Chapter Fifteen
Fifteen
Beau was singing. Ellie heard his voice all the way out in Mrs. Champion’s muddy yard.
The snow had all melted and Bitterroot had turned into a quagmire.
Oh! I’ll take you back, Kathleen / To where your heart will feel no pain .
Ellie stood on the porch listening to him, lost in dark imaginings.
She’d been standing there for at least three songs, tumbling down a dark well of thoughts, as night fell velvety dark.
A heavy pearl of a moon rose over the inky frill of the treetops, and across the way the lights of the hotel blazed golden.
I know you love me, Kathleen, dear / Your heart was ever fond and true.
His heart certainly wasn’t true. His heart was like a distractable puppy, bounding after anyone who threw it a pat and a kind word. The sight of him today, sparkly-eyed, kissing all those girls…
This couldn’t go on. She was tearing herself up inside.
Not an hour ago she’d heard him talk about his wedding. Because he was getting married. And she was flinging herself at him like a moth at a flame; eventually she’d burn herself alive on his light. And then he’d get married. While she’d be a crispy dead moth.
The golden hotel lights swam before her eyes as she wept.
Why did the sight of him have to flood her with this enormous shimmery feeling, electrical as the promise of lightning?
Why did her skin sing in his presence, and her heart lose time?
Why did she have no control over herself?
As Ellie listened to the closing strains of his song, she enjoyed her weep in the snow, feeling every last shred of pathos.
But then he swung into a more upbeat—and honestly quite filthy—sea shanty, breaking the whole effect. She swiped away the tears and headed in to tackle him head on.
Oh my God. He was in the bath. She hadn’t expected that. Why hadn’t she heard splashing? What kind of man didn’t splash in the bath! But maybe she’d been so deep in her thoughts she hadn’t heard…
The tub was in the kitchen in front of the hot stove.
A single lantern cast a soft glow over him as he soaped his face and hair.
He was singing some obscene lyric about a mermaid as he scrubbed and hadn’t heard her come in.
The muscles in his arms flexed as he lathered up, and the lamplight chased his slick skin with golden light.
Tiny muscles Ellie didn’t know she had clenched deep inside of her.
Then he reached for a tin cup on the table, his eyes scrunched closed against the soap as he began ladling water over his head. Ellie watched the rivulets run down his shoulders, across his sharp collarbones, over the contours of his chest.
And then he opened his eyes.
“Goddamn!”
“Don’t stand up!” she shrieked. She’d scared the hell out of him, and he’d lurched up. “It’s only me!”
“What in hell are you doing here?” He sat back down and scooped the white soap scum over his lap, to preserve his modesty. He pushed his wet hair off his face.
“I want to talk to you.”
“ Now? You’re going to see me in an hour at the party.”
“Alone,” she clarified. “I want to talk to you alone.”
“Well, this is about as alone as I get,” he said dryly.
“I didn’t know you’d be in the bath.” She should turn away to give him his privacy. “Who has a bath in the kitchen?”
“It’s the warmest place in the house.”
“What about Mrs. Champion?”
“She’s busy cooking over at the hotel.” He swiped a stray soap bubble from his face. “Now, what couldn’t wait?”
“I need you to answer a question.”
His hands curled around the lip of the tub. “Is that what you’re wearing tonight?”
Ellie looked down at herself. She was wearing her shawl over her twill skirt and blue shirt. She’d lost her warm coat running from the bear. “No.”
“Oh, good.”
She flushed. She was sick of everyone judging her clothes.
“Your hair looks nice down.”
Her hand flew to her hair, which hung in a thick curtain down her back.
Diana had washed it for her and then brushed it to a high shine.
When it wasn’t braided it fell in a silky waterfall, framing her face.
She admitted to being vain about her hair.
Not that she ever had much opportunity to wear it down like this.
Beau was lazing back in the tub now, giving her a smile that made her loosen in the most inappropriate ways.
No. She couldn’t do this to herself. Or to Diana. This had to stop. She needed him to put her out of her misery.
“Are you going to ask your question?” he asked, his voice husky.
“Are you going to marry Diana?”
His eyebrows shot up. “Are we still on that?”
She lost her temper then. She snatched his towel off the kitchen chair, wound it, and snapped it at him.
