Sweetwater Seduction

by Johnston, Joan

  “Then why are you in such a hurry to pin it up?”

  Eden jabbed another pin in. And another. “I'm not in a hurry.”

  “No?”

  Eden frowned. As usual, curly tendrils had escaped at her temples and around her ears.

  She had started to brush them smooth when the Texan's voice stopped her. “Don't. You've got the rest of it tied up tight. Let those few curls be. That fiery hair of yours is too damn pretty to hide in an old lady's bun.”

  She whirled on the gunslinger. She wanted to tell him what she did with her hair was none of his business, but the clear admiration in his eyes stopped her short. She wouldn't have believed him for a heartbeat if he had said her face was pretty. She had been looking into a mirror too many years to believe that. But she had thought sometimes, when the sun glinted off her burnished curls, that they looked quite nice. If she had always kept her hair pulled back in a bun, it was only because she thought leaving it down would be like putting a too-rich frame on a nondescript painting.

  Confused by her feelings, needing to censure Kerrigan but unwilling to deny his compliment, she snapped, “Keep your voice down. We have company.”

  He arched a questioning brow.

  “Hadley Westbrook and Bliss Davis are here.”

  “Westbrook, the rancher's kid . . . and Davis, the nester's kid? Sounds like trouble to me.”

  “There are some . . . problems. Nothing that can't be handled. They just needed a place to talk.”

  “Ahhh. She's pregnant.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  He arched a knowing brow and Eden shook her head in disgust. “All right. Maybe she is. But you'd better not say—

  “Anybody else know?” he interrupted.

  “No. And I think it's best kept secret until things are settled between Oak and Big Ben.”

  The gunslinger whistled low. “That's for sure.” He glanced at the door and back to her again with a rueful grimace. “I hate to bring this up, but I need—”

  “Miss Devlin? Are you dressed?”

  “That's Hadley,” Miss Devlin whispered. “I'll send him and Bliss on their way and be right back.”

  She squeezed through her bedroom door and closed it behind her. Hadley's face beamed with pride, yet his blue eyes were troubled.

  “I assume congratulations are in order,” Miss Devlin said with a smile.

  “Yes, thank you. I'm sure you'll agree that Bliss and I have to be married soon. We're probably going to have to go to Canyon Creek to find a preacher who won't go running straight to our fathers.”

  “Getting married is a good idea. But you'll both be missed if you try to leave town right now,” Miss Devlin said. “You'll have to wait. And plan.”

  It was plain from the look on Hadley's face that he didn't want to wait. It was equally plain that he could see the wisdom of planning. After all, Miss Devlin hadn't vetoed his idea, only encouraged him to act wisely in carrying it out. “All right,” he agreed. “We'll make plans to get away so that neither of our parents will be the wiser.”

  “You still won't be able to live together, even after you're married,” Miss Devlin warned. “Unless this plan of yours to get married also includes running away.”

  Hadley had difficulty meeting her probing gaze. He had bragged about how he was a cowman, how he would get a job and earn a living. But he was aware, as he knew she was, that he would have a hard time supporting a family on a cowman's wages. His wife and child deserved better. If things got settled in Sweetwater, they would have better.

  “Bliss and I talked it over, and we're willing to keep our marriage a secret in the hope that things will get settled between our families before the baby . . .” Hadley gulped. “. . . before we have any explaining to do.”

  Miss Devlin put one hand on Hadley's shoulder, and lifted Bliss's chin with the other hand. “You're both being very wise. Things will turn out for the best. Right now, I think you'd both better get home, before your parents miss you.”

  Once she had the young people out the door Miss Devlin squared her shoulders and headed back to her bedroom.

  “Theyone,” she said as she shoved open the door.

  Kerrigan was sitting on the edge of the bed facing her, wearing nothing but his unbuttoned Levi's and socks. She hadn't paid much attention to his chest the previous evening, and gaped at the broad expanse covered by a pelt of curly black hair. He looked magnificent—if you ignored the scowl on his face.

  “I tried reaching for my boots, but I'm having a problem bending over. I could use some help,” he admitted in an irritable voice.

  “You aren't going anywhere. You're too weak—”

  “If you won't help me, I'll do it myself.” He bent over and nearly fainted.

  She caught him and discovered he was trembling with pain and exhaustion. “I'm not going to help you finish the job those rustlers started,” she said angrily. “Now lie back down.”

  He turned a baleful eye on her, but didn't move. “As I started to explain once before, I have some needs to tend to first.”

  Miss Devlin stared for a moment until she realized what “needs” he was talking about. Her face flamed. There was no way he could walk all the way to the outhouse. And no way she could carry him that far either. As weak as he was, he couldn't make it on his own. “There's a chamber pot under the bed,” she said.

