Chapter 24

 

Jeff left the organizing of the search to his father and Paul Tyler. Alone, he leaped up the hillside, Grouchy intent behind him.

At the sandy entrance to the cave, Jeff stared down into the dim first chamber. The dog, on the other hand, went sniffing along the ground to the ice cream boxes just inside.

Glancing at the dog, Jeff saw the whip-like tail lashing and the sound of a slurping tongue. “Get by, dog,” he said. “Come out of it.”

In no humor for kindness, Jeff went to haul the animal bodily away from the sweet delicacy. He saw, with a jolt of horror that twisted his heart, the body of his daughter, laid out behind the boxes. Grouchy licked the child’s hands and looked around at Jeff’s exclamation.

Then Jeff saw Maribel’s beslobbered hand move as she pushed the dog away. “Yuck! Grouchy!” Sitting up, she wiped her hand on her skirt.

“Daddy!” she protested as he swept her high into the air. He cuddled her close, leaning his head on hers, unable to believe for a moment that she was alive and apparently unharmed.

“My God,” he said, his voice trembling in thanks. “My God.”

Maribel turned to look up into his face. “You’re not mad at me? For going away with that nice man. Miss Edith said . . .”

“Edith? Where is she?”

“In there. With the nice man.” Maribel pointed down the throat of the cave. “She said I should wait ‘til somebody comes. But I got sleepy.”

Jeff glared at the darkness over the threshold, then embraced his daughter again. “I’m just glad you’re okay. I was worried when I couldn’t find you.”

“Sorry, Daddy. I won’t ever leave without asking p’mission again.” She crossed her chest from shoulders to stomach with the forefinger of her right hand.

She obviously hadn’t the slightest idea that she had been in any danger. Jeff promised that he’d let her off lightly for any future misbehavior. What could she do that would make his heart stop again as it had the instant he had thought her dead?

“I’m going to take you to Grandpa, honey. Then me and a couple of other men are going to join Edith and Mr. Sullivan.”

As he stood up, his daughter still in his arms, he looked around for the hound. “Grouchy?”

He heard a woof, the same happy sound the dog made when hunting rabbits through the pastures. “Come on, boy,” he called, and whistled.

The tan dog came running out of the darkness, his paws scrambling on the loose surface. He held something in his jaws. Coming to a stop before his master, he laid the slobbery circle on Jeff’s boot. Then Grouchy slunk back, his belly to the ground but his tail thumping with barely suppressed delight.

Balancing Maribel on one hip, Jeff slowly lowered himself to pick up the brown circle. It smushed in his fingers but gave out the smell of allspice and nutmeg.

With a giggle, Maribel said, “It’s a cookie. Daddy. Grouchy brought me a cookie.”

“Hot damn! Lemonade and gingersnaps!”

“Daddy! You swore!”

A few minutes later, Maribel stood in danger of being smothered by the joyful ladies of Richey. She stood it only so long before saying in an widely audible whisper, “Louise? Let’s go see Orpheus.”

There was some laughter, and then the ladies went to start cooking for the menfolk. No one could tell how long the searchers might have to remain here, except that they’d stay as long as it took one way or the other.

Putting Maribel down, Sam said, “We’ll go see that bird all right, darlin’. But then we’re going to go home.”

A woman’s voice cut through the children’s automatic complaints. “Sam?” Vera Albans stood a few feet away, as though afraid to approach.

With the swiftness of instinct, Sam held out his hand to her. A hesitant smile curving her lips, she took the steps that brought her to his side and gratefully slipped her hand into his. “I was afraid you’d hate me. This is all my fault.”

Keeping a careful eye on the girls, but letting them get out of earshot, Sam said, “Like hell it is. You didn’t tell me to go thrash the sonofabitch. Pardon my language.”

“It’s all right. I’ve heard worse.” She also looked ahead to the children. It felt so right to be walking hand in hand with this man. If only there wasn’t such a cloud over them.

“Maribel seemed unscathed by her experience,” she said.

