Desperado

by Lisa Bingham

  Impatiently, she dashed the moisture away, twisting off the taps.

  Damn, damn, damn. She never cried. Never. Ever. But since she’d met Elam, her emotions were all out of whack. Everything she felt was stronger—laughter, sorrow, and yes, anger. Damn that man! He’d led her to the door of her hotel as if she were a stranger or … or a little sister. If she’d done something to offend him, he should have told her to her face, not, not …

  Kissed her on the cheek like a little girl.

  Filled with righteous indignation, she stormed into the main room and threw her suitcase on the bed. A small portion of her acknowledged that she was overreacting. Maybe Elam was too tired to deal with her right now—or he wanted some time alone. But the man could have explained the situation. Things between them were tenuous enough without her having to guess his thoughts. Maybe that had been his modus operandi with Annabel, but it sure as hell wasn’t the way P.D. worked.

  Unzipping her bag only far enough to reach inside, she grabbed the cotton nightgown Helen had folded on top and dragged it over her head. Then, snatching her key from where she’d left it on the bathroom counter, she dodged outside.

  Thankfully, there was no one else walking along the paths—not that it would have stopped her if there had been. She was going to drag her answers from Elam, one way or another. Because right now, she was fighting her own inner demons, the ones who were whispering to her that less than a week of knowing Elam Taggart had been long enough for him to discover that she wasn’t the type of woman who could keep his attention for long.

  Her hair hung down her back, dampening her nightgown and making her conscious of the fact that it was her only covering. She quickened her step, thankful that there weren’t any other hotel guests in sight. As soon as she spied Elam’s truck, she cut across the grass. A sign bolted to the side of the quaint clapboard building read, BACHELOR’S QUARTERS. How fitting.

  Another angry tear coursed down her cheek and she swiped it away.

  Stop it! No man was worth tears. Anger, yes. But not tears.

  Lifting her hand, P.D. prayed she was about to pound on the right door. But the muted sound of a shower and a muddy pair of boots sitting on the stoop confirmed her suspicions.

  Bam, bam, bam!

  Her knuckles stung from the strength of her knocks. Too late, she realized she should have planned what to say. Because when the door wrenched open and Elam stood on the other side, clutching a towel to his waist, water running in rivulets down the body she was just beginning to learn by touch … she immediately fell into an old familiar web of desire and need and … and …

  She shouldn’t have forced this confrontation. Not because of what Elam must be thinking as he saw her standing like a wet, bedraggled kitten on his doorstep. But because her own feelings for this man had become blindingly clear to P.D. In an instant, she realized how deeply she’d begun to care for him.

  Dear God, she was falling in love with him, with Elam Taggart, Bliss’s own Desperado.

  A man who would never love anyone but his first wife.

  She took a step backward. Then another.

  But before she could turn and run back to her own room, Elam yanked her inside and slammed the door. Then, somehow, her arms were around his neck and he was hauling her against his body. Her legs locked behind his back as his towel fell to the floor and he slammed her against the wall. And yes, he was blazingly aroused and fighting with the hem of her nightgown, his lips slanting against hers. There was no finesse, no tentative overtures. It was pure, unadulterated need, and his blatant hunger touched hers like a match to dynamite.

  When he discovered that the nightgown was all she wore, he ripped his lips free and swore. “I didn’t … I don’t … I … shit!” He carried her to the bed, dropping her onto the bed, then whirled, searching until he found his bag. “Look. I need to go into town—”

  “What?” P.D. was sure she’d heard him wrong. Damnit, how could one man send her from despair to ecstasy to utter bewilderment?

  She stared at him, her mouth agape. But before she could speak, Elam returned to frame her face with his hands. “I’m out of condoms, damnit. I just came into my room long enough to take a shower. I was going to throw on my clothes and run into town. Then …” He grinned. “I was going to come back and wake you up.”

  Relief surged through her. “Why didn’t you say that?”

  He must have suddenly understood what had caused her to storm over to his bungalow like Carrie Nation in search of demon rum.

