by Diana Palmer
He caught her hand and lifted it to his shoulder, holding it there as he studied her downcast face. “Maggie, don’t,” he said gently.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured in a whipped tone. “I didn’t mean to…”
He caught a handful of her wet hair and pushed her face against him until it was smothered against the cool, bronzed flesh, the curling hairs tickling her nose.
“My God, I like it when you touch me,” he whispered at her ear, a husky, strange note in his voice. “There’s nothing to be ashamed of. It’s natural for a woman to be curious, especially when she’s innocent.” His fingers tightened at her nape. Against her, under the water, she could feel the heavy, hard beat of his heart. “Come here, honey,” he whispered, and both arms went around her, swallowing her, in an embrace that brought the stars down into the pool with them. His hold tightened slowly, holding her, crushing her, hurting her…
“Give me your mouth,” he growled huskily.
Burning, hungry, she lifted her face to his blazing eyes and saw them shift to her lips with something like awe. This was Clint—Clint, who teased her and tormented her, who was as much a part of her childhood as the ranch, the horses, Janna. But it had never been like this, not in all her wild young imaginings. He was a man, older than she, experienced, confident. And her inexperience was no match for the hunger she read in his face.
“And now,” he whispered roughly, bending his dark head, “now I’m going to teach you sensations you never knew you could feel, little innocent. I’m going to show you how to be a woman…”
She was trembling, helpless as she waited breathlessly to feel his hard, chiseled mouth on hers. She started to speak, to say something, anything, just as the patio door opened and broke the spell.
She felt the shudder run through Clint’s hard body as he released her and dove under the water. Brent came running, his bare feet thudding on the wet concrete, and dove into the water with a resounding splash.
Maggie went riding with Brent the next day when she finished Clint’s terse correspondence, which he left for her on the Dictaphone.
“I love this place,” Brent said with a smile, drinking in the lush green forest around them. “I spent a lot of my childhood here.”
She smiled, too. “So did I. Janna and I used to play cowboys and Indians here, remember? Once we ambushed you from the top of one of those pines.”
“And got ticks, both of you,” he remembered gleefully.
She shuddered. “It was awful!”
“No doubt.” He stopped and looked down at her, frowning. “What got into Clint last night?” he asked suddenly.
She felt the blush rising, and averted her face. “Bad temper,” she said flatly, remembering how he’d left the pool without a backward glance just after Brent’s return. He had left the house not long afterward, and it had been early morning before Maggie heard the car return. By the time she and Brent got to the breakfast table, he was already at work. She closed her eyes on the memory of what he’d been about to do—what she’d almost let him do. She could still see his hard mouth poised just above hers, feel his warm, smoky breath mingling with her own. She’d wanted that kiss so much that it was like being torn apart when Brent had interrupted them. But it was better this way, she reminded herself. Clint had all the women he needed, that was obvious. He liked to humiliate her, anyway, so she should have been better armored. Perhaps now that Brent was here…
“Where are you?” Brent asked, waving a hand in front of her eyes.
She glanced at him with wide eyes. “Mars,” she whispered theatrically, “out there! Exploring strange and exotic places with my mind!”
He grinned. “Why not try exploring me with your lips?” he leered, raising and lowering his eyebrows for effect.
She burst out laughing and let Melody flow into step beside his horse. “You’re just what I needed. Oh, I’m so glad you came!”
“I’m glad you are,” he replied.
“What do you mean?”
He glanced at her speculatively. “I mean, Cousin Clint isn’t. Look out, my long-ago leading lady. Clint in action is a force to behold.”
“I don’t understand.”
“He wants you,” he told her nonchalantly.
Her heart stopped, then started again. “He’s only playing games, Brent. Lida ripped at his pride and…”
“He wants you,” he repeated quietly. “I’ve never seen him look at a woman exactly that way before, but the intent is all too familiar. I wouldn’t like to see you hurt.”