“To her, this is just another part of the fair. At least, Sullivan didn’t scare her. That’s the only thing that’ll keep me from ripping him apart when they find him. I just hope none of the boys get so riled they hang the bastard before he can tell us where Edith is.”

“Surely they wouldn’t do that!”

“You better believe they would. You see, they all remember the last time somebody got lost down there.”

“I never heard . . .”

“Well, you wouldn’t. Nobody likes talking about it. It was fifteen years ago. There was this kid ... He was one of those boys nobody seems to take to much. Always on the outside, you know? He seemed to think if he explored the cave everybody’d look up to him as some kind of hero.”

“I take it that he didn’t.”

“We looked for three days and nights. The whole town turned out. Jeff and Paul led a lot of the searches, because they’d spent so much time in the place. They never went back much after the two of ‘em brought that kid out on a plank. He’d been crushed by falling stone. Nobody knew if he was killed outright or not.”

Vera looked away. “Do you think they’ll find Edith?”

“They’ll find her. But in what condition . .  .”

About an hour and a half after Jeff found Maribel, the girls’ elation at the new fair had faded. The day had become hot enough to bake bread, and not a breeze moved.

Mrs. Armstrong came up to Sam, pacing at the entrance of the livestock tent. “Why don’t you send the girls home with us? You know my daughters would love to keep them, as long as need be.”

“Thanks, Millie. I appreciate that. This isn’t good for 'em.” He called them. As they went off with the preacher’s wife, who was promising them pie and new games, he said bitterly to Vera, “Even if they were both of ‘em lost up there, I wouldn’t be able to stand going in after ‘em. I can’t even bear to be up there at the hub of things.”

“That’s all right,” she said, leaning her head on his shoulder. What else could she say?

“I’ve always been afraid of places like that. I won’t even go in my own blasted root cellar. And there’s no reason for it.”

“There doesn’t have to be a reason. I’m scared of bees. Actually, it isn’t bees. It’s the noise they make. That buzz!” She shivered.

“Let’s get away from here then. The flies make enough noise to drive you crazy,”

As they walked away, Gary came running up. He was marked with clay and candle wax. “Oh, there you are, Mr. Dane. Jeff sent me back.”

“Have they found her?”

“No, sir. Grouchy lost the trail. There’s this place where the water runs down. They’re casting around for a new trail now.”

“You go take a rest, son. You look worn to a nub.”

Gary passed his arm over his forehead and looked surprised at the amount of dirt and sweat that came off. “It’s not so bad in there. Mr. Tyler said it’s about fifty degrees inside. It’s coming out to this heat that knocks you down.”

Vera said, “I’ll get you a drink, Gary.”

She came back at a run, holding her skirt high out of the way. “I saw him.” she gasped out.

“Who? Sullivan?” Sam demanded.

“Yes. He’s . . . he’s down by the flower-show tent.”

“Come on!” Sam shouted to Gary. The two men raced away, Sam’s limp not slowing him down a hair. The gaudy silk sling fluttered to the ground behind him. Heads turned as they shot past, and in a moment, twenty or thirty people were following.

Vera arrived just in time to see Sam’s left fist slam into Victor’s face. His head rocked back but already his fist was coming up. It began as a slugfest but after the first blood showed, dotting Victor’s clay-streaked shirt, they fell into a clinch, hammering at each with short, punishing blows.

They rocked and reeled between the tent and the spectators. Not a man stepped forward to stop the fight, the crowd stood by in a horseshoe. Looking at their faces, Vera saw stalwart resolve and knew that if by some chance Sam should go down, half a hundred men stood ready to take his place.

The two combatants staggered back and forth before they broke apart. Sullivan brought in a roundhouse punch that sent Sam tottering back into the crowd. The younger man turned to flee and ran into the tent.

The crowd surged forward as Sam broke free of the supporting arms of his friends. He chased Sullivan, nearly falling but pursuing like a Fury. Catching hold of his shoulder, Sam spun him around, connecting with a bone-crunching right to the jaw.

