by Janet Dailey
“There hasn’t been any need for one in the mornings, but you certainly can’t ride in this midday sun without one,” Colter stated firmly.
The reins were clutched tightly in her hands while the humiliating image of herself in that wretched sunhat with its ludicrous flowers flashed through her mind. Mutinously she averted her head.
“I don’t need one,” she answered tautly, placing a hand on the saddle horn to mount.
But Colter’s fingers dug into the sleeve of her blouse. “I said go to the house and get your hat.”
Poisonous gold flecks sprang into her eyes as she met his unrelenting gaze. Then her gaze flickered past him to Deirdre, who was watching their silent battle of wills with obvious pleasure. Without a word, Natalie wrenched her arm free of his hold and angrily tossed the reins at him. Then she spun around and stalked towards the house, resentment blazing in every rigid muscle.
How long would they wait for her to return? she wondered with trembling rage. Because she had no intention of riding with them, certainly not with that stupid hat on top of her head. With impotent fury, she slammed the front door behind her and didn’t slow her strides until she reached the kitchen. She stood by the table, needing a release for the rage that consumed her.
Yanking a bucket and brush from a closet, Natalie shoved the bucket beneath the taps in the sink, poured a generous amount of ammonia in the bottom and filled it with hot water. Seconds later she was on her hands and knees on the floor, stripping the wax from the surface with savage scrubbing motions of the brush. The floor was half-done when she heard the front door open and the commanding summons by Colter for her. Her mouth tightened grimly, but she didn’t answer.
Nor did Natalie glance up when his footsteps stopped in the doorway of the kitchen. “I thought I told you to get a hat,” he said with ominous softness.
“I’m busy,” she snapped, dipping the brush in the soapy water and sloshing it over the floor.
“You are going riding.” Each word was concisely and emphatically spoken.
“You and Deirdre will find the ride infinitely more satisfying alone, I’m sure,” Natalie responded sarcastically.
She rose to her feet, setting the pail of water on the table while she began to move the kitchen chairs out of the way, aware of the steel gaze that followed her every movement and uncaring for its harshness.
“Are we going to go through this again?” Colter demanded. Natalie didn’t reply, but mutinously kept moving the chairs. “Are you going to get your hat or am I?”
“Go and get it if you want,” Natalie shrugged indifferently, “but I am not going riding.”
“Because of Deirdre?” he jeered harshly.
In a fit of temper, she stamped her foot on the floor, turning to face him in a trembling rage. “I am not going to have that woman making fun of me! I don’t care what you do to me, but I am not going to wear that ridiculous hat!”
There was a slight tilting of his head to the side in curious amusement. “Ridiculous?” Colter repeated.
“Yes, ridiculous!” she flashed. “You know very well that the only hat I own is that straw one with the flowers!”
Laughter rumbled from his throat, taunting in its mockery.
“It is not funny!” Natalie declared in a voice that quivered with uncontrollable anger.
But the low sound continued. Before she took the time to consider her actions, Natalie was reaching for the bucket of soapy water and emptying it in his direction. Only a few scattering drops fell on him as he side-stepped the bulk of it with ease. Silence splintered the room. Then the glint of reprisal was focused on Natalie through narrowed eyes.
Intimidated in spite of her own anger, she took a hasty step backwards as Colter moved forward. She forced herself to stand still, fighting the cowardly inclination to run while her heart pounded in her throat. She succeeded until he towered in front of her. Too late Natalie tried to pivot away.
Her shoulders were seized in a punishing grip and her back was pulled roughly against his chest. The outline of his masculine form was impressed on to hers. Quicksilver shivers raced up her spine as Colter buried his mouth on the taut curve of her neck. His hands glided smoothly down her arms, sliding on to her stomach, their erotic touch igniting the kindled desires of her flesh.
“You made me do it, Colter. You shouldn’t have laughed.” The words vibrated huskily from the emotion-charged tenseness of her throat.
Under the drugging influence of his touch, she hadn’t the will to resist when he turned her into his arms. His warm bruising mouth moved sensuously over her lips as he easily lifted her off her feet and cradled her in his arms.
