by Thea Devine
Carefully, silently, he opened the door just a sliver and then a crack more so that he could see Kalida's wilted figure sprawled dispiritedly on his bed, wrapped in his bedcover. The sight of her aroused intriguing possibilities; his unruly manhood snapped to attention and he clamped down hard on his wayward thoughts. And he watched.
Slowly, very slowly, she roused herself to the realization that the bath water was growing cold and she had very little time now to perform even the sketchiest of ablutions. With firm decision, she thrust away the cover and, pulling her hands through her inky hair, slipped off the bed. On her two rock solid legs and stark naked she went to the copper bathtub, tested the water, and climbed appreciatively into its depths.
The nervy little bitch, Deuce thought in admiration. The vixen. The flat-out gorgeous naked liar; the brazen witch . . . What he would like to do to her for the depth of her deceit. He had to forcibly restrain himself from lunging into that room and lifting her wet, glistening body from the water and . . .
No, there was time to wreak his own revenge; perhaps, just perhaps, his punishment was to stand and watch her
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all-unknowing sensual ministrations to her deliciously naked body: the swoop of the soap down her lifted arm, the barest vision of the swell of her firm, conical breasts above the water, the barest hint of their twin taut tips; the flexing of her leg as she held it up to wash it down with the sponge. The knowledge in his soul of what more lay quiescent beneath the water, enveloped by it, caressed by it, surrendering to its liquid embrace, giving in to its warmth in a way she would never give in to him.
Yet.
The ominous word formed in his mind even as she disappeared beneath the water for a moment to wet the top of her head, and then began rubbing the soap briskly through her sopping inky hair.
In another moment she was standing, reaching for the bowl and pitcher Prestina had put by the boiler that was full of cool water for the rinsing off of her body and hair. Her back was to him, and she stood and bent gracefully from the hip so that her body was one curved line, broken only by the enticing swing of her breasts as she leaned over, then straightened up, bringing the glazed china pitcher with her, looking like a water nymph with her streaming midnight hair, satin soaked skin, and lush naked charms totally revealed.
She tilted the pitcher over her head and fresh water coursed down the profile of her body, washing over her shoulders and slender arms, dripping down the slope of her breasts, drops hanging tantalizingly on her taut tipped nipples, sluicing down the hollow of her hip, sliding down her thigh to the vee of her flagrant womanhood, catching in the thick black bush of hair that guarded all her secrets; and from there, down and down the long, lean curve of her endless legs and tight firm cushion of her buttocks. She reached again, this time for a towel, which she hurriedly wrapped around her enticing nakedness before she stepped from the copper tub.
He let out a breath; how much more of watching her he could stand he did not know. He was filled to bursting with the sense of her, as a liar and the most desirable woman he could ever want.
Deuce took a deep, shuddering breath as Kalida removed the towel and began patiently drying herself off, and he remembered full well the day he had toweled her down in her bed. But this was nothing to watching her, privately, alone, with her having no knowledge of his presence, viewing her solitary ministrations as she rubbed the towel all over her glowing naked body and finally began drying her ebony hair, lifting it over her head and letting it fall to flow down her shoulders and her straight tense back, to curl wetly down her breasts and just gently caress her two voluptuous nipples.
The towel now went around her hips as though she were some primitive island woman. Kalida sashayed around the room, looking at things, thinking . . . what? he wondered as he gazed his fill of her long strong legs and her pagan breasts. Just what was she seeking? And how far would she go?
He eased himself back into the room as she turned and walked toward the door, her hips swaying enticingly. Knowing he was there? The audacious spitfire. The air vibrated for an instant with his indecision. He almost— almost —opted for letting her discover him there, waiting and watching. For just one instant he savored the impact of that meeting on her. But it was not time yet to expose her. In this way, or any other way. She was in his house now, a partner to the bargain he had made and the new one he would make with her father. That was all he needed. The rest would come, as fully and completely as he could make it, and later He could wait. He had waited —for her.
