by Diana Palmer
"Yes, I know," Ivy said in anguish. And she thought, that's the whole problem.
Even though she'd refused to go with him to the auction, Ryder came by the house on his way. He was driving the farm's four-wheel-drive this time, a big tan-and-brown pickup, and he was dressed in tan boots, tight jeans, and a chambray shirt that might have been tailor-made for him. A black Stetson was cocked over his pale eyes. Ivy stood at the back door and just stared at him, filling her empty heart with the sheer masculine perfection of him as he climbed out of the vehicle and strode lazily toward the porch.
She was wearing a denim skirt and a long-sleeved white blouse with a patterned scarf carelessly knotted at her throat. She had on her boots, too, because she'd planned to go for a walk so that she wouldn't brood over having turned down Ryder's invitation. If she'd left five minutes earlier, she'd have missed him. She didn't know whether to be sorry or glad.
She opened the door as he came up the steps, noticing the way his eyes narrowed and skimmed lightly over her figure before they found their way to her own.
"Ready?" he asked with a taunting smile.
"I was going for a walk," she began.
"Jean, we're gone!" he called to her mother.
"Have fun!" Jean called back from her bedroom.
"But, I'm not going with you," Ivy began weakly.
He swung her easily up in his hard arms, smiling at her consternation. "Yes, you are," he said softly.
He turned and walked out the door, his taut-muscled, fit body taking her weight as easily as if she were a sack of feathers.
His chest was warm and hard against her breast, and she smelled the tangy cologne he wore and the faint scent of shaving cream on his face. He had lines beside his silvery eyes, and thick black lashes over them. His nose was slightly dented from a few free-for-alls in his younger days. But his mouth…she almost groaned aloud just looking at it. Wide and sensual, chiseled, with a thin upper lip and slightly fuller lower one over perfect white teeth. She wanted so badly to lift her face the fraction of an inch necessary to put her open mouth to his.
The feverish need shocked her. She'd never wanted to kiss anyone else so badly, and she'd dreamed about it for years. But she had to remember that Ryder was only being kind. He didn't feel that way about her, and the sooner she realized it, the better.
Her convictions didn't help, though, when he balanced her on one knee to open the door and slid her onto the seat. She fell against him in the process and his mouth came so close that she could all but taste the coffee on his breath.
He hesitated, his eyes narrow and glittery, his body tense for just an instant. Then he smiled and let her go, and the moment passed.
He climbed in beside her to start the truck, lifting an eyebrow at her fumbling efforts to fasten her seat belt.
"Bulldozer," she accused.
He grinned. "Women are like machinery, you have to give them a push sometimes to get them going."
She laughed in spite of herself. She couldn't really picture another man with Ryder's boldness. He was in a class of his own.
"What do you need to buy at an auction that you couldn't afford at retail prices?" she asked curiously.
He draped his hand over the steering wheel as he sped down the driveway toward the main road. "Nothing in particular." He shrugged. "It was someplace to go. I don't like sitting at home. People know where to find me. And Kim Sun loves to put through people I don't want to talk to," he added, scowling. "Damn it, I ought to fire him!"
"What did you do to him?"
His eyebrows arched. "What?"
"You must have done something to irritate him," she persisted.
He glanced at her. "All I did was throw a plate of fish at him," he muttered. "Well, I hate most fish, anyway," he said defensively. "But this wasn't even cooked."
"Sushi." She nodded.
He glared at her. "No, not sushi," he muttered. "I had my heart set on salmon croquettes like your mother makes. He brought me balls of raw salmon with, ugh, onions cut up on them."
"Did you tell him how to make salmon croquettes?" she asked, trying not to laugh.
"Hell, I don't know how to cook! If I knew how to cook, would I cart that vicious renegade around with me?"
"Kim Sun can't read minds," she said. "If you'll send him down to us, mother can show him how to make the things you like."
He shifted his eyes back to the road. "You can cook. You might come up to the house and show him yourself."
She didn't answer. She stared at her hands in her lap. The temptation was overwhelming, but he wouldn't know that.
