She cried hard mournful sobs that rose from the deep well of her heart. He gazed at the stars. He supposed if she needed or wanted more from him than his arms around her, she'd tell him.

She sniffed inelegantly. "Do you have a handkerchief?"

"No, ma'am."

She lifted her skirt and blew her nose before wiping the tears from her cheeks. He caught a glimpse of white cotton and closed his eyes against the sight He'd never realized how alluring white cotton could be.

"It hurts to cry," she said, her voice raspy.

"It hurts worse not to."

"Did you cry?"

"For four days straight."

"Is that how long it took you to bury them?"

"Yes, ma'am," he said in a voice that sounded like stone grating against stone.

She looked to the heavens. "The moon's pretty tonight."

He wanted to tell her she was pretty tonight, but he didn't know how to phrase the words so he wouldn't sound like some love sick school boy.

She pressed her finger to his lips. "You said you spent a lot of time thinking about our kiss. I thought about it as well." She wrapped her hand around the back of his neck and threaded her fingers up into his hair.

"Meg-" He wasn't certain what he'd planned to say, but he knew it couldn't have been important because the words drifted from his mind as soon as her lips lighted upon his. Her mouth was as warm as the shade in August and as soft as a piece of velvet that his mother had sewn into one of her quilts.

She touched the tip of her tongue to one comer of his mouth, then to the other. She nibbled on his lower lip, and he felt as though she were pulling him through the keyhole of hell into heaven.

He cradled her face between his hands, angled his mouth over hers, and welcomed the bliss she offered. Boldly, she gave her tongue the freedom to roam within his mouth. She sighed. He moaned.

He thought a man could become spoiled touching a woman. He might never want to touch stone again. Stone wasn't warm. It didn't alter its shape with the gentlest of pressures. Stone didn't breathe so he could feel its moisture on his face. Rocks didn't make soft sounds that he'd cany with him until the day he died.

She drew her mouth away from his, and he forced himself not to follow and reclaim what he wanted.

Her eyes were dark within the shadows of the night, but he felt the intensity of her gaze as strongly as he felt her fingers tighten their hold on his neck.

"I hate you," she whispered hoarsely.

He lowered his hands from her face. "I know."

"So why am I here?" She trailed her fingers over his face, touching every line, crease, and crevice. "Robert kissed me tonight." She rubbed her thumb over his lower lip. "And all I could think about was kissing you."

She returned her mouth to his. If this was hate, he'd probably die if the woman ever loved him. His heart beat so hard he was certain she could feel it thrumming through his shirt. Each breath he took carried with it the scent of honeysuckle. Her hands, so small, slipped beneath the collar of his shirt. Her slim fingers moved gently, creating small circles on his neck that seemed to travel clear down to his toes. Then she parted her lips and gave him the greatest treasure of all: hot, moist, and silky, her mouth invited him home.

Meg felt Clay's hesitancy to follow her lead. She teased his tongue, suckled it, then drew it into her mouth. He groaned, and she felt a shudder run the length of his body. She found his uncertainty endearing. When it came to matters of the heart, he had maintained an innocence that she had seldom seen since the war.

She knew Kirk had kissed an abundance of girls before he ever kissed her, knew he had bedded others before he took her as his wife. He had taught her the pleasures to be found with a man, had given much more than he'd taken. He'd been a skilled teacher, she an apt student.

Yet now, she found Clay's lack of experience as intoxicating as she'd found Kirk's abundant knowledge. He moved his hands back to her face, his fingers lovingly tracing the curves of her cheeks, the lines of her brow, and the jut of her chin. He touched her as though she were as delicate as finespun glass. He touched her as though she were more precious than gold.

Drawing away from the kiss, she placed her hands over his. "Arc you trying to memorize my lines so you can carve the stone accurately?"

Slowly, he moved his head from side to side. "I could carve your likeness in stone if I were blinded. I've just never touched anything as soft or as smooth as you are. I can't get over how incredible you feel." His hands fell away from her face. "What's wrong?"

In the moonlight, she could see the barest of smiles touch his lips. "Wish I had different hands. Mine are so damn ugly, they shouldn't be touching you."

Wrapping her fingers around his hands, she lifted them to her lips and pressed a kiss to his knuckles. Releasing one of his hands, she turned the other over and skimmed her fingers over the roughened surface, a palm that was as unpolished as the stone it had caressed over the years. She placed a kiss in the center of his palm. "I tike your hands."

"Why?" he asked, and she heard the disbelief mirrored in his voice. "They're so big. They look and feel like stone."

