BODACIOUS Page 8

  Bo’s was the first she learned. After she got used to it, she easily recognized his smell which she found not entirely unpleasant. His was not a socially acceptable fragrance of aftershave or cologne, but a mingled aroma. He smelled of pine needles and gunpowder, pipe tobacco, leather, and a man’s sweat dried in the outdoors. His aroma had become synonymous with safety, important she thought, in a place where one felt threatened by animals, plants, and even the weather.

  Bo’s fragrance now, so near, soothed her as it did when she was restless or frightened, yet she quivered.

  Adding more buttermilk, she stirred the thick dough slowly with the spoon, trying to collect the bits and pieces that clung to the edges of the bowl.

  Bo’s hands came from both sides of her. The front of his body pressed close against her back and his breath pulsed warm on her neck. He took the dough into his hands, kneading it, picking up the errant pieces and working them into a cohesive ball. Sara stood very still. Her face became hot. She found this closeness intimidating, and at the same time, exhilarating.

  Bo put the dough down, placed his hands over hers, guided them into the mixture, then massaged both hands and dough.

  There was something sensual about his large, warm hands over hers, kneading the cool, malleable mixture. She didn’t know why his nearness had such a stimulating effect. Her hands trembled beneath his. Her face burned. Her breath came in gulps and her heart pounded.

  She had tried to contrive these responses in the past, with suitable men and had failed. Now, here, unbidden, she fluttered in the arms of this unsuitable man.

  What was happening? What was it about this mute mountain man that triggered these responses?

  And there was something else. She felt incredibly safe enveloped by his large, powerful body, as safe as a child tucked into bed at night.

  The ball of dough became elastic. Abruptly, Bo released her and backed away. Sara turned in time to see him close the door, leaving the cabin, his bearskin coat gone from the peg on the inside of the door.

  What had happened in those brief, intimate moments? She hadn’t a clue. She had no idea what prompted the sudden familiarity nor what brought it to such a rude end.

  She shaped and cooked the biscuits, peering into the crude stove from time to time, as Bo usually did, waiting for them to turn the golden brown color.

  When Bo didn’t return, she ate alone while the wind whistled strangely through seams between the cabin’s logs. Her first try at stew turned out better than she’d hoped.

  Eventually, wrapping herself in all the clothing she possessed, Sara hurled herself out the cabin door, ran to the shed, and shut herself into the familiar darkness, slamming the doors as quickly as possible to keep the cold wind from following her inside.

  Shivering, she pushed all the hay in her stall into a single pile, threw one quilt over it, rolled herself into the second quilt and burrowed, without removing either her clothing or her shoes. She heard ice tapping the metal roof. Sleet.

  Would Cappy venture out on such a night, risk the steep climb to rescue her? Bo might forget to bar the shed door. She could take off on her own again. But she didn’t intend to freeze to death lost in the woods in this weather.

  If Cappy were coming, she could wait at the ridge. On that high ground, however, she would be exposed to the elements. She decided to remain in the shed.

  Sara couldn’t seem to get warm. She curled into a ball, her feet and hands like ice.

  Two brisk knocks and the door of the shed swung open.

  Keeping the quilts wrapped tightly, Sara struggled to her knees and peered around the stall’s half wall to see the lantern and Bo’s form in the doorway.

  “What is it? Do we need to go to the cave?”

  He strode to the stall, grabbed her wrist and jerked her to her feet, growling. Maybe he suspected something, had guessed that Cappy was coming for her.

  Or was this about this afternoon? Had he experienced the same strange palpitations she felt during their moments of closeness? Was that what he wanted? Silently she pleaded, “Please, God, no.”

  She sparred, pulled her wrist free, and stepped away from him.

  It was difficult to read his facial expressions anytime. Bo always looked angry. Perhaps it was the way his eyebrows arched or the way the hair over his forehead dived to the bridge of his nose. In the semidarkness of the shed, she could not see his face at all, was barely able to discern his form.

  He lumbered forward, scooped her up, quilts and all, and slung her over his shoulder as he had the night of the storm. He carried her outside then turned to slam and secure the shed door. Sleet peppered them.

  Fighting him had not worked before, so Sara tried to remain calm, dangling from Bo’s shoulder, again like a sack of feed.

