Distant Thunder Read online

  “Go on. I’ll watch.”

  And he knew she would. He knew she’d follow each move he made with those big green eyes. He trembled even more—and not from the weakened condition of his limbs.

  “Higher. Hold it higher.”

  While he still had some control left in his body, he began to scrape the four-day stubble from his chin. To his infinite relief, Susan didn’t tax his concentration any further. And with the mirror held the way it was, he couldn’t see the way she followed each stroke of the blade.

  But he knew he’d counted his blessings much too soon.

  “Does it hurt?”

  The blade nicked the underside of his chin, and he jerked. “Does what hurt?”

  “Shaving. It sounds terrible. I can hear your beard scraping the razor as you cut it.”

  He grabbed the towel slung around his shoulders and dabbed at the nick on his chin. “No, it doesn’t hurt.”

  “But you’re bleeding!”

  “It’s nothing. Honest.” He dropped the cloth and began again.

  “How many times do you do it?”

  “Do … what?” Why was it that each time she asked a question, his mind formed a much bawdier interpretation.

  “Shave.”

  He gave the blade to her so that she could rinse it in the warm water. This time, when she returned to sit on the bed, she brought the bowl with her and nestled it in her lap, causing her thigh to push even more tightly against his. For the time being, her delight in his company seemed to have sent the past to the back of her mind. Yet he feared that it would rush back if he dared to touch her.

  “How many times, Daniel?”

  He pulled his attention back to her earlier question. “Unless my job requires me to appear …”

  “Scruffy,” she supplied.

  “Scruffy?”

  “Scruffy,” she affirmed.

  “Unless I need to appear … scruffy I shave every morning. Sometimes in the evening as well.”

  “Why in the evening?”

  He opened his mouth, hesitated, then returned to his task. How could he tell Susan that there were times when he wanted to ensure that his beard didn’t leave a mark on a pretty woman’s skin? “Sometimes it grows a lot faster. When it’s sunny.”

  “Oh.”

  Daniel managed to finish the job and avoid any more mishaps. By that time his hands were noticeably shaking from the effort.

  As soon as he had removed the last whisker, Susan forcibly took the razor. “I’ll finish the job.”

  She retrieved another cloth from the tray, dipped it in the warm soapy water, then rinsed the lather from his jaw.

  “Why, Daniel! You look almost handsome with a clean face.”

  And it was true. There were men who appeared naked without a beard. And some used their whiskers to hide a weak mouth or skinny lips. But Daniel’s jaw was hard and square, with a slight cleft in his chin.

  “Now we need to do something about your hair.” She immersed her fingers in the golden brown tresses that hung past his shoulders. To her infinite surprise, the strands spilled through her fingers like sunshine. Warm and silky and clean. It was a bit of a shame she had to cut it.

  Susan frowned at that idea, but she really did regret having to trim his long hair. Though she had never approved of men who let their appearance run wild, Daniel’s “ruffian” looks piqued some latent fascination deep inside her. The long golden waves were slightly pagan, primitive. As if the civilized veneer Daniel wore had been stripped away, revealing the primeval man beneath.

  “Susan?”

  “Hmm?” She’d been staring. Susan cleared her throat and stood up. Water from the basin she held sloshed onto the floor, but she paid it no heed. What was happening to her? Why was she thinking these inappropriate things?

  But how could she avoid such thoughts when the room seemed to be closing in on them both? Memories of other stolen glances, other caresses, kisses, hung like incense in the air.

  “Maybe we’d better finish this another time.”

  “No. No, now is as good a time as any.” She surveyed the room as if she’d never seen it. It took a minute to focus on what was actually there.

  “This would be easier if you sat somewhere else. I don’t want to get hair in your bed.” She marched from the room and into the kitchen.

  There she leaned against the ladder back of a chair. Curling her fingers tightly around the top slat, she gathered her composure, then returned to the bedroom.

  “Here we are!” she proclaimed brightly.