When she opened the door curiously several moments later, she found an empty room, empty save the bed and
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bureau and a curious sense of heaviness that permeated the air—and meant nothing to her.
"This is perfect," Ardelle said with satisfaction, surveying Kalida as she finished struggling into the robe the older woman had brought. "Lovely with your hair and eyes, my dear. My grandfather brought it back from China, did you know? In the trade. That's where my Papa got the nerve and the money to go west. Grandfather was totally nonplussed that my Papa did not want to go to sea. But luckily there were three other boys who did. My Papa loved the land, you see, and this was ideal for him. But he used to like to take the family back to New York whenever Grandfather put into port. He brought us back many things. This was one of them which, though I can't wear it anymore, I treasure and keep."
Ardelle smiled at Kalida and Kalida smiled back without guile or hurt or anger. Ardelle was almost beautiful as she talked about her memories. She was handsome, with her glowing brown-red hair that was piled into a loose chignon on top of her head. And while her features were strong, almost mannish, she had a lovely smile and her skin was creamy white and showed none of the years she had spent on the Montana plains. She was kind, too, Kalida thought, trying dearly to make her feel at home instantly, and she was grateful for that.
"Another thing Grandfather brought which I still have is a little Chinese slipper. Have you ever seen one?"
Kalida shook her head, and Ardelle went on. "It is perhaps four inches long and just a beautiful little object—all deep red silk and embroidered delicately with gold thread. Oriental women bind their feet, you know. I keep it," she added, "to remind myself that everyone has a different standard of beauty." There was a heavy silent pause and then her sherry eyes rested again on Kalida.
"Well, there is a late breakfast waiting for us; I believe your father and Ellie are already at table, if they aren't finished, so we'll join them as soon as Deuce—ah, there you are. . . ."
She turned as Deuce pushed his way into the room briskly, followed by Prestina, his gray eyes hard as slate and focused solely on Kalida. She looked like an extravagantly exotic flower sitting in the middle of his bed. She was enveloped by the fragile silk robe, which was the same shade as her eyes; the colors glowed, from the deep blue of the background to the finely sewn golden threads that outlined the burgundy, green, and gold Oriental hieroglyphics that were sinuously woven all over the fabric. The thin silk draped across her body like water, hiding everything and revealing everything at the same time. She sat ramrod straight against the towering headboard, with her long legs pointedly straight out in front of her. Her eyes glowed with an edgy resentment of what was to come, and as she became aware of the direction of his smoldering gaze, she shrugged the two edges of the robe closer together, as if that were an effective barrier to his imagination.
She was not a little dismayed to see that Prestina did not bear a tray. She had been counting on taking this breakfast in this room, having discounted what Ardelle had said about going downstairs. Now it looked as though Deuce was going to carry her downstairs, and her whole body resisted as he bent toward her. "Your pack mule, ma'am," he said sardonically, holding out his strong, muscular arms that were now encased in a fresh white shirt.
Kalida edged away from his hands — and the memory of how they felt on her. "This is ridiculous. I'll have a tray here."
; "Yes, that would be simplest and most convenient for you, wouldn't it?" Deuce retorted in a tone of voice that
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verged on nasty. She drew back as he went on. "But we're not here to make things simple and easy for you, Kalida. So while you still have your beast of burden, I suggest you make the most of it. He may kick you off rather sooner than you expect."
"Bullheaded bastard," she muttered rebelliously, knowing she could hardly make a scene before Ardelle and Prestina. She reluctantly shifted her position so that she moved closer to the edge of the bed where he could slide his arms under her legs and around her waist.
"I'm not the only stubborn ass in this room," he grated warningly as he lifted her high into the air and hard against his steely chest.
His hot hands burned her skin through the delicate fabric; she felt as though she were naked in his arms, that nothing was hidden from him by the veil of silk that surrounded her body. The hard, unbending steel in his eyes seemed to say she was totally at his mercy, dependent on him, a supplicant should he choose to make her beg.
