by Diana Palmer
His pale eyes narrowed. “I don’t accept many,” he corrected, his face set. “I’m particular about the company I keep.”
“One supposes that the reverse is also true,” she replied, and wrinkled her nose.
His pale eyes flashed. “I don’t like your condescending manner, Miss Marlowe,” he added with magnificent honesty. His eyes held no warmth whatsoever. “And while we’re on the subject, I especially don’t like having you flirt with my men to embarrass them.”
She colored. “I did not mean…”
“I don’t care what you meant,” he said levelly. “Greely is just a kid, but when you started teasing him, he worshipped you. Then he overheard you discussing him, confessing that you only played up to him to watch him stammer and stumble about. He was shattered.” He looked down into her embarrassed face with cool disregard. “No decent woman does that to a man. It is beneath contempt.”
She felt the words like a cut on soft skin. Her chin lifted proudly. “You are right,” she confessed. She didn’t add that she was so accustomed to sophisticated men who liked to flirt and see a woman flustered that it had secretly delighted her to find a man so vulnerable to a woman’s attention. But she didn’t say that. “Honestly, I did not mean to hurt him.”
“Well, you did, just the same,” he said curtly. “He quit. He’s gone over to Victoria to get work, and he won’t be back. He was one of the best men I had. Now I have to replace him, because of you.”
“But surely he did not take it so to heart!” she exclaimed, horrified.
“Out here, men take a lot to heart,” he said. “Keep away from my cowboys, Miss Marlowe, or I’ll have your uncle send you home on the next train.”
She gasped. “You cannot dictate to my family!”
He met her eyes levelly, and chills ran through her at the intensity and power of the look. “You’d be surprised what I can do,” he said quietly. “Don’t tempt me to show you.”
“You are only a hired man, after all!” she added haughtily. “Little more than a servant!”
His expression was suddenly dangerous. His hand clenched at his side, and the glitter in his eyes had the same effect on her as a rattlesnake coiling. “While you, madam, are an utter snob, with greenbacks for blood and parlor manners for a heart.”
Her face went rosy. Impulsively she reached out to strike him, but his steely fingers caught her wrist before she got anywhere near that strong, lean cheek. He held her without effort until he felt the muscles relax. Under his fingers, he felt the sudden increase of her pulse. When he looked into her eyes, he saw the faint flicker of awareness that she couldn’t hide, and her eyes betrayed her surprise and helpless attraction. A slow, cunning smile touched his hard mouth. Why, she was vulnerable! It made his mind spin with dark possibilities.
With a short laugh of triumph, he drew her hand to his broad, damp chest and pressed it into the muscle. He felt her gasp, and knew that she didn’t find him distasteful, because he was watching her face.
“Do eastern men stand for being slapped?” he drawled. “You’ll find that we’re a bit different out here.”
“No doubt a man of your sort would find it acceptable to strike me back,” she said with bravado. Under her long skirts, her knees were shaking.
He searched her wide, uneasy blue eyes with quiet confidence. Either she knew less of men than he knew of women, or she was a good actress. Chester had said that she was something of an adventuress, a globe-trotting modern woman. He wondered just how modern she was, and he had a mind to find out for himself.
“I don’t strike women,” he said easily. His pale eyes narrowed and he slowly stepped in closer. He wasn’t blatant or vulgar, but with that simple action he made her aware of his size and strength and of her own vulnerability. “I have…other ways of dealing with hostility from a female.”
She was left in no doubt as to his meaning, because he was looking at her mouth as he spoke. Incredibly, she went weak all over and her lips parted helplessly. Since Edward Summerville’s hateful advances, she had never liked men close to her. But her traitorous body liked this one, wanted to incite him even closer, wanted to know the touch of his warm strength in an embrace.
Because her thoughts shocked her, she jerked back against his restraining hand. “Sir, you smell like a barn!” she stammered angrily.
