LED ASTRAY Page 4

  He'd been trying to lease the mineral rights on the Parson's land for years. The elderly couple had died within months of each other, but the children had held out, saying they didn't want their family's land to be desecrated by drilling rigs. That was a crock, of course, and Cage knew it. They had been holding out while the price went up. He'd pay a call on the executor of the estate tomorrow.

  "Hiya, Cage."

  He had been so lost in thought that he hadn't seen the woman until she sidled up to his table, managing to nudge his shoulder with her hip as she did so. He glanced up with a notable lack of interest. "Hi, Didi. How're things?"

  Without a word, she laid a single key on the polished sur­face of the small, round table, covered it with the pad of her index finger, and slid it toward Cage. "Sonny and I have fi­nally called it quits."

  "'S that a fact?"

  Didi's marriage to Sonny had been on the rocks for months. Neither upheld their vows, especially the one promising faith­fulness. She had made inviting moves toward Cage before, but he'd stayed away from her. He didn't have many scruples, but he was loyal to one; never with a married woman. Something inside him still believed in the sanctity of marriage, despite everything, and he never wanted to be responsible for helping break one up.

  "Uh-huh. That's a fact all right. I'm a single woman now, Cage." Didi smiled down at him. If she had licked her lips, she would have been the perfect imitation of a well-satisfied she-cat that had just lapped up a bowl of cream. Her generous figure had been poured into a pair of jeans with a Neiman­-Marcus label, and a low cut sweater. Leaning down, she gave him an unrestricted view of her deep cleavage.

  Rather than inciting desire, she made him feel like he needed a bath.

  Jenny. Jenny. Jenny. So clean. Her body so neatly feminine. Not overblown, not lush, not voluptuous, just womanly.

  Damn!

  Mentally he jerked himself erect, though he still slouched in his chair, nonchalantly twirling the bottom of his glass on the table.

  Didi dragged a long fingernail down his arm. "See ya, Cage," she said with a seductive certainty as she undulated away.

  One corner of his mouth twisted sardonically. Had he ever thought such a bold invitation was attractive? Didi's blatancy was almost laughable.

  Jenny didn't even know she was sexy. She wore such a subtle fragrance. In comparison, Didi's heavy perfume lin­gered after her distastefully.

  Jenny's voice was nervously breathless, a voice Cage found far sexier than Didi's affected purr. And Jenny's amateurish caresses had stirred him more than the calculated foreplay any of his former lovers had practiced.

  Closing out the seamy setting before him, he let his mind wander back to that innocent bedroom that should have be­longed to a child, not to a woman who wore silk nightgowns. And it had been silk. His touch was educated to the matchless feel of silk against a woman's body. But Jenny's skin had been almost as soft. And her hair. And—

  Her virginity had been a shock. Surely, surely his brother wasn't that saintly. How could Hal, how could any man, have lived in the same house with Jenny all these years and not made love to her?

  Were he and his brother that different? Weren't they simi­larly equipped? Of course they were. There was nothing wrong with Hal physically. Cage had to admire Hal's unflagging mo­rality, though he couldn't imagine anyone imposing such a rigid code of morality on himself.

  Jenny hadn't, had she?

  She had been willing to give herself to Hal on the night of his departure. What a sap Hal had been not to accept that precious gift. Cage hated to think of his brother in such de­risive terms, but that was how he felt about it. Hadn't Hal realized what a sacrifice Jenny had been making for him? At the moment he had encountered the frail barrier of her virgin­ity, Cage had.

  God above, had he ever known such rapture as when he was sheathed inside her? Had he ever heard any sweeter sound than the little catches in her throat when passion claimed her?

  Never. It had never been so good.

  But then, no other woman was Jenny. She was the unattainable one. The one forbidden and off-limits. Even beyond his far-reaching boundaries.

  He had known it for years. Just as he had known that she belonged to Hal. It was understood. Years ago, Cage had had to reconcile himself to that. He could have any woman he wanted. Except the one he really wanted. Jenny.

