Forever and a Day

She faced the bench opposite them again, staring out before herself with a dreamy smile still touching her lips. “I intend to farm that half acre and set a one-room cabin on it. It won’t be much, barely a few logs slapped together on a scrap of land, but it’ll be more than enough for me. And just beyond that pile of logs, I’ll plant a row of apple trees that’ll blossom every spring and bear barrels of fruit. Apples, flowers and freshly overturned earth will scent the air durin’ the day, and at night I’ll stand outside on my land, lookin’ up at starry skies, listenin’ to the wind.”

She released a breathy sigh and half nodded. “I’ll be self-made. Not man-made. Though I do plan on marryin’ again. The thought of livin’ alone depresses me.”

Robinson intently observed her, the clatter of the wheels overtaking all sound. God, did he admire the wistful dreaminess in that lilting voice. It made him want everything she had just described, right down to the whistling wind and the apple trees. It held a peaceful and divine purpose found by honest, hard work cradled within a dream and a promise that something could be his. Compared to this void writhing within him, telling him that he owned nothing, not a family or a home or a woman of his own, it was paradise in its truest form.

She glanced out the window. “Time sure does flit. The next stop is already ours. Pardon my reach.” She leaned forward, setting her bare hand on his thigh to balance herself and reached across him to pull on the rope attached to the driver’s leg. “Sometimes these damn drivers claim not to feel the rope. So I make sure they do.”

She set her chin and yanked the rope several more times, the faint scent of crisp soap and lye drifting toward him as she swayed against each solid tug.

A familiar shiver of awareness raced through him. That scent. It was so hauntingly familiar. It whispered to him that if he buried himself within that fragrance, he would forever know compassion, comfort and peace.

He instinctively slid his hand to her back, grazing the small hooks on her gown, and pressed her warmth against the side of his body, desperately wanting to touch her. “Georgia?”

She stiffened and glanced up at him, her hand falling away from the rope and drifting down to his thigh. Her lips parted as her shadowed green eyes searched his face. “What is it? Is something wrong? You not feelin’ well?”

Art thou afraid to be the same in thine own act and valour as thou art in desire?

Were those his words responding to his heart in this moment? He didn’t know, but something chanted that if he didn’t attempt to make this woman his, he’d be missing out on the greatest opportunity he’d ever known as a man.

He drew her closer toward himself, his hands rounding her slim shoulders, and whispered, “I want to kiss you. Can I?”

She let out a shaky breath, the warmth of that mouth grazing against his own. “I’m not very good at kissin’.”

Cradling her against the curve of his arm, he pressed her softness against his tensing body. “At least you remember what it’s like.”

She tilted her lips upward toward his own and smirked. “You’re just tryin’ to make me feel sorry for you.”

“Do you?”

“Oddly, yes. I do feel sorry for you.”

“Good.” He lowered his lips to hers. Closing his eyes, he savored the warmth of her soft mouth lingering against his own and better molded his lips against that delicate mouth.

Her moist lips parted. Though he wanted to slide his tongue deep into that mouth and ravage it, he didn’t know if that was something he was supposed to do, so he lingered, hoping she would take the lead. He could barely breathe.

Her hot velvet tongue instantly slid against his own, grazing his teeth. He bit back his own need to groan, as an ache overwhelmed his entire body. He slowly gave in to circling his tongue against hers, sensing the tongue was more than permissible.

She tasted like spiced…whiskey?

She grabbed hold of the lapels on his coat and dragged him down, down onto her, shifting her entire body beneath his own, until they were both practically hanging off the bench. He tightened his hold on her shoulders and waist and dug his booted heels into the floor of the omni to keep them both from falling.

Pressing herself more savagely against him, she pushed her tongue deeper into his mouth, responding to his tongue so fiercely his heart pounded in disbelief. Entranced by the unexpected passion pouring out of her, he reveled in the way that wet tongue moved so erotically against his own. If this were the one and only kiss he were to ever remember as a man, he would honor it with never-ending, glorying pride.

May the lightning of heaven consume me, if I adore thee not to distraction!

Crushing one hand against her bonnet, he slid his other hand down the smooth fabric of her gown, curving it to her firm, corseted waist. He dug the tips of his fingers into the fabric separating them, feeling as if he were racing against his own mind and breath, trying to remain grounded in this incredible reality. He trailed his hand back up toward her breasts, rounding his hand around its softness and weight. His cock swelled from the touch, and the need to rip his clothes apart, in an effort to show her just how divine she was, consumed the last of him. He kissed her harder, frantically digging and grinding his erection into her thigh.

Georgia tightened her lips in an effort to force out his tongue, digging her fingers into his biceps.