  “Shit. You thought that I … that I didn’t …” He kissed her again, more slowly this time, then groaned. “What you do to me … All I have to do is touch you and I come unglued. I was afraid that if I let you tempt me inside, I wouldn’t be able to think straight, let alone stop.” His lopsided smile was rueful and filled with heat. “You have that effect on me.”

  Those words, more than anything else, had the power to reassure her that Elam’s ardor hadn’t eased now that they’d returned to the reality of modern living.

  “So talk to me next time, okay? I can’t read your mind.”

  His lips hovered over hers. “It’s a good thing you can’t, or you’d know that I spend most of my time thinking about you”—he pressed a kiss to her cheek—“and me”—her jaw—“doing this”—her neck. Then he found her mouth with another searing kiss. One that he only allowed to develop for a minute before pulling back.

  He stood, searching the room.

  “I’ll go with you. Into town,” P.D. offered, then suddenly frowned. “Shoot. I left my clothes in my bungalow.”

  He reached to stroke her cheek with his thumb, obviously not trusting himself to do any more. “Just … stay here, okay? Relax. Rest. I’ll be back. Twenty minutes, tops.”

  She nodded.

  “Offer up a prayer that Bodey packed clean jeans and a decent shirt.”

  He moved to the foot of the bed, where he finally found his bag. Throwing it on the mattress, he unzipped the top. Then, to P.D.’s amazement, he started to laugh.

  Wondering what on earth had caused this abrupt about-face, she leaned over to look in the case. She’d expected to see Elam’s clothes stuffed in a haphazard jumble the way Bodey was prone to packing for his competitions. But as she glanced inside, she had no idea if Bodey had packed any clothes at all because the duffel was stuffed to the brim with condom packages.

  Her own laughter joined Elam’s—and she vowed to bake a batch of Bodey’s favorite rum raisin cookies and deliver them to his doorstep. But not tonight. Tonight, she had other plans.

  “Remind me to thank him,” P.D. said, grabbing one of the packets from the top. Then she pushed the bag onto the floor, where it tipped over, leaving a cascade of rainbow-colored squares spilling out over the carpet.

  “Don’t you dare,” Elam growled, allowing her to pull him onto the bed. “It will only encourage him.”

  “Oh, I dare,” she whispered as his body pressed her into the marshmallow softness of the featherbed. “I definitely dare.”

  *

  THEY made love off and on throughout the night, interspersing their bouts of passion with a hearty meal from room service and long soaks in the jetted tub. Tired as she was, P.D. battled her weariness, hoarding each kiss, each caress until, finally, neither of them could keep their eyes open and, in a tangle of limbs, they fell asleep.

  Late-morning sun was slanting through the slats of the blinds when P.D. fought her way to consciousness again, her body rousing her with a curious mixture of pain and pleasure. She would have willingly drifted off again if it weren’t for the featherlight kiss pressed to her shoulder.

  “Morning, sleepyhead.”

  She twisted to peer out of lashes that were heavy as lead. But she was rewarded for her efforts. Elam. Dear sweet heaven above. Did anyone have a right to look that good in the morning? His hair was tousled and stubble etched the planes of his jaw. And his eyes …

  They were filled with an inner light that grew with eac
h passing day.

  Groaning, P.D. realized that she must look a wreck. She hadn’t braided her hair the night before so it fell in a riot of curls. She was scratched and scraped, blistered and bruised—and heaven help the person who told her she was going to have to hike anywhere anytime soon.

  Squeezing her eyes shut, she buried her face in the pillow, but not before she realized that Elam was fully dressed in jeans and a button-down shirt.

  “Why are you up so early?” she mumbled.

  “It’s past noon.”

  She groaned again.

  “Here. This might help.” The bed dipped.

  Even through the fluff of the pillow, P.D. smelled coffee. Heavenly, heavenly coffee.