As Sam hollered aloud in pain, Sullivan slid slowly down, his eyes rolling up in his head. As he fell, he caught the edge of a table, in a last-ditch effort to stay upright. The table, unbalanced, tipped up. The entire display—vases, roses and all—came crashing down on Sullivan’s unconscious form.

As Sam stood swaying above his vanquished opponent, Vera rushed to his side. “Are you hurt?” she cried.

“Course. But I feel fine.” He prodded Sullivan with his toe, tenderly kicking aside a dark red rose. “At least Fred Grant can’t win first prize either. That’s his prize bouquet right there on top of this louse. Only time he’s ever smelled this good, I’ll . . .”

Still with a smile on his face, Sam dropped to his knees. Vera cradled his head against her bosom. “Somebody get some water! And get Doc Butler. Sam, darling, you’re going to be all right. I’m so proud of you.”

* * * *

Grouchy tugged against the rope through his collar and whined. To him, being underground was the same as hunting in the light, though the smells were all long dead. All except one, the scent he sought, snuffling along the shale and limestone.

He could sense his master’s impatience and excitement flowing down the rope. Grouchy wanted to please him. Once more he snuffed and sniffed along the dry side of a slight rise where the water ran down. Then Grouchy caught the faintest, shivery whiff of the smell he sought. He dragged forward, his big paws digging into the ground so that he staggered like a fur-bearing iguana. The smell was a bright light reaching through to the back of his head, calling him forward.

“I think he’s found it!” Jeff shouted over his shoulder to the searchers behind him. They’d all sat down after Grouchy searched fruitlessly for half an hour. There had been no grumbling, however.

Jeff found himself being towed along behind the dog so quickly that he had to duck to pass under low overhangs almost before he saw them. He didn’t care how many bumps or bruises he had to take out of here, so long as he found Edith. Besides, compared to what he intended doing to Sullivan . . .

He tripped and went down. The rope slipped from his nerveless fingers. Free of the dragging weight of his master, Grouchy ran ahead. “No, dammit!” Jeff yelled, scrambling up.

Someone from behind caught his arm when he would have gone running into the darkness. “Slow down, Jeff.” Paul’s voice came out of the dark as it had when they were boys, reassuring and calm. “We don’t want to be lookin’ for two of you.”

“But without Grouchy ...”

“He’ll come back.”

They were struck into silence by the deep baying of a hound on the scent. It came rolling and echoing back like the roar of some creature from the distant past. Suddenly changing into a higher pitch, it cut off abruptly.

Someone said, “You reckon he fell in?” Everyone had the same picture in his head. They all knew there were pits in the caves too deep for a man to measure.

“Come on,” Jeff said. “We can go a little farther. Grouchy was heading straight as an arrow when I saw him last.”

“Okay.” Paul looked back over the other men’s head. “Mike, you stay put. And the rest of you, go careful.” Once they’d gotten beyond the knowledge of any man there, they’d left men at every crossroads or fork they came down. Mr. Armstrong sweated impotently on the far side of Fat Man’s Nightmare, a passage no more than three feet wide.

Jeff began walking ahead. Though he knew Edith had only been down here perhaps two hours, he hated to think of her alone with Sullivan. His mind obligingly coughed up a dozen scenes of lurid melodrama, and he fought to keep sane. If he’s hurt one hair on her head . . . , he thought, in but the latest of futile vows he’d made with God or himself.

“Grouchy,” he called. “Here, boy!”

He whistled, but the echoes were too shrill to bear. Straining his eyes, he peered past the darkness until he saw sparkling lights when he blinked. The others held the lanterns, high and low, the yellow circles only making the dark that much more intense beyond the light.

Jeff tried to fix his mind on anything but his greatest fear. If she were unable to answer when they called, they might pass within feet of her and never know she was there.

He whistled again for Grouchy, patting his thighs and calling in mock excitement, “Come on, boy. Come on!” Silence was his only answer. Even the echoes failed.

