He had overwhelmed her, made her open herself up to him, open her heart to him the way she never had before, not for any man. Not even for herself. And it hurt.
But she had hurt him, too, and she hadn’t known she could, not over plain, ordinary sex. Not even over spectacular sex. They were friends. They should not have been able to breach each other’s internal barriers.
And dammit, she thought with a sniff, she should not still be crying. Crying solved nothing; all it did was stop up her nose and turn her face red and splotchy.
After a few more sniffs she turned on the faucet and splashed cold water on her face. Jack had probably torn off his ice pack by now. She took a stack of gel cold packs from the pantry and put them in the freezer for use later, then went back out to the barn to see about her horse.
At the Cherokee Rose, Caleb parked beside the barn where Justin and Sloan stood waiting for him.
“About damn time you decided to put in an appearance,” Sloan said tersely.
“If you needed me,” Caleb said calmly, “you knew where I was.”
“I knew.” Sloan eyed him carefully. “What I want to know is why. What are you up to with Melanie?”
Justin elbowed his way between them and faced Caleb. “Are you taking advantage of her?”
“Oh, yeah, that’s right, jump on me. Get your minds out of the gutter, both of you.” Never mind that his own had been there for the better part of the week. “It so happens she’s all alone out there on the PR with no one to help her. I’ve been giving her a hand.”
“What do you mean, alone?” Sloan demanded. “Where’s her dad, where are their men?”
“They’re having trouble. Her dad’s gambling again and they had to let the men go. And that’s probably not for public consumption.”
“Why the hell didn’t she say something sooner?” Justin demanded.
“Why the hell didn’t any of us notice sooner?” Sloan asked with disgust.
“Well, it’s done.” Caleb shifted. He thought he heard the rumble of a truck engine approaching. “I’m helping out, and when Ralph Pruitt shows his face again I intend to straighten him out, one way or another.”
Justin gave a sharp tug on the brim of his hat. “You need any help in that department, I’ll be more than happy to lend a hand. He’s got no business leaving her with all that work and responsibility. But right now, we’ve got something else to do.”
“Who’s this?” Sloan motioned toward the pickup and horse trailer coming up the driveway. “Somebody must be lost.”
Caleb and Justin shared a grin.
“Not exactly,” Justin said. “I’ll go get Emily and Grandmother. They’ll want to see this.”
“See what?” Sloan demanded as Justin ran off toward the house. “Hey, that looks like…is that Cal? What’s he doing here?”
Caleb kept quiet until the others arrived and Cal stepped out of the pickup.
“Hey, guys.”
“Cal?” Sloan strode forward to shake hands with their cousin. “What the hell are you doing here? How long can you stay?”
“Save your questions, big guy.” Justin slapped Sloan on the back. “Let’s unload that trailer first.”
When Sloan saw the horse in the trailer, he didn’t have to be told who it was. He recognized the mare he’d fallen in love with last year in Kentucky.
“Cherokee Beauty,” he breathed. “Where are you taking her?” he asked Cal.
“Here,” Cal said.
“Here? What do you mean, here?”
Caleb and Justin shared a look, then laughed. “Happy wedding,” Caleb said, putting a hand on Sloan’s shoulder.
Sloan blinked. “What?”
“You heard me. She’s yours. Yours and Emily’s. A belated wedding present.”
Sloan appeared stunned. “Man. She’s ours? No fooling?”
It wasn’t often that Sloan Chisholm was taken by surprise. Caleb was pleased and proud to have been in on the surprise that so obviously held his brother in awe.
In Caleb’s book, Sloan was the best. He worked like a dog to make sure everyone he loved was taken care of. It felt good, damn good, to be able to do something good for him for a change.
Having just washed another application of liniment off, Melanie was standing with her back to the kitchen window, drying her hands, when she heard a vehicle drive up to the back of the house.
She groaned. She wasn’t ready to face Caleb yet.