  Chancing a quick look, she saw that Elam had stretched out beside her, propping his back against the headboard with pillows. In his hand, he held a huge foam cup.

  The sight alone was enough to make her sit up. She eagerly reached for the beverage, blowing at it before taking her first sip. A sound of pure bliss seeped from her throat.

  “Where have you been?” she croaked.

  “I borrowed your key and retrieved some clothes for you.” He gestured to a pile on a nearby chair. “I figured you wouldn’t want to make the trip back to your room in nothing but your nightgown.”

  No kidding. Especially since they’d ripped it in their eagerness to make love sometime in the middle of the night.

  “Thanks.” With each sip, she was becoming a little more coherent.

  “I also got us some breakfast.” He reached for a sack on the bedside table and P.D. immediately recognized the colorful logo.

  “You’ve been to the Cake Dump,” she said reverently, referring to Evertson’s Sweet Shop. Situated across the street from the local high school, the bakery had been affectionately nicknamed by the kids, and unfortunately for the Evertsons, the moniker had stuck.

  “I didn’t know what you’d like, so I got a little bit of everything.”

  He opened the bag for her perusal. Inside were two glazed twists, a pair of bagels, a cellophane sack of donut holes, and two huge hot rolls.

  P.D. immediately grabbed one of the hot rolls. Twice the size of a normal dinner roll, the bread was still warm and the generous pat of butter that had been thrust through the upper crust into the softness beneath had already melted and been absorbed.

  “I’ve got gravy, too, if you want it.” Elam gestured to another Styrofoam container on the nightstand.

  “Brown or white?”

  “Brown.”

  Her eyes nearly rolled back into her head in delight and she moaned her approval. Heaven. This was heaven. Elam, hot rolls, coffee, and gravy. Life couldn’t get much better than this.

  Again, Elam laughed. “I see you’re easy to please first thing in the morning.” He took her coffee, setting it on the table, then grabbed the gravy and another hot roll for himself. Soon, the two of them were sitting cross legged, dipping hunks of bread into the rich brown gravy—a treat that P.D. had never even heard of before moving to Bliss.

  “We’ve got several hours until Helen shows up. Do you want to go to Vern’s?”

  P.D. thought about it for a moment, then shook her head. “There’s nothing I can do until I meet with the contractor, so there’s not much point.”

  Her answer seemed to surprise Elam as much as it did her, so she tried to explain. “For a long time now, Vern’s has consumed me. Every minute of every day was spent worrying about how to make it better. But by stepping away for a few days, I’m beginning to see that I was starting to burn out. I was going through the motions, but I wasn’t really … emotionally and mentally present.” She frowned, remembering the incident with the line cook who’d stolen steaks from her freezer. Normally, the missing meat would have hit her radar long before it had. “Does that make any sense?”

  Elam’s features grew still and thoughtful. “Yeah. Yeah, it makes perfect sense.”

  “So I’ve decided that I’ve got to reexamine all of my employees’ work history and train a couple of them to take over part of the day. That way, I can have a personal life as well.”

  Her words hung in the air, providing the perfect opportunity for Elam to reassure her that he’d love to be a part of that “personal life.” But he didn’t take the bait.

  “You don’t trust Bart with that?”

  She ignored the twinge of hurt at Elam’s apparent obliviousness to her concerns, focusing on his question instead. Normally, Bart would be the natural choice to take over Vern’s in her absence. But there’d been such a weird vibe between them since Bart had seen Elam kissing her in the parking lot. She didn’t know if she wanted to deal with the man’s bruised ego.

  P.D. tossed the rest of her roll into the sack, no longer hungry, wishing she’d steered the conversation in another direction. All this talk about Vern’s was making her realize that her time alone with Elam was becoming more limited. All too soon, the real world would intrude, if it hadn’t already.

  Elam set the gravy aside. “Hey, I didn’t mean to bring back all your worries. You’re right. We’ve both been too caught up in our heads lately. I let the construction of my new house become my main focus. Hopefully, now that it’s pretty much done, I can concentrate on the ranch, my brothers.” He caressed her cheek. “As well as other things …” He leaned forward to kiss her. “Other people.”

