Too restless to stay inside, and with too many hours left until she'd be tired enough to sleep, she crept down the stairs and slipped past the dining room, hoping Matt wouldn’t notice her. But the moment she stepped onto the porch, the screen door shot open and Matt grabbed her by the arm. "Where are you going?" he asked, his tone snappish.
Tugging against his grip, Ruth said, "Some place where I can be alone."
Matt tightened his hand on her arm. "Not until we talk this out."
Not prepared to answer Matt's questions, Ruth said, "What about your brother?"
Matt looked at her, baffled. "What's he got to do with anything?"
"Shouldn’t you be inside with him? He came all the way from Salem to see you."
"He's in the study putting together a case that will send Jody packing," Matt said, "and we are going to talk."
"All right, have it your way. You will anyway," Ruth said. When he loosened his hold, she started for the door.
Matt's hand shot out, taking her by the arm again. "Not in there. In the barn where we can talk without being disturbed."
Glaring at him, Ruth said, "If we go to the barn, talking's not the way it will turn out, and you know it as well as I do."
"I don't intend to have a quick roll in the hay if that's what you're implying. I mean to talk to you in private, which will be in the barn." Matt took her arm and she made no attempt to pull out of his grasp. She knew better than to try.
In the barn, Matt braced his arms on her shoulders, and said, "You've got me so tied in knots I can't think straight. All I see is you at the swimming hole, near-naked and wanting me, and I can't do a damn thing about it."
"Then go to Lorinda," Ruth said, irritably. "She can fix your problem."
"But she can't fix this." Matt clamped his hand over his heart. She stared at his hand, then looked into eyes that were no longer angry, but instead, softly luminous in the subdued light. Her anger too began to fade, replaced by puzzlement. "I don't understand."
"Then I'll try to explain." Matt peered into her eyes and she felt the tingle of his breath against her face as he said, "Honey, I can't give you love right now, it's not in me to give, but I can give you whatever you want to make you happy here. All I ask is that you stay with me and help me with Annie."
...can't give you love... not in me to give...
Matt's words hung heavily as a deep nagging uneasiness settled over Ruth. She tried to keep her voice steady, as she said, "That's exactly what I am doing."
"When I say stay with me, I'm talking about with me in a relationship," Matt said.
"And in your bed," Ruth clarified.
"No. Well... yes... that is, I don't know what I'm asking. All I know is you're different. You're important to me."
"I see."
Matt glided his hands down her arms and back up to rest on her shoulders, and said, in a voice filled with expectation, "You're a passionate woman, honey, but you keep it bottled up inside. We could be good together."
Ruth shrugged from under his hands and backed away from him. "Let me see if I get this straight. Along with helping you with Annie, you want me to be on-call for sex whenever the notion moves you, and in return you'll feed me and clothe me and give me whatever I want to make me happy here. I assume that will also include pay for being Annie's nanny."
"You're twisting what I said."
"What you said is very clear. It's a very tempting offer, but most mistresses at least get a car out of the deal."
Matt's eyes narrowed, and the muscles in his jaws bunched. "You know that’s not what I’m asking you to be."
"Fine. Then you tell me what, exactly, it is you're asking of me," Ruth said, "because I haven't got a clue."
"Why are you making this so complicated? Couples live together all the time."
"Is that the message you want to send Annie, that Daddy and her nanny sleep together?"
"We could be discrete."
"Yes, we could, but I already told you my feeling on sexual relationships outside of marriage," Ruth said. "So the way I see it, you keep your pants zipped, and I'll continue the job I was hired to do. That way no one will get hurt by anything as archaic as falling in love. Now that would be a complication."
Matt sighed. "Maybe I just need more time."
"Fine. Take all the time you want. I'm satisfied with things the way they are."
"You're the most stubborn woman I've ever met."
"Me stubborn? Hah! If that isn't the pot calling the kettle black. What is it about me that you find stubborn?"
"This notion that love has to be a factor in a fulfilling relationship."
"Love is a factor. Didn't you love your wife?"
