“So. Tell me about your childhood.”
Tell me about alien ocean monsters. Tell me about the next presidential election. Tell me about elephants in Africa. Tell me anything, just to get my mind off a good-sized chunk of me that’s all of a sudden waking up and ready to function.
“My childhood, hmmm?”
Be damned to this girl, if she wasn’t guessing his innermost thoughts! Must come from growing up on a farm. Closer to the earth, and all that. Closer to the animals.
Animals. Jesus. He might as well be one, himself, just like that. Horny as an old he-bear. Good thing it was late. Good thing he was getting tired. Otherwise…
He liked the sound of her voice. He liked the sound of her laughter. He liked the sound of her conversation, as she talked about idyllic days in southern California, with childhood playmates and plenty of chores to learn responsibility.
His black leather boots stirred up little puffs of dust in the gray powder that was the road. “You’re lookin’ a little worse for wear,” he blurted out.
Startled, her gaze shot to his. The coiffure she had so carefully arranged at the start of their evening had come completely undone, so that rich mahogany curls fell every which way around her bare shoulders. A small discoloration marked one cheek; another lay in the curve beneath her jaw. The dress was surely in a state of ruination, given dirt and ripped fabric and torn hems.
None of tonight’s costume was meant for a stroll in the park, let alone a lengthy trek in the middle of nowhere.
“You’re not such fresh daisy material yourself,” she replied impertinently. And then shivered.
With several silent curses, Rob chastised himself as a clod. Just because he enjoyed surveying the landscape of her semi-exposed bosom didn’t mean he shouldn’t offer aid as necessary.
Pausing, so that the muzzle of the gelding banged into his shoulder blades, he unbuttoned and removed his suit jacket, then slipped it around her shoulders.
“Ahhh,” she murmured, as contented as possible under the circumstances. “Thank you, Rob. I was feeling a little chilly.”
“How are the feet holding up?”
“Well...Remember that women in the military thing? I think I’m getting good practice.”
“Huh. Should wear some sensible shoes next time.”
“Why, certainly, I’ll do just that. You let me know the next time someone plans on kidnapping me, and I’ll plan on putting on my oldest pair of boots, in case I’ll end up walking a few hundred miles or so out into the wilderness.”
Grinning with a flash of white teeth, he reached for her hand, smooth and cool in the damp night air. “You’re a badass, aren’t you?”
Clumping along with steps that were growing more and more tired, she pointed her disdainful nose into the air. “That sounds vulgar. I don’t think it’s a very proper thing to say to me.”
“Maybe not,” Rob agreed. “But then, you’re not proper anyway, even if you do get away with that ladylike style. You’re like my aunts. They’re badasses, too, every last one of ’em.”
She bristled. “If by that you mean I’m not fit company, I certainly beg to differ. I’ll have you know that—”
“Oh, you’re fit company enough for me.”
And then he sprang.
Like the jaws of a trap snapping shut, he clenched both hands into her waist and sought out her astonished mouth to seize and capture. This, their first kiss, burned and seared into his memory with its force, Fiona was backed up against the horse’s saddle, unable to move, as Rob took advantage of her helpless position. Another kiss, long and hard, that sucked the breath from her lungs and doubled the power of his loins.
All pressed together, fused together, there under the star-studded night sky, his grip skimmed upward to cup and mold those fabulous breasts. Fiona moaned. Whether in protest or delight, he couldn’t tell. He was lost in what he was doing, what he was feeling, and how she was responding.
Because now, now, at last, came the charge of electricity that sang and hummed through his veins. A frisson like wind over water sent gooseflesh skittering down his arms and along the back of his neck, and deep in the pit of his stomach something uncoiled and stretched.
He wanted to turn cartwheels. He wanted to swim a hundred laps. He wanted to howl at the moon in pure, greedy triumph.
“Fiona!” he gasped out, finally releasing her so that both could come up for air. “Oh, my God—Fiona!”
Panting, she had buried her face and her blushes in the comforting hollow of his collarbone.
All the while his patient horse had stood still, supportive, understanding.
