Angel in My Arms (18 page)

Celeste opened the door and was greeted by Silver, who bounded at her out of the darkness.

"Hello there, old boy." She set down her satchel, removed her hat and cloak, and scratched the mutt behind the ears.

"Have you been a good boy? Have you? Did he feed you while I was gone? Huh?"

The dog panted and rubbed his head beneath her hand as they walked toward the kitchen. The house was dark. It was eerie.

"Fox?" she called tentatively.

Moonlight had shone through the windows framing the door in the
front foyer, but the hallway was dark. Celeste had never been afraid to
be in the house alone, not even right after John died, but she was
suddenly uncomfortable. The thought of Pearl lying dead, tied to her
bedpost, had her spooked.

"Let's just get one of these lamps lit, shall we?" she said loudly to the dog to comfort herself.

She walked across the shadowy kitchen to the stove, which was warm to her touch. With a broom straw, she lit a gas lamp.

"There, that's better, isn't it?" She turned, blowing out the broom straw. "I— Oh!"

Celeste took a step back, startled to find Fox sitting in the kitchen.

She pressed her hand to her pounding heart. "You scared me half out
of my wits. What on God's green earth are you doing sitting here in the
dark?"

He took so long to answer that she began to feel uneasy. He just stared at her with some unfathomable emotion in his black eyes.

Finally he spoke, his strong jaw set, his dark gaze fixed on her.
"Welcome home. Three days. You mind telling me where the hell you've
been?"

"Where the hell have I been?" She dropped her hand to her hip,
narrowing her eyes. No man had a right to speak to her that way. She
was her own woman, dependent on no one. That had been her vow the night
her father had thrown her into the street in the pouring rain, without
so much as a cape to protect her from the downpour.

And Fox had no right to demand any information in that tone of voice.

Especially since her trip to Denver had been so wonderful. It had
felt so good to hold Adam in her arms. She'd not been able to tell him
about the claims or her intention to mine them, of course, because Adam
thought she was a widow and ran a ladies' clothing shop in Colorado
Springs. But seeing him, eating with him, taking a long walk with him,
had strengthened her determination to find gold on that land. Being
with Adam had made her realize just how badly she wanted a real life.

Celeste stared Fox down. "Where have I been?" she repeated. "I've been in Denver."

"I know that," he snapped. "I want to know why you went to Denver, who you went to see. A man, I assume?"

"That's none of your business," she flared. The good feelings she
had carried home from Denver ebbed. Of course she had expected a
confrontation with Fox on her return, but the man just sounded so… so
possessive.

He glanced away and then back at her. "I was worried about you. I
didn't know where you'd gone. What happened to you. I kept thinking you
were tied to some bedpost with your throat cut."

She crossed her arms over her chest. She supposed she should be
flattered that he was concerned for her well-being, but her anger
prevented it. "That's certainly a pleasant thought."

He scowled. "It's the truth. The only reason I knew you went to
Denver was because Sal saw you chase down the stagecoach to Odenburg.
He said you were in an awful hurry. Was that to get away from me, or to
get to someone else?"

She ignored his question. That was none of his damned business
either. "I've a right to come and go as I please. I don't have to tell
you what I'm doing or
whom
I'm seeing. You made it clear when
you found out who I was that you had no intention of pursuing any kind
of permanent relationship with me. You reneged on that charming
marriage proposal rather quickly, remember?" Celeste didn't know what
made her say that. To push him away, she guessed. To hurt him so he
would go. Leave. Leave Carrington, leave her and her pathetic trollop's
life.

He flinched.

If her intention had been to hurt Fox, it worked. She could see it in his stormy eyes.

"I…" He paused. "No," he said quietly. "I don't guess you owe me an
explanation. I just thought that after the other morning…" His sentence
drifted into silence.

Celeste knew what he was referring to. Her bedroom. And he didn't
just mean the kissing, the touching, the incredible way he had made her
feel. He meant the emotional connection they made in each other's arms.
It wasn't her imagination. He had felt it, too. Now she was really
confused by her emotions, by what she wanted and didn't want.

Celeste didn't know what to say. She had planned this entire
conversation. On the train from Denver, she'd gone over and over in her
head what she would say to Fox. She'd intended to tell him he would
have to move out of the house. Their partnership could be conducted at
a distance; the further he was from her, the better. She'd intended to
tell him that the morning in her bed had been a mistake. She'd been
overwrought about Pearl and hadn't realized what she was doing.

She had intended to lie through her teeth.

Now that he stood before her in the flesh, it seemed somehow harder to follow her well-thought-out script. "Fox…"

He waited.

She felt as if a glass window separated them, and anything she might
say or do would shatter the glass. She didn't know if she wanted to
break it or not. She sighed, lowered her gaze, then glanced back at
him. Silver sat beside him.

