by Linda Howard
“Hey!” Ricky squealed as Cathryn slung her around to the door. “What do you think you’re doing? Have you gone crazy?”
Without a word, so angry that she couldn’t say anything else, Cathryn dragged the other woman through the door and slammed it shut behind them, not hearing Rule’s hoarse cry for her to come back.
The banisters of the staircase beckoned madly and the temptation was sugar sweet, but at the last moment a small piece of sanity returned and Cathryn refrained from simply dumping Ricky down the stairs. Ladies didn’t do things like that, or that was what she told herself as she forced Ricky along the hall at a trot, handling the young woman with as much ease as if she were only a child. Ricky was yelling and wailing loudly enough to wake the dead, but Cathryn drowned her out with a roared, “Shut up!” as she rushed her into Ricky’s own room.
“Sit down!” she bellowed, and Ricky sat. “I warned you! I told you to stay away from him. He’s mine, and I won’t tolerate you crawling all over him for another minute, do you hear? Get packed and get out!”
“Get out?” Ricky looked dazed, her mouth falling open. “Where to?”
“That’s your problem!” Cathryn opened the closet and began hauling suitcases out. She threw them on the bed and opened them, then began pulling open drawers and dumping the contents into the bags, helter-skelter.
Ricky sprang to her feet. “Hey, don’t blame it all on me! I wasn’t exactly raping him, you know! One woman has never been enough for Rule—”
“It will be from now on! And don’t try to make me believe that he invited you, because I don’t believe it!”
Ricky glared at the tangle of clothing. “Damn it, quit throwing my clothes around like that!”
“Then pack them yourself!”
Abruptly Ricky bit her lip and tears slid down her cheeks. Cathryn stared at her in mingled disgust and amazement, wondering how anyone could cry and still look so lovely. No red and streaming nose, no blotched face, just diamond-bright tears sliding gracefully down.
“But I really don’t have any place to go,” Ricky whispered. “And I don’t have any money.”
The door opened and Monica came in, frowning her annoyance. “Must you two brawl through the house like wrestlers? What’s going on?”
“She’s trying to make me leave!” Ricky charged hotly, her tears drying up as if by magic. Cathryn stood silently, her hands on her hips and her expression implacable.
Monica glanced quickly at her stepdaughter and said in exasperation, “It’s her house; I imagine she has the right to say who lives here.”
“That’s right, it’s always been her house!”
“Stop that!” Monica said sharply. “Feeling sorry for yourself won’t help anything. You must have known that eventually Cathryn would be coming back, and if you lacked the foresight to prepare yourself for the future, don’t blame anyone else. Besides, do you really want to spend the rest of your life listening to the pitter-patter of someone else’s kids?”
Evidently Monica observed a lot, even though she always seemed disinterested in anyone’s concerns except her own. Cathryn pulled in a deep, calming breath. Of course! Life wasn’t so complicated after all. It was really very simple. She loved Rule, she loved the ranch, and she wasn’t about to give up either of them. Why tear herself up worrying about the depth of Rule’s feelings? Whatever they were, they were there, and that was all that mattered.
With that thought full sanity returned. She sighed. “You don’t have to leave right now,” she told Ricky, rubbing her forehead to ease the tension that had begun to throb there. “I lost my temper when I saw... Anyway, you can take your time and make some plans. But you can’t take forever,” she warned. “I don’t think you want to stay around for the wedding, anyway, do you?”
“Wedding?” Ricky turned pale; then two spots of color appeared on her cheeks. “You’re awfully sure of yourself, aren’t you?”
“I have reason to be,” Cathryn replied evenly. “Rule asked me to marry him before he broke his leg. I’m accepting.”
“Congratulations,” Monica inserted with smooth precision. “I can see that we’ll really be in the way, won’t we? Ricky, dear, I’ve decided to take Cathryn up on her offer to use her apartment in Chicago. I suppose we can get along well enough for you to share the apartment with me, if you’d like. It does have two bedrooms, doesn’t it?” she asked Cathryn hastily.