Reluctantly breaking their kiss, he dragged her back upright and repositioned her sidesaddle onto his lap. He cradled her for a long moment, her uneven breaths matching his own. It was the first time in nine days he felt like he finally belonged to someone and he swore to himself that he would never let this or her go, lest he be swallowed back into nothingness.

The omni around them swayed to a halt as the driver called out their stop. She shifted to move, but he fiercely held her in place. Reaching up, he trailed the tips of his fingers down past the faded ribbon of her bonnet toward the soft slope of her curving throat. “Take me out west with you,” he insisted in a barely composed tone. “I want everything you spoke of. Right down to the wind and the apple trees. I will give you every last nickel in my pocket if you promise to take me with you.”

Her eyes widened. She shoved his hand away and scrambled outside of his grasp and off his lap. Stumbling forward and onto her feet, she caught herself against the narrow pathway between the two benches leading to the rear door of the omni. “Whatever do you mean you want my land and my apple trees? We barely know each other. Even worse, you don’t even know your name.”

He sat up. “You will need someone to build your cabin, till the land and chop timber. I can do that for you. I can.”

She gawked at him, then shook her head and frantically arranged her skirts. “No. Don’t you be stickin’ your hands into my head and playin’ with my dreams like that. They’re my dreams. You hear? Not yours. Mine.”

He swallowed, his chest tightening. “I need help, Georgia. I need help if I’m going to rebuild a sense of reality. And I think you’re the one to help me do it.”

“Stop it,” she tossed at him in a harsh tone. “I’m not takin’ you with me and I most certainly can’t help you in the way you think I can.”

“I know you can. I felt it before and after we touched.”

She glared at him. “I know what you felt, Brit, and it wasn’t that. I’ve got plans and I’m sorry to say this, because I like you, I really do, but my plans don’t involve a man who doesn’t know his up from his down. A woman such as myself, who has very little to begin with, needs a grain of security. And you aren’t it.”

He scrambled to his feet. “But that kiss—”

“I shouldn’t have allowed for it. All right? I shouldn’t have taken advantage of you. You’re not in your right mind and it was wrong of me. Now just…just get off the damn omni before it takes off and we’re forced to walk half the night.” Throwing open the door, she hurried down the small stairs leading out of the omni and disappeared into the night, leaving him to feel again he belonged to no one and nothing.

CHAPTER FIVE

At Christmas I no more desire a rose

than wish a snow in May’s newfangled shows.

—William Shakespeare, A Pleasant Conceited Comedie Called, Loues labors loft (1598)

ROBINSON JUMPED OUT AFTER Georgia, his boots thudding against the shadowed dirt road, and slammed the rear door of the omni. The boxed carriage reared forward, its large wheels kicking up dust that bit into his watering eyes. An overwhelming stench of festering sewage penetrated his nostrils.

“Bleed me,” he growled, burying the lower half of his face into the crook of his arm in an attempt to block the assaulting stink.

He swung toward Georgia, who was already crossing the wide, dimly lit street. She dodged an oncoming huckster and a peddler cart, disappearing from sight.

He lowered his arm, his heart pounding knowing that his only connection to reality was abandoning him. “Georgia!” He jogged after her, the acrid air crawling down his throat. He swallowed, mentally willing away the sensation of nausea that threatened to heave out his innards. “Do you intend to loathe me for wanting to share in your dream of going west? That hardly seems fair.”

Her shadow reappeared on the pavement just outside the dull, yellowing light of a gas lamppost. She paused and glanced back at him, dropping the folds of her skirts. “Your family is waitin’ for you, Brit. Try to remember that. Someone is out there sheddin’ tears for you, worryin’ themselves into a grave whilst you foolishly talk of chasin’ a dream that isn’t even yours to chase.”

Why did he feel as if she was wrong? Why did he feel as if there was no one waiting for him? Not a mother. Not a wife. No one. “’Tis very difficult for me to care about people I can’t even remember, be they shedding tears for me or not.”

Though he couldn’t see her face against the wavering shadows, he could see the softening of her rigid stance. She blew out a breath. “I suppose I understand.” She waved him over. “Come. We shouldn’t linger. Trouble brews in the dark around these parts.”

Drawing in the sharpness of the dank evening air, he crossed the dirt road toward her, the lone gas lamp flickering as it unevenly lit the mired path before him.

He scanned the stretching width of the dank street. Cramped wooden buildings loomed in the surrounding darkness, murky-yellow lamps lighting broken windows stuffed with rags and heaven knows what else. Silhouettes of men and women lurked on the streets and hovered in doorways. Others casually lounged on the curb of the pavement in small groups, chuckling and having muted conversations as if respectably sitting around a table to dine.

An old man holding a dented tankard staggered past on an angle, bellowing in an off-key tone, “The devil and me, together we pee, yessiree, the devil and me.”