Elena smiled again, as if whatever she’d seen deep within Alicia she liked. She sipped her coffee, then set the cup back in the saucer. “It will be nice having another woman so close when winter comes.”
“I’ve heard the winters out here can be pretty rough,” Alicia said.
Elena nodded. “Brutal. Last winter was unusually mild, but all the forecasters are calling for a doozy this year. You have to be of sturdy stock to endure the isolation of a Montana blizzard.”
“Trust me, I’m strong enough to endure.” Alicia thought back over the past year of her life. She’d endured more than she’d ever believed herself capable of...a blizzard or two was nothing.
“You’ll have to bring your little girl over for a visit. I’ve got a little poodle who would love to play with her.”
“Oh, Rebecca would love that. She adores animals,” Alicia exclaimed.
“And my little Spooky loves everyone.” Elena took another sip of her coffee, then stood. “I’d better get back home. My handsome husband is strong and courageous until little Travis cries, then Trent falls apart.”
Alicia smiled with understanding. Robert had been the same...utterly helpless in the face of his daughter’s tears. As Elena stood, Alicia did the same and walked with her to the front door.
“Thank you for stopping by. The only other person I’ve met is Millicent Creighton,” Alicia said. “And I’m afraid I didn’t make her very happy.”
Elena laughed. “Millicent isn’t happy unless you’re whispering deep dark secrets in her ear that she can then tell to the world in her column.”
“She wanted to do a little introduction of me in the paper and I asked her not to.”
Elena nodded with apparent understanding. “If you were raised like me, you were taught that you get your name in the paper three times in your life...when you’re born, get married and get buried. Any more than that is considered scandalous.” She took Alicia’s hand and squeezed it. “Anyway, I’m glad you’re here and I hope we’ll be good friends.”
“Me, too.” Alicia watched as Elena turned and lightly ran down the porch steps toward her car. When she reached the vehicle she turned and waved.
When Elena’s car disappeared from sight, she turned and went back into the kitchen. As she cleared their cups from the table, she thought of Elena’s parting words.
Yes, it would be nice to have a friend...but how close could she get to any friend without jeopardizing their safety? How many lies would she have to tell, how many times would she have to bite her tongue, pretend that everything was fine and her life was normal?
Oh, it would be so wonderful to have a friend to talk to, to confide in. It would be so good to talk to somebody about Robert’s death, to divulge her fears about Robert’s parents’ attempt to gain custody of Rebecca, and Alicia’s subsequent running away to keep her daughter safe with her.
Unfortunately, she’d had to face some hard truths about her relationship with Robert, and she knew Broderick would have offered a small fortune for any information regarding her whereabouts. Even if she decided to trust a few of the new people in her life, there was always a chance they might whisper something to somebody else and her daughter would be forfeited for a quick, healthy reward.
Broderick and Ruth Randall had destroyed their son—her husband—with their unnatural coldness, their wicked manipulations and their impossible standards. And Alicia would never...ever allow them the opportunity to do the same to Rebecca.
No, it was better to have acquaintances than good friends, better to have surface relationships with everyone until the threat of Broderick and Ruth no longer existed. She shivered slightly, wondering if that day would ever come.
Looking at her watch, she realized her daughter would be home from school in an hour. Enrolling Rebecca in the Mustang Elementary School had been one of the first tests of establishing their new identities.
The school secretary had requested Rebecca’s birth certificate and a copy of her immunization records. Alicia had covered the immunization problem by mumbling something about religious reasons then had promised to send for the paperwork and hoped in the meantime the school would forget all about them. She couldn’t provide a birth certificate because she knew that enrolling Rebecca under her real name would leave a paper trail that could be followed.
As she pulled a roast out of the refrigerator and put it in a pot on the stove to cook for dinner, she thought of her conversation with Elena.