"We'd have a chaperone," he said softly.
She flushed, refusing to meet his eyes. "Ryder…!"
"So shy of me," he said on a heavy sigh. "I've stayed away too long. I guess I knew it wouldn't be long enough, at that, but a man can stand just so much," he added enigmatically. "I thought you'd be healed by now."
She swallowed. "Healed?"
"You can't climb into the grave with him," he said through his teeth.
"I'm not trying to do that," she said. She glanced at his strong profile and felt her heart jump. "I… missed you," she said huskily.
He seemed to shiver. His pale eyes cut sideways, narrow, dangerous. "I'd have come home anytime you told me that," he said roughly. "In the middle of the night, if you needed me."
She felt warm all over at the tenderness in his tone, and wanted to cry because it was just friendship. He cared about her, of course he did, but not in the way she wanted him to. She straightened her full skirt. "You had enough to do, without worrying about me," she said. "All I need is time, you know."
He pulled into a drive-in and cut off the engine. "Want coffee?" he asked.
"Yes. Black, please."
"I remember how you like it," he said. He got out of the truck and came back less than five minutes later with coffee and doughnuts. He handed hers to her and made room for the cups in the holder he'd installed on the dash.
She sipped coffee and ate the doughnut. "Delicious," she said with a smile. "I haven't had breakfast."
"Neither have I. Food bothers me if I eat too early." He let his eyes slide over her figure. "You're too thin, little one. You need to eat more."
"I haven't had much appetite lately."
He turned toward her, crossing his long legs as he dipped his doughnut into his coffee and nibbled it. "Talk about it. Maybe it will help."
She searched his pale eyes, finding nothing there to frighten her. "He was drunk," she blurted out. "He went to work drinking and pushed the wrong buttons."
His chiseled lips parted. "I see."
"Didn't you know? Don't pretend you haven't asked how it happened. The insurance company refused my claim, but the company stood for it, so that we could afford the funeral." Her big black eyes searched his. "You did it, didn't you? You made them pay it."
"Employees pay into the credit union," he said tersely. "Ben had accumulated a good bit, to which you were entitled. That's what paid the funeral expense."
"You knew he was drunk on the job," she repeated, her eyes huge and hurt.
He sighed. "Yes, Ivy, I knew," he replied, meeting her gaze. "I knew about the drinking." His face tautened. "It's why I stayed away as much as I did. Because Jean told me about the bruises, once, and if I'd seen them, I'd have killed him right in front of you."
She started as the words penetrated her brain. She couldn't even respond, because he looked and sounded violent.
He saw her reaction and cursed his tongue. He couldn't afford to let anything slip; not now. "I'd have done the same if Eve had been in a similar position," he added. "You girls mean a lot to me. I'm sure you know that."
"Yes. Of course." She couldn't afford to look disappointed. She managed a smile. "You always were protective."
"I needed to be, just occasionally." His eyes pierced into hers. "If I'd been around when Ben made his move on you, you'd never have married him. I couldn't have been more shocked than I was the da
y I came back and found you married to him."
"I'd gone to school with him, you know. We were good friends."
"Friends don't necessarily make good mates," he returned. He finished his coffee. "Ben was known for his drinking even before I hired him. He'd sworn off it and seemed to be on the wagon, so I told the personnel department to give him a chance."
She'd wondered suddenly why he'd done that. She knew that Ben's father had worked for the company, but it was curious that he should have hired a man who'd been known for his tendency toward alcohol. Perhaps it had been out of the goodness of his heart, but there was something in his face when he said it…
He looked at her suddenly and she averted her eyes. "Ben appreciated your giving him the job," she said.
"Hell! He hated my guts and you know it," he returned, glaring at her. "The longer you were married, the more he hated me."
She held her breath, hoping he wasn't going to start asking why. Surely he didn't suspect the reason?
"He hated mother, too," she said, trying to smooth it over, "although he never let her see it. He hated anyone I… cared about."
His face hardened. "And he hit you?"