“Fire should be fought with fire,” Colter murmured mysteriously, his head moving a tantalising inch from hers.
Her arms had instinctively circled his neck for support. As he burned her mouth with a fiery kiss, his statement wasn’t nearly as mysterious as it had seemed a moment ago. Natalie was distantly aware of the smooth strides he was taking. There was even a fleeting sensation of satisfaction at the thought of Deirdre walking into the house and the livid greenness of her eyes if the redhead saw the way Colter was kissing her.
A blithe, melodious song seemed to fill her hearing like the trill of a bird, and Natalie closed her eyes tighter to savour the joyful sound. His ardent touch was truly embracing her with a buoyant feeling that she was floating on a cloud. Unwillingly she moaned softly when he took his lips away from hers. Blinking her eyes weakly, she could look at nothing but the provocative curve of his mouth.
“So you wanted to get me wet, did you?” Colter mocked softly.
There was a split second of dazed shock at his taunt before she felt him lifting her away from his chest, then she was falling. Her mouth opened to call out and water closed around her, drowning her efforts as she gulped in the chlorinated water of the swimming pool.
The lethargy his kiss had induced was immediately gone, her arms flailing the water to fight for the surface. Coughing and spluttering, she reached the concrete edge, pulling herself on to the deck, feeling like a half-drowned cat.
Pushing the straggling, wet locks of hair from her eyes, Natalie turned to glare angrily at Colter. A wide smile split his usually impassive face, the white flash of his teeth laughing at her predicament. Yet Natalie was mesmerised by the smile, the genuine grin. She had never seen Colter smile and its effect was dazzling.
“I’ll convey your apologies to Deirdre,” he chuckled.
Not until he had disappeared around the side of the house did Natalie move, suddenly shivering from the clinging wetness of her clothes.
Colter didn’t return to the house again that afternoon. But he unexpectedly appeared in the kitchen as she was adding the dressing to the spinach salad she had made for the evening meal. He unceremoniously dumped the boxes in his arms on to the table. Nervously Natalie turned, self-consciously wiping her hands on her apron.
“You have no more excuses for not riding,” Colter stated, his impersonal gaze sweeping her face and hair.
There was a rush of pleasure as she recognised a hat box. But she forced herself not to hurry as she opened it and removed an ivory felt Stetson hat with a wide brim. The other box contained denim slacks with a matching jacket. She raised her gaze from the clothes to sincerely offer her thanks, wondering silently if his gifts had been motivated by a thoughtfulness for her feelings or by simple practicality.
But Colter spoke before she had a chance. “By the way,” he said smoothly, “we’re going to have a house guest this weekend. I thought I’d better tell you now so you’d have plenty of time to get the spare room ready.”
“One guest?” Ice froze the blood in her veins, almost stopping the beat of her heart. Her temper would never allow her to endure Deirdre’s company for an entire weekend.
“Yes, only one.” Colter studied the betraying quiver of her chin. “Why?”
“No reason,” Natalie shrugged, carefully folding the clothes back into their box. She closed
her eyes tightly at the pain in her chest and shoved the slacks on top of the jacket. Her fingers curled tenaciously over the edge of the table. “Did you have to invite her here, Colter?” she demanded suddenly in desperate protest.
“Her?” A light brown brow rose arrogantly. “I never said the guest was a female.”
“Oh, stop playing games!” she sighed angrily. “I know you invited Deirdre to pay me back for this afternoon. It’s that sadistically cruel streak in you that wants to be certain I’m sufficiently humiliated to remember my place.”
“When have I ever been cruel to you?” His metallic gaze locked with hers.
There was a slight shifting of his stance so that she was cornered by the table and a chair, her escape blocked by his lean form.
“With your coldness, your indifference, the aloof, cynical way you mock life,” Natalie answered in a quiet but firm voice. “A newborn baby needs more than food and warmth. He has to have affection and attention or he simply dies. Adults aren’t any different.” She searched his carved mask. “Colter, don’t you truly care about anyone? Isn’t there someone’s happiness that is important to you?”
