Enchanted Heart (17 page)

The wind brought back his expression of admiration several times, emphasizing the word ‘love’ loudly and prominently.

Marty laughed and yelled, “I love
you
!”

Again, the wind answered, “I love
you
—you—you!”

He took her hands in his and turned her to face him and again, his look was serious again. He pulled in a breath of air before he confessed, “I love you, Marty Ingram. I knew the moment that I saw you ringing that school bell, with your hair shining in the morning sun and your face all lit up like you had something that you wanted to teach those ragamuffins. And your eyes, when they looked toward me, made my heart stop for just a moment—and it still does, whenever you look at me. But, you didn’t see me. I was in the shadows of the blacksmith shop—your father’s shop—getting my horse re-shod. No, you were smiling at your father.”

At first, Marty’s expression was one of confusion at his words. Then she remembered her recollection in the darkness about a shadowy silhouette of a man in Sven’s shop who had waved to her in the schoolyard. She wanted to tell him of her memory, of how that moment had affected her, but he continued, cutting off her words of reminiscence.

“You waved to him and for an instant, I hoped, I wished that you had waved to me,” Caid said sadly. “But I knew when he waved back that you were waving to him. I asked him who you were and he told me that you were his beautiful daughter. Then he corrected himself as if he wished that you were truly his daughter and he said that you were really his step-daughter.”

Still wanting to interject her own version of that enchanted day, but not wanting to interrupt his beautifully mesmerizing story, she clamped her mouth shut and listened.

But Caid paused then and touched his curled forefinger to her chin before he continued, “I asked him right then and there if I could marry you.”

Marty sucked in a breath of surprise and her face went white before it was replaced by dark red and she asked, “You asked my father for my hand? And you didn’t even know me yet?”

Caid nodded and admitted, “Yes. Are you angry with me?”

“N—no,” she stammered, still recovering from his confession, so much so that she forgot to tell him of her experience that same day.

“He told me that it was your decision, but he assured me that if I ever hurt you, he would hunt me down and brand me with that iron shoe in his hand,” he said with a chuckle. “I told him that I loved you too much to hurt you, ever.”

“How—how could you know that you loved me without even knowing me?” she asked, looking into his deep blue eyes. But she knew, somehow, she knew.

“I knew,” he said, placing his hand on his heart to indicate where his love originated. “In my heart, I knew.”

“Oh, Caid. This is so—so…” she could not find the words to tell him that his words had touched her heart so warmly that if she had not loved him before, she certainly did then.

But, he put up a palm to stop her before he leaned toward her to kiss her cheek and then he moved his head back in order to see her reaction before he asked, “Will you make my heart start beating again? Will you save my life?” He fell to his knees, still clutching her hands while he requested, “Will you be my wife? Will you grow old with me and love me for the rest of my life?”

This time, she was not surprised by his words, nor did his indication that they would spend eternity together spring forth fear in her heart. It was meant to be. That fateful day in the schoolyard, his intervention with the management of her wagon, the river rescue, the time-stopping kisses were all written down eons ago by some benevolent figure in their mutual book of life. Who was she to interfere with that schedule? She could not stop the tears from dripping from her dark lashes as she nodded and yelled to the Heavens, “
Yes
!”

Again, that word traveled across the valley in a resounding repetition of her joyful answer, “
Yes
—yes—yes!

Chapter Eighteen

A few hours later, they found their way back down the dome’s face to their horses and then turned their mounts toward the path that the wagon train had taken. Love followed them, no, enveloped them in an enchanted whirlwind that carried the two away from the place where they had sealed their promise to each other.

High upon the Enchanted Rock, they had almost consummated that promise. A smile welcomed a kiss, a kiss turned to embracing and embracing became insistent, ardent and fervent. Arms entangled, lips firmly vowing to venture further, they found themselves pressing their hungry bodies into the pink, enchanting rock.

Until Caid finally came to his senses.

