Don’t even think it, he commanded himself. Don’t go near there, man!
“Sweetheart, you’ve been through a lot tonight. You’d better get some sleep. We both need it. I’ll see you at breakfast.” He slipped off the holster and turned to leave, knowing that if he spent another minute in there, he’d be in serious trouble. But she grasped his hand and clung to it, her voice soft, her expression wistful.
“I don’t know how to thank you. I mean, I don’t know what to say to you. Nothing that I can possibly say will reflect what I’m feeling.” She was rambling. He stood over her, his hand wrapped tightly in both of hers. This wasn’t the time. This wasn’t the place. But God in heaven, she’d come damned close to asking him to stay with her. He wasn’t a saint, he thought, ruefully. He was human, and the heat in his loins simmered like a time bomb. He had to get out of there, and he turned again to leave, but suddenly, she squeezed his hand.
He flung the holster on the chair beside her bed and, moving with lightning speed, he was beside her in a second, jerked the blanket off of her and pulled her to him. She met his kiss with her own eager, open mouth. She’s a fast learner, he thought, as he plunged his tongue into her. He’d known that Leslie was basically uninhibited, at least with him. But he was unprepared for the power of her passion, when she threw her left leg over his lap, leaving her gown riding high near the top of her thighs, and buried her hands in his hair. Not satisfied with that, she began to caress his face, whimpering in the fashion of a woman wanting more. Much more. He knew she was in shock and only barely aware of what she was doing or of its effect on him.
“Baby, slow down here. We can’t do this.” She pulled him over on her, burrowing beneath him. He knew he had to stop it, but her passion, her heat, lured him as nectar entices a bee. And he had wanted, needed, gone half-mad with desire for her for so long.
She wrestled him for his hand and placed it on her breast, and with a groan of resignation, he capitulated. She arched her back, and cursing himself for his weakness, he lowered his mouth to her breast and sucked it through her sheer gown. He heard her cries and whimpers, and it occurred to him somewhere in the far reaches of his mind that they were not alone in the house. But he couldn’t stop himself. He wanted so badly…needed what she offered. If he could just hold her forever! His common sense returned like a blast of arctic air when she tried to wrap both of her legs around his waist and began to undulate beneath him.
He didn’t want to hurt her, but it wasn’t the time or the place for them to make love. He first eased away from her and then cradled her to him. Best to talk about it, he decided.
“Leslie, honey, I want to make love with you more than anything. I want you more than I have ever wanted any woman, but after what you’ve just experienced, this is the wrong time. You’re reacting to shock. I don’t want you to associate our first time with that incident. And another thing. When we do make love, we will need more privacy than we have here and plenty of time. Leslie, tell me it’s all right! Tell me what you’re feeling.”
He’d swear that she withheld the truth, or told only half of it, saving face, when she said, “What I’m feeling is, I’m scared.”
His laughter wasn’t honest, either. “You just think you’re scared. If I hadn’t put the brakes on, I’d be inside you right this minute.” Where I want to be, he finished silently.
“Don’t be so smug, Jordan Saber. I’ve always heard that talk is cheap; it takes money to buy land.”
“Hell, there’s nothing on earth that feeds a man’s ego like having his woman want him to the point where she’s willing to take what she needs. Damn straight, I’m smug.”
“I fattened your ego? I dread the thought of what would happen if I put some effort into it. What’s with you anyway?”
If she only knew what it cost him to keep his hands off her.
He leaned toward her. Exasperated. “Listen here. It’s a foolish man who runs with the ball when he doesn’t have a hope in hell of scoring. Sometimes you have to punt, to give it up and wait for a better chance.”
“Jordan—”
He interrupted her. “Can’t you ever address me with an endearment? Must it always be ‘Jordan’?”
She looked up at him and shook her head as though denying an unwanted truth, but her silence didn’t fool him and it didn’t please him,either. He suspected that the old, self-protective Leslie was trying to emerge. Another setback. He told her good night and stepped across the hall to stare at the ceiling for the remainder of the night.