“Are you trying to save my soul, Natalie?” There was a wry twist to his mouth.
“I guess I’m trying to find out if you have one — if there’s anything you would sacrifice for the benefit of someone else,” she answered softly, an unexplainable aching throb in her throat.
A surge of restlessness visibly rippled over him. “No.” The slicing edge of his clipped answer made Natalie wince. Long, lithe strides carried him to the door where he paused to study her with deliberately arrogant detachment. “Nor do I have any desire to punish or humiliate you,” Colter stated. “Our guest this weekend is Cord Harris. A man.”
But Natalie found little comfort in his announcement.
On Friday afternoon, the drone of a small plane sounded above the house. Colter had made no further mention of their weekend guest, not even explaining whether he was a friend or a business acquaintance. Natalie glanced through the window, seeing the red plane descending towards the ranch before she lost sight of it in the trees. Was this Cord Harris? she wondered. Colter had not said how he was arriving, although she knew there was a dirt airstrip beyond the barns.
In case it was their guest, Natalie set two beer glasses in the freezer section of the refrigerator to frost. Twenty minutes later she heard the front door open and the sound of Colter’s voice and that of another man. Smoothing the skirt of her yellow-flowered dress, she walked through the dining room into the living room.
Hesitating near the middle of the room, she studied the stranger while waiting apprehensively for the two men to notice her. Taller than Colter, the man had raven-dark hair and nearly black-brown eyes. High cheekbones emphasised the patrician look of his features. The suggestion of arrogance was there, too, not so blatantly forceful as Colter’s because the stranger’s was tempered by a ready smile.
“Where’s Flo?” the man asked in a richly resonant voice. “I expected her to meet us at the door.”
At that instant the man’s dark gaze swung to the living room, but Natalie had already braced herself for the startled, curious look that sprang into his eyes. The very fact that he had expected Colter’s aunt indicated he was unaware of Natalie’s existence.
“Hello.” There was a faint quiver of anger in her voice, her smile taut with the discovery that Colter had not mentioned her.
“Didn’t I tell you when you called that Flo had retired?” Colter asked with infuriating calmness. “More or less, anyway. With her church and charity work, she’s hardly ever at home.”
“No, you didn’t tell me.” A narrowed look of hard appraisal was turned on Colter by their guest.
“Then I probably forgot to mention my wife,” Colter went on, impervious to the suggestion of censure as he directed the tall, dark-haired man’s attention to her. “This is my wife, Natalie. Cord Harris,” he introduced with an offhand gesture.
A rueful smile accompanied the hand Cord Harris extended to her. “I feel I must apologise for my ignorance,” he murmured.
“Don’t, please,” Natalie refused, her chin lifting in proud defiance. “It was a very quiet and quickly arranged ceremony.”
Colter’s level gaze was locked on to her face. “What she means is that we met at the Fiesta and slipped across the border to get married.”
His detached explanation left no room for any romantic construction to be placed on their hasty wedding. That goaded Natalie into discarding any pretence that their marriage was based on love.
Amber lights were still flashing in her eyes as she swung her gaze to the man at Colter’s side. “You see, Mr. Harris, I met all his requirements. I could cook, keep house, and liked children.” Before either of them had a chance to respond, she rushed on. “Would you two like a beer?”
“Yes,” Colter said drily. “That’s a good idea.”
With the slight inclination of Cord’s head in agreement, Natalie walked swiftly from the room, her hold on her temper almost snapping completely. In the dining room, she was halted by the accusing demand she heard Cord Harris issue to Colter.
“What kind of marriage is this, Colter?”
“It suits us,” was the shrugging reply. “At least I’m not twisted around a woman’s finger the way you are.”
“Some day you’re going to get brought to your knees,” Cord stated grimly, “and you’re going to find that it’s a position that’s not so much humbling as it’s enlightening.”
