THE EIGHT SECOND WEDDING

by Anne McAllister

  In fact, though she still looked for all the world like some damn fence post, all he could remember was that she didn't look like a fence post underneath.

  And she said no sex.

  Cripes, was she nuts?

  She wasn't even a virgin! He could almost understand her saying no if she'd been a virgin. But since she wasn't—

  He wondered who she'd had sex with.

  She didn't look like the kind of woman who had sex. Well, of course at some point she probably would, but she didn't look like the type who just hopped into bed for a good time. She didn't look as if she knew what a good time was. And when she had sex, she probably wouldn't call it that. She'd call it "making love."

  So, then, who had she made love with?

  A philosopher? Probably.

  And what had happened to him? How come she wasn't still making love with him? What was she doing out here in the middle of the California desert bedeviling an unsuspecting rodeo cowboy like him?

  He knew right now that he was never going to survive living with her in this very truck for two months, sleeping just feet away from her, sharing meals with her, knowing she was showering behind that flimsy accordion door.

  Not if they couldn't have sex.

  Another more vivid vision of Madeleine Decker without her curve-hugging black shirt spun through his head.

  Damn. He shrugged his bottom against the driver's seat, trying to find a little more room in his jeans. He really must have been concussed to agree with her harebrained scheme.

  She didn't seem to have the same problem. She was just humming away back there like some little broody hen, chipper as you please. He glanced over his shoulder.

  Another mistake.

  He could just glimpse her silhouette in the evening shadows. Her small straight nose. Her slightly tilted chin. Her breasts.

  He jerked his gaze right around and hit the gas pedal. Keep your eyes on the road, Richardson! he chastised himself.

  He should've told her he'd meet her in Santa Maria. No, he should have told her not to come at all.

  He wished his old man hadn't asked him to check out a bull at Frank Parker's tomorrow morning. They could've stayed at a motel tonight, had separate rooms, a little space, maybe got to know each other gradually.

  The way it was now, as the miles rolled by and dusk turned to dark, he felt like the walls of the camper were closing in on him. Even if he didn't glance back at her, even if he turned the radio up so he didn't have to listen to her hum, he still knew she was there.

  He could smell her presence even without a glance.

  She wasn't wearing perfume exactly. But there was something unique about Madeleine Decker, some sunny floral scent, a freshness that touched his nostrils even now, teasing him.

  Forget that, he thought and hit the gas harder.

  He flexed his fingers on the steering wheel. He watched the white line and tried to anticipate how long it would take him to get to the next curve. He tried to beat what he thought would be the time. He tried to hum along with the music on the radio.

  But damned if she didn't hum louder, too.

  He stomped down harder on the accelerator.

  The humming got louder yet, became high-pitched and not very tuneful.

  "Richardson?" Madeleine's voice drifted up from the back of the truck.

  He jerked his head around as she came toward him up the aisle. How could she talk and hum at the same time? Could the damned woman do miracles on top of driving him nuts?

  He scowled. "What?"

  "The car behind us," she said. "The flashing lights. The siren. I think it's a cop."

  * * *

  She could tell he was embarrassed. He tried to sound nonchalant when he got out of the truck to talk to the officer. He even joked a little with him while the patrolman was writing out the ticket.

  But he was embarrassed because when he took off his hat to rake his fingers through his hair she could see that the tips of his ears were bright pink. And when he got back in the truck and the light turned on, his neck was red, too.

  He tossed her the keys. "Your turn."

  "What?" Madeleine stared at him, aghast.

  He grimaced. "Your turn. You drive."

  She shook her head. "Don't be silly. You're doing fine."

  "Yeah, right."

  "It's just one little ticket."

  "Just one little ticket?" he echoed. "Well, yeah, I guess you could look at it that way." He gave her an odd look. "Though frankly I'm surprised you are." He shook his head. "But even so, it's been a long day. You're bound to do better."

  "No."

  "No?" His brows lifted. "Is this modesty, Decker?"

  Madeleine gave a blithe little shrug, quite willing to have him believe that. "What else?"

