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“Even with fear in your eyes you are beautiful,” he said, his voice drawn. “But you are more beautiful when it is not there
.” He bent low and softly kissed her lips. “Let me kiss the fear away.”
Marsha found it hard to concentrate at all, as he swept her closer to him and kissed her with more intensity, the passion strong between them. Then, breathless from these new feelings that were overwhelming her, Marsha moved her lips from his.
“I feel so many things,” she murmured, gazing into his eyes. “But nothing akin to fear.” She searched his eyes and placed a gentle hand on his cheek. “Swift Horse, how can someone love as quickly as I have fallen in love with you?”
“How can I answer that when I feel the same for you and as quickly?” he said huskily.
“But you are a powerful, noble, and knowledgeable man,” Marsha said softly. “I see you as a man who knows everything.”
“This thing called love is new to me, for as I have told you, I have never loved a woman before,” Swift Horse said, framing her face between his hands and bringing her lips ever so close, yet not close enough to kiss. “But soon I will know everything there is to know about this thing called love, for each moment that I am with you, you teach me more about it.”
“As you are teaching me,” Marsha said, the breath catching in her throat when he brought his lips down onto hers again, then moved them as quickly away.
He could hardly control his heartbeats, nor his passion, and knew that it was time to return her home, or they might be drawn far past just kisses, and he respected her too much to go that way, just yet.
“Your brother will be concerned if we remain gone for much longer,” he said thickly. “I will return you home now. He can see that I am an honorable man in doing so.”
“You are honorable in all that you do, but yes, I believe we should leave, too, for my heart is pounding so hard, if it gets much harder, I will not be able to think, much less ride White Cloud,” Marsha said, seeing the danger in their staying alone like this for much longer. She had strange new feelings within her, chief among them a hunger she had never known before.
“I will take you home to your bread-making,” Swift Horse said, chuckling as he helped her up from the rock.
He could not help himself, though. He needed her in his arms at least one more moment, to sustain him until they were together again.
But this time he did not kiss her. He just gazed adoringly onto her face and into her eyes, which were the color of wild violets in the spring.
“You are more beautiful than any flower, butterfly, or sunset that I have ever known before in my life,” he said huskily. “I shall always love you. Always.”
“As I shall you,” she murmured, then walked hand-in-hand with him to their horses.
When they were riding toward home, there was more peace within Marsha than she had felt since before leaving Kentucky. This man did have a way of righting wrongs within her heart. She knew that she had found the man she was destined to meet and marry.
Marsha caught him watching her as she glanced over at him.
“I do love you,” Swift Horse said.
“I have surely loved you forever, even before I knew you,” Marsha said softly. “I do love you, Swift Horse.”
“The day your parents chose to move to my land, surely I knew it already inside my heart that we would meet and fall in love,” Swift Horse said. “I do remember not so long ago, when the sun was still high and hot during the summer months, and a vision came to me. In it were eyes such as yours, and a smile. That vision was you, my woman. You.”
She was stunned that he had seen this in a vision, long before they knew each other existed. That was proof that it was meant to be—that fate had drawn them together!
Chapter 18
Shadow of annoyance
Never came near thee:
Thou lovest, but ne’er knew love’s sad satiety.
—Percy Bysshe Shelley
“Are you all right?” Edward James asked as he slipped a fringed buckskin jacket on. “Sis, you’ve seemed flushed since your ride with Swift Horse. Do you have a fever?”
Marsha placed the last of the dishes in the cupboard, untied her apron and hung it on a peg on the wall, then gave her brother a big, warm hug.
“I’m fine,” she murmured. “It was just the sun. And you know how warm the weather can get during the days of Indian summer. That’s all, big brother. I just got a bit too much sun.”
