by Jenny Penn
“I’m not going to do that.”
“No?”
“No.” And she meant it. There really didn’t seem a point in fighting it. Malcolm had it right that her brother or his would be forcing the issue once they found out about this indiscretion. Apparently, Malcolm intended to blab about it, so there wouldn’t be much hope of avoiding the marriage.
Not that any of that would have her agreeing to marry a man she didn’t want. The thing was she wanted Malcolm Tanner. Not just for the pleasure he gave her, but for the comfort, for the security, for that grin and his exasperating attitude. She’d do well with Malcolm Tanner, and the good Lord knew she could do a lot worse than marrying him.
“I’ll marry you, no objections,” Mary Anne promised. “But you don’t tell Mike nothing for now.”
Malcolm didn’t appear to like that proposition. “If you’re going to agree to marry me anyway, why not tell him? I’d rather get separate beatings or possibly only one instead of letting him and Richard gang up on me together.”
“I don’t want to go back out there,” Mary Anne whispered the fear that had been riding beneath all the bluster she put on the past few days with her brother. “I don’t want to go back into the cold wilderness. I just want to stay here where it is warm and safe.”
That last part got muffled as she showed him just where here was. Pressing her face back into his shoulder, she snuggled into his chest with little whimpers that had his arms circling in tight.
“All right, angel,” Malcolm sighed. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll play the sick patient, dead asleep every time Mike comes around, for now.”
“Thank you, Malcolm,” Mary Anne sighed that relief into his neck.
“Don’t be thanking me, Mary Anne, because you’re going to be keeping me entertained in this bed every morning, every day, and definitely every night. If Mike hears, that’s when he’ll know.”
“But you won’t be trying to make a whole bunch of noise, right?”
“Well, I’ll be trying to make you make a whole bunch of noise.” Mary Anne pinched him for that. “Oww. Uh, Mary Anne?”
“What?”
“I think I might have pulled a stitch or two when I was making you make noise a few minutes ago.”
Her eyes popped open at that as she sprang up, full of energy and apologies. Malcolm just laughed at her.
Chapter 6
Mike put off going back into the house until the very last band of light blue began to fade from the sky. Even then, he lingered in the barn, glaring out at the cabin. Mary Anne waited up there, and he owed her an apology. Mike really hated apologizing.
Given that he really couldn’t explain to the little woman why he’d been so annoyed, he didn’t think apologizing would be worth the effort. It’d probably only mess up the situation, and as far as he could tell, his life was one kiss away from utter disaster.
As if it hasn’t already run that course.
Mike’s head dipped as he sighed out that thought. Nothing ever went right. He could live with that. He could live with the fighting and warring, with the struggles and the hard work. What he wouldn’t do was live looking in the mirror and knowing he’d broken a woman.
For all her bluster and determination to be hard, Mary Anne was nothing but soft and sweet. Not innocent, Richard’s sister had been married. That didn’t make her ready for him. Whatever had happened in her marriage bed, it would pale in comparison to the things he and his brothers enjoyed doing to a woman. Even a small taste of what they liked would probably send the little girl running into the hills screaming.
What kind of man would that make him? Mike knew he did wrong sometimes, but he always tried to do right. That’s what he’d do here and now. She was Richard’s sister. The man left her in Mike’s care, not to be molested and shared, but to be protected and coddled.
He’d be polite. Not rude, not friendly, and if all else failed, he’d lock himself in the barn. Mustering up his confidence for that plan, Mike’s boots started to crunch over the brittle grass as he started across the yard. He reminded himself every step of the way that he could control his lusts and desires. He was the master. No little, violet-eyed angel would bring him to his knees. Not tonight.
Braced for the battle, Mike opened the back door only to come to a halt. Blinking in absolute shock at the main room that normally greeted him dark and cold, he just couldn’t believe his eyes. The cabin glowed with the warmth of the flames crackling in the fireplace.
