"We'll talk about anything you want some other time... when we can't think of anything better to do."
Chase groaned. Gazing deeply into her eyes, he looked as if he were going to say something more anyway. But, in the end, he changed his mind. His head swooped down, his mouth covering hers fully.
This time, Kate took the utmost pleasure in his kiss, drawing out the interplay of lips and teeth and tongue. Eyes closed, emotions open, she shared with him her renewed sense of wonder. A woman now, she was no less thrilled by the thorough contact than she'd been as a girl.
Breathing hard, Chase broke the connection and made a new one as he buried his face in her throat. Sensation swamped Kate as he trailed his mouth along her sensitive skin -- nudging her blouse out of the way -- and lightly bit the delicate flesh between her neck and shoulder. His fingers tangled in her hair and she felt him unsnap the clip that had been holding it out of her face. Now the natural curls tumbled around her shoulders in disarray.
Chase pulled back slightly, his hand coaxing her hair into an unruly mass. "That's the way I've dreamed of seeing you -- wild and wanton."
"You should see me on a bad hair day," she joked, then swallowed her breath as, beneath her skirts, his hand slid up the outside of her leg.
"Mm, and that scent you're wearing is almost as intoxicating as you."
Keelin's ylang-ylang, Kate thought.
Liquid heat followed the trail he broke with his hand. Kate responded by laying back and parting her thighs, allowing him more intimate exploration. She burned where his fingers found her and arched toward them for more. He tried to pull away the scrap of satin covering her, but the material wouldn't give. He slid the garment down her hips, sliding himself, as well, so he could follow the material with intimate kisses.
Finally, he rid himself of his jeans, then lay back, and taking her with, positioned her to straddle him.
She'd been wearing a skirt the night she'd been initiated to lovemaking, and Kate almost felt as if she were experiencing the memory even as she had when she'd tuned into Sage. Every touch felt like the first, her reactions that of an overeager and inexperienced girl. But when she slid onto him -- they hadn't been quite so inventive that first time -- she felt like the wanton he'd imagined her to be.
This had been predestined, Kate thought, unbuttoning his shirt, running her hands over his chest and down his taut belly. Their constant sparring had been a mating dance, a prelude to a joining that had been inevitable from the moment they'd laid eyes on each other again.
Even as she pulsed languorously over Chase, he continued to undress her. Button-by-button, slowly opening her still-damp blouse, he watched through slatted eyes.
When he reached for the bag of herbs as if to remove it, however, she croaked, "No, leave that be." Whether or not it really held an aphrodisiac, she felt as if they'd both fallen under its exotic scent. No sense in breaking the spell.
As he slipped the blouse off her shoulders and down her arms, the tangled material imprisoning her hands, she threw back her head and closed her eyes. He thumbed her nipples through the satin covering her breasts.
Overcome by desire, Kate bit her bottom lip to stop from crying out. As if sensing her need, Chase rid her of the garments, molding his hands around her full flesh, while she began rocking her hips in the same natural rhythm as the beating rain.
She bent to kiss him. Their breaths mingled and grew heavier. A lusty sigh escaped her.
Waiting no longer, Chase turned her flat on her back, him buried deep inside her. She tore at his shirt, frantic to feel not only his bare chest against her breasts, but the strength of his arms and the muscles of his back under her palms. She had little time to savor him before their passion exploded at the exact moment sheet lightning lit the sky directly outside the house and thunder rattled all the windows.
For a moment, Kate floated, again visualizing that first intense glance when they'd rediscovered each other... until Wrangler's fearful whine and bark of alarm sent a chill through her.
She remembered that special moment had taken place at Doc's gravesite.
BUCK STOOD OUTSIDE THE WINDOW, heedless of the rain that rolled inside his jacket and down his back. He'd had too much to drink to let a little rain worry him. And the naked bodies inside left him unaffected but for a growing resentment.
Chase Brody owed him.
He could have had a life.
A job.
A family.
Instead, he was left with a bottle in a paper sack. He took a drink. Whiskey dribbled down his chin along with the rain. Chase's fault he was a shell of what might have been -- a damn living ghost who'd been given a pity job by the man who'd crippled him.
Chase Brody owed him big time, would never stop owing him as long as he lived, Buck decided. Nothing would ever be enough for what he'd lost. Still, he would keep Chase paying for as long as it suited him. The guilt would keep him from suspecting he was being duped.
Another swig had Buck considering new punishments. Especially one that would steal away Chase's humanity as Chase had stolen his.
Bleary-eyed from too much booze, he watched the couple inside hold onto each other like they would never let each other go again. Then he smiled.
The woman. That was his ticket.
Chase's losing the woman he loved would be the ultimate payback.
CHASE AWOKE KATE AT THE CRACK of a drizzly dawn in a delightfully intimate manner. One body part led to another, and before she knew it, all thoughts of sleep had fled. The early morning sex-play left her ravenous, and she was surprised that Chase was talking about heading back to the refuge rather than joining her for breakfast.
"What's the hurry?" she asked, pulling on a terry robe while he climbed into his clothes.