“Ow!” He whipped his hand back off the lip of the tub.
“Yes, we’re still on that, you lummox! You brought her here to marry her!” She snapped the towel again.
“Give me the towel, Ellie.” The water splashed as he jerked out of its reach.
She shook her head. Not until he answered her question.
“If you don’t hand me that towel, I’m going to come and get it.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Wouldn’t I?”
The bathwater sloshed as he stood. Ellie couldn’t help herself—she looked. Then she let out a soft gasp as her gaze lit on the entire stretch of him, and she scrunched her eyes closed. She thrust the towel out. “Fine. Take it. But you still have to answer my question.”
She heard the water splashing as he climbed from the tub. She kept her eyes closed, but her imagination ran riot, building on what she’d seen. All that glistening skin, the dark trail of hair down his muscular stomach, his… oh his…
It was too shocking.
Who knew a man could look like that ?
She felt the towel tugged from her grasp and she could imagine she felt the heat radiating from his damp body. Mere inches from hers.
“Ellie,” he said, his voice a deep rasp. “Open your eyes.”
She shook her head. No .
She could feel his breath on her face, he was standing so close. “I’m wearing the towel. I’m decent.”
But he wasn’t decent in the slightest. None of this was decent. Including her. The feelings shooting through her were the opposite of decent. They were obscene.
She felt the heat of his breath against her lips and she shivered.
“You didn’t leave,” he whispered against her lips. “You could have dropped the towel and run.”
She swallowed hard. She should leave. She really should.
But she didn’t want to.
“Open your eyes, Ellie.”
Slowly, shivering with an onslaught of feeling, Ellie opened her eyes, and stared straight into his. They were dark pools. The kind you could drown in.
“Look all you want,” he said in that uneven, rough voice that sent goosebumps down her body. “I don’t mind.” Those plump lips, with their sharp cupid’s bow, curved into a wicked smile as he took a step back and held his arms out.
She looked. She couldn’t have stopped herself if she tried.
He had the towel around his waist, but it barely covered him.
His body was pearly with water droplets, and she watched, hypnotized, as a droplet on his collarbone burst, rolling down the slope of his chest, over his dusky nipple.
The drop rolled from nipple, to stomach, over his flexing muscles, to the sharp line of his hip, before hitting the towel. Ellie forgot to breathe.
He was perfect.
“You can touch too,” he said, his voice slow and soft. “If you want to.”
Oh God. She did want to. Ellie lost all ability to think; she was just a creature of wanting.
With trembling fingers, she reached out and touched his collarbone, in the exact spot where the droplet had burst. She felt his hot skin shiver under her touch.
“Ellie,” he sighed, tilting his head back as she traced his collarbones. His thick eyelashes were quivering against his cheeks.
“Don’t talk,” she begged him, putting her hand over his mouth. If they talked, reality would crash in, and this would end. Because it had to end. This was impossible.
He put his hand over hers and pressed a kiss to her palm.
Ellie couldn’t breathe. She was full of cascading liquid heat.
She closed her eyes and enjoyed the sensation of his mouth against her palm.
Then she felt the hot flick of his tongue and gave a soft moan.
Her hand fell away and then she was kissing him.
His damp arms enveloped her, hauling her tight and hard against him.
For once in her life, she didn’t think. She was aware of every inch of her body in this moment.
She wasn’t daydreaming or ruminating or imagining, she was nothing but this body, in his arms.
His wet body was hard against her, soaking her shirt. His mouth was hot and insistent. Ellie ran her hands over his shoulders and down his arms as his tongue tangled with hers. He made low hungry noises, backing her into the wall. Ellie wanted more. As much as she could get.
“Say yes,” he whispered between deep kisses.
She didn’t know what she was saying yes to and she didn’t care. She was just yes. To everything.
“Touch me,” he begged. “Please.”
Yes.
Ellie’s hands slid over him as their kisses became one all consuming delight.
Her fingertips ran down the hollow of his spine, up the ladder of his ribs, across his sharply erect nipples.
The noises he made when she touched him made her ache.
She was vaguely aware that he was pulling her away from the wall and that he’d lost his towel as he led her out of the kitchen.
The air felt thicker, like water. Her movements were slow and clumsy as she stumbled with him, too hungry to keep kissing to look where they were going.