Emma was silent as she considered this. ‘You’d better tell me where he is.’
‘He’s at the ranch where we spent summers growing up. We sold the main family house in Rio because of memories we prefer to forget, but we kept the ranch house, the land and the old cabin as a reminder of our holidays there. We just couldn’t bring ourselves to lose contact with the people who worked the ranch. They were like family. They still are. Luc bought the adjoining fazenda so he can ride out to the cabin like before.’
‘How far away is it?’ Emma’s brain was racing.
‘It’s a couple of hours to fly to the ranch, and then another couple of hours to ride out to the cabin. You’re not thinking of going there on your own, are you? Can you even ride? The cabin’s in the middle of nowhere, and you’re pregnant.’
‘Yes. But I’m not sick, and I’m not helpless. Exercise for pregnant women is actively encouraged, and this is something I’ve got to do. Tell me about the cabin,’ Emma insisted, in an attempt to distract her friend.
‘It used to be a wreck when we were children, but Luc put it together again plank by plank. There’s no one else there, just Luc. It’s the place he goes to when he wants to be alone.’
‘So...this flight to the ranch?’ Emma asked casually.
‘No,’ Karina said flatly. ‘I’ve changed my mind. Luc would never forgive me if he thought I’d let you go to the ranch on your own. We won’t even contemplate his reaction if you turned up at the cabin—’
‘And I won’t forgive you if you don’t tell me how to get there,’ Emma threatened. ‘Please...’ She grabbed Karina’s hand.
Seeing she was set on going, Karina relented. ‘The Carrier Pigeon would take you as far as the ranch—’
‘The Carrier Pigeon?’
‘That’s what we call the Marcelos light aircraft that shuttles back and forth between the city and the ranch. You’d be safe at the ranch, but you can’t get to the cabin because you would need to ride there—there’s no other way. There are no roads or landing strips. And you don’t ride, do you, Emma?’ Karina demanded in her best attempt at a stern voice.
Emma’s shoulders lifted in a reluctant shrug. ‘If I could just get to the ranch...’
‘Anyway, Luc doesn’t pick up calls when he’s at the cabin, so you’ll have to wait for him at the ranch. And goodness knows how long he plans to stay at the cabin. It’s in a really remote area. The only way Luc can be contacted is by satellite phone, and then he never picks up.’
‘I’m happy to wait at the ranch,’ Emma said blandly.
Karina studied her face. ‘You wouldn’t try anything stupid, would you?’
‘Of course not,’ Emma protested, eyes open wide. ‘I’d really like to visit the ranch...if I wouldn’t get in the way?’
‘You wouldn’t get in the way,’ Karina confirmed, glancing up.
‘Well, then. Will you fix it for me?’ Emma held her breath.
‘I could ring to let the staff at the ranch know that you’re coming, but that doesn’t mean they’ll be able to get hold of Luc. He switches off completely at the cabin. That’s why he goes there. You’d be on your own until he got back.’
‘That’s fine by me. I wouldn’t mind, if I’m not going to be too much trouble for the staff?’
What did she have to lose? She had to see Luc. And as things stood, she was on her own anyway.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
HORSE-RIDING CAME with a far better press than it deserved, Emma thought as she stared down a stable block that boasted snorting firebrands in every stall. Did people actually enjoy sitting on top of a volcano? She’d only arrived at Luc’s ranch that lunchtime and, after being collected at the landing strip by an elderly gaucho who had introduced himself as Pedro, she had quickly settled in and then come straight here.
Her first sight of Pedro had thrilled her, and not just because seeing him had told her she was closer to Luc. With his outfit of battered leather chaps, coin belt and typical hat, garnished with old-world manners, the elderly gaucho had made her feel special from the moment she’d arrived. It was Pedro she was trying to convince now—and not that well—that she had to borrow one of these horses.
‘I’ve been riding since I could walk,’ she asserted airily, hoping he couldn’t see her shaking.
