by Linda Turner
Her eyes glinting with resolve, she turned on the small boom box she’d brought with her from L.A. and cranked up the volume until it blocked out all the noise from downstairs. Only then was she able to work.
She couldn’t, however, stay in her room indefinitely without slowly climbing the walls. So she took breaks over the course of the day, going downstairs to wash and dry another load of clothes, to eat lunch, to get something to drink. And every time she came out of her room, she found herself listening for him, looking for him, finding him. If he wasn’t outside repairing a loose railing on the porch, he was in the downstairs bathroom patching a cracked piece of drywall or in the laundry room sanding a cabinet door that had an irritating tendency to stick.
And try though she might, she couldn’t, to her growing frustration, ignore the man. She turned the music up until she couldn’t hear herself think, but when he came upstairs to reinforce a wobbly shelf in the linen closet in the hall, she knew it immediately. It was as if she had radar where he was concerned. All her senses went on alert, her heart started to flutter in anticipation, her nerve endings to tingle. It was mortifying, annoying, exhilarating.
She couldn’t, she told herself, spend another day cooped up with him in the house. So she escaped downstairs with her script and called Charles to tell him she was a hundred percent better and ready to get back to work. He was thrilled. Every day shooting was shut down the studio lost a small fortune, so the sooner they could start filming again, the better. Promising her he’d have a car for her the next morning with one of the drivers she knew, he quickly hung up so he could notify the rest of the cast and crew to report back to work the following morning.
If she still needed incentive to concentrate, that should have done it. There was no question that everyone would be tense returning to the set after the explosion, and that meant blown lines and missed cues. To make matters worse, the scene scheduled to be shot in the morning was a love scene, and she always found those awkward and nerve-racking. She hadn’t looked at her script in days. If she didn’t want to be the one responsible for a long day of take after take, she’d make sure she had her lines down pat. With her script in hand, she retreated to the living room to study.
Shutting the door on the linen closet, its newly secured shelf loaded down with sheets and blankets, Joe gathered up his tools and would have moved on to another project, but there weren’t any more. He’d fixed every loose board in the house, changed every burned-out lightbulb, even cleaned the air-conditioning vents in every room but Angel’s. There was nothing left to do except face the inevitable. He could work from sunup to sundown, until he was so tired he wanted to drop where he stood, but he still wanted her. And they were alone together in the house and would be until her stalker was caught.
Outside, the day had already slipped into evening and he hadn’t even noticed. Soon it would be completely dark. A muscle clenched in his jaw at the thought of the two of them sitting around, waiting for bedtime. Maybe he’d just lock himself up in his study and reorganize all his computer files. Then tomorrow night, he’d start on his workshop in the barn. His pickup needed a tune-up, and if worse came to worse, he’d give the barn a new coat of paint. At the rate he was going, he thought irritably, by the time it was safe for Miss Hollywood to finally leave, the place would look brand new.
Scowling, he returned his tools to his workshop, then strode back inside to make himself something to eat. He’d skipped lunch and should have been hungry, but the sandwich he ate while he stood at the back door and glared out at the night could have been cardboard for all the notice he gave it. All he could think of was Angel, sitting in the living room, studying her lines and doing a damn good job of ignoring him.
He should have been pleased. She was in one part of the house, he was in another, and at the rate they were going, they could coexist alone there together for months without ever coming face-to-face. And that was just the way he wanted it. Then, when she eventually left and returned to her life in Hollywood, he wouldn’t find himself looking for her everywhere he turned. All he had to do between now and then was keep his distance.
He might as well have asked the stars not to shine in the night sky.
Without saying a word, she drew him to the living room doorway, and there didn’t seem to be a damn thing he could do about it. There was just something about her he couldn’t resist. Standing there, he watched her frown down at her script and tried to figure out what it was, but he couldn’t explain it. It wasn’t as if she went around the house in a negligee and deliberately tried to seduce him. With her face free of makeup and her hair pulled back from her face with a headband, she looked like a teenager in jeans and a T-shirt.
And still, somehow, she was beautiful.
He felt need hit him hard and low and should have gotten the hell out of there right then. But she swore softly then and threw down her script in frustration, and before he could stop himself, he stepped farther into the living room. “Problems?”
Startled, she jumped. For the first time all day, she’d actually been able to put him out of her mind, and now here he was, and she hadn’t even heard him walk in the room. “I’m just having trouble with my lines,” she said with a dismissive shrug. “Sometimes that happens.”
“Maybe it would help if I read them with you. Not that I’m any good at that kind of thing,” he added quickly, “but hearing the other character’s lines might help you remember yours.”
The second he made the suggestion, Angel knew he wanted to take the words back. If she’d had a brain in her head, she would have let him. All she had to do was give the excuse that she’d never been able to work with someone else when she was learning lines, and he would have accepted it.
But when she opened her mouth to politely decline his offer, no one was more surprised than she when she said, “You might be right. If you’re sure you don’t mind.”
What could he say? “No, of course not. I’m game if you are.”
