The Seduction of Roxanne Read online

  "Of course,” she said softly. “You can walk with me to school."

  They walked slowly, taking long, leisurely strides down the side of the street. What a beautiful spring morning, Roxanne thought as she took a deep breath. Just a hint of coolness touched the air. The chill reminded her, a little, of last night's cool breeze washing over her face and her bare legs, the chilled air she'd gasped into her lungs when Calvin had touched her. Remembering brought a warm flush to her cheeks.

  Poor Calvin, he had a terrible time gathering his courage. He hemmed and hawed, and dragged his big feet as they walked down the dirt road. Roxanne smiled and waved to the people they passed, those who were setting up shop for the day, but Calvin seemed not to see them at all.

  They had passed the business district and walked before a row of small cottages before he finally spoke. There weren't so many eyes on them here. Roxanne told herself that was the reason he'd waited. Such private matters should remain private, particularly for someone as timid as Calvin.

  "I told you once that I wanted to get married and have kids and get myself a farm.” Reticent as always, he didn't quite look her in the eye.

  "You did,” she said, her heart singing. This was the man who'd poured his heart into precious love letters, who'd held her close and loved her as a man loves a woman. This beautiful creature had restored her life, awakening her not with a rude shake but with a gentle hand and a heart-stopping kiss. “I think it's a wonderful plan,” she said with a coy smile.

  "I figured it might be a while before I found the right gal and the right piece of land, but sometimes things happen that you don't expect, they just come right out of the blue and whack you between the eyes, you know what I mean?"

  "I do,” she whispered. “Like last night,” she lowered her voice, even though there was no one around to hear. “Last night was marvelous, Calvin. It was...” How could she explain when she didn't understand herself?

  Calvin stopped before a bois d'arc hedge that shielded them from view. “Last night?” He looked confused, dull even, as he narrowed his eyes and wrinkled his nose.

  She wouldn't let him play the game any more—distant by daylight and lover in the dark. There was no reason for him to hide anymore. Calling on a boldness she'd just recently discovered within herself, she rocked forward and laid her lips over his, ready for the explosion of power and excitement she'd experienced last night, the tingle that would warm her heart and electrify her body, the thrill that would make her weak in the knees. Her lips molded to his, soft and warm, accepting and loving, and she waited for the response that had, just a few glorious hours ago, moved her to unexpected levels.

  Nothing. The kiss elicited no response at all, not in her and apparently not in Calvin, either. She opened her eyes as she took her lips from his apathetic mouth. He was blushing, beet red, and looking down at his feet again.

  "Miz Roxanne, you shouldn'ta done that,” he said as he took a step back.

  "Last night.... “she began.

  Calvin raised his hands in the air. “I don't remember nothin’ about last night,” he protested. “I went into the saloon and had myself too much to drink. Woke up this morning in my own bed with my hair cut off and no idea how I got there."

  "You were...” she swallowed hard. “Drunk?"

  "Whew,” he said with a shake of his head. “I was downright wobbly-ass drunk. I don't usually drink liquor much at'all, but yesterday I got so flustered...."

  "Flustered?” she repeated, taking her own step back. “You don't even remember what happened?"

  He began to look concerned. “What happened?"

  She shook her head slowly, embarrassed and more than a little flustered herself. “It doesn't matter.” A hard, painful lump formed in her throat as she held back tears. She'd tasted the whiskey on his breath last night, but he hadn't acted intoxicated, not at all. On the contrary, he'd seemed very much in control.

  Their passionate night had been so wonderful for her, so magical, and he didn't even remember! She was mortified at the memory of her behavior, her brazenness. Drunk or not, Calvin had still found the good sense to try to refuse her when she'd offered him everything. She felt suddenly lightheaded at the memories that had been precious moments ago and were now mortifying.

  When he'd protested that she wasn't his, she'd practically begged him to ravish her. She'd touched him intimately, held on to his body and refused to let go. She'd asked him to love her ... and he had.

