by Ana Seymour
“I’ve talked to Miss Hanks.”
“From now on, if you need to speak with her, I’d appreciate it if you would do so through me.”
Tichenor’s eyebrow rose. “And why would I do that, Mr. Dickerson?”
“I consider all the Hanks sisters to be my responsibility now that their father is gone. And Molly and I are practically affianced.”
“Practically affianced?” the marshal drawled. “You understand that lingo, Parker?”
Parker, whose stomach had tightened at the first sound of Jeremy’s voice, stopped grinding his teeth long enough to answer. “It means he’s doing everything he can to get his hooks into Molly’s ranch.”
“Oh,” the marshal said. “I thought it meant something like that.”
Jeremy’s face took on an almost purple cast in the dimly lit street. His hand flexed and hovered over a revolver that was tucked into the front of his pants. “You won’t be talking so pretty when Molly and I announce our engagement, Prescott. Because you’ll be packing up your gear that same day.”
“If you and Molly announce your engagement, I’ll be packed and halfway to Montana that same hour. Until that time, I’m staying—for as long as Molly wants me.”
Tichenor seemed to sense the escalating tension between the two men. He grasped Parker’s arm and pulled him toward the saloon. “Like I said, we’ll keep you informed of the investigation, Mr. Dickerson. Good evening, gentlemen.”
Benton and Dickerson did not follow them into the Grizzly. For a moment Parker thought he was going to be sick as the bright lights of the bar and the strong odor of cigar smoke overwhelmed him. “Are you all right?” Tichenor asked.
“Yeah. That fellow sticks in my craw.”
“Mine, too,” the marshal agreed easily. “And I’m not even jealous of the son of a bitch.”
Parker gave him a sideways look. “Meaning that I am?”
Tichenor nodded solemnly. “Wretchedly.”
Parker didn’t argue. “Damn,” he said simply.
“There’s only one thing to do about jealousy.”
“What’s that?”
“Stake your claim.”
They’d walked up to the bar and the marshal had signaled the bartender to give them two beers. He pushed one toward Parker, who drank half the mug without stopping. “I don’t have a claim,” he said finally, swiping a hand across his dripping mouth.
“Well, see. That’s your problem. You’ve got to get out there, pound in your stakes and take possession. Then you’ll be able to sleep at night.”
Parker looked at the marshal with a look of amazement. How did Tichenor know that it had been weeks since he’d had a good night’s sleep? “Pound in my stakes, eh?”
Tichenor took a gulp of beer and nodded. “Yup. Stop sittin’ here every night making chin music with me and get to it.”
Suddenly Harry’s words made absolute, brilliant sense. Parker stood up from the stool and clapped on his hat. “You want me to pound in one or two around Susannah while I’m at it?” he asked with a grin.
Tichenor took another swallow of beer. “Nope. I plan on staking out that filly myself one of these days. You can just leave her plumb alone.”
Once he’d made up his mind, Parker couldn’t get back to the ranch fast enough. He apologized silently to Diamond for pushing so hard after a long day, but he wanted to get back before Molly had turned in for the night. What he had to say wouldn’t wait until morning.
As it turned out, his timing was perfect. When he rode into the barn she was there, standing in the stall next to Moonlight the calf and talking to it softly. She was wearing her buckskins. She hadn’t put on a dress for supper as often in recent days, though Parker had noted with some irritation that she did seem to don her female attire lately every time she headed over to the Lazy D. Of course, as he had told her, she looked every bit as appealing in the buckskins. In fact, there were times when she moved around and he watched how the soft leather molded itself around her firm little bottom… He felt it now—the familiar tugging through his midsection.
“Hello, Parker.” Her greeting was frosty. “I trust you had another pleasant evening in town.”
He swung down from his horse and began to unsaddle her. “It was pleasant enough, except for a notso-pleasant run-in with your friend Dickerson.”
“Jeremy?”
He lifted the saddle and blanket off Diamond’s back and began to rub her down. “Yes. The charming Jeremy.”
