He could smell the eggs and wondered if they were encased in a crispy layer, burned beyond taste as usual.

“Would you like me to help you put on the shirt?” Her voice could have frozen the Mississippi.

“No, thank you. If you’ll just lay it on the bed, I can manage from here on.” The coffee actually tasted good as it softened the biscuit in his throat. “If you’ll close the door, I think I can bathe without help.”

“All right.”

That was it then. They’d settle into the politeness of strangers.

The moment he heard the door click, he set the tray aside and stood, letting the sheet fall away from his bare body. Careful not to put any weight on his leg, he hopped the few steps to where he’d heard her get water. As he’d expected, a bucket stood beside the washstand.

He felt for the washcloth and soap. The scissors, he guessed, might be near, for he’d heard her lay them again and again on the night stand while she sewed. His fingers patted the corner of the table. Her scissors were exactly where he’d thought she left them.

Carefully, he cut the bandages from his hands. The
burns felt healed enough to take the air. It was time to let his skin breathe.

Ignoring the pain, he dipped the rag into the cold water and began to wash. Jefferson was warm enough to swim in the river most of the year. He’d give a great deal to float in the water now, for hard as he scrubbed, he couldn’t feel clean with cold water and hard soap. The smell of the fire still lingered on his skin.