Hard Rain (7 page)

“Four.” Jesse slid the candies into the middle of the countertop between them.

Amy nodded approval as she added her candies to the pile. “Feeling lucky, Sheriff?” She grinned at him.

The smile he gave her almost toppled her off her stool. “Quit stalling. Place your bet and take your punishment.”

She laughed easily, the kind of laugh that seeped into a man’s bones and turned them soft. One grin and she had him. Jesse would tell her the truth, tell her everything before the night was over, but not yet. He did not know what would happen once he did, but for the moment, he would not worry. He would sit here, the woman he’d always loved across from him, and be grateful. He’d been given a wonderful gift. It might not last long, possibly only a few hours at the most. Plus, he’d already wasted a day trying to keep his secret safe and protect Amy from the truth. A whole day—so much more than he had ever expected to receive. He now realized God in his strange, mysterious ways had answered his untold prayers and given Amy back to him—if only for a few hours.

Feeling lucky?
She’d asked him. He looked at her and smiled. She had no idea.

Outside the storm raged around them, the winds thunderous, the darkness almost complete. Inside, in the lanterns’ light, Jesse watched Amy study her cards with the intensity she applied to everything. When she looked up, her eyes took a moment to focus. A flash of surprise lit their blue-green depths as if she was startled to see him there. She smiled, turning Jesse to Jell-O, as she laid two cards face down. “I’ll take two.”

He watched her as she slid over the new cards. Her eyes still on him, she picked them up. Her gaze flickered to the cards, her expression revealing nothing. She inserted them into her hand, shuffled another card to the opposite side. She looked up at him, her hand of cards held close, her smile mysterious. She added two more candies to the pile.

“Feeling lucky,” he teased her, wanting the smile to remain on her face.

“You’ll rue the day I walked into your tiny town, Sheriff.”

He kept smiling as he discarded and drew one card from the deck, afraid if he didn’t, the anguish inside him would spill over, out his every emotion. He met her bet.

“Call?” she asked.

He nodded.

“Read ’em and weep, Sheriff.” She fanned her cards onto the counter. “Three of a kind. All ladies.”

He sighed as he stacked his cards face down. “Beats my two deuces.”

“Come to Momma, my little beauties.” Amy wrapped her hands around the pile of Good & Plenty candies and slid them toward her. Jesse gathered the
cards—including his own hand with a king high flush—into the deck. Watching her delight at winning was worth risking his soul for a white lie.

She pushed four candies into the space between them. “Ante up, lawman.” She smiled.

Oh yes, he thought as he added his share to the pot, he’d go to hell and back just for her smile. Their gazes locked, held too long. Their isolation, the intimacy of being cut off from everything except each other seemed to pulse in the air like a living, breathing entity. Her smile turned puzzled, as if she felt the connection but didn’t understand why. He looked down, concentrated on dealing a new hand.

“So, are all your family around here, your mom and dad, sisters, brothers?”

Here we go again,
Jesse thought. “All that I know about.” He wasn’t ready to reveal more.

She raised a brow as she looked at him over her hand. “You suspect there’s some you don’t know about?”

“Just a figure of speech. How many?” He nodded toward her hand, turning the attention back to the game.

She laid her cards down, her eyes staying on him. “Three.”

He dealt her the cards.

She slipped the cards into her hand. “How many relatives are around here? And are they all as ornery as you?” She added two candies to the pile between them.

“No one’s as ornery as me.” He slapped down two cards, picked replacements off the top of the deck.

“How about tight-lipped?”

He slid the cards one at a time into his hand, keeping his eyes on her. “I like to play my cards close to the chest.” He met her bet and raised her by two. “Call?”

She shifted her gaze to study her hand. Her eyes raised to study him. “You’re bluffing.”

She referred to more than the game. “Prove it,” he challenged.

He saw the gleam in her eye and realized his mistake. Nothing got her juices flowing more than a challenge. She met his bet and raised it by two. She leaned back with a satisfied smile, enjoying herself.

This time he did only have a pair of threes. She’d done it again. Seen right through him. Fourteen years later and he still hadn’t learned a damn thing. He should fold.

He met her bet, raised her three, playing another game now.

He leaned back on the stool with the air of a pleased man. “Take your best shot.”

She studied her cards for several seconds before she looked up at him. No smile now. Only an intensity to her eyes that mesmerized him. He did not move, even as she leaned forward and pressed her mouth to his.

Shock rippled through him. Still he did not pull away but leaned into her, tasting her sweet lips and thinking no farther. He heard her own gasping intake of breath and knew she shared his shock. She stood, as if needing to get closer to him, even as they both knew they should pull away, had to pull away.