The letter in his pocket crinkled. Jeff touched it. If there were truth in such things, if he had faith in the unknowable, then . . .

“Wait there a minute!” he called to the men following him.

“You see something?” Paul called.

“Just wait.”

Jeff walked ahead until he was out of range of the lanterns. He could tell that the roof was too low for him to stand upright. He closed his eyes and counted slowly to thirty, thinking, wishing and praying that when he opened them, he’d see something.

When he reached thirty, he pried his eyes open reluctantly, unwilling to be disenchanted, sure he’d see nothing but the appalling dark. In wonderment, he saw a glow, very faint and flickering, like a lantern strangling for want of oil.

With a glad cry, Jeff ran forward. The fissure in the rock lead to a wide chamber, filled with loose stones and slabs of rock. Jeff skidded to a stop, his eyes amazed.

Yet there was nothing there to make him stare in surprised amazement. Only a lovely girl sitting on a rock, a panting dog by her side. She looked up from Grouchy and smiled. “Hello, Jeff. I knew you’d find me.”

Then she slid off the rock boneless in relief.

The other men crowded into the opening behind him, swinging their lanterns and gabbling a mile a minute. Jeff picked up Edith’s limp, chilled form. Grouchy dancing around him, shivering from doggy happiness.

“Let’s get her out of here,” Jeff said, gazing at her pale face, the lashes thick on her cheeks.

“Say,” said Ozzie, picking up an unlit lantern from the floor. “How long do you reckon she’s been sitting in the dark?”

“Dark?” Jeff asked as he moved toward the exit. “One of you must have knocked it over.”

“Couldn’t be—this lantern’s cold.”

Jeff looked down at her, a question in his mind that would never be asked. But he could have sworn he’d seen . . .

“Wake up, now, Edith. Come on.” He patted her cheek with the back of his hand. She was chilled through.

Her eye lids fluttered and lifted. “And they lived happily ever after,” she muttered.

“That’s right.” Over his shoulder, he said, “Whiskey.”

“No,” Edith said, pushing away the flask that appeared. “Don’t want to sing now.”

“Have a little sip to warm you up. You’ve gotten kind of cold sitting down here and we need you to be able to walk.”

“I can walk.” She pushed again at his hand, though lying against his chest was a blissful comfort after the cold rock. “I don’t need liquor, Jeff. Just the sunlight. It is still sunny somewhere, isn’t it?”

Eager voices assured her that it was only about one o’clock in the afternoon. “Oh, good, just time for lunch,” Edith said. “I’m so hungry the rocks were starting to look tasty.”

“Edith,” Jeff said softly. “You’ve got an hour’s walk ahead of you.” She looked so disappointed that the men began to pat their pockets to bring out their own supplies of portable food.

“Here’s some beef jerky the lady can chew on.”

“I got an apple—kind of wrinkly but I’m sure it’s good.”

“Want some penny candy?”

Feeling a little foolish for making an exhibition of herself in front of all these nice people, Edith tried to struggle up, her hand on Jeff’s shoulder. She was glad of his support, for her knees wobbled strangely. He didn’t take his hand off her— touching her waist, or her arm or her hand—throughout the entire journey upward.

When they at last reached the fresh air, Edith hid her stinging eyes against his chest. She’d never seen anything more beautiful than the meadow and the fair in the summer sunshine.

“No reason to cry now,” he said, tilting up her chin.

Edith blinked in the light and the tears that ran down were hot against her cheeks. “It’s just ... I only now realize I might have died without ever telling you . . .”

Jeff pulled her against him and kissed her cold lips. They heated quickly under his treatment. She threw her arms with abandon around his neck.

“Tell me later,” he murmured as a cheer went up from the searchers. “Tell me every day for the rest of our lives.”

Word spread quickly that she was safe and sound. The people of Richey began to surge up the hill as though needing the proof of their eyes before they’d believe it. Jeff and Edith heard from a dozen simultaneous tongues the story of how Sam had clobbered Sullivan, who was now in the hoosegow. But among all the smiling faces there were four they missed.