She rubbed her cheek along his hand. "But they don't touch like stone. I watch the way you chip at the stone, and then you touch it as though you're apologizing for treating it so harshly, as though you don't realize you're doing it a favor and turning it into something of beauty. I've missed watching you work this week to the point that I've resented every thoughtful neighbor who stopped by to visit Mama Warner because I had to play hostess and couldn't sneak away for a few minutes. I don't mind caring for Mama Warner, but it wears me out to care for all the people who come by to see her."

"I've never felt lonelier in my life than I felt the day after I saw you here, and you didn't come to watch me work. I started carving Kirk's features because I thought it would bring you back to me."

"Will you stop working on his face now that you know why I didn't come?"

He shook his head. "No, I'll go ahead and finish it now that I've begun. Might have to carve your features as well, just so I won't feel so dadgum alone."

"I'd watch you work if I could, but Mama Warner has always been mere when I needed her. I can't leave-"

"I know."

She pressed her check against his chest. "Don't stop working on the monument."

"I won't," he promised.

Chapter Fifteen.

By unspoken agreement, they met at the swimming hole every night after that. Lying on a quilt, Meg gazed at the stars. Stretching out beside her, Clay looked at her.

She told him about her day, caring for Mama Warner. She never talked enough to satisfy him. He could have listened to her soft voice all night, well into the morning, if she would have stayed with him that long, but he always escorted her home around midnight, watching while she climbed in through the window, wishing he could boldly escort her to the front door.

The days were shorter when he had the nights to look forward to, but the nights were never long enough.

Perched on an elbow, he lifted the end of her braid.

"What are you thinking?" she asked.

"Wishing I was a painter. I'd use your braid as my brush, dip it in the colors, and create the most beautiful

paintings in the world."

"And what would you do if I wasn't near you?"

"Ah, there's the secret I'd have to keep you near me."

She wrapped her hand around his neck and pulled him toward her waiting mouth. With no doubts, she

initiated his favorite part of the night.

Rolling onto his stomach, he braced his elbows on either side of her to keep his weight off her, grazed his knuckles along her checks, and lowered his mouth to hers.

Words he dared not speak drifted through his mind, questions with answers he'd rather not hear taunted

him. If she hated him, why did she meet him here every night? If she hated him, why did she welcome his

touch? If she loved him, why did she meet him secretly?

If he loved her, why didn't he leave her alone instead of luring her into his world where hale overshadowed love, and battles were still fought over a war long over?

Moaning softly, she pressed her head back against the quilt, arching her throat. Clay had learned that she liked it when he used his mouth to blaze a trail along the ivory column of her throat. Each night he learned more what she enjoyed because each night, she gave a little more of herself to him.

Gliding her hands along his shoulders, she kneaded his muscles. "You feel so tight, you must have

worked extra hard today."

"Worked extra long." He lifted his face, his gaze holding hers. "I want you to come and see what I've done before you go home tonight."

"I wish you could work at night."

"Lanterns wouldn't give me enough light I need the sun."

"You carved a headstone during a storm at night."

"That was different. It's smaller. I have to keep all the monument in sight Shadows at night would distort

the stone. No telling what I'd end up carving."

She threaded her fingers through his hair and rubbed her thumbs in circles over his temples. "Have you made Mama Warner's marker?"

"I made it the day after I saw her."

"Is that what you want to show me?"

"No, making markers never brings me joy."

"What you did today-" "I think it'll bring you joy."

Walking through the moonless night, her hand wrapped firmly within his, Meg wanted to tell Clay that he brought her joy.

Watching Mama Warner grow weaker with each passing day, knowing she could do nothing but offer comfort and company, Meg went home exhausted each evening. Only the knowledge that she'd see Clay carried her through the long hours of the day.

She didn't know why she'd denied herself the pleasure of his company that first week or why she thought

she was too tired to crawl out the window and run to the darkened swimming hole.

She enjoyed listening to his voice as he talked about his day. Carving, she discovered, was very much like plowing a field, only the crops he hoped to harvest grew from seeds planted in dreams. Mesmerized, she'd watch his hands create shapes in the air as she was certain they'd created shapes in the stone. He talked low, his voice a caress in the night She look the sound of his voice, the feel of his kiss into her dreams, drew strength from the small amount of lime that they had together each night.

They neared the shed, and he gripped her hand harder as he slowed his steps. He opened the shed door.

"You oiled it," she whispered.

"Yeah, sometimes I just come out here and sit, long before dawn. I prefer not to wake the twins when I do."

They stepped into the shed, and he released his hold on her hand. She heard scratching, then a flame flared, and he lit a lantern. Lifting it over his shoulder, he walked toward the statue.