Molly looked as if she wanted to appear indifferent, but curiosity got the better of her. “What was it about?” Then she added, “And he can be charming when he wants to be, you know. He’s been very nice to me.”
Parker gave Diamond’s rump a gentle slap to send her into a stall. “You mean he can be charming when he’s angling to get control of a prime piece of property—like the Lucky Stars.”
Almost instantly he regretted his statement. She winced, almost as if he had hit her, and then her eyes took on the same hurt expression that she’d had the night they’d talked about Claire. She looked young and vulnerable, and he realized that, however brave a front Molly might be putting on, she had lost some of the confidence she’d begun to gain when she’d been falling in love with Parker. It was obvious that she, too, believed Dickerson’s interest in her was based solely on his desire to control the ranch. Parker sighed. He had some amends to make. Some repair work to do.
He walked toward her slowly. “I’m not saying that he only wants the ranch, Molly.”
Her nose had that defiant tilt he had learned to expect when she’d been hurt. “Yes, you were. It’s what everyone says, and I expect it’s true.”
Yesterday as she’d left the Lazy D, Jeremy had kissed her. She’d told herself that it was a good sign, that it meant he cared about her as well as the ranch. So she’d kissed him back, willing herself to feel something. She’d hoped that his kisses would help blot out her memories of those few impassioned nights with Parker. But it hadn’t worked. Jeremy’s kisses had only filled her with a mild distaste, and she’d cried all the way home.
Parker took her chin in his big hand. “It’s not true. I can’t imagine any man getting near enough to look into those blue eyes and still keep his mind on cattle and grazing land.”
She pulled her face away. It felt too good to feel his fingers on her skin. Good and awful at the same time. She felt a surge of resentment. She’d been rejected once by Parker. He had no right to come in and stir things up again.
“I suppose he thinks about a thing or two besides cattle when he kisses me,” she said with deliberate nonchalance. It was a slight exaggeration of the status of her relationship with Jeremy, but she saw that the barb had hooked as Parker’s nostrils flared in quick anger.
“When he kisses you,” he repeated slowly.
She nodded.
Parker reached toward a nearby stall and wound his fist around a bridle that was hanging over the wall. “Then Susannah was right all along. Jeremy’s the one you want.”
“Jeremy and I make sense. It would be a good move for both our ranches.”
“Ah, yes, the ranches. Let’s forget about the kissing and talk about what makes sense for the ranches.”
Molly had never heard such tight anger in his voice. The knuckles of the hand holding the bridle were white. She backed away a step. “It’s my life, Parker,” she said softly. “The ranch is my life.”
“Do you love him?”
Molly looked away from the intense scrutiny of his dark eyes. “That’s none of your business, Mr. Prescott.” She started to turn away toward the door, but he grabbed her arm.
“The hell it’s not.” She was in his arms then and he didn’t make any effort to be gentle. His lips smashed against hers and opened her mouth to the fierce onslaught of his kisses. He held her uncorseted body against his with both hands, her breasts crushed into his chest, her thighs tightly pressed to his. Then he put his hands on her waist and turned her so that her back was against th
e wooden wall of the stall, and he kissed her some more, filling his hands with her softness and bending his legs to nest his stiff arousal in the hollow below her belly.
The moist heat of her mouth burned him, incinerating a streak down his middle, ending in an explosive fury at the juncture of his legs. He’d never felt anything quite so extraordinary… or so devastating. It was a combination of lust and anger. He wanted to lose himself in her body, to pour inside her all the rage he’d been saving up underneath his carefree manner—rage against Claire for leaving him alone, against Molly for waking up his heart so that he could once again feel the pain of loving someone. And blinding, scalding rage against Dickerson for daring to touch her.
“Did it feel like this when he kissed you, Molly?” he growled against her softened lips.
She pushed against him and bit the side of his lip. But the struggle was halfhearted and the bite inflamed rather than punished. Parker retaliated by biting her back.