  And then he'd said he was sorry.

  "Anyways,” he began again. “What I wanted to tell you is that I'm getting married. Next week."

  Everything went gray around the edges of her vision, and she thought for a moment she would faint. Calvin wasn't proposing to her, he was letting her go.

  "Really,” she said weakly.

  "Yep. I met Maggie while I was staying with the cousins. She's a neighbor of theirs, the youngest daughter of a farmer out that way.” His eyes lit up in a way she'd never seen, and what was left of her heart broke again. “I was smitten with Maggie the minute I laid eyes on her. Usually I'm right bashful with purty gals, but with Maggie I didn't have no trouble at'all speakin’ up. Met her on Sunday, and on Monday I rode out to her Daddy's farm and asked her to be my wife."

  "How wonderful for you,” she said weakly, wishing for the strength to give this man a piece of her mind. She couldn't very well do that without embarrassing herself further, without reminding him of everything that had happened in the dark. “Were you...” she had to ask, she had to know, “thinking of Maggie last night?"

  He actually smiled, his lush mouth curving into a sweet, appealing grin. “Gosh, I think about her all the time, nowadays. Sure I was thinkin’ about her last night."

  Dignity be damned. She took the book she held in her hands, a weighty novel by James Fenimore Cooper, and smacked Calvin with it. The blow landed ineffectively on his arm, and when she swung again he deflected the book with a meaty hand.

  "Now, there's no call to get upset. I know I said in my letter that we'd do some courtin', but—"

  "Do some courtin'?” She swung again and this time he snatched the book from her. She wasn't just angry and hurt, she was furious. After everything he'd said and done....

  Her fists balled at her sides, and her breathing came ragged and shallow. For a split second she felt an abysmal certainty that her life was over, that she was devastated beyond repair, that she was unbearably distraught.

  Yet when she stopped long enough to look Calvin Newberry square in the eyes she realized something important, something monumentally important.

  She didn't love him. Oh, she'd allowed herself to fall in love with the idea of loving again, with the sweet words and the ideal picture of a long and happy life with a loving husband at her side—but her dream was a meaningless fantasy. Like a fool she'd fallen in love with a voice in the dark, with letters that apparently meant nothing to this man, with the notion of a peaceful life with a beautiful husband and his beautiful children.

  But right this minute, searching Calvin's eyes for a hint of the man she loved, she saw nothing. No thrill, no spark, no romance. No love at all. Heaven help her, she'd manufactured a man that didn't exist out of a few moments in time, out of a few words. Her breath came a little easier now than it had a few minutes ago, and the lump in her throat disappeared.

  This fiasco was all her fault. Maybe she'd needed to be loved one more time, maybe she'd only wanted what he'd given her last night; warmth, touch, another body pressed against hers. She'd allowed this man to take unimaginable liberties with her, and yet when she looked into his eyes she saw nothing. Nothing at all.

  She didn't love him.

  "Give me my book,” she said softly.

  He held it just out of her reach. “Not if you're going to hit me with it again."

  "I won't,” she promised calmly.

  Reluctantly, he returned her book to her. He tensed, as if he waited for her to strike out at him again. She tucked the book in the
crook of her arm and looked Calvin straight in the eye, calling on every ounce of courage in her cowardly body. “I wish you every happiness."

  He grinned at her, obviously relieved. “Thanks, Miz Roxanne. And you know, I hope one day you meet a man you want to marry as much as I want to marry my Maggie."

  She clutched the book tightly to keep from lashing out again as she turned her back on Calvin. Miz Roxanne, he called her now, so formally and respectfully, as if she were an old woman. And he so sweetly wished her the same happiness he'd found.

  "Oh no,” she whispered as she continued, alone, toward the Paris Female Academy. “Never again."

  Where was she? Cyrus paced on the boardwalk, waiting impatiently for Roxanne to walk past. Many of her students had passed by already, arms full of books as they complained about the extraordinary amount of homework they'd been assigned, whispering—loudly—about what a foul mood their teacher had been in today.

