From Runaway To Pregnant Bride

She could feel Clay’s attention on her, saw him shift uneasily on his feet. Again, Annabel could sense his sudden withdrawal. “No,” he said curtly. “Not today. I need to crush the ore. There’s another cartful waiting at the mine. You can work in the kitchen. See what you can put together for a noonday meal.”

His rebuff ought to have offended her, but instead it triggered a frisson of excitement. She had little experience of young men, apart from the footmen and grooms at Merlin’s Leap, and they had treated her with a formal respect. She had never had a chance to banter with a young man, and now the challenge filled her with a heady fascination.

Leaving Clay to tend to the mule, Annabel went into the kitchen. A pot of coffee, still warm, stood on the table, with a plate of biscuits. And next to them, a jar of honey! She sat down, poured coffee into a cup and spread honey on two biscuits and devoured them, not touching the rest, in case they were intended as a midmorning snack for the men.

Finished, she dusted the crumbs from her fingers and examined the skin on her palms. There was no sign of infection, just some ragged edges of burst blisters that were beginning to harden into calluses.

Satisfied with the signs of healing, Annabel got up to survey the kitchen contents, starting with the row of grain bins beneath the work counter. Flour. Evaporated vegetables. Rice. Beans. More beans. Jerked meat, perhaps venison.

Her inspection progressed to the shelves. Canned goods. Tins of evaporated milk. Another jar of honey. A crock of cooking oil. Kerosene for lamps. Matches in a waterproof tin. A bag of salt and small pouches of spices, not imported ones, such as saffron or pepper, but some kind of native herbs.

There was plenty of flour, and Liza had taught her how to bake bread. Dinner would be beans and rice, with bread and honey for dessert. Annabel rolled up her sleeves and set to work.

The mule had resumed its plodding circle. The grinding noise boomed over the clearing. Dust floated in the air. Annabel stirred dough in a bowl, gripping the wooden spoon with her fingertips to ease the pressure on her blisters.

She took to singing a sea shanty, altering the words to suit the occasion. After a few verses, she raised her voice to compete with the crashing and banging and the clatter of the mule’s hooves.

They say, old Clay, your mule will bolt,

Oh, poor old Clay, your mule will bolt,

Oh, poor old Clay!

For thirty days you’ve ridden him,

And when he bolts I’ll tan his skin,

Oh, poor old Clay!

And if he stays you’ll ride him again,

You’ll ride him with a tighter rein,

Oh, poor old Clay!

When she got to the end, she started again, increasing the volume until she was bellowing out the words. So engrossed was she in the competition to produce the most noise that when the mule stopped, she went on, her voice preventing her from hearing the sound of footsteps as they thudded over.

“There you go again, scaring every living creature in the forest.”

Instead of pausing in the middle of a verse, Annabel put extra force in the final “poor old Clay” before she turned to face him.

The bowl nearly slipped from her fingers. He’d taken off his shirt! Standing on the edge of the kitchen, one arm lazily dangling from a timber post, Clay leaned forward and studied the evidence of her efforts.

“What are you making?” he asked.

Annabel tried to look away, but her eyes refused to obey. A strange new sensation clenched low in her belly. Her head spun, as if she’d been holding her breath for too long.

She gave up the attempt to avert her eyes and let her gaze roam over him. She could not recall ever seeing a man’s naked chest before, not even Papa’s, for a gentleman did not remove his shirt in the presence of his daughters.

Clay’s body was lean, his arms roped with muscle, and beneath the sheen of perspiration Annabel could see a ridged pattern on his abdomen. Higher up, his torso broadened, and hidden in the sprinkling of dark hair on his chest, Annabel noticed two flat brown nipples, different from the pink tips of her own breasts and yet somehow the same.

“What are you staring at?” Clay stepped closer. “Your eyes are like dinner plates. Haven’t you ever seen a man peeled to his belt before?” Reaching out, he pinched a dollop of dough from the bowl and popped it into his mouth.

Lips pursed, cheeks hollowed, he considered the flavor. Annabel studied the rugged features, now clean-shaven instead of covered with a thick coat of beard stubble.

Her attention settled on his mouth, and all of a sudden a wave of heat rolled over her. She knew she was blushing scarlet. Clay stiffened. The change she was learning to recognize in him came over again, as if a storm cloud had rolled in from the ocean, obliterating the sun.

“Better get back to work.” His voice was gruff.

Annabel watched him go. And something tempted her to go after him. Curiosity. Devilment. Playfulness. The strange new tugging in the pit of her belly. Perhaps even the challenge she had set for herself earlier, to jolt him out of his carefully constructed coolness and indifference.

Quickly, she finished her kitchen chores. When the bread was baking in the oven and a pot of beans simmering on the stovetop, she left the shelter of the kitchen canopy and strolled over to the arrastre. The mule was going round and round again, the stones crashing and grinding, dust rising in the air.

Clay was bent over a bucket to splash water over his face and arms. When he straightened, their eyes met. For a moment, they looked upon each other. Annabel held her breath. She could feel all those pent-up emotions seething within Clay, creating pressure, a force as powerful as the head of steam that drove the engine on the train.

Like a door closing, Clay’s features hardened. Using the flat of his palm, he flicked away the droplets from his face, and then he turned to look the other way. Pointedly ignoring her, he went to coax the mule to a greater speed.

Bolder now, not even trying to hide her interest, Annabel watched him. She could feel his irritation rising, as if the storm clouds in his mind were about to burst into thunder and lightning.

When the mule needed a break, the noise ceased. At first, the world appeared silent in contrast, but an instant later Annabel could pick out the mocking call of a blue jay and the rustling in the trees as a squirrel leaped from branch to branch.

“Your skin is nicely bronzed,” she called out to Clay. “You ought to always stay clean-shaven. Otherwise the top half of your face will tan but the lower half will remain pale. It will look funny. Girls won’t like it.”

“Girls?” Clay drawled. “What might you know about it?”

“Plenty. I have two older sisters.”

“How old?” Clay stole a glance toward his shirt hanging on a juniper on the edge of the clearing, but he made no move to retrieve the garment.

“Twenty-four and twenty-two.”

His shoulders shifted in a careless shrug. “Just right for me, then.”

The jolt of jealousy at the imaginary prospect took Annabel by surprise. She brushed the feeling aside and went on with her probing. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-three.”

“Twenty-three?” Her voice rose in surprise. “I thought you were older. Close to thirty.”

“Everyone grows older at the same rate but some grow up faster.”

“Mr. Hicks says you have been with him for five years. That means you were eighteen when he employed you. Are you an orphan as he says?”

“Yes.”

“How old were you when your parents died?”

Clay took down his hat, raked one hand through his thick brown curls and replaced the hat on his head. For a moment, Annabel thought he might not reply. When he spoke, his tone indicated his patience was wearing thin.