"I've got something really big that I want to show you."
Sam slipped her hand between their bodies and took him into her hand. "I hate to disappoint you, Nash," she said, a slow smile tugging at her lips as she stroked him. "But I've already seen it."
Her playful teasing caught him by surprise, but it was the clever movements of her fingers on him that tripped a wire, making his need to hurry seem less urgent. He rolled, bringing Sam across his chest. Just one more taste, he promised himself, then he'd take her and show her his dreams.
Her smile spread, lighting her eyes with mischief as she braced her hands against his chest and gazed down at him. "I thought you said we needed to hurry?"
"Forget what I said," he growled, catching her lower lip between his teeth. He clasped his hands at her hips to guide her to him. "We've got all the time in the world."
Sighing her pleasure, Sam closed her mouth over his as he entered her. The heat was instantaneous, spreading through her womb, burning away whatever inhibitions remained and leaving her with a confidence she'd never thought she'd possess. She was a woman now in every sense of the word and she had a woman's needs, a woman's desire. Lacing her fingers with his, she drew his arms above his head and held him there, then lifted her head to meet his gaze. Heat danced between them. "I want you," she whispered and began to move, her eyes locked on his. "All of you."
And all of him was what Nash was prepared to give her. "Then take me," he replied, his voice rough with his own need as he arched his hips high to meet her. He thrust deep inside her, filling her with his hardness, and nearly lost his fingerhold on control when she sank down, taking him even deeper. Passion glazed her eyes, slackened her grip on his hands … and then she began to ride him. Faster and faster until perspiration glistened on her skin and her face was flushed with the effort. When he was sure he couldn't hold back any longer, she arched, crying out, and curled her fingers into fists around his hands. With one last thrust he sent them both tumbling over the edge.
"So when are you going to tell me where you're taking me?"
Keeping his gaze on the road, Nash reached across the console and grabbed Sam's hand, dragging it to his thigh. "I'm not. It's a surprise."
"Meanie," she muttered halfheartedly.
Chuckling, he slung an arm along the back of her seat and drew her as close as the bucket seats would allow. "So Colby tells me."
Biting back a smile, Sam gave his thigh a squeeze and settled back for the ride. She couldn't remember the last time she'd ridden in a car with a man. Other than Gabe and Jesse, of course. More often than not when out on the ranch, she found herself squeezed between the two of them in the cab of the truck.
But it had never felt like this. This was special. Intimate. She could feel the swell of muscle on Nash's thigh, the heat that burned through his jeans and into her hand. The weight of his arm on her neck wasn't a burden, but a comfort, one she hadn't dared to believe she'd ever experience.
"We're here."
His announcement drew her from her thoughts and she sat up just as they passed under the faded and rusted sign that proclaimed Rivers Ranch.
"Oh, Nash! We can't go to your house! It's barely morning! What will Nine, and Colby think?"
"Don't worry. We aren't stopping at the house. I just want to show you my plans for the property."
Sam sank back with relief as Nash swung the car onto a dirt path barely visible through the tall grass and weeds.
"Along the highway frontage will be a strip shopping center," he explained. "Fast food, convenience store, dry cleaners, that type of thing. Here," he said pointing, "is where the residential lots begin. Most are five acres, but we do have a few that are closer to ten."
They bounced along with Nash pointing out different features of each of the lots, sharing his dreams. Sam could hear the pride in his voice, the excitement, but as she looked around her all she felt was an overwhelming sadness.
"And this will be the golf course," he finished, waving a hand at the acreage in front of them. "Arnold Palmer is designing it for me."
"What did you raise here?" Sam asked, trying her best to envision a golf course where cattle or horses should be grazing.
"Herefords. Dad was real proud of his herd."
"What happened to them?"
Sam felt his shoulder rub against hers as he shrugged. "I sold them." Swinging the car around, Nash headed back to the entrance. "Now I have another surprise for you."
As they drove, Sam looked around her, imagining the land being used as it was meant to be. Cattle grazing on thick green grass. Horses running across the wide meadows, their manes and tails flying in the wind. Birds singing in the trees. Ducks swimming in the ponds.
