by Janet Dailey
One moment he was on her, and the next he was rolled off. For a dazed second, Diana thought it was something she had done as Curly pushed himself to his feet.
“Get out of here, Holt!” he snarled. “This is none of your damned business—unless you want to be next after me.”
Diana’s eyes focused on the second figure looming in front of Curly. Of all the people to come to her rescue, Holt Mallory was the last she would have chosen.
“Forget it, Curly,” was his deadly quiet answer.
“Like hell!”
In the dim light, Diana saw Curly aim a right swing at Holt’s face, but it glanced off an upraised left arm. At the same instant that Holt blocked the first punch, he jammed a right fist into Curly’s loin. Curly doubled up, falling to his knees, mouth open, his glazed eyes wide with pain. Diana waited with savage anticipation for the next blow, but none came. Holt had stepped back, his arms lowered.
She scrambled to her feet, determined that Curly would not get off so easily after he had nearly raped her. A pitchfork was stuck in the side of the pile of hay. She grabbed it and ran toward the kneeling figure, sobbing with her desire for vengeance.
“Bastard!” she cried hoarsely. “I’ll—”
So intent on Curly, Diana didn’t see Holt move into her path until his fingers were closing over the wooden handle of the pitchfork to wrench it from her grasp. She fought to regain possession of her only weapon, but Holt tossed it into the hay pile like a spear. She would have retrieved it, but a steel arm circled her to crush her to his chest.
“Let me go!” Diana twisted uselessly in his hold. “He tried to rape me! He deserves to die!”
“Shut up.” Holt covered her mouth with his hand, his cold gray eyes boring into her when she tried to bite him. Behind her, Diana could hear Curly staggering to his feet. Holt’s sharp gaze fixed on him. “You’re fired, Lathrop. Pack your things and be gone within the hour.”
“You can’t fire me because of her.” Curly’s breathing was still labored from pain. “My God, she’s been asking for it. She’s been following me around since I got here, watching me, teasing me, walking around with her blouse half-buttoned and wearing those tight pants. You’ve seen her. She’s been like a bitch dog in heat.”
Diana was sickened by what he said. It was too uncomfortably true. But it didn’t change the fact that he had been going to take her against her will. The anger brought on by humiliation served to fuel the rage she felt toward Curly.
“Officially you are being fired for drinking on the job.” Holt made no other acknowledgment about the accusations Curly had made. “The evidence is that whiskey bottle sitting in the tack room. You’re through, Curly. Now clear out!”
His hand continued to smother Diana’s cries of protest. She struggled against his constricting arm, the buttons of his shirt scraping against her breasts. Holt didn’t let her go until the stable door had closed behind Curly. She pivoted away, hastily buttoning the front of her dress.
“How could you let him get off scot-free like that?” Her eyes were a murderous blue as she turned on Holt. “What kind of a man are you to let him walk away after what he tried to do to me? The Major would have beat him to a pulp.”
“For what?” he challenged. “For taking you up on one of your many invitations? Everybody has seen the way you’ve been strutting around him. Curly was right. You were asking for it. If it wasn’t for the Major, I wouldn’t have interfered.”
The shame of his words burned through her. “He isn’t going to get away with it.” Her voice was tight as she turned to leave. “The Major will see that he’s punished.”
Hard fingers on her arm spun Diana around. “You aren’t going to say a word to the Major about what’s happened,” Holt ordered.
“I am,” she defied him. “He’ll call the police and have Curly put in jail. And I’ll tell him the cowardly way you handled everything. Before I’m through, you won’t be working here, either!”
“You spoiled little bitch.” His expression was carved with contempt. “We just lost the best horseman in the state, and all you can think about is blood. You want the Major to publicly defend your honor, knowing you chased after Curly like a cheap little tramp. You don’t care if the Major looks like a comic figure in front of all his friends, just as long as you get your pound of flesh. He’s too fine a man to deserve a daughter like you.”
The attack demanded some kind of retaliation. There weren’t any words to argue what he said, so Diana swung her open palm at his face, striking his cheek. His eyes took on the color of molten silver. He clamped a hand around her wrist and dragged her to the short bench in front of a stall. Holt bent her over his knee, her skirt falling around her head.
“No!” Diana screamed in shocked protest, suddenly realizing his intention.
It was already too late as her panties were pulled partially down and the first hard slap was administered to her tender flesh. A strangled cry of pain wrenched from her throat. All the struggling in the world couldn’t free her. She sunk her teeth into her lips after that, permitting only grunting moans to escape. Diana didn’t want anyone hearing her cries and finding her in such a humiliating position. Holt made no attempt to check the force of his blows.
The spanking seemed to last for an eternity before he stood her up. Red-faced, her eyes brimming with tears she wouldn’t shed, Diana flashed him a proud and wounded look, her knees quivering, but keeping her upright.
“Are you satisfied?” she challenged in a wavering voice.
The hard lines of his face were impassive. “Somebody should have done that a long time ago.”