He rose to meet her, need driving him now as it
drove her. It had always been like that between them. Explosive. Fourteen years and the wide separation that had become their lives disappeared beneath the touch of flesh to flesh, two mouths melded together, opening, tasting, drinking, greedy with a power and drive equal to the storm around them. A storm that moved inside them now.

The cards and candy scattered as he cleared the counter to ease her up onto it, his tongue delving deeper, his hands eagerly touching, taking what they’d ached to do since he’d first seen her. She responded with similar fire, exploring him, her need as agonizing as his. But not like this. Not without her knowing the truth. He had to stop.

Her hands roamed along his shoulders. Anxious fingertips explored his back, his chest, as if discovering a new treasure. He propped her up on the counter. Her legs wrapped around him, pulling him tight to her while their mouths stayed locked, never leaving each other but drinking deeper, the need too great, too long unfulfilled, too long denied.

He had to stop. He would not, could not go on without her knowing the truth. He had to stop now before it was too late. Yet he couldn’t.

She reached for his hand and placed it on her breast, pressing her softness into his palm. Her body arched, her legs tightened as if she couldn’t get him close enough. He feared it was too late. The crash outside, the tremble of the building that caused her breath to hitch and her body to jerk with surprise called him back, allowed him the second to gain control. He wrenched his mouth
from hers, his breathing ragged. Her legs loosened, went limp as a rag doll’s as she pulled back from him. He stepped away, needing space now. Her lips were thick from his kisses, her cheeks flushed. He had to tell her now.

“Amy—”

Her eyes lost their glazed look. “It’s you. You bastard. It’s you.”

O
UTSIDE
, another crash sounded. Inside, Amy’s world collapsed. The moment her lips had touched his, she’d known the truth. No man had ever made her lose control the way Jesse Boone had—not fourteen years ago, not now. Even standing before him now, she still wanted him more than she’d ever wanted any man in her life.

“You bastard,” she cursed him again. She drew on her anger, fanned it high for fear other emotions would take its place. She glared at him. Inside she could feel herself falling, crumbling like an object that had gotten too close to the fire and was now ashes.

“Why?” She spat the question out at him. Their breathing was shallow, their chests heaving from desire and emotion. “Why?” She began to tremble in her fury. Outside the wind rode high with ear-splitting thunder.

“I was with my father on a job in Salt Lake. He was working off the books, laying pipe in a new apartment complex. I helped out after school, Saturdays, carrying pipe, doing the heavy work. The project was three months behind, and everyone was scrambling to get it
done. We were working on the fifth floor. My father sweating joints, me running pipe.” He kept his voice level, his gaze steady on her face. His face showed nothing. He’d had fourteen years to tell this story; he could do so without emotion.

“They weren’t sure what happened. They think there must have been a hole in the line of the hand-held tank my father was using and gas had been leaking out steadily. Anything could have ignited it, a hot piece of solder, a spark. The tank exploded.”

Acid-tongued flames and suffocating smoke. Jesse on his knees, crawling, inching forward. His vision going black as he groped blindly toward his father. Reaching the head, tugging, the flames closing in, the sizzling heat, the smoke.

“The scaffolding hadn’t been set properly.” His voice was flat, void of expression.

“You fell five stories?”

He released her hand. Her arm dangled at her side.

“Your father?”

Jesse glanced away, then back at her. He shook his head.

“I was in and out of consciousness the first few weeks from the dope to kill the pain. They learned from my father’s records that he had a brother, only known relative. The hospital contacted him. He offered to take me in once I was ready to leave the hospital. A few months later I was out of danger enough to be transferred to a Texas hospital.”

Amy dropped onto the stool, the assault of emotions draining her.

“When the scaffolding broke, I fell onto heavy equipment. My back was broken in three spots, one leg crushed. The doctors didn’t think I would ever walk again. It took six years to prove them wrong.”

Amy’s medical training told her he shouldn’t have walked again. In fact, he shouldn’t have survived.

“There were lacerations, contusions, a punctured lung…”

“Your face?” Amy asked softly.

“Shattered by the fall.”

She touched his cheekbone. “Reconstructed by plastic surgery.”

He nodded.

She drew her hand back from his face and stood, paced a few steps. “All these years. All this time. Didn’t you think I had a right…” Her voice quavered. She looked back at him. “Why, Jesse? Why?”

Her expression turned hard. “Even today, did you have any intention of telling me the truth?”

“I saw you this morning and realized you had done as I’d hoped. Become a doctor, created a life for yourself, achieved your dreams. What right did I have to try and turn that life upside down? What would have been the point of telling you the truth and risk hurting you again?”

