Ruth caressed his bare chest with her hand and then laid a feather light kiss on his lips. It didn't take him long to stir and respond to the kiss.
"This is the only way to wake up in the morning," Kid said with a sigh of pleasure. Then he flipped her over and began to nuzzle her neck. Her hand buried itself in his hair as she delighted in his lively exploration and then found her ring was caught.
"Hold still a minute. My ring's stuck in your hair," she said with a chuckle.
"So that's what they mean by ensnaring a man with a ring," he said with amusement.
"Who's ensnaring who?" She asked with another laugh then eased her finger out of the ring. Free of the entanglement, she slipped it back on. The smell of frying bacon had made its way into the room. "And from the smell of things, we better get a move on anyway."
"You think they would notice if we didn't come down for breakfast?" he asked, punctuating the question with a kiss to her chin.
"You really want my father to catch you sleeping in again?"
"Who'd be sleeping?" he returned.
She rolled out of bed anyhow and threw him his clothes, but he didn't make a move right away. He spent some time enjoying the view. "It's a good thing you wear such a high collar," he commented after she'd gotten her undergarments on.
Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion and she looked down to try and figure out what he was talking about. Then her cheeks flushed at the number of love bites around her collar bone. "Kid! What if someone sees this…"
He laughed. She still had some prudish ways about her despite their being married for a few months. "I wouldn't worry, honey, they're all down low and nuns don't dress as modestly as you do."
She shot him a look as she pulled her dress on and straightened her hair. She turned to go and saw her heavy hope chest was still blocking the door. "You going to help me move this?"
"I'd rather keep you prisoner, but if you insist. Let me get my pants on first though. Opening the door like this, wouldn't endear me to your daddy, I don't think."
"Probably not," she said with a grin.
In the kitchen, they sat directly across from each other at the table and they smiled every time their eyes met, thinking about last night, which seemed to put James in an irritated but silent mood.
"It'd be a better breakfast with eggs, but we'll have to be sparing with them," Mary grumbled as she sat their plates with biscuits, bacon, and dried apples in front of them.
"I'm sorry, Momma," Ruth apologized.
"Why? Did you do it?" she asked sharply.
"No, of course not, but—"
"No buts. The only apology I want is from the barn burner and the chicken killer, and I'd like to string him or her up in a tree."
"Momma," Robert said with a laugh as he buttered his bread.
"Can we talk about something else?" Anna asked with an exaggerated shudder. Then she noticed that Kid was giving her a look of suspicion, which she returned with a frown.
He quickly fixed his eyes on his plate, hoping she would dismiss it.
Mark arrived before breakfast was finished. "Isn't he the early bird?" Kid muttered when he heard him talking to James in the other room.
Ruth tickled him on the sensitive spot behind his ear as she walked by to say hello to Mark, her way of telling him to be nice.
Laura and Douglas also showed up with the boys. After breakfast, the men all got ready to go.
"Shouldn't someone stay up here and keep an eye on things?" Kid asked.
"Ruth and Anna'll be with us and Mary has a rifle," James answered. "Aim's not too bad either and she ain't afraid to shoot and ask questions later, especially if it means keeping her children and grandchildren safe."
What was it with these mountain women and their guns, he wondered. His mother and sisters were strong, hardy women, but they'd never handled guns as far as he knew.
It was a pleasant day temperature wise, but the melting snow left puddles to avoid. When they got down to the site, the first order of business was to get enough boards together. The men worked pairs James and Mark, Robert and Clyde, and Douglas and Kid and sawed the lumber. Ruth and Anna toted finished pieces over to a dry canvas, so it wouldn't touch the ground. Ruth in between times worked on nailing some of the boards together while Anna held the boards straight for her.
"You can wield a hammer too?" he asked in an entertained tone when he got a chance. "Is there anything you can't do?"
"When Momma wasn't teaching me to cook or sew or my letters, I was helping Daddy and the boys with their chores."
