“Then kiss me and seal the bargain between us. Once, just once, but it has to be real.”

He didn't respond, and she realized her “good idea” was crumbling like an overbaked corncake. Embarrassment rose, firing into her face. She'd probably burn him if he did touch her. He must be so shocked by her request, he couldn't speak.

“Oh, forget it!”

Karlee ran into the house, welcoming the cool darkness that closed around her. Tears blurred her vision as she hurried toward the stairs. When was she ever going to learn to keep her mouth shut? The aunts were right. She was an idiot destined to make a fool of herself at every opportunity. If the aunts were here, this story would keep them laughing for a month.

Her hand touched the railing a moment before Daniel caught up with her. He closed his grip over her shoulder so suddenly the force pulled her backward against him.

She cried in surprise when he twisted her around and flattened her back against the wall. Fear danced in her blood as he held her upright and leaned toward her.

“We seal the bargain. Once and for all, you'll be able to say you've been kissed, Spinster Whitworth.” Angry words brushed against her cheek as the weight of his body pressed against her.

His mouth closed over hers, hard and strong. His body pushed her to the wall.

Karlee fought to free herself. This wasn't what she wanted, not at all. She'd seen couples kiss at weddings and a few times when they thought no one was watching. A kiss was soft and petal-light on the lips, not bruising hard. He wasn't supposed to press her mouth against her teeth. He must know even less than she did. Or maybe he'd forgotten? Or maybe he wanted to hurt her?

As she struggled against his hold, Daniel's fingers moved down her arms, pinning her limbs with the length of his body. She jerked her head away, but his followed. When she tried to cry out, he invaded the inside of her mouth, taking her breath away.

Tears of anger bubbled in her eyes as she tried to kick at his legs and jab at his chest.

After a while, she stopped struggling, exhausted at the wasted effort for the force of his advance never lessened.

When she went limp in his arms, he loosened his hold on her and moved his fingers into her hair. With her head held still, the kiss changed, softened. He no longer demanded her response. He silently asked.

Karlee closed her eyes and let the wave of sensations wash over her. The pounding of his heart against hers. The feel of his strength all along her body. The warmth of his hands on her face. The demands of a kiss unlike she'd ever dreamed existed.

She relaxed in his arms, letting him guide her. He was not taking, but giving her what she'd requested. A kiss, a real kiss. It was so much more than she thought it might be. She'd never be able to forget. She'd been kissed, fully and completely kissed.

His hands turned gentle, almost hesitant, as he touched her face and brushed her hair back. She joined in the embrace doing as he did, letting his lips teach her with tender patterns. He brushed her arms, catching her hands and bringing them to rest on his shoulders. When she raised her arms to circle his neck, he sighed and leaned into her body, pressing her gently along the length of him.

The kiss changed once more. A fire seemed to build between them. A fire that might consume them both. He wove his fingers in her hair and closed his hand into a fist as though he needed to hold on while the kiss raged through them both. The taste of him was a part of her now. The feel of him, a need growing as he pressed against her. Even her breathing matched his as though they would forever be the same now they'd found the same rhythm.

Just when she thought she'd surely died and floated up to heaven, the kiss ended as suddenly as it began. He shoved away from her with such force she felt the wall creak.

“There.” He was out of breath as if he'd been running for miles. “You've been kissed.”

Karlee waited. It couldn't be over! It couldn't be. Surely he wanted to continue as desperately as she did.

She opened her eyes.

He was gone.

NINE

DANIEL STORMED FROM THE HOUSE AND CIRCLED it twice before he figured out where he was going. He couldn't believe what he'd just done. He kissed Spinster Whitworth! And not a polite, formal peck, either. He'd really… fully… completely kissed her.

He walked to the barn calling himself every kind of fool. How could he have done such a thing? It was crazy. He must be insane to allow it to happen.

