Free After the Thunder by Genell Dellin

quite a lot of lively talk, didn’t we?”
    She was smiling and speaking lightly, but in her own sweet way she was reproving him for causing the contretemps at her table. There was no doubt about it. He’d been right to think that word of it would eventually reach Olmun and that he would then hear a much stronger rebuke.
    “Please do forgive me, Miss Emily,” he said, in his most gallant manner. “I’m afraid feelings at supper may have run a little high last evening because of the stimulation of having the attention of so many beautiful ladiesas yourself and Miss Cotannah and you, dear Aunt Ancie.”
    He sketched an apologetic little bow toward the prune-faced old lady, but she never cracked so much as a ghost of a smile in return. From the corner of his eye, he glimpsed a teasing grin on Cotannah’s full lips. She would love nothing more than for Ancie to take him to task, it said, and she loved knowing that she had had the power, simply by her presence, to stir the men into controversy—for she knew full well he had meant only her when he’d named them all.
    Conceited little minx. Surely, in a few moments, he could get rid of the rest of them and get her off to himself. But even Uncle Jumper was sticking like glue, looking Jacob up and down as if he were a horse for sale.
    “Lonely bachelors like me and Mr. Phillips aren’t accustomed to having such beauty in every direction we look.”
    “Well, don’t you worry now,” Emily said, leaning forward to let the baby go into Ancie’s uplifted arms. “You’ll be getting used to it because Cotannah is with us for an extended visit.”
    “I’m truly happy to hear that.” For once, he did, indeed, mean what he said. He gave Emily a warm smile, then turned to look into Cotannah’s laughing eyes. Generously, he smiled at her, too—she wouldn’t be laughing at him long once he got that luscious body of hers beneath his.
    “I believe I promised you a tour of our new premises, Miss Cotannah.”
    He offered her his arm.
    “You did, indeed, Mr. Charley, and we are
all
of us looking forward to seeing the first brick building in Tuskahoma before it actually dons its bricks.”
    Smiling mischievously, she slid her hand into the crook of his elbow. So. This was the game she was playing this morning—tantalizing him but not letting him get her alone. Whetting his appetite was what she was doing, and well she knew it. Her laughing dark eyes said that she knew he knew it, too, and she loved having him in her power.
    The expression in those big eyes would be different when he had her in his power.
    “Isn’t that right, Emily?” she said sweetly.
    “Oh, yes, we would all love to see your new place,” Emily said, beaming at Cotannah for behaving so circumspectly.
    Poor Emily, little did she know!
    And poor Jacob, come to think of it—with his trap all set and no chance to spring it! Oh no! Plus the fact that William would bring that gibbering fool of a false shaman over here at any moment, and then Jacob would be competing for Cotannah’s attention again just like last evening! What a cruel turn of events!
    But there was no hope for it; they were moving slowly along the front of the building, surrounding him, making him a prisoner in their midst. Losing this perfect chance to attack the woods rat and having to behave politely to the idiot would make him really angry if he let himself think about it, but that would never do. Somehow, he had to turn this situation to his advantage.
    “Miss Emily, we were speaking a moment ago about our unfortunate abuse of your hospitality yesterday evening,” he said, “and I want to apologize to you again. You might be happy to know that just before you arrived I asked my carpenter, William Sowers, to go across the street to Brown’s and bring Walks-With-Spirits over here so that I could make sure that there are no hard feelings between us.”
    Cotannah’s fingers tightened on his arm. She probably wanted him to look at her, to