After the Frost Read Free

paused at the back door. "See you later."
    Then, stinging from the echo of their silence, she walked across the yard to the waiting wagon.

 
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter 2
     
     
          R and stood there, unable to move or think or even breathe. The kitchen seemed suddenly stifling; he could still smell the remnants of her scent—harsh soap and dust—floating in the air, suffocating him, mixing with the sweet, spicy aroma of pears.
    She was back. Sweet Jesus, she was back.
    Lillian took a deep breath; her slender fingers smoothed imaginary wrinkles in her apron. "Well, that was—"
    He spun angrily on his heel, knocking his shoulder on the doorframe in his haste to leave before she could finish her sentence. Whatever his stepmother wanted to say, he couldn't stand to hear it. He heard her startled gasp and then "Rand! Randall, please!" as he ran across the yard and into the fields, but he didn't slow his step. He searched for Sarah and saw her playing peacefully at the side of the house. He felt a moment's relief, but it wasn't enough to calm him, and he didn't stop, just rushed past her into the fields. He needed to get back to the corn, to be in the center of the fields, where the heavy smell and the clacking rustle of the stalks in the breeze were all around him; where he could think about nothing but the corn and when it should be cut or when the next thunderstorm would hit.                         ^
    God, yes, to think of nothing but those routine, day-to-day things. The things he'd hated thinking about until just this moment, the things he'd spent his whole life avoiding.
    The drying corn sawed at his face and hands as he pushed through it; he felt the spidery tassels in his face and the corn dust shiver into his collar. The warm, milky smell was all around him, soothing him.
    "Are you happy? Is this where you want to be?" Belle's words mocked him, tormented him, just as she must have known they would.
    "Are you happy?"
    Rand pushed his way through the heavy stalks, moving single-mindedly until he was in the center of the corn, until the house was gone, until there was nothing but brown leaves and dusty tassels.
    Are you happy?
    "Dammit!" He shoved his hands against his ears, trying to block the sound. "Dammit, why the hell did you come back?" But his words taunted him and did nothing to banish the image of her face. He almost laughed at the irony of it. There had been a time when he would have given his life to see her again, and now all he wanted was to exile her forever.
    Why had she come back? Why now?
    The question was meaningless; Rand already knew the answer. It made sense that she had returned now. Perfect sense, because he had finally managed to stop thinking about her, to stop feeling guilty about the past, to concentrate on anger instead. He laughed softly, bitterly. He'd been feeling contented, or if not that, then almost complacent. He should have known she'd show
    Up now.
    Someplace in the back of his mind he had expected it, he knew. The truth was, he'd waited for it, in some strange way even wanted it. But not this minute. Not today.
    He thought of her standing in the kitchen. She was still small, still delicate. He thought of her slender neck and the fine bones of her face, dwarfed by the huge man's hat, the thick hair that hung in a heavy braid down the middle of her back—a hundred colors of gold all twisted together. All so much the same, just as he remembered.
    Rand stared at the tall stalks without really seeing them. He'd told himself that the next time he saw her— if he ever did—he'd be in control. Cool, calm, self-possessed. He told himself she didn't matter, had never mattered, that he'd outgrown the madness that had overtaken him when she was fifteen and he was . . . old enough to know better.
    But then he'd walked into that kitchen and seen her standing there, facing him with that familiar, defiant lift of her chin. Hey, Rand . He heard her greeting again