And didn't the notion please him in the one instant it came to him! She saw that in his face, too, and she felt like clawing him. Her body went rigid and she turned her head away as he swiftly and efficiently carried her down the long straight staircase to the dining room where her father and Ellie Dean awaited them.
And as he placed her none too gently in an upholstered chair by the overloaded table, she mentally curtsied to the arrogant king of Sweetland—and all whom he controlled.
Look at her sitting there like a queen, Ellie Dean thought resentfully as she picked at her plate full of beans, bacon, eggs, and biscuit. And everyone's eyes were focused on her. She was like a living painting, so still and colorful, her expression enigmatic, her gossamer robe draped around her artfully, as though someone had ar-
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ranged it for the best effect. Ellie hated her passionately
in that still silent moment as Deuce and Ardelle sat down
on either side of Kalida, across from Ellie herself and Hal
Ryland.
There was something portentous in the air, but neither Deuce nor Ryland made any comment until after Deuce had filled his plate and Kalida's and settled back with a cup of coffee, in his hand. Then he said to Ryland, "Danton isn't back yet."
Ryland nodded. "All right. I know he won't be bringing good news."
"Not likely," Deuce agreed in a noncommittal tone of voice, and began attacking his plate. Ellie watched him avidly, noting too how Kalida's hooded gaze alternated between him and her father with an angry, speculative glint that did not bode well for either. And why should it, Ellie thought. They were both overbearingly proud, the center of their own universes, not accustomed to relinquishing an inch of power or to feminine interference in any of their high and mighty plans. Yes, and she could just see Kalida thinking that, too. Kalida was the pawn— and the reward. But Kalida would not surrender readily, and because of that, Ellie thought hopefully, she herself had the minutest chance to make a dent in this vainglorious, male-dominated world. And she fully intended to grasp and take all that she could.
The punctilious arrival of Jake Danton, who was Deuce's foreman, only confirmed what they all knew already. The house and everything in it had burned to ashes. They had saved the barn by dismantling the corral fences and digging a trench along that side of the house. He and the boys had brought Ryland's string of horses up to Sweetland, a decision that Deuce had made without even consulting Hal Ryland and for which Ryland did not
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look very grateful. Apart from that, the boys had stayed until they had beat out every last glowing ember so Mr. Ryland could be assured that the conflagration was truly out. But as he had said, Danton reiterated, everything but the barn had burned.
"Thanks, Jake," Deuce said abstractedly, now totally immersed, it seemed, in the coffee grounds on the bottom of his cup.
Danton swept a long look around the room, his eyes resting appreciatively for a telling moment on the butterfly bright figure of Kalida. She was something, he thought, sitting there like a stone-faced queen in her robes that concealed and revealed all at the same time. He wondered if she knew it. He wondered if she had chosen it that way, if she were aware of how the fabric draped over the sweet swell of her breasts and the two luscious points of her nipples, if she deliberately thrust herself out that way to invite the eye and, perhaps, were there not others present, the appreciative comment. "I wish we could've done more," he said suddenly, wanting to extend his dismissal so he could gaze at Kalida's provocative breasts. "I gave the boys the morning, by the way, and we'll come back on in shifts this afternoon."
"That's fine," Deuce said, again with that distant tone of dismissal, and this time Danton knew he could not linger. He cast a long glittering look at Kalida's silk-shrouded body, and then let himself out disappointedly. She was naked under that robe, he would swear. She had to have chosen to wear that; Ardelle Cavender would never have allowed such impropriety at her table, even il her guest had just been burned out of her home.
Kalida stared after his retreating figure, not even seeing him, as if all hope were drained out of her.
There was a deadly air of futility in the ensuing silence. Deuce's stone-hard eyes swept from Kalida to her fathei and back again.
Kalida pointedly refused to look at either him or her father. And Ellie began to feel distinctly uncomfortable.
It was obvious Deuce was not going to speak until she and Ardelle left the room, and finally Ardelle realized it too.
