“I’m…fine. Have…have you talked to your father?”
Had she taken up mind reading? “Uh-uh. Haven’t been home. I’ll stay and help with the hay, if that meets with your approval.”
She was quiet for a moment. He found himself holding his breath. Then she said, “Oh, I don’t know. That’s a big favor to ask. But if you’re a really good guy, maybe I’ll let you go out there and get all hot and sweaty and full of hay stems.”
“You’re such a generous woman.” He tilted his head down to her, found her mouth. He felt her come up on tiptoe, press her breasts against his chest. Her mouth was sweet and generous under his. Nothing held back. If time and circumstances were different, he would take her with him down into the hay, stems be damned, and love her until neither of them could think straight.
He could feel her beginning to burn in his arms. He knew her well enough now to know the signs, the slight acceleration of her breathing, the tension under the surface of her skin. He fit her to his body, knowing she’d feel his desire. He didn’t care. With Charlotte, he felt the need to be as honest and generous with her as she was with him.
“Luke-”
“I know,” he murmured. But he held her still.
Lady Luck whickered low in her throat, and a mourning dove cooed somewhere in the eaves of the barn, and Luke thought how peaceful it was to stand here like this with Charlotte in his arms.
“I wish we could stay like this forever,” she murmured.
“Yes,” he said.
“Luke, I have to go.”
“No,” he said, but he forced his hands to loosen and release her.
She stood there, looking delectably aroused, her hand fussing with the shirt button at the top of her throat. “Were you serious about helping me with the hay?”
“Yes.”
Charlotte liked the look in his eyes, clear and open, as if he had nothing to hide from her.
“We’ll be in the field next to your father’s fence. Perhaps you should go talk to him. Nick will probably have told him about seeing us together. You could explain—”
“There’s nothing to explain.” Now he shuttered his eyes, closing her off. “Let’s go make hay while the sun shines, shall we? Where’s your hat?”
He escorted her out of the barn into her house and bullied her into digging through the clothes hanging on her back porch to find a hat. He plopped it on her head and pushed it down tight. “You’re trading me a sunburn for a headache. I hate hats.”
In answer, he swatted her rear end and pushed her out the door.
“What’s he doing here?” Out in the hay field, Tex stomped around from the front of the tractor and favored Luke with a good old scowl.
“He’s helping.”
Tex mumbled an expressive word that articulated his opinion succinctly, and turned away to climb up into the tractor seat.
Six hours later, inside Charlotte’s house, after they dined on an omelet Charlotte had made, she sat across the table from Luke and tried not to drink him in with her eyes, but she couldn’t seem to stop. He sat sprawled back in the chair, his long legs stretched out to the side of the chair, which was too small for him. His eyes were dark with tiredness, and his mouth had trouble trying to smile at her, but he did it anyway. “I wish you’d have let me tell Tex to slow that tractor down so the bales wouldn’t come out of the baler that fast.”
“Couldn’t do it. Test of male strength, horns locked and all that. He’d think I was a wimp for sure, if I’d let you intercede for me.”
“He gets a little carried away—”
“Don’t apologize for Tex. We need a thousand more people on the planet like him. He’s stood by you through tough times, and that makes him golden as far as I’m concerned.” His eyes caught hers, held. He might be tired, but he had enough energy to turn her heart over. “I’m glad he was there for you, Charlotte. I do…care about you.”
Funny how those words, those simple words that sounded so loving, weren’t enough. She rose, turned her back to him and leaned on the stove, trying to keep her insides from churning. She’d promised she wouldn’t ask for more.
Reaching for a strength she hadn’t known she had, she turned around. “Would you like to stretch out on the couch and take a nap before you go home?”
“Does that mean I’m not invited to stay the night?”
Her hesitation was very brief, but he saw it. “Do you think it’s wise for you to consort with the enemy so…consistently?”
“You mean, Henry might forgive me for one lapse, but two nights puts me beyond the pale? I don’t give a damn what Henry thinks. Will you come lie down with me? Just for a little while.”
Her heart leaped, her blood sang. She knew how her face must look—illuminated. He needed her. But just for a little while. “I’m going back up into the mountains tonight.”
“Not without me, you’re not.”
She didn’t argue with him. She guided him up the stairs and into her little bedroom under the eaves. He looked darkly masculine there in her feminine retreat, the pale twilight flooding the room with windows dressed in white cotton ruffles. He looked even more masculine lying stretched out on her bed, whipcord-lean and muscled, his stockinged feet nudging the edge of the foot rail.
He flopped an arm away from his body. “Come here,” he said. She tugged her boots off and slipped into the hollow of his body that open arm created. He rolled toward her, fitting her into his hard leanness.
“Wake me when you’re ready to go.”
He dozed off, breathing deeply. She lay with the feel of his body pressed against hers, his weight and warmness so exhilarating, so strange yet so familiar.
The ruffled curtains fluttered in the breeze wafting into the room, bringing coolness and the smell of new green grass and wild plum trees exploding in blossom. She would always remember this moment when he lay beside her in that vulnerable state of sleep.
