Zane bent down and collected her flashlight, which he pressed into her hand. Then he turned her in what she guessed was the direction of the camp and gave her a little push. She felt dazed. As if she’d just been given laughing gas, and some kind of potent sex drug. She felt giddy and giggly and light enough to float. Zane Nicholson might not be big on conversation, but the man obviously knew his way around the bedroom...not to mention her body. She couldn’t wait for morning, when she got to tell Rocky all about it.
* * *
ZANE WAS UP before sunrise, mostly because he hadn’t slept more than a couple of hours. He told himself the reason was his concern over the greenhorns in his care, which was about 60 percent true. The other 40 percent had a whole lot more to do with a big-eyed brunette with full lips that could drive a man to insanity and back with a single kiss.
He finished storing his gear and stood in the quiet morning. He was tired, on edge and horny. His body ached, his mind raced and he couldn’t stop thinking about how Phoebe had felt in his arms mere hours before. Intense longing gripped him. He did his best to remind himself that wanting her had nothing to do with liking her. He didn’t know her, although he would admit what he did know, he liked.
He sighed. A man shouldn’t have to deal with women or even sex before coffee.
He headed toward the cook fire. Cookie already had a pot bubbling. Zane poured himself a mug, then gulped down two mouthfuls of the steaming liquid. Heat and caffeine jolted his system.
The old man shuffled around from the side of the wagon. “We’re having eggs this morning,” Cookie announced. “Hell if I know if them tree huggers are gonna eat. I made pancakes yesterday, but we’re on the trail. I’m not Emeril Lagasse. I can only do what I can do.”
Zane drank more coffee. “Don’t sweat it. Andrea will eat when she gets hungry enough. Martin, too, although he seems like less trouble than his wife.”
Cookie grinned. “Less like a pain in the ass, you mean.”
“They’re our guests,” Zane reminded him warningly.
“That don’t change what they are.” He set down the big fry pan he’d been carrying and held up both hands. “I’ll be good.”
Zane didn’t believe that for a second, but he hoped Cookie would at least keep his opinions to himself.
Fifteen minutes later, everyone was up and moving around the camp. Zane sent Chase to make sure no tent poles or stakes were left behind. Involuntarily, he found himself glancing over at Phoebe’s tent, as if he were waiting for her to appear. When the flaps finally opened, he was rewarded for his patience in a big way. She chose to back out.
That perfect, curved fanny he’d been fondling the previous night wiggled into sight, followed by the rest of her. The hand not holding the coffee mug curled slightly as he remembered the feel of her bare skin against his palm and the sound of her rapid breathing. She’d been hot, ready and wet. When he’d slid his fingers between her legs, it had been like going home. Under other circumstances, namely them being alone, he would have lowered her to the ground and eased both their aches. As it was, he’d been left to wonder if she’d had as much trouble sleeping.
He drained his mug and took a step toward her. But before he could get there, Chase appeared.
His younger brother grinned at Phoebe, then took her saddlebags from her and slung them over his shoulder.
“So you’re one of those special women who looks even more beautiful in the outdoors,” Chase said with a wink. “I should have guessed.”
Phoebe laughed. “Maya already warned me that you shamelessly flatter women and that it doesn’t mean anything.”
“Sometimes that’s true, but in this case, I’m simply stating the obvious.”
Zane turned back to the fire and poured himself another cup of coffee. Chase’s ability to charm the opposite sex was an innate talent, like being good at math or having a great singing voice. Most of the time Zane found his brother’s machinations amusing. But not this morning. Instead something dark swirled inside of him. He wasn’t jealous—that would imply an interest in Phoebe that wasn’t there. Besides, Chase’s talk was cheap. But he couldn’t seem to make the twisting go away, nor could he find a reason to move to the far side of camp.
“How’d you sleep?” Chase asked.
“Okay. Everyone talks about how quiet it is in the wilderness at night, but I thought there was a ton of noise.”