Mr. Dour Personality...that’s what Elena had called her brother. In the two weeks Alicia had been working for him, she had found Cameron Gallagher to be many things. Forbidding, aloof and uncompromising... he was all those.
However, there were times when she felt his gaze lingering on her...a gaze filled with curiosity and something else...something far more evocative, far more dangerous. Even now, just thinking about that expression in his eyes, a wave of heat swept through her.
She wondered what it would be like to be kissed by Cameron. His mouth had a natural sexuality...a full lower lip and a strong upper. She had a feeling kissing Cameron would be like relinquishing your soul. His intensity would make it impossible not to respond, impossible to hang on to any vestige of self.
As she made his bed each morning, she found herself running a hand over his body-warmed sheets, wondering how it would feel to be held in his arms, pulled against his firm chest.
She assumed most of these disturbing thoughts were because she was alone...so achingly alone, and lonely, and in the past several months had come to realize that what she’d felt for Robert had been less love and more gratitude.
Robert’s lovemaking hadn’t come close to touching the well of passion Alicia knew she possessed deep inside. She longed for a man to make her feel the kind of desire she’d only read about in books...the heart-halting, breath-stealing kind of passion that she’d seen in movies, but had never experienced herself.
As she added water to the browning roast, she chided herself for her fanciful thoughts. The kind of passion she longed for was probably an invention of Hollywood that had nothing to do with real people and real life.
She shook her head and began peeling potatoes, inwardly laughing at her own foolishness. She was a woman on the run, a woman who’d sacrificed everything for the safety of her daughter. Desire, passion and love-ever-after hardly had a place in her life at the moment.
“Cameron, watch out!”
Burt’s warning came a second too late for Cameron to dodge the roll of barbed wire fencing that fell off the back of the truck. The roll caught him in the upper back and slid down his buttocks then bounced to the ground, but not before it had taken his shirt and a layer of skin with it.
“Boss! Are you all right?” Burt hurried over to Cameron.
Cameron let loose a string of oaths as he plucked at his shirt, felt the burn of deeply lacerated flesh. Burt stepped behind him and clucked his tongue like an old woman. “Gosh, Boss, we’d better go get you cleaned up. You’ve got some pretty good gouges there.”
“Yeah. I’ll take Bandit and head back to the house.” Cameron released another round of swearing as he reached a hand around his back and felt the slashed condition of his shirt.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to get you home?”
“No, I’ll be okay. I need you to stay here and finish up. See if you and the men can get the last of that old fencing out and get some of the new fence in place.”
Moments later, on the back of Bandit, a huge black steed, Cameron headed for the house. As he rode, he cursed again, angry with himself for not paying close enough attention. He and his men had begun work at dawn, removing all the old barbed wire in the west pasture in anticipation of putting up new.
Nothing irritated Cameron more than carelessness, and he’d been careless to turn his back on a teetering pile of barbed wire rolls. And what irritated him more than anything was that he knew his unusual carelessness was provoked by a preoccupation with his housekeeper. He’d been
thinking of her instead of keeping his mind on his work.
He nudged Bandit into an all-out run, enjoying the speed, the chilly wind in his face, the adrenaline that pumped through him as the horse tore across brown pasture.
As he rode, his thoughts whirled. His house had never been in such good order. Each morning he awakened to fresh coffee and a hearty breakfast, and in the evenings he walked into a spotless house with a warm meal waiting for him.
More than these mundane creature comforts, he found Alice Burwell an easy woman to be around. Unlike most women he knew, who prattled mindlessly to fill any moment of awkward silence, Alice seemingly felt no need to hear her own voice fill up a void.
Nor had she tried to change any of his bad habits. She didn’t nag him about wiping his feet when he came in, didn’t censure him when he forgot to put away his shaving cream or throw his towel in the hamper. And it was these very unimposing traits about her that had made him reluctant to dig too deeply into her story. He didn’t want to discover if she’d lied, because then he’d have to do something about it.