Outside, a car door slammed.
Melanie threw her towel onto the counter. Ready or not, her time seemed to have run out. She turned toward the back door just as it flew open.
“I’m home!”
Melanie gaped. It took her a moment to fight her way through the shock, the relief, to find her voice. “Mama!”
“Baby!” Fayrene Pruitt swept her daughter up in a tight hug.
Melanie hugged her back, fiercely glad to see for herself that her mother was all right. In the brief glimpse she’d had before her mother reached her, Melanie had noted that even discounting the cosmetics, her mother’s color was good, her eyes clear and filled with delight.
Mama was okay. Thank God, Mama was okay, and she was home.
But as she stood there in her mother’s beloved arms Melanie became aware that something was different. Her mother had finally lost the extra weight she’d been threatening to shed for years. Melanie pushed back and grinned.
“Mama, you’re all skinny.” At least compared to her former shape. Fayrene had always been a little on the pudgy side. Now she was trim and curvy.
Fayrene grinned. “Well, not all of me.” She wagged her shoulders forward and back.
“Mama, you look great. You’re—” Then Melanie saw what was truly different about her mother’s shape, and she gaped. Her eyes felt ready to pop clear out of her head. “Mama! What have you done?”
Where once a nice, comfortable set of A-cup breasts had rested reliably, there now sat perched the grandest pair of D-cups Melanie had ever seen.
“Mama!”
Fayrene threw back her head and laughed. “You like ’em?”
“What have you done?”
Fayrene held her arms in the air and danced around in a circle. She wore blue jeans that looked painted on, a silver concho belt and a red, Western style blouse with white piping and, along the yoke, fringe, which only accented her new breasts.
“This is what you had done at the Scottsdale Clinic?”
Fayrene patted her new breasts. “They did a really nice job, too.”
All the worry, all the fear for her mother’s life, and she’d had a boob job? Melanie didn’t know whether to laugh, cry or throttle her mother.
She did all three. She started laughing, hysterically, then went for her mother’s throat. “I could strangle you.” Tears came through the laughter. “I thought you were sick or dying. Dammit, Mama, you scared the daylights out of me.”
Fayrene stepped back and gaped. “Why on earth would you think something like that?”
“What am I supposed to think when you charge ten thousand dollars on the credit card at a place called Scottsdale Clinic? And then you don’t return my phone calls? And while we’re on the subject, how in the hell are we supposed to pay that bill?”
Fayrene’s mouth opened and closed like a fish sucking air. “What do you mean?” she finally managed to say.
“Hell-o-o.” Melanie tapped a finger against her mother’s temple. “When you charge on the credit card, I have to come up with the cash to pay the credit card company.”
Fayrene shook her finger in Melanie’s face. “Don’t you talk to me that way, young lady. I’m still your mother.”
“I know you are, and I love you, and I respect you. But between you and Daddy—”
“What about your daddy?”
Melanie shook her head and turned away. “He’s—” She paused at the sound of another vehicle approaching the house. She glanced out the window.
“He’s what, baby?”
&n
bsp; “He’s here,” Melanie said. “He just pulled up.” A man was in the pickup with him, and another man followed in a sedan.
Just great, Melanie thought. What a time for her dad to bring company home with him.
If she had been counting to ten she wouldn’t have finished before her father burst through the back door. “Mel?” Then he saw his wife. His eyes popped. “Good grief! Fayrene? Holy smokes! What the hell have you done to yourself?”
“Well,” Fayrene said, propping her hands on her hips and thrusting out her new, more-than-ample chest, “it looks like I finally have your attention. For once.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Ralph demanded.
“Wait a minute,” Melanie said, stunned. “You don’t mean to tell me that you did this just to get Daddy’s attention.”
“It worked, didn’t it?” Fayrene smirked. “Look at him. He can’t take his eyes off me.”
“He’s staring at your boobs.”
“Yes.” Fayrene’s smile was pure feline. “He is.”
