“That was wonderful!” she exclaimed.
“Would you like something to drink?” Buck asked.
“Just a soda, please.”
Buck found a seat for Tate at one of the small tables that surrounded the dance floor and forced his way through the crowd toward the bar.
Tate was tapping her foot to another two-step tune and enjoying watching the couples maneuver around the dance floor when she thought she saw someone she recognized. She followed the couple until they turned at the corner of the room.
Tate gasped aloud. It was Adam! He was dancing the two-step with a buxom redheaded woman.
As he passed by her table, Adam smiled and called out, “Hi, there! Having fun?”
Before she could answer, they had danced on past her, and she was left with the trill of the woman’s laughter in her ears.
Tate felt sick. Who was she? The Redheaded Woman in Adam’s arms was absolutely beautiful. No wonder Adam hadn’t been interested in pursuing her when he was acquainted with such a gorgeous female.
“What’s caught your eye?” Buck asked as he set a soda in front of Tate.
“Adam’s here.” She pointed him out. “See there. With that redhead.”
To Tate’s amazement, Buck scowled and swore under his breath.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“Nothing I can do anything about.”
“That’s the sort of statement that’s guaranteed to get a nosy female’s attention,” Tate said. “Out with it.”
Buck grinned sheepishly and admitted, “All right. Here goes.” He took a deep breath and said, “That woman dancing with Adam is my ex-wife.”
“You’re kidding!”
“’Fraid not.”
Tate watched Buck watching the Redheaded Woman. His feelings were painfully transparent. “You’re still in love with her.”
Buck grimaced. “Much good it’ll do me.”
“I assume Adam knows how you feel.”
“He asked my permission before he took Velma out the first time.”
“And you gave it to him?” Tate asked incredulously.
“She isn’t my wife anymore. She can see whoever she pleases.”
Tate snorted in disgust. “While you suffer in noble silence. Men!”
Tate had been so involved with talking to Buck that she hadn’t realized the song was ending. She was less than pleased when Adam and Velma arrived at their table.
“Mind if we join you?” Adam asked.
Tate bit her lip to keep from saying something censorable. She slipped her arm through Buck’s, put a gigantic smile on her face, and said, “Why sure! We’d love to have the company, wouldn’t we, Buck?”
It was hard to say who was the more surprised by her performance, Buck or Adam. What she hadn’t expected was the militant light that rose in Velma’s green eyes when Tate claimed Buck’s arm. Well, well, well. Maybe there was more here than met the eye.
Adam made introductions, then seated Velma and caught one of the few waitresses long enough to ask for two drinks.
“I didn’t expect to see you here,” Tate said to Adam.
“I enjoy dancing, and Velma’s a great partner.”
Tate could imagine what else Velma was great at. She had observed for herself that the redhead had a wonderful sense of rhythm.
Tate was aware of Buck sitting stiffly beside her, quieter than he had been at any time during the evening. How could Adam not be sensitive to the vibrations that arced across the table between the cowboy and his ex-wife?
In fact, Adam was eminently aware of how much Buck Magnesson still loved his ex-wife. It was why he had brought Velma here this evening. Adam knew that with Velma in the room, Buck wasn’t liable to spend much time thinking about Tate.
There was more than one way to skin a cat, Adam thought with satisfaction. He had known Tate would rebel against an ultimatum, so he hadn’t protested her date with Buck. He had simply sought out a more subtle way to get what he wanted.
Bringing Velma to the dance seemed like the answer to his problem. He was pretty sure Velma was as much in love with Buck as the cowboy was with his ex-wife. He didn’t mind playing Cupid, especially if it meant separating Tate from the virile young cowboy.
“How about trading partners?” Adam said, rising from his chair and reaching for Tate’s hand.
Before Tate could protest, Buck said, “That sounds fine to me,” took Velma by the hand and headed for the dance floor.
Tate wasn’t sure what to make of Adam’s ploy. She waited until they were half a dance floor away from the other couple before she said, “That was a pretty sneaky thing to do.”
“I wanted to dance with you.”
“Are you sure you aren’t matchmaking?”
Adam smiled. “You could feel it, too?”
“I think he might still love her.”
“I’m sure he does.”
“Then why did you bring Velma here tonight?”
“I would think that’s obvious.”
“Not to me.”
“I enjoy her company.”
“Oh.”
He grinned. “And I knew Buck would be here with you.”
He sent her into a series of spins that prevented her from making any kind of retort. By the time she was in his arms again the song was over and he was ushering her back toward their table, where Buck and Velma were sitting across from each other arguing vociferously.
“Buck?” Tate didn’t want to interrupt, but she wasn’t sure whether she should leave him alone with Velma, either.
“Let’s get out of here,” Buck said, jumping up and turning his back on Velma. “Good night, Adam. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
As Buck hurried Tate away, she heard Velma say, “I’d like to go home now, Adam. If that’s all right with you?”
Tate wasn’t sure where Buck was taking her when he burned rubber on the asphalt parking lot. It was a safe guess from the dark look on his face that he had no romantic intentions toward her.
“Want to talk about it?” she asked at last.
