by Anne Stuart
She was still waiting. Carefully he set the drink on a table, controlling the urge to down it in one gulp. Reaching out, he took her slim, strong hand in his.
* * * * *
She’d almost forgotten what he looked like. No, that wasn’t true. She’d assimilated his looks, his seductive eyes and sexy grin and long, lean body before she’d known who he was. Now, knowing he was Charles Tanner’s son, she had to look at him through fresh eyes, as if seeing him for the first time. She didn’t like what she saw.
He was too good-looking, with that faint air of someone who knows it and uses it. His hand was rough, callused, strong and dry and warm around hers. He was trying to look innocent and friendly, but she didn’t believe it. He didn’t like the fact that she’d run away from him, he didn’t like this town or anyone in it. She had the impression he didn’t like much of anything, no matter how much charm he tried to spread.
Well, he didn’t have to play games for her. He didn’t have to flirt with her, smile at her, be anything but what he was. She’d already wronged him with her blind panic. She wouldn’t do so again.
“Would you fix me one of those?” she inquired. “More water than whiskey—I never could hold the stuff.”
He released her, turning to fill her request without saying a word. She wanted to hear him speak again, wanted to hear those slow, deep tones. He turned back, handing her the pale-amber drink, and for a moment he let his green eyes drift downward, over her breasts in a deliberate glance that brought back her afternoon’s ride.
She almost clasped her arms around her chest, almost spilled her drink, almost turned and ran to Doc for protection. But she stood her ground. That lingering gaze was a deliberate affront, and the worst thing she could do was react to it. Instead she smiled, a faint, dismissive smile.
“Thanks for the drink.”
“My pleasure,” he said in that slow, delicious voice of his. And she knew he wasn’t talking about the drink.
She could sense the rekindled tension in the room. Doc was looking troubled, his bushy eyebrows frowning behind his horn-rimmed glasses. Ginger’s expression was speculative. She’d always been too damned observant—she’d know something was going on between them, and knowing Ginger, she wouldn’t rest until she’d wormed it out of Ellie. She’d probably think it was hysterically funny, the thought of prim Ellie Lundquist riding around half-naked. The two of them would laugh over it. For some reason, Ellie hadn’t been able to laugh yet.
“So what do you think of Tanner?” Maude demanded, never at a loss for words. “Think he’ll stir up a parcel of trouble?”
Ellie allowed herself a brief glance at Tanner’s impassive features. “I imagine he will.”
“Should be mighty interesting,” Maude cackled.
Tanner was no longer looking at her; his gaze was directed at Maude. But she could still feel his awareness in every pore of her body, and that tingling, nervous sensation she’d been fighting all day was back at full strength. Maybe she wouldn’t tell Ginger the details of how they had met.
“Mighty interesting,” Ellie echoed faintly. “I can hardly wait.”
* * *
Chapter Five
* * *
Ellie had been through more pleasant meals. To be sure, Ginger made the best pot roast in Morey’s Falls. And Tanner, once he set his mind to it, proved to be an entertaining dinner guest, full of lazy, fascinating stories of the wilderness. He’d walked just about everywhere, he said. The Appalachian Trail, the Continental Divide, the Grand Canyon, even, one monumental year and a half, from Virginia to Oregon. If she could just have sat back and listened to the rich, slow voice and the world he conjured up she could have had one of the best times of her life.
But every time she began to relax, to fall beneath his spell, she’d glance over at him and find those disturbing eyes on her. She didn’t trust his eyes. They were too calculating, with their heavy-lidded, deliberate sensuality and their chilly blue depths.
For some reason she didn’t much care for Ginger’s attitude either. Ellie knew her well enough to recognize when Ginger was on the make, and Tanner had brought out her old friend’s unquenchable predatory instincts. Tanner knew it, too. When he wasn’t looking at Ellie with that disturbing expression in the back of his eyes, he was smiling and flirting with Ginger. Ellie didn’t know which bothered her more.