“For your information”—Diana made a miserable attempt to sound sarcastic—“I did come here tonight to see Curly. I did want him to notice me. I wanted him to kiss me, but I didn’t ... He offered me some whiskey and I drank it because I didn’t want him to think I was a child. After that, when he . . . I couldn’t seem to . . .” She was having difficulty using the right words. “I never wanted him to do what he was going to when . . .”
What was the difference? Diana turned away in frustration. Holt probably wouldn’t believe her, anyway, and she didn’t care whether he did or not. Why did he have to be the one to come in and find her with Curly? Why couldn’t it have been someone else? God, how she wanted to cry—but not in front of him.
He rose to stand beside her. When Diana wouldn’t look at him, his fingers closed around her chin and forced her head around.
“Supposing what you say is true, the next time something like this happens, and with your kind there will always be a next time,” he inserted, cold and insensitive, “there are two things you can do. You can take your lovely manicured fingernails and scratch his eyes out or ram your knee into his crotch as hard as you can— if you really don’t want him to make love to you.”
“Thanks for the advice,” Diana responded acidly. If her legs weren’t so shaky, she would have tried out the last on him.
His eyes narrowed. “And not a word of this to the Major or anyone else,” Holt ordered. “Not even so much as a hint. The Major knows I already warned Curly once about drinking. He isn’t likely to be suspicious unless you make him so. You got that?”
“Yes, I’ve got it.”
“I am not going to let you hurt or shame the Major,” he warned.
“Your sense of loyalty is overwhelming.” The very last thing Diana wanted to do at this moment was talk to anyone about what had happened tonight. She just hoped she could forget it, but she had the feeling that the sight of Holt Mallory would always remind her. She pulled her chin out of his hand and turned away.
“Where are you going?”
“To the house,” she snapped.
“Not like that,” Holt answered just as sharply. “Hold still.” And he began brushing the hay from her dress and picking it from her hair. When he was through, he offered her his handkerchief. “Blow your nose.”
“It doesn’t need blowing.” Diana refused it and blinked the
last tear from her eyes.
As she walked to the door, Holt’s voice followed her. “Remember what I said.”
“I’m not likely to forget.” Her terse answer was the truth. Her bottom was so sore that Diana knew she would have to sleep on her stomach tonight.
Diana didn’t say a word to anyone about that night. She pretended surprise when the Major mentioned, regretfully, that Curly had been fired. Those who noticed the way she moped around the ranch for the next couple of weeks blamed it on the fact that Curly had left, without realizing there was any connection. Now Diana hated Holt.
Diana graduated from high school with honors, addressing her valedictory speech to the proud face of the Major, seated on the aisle near the front. She enrolled at the university in Reno at the Major’s suggestion.
At first Diana had tried to argue against going on to college. She had no desire to further her education. As far as she was concerned, it was complete.
“But what’s the point of going on to college? I know everything that I need to,” Diana had insisted on a late summer afternoon. “There isn’t anything a professor can teach me about ranching that I can’t learn from you. I know how to keep the books and make all the entries.”
“I am not going to let you waste your intelligence. Besides, there is more to college than classes and professors.” The Major had smiled indulgently. “There are sororities to join, activities to participate in, and parties to attend. You need to taste more things in life before you can be so positive that you know what you want.”
But Diana had been skeptical. “I won’t change my mind.”
“Maybe not,” he had conceded, “but at least you will have experienced something more than the life you’ve known.”
A knock at the door had interrupted their discussion. When the Major had opened the screen door to Holt, resentment had welled up inside Diana. He had read her expression and glanced at the Major.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to intrude.” His apology had been smooth, with the proper degree of respect. Diana could have told him that his presence had been an intrusion in her life since the day he’d arrived. But each time she had tried to shut him out, the Major had welcomed him in. It had become a losing battle.
“You aren’t intruding,” the Major stated. “Diana and I were just discussing her college plans.” Diana could have corrected that, too. They were “his” plans, not hers. “What is it?”
“There are a couple of buyers here interested in your Arabians. They specifically want to look at the yearlings,” Holt had explained. “Rube is bringing the Jeep around to drive them out to the pasture. I thought you’d want to ride along; the buyers seem to have an eye for the good stock.”
“You can handle it without me.” It had been a flat pronouncement of trust in Holt’s ability.
Diana had stared at her father, shaken by his statement and its implication. The Major had delegated responsibility to others before, but never when his prized Arabians were involved. Holt had become firmly entrenched, and she could no longer ignore the fact. The discovery had deafened her ears to the rest of their conversation. The shutting of the screen door had brought her sharply back.
“Your four years at college will go by so fast that they’ll be over before you know it.” The Major had picked up the threads of their previous discussion with hardly a break in rhythm.
In agitation, she had turned away. The Major had come up behind her and rested a hand on her shoulder. She had found scant comfort in this rare display of affection. The Major had always been a very controlled man emotionally, rarely expressing his inner feelings, part of the rigid discipline he acquired in the military, plus a natural male reticence.