“I am not.” Ralph jerked his gaze away from his wife’s chest for the first time since entering the house. “Okay, I was,” he grumbled. “Hell’s bells, look at ’em? Who wouldn’t stare?”
“Daddy, for heaven’s sake.”
“No, baby,” Fayrene said. “It’s quite all right. This is exactly how I’d hoped he’d react.”
“Good God, you did do it for him,” Melanie cried.
“Of course. Why else would a woman do such a thing?”
Melanie groaned in frustration. She and her mother had entirely different personalities and ways of thinking. Thank goodness.
Outside the back door the man who had ridden with her father started whistling.
Melanie’s father jumped as if jabbed by a cattle prod. “A couple of guys came with me.”
“I can see that,” Melanie said. “Who are they? Why are they here?”
“I made a deal.”
“You’ve been gambling again,” Fayrene accused.
Ralph glared at Melanie.
“Don’t look at me,” she declared. “I didn’t say a word.”
Fayrene huffed. “She didn’t have to. You look guilty as hell, the place looks run-down and our baby girl is griping about money. If that isn’t enough, I recognize a couple of goons when I see them,” she added, nodding toward the two men outside. “What have you got yourself into this time, Ralphie?”
Ralph pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket and wiped it across his forehead. “Look, you two. I owe these guys’ boss a lot of money, money Melanie says we don’t have. I made a deal with him to clear my slate, but you can’t talk about it, either of you, to anyone. Not ever, do you hear me? Not ever.”
Melanie had never seen her father so distraught. He looked as if he might throw up any minute. “Let’s sit at the table and have some iced tea while you tell us about it,” she suggested.
Ralph seized the idea like a lifeline. However, he wasn’t so distracted by his problems that he didn’t have the presence of mind to pull out the chair at the foot of the table for her mother before seating himself at the head of the table.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” Ralph said to his wife as Melanie filled glasses with ice.
“I can’t believe you’ve been gambling,” Fayrene said softly.
While Melanie poured tea, her father stared down at his folded hands and blushed.
Good for you, Mama, Melanie thought. Maybe her mother could reach Daddy, when Melanie had been unable to.
“Okay,” Melanie said, giving them their glasses and taking a seat between them. “What’s this deal you made?”
Ralph stalled by taking a long, deep gulp of tea. Finally he put the glass down and swallowed. “I made a deal with Bruno.”
“Oh, God,” Fayrene cried. “You owe money to somebody named Bruno? I suppose his last name is Corleone or Gotti or something.”
Ralph rolled his eyes. “His last name, Miss Smarty-Pants, is McGuire. Bruno McGuire. Now just hush up, both of you, and let me tell this. Sometime late tonight somebody’s going to drive a pickup or truck or something in and park it in the pasture behind the barn. A little while after that, Bruno and some of his people will come, split up the cargo and leave. In a couple of weeks they’ll do it all again, and my debt will be wiped out.”
Melanie did not like the sound of this. “What kind of cargo has to be driven in and split up in the middle of a pasture, in the middle of the night?”
“I don’t know,” her father said. “I didn’t ask, and you won’t, either. We don’t need to know. All we need to do is stay in the house until it’s all over with.”
“What kind of trouble are you getting us into with this deal?” she demanded.
“I’m keeping my kneecaps whole,” he barked back. “Don’t give me any grief on this, little girl. Just keep quiet and go along with it.”
“What are the two goons outside for?” she demanded, far from satisfied with his response.
Ralph shifted in his chair and looked decidedly uncomfortable. “George is going to wait here so he can call Bruno when the shipment arrives.”
“What about the other one?”
Ralph flushed. “That’s Little Donnie.”
Melanie leaned sideways to look out the door at the two-hundred-fifty-pound ball of lard leaning against the front fender of his sedan. “Little Donnie?”
“Yeah, well. He’s gonna park out across the driveway and make sure nobody drives in except the truck they’re expecting.”