She averted her gaze to the floorboard. "Not often," she said huskily.
"My God—" His voice broke. He sat up straight and began to bag up the refuse.
Ivy felt his pain even through the cold wall he was already putting up. Impulsively she touched his hard arm, feeling him stiffen at the light touch. His pale eyes met hers and she saw his breathing quicken.
"Please," she said softly. "I hurt him. I can't tell you all of it, but he was a gentle kind of man until he married me. He wanted something I couldn't give him."
His eyes held hers. "In bed?" he asked roughly.
She flushed and drew back, embarrassed. "I can't talk about that," she said huskily.
"Shades of my prim and proper spinster aunt," he murmured, watching her. "Three years of marriage and you can't talk about sex."
The color deepened. "It's a deeply personal subject."
"And you can't talk to me about it?" he persisted. "There was a time when you could ask me anything without feeling embarrassed."
"Not about…that," she amended tautly.
His eyes fell to her firm, high breasts and lingered there with appreciation before they ran back up over her full lips to her eyes. "So reserved," he murmured. "Such a ladylike appearance. But you have French blood, little one. There must be sensuality in you, even if your husband was never one to drag it out of you. Wasn't he man enough?" he taunted mockingly.
She actually gasped. He sounded as if he hated Ben, and it was in his eyes, in the way he spoke. He even looked rigid, as if his backbone were encased in plaster.
"I'm sorry," he said abruptly. "That was a question I had no right to ask. Here, give me that."
He took her cup and the paper that had held the doughnut and put them into the sack that had contained the food. He got out without another word to put it in the garbage container.
She sat almost vibrating with nerves. She'd never dreamed that the conversation would turn into an inquisition, and his attitude toward Ben was frightening. How much did he know? And if he'd been aware of Ben's drinking, why hadn't he fired him? Ryder was so particular about his work force. He knew intimate little things about almost all of them, and he had his secretary send get-well cards when they were sick and flowers if someone died. He wouldn't tolerate crooks or drunkards, but he'd tolerated Ben, whom he actively disliked. Why? For Ivy's sake? Because she was like a younger sister to him? She couldn't understand it.
He got back into the truck. "Well, I'm still starved, but that will have to do," he said, good humor apparently restored. "A few hamburgers at lunch will save me yet."
She laughed, their earlier harsh words already forgotten as he turned the pickup toward the highway.
The auction was fascinating. She walked along beside Ryder, looking at equipment she didn't even know the name of, listening while he expounded on its merits and flaws.
His pale eyes looked out over the flat horizon and narrowed. "Before too many more years, little one, land and water are going to be as rare as buffalo. The population keeps growing, and someday soon there isn't going to be enough for all the people."
"Land grows, too," she said, smiling up at him. "It comes up out of the ocean."
"Not around here, it doesn't," he mused, tapping her nose with a long forefinger. He smiled back, but his finger moved down to her mouth and began to trace, with apparent carelessness, the perfect outline of her lips.
The tracing made her feel shaky all over. Her breath jerked out against that maddening finger, and he seemed suddenly intent on her mouth, his jaw tensing, his eyes going glittery. His own lips parted and she could actually hear his heartbeat.
"How long have we known each other?" he asked huskily.
"Years," she whispered. "Since I was…in grammar school."
"All those years, and nothing but bitter memories for both of us," he said harshly. His voice had gone deeper, huskier, and his gaze was intent on her mouth. "Yes, you remember, don't you?" he asked, watching her cheeks flush. "It's still there between us, even now."
She could hardly breathe. She dropped her eyes to his chest. "I didn't realize the door was open," she said miserably.
"I know. But at the time I didn't. And for that, I'm sorry."
Her face did a slow burn. She remembered that night as if it were yesterday. She'd tormented herself with it for years. She'd been spending the night with Eve. She was only eighteen, and a very naive eighteen. Eve had gone with her mother to get a pizza, leaving Ivy alone in the house, or so she thought. Ryder had come home unexpectedly. Not knowing he was in the house, she hadn't thought to close her bedroom door.
