by Janet Dailey
In the distance a coyote wailed its mournful cry to the moon, the only sound that accompanied the crunch of her footsteps. She was conscious of the frigid nip in the air, but her attention was too concentrated on the light shining from the window of the small house to pay much attention to the cold that turned her breath into a smoky vapor.
When she reached the front door, she paused only an instant, then opened the storm door and knocked on the inner door. The glass panes were steamed over. Even if she had tried, Layne couldn’t see inside. But there was only a short wait until the inside door was pulled open and she faced Creed. His gaze narrowed on her as she stood poised on the threshold.
“May I come in?” she requested when he failed to immediately invite her inside.
He inclined his head in an agreeing manner and stepped to the side to permit her entry. Layne walked past him into the main room, where logs glowed a cherry-red in the fireplace, blue-white flames licking over them. The room was small, and the oversized furniture in it was out of proportion to its dimensions but in keeping with the size of the man who occupied the house. The tan leather sofa was long to accommodate Creed’s tall frame, and the recliner, too, was large to fit him comfortably. There was a gun rack on the wall where the desk stood. An oil painting of a wildlife scene occupied the only other vacant wall space.
Halfway into the room Layne turned to wait for him. Her scarf slipped off her chestnut hair and fell loosely about her neck. She unbuttoned her coat but made no attempt to take it off. Without looking at her, Creed walked to the fireplace and added a split log from the woodbox to the hot fire. Backlighted by the fire, his silhouette appeared so deceptively lean.
The flames crackled noisily over the new fuel to fill the silence. It became obvious to Layne that Creed was waiting for her to speak. She stifled a rush of irritation at his laconic obstinacy. As a teenager, she had often thought she wanted to fall in love with a man who was the strong and silent type. But after meeting one in the flesh, namely Creed Dawson, it seemed to be his silence she couldn’t stand.
“I came here tonight because I wanted to talk to you alone,” she stated.
“About what?” He sounded disinterested.
Remaining by the fireplace, Creed angled his body toward her and rested a foot on the raised hearth. The pale blue of his chambray shirt appeared almost white in the firelight as it stretched across his wide shoulders and tapered to his narrow hips. Most of the light in the room came from the fireplace. It softened the harsh contours of his face. A kind of tension knotted her stomach.
“I’d like to know just exactly what our relationship is supposed to be,” Layne said, coming straight to the point of her visit. “I don’t know whether we’re friend, foe, or what.”
“That’s simple,” he replied smoothly. “I’m the boss, and you’re the hired hand.”
“And you have a policy of not fraternizing with the hired help, is that it?” she guessed stiffly.
“No, it isn’t.” Creed appeared to be untouched by the tension that gripped her. “But to this point, that is the extent of our relationship. If you’ve read more into it than that, then it’s your problem.”
Struggling to keep her calm, Layne smiled coolly. “It’s funny that neither Stoney nor Hoyt mentioned to me that you are in the habit of kissing your help.”
Something close to a smile quirked his mouth, then he turned to prod at the fire with a brass-handled poker. “When a man finds a beautiful and willing female in his arms, it’s second nature to kiss her. But one kiss hardly changes anything. If you cross-examine every man who kisses you to see how it’s affected his attitude toward you, I pity them.”
He was making her sound like some romantic, idealistic fool. A hotly angry retort trembled on the edge of her tongue, but Layne swallowed it. This was not the first time she had questioned someone adept at avoiding the issue. She noticed a coffee cup sitting on the desk in the corner.
“I suppose you’re right.” She appeared to concede the point. “Acorns turn into oak trees, but it doesn’t necessarily follow that mountains grow out of molehills.” She rubbed her hands together as if to warm them. “Do you have any coffee? It’s awfully cold outside tonight.”
The upward slant of a thick brow seemed to silently speculate on the motive behind her request, but Creed didn’t comment on her forwardness, not only inviting herself into his house but also asking for refreshments.
“Sure.” He pushed away from the hearthstone and headed for the small kitchen Layne had noticed just to the right of the front door.
After unwinding the scarf from around her neck, she removed her coat and pulled the scarf through one of the sleeves. She draped her coat over the armrest of the sofa and wandered to the fireplace. From the kitchen she heard the clatter of a cup. She was forced to admit she had doubts in her mind, a question whether her imagination might have been overactive or that the attraction was all one-sided. Layne held out her hands to the heat radiating from the glowing logs.
When Creed returned to the room with a coffee cup in his hand, she glanced briefly in his direction. She absently noted again how lightly he moved for a man of his size. He crossed to the fireplace and handed her the cup of steaming black brew. As he resumed his casual stance by the fireplace, his presence seemed to fill the room.
“This is a very compact house,” Layne remarked idly. “How big is it?”
“Just three rooms—this one, a kitchen, and a bedroom. Four rooms, counting the bath.” He eyed her with a sidelong glance, a waiting look in his closed expression.
“You haven’t always lived here, have you?” she asked.
“No. I built this when I went into partnership with John on the ranch,” he acknowledged.
“Have you always lived alone?” she wondered.
“I don’t think my private life is any of your business,” he countered without a break in his expression.
