Page 18 of Texas Glory
Cameron nodded, stumbled to the ground, and started to snore.
Damn! Austin decided that he needed to go after his best friend’s sister and figured as soon as he found his legs he would. Meanwhile, he downed the remaining amber brew. Unfortunately, the burning in his throat didn’t ease the ache in his heart.
“There you are.”
Austin heard a voice sweeter than any sound his violin could make. Dusk was easing in around him as he squinted at the girl standing before him.
Becky Oliver. Sweet Becky Oliver. With eyes the color of a summer sky. The setting sun turned her auburn hair a shade of red. Her father owned the general store. Austin started to smile at her and then remembered she was the reason he was trying to get drunk. He tipped back the bottle. Two drops were hardly enough to satisfy him.
She knelt beside him, and he could smell vanilla. She always smelled like something he’d like to run his tongue over.
“You’re angry at me,” she said softly.
He shook his head, then nodded. “You were dancing with Duncan McQueen.”
“I would have danced with you, but you didn’t ask.”
“Only got one good arm,” he said as he tapped his shoulder and grimaced.
“You could dance with one arm.”
He shook his head. “Like to hold my women close. Need two arms to do that.”
She worked the empty bottle from his grip and tossed it aside. “How many women do you have?”
He smiled crookedly. “One. Just one.” He touched her cheek. It was softer than a cloud billowing in the sky. “I wanted to play my violin for you, but I can’t do that either.”
She lowered her gaze to her lap. “Do you need two arms to kiss me?”
“To do it proper.” He slid down the adobe wall. He deserved to have his head slam into the hard ground. Instead, she scooted nearer, and he found his head nestled in her lap, a pillow softer than any he’d ever known. He closed his eyes. “Gotta kiss you proper the first time.”
She combed her fingers through his hair. The darkness swirled around him. He moved his good arm around her backside, and promised himself that as soon as his shoulder healed, he’d kiss her proper.
Cordelia wanted to hide, to be alone with her thoughts, her sorrow. She wanted to be in her own room, curled in her bed, with a book in her lap.
But here, in this huge house, she had no room that belonged only to her. She had no private sanctuary. No place to call her own.
She closed the heavy front door behind her and held her breath. She heard no voices, no footsteps. Everyone was outside, celebrating her marriage, a marriage she didn’t want, a marriage that family obligations forced her to accept.
She tiptoed down the hallway, retracing the steps she’d taken earlier in the day until she reached Dallas’s office.
Quietly, she opened the door and peered inside. Early evening shadows lurked in the corners. Slipping into the room, she closed the door. She walked to the chair and sat, pulling her legs onto the soft cushion.
And gave the silent tears the freedom to fall.
Dallas Leigh didn’t want a wife. He wanted a son.
She felt like a prized mare chosen for the offspring she could produce. Dallas Leigh cared nothing for her appearance, her wants, her needs, her dreams. She wasn’t the person he wanted by his side as he journeyed through life. She was simply the means to an end.
Her thoughts drifted back to the kiss Dallas had begun on the veranda. She wondered where it might have led. She supposed that Boyd had interrupted them because he knew exactly where it would have taken them.
Boyd’s horrid words slammed into her, terrifying her … unless she held on to the memory of Dallas’s kiss. When he had looked at her, before he had kissed her, she had felt … touched, as though his hands were on her when they weren’t. Perhaps if he kissed her again …
She buried her face in her hands. She didn’t want to be here. She didn’t want to be a wife. She didn’t want to give him a son.
She heard a soft crackling. She tensed, her heart beating at a rapid tempo. She lowered her hands and gazed around the room.
She was alone.
