A Creed in Stone Creek - Linda Lael Miller [68]
Steven was gracious enough to ignore her embarrassment, obvious as it was. “I agree,” he said. “I’m convinced because of thunderstorms, the kind that seem to shake the ground itself. And because of the way little kids laugh, from way down deep in their middle, just because they’re so full of joy they can’t hold it in.”
Melissa’s eyes smarted, and her throat thickened, too. “Yeah,” she managed to croak out, after what seemed like a long time.
Steven smiled, stretched out a hand to her.
Melissa hesitated only briefly, then took it. He led her out of the house, with its benign ghosts and soft, musty shadows, into the deep grass that was once a lawn.
With a sweep of his free arm, he indicated the surrounding countryside. “Now it’s your turn, Melissa,” he said, his gaze resting gently on her face. “Show me the Stone Creek Ranch you remember, the parts of it you loved the best.”
The request quickened something inside Melissa. “Okay,” she said.
They took his truck, since there wouldn’t have been room for Zeke in the roadster and neither of them had the heart to leave the dog behind.
She directed him to the pioneer cemetery first, the place where generations of O’Ballivans were buried, along with her dad and Big John, her grandfather.
“Olivia and I used to come up here on horseback all the time,” Melissa confided, with a slight smile. “We were hoping to see a ghost and absolutely terrified that we might get our wish.”
Steven grinned. “You and Olivia? What about Ashley?”
“She didn’t care much for riding horses,” she answered. “And even less for ghosts.”
He laughed.
She loved the sound of his laugh.
“So,” Steven began presently, looking around that peaceful place, “did you ever get your wish? See a ghost?”
She knew her answer would surprise him. “Once or twice, I thought I did,” she said softly, remembering. “But it happened in the ranch house, not here.”
Steven arched an eyebrow, ever so slightly, and the breeze raised tendrils of his hair, as if offering a mischievous caress. And he waited for her to elaborate.
“A glimpse of a figure, out of the corner of my eye, that’s all it was,” she said. She’d been comforted, rather than frightened, by the experience.
After a few moments, during which the two of them tacitly agreed that it was time to move on, Steven whistled for Zeke, who’d gone exploring amid the tall grass, sheltered, like the graves, within the cluster of flourishing oak trees.
Their next stop was the high ridge, with its spectacular view of both Stone Creek Ranch and, in the near distance, the town as well. Melissa had hoped for a sighting of King’s Ransom, the legendary wild stallion that sometimes put in an appearance, but that day, he kept himself and his band of mares and foals well hidden.
“There’s still the house, of course,” Melissa said, once she was settled in the passenger seat of Steven’s flashy truck again, figuring the tour was complete, “but since it’s occupied, that part will have to wait.”
Steven smiled, looked back at Zeke to make sure he was settled, and started up the engine.
Something had definitely changed between herself and Steven, Melissa thought. There was still tension, of course, but the strange sense of urgency had passed. Being together seemed only natural now, and easy.
Things just sort of unfolded after that, with no hurry and no fretting and no drama.
“What will it be, Melissa?” he asked her, very quietly and after a long silence, when they were back at his place, inside the tour bus. “Is it now, or is it never?”
“How about now?” Melissa murmured, realizing, as her heartbeat quickened and her breath caught, that she was completely lost. If the scent of lilacs had made her drunk, this man’s close proximity affected her like opium.
Of course she could have cited chapter and verse on why she shouldn’t go to bed with Steven Creed—they’d only been acquainted for a