So without quite knowing how it happened, she found him seated close beside her on the couch, his knee and shoulder almost brushing hers as she held the script between them where he could read it, too. He didn’t touch her, didn’t move except to help her steady the script, but her heart was racing, her mouth suddenly desert dry. Swallowing she tried to focus on her opening line in the scene, but the words swam before her eyes.
“I like you with your hair down like that. It makes you look all soft and touchable, the way a woman’s supposed to look for her man.”
His voice was rough with emotion and stroked her like a lover’s caress. Surprised, Angel’s eyes flew to his, but his gaze was focused on the script. Heat flooded her cheeks. What an idiot she was! She should have realized he wasn’t talking to her, but to her character, Grace, the woman Garrett’s character, Sebastian, was in love with. This was all just an act, just words on a page to Joe, and she’d do well to remember that.
Still, her heart fluttered with emotion as she dutifully repeated her own lines. “Am I your woman, Sebastian? Or are you just looking for someone to warm your bed for a while before you move on further west? Because I want more than that from the man I give myself to. I’ll have more than that.”
“So what do you want?” he murmured. “My heart and soul? You’ve already got it.”
Tearing his eyes from the script, he turned to face her, his gaze dropping to her mouth, and too late, she realized she should have told him that all they were rehearsing were the lines themselves. It wasn’t necessary to act out every single detail of the scene. “Joe—”
“Sebastian,” he whispered huskily, leaning close and brushing her mouth with his. “My character’s name is Sebastian.”
She should have protested, should have beat a hasty retreat and put the length of the room between them while she still could. But it seemed like forever since he had kissed her. Her senses spinning, the script forgotten, she lifted her mouth to his. “Joe.”
That was all she could manage, just
his name, then his arms came around her, cradling her close, and he was kissing her hungrily, as if he were starving for the taste of her and was afraid she would be taken from him any second. Slanting his mouth over hers, his tongue urgent and seducing, he consumed her like a man possessed.
She loved it. He was always so careful with her, his emotions kept under a tight rein, that she hadn’t thought she could drive him to such wildness, such need. Burying his hands in her hair, he tore his mouth from hers, but only to change the angle of the kiss and take her mouth all over again. Dizzy, delighted, the thunder of her heart roaring in her ears, she gave herself up to him without a murmur of protest, giving him back kiss for kiss, touch for touch.
“You conniving little slut!”
From the safety of the trees a thousand yards away and downwind from the house, the furious man stood in the all-concealing darkness of the night and watched the couple in the living room with high-powered binoculars. They were all over each other, unable to keep their hands off each other. And with the blinds wide open and the guards patrolling the perimeter of the house, they didn’t care who knew it.
Then, even as he watched, McBride reached over and switched out the lights. Instantly, the living room went black.
Rage burned in the watcher’s gut like hot oil, and what little self-control he had snapped. Damn them! Damn them both to hell! She was his. He’d told her time and again, but she just didn’t get it. And neither did McBride.
But they would, he promised himself savagely, lowering his binoculars. By the time he got through with the two of them, they would both regret that they hadn’t listened to him when they had the chance.
Hatred glinting in his eyes, he turned his back on the house and slipped away in the dark. Like a shadow, he silently blended in and out of the trees until he disappeared completely into the night.
Surrounded by the darkness of the night and the strength of Joe’s arms around her, Angel sank down to the cushions of the couch with him. Lying side by side, facing each other, the kisses they shared turned hotter, longer, hungrier. When he reached for the hem of her T-shirt, she knew she should have stopped him, but she couldn’t. She loved him.
Shaken, she knew herself too well to question what she was feeling. It was love—there wasn’t a doubt in her mind. It seemed to be her fate in life to love men who couldn’t love her back. First, with Kurt, Emma’s father, and now Joe. The feelings she’d had for Kurt were nothing compared to what she felt for Joe, but the result was the same. He might want her and need her, but he wasn’t going to let himself love her.
And it broke her heart. He was a good man who was wonderful with children and deserved a wife and family of his own, but he’d resigned himself to living the rest of his life alone. If she just had the time, the optimist in her had to believe she could find a way to get past the wall he’d built around himself because of his ex-wife’s betrayal. But she had to leave him soon, and she didn’t know how she was going to find the strength to do it. Filming on the ranch would be wrapping up next week, and then they would move on to another location in southern Utah. Once she left Liberty Hill, her chances of ever seeing him again were slim to none.
Tears welled in her eyes at the thought. This time with him was all she would ever have. Her hands helping his, she pulled her T-shirt over her head. Before it hit the floor, her fingers were fumbling blindly in the dark for the buttons of his shirt as he worked at the fastener of her bra.
Breathless, her heart rolled over in her chest when he pulled her under him and his work-roughened hands finally found her breasts. Merciful heavens, what hands he had! His fingers stroked and teased and played with her until she was wild with need, then his mouth latched onto her nipple and suckled strongly. Desire, white hot and swift, shot straight from her breasts to the heart of her femininity. With a soft, strangled cry, she arched under him. “Joe…please!”
