Men Made in America Mega-Bundle

by Gayle Wilson, Marie Ferrarella, Jennifer Greene, Annette Broadrick, Judith Arnold, Rita Herron, Anne Stuart, Diana Palmer, Elizabeth Bevarly, Patricia Rosemoor, Emilie Richards

  “Horse feathers,” Kansas said sharply.

  He turned his head, startled by the sudden vehemence in her tone. It was late now. The sky had turned a deep, royal purple, the ledge over hang so shadowed that he could barely see her face.

  “He had you. He had the responsibility of a son—you’d just lost your mom, too. He wasn’t the only one going through grief—and he always had you to love. There was huge meaning in his life. He just dropped the ball. And personally, I think he should have been strung up by a rope for being such a selfish jerk as to leave you like that.”

  Normally the instinct would have been automatic to defend his father, yet Pax found his throat suddenly dry. He’d seen evidence of her unconditional loyalty before, but he’d never expected it to be showered on him. “I coped fine.”

  “That’s not the point. If you were seventeen, weren’t you in the middle of a school year?”

  “Yeah. Finished out without letting anyone know.”

  “You never told anyone that you were alone?” The shock in her eyes shone even in the gathering darkness.

  “Well, at first, I kept thinking he’d come back. And when he didn’t…well, I just didn’t know what would happen if I told. I was afraid of being uprooted, forced to go into a stranger’s home or have some stranger have authority over my life. I knew how to cook. I got a job, after school and weekends, working for the local vet. I made enough to pay the bills.”

  “So that’s how you came to be a vet? Because of working with one?”

  “Yeah. Old Henry Willis. Gruff, bad tempered—couldn’t stand people—but he had hands with an animal like I couldn’t believe. He pushed me into applying for vet school. My grades were good enough to get me in and cop a small academic scholarship—I worked the rest of the way. Every year, though, I got a cashier’s check for a couple thousand bucks. I know damn well it was from Henry, although I never could get him to admit it.”

  “You’re talking about him in the past tense. He died?”

  “Yes. When I was in school. No one told me. I didn’t know until I came home from college that summer—” Abruptly Pax fell silent, suddenly aware how long he’d been talking about himself. Damned if he understood how Kansas kept doing this to him. He never talked about personal history, ever. Except with her. “Before it gets pitch-black, we’d better get settled down for the night,” he said briskly.

  “You’re right.” Kansas peered out, as if she were just now noticing the landscape around them. From their tuck of an overhang, jagged hills stretched for miles, blanketed with windswept gnarled cotton trees and dusty cactus. A pale moon was rising. To Pax, the crisp air and still ness and silver-blue glow on the hills was the stuff of beauty and peace. For a moment, he thought—hoped—that Kansas might see the same beauty that he did.

  “I guess I thought a desert was automatically like the Sahara,” she mused. “All bleak sand and barrenness, nothing alive, nothing growing. I never expected to see the trees, the endless variety of plants.”

  It was the first positive thing she’d said about his country. Pax had the strangest inclination to hold his breath…but as he might have anticipated, her appreciation was short-lived.

  “Probably an endless variety of critters thriving out there, too,” she muttered darkly. Hunching down, she swiftly gathered up, face cream, tooth brush, canteen and a hairbrush. “I’m off to find a place to do my nightly ablutions. I won’t be long. This definitely isn’t the place for a sybaritic jasmine scented bath and a manicure.”

  “Don’t go far.”

  “Don’t go far, the man says. If I weren’t suffering from a little modesty, I wouldn’t even consider going out of your sight. And I’m warning you now, Doc, if I see even the teensiest snake—”

  “I can’t imagine that I would have any problem locating you, Red. I’ve heard your scream before.”

  “Good,” she said. “Then you’re prepared.”

  When she disappeared from sight, Pax stared after her, thinking: no. From the day he’d met her, he’d never been prepared for Kansas.

  But her mind was on her brother, and one way or another, her sole reason to be in this part of the country would be resolved tomorrow. He could surely keep her safe for such a short time. Safe from the snakes and all the imaginary desert monsters she loved dreaming up.