He laughed, because he saw through the anger to the hidden excitement. “Why, isn’t that natural? A cowboy spends a good portion of his time with animals. Or didn’t your dime novels tell you so?”
She straightened her cuff, still feeling his touch there. She couldn’t remember ever being so flustered. “I am learning that my novels are not altogether accurate.”
His firm mouth tugged up at the corner. It pleased him that as a ragged cowboy, he could have such a devastating effect on an adventuress who had been on safari and lived a modern life. None of the women of his acquaintance had dared to flout convention. He found this woman exciting beyond measure, and the thought of leading her down the garden path in his disguise was appealing. If nothing else, it would teach her not to jump to conclusions about people. Taking a man at face value, judging him on his appearance alone and by eastern standards of conduct, was hardly worthy of such a traveled aristocrat. But, strangely, she lacked that glossy veneer that he would expect a hardened adventuress to possess. Now, as he stared down at her flushed face, he thought that she seemed not much more than a flustered girl.
“You are very pretty,” he remarked gently. In fact, she was, with that wealth of chestnut hair and her fair skin and deep blue eyes.
She cleared her throat. “I must go inside.”
He swept off his hat and held it to his heart. “I will count the hours until we meet again,” he said on an exaggerated sigh.
She wasn’t certain if he was serious or teasing. She made a funny sound, like a stifled laugh, and moved quickly back into the house. She felt as if she might suffocate.
Cal watched her go with a pleased smile and speculation in his silver eyes. She was going to make an interesting quarry, he thought as he put his hat back on his head and slanted it over his eyes. When he got through with her, she was going to think twice before she looked down her nose at a man again, regardless of how he smelled.
AFTER THAT, CAL BARTON seemed to be everywhere she went. He was blatantly attentive, and he looked at her with such worshipful eyes that Melly began to tease her lightly about his devotion.
She wasn’t convinced that he wasn’t playing some monumental joke on her. She didn’t respond to his displays of interest, which made them all the more obvious. He made a point of speaking to her with warm affection, regardless of whether she was alone or in company at the time. He was making his company felt, and the way he looked at her made her toes tingle. She had never been actively pursued by a man whom she felt attracted to, and she wasn’t certain that she could handle this situation. She didn’t want to become attached to Mr. Barton. But the more he pursued her, in his gentlemanly, teasing manner, the more unsettled she became.
She worried about Cal Barton so much that she couldn’t sleep at night. To make matters worse, the cowboys had come in from the roundup. The noise from the bunkhouse that night was deafening. She knew that alcohol wasn’t allowed unless the cowboys went into town. But they went into town on weekends, and when they came back, more often than not, they were audibly inebriated. Nora was used to noise in the city, but it was disturbing when she heard raised male voices close to her open window. These sounded sober, which was reassuring, but they were loud anyway.
“I won’t!” a raspy male voice asserted. “I’m damned if I will! He ain’t puttin’ me to digging postholes, with my rheumatism in such bad shape! I’ll quit first!”
“Dan, your rheumatism is awful convenient,” came the amused reply. “It only hurts when you have to work. Best not rile Barton. Remember what happened to Curtis.”
There was a pause, and Nora felt the new information about Barton sinking in with dea
dly meaning.
“Guess I do like it here since Barton came,” the first man said on a sigh. “He got us better pay and he made the boss replace those damned worn-out horses. Hard to work cattle on a rocking horse.”
“Sure it is. And he replaced the cook, too. I don’t mind eating in the bunkhouse these days.”
“Me, neither.” There was a chuckle. “Sort of tickles me, about Curtis. There he was, throwing his gunman reputation around, intimidating the new kids. And he drew that big pistol on Barton and got his brains half knocked out with it for his pains.”
“Barton’s no sissy with a gun. I expect he’s shot some. He was in Cuba with Teddy Roosevelt—one of them Rough Riders.”
“Well, that don’t mean he knows Teddy personally,” the other man chuckled. “Come on. We got things to do before we bunk down. Roundup will start middle of next month, more’s the pity. A cowboy’s work is never done, is it?”