Silently Natalie wished those words were prophetic and not wishful thinking. She would like to see Colter grovelling for a woman’s affection. She brought them their frosty glasses of cold beer and would have retreated to the kitchen had not Missy and Ricky arrived home from school at that particular moment. After a shyly affectionate greeting, Missy dutifully introduced Ricky, who was as usual not the least bit bashful in front of the stranger.
“Didn’t Aunt Stacy and Josh come with you?” Missy asked.
“Not this time,” Cord answered with the patient attention of a man who genuinely likes children. He glanced at Natalie to explain. “Stacy is my wife. She and our little boy usually come with me any time I’m on a horse-buying trip. But our own annual registered quarter horse sale is only a couple of weeks away. Colter was best man at our wedding. I know Stacy will regret missing this opportunity to meet you.”
“I would like to meet her, too,” acknowledged Natalie.
There was a funny ache in her heart at the way he so caressingly spoke his wife’s name and the special light that appeared in his dark eyes whenever he mentioned her.
“How old is your little boy?” Ricky piped up.
“Nearly three,” Cord answered.
“He’s too young to ride a horse,” Ricky told him sadly.
“A bit.” A barely suppressed smile edged the corners of Cord’s mouth. “Although sometimes he rides with his mother or me.”
“I’ve learned how to ride by myself,” Ricky announced importantly. Then he darted a cautious glance at Colter. “Almost,” he qualified.
“That’s enough visiting for now,” Natalie said quietly, knowing Ricky would continue without pause if he had a willing participant. “Go change out of your school clothes. And don’t forget to change your shoes.”
“I’ll make sure he does, Natalie,” Missy offered tentatively.
Natalie smiled her thanks.
“Missy doesn’t seem quite as reticent as she did before,” Cord Harris observed after the two children had left the room.
Colter’s glance slid thoughtfully to the taller man. “She’s become attached to the boy. She’s very fond of him.”
Cord fixed his attention on the light reflecting through the amber liquid in his glass. “That’s understandable. She had a lot of love to give and no one who seemed to need it.”
“We’ve known each other a long time, Cord.” There seemed to be a hidden warning in Colter’s statement and the two
men exchanged measured looks.
Natalie felt the sudden tension, the clang of hard steel when two forces of equal strength meet. It was almost with relief that she heard the front door open and Travis walked through. There was a veiled look to his brown eyes when he glanced at her, but they still managed to convey a silent greeting before he turned to the other men.
“Karl looked at the plane’s engine and carburetor, Mr. Harris,” he said. “He couldn’t find anything wrong, but he suggested that you should call in an airplane mechanic to be safe.”
“Is something wrong with the plane?” Natalie frowned.
“It cut out on me twice on the way here, but I didn’t have any trouble after the first hour of flight,” Cord explained. “The annual inspection on it was just a week ago. I’m sure it’s all right,” he smiled thoughtfully at Travis. “Thank Karl for checking it out, will you?”
“I will,” Travis nodded, and left.
With Travis’s departure the two men began discussing the merits of the brood mares Cord Harris had come to see with the thought of purchasing one or more of them. That brief friction that had occurred only minutes before was ignored or deliberately forgotten.
EIGHT
“CAN I have a ride in your airplane, Mr. Harris?” Ricky requested.
“Ricky!”
Natalie’s sharp reproof failed to silence him as he glanced up, a serious frown drawing his brows together as he met her quelling look.
“But I’ve never been in a plane yet,” he reasoned.
“Not this time, I can’t take you up,” Cord Harris apologised. “Maybe the next time I come I’ll have more time, but now I have to go home. My little boy is waiting for me.” He turned to Natalie and offered his hand. “Thank you for having me here.”
“There’s no need for thanks. You’re welcome any time,” she insisted.
The dark-haired man bent to Missy, brushing her cheek with a light kiss. “I’ll bring Josh when I come again,” he promised with a wink, and she smiled in return.
Then Colter was walking with him to the plane, a red Cessna parked on the edge of the airstrip. Over the weekend, Natalie had observed the unusual regard Colter held for Cord Harris. Of course, Cord Harris was a man whom nearly everyone would respect and admire whether they hated him or liked him. The unusual part was that Colter did.