Authors: Traitorous Hearts
"Yeah," added the boy next to him. "She's a carrot.
Long and skinny and
orange..."
"I'm not orange! I just want Pickles. If you don't give her
to me, I'll—"
"Hello."
The boys jumped abruptly, turning guilty faces toward the
newcomer. They visibly relaxed when they saw it was Jon.
The towheaded boy, apparently the self-appointed leader of the
gang, puffed out his small chest and stepped forward. "I know you."
"You do?" Jon said mildly.
"Yeah. You're that stupid lobsterback. The one who shot the
tree."
"I'm Jon. What are you doing?"
"Aw, nothin'." He shuffled his feet. "Jes'
playin'."
"Oh." Jon grinned. "That's good. Thought maybe
you'd hurt the kitten."
"Naw," he said, an innocent look on his face. "We
was just teasin'."
"Good." Jon crossed his arms over his chest, towering
over the boys, who came barely to his hip. "Because, y'know, little
kittens and girls and other things that are small and alone sometimes got big
fathers and uncles and friends."
"Jimmy," whispered another little boy, poking the leader
in his side. "What if'n her father finds out?"
"Her father, nothin'," said a third. "What about
Bennie?..."
"Don't worry about it." Jimmy gave the little girl a
hard glare. "She ain't gonna tell nobody. Are ya, Sarah?"
Sarah sniffled and wiped her sleeve across her eyes. "I want
Pickles."
Jimmy frowned and dumped the tiny gray puff of fur into Sarah's
waiting hands.
"Don't you boys think you'd better go back and find your
parents?" Jon suggested.
"Huh," Jimmy said belligerently. "We ain't gotta do
somethin' jes cause you say, you lousy redcoat! We—"
When Jon's hand clamped down on Jimmy's shoulder, he gulped. The
man might be a stupid lobsterback, but he was a big stupid lobsterback.
"We're goin'."
Once the boys had scrambled around the corner, Jon knelt by Sarah,
who was clutching her kitten to her chest. "Are you all right?"
She sniffed. "I think so."
"And Pickles?"
"I don't know." She cuddled the mewling kitten, not
seeming to notice the sharp little claws digging into her skin, and looked up
at him. "Please, mister, don't tell anyone."
"Why not?" he asked, wondering at the strange request.
"Oh, please," she begged, her eyes beginning to shimmer
again. "You can't!"
Out of the corner of his eye, Jon caught a twitch of green coming
around the corner of the school behind Sarah. Beth flew into his line of
vision, her skirts clutched in both hands, her face set with grim
determination. Anger and fierce protectiveness flashed in her eyes, and Jon
could tell she was ready to lay into any little boy she got her hands on. This
was not the quiet, controlled woman he'd seen in the tavern; here was the deep
fire he'd sensed in her music.
Jon threw up his hand, motioning her to stop. When she did, he
lifted a finger to his lips and jerked his head toward the wall. Beth frowned
but stayed put, standing near the spot he'd indicated. She held her body
tensely, as if ready to jump in at the first sign of trouble.
Jon returned his attention to Sarah, who stood holding her kitten
to her cheek, her small shoulders still shaking.
"Can I see your cat?"
Sarah slowly lifted her face, her blue eyes swimming with tears.
"Are you gonna hurt her, too?"
"No." Jon reached out a finger and tested the delicate, smoke-colored
tufts of fur on the kitten's back. "Did the boys hurt her?"
"I think so. They threw her up in the air an' let her fall,
an' now she's cryin'."
"Let me see." He held out his hand, palm up.
Sarah studied his hand. He waited patiently, not moving. Finally,
she gave a tentative smile and carefully deposited the kitten in his hand.
The kitten, so small it must barely be old enough to be away from
her mother, gave one last yelp and quit mewling. She investigated her new
perch, delicately tapping the pad of Jon's palm with her paw, her nose
twitching, her tail swishing back and forth.
