He glanced at her eyes, warm with respect, and he wanted to duck away from her open emotion. Another woman might have played the game of feigning shock at his actions. Clearly, the schoolteacher didn’t understand the affectation of womanly wiles and, more than that, she seemed to hold some kind of misguided admiration for him. And he didn’t think that rescuing a horse from Granger was worth admiring, even though everyone around knew Tom Granger was a surly Englischer who mistreated his wife, son, and stock, and who cursed loudly as Amish women and children walked past his farm.
Jacob roused from his musings when Lilly replaced the handkerchief and folded the torn edges of his shirtsleeve back over the makeshift bandage, fussing with the fabric.
“You are fortunate that you’ve escaped the notice of the police. They’ve searched the area but probably overlooked this outlying barn.”
“Well, that’s one thing in my favor, I suppose. But I’ve got to face them sooner or later, and I—”
He realized that she peeked at his mouth while he spoke, and he recognized the brief, veiled glance. Girls had studied his lips with speculative interest since he’d turned sixteen, and impetuous instinct now drew his eyes to her lips.
He was bone weary, wounded, and besides the physical pain, his heart hurt more than the time an anxious stallion had broken his ribs.
But he was also alive and sick of feeding on ideas about what might have been. Now mattered. That was all. What was right in front of him. He ignored the prick of conscience that might have checked his words and tilted his head to one side.
“I know what you want,” he said evenly and without conceit.
She startled, a ready denial in the depths of her eyes.
He shook his head. “Don’t. I want it too.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Then the schoolteacher knows more about books than she does about herself, he thought, leaning forward.
He cupped his callused hand around her fragile chin before she could draw away.
“I’m talking about escape,” he whispered. “Just for a moment. No responsibilities. No wedding. No heartache. Nothing—but now.”
He lowered his lashes until all he could see was the petal pink of her mouth against the paleness of her skin and then he dipped his head. He kissed her until he felt her resistance melt into tentative response, and then he closed his eyes. He wanted to banish the image of Sarah that burned in his brain and slanted his chin to deepen the kiss. He heard his own frantic intake of breath when she laid a hand on his chest, and he surrendered helplessly to the fantasy of another man’s wife—a vision that he longed to deny.
CHAPTER 2
Lilly envisioned a thousand granules of sugar quickening through a funnel to some dark, waiting center. She was sliding with them, covered in sweetness, until the rational part of her mind intruded. Substitute. Substitute teacher. Sarah’s substitute. She wrenched backward and Jacob made a strangled sound in his throat that jarred her senses, leaving her longing to soothe him. But she sank back to rest on her legs. Her mouth stung and her chin burned from the dark shadow of his jaw. She prayed that the Lord might forgive her for allowing such a thing. And then added her request that He also might bring someone, someday, to love her with as much passion as she felt through Jacob’s kiss.
She watched him come to himself, like a dreamer waking with reluctance. His heavy lashes lifted from his flushed cheeks and he sighed.
“I’m sorry.”
“No, you’re not,” she replied, surprised at the steadiness of her voice. “You wanted an escape; you got it.”
His green-gold eyes narrowed. “I think you got a bit of it too, Miss Schoolteacher.”
“You’re right, of course. I’ve never had the kiss of a man, only a father’s.”
A tenseness appeared around his handsome mouth at her admission, and he looked away.
“You need medical attention.”
He nodded, still concentrating on some unknown spot at the back of the barn. “Jah, but the only doctor around is the good Grant Williams, veterinarian at-large. And he, as you know, has other plans this morning.”
Lilly didn’t need to listen hard to hear the bitterness in his tone.
Dr. Williams was an Englischer who’d been baptized into the community only a few months past, but he was as accepted as one to the bonnet born. And, he was the man who had won Sarah King’s heart.