Layne sipped at her coffee, concealing the smile on her lips but letting the amusement show in her eyes. “I believe that you were the one who mentioned something earlier today about truth between friends.”
“Maybe I should ask why you want to know,” he challenged, almost lazily. “Are you gathering material for that piece you’re going to write about ranching?”
She stiffened slightly. It had completely slipped her mind that she had told Mattie that story to persuade her into hiring her on.
“No,” she admitted frankly. “I just wanted to know more about you.”
“There isn’t much to know. I’m a native of the area and have lived here all my life.” A grimness settled into his tight-lipped expression to accompany the challenging gleam in his eyes. Creed shifted position to rest a large hand on the mantelpiece and lean toward her. “But I have the feeling you aren’t interested in my background. It’s the women in my life you want to know about. Well, with this face, there haven’t been very many of them. So I’m not what you would call ‘experienced’ with the opposite sex,” he stated roughly.
It explained a few things that should have been obvious to her. There had been no practiced subtleties in their encounters, no masculine persuasion. And it bothered her to hear Creed say such things about himself. She lowered her glance to the cup in her hands, unwilling to meet his keenly assessing gaze.
“I can’t believe your life has been as bereft of female companionship as you imply. You’re a strong and solid man,” Layne insisted.
“Maybe I should have clarified myself by explaining that the type of women I’ve known aren’t the kind you would associate with.” The dry sound of amusement was in his voice. “Be honest. I’m not the kind a girl would be anxious to introduce to her parents.”
“I wouldn’t have any qualms about it if I loved him,” she asserted, aware of the agitated turn her breathing had taken.
“What would a beautiful woman ever see in a man who looks like me?” Creed demanded with faint self-derision, mocking her noble-sounding words.
“Looks have no
thing to do with it.” Her glance flared upward to lock with the penetrating study of his eyes.
“Don’t they?” All in one motion, he was straightening from the mantel and hooking an arm around her waist to draw her up close to him so she had no choice but to look at the hard ridges and broad planes of his lean and unattractive features. “Could you love a man who looked like me?” Creed challenged with a sure and knowing look in his half-closed eyes.
It was an impossible question to answer, and Layne didn’t even try. “I’ve never met such a lonely … and angry man before in my life,” she murmured instead.
The anger she had referred to flashed in his eyes. “I don’t need your pity,” he growled low in his throat.
The coffee cup was taken from her hand. Layne never had a chance to see what he did with it as he bent his head to compensate for their differing heights and brought his mouth down heavily onto her lips. A second later his bearlike arms were encircling and gathering her to his lean, hard body.
This kiss held neither the cruelty of the first nor the gentleness of the second, but existed on a plateau somewhere in between. His mouth rocked across her lips with a rough hunger that was moist and all-consuming. It seared her with a rawness that hurt in the oddest way.
But that wasn’t the only sensation that was rocking her. For the first time there was no heavy, bulky outer clothing to insulate her from the contact with his long, masculine body. Through his shirt, her hands could feel the bunched and flexing muscles in his shoulders and back, the source of the strength she knew so well. Her breasts were nearly flattened by the solid wall of his chest, so flatly roped and powerful, and the wide expanse of his shoulders seemed to curve around her.
A headiness reeled through Layne, heating her blood with a wild kind of excitement. His large hands arched her spine while a muscled thigh insinuated itself between her legs and applied arousing pressure to the lower part of her body. Her lips parted under the sawing force of his mouth to invite the plundering entry of his tongue to mate with hers. Layne knew that her responses were being dictated by a raw and blatant passion—not the domination of his, but her own.
The taste of him was like a wild wine, potent and intoxicating. It rivaled the rough and molding caress of his hands, which roamed her hips and spinal cord, pressing with a disturbing urgency. She, who had always been so rational and analytical in her thinking, found herself without a sane thought in her head. A whirlpool of sensuality was dragging her down, and she had no desire to be rescued.
When he dragged his mouth across her cheek to nuzzle the sensitive hollow of her ear, shivers of pleasure raised the flesh of her skin. His hand moved onto her breast and Layne was absently amazed at how perfectly its roundness fit into his large palm. She pushed against him, finding his bold intimacy more than satisfying. At the kneading pressure of his touch, she pulled in a hissing breath of sheer delight.
She was picked up with such effortless ease, then carried to the sofa. Her hands had curled themselves around his neck, her fingers gliding into the shaggy ends of his dark hair. They remained there after Creed had set her feet on the floor. He straightened to stand tall and erect, no longer bending his head to bring it down to hers.
It took a second for the aloofness in his expression to register. When he gripped her wrists to pull her hands from around his neck, Layne made no protest even though her senses continued to clamor for the intimacy of the previous embrace. She stared at him, searching for some hint of his inner thoughts. Her breathing was long and deep, slow in recovering its former rhythm.
Reaching down, Creed picked up the coat she’d draped over the sofa’s armrest and held it out to her. A wry smile twisted her mouth.
“I take it this is an invitation to leave.” The huskiness in her voice betrayed her attempt at a chiding challenge.
