Texas Heroes: Volume 1

by Jean Brashear

  She felt an urge to comfort him, to bring him closer to the fire, like a dark wolf who roamed the perimeter of a campsite, starving to death.

  But that was foolish in the extreme. He wouldn’t thank her for her sympathy, she knew instinctively. He was a grown man, a strong man who had made it through life without her help. Davey must be her only concern.

  So she merely nodded at him and closed off the part of her heart open to his pain.

  “Thank you.” And I’m sorry. More sorry than I can say.

  Mitch lay in his bed and listened to her moving around the cabin, wishing she’d just go to bed and let him be. Quit playing with his mind.

  But his mind didn’t want to quit playing with her.

  She wasn’t the china doll he’d first thought. Oh, she looked like one, all right, all big blue eyes, creamy skin and rosy lips. And that hair. His fingers still itched to tangle themselves in it, to stroke from scalp to tips, letting the waves shift against his skin like ribbons of silk. The one sight he’d had of it unbound made him understand why the sight used to be reserved for a woman’s husband. He understood why hair was called a woman’s crowning glory.

  He wanted to free it from its braid, separate the heavy skeins with his fingers. Feel it brush over his body with languid, drifting strokes. For a bittersweet moment, he wished that she was someone else—and that he was. That they could meet as strangers. Nothing between them but the night and the wanting.

  He turned over with a groan, his body hard and aching.

  Damn this storm.

  He punched the pillow again and shifted against the sheets. Squeezing his eyes shut, he searched for sleep. But sleep taunted him like a scornful lover.

  Who was Perrie Matheson, really? Was she the callous socialite who hadn’t cared enough to come when her only blood needed her? Mitch wasn’t sure what a socialite should look like, but Perrie didn’t fit any description he could imagine. Her car was several years old and nondescript. Her slender fingers sported no jewels, her nails short and unpainted. The only clothes she’d worn so far had seen better days.

  And she was stronger than she looked. Still physically weak from her illness, she’d put in a full day’s labor, anyway. Hadn’t considered herself too good to wash his socks. Had cooked a damn good meal on a cantankerous stove.

  There was more to her than one would think, just looking at her small frame. But she was lying to him, he knew it. Why? With every day that passed, Mitch found himself more curious, yet as someone with plenty of his own to hide, he’d made it a religion not to pry into the lives of others.

  Live and let live had been his motto. Don’t get involved. Pack light and move fast.

  And silence is golden.

  She had a right to her secrets. And he didn’t need the hassles. A few more days, that’s all he had to survive.

  A few more days of watching her…and wondering.

  Of wanting to touch.

  Of seeing the world through Davey’s eyes, feeling the magic of the boy’s innocent wonder.

  Of looking at a mirage that mocked a longing he’d thought long ago drained from his very bones. The way the woman and the boy had moved into a stark cabin—

  And made it feel treacherously like what he remembered of home.

  Mitch bolted up in the bed and scrabbled for a match in the moonlight. He lit the kerosene lamp and reached for a book—any book—to make the hours pass until dawn.

  In the faint morning light, Perrie worked as silently as possible to build up the fire. She should have left the bedroom door open last night to draw in some of the heat, but she’d wanted distance. Waking up to a frigid room had been a real jolt to the system. She’d covered Davey with her own blankets and left the door open.

  Mitch’s was closed, too. It was the first time she’d ever awakened before him. She thought about opening his door at least a crack but reminded herself that he was a grown man—and a very private one, at that.

  In a few minutes more, she had the coffeepot bubbling on top of the stove, and she was able to remove some of the clothing she’d worn for her trip outside.

  The world was a white wonderland. That was the good news.

  It was still snowing. That was the bad. This cabin was too small to live in a state of armed warfare with anyone. She and Mitch would have to come to some accommodation if they were to survive with sanity intact.

  Last night they’d had an actual conversation, without rancor. The contempt that had filled his eyes since the first day had been replaced by a wary politeness. Maybe there was hope that they could come to some sort of accord, some way to make do until the snow stopped.

