“I don’t.”
“Yeah, I agree, there’s only so much tractors can do for you in this situation. I’m afraid what you’ve got is a ton of handwork. I’ve got a crew trimming my apples, won’t be done for a couple more weeks. And they’d have to be taught what to do with the lavender. They wouldn’t have a clue, but they’re dependable, steady. If you want the bodies-”
“That won’t be necessary, since I won’t be having any strangers on the farm. I don’t want your crew. Don’t want anyone’s crew. Don’t want anyone’s help or advice. Now, damn it, Pete, stop being nice to me!”
She whirled around to stomp off, tripped on her sagging jean hem, yanked up her trousers and then stomped off.
Pete didn’t grin-there wasn’t a damn thing funny about what shape that woman was in-but he did stand there, thoughtfully stroking his chin.
Camille had to think he was the most obnoxious jerk to ever cross her path-since she’d done everything but stand on her head to make him butt out. She didn’t want help. That was obvious. She didn’t want a friend. That was obvious, too.
But she’d at least roused enough to snap at him. According to her sister, that was major progress.
When a man found a wounded deer in the road, he didn’t just drive by. At least a MacDougal didn’t. That woman was so wounded she was over her head, sick with it, sad with it, in a rage with it. And no, she wasn’t his problem, but it had been so long since a woman touched him-much less snagged a feeling from his heart-that Pete was unwilling to walk away. At least not yet.
For her sake, but just maybe, for his, too.
Camille woke up to a damp pillow, sore eyes, mental flashes in her mind of a dark alley, her screaming, Robert, the blood, the three faces of drug-crazed kids, the sick feeling of terror…
Same old same old.
She crawled out of bed and took her exasperated scowl into the bathroom. She’d just started to wash the sleep from her eyes when she suddenly heard an odd sound, coming from somewhere close to the front porch outside. A growl? Like an animal growl?
When she didn’t hear it again, she assumed that she’d imagined the sound. Still, once she tugged on a sweatshirt and jeans, she glanced out the murky window in the living room-and then almost dropped the socks in her hand. As fast as she could cram on shoes, she yanked open the door.
There was a dog, tied by a rope to the maple tree. The instant it saw her, the dog sprang to its feet and lunged, starting a teeth-baring, vicious, snarling and barking routine. If it hadn’t been snugly tied, Camille was pretty sure it would have been happy to tear out her throat.
Considering she was afraid of almost everything these days, she wasn’t sure why the dog didn’t terrify her. Possibly it was because the poor thing just looked so pitiful. It had the look of a full-blooded German shepherd-but it had obviously fallen on disastrous times. Its skinny ribs showed. Its right ear had a nip. The eyes were rheumy, the golden-brown coat crusted with old mud.
“Take it easy, take it easy,” she coaxed. But the dog showed no inclination to take it easy and snarled even harder. “Well, for Pete’s sake, how did you end up here? Who tied you to my tree? What are you doing here?”
She couldn’t think, the dog was barking too loudly and too fiercely. So she went back inside, shut the door, and then stared out the window. Once she was out of sight, the dog settled down. She could see a cut in its coat now, close to its right shoulder. The injury didn’t appear too bad, but it was still another sign that the shepherd had been treated badly.
Unfortunately, whoever had tied it to her tree had given it enough room to run and lunge-a little-but hadn’t left it food or water. How anyone had gotten close enough to bring it here to begin with, she couldn’t imagine, but the mystery of the situation had to wait. She foraged in the kitchen cupboards and finally came up with a bowl. It was cracked and dusty, but it would hold water.
When she opened the door again, the shepherd leaped and lunged and did an instant replay of its snapping, snarling act. Camille hesitated, but then slowly carried the water closer. “This is ridiculous. Quit having such a cow. I’m not coming any closer than I have to-you can take that to the bank. But if you want water and food, you’re going to have to shut up and relax. If you don’t like me, don’t worry about it. Believe me, you won’t be here long.”
