Christmas Lone-Star Style

by Linda Turner

  Ruthlessly, he reminded himself that she was sick, that she would have blindly turned to any stranger who could offer her relief from the raging heat that seared her body from the inside out. But he couldn’t quite bring himself to believe it, not when he was the one she turned to with complete trust in her sleep. Not when it was his touch that calmed and soothed her and seemed to ease some of her restlessness. Not when the mysterious, unexpected attraction that had sparked between them right from the beginning was even now, when she was hardly aware of his presence, stronger than ever.

  As if she read his thoughts, she stirred then, and before he could draw back, he found himself caught in the trap of her gaze. Through pain-dulled eyes, she looked up at him and didn’t seem the least surprised to find his hands on her. Instead of protesting as he’d expected, she glanced over at the kids’ bunk beds and struggled to sit up when she saw that they were empty. “The kids—they should be in bed. Becky—”

  “Is just fine,” he assured her, pressing her gently back down onto her pillow. “She seems to be over the worst of it—she even ate supper, and she hasn’t had a fever in hours. Robby is still healthy as a horse, too. They’re sleeping in my room tonight so they won’t disturb you.” Taking her arm before she could guess his intentions, he pushed the sleeve of her nightgown up past her elbow, then gently stroked the damp cloth down her forearm to her fingers and back up again. “You’re hotter than a firecracker, sweetheart. We’ve got to get this fever down.”

  Her heart slamming against her ribs, Phoebe felt the heat inside her instantly flare to flashpoint and was helpless to do anything about it. He was, she told herself, only trying to help her. He would have done the same thing for any other poor soul who was alone and sick and had no one else to help her, and she would be a fool to read anything else into it.

  She knew that, accepted it, should have been grateful that she could trust him to be a gentleman. But her defenses were down, her head felt like it had been split wide open with a battle-ax, and her emotions were in a tangle. Tears stung her eyes, and she couldn’t for the life of her blink them away. Horrified, she turned her face away. “I’m sorry to be such a bother,” she said thickly. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I’m not usually such a crybaby.”

  “So, here’s your chance,” he teased gently. “Go ahead. Let her rip.”

  She laughed weakly—she couldn’t help herself—and felt immeasurably better. “Maybe later. I don’t think I’ve got the energy right now.”

  “Tomorrow then. You’ll be feeling better then.”

  She could have told him she was already feeling better, much better than she should have when her temperature was still hotter than hell. And it was all because of him. Because of the touch of his hands on her neck as he swept her hair out of the way and gently stroked the dampened washcloth over her hot skin. Because of the surprising tenderness he showed her, without even seeming to realize it. Her pulse jumped in the hollow of her throat, her eyes locked with his, and suddenly the silence that fell between them was electric.

  She knew the exact moment he realized that they were alone together in her bedroom, it was late, and he was running his hands all over her. He froze, the breath seemed to still in his lungs, and his gaze dropped to where his fingers had moved to the buttons of her gown. Slowly, his eyes lifted to hers, and the heat in them was scorching. Her heart jerked in her breast, and for the life of her, she couldn’t come up with a single word of protest. She wanted him to touch her.

  And he wanted to touch her. She could see it in his eyes. Then, in the next instant, he was shoving the washcloth in her hand and jumping to his feet. “Since you’re awake, you’d better do this,” he said hoarsely. And before she could protest, he was striding out of the room.

  Chapter 8

  The door slammed shut behind him, leaving her alone with her thoughts and her pounding heart. Foolish tears stinging her eyes, she opened her mouth to call him back, only to shut it with a snap. No, she thought, sniffing. Some things were better off left alone, and whatever had just passed between her and Mitch was definitely one of those things. She didn’t need him, didn’t need the feelings he stirred in her so effortlessly, didn’t need him to take care of her. She’d been on her own for a long time now and she didn’t mind being alone. In fact, she liked her independence. She could go where she wanted, do as she wished, and not have to answer to anyone. So if Mitch was under the mistaken impression that she was one of those clingy, desperate women who thought she was nobody if she didn’t have a man to make her feel beautiful and wanted, he could think again. She liked her life just fine the way it was.

