Part of the Bargain

by Linda Lael Miller

  Jess felt a despairing sort of anger course through him. “What about Cathy?” he asked, without turning around. “Who is going to take care of her?”

  “You’ve always—”

  Jess whirled suddenly, staring at his brother, almost hating him. “I’ve always what?”

  “Cared for her.” Stacey shrugged, looking only mildly unsettled. “Protected her…”

  “Are you suggesting that I sweep up the pieces after you shatter her?” demanded Jess in a dangerous rasp.

  Stacey only shrugged again.

  Because he feared that he would do his brother lasting harm if he stayed another moment, Jess stormed out of the house. Cathy, dressed in old jeans, boots and a cotton blouse, was waiting beside the truck. The pallor in her face told Jess that she knew much more about the state of her marriage than he would have hoped.

  Her hands trembled a little as she spoke with them. “I’m scared, Jess.”

  He drew her into his arms, held her. “I know, baby,” he said, even though he knew she couldn’t hear him or see his lips. “I know.”

  Libby opened her eyes, yawned and stretched. The smells of sunshine and fresh air swept into her bedroom through the open window, ruffling pink eyelet curtains and reminding her that she was home again. She tossed back the covers on the bed and got up, sleepily making her way into the bathroom and starting the water for a shower.

  As she took off her short cotton nightshirt, she looked down at herself and remembered the raging sensations Jess Barlowe had ignited in her the day before. She had been stupid and self-indulgent to let that happen, but after several years of celibacy, she supposed it was natural that her passions had been stirred so easily—especially by a man like Jess.

  As Libby showered, she felt renewed. Aaron’s flagrant infidelities had been painful for her, and they had seriously damaged her self-esteem in the bargain.

  Now, even though she had made a fool of herself by being wanton with a man who could barely tolerate her, many of Libby’s doubts about herself as a woman had been eased, if not routed. She was not as useless and undesirable as Aaron had made her feel. She had caused Jess Barlowe to want her, hadn’t she?

  Big deal, she told the image in her mirror as she brushed her teeth. How do you know Jess wasn’t out to prove that his original opinion of you was on target?

  Deflated by this very real possibility, Libby combed her hair, applied the customary lip gloss and light touch of mascara and went back to her room to dress. From her suitcases she selected a short-sleeved turquoise pullover shirt and a pair of trim jeans. Remembering her intention to find Cathy and persuade her to go riding, she ferreted through her closet until she found the worn boots she’d left behind before moving to New York, pulling them on over a pair of thick socks.

  Looking down at those disreputable old boots, Libby imagined the scorn they would engender in Aaron’s jet-set crowd and laughed. Problems or no problems, Jess or no Jess, it was good to be home.

  Not surprisingly, the kitchen was empty. Ken had probably left the house before dawn, but there was coffee on the stove and fruit in the refrigerator, so Libby helped herself to a pear and sat down to eat.

  The telephone rang just as she was finishing her second cup of coffee, and Libby answered cheerfully, thinking that the caller would be Ken or the housekeeper at the main house, relaying some message for Cathy.

  She was back at the table, the receiver pressed to her ear, before Aaron spoke.

  “When are you coming home?”

  “Home?” echoed Libby stupidly, off-balance, unable to believe that he’d actually asked such a question. “I am home, Aaron.”

  “Enough,” he replied. “You’ve made your point, exhibited your righteous indignation. Now you’ve got to get back here because I need you.”

  Libby wanted to hang up, but it seemed a very long way from her chair to the wall, where the rest of the telephone was. “Aaron, we are divorced,” she reminded him calmly, “and I am never coming back.”

  “You have to,” he answered, without missing a beat. “It’s crucial.”

  “Why? What happened to all your…friends?”

  Aaron sighed. “You remember Betty, don’t you? Miss November? Well, Betty and I had a small disagreement, as it happens, and she went to my family. I am, shall we say, exposed as something less than an ideal spouse.

  “In any case, my grandmother believes that a man who cannot run his family—she was in Paris when we divorced, darling—cannot run a company, either. I have six months to bring you back into the fold and start an heir, or the whole shooting match goes to my cousin.”

