第 32 页

Devon felt his skin against every hot, sweaty inch of hers, and she reveled in the feel of it. The smell of his body, as familiar now as the smell of her own, filtered to her nostrils. They were so perfectly matched, so right. How could he not see it, how could he not feel it?

He had to, she told herself.

She chewed nervously on her lower lip. It was time to find out. Her first instinct was, of course, to blurt out the question burning in her mind. She refrained, reminding herself of her plan to go slowly, to start with a few innocuous, leading questions.

She laid her cheek on the soft, slightly damp mat of hair on his chest. Her forefinger trailed lazily through the black hairs, her touch slow and feather soft.

"You know, Cornelius-"

Laughter rumbled in his chest. She halted, peering up at him. He was smiling broadly.

She frowned. "What are you laughing about?"

His hand stroked her face. "Just memories, love. It's nothing."

Love. He'd called her love! Hope soared in her breast. Her plan was going to work. She could feel it. He already loved her; he just didn't know it. All she had to do was get him to realize it, slowly and in his own way, and then everything would fall into place. If he loved her, really loved her, he would want their child.

He would ask her to stay and make a life with him.

She took a deep breath, forcing herself to follow the plan. She still had to go slowly. "Cornelius, I've been thinking about your work."

"My work?" He chuckled. "We make hot, exciting love, and all you can think about afterward is my work?

How unflattering."

She caught the teasing in his voice and smiled. "Well, I've been thinking about it for a while," she admitted.

"I have an idea."

"Fire away."

She scooted upright for a better look at him. She didn't want to miss any nuance of emotion that crossed his face.

Her expression was too earnest, too eager, she knew, but she couldn't seem to change it. Excitement tinged her voice. "You know how much I hate you stomping off to the gulch, dragging that horrid sled."

"Yeah."

"Well, I know you have to carry all that stuff with you, and I thought... Well, I thought a dog might help."

She smiled at him expectantly, waiting for his agreement.

It didn't come.

In fact he didn't say anything; he just looked at her, strangely, a lazy smile lurking at the corners of his mouth. She frowned. He certainly didn't seem to be thinking about the merits of home and hearth.

Maybe he needed a little more convincing. "Plus it would be nice to have a pet, don't you think? Especially a dog. He could sleep on the floor, curled up in front of the stove. It would make everything so... homey."

He propped up on one elbow to look at her. "You want me to get a dog?" He sounded incredulous.

Devon felt the first stirring of apprehension. It wasn't going right. The plan had barely begun, and already he wasn't following it. He should have agreed by now. Why was he smiling?

"I'd take care of him," she added as an afterthought.

That smile again, a little bigger. "You would, would you?"

"Y-Yes." She nibbled nervously on her lower lip. Oh, why didn't he just agree? How hard could it be to say "Yes, Dev, a dog would be nice. A malamute, maybe." That's what he'd always said in her thoughts.

When she couldn't stand the silence anymore, she started talking again, "A dog would be nice. At least, / think it would. I mean, it would make us more like a family-" She looked at him meaningfully. "You know, a real family. You know it-"

He pressed a finger to her lips."You're babbling, Devon."

"I know, but-"

"Shhh. I appreciate the thought, Dev. Honestly I do. But if I'd wanted a dog, I'd have one."

"But-"

"But nothing. A dog is too damn much responsibility. Hell, what if I forgot to feed the damn thing and he died? I'd feel like shit. No, it's a nice thought. But I couldn't take the responsibility."

Devon sucked in her breath as the implication of his words hit home. Tears seared her eyes. She blinked them away rapidly then sank into the mattress, burying her face in the pillow.

" Devon?" She felt his hand on her bare shoulder, stroking it gently."What is it? Did you really want a dog that much?"

She shook her head, grateful now for the russet curls that shielded her face. "No," she answered in a muffled voice. "I'm just tired. Let's go to sleep."

He snuggled alongside her, his arms coiled around her naked body. One warm hand slid beneath her body and settled against her navel.