  Satisfied that she’d finally put her feelings for him into perspective, she collapsed back against the pillow and weakly tossed the washcloth into the bowl of water he’d set on the nightstand. She was still hot—her muscles ached from the fever—and she needed to get up and change into a cooler nightgown, but she couldn’t find the strength. Exhaustion dragged her down, making it impossible for her to keep her eyes open. She’d just rest for a minute, she told herself with a tired sigh. Ten seconds later, sleep pulled her down into oblivion, and she never even knew it.

  The night, however, was not a peaceful one for her. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew she slept, but she couldn’t have said when. Dreams warped by fever haunted her. She thought Mitch came to her sometime in the wee hours of the morning, murmuring to her, coaxing her to swallow some aspirins as he once again wiped her hot face with a cool washcloth; but the images were dark and hazy and she couldn’t be sure. She drifted back to sleep and wasn’t aware of when Mitch left.

  Hours later, she woke to find the apartment bathed in silence and the morning sun streaming through the open curtains of the bedroom window, hitting her right in the face. Blinking, she brought her hand up to cover her eyes and was stunned by the effort it took. Half asleep, she frowned, wondering what was wrong with her. Then sharp, disjointed images from yesterday flashed before her eyes, and she groaned. No wonder she was weak as a newborn kitten. She’d been sick as a dog!

  Her head groggy, she lay perfectly still, afraid that if she moved just the slightest bit, the nausea would come roaring back. But when she carefully shifted to a more comfortable position, her stomach was thankfully quiet. Relieved, she pushed back the covers and stumbled to the bathroom to wash her face and take stock of her condition.

  One look in the mirror and she winced. With her eyes sunk in her head and her cheeks as pale as Ivory soap, she looked as if she’d been dead for three days. No wonder Mitch’s face had been so grave when he’d tended her in the middle of the night. A zombie would have had more color in its face.

  Her energy quickly deserting her, she tugged on a robe and stepped out of the bedroom into the hallway. Hushed stillness engulfed her, broken only by the muffled chiming of the antique grandfather clock from the Social Club’s entrance hall, and she knew that she was alone. She didn’t have to count the sonorous strikes of the hour to know that Mitch must have taken the kids to school. It was too early in the morning on a weekday for them to be anywhere else.

  She should have gone back to bed. She needed the rest if she was going to get back on her feet as soon as possible. But even as she told herself that, she made the mistake of stepping into the kitchen. She took one look, and any thought of going back to bed flew right out of her head.

  He’d done yesterday’s dishes, just as he’d told her he would, but he’d cooked while she was laid up in bed, then hadn’t gotten around to cleaning up his mess. Considering the disaster she herself had left the kitchen in when Becky was sick, she couldn’t blame him for that—and she was used to having the sole responsibility of the kids. Returning from a business trip to suddenly find himself saddled with the care of two kids and a sick woman would have thrown any man. Mitch, though, had handled it well, in spite of the condition of the kitchen.

  He’d handled her well.

  Even now, she could still feel his hands on her, caring for
her, setting her heart thudding. If she’d had the energy, that would have worried her. Their relationship was strictly business and it was going to stay that way. He was her boss, nothing more, the man who had offered her shelter because he was in a bind and temporarily needed her services. Just because he had impulsively kissed her, just because he’d taken care of her while she was sick with a gentleness that brought tears to her eyes, it didn’t mean that there was anything between them. Life had just thrown them together in unusual circumstances. Once things returned to normal, once they were back on a businesslike footing, they would both breathe easier.

  And the quickest way to do that, she told herself as she slowly began to clean the kitchen, was to get back on her feet again as soon as possible.

