Mountain Laurel Read online

  “How many of these thorns are sticking in you from the waist down?”

  “Not enough to make me strip off in front of a lady.”

  “How ridiculous. Especially after the way you sneaked into my tent wearing practically nothing the night you were trying to scare me.”

  “Little did I know that an attack of Blackfeet couldn’t frighten you.”

  “There you’re wrong. Bug’s Boys scare me to death. Take off those trousers and let me see. I promise not to be shocked at the sight of your bare backside.”

  He stood up and grinned down at her. “I hate to disappoint you, but I have on underwear. And it’s a good thing, too, since otherwise I might have frozen to death in the last few days while chasing you around these mountains.” He unbuttoned the fly of his trousers and, after removing his boots, dropped them and stepped out of them. He wore long, red summer underwear under his trousers, and when he turned his back to her, there were several long thorns sticking out of his legs.

  On her knees, she began pulling the thorns from his legs. He stood quietly and she became aware of her hands on his body. He’d said that she’d never allowed people close to her. Always, there had been the knowledge that if she’d allowed herself to love anything but her singing, she would have to give up too much. Over the ten years that she’d been singing professionally, she’d seen so many good singers give up a career to marry a man and have babies. Maddie had never wanted to have to make such a choice, so, by necessity, she’d kept to herself. And John Fairlie had helped a great deal by keeping her so busy with lessons and rehearsals and performances that she’d had little time for a social life. What little social life she did have had been booked by John. He had always arranged for her to socialize with rich, influential people who could further her career.

  But now, in these mountains where she’d grown up, in this wild and beautiful country, the drawing rooms of the East and Europe seemed far away. She’d bragged to Captain Montgomery that she’d had hundreds of affairs, yet the truth was that she’d had none. Her fingers tightened on the muscle of his leg.

  “There,” she said at last, and then, to make sure that he had no more thorns in him, she ran her hands up and down his legs. She had never touched a man like this before and, if the truth were known, she’d never had an urge to, at least not since she was sixteen years old and had fallen for the cowboy. At that time Madame Branchini had made it so clear to her that it was either singing or men, Maddie had made her choice and had never once regretted it.

  Now, as she touched him, it was as though she were in a trance and couldn’t stop herself. He stood perfectly still as she ran her hands over him, down the back of his heavy, muscular legs, down his calves, then to his heels. She wished he weren’t wearing the underwear so she could feel his skin. Vividly, the memory of the night he’d appeared in her tent wearing only the loincloth came to her. She hadn’t paid much attention to him that night, but now she remembered the color of his skin.

  Still silent, she stood, letting her hand trail up his body, over his buttocks to his naked waist. With both hands she touched the smooth, warm skin of his back, traced the faint white scars, the red places the thorns had made.

  It was as though she’d never seen a man’s body before, although she’d grown up around men who in the summer rarely wore much besides a breech cloth. But at that time music had meant more to her than any well-put-together male.

  Her hands went to his shoulders, to the round strength of them. She moved to the right and ran her hands down his arm to his hand, then back up again. She didn’t look at his face; for all she cared, he could have been a warm, living statue. When she reached his shoulder again, she moved her hands over his chest. He was hard and muscular, a body used to exercise, to a life spent outdoors. Her fingers entwined in the hair on his chest, then moved down to the hard flatness of his stomach.

  When her hands lingered at his waist, he caught her wrists. “No,” he whispered, and she looked into his eyes.

  His eyes broke her trance, and she pulled away from him, terribly embarrassed. She turned away. “I…I was looking for more thorns.”

  “There are no more thorns,” he said quietly.

  “I…I have to go now,” she said, and ran down the hill as fast as she could. She couldn’t bear to look at him again.

  Chapter 8

  When Maddie awoke the next morning, she knew that something was wrong. At first she wasn’t sure what it was, but then she vividly remembered her embarrassment over Captain Montgomery.

  Edith brought her washing water. “You two were sure up there a long time last evenin’. And you sure came down that hill in one big hurry. He try somethin’ you didn’t like?”

  Maddie recalled all too well that nothing had come from Captain Montgomery in the way of an improper advance, but she’d certainly made a fool of herself. She could still hear him saying “No” to her when her hands had strayed too far.

  She turned to Edith. “Absolutely nothing happened. Captain Montgomery was a perfect gentleman at all times.”

  “So that’s what you’re so mad about.”

  “I am not angry in the least,” she snapped. “Don’t you have a breakfast to cook?”

  “You want me to feed him?”

  “If you’re referring to Captain Montgomery, you’ll have to ask him if he wants to eat with us. Whether he eats or not is none of my business.”

  Edith left the tent, chuckling.

  As Maddie washed herself and dressed in her sturdy traveling clothes, she told herself that she wasn’t angry, that Edith was a stupid woman with no morals and even less sense. But the more she thought, the more the muscles in her body began to tense up. How dare he treat her like some woman of the evening? All she was doing was removing thorns from him, yet he’d thought she was trying to make advances toward him. Of all the presumptions of any man, this was the worst. She wasn’t interested in him. If she was going to be interested in a man, it would be in a man who was…was more romantic. A man who gave her a compliment now and then—at least a compliment better than “You’re not painful to look at.”

  By the time she was dressed and left the tent, she was no longer embarrassed, but good old-fashioned angry at Captain Montgomery for taking advantage of her and misunderstanding her intentions. Outside, Edith had fried eggs and ham, and had thrown slices of stale bread in the grease and fried them too. Frank, Sam, Toby, and Captain Montgomery were all sitting on the ground and eating heartily.

  The first one to meet her eyes was Captain Montgomery. To Maddie’s mind he gave her a look of smug knowing. So, she thought, he thinks I’m one of his women, does he? He thinks that I’m one of those weak-headed, simpering females who follows handsome men around and begs them for attention.

  She put her nose in the air and looked away from him, but she smiled at the other three men. “Good morning,” she said cheerfully. “I hope everyone slept well. I know I did. Not a care in the world.”

  She sat down at the table and looked at the plate of greasy food Edith had put in front of her and lost her appetite completely. She pushed the food around for a while, then looked at Frank. “Did you look at that music I gave you?”

  “Yeah,” he said without much interest.

  “Did you like it?”

  “It’s all right.”

  She looked back at her food. So much for conversation with Frank. She turned to Sam. “How are the horses faring on the trip?”

  All Sam did was nod at her, so she looked right past Captain Montgomery as though he weren’t even there and smiled at Toby. “How’s your breakfast?”

  “Beats army food.”

  She took a small bite of egg. “Toby, tell me something about yourself.”

  “Ain’t much to tell. I got born and I ain’t died yet. Ain’t been much in between.”

  With great concentration she avoided Captain Montgomery’s eyes on her and looked back at her plate. She was not going to try to make conversation with him. From now on she