  His mouth thinned. “If I could bend over, I could put on my boots.”

  Miss Devlin bit her lip in an agony of indecision. What was she supposed to do? Her practical nature came to the rescue. She bent down and pulled the pristine flowered chamber pot with its porcelain lid out from under the bed and set it beside him. “Call me when you're finished,” she said. Then she turned and left the room.

  Miss Devlin paced the parlor anxiously. The situation was embarrassing for her, but it must be even more so for him. They were stuck together until he was well, so she was going to have to get over any squeamishness she felt about what had to be done. Eden must have paced for ten minutes, but he hadn't called for her. Worried, she walked up to her bedroom door and knocked softly. No answer. She knocked a little louder. Still no answer.

  “Kerrigan?” she whispered. Why was she whispering? There was no one in the house but the two of them. She twisted the doorknob and slowly opened the door.

  He was lying facedown on the bed. He had managed to set the covered chamber pot on the table beside the bed. He appeared to be asleep. Or unconscious. She quickly grabbed the pot and started out the door, hoping to be gone before he awoke.

  “I could use a cup of coffee when you get back.”

  She didn't answer, just glared at him, pink-faced, and hurried out the door with her burden. That horrible, despicable man! He had been awake all along and had waed to catch her at the most awkward . . .

  Eden grinned. She had gotten a good look at his face—at the mischievous grin on his face—before she escaped the room. Well, two could play that game. If he wanted to match wits, he had certainly met his match.

  Eden returned with a cup of coffee, only to find that Kerrigan really was asleep this time. Except for brief moments of consciousness, when she would pour some chicken broth down his throat, he stayed that way through most of the night. She quickly realized that the embarrassment she had felt when she removed the chamber pot wasn't the last of the indignities they would have to endure.

  In the early morning hours, as she sponged his face and shoulders with cool water to try to get his fever down, she realized her efforts would have more success if she sponged all of him down. She wouldn't even have considered such a thing, except the fever kept him from being conscious most of the time. If he wasn't awake, neither of them would suffer as much embarrassment at his nudity. Once the thought took h
old, she decided to act quickly before she changed her mind.

  As soon as she stuck her hand into the warmth between his body and the sheets to unbutton his trousers, she had second thoughts about what she had decided to do. She wasn't sure she could bear to see him naked. She told herself it was just a body. He wasn't even conscious. Still, what she was going to do was so . . . personal. Once she had seen Kerrigan naked, she was sure it was something she wasn't going to be able to forget.

  Eden pulled her hand back and sat down on the edge of the bed, trying to think of whom she could go to for help. But anyone she contacted would find out she had allowed Kerrigan to spend the night here. She would be exposing herself to gossip that might very well force her to leave Sweetwater. And that she did not want to do.

  She rolled up her sleeves, gritted her teeth, and slid her hand back into the cocoon of warmth between his belly and the sheets. The hairs on his stomach tickled her.

  Suddenly a hand clamped down on her wrist and a raspy voice demanded, “What the hell are you doing?”

  Eden sat there stunned. What could she say?

  “I'm not in the mood,” he grumbled. “Go away.”

  Eden's face flamed. Did he think she . . . ? “You've got a fever,” she said through bared teeth. “I was trying—”

  Suddenly he opened his eyes, and she watched as the confusion cleared. His lips quirked. “I've got a fever for you, lady, that's no lie. But you're going to have to wait till I'm feeling a little—”

  “Will—you—shut—up!” Eden gritted out. “I was trying to get your pants off—”

  “No kidding.”

  “—to sponge you dow” Eden persisted. “To try to get your fever down.” She defiantly met his dark eyes, which glittered with the fever that indeed was ravaging his body.

  His lips curled down in a cynical twist. “You ever seen a naked man, Miss Devlin?”

  “No, I have not.”

  “You're determined to do this?”

  “I don't see that I have much choice,” she said, shifting her gaze to the fireplace on the opposite wall. “I have to get you well to get rid of you.”

  “All right.”

  He didn't sound happy.

  She wasn't either.

  He released her hand and she rubbed her wrist where he had held it.

  “How do you want to do this?” he asked.

  “I . . . uh . . . can you manage the buttons yourself?”

  He tried. He couldn't.

  “If you could lift up a little, I'll do it,” she said. Eden found it difficult to breathe. It was one thing to undo the buttons on an unconscious man's Levi's. It was quite another thing to do the same task when the man was awake and watching with a frankly challenging look on his face.

  The jeans had worn soft and the buttons slipped free easily. Too easily. Eden's eyes narrowed as she looked at Kerrigan's face. His eyes were closed but his lips were curved in a self-satisfied smile. Kerrigan had tricked her. He could well have done this himself. But he hadn't, knowing full well that if she did the chore for him, she couldn't help but feel . . . him. The instant the last button fell free, Eden pulled her hand away. Her cheeks were beyond pink. She swallowed and tried to steady her breathing. It was a hopeless task.

