A Promise of Thunder

unaccustomed show of bravado.
    “No one tells me what to do,” Grady said with quiet menace. “Now I suggest you leave before I do something you won’t find very pleasant.”
    Turner opened his mouth to protest, then thought better of it. He hesitated a moment too long for Grady’s liking. Moving with the speed and stealth of a panther, Grady seized Turner by the collar of his stylish jacket and the seat of his pants and threw him out the open door. Then he slammed what was left of the shattered panel hard enough to rattle the wall. When he finally turned back to Storm, she was still sitting on the side of the bed, weaving from side to side, glassy-eyed and disoriented. He spit out an epitaph and bore her down on the soft surface of the mattress.
    “Gra-dy,” Storm complained when Grady pulled the covers over her, clothes and all.“What are you doing here? What’s going on?”
    Anger boiled up inside Grady, and his voice was roughened by it. “Do you realize what you almost did, you little fool? Are you aware of nothing that happened tonight?”
    Storm frowned in concentration, but all it did was give her a headache. “I went to the barn dance with Nat Turner and had a wonderful time.” She wanted to giggle, but Grady’s fierce expression stopped her.
    “Was it your idea to stay in town tonight instead of returning home? Did Nat suggest you rent a hotel room?”
    “I—I—For heaven’s sake, Grady, will you please stop badgering me? If you must know, I stayed in town because—because I knew it would make you angry.”
    Grady looked thunderstruck. “You almost lost your homestead. Was making me mad worth it? Women!” He shook his head in exasperation.
    “Lost my homestead? That’s not possible. I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”
    “No, I don’t suppose you do,” Grady said with an impatient growl. “You’re too drunk to understand anything.”
    “I am not drunk!” Her eyes grew round when a hiccup slipped past her lips.
    “I’m not going to argue with you tonight, Storm. You’re in no condition to comprehend what took place in this room even if I spell it out for you. You’re tired. Go to sleep. I’ll take you home tomorrow and we can talk then.”
    Storm’s face wore such a woebegone expression, Grady almost felt sorry for her. Almost, but not quite. She should have known better than to drink so freely of the punch after he’d warned her it was spiked.
    Storm struggled to put a meaning to Grady’s strange words and came up lacking. There was an odd buzzing in her head and the room was spinning. Perhaps she was coming down with a strange malady. Or maybe she was just too weary to think coherently. In any event, Grady’s advice was too tempting to resist. After a good night’s sleep she’d feel better prepared to face his anger. Was the man perpetually angry? she wondered dully as she closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.
    The steady rise and fall of Storm’s breast told Grady that she was slumbering peacefully, unaware of the danger in which she had placed herself tonight. He’d show her no mercy tomorrow when he regaled her with all the lurid facts about her “friend” Nat Turner and how he’d tried to cheat her out of her homestead. But there was tonight to consider. What was he going to do about Storm tonight? True, she was sleeping quite peacefully now, but the door was all but ruined, and anyone could barge in and do her harm. He solved the problem neatly by renting a room for himself across the hall and tucking her into his bed.
    Then he lowered himself into a chair and sat beside her the rest of the night, staring at her as if trying to make up his mind about something.What made Storm Kennedy different from any other woman he had ever known? he wondered curiously. Was she really the Storm that Wakantanka had referred to in his vision, or was he being fanciful and imagining things because her name happened to be Storm? In his heart Grady knew he wasn’t responsible for the death of Storm’s husband. So why had he appointed himself her protector? Why did he want her with a fierceness that was more pain than pleasure? And why, after he had loved her only once, did he resent any other man who had ever touched her?
    Nat Turner rushed past the dozing hotel clerk as if the devil was on his heels. He went directly to the saloon where both Fork and Purdy were known to hang out and found them playing cards at one of the gambling tables. He snarled out a