For the first time since he’d met her, Richard began to wonder if that might not be true. The possibility flat-out intrigued him.
They were still dusting snow from their clothes and bickering about the fairness of the race when they arrived at Anna Louise’s.
She stood on the front porch gazing up at him. “Would you like a cup of coffee before you walk back? Or maybe some hot chocolate?”
“Put marshmallow on top of that chocolate and you have yourself a deal,” he said, wondering when that sort of drink had become more appealing to him than a tumbler of aged Scotch whiskey. He realized that since he’d met Anna Louise only once had he needed the liquor to take the edge off of his memories. For that alone, he ought to be grateful.
It wasn’t exactly gratitude he was feeling, though, as he sat across from her in front of a fire, sipping the sweet cocoa with its melting marshmallow topping. The fire lit her hair in a way that had him debating which red was brightest...or which was more dangerous. He felt a sudden yearning to run his fingers through the strands that wisped around her face and tumbled to her shoulders in careless, untended curls.
A stern reminder that she was off limits played through his head, but sounded weaker than usual. He settled for reaching into his pocket for the package of antique combs. He pulled it out and held it just out of her reach, deliberately forcing her to move closer to take it.
“You shouldn’t have,” she said, eyeing the small package speculatively.
He took it back. “If you don’t want it...”
She scowled at him. “Hand it over.”
“You are a greedy little thing.”
“Just curious. I want to see what sort of taste you have,” she said, taking the package and fingering it as if she wanted to guess its contents before opening it. Or maybe she just wanted to prolong the anticipation. That possibility delighted him in some inexplicable way, perhaps because it hinted that a gift from him might really matter to her.
Eventually, though, her patience wore thin and she ripped off the paper and opened the small, square box. At the sight of the silver combs, her eyes brightened with what just might have been the sheen of tears. “They’re beautiful,” she murmured, delicately tracing the silver.
He held out his hand. “May I put them in your hair?”
Her own hand trembled just a little as she held them out. Richard took the combs from the box. Scooping up a strand of her hair on one side, he held it in place with one comb, then followed the same pattern with the other. The light of the fire caught in her hair and glinted off the silver. His fingers remained tangled in her silken strands as his thumbs brushed against her cheeks, framing her face.
“You look so incredibly lovely,” he whispered in a voice that had grown thick with emotion.
Anna Louise’s eyes sparkled back at him. “Can I tell you something?”
“Anything.”
“When I see the expression on your face, for the first time in my life I feel truly beautiful. Is it so terribly wicked to want to feel this way?”
“Never,” he said as a sigh shuddered through him. He pulled her into his arms. “You are beautiful. Inside and out.”
He could feel the rapid beat of her heart, the unmistakable quickening of her breath, and knew that they matched his own. It required every ounce of willpower he possessed to resist the temptation to do more than hold her close, to keep the promise he’d so recently made to himself.
“Richard?”
“Hmm?”
“Kiss me,” she requested, her voice all soft vulnerability and sweetly innocent pleading.
He swallowed hard, his body aching with desire. The stern voice in his head protested, louder this time, but he pretended not to hear. One kiss. Was it so terribly much to ask? He had kissed her before, and it hadn’t led to anything more.
Tonight, though? Something about tonight was magic, a continuation of the wondrous feelings first stirred in him during the Christmas Eve service. Could he deny himself, or her, on a night like tonight?
The answer came when he tilted her chin up and looked into her eyes, which were so filled with hope and longing. A heavier sigh shuddered through him.
“You do know how to test a man, Anna Louise,” he murmured right before he settled his mouth over hers.
The feelings that rocked him then had less to do with raging desire than they did with something even more incredible, something even more alluring. For the first time since he’d returned to Kiley, Richard felt as if he’d truly come home.
* * *
After the holidays, Anna Louise started getting more harassing late-night calls filled with vitriolic accusations and dire threats. A woman’s voice had been added to the man’s now. Anonymous promises of eternal damnation became as commonplace as her bedtime prayers.
She refused to admit to anyone how shaken she was by the stepped-up intensity of the calls. In fact, she told no one they were happening. She should have known, though, that she couldn’t keep them a secret forever.
“Looks like you have quite a few messages,” Richard said one night after he’d brought her home from a visit with Maisey.
Anna Louise was in the kitchen fixing hot chocolate. The walks, the cocoa, the conversation and a sweet achingly tender good-night kiss had become habit ever since Christmas night. It always stopped with a single kiss good-night, though, as if Richard had set a line and nothing on earth or in heaven would get him to cross it.
“I’ll listen to them later,” she said just as he apparently pressed the Play button.
With her heart climbing into her throat, she listened to the first message. It was innocuous enough. Her youngest sister had called to ask how her holidays had been and to report that her brand new baby niece had loved the stuffed toy