  He was rotten to the core. No good. Didn't give a damn about anyone or anything. That was what folks said about him and it was mainly true. But he had cared enough about Jenny and Hal not to ruin their lives with his interference.

  He had kept his secret well. No one knew. No one would even guess. Least of all her. She had no idea that every time he was near her, he ached to touch her. Not sexually. Just touch her.

  Her affection for him was purely fraternal. Yet he had al­ways sensed that she was afraid of him, too. He made her uncomfortable and that had often broken his heart. Her fear was justified, of course. He had a scandalous reputation and any woman who valued her good name stayed away from him as though his sexuality was as contagious and dreaded as lep­rosy.

  But he had often wondered what would have happened if Jenny had come to live with them sooner. If he hadn't been off at college, if he hadn't already been known as a hell-raiser without equal, if they had had time to develop a relationship, would Jenny have turned to him instead of Hal?

  It was his favorite fantasy to think so. Because he sensed that beneath Jenny's reserve, there was a free spirit longing to be released, a sensual, sexual woman trapped in an invisible cage of circumspection. If she were given her freedom, what would happen?

  Maybe she wanted to be rescued. Maybe she made silent appeals to be freed that no other man had responded to. Maybe—

  You're fooling yourself man. She wouldn't want to get her life tangled up with yours under any circumstances.

  He shoved his chair back and stood, angrily tossing a pile of bills onto the table. But in the process, his hand paused as a thought struck him.

  Unless your life changed.

  He hadn't gone into her bedroom that night with the inten­tion of doing what he'd done. He had heard her crying and knew that her appeal to Hal had failed. She had been heart­broken and it had been his intention only to comfort her.

  But then she had mistaken him for Hal and, like the tide washing into shore, he had been compulsively drawn to her. He had crossed the dark room to her bed, telling himself that at any moment he was going to identify himself.

  He had touched her. He had heard the desperation in her voice. He had understood the despair of craving love and not receiving it. He had answered her plea and held her. And once he had kissed her, felt the responding warmth of her body beneath his hands, there had been no turning back.

  What he had done had been unforgivable. But what he was going to do was almost as bad. He was going to try to steal her from his brother.

  Now that he had had her, he couldn't let her go. Not if hell opened up and swallowed him. He wouldn't let her spirit be stifled by his family any longer. Hal had been given a golden opportunity to claim her love forever, but he had rejected her. Cage wouldn't stand by and see the yearning in her face even­tually become defeat, her vitality become resignation, and all her animation be smothered in a cocoon of righteousness.

  He had months to win her before Hal returned, and, by God, that was what he was going to do.

  "Didi." She was cuddled in a dark booth with a roughneck who had a hand under her sweater and his tongue in her ear. Annoyed by the interruption, she disengaged herself. "You forgot something," Cage said, flipping the key toward the booth.

  She missed it and it clattered noisily onto the table. Didi snatched it up and looked at Cage blankly. "What's this for?"

  "I won't be using it."

  "Bastard," she hissed venomously.

  "Never said otherwise," Cage said breezily as he pushed open the door of the tavern.

  "Hey, guy," the roughneck called after him, "you can't ta
lk to the lady—"

  "Oh, let it go, honey," Didi cooed, smoothing a hand down his shirtfront. They picked up where they had left off.

  Cage stepped into the cool evening air and drew it in deeply to clear his head of alcohol fumes and the odor of the tavern. Sliding beneath the wheel of his '63 split window Corvette Stingray, he gunned the engine to a low growl and sped off into the night.

  The restored classic car was the envy of every man within a hundred-mile radius of La Rota and was readily identified with Cage. It was a mean midnight black with a matching leather interior that was equally as devilish.

  Sleekly it rocketed down the barren highway, then slowed to silently take the corners of the town's streets. Half a block away from the parsonage, Cage pulled it to the curb and cut the engine.

  The window in Jenny's room was already dark. But he sat and stared at it for a full hour, just as he had done for the past six nights.