Gary fought through the crowd. “I’m glad you’re alive,” he said to Edith and blushed.

“Me, too. Where are the girls? And Sam?”

“I don’t want you to worry about Sam. Doc says he’ll be fine if he stops laying into people. Miss Albans is looking after him.” He winked and looked knowing. “And the girls are at our place, having the time of their lives. They didn’t know anything about all this.” He looked around at the clay-streaked and tired men. His eyes lit on his adoptive father. “Lord-a-mercy, wait ‘til Mother sees you!”

The massive Mr. Armstrong looked down over his shirt and pants, to the thick-coated shoes. Mournfully, he shook his head. “How the mighty are fallen. Look, boys, last one in the creek is a godless heathen!”

With a shout, the searchers ran down the hill, scattering nervous women and excited children with their speed. Though it had been his challenge, Mr. Armstrong lingered a moment to speak with Jeff.

“We’ll convene a committee about closing this cave off. It’s too dangerous,” He looked between the two of them and grinned. “I hope to see you in church mighty soon, my boy. Mighty soon.”

As agile as any of his sons, Mr. Armstrong launched himself down the hill. Soon he’d passed the stragglers and was running in the thick of the pack.

Alone with him and the crates of ice cream, now silting in milky puddles, Edith looked up at Jeff. “Do I have to wash in the creek before I’m allowed in the house?”

She was so hungry that as soon as they drove away from the fairgrounds she dove into the picnic basket that some ladies gave her from the Methodist tent. Jeff shared the contents. But Edith noticed that he juggled the reins and the food so that he always had one hand on her. It was as if he couldn’t bear to let go.

The house was strangely quiet when they got home. Jeff said, “I’ll start heating some water for your bath, Edith. Then I suggest you hop straight into bed.”

“That sounds wonderful. I’m still frozen through.”

About half an hour later, as the shadows began to grow, Edith slipped into her nicest nightgown. She sat down before the mirror and began to brush out her towel-dried hair. It was so wonderful to be warm and clean! Behind her in the mirror, the white bed looked inviting but a little lonely.

When she awoke, the darkened room showed only a glimmer of moonlight through the translucent curtains. Faintly, she heard a footstep in the hall outside her door. She looked toward the sound and saw the white china knob of the door turn. A slice of light grew as the door opened. Soft as a whisper, Jeff called her name. “Are you awake, my dear?”

Pleased, for a moment she didn’t think to answer. She heard him sigh and the creak as he began to close the door. “Yes, I’m awake.”

He came back into the room, closer and closer, bearing a candle. “I thought ... in case you woke up and thought . . . since it’s dark now . . .”

“That was very kind.” Edith sat up and looked up at him, knowing her eyes were filled with trust. She patted the mattress. “Don’t you want to sit down?”

With a sigh that was nearly a groan, Jeff sat beside her. She put her hand in his. “Jeff, I think...” Her heart was too full to say easily all that she wanted to.

“Yes, Edith?”

“There’s a nice girl a Mrs. Rivers told me about. Twenty-one, three younger sisters, loves children. . .”

“What are you talking about?”

“Well, I promised to find you a wife. And, as it seems Miss Albans has deserted you for your father, I still have a duty . . .”

Jeff leaned down, his hands grasping the brass posts either side of her head. “Oh, yes, you do.”

His kiss began as softly as a feather touch. Edith felt like a cat about to purr. She stretched up to entice him closer. Shamelessly, she put her arms around him and leaned into him, her breasts flattening against his chest.

He caressed the back of her head firmly through the soft clinging cloud of her hair. He sought her eyes. “Edith, we can wait ‘til we’re married. I don’t want to rush you.”

“I got very cold in the cave,” she answered, her deep blue eyes smoky. “I’m not warm yet. Warm me, Jeff.”