Fox patted the dog's head, but his full attention was on her.

"I…" She exhaled again. "The other day. It was a mistake."

He glanced down at her button shoes that peeked beneath her green and black taffeta petticoat and overskirt.

The dress was new. She'd splurged and bought it in Denver. The sales
clerk had said the green matched her eyes. In the back of her mind, she
knew she had bought the dress because she wanted to look good for Fox.

"A mistake?" he asked coolly.

"A mistake," she repeated. "You have no intention—I have no
intention of getting involved with you, Fox. It was wrong for me to—"

"It was wrong for me to take advantage of you." He rose and turned,
to lean against the back of his chair and face her. "I shouldn't have—"

"You didn't take advantage of me," she corrected, wanting to get it
straight between them. She had been forced once. She'd let no man make
that claim ever again. "I'm an adult woman. I know what I said to you."
It seemed so strange for her to be dancing around the subject of sex,
when sex was what she did for a living. But somehow it was different
with Fox. It meant something now. "And
I
know and
you
know what I meant." She folded her arms, refusing to look away.

She'd gotten herself into this; she could at least have the decency
to look him in the eye while she got herself out of it. "And I have to
admit," she continued, "that it was sweet of you not to—" she lifted
her hand lamely "—you know."

They both stared at each other for a moment, at an impasse.
What now?
Celeste thought. She knew he was thinking the same thing, because even
as they mutually admitted their lovemaking had been a mistake, the
attraction between them still existed against all logic. No matter what
either of them said, the desire was still there, a hot flame burning
between them.

"So what now?" He said it first. He scuffed his boot on the floor,
which she noticed had been washed while she was gone. "You want me to
leave?"

He didn't say if he meant the house, or Carrington.

No.
The protest leaped into her mind. She didn't want him
to leave. She knew it was crazy, but she didn't want him to leave her.
She didn't want to feel alone anymore.

She studied his face. He appeared haggard, as if he'd been up all
night. He hadn't shaved since she left and was beginning to look like a
genuine miner. "Do you want to leave?" She wondered what had happened
to her speech about him getting out of the house by morning.

He thought for a moment. "I think Titus may be on to something. He
found an underground rock formation while you were gone. It's not a
placer, but it looks promising."

Her eyes widened. "Gold?" In the back of her mind, she knew the idea
of finding gold on the property was just a pipe dream, but the longer
she stayed away from Kate's, the more desperate she became to keep it
that way. Her visit to Adam had solidified that desire. Since she'd met
Fox, the idea of returning to her old life seemed out of the question.
Somehow he had given her the confidence to believe she could find a way
out of the life she'd begun to hate. She almost believed that she
deserved something better."He thinks he found gold?"

"Well, no. He didn't find anything, but there's a certain pattern to the rock formation around a strike."

The talk of gold cooled the heat between them, both the anger and the desire.

He pointed to the stove. "You want some tea? Mrs. Tuttle sent some kind of berry pie. You look tired."

"Tea would be good." She sat on the edge of his chair. Suddenly the
fatigue of traveling to and from Denver in three days caught up to her.
She was tired and she was hungry. All she wanted to do was climb into
her bed and sleep.

Fox put the kettle on the stove. "He wants to start drilling at first light."

"All right. I can be ready."

He leaned on the work table. "So I guess I'll stay a few more days.
Just to… to see if anything comes out of the rock formation."

This was Celeste's chance. She could just tell him no. It was her
house. She had a right to refuse him. He could go elsewhere. Sal might
rent him a room. He could bunk up at Titus's, or he could just go back
to San Francisco. "All right," she said. "You might as well stay here.
We'll see what happens in a few days."

Celeste felt weak-spined, but she couldn't help herself. She didn't
want him to leave. Well, she did, because she knew nothing could come
of their relationship. Her head told her to kick him out the door, now,
while she could still muster the strength. But her heart wanted nothing
more than for her to be in Fox's arms once more.

Celeste stood on the back step, an old leather vest of John's in her
hand. Fox was in the backyard, shoveling coal for the kitchen stove.
Because it was already dark, he worked by the light of an oil lantern.
They'd stayed out on the claim until sunset, and both of them were
exhausted. After a quick meal, she knew they'd each go into their
respective bedrooms for the blessed sleep they needed.

Since Celeste had returned from Denver last week, they'd followed
the same routine every day. They were up at dawn, ate cold egg
sandwiches for breakfast on the wagon ride to the claim, worked till
noon, ate again, and worked until the sun set. It was hard on both
Celeste and Fox, but there was something comforting about their
routine. The animosity between them had faded somewhere between the egg
sandwiches and the tons of useless dirt they'd moved. It seemed that
they had both accepted themselves, each other, and the relationship
that would never be. And yet… something was changing very subtly
between them.