  "Well, it doesn't become you," he said flatly. "Come on. Show off."

  "No, really. You go ahead." Why in God's name hadn't she thought about this?

  "You're not afraid it's too big, are you, Decker?" he teased. "It's just like handling a regular pickup. You learn to use the mirrors a bit more. It's not even a stick."

  "It's not that," Madeleine assured him.

  "So what is it?"

  "I just … think you drive really well." One compliment shouldn't swell his head too much.

  "Thanks," he said dryly. "I also sleep really well, and I'd like to. Just a couple of hours. I could use a little shuteye."

  She yawned prodigiously. "So could I."

  His gaze narrowed. "You're sleepy, too?"

  "Oh, yes."

  "What've you got to be tired from?"

  "I was up at six this morning, packing, settling my cat—"

  "Okay, okay." He sighed and turned back to the driver's seat. "I'll give it another hour or two and you sleep. Then we'll trade." He jerked his head. "You can sleep where you are or up over the cab. Suit you?"

  "That's fine," Madeleine said softly. She hesitated as he pulled the truck back out onto the road, then knew she had to say something else. "Richardson?"

  "What?"

  "I think maybe you'd better drive until we find a rest stop and then we'll both get some sleep."

  His head jerked around. Then he pulled over onto the shoulder again, shut off the engine and turned to look at her. "Yeah?" His eyes were glittering in the oncoming headlights. "Are you saying what I think you're saying?"

  "What do you mean, what am I saying? Which words didn't you understand?"

  "The part about us both getting some sleep." His voice gave the words an inflection that told her only too clearly what he was asking.

  Her cheeks flamed. "No!" she blurted. "I absolutely do not mean that! Honest to Pete, is all you can think about sex? I meant exactly what I said. Sleep."

  "Sleep." Chan weighed that, then shook his head. "I must be getting tireder than I thought, Decker," he said finally, "because for the life of me, I cannot understand why. Maybe you, being a logical scientific type, can explain it to me. How about it, Decker? If I drive while you sleep, why can't you drive while I sleep?"

  "Because, damn it, I don't drive!"

  * * *

  Outside cars whizzed past. One semi thundered by and then another, rattling the windows of the camper. Inside no one said a word, except the radio announcer. Chan reached around and shut the radio off.

  "I don't think I heard you right," he said carefully. "You said…"

  "I said I don't drive."

  "Don't. Drive." He rolled the words around in his mouth, tested them, tasted them. Then spat them out. "Don't drive?" He glared at her. "You're kidding, of course."

  "I'm not, actually. I mean, I guess I could in a pinch. I drove a Jeep once in Indonesia. And when we went to visit some friends in Australia I drove a tractor once. But I don't … have a license."

  He couldn't believe it. Even when she spelled it out, he couldn't believe it. "Why the hell not?"

  She shrugged. "I've never needed one."

  "Never needed one?" he echoed faintly. "This is the tw
entieth century, Decker. Practically the twenty-first. The age of the automobile. How the hell do you get around? Or don't you? Maybe you philosopher types just float up above on the clouds. Is that what you do?"

  "I live in New York," Madeleine snapped. "I take the bus. The subway. Taxis. I ride my bike."

  "You ride your bike. In New York City?"

  "What's wrong with that? It's far less polluting. Far more ecologically sound."

  "You could get killed!"

  "Says the man who rides bulls for a living."

  "I don't do it in traffic! I don't believe this," he muttered. "How the hell did you imagine you were going to go down the road with me if you can't drive?"

  "How the hell should I know?" Madeleine shouted at him.

  Chan wanted to shout, too. No, he wanted to do more than shout. He wanted to scream. He wanted to strangle his mother and her mother and that pea-picker geneticist Gregor Mendel and those damned anthropologists Levi-Strauss and Margaret Mead and anyone else who'd ever influenced either one of those batty old ladies.

  How could they have thought he was suited in any way, genetically, anthropologically or otherwise, to spend a summer – hell, to spend a day – with a woman who couldn't drive? And hadn't even seen fit to mention the fact?