He drank a lot of whiskey. She watched him, more covertly than he watched her, watched the amount of liquor he put away without showing it, the edgy, nervous grace of him. She watched him charm Maude, who was old enough to know better, tease Ginger, who’d never had any sense as far as men were concerned, and even treat Doc with a sort of mock deference that held just the right note of respect and assertion of equality. With Ellie, all he did was look.
She had to admit it was the most effective thing he could have done. Flirting she knew how to handle, how to defuse it and turn it into harmless friendship. But she couldn’t handle something as ephemeral as subtle glances, she couldn’t handle that distant politeness that was a lie.
He was a manipulator, she thought, watching him. He knew just how to play each of them, to get the response he wanted, and the other three were falling for it. She was falling for it, too, fascinated despite herself. The thought gave her a little chill down her sunburned back. With defenses that strong he must have something to hide. Maybe it came from a lifetime of running, no, walking, walking away.
She didn’t trust him. But then, he didn’t trust any of them either. If he did, he wouldn’t be quite so charming; he’d allow that mask to slip a little.
He was telling the others about the time he came across a mother grizzly and her cub, and how he’d had to walk backward, slowly, carefully, not even daring to breathe, while the mother just stared at him fiercely. “My mistake,” he drawled, his voice unslurred by all the Jack Daniel’s he’d swallowed. “I wasn’t paying proper attention. Usually you can smell a bear before you see him. But it was damned cold that August, I hadn’t seen a living soul in thirteen days, and I hadn’t been too attracted to the icy streams around there. Probably ol’ Griz smelled me before I smelled her.”
Doc laughed, pouring himself another glass of the bourbon that had somehow made its way to the dinner table. The dessert dishes had been cleared away long ago. Doc was smoking his pipe under Ginger’s disapproving gaze, though Tanner made no move to take out his ever-present pack of cigarettes, and Maude had brought out her own pipe and her Indian tobacco.
“There’s a heap of powerful medicine in that bear, boy,” she observed sagely, having matched the men drink for drink. “Don’t you go being disrespectful.”
“I’m very respectful of grizzlies, Maude,” Tanner said. “And I like to keep a respectful distance.”
“Well, if you haven’t bathed in thirteen days I’m sure they’d like you to keep a respectful distance too,” Ginger said, her blue eyes alight with amusement and something more.
Tanner laughed, a slow, easy laugh, and his eyes once more drifted toward Ellie. “What do you think, Mrs. Lundquist?” he drawled. “Are you one for respectful distances?”
She’d just about never been called Mrs. Lundquist. When she heard that name she thought of the Judge’s first wife, with her matronly bosom, her blue hair and her unbending pride. She wrinkled her nose in dismay. “I’m not one for being called anything but Ellie,” she said, observing Ginger’s look of displeasure. “I’m also one for early nights.” She pushed her chair back from the table. “I think I’ll head home now. Thanks for everything, Doc. Ginger, you put my cooking to shame.” She rose, grasping the cane in her right hand, feeling the cool, smooth gold of its head with a reassuring gesture.
Everyone else had risen. Tanner was watching her still, a speculative expression on his face. He probably thought she was running away. Well, she’d like to, but Eleanor Johnson Lundquist, though she might be weak in many ways, wasn’t a coward. She met that gaze fearlessly. “Can I give you a ride out to your place, Tanner?
She’d startled everyone. Tanner recovered first, but then, he was used to hiding his emotions.
Ginger wasn’t. “I thought I’d drive him,” she said, and there was just a hint of irritation in her voice.
“No,” Doc broke in, looking more troubled than Ellie would have expected. “I drove him here, I’ll take him back.”
“Well, I sure as hell ain’t going to offer,” Maude announced. “I don’t even drive.”
“I can always walk,” Tanner suggested with the faint trace of a smile. “I’m used to it.”
Ellie stood patiently, waiting. She wasn’t going to say anything more, press him in any way. He’d come with her if he wanted to, or he’d choose another place and time. Sooner or later those speculative looks were going to evolve into something a little more physical, and she wanted to scotch it before it started.
