he couldn’t shake off the feeling that this morning was like no other they’d ever spent together.
He watered his horse, then took him over to the sycamore growing beside the river. He looped the reins around the same branch Tess had used to tie Peppermint Patty and went to sit beside Tess on a shady part of the riverbank.
He picked up a pebble and chucked it into the water. “Did you hear from that teacher at your new school?”
“Yep.” Tess plucked a stem of dry grass and began shredding it between her fingers. “I got an e-mail from her and she’ll be glad to let me stay with her until I can find an apartment.”
Mac glanced at Tess. He’d wondered when she’d suggested the ride if she had something specific on her mind. Maybe this move had her spooked. She’d been renting a little house ever since she got the counselor’s job at Copperville High, but living on her own in a small Arizona mining town with her parents three miles away was a lot different than living alone in New York City, two thousand miles from everyone she knew.
“Would this teacher rent you a room in her apartment?” he asked.
Tess shook her head. “She doesn’t have the space. I’ll be on the couch until I can find an apartment of my own. Besides, I want my own place. After growing up in a houseful of brothers, I’ve discovered I love the privacy of living alone.”
“You just think you’re living alone. Your family drops in on you all the time.”
“I know.” She sighed. “I love them, but I’m looking forward to being less convenient for a change.”
Mac could understand that. It was one of the reasons he’d decided to get a private pilot’s license. He looked for excuses to fly the Cessna because it was one of the few times he could be alone. “You might get lonesome,” he said.
“I probably will.” Tess began shredding another blade of wild grass. “But after living in a fishbowl for twenty-six years, lonesome doesn’t sound so bad.”
“Yeah.” Mac tossed another pebble in the water. “I hear you.” He breathed in the familiar mixture of scents—the dankness of the river, the sweetness of the grass, the light, flowery cologne Tess had worn for years, and the wash-line smell of sun on denim. Dammit all, he was going to miss her. He’d avoided facing that unpleasant fact ever since he found out that she’d gotten the job, but now it hit him all of a sudden, and he didn’t like it.
Tess had been part of his world for as long as he could remember. So had the rest of her family, giving him the brothers and sister he’d always longed for. But Tess had always been the one he’d felt closest to. Maybe it was all those Halloweens together when she’d insisted he be Raggedy Andy to her Raggedy Ann, Han Solo to her Princess Leia, Superman to her Lois Lane. Or maybe it was the Easter-egg hunts, or the Monopoly games that lasted for days, or tag football—Tess had been there for everything. Every Christmas she dragged him out to go caroling even though he couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket.
He’d die before admitting to her how much he’d miss her. In the first place, they’d never been mushy and sentimental with each other, and in the second place, he didn’t want to be a spoilsport right when she had this exciting chapter opening in her life. He was happy for her. He was jealous as hell and he’d have a hard time adjusting to her being gone, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t glad she had this chance.
“I’m glad you got the job,” he said.
“Me, too. But I asked you to come here with me because I have this one problem, and I think you can help me.”
“Sure. Anything.”
“It’s a different world there in New York, and I don’t feel exactly…ready for it.”
Her voice sounded funny as if she was having trouble getting the words out.
“You’re ready.” He broke off a blade of grass and chewed on the end of it. “You’ve been working up to this all your life. I’ve always known you’d go out there and do something special.” He turned to her. “It’s your ultimate quest, Tess. You might have butterflies, but you’ll be great.”
“Thanks.” She smiled, but she looked preoccupied and very nervous.
He hoped she wasn’t about to break their code and get sentimental. Sure, they wouldn’t be able to see each other much, but they’d survive it.
She cleared her throat and turned to stare straight ahead at the river, concentrating on the water as if she’d never seen it flow before. God, he hoped she wouldn’t start crying. She wasn’t a crier, for which he’d always been grateful. He’d only see her cry a couple of times—when Chewbacca died and when that sleaze Bobby Hitchcock dumped her right before the senior prom. Good thing he hadn’t had a date that night and had been able to fill in.
They’d had a terrific time, and he’d even considered asking her out again, for real. She’d looked so beautiful in her daffodil-yellow dress that it had made his throat tight, and to his surprise he’d been a little turned on by her when they’d danced. He’d almost kissed her on the dance floor, until he’d come to his senses and realized how that would be received by the Blakely brothers. Then, too, he might gross himself out, kissing a girl who was practically his sister.
She continued to gaze at the river. “Mac, I—”
“Hey, me, too,” he said, desperate to stave off whatever sappy thing she might be about to say. If she got started down that road, no telling what sort of blubbering he’d do himself. He chewed more vigorously on the blade of grass.
“Oh, I don’t think so,” she said in a strained voice. “The thing is, Mac…I’m still a virgin.”
In his surprise he spit the blade of grass clear into the river. Then he was taken with a fit of coughing that brought tears to his eyes.
She pounded him on the back, but the feel of her hand on him only made him cough harder. Ever since he’d discovered the wonders of sex, he’d made sure that he and Tess didn’t talk about the subject. Life was a lot safer that way, and he wished to hell she hadn’t decided to confess her situation to him this morning.
As he sat there wondering if he’d choke to death, she stood up and walked toward the river. Taking off her hat, she scooped water into it and brought it back to him. She held it in front of his nose. “Drink this.”
He drank and then he took off his hat and poured the rest of the cool water over his head. As he shook the moisture from his eyes and drew in a deep breath, he felt marginally better.
She remained crouched in front of him, and he finally found the courage to look at her. “So what?” he said hoarsely.
“I’m twenty-six years old.”
“So?” His response lacked imagination, but she’d short-circuited his brain. If he’d ever thought about this, which he’d been careful not to, he’d have figured out that she was probably still a virgin. The Blakely boys had fenced her in from the day she’d entered puberty.
“I can’t go to the big city like this. I can’t counsel girls who’ve been sexually active since they were twelve if I’ve never, ever—”
“I get the picture.” Much too graphically for his tastes. His mind had leaped ahead to a horrible possibility—that she would ask him to take care of her problem. And the horrible part was that he felt an urge stirring in him to grant her request. He pushed away the traitorous thought. “I think you could certainly go to New York without…experience. Chastity’s catching on these days. You could be a role model.”
“Oh, Mac! I don’t want to be a role model for chastity! I didn’t choose to be a virgin because of some deeply held belief. You know as well as I do that my brothers are the whole reason I’m in this fix.”
Her brothers. God, they would skin him alive if he so much as laid a finger on her. “Well, your brothers aren’t going to New York!” He knew