The Forever Man(27)

"Are you warm enough? I could have put on an extra quilt."

She shifted, turning back to face him, her fingers twining in the edge  of the quilt. "I'm fine. The register brings up the heat from the  kitchen."

"We'll need to start the fire in the parlor evenings. That part of the  house is pretty cold tonight." He turned to his side and reached for her  hand, his fingers gentle as he loosened the grip she'd taken on the  covers. "Your hands are cold, Johanna. Let me warm them."

"Don't be so nice to me."

For the first time, he caught an edge of petulance in her voice, and his  smile was quick. "Why shouldn't I be? You're my wife. I guess I don't  know you as well as I thought, but then, we all have secrets, don't we? I  was thinkin' while I was out milking the cows. There's some things I  haven't told you, Jo. I don't know if they're important or not, and  sometime I'll probably … "

Her fingers squeezed his hand, and he heard the sob in her voice as she  inhaled sharply. "Don't, Tate. I can't stand for you to be so good to  me, when I've deceived you from the beginning."

He nodded. "Maybe you did. But then again, maybe it wasn't time for me  to hear some things. We didn't know each other well enough then, Jo."

"And now we do?" She sounded hopeful, to his way of thinking. In the dim  light, she'd shed her prickly ways and her pride. Tomorrow she'd  probably be the old Johanna, but for tonight she was willing to soften  to his touch.

He lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed the back of it, his lips open  against her flesh. "We're gonna know each other better before morning."

She was silent for a moment, and he ventured another kiss, moving his  mouth across her fingers, then tucking them against his cheek. His hand  moved to her shoulder, pulling the quilts higher against the back of her  neck. His fingers pressed against her back, and he shifted in the bed,  moving closer to where she lay, until his shins felt the cold pressure  of her feet.

"I'll get you warm, Johanna, if you let me." Somehow his voice had lost its even tenor, had developed an urgency of its own.

She drew in an audible breath, harsh and rasping. "You're not going to … do that, are you, Tate?"

"No, honey." Without hesitation, he allayed her fear. "I only want to share my body heat with you. You're cold, Johanna."

Her whisper was a harsh confession. "I've been cold for years, Tate  Montgomery. Even in the summer, sometimes I'm cold inside and out."                       
       
           



       

"Well, Mrs. Montgomery, you don't have to be cold now."

"I think it's time for me to tell you something, Tate." Seeking his  gaze, she took a deep breath. "I think I knew it would come to this one  day, and I was going to show you instead. But maybe it's better to  prepare you first." She peered at him in the dim light, her eyes  anxious. "There are three graves up on the hill. My mother and father,  and-"

His whisper cut in smoothly. "Your baby, Johanna?"

"Yes." It was a hissing sound, her confession, and he moved closer, until his face was just inches away.

"Who was it, Jo? Who gave you a child and left you on your own?"

Her shoulder lifted in a shrug. "His name was Joseph Brittles. He lived  in town and worked at the mill." She touched her upper lip with the tip  of her tongue, and his eyes caught the gesture. "My mother had just  died. She was sick for a long time, and by the time she died, it was  almost … almost a relief, I suppose." Her laugh was rasping. "I think I  felt guilty, because I was … "

Tate moved his hand from her back, lifting it to rest against her face.  "Sometimes it's harder to be the one left behind, Johanna." Her skin was  soft to his touch, and his fingers cherished it, brushing back stray  wisps of hair as he traced the line of her cheek and the furling edge of  her ear.

Her eyes closed, as if she relished the comfort he offered. "Joseph had  been keeping company with me, and he talked about getting married and  setting up our own place. He was a big comfort to me, Tate. I think I  felt I owed him something for taking up so much of his time, after Mama  died." She closed her eyes for a moment, and he waited, his hand moving  in a slow, comforting caress.

"He persuaded you to make love with him?" The words were difficult for him to utter, emerging in a harsh tone.

