Jillian Hart - Stetsons, Spring and Wedding Rings

“Are you always friends with your household maids?”

“No.” Humor stretched his mouth into an amazing smile.

She didn’t remember settling farther over on the seat to make room for him, only that suddenly he was beside her. Her skin tingled with awareness of him. His big, capable hands were gloved, and when he took up the reins she did not feel a shiver. Really. She did not remember how his touch had been as hot as a branding iron. Honest.

Fine, maybe she remembered a little. Okay, more than a little. Sometimes hope was a terrible thing, making you want something you couldn’t have—something you were afraid to have.

“This is a first for me, Clara. You have to believe it.” His big hands gathered the thick leather straps. “You have to understand. Surely this has happened to you before.”

“What has?”

“Captivating a man so he can’t see anything else save for you.”

“Why, yes. It happens constantly. It’s such a bother, really, how men fall at my feet. I can hardly walk for tripping over them.” How could this man be serious? “I know what your problem is. Your mother has to write to larger cities to hire household help and to marry off her sons. You aren’t used to being around women your own age.”

“Not true. In school, there were three girls in my grade. The trouble was, they fell in love with other fellows and married before I could snatch any of them up.” Although he tried to hide it, she could sense a hint of sadness. He inched closer and presented her with the thick leather straps. “You take the reins. Go on, grab them right behind my hands.”

“You have never beaued a girl?” She leaned closer into his heat and breathed in his fresh man-and-winter-wind scent. Her fingers closed around the reins inches behind his, and her shoulder bumped the warm iron of his arm.

“Got turned down when I tried.” When he tried to grin, it didn’t reach his eyes. “Lara turned around and let Chuck Thomas court her. They married right after she graduated from school. I guess that smarted for a while.”

“Being cast off by someone you care about hurts.”

“You sound like you know something about that.”

“Yes. Of course. There have never been any men falling at my feet. Only one, and he was not falling, believe me.” The big bay stallion shook his head, as if he did not approve of the switch of drivers.

“Don’t worry about Don Quixote. He’s a gentleman, too. You want to tell me what happened?”

“No, but I have a feeling you will pester me until you have the truth.” Dimples framed her mouth, a hint of the smile she held back. She nodded toward the horse. “I can feel him through the lines.”

“Yep. See how I keep the reins light, but not too light? That’s the tension you want. Each horse is different, but my boy likes a gentle hand.” He did not want to talk about his horse. She captured his interest. He had to know why she held herself back, as if reserved, as if she were even more wary than before. Her heart was a puzzle he intended to solve. He gave the reins a quick snap and the horse and sleigh shot forward. “Feel how I did that?”

“Yes.” She nodded, her wool cap brushing against the side of his jaw. “This is like flying!”

“I take it you haven’t been in many sleighs?”

“Not once.” Wispy tendrils escaped from her knit hat and framed her face perfectly. If sweetness could be caught in an image, hers would be it. Bright blue eyes sizzling with excitement, her petal-pink mouth stretched into a tantalizing smile, her cheeks rosy. But there was more. A beautiful joy radiated outward from her heart. She could have been a winter sprite soaring with the snowflakes.

“You surely are a city girl. Hold on.” He snapped the reins lightly, clicking to Don Quixote. The stallion swiveled his ears, nodded his head and stretched out into a fast trot. The sleigh felt airborne, hardly deigning to touch the top layer of snow. “What do you think now?”

“We should slow your horse down. We could crash.”

“Hardly.” He kept hold of the reins long enough to direct Don Quixote toward the next hillside, nestled with snowmantled trees. “See how I tugged on the right rein?”

“Yes, I see. You would do the same to turn left.” A crinkle of worry cut into her porcelain forehead. “How do you slow down?”

“No more worrying.” He released his grip, leaving her in charge of the horse, and settled back, relaxing against the seat. “You’re driving, Clara. It’s that easy.”

“Sure, you can say that because you know how to stop.” But she was laughing, beginning to see that they were as safe as could be. Don Quixote, well aware of where they were headed, obliged by cantering along the cut trail. The fence line rolled by, a foraging moose looked up in disgust as they blew by and her musical laugh rang as clear as the truest bell. “I think I’ve stepped off the train into a wonderland. Storybooks are this magical—not real life.”

“Glad to hear you like this corner of Montana.”

“Oh, I do. It’s like a slice of heaven dropped to earth. I’ve never heard such peaceful quiet or breathed in cleaner air.”

“There’s no one back in Chicago who would miss you? A few old beaus, perhaps?”

“I thought we had already been plain about that. There were no beaus. Just one. Once.”

“Sometimes that’s all it takes.” He didn’t need to read the sadness that slipped across her face, for he could feel it square in his heart. That man, whoever he was, had hurt her. “What was his name?”

“Lars. He worked at the livery stable close to where I worked.” She set her delicate chin, a show of strength and not defeat. “And because you seem to think it’s your business, no, I don’t miss him, and I doubt he even remembers me.”

“How can that be?” He couldn’t imagine it, for he would never forget her. This moment, with the warm softness of her arm against his, was emblazoned on his soul forever. He would always recall the faint scent of roses, the silk of her hair against his jaw and the beat of desire rising in his blood. The desire for something he knew not—he might not know much about love and all the intimacy that went with it, but he knew one thing. He wanted more than what could be found at night with her. He wanted to wake each morning with her in his arms and her cheek resting on his chest. He wanted to go about his day’s work with thoughts of their closeness keeping him warm. Coming home to her in the evenings, to her smile, her embrace, her kiss. “You are too beautiful to forget.”

“There you are, trying to charm me again.” She shook her head as if to scold him, but her words were falsely light. Perhaps she was trying too hard to hide her sadness. “Joseph, you should try telling the truth for once.”

“But I am.”

“You think you mean that.” Snow clung to her face like tears. “You shouldn’t call me beautiful. It’s not true.”

“Is that what this Lars fellow told you?” Now things were making sense. “If he did, then there was something wrong with that man.”

“He met another woman, who was actually very beautiful, and he proposed to her instead.” She blinked hard, as if troubled by the snowflakes caught in her eyelashes.

He wasn’t fooled. “You fell in love with this man?”

“I cared for him very much. A huge mistake, as it turned out.” She nodded up ahead, where the trees lining one side of the slope gave way to snowy meadow and fence line. “Are we here? You never told me how to stop your horse.”

“That’s easy.” He covered her hands with his, not because it was necessary but because he wanted to. She was much smaller, her bones and muscles fragile when compared with his own. Stinging tenderness bruised him from the inside out, both a painful and a healing emotion at once as he gently tugged at the reins.