Matt looked at Ruth with a start. Then his brows gathered, and he said, "I thought I did. But at the time I was a teen, with down for a beard, and only one thing on my mind."
"It seems that one thing is still on your mind," Ruth groused.
"This time it's different. You're different. I've never met a woman like you. You're strong and independent and passionate. And you've connected with Annie in a way no other woman has, not even Jody."
Ruth was on the verge of saying... I connected because she's my daughter... but willed herself to focus on the reason she was there. But Matt had just given her the perfect opening to ask all the questions she'd wanted to ask from the day she first arrived, including questions about the adoption, though she'd have to tread carefully.
Putting some space between them, she said, "I know you're a dedicated father, and I respect you for that, but just because I've managed to connect with Annie, you're asking me to stay here and share your bed without a commitment of marriage. Yet, I know little about you. I think that gives me a right to ask questions."
"Fine. Ask all the questions you want," Matt replied.
Deciding she'd start by verifying information Bill passed on to her, Ruth said, "Well... first of all, how did you meet your wife?"
Holding her gaze, Matt replied, "I worked for her father."
...he married a rancher's daughter, divorced her and ended up with the ranch and sole custody of their daughter...
At least Matt wasn’t lying. But would he reveal the rest? How he got the ranch and sole custody of Annie? "You said you were nineteen when you married. Did her father approve?" Ruth asked.
"Yes it was with his blessing," Matt replied. "By the time I hired on Jody had slept with every cowhand on the ranch and half the boys in Pine Grove. She was a couple of years older than me, but she told me early on she'd make a man of me, and she did."
"Didn't it bother you that she'd been with other men?" Ruth asked.
Matt gave a kind of grudging laugh. "She told me early on that I had the biggest you-know-what she'd ever seen. You can imagine what that did for a sixteen-year-old's ego. I felt like the ranch stud. And she treated me like it too. I was obsessed with her, having her on my mind day and night. Do you have any idea what it's like for a guy to ride all day with sex on his mind? By the end of the day I felt like I had a corncob shoved down my pants. But she'd be there to tell me she'd kiss it and make it all better. And when she did, I thought I'd died and gone to heaven."
Ruth tried not to focus on Matt's virility, or his sexual obsession with his wife, but the images of Matt with his wife couldn't be dismissed. Nor could she understand why she found them so disturbing. Matt and his wife had been hot-blooded teenagers with raging hormones. Of course it would have been that way. And now she was acting like a teenager with raging hormones. It was unseemly behavior for a woman past thirty. It was also getting her off track, and there were still questions that needed to be asked.
"How did you happen to end up with Annie and the ranch?" There, it was out. She hadn't intended to be so blunt, but she couldn't take back the words.
"Jody's father thought I could tame some of that wild spirit of hers," Matt said, "but in the twelve years we were married, I never did. Jody left Annie and me when Annie was two-and-a-half to run off with that b
astard, Wayne. He was lead guitar in an up-and-coming country and western band. Divorce papers followed."
"And you're still angry about it," Ruth said.
Matt let out a short guffaw. "No, I understand it now. But at the time, I was too caught up with my own bruised pride, wondering why I couldn't satisfy my wife, that I failed to see that all along she'd been searching for something I couldn't give her. And I should have known. Many nights I'd wake up and reach for her, only to find an empty bed. But she wasn't with a man. She'd be sitting on the porch with her guitar, working out a song, always a song about searching for something. And in the end she got what she wanted, and so did I."
Ruth looked at him, puzzled. "I don't understand."
He shrugged. "Jody never liked the ranch, and her father never got over her walking out on Annie and me. He changed his will after she ran off. When he died two years later, I found out he’d left half the ranch to me and half to Annie when she's thirty-five, or whenever I think she's ready to run her half. It wasn't much of a place when I first married Jody, and her father’s method of keeping records was to shove everything into as many shoeboxes as it took, but I worked my butt off, and by the time her father passed away, it was a pretty respectable spread."