When she felt his hand on her stomach, she lost control Tears poured from her eyes. She didn't try to stem their flow, for she knew it would be useless. Every dream she'd ever h had just been shattered.

God help her. She was pregnant by a man who couldn accept the responsibility of feeding a dog.

A child was certainly out of the question. There was choice left to be made. She loved Cornelius too much make him accept a responsibility he didn't want. She'd firsthand how forced responsibility affected a man.

Not that Cornelius was anything like her father; he wasn't He was an honorable, loving man. So honorable in fact that if he knew about the child, he'd marry her. A marriage he didn't want for the sake of a child he didn't want.

No, she decided grimly, that kind of marriage wasn't what she wanted. Not for herself, not for the child, and certainly not for Cornelius. There was no choice to be made. She had to leave before Cornelius found out about the baby-and that wouldn't be much longer.

When the boat left Dawson City, she'd be on it.

Chapter Twenty-one

In her sleep Devon snuggled closer to Cornelius. Beneath her bunched-up nightgown, she felt the welcome, familiar warmth of his legs intertwined with hers; a quiet, contented snore escaped her lips.

She became aware of it slowly: his sensuous, lingering kiss. Without thinking she parted her lips, allowing her lover free access to her mouth. The kiss-a building, magical caress-deepened. She felt his tongue graze her teeth then move on, tangling with her own. A knot of sweet, aching pleasure formed in her loins.

The hard skin of his palms slid across her breasts, making her shiver in anticipation. She blinked awake.

"Hi," he said.

The sound of his voice brought a lazy smile to her lips. A smile that faded the moment she remembered last night.

The memory hit her with the force of a physical blow. Oh God, she thought suddenly, if the boat came today, this would be the last time she'd waken in his arms. The last time she'd feel his loving touch on her body.

She threw her arms around him. A sob welled in her throat; she felt the hot sting of tears in her eyes.

"Love me," she whispered shakily. "Now..."

It was slow and quiet and almost bittersweet, their love-making. Afterward, as Devon lay in his arms, she tried to block out the memory of last night, but it was useless.

"Devon?"

She heard his voice as if from far away and wrenched her thoughts back to the present. Pulling out of his warm embrace, she looked up at him. The concern in his eyes twisted her heart. "Y-Yes?"

"What's the matter?"

She bit down on her lower lip to stop its tremble. Her gaze plummeted. God help her, if he kept looking at her like that she was going to crumble...

"Dev?"

"Nothing's the matter. I was just thinking about- "About last night. About our child. Her voice wobbled."-about the post. Shouldn't one of us get down there? The men are counting on us."

He sighed, a worn, weary sound that said he knew exactly what she'd been thinking about-and that it wasn't the post. "Yeah," he said finally, pushing away from her body. "I'll open up. You come on down when you want." ' The minute their bodies separated, Devon felt coldness, sweep the length of her exposed skin. A coldness of the soul, She forced herself to remain in bed as he dressed for theL day. It was the only way she could keep from flinging herself I into his arms.

When he'd finished dressing he sat down on the bed beside her. The wooden planks supporting the bed groaned beneath his weight, as they did every time he came to bed. For the first time the noise sounded melancholy to her ears. She felt an almost overwhelming sense of loss.

Stop it! her mind commanded. Quit being so maudlin.

She had no reason to cry. For one brief, glorious winter, God had given her what she'd never even dreamed of having. A piece of heaven.

True, it was only a handful; and true, she didn't get to keep it; but she'd had it, and that was more than most people could ever say. And more than that, she had a piece of it to take home with her; a living, breathing memory of her love. She had her child.

It was greedy to ask for more.

She looked up into his face, and her sense of melancholy melted into manageable proportions. She was lucky, she told herself. Lucky to have known him at all. He'd changed her, softened her, and without even knowing it he'd given her the two greatest gifts of her life-his love and their child.

She took his face in her hands. The freckled, milky white flesh of her fingers was a pale contrast to his dark skin. Their gazes locked, and in the golden depths of his eyes she saw what she'd always seen. Love.

"If only you could admit it," she said wistfully.

"Admit what?"