  Daniel wasn’t interested in the chair she brought with her. He watched her with a cat-eyeing-a-canary look that made her uncomfortable.

  “You don’t want to be a nun.”

  She slammed the chair onto the floor with evident pique. “I don’t want to have this conversation. Now, are you going to sit here or are you going to spend the evening sleeping in little bits of hair.”

  Grumbling, he swung his legs to the floor. “Turn around.”

  Susan paled. She’d forgotten. He didn’t wear any drawers.

  Her skirts swirled around her ankles in her haste to offer Daniel her back. She heard the rustle of bedclothes, the shuffling of feet.

  “All right. I’m ready.”

  To Susan’s infinite relief, Daniel had wound the linens around him several times and now held the folds securely beneath his arms. Even so, those flat copper nipples were exposed to her view.

  Daniel wasn’t the only person in the room who had begun to tremble. As she gathered the sewing shears and another towel, Susan wondered how she would survive the next few minutes without dissolving.

  Approaching him from behind, she held out the scissors. “Would you hold these, please?”

  After he’d taken them, she draped the towel around his neck. Through the cloth, she could feel the taut expanse of skin and muscle.

  “I take it you’ve cropped hair before.”

  “Yes.” But she didn’t tell him that she had cut the sisters’ hair. There was no skill involved in trimming their tresses as close to the scalp as possible.

  “I’ll hurry so you won’t get cold,” she murmured. Though a fire now burned on the hearth, a draft snaked around the window frame and across the floor.

  He didn’t answer. The chill air wasn’t the only thing that sifted tantalizingly between them. A burgeoning intimacy snuggled into the small room, arousing a gamut of unfamiliar emotions. Susan could feel the same tension being emitted from his body that was emanating from her own. But how could such a simple task take on such sensual overtones?

  As Susan took the shears and began to cut away the rich golden hair, she wondered what had happened to her strength of will. Her piety. When she had agreed to help Essie, she hadn’t thought that the bounds of her endurance would be tested so severely.

  Working as quickly as she could, Susan tried to divorce herself from the nature of her task. She snipped and cut, trimmed and evened. And through it all she ignored the heat of his body, the texture of his hair, the sheen of his skin. She didn’t allow her gaze to drop and trace the crease of his chest or the molded shape of his breast. She didn’t try to analyze the irregular pattern of his breathing.

  When the last hair had been cut and combed into place, she stopped.

  “Finished?” Daniel shifted, and the towel around his neck shivered, clung, then dropped to the floor.

  He bent to retrieve it, and Susan stopped him, saying, “No, I’ll get it.” Unwittingly, she reached down to keep him from bending. Her hand encountered the naked masculine flesh cradled between his neck and shoulder.

  She blanched even as she pressed the golden expanse. But she couldn’t draw away. She was melded to the spot.

  “Susan?” Her name was a whisper. A promise.

  She shifted, rubbing the swell of muscle that ran down his neck to the ridge of his collarbone. Like a blind woman, her exploration filled her senses with sights sh
e had never imagined. Her pulse thrummed. Her heart lurched against her ribs as if in an effort to spring free.

  He didn’t move beneath her caress, but she could feel the raggedness of his breathing and the irregular beat of his pulse.

  Growing bolder, she spread her fingers wide and plunged down, down, until her thumb grazed the nub of his nipple.

  Daniel’s head arched back. His eyes were closed, though whether in pleasure or in pain she didn’t know.

  Once, twice, she brushed the sensitive kernel. A heaviness flowed into her limbs, robbing her of the ability to do anything more than feel. Feel.

  She hadn’t felt in so long. So long …

  Brackish memories swam to the fore.

  Mama!

  Susan, run, you hear me? Run as fast and as hard as you can. Run!

  Daniel’s eyes opened. They were filled with age-old masculine desire. They burned into her, awakening a part of her she hadn’t believed existed. But with the arousal came a pain like none she’d ever known. It sliced through her body with a piercing swiftness, tearing free years of scar tissue and exposing the ache beneath.