She'd been on her way to the shower and had stripped off everything but the lovely cream-colored silk teddy that Eve had given her for Christmas. It was the most expensive piece of lingerie she'd ever owned, despite the fact that she never expected anyone—much less Ryder—to see her wearing it.
But that night he'd seen the open door, and Ivy in the lacy teddy, and he'd thought she was parading around in it deliberately, for his benefit.
Even now she could see the look on his face. He'd frozen in the doorway, his pale eyes narrowing, darkening. His lips had parted on a shocked breath, and instead of apologizing and going out, he'd closed the door and walked into the room, something in his face vaguely accusing and angry.
Ivy had been eighteen. Young, hopelessly naive, and in the throes of her first real crush. She'd looked up at him with all her helpless longing in her eyes, so innocently beautiful that it had taken all his willpower to keep his hands off her. His eyes had touched her, though, like caressing hands, lingering where the all-but-transparent lace of the bodice gave an explicit glimpse of the tight bud of her nipples, dark against the pale lace.
She'd stopped breathing. Ryder's eyes had met hers then and held them, his big body rigid.
It was a permissive world, and Eve made no secret of her liberated attitude toward the boys she dated. But Ivy was old-fashioned, and to let a man see her in her underwear was a shocking and embarrassing experience. Unfortunately for her, Ryder didn't know that. He'd always assumed that she shared Eve's modern outlook.
"Very nice," he'd said, his voice caressing while his eyes had feasted on her lace-and-silk-clad body, lingering where her breasts pushed against the bodice. "But then, you always were a beauty, Ivy."
"You shouldn't be in here," she faltered, torn between delight and fear.
"Why not?" His pale eyes had glittered. "You left the door open and waited for me, didn't you?"
Her eyes had dilated wildly even as he reached for her. "Ryder, you don't understand…!"
But the feverish protest had come too late. Ryder had been watching her, wanting her, for a long time. Despite his anger at what he thought was entrapment, her beauty was too much for his self-control.
His big, lean hand
s had framed her face and his eyes watched her as he bent his head. But it wasn't her mouth he touched. It was the hard, aching tip of her lace-covered breast.
Her hands had curled on his shoulders and she'd made a sound that she could barely recall making. The warm, moist suction of his hard mouth had caused the most abandoned sensations in her slender body, had made her ache and burn and shiver with needs she hadn't been aware of before. She'd been dazedly aware of his hands sliding the straps of the teddy down her arms, of his eyes suddenly, shockingly, on her bare, mauve-tipped breasts before he bent again. This time, he'd picked her up in his arms, lifting her, his mouth still covering her nipple.
Her fingers had been in his thick hair, holding his mouth to her body while she fought with pride and inhibitions and a certainty that he'd lost control of his own body.
"Ryder, you mustn't," she'd whispered weakly as he laid her on the twin bed across the room from Eve's, the bed she was sleeping in during her overnight visit. "You mustn't!"
He hadn't seemed to hear her. He'd followed her down onto the bed, his long, powerful legs trapping hers, his hands smoothing the satiny skin of her back while his mouth suddenly found hers and took it with deliberate intent.
It was the first real adult kiss Ivy had ever received, and so passionate that even the memory of it could make her blush.
It was a deep, sultry probing of her mouth that had left her shaking and helpless in his arms.
His mouth had smoothed over her body then, like fire, and she'd arched upward, her response so uninhibited that it had knocked any suspicion of her innocence right out of his whirling mind. Her arms had twined around him, her hands tangling in his thick hair, and tiny little moans had whispered into his mouth as he teased her nipples with strong, warm hands before he began to nuzzle them with his lips and bite at them gently.
Her trembling pleas had sent him over the edge. "Feel how hard you turn me on," he'd whispered roughly, his dark eyes looking down into hers as his hands contracted on her hips, bringing them into tight contact with his aroused body. He ground her against the hardness, watching her lips tremble, her eyes widen at the graphic evidence of his desire. "I want you so much, I can hardly bear it! Can you take care of yourself, baby?"