"I want to check things out," he admitted, "before everyone's up and around."
"You think something else has happened? More horses missing?" Kate's protective instincts were aroused. "I think I'd better go with you."
"No need." He played with a loose strand of her hair and kissed her on the nose. "I'm just being cautious. Who knows when they'll strike again?"
He'd said they, so he, too, believed more than one person was at fault. Learning that more wild horses were missing after the fact didn't exactly help matters. Not the horses, certainly. Kate was convinced there had to be a way to catch the rustlers in the act.
"I know it's impossible to predict when something is going to happen," she said, "but I was thinking of how we might catch them." Thinking about the day they'd found the horses missing had given her the idea. "You can see a pretty good portion of the north and west refuge boundaries from the old observation tower --"
"Too dangerous." Chase frowned down at her. "If I had the money or the manpower, I'd pull that thing down before someone gets hurt. You stay away from it." His hand worked its way under her chin, lifting her face to his. "Promise me."
Chase could be very persuasive when he wanted to be. Kate promised.
After he left and she had her breakfast, Kate entered Doc's study, Wrangler at her heels. The room was still overflowing, but she wasn't much in the mood to do anything about the clutter, even though she had a couple of hours before her first appointment. Besides, what was the rush? Happier than she could ever remember being, she swiveled in the office chair, her eye caught by the journals Doc had been keeping all his professional life.
Doc.
Her smile fading to bittersweet, she let her mind drift to his untimely death and the people suspect -- nearly everyone they knew, it seemed -- though she and Chase had concentrated on examining Thea Lockridge and Nathan Lantero. She wondered why he'd never figured on them working together, but she and Chase might be of like mind. Somehow she couldn't see Nathan giving Thea the time of day.
Who would?
Though she still couldn't envision Buck Duran hurting Doc, Chase hadn't eliminated him. Considering the difficulty he'd had in getting work over the years, Buck might be open to less than sterlin
g methods of earning money. And no matter that he seemed to have forgotten the past, he did have reason to resent -- maybe even hate -- Chase.
Laying in wait for the guilty ones to strike was the only way they were going to learn their identities for certain, but how to convince Chase?
Leaning forward, she fetched the journal for nineteen-seventy-eight from the shelf and paged back to the day of the fateful accident. Curious to know Doc's thoughts on the matter, she skimmed the passage relating the details of his working on Buck's leg and scanned the next few pages for a less graphic follow-up entry.
Nothing caught her attention until another name fairly jumped out at her:
Merle Zwick came to me desperate for help. Nothing I could do for her but shore up the bleeding and get her to a clinic in Hot Springs. Poor girl. Two losses in as many days is enough to break anyone.
Kate stared at the enigmatic entry for a moment, then paged ahead, looking for another about Merle, but Doc didn't mention her again, either.
Even back then she hadn't known Merle very well, but Bitter Creek had always boasted a well-developed rumor mill. If Merle had hurt herself badly enough to be taken to a clinic for treatment, word would have gotten around town faster than greased lightning. Surely she would have heard something.
Nothing I could do for her but shore up the bleeding...
Kate shifted uneasily at the ominous statement. What if the bleeding hadn't come from an outer wound? What if she'd been bleeding from the inside? Doc made it sound as though Merle had been having a miscarriage.
Two losses...
Losing a baby would have been emotionally devastating -- if Merle had wanted to be pregnant. And nothing of the sort had ever come over the grapevine.
A secret pregnancy?
But whose baby might it have been?
The possibility that came to mind spoiling her good mood, Kate closed the journal and replaced it on its shelf, wishing she had never remembered that Doc had treated Buck. Then her suspicions wouldn't be aroused. She wouldn't have another truth to learn.
She wouldn't have the awful feeling that even while Chase had been courting her, he'd been sleeping with Merle Zwick.
"No, it can't be," she whispered, emotions charged in a devastating direction.
But Chase had been trying to tell her something about the past before they'd made love. He'd indicated she might not want to be with him after he told her everything.
And she had stopped him, fearing the past would come between them.
As if he knew she needed some comforting, Wrangler nosed his head onto her lap. Absently, she stroked his fuzzy face and scratched him behind the ears.
Two losses in as many days...
First, Chase, then the baby?
Kate knew she was jumping to conclusions, but she couldn't help herself, because she couldn't figure out what else Doc might have meant. The truth seemed clear enough for a blind person to see.
Kate wrapped her arms around Wrangler's neck, taking what comfort she could in his doggy devotion.
When Chase had run away without looking back, she realized, it was altogether possible that he hadn't left one broken heart behind, but two.
BY THE TIME SHE ARRIVED at the refuge later that afternoon, Kate was feeling a little more rational. Though she would make no accusations, she would ask Chase directly what he knew about Merle's plight. She only hoped he would give her an answer that she could believe.
First thing she checked on Hercules and tended to his wound. That the infection was already showing signs of clearing pleased her.
"Feeling better?" she asked the gelding, rubbing his nose and giving him an entire apple.
He munched contentedly until a voice from behind her said, "You're spending an awful lot of time around here. Almost as much as Doc Weber did."