  Libby was too stunned to speak or even move; she simply stood in the middle of her father’s kitchen, trying to absorb what Aaron was saying.

  “That,” Aaron went on blithely, “is where you come in, sweetheart. You come back, we smile a lot and make a baby, my grandmother’s ruffled feathers are smoothed. It’s as simple as that.”

  Sickness boiled into Libby’s throat. “I don’t believe this!” she whispered.

  “You don’t believe what, darling? That I can make a baby? May I point out that I sired Jonathan, of whom you were so cloyingly fond?”

  Libby swallowed. “Get Miss November pregnant,” she managed to suggest. And then she added distractedly, more to herself than Aaron, “I think I’m going to be sick.”

  “Don’t tell me that I’ve been beaten to the proverbial draw,” Aaron remarked in that brutally smooth, caustic way of his. “Did the steak-house king already do the deed?”

  “You are disgusting!”

  “Yes, but very practical. If I don’t hand my grandmother an heir, whether it’s mine or the issue of that softheaded cowboy, I stand to lose millions of dollars.”

  Libby managed to stand up. A few steps, just a few, and she could hang up the telephone, shut out Aaron’s voice and his ugly suggestions. “Do you really think that I would turn any child of mine over to someone like you?”

  “There is a child, then,” he retorted smoothly.

  “No!” Five steps to the wall, six at most.

  “Be reasonable, sweetness. We’re discussing an empire here. If you don’t come back and attend to your wifely duties, I’ll have to visit that godforsaken ranch and try to persuade you.”

  “I am not your wife!” screamed Libby. One step. One step and a reach.

  “Dear heart, I don’t find the idea any more appealing than you do, but there isn’t any other way, is there? My grandmother likes you—sees you as sturdy peasant stock—and she wants the baby to be yours.”

  At last. The wall was close and Libby slammed the receiver into place. Then, dazed, she stumbled back to her chair and fell into it, lowering her head to her arms. She cried hard, for herself, for Jonathan.

  “Libby?”

  It was the last voice she would have wanted to hear, except for Aaron’s. “Go away, Stacey!” she hissed.

  Instead of complying, Stacey laid a gentle hand on her shoulder. “What happened, Libby?” he asked softly. “Who was that on the phone?”

  Fresh horror washed over Libby at the things Aaron had requested, mixed with anger and revulsion. God, how self-centered and insensitive that man was! And what gall he had, suggesting that she return to that disaster of a marriage, like some unquestioning brood mare, to produce a baby on order!

  She gave a shuddering cry and motioned Stacey away with a frantic motion of her arm.

  He only drew her up out of the chair and turned her so that he could hold her. She hadn’t the strength to resist the intimacy and, in her half-hysterical state, he seemed to be the old Stacey, the strong big brother.

  Stacey’s hand came to the back of her head, tangling in her freshly washed hair, pressing her to his shoulder. “Tell me what happened,” he urged, just as he had when Libby was a child with a skinned knee or a bee sting.

  From habit, she allowed herself to be comforted. For so long there had been no one to confide in except Stacey, and it seemed natural to lean
on him now. “Aaron…Aaron called. He wanted me to have his…his baby!”

  Before Stacey could respond to that, the door separating the kitchen from the living room swung open. Instinctively Libby drew back from the man who held her.

  Jess towered in the doorway, pale, his gaze scorching Libby’s flushed, tear-streaked face. “You know,” he began in a voice that was no less terrible for being soft, “I almost believed you. I almost had myself convinced that you were above anything this shabby.”

  “Wait—you don’t understand….”

  Jess smiled a slow, vicious smile—a smile that took in his startled brother as well as Libby. “Don’t I? Oh, princess, I wish I didn’t.” The searing jade gaze sliced menacingly to Stacey’s face. “And it seems I’m going to be an uncle. Tell me, brother—what does that make Cathy?”

  To Libby’s horror, Stacey said nothing to refute what was obviously a gross misunderstanding. He simply pulled her back into his arms, and her struggle was virtually imperceptible because of his strength.

  “Let me go!” she pleaded, frantic.