* * *
It wasn’t fear of an intruder or lack of comfort that kept Leslie awake. Pondering the night’s happenings, she figured she didn’t and never would understand men. She’d bet anything that if Jordan had caught that man, he would have been merciless. He cared. He had to, because he showed it. Yet she’d had powerful evidence of his desire for her, and he’d still walked away, even though she’d all but begged him to stay with her. She didn’t care one bit for that philosophy about knowing when you could score. By damn, she’d given him a clear field. What else did he need?
She thought about his chest, thick and hard, shirtless, its hairs teasing the tips of her breasts through her gown. She turned over and crossed her legs in frustration. And he’d had the gall to ask her to call him by some sweet name. He was lucky she hadn’t socked him. She’d touched his bare flesh for the first time, and he’d squeezed her to him, his arms so strong and his body so hot. She fell over on her stomach, almost choking on her breath at the memory of his mouth on her and the fire he stoked in her. A blaze that still threatened to roar out of control. She closed her eyes and tried to sleep, but her mind had latched on to Jordan and imprisoned her with images that made her wish she had the courage to get up and walk across that narrow hall.
On the one hand, she wanted him but, at the same time, the ultimate intimacy that lovemaking with him would involve made her uneasy. Yet, when he’d walked away from her, she’d felt that he’d rejected her. She couldn’t figure it out. Get away from here, girl, while your head is still above the water. Pounding the pillow with her fist, she vowed, Come January, and I’m gone.
* * *
Leslie managed to greet Julia warmly when she walked into the kitchen the next morning at precisely six-thirty, though she’d lost her sense of belonging with Jordan’s “family.” She wasn’t one of them, and she meant to carry that fact boldly before her the way the Crusaders had carried their flags and crosses. But Julia’s warmth and sympathy tugged at her heart, threatening to demolish her hastily established defenses.
“I’m so sorry about last night, honey. We can be thankful that he didn’t succeed and that Jordan chased him away.” She walked over, put both arms around Leslie and spoke to her in soft, soothing tones. “I can imagine how you felt, because that’s something all we women fear. But let it go. Won’t do you any good to remember it.”
Deeply touched and chastened for having decided to separate herself from Julia, Cal and Clifford, she shook her head sadly, reached out and took Julia’s hand. “I…Thanks. I…I was scared, Julia. Nobody will ever know how scared I was.”
Julia hugged her. “Let’s just thank God Jordan was here.”
Leslie did what she’d always done when she was distressed; she got busy. After she drove herself mercilessly for an hour, Julia stopped her. “The way you’re going at it this morning, anybody would think you’re dodging a pack of demons.”
Energy that didn’t belong to her had stolen into her being, an invader, driving her, and she had to expel it, to cleanse her soul of it. Impatient with Julia’s remark, she said, “Will the sun shine brighter if I drag my feet?”
“Oh, oh. Well, ‘scuse me.”
When Jordan and Cal arrived from the fields for breakfast, Leslie’s “good morning” lacked enthusiasm.
Evidently giving notice that he wouldn’t react to her coolness, Jordan chewed with relish as though savoring the morsels in his mouth. “These waffles are wonderful, Leslie.”
>
Why pretend what she didn’t feel? “If they are, it’s not because I tried.”
Everyone present knew that Jordan loved waffles, and her comment confirmed for them the coolness of relations between Jordan and her. She knew she’d gotten to him when he remained quiet during the remainder of the meal. And she was barely chastened when he didn’t eat much, his taste for the food apparently gone. All of them knew that for Jordan, food and conflict didn’t mix.
Jordan was about to leave the house when it occurred to him that Leslie might have misunderstood his actions the night before. He reasoned that he’d better clear it up right then. “Leslie, may I see you a minute?”
“You’re the boss.” Taking her time in a show of insolence, she followed him slowly to his office.
“Come in, Leslie.” She closed the door, but didn’t move from it.
“Leslie, I tried to explain to you last night, but I see I didn’t succeed.”
“It’s best we limit our exchanges to my work. There’s nothing else between us.”