  She turned at the sound of footsteps, to see Mitch’s head buried beneath the shirt he was shrugging on. For the briefest of instants, she saw his bare chest, ridged with muscle and covered with dark whorls of hair tapering down to a fine line bisecting his flat belly.

  Then the dark blue fleece shirt came down to cover it.

  Wait, she wanted to say. Let me see that again.

  Perrie could barely stifle a gasp at her own thoughts. She’d never felt an urge like that before. Heat blossomed in her center and spread to her face.

  Mitch’s startled gaze met hers. For an unguarded second, his eyes took on a glow that burned right into her. Caught like prey in the heat of his eyes, she found herself unable to look away.

  Then his shutters slammed closed again. She quickly averted her eyes, but she was so rattled that she brushed one hand against the stove, jerking back reflexively, sucking in a breath at the stab of pain.

  “Are you okay?”

  She whirled at the sound of his voice right behind her, stumbling backward.

  Strong arms shot out to pull her away from the stove.

  And into the solid wall of his chest.

  She wanted to lean into him, to wrap her arms around his waist and hold tight. She’d never felt as safe in her life as she did with Mitch around.

  But deep within her, the woman scented danger. This male was all male. Too male for someone like her.

  She pushed against his chest, stepping carefully away from temptation. One glance at his face showed her a jaw gone rock-hard, eyes turned cold.

  “Let me see your hand,” he ordered, reaching for her after a hesitation that showed his unwillingness to touch her any more than he must.

  She jerked her hand back. “It’s fine—I just—” she stammered. “I made coffee—”

  “Don’t be foolish,” he growled, reaching for her hand again. “You can’t be careless with wounds up here. Medical help is too far away.” He turned her palm upward, then to the side. Then he grabbed a cup from the dish rack and moved to the door, opening it and scooping up snow. He returned and shoved it toward her. “Hold the spot against this for a few minutes.”

  Then he walked away, shrugging on his coat and knit cap and heading outside, leaving Perrie staring after him.

  So much for the truce. But armed dislike might be safer than that riot of feelings he’d provoked. Her mind drifted back to that brief, electric glimpse of skin. He had the muscles of a working man, not the pretty-boy bulk built in gyms. He was big. Powerful. And he made something deep inside her ache.

  She’d had a crush or two when she was younger—all those towns where her mother drifted meant that she’d been exposed to lots of boys in many different schools. But the increasing stares from her mother’s boyfriends had kept her wary of the male of the species. And the last one—well, he’d scared her enough for her to leave for good.

  And after that, she’d been too busy to worry about boyfriends of her own. All her time and efforts had been focused on survival, on working and finishing school and getting that first plum secretarial job that would lead her away from her mother’s life.

  Fate had intervened, giving her the job at Matheson Industries, where she’d attracted Simon’s attention. He’d seemed worlds away from the squalor of her youth, like someone who could lift her up into a life that was pristine and o
rderly, free of any remnant of the life she’d escaped.

  But she’d discovered darkness in his world, too.

  Perrie had never felt like this before. Too warm, achy and restless in a way that made no sense.

  But if this were desire, Mitch wouldn’t welcome it. Or share it. Simon had given her ample evidence that she wasn’t the kind of woman who could satisfy a man. She was no good at passion.

  But still something called to her, made her wonder, made her wish, just a little. Foolish or not.

  No harm in wondering, right? All too soon, she and Davey would be gone.

  Perrie removed her hand and studied the faint red streak, assuring herself that it was minor. Then she looked out the window again, smiling wistfully at her thoughts. For one bittersweet moment, she remembered how his body had felt against hers, how his dark eyes had sparked.

  All of a sudden, Perrie was sick to death of being careful. Tired of playing it safe, of being afraid of every shadow, every single misstep.

  She wouldn’t do anything about how he made her feel—couldn’t, because they must go soon. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t imagine how it would be, if he didn’t want her gone—and she didn’t have to leave. If they were alone here, just the two of them, no past to come between then, no future to decide.