  * * *

  Chapter 3

  «^»

  Jenny glanced up from the altar at the front of the church when a tall silhouette loomed in the sanctuary door, dark against the bright sunlight outside. The last person she ex­pected to see here was Cage. Yet it was he who took off a pair of aviator sunglasses and strolled inside and down the carpeted aisle of the church.

  "Hi."

  "Hi."

  "Maybe I should increase my tithe. Can't the church afford to hire a janitor?" he said, nudging his chin toward the basket of cleaning supplies at her feet.

  Self-consciously she stuck the handle of her orange feather duster into the rear pocket of her jeans, which left the plume sticking up like a tail feather. "I like doing it."

  He grinned. "You seem surprised to see me."

  "I am," she replied honestly. "How long has it been since you came to church?"

  She had been dusting the altar in preparation for the bouquet of flowers the florist had delivered. Sunlight poured through the tall stained glass windows and made the fuzzy dancing motes look like a sprinkling of fairy dust. The light cast rain­bows on Jenny's skin and her hair, which had been pinned into a haphazard knot on the top of her head. Her jeans fit snugly. The tennis shoes on her feet were appealingly well worn. Cage thought she looked as cute as a button and sexy as all get out.

  "Last Easter." He dropped down onto the front pew and laid his arms along the back of it, stretching them out on either side of him. He surveyed the sanctuary and realized it had remained virtually unchanged for as far back as he could re­member.

  "Oh, yes," Jenny said. "We had a picnic in the park that afternoon."

  "And I pushed you in the swing."

  She laughed. "How could I have forgotten that? I screamed for you not to push me so high, but you kept right on."

  "You loved it."

  There was a trace of mischief in her eyes as she smiled down at him, the corners of her mouth turning up adorably. "How did you know?"

  "Instinct."

  When he sent a lazy smile in her direction, Jenny guessed that Cage had many instincts about women, none of them holy.

  Cage was thinking back to the previous spring, to the Sun­day they had mentioned. It had been a late Easter and the skies had been purely blue, the air warm. Jenny had worn a yellow dress, something soft and frothy that had alternately billowed around and clung to her body with each puff of south wind.

  He had loved drawing her close against his chest as she sat in the swing, the old one with ropes as thick as his wrists suspending it from the giant tree. He had held her against him for an unnecessarily long time, teasing her by almost letting her go before jerking her back. It had given him the oppor­tunity to breathe in the summery scent of her hair and enjoy the feel of her slender back against his chest.

  When he did release her, she laughed with childlike glee. The sound of her laughter still rang in his ears. Each time the pendulum of the swing carried her back to him, he pushed the seat of it, almost touching her hips. Not quite, but almost.

  It was true what the romantic poets penned about the fancies of young men in spring. Virile juices had pumped through his body that day, making him feel full and heady, heavy with the need to mate.

  He had wanted to lie in the grass with Jenny, letting the warming rays of the sun fall on her face as gently as his lips kissed her. He had wanted to rest his head in her lap, gazing up into her face. He had wanted to make soft, unhurried, gentle love to her.

  But she had been Hal's girl that day, just as always. And when Cage had taken all he could of seeing them together, he had stalked to his car to drink a cold beer from the cooler he kept there. His parents had demonstrated their extreme dis­approval.

  Finally, to keep from ruining everyone's good time, espe­cially Jenny's, because Cage knew that dissonance within the family distressed her tremendously, he had bade everyone a snarling farewell and roared away from the park in his black Corvette.

  Now he felt the same compulsion to touch her. Even in her mussed state, she looked so touchable and soft. He wondered if the wall of the church would cave in if he took her in his arms and kissed her the way he longed to.

  "Who donated the flowers this week?" he asked before his body could betray his lusty thoughts.

  Each year a calendar was circulated through the member­ship of the church. Families filled in a Sunday when they would provide flowers for the altar, usually in honor of a spe­cial occasion.

  Jenny read the card attached to the bouquet of crimson gladiolas. "The Randalls. 'In loving memory of our son, Joe Wi­ley,'" she read aloud.

  "Joe Wiley Randall." Cage squinted his eyes, a smile on his face.

