The Turtle Incident

Note: This is a deleted scene from Letters to Dogwood. To get the full effect, it helps to read the book first 🙂

Marriage to Ben was wonderful, but there wasn’t a day that Lucy’s husband didn’t work from sunup to sundown.

It was a cool September morning not long after they had said their vows when Ben strolled up from the barn and stopped at the open kitchen doorway, and watched Lucy clean up breakfast.

After a minute of silence, Lucy gave him a sleepy, questioning glance. “What is it?”

Unrolling the sleeves of his work shirt, he said, “Go for a walk with me.”

“A walk?” She yawned behind a hand that was still soapy from scrubbing pans.

Eyebrows wiggling, he suggested, “Unless you want to climb back into bed?”

Lucy swatted him with the dishtowel she had grabbed to dry her hands. “I don’t think so, Benjamin Stone. You have something planned, I can feel it.”

His dimples deepened as he snatched the dishtowel, tugging her against him. “Come on. I’ll show you.”

At that time of year, there was a bite to the air, and every breath was fresh and brisk. Birds twittered and flew from tree to tree. They waved at Frank and Tia, who sat in their rocking chairs on their front porch, each holding a cup of coffee.

Ben and Lucy held hands as they walked, and, as usual, she talked while he listened. The breeze was chill, and she squeezed his fingers. “Isn’t it a little too cold for a swim?”

“We’re not swimming,” he said mysteriously.

“Well, you’re taking me to the gilly hole.” She scrunched her nose at him. The gilly hole was a round pool of water in the creek bend, perfect for swimming and fishing. Her eyes brightened. “Are you taking me fishing?”

“If I recall, a certain city miss once told me that she could outfish me any day.”

Teeth flashing, Lucy let go of his hand and skipped ahead, skirts flapping like bird wings. “And I can! Shall I prove it to you?”

Their banter continued through the woods until they made it to the sandy bank of the creek, brown water shimmering as the sky brightened in the open canopy above it. Next to the creek was a rope swing and a lean-to.

He nodded toward the small lean-to. Beneath it were two cane poles, already formed and strung with a hook at the end. “Care to make a bet on who catches the most fish, little lady?”

That surge of competitiveness rose in her, and she ruched her sleeves up a bit. “I’d love a wager with you, Mr. Stone. What would you care to bet on?”

Ben grabbed a pail filled with dirt and night crawlers and snatched up two of the cane poles. He’d obviously readied everything before they’d arrived, the scheming miscreant. “If I win, you have to cook something special.”

Lucy was already shaking her head. “No, that’s too tame. I already cook for you every night. Why don’t you liven the stakes a bit?”

No longer looking at her as he dug for a worm, he nevertheless appeared more attentive. Alert. “What would you suggest?” he asked formally.

Snatching her hook away from his wandering fingers, she plucked the fat, brown earthworm from him and calmly speared her hook through its length. “How about, if I catch more fish than you, you take me to a circus or a Wild West show.” She was studiously avoiding his narrowed gaze.

“Alright,” he agreed. “And if I win, no matter what I ask, you have to say yes.” When her eyes shot to his in curiosity, he held up a hand. “Deal?”

Holding out a dirt-stained hand, she shook his firmly. “Deal.”

She untied her shiny black boots, took them and her stockings off, and hopped onto a felled log across one end of the swimming hole. Balancing on the log with carefully placed bare feet, she walked her way to the deepest end where the log was widest. Once there, she tucked her skirts up from the back and perched her bottom onto the old cypress trunk. Lucy spat on her worm and dipped her hook into the depths beneath the log, utterly silent and still.

BEN GAPED AT her from the bank. Eventually, he shook his head and grabbed a handful of bait and a pole to his favorite fishing corner opposite his lovely wife. Her stillness was disconcerting to him. She was almost never still, and she was never quiet. The only exception was when she read a book. Ben discovered that he enjoyed watching her doing nothing as much as he loved watching her flit from task to task.

They fished in complete silence, and Ben began to doze, hunkered as he was under the trees, when Lucy whooped. Frowning in disbelief, Ben stood and watched her jerk her pole with a quick viciousness.

“You get a bite?” he called to her, betting she had hung her hook up in underwater branches.

At the end of her line was a scrawny, foot-long mud cat, writhing in the air with smooth gray and white skin. “I caught a catfish!” she replied jubilantly. “He’s on the smallish side, though. I’ll put him back.” She released the fish on the other side of the creek after competently unhooking it.

Beginners luck, he muttered to himself, watching her hop along the log for another worm.

In the end, she caught three fish. That one cat, a perch, and a good-sized bass that had almost yanked her into the water. By the time he’d gotten a nibble, his mood had become surly. The twitch of his pole roused him from his thunderous crouch.

“You’ve got one!” she shouted maniacally, and his cheeks flushed with fierce pleasure that his luck had changed. “What did you get?”

“It’s a big one,” he crowed to her, nodding to the bend of the pole. “At least six pounds. It fights like a catfish!”

Breathlessly, Ben pulled the string up, trying to peer through the murky brown depths of the creek water to see which fish he’d snagged.