Zane wanted to turn around and look at Phoebe’s face as she spoke, but he forced himself to stay by the fire.
“Ready to take your tent down?” his brother asked.
Phoebe sighed. “I wanted to check my sleeping bag one more time. I’m missing an earring.”
“Is it shiny?”
“Of course. You’re going to tell me it’s raccoons, aren’t you? I’ve already heard about them. The thing is, if they took my earring, should I go ahead and leave them the other one so they have a matched set?”
One corner of Zane’s mouth twitched as he pictured a raccoon with Phoebe’s earrings dangling fashionably.
“It’s your call,” Chase said.
“I want to make sure I keep my cell phone tucked away. With my luck, it would be taken by a raccoon family with relatives in Madagascar.”
Chase laughed. “Come on. I’ll help you look for your earring.”
Zane turned to tell his brother that he would take care of that and that Chase could move on to another tent, but just then Maya strolled up. She reached for his mug and took it from him. After draining it, she handed it back.
“So how’s the head cowboy this morning?” she asked. “Are we dealing with friendly Zane or crabby Zane?”
He poured more coffee. “I’m always friendly.”
“If only that were true.”
There was something about her words and the way she didn’t look at him as she spoke that got to him. He sighed. “I never disliked you.”
“Wow. Talk about a compliment. Wait. Don’t say anything for a second. I want to feel the love.” She dramatically clasped her hands together over her heart, then shrugged and dropped them to her sides. “Sorry. I know you didn’t hate me or anything. You were very generous in your tolerance. You tolerated me and you tolerated my mother. Not that I blame you for that. She was obviously in it for the money.”
Zane didn’t know what to say. Maya’s mother had been a Las Vegas showgirl when Zane’s father had met and married her.
“It wasn’t all her fault,” he told Maya. “My father never loved her. He shouldn’t have married her.”
“I don’t know. Their marriage might have been hell, but I enjoyed my time on the ranch.”
Zane remembered a gawky blonde blossoming into a beautiful young woman. Maya had been the sort of serious, responsible child flaky parents often produce. She’d ignored the neighboring young men, had concentrated on her studies and spent all her spare afternoons with Chase.
The summer after she’d graduated from high school, things had changed. She’d fallen for a local guy, then had bailed on all of them when she’d headed off to college.
He passed her the mug. She took it and held it between her hands.
“Your father expected you to run things, but he wouldn’t let you make any decisions,” she said, looking at him over the steam. “I remember a lot of teeth grinding on your part.”
Chase and Phoebe laughed about something. Maya turned to watch them. “He’s growing up.”
Zane was aware of that. “His stunts are getting worse.”
“He’ll always be a handful, but you’ve done a good job with him. He’s going to be a good man.”
Zane wasn’t sure about that—not yet. But if it was in his power, he would make sure Chase didn’t have to live with the bitterness of too many regrets.
“’Morning, folks,” Gladys said as she crossed the camp. She collected mugs for herself and her best friend, then poured coffee for both of them. There was a slight tremor in her hand, but overall, the two elderly women seemed sprightly despit
e the early hour and the long day yesterday.
“Fine morning,” Eddie said with a smile. “There’s nothing like sleeping in the outdoors.”
Maya stretched. “I don’t know. There’s something to be said for a feather bed and heated towels.”
The two kids raced into the clearing, with C.J. and Thad trailing after them. Andrea and Martin followed.
“Chow’s on,” Cookie yelled as he banged on the large triangle bell he’d brought with him. “Get it while it’s as hot as these two hot young things.” He winked at Eddie and Gladys.
People jostled for position. Zane stepped out of the way. He told himself he was being polite, but he was also watching to see exactly when Chase and Phoebe emerged from the close confines of her tent.
Ten seconds later, Chase popped out, shaking his head. Phoebe followed, looking defeated. Zane took that to mean that they’d been unable to find her earring. His gut churned at the thought of them looking together, heads bent close, arms touching.
He stalked over to the wagon and grabbed a plate, then took his place in line.