He sized her up. ‘I’ll fetch you a mount.’
‘Thank you.’ She smiled. Job done.
He brought out a mule.
‘I’m to ride that?’ she said, trying not to be unkind as she looked into the doleful eyes of the clearly ancient animal.
‘Sim, senhorita. Nancy is slow, but she is kind. You will be safe.’
Hmm. Biting back her apprehension, she approached the apparently docile animal and stroked her long, velvety ears. Nancy was cute, but that was her assessment while her feet were firmly planted on the ground.
‘She is grandmother here,’ Pedro explained, his weather-beaten face creasing in a smile.
‘Oh, good.’ Perhaps Nancy and she would get along after all. She had always had an affinity with older people.
‘And Nancy knows the way to the cabin.’
‘The cabin?’ Emma adopted an innocent expression. She had intended to go it alone, but any information she could garner from Pedro was all to the good.
‘Sim.’ Pedro was busily checking all the straps and buckles required before she could mount up. She didn’t want to get Pedro into trouble. ‘Wouldn’t Senhor Marcelos be angry if I interrupted his solitude?’ she asked carefully.
‘Senhor Marcelos is never angry with Pedro. I will accompany you.’
‘Oh, no—that’s not necessary.’ She quickly turned away as her cheeks burned red. She had no idea what everyone thought of her sudden arrival at the ranch house, and could only presume that Karina had called them and made some excuse or other—saying that she worked for their boss, perhaps. ‘I’ve got a phone for security.’ She brandished it to make the point that she was really together and ready for this.
‘That won’t work here,’ Pedro said flatly, reaching beneath his hat to scratch his head.
‘And I’ve got supplies from the kitchen.’ The saddlebags she was carrying were bulging with food and water. Pedro couldn’t argue with that. And then there was her trump card. ‘And I’ve got a map.’ She produced it triumphantly.
Pedro shook his head. He didn’t seem happy at all, but as he said nothing more about it she felt confident that he was going to let her ride out on her own now that she had proved to be so organised.
‘You like it here?’ Pedro asked, smiling up at her as he tightened the strap beneath the mule’s stomach.
‘It’s fabulous,’ Emma said honestly. So fabulous it was hard to take in everything Pedro had shown her.
He’d had driven her for miles from the landing strip, across Luc’s land, he told her, until they came to a towering archway that marked the boundary of the main house. It had taken them another twenty minutes before the sprawling ranch house had come into view. Things were on such a vast scale she could easily see why Luc belonged here. He was a big man from a land whose scale she was still getting used to. The stark beauty of the pampas had struck her in the heart as she’d flown over it. Perhaps because it was wild and seemingly unknowable, like him.
The kindness shown to her by Luc’s staff had told her a lot about him. They couldn’t do enough for her—even when she said she was going out on a ride just a few short hours after arriving. Excitement at the thought of seeing Luc again didn’t allow for delay. Not even her glorious guest room, with its billowing white canopy over the huge four-poster bed, could tempt her to stay.
Now, if she could just get her leg over the saddle...
She was supposed to be an experienced rider, remember that?
Thankfully, Pedro cupped his hands and gave
her a leg up, but even on the back of a mule it felt a long way down to the ground. No handrails?
No handrails.
* * *
He was splitting logs when Pedro called him.
‘What?’ He ran to his horse while Pedro was still explaining that he was trailing Emma at a distance.
‘I won’t let any harm come to her,’ his old friend assured him.
Not good enough. Luc had to see Emma for himself. He had to know she was safe. Out here on the pampas there were miles of apparent nothingness, and if a stranger wasn’t wary they could easily get lost. Emma might panic. The mule could trip. There were countless risks for the unwary traveller. He wasn’t about to take any chances where Emma’s safety was concerned. Stowing the phone, he sprang onto his stallion’s back without wasting time saddling up. His first aim was to make her safe. The second was to come clean. Karina was right in that it had done him good, coming out here away from every distraction. It had shown him what counted and what didn’t. His pride was nowhere on that list. Emma’s peace of mind was the headline event.