"That you love me."

His face hardened. "You put so goddamn much stock in words, Dev. But if you don't know how I feel about you by now, you're not as smart as I thought you were." With that he bounded off the bed, grabbed his mackinaw, and bolted out of the tent.

As the door clicked shut, a steel weight settled on her lungs. Tears pricked her eyes.

He was right. She knew he loved her; it was in his eyes every time he looked at her and in his hands every time he touched her. He just couldn't say the words-and that wasn't surprising, given his past. She even knew that, in time, he'd find the courage to speak.

Unfortunately they'd run out of time. It was all well and good that he loved her, but it wasn't enough. She needed a commitment.

If he'd asked her to stay with him, even once, she'd risk it all. For an invitation would mean he wanted to change his isolated life-style, wanted to build a home with her. It might even mean he wanted to be part of a family.

Normally she wouldn't need an invitation. In fact, if things had been normal, she would stay whether he asked her to or not. But the child changed all that.

Now she needed the security of that invitation, and it hadn't come.

She'd reached the right conclusion last night. She had to leave. It was best for Cornelius. He had his life as he wanted it: solitary and isolated. Without responsibility or commitments. Being tied down to a family would kill his spirit, and "is spirit was what Devon loved most about him.

Yes, it would be better for all of them if she left. Now.

Before he found out about the child and forced himself to take an action they'd all regret.

Stone Man noticed her coldness the moment she stepped into the post. It swept across his flesh like a winter wind, chilling him to the bone.

It had begun, he realized wearily. She had begun the grim, determined separation of their lives.

Regret churned in his gut. The acrid, angry taste of a thousand what ifs burned on his tongue. What vengeful God had done this to him, he wondered bitterly. Taken an isolated island of a man and thrown him under a brilliant beam of light-a transitory brightness that, when it died, would leave in its wake a darkness colder and more complete than a midwinter Yukon night.

If only he had the courage to ask her to stay. Hope surged at the thought, flaring brightly for several agonizing heartbeats before it died.

He couldn't do it. He'd done that once, with Mibelle, and that little naivete had cost him five years of his life. With Devon he'd be risking more than his freedom. Much more. If he asked Devon to stay and she said no, it would kill him. He'd given up his emotional armor months ago, and he had no shred of it left. He was naked to her attack.

It all came down to self-preservation. If he didn't ask her to stay, then she couldn't turn him down. And if he'd never heard the refusal, he could, in later years, tell himself that perhaps she would have stayed. He could cherish the memory of her.

Besides, why should he have to ask her? He knew Devon; if she wanted to stay with him, wild horses couldn't drag her onto the sternwheeler. She was a woman who did as she pleased; a woman who knew her own mind.

So why should he embarrass himself by groveling? She'd just turn the tables on him like she always did.

She'd get that perfectly logical look on her face, gnaw on her thumbnail, and ask him why he didn't come to St. Louis with her.

Why didn't he? The thought came out of nowhere with stunning force.

Why didn't he?

He didn't because he couldn't. Years ago, when he spurned society, he vowed never to look back. It was a vow he'd kept easily, and after a few years, civilization had come to mean hell to him. The thought of going back, of having to fit in, was terrifying. He'd lived on his own, like a wild animal, for the last twenty-two years. How could he possibly go back?

Even more frightening than the thought of trying to be something he wasn't was the thought of disappointing her.

And he would. Oh, sure, he'd mastered the rudiments of table manners, and he'd even given up chewing tobacco, but he wasn't exactly church-social material. He'd embarrass and disappoint her. Then she'd get that pained, pinched expression on her face-the one that said he'd failed.

She was too big-hearted ever to say a word, but he'd know he'd failed, and he'd want to crawl under the nearest rock and die.

He refused to set himself up for that kind of pain. He much preferred one swift stab in the heart to a lingering, drawn-out bloodletting.

"Miss Devon. Miss Devon!" Her name echoed down Front Street.

Stone Man felt a jab of apprehension. His gaze cut to Devon. She was still sitting at the table, knitting on that silly pink tablecloth.