His eyes met hers again, and she met that gaze fearlessly. “Why don’t I go with Ellie?” he said finally. “After all, she has to go out anyway.”
“It’s no trouble...” Ginger began.
“I don’t mind...” Doc said.
“Fine,” Ellie said. “If you’re ready?”
He followed her out into the cool night air. She always limped more when someone was watching her, and Tanner had the gift of making her feel as if she was on permanent display. She tried to hurry down the cement walkway to her huge black car, and stumbled slightly.
She hadn’t realized he was so close. His hand caught her elbow from behind, steadying her, keeping her from falling in an ignominious heap in front of Doc’s modest ranch house. Thank God. It had been years since she’d been lame enough to fall. She had no doubt at all that Maude and Doc and Ginger were standing in the picture window, staring out at them. It would have been a lovely sight.
“Thanks,” she said briefly, not even glancing back.
His hand left her. He moved ahead, silent as a forest creature, and opened the door of her Buick. The keys buzzed in the ignition. It had been the Judge’s car, too new for her to turn in, but she hated the big, unwieldy thing. Its only advantage was the automatic transmission, so she’d held on to it, more out of apathy than anything else.
She slid onto the leather seat and started the car. “You always leave your keys in?” he inquired as he joined her.
“Always,” she replied, pulling out into the empty street. “There’s no crime in Morey’s Falls.”
“At least there’s been none in fifteen years,” he amended for her.
She glanced over at him, but the meager light from the dashboard wasn’t enough to illuminate his expression, and Morey’s Falls was too small to go in for streetlights. “Not in fifteen years,” she agreed.
He slid down in the seat beside her and pulled out his almost empty pack of cigarettes. No one had ever smoked in the Judge’s car. He’d given up smoking when he was sixty, and like most converts, had been rabid about the nonbelievers. Out of deference to his memory she’d always kept people from smoking in what she still thought of as his car, and she opened her mouth to say something.
She shut it again, listening to the flare of the wooden match, watching as it lit Tanner’s face. He looked wary and a little brutal in the flickering flame. Was she out of her mind, driving off into nowhere with the son of a killer?
She was being unforgivably paranoid. “Those things are lousy for you,” she observed, striving for a note of normalcy.
“So they tell me.” His voice was crisp and cool, inviting no further conversation.
Another long, uncomfortable silence as she drove past the cluster of houses that marked the end of town. “How much did you drink tonight?” The moment the words were out of her mouth she could have bitten her tongue in horror. She wasn’t used to having to watch what she said.
His laugh was short and sharp. “Too much. Do I show it?”
“Not at all. That’s why I was curious. I’m sorry, that was horribly rude.”
“Yes, it was,” he agreed. “Are you trying to reform me, Ellie?”
“I wouldn’t think of it.”
“That’s good. Because it’s a lost cause.”
She glanced over at his shadowed profile. “Some women would take that as a challenge.”
“But not you?”
“Not me,” she said firmly. “I’m already responsible for too many souls as it is. You’ll have to reform yourself.” They were heading out Route 5 now, the road getting narrower and narrower, and the moonless night growing darker and darker.
“Maybe,” he said. “If I ever find a good enough reason.” He was speaking more to himself than to her, and she had the good sense not to respond.
“Why are you here?” she asked finally. “I would have thought this was the last place you’d want to be.”
“Why?”
“Because sometimes it’s the last place I want to be,” she said frankly.
“Why don’t you leave?”
She shrugged. “Sooner or later I will. That doesn’t answer my question. Why are you here?”
“Maybe I don’t want to answer your question.”
She thought about it. “Do you have a reason not to, or is it just general cussedness?”
He laughed then, sounding surprised and oddly good-natured. “Just general cussedness. I’m here to find out what happened to my father.”
“Didn’t you read the papers?”
“You know better than that, Ellie,” he said. “The papers give you facts, if you’re lucky. I need reasons.”
She pulled up in front of the clearing and put the car in park, keeping the motor running. “I don’t know if you’ll find them.”