Andrea was up in front. Cookie held a ladle full of scrambled eggs over her plate. His dark expression warned there would be trouble if she refused. Martin—apparently smarter than his wife—nudged her elbow so that her plate shot toward the grumpy old cook.
“We love eggs,” Martin said. “I have to say that so far the food has been really delicious.”
Cookie grunted and scooped more eggs for his plate, then thrust out two platters. One was covered with bacon and sausage, the other had flaky biscuits. Andrea blanched at the sight of so much animal flesh in one place. She took a couple of biscuits and stumbled away. Martin hesitated.
“Bacon’s real good,” Cookie said with a sly wink. “It’s the real thing. Lean and tasty. Not like that store-bought crap you get in the city.”
Martin reached for the serving tongs. He’d nearly picked them up when Andrea’s voice cut through the morning. “Martin, what are you doing?”
Martin backed away as if faced by the devil himself. “Nothing. I’ll be right there.” He took three biscuits, then scurried toward the chairs.
The kids were next. They took some of everything Cookie offered. Thad took a plateful as well, but C.J. only wanted coffee. Eddie and Gladys pretended not to like Cookie’s flirting as they collected their breakfasts and walked toward the chairs. Maya moved up behind Zane.
“I want to be like them when I grow up,” she whispered.
Zane glanced at her. “A cougar?”
She rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean. They’re not letting age stop them from doing anything. They’re still having adventures. I wonder if they get lonely sometimes.”
Zane saw the longing in Maya’s eyes. From his observation, she had always both yearned for and feared romantic love.
“If you’re lonely, find some guy and settle down,” he said.
“Oh, right.” She stepped in front of him and held out her plate to Cookie. “Because charming, sensitive types always fall for lady shark news producers.”
“You don’t want some sensitive man,” Cookie told her. “You want a real man.”
Maya laughed. “Not you, Cookie. You’re too much man for me. You’d plain wear me out.”
“That I would.”
Zane listened to their banter but didn’t join in. Unlike Maya, he didn’t want romantic love. Not because he mistrusted it, but because he knew what it did to a person. He’d grown up with parents who loved each other to the exclusion of all else, and he’d always felt like the third item on a list of two. Love wasn’t the great gift everyone claimed. Love isolated, and sometimes it even destroyed. From what he could see, it cost too much and didn’t offer enough in return. He’d spent his whole life avoiding love, and he had no plans to change.
CHAPTER TWELVE
PHOEBE DELIGHTED IN the beauty of the morning. A light breeze teased at her hair, the sounds of the birds provided a tinkling melody for the background beat that was the hooves of the cattle. Despite her relatively sleep-free night—erotic fondling and kissing by Zane did that to her—she felt happy, energized and alive. So when Rocky meandered toward C.J. and her horse, Phoebe didn’t pull him back into line, even though C.J. wasn’t the friendliest person on the cattle drive.
The two women rode next to each other for several minutes before Phoebe thought of something to say.
“Have you and your husband taken many foster children on vacation?” she asked.
C.J., a blonde woman in her early forties, shook her head. “We’ve never done anything like this before. We wouldn’t have except the people who had agreed to bring Tommy and Lucy on the cattle drive had a death in the family and were unable to go. Rather than let the kids be disappointed, we agreed to accompany them.”
Phoebe nodded. The words sounded fine, but there was something about her tone that wasn’t right. Was C.J. here out of obligation rather than preference? The thought made her feel sad.
“I grew up in foster care,” Phoebe told the other woman. “My parents died when I was seven. There wasn’t any family, so I became a ward of the state.”
C.J. looked at her. “You were never adopted?”
Phoebe shrugged. “It wasn’t like it is now. Prospective parents had no way to meet kids like me. For the first year, I was in shock over losing my folks. If anyone came around looking, I doubt I made a very good first impression.”
C.J. nodded. “We’ve seen some children like that. Their eyes are so sad. Do you remember your family?”
