by Ann Major
Jackson Ranch was a hands-on operation, and everybody knew that Jeb Jackson would never ask a man, woman or child to do something he wasn’t ready to do himself. Because he ran his empire with an iron hand, his Mexican-American vaqueros called him El Rey, the king. When Jeb gave orders, he expected instant obedience, and he got it.
With one exception.
Why Jeb was so lenient with his beautiful, rebellious pilot, Megan MacKay, nobody knew.
There was a rumor among the men that Jeb had won her daddy Glen MacKay’s ranch in a poker game—and that Glen’s daughter had been part of the package, that one night Jeb had spent the night with her, and she’d hated him ever since.
But the women said knowingly that the last part of the story couldn’t be true. They thought any girl lucky enough to have Jeb Jackson for a night wouldn’t hate him half as much as Megan did. He’d always had a way with women. It was his incredible smile, some said, but there were also those who whispered slyly that it was much, much more than his smile.
Tall and dark, his sleek, muscled body was as dangerous and graceful as a tiger’s. His bold, black eyes slanted sensually beneath heavy dark brows. His hair was black and worn carelessly long, falling across his tanned brow, curling against the top of his collar. He had a reputation for toughness, an instinct for getting his way and a fierce sense of duty to his family.
There had been rumors about Jeb and Megan for years, but there was no way of knowing the truth. Glen MacKay had run off for good. His son Kirk wasn’t talking. Nobody dared to ask Megan or Jeb.
When Jeb dutifully married wealthy Emmy Spencer from a neighboring ranch, the gossip simmered down for a while. Then Emmy died, and Megan came home from college and flight school, and the sparks began to fly again between the king and the pilot. Many recalled the old story and continued to wonder.
Jeb felt bone-weary from the long day. Every muscle in his body ached. Not that he hadn’t been bred to hard work and long hours—he had. Ranching in arid south Texas was a tough business; ranchers had to be tough men.
Jeb didn’t mind the hard outdoor work as much as he minded the endless worrying over money. The Jacksons were land-rich and cash-poor. Drought, disease, taxes, a myriad of new paralyzing government regulations and low cattle and oil prices had forced Jeb to borrow heavily to meet the ranch’s obligations. If the situation didn’t change drastically, and soon, he would be forced to start selling the ranch’s assets one by one. Today Jeb had been down to the MacKay land to meet with Jack Robards, the oilman who was interested in taking a lease on some acreage.
The wind howled through an oak mott, rustling the leaves and the grasses. Caesar whinnied as a cactus thorn bit into his leg.
“Easy, boy,” Jeb whispered. He pulled his bandana up over his nose and mouth so he could breathe without taking in gulps of dust. “We’re almost home.” He pulled his Stetson lower on his forehead, but there was little he could do to protect his red-rimmed eyes as he peered through the grit for some sign of the Big House.
Jeb was ready to hand Caesar over to Mario and enjoy the comfort of a hot shower and a warm supper. Then he would call his girlfriend, Janelle Jacobs, who lived in California.
Most of all, he wanted to collapse into his bed.
The wind would probably die down around dawn and then come up again before noon. Tomorrow would be another humid, white day. Jeb hated these smothering white days. They always put him on edge and made the muscles at the back of his skull tight. He had a headache from fighting the wind and the range and the animals.
Suddenly, from out of nowhere, there came a storm of sound in the swirling, humid darkness.
Caesar screamed and reared exactly as he had the time he almost stepped in a nest of sidewinders.
Jeb cursed under his breath, dug his knees into Caesar’s flanks and jerked hard on the reins. When the quarter horse quieted, Jeb sat rigidly upright in his saddle, straining to listen.
From above the cloak of clouds throbbed the unmistakable motor of a single, fragile engine.
It flew over and was gone.
It was a plane, flying low in the clouds. There was something secretive, something illicit about the sound, and Jeb felt an uneasy sensation in the middle of his gut.
Most South Texas ranchers in the same circumstances would have imagined a drug runner flying in from Mexico.
Jeb thought of Megan MacKay. Her brother Kirk had disappeared two days before on one of his mysterious missions.
