Western Man

by Janet Dailey

  She felt the disturbing difference in his attention, something that had been bred by the forced intimacy of their positions and that had been growing ever since. This sudden tension seemed to snatch at her breath and heighten her senses. She was conscious of so many things all at once, the smell of him tinged with hospital antiseptic and tobacco smoke, the sight of the throbbing blue vein in his throat, and the touch of his calloused hand rasping over the smoothness of her nylon-clad thigh.

  “You should wear dresses more often.” His voice was pitched low and velvety husky. “I never noticed your legs until today. You have beautiful legs.”

  “Really.” Sharon tried to sound calmly indifferent, but her voice came out all thick and disturbed, throbbing with the attraction she was feeling.

  “Really,” Ridge repeated her response with mocking emphasis. “Do you mind that I noticed your legs? You seemed quite interested in mine earlier.”

  She chose to ignore his comment. “This is very uncomfortable. Would you mind moving so I can get my arm out?”

  “I think I would,” he replied thoughtfully.

  His hand ceased its absent stroking of her leg and came away from beneath her skirt to slide up her back and tunnel under the weight of her hair. Sharon resisted the slight pressure his fingers exerted to move her closer to his mouth.

  “Ridge, let me go.” There was a trace of exasperation in her voice as if her patience with him had been pushed to the limit.

  “Careful,” he warned when her resistance started to take on a more physical aspect. “You wouldn’t hurt a guy when he was down, would you?”

  “When it’s you, I might,” Sharon retorted, but she couldn’t bring herself to inflict any additional pain on him, unintentionally or not.

  “No, you wouldn’t.” Ridge was very confident about that as she let herself be coerced into seeking contact with his mouth.

  He rubbed it over her lips, warming them with his touch and his breath. She found herself enjoying just the feel of her sensitive lips moving against his, nuzzling and exploring in a purely sensuous fashion. His hand slid down to the side of her waist, no longer possessing the strength to ensure that she maintained the intimate contact. It wasn’t necessary.

  Of its own accord, the mutual investigation grew into a long, breathless kiss. The thudding of her heart sounded loudly in her ears when Sharon finally drew an inch away from him. She felt the light touch of his finger under her jaw. It glided to the point of her chin, then shifted to trace the outline of her lips, still warm from his possession of them.

  “You have the softest lips,” he murmured.

  The lift of his chin invited them back. The last kiss had been marked by gentle seduction, but this time Sharon sensed a frustrated urgency in the moving pressure of his mouth. His hand dug into her waist with unconscious force, as if he wanted to pull her into his embrace and dared not. She, too, wanted to relax against him and feel the hard contours of his muscled body against hers, but she held herself rigidly away from him. Her weight on his broken ribs and badly bruised stomach would cause more pain than pleasure. Before the ache inside became any stronger, Sharon broke off the kiss.

  “It’s no good, Ridge. You’d better let me up.” Her voice was softly taut with things better left unsaid.

  “I ought to make you stay here all night,” he retorted thickly. “‘Beware of Greeks bearing gifts.’”

  Sharon didn’t see what one thing had to do with another. “What?”

  His gaze narrowed at her briefly and then moved to the shoulder bared by the drooping neckline of her dress. He shifted it back into its proper position, then let his finger hook itself on the elastic neckline while it traveled to the middle front until it rested against the slope of her breast, creating a tingle.

  “You put something in that cocoa, didn’t you?” Ridge accused.

  After a brief hesitation, she openly admitted her trick. “Yes. You needed something to dull the pain, so I ground up two of the pills the doctor prescribed for you and dissolved them in the milk.”

  “I thought I felt odd,” he muttered.

  For some reason, his remark struck her wrong, hardening all her sympathies into stone. Without caring any more whether it hurt him, she jerked her arm out from beneath him. Remorse flashed for an instant at his involuntary grunt of pain. Already she was pushing off the bed onto the floor.

  “You didn’t have to be so rough,” he snapped.

  “I thought you were a big, tough guy,” Sharon countered, with a hint of mockery. “It only hurts for a little while.”