Lanterns placed strategically around the room made it beckon and invite a man into its embrace. So, too, did the smells. Layers of sweet and savory tickled his nose and made his stomach growl with anticipation. This is what coming home should be like, and damn Mary Anne for reminding him of that fact.
Slumping down onto the bench just inside the back door, Mike began tugging off his boots instead of tracking the dirt across the floor like he normally would. He could see the gleam of light on the wood and knew she scrubbed the floor. Nobody had done that since they built the cabin some three years back.
Mary Anne had, no doubt, spent most of the day on her hands and knees annoyed him even more. The woman already looked half worn through, and the last thing he needed was her keeling over dead from hard work before Richard got back. That son of a bitch really screwed him over. Mike wouldn’t be forgetting that.
As the second boot clunked down, Mary Anne came flying out of the hall that led to the bedrooms. Stumbling to a halt when she saw him sitting there, she appeared almost flustered for a second.
“Well, there you are, Mr. Tanner.”
Mike studied her smile for a second. Her voice had been too loud, her smile a shade too nervous, and a flush lingered on her cheeks that Mike hesitated to conclude came from the fire. His gut told him, in that second, he’d interrupted something. What, though, Mike didn’t know. It made him cautious as he rose.
“And how was your day?”
“It was all right, Ms. Winters.” He kept his tone cool, only mildly interested, though his eyes tracked her as she came forward. She was wearing a different dress, an older one from the faded color. This one actually fit. A little too well.
“Would you like some dinner? I made stew, and there is some fresh bread.” She nodded toward the already set table. “I found some canned peaches, so I made some cobbler for desert. I hope you weren’t saving them for something special.”
Mike blinked, thinking for just a second that he had stepped into heaven. “You made cobbler?”
“Yes. I know you boys were probably saving them for winter, but your brother was shot, and he does deserve some kind of treat for that. Now go on and eat before it gets cold.”
Damn right he would eat it before it got cold. Mike didn’t have to be told twice. The clean house might have irked him a little, but good food never would. Especially when she laid a feast out for him, enough to feed both brothers twice, awaited only him.
He looked over to where Mary Anne washed something in the sink. “Aren’t you going to eat?”
“I already did with your brother.” She paused in what she was doing to cast him a quick smile. “But thanks.”
“You ate with Malcolm?” Mike asked as he broke off a chunk of bread to line his bowl and ladle stew over. “He’s awake and aware?”
“No. He’s still running a fever, and he keeps babbling on about angels, but I did manage to get some food down him. He pulled his stitches again this afternoon. He gets very restless and demanding.”
It wasn’t so much what she said, but how she said it, that had Mike casting a glance at her with his spoon halfway up. Mary Anne didn’t sound worried or concerned in the slightest. She actually sounded like she wanted to giggle.
“Does my brother’s condition amuse you?” Mike asked pointedly.
“No, of course not.” She gave him that over the shoulder look again. “The fact that he thinks I’m an angel does.”
It didn’t shock Mike. With her long curls, her delicate features, and those
eyes, any sick man would look up at her and think he’d died and gone to heaven. Mike let it go and turned back to his dinner.
“I should probably check his bandage.” Finally finished with her washing, she turned, wiping her hands on a towel before coming forward.
“Why don’t you just have a seat and rest?” Mike asked that question out of instinctive need to protect something smaller and obviously fragile. Almost immediately, though, he hoped she’d say no. The last thing he needed was to invite temptation closer.
“What makes you think I’m not rested enough?” Mary Anne settled down in the seat across from Mike as he snorted at that.
“Those bags under your eyes kind of give it away, Mrs. Winters. Besides, this cabin didn’t get to looking this good without no effort.”
Mary Anne’s own snort had her lips curling up. “It wasn’t much work at all, Mr. Tanner. You should try keeping a camp without any walls or floors clean. Now that’s what puts bags under my eyes.”
“Been kind of rough, huh?” Giving over his spoon, Mike decided to eat the way he liked and not worry so much about the lady in front of him.