He breathed deeply, but the pain that had settled around his heart wouldn’t move. Why couldn’t she understand? He rounded the desk, braced his hands on either side of her head and pinned her between the door and him.
“Now you listen to me. A man would be less than a rutting bull if he took advantage of a woman’s fear and vulnerability after she turned to him for help. You don’t know what it cost me to walk away from you last night. I didn’t want your memory of such a precious experience tarnished by thoughts of another man’s monstrous intentions.”
She braced her hand against his chest, and he gave her the space she demanded. “If you say so.”
“What the devil does that mean?”
She looked him up and down, and her wide brown eyes were not soft. Nor were they wet. He saw only fury, which he suspected she aimed at herself for being susceptible to him. And he saw sadness too. And a lot of spirit.
Her level stare wasn’t what he’d have expected from a woman who could be as soft and as yielding as she. She stepped closer and squinted as though searching for something in him that she couldn’t find. “Men are…Men are…” Apparently at a loss for a suitable word, she whirled around and walked out of the room.
Julia stopped Jordan with a hand on his arm as he hurried past her, looking straight ahead.
“Yeah?”
“Did you put Leslie in your bed last night?”
He meant his scowl as a warning that she should back off. She didn’t heed him. “Did you?”
“Look, Julia, I’m thirty-six years old. You don’t ask me that.”
“I don’t care if you’re a hundred and thirty-six. I’ve looked after you since you were nine years old, and I’ll ask you anything I want. Did you?”
“No.”
The contours of her lovely face changed into a brilliant smile as understanding dawned on her. “That’s why she’s so mad at you. Mad at the world, in fact. She feels rejected.” Julia patted his shoulder and turned to go about her work. Noticing that he remained standing there, uncharacteristically subdued, she spoke softly.
“Don’t make it too easy for her. But don’t make it too difficult, either. She’s had a hard life. I know she’s strong, and in some ways she’s tough, but every woman can hurt.”
He rubbed the back of his neck and blew out a long breath. “She doesn’t want to need me or anybody else. Anyhow, I think she’s taken a few steps backward where I’m concerned.”
* * *
Dinner later that day was not the occasion for happy camaraderie and arm twisting that meals had been in the recent past. Leslie barely spoke to him, and while he didn’t reciprocate outright, he showed his displeasure by refusing to look at her. Clifford was uncharacteristically quiet and subdued, sensing something amiss between his two favorite people. It was he who finally brought it to a head.
“Leslie, are you mad at my Unca Jordan?” When she didn’t reply, he looked fearfully at his uncle. “Don’t you like Leslie anymore?”
Jordan answered Clifford, but he looked at Leslie. “You don’t stop liking somebody just because they turn out to be stub—” He caught himself, and it was well that he did.
“Now, you just look here, you—you—” she sputtered, obviously too annoyed to express her ire as she would like.
That finished the meal for him. He had already decided after speaking with her that morning to give her plenty of space. And in his present mood, he reckoned she’d better do the same for him. His annoyance was at such a pitch that he left the table.
“Excuse me,” Julia corrected him, something he’d been required to say when, as a child, he left the table with anybody sitting there.
He automatically repeated the words after her, indicating to anyone who knew him that he was in one fit of a temper. He started out of the kitchen door, turned and looked at Julia.
“When you’ve finished polishing my manners, see what you can do for adolescent immaturity around here.”
As the screen door closed behind him, Leslie was on her feet and headed for the door. He heard it when she slammed it, but he accelerated his pace. Just as he reached the barn, he felt her hand grab the back of his shirt.
“How dare you,” she fumed. She had to have some contact with him. Any contact.
He turned around to face her, the heat of wrath burning his face, and pinned her arms to her sides.
“What the matter with you? Try and get a grip on yourself. I won’t tolerate this from you.”
She twisted out of his grip. “I suppose you’re going to send me to bed without my supper.”
He reached for her, and she pushed at his chest. “That’s right,” he said. “Get rid of your sexual frustration by attacking me. You and I both know what your real problem is. Well, I am my own man, and neither you nor any other woman can budge me one way or another until I’m ready to move. And I move in my own sweet time.”