He hadn’t known her full lips could take on such a beguiling curve. Taking them under his, he lifted her against him. As she closed her eyes, he laid her gently onto the mattress. The feel of her beneath him was enough to make him totally ready for her. But he reminded himself that this was her first time.

Edith gave herself up to the feelings he unleashed with his touch. Her modesty seemed to have fled into the darkness when she’d thought she’d never see him again. She helped him slip free the tiny buttons that ran from the square beribboned neck of her gown to her stomach.

When he parted the fabric to gaze with heated eyes at her breasts, Edith boldly flaunted them. She remembered the way he’d put his mouth there and wanted it again. Telling him so without words, she dragged his hands up to cup her. His thumbs brought her nipples to aching peaks while he plunged his tongue relentlessly into her mouth. She met him halfway, more than halfway, meeting his plunge with a thrust of her own.

They rolled over and over, nearly to the edge of the bed. Her gown twisted around her waist, leaving her intimately open to his gaze. She brought her knees up together, to conceal herself, while a burning blush spread over her face and chest. Maybe she had kept a little modesty after all.

“Edith,” Jeff said, dragging his attention from the curls so dark a red against the pure white skin of her thigh. “Edith . . . I don’t want to hurt you.”

“I’ve heard .  .  . whispers about it.”

“Then you know. But I’ll do my best to make it right.” He kissed her, gently again, while his hand slipped down, stroking over her exposed hip and across her smooth, quivering stomach.

“It’ll be good,” he promised in a ragged voice. “I’ll make it good for you.”

Edith closed her eyes again, flinging her head back as a strange heat blossomed wherever his rough hands dragged. She moved restlessly, her leg rubbing on the sheet between his. But when he reached the springy curls between her thighs, she froze.

“Don’t .  . .”

Instantly he withdrew his hand, returning to stroke the gleaming satin of her shoulder. He nibbled her neck, and scattered tender kisses over her neck and face. Edith reached for him, but he was always teasing, never lingering.

Her lips burning for a taste of him, she dragged his head down to hers. Somehow her nightgown had come off, though who pushed it down to the end of the bed was unclear. As Jeff’s solid body centered over hers, Edith bit back a cry of pain.

“What’s wrong?”

“I think . . . you’ve got a broken button on that shirt.”

Jeff squinted down at the blue chambray. “Maybe I should take it off then.”

She nodded, biting her swollen lip. When he had it unbuttoned, she pushed it off his shoulders. She dared to comb her hand through the golden hairs that spread across his chest and downward. She followed the trail, felt his hard stomach muscles dance as he sucked in his breath. His eyes closed, and Edith realized how much pleasure she could give him. She found the knowledge as exciting as his touch.

He clapped his hand over hers as it came perilously close to his belt buckle. “That’s enough.”

“But, your buckle is cold. I can feel it on my stomach.”

“Should I take it off?”

“I think so. And you . . . might as well take off everything else too.” She couldn’t meet his eyes when she said that, though she watched him covertly under her lashes as he stood up and impatiently jerked his belt open.

“You might as well look,” Jeff said. When she glanced at him with wondering eyes, her mouth fell open. Jeff forced himself to think cold thoughts as he knelt on the bed.

Edith stared in open astonishment at the intimidating size of him. “What is that?”

Jeff chuckled despite his desire. “That’s . . . hard to explain. Didn’t anyone tell you how a man and a woman come together?” She shook her head. “I’ll show you. But I’ve got to touch you.”

She knew where he meant. “Will it feel like last time . . . in the buggy?”

“Better. Much better.”

He hadn’t lied.  Edith couldn’t be frightened of what he thought of her when he found her ready. When he slid one finger between her legs, he said on a throbbing note, “Oh, God, you’re so perfect.”

He moved his hands, weaving a spell that stole her heart and her senses. She couldn’t hold herself still, she had to move in concert with his wonderful hands. Hot words whispered in her ear urged her to give in fully to the sensations that promised to carry her off.