  Stepping in the open doorway of the kitchen, Mitch couldn’t believe his eyes. When he’d last checked on her before taking the kids to school, she’d been out like a light, which wasn’t any wonder. Not when she’d spent the night fighting a raging fever and troubled dreams. When her fever broke around six and she finally fell into a deep, dreamless sleep, he’d expected her to be out at least until noon. Instead, barely two hours later, she was not only up, she was cleaning house! She could barely stand up. He knew for a fact that nothing she had put in her stomach over the last twenty hours had stayed down. What was she trying to do? Kill herself?

  Muttering curses, he headed straight for her. “Dammit, woman, what the devil do you think you’re doing? Don’t you know you should be in bed?”

  Startled, she jumped guiltily and whirled to face him. “I was just cleaning up—”

  That was as far as she got. Reaching her in three long strides, he leaned down and scooped her up in his arms.

  “Mitch!”

  She was still gasping when he headed for the bedroom. “Stubborn woman,” he grumbled. “I knew I shouldn’t have left you alone. Mrs. Sanchez offered to sit with you while I took the kids to school, and I should have let her. She used to be a deputy with the sheriff’s department. She would have made sure you stayed in bed where you belong.”

  “I’m not a child,” she sniffed, even as she flung her arms around his neck to hang on. “I don’t need a keeper.”

  “Tell that to someone who hasn’t held your head while you tossed your cookies,” he retorted, scowling down at her. “In case you haven’t noticed, you couldn’t swat a mosquito right now and do any damage. You need to rest.”

  “But that’s all I’ve been doing!” she cried. “I’m so tired of lying in bed, I ache. My stomach feels like my throat’s been cut, and I’m so thirsty I could drink a gallon of juice. Please, Mitch, let me stay up for a while. Just long enough to eat a piece of toast.”

  He should have insisted she go to bed and let him bring her a tray, but when she was caught so close in his arms, her face lifted to his, she could have asked to walk on the moon and he would have been hard-pressed to deny her. God, she was beautiful! Even pale and weak, her face totally devoid of makeup and her hair tousled from the restless night she’d had, she had a natural beauty that punched him right in the gut.

  Instinctively, his arms tightened around her, drawing her higher on his chest. It was her eyes, he thought even as reason started to slip beyond his grasp. A mystifying hazel—sometimes brown, sometimes green—that reflected her every thought, they caught a man’s interest at first glance. And then there was her mouth. Soft, sensuous, unconsciously pouty, it all but begged for a kiss. Just one, he told himself as his blood warmed, then heated. That was all he wanted. It seemed like forever since he’d tasted her, and he only just now realized that ever since that first time, the need had been silently eating away at him, lingering in the shadows of his thoughts, haunting him. It was enough to drive a sane man right over the edge.

  Just one kiss, he promised himself again. That’s all it would take to convince him that he’d imagined the heat and sizzle of the last one. Then he’d get her out of his system and he could sleep at night without reaching for her. In the scheme of things, he didn’t think that was so very much to ask for.

  But even as he slowly started to lower his mouth to hers, his gaze met hers and he knew one kiss was never going to be enough. Not when her lips were already parted in anticipation and the same emotions that tore at him were there in her eyes, darkening them with a need she couldn’t hide. She wanted him as badly as he wanted her.

  And that scared the hell out of him.

  He never remembered moving, but suddenly he was depositing her in a chair at the old oak kitchen table and backing away like she had cooties or something. He saw hurt and confusion flash in her eyes and knew his behavior was asinine, but he couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Abruptly turning away, he yanked open the door to the refrigerator.

  “You’re right,” he said gruffly. “You need to eat something. How about a scrambled egg and toast? That shouldn’t bother your stomach and it won’t take me two seconds to fix it.”

  Not waiting for a yea or nay from her, he quickly assembled everything he needed to cook her breakfast, then moved to the stove. Shaken, Phoebe all but dissolved in a puddle in the chair. Close. That was close. He’d almost kissed her, and she’d wanted him to. So badly that even now, when he’d clearly changed his mind, she ached with longing for the feel and taste of his mouth moving over hers.