  And safe from him.

  Ten

  “Do snakes sleep?”

  “How amazing. I could have sworn we’d al ready had this conversation—several times. There is nothing to worry about, Ms. Wuss. Desert nights get chipper, like this one. And once the temperature drops, a snake curls up and snuggles just like a bug in a rug. He has no interest in bothering you whatsoever.”

  “Hmm.” He was right about the night turning chipper. Kansas had the down sleeping bag zipped to her neck. Stars salted the navy sky. The air was so crisp and clear that she could see the faces on the moon…but it was Pax’s face that captured her attention. He was stretched out next to her in an identical sleeping bag, lying flat on his back with his eyes closed. “Exactly what kind of snakes live in the desert?”

  “You do not want to know that answer, Red.”

  “Yeah, I do.”

  Without opening his eyes, Pax sighed. A loud, distinctly masculine sigh. “Western diamondbacks and sidewinders both live around here.” He added swiftly, “Sidewinders are fascinating. They’re little squirts, and they got their name from their funny method of locomotion. They can’t get any traction to move in loose sand, so they kind of throw their body in a sideways loop and propel themselves forward that way.”

  “You’re right. That’s absolutely fascinating. How gruesomely do you die if they bite you?”

  Another sigh. This one husky with patience. “Should you get bitten—which you won’t—I have a snakebite kit in my pack and I know what to do. You’re not going to die. Gruesomely or otherwise. That’s a promise. And I think it’d be a real, real good idea if you got your mind off snakes for a while.”

  “Okay. We can talk about centipedes and scorpions and spiders and tarantulas and gila monsters—”

  “Just for the record—are you planning on doing this all night? Worrying yourself to death?”

  “It sure looks that way. I’ve got one thumbnail chewed down to the nub and my pulse is racing like a 747. Pax?”

  “What?”

  “I’m petrified. Every time I close my eyes, I imagine a snake slithering toward me, or a tarantula jumping on my face. Do you know what I think would be a good idea?”

  “That is not a good idea, Red.”

  She propped up on an elbow. It struck her as fascinating that he’d filled in the blanks without her needing to voice the thought. He knew her that well now. And although he’d half slept through the first part of the conversation, she noticed that his eyes were suddenly wide open. “I think it’s a great idea. We could just zip the sleeping bags together. And then you could protect me from all the snakes and tarantulas…oh.” She snapped her fingers in the darkness. “I know what you’re thinking. Let that ditsy redhead get close, and who knows if she’ll jump your bones again. But if you’ll notice, I’ve behaved myself for days. You were always right, you know.”

  Not too surprisingly, his tone was guarded. “Right about what, precisely?”

  “You were right that once I find my brother, I have to leave. I have a job, a family, a place I’m paying rent on back home. I’m not too proud to admit that you stir my soup, Doc, but I can’t just leave a whole life hanging. It’s not like we fit into each other’s life-styles in any way. There couldn’t be two people born who were less meant for each other—”

  “Is there a prayer, Kansas, the smallest prayer that you might go to sleep and quit talking soon?”

  “Not,” she said, “in my own sleeping bag. If I promise—if I swear to control my wayward impulses and not jump your bones—could I come over there with you?” When he didn’t immediately respond, she said, “This is about tarantulas, Pax. Not sex. This is
about nightmares. This is about a small, frail, pitifully wimpy woman who needs a big strong guy to protect her—”

  “You could only sell me that horseradish the first day I met you, shortie. You’re about as pitiful as an armed lion, and you wouldn’t sing ‘rescue me’ if you were up to your neck in quicksand.”

  “Heavens. Have we made headway. I didn’t realize how well you’d come to know me,” she murmured. “Still, I think everyone needs rescuing sometimes. Especially from the screaming meemies in the night.”

  Utter silence. Then a muttered, “Aw, hell.” Then the slow, reluctant sound of zipper teeth sliding down. He yanked her sleeping bag closer—with her in it. A flashlight snapped on, ribboning a trail of light down the zippers of both sleeping bags until Pax found where to join them together. He got the zipper ladder started, then switched off the light and finished the connecting job in the darkness.