  Stacey released her, but only grudgingly. “I’ve got a plane to catch,” he said.

  Libby was incredulous. “Tell him! Tell Jess that he’s wrong,” she cried, reaching out for Stacey’s arm, trying to detain him.

  But Stacey simply pulled free and left by the back door.

  There was a long, pulsing silence, during which both Libby and Jess seemed to be frozen. He was the first to thaw.

  “I know you were hurt, Libby,” he said. “Badly hurt. But that didn’t give you the right to do something like this to Cathy.”

  It infuriated Libby that this man’s good opinion was so important to her, but it was, and there was no changing that. “Jess, I didn’t do anything to Cathy. Please listen to me.”

  He folded his strong arms and rested against the door jamb with an ease that Libby knew was totally feigned. “I’m listening,” he said, and the words had a flippant note.

  Libby ignored fresh anger. “I am not expecting Stacey’s baby, and this wasn’t a romantic tryst. I don’t even know why he came here. I was on the phone with Aaron and he—”

  A muscle in Jess’s neck corded, relaxed again. “I hope you’re not going to tell me that your former husband made you pregnant, Libby. That seems unlikely.”

  Frustration pounded in Libby’s temples and tightened the already constricted muscles in her throat. “I am not pregnant!” she choked out. “And if you are going to eavesdrop, Jess Barlowe, you could at least pay attention! Aaron wanted me to come back to New York and have his baby so that he would have an heir to present to his grandmother!”

  “You didn’t agree to that?”

  “Of course I didn’t agree! What kind of monster do you think I am?”

  Jess shrugged with a nonchalance that was belied by the leaping green fire in his eyes. “I don’t know, princess, but rest assured— I intend to find out.”

  “I have a better idea!” Libby flared. “Why don’t you just leave me the hell alone?”

  “In theory that’s brilliant,” he fired back, “but there is one problem— I want you.”

  Involuntarily Libby remembered the kisses and caresses exchanged by the pond the day before, relived them. Hot color poured into her face. “Am I supposed to be honored?”

  “No,” Jess replied flatly, “you’re supposed to be kept so busy that you won’t have time to screw up Cathy’s life any more than you already have.”

  If Libby could have moved, she would have rushed across that room and slapped Jess Barlowe senseless. Since she couldn’t get her muscles to respond to the orders of her mind, she was forced to watch in stricken silence as he gave her a smoldering assessment with his eyes, executed a half salute and left the house.

  Chapter 4

  When the telephone rang again, immediately after Jess’s exit from the kitchen, Libby was almost afraid to answer it. It would be like Aaron to persist, to use pressure to get what he wanted.

  On the other hand, the call might be from someone else, and it could be important.

  “Hello?” Libby dared, with resolve.

  “Ms. Kincaid?” asked a cheerful feminine voice. “This is Marion Bradshaw, and I’m calling for Mrs. Barlowe. She’d like you to meet her at the main house if you can, and she says to dress for riding.”

  Libby looked down at her jeans and boots and smiled. In one way, at least, she and Cathy were still on the same wavelength. “Please tell her that I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  There was a brief pause at the other end of the line, followed by, “Mrs. Barlowe wants me to ask if you have a car down there. If not, she’ll come and pick you up in a few minutes.”

  Though there was no car at her disposal, Libby declined the offer. The walk to the main ranch house would give her a chance to think, to prepare herself to face her cousin again.

  As Libby started out, striding along the winding tree-lined road, she ached to think that she and Cathy had come to this. Fresh anger at Stacey quickened her step.

  For a moment she was mad at Cathy, too. How could she believe such a thing, after all they’d been through together? How?

  Firmly Libby brought her ire under control. You don’t get mad at a handicapped person, she scolded herself.

  The sun was already high and hot in the domelike sky, and Libby smiled. It was warm for spring, and wasn’t it nice to look up and see clouds and mountaintops instead of tall buildings and smog?

  Finally the main house came into view. It was a rambling structure of red brick, and its many windows glistened in the bright sunshine. A porch with marble steps led up to the double doors, and one of them swung open even as Libby reached out to ring the bell.