“Good horse,” he muttered. “Gonna find your owner and buy you outright. One helluva night for all of us.”
“I think I’d—I think I’d better—”
“Why, darlin’, you’re shaking all over. I’m sorry, did I scare you?” His voice was rich with the honey-molasses cadence of the south. “You okay?”
Fiona nodded. “We need to get back, Rob. My father will be so worried.”
Disappointed, because he had hoped for more—if only to murmur and nuzzle together in this newfound discovery of a mating ritual he wanted to further explore—Rob could only give in and agree. “Sure, you’re right. Let’s get back on the road again. I’m anxious to see your paw myself.”
They arrived, footsore, weary beyond measure, and strung out by sexual tension, at the outskirts of San Jose just as the sun was rising, in a brilliant panorama of pink and orange. Just as a mounted posse was approaching to begin a desperate search for the abducted girl.
Her father was one of the leaders. Spying her in the distance, limping along with the limping horse, he flung himself to the ground and rushed to tearfully gather her in his arms.
“Oh, sweetheart,” Padraic crooned, cradling her close. “You had me on tenterhooks. Didn’t know what happened, or where you were, or if you’d been hurt…”
It felt very good to be comforted like a child again, after the night she’d been through. Too much nervous strife, too much exhaustion, too much raw emotion. She needed to escape to her room, sink full into a tub, and then sleep for at least ten hours. Then she could sort things out.
“No, Papa, I’m all right. Just tired. Very, very tired. And blistered.” With a hollow little laugh, she raised the hem of her dress to show the gay buckled slippers, now worn to shreds.
“My God!” he exclaimed in horror. “Here, Fee, you climb onto my horse and ride to the hotel. I’ll walk with Rob. Gentlemen,” in louder tones, he addressed the group of men, armed and waiting, “as you can see, my daughter has been safely returned. Obviously, we can call off the search. But I want to thank you for your offers of assistance, and for being so willing to help.”
Without a murmur of protest but some hearty congratulatory phrases—“Good work.” “Glad t’ hear it.” “Welcome back, Miss.”—the posse disbanded a block or so south of the hotel.
Meanwhile, Padraic had joined Rob, who was leading his own horse toward the stable.
Rob felt he was having to meet too many sidelong skeptical glances from the men now gathered in small groups, and from a few clumps of curious women here and there. “Is it my imagination,” he said in a low tone, “or is something going on here that doesn’t sit well?”
His companion sent him a dubious look, then stopped to peer back and up at his daughter, riding silently behind them. Hair disheveled, face smudged by dust and dirt and a couple of bruises, shoulders draped with Rob’s suit coat, once beautiful evening frock rumpled and torn as if by savage beasts…
“Jesus,” breathed a shocked Padraic, just now, in full view, realizing the extent of her damage. “What in hell has happened to my girl? Did that ruffian—”
“No, no, there wasn’t time.”
A glare from the outraged father. “There wasn’t time? What does that mean?”
“I mean—well… No, Hadley had nothing to do with the way she looks.” Rob’s tone sounded as lame as his word
s. “Look, it was a rough night out there, Paddy. Both of us are worn to the gills. Let’s all get some sleep, and then we can—”
Padraic’s rough big hand had fastened squarely into Rob’s collar, pulling and tightening until his explanation choked off. “Don’t you give me any bullshit, son. I wanna know what happened, and I wanna know now.”
With dignity, Rob carefully pried loose the meaty fingers and then put himself back into order. Standing tall, spine straight, head high, he met the man’s simmering anger right on. “Mr. Brennan, sir,” he said, quietly and composedly, “I would like permission to marry your daughter.”
“You—what—?”
“Just that. I would like your daughter’s hand in marriage. The sooner, the better.”
“So something did go on out there!” he roared.
“No, Paddy, nothing went on. Well…” if he were being perfectly honest, “…a kiss. Uh. Two kisses. That’s it. That’s all. Uh. Well…maybe a little—uh—touching…” Jesus. Uncomfortable as all get-out, Rob rolled his shoulders. Just how much candor was a man required to provide a future father-in-law, anyway?