Hercules nervously shied away from the rail as Kate turned to face Whit Spivey on the other side of the corral fence. He was grinning at her, showing off his rotten teeth.
"If you'd rather have someone else vet your horse just say so."
"A body'd think the refuge was more important than your private practice."
"Getting the lay of the land takes a while," she said, wondering what he was getting at. "And the place has had a few problems lately."
"None of your concern, though."
The flesh along her spine bumping, Kate stared at the odious man. "Doc was my concern."
"The refuge isn't the safe place it used to be," Spivey said, moving away. He was heading for the lean-to and the handful of customers waiting on him. "I'd be careful where I stepped if I were you."
A warning if she'd ever heard one.
On edge again, Kate thought it a good idea to walk off her anxiety, so she headed for the visitor's center on foot. While wet in spots, the porous ground was free of muck. Not that she'd donned any of her good boots. She was wearing her oldest pair, the tobacco color leather darkened by myriad years of rains and snows. The heels had been replaced several times, the soles once. But still, she wouldn't get rid of what she considered to be her lucky boots that had gotten her through vet school. At the moment, she figured she needed all the help she could get.
That's why, tucked beneath her green cotton shirt was Keelin's version of a medicine pouch. She reminded herself of its benefits -- quieting anxiety, battling fear, calming anger, keeping her spirits up.
Fat chance! she thought gloomily, feeling sick inside again.
Merle and Chase...
Please let it not be so!
Though the sky remained thick with clouds, they'd seen the last of the rain early that morning and more was not expected until late that night. The gray day pressed down on Kate, a fitting match to the depression she was fighting, not only because of Doc's journal but because they were no closer to catching the people responsible for his death and the disappearance of the horses.
She still thought the observation tower was a good idea and meant to talk to Chase about it again.
Among other, equally disturbing, things.
As she approached the visitors' center, Kate could see through the screened wall. Huddled together in the doorway of the office, Annie and Buck were having an intense conversation that seemed personal... almost conspiratorial.
She shook herself. Now she was seeing demons everywhere.
"We can figure out the details later," Buck was saying, his tone intent.
Feeling a little odd coming in on their private conversation, Kate made enough noise opening the screen door to warn them of her arrival.
Buck started. Upon seeing her, he nodded curtly to Annie and turned to leave, giving Kate the distinct impression that his sudden departure was directly related to her arrival. How weird. Buck had always been friendly with her. As he limped out of the office, he didn't even look her way.
Wondering what the unexpected hostility was about, she stared after him.
"If you're looking for Chase," Annie said, "he should be back any minute now. He's at his cabin finishing that paperwork on the grant proposal."
"Thanks." Kate plugged the vending machine with enough coins for a can of soda. "I'll wait for him here, if you don't mind." Though she certainly wouldn't talk to Chase about Merle where anyone could overhear. "Say, where's Merle today?" She hadn't seen the other woman around.
"She called in sick with stomach flu."
Kate sat and popped the can top, aware that Annie remained wedged in the office doorway staring holes through her. Didn't she have anything better to do?
Taking a sip of soda, she tried to remain polite. "Something I can do for you?"
"It's what I can do for you." The volunteer crossed the porch and slid into the seat opposite Kate. Her expression was sympathetic as she qualified her offer. "If you want to hear the truth about Chase, that is."
Wondering what Annie was up to this time, Kate asked, "And what truth would that be?"
"An old one."
About Merle?
The entry in Doc's journal w
as obsessing her, perhaps because she'd already suspected Chase and Merle had a history together. She'd merely assumed that history had been a bit more up-to-date.
Kate took a big enough sip of pop to wet her suddenly dry throat. "Say what you have to say."
"This isn't easy. Buck was just telling me... well, he's concerned that Chase doesn't hurt you a second time."
Never having been good friends with Buck, Kate wondered at his sudden concern... or that he knew she'd been in love with Chase. And if he was worried about her, why had he acted so strangely just now?
"I'm touched, but I don't think Chase will be taking off without notice again."
From Annie's confused expression, Kate realized the other woman had no clue as to what she meant. Then Chase's leaving her in the lurch wasn't the topic in question. What had the volunteer hoped to share?
Back to Merle?
Taking a longer swallow of soda to hide her nerves, Kate said, "I'd appreciate your getting to the point."
"Yeah, sure." Annie looked down at some invisible spot on the table, her hair sliding forward to mask her expression. "Buck told me that when you were teenagers, Chase was never really interested in you."
Relief flowing through her, Kate laughed. "He could have fooled me."
"I know this isn't something a woman with any kind of pride wants to hear... but it's the truth," Annie insisted. "Chase bragged to his buddies about how someday he was going to have it all, including a girl who wasn't trailer trash."
Like Merle... she added silently.
Aloud, she said, "That doesn't mean he didn't care about me."
"Buck and his brother bet him he couldn't get you. He took the bet, Kate," Annie said, lifting her head. Her blue eyes were filled with pity. "That's why he went after you in the first place."
The McKenna Legacy Trilogy Page 56