As he urged his mount across land he knew intimately, he felt strong and certain. When he told Emma the truth he would be anything but. He wasn’t used to making himself vulnerable. As a youth he’d been so sure-footed and confident—until he’d got the biggest slap in the face of his life. At the time he’d been stunned. Then he’d been driven by bitterness and revenge. It had turned him cold until Emma had shown him a different way. Talking it through with her would either end things between them for good, or prove that people could change, and that he was trying.
As much as he liked to be in control, this was one occasion when Emma would be his judge and jury, and he wouldn’t be able to control or influence the outcome.
His first impulse when he spotted her was to laugh—with sheer relief, and with happiness and amusement at the sight of a very determined woman trying to coax a mule up a hill. Leaning almost flat on Nancy’s neck as the old mule took every opportunity to snatch mouthfuls of her favourite herbs, Emma was holding a carrot in front of Nancy’s muzzle. It wasn’t getting her very far. Nancy was too clever to be fooled, and was as stubborn as a mule was supposed to be. Nancy had her head in the air and was contentedly munching, with long strands of grass escaping from either side of her mouth. This forced Emma to hold the carrot higher and higher, with the end result that neither of them was going anywhere fast.
‘Luc!’
Emma sat up so abruptly when she saw him he was frightened she would spook the mule. He brought his horse to a skidding halt across Nancy’s bows, and scooping Emma up, he deposited her on the stallion in front of him.
‘Luc!’ she exclaimed, turning to face him. ‘What a surprise to see you.’
‘Yeah,’ he said drily. ‘Imagine that. What are the chances?’
‘I’m glad I found you.’ She smiled as if she really meant it.
‘Glad I found you, don’t you mean?’ he said, urging his stallion forward. ‘You are an extremely reckless woman.’
‘In Scotland you criticised me for not being adventurous enough,’ she argued, bouncing stiffly in front of him.
‘I didn’t expect you to take your adventuring to these lengths.’ Putting an arm around her waist, he drew her close. ‘Lean into me—move with me. We have to move as one.’
‘I’m not sure I—’
‘I know you can. That’s one thing I do know for sure.’
‘Maybe I could relax if there was something to hang on to.’
‘I won’t let you fall.’ He brought his mouth close to her ear to say this. The temptation to taste her neck was overwhelming.
‘How will you steer if you’re hanging on to me?’ Her voice was tight with tension.
‘How I always do...with my thighs.’
She stiffened and held herself away from him, but not before he’d felt the shiver of arousal that coursed through her frame. ‘Take hold of some mane and hang on to that, if it makes you feel safer,’ he suggested.
‘I’m perfectly relaxed,’ she assured him through gritted teeth. ‘But, what about the mule? We can’t just leave her here.’
‘Pedro will take her home.’
‘Pedro?’ She sounded shocked as she glanced around. ‘Has Pedro followed me all this way?’
‘Did you seriously think he would allow you to ride out here on your own? You told him you didn’t want company, apparently, but thankfully he had more sense than to set you loose on thousands of acres of pampas.’
‘He needn’t have worried,’ she said, frowning as she shook her head. ‘I brought a map.’
‘That makes all the difference,’ he agreed drily.
‘Are you being sarcastic?’
‘Would I?’ A subtle twitch of his thighs was all it took to urge his stallion forward from a loping walk to a bouncing trot.
‘You did that on purpose,’ Emma accused him through chattering teeth.
He smiled as he held her close, relishing the sensation of having Emma in his arms again. He urged his horse into a smooth, rolling canter, and from being as stiff as a board, Emma was gradually learning to relax. ‘You mustn’t ride out here on your own.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because there are dangerous animals—’
‘None more dangerous that you,’ she said.
He laughed as he took his stallion forward from a canter to a gallop, wondering when he’d ever felt so free as he headed with single-minded purpose towards the cabin.