His rusty-red brows shot up, his mouth pulled down as he surveyed the young man who had requested to join his family. A bit rough around the edges, himself. Looking, in fact, a bit like the miscreant now being pursued and, hopefully, soon apprehended.
Thick black hair as disheveled as Fiona’s coiffure. Caused by her eager fingers, thrusting up to hold on and hold fast? Pale blue shirt as rumpled and worn as Fiona’s elegant gown. Caused by her inexperienced body, crushed against his virility? Trousers equally rumpled and worn and—Paddy stared. Was that a faint damp stain, near the fly?
“Horse drool,” Rob coolly offered, seeing the direction of his gaze. “It happens.”
“Huh.”
If something untoward had gone on between these two on the night road back to San Jose, certainly Padraic would never know the truth of it. And at least Rob Yancey was planning to make the possible indiscretion right.
If something untoward hadn’t gone on, Padraic would be gaining a capable, competent, and quite admirable son. Not to mention the backing of the whole Yancey clan.
This situation, if there was one, seemed to be looking better and better. Business deal or love match, you couldn’t beat it.
Padraic’s stern disapproval was rapidly diminishing into neutral consideration, which was rapidly diminishing into outright acceptance. “Ask me again.”
A few steps away, an exhausted Fiona had slid down from her father’s horse to stand in her ruined finery and watch, with disbelief, while all this was taking place.
A glance from father to daughter, a split second of contemplation, and Rob’s mind was made up. The decision was instantaneous and clear as the morning air. There, in front of Sea Wind’s open front door and whichever staff might be coming and going, Rob Yancey went down on one knee.
“Mr. Brennan, I would like your blessing and permission to marry your daughter.”
“Yes. Yes, you may. We can go talk to a preacher later this afternoon and get the arrangements made.”
Beaming, Rob regained his feet and turned toward the object of his proposal.
“No,” said Fiona.
“What?” both men exclaimed in unison.
“No, I said. Are you hard of hearing? Is there a language barrier? No!” Reins dangling, she patted her steed and moved away, ready for some much-needed personal time.
“Fee!” protested Rob. Astounded, he reached out to detain her, but she shook loose. “But—why? You and me…we get along, things are okay between us,..why not, for God’s sake?”
“I don’t want to, that’s why. Now get away and let me alone. I have no desire to see you again.”
Helpless to interfere—other than trying an abduction of his own and hauling her away bodily to the nearest alcalde—he could only stand and watch as she hobbled uneasily off and disappeared inside.
“Paddy, what the hell?” Perplexed, overwhelmed, and, it must be admitted, heartsick, Rob appealed to his companion. “I offered her my name and all I have. I offered to make an honest woman out of her. I offered her protection and security. What more could she want?”
Brennan swept him with an incredulous sideways glance. “For one thing, son, you asked me.
You didn’t ask her.”
Open-mouthed, Rob stared. “But that’s—”
“For another,” he bulldozed right over the objection, “d’ you love her?”
“Love her? Hell, yes, I love her. I thought she would—”
“And didja tell her that?”
Rob’s contentious, appalled position suddenly slumped and his head bowed, like a marionette whose strings have been unexpectedly cut. “No.”
All the world seemed to surround him with silence. No birds twittered, no voices rose, no horses whinnied, no traffic noises jangled. It was just Rob, alone with his realization that, much as he might want to deny it, much as he might claim his own resistance to matrimony, here was a woman who was refusing to marry him!
He was gazing mournfully at the building which, caught on the cusp of going under, he was working to return to her former glory. The Hotel Sea Wind, one of the jewels of the Yancey chain.
“And here I thought I was such a catch.”
“You are, son, sure ’nough.” Paddy slung an arm over the young man’s shoulders, in commiseration. “But, at this point, I think you need to come up with another plan.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
MA,
FOUND FUTURE WIFE STOP
NEED HELP CONVINCING HER OF SAME STOP
YOU AND AUNTS AND ANYONE ELSE YOU CAN FIND
NEEDED IMMEDIATELY STOP
YR LOVING SON ROB
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
A brisk tattoo beaten on Padraic’s door brought him, frowsy-headed and half-asleep, out of hibernation. “Huh,” was his greeting to Rob. Neither welcoming nor unwelcoming. Simply “Huh.”
