Tallchief for Keeps (30 page)

Emily, almost sixteen, took Talia’s other hand. “I’m going to be a doctor. Or a vet”

“Now is a good time to learn,” Talia said, gritting her teeth. “You’ll take care of Calum for me, won’t you? When he passes out?”

“You bet. Hey, I like the boots.”

“Aren’t they fine? We’ll get you a pair—Ohh! Calum, you are a lowdown—”

When the Marrying Moon is high,
a scarred warrior will rise from the mists to claim his lady huntress. He will wrap her in the shawl and carry her to the Bridal Tepee and his heart. Their song will last longer than the stars….

Elspeth dismounted and tied Delight to a tree. The mare whinnied as Elspeth hugged her for reassurance. She took the shawl from her saddlebags and wondered how the treasure, so fragile and light, had stood the poor use of the past months.

Yet it shimmered magically in her hands, just as it must have done in Una’s when she’d claimed Tallchief. The shawl was a part of Elspeth’s life, what had happened and what would grow deeper.

The words in Una’s journals attested to
how much she loved Tallchief, how the legend was a blend of their lives and how it had come true.

Elspeth didn’t need her tracking skills to find Alek this time. The tepee shone in the moonlight, gleaming in the shadows of the trees. On Tallchief Lake, mist hovered over the black waves and whispered of other loves; on a moonlit night, it floated and curled around the reeds, swaying in the restless wind.

Elspeth braced herself against what Alek might say. He’d been hurt today, a passionate man wanting more from her than she’d given. She moved from the shadows of the pines into the moonlight lying on the mist; the cool, damp layer curled around her, whimsically choosing its path.

Suddenly Alek stood before her, his legs
spread, arms crossed over his chest, and not an ounce of tenderness showing on his face. “Dad didn’t know that the tepee had a special meaning. Duncan and your brothers did.”

“I didn’t come about the tepee.”

The mist clung to his hair, making it even more unruly as she continued to walk toward him. His head tipped at an arrogant angle. “I meant what I said today in the arena. I’ll be here when you need me. I’ve changed, Elspeth. I’ve found what I want with you. I’ll be writing assignment stories, but I’m staying right here.”

Fear ripped through her again, but she pushed it away, determined to let him know her mind…and her heart. “I love you, Alek Petrovna.”

She gripped the shawl with aching fingers as he stared down at her, eyes narrowed. “Uh-huh.”

“You’re not going to make
this easy, are you?” She should have known Alek wouldn’t make anything easy for her. She tossed away the image of him running to her, kissing her wildly and bearing her off to the tepee. This was Alek, hard down to the core, nasty, tender, sweet, passionate—

“Hell no. You ripped the heart out of me today, riding as though your life didn’t matter. It does matter.

To me. There you were, standing on that
damn horse, that shawl flapping around your neck—”

She placed her hand on his, needing to anchor
her tumbling world, share it with Alek. His fingers slowly wrapped around hers, and she sucked in air, just realizing that she’d been waiting for him to show that he hadn’t stopped caring. “But my life does matter now, every color and every shred of it, since you’ve come into it. The weave has deepened, heated, come alive with you. I thought I was happy, living in Amen Flats with people I’ve known all my life. I thought I was happy when Duncan and Calum found their loves.”

“Thought?” he shot at her, making her come all the way. Alek’s fingers laced with hers, giving her support in a difficult passage. “And?”

Elspeth tossed away the need to shield emotions. She’d learn to share more easily with Alek in time. “And then you came, and I discovered that I needed more. I needed you.”

“Did you?” The challenge was there, making her take that last step.

She moved close to him, so that he
could see her face and know that she had no doubt about her love or her future with him. “Marry me, Alek. Give me your heart—I won’t tear it. I’ll be there when you wake up and when you go to sleep. I’ll keep you warm in the hard, cold times and hold you when you ache. You ache, Alek. It rides just beneath the surface, what you’ve seen, what you’d like to change. I will help you—if you want to travel, I’ll leave Amen Flats to be at your side. Give me your children—I’ll love and tend them and then love you more.”

“You love me,” he repeated, his Texas drawl uneven. “Would you say that meant you were greedy for me? Really deep down, nasty greedy for me? Or just the innocent, temporary kind of greed?”