Lost to everything but the feel of his mouth at her breast, she couldn’t have said what she asked for, but he knew. With a muttered curse, he pulled back, but only long enough to tear off the rest of both of their clothes. Then he was coming back down to her, his hard, lean length pressing her softer one into the cushions of the couch, and nothing had ever felt so good.
Moaning, she took his weight gladly and gloried in it, loving the differences in their bodies. If he’d done nothing else but hold her that way the rest of the night, she would have been happy.
But the fire he’d lit in her blood was hotter than ever, the flames licking at both of them, and deep inside, she ached for more. Moving under him, she slid her hands down the long length of his whipcord lean back to urge him closer. His response was immediate—and hard.
In the dark shadows, her eyes met his. “Make love to me,” she said softly. “Right here. Right now.”
He should have taken her upstairs to his bed. At the very least, he should have retrieved the condom in his wallet. But it was in his jeans, and he’d sent them flying when he’d finally tugged them off. He thought they’d landed somewhere by the fireplace, but there was no way on God’s green earth that he was letting go of Angel long enough to look for them—not when he had her right where he’d wanted her for days.
“I won’t be gentle,” he warned in a low growl as his body tightened with need. “Not this time. I want you too much.”
For an answer, she lifted her hips to his and gently nudged him.
Groaning, he couldn’t have resisted her then if a herd of cattle had stampeded through the living room. Something in him snapped, something dark and primitive that no other woman had ever touched in him. Moving over her, he didn’t give her time to think, to gasp, to do anything but moan with delight as he took her to the first peak with his hands alone. She was still shuddering when he kissed his way down the center of her body and nearly shattered her.
“Joe!”
His gut a knot of need, his body unbearably tight with tension, he went wild at her cry. Parting her legs, he surged into her and laced his fingers with hers. Then they were moving, dancing, racing toward insanity and loving every second of it.
Just as he’d promised, he was rough, too rough. But she’d long since destroyed what was left of his control, and he was helpless to do anything but take the ride with her to the end. Setting a bruising pace, he groaned as she kept up with him. Then he felt her start to come undone around him, and the madness caught him. Her name torn from his throat like a prayer, he thrust into her one last time and felt his senses explode.
Chapter 12
When the phone rang in the middle of the night, Angel came awake with a start, her heart pounding. Beside her, Joe reached for the phone on the nightstand, and memories of their wild loving on the couch in the living room came rushing back. He’d carried her upstairs afterwards to his room, his bed, only to love her again until they’d fallen asleep in each other’s arms, too exhausted to move.
It had been the most wonderful night of her life, like a dream come true, but something told her the dream was over. No phone call at that hour of the night was good news.
Afraid that something had happened to Emma, Angel sat up, clutching the covers to her breasts as Joe swore and slammed down the phone. “What is it?” she asked, alarmed as he rolled out of bed and quickly reached for his jeans. “What’s wrong?”
“Forest fire,” he said shortly. “Near Merry’s clinic. She’s already called the volunteer fire department, but ev erything’s so dry because of the drought that the trees are going up like cinder and the buffalo grass has started to burn. The wind is blowing it straight toward her house and the clinic.”
Tugging on a shirt, he stepped into his boots. “I’ve got to go help. I’ll be back as quick as I can.”
“Wait! I’ll go with you.”
She started to throw off the sheet, but he stopped her. “No. It’s too dangerous. I’ll have to take everyone but one of the guards with me—we’ll need all the help we can get to keep this thing from raging out of control—but you’l
l be safe here with Buster and the one guard to watch over you. I’ll reset the alarm on my way out,” he promised. A split second later, he was gone.
Left alone in the dark house with nothing but apprehension for company, Angel shivered. She’d seen a forest fire once as a child and had never forgotten the horror of it. In an instant, it had taken on a life of its own and consumed everything in its path. Thousands of acres of forests had been lost; people had died. Tonight, while she was safely tucked away from the licking flames, Joe and his family would be right out there in it, fighting to stop it before it took everything they held dear. And it scared her to death.
Chilled, she pulled on one of Joe’s denim shirts and hugged it to herself as she hurried toward the windows. She couldn’t see Merry’s house and clinic because it was too far away and trees blocked the view, but even from that distance, she could see the thick black smoke billowing into the clear, moonlit night sky. And somewhere, far off in the silent night, she heard the desperate whine of a fire truck’s siren.
Just watching the smoke, she knew the fire was worse, much worse, than she’d first thought. Worried sick, she wrapped her arms tighter around herself and prayed.
She never knew how long she stood there, unable to drag her gaze away from the view from the window. Downstairs, there was a noise at the front door, but she hardly gave it second thought. It was just the security guard checking to make sure that Joe hadn’t forgotten to lock the front door on his way out. There’d been a shift change an hour ago, and the late-night guard was always very conscientious about his duties.
Outside, the wind howled around the house, fanning the flames of the fire on the horizon, and she could only imagine the heat Joe and the volunteers who had rushed to fight the fire must be feeling. Were they wearing protective gear? And what about water? There was no city water system this far from town. How did they fight a fire without water?