Snarl, snarl. Growl, growl. The dog was so intent on trying to attack her that it tipped over the water bowl. Camille eased back, perplexed. What now? She couldn’t free the dog-at least not without risking her life. She also couldn’t leave the dog without food or water-but she couldn’t seem to get water to it, and she didn’t have food. Temporarily she seemed to be stymied-and confounded that this could possibly be her problem.
She trudged up to the main house, yanked open the back screen door and yelled for Violet. No answer. She tried upstairs, downstairs, the basement, then the front yard. No sister in any of those places, either. Finally she found Vi in the back of the second greenhouse, up to her elbows in potting soil and roots and plants. She’d look like an earth mother if it weren’t for the five pounds of bangly gold bracelets and wildly tousled blond hair. The place was a jungle of earthy scents and humidity and plants that seemed to be reproducing in every direction.
“Cam!” Violet said delightedly when she spotted her. “You haven’t come out here before. I never thought I’d get you to see all the stuff I’ve been doing in the greenhouses-”
“And I’m not here now,” Camille said. “I’m here about the dog.”
“What dog?”
Camille sighed. If Violet had to ask, then she obviously didn’t know. “Do you have any dog food around? Or anything I could use for dog food? And do you have last night’s paper?”
Asking Violet was a mistake. Once she knew the details she immediately wanted to drop everything and come help. Thankfully, a customer showed up and occupied her sister, which left Camille free to raid the farmhouse kitchen. Vi had enough cat food to feed a zoo of felines. And three days worth of newspapers, none of which listed any reference to a lost dog.
She stomped out of Violet’s house, more aggravated than ever, carting a grocery bag full of dry cat food and a mixing bowl. How on earth had this come to be her problem? She couldn’t care less about a dog she didn’t know from stone and wasn’t conceivably her responsibility.
Getting the bowl of food close to the shepherd was an uphill struggle, since it seemed to want to kill her even more than it wanted to eat. She ended up storming back up to Vi’s kitchen, slamming doors around, heating up some dadblamed hamburger and driveling it into and over the cat food, then storming it back to the worthless mutt.
It quit snarling and lunging when it smelled the ground beef. The tail didn’t wag, the fur didn’t stop bristling, the eyes didn’t look any less feral…but at least the damn dog let her push the bowl within its reach.
Then it fell on the food as if it hadn’t eaten in a week, looking up and growling every few bites-but still, gulping down the chow almost without stopping to chew. By then, Camille had managed to get the heavy mixing bowl of water secured within its reach, too. God knew why she was going to so much trouble. The dog was pitiful. Too mean to love, too ugly for anyone to care, and definitely not her problem. But pitiful.
She never meant to go inside and wash windows. She hadn’t done a single thing to make the cottage more livable, and still didn’t plan to. But because she had to keep glancing out to check on the damned dog, the filthy windows were distracting. And once she rubbed a spot clean, the rest of the window looked disgusting. And then once one window got cleaned, the others looked beyond disgusting.
She’d used half a roll of paper towels when the dog’s sudden fierce, angry barking made her jump and look out.
Pete was out there, leaning over the fence, his jeaned leg cocked forward, wearing an open-throated shirt as if it were a balmy spring day…which actually, Camille guessed it was. He was just…hanging there…looking at the dog, not appearing remotel
y disturbed by the canine’s aggressive, noisy fury.
For just an instant, she felt the most curious fear, as if she should hide behind the door, not go out, not risk being near him again. There was an old Scottish phrase her dad sometimes used. Ca awa. It meant something like “proceed with caution” and that’s what she thought every time she saw Pete. Something in those sexy, ever-blue eyes made her feel restless and edgy. Something in his long, lazy stride, in his tree-tall height, in those slow, teasing smiles of his made her stomach drop.
She wasn’t aware of him as a man.
She couldn’t be.
She certainly didn’t want him. She didn’t want anyone. She never planned to want another man as long as she lived. But damn…he did bug her.
Quickly, she shook off the ridiculous sensation. Pete MacDougal was no one she needed to feel cautious around. She knew that. He was a neighbor. He was interfering and bossy, for sure, but being afraid of him at any level was absurd. And more to the immediate point, he’d obviously noticed the dog.
