When he should have been humming, taking over the kitchen, acting confident and friendly, he'd handed her the cat and let his all-too-human weaknesses take over.
He'd stood, electrified by her touch, hypnotized by the perfectly rounded slope of breasts he'd glimpsed between her loosened lapels. His mind had snagged on wondering what she might or might not be wearing beneath the long robe. He'd fought the urge to drag her over the railing that separated them and use her. When he should have been friendly and working hard to gain her confidence, he'd been longing to annihilate his primitive frustrations with her body.
He resented his body's betrayal. And he resented her for causing the jagged, harsh wanting, for putting his senses on alert and his brains on hold.
He held open the door of Weston's Feed and Seed for her, and she stepped in front of him and into the store. Her faded jeans fit her almost as closely as her skin. How in the hell would he ever concentrate at this rate? He had to put the tightening in his groin out of his mind just to listen to her.
"If s probably good that you came with me today," she was saying. "If you're going to be able to do what you need to without bothering me over every little detail, I need to introduce you to Charlie. Let him know you're authorized to charge on my account."
His brows rose in surprise.
"I guess it doesn't matter whether or not you trust me," she added. "You're worthless to me if I can't trust you."
She pasted on a wide smile and headed to meet the plump man with a rim of white hair around his shiny bald head who was moving down the wide center aisle of the store toward them. "You'll find those gloves you need right here," she said louder, over her shoulder. "Right, Charlie?"
"You betcha." Charlie clasped her hand and pulled her in for a one-armed hug. "The best you'll find anywhere in town. How ya' been, Jonna?"
The rest of the morning passed quickly as Sam followed Jonna from store to store, place to place, watching her take care of the business they'd come to do.
He kept his friendly pose plastered on as she introduced him to a variety of people. The postmistress offered him change of address cards to send out. He took them without comment, slipping them into his back pocket for disposal later.
Jonna again introduced him as her hired man to the men at the hardware store and the service station, asking them to please allow him to charge supplies and fuel to her account.
The owner of the service station eyed Sam closely and Jonna watched with noticeably heightened interest. This was someone she trusted, Sam decided, and consciously put on his most practiced, confidence-gathering grin.
The man turned to Jonna approvingly. "Glad to see you found someone so quickly, Girlie."
Jonna rolled her eyes and explained, "My father's nickname for me."
Mr. Phillips made several disparaging remarks about the hired man who had just deserted her, and Jonna said she'd expected it eventually.
The whole experience was an ordeal. Sam didn't want to see her personal relationships, hear her friends and acquaintances offer congratulations on the award. The reminders gnawed at him. But he finally knew when she would go to Los Angeles to accept it.
He knew now how long he had to prepare; how long he would have to keep up the smiling farce that made his face ache.
Eight days. Eight days to maintain control.
"Well, Sam," she said as she pulled up outside the Whitfield Mercantile, no longer wearing one of the plastic expressions she'd been wearing for the world, "you're on your own. I'll let you finish whatever shopping you have to do, and I'll go here." She indicated the small cafe next to the general store.
This was it. Moss. "What about groceries?" His arrogance over how well their morning had gone ebbed away. The tightrope he'd been dancing on with such finesse began to shake and pitch.
"We may as well have lunch before we get groceries and head for home, don't you think?"
He searched for a reason not to separate.
"I'll have a cup of coffee while I'm waiting for you." Before he could blink, she strolled toward the cafe.
This must be it, he thought fatalistically, then realized that if Moss owned the cafe, she was already inside, learning that the man didn't know Sam Barton any better than he knew the man in the moon.
"May I help you?"
Sam started. His legs had carried him along with Jonna's suggestion, and he was inside the Mercantile.
Not much later, Sam paused inside the small cafe's door, searching for Jonna. He honed in almost immediately on the spot she brightened near the rear of the room. Her head was bent toward her older male companion's. Sam held his breath.
Jonna looked comfortable, open, approachable. If that was Moss, Sam was fairly sure Jonna didn't suspect anything out of the ordinary yet.
She lifted her head, arching and displaying the elegant length of her neck. God, but she was seductive. Her low melodious chuckle carried over the clatter and din.
He wasn't that anxious to find out if her friend was the infamous Moss, and this, he realized, was a perfect opportunity to take care of one of the necessary odds and ends— if he didn't waste it, staring and imagining and letting his hormones take charge again.
Quietly, he reversed his movements and went back outside.
CHAPTER FOUR
Jonna shivered as the sun went behind a cloud and turned the cafe ten degrees cooler.