Murmuring voices and jingling spurs died away into the night. Nora curled deeper into her pillow with a sense of uneasiness. She was not used to rough men, and the only guns she’d seen used were in pursuit of wild game. She knew about war, that men fought in the unsettled regions of the country and sometimes with guns. But even on her previous trips to Texas, it had never occurred to her that she might meet men who had killed other men outside of war.
It was chilling to think of Mr. Barton with a smoking pistol in his hand, and suddenly she remembered one cold look from those silver eyes in that unsmiling, lean face, and realized what a formidable adversary he might be across the barrel of a gun. But he wasn’t like that with her now. He was gentle, attentive, and he smiled at her in a way that made her heart race.
She began to look forward to their frequent chance meetings, because that smile made her feel so wonderful. She turned over abruptly, trying to force it from her thoughts. What good did it do to dream when there was no hope for a future? She had nothing to give to Cal Barton. But knowing that didn’t stop her heart from racing every time she thought about him.
IT WAS NOW the second week of her visit, and as she saw more of the enigmatic Mr. Barton, she began to understand the gossip she’d overheard that night outside her window. Watching him send the men about their chores was an education. He never raised his voice, even when he was challenged. His voice became softer in anger, in fact, and his eyes took on a glitter like sharp-edged steel in sunlight. But whenever he saw Nora, his firm mouth tugged into a smile, and he looked oblivious to everything except her.
“Nice day, Miss Marlowe,” he commented as he passed her on his way to the stable, his lean fingers holding a pair of stained work gloves. He glanced at her neat lacy little gloves. She was just pulling them off, because she and Melly had only returned from town. “How dainty you are,” he mused. “And always so fastidious.” His silver eyes wandered down her body in the high-necked middy blouse and flaring dark skirt that reached to her high button-topped shoes. The intensity of his interest was disturbing. It made her knees weak. “You make my breath catch,” he added softly.
She was drowning in his deep, soft voice, in the eyes that held hers so hungrily.
“Please, sir, this is not proper,” she faltered.
He moved closer step by step, aware that they were in a very public place in the middle of the yard. He stopped just in front of her and smiled slowly, slapping the gloves absently into the palm of one hand. “What is not proper?” he asked gently. “Is a man not allowed to tell a woman how sweet she looks in her lacy finery?”
She swallowed. She had to look up a long way to see his face. It was hard to remember that she was supposed to be a sophisticated, traveled intellectual when her heart was trying to crawl up into her throat.
“Your attentions could be…misconstrued,” she said.
He lifted an eyebrow. “By someone else? Or by you?” He reached out and traced a loose strand of her hair, making incredible sensations along her nerves. His voice dropped in pitch, softened. “I find you fascinating, Miss Marlowe. An orchid barely in bloom.”
Her lips parted. No one had ever said such things to her before. She was enthralled by his deep voice, by the look in his eyes, his presence. The odors of horse and leather and cigar smoke that clung to him were not even noticeable in her state of excitement. Helplessly her blue eyes went from his deep-set eyes to his straight nose and high cheekbones and down to the wide, thin lines of his firm mouth. The lower lip was a little thicker, almost square, as if it had been chiseled out of stone. She felt her pulse quicken as she wondered shamefully how it would feel to kiss him.
He saw that speculative look, and he smiled. “You are very quiet, Miss Marlowe. Have you no scathing comment to make about the condition of my clothes?”
“What?” She sounded, looked, dazed, as her eyes were forced back up to his by the question.
He bent toward her, so that his eyes filled the world, so that under the wide brim of his hat, she could feel his warm breath right on her lips.
“I said,” he said softly, “do you not find me offensive at such close range?”
She shook her head in a helpless little gesture. She could feel his strength, like a rock, in front of her. She wanted to lean forward and press her breasts into his chest. She wanted to drag his hard mouth down over her lips and kiss him until her knees gave way. Other, shocking, images flashed through her mind, and she gasped.