"I didn't want to. I told him we should wait, but he said he couldn't, he loved me too much. And even then … "

"He took advantage of you, honey." As if he must give her some particle  of comfort, he leaned to kiss her forehead, his fingers buried in her  hair, holding her in place for his touch.

"It was horrible, Tate. He hurt me, and I was ashamed that I'd allowed  it to happen." She drew a shuddering breath. "When I knew I was going to  have a child, I went to see him. He'd stayed away from the farm for  weeks. He told me he was busy at the mill, working as many hours as he  could to save money for us. But when I told him I needed to be married  right away, he pushed me away. He said he wasn't ready for that yet."

"How old were you, Jo?" The thought of her begging for what should have  been hers by right was repugnant to him, and he sensed an enormous  hatred for the man that filled him almost to overflowing.

"Sixteen. Old enough to know better." Her laugh was a bitter sound, and he shook his head.

"You were a child. Just a child, Jo." Carefully, he raised the covers,  his arm sliding beneath them, lifting her with gentle hands, holding her  closer, till her shivering flesh was comforted by his warmth.

She rested her head in the bend of his shoulder. "He left town, Tate.  When I went in the next week with the butter and eggs, I stopped by to  see him, and Hardy Jones said he'd quit his job and gone."

"What did your father do about that?" Had she been his daughter, he'd  have chased the coward down and strung him up, Tate thought vengefully.  But apparently, Fred Patterson had been a milder man than he.

She laughed again, softly-a mirthless sound. "When I finally had to tell  him, Pa said I'd tempted Joseph. He called me a Jezebel." The word took  on the sound of a curse as she spoke it. "And then the baby came early.  He never breathed. He was so small and blue. I never saw his eyes."

Tate's arms tightened around her, and she stiffened in his embrace. He  muttered a curse word beneath his breath and relaxed his hold. "I'm  sorry, Jo. I didn't mean to squeeze you. Did I hurt you?"

She shook her head. "Just a little. I'm stiff and sore, mostly. The parts that hurt worst are on the front of me."                       
       
           



       

The vision of her pale, rounded breast, its smooth surface marred by the  shallow, slashing wound, pierced Tate's mind, and he stifled the urge  to expose it to his view once more, even as he yearned to caress its  rounded softness. His mind visualized the scar she would sustain, and he  swallowed the need to purge the hurt she'd borne with the pressure of  his lips. His whisper was rough and rasping as he fought the yearnings  roiling within himself. "The cuts aren't deep, Jo. They'll be healed in  no time."

"I know." She nodded her head, her hair brushing his lips. "I can reckon  with those kind of scars. It's the ones that don't show on the outside  that are the hardest to deal with."

"Johanna? Who cared for you, when you had the baby? Did your father help  you bury him?" For one reason or another, he had to hear it all. Even  knowing the hurt he inflicted on her as she recounted the ordeal, he  must hear each detail, must live out with her the final days of her  torment.

Shaking her head, she whispered the saddest words of all. "No one helped  me. I was alone. I wrapped him in a flannel blanket I'd hemmed from one  of my mother's nightgowns and put him in the box my shoes had come in.  It's a good thing it was summer. I had to dig a long time to make sure  he was deep enough in the ground. And then I buried him. I knew I  couldn't mark the grave, but I thought maybe … Anyway, the next spring I  planted a rosebush there." She shivered once more in his embrace and  buried her head against his chest. "It was a horrible night, Tate. It  was the darkest night of my life."

He'd heard it all. She'd stripped her soul bare of its sad secret and  placed it before him. It was a gift of sorts, he supposed. That she  could bring herself to trust him so readily was more than he'd hoped  for.

For a moment, he faced his own hurt. That he had wanted her to be  virgin, that he had hoped to be the only man to lay hand upon those soft  curves, was a fact he must face. And, to his shame, he felt a sense of  bitter disappointment that she had lain in another man's arms before  this night. That she had given her love to another.