  “All that honey and sweetness has turned to vinegar, hasn’t it?” His mouth thinned. “What’s the matter? Are you sore at yourself for kissing me?”

  “Rest is the cure for what ails you,” she retorted. “Not sex.”

  “Is that part of the doctor’s orders?” Ridge mocked.

  “No. It’s mine,” she flared.

  The sudden ringing of the phone on the bedside table startled Sharon. She whirled to face the noisy interruption, then quickly took a breath to calm her jangled nerves before reaching to pick up the receiver.

  “Latigo Ranch.” Her voice was unnaturally low but steady when she answered.

  “Hello?” An uncertain male voice came back, vaguely familiar, but Sharon just thought it was some neighboring rancher calling to find out how Ridge was doing. “Is ... is this Sharon?”

  “Yes.” Her forehead became knitted with a small frown.

  “It didn’t sound like you,” the voice replied with relief. As if sensing from her blank silence that she still hadn’t identified him, the caller eliminated the problem. “This is Andy . . . Andy Rivers. Your mother told me where you were when I called the house a few minutes ago.”

  “Yes, I told her to have you phone me here,” Sharon remembered belatedly.

  “Who is it?” Ridge demanded from the bed.

  She threw a glance at him, not wanting to carry on an essentially personal conversation with Andy in his presence. “Just a minute Andy,” she said into the phone, then clamped a hand over the mouthpiece while she answered Ridge’s question. “It’s for me.”

  “Andy, the oil man boyfriend.” Ridge had caught the name and connected it, a trace of sarcasm in his disparaging tone.

  Sharon wanted to snap back some kind of denial, both at his description and at his tone, but Andy was probably calling long distance. She didn’t want to keep him waiting on the line while she argued with Ridge.

  “I’m going to take the call in the kitchen,” she informed him stiffly. “Would you hang up the receiver here after I’ve picked up the one in there?”

  “Talk to him here,” Ridge challenged. “Or are you too embarrassed to whisper love words in his ear while I’m listening?”

  “It’s a personal call, which I wish to conduct in privacy.” She refused to let him goad her into taking the call in his room. She took her hand away from the mouthpiece and spoke into the phone again. “Hold on a second, Andy, while I switch to the extension in the kitchen.” Not trusting Ridge, she added, “If we accidentally get disconnected in the process, call me back.”

  After she had passed the receiver to Ridge, she moved the phone within easy reaching distance so he could hang it up once she was on the extension. He eyed her coolly.

  Without waiting for Ridge to continue his attempt to incite an argument, Sharon left the room and hurried to the wall phone in the kitchen. She picked up the receiver and tried to force the tension from her body.

  “Hello, Andy.” She waited until she heard his puzzled but affirmative response before she said to Ridge, “You can hang up the phone now.” There was a long moment before she heard the click of the extension going dead. It was funny, but she didn’t feel as relieved as she had expected. “Sorry to keep you waiting on the line for so long, Andy, but I . . . just gave Ridge some pills to help him sleep. I didn’t want my conversation with you to disturb him.”

  “Your mother mentioned something about Halliday hav
ing an accident. What happened?” he inquired.

  Sharon retold the story as briefly as she could and made an even sketchier explanation of how and why she had volunteered to look after Ridge in his home. But he didn’t seem to think it was either unusual or improper. Sharon smiled at herself, wondering why on earth she had thought Andy would be upset or possibly jealous. A guilty conscience, she supposed.

  Finally the conversation came around to the reason for his call. “I’m going to be in town over the weekend. I thought we might take in a show together Saturday night.”

  “It sounds great,” Sharon accepted the indirect invitation. “Ridge should be up and around by then, so I’ll probably be home. Why don’t you call on Saturday to be sure?”

  “I’ll do that,” Andy agreed. “If you aren’t there, I’ll understand the movie date is cancelled.”

  “No.” She rushed to eliminate that conclusion, not entirely sure why she didn’t want to accept an easy excuse. “Even if I’m still at Latigo, we can go to the movies. Scott can come over and visit with Ridge if he isn’t in any shape to be left alone.”

