Page 80 of I Do, I Do, I Do
“So. Are you ready for our rematch?”
Turning, she gazed into his brown-bear eyes. “I concede. We don’t have to arm-wrestle. You win. I’d like to have some of that ale and talk for a few minutes.”
Alarm flared in his gaze. “You’re changing the plan!”
My heavens, he looked good. A golden giant. Clara studied him and genuinely could not imagine why every woman he met didn’t throw herself at him. She especially liked the small scars on his face. They gave him character and distinction, and before tonight ended she hoped to know the stories behind them.
“I’m not changing the plan, except to dispense with the match, just rearranging it a bit. We can talk again after dinner like you intended.”
Suddenly she understood his plan for what it was, a schedule that relieved his endearing anxiety about entertaining a lady. That he was nervous made her smile. Lifting on tiptoe, Clara brazenly brushed her lips across his clean-shaven cheek. Instantly, he went rigid and stared at her with narrowed eyes.
“You fetch us some ale, and I’ll wait for you by the fire.”
After touching his cheek, he gazed at the hills of peachy breasts rising above her bodice. Then he nodded and hurried toward the kitchen without a word.
Clara considered the distance between the chairs he’d placed before the fire, then moved them closer together. Exercising a woman’s prerogative, she chose one of the small tables scattered about the room and set it near the chairs. Stepping back, she studied the arrangement. Much better. More intimate and cozy.
Bear noticed immediately. He looked at the chairs, then slid a glance at her before he placed the bottles of ale, and a glass for her, on the table she’d chosen.
“I thought you’d want a glass tonight,” he said. Gripping the back of a chair, he started to slide it back.
“Why are you moving the chairs apart?”
“Honey girl, I can hardly keep my hands off you as it is.” He gave her an apologetic look. “I want tonight to be perfect. I don’t want a big uncouth lummox forgetting himself and doing something to offend you.”
Clara tossed the fountain of curls and drew herself up with a glare. She flung out a hand and pointed to the chair. “Sit!”
“What?”
“Right now.”
He hesitated, then sat. He reached for the ale bottle and took a long swig, watching her while he swallowed.
Clara sat on the edge of the facing chair and folded her hands in her lap. She hadn’t worn a corset in so long that she had forgotten how uncomfortable they were and how they restricted relaxed movement. If she had leaned back in the chair, the steel bones would have pinched her waist.
“It’s true that I am a respectable woman,” she said finally.
“Oh, hell. If you feel you have to point that out, then I’ve already done something to offend you. I’m sorry.” Leaning forward, he clasped his hands between his knees, the ale bottle dangling between two fingers.
“Bear, you haven’t offended me. But we need to talk about this.”
He didn’t seem to hear. “There’s something I planned to tell you later, after we’d enjoyed the evening. I should have told you long before now.” Throwing his head back, he took another deep pull on the ale bottle and drained it before he placed it on the table and raised his head. “My mother was a whore, Clara. I don’t know who my father was. I grew up in a Chicago brothel.”
“Oh, Bear.” Sympathy widened her eyes, but he waved it aside with a quick gesture. And suddenly she understood why she seemed to make him so uncomfortable at times.
“All in all I had a good childhood. My mother and her friends fussed over me, saw to it that I had everything I needed. When most children were tucked in bed, I was wandering the neighborhood, pitching pennies with other boys who were free to roam the night. I learned to fight, learned to take care of myself, learned a lot of things that aren’t taught in books. It was a childhood most boys would envy.”
“Bear—”
“Wait.” He held up a big hand. “My mother and her friends were kind, generous, honest in their own way.” His expression challenged her to disagree. When she said nothing, he continued. “But even as a boy I understood that most of the world didn’t live like we did and didn’t approve. I knew my mother and her friends were reviled, often by men who later came to the door. I won’t say that I was ashamed of her. I wasn’t. But I knew that she and I lived on the wrong side of life.”
“Your mother—”
“My mother was everything you aren’t. She perspired, swore, drank like a man, and made no apology for her pleasures. She wasn’t a dainty person, cared little for proper manners. Her idea of culture was enjoying a bawdy melodrama at Basker’s Lyceum.”
Clara was beginning to understand. He believed respectable women were the direct opposite of his mother in every way. And he’d placed respectable women high on a pedestal.
“When I meet women like you, Clara, I lift my hat, nod, and walk on by. A lady isn’t going to approve of where I came from or who I am. And she’s right. As hard as I try not to, I’m still apt to swear or scratch or make an inappropriate remark. Look how many times I’ve offended you. And believe me, I’ve tried not to.”