“Yes.” It seemed a good idea to Cathryn. She looked at Ricky.
Ricky chewed her lip. “I don’t know. I’ll think about it.”
“Don’t think too long,” advised Monica. “I’m making arrangements to leave by the end of the week.”
“You said I was too old to live with Mommy,” Ricky mimicked with a flash of resentment.
“Neither the arrangement nor the offer is a permanent one,” snapped Monica. “For God’s sake, make up your mind.”
“All right.” Ricky could look as sulky as a child when she tried, and she was really trying now, but Cathryn didn’t care. She heaved a sigh of relief. When her temper cooled she would have felt guilty if she had thrown Ricky out of the house without giving her a chance to make some sort of arrangements. Now that she knew the time limit on Ricky’s presence she felt better able to cope with it—so long as she didn’t catch the woman touching Rule again.
Rule. Cathryn took another deep breath and prepared for the last battle. Rule Jackson’s days as a bachelor were limited. It didn’t matter if he didn’t love her. She loved him enough for two, and she wasn’t going to run away ever again. She was going to stay right there, and if he wanted the ranch he had to take her, too. One thing was certain: She couldn’t bear the thought of any other woman thinking that he was unattached and jumping into his bed! She planned to attach him as soon as possible, and do it up right.
With the determination of a charging cavalry brigade, her dark eyes intent, she went down the hall to his room and thrust the door open.
She looked automatically at the bed and was stunned to find it empty. A chill ran down her back. She stepped into the room and at a movement to her right she turned her head. Aghast, she stared at him, a terrified cry of “Rule!” bursting from her throat.
He was out of the bed, struggling with the cast on his leg as he pulled on a pair of jeans. Somehow he had managed to tear open the seam of the left leg of the jeans so he could get them on over the cast. He was wavering precariously as he battled to dress himself, cursing between clenched teeth with every breath he drew, damning his own weakness, the cast on his leg, the throbbing of his head. He swung around clumsily at her cry and she nearly choked when she saw the raw despair that twisted his face, the tortured tears that streaked down his hard cheeks.
“Rule,” she moaned, as he turned a look of such agony on her that she wanted to hide her eyes from it. He took a step toward her and lurched suddenly to one side when his broken leg was unable to take his weight. Wildly, Cathryn leapt across the room and caught him as he started to fall, holding him up with desperate strength.
“Oh, God,” he groaned, wrapping his arms around her in a death grip, crushing her against his hard body. He bent his head to hers and harsh sobs shook him. “Don’t go. God, baby, please don’t go. I can explain. Just don’t leave me again.”
Cathryn tried to stiffen her legs, but she was slowly collapsing under the burden of his weight. “I can’t hold you,” she gasped. “You’ve got to get back in bed!”
“No,” he refused thickly, his shoulders heaving. “I won’t let you go. I couldn’t get out of that damned bed, couldn’t get my clothes on fast enough...I was so afraid you’d be gone before I could get to you, that I’d never see you again,” he muttered brokenly.
Her throat closed at the thought of him battling his pain and injuries to reach her before she left. He couldn’t walk, so how was he going to get to her? Crawl? Yes, she realized, he would have crawled if he had had to. The determination of this man was an awesome thing.
“I won’t leav
e,” she assured him through her tears. “I promise. I’ll never leave you again. Please, darling, get back in bed. I can’t hold you up much longer.”
He sagged in her arms as some of the tension left him, and she felt her knees begin to buckle. “Please,” she begged again. “You’ve got to get back in bed before you fall and break something else.”
She was fortunate that the bed was only a few steps away, or she would never have made it. He was leaning heavily on her, sweat running down his face and mingling with the tears that wet it. He was almost at the end of his rope, and when she supported his head and shoulders as he lay back on the pillows he closed his eyes, his breath heaving in and out of his chest. He gripped her arm tightly, holding her beside the bed. “Don’t leave,” he said again, this time in little more than a whisper.
“I’m not leaving,” she crooned. “Let me lift your leg up on the pillows. Oh, Rule, you shouldn’t have tried to get up like that!”