His concern was comforting. She reached out and touched his thin arm. “I don’t want to see me hurt, either,” she said with a smile. “I’ve got both eyes wide open. I’m not burying my head in the sand.”
He shook his head, smiling back. “My sweet, you’ve been in love with him most of your life, pseudo-fiancés notwithstanding. He may not see it, but I do.”
She chewed on her bottom lip, staring down at the pommel of her saddle. “I thought Philip would…”
“…Compensate?” he finished for her. “You knew better, didn’t you? Maggie, you shouldn’t have come here.”
She laughed softly. “It’s a little late now.”
“Come home with me when I leave,” he said quietly.
She stared at him, trying to read his thin face.
“No, it isn’t like that,” he laughed. “Maggie,” he added, solemn now, “I know how you feel. There’s a woman back home…I’d give everything I own, and more; she doesn’t feel that way about me. And, like you, I know that nobody else could take her place. Don’t let yourself be drawn and quartered like this. We’ll console each other.”
“A shoulder to cry on, Brent?” she asked softly.
“That’s all I can offer you,” he replied, more serious than she’d ever seen him. He grinned suddenly. “Did you think I was offering you a grand passion?”
She laughed feverishly. “Let me think about it. Right now, I’m doing a job, and I gave my word.”
“It’s up to you what you do,” he replied. “I never try to actively interfere in anyone else’s life. But I’m offering you a refuge if ever you need it. And he’ll never find you.”
She nodded. “Thanks for the option.”
He winked at her. “You’re more my cousin than he is. We always were a pair of rascals.”
“We still are.” She leaned toward him conspiratorially. “Let’s swipe the rotor out of his jeep.”
“You’re on!”
Clint eyed both of his innocent-looking guests over the supper table.
“A strange thing happened to me today,” he remarked casually. “I tried to start my jeep and the rotor was missing.”
“The rotor?” Emma exclaimed, pausing in the act of lifting a forkful of mashed potatoes to her mouth. “The rotor was gone?”
Maggie raised both eyebrows and met Clint’s searching gaze levelly. “How strange,” she said impassively.
Brent strangled on his coffee and had to excuse himself from the table.
“Never fear!” Maggie called after him, rising. “First aid is on the way!”
For the next few days, she and Brent fortunately were able to keep out of Clint’s way—just. But his temper was shorter than ever, and getting things ready for the mammoth sale wasn’t helping it.
“Hey, Maggie,” Billy Jones, the foreman called, “Clint wants to see you!”
She looked up from the porch where she was getting a checklist ready for the midday barbecue at the sale. “Well, here I am!” she called cheerfully. “Tell him to look to his heart’s content!”
Billy went away shaking his head, and Maggie was instantly sorry. Brent had just been called away on business that morning and she was afraid to push Clint too far without Brent’s protection. But the tension was beginning to get to her…
“So there you are, you damned little witch,” Clint muttered, coming up the steps, his hat cocked over his brow, fury in every line of his hard face.
She felt
herself cringing, but she kept her eyes raised. “Yes?”
He stopped just in front of her and swept off his hat, slinging it onto the nearby table. He leaned down, one hard-muscled arm on either side of her where she sat in the big, high-backed rocking chair, trapping her.
“If I were you,” he said in a dangerously soft voice, “I wouldn’t push too hard. I’ve had about all I can take from you and Cousin Brent!”
She felt the raw power in that lean body at the proximity, and it was disturbing. “Just because we hid your rotor…”
“…And tied pink ribbons on the tails of two of my milk cows, and put bubble bath in the swimming pool, and…” he growled hotly.
She flushed. It had really been funny at the time. “Your trouble is that you don’t have a sense of humor,” she grumbled.
“You’ve got enough for both of us!” he shot back. His eyes were like a panther’s—green-gold in that swarthy face, narrow and threatening.
“Even when Brent and I were kids, you managed to make us feel like criminals every time we played a prank,” she told the open front of his blue-checked shirt, where dark, curling hair peeked out, damp with sweat.