His lean hand came to her cheek and his thumb pressed suddenly, hard over her mouth, bruising the soft tissues. His glittery eyes looked straight into hers. “I know what you’re thinking,” he whispered roughly. “Shall I put it into words, or is it enough that I know?”
She was too far gone to register the words at all. His thumb played with her mouth and she let it, standing hypnotized by his gaze, his closeness. He pushed her lips against her teeth in his fervor, and she looked up into his eyes with desire plain in her own. For an instant, time ceased to exist….
She realized quite suddenly what was happening to her, and it was frightening. With a tiny sound, she jerked away from him and ran into the house without a backward glance, her lips still stinging from the tender abrasion of his thumb.
She swept into the house red-faced, met by her amused aunt.
“Mr. Barton is in pursuit again, I presume?” the older woman murmured dryly.
Nora’s eyes were very eloquent, even without her hectic flush. “He is…disturbing.”
“He is the soul of courtesy with women, but never have I seen him so attentive,” her aunt replied softly. “He is a personable young man, and very intelligent, especially about ranch management. Chester could not operate so large a property without his help. He was very somber and businesslike before, but I have to admit that he has changed since you came.” She hesitated then, as if it disturbed her to have to speak when she added, “Of course, there is no question of him becoming a serious suitor, you understand.”
Nora didn’t, at first. She frowned, slightly.
“He is a fine young man, but so far beneath you socially, Nora,” her aunt continued gently. “You must not become involved with a man in such a low social station. Your mother would never forgive me if I did not advise you thus. It is amusing that Mr. Barton finds you irresistible, but he is not suitable in any way as a contender for your hand.”
Nora was shocked. She should have realized how her aunt, as much a descendant of European royalty as her own mother, would feel about Cal Barton paying her so much attention. And they were right. A dirty cowboy was hardly a match for a socialite with a wealthy background.
“Oh, I have no interest in Mr. Barton in that respect,” she said quickly, laughing to cover her shock. “But I have noticed that the cowboys respect him. Mr. Barton has had to calm his men down every night.”
“They are high-strung,” her aunt said with a smile. “And surely you’ve become used to noise in your travels.”
“Not really,” Nora recalled as she stood by the window and gazed out over the flat horizon. “I wa
s protected from anything really upsetting, even from the smells and sounds of camp life. And I was always among relatives of one sort or another.”
“Relatives?” her aunt asked pointedly. “And not suitors?”
Nora sighed, and a slight frown marred her lovely face. “I fear that I am…unusual in that respect. I do not encourage the advances of men, although I like them very well as friends.”
“But, my dear, you are lovely,” she said. “Surely you will want to marry one day, and have children….”
Nora’s face closed up. She turned jerkily. “Melly and I have planned to picnic by the river tomorrow.” She glanced at her aunt. “I have a…fear of rivers, but Melly says that this one is shallow and not very fearful.”
“And she is right,” Aunt Helen said, curious about the wording of Nora’s remark. “It will be pleasant for you both, and as it is near the house, it is quite safe to go there unescorted. The heat and dust are terrible this time of year, but it is cool beside the river. Except for the mosquitoes,” she added with a grimace.
Mosquitoes. Nora felt queasy.
“There, now, the mosquitoes are worst in late afternoon,” her aunt said soothingly. “Do not worry.”
Nora turned and then she knew that her mother had told Aunt Helen everything. It was almost a relief to have someone know the truth. She bit her lower lip. “It frightens me.”
Helen touched her shoulder gently. “You had a bad time of it. But you will be fine here. Do go with Melly and enjoy yourself. It will be all right, my dear, truly it will. Why, doctors are often wrong. You must always keep hope. It is God who decides our fate, not the medical profession. Not always, at least.”
“I should have remembered that. Very well,” she said after a minute, and smiled. “I suppose there are worse things than insects,” she added solemnly as she walked out of the room.