"You sure are jumpy today," Sol Steward said, placing his bony old hand over hers. His leathery face looked as if it would crack if he smiled any wider.
"Silly, huh, Stew? Seems like everything makes me feel cold. The phone ringing, the sun going behind a cloud..." She waved a hand toward the window and Sol burst out laughing. "Maybe I'm coming down with something."
"And maybe your imagination is working overtime." He pointed vaguely toward the outside. "Some man is standing out there. With those shoulders, ain't no way much sun is going to get past him and in here."
Even without looking in the direction he pointed, Jonna knew who was standing there. Sam's broad shoulders filled the storefront window of the small cafe. She watched as he cupped his hands in front of his face to light a cigarette.
"Shoot," she said, "I'm going to have to go, Sol. That's my new hired hand. I guess he's decided not to come in."
"What’sa matter? He shy?"
She shrugged. "I wish I knew what his problem is. I'll get your coffee," she offered, setting a quarter on the table for the waitress.
"Thanks anyway, but Moss already got it," he said.
"Oh? How long ago was Moss in?'' The stains in the mug Sol lifted to his lips said he'd been here long enough to know. "I hoped to catch him today."
"Won't have much luck, I don't suppose." Sol retamped the pipe he never lit anymore. "He was headin' for Emporia this morning."
"Well." She grimaced. "Nothing else has gone exactly like I planned today. I guess I shouldn't be surprised Moss isn't around."
"He's usually back by two," Sol said helpfully, scouting around the rapidly filling restaurant for another patron to join with his mug.
Jonna glanced at the clock over the cash register. "I've already spent longer in town than I intended. See ya, Sol."
She plunked a couple of dollars on the cash register and waved at Millie.
Sam had moved over in front of the pickup by the time she got outside. With one foot propped on the bumper, he studied the small town.
"I didn't know you smoked," Jonna said, joining him.
"Is that a problem?" he asked.
She lifted one shoulder. "I guess not."
"I only smoke occasionally. If you'd prefer I didn't—"
"I said I didn't mind," she snapped.
He raised an eyebrow and flicked the cigarette away.
"Sorry," she said. "I didn't mean to bark at you."
"I hope your bite is worse than your bark," he quipped.
He did have a sense of humor. Amazing.
"You'll need these." He ex
tended her keys. "You left them in the truck again."
She was careful not to touch him as she reached out, a precaution she need not have taken. He dropped than into her hand from six inches away. "Thanks." They were warm from his body heat.
"Do you leave your keys in the vehicle often?"
"This is a small town. We're all probably a little lax."
"And I'm probably too security conscious."
Yeah, so security conscious he couldn't, wouldn't talk about the work he'd done at her alma mater. Thoughtfully, she watched him round the truck to get in the other side.
"Leaving your keys in the pickup is not a very safe habit," he added as if he couldn't help himself.
She crawled behind the wheel. His warning was almost funny. He hadn't thought twice about opening the door to her house and he was the most dangerous thing she'd seen in a long time. It smacked of the fox telling the hen to keep the chicken coop latched.
"You leave your house unlocked, too," he admonished, as if reading her mind.
"Not always."
"It was unlocked when I came. It only takes—"
"You shouldn't have tried to open it in the first place," she interrupted irritably.
"Pure habit, from checking campus doors at night," he said. "You really do need to be more careful. You're very isolated. A beautiful woman, all alone in the middle of nowhere….”
Her mind stuck on the "beautiful." Her hand stuttered over the keys in the ignition. She'd seen it in his eyes, but hearing the words... in his most matter-of-fact voice...
"You also said everyone in town knows everyone else's business." He'd warmed to the subject. "And you wander around at the farm alone at all hours of the day and night, I imagine. Don't you think anyone who wanted to hurt you would make it a point to know that sort of thing, too? That makes you a prime target for any burglar or rapist or—"
"You're hired," she said. "You are now the farm's official security guard." She didn't enjoy feeling defenseless when she thought about those kinds of things, so she didn't. And most of the time, she felt very safe. "Do you feel better?"
He laughed and the tension that had hung between them all morning eased.
"You decided you didn't want lunch?" she asked, changing the subject.
"You came out of the cafe. I thought you'd changed your mind," he answered.
"I thought you weren't coming in."
"I just stopped to have a cigarette," he said. "My last for a while," he added quickly.
She smiled. "You hungry?"
"Not really."
She put the vehicle in reverse.
"Where to next?" he drawled a moment later.
"Groceries."
"Could we stop by the phone company when we're through there? I need to get the phone transferred to my name. You’re right about cell phones,” he added. “Mine has been totally worthless since I got here."
