In a Stranger's Arms by Deborah Hale Page B

minutes, feelings he’d been evading for over a week suddenly ambushed Manning and took no prisoners. He fought a desperate rearguard skirmish against desire, but it overpowered the ragged forces of his will to rage through his body.
    Caddie fit into his arms so perfectly, like the snuggest dovetail joint that hardly needed glue or peg to hold it in place. Her fragrant feminine softness promised to fill a gaping void he’d refused to acknowledge in his life. Her nearness roused him and tempted him to venture even closer.
    If she felt this good sitting on an old kitchen chair, fully clothed and with her hair pinned up... His imagination caught fever as he pictured Caddie sprawled naked on a feather bed. Manning’s mouth went dry and every inch of his flesh smoldered. The kiss he didn’t dare give her burned on his lips.
    If he held on to her much longer, Manning suspected his sense, his honor, even his fear might be incinerated to useless ashes. They wouldn’t provide any kind of barrier to prevent him making the second worst mistake of his life.
    With an awkwardness born of forcing himself to do the opposite of what he wanted, he let Caddie go and scrambled to his feet.
    “If I can’t get men to work, or wood to mill, it doesn’t make much sense for us to stay around these parts.” He spoke the first suitable words that came into his head. “I’ve got enough saved to let us make a fresh start somewhere else. Out west in the border states, maybe.”
    When Caddie tensed and her tear-streaked features stiffened, Manning knew he’d blundered yet again.
    “Leave Sabbath Hollow? Not while I have breath in my body. This is my children’s home and I mean to see it thriving again by the time Templeton’s old enough to claim it in his own right.”
    She snatched the pot of beans from the table and slammed it onto the stove, cheap tin clashing with futile defiance against thick black iron. “No sneaking scoundrel of a brother-in-law and no shiftless, gossipy neighbors are going to stop me, either!”
    Had she meant to add no Yankee carpetbagger husband to that list? Manning wondered. He’d been a fool to think Caddie had softened her attitude toward him on the basis of a moment’s weakness and a few words in his defense hurled at old Mrs. Pratt.
    Before he could demand to know how they’d make a success of the mill without the grudging cooperation of the community, Caddie spoke again. “While you keep the children occupied fishing tomorrow, I plan to call on the rest of the neighbors and make sure they know what’s what. If they aren’t willing to help themselves, I’d sooner you brought in a crew of Yankees to run the mill than let Lon get his clutches on Sabbath Hollow.”
    Verdant fire fairly crackled in her eyes—the most attractive show of defiance Manning had ever witnessed. He knew better than to gainsay her decision. Did he like her best soft and vulnerable, weeping in his arms, or proud and gallant, a tigress ready to battle the world on behalf of her cubs? Both, he decided at last.
    Both. Far too much for his own good.

    For all her bravado before Manning, Caddie drove down the Gordons’ lane with a sinking sensation in the pit of her belly. She prayed they would give her a more cordial reception than the one she’d received from Mrs. Pratt.
    She had some hopes of it. Before the war, she’d been good friends with Mrs. Gordon, a genial lady who also hailed from South Carolina.
    If her pride did take another mauling today, Caddie vowed not to seek sympathy in the arms of a Yankee this time. She cringed at the memory. Somehow those few chaste moments weeping on Manning’s shoulder felt more disloyal to Del than if she’d committed flagrant adultery while he was still alive.
    As Caddie pulled up outside Gordon Hall, a slender girl hurried out to greet her. All Southern girls looked slender these days, Caddie reflected bitterly, remembering the withered wraith Ann Pratt had become. They no longer needed