“You damned near turned my hair white a few times,” he recalled, and some of the anger drained out of him. He smiled.
“So I see,” she murmured, and involuntarily her fingers reached up to touch the silver at his temples. “You’re absolutely sure it isn’t a sign of old age?” she added mischievously.
He chuckled softly. “You brat.”
All the years seemed to fall away when he laughed like that, and he was the Clint of her childhood, the bigger-than-life creature her dreams were made of, invulnerable and indestructible.
“Clint, I am sorry about the bubble bath,” she said, “but it did look so pretty…”
He tweaked a long strand of her hair. “Brent’s a bad influence on you. And from now on keep your little hands off my jeep.”
“Yes, Clint.”
“So meek!” he drawled. His eyes dropped to her mouth and lingered there for a long time. Abruptly he caught her tiny waist with both hands and jerked her up against him, holding her so tightly that she cried out involuntarily.
“You beast, will you let me go?” she gasped angrily.
His breath was warm at her temple. “It’s dangerous to stop fighting me, Irish,” he murmured in a stranger’s husky voice. “I’m a man, not a boy like Brent, and I’m not used to limits of any kind. Are you too innocent to understand that, or do you want me to spell it out?”
She felt the lean, hard body against hers go taut as his hands put her away, and she moved to pick up the sheets of paper and pen that had fallen to the floor.
“I seem to remember your telling me that I didn’t…appeal to you that way,” she said through tight lips, avoiding his watchful gaze.
There was a long, static silence between them. “Do you have a list for Shorty?” he asked after a while, and she heard the click of his lighter just before a cloud of smoke drifted around her. “He’ll need to get those supplies today so that he can start cooking early in the morning.”
“I’ve just about finished it,” she replied, sitting back down. “I thought I’d have him get some paper tablecloths and plates and napkins, too, and plastic utensils.”
“Thrifty little soul, aren’t you?” he asked gruffly. “Am I supposed to be impressed?”
“The only thing that might impress you,” she returned hotly, “is a steam roller!”
“More depressing than impressing, surely,” he said with a flash of a grin.
She drew a hard sigh. “You are without doubt, the most maddening human being…!”
“With your hair loose like that,” he murmured, “and your eyes like green buds in early spring, you’re pretty maddening yourself, honey. Just make sure you don’t fling any of that sweet magic in Brent’s direction. I’d hate like hell to have to throw him off the property.”
“What I do with Brent…!” she began.
“…Is my business as long as you’re on my ranch,” he said flatly, his eyes daring her to argue about it. “Don’t make the mistake of underestimating him, either. He’s a man, and the kind of teasing you do with him can be just as inviting as a come-on.”
Her mouth flew open. “Clint, for heaven’s sake, I’ve played at words with him all my life!”
“And while you were still eight, and he was ten, it was safe.” His dark green eyes swept over her lithe figure in the soft tan blouse and slacks. “Baby, you’re a hell of a long way past your eighth birthday. Don’t tempt fate.”
“How strange that you should be warning me about Brent,” she flung at him, “when just the other day he was warning me about you!”
One eyebrow went up and she could see the mischief sparkling in his eyes. “What did he say?” he asked.
Her mouth opened to say the words just as she realized what they were and shut it again. Her face burned like fire.
He laughed softly. “Well?” he prodded. “You know I’m not going to let that drop until you tell me. What did he say, Maggie?”
She shifted uneasily. “He said you were a force to behold,” she said finally.
“And what else?”
“That was…all,” she faltered.
He studied her for a long time, idly drawing on the cigarette. “I think I can guess,” he mused. “And he’s right, up to a point. I can have damned near any woman I want. But, Maggie,” he added, his voice soft now, “I don’t rob cradles.”
She kept her eyes down, inclined to argue, but too smart to open that can of worms. “How soon do you need this list?”
“In an hour. I’ve got to send Shorty into town anyway for some wire I ordered. Since mother’s not going to be back for two or three more months,” he added, “you’ll have to act as hostess.”
