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"And, Adam… ?"
"Huh?"
"Will you please quit calling me ma'am? My name's Eugenia."
Adam looked serious for a moment, studying her. "But you're the madam of this house," he stammered. "Are you sure you want me to call you just Eugenia?"
Eugenia laughed. "To you? I'm just Eugenia. Remember that. As long as you want to share my bed with me. I am only Eugenia. Get it?"
Laughing, hitting the bed a loud pop with the slap of a hand, Adam said, "Yep, I get it."
"I'll be back in just a minute, love," Eugenia purred.
"I'll always be waitin' for you, Eugenia," Adam said, then stretched back out on top of the bed. Eugenia took one last look then stepped out into the hallway. She was relieved to find it empty. As she passed each closed door, she could hear small titters of laughter, some moans of pleasure, and in some, nothing.
All seemed to be going well with her girls, which was good. The only thing of importance to Eugenia at this moment was the feeling aroused once again for a man. Feelings that she had kept hidden for way too long. She had to get back to him, survey this desirous longing inside herself.
But she had a dark, gnawing feeling, remembering why she had waited so long, knowing how Drew had always rushed away from her, leaving her after he had had his desires filled. He did not truly love her, but what she had always so willingly given him.
But surely Adam wouldn't be the same. He had been pursuing her for way too long. Surely she could depend on him. She knew that she didn't love him as she had loved Drew, but she loved what he could give her, his body, his touches, his kisses.
She was a woman again.
* * *
Chapter Eighteen
The feel of a horse beneath her was one that Eugenia had sorely missed. Riding atop Adam's own horse, the one that she had so admired in front of her establishment the day before, she threw her head back and laughed loudly.
"Adam, I'd forgotten how it felt to be on a horse," she shouted to him as he rode ahead of her.
The wind whipped Eugenia's hair around her face as she raced the chestnut mare on in front of Adam, so glad to be away from the town and its confusion. She was finally able to mingle with nature once again, and on her mountain. She inhaled deeply, smelling the pines and spring flowers dotting the ground around her. She recognized them all; the coral-colored wild geraniums, brown-eyed Susans, and mountain daisies intermingling as though they had been painted, skillfully, onto a large canvas.
"Hey! Wait up!" Adam yelled from behind her.
Eugenia yanked on the horse's reins, until the horse was only clopping along in a slow gallop, then pulled it to a halt. The horse stood, panting, restless, stomping its right foot, stirring rocks on the path beneath it. Eugenia ran her hand along its neck as she leaned to comfort her.
"It's okay, girl," she whispered, waiting for Adam to pull up to her side on the nervous roan that he was riding.
"I'd never have guessed Madam Eugenia could be so skilled at riding a horse," Adam said, lifting his cowboy hat from his head, wiping his brow with the back of his hand.
"There's a lot you don't know about me, Adam," Eugenia said, tossing her long, auburn hair back behind her shoulders.
Adam took the reins from Eugenia, smiling, while his dark eyes gleamed invitingly in her direction.
"This looks like a good enough spot to enlighten me, hon," he said. "How 'bout parkin' our carcasses beneath that big ol' blue spruce over there?"
Eugenia studied the ground beneath the tree. "If you'll spread a blanket," she said, laughing lightly. "I don't care to be picking pine needles from my skin all night."
"Oh? You plan to be unclothed? Out here in the open?" Adam teased, as he climbed from his saddle.
Even though Eugenia and Adam had made passionate love the day before, she still looked to him as a stranger and could feel her face reddening because of his implications. She scooted from her own saddle and quickly smoothed down her heavy, brown riding skirt. She stood, watching him remove his saddle, then a blanket from atop his horse. Then she walked by his side until he stopped to spread the Indian blanket beneath the tree.
"After you, madam," Adam said, bowing, gesturing with the sweep of a hand.
Eugenia lifted her skirt and sat down, crossing her legs in front of her. Her gaze moved around her, remembering the last time she had sat
in such a place as this. She had been with Drew. She could even hear the faint splashing of water as it tumbled down the mountainside, and moved into the slow moving stream only a few yards from where she and Adam had chosen to take their rest.