“That’s sort of the way life is, Mr. Tanner.”
“You know it seems to me, Mrs. Winters, that a lady such as yourself might find life easier in more civilized location.”
Mike offered that suggestion with a wave of the chunk of bread he ripped off the loaf. Dipping it into his bowl, he hunched down to sop up the stew and then choked on the bite when she came back at him.
“It seems to me, Mr. Tanner, that a man such as yourself doesn’t really know much about ladies like myself.”
Chin out, lips stiff, she looked as offended as he felt. That didn’t change his response one bit. “Trust me, Mrs. Winters, I know all about ladies like you.”
“Is that so?”
Mike didn’t back down from the challenge of her rising eyebrow. He stepped into it. “I bet you can keep this cabin shining for every damn day of your life. I bet you can even mend a tear so nobody ever knew it was there and cook dinners that make men grow fat. Problem is, none of those skills mean much out here where men cook for themselves and tend to their own clothes. That’s not what we need a woman for out here in the West, Mrs. Winters.”
He knew she understood exactly his point, but the little angel just blinked those eyes with too much innocence and asked, “And just what is it you need a woman for, Mr. Tanner?”
It took everything in him to bite back on his honest answer. If she’d been anybody other than Richard’s sweet-faced, innocent Mary Anne, he’d have treated her to the truth just to watch that face go up in flames.
Instead, he growled at her. “Nothing, Mrs. Winters. Nothing at all.”
“I see.” He felt like the bastard he was when she drew back from that blatant warning. “Well, I guess I should go and check on Malcolm.”
Just as he expected, she fled, but not before she paused to load on more guilt for his bad manners.
“Oh, I drew you a bath. I don’t know what your habits are, but my brothers tend to bathe daily. It’s all waiting for you in the bathroom. I put the coals under the tub about half hour ago, so it should be good and warm when you’re done.”
He’d been a jerk and she’d drawn him a bath. A cozy house, a cooked meal, a hot bath, the damn woman probably put fresh sheets on his bed. Mike loved fresh sheets, and God’s honest truth, they didn’t do much laundry.
Groaning over the pain of being wrong, Mike had to speak up. “Mary Anne?”
She didn’t respond, but the slight patter of her footsteps stilled. He didn’t have to look over to know she waited for him to finish.
“I’m sorry. Won’t you please come back and sit down?”
Damning himself as an idiot with every step that brought her back to her seat, Mike didn’t know which fate was worse—suffering the guilt of being an ass or the torment of being so close to Mary Anne. The damn woman still smelled like roses.
“I know my brother, Richard, probably told you all sorts of things.” Mary Anne settled onto the edge of her seat, all stiff and tight, just like her tone. “But you should refrain from involving yourself in our family affairs.”
“Your brother told me all about your problems, Mrs. Winters, starting with a man name Nate Willis.” It pleased Mike to see her skin go pale and her gaze shift nervously. At least Mary Anne understood she should be afraid.
“I didn’t think Richard intended to tell anybody about that.”
“He had no choice. Any man standing next to you is going to have a target in the middle of his chest. Richard wouldn’t set me up for that and not warn me.”
Instead of taking that as the threat she should, Mary Anne’s lip curled as her eyes lifted with guilt, making them go wide. “I’m real sorry he did that, Mr. Tanner. You shouldn’t have to be taking that risk.”
Mike went instantly stiff with that comment. “Are you insulting me, woman? You don’t think I can keep you safe?”
“I’m saying you shouldn’t have to.” All traces of sadness gone from her tone, Mary Anne’s temper flared quick and easy. Not that Mike cared.
“Don’t you be telling me what duties I should or shouldn’t be minding after, Mrs. Winters. Lest you forget you are still the woman in this room.”
Hands in fist, she came right out of her chair with that not so gentle reminder. “And just what is that supposed to mean?”