  How? she thought wildly. How had this happened? She was the one who had laid down the ground rules and made it clear that there would be nothing physical between them. He’d kissed her once. Once, for God’s sake! And even then, she’d convinced herself that the unexpected attraction he held for her was just a passing fancy, something she could easily control. But there was nothing fanciful—or easily controllable—about the emotions churning inside her now. And she couldn’t for the life of her explain how the man had brought her to this when she’d known him just a matter of days, and part of that time, he’d been in Dallas.

  But even as questions bombarded her, the answer was right there in the hazy images that flashed before her eyes. Mitch sitting on the side of her bed in the middle of the night, murmuring to her, stroking her aching brow, wiping a cool washcloth over her hot skin again and again. He’d only been trying to bring down her fever and make her feel better, and he’d done that. But he’d also, in the process, become much more intimate with her than she’d realized and taught her body to recognize his touch.

  Hot color flooding her cheeks, she realized, stricken, that she never should have let him take care of her. If she’d been thinking clearly, she would have asked him to call Dana to come and stay with her. Then he could have gone to a hotel with a clear conscience. But she’d been so sick, and turning to him for help had, at the time, seemed so right. And now she was paying the price.

  Her stomach tied in knots, the last thing she wanted to do was eat when he set a plate of fluffy scrambled eggs and toast in front of her a few minutes later. Especially when he took a seat opposite her at the table and looked as if he intended to stay a while. Forcing a weak smile, she said, “It looks wonderful, but I’m really not very hungry.”

  “Just a bite,” he coaxed. “Just a taste to whet your appetite.”

  Caught in the trap of his watchful gaze, she dutifully picked up her fork and reminded herself that she had to eat if she was going to get her energy back. She just didn’t know how she was going to do it, not with him watching her. Her throat was tight, her heart pounding, her mouth dry. Sure she’d never be able to swallow, she scooped up a forkful of eggs and was surprised at how good it tasted. She took another bite, then a third. Before she realized it, she’d cleaned her entire plate.

  When she blinked in surprise, he teased, “And you thought you weren’t hungry. Would you like something else? How about a cup of coffee?”

  Another time, she would have loved one, but just eating had used up her last reserves of energy. Suddenly her eyes were heavy, and all she could think about was lying down. Just for a minute. “I think I’d better lie down instead,” she said, yawning delica
tely behind her hand. “I’ve suddenly run out of gas.”

  “Then I’ll carry you back to bed,” he said easily, and pushed to his feet.

  “Oh, no! You don’t have to do that. I’m feeling much stronger. Really!” she insisted when he stepped purposefully toward her. “There’s no reason for you to carry me around like I’m some kind of invalid. I can walk.”

  “You’ve been pretty sick,” he retorted, his eyes dark with determination. “I wouldn’t want you to fall.”

  “I won’t.” Jumping up, her heart already thumping at the thought of him sweeping her up into his arms again, she quickly glided around the table, keeping it between them. “See...I’m just fine. I may not be ready for a marathon, but I can certainly make it to my room under my own steam. So if you’ll excuse me, I’ll do just that.”

  She didn’t give him a chance to reply, but simply scurried out of the kitchen like a skittish virgin running from the devil himself. She didn’t look back, but she didn’t have to to know that he found her antics highly amusing. His chuckle followed her all the way down the hall to her room.

  She meant to lie down for fifteen or twenty minutes. Instead, she discovered when she finally woke up, she slept for three hours! Stunned, she hurriedly dressed in real clothes for the first time in what felt like days, then made her way back to the kitchen. She was determined to do the dishes whether Mitch liked it or not, but he had already taken care of the problem. There wasn’t a dirty glass or dish in sight.

  She should have been relieved—doing the dishes was one of those never-ending household chores that she detested—but it irritated her that he’d so easily outmaneuvered her. She wasn’t sick anymore—she could carry her own weight when it came to her share of the chores. And the sooner he understood that, the better.