* * *
Did Luc have to be quite so provocative? Or quite so sexy? She wasn’t here to go to bed with him but to get things sorted out once and for all. Then, if it was over between them, her heart would break, but she’d have to get over it for the sake of their child.
Luc had slowed his stallion to an ambling walk as they approached the stretch leading to the cabin.
‘I kept my promise,’ he said. ‘I didn’t let you fall.’
‘It must have been tempting,’ she suggested, testing him.
He didn’t play. This wasn’t Lucas Marcelos, the smooth businessman from the city with his private jet. This was a man who battled nature, not a man who battled spreadsheets on a desk. And this version of Luc looked way beyond sexy with his sharp black stubble, swarthy skin and his wild, unruly hair. She loved the way he rode bareback in battered jeans and boots and just an old shirt with the sleeves rolled up. She loved everything about him...
She loved him.
‘Daydreaming again?’
‘Just enjoying the ride,’ she said quickly.
‘Now I know you’re lying.’
‘No. Seriously. I’m not.’
Could there be anything more romantic than riding on a stallion with this man across this land? The rhythm of the horse’s hooves, together with the undulation of the horse’s body was the best workout she’d ever had. And it was soothing. She almost wished that she belonged here too.
She pressed back against Luc’s chest, relishing his strength and his heat. He was so virile, so potent, and here, in this wild country, she was glad of his command. There was nothing soft or easy about the pampas. Like the man riding behind her, it was hard and challenging, but full of opportunity too—or was that her imagination running riot again?
‘I’ll teach you how to ride one day.’
One day. The phrase remained in her head like a charm, a talisman. Could they really make it work one day?
Luc reined in outside the cabin. Nestled in the lee of a hill, it looked so welcoming. ‘Will you really teach me how to ride?’ she asked impulsively.
When Luc didn’t answer right away, she took that as a no. She probably wouldn’t be here long enough, Emma reasoned.
But while she was here, she would live and love and take her chances. That was h
ow Luc’s wild land made her feel.
He sprang down first, and turning to her, he lifted her into his arms. Backing his way through the door, he lowered her onto her feet on a lovingly polished wooden floor. The whole place smelled of beeswax and coffee. Steadying her, he stepped back, but she wasn’t in the mood for half measures. Putting her arms around his neck she hugged him tight. It was too late to worry about what he thought. The way she felt about him had to find expression.
‘What was that for?’
Angling her chin, she stared up at him.
‘Why aren’t you saying anything?’ The corner of Luc’s mouth lifted in a smile. ‘What do you want me to do?’
‘Kiss me?’
Barely a heartbeat passed before he dragged her into his arms.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
SHE WAS INSTANTLY LOST. Drunk on Luc’s consuming power, his strength, his familiar scent, his touch, the taste of him and, most of all, the way her heart sang when they were close. Her body ached to be one with his. There was no other man who could do that to her. He was the one, the only one. He completed her. He made her strong. But if Luc couldn’t open up and talk about the past, and his plan for the future, her visit here was a waste of time.
He pulled back to look at her. ‘What’s this?’ He caught a tear on the pad of his thumb.
‘Pain,’ she admitted, gritting her teeth.
‘Pain?’ Luc demanded, anxious at once. ‘Not the baby?’
‘Riding?’ She grimaced as she admitted this. ‘My bottom is in agony. Why on earth do people do it?’
Luc laughed softly. ‘Maybe I’ll show you someday.’ He rested his brow against hers and they shared a smile. Somehow the mundane applied to the soaring tensions they both had to face made a bridge between them. ‘You want to talk?’ he prompted.
‘Yes. About you,’ she said. ‘If we don’t, I’ll go back to Scotland.’
He led her over to the old battered sofa in front of the fire and invited her to sit. He brought coffee for them both from the pot on the stove, and set it on the table in front of them. ‘Invisible housekeeper,’ he explained.
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