Buck glanced quickly at her, then turned his eyes back to the road. “I don’t want to bother you with my problems.”
“I’m a good listener.”
He sighed and said, “Velma and I were high school sweethearts. We married as soon as we graduated. Pretty soon Velma began to think she had missed something. She had an affair.”
Tate bit her lip to keep from saying something judgmental. She was glad she had when Buck continued.
“I found out about it and confronted her. She asked for a divorce, and I gave it to her.”
“Why?”
“Pride. Foolish damn pride!”
“And you regret it now?”
“My life’s been running kind of muddy without her.”
“So why don’t you do something about it?” Tate asked.
“It’s no use. She says that I deserve better. She doesn’t believe I can ever forgive or forget what she did.”
“Can you?”
The cowboy’s eyes were bleak in the light from the dash. “I think so.”
“But you’re not sure?”
A muscle worked in his jaw. “If I were, I’d have her back home and under me faster than chain lightning with a link snapped!”
Tate had thought they were driving without direction, yet she realized suddenly that they had arrived back at the front door of Adam’s house. She saw Adam’s truck parked there. So, he was home. And there was a light on in the living room.
She let herself out of the truck, but Buck met her on the front porch. He put an arm around her waist and walked her away from the light.
“May I kiss you good-night, Tate?”
Tate drew a breath and held it. This was so exactly like the scene she had played out the night she had left home that it was eerie. Only there were no brothers here to protect her from the big, bad wolf.
“Of course you can kiss me good-night,” she said at last.
; Buck took his time, and Tate was aware of the sweetness of his kiss. And the reluctance in it. When he lifted his head their eyes met, and they smiled at each other.
“No go, huh?” he said.
Tate shook her head. “I like you an awful lot, Buck. I hope we can be friends.”
“I’d like that,” the cowboy said.
He leaned down and kissed her again. Both of them knew how much—and how little—it meant.
However, it was not so clear to the man watching them through a slit in the living room curtains.
CHAPTER 5
IT HAD TAKEN EVERY OUNCE of willpower Adam possessed to keep from stalking out onto the front porch and putting his fist in Buck Magnesson’s nose. It wasn’t just the thought of his sister Melanie that kept him from doing it. There were things he couldn’t offer Tate that Buck could.
But he wasn’t a saint or a eunuch. If Tate persisted in tempting him, he wasn’t noble enough to refuse her. He was determined to keep his hunger leashed at least until he was certain Tate knew what she wouldn’t be getting if she got involved with him. She was too young to give up her dreams. And there was no way he could fulfill them.
Before Adam had time to examine his feelings further, the front door opened. Tate stepped inside to find him sitting in one of the large Mediterranean chairs before the blackened fireplace, nursing a half-empty glass of whiskey.
“Hello,” she said. “I didn’t expect to see you again tonight.”
“I was waiting up for you.”
Tate immediately bristled. “Look, I don’t need a caretaker.” She wanted a lover. But not just that. A man who loved her, as she was beginning to fear she loved him.
“Old habits die hard.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I used to wait up for my sister Melanie.”
“You have a sister? Why haven’t I met her?”
“She died ten years ago.”
“I’m so sorry.”
Adam had drunk just enough whiskey to want to tell her the rest of it. “Melanie ran away from home when she was seventeen. She was picked up by a stranger while hitchhiking. He raped her, and then he stabbed her to death.”
“That must have been awful for you!” Tate wanted to put her arms around Adam to comfort him, but his body language posted obvious No Trespassing signs.
She used sitting on the couch as an excuse to cross closer to him, slipped off her boots and pulled her feet up under her. She folded her arms under her breasts to give herself the comfort he wouldn’t accept.
Then another, more troubling thought occurred to her. “Is that why you picked me up on the road? Because of your sister?”
Adam nodded.
Tate felt as though she’d been physically struck. She hesitated and asked, “Is that why you offered me a job?”
“It seemed like a good idea at the time.”
Tate swallowed over the lump that had grown in her throat. “So I’m just a charity case to you?”
Adam heard the pain in Tate’s voice and realized he had handled this all wrong. If he didn’t do some fast talking, he knew she would be gone by morning. “You can hardly blame me for offering help under the circumstances, can you? I couldn’t take the chance that I might be responsible for another young woman’s death!”
Tate wasn’t so wrapped up in her own feelings that she failed to recognize the significance of what Adam had just said. “How can you blame yourself for your sister’s death? What happened couldn’t possibly be your fault!”
“Oh, no?” Adam’s nostrils were pinched, his blue eyes like shards of ice. “Didn’t you tell me that you left home because your brothers made your life miserable?”
“They only did what they did because they love me!” Tate protested.
“So that makes it all right for them to interfere in your life? To aggravate you enough to send you running in that old rattletrap truck?”
It was clear Adam was searching for answers that would release him from the guilt he suffered over what had happened to his sister. Tate found herself equally confounded by the issues he had raised. Was love a good enough excuse for the high-handed way Garth and Faron had acted? What if she had met the same fate as Adam’s sister? Would they have blamed themselves for her death?