“We shouldn’t,” he groaned while he lay with her on the warm, glistening rock face.

“But…” Marty complained with agony coursing throughout her body upon feeling his heaviness leave her and he walked to the edge. “We are engaged now.”

“Not officially,” Caid argued when he turned back to face her. His heart crushed at the sight of her saddened expression. “We should wait until we’re married. It is what your father expects. I promised him.”

“Papa Sven is not here,” she argued.

“But I am and I told him that I would not force you into a physical relationship until we are married,” he replied with anguish in his hoarse voice.

“You’re not forcing me to do anything,” she said, gripping his arm with strength that he never knew she had.

“Still, we should wait. Besides, the others are probably wondering what has happened to us.”

“I have not given them a thought in a while. It is possible that they have not thought of us either.”

“Well, just the same, we’d better catch up to them,” Caid said with a quick kiss on her lips.

Marty allowed him to lead her back down the giant rock and to the horses that grazed in the meadow below. But her thoughts were on the bliss that could have occurred upon that enchanting rock.

But as they rode, it occurred to Marty that she knew very little about the man for whom she had professed her love and to whom she had promised to love forever. She furrowed her brow and blurted out the words before she thought about what she was asking, “Who are you? Where do you live? What is your background? Who are your parents, your grandparents?”

Caid pulled back on the reins, surprised by the barrage of questions coming from her, but he knew that they were justified. He drew in a breath to answer her, but she interrupted.

“I mean, I can trace my ancestors back for generations. I have a loving mother, a gentle twin sister, an adoring step-father and a sweet niece. You know all of this about me. I know nothing about you except the fact that your mother turned you away from her and your Grammy took you in,” she said all in one breath.

“Well,” Caid said as he slowed his mount to walk beside hers. “My father, as I told you before, was a gambler. He left my mother when she was about to give birth to me, proving that he knew that she was with child and that he did not care about either of us. She had to get a job as a teacher to support us.”

He looked at her to see if she would react to the fact that his mother had something in common with her, but she only lifted her eyebrow and nodded for him to continue, so he did, “My brother, as you know, died in the War. I have no other siblings.”

He took a breath as if the thought of losing his brother weighed heavily on his mind, and then he sighed before continuing, “Yes, my Grammy took me in when my mother sent me packing.”

For long moments, as if reliving that time in his life, he stared at his fist that enveloped the saddle horn. Whether it squeezed harder on its own because of the way his mother had treated him or because of the next revelation that he would utter, he did not know. He raised his head and peered at the canyons ahead and continued, “Then, Grammy died soon after that, leaving me with a huge house to tend. When I had enough of that, I left it in the capable hands of our butler, Mr. Ames. She left me with too much money for one man to spend in a lifetime and too little love for any of my relatives to give it to them.”

Marty tilted her head while she asked, “Relatives on your mother’s side?”

“Yep,” Caid said with a nod. “I don’t think even Mother knew my father’s relatives.” He waved his hand as if to dismiss his father’s kin’s significance and then went back to his story, “I left Vermont and went west to see if there was any gold left, not that I needed it, but it just seemed like an adventure. When I tired of that, I became a ranch hand driving cattle to the railroads. Then, I rode in the Texas leg of the Pony Express until the telegraph made that mode of communication obsolete. When I was riding through central Texas, I learned to speak German because folks around there refuse to learn English.”

He gave her a sideways look to see if she would react to his last statement, then continued, “I lived up near Dallas for two years and traveled across the state several times. I’ve met a bucketful of Indians and a handful of banditos, which tried their best to kill me. I ran with the Texas Rangers for a month or two, but never enlisted.”

Marty narrowed her eyes and declared, “I’m glad you didn’t. It seems very dangerous.”

Caid pursed his lips and told her, “I don’t give much thought to the dangers in the things I do. I just plain do them.”