“Can’t Emma…?”
“Honey, there’s nothing like a pretty, sexy woman to keep buyers happy,” he taunted.
The open glare she shot up at him was as potent as words. “I will not be used as a…!”
He leaned down, his warm breath mingling with hers, stopping the tirade effectively just by moving close. His eyes burned deep into hers. “Twelve years,” he murmured, “and you still can’t tell when I’m teasing and when I’m not. I don’t intend using you as bait. And if any man lays a finger on you, I’ll break both his arms. Satisfied?”
Her eyes widened, her whole expression puzzled. “Clint, why do you…?”
His finger tapped her nose lightly. “Finish your list. I’m up to my neck in work.”
He turned abruptly and left her staring after him.
Sale day came all too soon the next morning as the buyers started arriving by car and plane. In no time at all, the lush grounds were covered with them. Shorty was trying to be ten places at once, busy with roasting huge carcasses for barbecue, stirring baked beans, making rolls—Maggie volunteered to help, but he wouldn’t hear of it, gesturing angrily at her flowing white dress and demanding to know how she’d ever get grease spots out. She left him to do it with a smile and a wink. Seconds later, Emma barged in with her apron already spotted and stained, and started watching the beans. Shorty almost fell on her shoulder and kissed her.
Maggie supervised the temporary help, getting tables set up, coffee urns arranged, tea made and tubs brought in for soft drinks and beer. She remembered sale days in her childhood, when Mrs. Raygen had made this seem so easy. It was anything but.
Unconsciously, she searched the nearby stalls for Clint and found him with her eyes. A tall, slender, beautiful blond woman held onto him while he talked cattle with an elderly man beside her. There was something so familiar about the woman; she searched her memory and came up with a name. Sarah Mede. Little Sarah, who’d grown into a siren, and was chasing Clint as wholeheartedly as Maggie ever had at the precocious age of nine. Maggie sighed wearily. Janna had said something about Sarah and her father being on vacation in Europe. Apparently they were back, and she d
idn’t need to ask who Clint had been dating recently. That possessive little jeweled hand said it all.
She turned back to her chores, wishing with all her heart that Brent could have made it back in time to give her some moral support. She felt as if she’d never needed it more. If only she’d never come!
“Well, hello,” came a smooth masculine voice from behind and she turned to find a fortyish, rather attractive man in a rust-colored leisure suit standing behind her.
She smiled automatically. “Hello. Here for the sale?” she asked.
He smiled down at her. “That’s why I came,” he drawled with a laugh in his voice. “But I hear Clint’s cousin already put in a bid for Bighorn. I sure had my heart set on that old Hereford bull.”
“Sorry,” she said with a smile. “But Brent did, too.”
“You one of the family?”
She shook her head. “I’m Clint’s temporary secretary. But I grew up just a few minutes north of here. I’ve known Clint and Janna and Brent most of my life.”
“I hate to be pushy, but do you think I could get a cup of coffee while we wait on that barbecue?” he asked. “I flew out of Austin without breakfast, or coffee, or a kind word from my housekeeper, and I’m just about dry.”
“There’s beer if you’d rather,” she said, thinking he looked more like a beer man than a coffee one.
He grinned, making extra lines in his swarthy face. “Can’t stomach the stuff,” he said with quiet honesty. “Although I will admit to a taste for aged Scotch. But right now all I want is coffee.”
“Then, that’s what you’ll get, Mister…?”
“Masterson,” he replied. “Duke Masterson. You?”
“Maggie Kirk.”
“Just Maggie?” he probed.
She shrugged. “Well, actually, it’s Margaretta Leigh,” she told him, “but nobody ever calls me that.”
“Why not?” he asked gently. “I think it’s lovely.”
She felt very young under those quiet, dark eyes, and out of her depth. “Let’s see about that coffee.”
He was a cattleman, as she guessed, with a large ranch near Austin as well as real estate and oil holdings. He was also an attractive man, with a charm that put her immediately at ease.