21. Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-One

I sa felt detached from her body at the breakfast table. Like a specter with an aerial view from above, she appraised herself. She looked normal; she had donned a day dress the shade of claret that made her dark-blonde hair appear brighter. It had buttons in the front and didn't need a bustle or crinoline, and she felt half naked sitting there at the end of the table from the Stone family. Her cheeks bloomed with every memory of the night before, all encouraged by the ache low in her gut and between her legs. Matching her cheeks, Isa's hands were red-stained and conspicuous. Isa was a woman changed. Evolved. Some hybridized flower created in a hothouse. To the naked eye, her material was the same, but upon closer inspection, minute deviations appeared. She was somehow different. Altered.

Junior had transformed her.

As if she had summoned him, Junior walked into the dining room, adjusting a faded red kerchief over his neck. His great height and handsomeness truly were absurd. Deep-blue eyes met her gaze, and his fingers stopped fidgeting. Isa straightened fractionally, shoulders back, trying to halt the slow flush of heat rising from her chest to her collarbones.

"Jack, let Uncle Junior have that seat," Lucy ordered absently, stirring sugar into her coffee.

"Naw, it's alright." Junior playfully shoved a standing Jack back down into his chair. "Scoot down, Izzy."

The normal Isa would have asked Junior why he thought she'd want to sit by him.

Instead, she moved down a seat so Junior could take the chair beside her at one end. On her other side was Matthew, oblivious to everything but his breakfast. Wedged between the table and wall, Junior eased in beside her. The dining room's coffee and smoked meat scents disappeared until all she could smell was Ivory soap, tobacco, and the musk of his skin. It sparked an olfactory memory of his weight upon her, the smoothness of his broad shoulders between her knees.

Beneath the table, Isa noticed the way his faded denims stretched tight around his hard, muscular thighs. Hours earlier, she had dragged her nails along the fine blond hair that dusted them.

How was she supposed to sit beside him and eat with such lewd images bedeviling her? She'd never felt less hungry in her life. When the waitress arrived to take Junior's order, Isa took a bracing sip of her coffee…then almost spit it out.

Junior possessively placed his broad hand on her thigh beneath the table.

His palm was so hot, she could feel its warmth through her skirt and petticoats. So he was not unaffected. Peering at him from the corner of her eye, she took advantage of his attention on the waitress to study him. A lock of golden hair fell over his brow. She had pulled on that hair hours before. Had run her fingers through it. Mussed it.

The waitress left, and everyone made polite conversation around her.

"Mama, it ain't fair that I got third place in the sack race," Samuel complained to Lucy, who hid a yawn behind her hand.

"When I save up enough money, I'm gonna get a horse like Uncle Junior's," Matthew was saying to Ben, whose lip quirked up at this announcement.

Jack was teasing Samuel, pointing at him with a syrupy fork. "I got first place."

"Nobody asked you," Samuel said. "'Sides, you won runnin' with the little kids." Jack stuck his tongue out, and Lucy was forced to intervene.

Meanwhile, Junior's hand slid higher and squeezed. From the corner of his mouth, he murmured, "You feelin' poorly?" He didn't look directly at her, but his brows were furrowed.

Isa covered his hand with hers. They sat so close together that their arms appeared innocuously side by side above the table. "I'm a little sore."

Blue eyes flicked to her face. "Where?"

Checking that no one was paying undue attention to them, she slid his hand higher until he was cupping her gently between her legs. "Here."

In her periphery, the tips of his ears reddened. He swallowed. "How bad?"

"Not bad. It's like when you get saddle sore." She couldn't hide a wicked grin.

"You know what I want to do when you smile like that?" he asked. Junior had leaned so close that his breath tickled her ear.

She was considering how to reply when Ben spoke up from the other end of the table. "I got an invitation to a couple of Stock-Raisers' Association meetings up in Graham. You want to ride with me?"

Beneath the weight of everyone's stare, Junior withdrew his hand from under the table and tugged at his kerchief. "How long will it take?"

"A couple of weeks, I reckon. I promised Lucy I'd bring her home a turkey for Thanksgiving."

"Yeah, I'll go."