She knew they would have, just as Adam had blamed himself for Melanie’s death all these years. She didn’t know what to say to ease his pain. She only knew she had to do something.
Tate stood and crossed to Adam. She knelt on the cool tile floor at his feet and laid a hand on his thigh. She felt him tense beneath her touch. “Adam, I—”
He rose abruptly and stalked away from her. “I’m not in the mood for any teasing tonight.”
“I was trying to offer comfort!” Tate retorted.
“Just stay away from me!”
Tate struck back like the scorned woman she felt herself to be. “There are plenty of others who’ll welcome my attentions!”
“Like Buck?”
“Like Buck!” That was a lie, but told in a good cause. Saving her pride seemed of utmost importance right now.
“He’ll never marry you. He’s still in love with Velma.”
Since Tate knew he was right, she retorted, “I don’t have to marry a man to go to bed with him!”
“Is that so, little girl?”
Tate was gasping, she was so furious at the taunting words. But it was clear she could cut her own throat with a sharp tongue. She had certainly dug a hole for herself it was going to be hard to get out of. She took two deep breaths, trying to regain her temper.
Adam didn’t give her a chance to speak before he said, “If you’re smart, you’ll go back home where you belong. Now, before you get hurt.”
“Are you firing me?”
Tate held her breath until he said, “No.”
“Then I’m staying. If you’ll excuse me, I’m tired. I want to go to bed.”
Tate had started for the door when Adam quipped, “What, no invitation to join you?”
Tate slowly turned back to face him. She took her time getting from where she was to where he was. She hooked a finger into the opening at the neck of his shirt and looked up into eyes that were both wary and amused.
“I learned at my brothers’ knees never to approach a bull from the front, a horse from the rear…or a damn fool from any direction. Good night, Adam.”
“We’ll talk about this again tomorrow,” he said to her retreating back.
“Like hell we will!” she replied.
Tate spent a restless night, tossing and turning as her mind grappled with all of Adam’s revelations. What she found most disturbing was the possibility that Adam had merely been tolerating her because he felt responsible for her welfare.
Surely she couldn’t have been mistaken about his physical reaction to her! More likely, he was attracted to her, but his feelings of responsibility toward her were keeping him from pursuing a relationship. If so, she would soon cure him of that!
Tate felt somewhat cheered by her decision, and she made up her mind to confront Adam at breakfast. Only, when she arrived in the kitchen the next morning, she discovered that he had already eaten and left the house.
“Did he say where he was going, Maria?”
“No, señorita.”
Tate worked hard all day in the office so she wouldn’t have time to worry about where Adam had gone. He was bound to turn up sooner or later. He wasn’t going anywhere. And neither was she.
However, by seven o’clock that evening there was still no sign of Adam. He hadn’t even called Maria to say he wouldn’t be home for dinner. Maria was washing up the dinner dishes, and to keep herself busy, Tate was drying them and putting them away. Maria had tried to start a conversation, but Tate was too distracted to keep track of what she was saying. Finally Maria gave up trying and left Tate to her thoughts.
Tate was worried. Where could Adam have gone? She had already checked once at the bunkhouse, but no one had seen him all day
.
When she heard a knock at the kitchen door, Tate leaped to answer it. It wasn’t until she opened the door that she realized Adam wouldn’t have knocked.
“Buck! You look terrible. What’s wrong?”
Buck pulled his hat off his head and wiped the sweat from his brow with his sleeve. “Um, I, um.”
She put a hand on his arm and urged him inside the room. “Come in. Sit down.”
He resisted her efforts to move him from his spot just inside the kitchen door. “No, I—”
“You what?” Tate asked in exasperation.
“I need your help.”
“Of course, anything.”
“Maybe you better not say yes until you hear what I have to say.” He eyed Maria, but was too polite to ask her to leave.
Aware of the tension in the cowboy, Maria said, “I give you some time alone, so you can talk,” and left the room. But she made up her mind she wouldn’t be gone for long. The nice señorita, she was good for Señor Adam. It would not do to let cowboys like Buck Magnesson take what should not be theirs.
Tate turned a kitchen chair and sat in it like a saddle. “I’m all ears.”
Buck fidgeted with the brim of his hat another moment before he said, “I’ve thought a lot about our conversation last night. You know, about whether or not I could forgive and forget what Velma did? And, well…I believe I can.”
A smile spread on Tate’s face. “I’m so glad, Buck.”
“Yeah, well, that’s why I need your help. I’ve decided to go see Velma and tell her how I feel, and I thought maybe if you were along to sort of referee—”
Tate was up and across the room in an instant. She gave the startled cowboy a big hug. “It’ll be my pleasure. When would you like to go see her?”
Buck grinned. “Is right now too soon?”
Tate thought about leaving a note for Adam, then rejected the idea. It would do him good to know how it felt to worry about someone who didn’t leave a message where he was going!
Maria heard the kitchen door slam closed and came back in to see what Señor Buck had wanted. She frowned and clucked her tongue in dismay when she realized that Señorita Tate had left the house with the handsome cowboy. “Señor Adam will not like this. He will not like this at all.”
Adam Page 5