She’d hurt him, and his uncertainty had reared and his pride needed tending. She gave him that, because now it mattered; healing hearts wasn’t easy, but was a blend of give and take. Elspeth placed her hand on his scars, smoothing them. “I’d say I’m on the high end of greed with you. You’ve walked into my life, turned it upside down, and I’ve lost most of my ability to see things clearly…no thanks to you. I used to sense things before they happened. Now I’m too busy with thoughts of you. Before you swaggered back into my life, I didn’t let people too close to me, not even my family. Now I’m in a bog of people and loving every minute. I go a little lightheaded at the thought of you. I wonder how quickly I can corral you. Yes…I’d say I’m good and greedy for you.”

She lifted on tiptoe to kiss his lips, to caress the smooth, hard feel of them until they softened to her touch. “There’s no reason I should, of course. You’re arrogant, demonstrative, and you scared me badly today. I didn’t know what I’d do if anything happened to you a second time. I didn’t want to care, Alek, but I do and you’re the cause, the only cause…I love you.”

“Say it again,” he demanded, taking her hand to his lips and kissing her palm.

She leaned against him, this solid man who
was a part of her life and a part of herself. “I love you, Alek Petrovna. I know we’ll fight—I’ve grown to like a bit of spice in my life, thanks to you. You can set me off, and I’ll set you off and then we’ll make up. But there will be the quiet times, when I tell you what was in my heart back then, when we were struggling to stay together. I’ll tell you what’s in my heart for you.”

“Mmm. Sounds like a good story. I suppose I’ll pay for that contract. You’re getting good at pushing, if that horse-riding event was any indication.” Alek placed his lips on hers, promising that the good times would be there, overshadowing life’s hardships. He’d always be there for her, and she’d return the favor.

“Let’s say that it will be useful to drag up when we argue. This time is for keeps, Alek. Isn’t it?” Elspeth couldn’t help giving way to the last of her doubts.

“For keeps.” He looked up to the big, round silver moon. It had filled the night sky that way so long ago in Scotland, when they’d first met. “Looks like a perfect night after a long, hard day.”

He wanted to know about the Marrying
Moon, about what she’d said on that night long ago. But Elspeth wanted to give him that present at a moment of her own choosing….

She chose now and whispered, “See that moon? How big and bright it is, hovering over us? The legend says that ‘when the Marrying Moon is high, a scarred warrior will rise from the mists to claim his lady huntress. He will wrap her in the shawl and carry her to the Bridal Tepee and his heart.’”

Alek placed his face in the shelter of her throat and shoulder, giving himself into her care, the gesture filling her with love for him. “Thank you, Elspeth.”

She kissed his damp, curling lashes, and he kissed away the tears flowing on her cheeks. Then, with a flourish, Alek wrapped the shawl around her. He stood looking at her in the moonlight for a moment.

Pleasure rode his expression, pleasing her in turn. “You’re unpredictable, Petrovna.”

“I’m in love for the last
time,
honey. Give me a moment to enjoy my treasure, one that I’ll always cherish.” Then he bent to lift her in his arms. “Tell me the rest of the legend. I can tell by your smirk that you’re holding back.”

“I do not smirk.” She wouldn’t be easy, not with Alek Petrovna, who enjoyed a good battle. Elspeth trailed her fingertip over his lips, traced the scar and kissed it. “Submit, Alek Petrovna. You’re my love, my heart and dreams. Let me give you the best part of me, the part that’s always been yours.”

Later, after Alek had carried her to the Bridal Tepee, after they had pledged their love again and tenderly dined upon each other, unwrapping and sharing each other’s hearts, they began again in a searing heat that made them one.

This time, Alek rose above her, straining to leash his body, his hands wound in her hair. “Tell me.”

Elspeth fought the pleasure washing over her, strained to think—to give Alek what he needed—past the desires of their bodies ready to shatter in a heartbeat. “I love you, my heart, my love, my Alek.”

His lips attacked hers, hungry for her, their bodies fused together as he took them over the edge.

“Their song will last longer than the stars,’” she whispered later, wrapped in his arms as the Marrying Moon hovered in the sky.

Alek lifted her chin with the tip of
his finger. “I love you, Elspeth-mine.”

“Mmm.” Elspeth gave herself to his kiss and dived into the images there of Alek, proud of his present, another Tallchief cradle. The baby would have Alek’s black, curling hair and the Tallchiefs gray eyes—Una’s inheritance. A girl this time, the baby would look fragile in Alek’s hands, devastating him with the miracle of her birth. There would be a boy next, replacing another and astounding Alek, who would hold his one-year-old daughter close against him in one arm and his newborn son in the other arm. Tears would shimmer in his black eyes as he looked at Elspeth, and then he would tell her again that he loved her.