He slowed Bandit as he reached the stables. Dismounting, he put the horse in one of the stalls, then headed toward the house, his back still burning as if on fire.
He entered the house through the backdoor. As he stepped into the kitchen the scent of a simmering roast greeted him. Although it was not quite four o’clock, the table was already set for dinner.
There was a sense of welcoming in the sight. He felt as if he’d stepped into somebody else’s house...a house where a family sat at the table and shared the events of the day. This thought darkened his mood. He wanted no family, no ties to bind his heart.
He strode out of the kitchen and met Alice on the stairs.
“Oh, you’re home earlier than usual today,” she said. She stood on the top stair, her blue eyes retaining a hint of surprise.
He frowned and advanced up. “I had a little accident.”
She stepped aside as he reached the top. As he walked past her she gasped. “Oh, Cameron...your back!”
“Yeah, I managed to tangle with a roll of barbed wire,” he explained. “I’m sure it will be fine. I’ll just jump in the shower and wash off.”
“You need more than a shower. Those wounds need to be washed out with antiseptic.” She followed him into his bedroom.
He ignored her, wincing as he peeled off the shirt. It was torn to shreds and encrusted with blood. He wadded it up into a ball and tossed it into the wastebasket. “I’ll be fine,” he said to Alice as he waved a hand to dismiss her. “I’ll take care of it.”
She gazed at him in disbelief. “Unless you are a contortionist, I don’t see how you intend to manage it.” With hands on her hips, she eyed him narrowly. “You said you tangled with barbed wire? Do you need a tetanus shot? I won’t have you getting lockjaw because you didn’t get cleaned up properly.”
He sank down on the edge of the bed, realizing she was right. “No, I had a tetanus shot last year. There’s a first-aid kit under the sink in the bathroom. It should have whatever you might need in it.”
She disappeared and returned several moments later with the first-aid kit in hand and a basin of warm water and several hand towels.
He leaned forward as she began to dab at the wounds with a warm, wet cloth. The warm water soothed the burning sensation and he closed his eyes with a sigh of relief. As the sting dissipated, he began to notice other things.
He could smell her...a subtle floral scent mingling with a touch of musk. It was a scent that had attracted and disturbed him every day for the past two weeks.
“I’m going to use some hydrogen peroxide on these cuts,” she murmured, her breath a whisper of warmth on his neck. “It’s going to sting quite a bit.”
He nodded.
“I met your sister today. She stopped by to say hello. She’s very nice.”
“Yeah.” He stiffened as she dabbed his back with the cold peroxide.
“Have you two always been close?” Again the whisper of her breath warmed Cameron’s neck, beckoning a shiver he fought against.
He tried to focus on her words, not on the sensations her nearness evoked. “Elena and I have always been friends as well as siblings,” he replied.
“It must have been nice...growmg up together,.”
There was a wistfulness in her tone that reached deep inside him and plucked the memory of happy times in childhood, when he’d been in the bosom of his loving family...before the taste of adulthood and the bitterness of betrayal.
Looking in the mirror of the dresser, he could see her reflection. Her lower lip was captured between her teeth and a frown creased her forehead as she gently applied the antiseptic. She winced each time she touched his back, as if she felt the stinging herself.
“You don’t have brothers or sisters?” he asked.
“No. My parents were intelligent. They only had one mistake.” She compressed her lips together, as if irritated with herself for saying too much.
Her fingertips were soft...comforting and Cameron felt himself responding to her gentle touch. Transfixed by her reflection, he continued to watch her.
When had she lost the purple shadows beneath her eyes? No longer did she have those dark bruises, rather her skin glowed with health and the drawn appearance she’d had when she’d first arrived had disappeared. Even her hair appeared softer... slightly lighter in color and curled to frame her face.
Her gaze captured his in the mirror and suddenly the air around them seemed thicker, making it difficult for him to catch a breath.