“I have always planned for you to attend college, Diana,” he had told her quietly. “Every father dreams of his child obtaining a college degree. I’m no different.”
Diana could find no argument with that. All her life she had done what he wanted. It was too late to break the habit now. She had not wanted to endure his disappointment in her if she refused. Besides, after his conversation with Holt, there had seemed to be little reason to stay at the ranch.
Still, she had offered one small protest. “But Reno is so far away, on the other side of the state.”
“Not so far that you can’t come home on long weekends and holidays,” he had consoled.
So Diana had given in. Consoling herself that she was pleasing him, she threw herself into college life. Her class schedule did not permit many weekends home that first year, restricting her visits to vacation times that were all too short and too far apart. To make the time pass more swiftly, Diana involved herself in more activities and campus parties. She made many surface friends, but her crowded hours never contained the extra minutes to allow deeper relationships, male or female.
The summer came and went almost overnight. It seemed she had barely arrived at the ranch and she was leaving for the fall term.
There were two momentous occurrences in her second year of college. In October, she was called to the dean’s office, where she was informed her father had suffered a mild heart attack and was in the hospital. Diana caught the first plane home to Ely.
As she stared at him in the hospital bed, she noticed he looked pale but otherwise unmarked. The Major had always seemed so invincible. It was a shock to discover that he was not. A vigorous light still burned brightly in his eyes, not flickering, but not eternal, either.
“Don’t look so worried, Diana,” he admonished the concerned expression on her face. “I have plenty of years left in me. I just have to slow down, that’s all. . . take it a little easier than I have been.”
“I’ll make sure that you do.”
“What does that mean?” the Major demanded.
“I’m staying home until you’re better.”
“It was one thing for you to leave college to fly home to see for yourself that I’m all right, but it’s completely unnecessary for you to sit around holding my hand,” he informed her sternly. “I have Holt and Sophie to take care of me.”
Diana wanted to point out that as his only child, it was her right to look after him and not the privilege of some hired help, but the Major didn’t give her a chance to speak.
“I’m turning over the operation of the ranch to Holt. He’s more than capable of handling it now. I’m lucky to have him.” There was no mistaking the admiration and respect in his voice.
“I want to stay home with you.”
“Young lady, you can make me happiest by going back to college and getting your degree. After that, I hope you find an intelligent and ambitious man to marry, maybe have a few children later on. The chances of accomplishing any of those things by isolating yourself out on the ranch is next to impossible.”
“Yes, Major.” But Diana wondered if he would be sending her away if she were his son instead of his daughter.
Diana stayed at a motel in Ely until her father was released from the hospital. She claimed it was because she didn’t want to make the hour-long drive each way from the ranch. The truth, however, was she didn’t want to stay at the ranch knowing Holt Mallory was in charge.
That February, Diana attended a special lecture of her political science class. The guest speaker was a professional lobbyist for Nevada mining interests. His name was Rand Cummings. Tall, extremely good looking, with dark curling hair and blue eyes, he was charming, eloquent, and intelligent. Diana felt an instantaneous attraction to the man, but her experience with Curly had made her wary.
At the end of the afternoon lecture, Diana and a few of the others who had no class afterward remained, ostensibly to ask more questions. Only a blind man would have failed to notice Diana, and Rand Cummings was not blind. They “happened” to walk to the parking lot together. He asked her out and Diana accepted.
It wasn’t exactly a whirlwind courtship, since Diana was determined not to let her emotions carry her away. Rand met most of the criteria she had set. He was mature, in his late twenties,
well established in his chosen profession, and ambitious. He was enough like Curly to arouse her physically, yet he didn’t press her to have intimate relations. During the most heated embraces, Diana sensed his responses were controlled, even when she trembled on the edge of losing hers. His discipline increased her respect for him.
The weekend before her summer break, Rand had driven up from Carson City to spend the time with her. Sunday night was their last evening together. When Rand brought her home, parking the car near her dorm, Diana turned readily into his arms. She abandoned herself to his possessive kisses, in a way testing his control. Before desire could overpower him, Rand was unwinding her arms from around his neck, but he didn’t set her away from him. Instead, he shifted her sideways on his lap and satisfied himself with a leisurely exploration of her neck and throat.
“I’m never quite sure about you, Diana,” he murmured.
There was experience in the sensual way he nibbled near her ear. It sent pleasurable shivers over her skin. Her fingers sought the curling waves of his dark hair to slide through their thickness.
“Aren’t you?” she whispered.
But Rand didn’t seem to find it essential to be sure of her. “You are a beautiful woman. You’ll make an excellent wife for a lobbyist. As a matter of fact, you’d be an asset.”
Diana drew back slightly, eyeing his handsome features through the upward sweep of her lashes. “That sounds very much like a proposal,” she teased.
“It is a proposal. I want you to marry me, Diana,” he stated.
For an instant, she made no response. She tried to see him as the Major would, wondering if he would find in him the same positive attributes that she had found.