  He carried her inside the cabin, slammed the door against the persistent wind, crossed the room and dumped her unceremoniously onto his bed.

  “No.” Gathering the quilts tightly around her, she leaped off the bed and made a dash for the door. She was nearly there when he grabbed her around the middle and carried her back to deposit her again on the bed. She tried to get up. He shoved her down. His eyes narrowed and a forbidding vibration emitted from his throat. She shrank.

  Watching him carefully, she secured the quilts and moved to the far side of the bed to sit cross-legged, rigid, her back straight against the log wall.

  Without either looking at her or removing his coat, Bo strode to the fireplace, picked up his pipe, and filled it with tobacco, moving in his usual slow, methodical way. Noting his calm, Sara again attempted to get off the bed. Without looking at her, he growled, a low, menacing sound.

  Yielding, Sara wrapped up in her quilts and curled into a ball, on her side facing the wall, on top of the bed covers.

  Bo growled again. She turned her head to glower at him. Standing at the bedside, he pulled back the covers. Obviously he intended for her to get under them.

  Grudgingly she kicked her shoes into the floor and complied, still wrapped in her own quilts, her face to the outside wall, her back to him. She heard him shuffling around the room.

  He built up the fire in the fireplace until it blazed. He went in and out of the door four or five times, each time returning with armloads of wood which he deposited on the hearth.

  Even with brisk air seeping through the seams in the logs, the bed was warm, much warmer than her nest in the shed, but Sara shivered, dreading what she feared might be coming.

  She heard the familiar sounds as Bo removed his heavy bearskin coat. The old rocking chair creaked beneath his weight and groaned its usual objections as he began to rock.

  Turning her head slightly, Sara ventured a look.

  Sporadically puffing his pipe, Bo whittled. The fire in the fireplace crackled. The rocker popped and creaked. There in Bo’s bed, Sara breathed the scent of safety, his scent. The familiar surroundings lulled her.

  Pinpricks of cold coming through seams in the wall nipped her forehead and nose, but the rest of her was warm beneath the weight of the quilts.

  A long time later, dozing, she was vaguely aware of his moving around before he snuffed the lantern. She forced her eyes open. The room remained bright, bathed in the glow from the fireplace.

  There was a rustling and a delay before she felt him pull back the covers and settle his body next to hers. She clenched her teeth and her fists, ready to do battle, but he didn’t attempt to touch her.

  Soon his breathing became even, although not the deep inhalations of someone sound asleep. Sara remained tense. Her face was cold and her shoulder was getting stiff. She wanted to roll to her other side. Dare she risk rousing him?

  Slowly, carefully, she eased onto her back and waited. He didn’t stir. She turned to her left side facing him. His back was to her.

  Cautiously, not wanting to touch him, she put her face closer to his back, hoping to warm her frozen nose by the heat radiating from his body. She breathed in the comforting scent of him. Drifting back to sleep,
Sara hoped Cappy didn’t come tonight.

  She opened her eyes one last time. The firelight danced. Sleet peppered the tin roof. She breathed the comforting aromas, heard the familiar noises--the smells and sounds of safety--and she slept.

  Chapter Seven

  It was daylight when Sara opened her eyes. Bo sat on the side of the bed pulling up his trousers. He had peeled down to only the bottom half of his long handles and a T-shirt for sleep. Curiosity overcame modesty and Sara watched as he stood.

  Under the T-shirt, his waist was narrow, his back lean and supple. He certainly carried his age well. She supposed his face, hidden by all that beard and long hair, was ancient, although his eyes appeared to be the alert, watchful eyes of a young man.

  He’s definitely maintained a young man’s body, she decided. Probably all the exercise and manual labor.

  Watching him, Sara again felt the peculiar tingling. She bit her bottom lip and was trying to quell the butterflies loose in her stomach when Bo turned and looked directly into her face.

  She averted her stare quickly but not before he saw something which prompted a slight smile of, what? Surprise? Approval? In that brief glimpse, she couldn’t tell.

  He put on his bearskin coat and tromped out.

  When he returned, Sara slid her feet into her shoes, wrapped a quilt around her and dashed for the outhouse. The sun bristled over the horizon, burning off the thin sheet of ice which shimmered on dripping branches. Despite the promise of warming later, the air was brisk. She didn’t dally.