They bumped their way onto the main highway and Nash turned right, headed toward Austin. But Sam's mind was still focused on Rivers Ranch. She could understand why Colby was fighting so hard to stay there. It was a beautiful place, peaceful and full of promise. How could Nash not want to live there? She could understand his feelings about his career, but just because he lived on the ranch didn't mean he had to be a rancher. Lots of people owned farms and ranches but worked in Austin, hiring a manager to take care of their livestock and the daily chores. Why couldn't Nash? This was his heritage, for heaven's sake! His family had worked there and died there. Surely that must mean something to him!
"Well, what do you think?"
His question pulled Sam from her dismal thoughts. "About what?"
He pulled his car to the curb and parked, leaning around Sam to point. She turned to follow the line of his finger.
They were parked in the middle of a cul-de-sac, and a two-story stucco condo with a postage-stamp-sized lawn stood on the other side of the curb.
"This is my house," he explained proudly. "The one we're going to move into as soon as Rivers Ranch subdivision is underway."
Sam stared at the narrow building, at the less than twenty feet that separated it from the units on either side and felt a shiver chase down her spine. She couldn't imagine living in such cramped quarters, not after spending her whole life on the Double-Cross, where she had hundreds and hundreds of acres to roam. Not that the condo wasn't nice. It was obviously expensive, and probably very roomy inside.
"I'd show it to you, but I don't have the key with me," Nash said with regret.
Sam let out a slow breath. "That's okay. Maybe another time."
Nash dropped a quick kiss on her cheek. "Yeah. Another time."
As they drove back to the Double-Cross, Sam's mood sank lower and lower. She loved Nash and she suspected that his feelings for her were the same. Why else would he want to share his plans with her, his dreams? The problem was, Sam didn't share those same dreams. How did two people go about blending their dreams, their lives, when they were so different?
"Sam, look," Nash said, giving her shoulder a nudge with his. "Is that smoke?"
Sam pushed her worrisome thoughts aside and peered through the windshield ahead. Her eyes widened. "Oh, my God! Something's burning."
"At the Double-Cross?"
"No! It's too far away for that. It has to be the Circle Bar. We've got to tell Jesse."
Nash raced to the Double-Cross but when they reached the house, Sam pressed a hand against his arm. "His truck's gone," she moaned, her worried gaze scanning the drive. "He must already know."
Nash whipped the car around and headed back down the drive.
Sam sat on the edge of the seat, her gaze focused on the wall of black smoke billowing against the morning sky. "Oh, God, please don't it let be the barns," she murmured, her thoughts centered on the defenseless livestock she knew were penned there.
Hearing the fear in her voice, Nash stretched out a hand, lacing his fingers with hers. "It's probably nothing more than a load of hay that's caught fire," he offered, trying to reassure her. "You know how much those suckers smoke."
But when they topped the hill that looked down on the valley where the Barrister home lay, they both sucked
in a shocked breath. Flames leapt from the roof of the Georgian-style home and curled from the shattered windows, licking upwards. "Oh, my God, no!" Sam cried.
Nash pressed the accelerator to the floor, racing toward the burning house. Trucks were parked helter-skelter across the lawn in front, while men ran, dragging hoses from the volunteer fire truck and adding them to those already aimed on the house.
Before the car came to a complete stop, Sam was leaping out and racing toward the crowd who watched helplessly from a safe distance. Spotting Mandy, Sam grabbed her sister's arm. "Where's Jesse?" she gasped.
Her face creased with worry, Mandy nodded toward the barns. "He and Pete are moving all the horses out into the pasture, just in case it spreads."
"Margo?" Nash asked, joining them. "Did she get out?"
Before Mandy could answer, Nash heard the high-pitched wail. He craned his neck to see above the crowd and saw Margo, still dressed in her nightclothes, racing toward the house. A fireman grabbed her, pulling her back.
"My house!" she screamed, fighting to break loose. "I've got to save my house!"