While they planned back and forth, Isa forced herself to eat. Junior's food was brought out, and when he tucked in, Isa's mischievous nature lured her hand up Junior's firm thigh. He stopped chewing. Normally, Isa would have smiled at his startled reaction, but she found herself incapable of it now. Her heart was in her throat, her blood thick and hot in her veins. She couldn't drag enough air into her lungs. Of its own volition, her left hand slid dangerously close to the bulge a few inches north. When it seemed as though he had turned to stone by her soft touch, she cleared her throat and bumped his boot with her foot.

Junior responded with a warning glance, and he hooked her foot with his. His mouth resumed its chewing, so Isa completed her mission by laying a caressing hand on the hardening bulge behind his straining fly.

"Did you get enough sleep?" she asked softly, her brain muzzy.

"Nope." He was cutting his ham steak into a dozen pieces, his eyes unfocused. "I reckon I need to sleep again soon. Wish I could sleep right now."

If that wasn't a double entendre, Isa didn't know what was. Licking her lips, she moved her biscuit around in its pepper gravy. "I could nap, too. Maybe I'll find the time after Lucy and your brother go home."

Air hissed out of Junior's parted lips, and he shifted in his seat, spreading his thighs wider. Beneath her curious hand, he was long, thick, and hard. "God, yes."

"What are you two talking about?" Lucy asked curiously.

Isa's left hand froze. She took a bite of her cold, soggy biscuit. "We were just saying how late we came in. That we didn't get enough sleep."

"Aunt Isa wants to take a nap," Jack said through a mouthful of hotcakes.

"Jackie, don't speak with your mouth full," Lucy said. Her brown eyes were sharp on Isa. "Junior, whatever happened with the fight at the dance?"

Isa nervously eased her hand back into her own lap while Junior summarized the scuffle beside the dance floor. She was losing her sanity. If she didn't get hold of herself, she was going to get them both into big trouble.

"ISA, MAY I speak with you in my room?" Lucy asked brightly in the hotel's foyer.

Damnation .

"Of course," Isa said in the same bright tone.

The boys disappeared through the hotel's back door to play in the yard, and Isa resolutely followed Lucy up the family staircase as if she were ascending the gallows. Junior and Ben had already made their way to the feed store to stock up on supplies for their journey north to the Stock Raisers' Association meetings. Isa's mind raced the whole way to Lucy's favorite room—one decorated in blue with an enormous bed overlooking the backyard—and she scrambled to hone her wits when Lucy questioned her. Because Lucy had most assuredly noticed something strange between Isa and Junior.

Sure enough, Lucy snapped the door shut behind them and asked, "Do you know what you're doing?"

"Pardon?" Isa made a show of blinking in confusion.

"Don't give me that." Lucy's lips twisted. "You didn't insult Junior once at breakfast. And Junior—he couldn't keep his eyes off you."

At her friend's strained features, Isa opened her mouth to deny knowing anything. Closed it. Opened it again. "Lucy, I—"

"Don't bother lying to me. I can smell one a mile away. Ask Samuel." Lucy folded her arms beneath her breasts.

Flustered from this direct interrogation, Isa lifted her hands helplessly. "I don't know what you want me to say."

"The truth, if you please," Lucy said crisply. "What is going on between you and my husband's brother?"

None of your business , Isa wanted to snap. She wouldn't, of course—Lucy was one of her best friends. But Isa wasn't ready to talk about it. Not yet. She didn't have words for what was happening between Junior and her. Whatever it was, it was a newly hatched fledgling, weak and precarious on a nest's edge. One wrong word, one wrong move, and it would plummet to its death. She needed time. Needed privacy to mull things over.

Lucy's eyes widened expectantly.

Isa took a deep breath. "Junior and I formed a truce last night after the dance."

"A truce."

"Yes. I've been…" Isa chewed a lip, considering how to express herself.

"Angry with him?" Lucy's tightly crossed arms loosened.

"Well, yes." It wasn't a falsehood. Isa had been very angry with him. And the closer to the truth she was, the more Lucy would believe her. "I heard about the engagement, and he'd not once told me of it—"

"You two did get close during your travels," Lucy broke in softly, lips parted in wonder. "I knew it. Even Ben sees it, and he's always half-blind where Junior is concerned."

"Junior and I have done nothing wrong." There was an edge to Isa's words.