Incensed, she jerked away from him. “Somebody sold you on your importance.”
She started back to the house, but he was faster, bringing her so close to him that he could feel every line of her body, from her bosom to her hips to her thighs. His reaction to the contact shocked him.
“Damn you, Leslie. Damn you!” He didn’t want to think about how vulnerable to her he was. Galvanized by his mounting frustration, he put his right hand behind her head and his left on her buttocks, pulled her tightly to him and lowered his mouth to hers in a seething kiss. He knew he shocked her, because his kiss lacked the tenderness with which his mouth had always cherished her, and he wasn’t trying to make her feel as if she were precious to him She tried to move her lips from his plundering mouth, but he would have none of it. Her whimpers and trembling told him he’d begun to get to her, to expose her seemingly natural tendency to respond to his body.
She began kissing him, caressing him and, to his amazement, he experienced sudden and total arousal—the first time he remembered being unable to control it. Powerless to conceal it, he had no choice but to let her feel the full force of it against her belly. To his surprise, furious with him as she’d been, she tried to get closer to him. Hugging him. Loving him. He plunged his tongue into the sweet cavity between her parted lips and took what she offered. Her groans reminded him of their surroundings, and he set her away from him, chastened and also frustrated by her ability to bring him to heel without knowing it.
With a few deep breaths, he restored his equilibrium. “You said there’s nothing between us, so don’t play with me.” He strode into the barn and left her to lean against the tree trunk for support.
Belatedly, he realized that they’d had a sizeable audience, as the men were just headed back to work. But there was one onlooker that he’d as soon hadn’t been present. From the barn window, he saw Clifford run to put his arms around Leslie, and he surmised that what the boy had just seen had reminded him of what he’d witnessed at home. He made a mental note to talk to Clifford that night. Then he propped a foot on the
bottom rung of a ladder and tried to get a grip on his emotions.
Leslie trudged slowly back toward the house. The waning sound of horse’s hooves let her know that Jordan had saddled Casey Jones and headed toward the brook. If she dared risk it, she’d get on Serenity and follow him, but she’d never ridden alone. She picked up a dry stick and knocked a few pebbles from the cemented path, stooped down and examined them. Could they have been the ones tossed at her windows? She dropped the stick and leaned against the railing of the stairs that led to her old apartment. In spite of the chilled weather, thoughts of the incident with Jordan brought beads of perspiration to her forehead. She’d gone too far with him, pushed him and forced him to defend himself in the presence of his employees.
His kiss had awakened her to the truth. All she had wanted was passion in his arms; her audacity had been a poor substitute for the contact with him that she craved. She pulled air through her teeth, disgusted with herself.
“Well, miss, I’ve been wanting to speak with you.”
Her head jerked up at the sound of Ossie’s voice. “About what?”
He knocked his hat back and looked hard at her. “About a scruffy-looking white man who offered me fifty dollars last night to tell him which room in that house was yours. He didn’t look like a man you’d give the time of day.”
Her right hand went toward him involuntarily, as though to beseech him, but she quickly dropped it to her side. “And I suppose you’re fifty dollars richer.”
He glared at her and stood straight. Taller. Proud as a consummate actor displaying his power with words or a successful CEO in the presence of his stockholders.
“What kind of man do you think I am? I sent him away from here.” He looked into the distance, then back at her. “You and I haven’t hit it off from the beginning, Miss, and you’d be right if you said it was my fault. But I’m not evil. I suppose it’ll surprise you, but I’ve always prided myself in being a gentleman, and I try to do what’s right as I see it. I sent that man off because it was the decent thing to do, and for Jordan because he told me you’re important to him. I’m beginning to see that what’s going on between you two isn’t a bit casual, and I…maybe I was mistaken.” He put his hands in his pockets, brushing back his leather jacket and exposing his trim physique. “Jordan gave me a chance to recover my life, and there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for him. So you needn’t thank me.”
Against the Wind Page 15