  “No.” The word bled from her lips. Shuddering, she drew away.

  “Susan?”

  Daniel tried to control her, but she fought him like a wild thing. The memories came more strongly now, crumbling the blessed mantle of forgetfulness she had struggled to wear for so long. Her sins were laid bare. Her deficiencies hung naked for all the world to see.

  Moaning, she tore free and ran to the door. But Daniel caught her, slamming his hand against the wood before she could open it.

  “Don’t. Don’t punish yourself this way.”

  She tried to free herself. His body pressed her against the door, closing in on her in a way that was threatening and completely male.

  “Don’t!” He hissed at the pain arcing through his side, but ignored his own discomfort and held her shoulders, turning her to face him. “What you’re feeling isn’t wrong! It isn’t wrong.”

  Her expression grew tortured. Huge tears hung like diamonds on her lashes, but she refused to let them fall and humiliate her further.

  “You make me think things I shouldn’t. You make me want things I can’t have.”

  “Why can’t you have them?”

  She told him sadly, “No one would want someone like me.”

  When he opened his mouth to refute her statement, she continued, her voice dead. Quiet. “A part of me has been amputated. It’s gone. I know it’s not there even though I feel its spirit. And a phantom pain.” Her chin trembled. “But it’s gone. It’s gone.”

  She pushed him away. Not with her body, but with the depth of her withdrawal. Drawing her pride about her like a visible shield, she forced him to take a step back. Then she opened the door, walked into the hall, and disappeared into the blackness. A shadow of a woman being swallowed by shadows.

  Chapter 11

  Susan retreated to the darkness of her own room—yet not her own room. As she closed the door behind her and studied the familiar arrangement of the bed, rocker, dresser, and nightstand, she knew that things had changed. She had changed. She wasn’t the same young girl who had left Benton House years ago to begin her training at Saint Francis Academy.

  And she wasn’t the same woman who had left Saint Francis only days ago.

  She reached for the black bone buttons that closed her gown from neck to waist. One by one she slipped them free.

  For the first time in as long as she could remember, she yearned for the caress of silk or taffeta or faille. There were times when she thought the black wool she wore day in, day out, would smother her. She hated the prickly heat of the fabric in the summer and the scratchiness in the winter.

  Feeling confined, imprisoned, she tore the gown from her body and threw it carelessly on the floor. Then, taking deep gasping drags of winter-kissed air, she tried to rid herself of the sensation that the walls were closing in on her.

  Quickly she stripped the rest of her clothes away until she stood bare and shivering in the cold. Needing to avoid any feeling of confinement, Susan pulled her simplest linen nightdress over her head. Three sizes too big, it hung loose and flowing.

  Not bothering to fasten the buttons, she tore the heavy black scarf from her head. Free. She had to be free.

  Her fingers trembled with her urgency, and she yanked at the tight plaits and coils that were pinned in a thick twist at the nape of her neck. The ping of hairpins striking the floor pierced her conscience, reminding her of the pitfalls of vanity, but she didn’t care. One by one she unbraided the rich fiery strands. Ferverishly she worked until her hair spilled over her shoulders and down her back in a tangled cape.

  “Susan?”

  Her name was a stark whisper of sound in the silence. She turned, seeing the way the moonlight streamed through her window and limned the solitary figure in the doorway.

  She clutched at the gaping edges of her gown, then found herself rooted to the spot.

  Daniel stepped inside, closing the door behind him. He had abandoned the sheet and had put on a minimum of clothing. Though the trousers were fastened, his shirt hung open and unbuttoned. His feet were bare.

  Susan couldn’t speak. She couldn’t move. She stood rooted in tense silence as he walked toward her. At first his gaze clung to her face with such blatant hunger that she could scarcely credit her own interpretation. His eyes then dipped, skimming the fabric of her nightgown now clutched against her breast. Then his stare centered on the auburn waves tumbling wildly about her shoulders.

  “Your hair.” The two words held the reverence of a prayer. “Look at your hair.”