Marty thought before she interrupted his next speech that he would have to change that attitude after he was married. But she thought better of it and listened to him intently when he mentioned her home town.

“…and, I was riding through New Braunfels after I turned thirty. I guess maturity and sensibility made me decide that my rambling days were over and I was headed back East to die a lonely but ridiculously wealthy man. My horse threw a shoe just outside of town so I had to stop in at the blacksmith’s shop and there, across the street, I saw the most beautiful vision that I’d ever laid eyes on.” He smiled while staring at her, his eyes boring into her soul when he winked and uttered, “It was you!”

She ducked her head with sudden shyness, which had never happened in her life before that wink. But the gleaming smile that he flashed her while he leaned on the horn of the saddle gave her a reason to listen while he continued his enchanting tale.

“When I heard that there was a wagon train headed toward San Saba, I offered my services and when I found out that the love of my life was also going, my heart almost burst with happiness! That was the moment that I realized that I was not in control of my own future even though I was determined to be.”

Marty tilted her head with a puzzled expression but before she could inquire verbally, he interrupted with a lift of his black brow, “That was when I knew in my heart and in my soul that you were in charge of my destiny.”

Marty drew in a breath to protest, to argue that if it had not been for his intervention, she would never have come to know him, to love him. But again, he elaborated, “I was—what is the word that I’m looking for?”

She waited while he searched his mind for the term; her heart stopped its beating until he said it quickly, as if finding a treasure in the recesses of his mind, “Possessed!”

Marty giggled while she asked, “Possessed?”

He shook his head as if that was not the word he was looking for while he ran his fingers through his hair and threw more words out, “Infatuated, intrigued, fascinated captivated…”

“Enchanted?” Marty interjected, suddenly remembering the name of that all-encompassing and magical rock behind them.

He had taken in a long breath after spouting so many words so quickly and he held it as if mesmerized by the word that she had spoken. Suddenly, he poked the air with his forefinger and exclaimed, “That’s it!”

Marty jumped in surprise and so did the horse beneath her. Caid leaned over and calmed the animal down with a pat of his large hand before he said in a quiet voice, “I was enchanted by your beauty, by the way you carried yourself, by the way that you looked after those children in the schoolyard.”

He rubbed his fingertips on his chin while he recalled the sensation that had overcome him that day. Then, he eased his horse closer to hers and took her face into his palm while he softly told her, “That was when I knew that I had to spend my life with you. That was when I realized that you controlled my life. I knew that if you didn’t love me or even notice me, I would surely die. You are the only reason that I didn’t go home and wither away, empty and alone.”

“Caid, I’m not that worthy of your…” Marty began, but he cut her off by putting his fingers on her lips.

“You are,” he assured her, emphasizing the last word. Then, he leaned further toward her until his lips found hers to stress the sentiment.

He pulled back just enough to stare into her sky-blue eyes and repeat, “You are, Marty, my love.”

Deciding not to argue with him, or overwhelmed by his words and his actions, Marty could only stare back at him while the love in her heart grew to boundless measures. Mesmerized, she watched him move back to balance himself in the saddle and take the reins into his hands while he nudged the chestnut stallion into a walk. Without her asking it to, the gelding beneath her followed behind Caid’s horse as if led by an invisible rope.

When she urged the horse to move alongside Caid, she darted her eyes at him and asked, “Surely, if I had not fallen in love with you, you would have kept trying?”

He winked at her and nodded admitting, “Without a doubt.”

Marty smiled back at him and stretched her hand toward him, silently bonding her heart to his. He took it, held it lovingly in his palm before he leaned over to kiss her hand and while raising his eyes to her, he revealed, “Until I died.”

A long, blissful interval passed while they stared at each other, enchanted by the love that inspired their union. Silently, they agreed that while Fate had brought them together, it had been Caid’s persistent pursuit of her heart that had spurred their bond into motion but it had been Marty’s adoring response that had ultimately decided their destiny.