  “You happy now?”

  “Yes, Pax.”

  “No way to avoid close quarters, but don’t start getting nervous. And dammit, there is nothing that’s going to get to you in the night. Now believe it and go to sleep.”

  “Yes, Pax.”

  She lay as still as an angel for at least three minutes. Maybe five. Possibly he realized that she’d sold him a con job, but knowing Pax’s strong protective streak, she guessed he’d be in capable of turning her down. Volunteering to be her protector against Things That Went Bump In The Night, though, never meant that he was volunteering for any other type of closeness. He turned on his side and laid unbudgably still. Every muscle in his body was poker stiff. If he had to quit breathing to avoid accidentally touching her, he was clearly willing to make the sacrifice.

  Kansas sighed, the most innocent of sleepy sighs she could muster…and catapulted toward him.

  The tension in that cave-dark overhang was suddenly volatile enough to spark lightning. The threat of spontaneous combustion certainly wasn’t emanating from her. She was as limp as a dishrag.

  With another slumberous sigh, she burrowed her cheek in the curve of his shoulder. She nudged a knee between his legs in the most innocent of moves to nest more comfortably. One arm easily, naturally, draped around his ribs…which accidentally left no place for his arm to go. Except on her.

  He couldn’t hold that arm in midair forever—not in the cramped confines of the sleeping bag. Eventually his big callused hand fell, heavy and warm, on her shoulder. His palm connected with fabric, seemed to hesitate, and then slid down her back to feel more of the fabric. He suddenly clutched it. Tight.

  “What the hell are you wearing, Red?” His voice was a whisper, husky and raw. “You brought a satin nightgown? To sleep in the desert?”

  “I wasn’t about to buy all new clothes for one overnight camp out. This is what I had around. What can I say? Hopeless sissies wear hopeless sissy stuff.”

  “Kansas?”

  “Hmm.”

  “You lied to me. You didn’t climb into this sleeping bag because you were sissy-scared of tarantulas.”

  “True. I don’t care a hoot about tarantulas, Doc. I care about you,” she whispered, and lifted her face to catch the rough, hard, frustrated kiss that was already aiming for her. She doubted he heard her; momentarily Pax seemed more than a little consumed by a case of masculine aggravation. She rewarded him for venting it on her by nestling closer, kneading a sensual train of caresses down his back, and kissing him back. Thoroughly and completely.

  He didn’t want this, she knew. He didn’t want to let go. Not with her. Not again.

  And making him so miserable was nothing she’d planned. It had been a horrible physical day for a couch potato; she was whipped-tired, and she’d never stashed birth control in her gear because there was no chance of anything happening. Pax had made painfully clear that he didn’t want to touch her again. It still hurt. Like a raw sore. And Kansas knew too well it took two to love. She couldn’t force a man to care who was brick wall determined to keep a distance.

  “Damn you, Kansas.” His voice was lower than a whisper, harsher than a rasp, as he swept her beneath him. A spanking hard kiss suddenly involved tongues, suddenly turned wet and warm. Tenderness seeped into the taste of that kiss, although she knew Pax was still angry. Nothing upset him more than feeling helpless.

  The irony struck her. What he feared most was exactly what she wanted for him. If it was within her power—a mighty precarious if—Pax would suffer unbearable helplessness before this was over. Her fingers trailed the scrape of whiskers on his jaw and trailed to the long, strong cords of his neck, where a naked pulse was beating like drums.

  He did like that nightgown of hers. He rubbed the satin against her skin, kneading, clutching, his touch urgent and possessive. His chest was bare, but below he wore jockey shorts, and beneath that cotton she felt him, warm and hard against her thigh, throbbing with an urgent pulse beat of its own. She nipped his shoulder. She rubbed her breasts against his chest. She gave her sweetest, her deepest, her most desperate kisses, until he clawed in a lungful of air and swore at her again.

  It was his fault. She didn’t volunteer for heartache a second time, not for anyone. And Pax, damn him, already had an aching heart-hold on her soul.