So excited that, for once, he wasn’t able to mask the emotion bubbling over, Rob burst into the room. “Got the solution,” he proclaimed.
Pacing from the inner hallway to the suite’s window to a chair near the hearth and back again, he began explaining his plan, while Padraic plumped down onto an upholstered settee to watch.
“Ballocks!” Paddy finally exclaimed. “Son, you’re makin’ me dizzy here. I’ll be happy to listen to whatever you’ve got up your sleeve, but you gotta sit before I fall over in a dead faint.”
“Oh. Sure. Sorry.” Even as he collapsed onto the very edge of a fringed ottoman, his bent right knee continued to jig with nervous energy.
His gaze shifting from that movement to the boy’s face, Padraic sighed. Oh, to be that young again—!
“I just went down to the telegraph office and fired off a message,” he confided. “Before you can say ‘Jack Robinson,’ my ma will be here. Along with however many aunts she can drag along, my two sisters, probably my former teacher/governess, and any number of other women who’ve been part of my life since birth.”
Smiling, Paddy brushed a hand back through his uncombed frizz of hair. “And then what happens, when this army of women gets here?”
“Oh, hell, if they can’t talk Fiona into accepting me, God and all His angels wouldn’t be able to. Wait till you see ’em in action. It’s just the sorta thing they all love to do. Interference is their calling, man; that, and giving orders.”
“Rob.” He leaned forward, hands on thighs as if for support. “Are you serious about this? Do you truly love my daughter?”
Rob leaned forward in his turn, matching intent gaze for intent gaze. “Never more serious in my born days, sir. It suddenly hit me, when we came walking along that high road late last night, that this is the only woman for me. She’s the one I want. And—yes, I do love her.”
“Ah. Well, now, that relieves this creaky old heart of mine by a mighty amount. All right, go on and do whatever else you have to do, so
n, and leave me in peace for a little while. I wanna get back to my nap.”
For some time, later that day, Rob was involved in dealing with pressing details, business as well as personal.
First, he had spent half an hour soaking away the stiffness and tiredness of achy muscles in a tub filled to the rim with hot water and soap froth. Until the circuits of his brain, running helter skelter from this thought to another before the original thought was complete, refused to let him lollygag around any longer and shot him out of the bath and into a towel. Dried, he shaved off the newest crop of whiskers, slapped on some bay rum, and stepped into a fresh clean navy sack suit, complete with vest, watch fob, and pure white shirt.
He guessed that his as-yet-uncommitted betrothed, one Miss Fiona Brennan, was sleeping the sleep of the just and the innocent, so he wouldn’t even consider disturbing her to plead his case once more. Nope. It was on to other things right now.
During a break in between busy times, Rob called for an impromptu senior staff meeting in his office. Ten people showed up, and he ushered them inside with alacrity and dispatch.
“C’mon, there’s room. Yeah, I know it’s a little tight, but this won’t take long. Marietta, have a seat over there in the corner. You and Beth are on your feet all day; you deserve to sit a spell. Now, then.”
Rob smiled around at the expectant faces: young and old, men and women, restaurant help and general maintenance.
“First item on my agenda is to fill you in on a bit of excitement that took place here last night.”
Silent questions around the room from those who had not yet heard the story. Excitement?
Quickly, succinctly, he described what had happened and how it had happened, explaining that, even now, the Texas Rangers were in pursuit of the Chief Financial Manager, Walter Hadley.
“Hard to believe such terrible behavior from a trusted employee, right?” he appealed to the group. “But it just shows that a weak man will give in to temptation. Anyway, fortunately Miss Brennan is fine, although a bit shaken up from her ordeal. At the moment she’s indulging in some well-deserved rest in her suite.”
A Western Romance: Rob Yancey: Taking the High Road (Book 10) (Western Mystery Romance Series Book 10) Page 9