If the first time he’d ever touched her she had felt lightning, now she felt a whirlwind rise. She cried aloud, but not with fear. When it ended, she was clinging to his shoulders, breathless and limp. She opened her eyes to see him smiling down at her with infinite tenderness. “I told you it’d be good.”

Somehow it felt very natural to be naked together, though she had been told a lady never undressed except to bathe. Edith knew she was too thin, that her ribs still showed despite Sam’s cooking, yet she had no fear that Jeff found her anything but beautiful. He told her so repeatedly, as he touched and caressed every part of her body and urged her to do the same to him.

His groans when she touched him made her withdraw at first for fear she was hurting him. But Jeff brought her hand back to press against the resilient, velvet flesh. “We don’t have to do another thing,” he promised raggedly. “We can stop right here.”

“What else is there?” she asked. But she’d known the truth the moment he opened her with his hands.

“I don’t want to rush you. . . .”

“We’ve got until morning.” She bent her head and breathed across his flat nipple. Her dark hair tumbled forward to brush his sex and Edith smiled in delight when it leaped in response. Deliberately, she let the heavy locks curl and drift over him.

The world turned upside down as she found herself on her back, her feet flat on the mattress. The tip of him demanded knowledge of all her secrets. She slid her hands along his slick back. “I want you to,” she whispered. “Please.”

He pushed slowly, slowly, his forearms trembling with the strain of control. When she stiffened, frowning with distress, he stopped. “Do you want me to ... ?”

“Go on,” she gasped. “It’s all right ... I think.” Her hands slipped down to cup his firm buttocks.

Her tightness was almost too much. He wanted to plunge madly, to drive her over the edge and to fall with her. The hardest thing he’d ever done in his life was to continue to go slowly. But when Edith rose to meet him, the sensation was incredible. He lunged deeply, unable to stop now, though she caught back a cry that could only have been from pain.

Incredibly, after a moment, she answered his rhythm with her own. He wasn’t in charge of this seduction, he realized, as the liquid warmth of her drove him wild. This was an act of pure creation, as they established together a new whole, a new identity. He heard her cries, now unmistakably of passion, mingle with his own roar of completion.

When Jeff raised his head from the junction of her neck and shoulder, the first thing he saw was a single tear falling from the outside corner of her closed eye. “I’m sorry if I hurt you. I couldn’t stop myself.”

“I didn’t want you to.” She turned her head to look at him from inches away. Her eyes glowed with happiness. “I couldn’t have stood it if you had stopped.”

They kissed playfully now, light nips and transient nibbles. After a minute though, Edith pushed lightly against his shoulder. “Are you going to be on top of me all night?”

“Hmmm, it’s a thought.”

“You’re heavy.”

“You’re beautiful. But, I suppose, if we’re getting married tomorrow, I should let the bride get some sleep.” He rolled off her. She followed at once, to lie on her side, cuddled against his warm body.

“You’ll sleep here?” she asked.

“Well, it is my bed. But I don’t mind sharing.”

“Big of you.”

“Yes, it was.” He caught her hand against his chest when she would have playfully slapped. “This finger,” he said, touching the third one. “That’s where the ring goes.”

“So I hear.”

“You will like being married to me, won’t you?” he asked in sudden doubt.

She counted on his fingers, “I’m not sassy, I’m not voluptuous—you do like women who are a little that way don’t you?—I haven’t any experience with children . . . need I go on?”

“No, you’re right. You’re absolutely wrong for me. What was I thinking?”

Once again she tried to punish him, but he caught her hand. Rolling on his side, he carried it to his lips and began tenderly biting each sensitive pad in turn.

“What could possibly make me change my mind and keep you around, Miss Parker?” he asked, as he moved her arm to lick into fire the ticklish nerves of her wrist.

“I can’t think of a thing .  .  . Oh, unless . .  .”

“Unless?” His mouth was only an inch from hers. She could feel that he was ready to love her again. The warmth growing in her lower body told her that she too could revive quickly.

Looking into his eyes, Edith said, “I love you. Is that reason enough?”

“That’s the best reason in the world.”