  Mrs. Bradshaw, the housekeeper, stepped out and enfolded Libby in a delighted hug. A slender middle-aged woman with soft brown hair, Marion Bradshaw was as much a part of the Circle Bar B as Senator Barlowe himself. “Welcome home,” she said warmly.

  Libby smiled and returned the hug. “Thank you, Marion,” she replied. “Is Cathy ready to go riding?”

  “She’s gone ahead to the stables—she’d like you to join her there.”

  Libby turned to go back down the steps but was stopped by the housekeeper. “Libby?”

  She faced Marion, again, feeling wary.

  “I don’t believe it of you,” said Mrs. Bradshaw firmly.

  Libby was embarrassed, but there was no point in trying to pretend that she didn’t get the woman’s meaning. Probably everyone on the ranch was speculating about her supposed involvement with Stacey Barlowe. “Thank you.”

  “You stay right here on this ranch, Libby Kincaid,” Marion Bradshaw rushed on, her own face flushed now. “Don’t let Stacey or anybody else run you off.”

  That morning’s unfortunate scene in Ken’s kitchen was an indication of how difficult it would be to take the housekeeper’s advice. Life on the Circle Bar B could become untenable if both Stacey and Jess didn’t back off.

  “I’ll try,” she said softly before stepping down off the porch and making her way around the side of that imposing but gracious house.

  Prudently, the stables had been built a good distance away. During the walk, Libby wondered if she shouldn’t leave the ranch after all. True, she needed to be there, but Jonathan’s death had taught her that sometimes a person had to put her own desires aside for the good of other people.

  But would leaving help, in the final analysis? Suppose Stacey did follow her, as he’d threatened to do? What would that do to Cathy?

  The stables, like the house, were constructed of red brick. As Libby approached them, she saw Cathy leading two horses out into the sun—a dancing palomino gelding and the considerably less prepossessing pinto mare that had always been Libby’s to ride.

  Libby hesitated; it had been a long, long time since she’d ridden a horse, and the look in Cathy’s eyes was cool. Distant. It was almost as though Libby were a troublesome stranger rather than her cousin and confidant
e.

  As if to break the spell, Cathy lifted one foot to the stirrup of the Palomino’s saddle and swung onto its back. Though she gave no sign of greeting, her eyes bade Libby to follow suit.

  The elderly pinto was gracious while Libby struggled into the saddle and took the reins in slightly shaky hands. A moment later they were off across the open pastureland behind the stables, Cathy confident in the lead.

  Libby jostled and jolted in the now unfamiliar saddle, and she felt a fleeting annoyance with Cathy for setting the brisk pace that she did. Again she berated herself for being angry with someone who couldn’t hear.

  Cathy rode faster and faster, stopping only when she reached the trees that trimmed the base of a wooded hill. There she turned in the saddle and flung a look back at the disgruntled Libby.

  “You’re out of practice,” she said clearly, though her voice had the slurred meter of those who have not heard another person speak in years.

  Libby, red-faced and damp with perspiration, was not surprised that Cathy had spoken aloud. She had learned to talk before the childhood illness that had made her deaf, and when she could be certain that no one else would overhear, she often spoke. It was a secret the two women kept religiously.

  “Thanks a lot!” snapped Libby.

  Deftly Cathy swung one trim blue-jeaned leg over the neck of her golden gelding and slid to the ground. The fancy bridle jingled musically as the animal bent its great head to graze on the spring grass. “We’ve got to talk, Libby.”

  Libby jumped from the pinto’s back and the action engendered a piercing ache in the balls of her feet. “You’ve got that right!” she flared, forgetting for the moment her earlier resolve to respect Cathy’s affliction. “Were you trying to get me killed?”

  Watching Libby’s lips, Cathy grinned. “Killed?” she echoed in her slow, toneless voice. “You’re my cousin. That’s important, isn’t it? That we’re cousins, I mean?”

  Libby sighed. “Of course it’s important.”

  “It implies a certain loyalty, don’t you think?”

  Libby braced herself. She’d known this confrontation was coming, of course, but that didn’t mean she wanted it or was ready for it. “Yes,” she said somewhat lamely.