The kitten nuzzled Jon's skin, and Pickles's tiny pink tongue came
out to daintily test the unfamiliar substance.
"She tickles."
Sarah gave a watery giggle. "She does, doesn't she?"
The kitten evidently decided Jon wasn't edible. Lifting her head,
Pickles curled around and around on Jon's hand before settling down into a
tight ball of fluff. She was the dark, smooth gray of a warm, cloudy autumn
sky, and she looked ridiculously tiny in Jon's big palm. Jon felt a faint,
gentle vibration as the kitten began to purr.
"She likes you," Sarah said.
"Do you think so?" With the forefinger of his other
hand, Jon lightly stroked the kitten's back. "How about you, Sarah? Are
you feeling better?"
"Some." She wiped her forearm across her nose and
sniffled again.
"What's the matter? Are you hurt?"
"No." Her shoulders drooped. "But I cried."
"People cry when they're sad, Sarah."
Sarah scrunched up her freckled nose. "Do you?"
Jon's throat tightened as he fought the memory of when he'd been
not much older than Sarah and it seemed as if he'd done nothing but cry.
"Sometimes. Everybody cries sometimes."
"Not Bennie," Sarah asserted.
"Bennie?" Jon lifted his gaze to Beth. Leaning
comfortably against the schoolhouse, she looked relaxed, her calm restored. At
his questioning look, she shrugged. "Never?"
"Never," Sarah said with conviction.
"That why you didn't want anyone to know?"
"Yeah."
"I won't tell," he assured her. "Here." Jon
deposited the kitten into Sara's hands. "Maybe you should find your mother
now."
"Thank you, Mr...."
"Jon."
"Mr. Jon." Sarah whirled and skipped awkwardly away,
smiling brightly when she caught sight of Bennie. "Oh, hi, Auntie Bennie.
This is my new friend. His name is Jon."
"Yes, I know, Sarah. He's a friend of mine too."
"Is he? I don't know why Grandpa always says the redcoats are
bad men. Jon's nice. He's pretty, too, don't you think, Aunt Bennie?"
"Ah..." Bennie felt her cheeks heat. "Why, yes,
he's pretty."
"I'm going back to the mustering. Are you coming?"
"Soon."
Bennie watched her niece run toward the meadow, her kitten tucked
in her arms. Although her brothers were proving every bit as good at producing
boys as their father was, Adam had managed to have one girl in the midst of
siring miniature versions of himself.
Sarah was Bennie's only niece, and she reminded Bennie so much of
herself. Taller than the other children her age, with big hands and feet that
Bennie was terribly afraid she would grow into, Sarah had the added
disadvantage of having inherited her mother's blazing hair. Bennie knew too
well what the next few years were going to be like for her niece and silently
vowed to make them as easy for Sarah as she could.
"Hello, Beth." Jon's deep voice rumbled behind her.
Bennie smoothed her hands over the wild mess of her hair, finding her quick run
from the meadow had left it hopelessly tangled. She closed her eyes briefly—had
he heard her call him pretty?—and turned.
She shouldn't have worried. He was grinning at her as always,
openness shining from every beautiful plane of his face. "Ta-da!" he
said triumphantly. "You came to rescue her?"
"Well, yes."
"How did you know?"
"To come?" He bobbed his head in response to her
question. "Oh, Adam came to get me. He saw the boys bothering his sister
and ran and found me."
"Why you?"
"Me? I'm a little protective, I guess. About my family. The
boys have sort of gotten in the habit of coming to me, because, well, their
fathers sort of expect them to handle things themselves."
He'd been walking toward her, all the time she was talking, and
now he was close to her; oh, so close to her. His chest filled her vision, and
all she would have to do was reach out to touch him.
He braced an arm against the wall beside her head, nearly caging
her in. He loomed over her, and if he had been anyone else, she might have been
frightened.
But this was Jon, and she wasn't frightened, even if her heart was
pounding just as if she were. She wondered at this compulsion to touch him; the
memory of her arms around him by the creek was so clear and vivid she could
still feel it.