So she hurled out the door lickety-split. Immediately Pete glanced up and motioned toward the shepherd.
“I see you managed to give our boy some food.”
“Our boy,” she repeated, abruptly realizing that Pete already knew the dog. “Peter MacDougal! You did this to me?”
“I did what?”
“You left me this dog? You tied this mean, godforsaken, dangerous dog to my tree? Why in God’s name would you do such a thing?”
He smiled. As if she hadn’t just screamed abuse on him up one side and down the other.
“His name is Darby. Used to be a show dog. Hard to believe, the way he looks now, isn’t it? But he’s a thoroughbred shepherd with a long, pretty lineage. The neighborhood kids used to play with him, he was that sweet and gentle…”
She crossed to the fence, her gaze sweeping the ground for a log big enough to brain him with.
“…belonged to Arthur Chapman. You remember him, don’t you? Quiet guy, lived down Cooper Street and across the creek, that property on the left after the bridge. Good man. Dog lover. But then Art got Alzheimer’s. Naturally, people realized he was getting strange, but you know how folks are tolerant in White Hills. So they just tried to let him be. Nobody realized that in his own house, he’d gotten mean, was beating and starving the dog. It wasn’t really his fault. He wasn’t in his right mind. Anyway-”
She couldn’t find a log. Lots of twigs in the grass, but nothing big enough to do any damage.
“Anyway, the neighbors finally figured out that Art wasn’t coping on his own. They called the cops, who called Social Services, all that. Everybody was prepared to take care of Art, but no one realized they’d find the dog in such a godawful mess.”
“You’re taking this dog right back.”
“Nope, I’m not. But if you don’t want him, you can call the pound.”
“I most certainly do not want him-”
“Of course, they’ll put him down,” Pete assured her genially. “They don’t have the time or means to turn him around. Actually, I’m not sure anyone can. But the pound, for sure, will believe it’s easier to put him to sleep. In fact, that’s probably what I’d do.”
“You son of a sea dog, you take this dog back! I can’t believe this! That you’d desert me. Leave me alone with this horribly vicious dog!”
“Naw. I’ll give you the number for the pound, if you want them to come and kill it-”
“Quit saying that.”
“Quit saying what?”
“That they’re going to kill the damn dog!”
“Well, Cam. That’s how it is. I just thought… Darby’s got one chance left. That is, if you’ll give him one. He was such a great dog that I just thought, man, he has to be worth one last try… But hell.” Pete pushed back from the fence. “Who cares, right? I’ll go home, get the phone number for the pound-”
A log was too good for him. She vaulted over the fence, determined to give him what-for. She wasn’t precisely sure how to deliver that what-for, but she was madder than a bed of hornets and the “how” didn’t immediately seem that important. She hurled after him, yanked at his shirt, put a wagging finger up in his face, and the next thing she knew, she was in his arms.
It all didn’t make a lick of sense. She was mad. She knew she was mad. And whatever emotion Pete MacDougal might have been feeling, he’d never let on for a blink that he felt anything sexual for her.
Yet his lips came down on hers as if they had been waiting for just that moment. His arms slid around her waist, as if he’d known she was going to be on shaky ground. The sun tilted in her eyes, so bright and hot she couldn’t see. She still planned to sock him. Eventually. It was just that right then…she was so stunned.
His lips were sun warmed, smooth. He dipped down for a second kiss before she’d recovered from the first. He was tall enough to make her feel surrounded, protected. She heard the yearning coo of a mourning dove. Felt the damp earthy loam beneath her feet, felt the sliver of breeze tickle the hair at her nape. She felt his heart, beating, beating. Felt her own, clutched tighter than a fist.
Slower than a sigh, he lifted his head. His gaze roamed her face, his eyes dark with awareness, electric with what they’d kindled together. She felt his fingertip on her cheek. His voice came out rough and tender-low.
“I knew it was in there. That soft, wonderful heart of yours. I hate to see you hurting so bad, Cam.”