  She didn’t have to tell anyone, least of all Mitch. But in her own private thoughts, she could spin a new kind of story. One where two bodies, one dark and one fair, intertwined. Where whatever this feeling was that Mitch stirred could be explored.

  Where maybe, just maybe, she could coax the lone wolf to the fire, even for a minute.

  Then she heard the front door opening and quickly fled to the room she shared with Davey.

  Chapter Seven

  “I can’t do this,” Davey sighed, crumpling the length of soft rope in his hand.

  Perrie started to soothe him, but Mitch spoke up first.

  “I thought the same thing when I was learning.” He smiled at her son as he’d never smiled at her. “Come here.” He set down the piece of wood he was whittling and scooted forward on his chair, patting his thigh. “Come stand right here.”

  He settled Davey in front of him, reaching around her son’s body. “Let me hold these ends for you again.”

  Patiently, he instructed Davey through the steps of tying a square knot once more, his deep voice gentle and calm, no matter how Davey’s fingers fumbled.

  Perrie watched her child’s intense concentration, watched the big hands work with the tiny ones as the fire lit the two of them with a golden glow.

  In that moment, she felt the lash of regret. Davey should have had this all his life. Should have been granted a father who would care for him, guide him, show him how to be a man like—

  A man like Mitch.

  She jerked her gaze away from them, shocked to her marrow at the direction of her thoughts.

  Mitch wasn’t a father, didn’t pretend to be one. Or to want to.

  He was a rolling stone, gathering no moss.

  He was a difficult man, hard and cynical. He had no interest in the family he had, much less in acquiring a new one.

  And she—did she want another man in her life? A man to restrict her, to shove her into his own definition of who she should be? To walk away from Davey when he was too much trouble?

  No. Absolutely not. She and Davey were enough for each other. It was that simple. She would care for Davey until he was grown, and then—

  What would her life be, once Davey was gone? For that was the way of nature—babies grew up and left the nest. She would be alone.

  Alone, as she’d been so often in her life. Her mother hadn’t been interested in motherhood at all. She’d wanted laughter and good times and raucous fun.

  Only with Grandpa Cy, only in these mountains, had she found peace. Only here had she felt like she’d belonged.

  “Look, Mom! Look what I did!” Davey rushed to her side to show her the knot he’d made, with Mitch’s help.

  Over her child’s blond head, she met Mitch’s gaze. Thank you, she wanted to say. Hoped she was saying, with her eyes.

  Thank you for caring more than his own father ever did.

  “This is wonderful,” she responded. “You did such a good job.” She drew Davey close, breathing in that little-boy scent. “I’m very proud of you.”

  And then she lifted her gaze again, capturing in Mitch’s eyes a naked longing that hurt her to her soul. Her throat thickened with tears she dared not shed. She held his gaze, measure for measure, refusing to look away.

  Dark eyes studied her own for long moments, within them a maelstrom of need and confusion…and a loneliness so deep that her heart ached.

  For that span of time, she felt closer to him than she’d felt to anyone but Davey in years. It made no sense, given that he had never uttered a word to make her think he wanted more than he had.

  Caught in the grasp of his powerful spirit, Perrie could barely resist the sigh that threatened. A sigh that reached out to this solitary man. Part wish to comfort him, part longing for a safe harbor of her own.

  When Davey spoke, she felt jarred to her bones.

  “Tell me more about Ermengilda, Mom,” he pleaded.

  Perrie snapped her gaze away from Mitch’s. She could barely remember her own name, much less Ermengilda’s story. “Oh, sweetie, I don’t think Mitch wants to hear that.”

  “Sure he does!” Davey turned. “Don’t you, Mitch? I told you my mom makes up cool stories. This one’s about a princess who’s a fish.”

  When Mitch’s amused look met hers, Perrie felt her cheeks warm.

  “Ermengilda?” Mitch asked.

  “Yeah,” Davey laughed. Then he sobered. “But don’t kid Mom about it.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “She likes it.”