“I had to stop you. You wouldn’t have come back again.” But he released her arm and she moved to the foot of the bed to lift his leg up. For a moment she stared at the gaping seam of his jeans, wondering how he had managed to tear the heavy-duty pants like that. She decided to get him out of the jeans while he was weak and unable to put up much of a fight, so she eased them down his hips and carefully drew them off. He lay limply, his eyes closed.
She wet a washcloth in cold water and wiped the sweat from his forehead, then the moisture from his cheeks. He opened his eyes and stared at her in fierce concentration, strength already returning to his magnificent body.
“I didn’t invite Ricky in here,” he said harshly. “I know what it looked like, but I was trying to make her stop. Maybe I wasn’t pushing her away too hard, but I didn’t want to hurt her—”
“I know,” she assured him tenderly, placing her finger on his lips. “I’m not an idiot, at least not completely. I’d already warned her once before to stay away from you, and when I saw her crawling all over you like that I blew sky-high. She and Monica are leaving at the end of the week to take my apartment in Chicago. They can save me a trip,” she added whimsically. “I left most of my clothes up there, and I need them. They can ship them to me.”
He sucked in a deep breath, his dark eyes as bottomless as eternity. “You believe me?”
“Of course I believe you.” She gave him an exquisite smile. “I trust you.”
For a moment he looked stunned by her unquestioning faith; then a tiny scowl began to form between his brows. “You had no intention of leaving?”
“None.”
“Then, damn it all,” he said from between clenched teeth, “why did you go storming out of here and leave me lying in this bed screaming my guts out for you?”
Cathryn went very still, staring down at him. She hadn’t realized it until this very moment, but his reaction said a lot. If he cared that much...was it possible? Did she dare dream...? She said carefully, “I never thought it would matter that much to you if I left or not, as long as the ranch stayed under your control.”
He uttered a very explicit comment, then attacked fiercely. “Not matter! Do you think a man waits for a woman as long as I’ve waited for you if it doesn’t matter to him whether she leaves or stays?”
“I didn’t know you’d been waiting for me,” she said simply. “I’ve always thought it was the ranch that meant the most to you.”
His jaw tightened to granite. “The ranch does mean a lot to me. I can’t deny that. I was almost at the bottom of a long downhill slide when Ward brought me here and saved my life, put me back together. I’ve worked myself half to death for years because this place meant salvation to me.”
“Then why did you talk to Ira Morris?” she blurted, her dark eyes shadowed with the pain and shock she had felt at that betrayal. “Why did you tell him that I’d probably sell if the price was right? Why did you tell him how much the ranch is worth?” She couldn’t understand that, but then, there was so much about Rule that she didn’t understand. He was so deep, hiding so much of himself. He’d have to learn to talk about himself, to share his thoughts with her. And he was learning, she thought hopefully.
He caught her hand, curling her fingers under his, and held it against his chest. A desperate look tightened his features before he looked away and deliberately wiped his face clear of expression. “I was scared,” he finally said in a strained voice. “More scared than I ever was in Nam. At first I was furious at the thought that you might sell; then it really hit me and I was scared. But I was scared for myself, and what I might lose. Finally I realized that the ranch is yours, not mine, just like you’ve been telling me all along, and if you weren’t happy here then the best thing for you would be to sell it and go somewhere where you could be happy. When Morris called I agreed to talk to him. I want you to be happy, honey. Whatever it takes, I want that for you.”
“I am happy,” she assured him softly, turning her hand under his so she could feel the hard warmth of his body beneath her fingertips. She stroked the dark curls with absorbed delight. “I’ll never sell the Bar D. You belong here, and if this is where you are, then I’ll be here, too.” She caught her breath as soon as the words were out, unable to look at him as she waited in agony for his response. The seconds ticked by and still he was silent. She swallowed and forced herself to lift her gaze to him.
She hadn’t expected him to shout hosannas, but neither was she expecting the way his eyes had narrowed, or the guarded expression that masked his face. “What are you saying?” he rumbled slowly.