Laura came with a bucket of water and a dipper about halfway through the morning. The dipper made a circle around the group, Kid being last. When he raised the dipper to his mouth to take a drink, he spotted a small brown minnow swimming in circles in its limited space just in the nick of time.
He dumped it back into the bucket. "Very comical."
They all took note of the fish. James' guffaws making it obvious who'd slipped it in there. Douglas and Laura gave Kid looks of sympathy.
Kid stormed back to the boards and put his energy into hammering, all but splitting the wood. Ruth joined him. She didn't say anything to him just supported him silently until his temper cooled.
"Your father is very amusing," he remarked at last. Then Ruth pressed her lips tightly together, but he wasn't fooled. "You think it's funny."
A small chuckle escaped her lips. "It could've been worse, honey. You could've drank it."
"You bet I could've," he said, his anger returning.
"A minnow is better than a gun. Try to think of it as an initiation for son-in-laws. Poor Douglas had a pig run through the room when he was trying to get to know Laura."
"I know. I heard about that from your grandmother. She said you were in on it."
She looked a little sheepish. "I was 11 and it was my pig. If any sister should resent me, it should be Laura. I teased the poor girl out of her mind, but she's a well of patience. I wasn't in on this one if that's what you're thinking."
His temper cooled again. "I know."
"It is kind of a cute thing," she said, looking toward the bucket.
"We're not keeping it as a pet."
"Nah, I don't imagine it enjoyed almost getting drunk anymore than you enjoyed almost drinking it. I'll slip in the river on the way up to the house."
Samuel didn't join them until they were eating their lunch on the porch, the bottoms of their clothes and shoes being too muddy for Mary's tastes and none of them feeling like changing. Besides that, the low 60s was too mild a day for winter to miss enjoying it as they weren't likely to catch another for awhile.
"Nice of you to come when the work's about through," Robert joked.
Kid wouldn't have minded some brotherly ribbing like Robert had just done to Samuel, but Robert barely spoke to him.
Samuel only smiled in reply and greeted James before he indicated that he wanted to speak to Anna alone. They remained in sight but went over to the ash tree. Whatever he told her caused her to gasp.
"I've had my dinner. I'll meet ya'll down at the barn," Samuel said when they came back.
"Samuel says Ronald Campbell passed away," Anna informed them when he gone, looking specifically at Ruth.
"I'm sorry to hear that. I didn't know him well, but he was Michael's cousin, wasn't he?" Ruth asked.
She nodded. "And one of the men that blocked our way into the church Sunday."
"So he was," she said, putting down one of the plentiful chicken legs that made up their lunch and wiping her greasy hands on her old skirt. "A real shame. I hope he's safely in the arms of Jesus now."
"They're saying that you killed him. Michael in particular is saying that you gave Ronald the evil eye. That he was as healthy as a horse and young to boot and now he'd dead because of you."
"That's plumb ridiculous. So now not only do I have the power to heal at my own will, I can kill with my eyes. Do people even hear themselves talk?"
"Ridiculous or not, that's what people think," Anna said, worried lines creasing her forehead.
"Ruth, this is spinning more and more out of control," Kid said in hushed, concerned tones.
"I know," she said with a sigh. "The dance is tomorrow. Maybe if I spend some time with people they'll see how absurd they're being."
"Maybe," he said though he sounded unconvinced.
Ruth's father and brothers looked simultaneously distressed and angry over the news and were talking about it amongst themselves.
The rest of the day was uneventful and when the sun had sunk low in the sky, the skeletal frame of the barn was there.
"If it'd been a summer day, the barn would be done," James groused. "It should be done in plenty of times for you kids to go to the dance though."
Kid was looking forward to the dance, not only for the chance to play with Ruth's mother but for the chance to observe most of the community under one roof. He had a feeling the culprit was right under their noses though as he observed Anna laying a cover over the unused wood.