“Not as much as I would like. I have a few memories, some pictures. After a while, the kids I met in the various homes became my family.”
“Did you think about getting adopted?” C.J. asked.
“Sometimes. We’d talk about it. I knew my parents were dead, but other kids I’d met had just been abandoned. They would make up stories about what it would be like when their parents realized they’d made a mistake and came to get them. Even if we said we didn’t care, we all secretly wanted to belong to a family.”
Phoebe smiled sadly at the memory. “I wanted a big house with a couple of dogs and a cat that slept on my bed at night.” She’d imagined parents, too, but they’d been vague figures, and she’d always felt guilty—as if her emotional needs made her disloyal to her dead mother and father.
“The babies were never around long,” she continued. “A few of the toddlers were adopted, too, but the older kids never had a chance. I’ve heard that these days there are parties to introduce prospective parents to available children.”
“Thad and I have been to a few of those.” C.J. pushed up her sunglasses. “They’re so awkward and difficult. The children are on their best behavior and the adults...well, I’m not sure what they’re thinking. I just know Thad and I felt strange. As if we were shopping for a child. We met Lucy and Tommy at a park party a few months ago.”
“They seem like nice kids,” Phoebe said.
C.J.’s mouth tightened into a straight line. “They have some problems.”
No one could grow up in the foster-care system without having some scars, she thought, but didn’t say anything to C.J. The other woman was smart enough to have figured that out for herself.
“We can’t have children,” C.J. explained in a rush. She stared straight ahead as she spoke. “There’s something wrong with both of us. I couldn’t believe it when I found out. If only one of us had been the problem, we could have used in vitro fertilization or a surrogate mother, or something.”
“I’m sorry.” Phoebe didn’t know what else to say. The pain of not being able to have a child—she knew what it was like to feel separate and alone. Although C.J. did have Thad.
“Once we realized we wouldn’t be having a child of our own, we went the adoption route. Two days before we were approved, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. That knocked us right off the list.” Her voice turned bitter. “Private adoption won’t work, either. No single mother wants her child rais
ed by a woman who had cancer. So we decided to try foreign adoption.”
“What country?”
“Kazakhstan. We were supposed to get a little girl. She was about seven months old. But she got sick, and they wouldn’t let us go get her. While we waited, another couple went to get another child, who turned out to be our little girl’s brother. The agency gave them permission to take them both. Then the agency director was arrested on charges of accepting bribes. It’s been a mess.”
C.J. shrugged as if to say it didn’t matter, but Phoebe knew better. Nothing mattered more.
“Thad and I decided that we’ve had plenty of signs from the universe. We’re just not meant to have a child. We’re very happy together, and that’s going to be enough.”
Phoebe didn’t believe that for a second. She wanted to point out that Lucy and Tommy were right here and available to adopt. Or, if not them, then there were hundreds of other children desperate to belong. But she didn’t say anything. C.J. already knew. Maybe she was one of those women who felt she could only bond with a baby or a very young child.
“Considering all you’ve been through, it was really nice of you and your husband to agree to take care of Tommy and Lucy for the week.”
C.J. shook her head. “I didn’t want to.” She laughed harshly. “Don’t I sound like a bitch? But it’s true. Thad talked me into it. Now that we’re here,” she said as she glanced at Phoebe, “I tell myself that we’re doing something nice, and that’s a good thing. But I can’t help being angry about how unfair it all has been.”
Phoebe wanted to say it was unfair for the kids, too. None of them had asked to be orphaned. None of them had asked to be alone. She still remembered every birthday she’d spent after her parents had died. That had always been the worst day.
Oh, sure, there was a party, a cake and a few presents, but it wasn’t the same. There hadn’t been anyone to hold her and talk about the future and love her. There hadn’t been cards from grandparents and dinners with aunts and uncles. No older cousins had teased her, no younger cousins had gotten in the way. There hadn’t been any family at all. After all this time, that was still true for her.
Kiss Me (Fool's Gold series) Page 14