  She should've passed by now, Cyrus thought as he paced. Dammit, he should've seen her a quarter of an hour ago!

  Calvin had broken the news about his impending marriage very casually, as he'd loaded a number of bags onto his horse and readied to leave Paris. Cyrus had been stunned speechless for a while, as he'd watched the kid prepare to leave town, sure that when Roxanne heard the news she would be heartbroken, devastated ... especially after last night.

  Calvin told him, as he climbed into the saddle to quiet protests from Cyrus, that he'd already told Roxanne the news of his impending marriage and that after an initial bit of surprise she seemed not to mind at all.

  Cyrus knew better. He knew, after last night, how much Calvin meant to Roxanne. She loved him!

  Finally, he saw her walking down the street. Eyes straight ahead, head high, from a distance it seemed nothing was wrong.

  But as she drew closer his heart sank. Her eyes were cold, dead, distant, and the hands that clutched a small stack of books were white-knuckled. She didn't seem to be paying attention to her surroundings, but stalked mindlessly, unerringly forward. If he hadn't stepped from the boardwalk to join her, she never would've seen him.

  "Pretty afternoon,” he said as he fell into step beside her.

  "Is it?” she asked tonelessly. Her face was a bit too pale, her chin stubborn and her eyes cold. Calvin was a bigger fool than Cyrus had ever imagined if he really thought she didn't mind at all.

  "Yes,” he said. Her step didn't slow, and she didn't so much as glance his way.

  Now, more than ever, he knew he shouldn't have gone to her last night. After everything that had happened, she was surely devastated to learn that the idiot Calvin had headed off to marry another woman. If only he'd kept his distance, if only he'd allowed her to run back into the safety of her home thinking that he didn't want her.

  It would be foolish to keep talking about the weather and ignore the problem, and since Roxanne obviously didn't intend to bring up the subject, he would. Better to get everything out in the open, rather than stewing over something that couldn't be changed.

  "I'm sorry things didn't work out with Calvin,” he said.

  She looked directly at him with cold, angry eyes. “Are you?"

  He shrugged his shoulders, nervous and uncomfortable and fighting the inclination to run. He'd caused this mess, and with every attempt to help he'd only made matters worse. He had to do what he could to fix it. “I guess it just wasn't meant to be. There will be other—"

  She stopped suddenly and turned on him. “Oh no,” she said heatedly. “You had the right idea, Cyrus, when you said you'd never get married. I should've listened to your advice and made a similar vow myself, to stay single and unencumbered and childless. What did you say about kids? Troublesome and sassy, I think you said, among other things."

  Her nostrils flared and she took a deep breath. “If having children means shackling myself to a man, then I'm better off remaining alone for the rest of my life.” A new, almost desperate spark lit her eyes, and he wondered if she'd just this moment considered the fact that their fast and furious coming together might have resulted in a baby.

  "Maybe I was wrong."

  "No,” she interrupted. “You were right. And if I ever ask you to introduce me to another man, if I ever mention marriage again—” she glanced pointedly at the Colt he wore on his hip—"shoot me."

  She stalked away and Cyrus followed. Well, he'd known this would be hard. She'd get over it, though. She had to. “It can't be all that bad."

  She spun on him, and he was distressed to see tears filling her angry eyes. “Not that bad?” Her lower lip trembled, and the white-knuckled hands that clutched her books shook. “Once, in one of his more candid moments, Calvin told me that pain was better than being numb.” She took a deep breath, as if she were fighting to keep control. “He was wrong. I can live with being numb, if I have to. I don't need the pain."

  This time when she turned and walked away he let her go.

  It wasn't as easy as she'd expected to slip back into her cold, miserable life of numbness. Maybe she had looked into Calvin's eyes and realized she didn't love him, maybe she had realized that allowing herself to believe herself in love was nothing more than a horrid mistake ... but none of that made her heartache any easier to take.

  Why?