“Oh, that’s great.” Melanie slapped her palms onto the table. “That’s just great. In other words, we’re prisoners here. In our own house.”
“Now, little girl, don’t—”
George tapped on the back door. “Hi, folks. Mind if I come in?” Without waiting for an answer, he pulled open the storm door and let himself in.
Melanie glared at her father. Anger didn’t come close to defining the fury she felt at his bringing these goons into their home. Neither did terror. For all she knew, these guys were here to kill them once they got what they wanted from them.
The first problem arose when Melanie announced she was going to the barn to give Jack’s ankle another treatment.
George had other ideas. “Sorry, miss, but you’ll want to stay in the house for the rest of the day.”
“Look—George, is it?”
“That’s right.” The man grinned like an idiot.
He might very well be an idiot, Melanie thought, but he had mean eyes. And a windbreaker. Gray slacks and blue shirt, and a navy blue windbreaker. On television, the only reason a guy wore a windbreaker when it was warm enough to do without one was to hide a gun.
She shook her head, certain she was being ridiculous. Even if he did have mean eyes.
“Well, look, George,” she said. “I’ve got a lame horse out there who needs care. If I don’t get out there and tend to him once more today, then three times again tomorrow, he could become permanently lame. Since none of us wants that to happen, I’ll just go take care of him and be back in a half hour or so.”
George motioned to her parents. “Then we’ll all go with you.”
Melanie glanced down at the man’s shiny, black patent-leather shoes and smirked. “Suit yourself.” She’d have to be sure and find a nice fresh pile of manure for him to step in. Too bad there weren’t any cattle at the barn. A juicy cow patty would be just the thing.
George proved adept at stepping around the horse droppings in the barn, but there was nothing he could do to avoid the bits of straw and alfalfa that floated through the air and clung to his once-clean slacks.
And Melanie made sure to splatter a little water on his patent leathers.
She started to give him a nice dousing with liniment, but decided against it when she realized she might very well be stuck in the same house with him for hours.
She would like to send him packing. Getting herself and her parents into the house and locking G
eorge out would be simple enough. But her father had asked her to behave. He wanted to do this deal to wipe out his debt. Since she was the one who had cut off his cash, rendering him unable to pay up, she owed him her cooperation. And her loyalty.
Back in the house Melanie scrubbed liniment from her hands for the third time that day.
“You did good with Jack,” her father told her. “It’s not a bad sprain. He’ll be good as new in another day or two.”
“You think so?” No one knew more about taking care of animals than her father.
“Yep.”
The phone rang. Ralph picked it up. “Caleb. Howdy. Sure, she’s here. Hold on.” He held the phone out toward Melanie. “It’s Caleb, for you.”
The sound of his name. That was all it took to make her pulse flutter in her throat. “I’ll, uh, take it in my bedroom.”
After she picked up the extension in her room and her father had hung up the one in the kitchen, she closed her bedroom door.
“Your dad came back,” Caleb said.
“That’s not even the half of it.” She forgot, for a moment, that she was angry with him and the reason for it. Instead she remembered only their friendship, the safety and security she felt in being able to tell him anything and know he would never judge her. “Mama came home today, too.”
“She’s all right?”
Melanie chuckled. “Well, she’s healthy.”
“You must be relieved.”
“I would be more relieved if Daddy hadn’t brought two creeps home with him.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I wish. I—”
Her bedroom door flew open.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she demanded harshly.
“You need to come out here with the rest of us.”
“Listen, you creep.” Oh, this man had way over-stepped. “You get out of here right this minute and I won’t rip out your tongue. But you so much as look at my bedroom again and I’ll peel the hide off your face with my teeth.”
On the other end of the phone line Caleb stiffened. One of her father’s goons was in her bedroom?
“Melanie?” he said. When she didn’t answer, he repeated himself, louder.
The Other Brother Page 12