Sliding the railing that concealed a room, Daniel vanished into a hidden corner of the barn he called his own. Since he'd been a boy, he'd always needed a place to disappear away from the world. It wasn't much, little more then a shack. Sometimes, he practiced his sermons here, sometimes he drank. Here he could drop his guard and be himself, or better yet, be nothing for a time. Not preacher, or father, or widower… just a man.

He pulled a velvet blue hair ribbon from the folds of a book and told himself he still loved May. He loved and missed her with every ounce of his being, just as he had the day she died. She'd been his private angel, his reason for living, his Heaven on earth.

He twisted the ribbon around his finger, but it didn't seemed to hold as tightly as it had in the past.

How could he have kissed Spinster… Daniel's frown deepened. Maybe since he'd had his tongue in her mouth, he should call her Karlee.

In the three years since May died, he'd never looked at another woman. He didn't want to care about another and run the chance of losing again. All he wanted to do was live with May's daughters and May's memory. That was enough for this lifetime.

He'd never asked anyone out, or hinted that he would. He'd never even danced with a saloon girl, or flirted at a social.

But he'd kissed Karlee!

He had to be honest with her. She had a right to know he'd never marry her. He never wanted a wife or any more children to have to raise alone. His life and his bed were too full of memories to allow another woman in.

Daniel slipped the velvet ribbon back in between the folds of a book.

If he had to be honest with Karlee, he had to be honest with himself as well. He'd never kissed a woman the way he'd just kissed Karlee. Never!

When he'd decided to kiss her, it had just been something he planned to get over with and go on. He could understand how a woman who'd never been kissed might want to know what it was like. He'd thought to deliver a hard, cold, impersonal kiss and be done with it.

But before he'd gotten up enough nerve to do it, she demanded he forget the request and ran away. And he'd snapped. First she told him what to do, then she told him not to do it.

Daniel paced around the dark room wishing he could shove the walls away. Everything in the barn was too small. Everything in the house was too small. Suddenly this town, this state, this planet was too small.

Without looking back, he left the barn and headed toward the edge of town. He'd walk out his frustration, then he would come back and work in his shop until his eyes refused to stay open. Then, maybe, he'd be able to get a few hours of sleep before he apologized to Karlee.

He almost ran until he reached Big Cypress Creek. As always, the ancient trees welcomed him. Their shadows invited him to disappear into the folds. The sounds of the night were not slight and recognizable as they had been when he was a boy in Corydon, Indiana. Here, the calls of the night were a hundred low cries beating together in a rhythm dark and forbidding. The water along the shore didn't lap in welcome, but ebbed and flowed as if wanting to pull all life into its depths.

“May,” he called, knowing he'd see her face in the water. “May.”

He stared harder. The wind whistled through ancient branches, calling her name to Heaven.

“May!”

For the first time, he couldn't summon the face of his sweet, young wife. She'd been his life, the reason he did everything. He forced his eyes closed and tried to picture her in his mind, but tonight the image wasn't clear. She was only a shadow moving through his memories. He remembered their long talks, but the subjects escaped him. He thought of the times they'd laughed, but couldn't think of the reason. The nights of lovemaking drifted thought his mind, but the feel of passion no longer throbbed his body with need.

She'd been tiny with dark hair and eyes. He'd called her angel. Daniel could think the thoughts in his mind, but the image of her wouldn't appear. She had a smile just for him that no one else ever saw. She never raised her voice. She made his world complete.

“May,” he whispered, but the water remained dark.

Daniel sat on the edge of the water and lowered his head in his hands. He'd lost her all over again.

Karlee didn't know whether to be happy or sad. She'd been kissed, that was for sure. Only the man who'd done the deed ran.

She looked at herself in the tiny mirror over her chest of drawers. In truth, she could find nothing pretty or particularly ugly about her. Her nose was straight but definitely no button. Her chin was strong but not pointed. Her eyes seemed the right size. And her hair, when she kept it combed down, looked almost brown.