She swept to her feet with uncommon grace, her hand grasping her cane, which was always nearby, and she said lightly, "Come, Ellie. We will spend the afternoon exchanging gossip instead of over dry, dull business." She limped across the room, took Ellie's arm companionably, and led her out of the dining room just as if a storm were not about to burst behind them.
It hung in the air for a long, long time, as though Ryland did not know what to say, nor did he want to hear what Deuce would tell him. Kalida still refused to look at either of them, for she knew whatever the outcome of this "business," her fate remained that same: Deuce would not renege on the proposal no matter what reverses her father faced.
And he would take advantage; she could just see him working up to it. The king was out to fill his own coffers no matter what the cost to others. The violent desire to oppose this imperious power shuddered through her. But how? How?
She started as Deuce began to speak.
"The situation is this: You've lost everything except the herd, the land, and your string of quarter horses. You have no reserves —yes? You didn't think I would look into that, Hal?" he asked parenthetically at Ryland's startled look. "As I see it," he went on in that flat expressionless tone that Kalida so despised, "your first priority has to be to rebuild the ranch and the herd if you are to be of any use to your backers —or me," he added with an ominous undertone. "What you can't afford to do this year is buy into Sweetland. I can't let you do it because it isn't sound business for me."
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Ryland's face went dead white, and Kalida almost jumped up to run to him. "You bastard," she hissed, banging her fist ineffectually on the table. "You contemptible—"
"Shut up," he ground out, his huge hand crashing down over hers. "Just shut up." His fingers tightened around hers and he held her in an inexorable grip, as though she were manacled to him. She couldn't bear the sight of her father's defeated face across the table from her.
"What's your deal?" her father said warily.
Deuce's grip relaxed on Kalida's hand. "I'll buy the herd. With enough to finance the ranch and set up a new trail drive if you're willing to buy in Texas. Or negotiate a lease; that's fine. But your profits would have to go back into the ranch no matter what you did, and a new herd. Besides, you'd have to find a buyer, and at your price. It's quicker this way, Hal, and it will get you where you want to go that much sooner."
Ryland nodded. "And Kalida?"
"Kalida stays with me," Deuce said with heavy finality.
Kalida's body jolted upright from her chair. "No!" she shrieked, and then she realized she had stood almost involuntarily and she slumped herself back down into her seat quickly, her heart pounding wildly, hoping madly that Deuce hadn't noticed.
But his hard gray gaze told her he had. One dark thick brown quirked tellingly, and it seemed to her that his expression became stonier. But all he said was an inexorable, "Yes."
"Why?" she demanded, thrusting aside her heaving emotions and the fact she had known that this would be the ultimate outcome, that he would not release her from the previous arrangement.
Deuce's firm lips thinned as he sent her a scornful look. "I'm buying the cattle," he said at last, "and I'm buying you."
"That's crazy," Hal Ryland interjected suddenly. "I won't do it. Kalida is not part of our business together."
"She was," Deuce said inflexibly. "And she is. Maybe you don't quite understand, Hal. There is no deal without Kalida."
The unyielding tone of his voice nonplussed both Kalida and her father. He looked across at her and she couldn't quite read his expression. He was going to leave it to her conscience. Her decision. She could ruin him forever. Or she could save him at a cost to herself.
He didn't assume she was so naive that she couldn't perceive these things. There was no pleading in his limpid blue gaze, only a kind of resignation: He would go whichever way she decided. Unspoken, unacknowledged as before was the tacit understanding that he knew she would do what was right.
"Kalida must decide," her father said suddenly with just a trace of weariness in his voice. Kalida shot him a resentful look at his having voiced the fact aloud. Why must she? she wondered. Why couldn't he just tell Deuce Cavender to go to hell? A moment later, her rational sense took over as she enumerated in her mind the steps her father must take to get back on his feet. Clearly, this was the cleanest, fastest way, to sell out to Deuce. But to include her in the bargaining when he gained nothing but space to breathe again at square one! No, it made no sense. But you would have sold yourself for the syndicate, a nasty little voice within her chided, so why not to save your father's reputation?