When the light had turned from the golden to soft gray to dark, she slipped out of his arms and sat up to pull her boots on. It was a measure of his fatigue that he didn’t waken. She stood up to turn and look at him. Heaven knew he hadn’t gotten much sleep last night. The sight of him sleeping in the soft twilight made her mouth lift in a tender smile.
Charlotte rode out under the stars slowly, deciding that this once she wouldn’t try to solve unsolvable problems or think about Luke, his father and her place in the tangle. She would just stretch out in her sleeping bag, watch the stars progress across the heavens, listen to the rustle of the leaves and the murmur of the water and hope she didn’t hear any other sounds that night.
He watched her the whole time she rode up, chose her spot, laid out her sleeping bag. He could feel his body burn with excitement, because she was totally unaware of his presence. She was asleep now, completely vulnerable to him. He could do anything to her that he wanted to do. But he was cleverer than that, smarter, more powerful.
He knew how to hurt her.
Did she think she’d stop him by sleeping there on the ground? She was a damn fool if she did. He was going to win. He knew it. He had such a surprise for her. She’d be so sorry she’d tangled with him. Oh, yes, he’d win. He always did.
* * *
She came awake too suddenly, her skin crawling, as if she’d been touched by an enemy. Around her the night was filled with night music, the sighing of the wind, the hoot of an owl, the bawl of a calf. She didn’t want to be alone. She wanted Luke. It struck her suddenly that she’d been alone all her life, and in only one night with him she’d learned to yearn for his presence. But he was in her room, sleeping, supremely at ease, as only Luke could be.
The room was filled with light glowing a pale gold when Luke awoke. He’d been interviewing witnesses in his sleep, taking depositions, one from Charlotte, one from Nick. Now he thrust a hand up through his hair, remembering, lying there in the soft, sweet darkness of dawn with the breeze blowing across his bare chest, knowing he was alone in the bed and wondering why.
Beside him, the sheet was empty and cool. Was she in the bathroom or the kitchen? Odd, how lonely this bed felt without her, when he hadn’t spent more than a few hours with her.
He rose and headed for the bathroom. He’d have a quick shower, shave, brush his teeth, get into his clothes and find her.
Fifteen minutes later, fully dressed, Luke strode into the kitchen, saw that the stove was cold. The only thing alive in the room was the swish of that silly cat clock’s tail. The sun was a little higher now, and the coolness was giving way to a summer’s warmth. The light streamed across the scarred maple table. There was nothing on it—no dish, no spoon, to indicate that she’d had breakfast and gone out to see about her animals.
Out in the barn, Gray Mist’s stall was empty. He knew then where she was. Muttering several incisive words, Luke strode to his car. He’d have to go home to get the mare and ride up into the high country. Then he’d give in to the distinct urge he had to wring her neck.
Charlotte was kneeling by the stream when Luke dismounted and walked toward her. She was dressed in her usual faded jeans and a blue-and-white-striped cotton shirt, and she was splashing water over her face with abandoned enjoyment. Unaware of him, she lifted her face to the sky and let the water glide down her cheeks. Caught in the half shade of the cottonwoods, she had the elfin beauty of a water sprite paying homage to the purity of the brook. She heard him and turned, her blue eyes dark with a joy that made him go weak in the knees. It was damn hard to be irritated with a woman who looked like a black-haired Lorelei after sleeping out on the range, but he’d give it a go.
“I told you to wake me.”
“You needed a good rest.” She rose to her feet and came toward him, with that slow, graceful walk that tore his guts out. She was a naturally sexy woman, young and alive with good health. He thought of how he’d have felt if anything happened to her out here alone while he was tucked up cozy in her bed sleeping, and he really wanted to wring that pretty neck of hers.
“You’re too damned independent for your own good.”
He was a male in a bad humor, and bound to make his displeasure known. A lesser woman might have quailed at the sight of six feet two inches and one hundred and ninety pounds of angry masculinity. Not Charlotte. She just looked bright and full of sass. “I thought I was the one who woke up grumpy.”
“What the hell do you think you’re doing, coming out here alone?”
“Protecting my land,” she said, and her words carried to him on the Montana wind.
He made a sound in his throat, turned back to his horse and flipped the reins over the horse’s neck to ground-rein him. When he faced her, he felt a little more in control. “Don’t come out here again without me.”
About a hundred replies jumped into her mind, but she looked up into his darkly beautiful face and knew she couldn’t say any of them. He was concerned for her. No one had been concerned for her for a long, long time.
“Nothing happened, Luke.”
“That’s no guarantee you’ll be so lucky the next time.”
“I’ll be careful.” And then, gently, “I’ve been looking out for myself for quite a while now.”
Slowly, Luke’s temper eased. She was all right. Nothing had happened to her. And at last, finally, none too soon, his training kicked in. If there was no agreement, it was best to change the subject. “So you didn’t find any more cattle?”
“No.”
“Then it was a waste of time staying out here.”