He didn’t lower his hand particularly fast, or turn around and start walking away with any speed. But still she couldn’t come up with an answer before he was already a hundred yards onto his own property. She couldn’t talk at all. She still seemed to be gulping in air and sensation both.
There’d never been anything wrong with her IQ. She realized perfectly well that Pete had been trying to reach out a hand to her ever since she’d come home, but she’d assumed it was a neighborly hand. She’d never expected…kisses. She’d never expected to feel his heart thundering against hers, to see the stark shine of desire in his eyes, to feel his body rousing because of their closeness.
Pete wanted her.
It seemed an astounding revelation.
She stared after him, but memories of Robert suddenly pushed into her mind-her lean, elegant Robert, with his city ways and boyish grin. He’d loved the night lights. So many Friday nights they’d gone clubbing, her in her highest heels and slinkiest black dress, Robert in his city-guy clothes. Robert could dance down the house when he got in the mood; he knew his wines, knew his music, knew all the cool places to go.
Camille couldn’t imagine Pete giving a damn about “a cool place” in a thousand years. He was day-and-night from Robert in every way.
Pete was lean himself, but when a man was built that tall and physical, he just wasn’t…elegant. His shoulders were as broad as a trunk. His skin had an earthy tan; his hair never looked brushed. He roared when he was mad, laughed from the belly when he was happy. Nothing scared Pete. He was elemental, earthy, wild himself.
He made her think of male alpha wolves-of the kind of guy a woman was instinctively very, very careful around. Not for fear he’d hurt her, but for fear of being taken under by a force bigger than her, an emotional force, a sexual force.
Camille shivered suddenly, and then abruptly, scowled. Elemental force? Where on earth was this horse hockey coming from? The damned man had left her with a filthy, vicious dog that no one could love or want, and somehow managed to divert her attention for a couple seconds by kissing her senseless.
Well-the next time she saw him, there’d be no kisses and no nonsense either. She whirled around, only to find Killer-alias Darby-snoozing on his side in the maple’s shade.
If that wasn’t typical! Both males had wreaked total havoc on her day, and now one was sacked out and the other had walked away.
She was simply going to ignore them both, and that was that.
Four
When most women got kissed, Camille thought grimly, th
eir mood perked up. At least if it had been a good kiss. And Pete’s kiss had certainly qualified as a humdinger.
As she trudged toward the lavender fields, carrying a long-armed set of clippers, she could feel every creaky, cranky muscle in her body complaining. For three days, she’d been working nonstop in the lavender. Specifically, that was the same three days since Pete had brought her that dadblamed mangy dog and kissed her.
Working herself into a state of exhaustion hadn’t made her forget Pete-but it was doing a fabulous job of completely wearing her out. It was also giving her something to do to earn her keep. The lavender appeared to be a thankless, ridiculous, hopeless job-but that just suited her mood, anyway. She wasn’t looking for meaningful. She was looking for something so mind-numbing and exhausting she’d be too tired to have nightmares.
When she reached the crest of the hill, the late-afternoon sun was temporarily so blinding bright that it took several seconds before she realized she wasn’t alone. There were bodies in the lavender field. Two of them. Squinting, she realized they were boys. Both were hunkered down in the first row of the overgrown lavender, working with clippers-in fact, working with far better clippers than her own.
In a single blink, she knew who they had to be. Pete’s sons. They were identifiably young teenagers-at an age when boys tripped over their own feet and their arms seemed longer than their whole bodies. But she could see Pete in their height, the strong bones and ruddy skin. Both had his brown hair, too, with that hint of mahogany in the sunlight.
She clomped closer, building up a good head of steam. Obviously Pete had sent them over with the clippers. Her father would have labeled Pete a clishmaclaver-which was one of his Scottish terms for busybody. Doggone it, she hadn’t asked for his help. And she may have turned into a rude, ornery bitch-and was proud of it!-but even a curmudgeon had to have a line. She sure as heck wasn’t going to let two young boys kill themselves working in those hopelessly overgrown twenty acres.
Wild in the Field Page 4