When the babies slept, Alek would come to Elspeth in the Kostyas’ renovated farmhouse bedroom.

They’d come full circle, and there
would be more circles, weaving their lives and love closer.

Alek smiled in the dim light. “Someday, you’ll have to tell me when the images come and share them with me. From your expression, I’d say it was a good one.”

“A very good one.”

She could have throttled Alek, a pushy man set on a quick wedding. “What? You would ask me, a Petrovna, to wait months?”

She hadn’t asked; she’d told him. So much for a logical discussion in the Bridal Tepee the next morning. After a night of making love, dozing and making love again, Elspeth had awakened to Alek packing his gear. He’d bundled her off to the farmhouse and immediately started making telephone calls to arrange their wedding.

No amount of arguing could stop him,
but Elspeth dived into the flaming arguments, delighting in them, in the passion flaring in Alek’s eyes when she did. Oh, she’d meet him on a level he understood and not on any nice, polite, shadowy, wishy-washy level, either.

She’d chosen to stand and fight, and Alek would have to reap what he had sown….

Now, a full week later—that was all the time he gave her to prepare everything for a horde of relatives and friends, including the Petrovnas’ Texas relations—Elspeth rode Delight down Amen Flats’s Main Street. Ribbons and flowers decked the horse, and she pranced, showing off. Leading the horse, Emily—Sybil’s daughter—would one day find her love.

Her hair loose and flowing
around her,
Elspeth wore LaBelle’s diamond stud earrings; Elizabeth’s long, lacy veil, topped with a tiny braided coronet from Elizabeth’s mother, fluttered in the fall air. Elspeth wore the garter her mother had given her years ago, decked with ribbons. On the lace high on her throat, Elspeth wore her mother’s favorite cameo; as a judge, Pauline had sentenced Matthew to jail wearing that cameo. A long-legged, tough Tallchief, Matthew had burst into her courtroom and called her a hard-hearted, evil woman who made him love her. Pauline had him hauled off to jail when she ordered quiet and Matthew had continued “contempt of court.” Later, in his jail cell, she’d admitted her love for him, and the cameo had always remained precious to her. Una’s shawl fluttered from the saddle horn, a fiery blaze amid the yards of pristine bridal gown.

Elspeth smoothed the gown, remembering how Talia, Sybil, Mrs. Petrovna, Lacey and a revolving sea of loving hands had fashioned the gown.

At the end of the street, waiting with a crowd of people she loved, waited her husband-to-be, dressed in a Tallchief kilt.

She wasn’t happy.
Alek had pushed and shoved, and if she hadn’t wanted the same so much and as soon, she would have pushed back so hard she’d get that swoon out of him yet.

Alek had insisted she wear a long bridal gown and veil. She knew he still thought of how he’d taken her years ago, and it was a small thing to concede. But managing the whole affair on top of Delight’s saddle was another matter. Then, because Megan wanted to ride the horse—Duncan was already making a horse-woman out of her—Elspeth held the toddler in her arms, her wedding bouquet of roses tied to the saddle horn with satin ribbons. She needed Megan’s soft, chubby body against her for support.

There Alek stood in the street, legs spread—he was wearing proper hose and brogans, unlike her brothers, who wore their western boots with their kilts. Of the lot, there was nothing tamed in the men wearing kilts, despite their ruffled shirts and tartans with broaches, Alek’s contribution. Into the broaches were tucked Mr. Petrovna’s orchids, looking extremely fragile against the blue-and-green plaid.

Duncan stood next to him, then Calum with his new daughter sleeping in his arms. Then Birk…
Ah, Birk, love is coming to you sooner than you think,
Elspeth thought, wishing that his road would be smooth. But when he finally found love, it would be strong and lasting.

Oh, she loved Alek Petrovna, Jr., more with each heartbeat, though at times in the past week, she hadn’t liked him at all. If only he hadn’t held her, rested his face in the vulnerable part of her, her throat and shoulder and told her, “I want us to be married as soon as possible. I’m dying for you, Elspeth.”

She’d gone down too easily, loving
him, letting him have his way, because it was what she wanted. The moment she’d agreed, he’d tossed her over his shoulder and strolled over to the Petrovnas next door, despite the names she’d called him. Alek had told his mother and father that Elspeth had agreed to marry him within the week, right while Elspeth was hanging upside down on his backside. She bit him, of course, on a place she hadn’t nibbled before.