  Through the morning, the mountains seemed to absorb the wind and the cold from the night and the sun shone brightly. By noon Sara was shedding outer layers of clothing.

  It had been a good idea, her spending the arctic night in the cabin, in Bo’s bed, but she would not make a habit of it, despite his exemplary behavior.

  She’d read that on very cold nights in some parts of the world, people slept with their dogs to survive. The coldest nights were those when they needed three dogs, hence the term “Three-Dog Night.”

  In the Ozarks, Sara figured she had experienced a “One-Bear Night,” the bear being Bo. She laughed quietly to herself.

  Obviously she didn’t appeal to him physically. Lucky for her. She shrugged off the discomfort that idea spawned. Perhaps he preferred pioneering mountain-type women like the one she assumed he was wooing Saturday night. But if theirs was such a hot romance, why didn’t his woman come around? Maybe he didn’t want her to know about Sara.

  Then a sudden, appalling thought. Maybe he wasn’t wooing a woman at all. These days, it could be a man. Sara shook her head sadly.

  All this speculation was just so much fodder, again, she told herself, making the bed for the day, as Bo always did. It did no good to speculate. She didn’t have any way of knowing what was true and what was not. She fumed. She could ask. She winced. What did she care anyway?

  * * *

  Everyone in Settlement knew Cappy stuttered worse when he was excited. Franklin listened intently when Gilbert told him Cappy returned from his deliveries dancing, gyrating, sputtering, unable to talk.

  “Hell, Franklin, he can’t string three words together at once. Queenie don’t know what put him in such a state. He can’t calm down enough to say. She says he’d been pacing back and forth in their trailer for more’n a’ hour.”

  Franklin hurried to the trailer to find Cappy.

  “What’s happenin’?” he asked as he slid through Cappy’s bedroom door, grinning like he and Cappy shared a secret.

  Cappy lay across his bed on his stomach thumbing through a women’s lingerie catalog. He slapped it closed and sucked back the spittle glistening at one corner of his mouth.

  “Nothin’.” The younger man swallowed the word, obviously trying not to stutter.

  Franklin leered. “Seen your girlfriend when you was making deliveries, didn’t ya?”

  Cappy sat up slowly, stood, and paced down the hall to the living room, gnawing on his lower lip and snapping his fingers, stepping, gnawing, and snapping out of sync. Queenie clattered in the kitchen, whipping something with an egg beater.

  Franklin studied him as he followed Cappy to the living room. “She was sure a pretty ‘un.” Franklin eased down, straddling a wooden chair, and propped his forearms on the back, one over the other. “Anyone could tell the way she was lookin’ at you, she was gonna be your girlfriend.” He hesitated. “Cappy?”

  “What?” Cappy fairly shouted the word.

  “That woman liked you. She wanted you. Was she smooth, Cappy? Was that peachy skin soft? Did she spread ‘em for you or did you have to get strong with her?”

  The younger man’s face clouded. He tried to speak but he stammered, couldn’t form the words or get them spoken.

  Franklin grimaced. “Been diddlin’ with yourself again, ain’t ya, bub? They say diddlin’ with hisself makes some men stutter.”

  Cappy shook his head, staring at the floor. “I’m tr-tr-tryin’ to quit it.”

  “I imagine it’s too late now, anyhow. The damage ‘as already been did. What I wanna know is, were that gal of yours sweet? How’d she taste?”

  “Didn’t t-t-taste of ’er.”

  “You licked her tits, didn’t ya, boy, while you was diddlin’ her? That’s practically a woman’s favorite part, the tit lickin’.”

  Cappy frowned at the floor for a long moment, then he looked up at Franklin and his face brightened. “Maybe I ain’t d-d-done with ‘er yet.”

  “Too bad she’s dead then, I s’pose.” Franklin looked hard at Cappy’s face. “You didn’t kill ‘er, did you, cuz?” Franklin kept his voice low. He didn’t want Queenie to hear. “Ma give you the job to do but you let Ma down, didn’t ya?”