  But he should never have told her about his father. Kansas always understood his fear of dependence, because she’d suffered being dependent on others herself. She understood his need to be strong, because she equally valued strength herself. But she hadn’t known that his father had fallen apart after his wife’s death. She hadn’t guessed that Pax could be afraid that needing someone too much could destroy a man.

  It wouldn’t do—leaving him believing that. Someone had to love Pax. Fiercely and well and thoroughly. Someone had to teach that man that you didn’t get slammed in the teeth if you dared need someone else. Someone had to show him that loving someone was not automatically a source of hurt. Someone had to spoil him with love, given freely, because otherwise the damn man could well go through the rest of his life lonely.

  And this was it. The only chance she had. Once she found her brother tomorrow, her sole excuse for being in Arizona disappeared. So she had a choice—to shut up and leave him alone. Or to share her heart with him. One last time.

  Desire sizzled. Needs steamed. The confining space of the double sleeping bag wasn’t working at all. A zipper skated down its track, freeing chilled midnight air to feather and cool their skin, but it didn’t seem to help. He was burning up. So was she. He pushed up the satin nightgown; she pushed and battled with his jockey shorts. He groaned when she found him, as if he were a man in pain.

  “You brought—?”

  “No. It’s a safe time.”

  “There is no safe time.” There was sanity in his eyes for that leak of a second. But even in the darkness, she could see that his eyes were as black and luminous as Apache’s tears, vulnerable with desire, fierce with needing her.

  “This is right,” she insisted, as aware of his sense of honor as her own. But this was not the same as being careless or irresponsible. A child from him could never be more wanted or loved. She had never been more sure of anything, a terrifying measure of how deeply she’d come to love him, but for right now, she was incapable of a discussion on biology. “I love you,” she said, because her feelings were all she knew how to express.

  His mouth came back to hers, tasting, taking, blocking out those words. When he was forced to inhale another surge of oxygen, though, she said again, “I love you. And you’re just gonna have to suffer through being loved, Doc, because tonight, this one night, I swear I’m not going to give you any other choice.”

  An arrogant plan, she recognized. Particularly considering that somewhere en route she’d stopped being in charge of anything. Her limbs felt liquid and her mind spun wild on the rush of emotions invoked by his hands, his mouth, the electricity mercilessly generated by Pax which shot sparks through every intimate part of her body. He reared up to claim her, wrapping her legs tight around him, her warrior out of co
ntrol and no longer even trying to be.

  It was what she wanted for him. The right to let go, to discover that with someone you trusted, that feeling of perilous, terrifying vulnerability was a wondrous thing. The only nasty thing was…that wondrous sword was always two-edged. The first time they’d made love, he’d laid her heart as open as an exposed and fragile rose.

  This time was worse. This time she knew all she was risking. Yet diving off a cliff with him was a celebration of what two people could bring each other. Pax was a disastrously fast learner. She thought she was strong. She thought she knew everything about herself as a woman. Yet Pax opened doors to freedom—and vulnerability—in herself that she’d never guessed.

  Afterward, she lay exhausted and exhilarated, waiting, waiting for her heartbeat to climb down from that heady stratosphere.

  Pax was breathing even harder than she was. When he collapsed, he stretched on his side facing her. She could feel his eyes on her face. At first, she thought he was stunned-tired, not stunned in any emotional sense. Yet even moments later, even minutes later, even in that heavy-sweet pitch-black darkness, she could feel his dark, silent gaze…

  “It’s okay,” she whispered. “You’re still free, Pax. You were always free. Nothing’s changed.”

  …drinking her in, inhaling her, memorizing her with such intensity that he seemed unwilling to even blink.

  “Close your eyes, Doc.”

  Finally he did.

  At daybreak, color stole over the sky in a pastel palette. There was no wonder the Spanish had named this place Valle de Oro, valley of gold. Light reflecting off the striated rock bathed even the spiny buckhorn chollas in a hazy halo of gold. The temperature was balmy; the whole world seemed softened and serene—except for his pain-punched heart.