Amy shook her head. “You don’t understand.”

“It’s been fourteen years. What good would it have done to tell you the truth now?”

“What good would it have done? I would have known the truth. I deserved that much.” Her voice cracked. She turned away. “I loved you.”

“I loved you, Amy.”

She spun around, her gaze sharp. “Don’t you dare, Jesse. Don’t you dare tell me that you loved me. Do you know how long, how many nights, how many tears…” She broke off, moved toward the windows. She turned her back to him, facing the storm. Her arms wrapped around her waist and she held herself.

“Amy?” She felt the tentative touch of his fingertips on her shoulder. She should step away. She didn’t move.

All was black outside. The wind surged stronger than she’d imagined possible.

“Come away from the window, Amy.”

At first, she thought it was only her body trembling as she reeled from shock, but the tremors surrounded her now, the floorboards and wall joints shaking from the storm. She stepped away from the window as Jesse asked, and tried to still her body. She could hear thrumming sounds and hard pings when objects hit the sides of the house, as if knocking to come in. She looked at Jesse. His grim expression answered her. If the storm had shifted, it might have missed Corpus Christi, but it had not made it as far as the Mexican border. It was now heading straight for the shore area where Amy and Jesse were stranded. Soon it would be pounding on the front steps. But for now, the hurricane was inside her.

She faced her first love. In the muted light, his scars were still visible. The aftermath of his accident, the pain that would not go away was in his eyes. Now it was her pain too. Added to the fourteen years of questions without answers, tear-filled nights, angry pleas,
unanswered prayers. Fourteen years of the pain of a heart missing its other half.

He extinguished one lantern, but left the other until the storm hit, postponing using the portable lights as long as possible to conserve batteries. He faced her again. “The storeroom should be the safest place. There are no windows.”

He had not asked her forgiveness. She did not know if she could answer him if he did. The strong and violent emotions had leveled off now, leaving her body physically weak. The wind howled against the walls. The windows rattled. There was not much time left.

She stared at Jesse’s face, so unlike the face of his youth. She searched for the boy she knew, saw the man he’d become. All those years lost. A new wrenching pain twisted her gut.

She knew there was a plea in her eyes, and she heard a plaintive keen in her voice as she said, “I don’t understand. Why?”

The pain inside her was mirrored in his eyes, eyes she now recognized as belonging to the boy she’d known. She stepped back. The deep blue of his eyes went black with grief. He closed them for a long moment as if overwhelmed. When he opened them again, she saw he had regained control.

“You would have come,” he said flatly.

“Yes.”

“You would have stayed by my side through every operation, every hateful procedure, every humiliating helplessness.”

“Yes,” she answered, although she knew he had not asked a question. “I would never have left you.”

She meant to hurt him, her anger still too fresh and irreconcilable. The pain in his eyes told her she had done so.

“No, you wouldn’t have abandoned me. You would have given up your scholarship, school, your career, your dream of being a doctor.”

She said nothing. They both knew it was true.

“For what?” he asked.

“For us.” Her answer sparked a fresh flash of pain in his eyes.

“No. I couldn’t allow that.”

Behind him she saw the windows take on a strange shape, as if bowing inward from the pressure of the wind. Inside her, her anger and pain gathered new fury. “What gave you the right to make that choice for both of us?”

“There was a big chance I would never walk again. Even if I did, it would have been years and years of surgery, hospital rooms, recovery time, therapy, setbacks, frustration, disappointment. I didn’t know if I would ever be able to hold a job again. I didn’t know if I would be able even to do a simple task like take out the garbage.” He paused. “Pleasure a woman, father a child. Is that what you wanted, Amy?”

Her body had tensed as if to ward off the reality of his words. When they stopped, she bowed her head as if unable to withstand any more and answered him.

“I wanted you.”

Her voice was small, quiet, contrasting with the
mounting fury outside. The building made a grinding, straining sound against the storm. Amy’s heart made the same pathetic protest inside her, unable to accept what she had learned.

Lightning flashed outside the windows. In the brief burst of light, she saw a huge tree upended, its root system higher than the windows, clods of dirt as big as cars shaking from its roots. Amy thought wildly of the people gathered down by the pier and prayed they had come to their senses long before this. And as for the boys…

Jesse grabbed her arm but she jerked it away. “Don’t touch me,” she hissed. The queer satisfaction she felt at the bleakness that passed across his features was soon replaced by her own anguish.

“We’ve got to get in the storage room.” He blew out the remaining lantern. The darkness inside matched the darkness outside. Disoriented, Amy waited until her eyes adjusted to the full blackness of the hurricane. A light beam cut through the dark. She saw Jesse standing there like a savior. He swung the beam toward the kitchen. The odd pot and pan rattled in the cupboards. Chairs toppled, and cans and boxes fell off the counters as the hurricane pawed to get in.