Lucy dropped her arms and softened fully. "I didn't say you were doing anything wrong. I just want you to be careful. Don't let him hurt you."

"He would never hurt me. If he did, I'd hurt him back, and worse."

"Which is why you went with Gareth to the dance?"

"I didn't go with Gareth. He just happened to ride with me and asked me to dance," Isa muttered.

"Junior had smoke coming out of his ears."

"Such a thing is impossible."

"Isa."

Isa rounded the wrought iron bed frame to look out the window at the boys playing in the backyard. One brown head, one black, and one fair.

She sighed. "Very well. Junior and I got close on the trail. But we didn't do anything," she said quickly before Lucy could interject. The lie tumbled free, and it sounded believable even to Isa's ears. Lucy was an honest person; if she knew the full extent of their relationship, she would either cajole Isa into telling Sol or would put a stop to it. And Isa would do neither. It was no one's business but their own if she and Junior enjoyed a little harmless fun. Who was it hurting?

"Did you two do anything last night?" Lucy sounded as though she were afraid to ask.

Isa took her time answering. "We talked. We kissed in the stable." They weren't lies, but the Spanish Inquisition wouldn't get more out of her.

Lucy's footsteps approached, and her hand rested carefully on Isa's shoulder blade. "That's wonderful."

Eyes widening incredulously, Isa turned around. "It is?"

Lucy's face was full of understanding. "Oh, yes. You make him happy, it's obvious to everyone. Even Sol. You may want to consider that. Your brother won't always have blinders on when it comes to Junior. What I saw today at the breakfast table…"

"What did you see?"

"I saw Junior acting very flustered around a woman." Lucy chuckled. "I've never seen such a thing in my life. And last night? Last night, he was so jealous he could spit."

Isa had the sudden urge to jump on the bed and kick her feet in the air. Alarmed by this revolting impulse, she nervously edged away from Lucy. "I don't think he was all those things. You're being fanciful."

"I'm not!" Lucy followed, prowling behind her like a zealous merchant with wares to sell. "I see it. Ben sees it. Poppy saw it years ago."

"Lucy—"

Lucy leaned in. "You even smell like him."

"I do not!" But she did. The musk of Junior was all over her.

Serious brown eyes bore into hazel. "Junior loves you."

Isa whispered, "What?"

"And I think you love him, too."

"You're mad."

"I know what I see."

They were staring at each other, Isa horrified, Lucy sympathetic, when several pairs of boots stomped up the family staircase. The door burst open.

"Mama! Mama, tell Jack this is a toad and not a frog!" Samuel bellowed from the top of his lungs. Lucy saw the toad in question and jumped back.

Isa took advantage of her friend's distraction and fled.

SHE FOUND REFUGE in Hobb's General Store's storage room. Tightly packed with parcels and wooden crates, the store room muffled all sound from the front. Woody scents of pallets and burlap allayed her racing thoughts. Dust motes swirled lazily in the stream of light from the single window near the roof.

After Isa begged for work, Mrs. Hobb gave her a clipboard with instructions to take inventory from Saturday morning's supply load.Half an hour ago, Isa had spied Junior's buckskin Stetson across the street behind a group of men through the front window. Now she was counting pine boxes of nails and writing crisp numbers in the margins when a shift in the air made her pause. A pair of strong arms wrapped around her waist and hoisted her effortlessly into the air. The clipboard and pencil clattered at her captor's feet as Isa struggled in earnest. She struck back with an elbow, connecting with the man's head, and the owner of the offending arms released a masculine grunt.

She would recognize that grunt anywhere.

From the doorway came bellowing laughter. Isa caught sight of Mrs. Hobb leaning against the storage room's doorframe, her stomach jumping beneath pendulous breasts that hadn't felt the restriction of stays in a score of years.

"I'd think twice before taking that one on again, Junior," Mrs. Hobb said.

"I can handle her," Junior growled close to Isa's ear. She cocked an elbow, and he set her down like a hot potato.

Color high, hair mussed, Isa bent down for her clipboard and pencil. "You're hardheaded. I'm sure you didn't feel a thing."

Junior touched a tender spot above his ear, wincing for dramatic effect.

A bell tinkled above the store's door in the front room.