It was now or never. She had to commit herself, had to take the first step, because if she backed off now she knew that Rule would, too. He had gone as far as he could go, this proud man of hers. She assured herself that it really wasn’t that much of a gamble. She couldn’t live without him—it was that simple. Cut and dried. She’d take him on any terms. “You asked me to marry you,” she said carefully, choosing her words and watching the effect of each one on his expression. “I accept.”
“Why?” he rapped out.
“Why?” she echoed, looking at him as if he had gone mad. Didn’t he know? Did he really not understand? The horrible thought arose that he might have changed his mind. “Is...is the offer still open?” she stumbled, painful uncertainty evident in both her voice and her face. He reached up with his other hand and caught a handful of her hair, forcing her inexorably down to him. When their noses were almost bumping he stopped and regarded her with such intensity that she felt as if he were walking inside her mind.
“The offer is still open,” he growled softly, the words whispering against her lips. “Just tell me why you’re accepting it. Are you pregnant? Is that it?”
“No!” she denied, startled. “It isn’t that. I mean, I don’t know. How could I know yet? There hasn’t been time.”
“Then why are you agreeing to marry me?” he persisted. “Tell me, Cat.”
He was pinning her down, refusing to let her hide behind anything, and suddenly she didn’t want to hide. Serenity and inner strength flooded her. Let him have his confession. She could give it to him out of the richness of her love. She freed her hand from under his and cupped his face in both palms, her fingers lovingly molding the hard contours of his jaw. “Because I love you, Rule Jackson,” she said with aching tenderness. “I’ve loved you for years...for what seems like forever. And it doesn’t matter if you don’t love me, if the ranch is all you care about. If you want the ranch, you have to take me. It’s a package deal. So, Mr. Jackson, you’d better start learning how to be a husband.”
He looked thunderstruck and his grip on her hair tightened. “Are you crazy?” he shouted. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“The ranch,” she said steadily. “If you want it, you have to marry me to get it.”
Raw fury began to form visibly on his face, in his eyes. He said something that didn’t bear repeating, but it illustrated his feelings. His entire body shuddered as what little control he had lef
t exploded, and he roared at her, “To hell with the ranch! Sell it! If that’s what’s been standing between us for all of these years, then get rid of it! If you want to live in Chicago, or Hong Kong, or Bangkok, then I’ll live there with you, because you’re what I’ve always wanted, not this damned ranch! My God, Cat, I’ve got a ranch of my own if that was what I wanted! Dad left everything to me when he died, you know.” His hand swept over her body. “Did you think this was because I wanted the ranch? Sweet hell, woman, can’t you tell that you make me crazy?”
Her blank expression told him that she had never even thought of it from that angle. He pulled her down on the bed beside him and clamped her to his side. “Listen to me,” he said slowly, deliberately, every word separate and distinct. “I don’t want the ranch. It’s a good life and it saved me, and I’d miss it if we lived somewhere else, but I can live without it. What I can’t live without anymore is you. I’ve tried. For eight years I got through life day by day, feeding myself on the memory of the one time I’d had you, hating myself for driving you away. When you finally came back I knew I’d never be able to let you go again. I’ll do whatever it takes to keep you, honey, because if you walk out on me again I might as well stop living.”
Cathryn felt as if her heart had stopped beating. He hadn’t actually said the words yet, but he was telling her that he loved her as desperately, as powerfully as she loved him. It was almost more than she could take in, more than she could allow herself to believe. “I didn’t know,” she whispered dazedly. “You never said...you never told me.”
“How could I tell you?” he asked roughly. “You were so young, too young for everything I wanted from you. I never meant for that day by the river to happen, but when it did I couldn’t regret it. I wanted to do it again, over and over, until that terrified look in your eyes was gone and you looked at me with the same need I felt for you. But I didn’t, and you ran. I regret that, because you met David Ashe and married him. It’s a good thing you didn’t come around for quite a while after that, Cat, because I’ve never wanted to take a man apart as badly as I did him.”