  Her voice had a distinct touch of acid when she said, “If you'll lift up just a little, I can pull your Levi's off.”

  With a knowing smile, he obliged.

  Eden grasped the trousers at his hips and tugged them down over his buttocks, exposing a pair of long johns. She reached down and pulled the denim over his feet and a moment later dropped the Levi's on the floor beside her bed.

  “The long johns have to go too,” she said in a constricted voice. Eden stood there staring down at him, unable to reach for the form-fitting piece of clothing that was all that remained.

  A minute passed.

  Kerrigan turned around and looked at her. “I knew you'd be too chicken-hearted to do

  “I'm not chicken-hearted,” Miss Devlin retorted.

  “Like hell!”

  “Don't swear at me.”

  “Then do what you have to do,” he challenged.

  Eden stared defiantly into his dark eyes as she grasped the waist of Kerrigan's long johns. She was completely unnerved by the heat of him as her fingertips brushed his skin. Her eyes glazed and became unseeing as she peeled the long johns down as quickly as she could, exposing Kerrigan's taut buttocks and his muscular thighs and calves. In what became a dramatic gesture of victory, she finally stripped them off over his feet.

  Kerrigan never made a sound, but Eden wasn't oblivious to the tension in the ridged muscles that stood out on the lower half of his body.

  “I'm done,” she said in a whisper.

  “No kidding.”

  Stung by the mockery in his voice, she quickly covered him with a quilt. “I'll go get some more cool water.” As she fled the room with the water bowl in her hands, she heard him mumble, “Damn fool spinster schoolteacher.”

  Kerrigan wasn't sure what kind of game she was playing, he only knew he wasn't winning. That woman had more guts and gumption than he'd thought. He hated being helpless. He hated depending on anyone. Most of all he hated having her see him like this. It wasn't that he hadn't been naked with a woman before. He had. Lots of times. But except for one other time, the woman had never been . . . innocent.

  Miss Devlin put on a good show of disinterest and aplomb, but he'd heard her gasp when she'd pulled his long johns down. And seen the rosy cheeks she couldn't hide. And felt her hands tremble as they skimmed down his legs along with the long johns. Oh, she was not quite so calm and collected as she wanted him to think. But she had spunk. And he'd always believed, the wilder the colt, the better the horse.

  He hadn't planned on pursuing Miss Devlin from the sickbed. On the other hand, he had been given a rare opportunity to jump several steps in his seduction of the spinster schoolteacher. He'd be a tomfool to overlook the chance to breach of few of her defenses while she was lulled into thinking he was a helpless invalid. He was looking forward with relish to the day when he had the pleasure of returning the favor Miss Devlin had done for him today.

  Meanwhile, the instant Eden left her bedroom, she put a hand over her pounding heart to keep it from leaping out of her breast. She hadn't been prepared for the feelings of tenderness and need that had welled inside her when she had unbuttoned Kerrigan's jeans, nor the heat she felt as she stripped him bare. She was angry with herself for letting her feelings get so out of control. She was his nurse, for heaven's sake! Nothing more.

  Eden pourout the water from the bowl into the sink and pumped some more. She found a multitude of things to do in the kitchen to keep her busy for nearly a half hour. At long last, she took a deep breath and headed back to her bedroom.

  To her surprise and relief, Kerrigan was asleep when she sat down beside him again. That left her worried that his fever had gotten worse. She felt his forehead and, sure enough, it was on fire. She dipped the sponge into the cold water and squeezed it out and ran it over his face and shoulders. Too soon, she had covered all the unwounded parts of his upper body.

  Slowly Eden pulled the quilt down to uncover the rest of him. All the while she sponged his body, Eden marveled at how perfectly he was formed. Because he was unconscious, she allowed the sponge to caress, as well as soothe, although she was careful not to actually touch his skin with her fingertips. The one time it accidentally happened, she felt a frisson of excitement race up her arm. The reaction stunned and dismayed her. Where did these rebellious emotions come from? How was he able to make her feel things she had no wish to feel?

  Eden prayed the fever would pass quickly, and that the gunslinger would get out of her house and out of her life. But she was not to be so fortunate. In
fection set in, worsening the fever, and she was forced to touch him again and again, until it became a kind of torture.

  After the first night spent in the rocker, she made herself a pallet in front of the fire in her bedroom, which was considerably more comfortable—when she was able to find time to sleep. She spent most of the next few nights sitting at Kerrigan's side, sponging him, talking to him, urging him to take broth, or comforting him when the nightmares came.

  The first time he flailed out at her, she had been caught by surprise. His fist had connected with her jaw and she had gone sailing across the bedroom.