They froze...two images in the mirror. Her hands remained on his back, warm imprints that stirred something deep inside him. Her sapphire eyes widened and her lips parted, whether in surprise or in invitation, he wasn’t sure.
All he knew for certain was that he wanted her. He wanted her now, this moment. He wanted her in his bed, naked and eager beneath him. It was a wanting that had been building from the moment he’d opened his door and saw her standing on his front porch.
He averted his gaze from the mirror and stood. Her hands fell away from his back as he turned to look at her. “Thank you,” he said, his voice husky and deep.
“You’re welcome.” Her reply was breathless.
He took a single step toward her.
She didn’t retreat.
His heart pounded in his chest as he stepped closer yet...so close he could feel the heat of her body radiating outward.
In the depths of her eyes, he saw desire. Glimmering, shining, it reached out to him, silently offering surrender. He had a feeling all he had to do was reach out and touch her...stroke her lips with the pad of his thumb, caress her cheek with his forefinger and she would succumb instantly.
In the distance, a horn honked, a familiar sound at this time of day. The sound broke whatever energy radiated between them.
“That’s the school bus. I need to go meet Rebecca.” Still, Alice remained motionless, as if trapped in place by invisible strands.
Cameron knew the bus dropped Rebecca at the end of the long, winding driveway and the driver always honked so Alice would know to meet her daughter. “You’d better go.”
Suddenly Cameron was the one who wanted out...needed to be away from her, distanced from her sweet fragrance, separated from the winsome look in her eyes.
“I’m going out,” he said abruptly as he grabbed a shirt from the closet. “The best medicine for me at the moment is a couple of beers at the Roundup. Don’t hold dinner for me.” He didn’t wait for a reply.
He buttoned his shirt as he took the stairs two at a time to the front door. Instead of taking his truck, he headed for the stables and Bandit. Within moments he was back on the horse.
As he rode down the driveway he passed Alice and Rebecca coming from the bus stop. He felt a moment of contrition as he realized Rebecca would be disappointed to miss her daily riding lesson. With a determined sigh, he shoved the guilt aside.
She wasn’t his kid, wasn’t his res
ponsibility. He didn’t owe her anything and it was just as well she learn early about disappointments and heartache.
He gave Bandit his head, allowing him the freedom to race toward the tavern on the edge of town. He knew what he was doing...trying to outrun his desire, hoping to leave it someplace behind him on the narrow two-lane road.
It had been two years...two years since Ginny had disappeared and Sam had been arrested...two years in which Cameron had survived by keeping himself numb. Somehow...someway, something about Alice Burwell had managed to sneak through his veil of numbness.
It took him over an hour to get to town. He hadn’t pushed Bandit hard, but had kept him at a steady gait Cameron reined in as he approached the Roundup, a one-story wooden structure with a neon cowboy flashing from the flat roof. As usual, pickup trucks and 4x4 vehicles filled the parking lot, and raucous music poured out of the door as it opened and closed with the comings and goings of patrons.
He dismounted and tied Bandit to the hitching post that was rarely used except in the summer and then only by the staunchest of horsemen.
It had been months since Cameron had ventured into the Roundup. Never particularly social, in the past two years he’d become a loner and had never been really comfortable in the smoky, crowded tavern.
He found a table in the corner, as far away from the guitar-twanging jukebox as possible. As he sat, he raised a hand in acknowledgement to several of the men who stood at the bar.
“Well, well, look what the cat dragged in.” Amanda Creighton greeted him, her eyes sparkling flirtatiously as she pulled an order pad from her pocket. “I thought maybe you’d moved out of town or something. It’s been so long since you’ve been in.
He smiled at her. He’d always enjoyed Amanda’s company. He had a feeling Amanda didn’t quite know where she fit, both in the town of Mustang and in life in general. “I’d never move without coming by to give you a goodbye kiss,” he replied.
She laughed. “Ah, you’re a talker, Cameron Gallagher. What can I get you? The usual?”
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