Though the faces of those who looked on were sympathetic, no one made a move to console her. Nash remembered Sam telling him that Margo had few friends. None among the wranglers who worked the Circle Bar, none among the neighbors who had gathered to offer their help in putting out the fire.
Feeling duty-bound by their business relationship to offer what comfort he could, Nash started pushing his way through the crowd. "Here, I'll take her," he told the fireman and took a firm hold on Margo, turning her away from the destruction. "Margo," he soothed. "There's nothing you can do now."
She collapsed into his arms. "Oh, Nash!" she sobbed, clinging to him. "My house. My beautiful house. It's ruined!"
"I know, Margo, I know," he murmured, trying to calm her. "But you can build another one, even finer than this one."
She pushed from his arms, her eyes wild. "No!" she screamed. "I can't! It was all in Wade's will. If the house was ever destroyed, the land it stands on reverts back to the estate. It's Jesse's now! Jesse's!"
The venom behind the name wasn't lost on Nash. Nor was the attention her screams were drawing from the crowd. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sam pushing her way toward him and was grateful for her support when she joined him.
"Why don't you let us take you somewhere?" Sam offered gently, laying a hand on Margo's arm. "Someplace where you can rest."
"You sumuvabitches," a male voice yelled drunkenly. "Git yore hands offn me."
The crowd parted, revealing Jesse and Pete striding forward, dragging a man between them. Soot camouflaged the parts of the man's face his hat didn't shadow.
Sam felt tension shoot through Margo's arm just before the woman jerked free of her.
"You!" Margo screeched, turning on the man. "You did this to me!" She flew at him, her nails scraping against his face, her fists battering his chest.
He lifted his arms to ward off her blows and inadvertently knocked off his hat. Sam's eyes widened in shock as his face came into full view. Though his eyebrows were gone and his hair was singed to a frayed mass of black, she recognized him. "Rube," she whispered in disbelief.
Nash turned to her, frowning. "Who?"
"Rube. He used to work on the Double-Cross. Mandy fired him when he threatened to whip Jaime." She gasped, grabbing for Nash's arm as Margo succeeded in landing a blow on the man's chin. Rube staggered back, cradling his chin in his hand while a snarl curled his lips.
"You bitch," he spat out. "I didn't do nothin' to you that you didn't deserve. You were supposed to pay me, remember? A sweet little deal. All's I had to do was provide you information on the goings on over at the Double-Cross between him," he said, jerking his head toward Jesse, "and that whore of a woman he now calls his wife."
At the word "whore", Jesse grabbed Rube by his collar and jerked him upright, thrusting his face up close to his. "Don't you ever let me hear you refer to my wife in that way again." He gave the man a rough shake. "You hear me?"
Rube's adam's apple bobbed convulsively, his eyes wide with fear. "Y-yeah, I—I hear you."
Jesse angled his head, turning his dark gaze on Margo. "Is what he said true? Were you paying him to spy on us?"
Margo took a step back, her eyes wide. "N-no! He's lying."
"I ain't lyin'," Rube yelled. "She paid me twice. Over six months ago. It was the last time she wouldn't pay up on. I was to call her and let her know when you and the kid and—" he swallowed nervously, obviously concerned about Jesse's threat "—and yore wife got back from that camp-out y'all went on jist 'fore you got hitched. I told her I was gonna make her pay one way or t'other."
"So you set her house on fire," Jesse finished for him.
"No! No! I swear! I was jist gonna scare her a bit. You know, put the fear of God in her. But I tripped and dropped the can of gasoline and it went sliding across the porch. When I went to grab for it, my cigarette fell outa my mouth and—"
Jesse tightened his hand on Rube's collar. "You fool. You're lucky you didn't blow yourself to kingdom come. I ought to kill you myself."
Another man pushed through the crowd, this one dressed in a uniform. "I'll take it from here," the sheriff offered, slapping cuffs around Rube's wrist.
Nash had to hold Margo back as the sheriff dragged Rube away. She finally sagged, weak and defeated, in his arms. "He's ruined me," she moaned. "He's ruined me."
Jesse turned to glare at her. "That's what you get when you play with fire, Margo. You get burned." With one last scathing look, he turned and headed back to the barn, Pete trailing him.