Jeb quashed the thought and tried to reassure himself. “Hell, it was only a drug runner. Had to be. Perfect night for it.”
Kirk had promised he would be back by noon today.
Megan was wild, but she wasn’t crazy. She would never go up on a night like this.
What if she’d found out Kirk was in trouble?
Jeb felt the familiar tightening in his gut again. Only Megan could make his insides knot up like this. His hands clenched around the reins, and he dug his heels into Caesar.
Megan MacKay would do anything.
Damn! If that was Megan up there, risking her neck and his plane, he’d fire her this time, once and for all.
To hell with the promise he’d made Glen MacKay ten years ago! Jeb didn’t like being pushed, and that redheaded she-devil had pushed him about as far as any man could be pushed.
Two
Horseshoes rang on concrete as Jeb rode into the stable. Funny how the weariness always went out of Caesar’s step the closer he got to his stall and a fresh bale of hay. Jeb dismounted and handed the reins to his stable boy.
“Is MacKay back?” Jeb demanded.
Mario shook his dark head and lowered his eyes. Nobody liked giving the boss bad news. Jeb towered over the thin vaquero and regarded him sharply. The two spoke rapidly in Spanish, the second language of the ranch, and as they did, Jeb’s frown deepened.
Without a word Jeb strode toward Kirk’s office and pushed the door open. A window unit gushed ice-cold air. Jeb flipped on the light switch, blinked hard and stared into the fluorescent glare. The insides of his empty stomach ground together. The mountain of unopened mail lay in the same neatly sorted stacks on Kirk’s desk, still untouched.
Jeb’s temple throbbed. The cord in the back of his neck tightened, and he reached up and rubbed it with his tanned hand.
Kirk hadn’t come back.
It could only mean one thing—trouble.
He slammed out of the door and strode back toward Mario. Jeb’s tanned face and black hair were streaked with sweat and dirt. The grimy stuff coated his narrow shotgun chaps, made of weathered rawhide, and his scuffed black sealskin boots. He took off his black hat and slapped it against his knees, lifting a cloud of choking dust. He could feel dirt and sweat clogging every pore of his massive body. His stomach growled fiercely. More than anything, he wanted to shower and eat.
Hell. He couldn’t rest until he found out about Kirk. Megan was the only one on the ranch who might know something.
Jeb had Mario resaddle Caesar, and he swung himself into the saddle, as reluctant as his stallion to gallop back into the hot windy night.
As he rode, Jeb fumed. The MacKays were trouble, more trouble than just about anybody Jeb had ever known, but they were special. There was nobody tougher or smarter on the ranch than Kirk MacKay, nobody Jeb admired more. At thirty-five Kirk was three years older than Jeb. As a boy, Jeb had looked up to him, and now he felt closer to MacKay than he did to any of his own brothers.
There was no woman on the ranch tougher or smarter than Megan, either, but that was the problem. She’d had it in for Jeb ever since he’d acquired the MacKay ranch, and she worked double-time to make his life hell. Jeb worked just as hard to avoid her. When he had to be around her he tried not to provoke her. Reminding himself of his fondness for her brother and father, he took her temper tantrums in stride and went easy on her. He wouldn’t ever forget she’d been a favorite playmate of his little sister Julia—before Julia had been kidnapped. Not that his generosity had ev
er done a lick of good. The nicer Jeb was, the meaner Megan was.
Still, Jeb felt a bond with the MacKays. For more than a hundred years, MacKays and Jacksons had stood side by side in south Texas, fighting Indians, defending their cattle from Mexican rustlers, fighting the Yankees during the Confederate War and ranching. Once the MacKay Ranch had been even bigger than the Jackson Ranch, but there had been a wildness in the MacKays that the steadier Jacksons lacked. When the frontier was conquered and the profitable cattle drives of the late nineteenth century were over, when cattle prices had plummeted, the MacKays had been reluctant to settle down and adopt modern methods of ranching. Slowly, acre by acre, the Jacksons had acquired the MacKays’ ranch.