"Sorry," she replied. "I should have thought of that myself.”
“Can I get internet access through the phone company?”
“That’s where I get mine,” she answered, then frowned. “But unless you’re in a real hurry, why don’t you try to connect with mine. I have wi-fi and I occasionally take my laptop out and about. I can usually get a connection unless I get too far from the house.”
“I’m not going to worry about it then.” He smiled. “With the cell, I’d pretty much decided I was going to be out of the loop while I was here.”
She was pleased with their almost normal conversation.
* * *
Sam's phone company business took forever, and by the time he was through inside, the wind had sharpened and he wished he'd worn his jacket. He scrunched his shoulders and hurried to where Jonna was waiting in the truck.
Then he saw her.
Panic clutched his throat. His nonexistent lunch pitched frantically in his stomach. God! Not again. It wasn't time yet. What had he done?
His knees were weak but they carried him the twenty or so feet as the pure strength of his rage took hold and moved him down the sidewalk.
He forced himself to her window. A horrified fascination chained his hands as he stared helplessly at the ominous curve of her neck. Last night's nightmare overlaid her face with a swirling and flashing montage of the dead faces of Jonna and Denise, until he couldn't distinguish the two.
She slowly sat up, bright-eyed and blinking, and her image swam, then focused. She'd only been asleep. Surprise that she was alive devastated him almost as thoroughly as thinking she was dead.
"What, Sam?" She opened the door and hopped out. "What happened? What's the matter? You look like you've seen a ghost."
The icy wind bit into him like a sandblaster and he began to shake. Jonna was out, beside him, her hand on his arm. "Are you all right, Sam?"
"I will be." Even his voice shook. He tried to stop it, stop the uncontrollable shivering. He braced himself against the pickup hood and watched the wind pitch the hodgepodge of dead leaves against the curb.
"Come on, Sam," Jonna said gently. Her arm draped his waist. "Let me help you."
"I'll be okay," he said thickly, but didn't resist as she led him to the passenger door.
"There," she said when he was settled. "Are you going to be sick?"
He shook his head.
She went around and climbed in behind the wheel. "Let's get you home." She let the motor idle a minute and reached over to lay a cool palm against his forehead. "You sure you're okay?"
He nodded but it was all he could do not to jerk away. He didn't want her concern.
With a fractured satisfaction, he realized his overreaction might have saved him. He had to fight a smile. She wouldn't take a sick man to visit a friend.
But he'd lost, too. How in the name of all that was holy could he justify caring what happened to her? You did not let yourself care about someone who might be doomed--even for a second. That was when you lost control, became obsessed.
He'd seen what his obsessions with Denise had led to. If they hadn't fought that night-
He yanked his mind from that train of thought and watched Jonna put the truck in reverse. He felt her examine him before she backed onto the street. "Better?" she asked.
He didn't feel so green now. "Must have been something I ate," he murmured and wanted to tell her to keep her concern to herself.
"Or didn't eat," she said. "I get the impression you don't take very good care of yourself." She slowed a bit on the outskirts of town. "Do you think it’s the flu? Do you have anything you can take?''
He glanced at her blankly.
"Pepto-Bismol? Alka-Seltzer?"
"I'll be okay."
She turned in at the convenience store edging the city limits. "I'll run in here. Moss'll have something."
He felt himself go pale again and she hesitated.
"Can't we just get back to the farm? I bought ice cream and TV dinners. They aren't going to be edible if I don't get them in the freezer soon."
"Definitely a man thing." She laughed, shaking her head.
He reprimanded himself for taking a brief pleasure in the sound.
"Sick, and you think about food. Oh well, I've probably got something at home in my medicine chest."
Keep your medicine and your concern. He closed his eyes and willed himself to ignore her. It was good practice. Better yet, he decided, he should keep playing the image of her dead over and over in his mind. In just a little more than eight days, if he couldn’t annihilate the monster, the monster might win another one.
* * *
Some kind of employee she'd hired, Jonna thought, pounding on his door. On his very first day, she was going to have to do the evening chores herself.
Of course, it wasn't his fault he was sick, she thought guiltily. And her father's repaired pickup was testament that he was going to be valuable to her.
She had brought soup with her—and the key. With his fetish about security, she knew his house would be locked, and if he was sle
eping she would leave the soup on the kitchen counter with a note. She was getting ready to use the key when he opened the door.
"Sorry," he apologized, roughly drying his hair with a massive white towel. "I was in the shower."
That was evident. His bare chest gleamed with beads of water. His loose jeans clung damply to his lean hips and long legs. She was sure that was all he had on. The thought left her breathless.
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