A big blue cat, that’s probably what he’d caught—

The pointed, scowling head of a red-eared snapping turtle surfaced, neck stretched so long Ben thought for a split second that he’d caught a water snake. Then, a shining, plated shell emerged behind it, contributing to the promising weight he’d felt. He held it up in dumbfounded silence for a minute until he became aware of a strange sound from across the water.

Lucy was shaking with laughter, hiccupping with it, holding her ribs with an arm, her cane pole forgotten and floating in the water next to her. He glared at her from his steep bank, not angry, but fed up with what he thought had been a “city miss”. Why, she wasn’t a city miss at all! She’d been fooling everyone this whole time with her good manners, pretty face, and friendly ways. Even though he was feeling not a little betrayed and more than a little foolish, her laughter was contagious.

Chuckling, he made to get the hook from the snapping turtle’s gaping mouth…and the damned thing immediately bit him. He cursed aloud, a word he would never have uttered in a lady’s presence if hard jaws hadn’t clamped over his finger, and was rewarded with a shriek from the log. Ben’s head shot up, turtle clinging tenaciously to his knuckle, and his eyes caught a blur of brown skirts disappearing into the water. Cursing even louder, he flung the turtle from his hand—and half the skin of his finger with it—and jumped into the water after Lucy.

Would she drown in all those skirts?

The water was freezing, but he was too consumed with panic to pay it any mind. He was halfway across the creek when her head resurfaced. She gasped from the shock of the cold water, blinking rapidly with her mouth wide open in surprise. They both trod water for a stunned moment, looking at each other, when Ben choked, “You alright?”

“This water is fr-freezing!” Brown water flooded her mouth and she spat it out in disgust.

Ben couldn’t help it. Her astounded expression hadn’t wavered and he started to laugh. It was the loudest he’d laughed since he was a kid, and even though her instant scowl warned him it wasn’t at all the time, he couldn’t seem to stop.

THEIR HAIR WAS plastered to their faces, lips turning pale from the cold, and he wanted to laugh at her!

“I fell off the stupid log because you let that turtle bite you,” she accused. He was shouting with laughter now. “It is not funny!

 She sprayed his face with water and fought a losing battle not to smile.

They made their way to the bank shaking with hilarity and cold.

“At least I won.” It was a pathetic grasp at the dignity she had lost with her sopping blouse and dripping skirt. She was a sloppy, sodden mess.

His own clothes clung to his body, round bulges of muscle exposed beneath the worn cotton of his shirt. “You might’ve caught more fish…but at least I didn’t fall in the water—”

Lucy groaned, unpinning her hair. “Here we go, I’ll never hear the end of it now.” She began to wring dirty creek water from her hair but froze when he whipped his shirt over his head. When he squeezed the water from it, the muscles in his arms and pectorals squared and flexed. Thick, ropey veins corded their way down his arms, a few spidering across his shoulders. Fine black hair covered his chest, matted now from his swim, and it tapered over his abdominals, growing sparser until it became a thin line beneath his navel just above his trouser buttons.

Feeling the intensity of her eyes on his, Ben paused wringing his shirt to death. He shook his head and unraveled his shirt, snapping the water from it.

“What?” Her voice sounded hoarse, and she swallowed at the sudden dryness.

“If you knew what I’d like to do with you, I doubt you’d look at me that way.”

Stimulated by his words, she struggled with how to respond. What would he like to do to her? How was she looking at him?

Ben looked dark and intense as he fumbled to fold his wet, cumbersome shirt.

“Why don’t we go back to the house?” she suggested, eyes plastered to his every move. “Then perhaps you can show me what you’d like to do with me.”

He tsked at her and shook a rough hand through his hair, flinging droplets everywhere. After the hot, dry summer, his neck and arms were two shades darker than his torso. She looked at his brown nipples, beaded from their frigid dip, with interest.

“That wasn’t your reward, was it?”

Scowling, she let the rope of her hair go. “You are a mighty sore loser, Mr. Stone.”

Eyes hooded, mouth quirking, Ben dropped the shirt on the sand and stepped into her space, gently fisting her wet hair. “Funny. It don’t feel much like I lost.”

Using the grip on her hair to bow her neck backward, he slanted his mouth across hers. It reminded her of the time they had snuck out here when they were courting, her father restlessly pacing the hill. She touched his body with her fingertips, and even though her touch on his hot skin was probably as chilled as she was, it set them both on fire. He ran his hands through the silken, damp skeins of brown hair that had blackened once wet. She leaned forward, and her cold bodice set goosebumps off across his chest and arms. She touched the bloom of his raised skin.

Lucy broke the kiss and nuzzled his neck, and his breath shuddered when she let her tongue slip out and caress the straining cords.

“All right. All right. You win.”

Blinking, she pulled away and fought to look confused. “I win what?”

Sighing, he dipped his head for another kiss, then swatted her rump. “Let’s go to the house.”

Biting her lip to hide her victorious smile, she nodded. “Yes, let’s get out of these wet clothes before we catch our death.”

Ben chuckled and his swat turned into a pinch. “Want to make a wager on who can get undressed first?”

“Now, that is one thing,” she said, grinning and looping her arm around his muscular waist, “that you always win at.”

They walked up the bank together, giggling and whispering. Behind them, a scowling, red-eared snapping turtle poked his head from his shell. The coast clear, he scurried with surprising swiftness across the leaf-strewn bank and jumped into the creek with a little plop.