“The storage room,” Jesse yelled. “Now.”

She grabbed the small flashlight with her free hand and circled its light around the room and the supplies they’d carried in, as if checking to see what could save her. Nothing. She looked at the items she’d arranged in precise order, now scattered in disarray.

She looked at Jesse. He was watching her, waiting.
From outside came the thunderous gibberish of howls and wails like hell itself.

“Amy?”

She moved toward him, stopping in front of him so close she saw the tension in his muscles, the restrained rise and fall of his chest.

Anger and bitterness were gone from her voice, leaving only defeat. “I wanted you, Jess.”

He followed her into the storage room, their lights leading the way. Amy settled down on a blanket, propping a pillow beneath her back. She switched off the flashlight. Jesse’s light scanned the narrow walls, high ceiling. He panned it across the kitchen.

“Sit down, Sheriff,” Amy said in a flat voice. “Nothing else can be done now.”

His gaze fell on her. His expression was hard to read, the muted light making him a mystery. He propped a pillow against the opposite wall. Their legs were drawn up to their chests. Three feet separated them.

“We’ll leave the door open for now,” he said.

She stared at him. “Tell me more,” she said plaintively.

“Amy—” He gentled his voice as if to placate her.

“Tell me everything,” she said, steel in her tone. “You woke to vertebral fractures, comminuted fractures of the leg, facial lacerations, intra-oral lacerations, avulsed teeth, fractured facial bones, fractured jaws…”

She laundry-listed the possible injuries as if knowing more, knowing everything could make her understand, could wipe away the loss of fourteen years.

“What was the hospital? Small? Community? Surely, your injuries would have required the skills of a large medical center.”

He watched her as she rose on her knees and came closer to him, examining his features with a critical eye. He didn’t flinch as she snapped on the flashlight. He remained stolid as she traced his scars, first with the light, then with her fingers, seeing new ones that had been so expertly stitched, they hadn’t left a seam. Only the whiteness of new tissue. She turned his head to the left, the right, her flashlight held high, illuminating the scars hidden along the hairline, behind the ears, down the neck.

She set the flashlight down, its light now aimed on Jesse’s body. Her gaze locked with his as she unfastened the top button of his shirt. She saw his muscles tense. She undid the next button and the next, pulling the shirt out of the waistband of his pants, spreading it open. A light layer of dark curling hair veed along the muscles, unable to hide the scars. She pushed the shirt off his shoulders, all the way down as she moved behind him. She repositioned the flashlight, then sucked in a breath as she saw the thick puckered scar along his spine. Her professional objectivity failed her, and the woman she was let the tears slide down her face. She reached out, touched the wound. The tension in Jesse’s shoulders forced him still.

“Jesus,” she whispered. Her voice caught in a sob. She leaned down and pressed her mouth to the wide swath of skin, felt his sharp intake of breath. Her mouth moved blindly up his spinal cord, the tender skin twisted by both injuries and surgery. Her fingers crept
up his arms, across his shoulders, as if by touching, tasting his flesh, his pain, she could understand how he could have abandoned her, how fourteen years that should have been theirs had been lost. At last she pulled back and sat on her haunches, shaking with confusion and fear, fury and desire. Then she leaned forward and rested her cheek on his broad back, beautiful in its agony, marked with suffering. He remained still as the wind beat against the walls and she sat trembling behind him. She felt the power that had allowed him to survive his accident.

He half rose and turned to her. She could see the strength in his face now, in his steady expression.

“I’m not saying what I did was right. I’m not saying I didn’t know it would cause you pain. But I’m not saying I’m sorry. When I walked into the firehouse this morning and saw you, a beautiful woman, an accomplished doctor, I was not sorry.”

She bowed her head. He came to her, crouched down and gathered her in his arms. She could not fight him off even if she’d wanted to. He stroked her hair, his touch light. She’d remembered the passion, the pain. She’d forgotten the sweetness.

“I’m not sorry, Amy.”

She laid her head against his chest and wept.

She heard a train coming straight at them. Lifting her head, she looked into Jesse’s eyes. The building, its walls shaking and windows rattling before in nervousness, now began to crack. She heard glass breaking, shingles being ripped off, and all around them, the very air shaking with an inhuman force.

“Lie down,” Jesse ordered.

She did as he said, lying flat on her stomach, the floorboards beneath her trembling so hard she didn’t know how they stayed together. She heard the storage-room door slam. A tree fell, clipped the roof. Amy swallowed the scream in her throat.