Pure Temptation & Old Enough to Know Better. Vicki Lewis Thompson

remark he’d made about mounting up. Or maybe she’d spent too much time reading those books, and every conversation had sexual overtones now. She certainly couldn’t go to New York keyed up like this. It would be good to get this whole business over with.

      Ducking an occasional overhanging mesquite branch, she rode at a trot ahead of him on the dusty trail. He knew something was up. She never could keep anything from him, so she might as well lay out her plan as soon as they got to their favorite spot by the river. As kids they’d used the sandy bank for fierce battles between their Star Wars action figures, and when they were older, they’d come out here to drink colas and talk about whatever was going on in their lives. Tess had never shared the hideaway with anyone else, and neither had Mac, as far as she knew.

      The riverbank was where they’d gone after Chewbacca died. They’d talked about heaven, and had decided horses had to be there or they weren’t interested in going. They’d headed out here after Mac broke his arm and couldn’t try out for Little League, and the day Tess had won a teddy bear at the school carnival. Before either of them knew anything about sex, they’d spent time by the river talking about whether men and women made babies the same way horses and dogs and goats did.

      Later on, Mac had put a stop to their discussions on that topic. Now Tess wanted to reopen the discussion, but she wasn’t sure if she had the courage.

      “So what’s your summer project this year?” Mac called up to her. “I know you always have one.”

      A perfect opening, but she didn’t want to blurt it out while they were riding. “I’m still thinking about it.” She drew confidence from the familiar rhythm of the little mare, the friendly squeak of saddle leather and the comfort of breathing in the dry, sweet air of early morning.

      “Really? Hell, you usually have something planned by April. I’ll never forget that summer you got hooked on Australia—you playing that god-awful didgeridoo while you made me cook shrimp on the barbie.”

      “How did I know it would spook the horses?”

      Mac laughed. “The sound of that thing would spook a corpse. Do you ever play it anymore, or are you taking pity on your neighbors?”

      “Watch yourself, or I’ll be forced to remind you of the time you mooned my brothers.”

      “That was totally not my fault. You could have told me the bridge club was coming out to admire your mom’s roses.”

      Tess started to giggle. “So help me, I tried.”

      “Sure you did.”

      “The boys stopped me! I felt terrible that it happened.”

      “Uh-huh. That’s why you busted a gut laughing and why you bring it up on a regular basis.”

      “Only in self-defense.” She barely had to guide Peppermint Patty down the trail after all the times the horse had taken her to the river. The horses flushed a covey of quail as they trotted past.

      She could smell the river ahead of them, and obviously so could Peppermint Patty. The mare picked up the pace. As always, Tess looked forward to her first glimpse of the miniature beach surrounded almost entirely by tall reeds. The perfect hideout.

      As the mare reached the embankment and started down toward the sand, her hooves skidded a little on the loose dirt, but she maintained her balance, having years of experience on this particular slope. In front of them the river gurgled along, about fifty feet wide at this point. Other than a few ducks diving for breakfast and a mockingbird trilling away on a cottonwood branch across the river, the area was deserted.

      There was no danger that anyone would overhear their discussion, and she trusted Mac to listen seriously without laughing as she laid out her problem and asked for his help. She couldn’t have a better person in whom to place her confidence. Yet no matter how many times she told herself those things, her stomach clenched with nervousness.

      * * *

      MAC LET HIS gelding, Charlie Brown, pick his way down the embankment as Tess dismounted and led Peppermint Patty over to the river for a drink. This morning was exactly like so many other mornings he and Tess had ridden down here, and yet he couldn’t shake off the feeling that this morning was like no other they’d ever spent together.

      He watered his horse, then took him over to the sycamore growing beside the river. He looped the reins around the same branch Tess had used to tie Peppermint Patty and went to sit beside Tess on a shady part of the riverbank.

      He picked up a pebble and chucked it into the water. “Did you hear from that teacher at your new school?”

      “Yep.” Tess plucked a stem of dry grass and began shredding it between her fingers. “I got an e-mail from her and she’ll be glad to let me stay with her until I can find an apartment.”

      Mac glanced at Tess. He’d wondered when she’d suggested the ride if she had something specific on her mind. Maybe this move had her spooked. She’d been renting a little house ever since she got the counselor’s job at Copperville High, but living on her own in a small Arizona mining town with her parents three miles away was a lot different than living alone in New York City, two thousand miles from everyone she knew.

      “Would this teacher rent you a room in her apartment?” he asked.

      Tess shook her head. “She doesn’t have the space. I’ll be on the couch until I can find an apartment of my own. Besides, I want my own place. After growing up in a houseful of brothers, I’ve discovered I love the privacy of living alone.”

      “You just think you’re living alone. Your family drops in on you all the time.”

      “I know.” She sighed. “I love them, but I’m looking forward to being less convenient for a change.”

      Mac could understand that. It was one of the reasons he’d decided to get a private pilot’s license. He looked for excuses to fly the Cessna because it was one of the few times he could be alone. “You might get lonesome,” he said.

      “I probably will.” Tess began shredding another blade of wild grass. “But after living in a fishbowl for twenty-six years, lonesome doesn’t sound so bad.”

      “Yeah.” Mac tossed another pebble in the water. “I hear you.” He breathed in the familiar mixture of scents—the dankness of the river, the sweetness of the grass, the light, flowery cologne Tess had worn for years, and the washline smell of sun on denim. Dammit all, he was going to miss her. He’d avoided facing that unpleasant fact ever since he found out that she’d gotten the job, but now it hit him all of a sudden, and he didn’t like it.

      Tess had been part of his world for as long as he could remember. So had the rest of her family, giving him the brothers and sister he’d always longed for. But Tess had always been the one he’d felt closest to. Maybe it was all those Halloweens together when she’d insisted he be Raggedy Andy to her Raggedy Ann, Han Solo to her Princess Leia, Superman to her Lois Lane. Or maybe it was the Easter-egg hunts, or the Monopoly games that lasted for days, or tag football—Tess had been there for everything. Every Christmas she dragged him out to go caroling even though he couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket.

      He’d die before admitting to her how much he’d miss her. In the first place, they’d never been mushy and sentimental with each other, and in the second place, he didn’t want to be a spoilsport right when she had this exciting chapter opening in her life. He was happy for her. He was jealous as hell and he’d have a hard time adjusting to her being gone, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t glad she had this chance.

      “I’m glad you got the job,” he said.

      “Me, too. But I asked you to come here with me because I have this one problem, and I think you can help me.”

      “Sure. Anything.”

      “It’s a different world there in New York, and I don’t feel exactly…ready for it.”

      Her voice sounded funny as if she was having trouble getting