  Mitch’s brown eyes lightened to amber. His mouth quirked at the corners when he looked at her.

  She was beginning to wish she were anywhere but here. “I haven’t thought much about her lately,” she said weakly.

  Davey’s big blue eyes turned downcast. “Aw, Mom, couldn’t you try, just a little?” he wheedled.

  She glanced at Mitch, who seemed to be enjoying her discomfort. For a moment, she thought about how good that harsh face looked, lit with the seeds of laughter.

  She owed him this, at the very least, for all he’d done for them. Mitch had had little laughter in his life, she was almost certain.

  So she swallowed hard and tried to ignore the steady glow of those dark eyes as she searched for the thread of her story.

  “So where were we?” she asked Davey.

  He climbed up on her lap, a smug smile on his face. “Ermie was laughing when that dumb boy was tickling her.”

  She poked him gently in the ribs. “Princess Ermengilda, young man. And the Prince isn’t dumb.”

  “But he has blue eyes, right? Just like mine?”

  She smiled. “Just like yours.”

  “And we get to have a sword fight?”

  Perrie heard Mitch’s chuckle and glanced up to see him shaking his head. “What is it about boys and fighting?” she asked.

  His face sobered. “Men protect. That’s part of who we are, since time began.” A darkness crossed his face, a stab of pain that made her want to soothe, to seek out his sorrow.

  Had he failed to protect someone? Was that the sadness that filled him?

  “Mom?” Davey wiggled in her lap. “So what’s next?”

  Perrie jerked her gaze away from the man who was such an enigma. Drawing a deep breath, she grasped for the threads of the story.

  “When we left them, Ermengilda was laughing so hard she couldn’t swim away. The Prince of the Pretty People was tickling her belly, and she felt all her bones turn to jelly. The next thing she knew, she was way up in the air, gasping for breath—

  “Prince of the Pretty People—ack.” Davey turned to Mitch and rolled his eyes. “Men can’t be pretty, can they, Mitch?”

  “It was never a goal
of mine.”

  He wasn’t pretty, no. But he had a hard, dark beauty of his own. Compelling…haunting…his face was one she would never forget.

  “Then what, Mom?” Davey asked.

  Mitch turned back to his whittling, and Perrie grasped at scattered thoughts.

  “The Prince was looking at her very closely. Ermengilda was a little nervous at first, but she was sure he didn’t mean to harm her. So she spoke to him first.”

  “Fish can talk, too?”

  “In my story, they can.”

  Davey shrugged and settled against her chest. “So what did she say?”

  “She said, ‘If you’ll tell me you love me, I’ll become a beautiful princess and we can marry.’”

  “What did the Prince do?”

  “He laughed and almost dropped her.” Perrie wasn’t sure which rewarded her most, Davey’s broad smile…or Mitch’s soft chuckle.

  She went on. “When she recovered her wits, she looked him straight in the eye and said, ‘You don’t believe me, do you?’”

  “‘You’re just a fish,’ he said. ‘Besides, I don’t want to marry anyone.’

  “‘But you have to,’ she cried out. ‘Otherwise, I can’t become The True Princess.’

  “‘What’s a true princess?’

  “‘The True Princess. The one who inherits the kingdom and tells everyone what to do and everyone lives happily ever after.’

  “The Prince snorted. ‘I wouldn’t live happily, if you were telling me what to do all the time.’”

  Davey giggled. Mitch’s mouth curved at the corners. Perrie wanted to be clever and witty and keep them both smiling, but she had no idea where this story was going.

  “But just then, Ermengilda couldn’t say any more. She couldn’t breathe except in gasps.

  “‘What’s wrong?’ the Prince asked.

  “‘Can’t—’ She tried her hardest to speak. When nothing else would come out, she tried to flap her gills on his palm in Morse code so he’d understand that she needed to get back into the water.”

  “What’s Morse code?” Davey asked.

  Mitch grinned as though he was very familiar with Davey’s penchant for questions.