It wasn't only that he was beautiful. It was his purity of spirit
that drew her; Jon would never judge and find wanting. He would only like, and
enjoy, and accept.
She lifted her face to his. She could see the rough, dark stubble
on the elegant, defined planes of his chin, and the lush, straight fringe of
mink-brown lashes. His eyes were pale, pale blue, like thick ice in the deepest
part of winter, when spring is only a dream.
He brushed his knuckle under her eye, as if wiping away a tear, a
touch so slow and gentle it felt as soft as that tear would, tracing down her
skin. She tilted her head, seeking more of his touch.
"Beth." He moved his hand to her other cheek, slipping
his finger along the lashes rimming her lower lid, but never in danger of
coming too close to her eye. "You never cry?"
"Oh." There were tiny nicks marring the perfection of
his chin. He'd hurt himself shaving, and she gave in to the impulse to smooth
her fingers soothingly over the cuts. "I... not for a long time. My
brothers used to have great fun seeing if they could make me wail. After a
while, I learned not to show what I was feeling."
His skin was rough with the day's growth of beard; prickly,
ticklish, masculine. The touch of her fingers became the touch of her palm; she
cupped his cheek in her hand.
"Sometimes," he said, his voice rough and mesmerizing,
"sometimes, it's good to let the feelings out."
There was a flash in his eyes, a bolt of spring sky in the winter
ice. He dropped his hand abruptly and stepped back, a sudden, jarring motion.
"Are they done shooting?"
"What?" Bennie shook her head in confusion at the
precipitate change of topic. "Oh, yes, I believe so."
"What's next?"
"Ah, knife throwing, I think."
"Good. I must go now. Coming?"
He turned and strode away, his long legs eating up the distance in
great chunks. Bennie hurried along beside him, wondering when her gentle friend
had become so enamored of sharp weapons.
***
Jon leaned against an old denuded oak tree, staring down at the
blood flowing freely between his thumb and forefinger. Damn. He'd meant only to
give himself a bit of a nick. Seems he'd gotten a bit overenthusiastic.
Back beside the school, he'd had to get away from Beth before he
did something stupid. So he'd rushed off to the knife throwing competition,
Beth trailing along in his wake. When they'd reached the meadow he'd
immediately plunged into a group of soldiers, leaving Beth to join her family.
But then he'd seen some skinny little dark-haired fellow smile at
her. And when that fellow had had his turn, he'd thrown his knife dead center
into the middle of the target.
On Jon's own turn, he'd taken the sharp blade between his fingers
and drawn back his arm, ready to hurl the weapon straight into the bull's-eye.
That's when he'd known he was in real trouble.
He was coming damn close to letting everything he'd worked for the
past six years get away, not to mention putting his own life in danger in the
process. He'd let the knife slip, and it had bitten deeply into his skin.
Jon ripped a ragged piece of linen off the bottom of his shirt.
Wadding it up, he pressed it against the wound, trying to staunch the flow of
blood.
He'd run off into the woods after his "accident," not
staying to hear the jeers of the spectators, not daring to glance at Beth. He
couldn't.
He was going to have to do something about her. He couldn't stay
away from her completely. It certainly hadn't worked the last time he'd tried
it. His job was going to require running across her now and again, and the
drought had made him crazier when he finally did see her.
Or he could spend as much time with her as possible, hoping
proximity would blunt her allure. Maybe she wasn't as wonderful as he kept
imagining. Not as strong, or sweet, or soft...
Soft. The skin beneath her eye had been tender, incredibly smooth,
and he'd seen her shiver when he'd touched her.
Wonderful. He jammed the rag viciously against his hand, hoping
the pain would bring him to his senses.
"You're going to make it worse."
She was there, slipping between the trees and taking his hand in
hers, her warm brown eyes soft and concerned. She peeled away the cloth,
wincing when she saw the gash in his skin.