  “As long as you’re sure that isn’t going to create any conflict, I’ll see you Saturday night around six,” he said.

  “Just be sure to call first to find out where I am,” Sharon reminded him.

  Goodbyes were exchanged and they rang off. Sharon bit thoughtfully at the inside of her lip as she turned from the wall phone and moved slowly in the direction of Ridge’s bedroom. She had the uncomfortable feeling that she was trying to use the Saturday-night date with Andy as some kind of shield’—as if it could protect her from the long-held attraction she had for Ridge. If that’s what she was doing, it was both childish and cowardly.

  “Did you and lover boy have an argument?” His taunting voice halted her when she would have walked past his doorway.

  “No. Andy was calling long distance.” Or so she had presumed. Ridge’s earlier comment prompted her to add, “So we kept it short and sweet.”

  His face bore a disgruntled look. “I guess I owe you an apology for the way I snapped at you earlier—and for some of my remarks.” Apology didn’t come easily to him, and it showed in the tautness of his wording. Perhaps it meant something because it was honest, rather than an insincere attempt to smooth over an argument. “It doesn’t seem to take much to rub me the wrong way—not the way I’m hurting. It isn’t much of an excuse but—I do appreciate you staying here to look after me. I sure as hell can’t do it myself.”

  Not five minutes ago, Sharon had been prepared to stay angry at him for the duration. But all that resentment was fading in the wake of his apology and his grudging admission that he needed her.

  “Apology accepted, Grumpy.” A small smile touched her mouth.

  A glint of humor entered his drug-tired eyes. “If I’m Grumpy, you must be Doc. And those pills you put in my cocoa must be Snow White. Either that or they were the poisoned apple.”

  “Why don’t you stop fighting it and close your eyes?” suggested Sharon. “You need the sleep. I’ll be in the next room. Just call out if you need anything.”

  “Okay,” he said and let his eyelids drift shut, the potent drug taking its effect.

  Unfortunately, Sharon didn’t find it so easy to fall asleep. After she’d taken a bath and climbed into bed, sleep eluded her. The day had been so packed with activity that she couldn’t seem to bring it to an end, despite the late evening hour.

  The combination of a busy day, a strange bed, and the knowledge of Ridge sleeping in the next room denied her sleep until sometime after midnight. Even then, Sharon slept lightly, alert to any sound. Twice she went to check on Ridge in the middle of the night, positive she’d heard him. Both times he was sleeping deeply, and Sharon went back to crawl into her own bed to make another attempt to do the same.

  Exhaustion had taken her into a dreamless slumber when a loud crash shattered her sleep. She sat bolt upright and listened. The yellowing streaks of dawn were spreading through the grayness of the sky outside her bedroom windows. Sharon was still trying to decide whether she’d actually heard something or merely imagined it again when a muffled curse came through the wall between the two bedrooms.

  Sharon grabbed for her jade-green robe as she scurried out of bed and went flying into the hallway. She was frantically trying to tie the sash as she reached the open door and stopped to stare at Ridge. Half-naked, wearing only his jockey shorts, he was holding onto the footrail of his bed.

  “What are you doing out of bed? Why didn’t you call me?” she demanded angrily and hurried to his side without waiting for an answer. Taking his arm, she draped it around her shoulders so she could help him back to bed.

  “I made it this far. I can make it the rest of the way,” Ridge grumbled and pulled his arm away. To prove his point, he began hopping along the edge of the mattress until he was at the middle of the bed.

  “What’s wrong with your foot?” Sharon frowned.

  “I stubbed my toe on a corner of the dresser,” he muttered. His answer explained the noise that had awakened her. As he sat on the edge of the bed, he made all sorts of faces in an effort to hold in any vocal expression of pain. Lying down was a different thing. He threw her an irritated look. “Don’t just stand there. Help me.”