"It's all the McClouds' fault," Margo wailed, needing to put the blame somewhere, anywhere but where it belonged … with herself. "They are the ones responsible for all this trouble."
At the insult, Sam's spine stiffened. "The McClouds had nothing to do with this."
Margo whirled on her. "Oh, yes, they certainly did. If your sister had left Jesse alone, he would have sold me the Circle Bar and gone back to Oklahoma where he belongs. But, no!" she said bitterly. "She had to woo him, just like she did years ago when she got pregnant with that bastard son of hers."
Sam thinned her lips, her anger building. She wouldn't listen to Margo demean her family in such a vile way. She grabbed the woman's arm. "This time you've gone too far, Margo."
Margo jerked free of her. "What are you doing here, anyway? Did you come here to gloat? To laugh while my home, my life went up in flames?"
Nash stepped between them. "No, she came out of concern. I brought her."
"You?" Margo fell back a step, stunned. Then her eyes narrowed as she took in his rumpled clothing, the shadow of a day's growth of beard. "You're sleeping with her, aren't you?" Before he could either deny or acknowledge the accusation, Margo lifted her chin imperiously, chilling him with a freezing glare. "I refuse to do business with anyone who associates with the McClouds. You'll end it now, or I'll remove every cent I have invested in the Rivers Ranch project. And I'll take the other investors with me. You'll be ruined. And it'll be all her fault," she accused, stabbing a finger Sam's way.
The threat was a blow that slammed into Sam's heart. She staggered back a step, then spun around and pushed her way through the crowd.
Nash felt the rage swell. "To hell I will," he said in an angry whisper. "Sam means more to me than your precious money." He whirled to follow Sam, but Margo grabbed his arm, her fingernails biting deep into his arm.
"I want my money now!" she raged.
He spun, glaring at her, and jerked free. "You'll get your money when I'm damned good and ready to give it to you."
He turned and pushed his way through the crowd, searching for Sam. As he broke through the other side, he saw the truck from the Double-Cross driving away.
Sam was behind the wheel.
"I don't want to talk about it."
Merideth and Mandy shared a concerned look over the top of their sister's head. "But, Sam—" Mandy began.
"Where?" Mandy cried.
"The Cowans. I've got to test their cattle for Bangs."
She strode from her bedroom, leaving her sisters behind.
Mandy turned to Merideth. "What are we going to do?" she cried.
Her arms folded beneath her breasts, Merideth tapped a polished nail against the satin sleeve of her robe. Though she'd missed all the action, Mandy had filled her in on the details, scant as they were, while Sam showered. "Nothing," she finally said, and returned to her room to resume her packing.
Mandy trailed her. "But we have to do something. Sam loves him. I know she does."
"If she does, then she'll talk to him, not us. You can't push Sam into doing anything. You know that as well as I do."
The doorbell chimed and Merideth called out, "I'll get it." She set her suitcase in the entry and opened the door, expecting to find the driver for the limousine she'd ordered.
But it was Nash who stood on the opposite side of the door, his hands braced against its frame.
"I need to talk to Sam."
The smell of smoke still clung to his clothes, his hair.
The fact that he looked like he'd been to hell and back tugged at Merideth's heart. "She's not here."
"Where is she?"
"I don't know," Merideth lied, though she knew very well that Sam was at the Cowans' testing their cattle.
"I need to talk to her."
"I don't think she wants to talk to you right now. Give her some time, Nash. She'll come to you when she's ready."
Nash buried his face in his hands. Two weeks. Two weeks of calling and leaving messages on Sam's machine. Two weeks without a reply. He'd gone to her house three times, trying to see her. But her family had formed a formidable wall of protection around her, refusing to let him inside.
She'd even had Gabe haul Whiskey back to the Rivers Ranch, removing even that small thread that still connected them. Gabe hadn't said two words to him when he'd delivered the horse, though he had stayed on at Nina's invitation to share a glass of lemonade with her on the front porch.
THE RESTLESS VIRGIN Page 14