  She paced in her dark room, the letters Calvin had written clutched tightly in one hand. She knew very well why. Calvin had made her want love again. He'd made her realize that her life was empty and meaningless. He'd tempted her with a future she'd never have. Mercy, there had been moments when she had loved him; when he'd teased her with pretty whispered words and love letters, when he'd touched her in the dark....

  Coming to a sudden standstill in the middle of her bedroom, she held back a wave of panic. Allowing him to touch her had been the worst mistake of all. Swept away by lavish kisses and pretty words, she'd effectively seduced a drunken man who'd only been thinking of another woman!

  What if there was a baby? There's no baby, she told herself. There can't be.

  In a fit of rage she crumpled the letters in her hand. This was her fault as much, if not more, as Calvin's. Last night he'd been the one to try to call a halt to their lovemaking, the one who'd tried to keep things from starting and then had tried to keep them from going too far. Even drunk he'd known it was wrong.

  And what had she done when he'd protested that it wasn't right? That she wasn't his? She'd touched him, tempted him, forced him to put his good judgment aside and make love to her. On the ground, for heaven's sake, as if she were an animal who had no control over her urges.

  Whatever pain and heartache resulted from last night's mistake, she deserved.

  She stepped onto the balcony with a tin bucket, her crumpled letters, and a single match. The rest of the world slept, but she wasn't even tired. She was cold and angry and—she sat gracelessly on the floor of the balcony—sad. She was mournful for what she didn't feel, for what she'd lost, for the lonely life she'd lead from this day forward.

  She crossed her legs and set the bucket between her knees, and with a burst of anger she struck the match on the floor beside her. It flared to life and she touched the flame to a corner of one of the letters. She shook the match out and watched the letter burn, focusing her weary eyes on the low-burning flame that consumed the letter Calvin had written. When there wasn't much left she lit another letter with the flaming missive in her hand, and dropped the almost-destroyed letter into the bucket. Again, she studied the fine paper as it flickered and burned.

  An unexpected wave of sadness washed over her. This devastating episode with Calvin was just something else that had to be put in the past, something else to keep her awake at night with what ifs.

  Cyrus stood at the window, no longer able to sit and watch. His hands rested against the window frame; he needed the support. The fire before Roxanne's face illuminated her in an unearthly, eerie way that reached his heart, and he wanted, too much, to go to her and make everything right again.

  He
knew what she was burning, that the letters he'd written were turning to ash as he watched. Just as well. The letters were a lie, not because the words weren't true but because Roxanne thought they'd come from another man. It was right that they burn. If only he could undo the rest of this so easily.

  He'd cursed himself a thousand times in this long day. This was all his fault. He'd tried to make things right for Roxanne, and instead he'd succeeded in ruining her life, in making her miserable again. If he'd left things alone, if he'd introduced her to Calvin and then stepped back and allowed things to take their natural course, this wouldn't be happening. She never would've thought herself in love with a man who didn't really exist, a man manufactured with Calvin's face and simple dreams, with Cyrus's own words and even his body.

  Dammit, he wanted to explain ... but he couldn't. He wanted to go out there right now and stand beneath her balcony and lift his head and tell her the truth. All of it. He couldn't do that, either.

  He wanted, more than anything, to claim her as his own. To love her, night after night, day after day. To give her everything she wanted; marriage, babies, forever. He wanted to make love to her by the light of a hundred candles, to sink into her while he looked into her eyes and saw a love for him and him alone.

  His eyes drifted closed. Obsession, hell, he loved her and probably had for years.

  His hand rose, involuntarily, to the scar on his face. He couldn't love her, couldn't look forward to night after night in her arms.

  Could he? She'd said, last night, that it had been the letters she'd fallen in love with, the whispered words. Who did she truly love? A handsome face or heartfelt words? Her dream of a safe and happy farm or the way she felt when he touched her? Him, not Calvin or anyone else. Not once, last night, had she mentioned Calvin's beautiful face or the safety of her ideal, isolated farm.