  "Did you know him?"

  "Sure did. He was several classes ahead of me, but we ran around together some." He leaned his head far back and looked over his shoulder at a pew several rows behind him.

  "See that fourth row there? Joe Wiley and I were sitting there one Sunday morning. When the offering plate came by, Joe Wiley stuck his chewing gum to the bottom of it. I thought that was hilarious. So did Joe Wiley. We followed the progress of that offering plate through the sanctuary, up one aisle, down another. You can imagine the expressions on people's faces when their hands got stuck in the gum."

  Jenny, her eyes sparkling, sat down beside him. "What hap­pened?"

  "I got a spanking. Reckon he got one too."

  "No, I mean, the card says 'in memory of.'"

  "Oh. He went to Nam." He stared at the flowers for a long moment. "I don't recall seeing him after he graduated from high school." Jenny sat motionless, saying nothing, listening to the silence. "He was a helluva basketball player," Cage said reflectively. Then he hunched his shoulders and ducked his head as though God's wrath might strike him like lightning for his curse. "Ooops. Can't say that in church, can you?"

  Jenny laughed. "What difference does it make? God hears you say it all the time." Suddenly she took on a serious mien and gazed at him, her eyes probing deeply into his. "You do believe in God, don't you Cage?"

  "Yes." There was no doubt he was telling the truth. His face was rarely that somber. "And in my own way I worship Him. I know what people say about me. My own parents think I'm a heathen."

  "I'm certain they don't think that."

  He looked doubtful. "What do you think of me?"

  "That you're a stereotypical preacher's kid."

  He threw back his head and laughed. "That's an oversim­plification, isn't it?"

  "Not at all. When you were growing up, you acted ornery to keep from being thought of as a goody-goody."

  "I'm grown up, but I still don't want to be a goody-goody."

  "No one would accuse you of that," she teased, poking his thigh with her index finger. She drew her hand back quickly. His thigh was hard, just like Hal's, and it reminded her too well of hard, jean-clad muscles rubbing against her naked legs.

  To cover her consternation she asked, "Do you remember trying to make me laugh when I was singing in the choir?"

  "Me?" he asked indignantly. "I
never did any such thing."

  "Oh, yes, you did. Making faces and looking cross-eyed. From way back there in the back row where you sat with one of your girls, you would—"

  "With 'one of my girls'? You make it sound like I had a harem."

  "Didn't you? Don't you?"

  His eyes lowered significantly and took a leisurely tour of her body. "There's always room for one more. Wanna fill out an application?"

  "Oh!" she cried, jumping from her seat and facing him with mock fury, fists digging into her hips. "Will you get out of here. I've got work to do."

  "Yeah, so do I," he said, sighing and pulling himself to his feet. "I just signed a contract leasing a hundred acres of the old Parsons place."

  "Is that good?" She knew little about his work, only that it had something to do with oil and that he was considered successful

  "Very. We're ready to start drilling."

  "Congratulations."

  "Save those for when the first well comes in." Playfully he yanked on an errant strand of caramel-colored hair that had escaped the knot on top of her head. Turning, he sauntered up the aisle of the church toward the door.

  "Cage?" Jenny asked suddenly.

  "Yeah?" He turned back around, looking rugged and hand­some, windblown and sun-baked, disreputable and dangerous. His thumbs were hooked in his belt loops. The collar of his denim vest was flipped up to bracket his jaw.

  "I forgot to ask you why you came by."

  His shoulders bobbed in a brief shrug. "No special reason. 'Bye, Jenny."

  "'Bye."

  He stared at her for a moment before he put on his sun­glasses and stepped through the door.

  * * *

  Jenny struggled to anchor the damp bedsheet to the clothes­line before the strong wind ripped it from her grasp. The linens she had already hung up popped like sails and flapped around her like giant wings.

  As she shoved the clothespin over the last corner and dropped her arms in exhaustion, her ears were met with a monster's roar. A threatening form reared up behind the sheet and grabbed her. It enfolded her in its massive arms as it made rapacious devouring noises.