"While you two hash it out, I'm gonna make a post office run. Mr. Hobb's in the front if you need anything." Mrs. Hobb winked at Junior and departed, leaving the door cracked behind her.

Now that they were alone, the air grew charged between them, crackling with static electricity. Isa dusted off her papers and side-eyed Junior, taking in the golden stubble, full lips, and indigo eyes that didn't waver from her face. He took a step toward her. Then another. He stalked her like the mountain lion he so resembled.

"If you pounce on me again, I'll be forced to use this," Isa warned, holding up the clipboard.

"Think I'm scared of you?" he asked, his eyes intense upon her.

"You should be."

His hand was a blur as it snatched the clipboard from her fingers and set it on a shelf beside them. Crowding her, Junior maneuvered them behind the lip of the shelf and into a dark little alcove, out of sight. Her back pressed tight against the wall, his hips flush against hers. Helpless not to, she ran her fingertip beneath his metal belt buckle, brushing the firm stomach behind his shirtfront.

"Did you get everything you needed for your trip?" she asked, dipping her fingers a little deeper.

Running his knuckles beneath her jaw, Junior watched her intently. "Yep."

"When are you leaving?"

"Tomorrow." He gripped her hips, pulling her until her feet were on either side of his, their pelvises even more snug together.

"Will you miss me?"

Junior took his hat off and nuzzled his soft lips against her neck. "I already miss you, darlin'."

"Mm." Isa couldn't think when he did that. She ran her fingers lightly through his hair, loving its coarse-silk texture.

"I think this is Ben's way of getting me away from you." He pulled away and pressed his lips against the top of her head, breathing her in. "He'll probably try and talk sense into me."

"Perhaps he just wants to spend time with you," Isa reasoned. "I don't believe you and I are being very convincing in our friendship . Lucy cornered me after you and Ben left."

He cursed and cupped her shoulders, meeting her eye. "What did she say?"

Junior loves you. And I think you love him, too.

"She knows there is…more between us. I may have told her we kissed."

Brows rising, Junior licked his lips and smiled. "You did?"

"Why do you look so happy?" she groaned.

"Because you're my girl. And people knowin' isn't necessarily a bad thing. Is it?" His eyes went slumberous, his lips in a boyish curve.

"Pff." The small noise was swallowed by his mouth moving hotly upon hers. It drove every sentient thought from her brain, and she returned the kiss with equal enthusiasm. Happiness was a bright note in the maelstrom of intense need. Always, his kisses tasted dark and exotic, but today, it was flavored with joy.

"I don't want that deputy sniffing around while I'm gone," he mumbled between kisses, plucking her lips with his.

"Who?" Sense returned sluggishly. "Oh. Am I supposed to control who visits the store or eats at the hotel, Junior?"

His fingers delved into the base of her updo, displacing pins. "No. But that's alright. Just so long as you know."

"Know what?"

"That you're mine."

This next kiss was so deep that it made Isa's jaw ache. Her pulse was erratic. Her skin throbbed. Every place he touched begged to be handled harder, wanting more, more until he was as deep inside her as she could get him. Isa moaned and clung to him, her body relaying a need her voice could not.

"Sh," he said against her lips, but he was gasping as loudly, as breathlessly as she. "I wish I could take you right now, right here, in this corner."

Intoxicated by his scent, by the strength of his sensuality, Isa lightly bit his cleft chin. Kissed it. "I would let you."

Grabbing two handfuls of her bottom, he tucked his head between her shoulder and neck, groaning. "Lord Almighty, I need to calm down. Talk to me about something. Anything."

"Yes. Excellent idea." Isa sifted through the muck of her brain. "Tell me about the Stock-Raisers' Association meetings. Tell me about the trail."

They spoke of normal, comfortable things, her hips still wedged securely against his. Junior's tawny head lowered repeatedly to steal a kiss, to murmur something shocking in her ear, the space between them filled with the scent of leather and laundered skirts. Isa never wanted him to leave. And when he finally did, it was with a goodbye kiss that made her toes curl in her boots, their lips damp and swollen when they broke apart. He had to exit through the back entrance door, adjusting himself through tented jeans, and his backward glance and tipped hat touched something deeper within her than the soul-stealing kisses.