“I haven’t had much sleep these last couple days. I’m tired, and I’d like to have an early night.” The graveled pitch of his voice also revealed that he was not as unaffected by their passionate exchange as he wanted her to believe.
“Am I supposed to accept that as your reason?” Layne eyed him with open skepticism as she shrugged into her coat, pushing the scarf out the sleeve.
“I don’t particularly care.” Creed shrugged.
“Why can’t you be honest?” she muttered in irritation.
“Why can’t you admit the real reason you came here tonight?” he countered swiftly.
“I did!” she flashed, stung that he could suggest differently.
“Don’t kid yourself,” he chided with a grim slant of his mouth. “You came here tonight because you happened to like it when I kissed you this morning. You wanted to find out whether it was a fluke or if it could happen again. You weren’t interested in my feelings toward you—only in finding out how it could be that you were attracted to someone like me.
She couldn’t deny that it was part of her reason for seeing him. “Actually, it was a combination of both.”
He breathed out a silent laugh that lacked humor. “I admit you’re different from most women. They’re usually too concerned about how other people would look at them if they admitted it had been a pleasant experience.” Creed paused, looking at her. “Your curiosity has been satisfied so now you can leave.”
His observations were a little too astute for Layne to be entirely comfortable with them. “All right, so my curiosity may have been satisfied. Where does that leave us?”
“Right where we started—I’m the boss and you’re the hired hand,” Creed stated.
“And what about outside of working hours?” she persisted.
He held her gaze without any hesitation. “I believe you told Mattie you were only going to work a couple of months. There’s only a couple weeks to go before you’ll be leaving.”
“Is that the way you want it?” she demanded.
An unfriendly smile broke across his features. “I think you’re finally getting the message.”
“Maybe I’ve had trouble because you send conflicting signals,” Layne said curtly and arranged her scarf over her head. “In case you’ve forgotten, you kissed me to start this whole thing.”
“Believe me, I’ve regretted it since,” he said dryly. “You’re all too tempting, Miss MacDonald, but I’m sure you know that.”
She bridled at the remark that somehow made this situation all her fault because she was an attractive female. “Go ahead and blame it on me,” she snapped. “I can’t help the way I was born any more than you can.”
A cold draft of air hit her as she opened the door, but she didn’t slow down until she was nearly to the main house. Her anger faded, leaving her with a sense of hurt and rejection. When she entered the house, her glance bounced away from Mattie’s inquiring took, but no questions were asked.
“The news is just coming on,” Mattie informed her. “Would you care to watch it?”
There was a reluctance to return to the privacy of her room. Layne didn’t want to be alone with her thoughts. She wanted to talk to somebody; she wanted to confide in Mattie about this crazy, mixed-up situation she was caught in, but she didn’t know how or where to start. So she simply sat down in one of the armchairs and looked at the television set.
But the images on the screen didn’t register. With a start, Layne realized Mattie had said something to her. “I’m sorry. What did you say?”
“It doesn’t matter.” Mattie eyed her thoughtfully, then asked after a short pause, “Is something bothering you?”
Here was the chance she had been wanting, but still Layne hesitated, her fingers plucking at the doily on the armrest. “I went over to talk to Creed tonight.”
“I figured you went somewhere,” Mattie acknowledged. “For as long as you were gone, you didn’t look cold when you came in, so I knew you hadn’t spent all that time walking.”
“How long have you known Creed?” Layne chose to back into the subject.
“He was here when I came to work for John,” she replied. “I gue
ss you could say he was the son John was never able to have. That’s why John took him in and made him his partner.” Mattie leaned back and gazed thoughtfully into space. “Creed was always something of a loner. I guess he had a hard time of it growing up—with kids teasing him and calling him names. When he was full size, they didn’t often say anything to his face.”
“I suppose he didn’t date much,” Layne offered.
“No. There weren’t many who would go out with him. I don’t imagine the pretty ones would give him the time of day. I often think it would have been easier for him if he’d gone out for sports—become a football hero or something,” Mattie said with a sigh.
“Because of that, he holds it against me because I’m good looking,” Layne realized, irritated that she was paying for something that was none of her doing. “So now he isn’t going to let himself like me.”
“Why should it matter to you whether he likes you or not? He treats you fairly.”
“Because …” Agitated, Layne pushed to her feet and prowled restlessly to the window. “This probably sounds crazy. I know it doesn’t make sense to me, but there’s something about him that appeals to me. Practically every time I try to get close to him, he rejects it.”
“I hope you don’t think he’s some overgrown stray dog that’s starved for attention,” Mattie chided.
“On the inside, he could be,” Layne suggested cautiously.
“Attention is not the same as love. If you just feel sorry for him, then leave him alone. I can’t help having some motherly feelings toward him, although heaven knows, he doesn’t need me to protect him,” Mattie admitted with a small shake of her head. “You probably feel an affinity for him because you felt unwanted and rejected as a child.”
“So you think I just feel compassion for him.” A frown knitted her forehead.
“It’s a definite possibility.”
Layne carefully thought through Mattie’s reasoning before discarding that explanation. None of her responses had been forced; they had sprung naturally, without any prompting. Neither compassion nor pity had anything to do with the feelings she had toward Creed.