“Of course it wasn’t. He may have seen me, decided the risk wasn’t worth it and gone away.”
“Oh, there’s a cheering thought.”
She tilted her head, looking at him as if he were a child to appease. “Let’s agree to disagree, shall we?”
Luke wasn’t in the mood to be conciliated. “Nothing new about a Malone and a Steadman having an altercation.” Deliberately he pulled back the cuff of his shirt and looked at his watch.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Wondering just how late in the day it has to be before I can have a civilized conversation with you.”
“How do you feel about midnight?” she shot back at him.
“Yes, nighttime does seem to work out rather better for us.”
She thought of about a thousand replies to that one, and was opening her mouth to deliver one or two when he strode to his horse, gathered up the reins and mounted.
“You’re not going to run away just when it’s getting good, are you?”
“I’ve decided it’s time for me to go home and face the music,” Luke said.
She sobered instantly. “Let me go with you.”
All he did was look at her and shake his head.
“You’re too damned independent for your own good,” she said to him.
He tilted his hat to her. “One more thing we have in common.”
She stood watching him ride away, torn between a longing to be with him and the sure knowledge that if she stepped into the Steadman house at Luke’s side, she could very possibly set Luke’s deteriorating relationship with his father in a cement that would never crack.
The tack room smelled of leather when Luke stepped inside. His father had a lamp on, with the light shining on the piece of tack he was repairing. His father had great skill working with leather, and he enjoyed the task, something few other ranchers did. He had the strip of rawhide clamped to a wooden board while he worked with his knife peeling off a thin edge.
Luke knew all about preparing a case to manipulate a witness. He didn’t want to do that with his father. He wanted honesty, and a not-so-simple truth. His father was a great lover of logic and truth. It wouldn’t be easy to talk to Henry, but he had a stronger reason to try again than he’d ever had in his life. “I’d like to speak with you for a moment, if I may.”
“So you decided to come home, did you?” Henry raised his head, and his eyes met Luke’s. If there was any reaction at the sight of his son, Luke didn’t know what it was. “You might have done better to stay where you were.”
Luke had known it wasn’t going to be easy. He’d always had a predilection for the jugular, and now he knew at whose knee he’d learned that preference. Henry was ever the gentleman, but he knew how to place the rapier with precision. “I wonder if, just for a moment, you could put aside your opinion of me and we could talk about something that’s very important.”
“I can’t see that we have much to say to each other.” Henry went on cutting the leather with a sure and steady hand. That evidence of his father’s detachment disturbed Luke more than his cold face.
Luke wanted to turn on his heel and walk away. He’d beaten his head against this particular stone wall too many times, and when he left the ranch that last time, he’d vowed never to try again. Now here he was. Here he had to be. For Charlotte.
“I’m afraid something is going to happen to Charlotte.”
“Yes, something is going to happen to her. She’s going to go to jail.”
“I don’t mean that way. I mean…someone is going to hurt her.”
Henry stopped cutting his leather. “Who would want to hurt her?”
“I’m…not sure.”
“You’re not sure? What kind of an answer is that?”
“It’s the only answer I can give you right now. I just wanted, needed, your assurance that you wished Charlotte no harm.”
“I wouldn’t have a hair on that girl’s head hurt. I only want what the law says is my right—protection from theft. If it takes putting Charlotte Malone in jail to stop the thefts, that’s what I want. Nothing less, but certainly nothing more.”
“Suppose she isn’t the thief?”
Henry shook his head, went back to cutting his leather.
“Suppose she isn’t the thief,” Luke said again, determined to have his father listen to him just this once.
“Doesn’t make any sense.”
“Think about that, Dad. Think about how it doesn’t make any sense.”
> “You’ve…taken up with her, haven’t you?”
He was used to shunting off attacks, by a witness, by a district attorney, by a disappointed woman. Still, his father’s blunt words hit him squarely in the solar plexus. “An archaic term, but yes, I suppose it describes the situation accurately enough. Just let me ask you this. If you were going to steal your neighbor’s cattle—”
“I don’t steal my neighbor’s cattle. Or anybody else’s.”
Luke took a hard grip on his patience. “But if you were going to do a little judicious rustling, wouldn’t you make sure you shipped them off before anybody found them?”
“Maybe she didn’t have the chance.”
“One, yes. But how many cattle do you have in the barn now? Five, six? She’s not a dumb woman.” He knew he should stop. He knew he shouldn’t play dirty. But Charlotte’s life could be at stake. “She’s too bright to do something so crazy. She’s Maureen Malone’s daughter.”
The knife slipped. A bright bead of blood appeared on the fleshy part of Henry’s thumb. Wordlessly Luke handed Henry his white handkerchief. Those glasses flashed at Luke. He thought his father might refuse the offer of the handkerchief, but Henry took the white cloth and wrapped it around the wound.
Luke had intended to give his father an emotional jolt, but he was sorry Henry had cut himself. “You’d better put some disinfectant on that. Do you want me to—”
“I don’t need any help from you.”
A Cowboy Is Forever Page 18
