Elizabeth Lowell: Fire and Rain

"Then why – why did you come here?" she asked.

He took a deep, shuddering breath and said simply, "I had to."

Carla watched Luke with uncertain eyes, afraid to think, to hope. "I don’t understand."

With a gentleness that made Carla tremble, Luke brushed his lips over the shining trails her tears had made on her cheeks. It was the first time he had ever kissed her without being asked; the realization was as devastating to Carla as the tenderness of his caresses. Without thinking, she raised her hand to push him away, unable to bear being hurt again.

"Don’t," Luke said hoarsely. "Please don’t push me away, sunshine. I know I deserve it, but I can’t – oh, God, I can’t bear losing you. When Cash told me you had come to the Rocking M, I went crazy. I knew you had come to September Canyon but I didn’t know why. I hoped – I hoped so much you were coming back to me."

"And then you told me you were going to leave my gift here and never come back. Full circle. That’s what you mean, isn’t it? Leaving and never coming back to me again?"

Slowly Carla nodded.

Luke closed his eyes and fought to control the emotions clawing at him. "Until a few seconds ago," he said finally, "I thought I’d accepted the fact that I could have a family or I could have the Rocking M. I’ve realized it for years, since before I even knew you and Cash. I tried not to care, because I love this ranch more than I ever wanted any woman." Luke bent his head a bit more, tasted the tears shining on Carla’s lips and felt his own eyes burn. "Then one day I looked at you and saw a woman I wanted to have children with…"

His voice went from husky to hoarse as emotion closed his throat. For long, sweet seconds he moved his hands gently over Carla’s womb as though to caress the life within.

"I’d sworn never to sacrifice my woman and children to the Rocking M," he said. "I knew what this land did to women. I had heard about it, seen it, almost been destroyed by it when I was young."

Luke drew a quick, broken breath and fought for control. "Every time I looked at you, I was reminded of the truth," he whispered. "I could have the ranch or I could sell it and have you. So I pushed you away and hungered for you to come back, because as long as you came back I could have both you and the Rocking M. Do you understand?"

Carla tried to speak but all that came out was Luke’s name, a ragged sound as painful as his voice.

"Don’t cry," he whispered, kissing her gently, repeatedly, as though he could drink all the sadness from her with his lips, leaving her free of pain. "It’s all right. When I realized you would never come to me again, the choice was easy. I can live without the Rocking M but I can’t live with knowing I hurt you."

Luke tilted Carla’s chin up until he could see her eyes. "Where do you want to live after we’re married?"

"On the Rocking M."

Pain and a wild, flaring hope tightened Luke’s features in the instant before he shook his head. "I’ll never ask that of you."

"Do you believe I love you?"

"There could be no other reason for what you’ve done, giving me so much, asking for so little and getting even less. I’m sorry for that, baby. I’m so damned sorry. You deserved so much more from me."

Carla pulled Luke’s head closer, returning the gentle kisses he had given her, loving him so much it was a sweet kind of pain.

"The Rocking M is part of you," she whispered between kisses. "If I hadn’t loved the ranch, I couldn’t have loved you. Not really. I could have had a schoolgirl crush on you. I could have been infatuated with you. I could have been fascinated by you. I could have been everything except in love with you. But I love the ranch, and I love you." Carla smiled suddenly, making the tears in her eyes sparkle like crystal in sunlight. "In fact, you should be worried that I’m marrying you for the Rocking M, not in spite of it"

"Sunshine," Luke said, his voice catching, "I want you to be happy. Are you sure?"

"As sure as I am pregnant"

He closed his eyes. "Are you happy about that?"

"Being pregnant?"

Luke’s eyes opened. "Yes."

"Oh, yes," Carla murmured, covering his hands with her own, cradling him against the new life growing within her body. "Are you?"

"I can’t – I don’t – have words." Luke bent down and kissed her hands, then sought the warmer flesh beneath that sheltered his baby. "When you left, I shut myself in the barn and made a cradle and a crib and a rocking horse for the child I would never have. And then I made a – rocking chair so that you – could – " His voice broke. He tried to speak, but all that came out was a raw whisper. "I looked at the chair – and dreamed of you nursing our child – and knew it would never – never – "

Carla felt the shudders that ripped through Luke’s control, felt the scalding heat of his tears against her skin and held him until she ached. For long minutes there was only the sound of his broken breathing and her own whispered words of love. Finally he stood up, carrying her with him, holding her as close as the beating of his own heart.

Then Luke looked down in Carla’s clear eyes. He felt something shimmer through him like sunrise, transforming him, freeing him from the darkness of the past, giving him a vision of a future more beautiful than his hungry dream. He wanted to tell Carla all that he saw – a girl with dark hair and golden eyes and her mother’s flashing smile, a boy with gentle hands and blue-green eyes and his father’s easy strength, a man and a woman sharing and building and creating together, giving back to life the gift it had given them.

The vision was so clear to Luke, so real, beyond question or doubt. He wanted to share it with Carla, to tell her that neither one of them would ever be lonely again. Yet of all the gifts that had come to him, of all the truths yet to be given and received, only one came to his lips when he bent down to her, for it was the only truth that mattered.

"I love you, sunshine."