“What was I, boss lady?” he asked between deep, rhythmic kisses. “What was the lovemaking we shared? A training run with the hired hand?”
She brought her hand up to slap him, but he caught it and held it inches from her face. “Is that what it was?” he asked again in a low, deadly voice.
She twisted her wrist suddenly to escape his grasp and slid out from beneath him. “You’ve been drinking, Parker,” she said, taking deep breaths.
For just a minute there was a look of something like fear in her eyes, and it stopped Parker cold. He knew that he hadn’t drunk enough at the Grizzly to intoxicate a bumblebee, but, nevertheless, he had lost control. He’d ridden out here planning to talk with Molly about a possible future for the two of them. Instead, when she’d told him that Dickerson had kissed her, he’d thrown her up against a wall and come close to ravishing her.
He squatted on the ground and dropped his head into his hands. “I’m sorry,” he said, taking a deep, shuddering breath. “I’m not drunk, Molly. I’m just… I don’t know what the hell I am.”
Molly looked down at him. The truth—the awful truth that even now had her head ringing—was that she’d been utterly aroused by Parker’s rough kisses. She’d wanted more. She still did.
“Sure you do, tenderfoot,” she said lightly. She rested a hand on his bent head. Of their own volition her fingers threaded into the dark waves. “You’re a fast-talking Easterner who came out West expressly to break the hearts of us simple ranch girls.”
Parker looked up at her and spoke softly. “Did I break your heart, Molly?”
She grimaced. “Bent it a little. I’m too tough to break.”
He tugged on her hand to pull her down beside him and they both fell backward onto a pile of horse blankets stacked against the stall wall. “Is that why you’ve been spending so much time over at Dickerson’s place?”
“The one thing has nothing to do with the other. I visited the Dickersons regularly before you ever showed up here, and I will continue to do so after you leave.”
“And continue to let Dickerson kiss you?”
She leaned back against the rough wood slats and held up a hand as if asking for peace. “Don’t start in again, Parker. You haven’t got a case here. It’s none of your business who I let kiss me.”
He looked at her soberly for a long minute. “I’m making it my business, Molly.”
Molly’s breath caught in her throat. “Don’t say that, Parker, unless you mean something by it. Please. My heart’s starting to look like a parade ground after a hard rain from all the stompin’ it’s taken.”
Parker stood suddenly and, before Molly could say anything, bent over and picked her up. “Have the folks over at the house turned in for the night?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
“Good. ‘Cause I wouldn’t want them waiting up for you.”
He started walking with her out of the barn. “Parker, what are you doing? Put me down.”
She bounced against him as he made his way toward the bunkhouse. “Parker!” she said again.
He stopped, but didn’t loosen his hold on her. “Listen, boss lady. In a couple of minutes I intend to close up that beautiful mouth of yours, but for the time being maybe you could manage to shut it all on your own.”
He kissed her hard, quickly, then resumed his walk. Her soft, leather-clad bottom rubbed against his forearm as he walked. “And stop squirming,” he added, “or I’m going to have to stop and make love to you right here on the cold ground.”
A surge went through his middle at his own words, and evidently they affected Molly as well, since she stopped protesting and instead tucked her head above his shoulder and began soft nips along the line of his jaw.
“You haven’t shaved,” she whispered.
“I didn’t figure to be entertaining a lady tonight.”
Suddenly she remembered her suspicions about all his recent trips into town. “What did you figure to be doing?” she asked.
He’d reached the door and kicked it open with his boot. “Now, see? I knew you wouldn’t be able to keep that mouth closed all by yourself. I reckon I’m going to have to do it myself.”
“But I just wanted to know—”
She couldn’t finish her question. He’d taken her mouth again in a head-spinning kiss. “I’ve never kissed anyone in trousers before,” he teased when he’d left her thoroughly dazed.
“Do you mind?” she whispered.
“No, ma’am.” He spread his hands over the seat of her pants and pushed her against him. “Does that feel like I mind? And anyway—” his hands moved to the ties of her shirt “—you won’t be in ‘em for long.”