  He rubbed a hand over his face. Then he scrubbed at his eyes with the heels of his hands and finally looked up at her again in the darkness of the truck.

  She was looking stricken, her face white in the glare of every pair of headlights that passed, and he found himself feeling guilty for exploding at her. She was so airy-fairy she probably didn't even think being able to drive mattered.

  Hell.

  He flexed his shoulders, rubbed the back of his neck. "I suppose it's not your fault," he said gruffly.

  "And whose fault is it supposed to be? Don't tell me you're going to take the blame."

  So much for feeling sorry for her. "No, damn it. It's not my fault you can't drive. It's not my fault you're even here. And as far as I'm concerned you can go the hell away."

  She took a deep breath and let it out again. Then she said, "I … can't."

  "Why not? You're not going to do me a damn bit of good. I can't do all the driving myself. I have to go to Arkansas and Kansas and Texas and Oregon and—"

  "I get the point."

  "So I need another driver."

  "I suppose you do." Her voice was subdued. It was practically the first time he'd heard it that way. She looked up at him and squared her shoulders. "Well, then, I guess you'll have to teach me to drive."

  He gaped at her. "Me? Teach you to drive? Have you got rocks in your head?"

  "Well, you said you need another driver and—"

  "A good driver."

  "I'd be a good driver."

  "How do you know?"

  She looked at him, affronted. "I'm good at everything I do!"

  He snorted. "Yeah? Well, you don't drive."

  "Not yet. I will if you teach me. Come on, Richardson."

  "I said you could come along, fool that I was. I never said I'd teach you to drive."

  "What you mean is, you can't."

  "The hell I can't. I won't."

  "Why? Afraid I'll be good and you'll have to admit it?"

  "Afraid you'll kill us both you'll be so bad."

  "I won't." She lifted her chin and stared at him, daring him. "I went with you to the hospital, Richardson. I sat for hours waiting in that stupid emergency room."

  "Nobody asked you to."

  "I guess I'm just a nicer person than you are." She smiled sweetly.

  He slammed his hand against the steering wheel. "Damn it!"

  "Come on, Richardson. You'll enjoy it. You'll get to boss me around. Yell at me. All those things you know you want to do." She gave him a winning grin.

  He raked his fingers through his hair. "We've only got four days if we start tomorrow," he argued. "Thursday night right after the rodeo, I'm heading for Fort Smith."

  "I can learn in four days."

  He looked at her skeptically.

  "If I don't have my license in four days, I'll go back to New York."

  "Is that a promise, Decker?"

  "If—"

  He groaned.

  "—you've really made an effort to teach me. You have to try."

  "I don't cheat, Decker. Ever."

  "Fine." She held out her hand. "Neither do I."

  He hesitated, then took her hand. Her grip was strong and firm, her skin soft and warm.

  "Deal," Madeleine said.

  Chan got back in the driver's seat and drove off in the darkness, muttering under his breath, "I must be nuts."

  * * *

  Chan drove the rest of the night. He was tired, his muscles were stiff, his ribs hurt when he moved. But he drove because he didn't know what else to do.

  He had to meet Frank Parker to see a bull at nine, so he couldn't stop, couldn't sleep. But what the hell, chances were he wouldn't sleep, anyway.

  Had he really agreed to teach Madeleine Decker to drive?

  He wondered if the effects of concussion could linger seven months. Everything he'd done as far as she was concerned was weird as hell.

  He didn't let women come on the road with him. He didn't give up traveling with his buddies and take on unknown philosopher-women to make his mother happy. Hell, he hadn't made his mother happy in years.

  So what in the devil was he doing?

  Losing his mind? Satisfying his curiosity? Scratching an itch?

  He wished.

  Madeleine Decker wasn't an itch anymore. She was a gawd-damned rash. He'd forgotten just how alive, how vibrant, how contentious she was.