Ruth contemplated everything Matt told her. It all connected. After a few moments, she said, "What I don't understand is how you could marry a woman who’d slept with every cowboy on the ranch, and not care if Annie and your men swim nude together. You're teaching Annie a total disregard for modesty, which can end up as an excuse for casual sex when she reaches puberty."
"Yeah, well, I've been thinking about that too," Matt conceded. "I never gave it much thought because Annie's still so young, but seeing her in that dress, looking so grown up... I got to thinking maybe what you said... That is, what I'm trying to say is—" he stopped short and looked at her.
Ruth waited, and after a stretch of silence, she said, "Is it so hard to admit you're wrong? Everyone makes mistakes. No one's infallible."
Matt heaved a sigh. "Okay, you win. Annie won't be swimming with the men. Are you satisfied?"
"Yes." Ruth smiled. She had no idea why his admission pleased her so, but it made her want to throw her arms around Matt and kiss him all the more. Instead, she said, "Was that so hard?" The way he was looking at her made her breath catch.
"No," he replied. "What's hard is seeing you smiling at me and wanting to take you in my arms and kiss you and... Hell, I think I will anyway." He dragged her to him, but when he went to kiss her, she braced her hands against his chest.
"I'm not through asking questions," she said, knowing if Matt kissed her, she'd lose the only chance she'd have to ask her most important question.
Matt looked at her with a blend of grudging tolerance and irritation, and said, "You know my background, my family, you're here at my home, you've seen me with Annie. What more do you need to know about me to be convinced I'm just an ordinary man?"
"Not a lot really," Ruth replied. "It's just that... since I'm here as Annie's nanny, I should know a little bit about the circumstances of her adoption. Where you got her."
Eyes narrowed, Matt said, "Annie's adoption's in the past, she's my legal daughter, and nothing more needs to be said. So is there anything else you want to know about me?"
Ruth knew from the look on Matt's face that any discussion about the circumstances surrounding Annie's adoption was closed. She also sensed he was hiding something. "No, I suppose not," she replied. "But it takes time to get to know someone and I feel like you're pressuring me into a relationship I'm not ready for."
"I'm not trying to pressure you into anything you don't want to do," Matt said, moving toward her, "but we have something special and I don't want to lose it. And right now I want to hold you." He curved his arms around her, and Ruth made no attempt to get free. During those terrible empty years she'd wanted to be held the way Matt was holding her. She tightened her arms around him, absorbing the warmth of his body against hers and the strength of his arms holding her. And when he kissed her, she responded by kissing him back with an intensity that seemed to release the tension that had been building.
He kissed her jaw and her neck and the side of her face and returned to her lips, and she thrust her fingers into his hair, drawing his lips closer. As the kiss deepened, his hands seemed to be everywhere. Down her back, over her hips, cupping her buttocks and pressing her to him. But when they began unsnapping her shirt, she broke the kiss, backed out of the circle of his arms, and said, "This is exactly what I was afraid would happen."
Without waiting for his response, she rushed out of the barn and returned to the house. Yet, it would have been so easy to play by Matt's rules. She could continue searching for the truth about Annie and Beth, and if nothing came of it, she'd simply walk away because they were playing by Matt's rules. No love. No commitment. No regrets.
But as each day passed, her feelings for Matt were growing deeper, and with those feelings came a stronger desire to tie herself to him, body and soul, and she wondered how long she could hold out. But she already knew the answer. She'd hold out until she knew whether or not Annie was Beth. Beyond that, she refused to dwell.
***
Ruth sat on the embankment of the swimming hole while watching Annie and Matt frolicking in the water. It had been four days since her encounter with Matt in the barn, and for the most part he was giving her the space she wanted by putting no pressure on her for a physical relationship. He'd gone back to light-hearted bantering. But there were moments when he'd look at her with an intensity that told her his desire for her was mounting, just as her desire for him was. She hated this paradoxical need for him. But she was determined to fight it...
"Ready or not, here I come." Annie sprang off the embankment.