Mike about told her what it meant, but at the last second, his brain kicked in and snapped his mouth shut before he said something he’d regret. This wasn’t his fight to have because she didn’t mean anything to him. All he had to do was keep her alive for the few days it took for Richard to take care of his business. Then Mary Anne and all her stubbornness would be of no concern to him.
“Nothing, Mrs. Winters. Absolutely nothing.”
Mike turned back to his stew and continued eating. It took her a moment to let it pass. She gave him a good huffing sigh as she sat back down, just a little reminder that he annoyed her.
“This is an excellent stew, Mrs. Winters.” Offering her a big, fake smile, he forced her to decide then and there whether she wanted the night to be bad or good with that compliment.
It looked like it pained her to let it go, but she finally, grudgingly accepted the change in conversation. “Thank you very much, Mr. Tanner.”
It took some work to smooth the conversation back into a pleasant tone. Before he could realize the stupidity of making that effort, Mike found his defenses slowly being whittled down as the meal progressed. Mary Anne really must have some magical ability because against all reason and reservation, he began to relax.
Instead of wolfing down his food, Mike dawdled through the meal. Becoming uncharacteristically chatty, he shared and matched her stories about her brothers and life before the war. All throughout the meal she waited on him, refilling his glass and taking his plate to bring him a fresh one along with the cobbler.
The cobbler exploded like an orgasm in his mouth, and he could have eaten the whole pan if she hadn’t removed it after two servings with a stern admonishment that treats were to be savored, not devoured. That comment stood to remind him why, despite all the ways in which she was perfect, Mary Anne was not the woman for him.
When Mike liked things, he devoured them, and that included women. He didn’t do the romantic flowers and kisses. He did ropes and whips. Just the idea of Mary Anne bound up and at his mercy put the tension right back in his muscles.
Mary Anne was an angel, a sweet, innocent angel, and only a true devil would dare to corrupt her. Mike wouldn’t die with that sin on his conscience. He’d rather sleep in the barn with the cows than in the warmth of Mary Anne’s body. That’s just what he’d do if it came to it, too.
Reluctantly pushing back from the table, Mike let the evening go, accepting what his life was and what it would never be.
“Well, I’m going to check on Malcolm and then take that bath.”
* * * *
; Mary Anne paused midsentence as a deep, baritone snore grumbled out from the bench. It was a wooden bench with pillows on it. Not particularly comfortable in her mind at all, she settled into the plush confines of the chair obviously reserved for the man of the house.
Mike hadn’t kicked her out of it when he returned from his bath. Nor did he steal it when she got up to make some hot tea for them. Instead, he settled down on the bench to listen to her read as the night grew colder around them.
It didn’t surprise her when he drifted off. He worked well past the setting of the sun, and it showed on his tired features. The hot bath had been his downfall, as she’d warned him. Well, she had suggested he take to his bed before he blacked out.
That’s just what he’d done, given that even a hard shake couldn’t snap him out of his slumber. She tried to rouse him to no avail, and there would be no getting him from the bench to his bed, not on her own strength. Mary Anne tried her best to make him comfortable. Maybe waking up with a few kinks would help him be less hardheaded tomorrow night when she suggest he take himself off to bed.
Arrogant men never listen, Mary Anne snorted to herself as she dragged out the pillows from his bed.
She tried to make it so he laid across the bench with a little support for his neck. Unfortunately, the bench was five feet long and that included the arm rests. Mike stretched out well over six feet. His knees bent over the wooden arms, and no matter her fiddling, his head rested at an odd angle.
She lingered, tucking in the blanket. He really did look like an older version of Malcolm. Beneath all that hardness and gruff demeanor, she knew a sweet man lurked. Bits and pieces of that man escaped during the evening.
It felt weird to stand there to know that her future lay here now with this man and his brother. There would be no keeping Malcolm from rushing her to a preacher, but agreeing to go on her own. A day ago, Mary Anne might have scoffed at the notion of marrying another man, but standing there looking down at Mike, she could think of no better fate than tying hers to his. His and Malcolm’s because that was what the reality would be.
