younger, he believed, than she’d claimed to be in her letters. He snorted softly. If she was twenty-eight, he was a cornstalk.
I have to be patient,
he told himself.
I have to give her time.
That solution was disturbing because of the evidence he had before him, in the persons of those two disparate children, that Hetty had a wandering eye. Was that why she’d wanted—needed—to leave Cheyenne? Had she been involved in some scandal with yet another man? What if she found someone more attractive to love, or make love to, before she fell in love with him?
Like Dennis.
Karl felt anew the
annoyance
—no, that word didn’t begin to describe his feelings—the
anger
he’d experienced when his friend had kissed his bride so soundly. Kisses meant nothing to Dennis. By the time his friend was seventeen and had left to seek his fortune as Jonas’s man, Dennis had cut a wide swath through the willing girls in their neighborhood. Dennis had never questioned whether a woman found him attractive. He knew he was.
To Dennis, kisses were like stones along a riverbed, plentiful and common. To Karl, they were something precious, to be shared with someone special, like your brand-new wife. Karl hadn’t kissed Hetty on the lips at the church because he’d wanted their first kiss as husband and wife to be savored between them in private.
Or maybe you had some inkling she might be unwilling, and you didn’t want to be embarrassed if she turned her head.
That hadn’t stopped his friend. Dennis had simply
given
her the kiss, as though Hetty would be happy to have it. Or maybe
taken
the kiss, as though Hetty wouldn’t mind having it stolen.
Karl resented the hell out of having it stolen. Not that he’d ever say anything to Dennis. His friend would only laugh at him for being ridiculous. Dennis didn’t take much of anything seriously. Except work. He took his work very seriously. His impressive physical appearance he simply took for granted.
Karl had compared himself all his life to Dennis and inevitably found himself wanting. Nevertheless, he’d kept Dennis as a friend because he would have felt petty cutting the acquaintance simply because he felt self-conscious—usually invisible—standing next to Dennis in a roomful of people.
Intellectually, Karl knew that looks didn’t define a person. Character and kindness and intelligence and imagination and a hundred other things were far more meaningful in a relationship. Except, even in his chosen life’s work, the study of flowers and trees and plants of every kind, appearance counted. The most colorful flowers attracted the most birds and butterflies and bees, which pollinated them, thus guaranteeing survival of the most stunning examples of the species.
Nature knew what it was doing.
Karl fisted his hands and clenched his teeth. He had to stop worrying about something over which he had no control. His wife would either fall in love with him, or she wouldn’t.
Hetty moaned again in her sleep, and Karl carefully turned on his side to observe her in the moonlight streaming through the hotel window.
Her skin was flawless. Her nose was small and straight. Her eyelashes were long and lush and lay on high, wide cheekbones. Her lips were full and tempted him to taste them. A riot of curls framed her heart-shaped face on the pillow. Her shoulders, one of which was bared by the too-large nightgown were…He was forming the words
creamy smooth
in his mind but stopped when he saw a puckered area of skin just below the line of her nightgown. He reached out and carefully moved the flannel lower, so he could see better in the moonlight.
It was a scar all right, a bad one. He surveyed the jagged circle of shiny, raised skin, which appeared to be only part of a terrible, newly healed wound. Bullet? Knife? The possibility that his new wife had recently been attacked seemed preposterous. Except, right there before his eyes was the wound to prove it had happened.
More alarming than the
I have to be patient,
he told himself.
I have to give her time.
That solution was disturbing because of the evidence he had before him, in the persons of those two disparate children, that Hetty had a wandering eye. Was that why she’d wanted—needed—to leave Cheyenne? Had she been involved in some scandal with yet another man? What if she found someone more attractive to love, or make love to, before she fell in love with him?
Like Dennis.
Karl felt anew the
annoyance
—no, that word didn’t begin to describe his feelings—the
anger
he’d experienced when his friend had kissed his bride so soundly. Kisses meant nothing to Dennis. By the time his friend was seventeen and had left to seek his fortune as Jonas’s man, Dennis had cut a wide swath through the willing girls in their neighborhood. Dennis had never questioned whether a woman found him attractive. He knew he was.
To Dennis, kisses were like stones along a riverbed, plentiful and common. To Karl, they were something precious, to be shared with someone special, like your brand-new wife. Karl hadn’t kissed Hetty on the lips at the church because he’d wanted their first kiss as husband and wife to be savored between them in private.
Or maybe you had some inkling she might be unwilling, and you didn’t want to be embarrassed if she turned her head.
That hadn’t stopped his friend. Dennis had simply
given
her the kiss, as though Hetty would be happy to have it. Or maybe
taken
the kiss, as though Hetty wouldn’t mind having it stolen.
Karl resented the hell out of having it stolen. Not that he’d ever say anything to Dennis. His friend would only laugh at him for being ridiculous. Dennis didn’t take much of anything seriously. Except work. He took his work very seriously. His impressive physical appearance he simply took for granted.
Karl had compared himself all his life to Dennis and inevitably found himself wanting. Nevertheless, he’d kept Dennis as a friend because he would have felt petty cutting the acquaintance simply because he felt self-conscious—usually invisible—standing next to Dennis in a roomful of people.
Intellectually, Karl knew that looks didn’t define a person. Character and kindness and intelligence and imagination and a hundred other things were far more meaningful in a relationship. Except, even in his chosen life’s work, the study of flowers and trees and plants of every kind, appearance counted. The most colorful flowers attracted the most birds and butterflies and bees, which pollinated them, thus guaranteeing survival of the most stunning examples of the species.
Nature knew what it was doing.
Karl fisted his hands and clenched his teeth. He had to stop worrying about something over which he had no control. His wife would either fall in love with him, or she wouldn’t.
Hetty moaned again in her sleep, and Karl carefully turned on his side to observe her in the moonlight streaming through the hotel window.
Her skin was flawless. Her nose was small and straight. Her eyelashes were long and lush and lay on high, wide cheekbones. Her lips were full and tempted him to taste them. A riot of curls framed her heart-shaped face on the pillow. Her shoulders, one of which was bared by the too-large nightgown were…He was forming the words
creamy smooth
in his mind but stopped when he saw a puckered area of skin just below the line of her nightgown. He reached out and carefully moved the flannel lower, so he could see better in the moonlight.
It was a scar all right, a bad one. He surveyed the jagged circle of shiny, raised skin, which appeared to be only part of a terrible, newly healed wound. Bullet? Knife? The possibility that his new wife had recently been attacked seemed preposterous. Except, right there before his eyes was the wound to prove it had happened.
More alarming than the
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