Sunlight was streaming in the bunkhouse window when Molly awoke with a start. Her first impulse was to jump up and get back to the house before her absence was discovered, but after a moment of thought she sank back into the pillows next to Parker. It was time, after all, that the rest of the family knew how things were between them. Though they hadn’t exactly talked about marriage during their long, drugging night of lovemaking, Parker had made it plain that he was ready to consider the idea of building their relationship into something more permanent. Molly knew she’d be in for some hearty teasing by her sisters after all the years she’d spent warning them about falling for a man. But they’d been used to sharing everything, and she wasn’t going to shut them out now, just because her life had taken such an unexpected turn.
Parker’s voice startled her. “I thought the moonlight on your skin last night was the most beautiful sight I’d ever see, but you’re even prettier with the sunbeams dancing in those big blue eyes.”
His smile reached deep inside her, warming her all the way to her toes. “You’re not too bad a sight to wake up to yourself, tenderfoot.”
He grinned and pulled her down beside him. “Tenderfoot? I was hoping after last night I’d have worked my way up to wrangler.”
She giggled and snuggled more closely against him. “I think I’ll move you all the way up to trail boss, Mr. Prescott.”
He pulled her underneath him and started nibbling at her lips. “Don’t do me any favors now, boss lady. I don’t want anything I haven’t earned.”
She made a sound in the back of her throat as he moved down her body to swirl his tongue around her nipple. His beard prickled against the tender skin of her breasts. They were both morning sensitive and ready. He entered her almost immediately and after only a few slow thrusts she clutched his arms and cried out. He increased the tempo, his eyes open, watching her, and ended with a long sigh of satisfaction.
She smiled shyly. “I think you’ve earned it, cowboy.”
He grinned. “Are you sure? I’d be happy to keep working at it.”
She daringly reached down and gave a slap to his bare rear. “How about you save some of your strength for the cattle?”
“I’ve plenty of strength to go around, sweetheart, but I’m going to get up now anyway and let you get dressed. As much as I hate to have all that covered up—” he boosted hi
mself up on his hands and looked down the length of her limp, sated body “—I don’t want Smokey or your sisters showing up looking for us.”
They pulled each other out of the bed amidst more laughter and kisses. Molly didn’t think she’d ever been so happy in her whole life. Was it only two days ago that she’d ridden home from the Lazy D in tears?
“I’ll have to tell my sisters something,” Molly observed as they were smoothing out the bedding, one on each end.
“About us?”
“Yes, about us.” Men were exasperatingly dim at times. “They’ll know I spent the night here.”
“Oh. Well, tell them the truth—that you’ve fallen madly in love with me.”
She gave the quilt an extra hard flip, pulling it out of his hands. “Humph. How about if I tell them that you’ve fallen madly in love with me?”
Parker grinned. “How about if we tell them that the tenderfoot and the boss lady have fallen in love with each other?”
She smiled. “That sounds like a good plan.” She held out her hand and he took it as they headed together up to the ranch house.
The teasing at breakfast had not been as bad as Molly had feared. Smokey and Mary Beth had both appeared to be too delighted with the news to taunt. And Susannah had been oddly restrained about the whole thing. Perhaps now that she was spending so much time with the young folks of the neighborhood, she was imagining that she, too, would be in a romantic relationship before long, so it didn’t behoove her to make fun of Molly’s.
Spring was officially just around the corner, and after the mild winter, Molly had decided that they would start the roundup any day now. The only thing stopping them was the lack of help. As he had promised, Parker agreed to ride into town with Smokey and convince some of the cowboys to sign on at the Lucky Stars.
“Tell them we have a male trail boss, if you think that will help,” she told him archly as they saddled up their horses.
He leaned over to kiss her. “I ain’t about to show off my trail boss credentials to a rowdy bunch like that,” he said with a wiggle of his eyebrows and a swift look down at his privates, which seemed to be in a state of half arousal these days whenever Molly was in the same room.