Matt caught her in his arms. "Get ready. Here you go." He tossed her into the water.
Annie emerged laughing. "Come on, Ruth. Jump in. Daddy'll catch you."
"Yeah, come on, honey, I'll catch you." Matt smiled. "You can count on that."
When Ruth remained sitting, Annie scrambled up the embankment, grabbed her hand, braced her heels in the embankment, and cried, "Come on. Daddy'll catch you. It's really fun."
Ruth tugged against Annie's grip. "Annie, I really don't think I should."
"Of course you should," Matt yelled. "Are you afraid I won't catch you? Believe me, you have nothing to worry about."
Ruth looked at Annie who was waiting expectantly, then at Matt, who looked like a tomcat on the prowl. At least he was wearing a bathing suit of sorts. He'd settled for a pair of cut-off jeans. But they were almost threadbare, and once soaked with water, they hung below his navel, emphasizing the dark line of hair that disappeared beneath the waist, clinging to that part of him she was having trouble ignoring....
"Do it, Ruth," Annie pleaded. "Please?"
Ruth sighed. "Okay." She glanced at Matt. "You will catch me, won't you?"
"Do I need to answer that?"
"Okay, here I come." Ruth launched herself into the air and landed in Matt's arms. But when she looked up at him, he wasn't smiling, and neither was she.
"This is hell," he mumbled. "When I suggested we come here, I didn't mean with Annie tagging along. We need to talk."
"We tried that, remember?"
"Which is why you’ve been avoiding me again, I suppose."
"It’s easier that way."
Annie's voice rang out. "Throw Ruth up in the air and catch her, Daddy, like you did me."
"We'll continue this later." He tossed Ruth in the air and caught her, one hand halfway covering her breast, the other holding her backside. He shifted her in his arms and grunted. "Like I said, this is hell. Come to my room tonight."
"No."
"Why? Because Annie might hear us or because I can’t make a commitment? You know my position on that. After Annie's gone, things will be different. You're everything I want in a wife, but not until Annie's gone. Please come to me tonight, honey. I won
't press you to go beyond whatever boundaries you set. I just want to hold you."
Matt's words tugged at her heart, and Ruth found herself saying, "All right, I'll come sometime after midnight—"
"Daddy, get ready, here I come."
"Damn!" Matt dumped Ruth in the water and opened his arms in time to catch Annie. He tossed Annie in the air and threw her into the water, while Ruth scrambled up the embankment, her body feeling as if it were wound tighter than a spring, a spring that needed to be released.
Although she told Matt she'd come to his room, she immediately had second thoughts. But looking at him now, with water rolling down his muscular chest and his cutoffs draping low, the notion of making love was beginning to take hold. It wasn’t as if she were a virgin. And once her sexual need was satisfied, she could put her energy into searching for the truth, and maybe bedtime talk after lovemaking would bring unexpected answers.
With a smile of anticipation, she reached for the picnic basket and lowered herself to the towel, and a few minutes later, Matt joined her. "Are you hungry?" she asked.
"In more ways than one." Matt's eyes gleamed with carnal intent. "Besides, a growing boy needs lots of food, and believe me honey, I'm growing bigger every second I'm around you."
Ruth scooped up some potato salad and plopped it on his plate. "Then this should take care of your problem, at least until tonight." The words seemed to slip out, and for the moment, she had no desire to retract them.
Matt kissed her lightly when Annie had her back turned, then leaned close to her ear, and said in a deep, low voice that seemed to touch every sensuous region of her body, "And just to prove to you my heart is captain of this ship and not my rudder, we’ll ignore that troublesome part of my anatomy for a while tonight and focus on your needs. I intend to make you tingle in places you never knew existed, and I want to kiss every place that tingles. Only then will we take care of my ongoing problem. Meanwhile here comes you-know-who."
Ruth looked past Matt to see Annie coming towards them. She scurried up the embankment, ran a towel over her little wet body, and sat beside Ruth.
Justified Deception (Prequel: Dancing Moon Ranch Series) Page 13