  But it sure hadn't taken her long to remind him. He grinned and shook his head. Chances were he'd regret it. He couldn't see much good coming out of tangling with Madeleine Decker for the next two months. But it was like taking on the meanest, rankest bull in the country. You weren't in it for the payoff. Not really. If you were, you were crazy, because odds were a hundred to one you'd get your butt kicked.

  No, you didn't climb on a bull like that for the result. You did it for the challenge. You dug in, hung on and enjoyed the hell out of the ride.

  * * *

  Chapter 6

  « ^ »

  It was late when Madeleine woke. The sun was already high in the sky. And the truck was no longer moving, so she thought Chan must be asleep.

  But when she peered over the edge of the bunk above the cab and looked down onto the one next to the table, he was nowhere to be seen. Only a rumpled pillow and tangled sheets proved that he had been there at all.

  She turned and drew back the curtain to get her bearings. The truck was parked on gravel near a garage, alongside another truck with a smaller camper top. Beyond it, on the far side of the gravel, she saw a broad lawn and a low-slung, white wood frame ranch house with dark green shutters. Someone's home. And a very nice home indeed.

  A movement caught her eye, and she spied a slender woman m jeans, with long blond hair braided down her back, hanging rows of blue jeans and long-sleeved shirts on a clothesline.

  The owner of the very nice home? Probably.

  Or maybe the daughter of the owner. She looked fairly young – maybe even younger than Madeleine.

  A friend of Chan's?

  No doubt.

  Madeleine was sure she would meet plenty of "friends of Chan's" wherever they went. He probably had the rodeo cowboy's version of a woman in every port.

  Good, she thought. It would keep his mind off her.

  She didn't know why she hadn't considered the sex business – she didn't know what else to call it – when she first proposed this insanity.

  Well, actually, yes, she did consider it: she just hadn't thought he'd be interested.

  Madeleine Decker wasn't the sort of woman that men were interested in. Well, not many men, anyway. Malcolm and Douglas had mustered a bit of enthusiasm. They'd managed the occasional peck on the cheek and nibble on the lips. But
they'd much preferred talking with her, arguing philosophy with her, trading quips with her. And that had been fine with Madeleine.

  Sex was highly overrated.

  She knew that from her experience with Scott.

  He was the other reason she hadn't considered sex to be an issue. Scott had certainly wasted no tears when their relationship had ended. In fact, if she were being brutally honest, she knew that he'd probably just made love with her because she'd thrown herself at him.

  God, she could still feel the mortification now, five years later, just thinking about it. Well, she was damned if she'd do it again. Even if she was no longer a virgin, Chan Richardson needn't think she was ripe for the picking.

  In any case, it looked as though he could have his pick of any orchard he wanted. And from a distance, at least, this one looked considerably more attractive than the hostess in the restaurant.

  She thought so, anyway. She wondered just exactly what Chan Richardson found appealing in a woman. Judging from the well-lacquered hostess and this blond, fresh daisy and his broad hints – no, blatant come-ons to her – he had wide-ranging tastes.

  Madeleine's jaw snapped shut. She glanced at her watch and was dismayed to discover it was almost ten o'clock. She hadn't slept that late in years.

  She stopped worrying where Chan was and started worrying that he'd be back and find her still in bed.

  She scrambled down out of the bed, straightened the blankets, gathered clean clothes and disappeared into the bathroom.

  There she took a quick shower and washed her hair, then dressed and was just wadding her hair up into a towel on the top of her head when there was a knock at the door.

  She opened it to find the blond woman smiling up at her.

  "Hi. I'm Lily. I wondered if you wanted to come to the house for some breakfast."

  A cheerful welcome from one of Chan's women wasn't exactly what she'd expected, especially after the hostess had looked right through her. But she smiled back. "Oh, er, yes. Thanks."

  The other woman actually resembled her name. Slender and strong, yet delicate, too. Her cheeks were smooth and pale, and she wore no makeup at all. Clearly a woman at the opposite end of the spectrum from the hostess. Lily shifted the empty clothes basket on her hip, and Madeleine noticed the wedding ring on her finger. Her eyes widened, then she understood Lily's equanimity.