  He grabbed the back of his shirt, pulling it over his head and revealing that killer chest and rock-hard abs that P.D. couldn’t seem to stop exploring.

  “So let’s enjoy all this as long as it lasts.”

  Then, he was drawing her into his arms and P.D. no longer had the power to think of anything but ridding him of his remaining clothing. Just as it had so many times already, passion erupted between them like wildfire, until she couldn’t touch Elam enough, couldn’t hold him tightly enough.

  Only when he plunged inside her was she given some relief from her hunger for this man. She gripped him tightly through her release, her fingernails digging into his shoulders. And when he threw his head back with his own shuddering climax, she watched him, desperately absorbing each minute emotion that crossed his features until he finally collapsed on top of her. Then, cradling him against her breast, she slipped her fingers into his hair, toying with the silken strands, absorbing the knocking wildness of his heart with her own flesh.

  *

  SO let’s enjoy all this as long as it lasts.

  Much later, after Elam had fallen asleep beside her, the words reverberated in her head.

  As long as it lasts.

  P.D. supposed that she’d finally been given the answer that she’d sought. Where she had briefly allowed herself to think of happily-ever-afters, Elam had already begun to prepare himself for the moment that their relationship would end.

  She closed her eyes, rolling away from the warmth of his body and burying her face in her arm to keep Elam from seeing even an echo of the devastation that rocked through her body. Yes, she’d warned herself of such an eventuality. From the very beginning, she’d told herself that she would end up being Elam’s transition relationship. The woman who convinced him that his heart could make room for someone new. And she’d known that a return to the “real world” and the responsibilities it held could prove the tipping point. She’d even convinced herself that she could handle whatever Elam was willing to give.

  But what she hadn’t realized was just how much it would hurt when he alluded to a time when he would move on.

  Again, she was rocked with a flood of doubt and misapprehension. What was she doing here? In Elam’s bed and Elam’s life? Why couldn’t she be content with the fact that she’d found a home here in Bliss?

  An overwhelming ache bloomed in her chest, threatening to cut off her breathing altogether. She focused on getting air into her system, on fighting back the misery that threatened to consume her. Biting her lip, she forced the emotions away until, finally, enough of the pain had subsided for her to slide from the bed.
<
br />   The movement roused Elam, just as she’d feared it would.

  “You’re not leaving yet, are you?” he asked sleepily.

  “Yeah.” She swallowed, forcing away the tightness of her throat when her voice emerged husky and thick. Hopefully, Elam would attribute it to her exhaustion. “Helen will be here soon and I need to shower and start working on my hair.”

  “Mmm.”

  He didn’t open his eyes and P.D. couldn’t help herself. For several long minutes, she drank in the sight of him sprawled on his stomach, a sheet barely covering his hips. Even now, she wanted to touch him, to let her fingers roam the planes and valleys of his body until she knew them by heart. She wanted to thrust her fingers into the silky softness of his hair and let the stubble on his chin rasp her palms.

  He looked so different from the man she’d met only a week ago. He’d lost the haunted look to his eyes and the rigid posture that had conveyed he was waiting for the next blow life would throw at him. He was … at peace with himself.

  P.D. supposed that if there was any comfort to be had from their relationship, it was that she’d been the one to help him get to that place.

  *

  WHEN Helen arrived at her room, carrying her magic carpet bag and towing her sewing machine and supplies in a special set of wheeled cases, P.D. pasted a happy smile on her face and did her best to field her gentle prying. It was easy to see that, in Helen’s mind, her matchmaking efforts were a success and wedding bells were forecast for the near future.

  P.D. didn’t have the heart to tell her the truth. P.D. wasn’t even sure what she intended to do herself. So she pretended to take an interest in the preparations for the Cattle Barons’ Ball and the awards announcements that would follow.

  “I think you’re ready. Have a look.”