  As she helped him he flat, she was careful not to get her arm trapped again. She lifted the weight of her sleep-tousled hair away from the side of her face. “How did you manage to get out of bed without help?”

  “As the old saying goes—it was as easy as falling out of bed. Nothing to it,” Ridge insisted dryly, his features smoothing out as the pain subsided. “What time is it? It looks like it must be close to five in the morning.”

  Sharon glanced at the alarm clock on the table. “It will be in another ten minutes.”

  “Good. I’m starved. How about fixing me some breakfast?” he asked.

  She really wanted to crawl back into bed and get some of the sleep she’d missed, but she stifled a yawn. “I guess it’s time to be getting up,” she agreed wearily.

  “I’ll have three fried eggs over easy, hash-browns, and a couple of rashers of bacon,” Ridge ordered. “Toast and jelly, too. Juice and milk and coffee.”

  “You can have oatmeal with either applesauce or mashed bananas, or hot milk with toast,” she informed him. “The juice, milk, and coffee part of your order is okay.”

  He gave her a not too pleased look. “How long do I have to eat this baby food?”

  “Until you stop acting like one and start doing what you’re told.” The faintly barbed exchange was chasing away her tiredness. Mental alertness was always essential around Ridge.

  “Is that right?” Behind the mockery of his vague smile there was a glint of amusement in his expression. “Is that why you mix my medicine into my food—the same way you would with a baby?”

  “If the bootie fits—” Sharon murmured.

  Ridge chuckled, although not too vigorously because of the pain in his ribs and stomach. “I’ll have oatmeal and applesauce. No pills, please—at least not for the time being. I don’t want to become dependent on them. If I do have to end up taking them, I want them on the side with a glass of water.”

  She smiled her approval. “You don’t like being called a baby, do you? I wouldn’t worry about it. All men are big babies, no matter how tough they act.”

  “And where did you glean that bit of priceless information?” he said mockingly.

  “From years of observing my father and my brother. The only difference between men and little boys is the size and the price of their toys,” she chimed. “They like being spoiled and having their own way.”

  “What do women like?” Ridge gingerly crooked an arm under his head, elevating it a few inches and changing the angle of his view.

  “Now that would be telling,” Sharon laughed.

  “From my limited observation of the opposite sex—” he began to make his own guess, watching her with lazy interest, “—I’d s
ay they enjoy mothering—which includes everything from spoiling to giving orders.”

  “I don’t think I would say that,” she hedged against agreeing with his answer.

  His mouth crooked into a half-smile. “Look at yourself. You like the feeling of power you have over me—telling me what I’m going to eat and giving me my medicine even if it involves tricking me. A part of you is glad that I’m laid up, because it makes me dependent on you. So you can be nice and loving—or stern and commanding.”

  The more she thought about his observation, the more accurate it sounded. Sharon wasn’t sure that she liked it. Even though she had accused him of liking to be waited on, she had never thought of herself as liking to wait on him.

  “Maybe it’s true,” she conceded. “Any maybe it’s simply human nature—on both parts.”

  “How come you don’t want to admit that you like telling me what to do because you know I’m in no condition to do anything about it?” Ridge challenged with a taunting gleam in his eyes.

  “It’s definitely a unique feeling,” she admitted, although she was uncomfortable admitting to anything beyond that.

  “And you like it?” he persisted.

  “I suppose I do.” Her chin lifted a fraction of an inch, tilting to a challenging angle. “It’s nice to have the upper hand once in awhile.” Since he claimed she did in this instance, Sharon took advantage of her position. “Stay in bed and don’t try to get out by yourself while I’m fixing your breakfast.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” His submissive reply was deliberately mocking, denying the obedience and respect implied by the words.

  “I think I liked you better when you were Grumpy,” Sharon declared in a parting shot as she turned to leave the room.

  “Just like a woman.” Ridge’s taunting voice trailed after. “You like to have the last word.”

  A vague sense of irritation threaded through her nerves as Sharon swept into the hallway. There was always an element of truth in generalizations. So to that degree, the things Ridge had said were true. It simply wasn’t the whole truth.