  Cappy clamped his scraggly teeth over his lower lip. He wouldn’t look at Franklin. He nursed his bottom lip, sucking it gently. His dull eyes glazed over and he hummed to himself.

  Franklin whispered. “Where you got ‘er hid?”

  “What-do-you-mean, w-w-where?” Cappy reared up glaring at Franklin and held the pose a minute before he wilted.

  “Cappy, come on, you can tell me. Ain’t I your own kin?” Franklin’s voice fell with feigned encouragement. “You been running back there diddlin’ ‘er all week, ain’t ya?”

  “I d-d-didn’t do no such a thing.”

  “You didn’t screw her?”

  Cappy shook his head.

  “You didn’t kill ‘er neither, did ya?”

  There was a delay followed by another head shake.

  Franklin crooned, coaxing. “Cap, where you got ‘er hid?”

  “In the sh-sh-shed, th-th-that’s where.”

  “Which shed would that be, Cappy?”

  “For me t-t-to know and you...” He turned away coughing and choking.

  Franklin shook his head in disbelief. “You sure don’t want nobody findin’ her now, Cappy, findin’ out you let that beautiful piece of pussy lay around locked up someplace cravin’ a man the way she was.”

  “She d-d-don’t like it.”

  “Don’t like what, Cappy?”

  “D-D-Diddlin.’ She can’t d-d-do it. Says she d-d-don’t like it.”

  “Cappy, Cappy, Cappy, females can’t never say what they like or don’t like. They don’t hardly know theirselves ‘til you show ‘em. Once I diddle ‘em, there’s no gettin’ ‘em over it. It makes ‘em crazy. They just keep wantin’ it, over and over again, keep beggin’ for it. At least that’s the way they do with me. Ain’t that the way they do with you?”

  “I s-s-s’pose.”

  Franklin lowered his voice back to the coaxing tone. “I understand, Cap. Sometimes I have to prime ‘em a little myself. With this one, it might help for someone to go first, get her ready for you. I’ll do it. You can be the one to hold her for me and watch real careful, pay attention to what all goes on, or maybe I ought to say what all goes in.” He cackled. Cappy frowned, nodding uncertainly.

  “Sure,” Franklin said, as if he were confir
ming a plan. “We’ll go get her from where you got her stashed. I’ll diddle her first, good and proper, get her ready, then I’ll keep her steady while you take your turn. If she wants more after that, we’ll do it long as we’re able. Why, Cappy, me and you together, we could keep going at it probably two, three days.”

  Cappy grinned and rolled his eyes, panting as he listened. He licked the drool again beading at the corners of his mouth.

  Franklin nodded. “Now, come on. Let’s get the truck and go get her.”

  Cappy’s grin disappeared as the color drained from his cheeks. He shook his head. “I ain’t goin’ up there.”

  “Okay, I’ll go get her and bring her to you, meet you someplace. Where you got her hid?” He started to get up, then stayed where he was as Cappy shook his head and set his jaw stubbornly.

  Franklin cajoled and pleaded a long time before Cappy finally came out with it.

  “She’s up to Bo’s.”

  “That crazy mountain man’s keeping her for you?” Franklin’s voice cracked. He paled and slouched in his chair.

  Franklin thought about things a long while, shaking his head as he dismissed one idea after another. He mumbled, recalling Sara’s face, her slender frame, the exceptional breasts. The memory tantalized his brain and titillated his body.

  “He’s keepin’ her down to his shed, did you say?”

  “Yeah.”

  “All time?”

  “No, he l-l-let’s her run l-l-loose in the d-d-daytime, not tethered or n-n-nothin.’ L-L-Locks her up nights. Guess it k-k-keeps the varmints off her.”

  Franklin grinned and raised his eyebrows. “Yeah. He’s smart, that one.”

  “D-D-Don’t tell him I sent you to g-g-git her.”

  “No, Cappy, I won’t be doin’ that. We’ll wait’ll the weather breaks, then I’ll just slip up there first dark night and grab her. I’ll tell her I’m there to get her for you, that you asked me to bring her down so’s you can rescue her.”

  “That’ll make her come all-all-all right. And the n-n-night when you g-g-go, I’ll w-w-wait at Melon’s and w-w-we’ll ask her d-d-does she want to-to d-d-diddle with any of us.”