Only 04 - Only Love

between one thumb and palm. The forked end of the needles rested against each other, interlocking gently.
    There was no pressure from either Reno or Eve that forced the needles into contact. Nor was there any attempt to keep the needles touching. In truth, there was no visible reason for the dowsing needles to remain interlocked while Reno and Eve walked over the rugged land.
    Yet the needles did.
    “It’s…incredible,” Shannon said.
    Her voice was a whisper, though there was no chance of being overheard.
    “The needles?” Whip asked.
    “The way Reno and Eve move together. Asthough the Spanish needles were connecting them rather than the opposite.”
    “Reno once told me that if moonlight were water flowing, the feel of its currents would be like the needles when he and Eve use them. Ghostly, but very real.”
    “Like the feeling that comes when I remember how we…” Shannon’s voice died as a flush climbed her cheeks.
    The quicksilver gleam of Whip’s eyes told her that he knew what she was thinking.
    “Just like that, honey girl. Interlocking, moving, rocking. Only with us, it’s more like currents from the sun than the moon.”
    Shannon smiled and took a shivery kind of breath. “Yes.”
    The back of Whip’s fingers brushed lightly down Shannon’s hot cheek. His thumb slid lower, caressing first her lips and then the race of her pulse in her neck.
    “Time to go,” Whip said, his voice unusually deep. “Crowbait is packed and ready for the trail.”
    Shannon spun to face Whip fully. Pain made her features bleak and her voice raw.
    “But I thought you wouldn’t leave until they found gold,” she protested shakily.
    Whip gathered Shannon close, wrapping his arms around her, feeling her pain as though it was his own.
    “Shannon,” he whispered against her hair. “I wasn’t talking about leaving alone. I was talking about taking you back to the cabin and doing some deer hunting.”
    For an instant Shannon’s arms tightened almost harshly around Whip. Then she pulled back andforced a smile onto lips that would rather have done anything else.
    “Of course,” she said, looking away from Whip’s too-knowing eyes. “Silly of me. I don’t know what I was thinking of.”
    Whip’s eyelids flinched. He knew exactly what Shannon had been thinking of. The fact that he would leave her soon had been haunting him, too.
    I don’t want to hurt her.
    I can’t stay.
    God, why did I ever come to Echo Basin in the first place? Before now I never guessed how much a man could hurt and never show a wound.
    Nor how much a woman could cry and never make a sound. Looking at Shannon’s sad eyes is tearing my heart out.
    But all Whip said aloud was, “You’ve learned a lot about tracking and stalking in the last few days. By the time deer and elk start coming down out of the high country, you’ll be a good hunter.”
    Not that she needed to be. Whip had shot enough game for Shannon, Cherokee, and a starving bear to winter on. Most of it was at Cherokee’s cabin right now, curing over slow fires.
    “Hunting. Of course,” Shannon said distantly, her voice as empty as her smile. “Well, we’d better get cracking, hadn’t we? Should I say good-bye to Reno and Eve now, or will they come by the cabin before the three of you leave for good?”
    “Shannon …” Whip’s voice dried up.
    He swallowed hard, trying to banish the emotion that kept ambushing him without warning.
    “Reno and Eve like you a lot,” Whip said finally. “They would be happy to have you visit them.”
    “Of course,” Shannon said for the third time.
    And for the third time, the words meant nothing.
    “Will you?” Whip pressed.
    “Will I what?”
    “Visit Reno and Eve.”
    “Don’t worry,” Shannon said, her voice neutral. “You won’t trip over me if you come back from yondering and want to see your own family.”
    “That’s not what I meant!”
    “Isn’t it? Well, in any case, it’s what I meant.”
    “What about Caleb and Willow?” Whip demanded. “Are you just going to walk away from them, too?”
    Shannon gave Whip a look from narrowed blue eyes.
    “They’re your family, not mine,” she said distinctly. “I’m not walking away to anywhere but home, yondering man.”
    “Damn it, that shack isn’t a home,” Whip said between his teeth.
    “It is to me. Nothing you can say or do will change that. Accept it. Just as I’ve accepted that you’ll leave me as soon as your conscience lets you.”
    Shannon