Jeb frowned. Why the hell couldn’t Kirk be content with being manager of the ranch’s quarter-horse program? He was the best horseman Jeb had ever known. Why did Kirk have to get involved in these so-called missions of mercy? Hell, hadn’t he retired from the CIA because he was sick of that sort of stuff?
Jeb knew it wasn’t the money alone that induced Kirk to risk his life time and again and sneak into foreign countries to free hostage victims. Kirk felt personally responsible for every kidnapping victim in the world. The feeling dated back to when Julia had been kidnapped as a child. She’d been out riding with Kirk, and although Kirk had been only fifteen and the kidnappers had beaten him when he’d fought to defend her, he’d blamed himself. Julia had never been found.
When Jeb reached the MacKay house, he dismounted and tied up Caesar. The house was black and silent, but Jeb knocked loudly on the door just in case. When there was no answer, he opened the door that led into the garage.
The wind sent a page of newsprint fluttering across the empty floor. Jeb let the door fall shut again. He lit a cigarette, and the wind swirled away sparks and the plume of acrid smoke. It was his first one in hours. Jeb took another deep drag.
It was a bad habit, smoking, one he was determined to quit—and soon. He just kept putting it off. He’d been putting off a lot of things lately, like asking Janelle to marry him. He kept remembering how restless he’d felt during his first marriage. Then Emmy had become ill, and he’d stood by her until the end.
Where the hell was Megan, anyway? It wasn’t odd that she wasn’t home. What was strange was that her car was gone. Megan was quite popular with men and had a date most evenings. Where had she gone alone? He pulled out his cell phone and dialed her. After four rings, his call went to voicemail.
Jeb remembered the roar of the plane flying low, and the familiar knot in his gut tightened.
He tossed his cigarette away and went over to Caesar and untied him. “No use both of us staying up all night,” he whispered into his stallion’s cocked ear. Caesar’s head swiveled viciously, and Jeb had to sidestep so Caesar couldn’t bite him. Jeb swatted the horse on the rump, and gravel flew as he galloped toward the stable.
Jeb hunkered down in the darkness to wait. In the blackness he listened to a coyote’s lonely yelp. Nearby a huisache branch scratched a windowpane.
Half an hour later, at a sound from the road, Jeb crouched lower in the shadows.
A Tahoe with its lights off inched its way cautiously into the caliche drive. Megan!
Her automatic garage door opened. She drove inside and cut the engine. The door closed behind her. Jeb listened to her keys jingling as she let herself into her house by way of the side door.
He waited for her to turn on a light. When she didn’t, he glanced at his watch.
It was past midnight. What the hell had she been up to driving across his ranch in the dead of night with no lights? He kept remembering that plane, flying low in the dark, and he didn’t like the suspicion forming in his mind.
He stomped his cowboy boots across the front porch and banged so loudly on the door that the clapboard house shook.
When she didn’t answer, Jeb started yelling. She ignored that, too.
“Megan MacKay, you’d better answer this door. If you don’t—I’ll kick it down.”
He paused and listened. Taking a step back, he waited. The house seemed like a living thing, holding its breath, waiting.
There was no sound, not even a delicate tiptoeing on creaky flooring that would indicate she was at least mildly curious, no sound other than the huisache branch scratching a windowpane.
“Damn mule of a woman!” Jeb thundered. “Megan!” This was a shout much louder than the others.
But there was only silence. And darkness. And the huisache branch. And hot humid gusts blowing dust in his face. The muscle in Jeb’s neck screamed with pain.
Damnation! He drew back his boot and measured the distance between his right foot and the door. He’d broken a toe on that foot once. It still throbbed every time a norther blew through. He decided on his left foot instead.
Just as the heel of his boot was about to slam into wood, suddenly, unexpectedly, the door flew open. He pitched forward into the black, rectangular hole that gaped as uninvitingly as the opening of a dark cave.
Jeb couldn’t see her in the darkness as he fell forward, but he felt her smoldering presence. As he stood up he caught her fragrance, the scent of wild rose blossoms on a hot summer night.
He half expected her to jump him in the dark.