“I don’t know either. I just know I’ve got to try.” In the darkness the words were softly spoken, intimate, a part of him opening up to her.
Just as quickly he slammed it shut again. He slid over on the wide bench seat, and before she knew it he’d reached out and touched her breast, a gentle, feather-light stroke that shocked and aroused her.
“How’s the sunburn?” he murmured.
He smelled of cigarettes and whiskey and warm male flesh. What would happen if the martyr of Morey’s Falls tarnished her halo? she thought for a brief, dangerous moment.
She backed away, up against the door, away from him. His arms were long, he could still reach her easily, but he didn’t choose to. He just sat there, looking at her in the dark.
“You are the most brazen man I have ever met,” she said finally, her voice a little breathless.
He grinned then, a slow, easy smile that made her toes curl. “But then, I don’t think you’ve met too many men, have you, Ellie?” And before she could say anything he slid back along the seat, out of the car, closing the door quietly behind him. “Thanks for the lift.”
She sat there for a long moment. He saw too damned much for her peace of mind. She rolled down the window. “Anytime,” she said calmly. “Do you want me to wait until you get a light going?”
“I can see in the dark,” he said. “Unless you want to come in and complete your little welcome wagon act?”
“Good night, Tanner.” She managed a satisfying spurt of gravel as she sped away from the clearing.
* * * * *
He watched her go with a speculative expression on his face. He’d bet she was damned proud of herself. Hell, she had every right to be. He’d done everything he could to put her on edge, and she’d done nothing but give him that faint, damnable smile all evening long. And he couldn’t see that well in the dark. He would have loved to have seen her expression when he’d touched her breast. He’d felt her tremble, a little shiver of reaction that was infinitely satisfying. He’d been tempted to push it, then and there, and see how far he got.
But he’d thought better of it. The chase was half the fun. If he’d blown it, it would have made it that much harder in the long run.
So Ellie Lundquist was the one survivor of his father’s madness. He’d come up with the impression that she was the town pet, a ma
scot to be stroked and cared for, the martyr who belonged to everyone.
She was going to belong to him. Sooner or later there wasn’t going to be such a vast discrepancy between the innocent and the profane. Ellie Lundquist was going to descend to his level, whether she liked it or not. Maybe she’d learn something in the bargain. And maybe she’d be able to leave the place she felt so tied to. He was doing a noble thing, he mocked himself. All for her own good.
“Sometimes, Tanner, old boy,” he said in a quiet, deadly voice, “you make me sick.”
Was that how his father had started? Talking to himself in the quiet stillness of a moonless night? He’d better watch it.
Hell, he’d had too much to drink, too much to smoke, too much to think about. What he needed was a decent night’s sleep on something that approximated a bed. Tomorrow he’d pull himself together.
It was more habit than anything else that made him decide to take one last walk around the cabin before he settled down for the night. The kerosene lamp lit the one-room building with a warm glow, shedding a little light out the broken windows. He walked slowly, watching the ground more out of habit than interest. There wouldn’t be cougar or bear tracks this close to civilization. He didn’t have to be that careful.
But it was instinct that made him do it, and sharp eyesight that caught the tiny bit of white paper. He knelt down, brushing at it with his hand.
It was the remains of a cigarette filter. It had been crumpled, shredded, almost obliterated, just as Tanner had always done with his cigarette butts. But he hadn’t been smoking out there. And it wasn’t his brand.
It was the brand his father had smoked, and it was crumpled the way his father used to crumple them. Tanner sat back on his heels and shivered in the warm night air.
* * * * *
Damn the man, Ellie thought as she drove, too fast, down Route 5. He was too observant, too sassy, too brazen, and too much trouble. Welcome wagon act, indeed! Trust Tanner to twist things around. All she’d wanted to do was be friendly, to make up for her earlier panic, to show him that everyone didn’t hate him, didn’t condemn him. If that made it a welcome wagon act then she had nothing to be ashamed of. Damn him!
