Chapter 19
CHAPTER 19
Silence dropped with a thud in the dining room.
Cally took in an outraged breath, her heart beating hard. “He can’t have it,” she said with a rush of indignation.
“Of course not,” Max said. “But he can cause a great deal of trouble before we convince him of that.”
“Is this what Zalgravia does?” Ma said, disapproval in her quiet tone. “Steal other countries’ land?”
Max’s face turned the smallest bit red. “In this century, ma’am? Yes. It’s what most of the European countries in this time are doing to their neighbors. Wars every time you look around, grabbing this bit of a country here, grabbing another bit over there.”
“I take it you no longer favor that practice,” Doc said, tamping cherry-scented tobacco into the bowl of his rosewood pipe.
“Certainly not,” Max said, and Cally felt a rush of relief that he didn’t come from a thievin’ country. “We’re a small, peaceful kingdom. We’ve learned to not be extravagant, to live within our country’s resources.”
“I reckon you mean money,” Cally said.
“I mean everything,” Max said. “Most nations are blessed with natural resources. Zalgravia is blessed with verdant fields, topnotch soil, abundant rainfall, and an aptitude for growing apples and almonds.”
“You also have the corner on the market for that semiprecious metal the semiconductor companies seem to think is the next evolution for microchips,” Livia said.
Max grinned. “That, too.”
“What’s that mean?” Cally said.
Max looked her in the eyes, making her heart beat faster. She hadn’t been sure how to face him, after his kissin’ her in front of Bart and her ma. When he’d come back to the house with the others, she’d felt shy.
‘Cally,’ Ma had said after Max had ridden away with Sheriff Sam and the others.
Cally had pressed her fingers to her lips, Max’s touch still lingering. ‘Yes, Ma?’
‘Prince Max is a handsome, charming man.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘A man from a different century, in the distant future.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’ And that was all Ma had needed to say. Cally understood the consequences of kissing Max again. What worried her was the feeling she had, that those consequences might just be worth another kiss or two.
Looking at Max now, that same reckless desire for another kiss washed through her.
“It means,” he was saying, “that my country is vital to the technology of my century. Technology is?—”
“Contraptions,” Cally said, proud of her knowledge of the future. “Livie told me.”
“But not what the contraptions are,” Livia said.
“Except for television,” Cally said. “And movies. You said, prince, that you reckon they’re making a movie of Sheriff Sam right now in the future.”
Max grinned. “I did.”
“I wonder if Livie and I will be in it,” Cally said. “Are we in any of the books written about him?”
“I don’t think so,” Max said. “I would have remembered you.”
Cally felt a warm, happy feeling fill her body, rush over her skin, then worry took its place. Would he remember her when he went back to his time? It was a silly thing to wonder, and yet the thought had consumed her all afternoon, when she should have been thinking more about her suitors. Cally was a practical young woman, Ma always said so, and if she were goin’ to marry soon, this crop of young men were the best pickings around.
She glanced out the window, the Sky Top mountains filling the view. Maybe she should marry Finn and be done with it.
She glanced back at Max. But what would she be missing? Kisses like Max’s? That hot, exciting feeling that lit her innerds up like a firecracker parade every time he came into her view?
He caught her gaze for a long moment, that hot exciting feeling hitting her again.
Max stood and folded up the map. “Here, Sheriff,” he said as Ma left the room, Ma real unhappy with the day’s events caused by the Evil Prince. “In case you have a use for it.”
Bart took it from Sheriff Sam. “I want a copy for myself.” He and the other men headed toward Bart’s office.
Cally watched Max stride away. “Livie?” she said in a low tone when Max had left the room, his strong legs carrying him away from her, his broad shoulders giving her body a thrill low in her belly. “When a woman finds a feller that makes her want to grab him and kiss him until she can’t think straight, what does that mean?”
“I means she’s taken the first step into infatuation.”
“I’m infatuated?”
“Sounds like it to me.”
“You think Prince Max is infatuated, too?”
“I think he has way too much experience to be infatuated. Be careful. I wouldn’t pick him for a first crush.”
“Crush?”
“Liking a guy in a way that makes you want to grab him and kiss him until you can’t think straight. It’s typical, especially when you first start paying attention to men.”
“Did you have a crush on Bart?” Cally asked. “Were you infatuated?”
“Sort of. It was more of a strong physical attraction that disguised our feelings for each other.”
“Them feelings were separate from the physical?”
“They can be.” Livie smiled. “Infatuation makes you think you’re in love when it might just be your hormones doing the thinking.”
“Hormones?”
“That flutter in your belly when you look at Max. That desire to grab him and kiss him until you can’t think straight. That’s why I want you to be careful, Cally. Max is likely past the stage of ever being infatuated. He’s dated too many women.”
Max stood at the top of the grassy riverbank, above the spot where Miss Calliope and her friend Finn had played just hours ago. Birds dove into the water. The scent of barbecue filled the air, the sun hot.
The icy-cold mountain stream at the bottom of the gentle slope flowed swiftly in a tumbling jumble over stones and boulders, its rushing sound a loud imitation of his tumbling jumble of thoughts, his every attempt to speak common sense to himself doing nothing to calm the infatuation his body had for one Miss Calliope James. He felt as if he were back at school, getting a crush on his first girl.
Maybe he should jump in, clothes and all.
Maybe he should go stay somewhere else. He’d told Bart he wouldn’t grasp Miss Calliope again and kiss her, but just sitting in the same room as her just now had been torment, to not tease her, to not laugh with her, to not sit anywhere near her, the eyes of her family on him, her eyes anywhere but.
Quiet footsteps behind him rustled through the long grass, coming closer.
His heart leaped for a moment, then he realized the footsteps were too slow for the vibrant young woman who was somehow making inroads on his heart.
Livia stopped at his side. “Bart thinks you should go back to town tomorrow with Sam, Doc, and Roy.”
A rush of pain struck Max at the thought of leaving the Sky Top—and Miss Calliope—behind. “What do you think?”
“I think that as much fun as you’re having as Sheriff Sam’s deputy?—”
“ Fun ?”
“It was all over your face when you got back.”
He laughed, acknowledging the truth of it.
Her grin faded as she handed him an oatmeal cookie that was still warm from the oven, the cookie spiced with plump raisins and smelling of sugar. “I think you should stay here.”
“To keep out of the way of the local populace?”
“To keep close to Cally.”
He choked on the cookie.
“That’s why you’re here, isn’t it? Listen.” She lowered her voice, though no one else was around. “The man described in those Royalty Watch stories would never treat Cally with the respect that you do—barring today’s kiss, which would be a perfectly respectable kiss in your time. I’m sorry I judged you.”
“Well, thank?—”
“So tell me, Max. What was it your ancestor did in 1897 that you had to travel through time to correct, and what does it have to do with Cally?”