His stomach clawed as he edged further inside.
“Evening,” he drawled mildly.
He could have cut the hostile silence with a knife.
There was only the sound of his boots shuffling clumsily on hardwood floors as he groped along one wall for the light switch.
She could have helped him, but she didn’t.
“What are you doing here?” Her breathless was velvet-soft, fluid and husky like the dark. Inviting.
His insides tingled. Funny that he’d never noticed before how warm and sexy, how sensual the sound of her voice was.
“I’ll ask the questions,” he replied roughly. He closed the door and flipped on the light.
“Just go,” came that startling, honey-toned whisper, stirring him as it never had before.
He turned toward her and blinked in disbelief.
She was dazzling. Or was it just the sudden brilliance?
He stared hard at the tall, slim woman with her blazing, sea-green eyes and fiery tangles of thick red hair spilling over her shoulders, at this strange yet familiar woman-child who wearing nothing but her brother’s rumpled green cowboy shirt.
Jeb Jackson, who had known Megan MacKay all her life, felt like he was seeing her for the first time as his eyes followed the vertical curve of her neck. Through the thin green-plaid material of her shirt he could see that her small, high-tipped breasts were alive with indignation. His hands itched to mold their shape, and he clenched them at his side so tightly that they ached. Her honey-colored legs were long and graceful. She was aglow, as if some fierce inner emotion illuminated her.
Never before had her strong, bold beauty so completely commanded his attention. Never had a woman seemed more furiously, more majestically erotic.
Had he gone crazy? It was the middle of the night. This was only Megan—part brat and all hellion. All he could think of was that she was wearing nothing but that thin shirt that came only halfway to her knees, that they were alone, that it had been forever since he’d had a woman.
A mad pulse throbbed in his temple. His loins were hot. He backed warily toward the door, instinctively reacting to her wildly mussed beauty, to the pleading terror and vulnerability in her eyes. He was angry at himself and at her because of his uncontrollable feelings.
“If you’re staying, I’d better change,” she said defiantly.
His black eyes ran over her. Usually she wore her hair tied back in a knot or a ponytail with tailored, drably colored clothes. Jeb had never seen Megan as she was tonight, her beauty rumpled and gloriously flamboyant, like some wildly, wind-tossed blossom on a stormy night.
“I like you just the way you are,” he murmured.
Her vivid eyes shot sparks at him. She pressed her lip
s tightly together, and he was grateful she was silent.
He knew that fiery-eyed look. It was damned cute and filled him with a strange hunger. But it meant she was going to be obstinate. He turned away and studied the familiar room in which he’d spent so many enjoyable hours when he was a boy. Megan had loved him then, idolized him even, but that had been before her father had lost the ranch to Jeb. The room was plainly furnished with the heavy furniture the vaqueros had built on the ranch for all of its cottages.
On a narrow shelf there were small carved wooden figures that depicted various aspects of ranch life. There was a horse and rider, a cowboy whirling a lariat, a windmill and a roadrunner. Graceful figures, lovingly made. Glen had whittled them. Jeb had always fancied one in particular, but Megan had refused to give it to him. The statuette was of Jeb and Megan walking together, holding hands. Her skirt and hair were blowing. Jeb could almost feel the cool wind and remember the smell of the wildflowers in that meadow, of the wildflowers in her hair. Megan had adored him then. That was before she’d decided he’d ruined her life.
Jeb turned back to Megan. She was as beautiful as before, and it was still as much of a shock to him.
He felt his will, his reliable, indomitable will, dissolving at the sight of her. It was as though her luminous beauty had invaded every male cell of his body.
She was strangely silent, as if she, too, were lost and uncertain and warily afraid to make the wrong move.
He watched her, noticing how her skin reflected the golden light, how her eyes flashed and shimmered with lovely violent-soft green fires. She made him feel young again; she filled him with a nostalgic yearning for things he hadn’t dreamed of in years. There had always been something missing in his life, something wonderful, half dreamed of and mysterious, something that was lacking in his relationships with his passive, understanding women. That something had been missing even during the brief contentment of his marriage.