  As if drawn by some unseen power, he edged closer until they stood a breath apart. His large callused hands reached out, hesitantly at first. One knuckle slid over a stray curl, then lingered. Next he rubbed a strand between his thumb and forefinger.

  “Your hair,” he breathed again, more to himself than to her. He cupped her head in both palms, tilting her face so that she couldn’t avoid his rapt expression as he savored the texture of the braid-crimped strands.

  Something magical spread through Susan’s body with each second that passed. He worshiped her. He made her feel special. He made her feel …

  Whole.

  Daniel’s hands shifted, and the neckline of Susan’s nightdress parted ever so slightly. A masculine nipple grazed her breastbone.

  Both of them froze. Susan focused on the firm contours of Daniel’s chest. In the firelight, the gilded muscles seemed even broader and more muscular. The smooth expanse was broken by the faint markings of old scars—evidence of his rigorous way of life since he’d left the orphanage.

  Susan’s eyes widened as she took in Daniel’s form. There was something frightening about a man’s body. It was so hard and angular, where her own was smooth and curved. Men were so …

  She squeezed her eyelids shut, trying to block out the past that crowded into her mind, the return of the horror, the fear.

  Mama? Mama, I heard you call!

  Susan, get back in the cellar!

  Mama?

  Stay, little girlie. Stay or I’ll cut your ma with this knife, see?

  Susan! Go back!

  “Look at me!”

  Daniel’s rough whisper brought Susan back from the web of the past. Her lashes flew open, blue eyes met with green. He took her fingers and pried them loose from his waist. With a rush of shame, Susan saw she’d squeezed his side so hard she’d pained him.

  Moaning deep in her throat, she tried to jerk free and run from the room. Daniel anticipated her intent and, despite his discomfort, snapped his arms around her waist, holding her fast. Folding her in his arms, he absorbed the brittle quality of her stance and the unintelligible sounds that spilled from her lips.

  Susan bucked and squirmed. He wouldn’t let her go! He wouldn’t let her go! Reality swam in front of her, mingling with the sounds and shapes of her child
hood, distorting, twisting, until it wasn’t Daniel who held her, but another angrier male.

  “Susan. Susan, stop it!”

  She felt him shaking her. She gradually focused on Daniel’s face, and she grew still, shivering against the cold that crept into the marrow of her bones.

  A choked, tortured sound escaped from the tightness of her throat. “Let me go. Please.”

  Daniel’s eyes became dark and inscrutable, filling with an echo of her own pain. His hold abated, but he would not allow her to pull completely away.

  When he knew that she would not try to escape, he reached for the buttons of her nightdress. Awkwardly he fastened the disks into their delicately edged holes.

  “I won’t hurt you. You know that.”

  But Susan felt differently. Every move he made affected her, making her doubt herself and her future. She wondered if he knew that he blazed a trail of fire and ice through her frame. Anticipation and fear. Though her body cried out for the sweet absolution of Daniel’s caresses, her mind would not free her from the prison of past horrors.

  Daniel’s fingertips teased the hollow of her throat, and the last button slid into place. A warmth spread from that spot, flowing into her entire being with an inexplicable enticement.

  His thumb traced a tempting circle before slipping up to her jaw, skimming her chin, and coming to rest on her lower lip. He lowered his head.

  “Just this once,” he whispered.

  She made a faint murmur of protest, but he paid no attention. He stroked her lip with his thumb, then replaced it with his mouth. His tongue.

  Her fists pushed him away in refusal even as her feet took a hesitant step forward. She wanted him to hold her close and ease the pain in her heart. She wanted him to step back and leave her alone. The constant pull in two directions filled her with an unbearable confusion and an unspeakable hunger. She didn’t know how much longer she could bear the warring feelings, but the thought of abandoning his touch left her with an even bleaker image.

  When the kiss ended, Susan’s knees threatened to buckle. The warring emotions grew, blossomed, overpowered her. Memories, dark and dank, crowded the room. Haunting scents filled the air. Phantom screams. Distant thunder.