“True, but if you’re really concerned about them breaking out, think how much harder it would be for them if they had cattle to take, or leave behind.”
A sharp gleam came to the agent’s eyes. “Yeah…yeah. Maybe I’ll think about it.”
“You do that. I’ll see you at the end of the month.”
When they rode out, Matt thought, maybe—maybe this time it would work. But he wasn’t optimistic enough to let the subject occupy his mind.
Serena had not spoken to him, had not even looked at him, all morning.
That occupied his mind.
Chapter Twenty-Two
While in the study catching up on ranch bookkeeping, Serena heard the door to the room close. She jerked and looked up from her ledger. Her breath caught.
Matt.
He seemed to fill the room and suck up all the air. A huge yearning ache squeezed her chest. With the exception of family meals, this was the closest she’d been to Matt since that night the warriors had nearly attacked Fort Apache, when he’d held her in his arms.
Against her will, she drank in the sight of him. No wonder she hadn’t heard him walk in. He had removed his boots—they had probably been caked with manure, for she knew he’d been in the corral working with the newest herd of mustangs.
His brown pants were tight and dusty, with a small tear at one knee. Serena envied the pants for the way they hugged his lean hips.
Sweat streaked the chest, arms, and probably the back of his light blue shirt. It looked ready to split apart under the strain of those wide shoulders of his. Shoulders she hadn’t touched, hadn’t leaned against in ages. Shoulders she had slept against only once, in Mexico. That time in the cave seemed like another life.
Slowly she raised her gaze past his throat to his tanned face. The heat in his dark eyes stirred an answering warmth in her blood. She fought against it.
He stood a scant inch from the front of the desk. “I’ve missed you.”
His nearness, his deep, quiet voice, the longing it revealed in him and generated in her, sent panic ricocheting through her veins. Visions of her father and Pace glaring at Matt, shouting at him, accusing him, ate at her.
With quick, jerky movements, she shoved her chair away from the desk and escaped to the window across the room. She turned her back to Matt and folded her arms across her chest. Maybe that way he wouldn’t notice her shaking.
“Rena?”
“Don’t be silly,” she said with a nervous chuckle. “How could you miss me? We’ve seen each other every day.”
She felt more than heard him move closer. “Only when you couldn’t find someplace to hide. You’ve been avoiding me.”
“Of course I haven’t.”
He put his hands, those big, strong, gentle hands, on her shoulders. Her knees nearly buckled.
“Then why won’t you turn around and look at me?”
She shrugged his hands away and stepped closer to the window. “Be sensible,” she said. “The house is full of people. Anyone could walk in.”
This time she heard his stockinged feet pound the floor as he made his way to the door. She also thought she heard a muttered curse. The next sound she expected was that of the door opening so he could leave. Instead, the grating of the key in the lock raised the hair along her arms.
She spun in time to see him pull the key out and toss it carelessly toward the desk. It hit, slid across the surface, and took two sheets of paper with it on its way to the floor.
“What are you doing?” she cried.
“That’s my question. In Tombstone you couldn’t keep your hands off me. Don’t blush, damn it, I’m not complaining. In Mexico, before the folks showed up, you were all over me. Hell, I was all over you. You said…Rena, goddamn it, you said you loved me.”
Oh, God. Tell him you lied. Tell him, you coward. It’s the easiest way, the only way now. But her breath caught in her throat and her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. The lie wouldn’t come.
“What was I, some kind of experiment? Did you think because it was me, I was safe? You could tease me, make me want you, just to learn the rules before you went out after bigger game?”
Serena stiffened. The lie on her tongue wouldn’t come, but maybe his way was better. A swift, sharp argument. Like a knife to the heart. Quick. Final. She raised her chin a notch. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“And pigs have wings.” He stepped closer.
She backed away.
“No.” He grasped her shoulders again. “You asked me on the way back from Mexico what my feelings for you were. I said I didn’t know. That wasn’t exactly true.”
“Matt, don’t—”
“Let me finish. I knew even before then what I felt for you, but it came as such a shock, I don’t think I let myself recognize it. I never expected to feel this way about a woman again, Rena. I’m not sure I’ve ever felt just this way before. I love you.”
Serena’s heart did a flip-flop. Her eyes burned.
“Not as a brother loves a sister,” Matt said earnestly. “I love you the way a man loves a woman. His woman. And you’re backing away from me, keeping me at a distance. Why, Rena? Why? If you’re trying to convince me you don’t love me, it won’t work. I see how you feel about me. It’s in your eyes every time you think I’m not looking. God, do you know what it does to me inside to see you look at me that way, then watch you turn away? Talk to me, damn it. Talk to me.”
She opened her mouth, not knowing what to say, but he cut her off.
“Then again, don’t talk.” He pulled her close and lowered his head. “This is better.” Then his mouth took hers.
It wasn’t a gentle brushing of lips. Not this. This was hunger, deep and raw. It was anger, confusion. Pain. His, and hers. Serena couldn’t stop herself from clinging to him, answering the need she felt rippling through him, responding with everything she had. She pushed her hands around his neck and into his thick hair.
He wrapped his arms around her tight and pulled her flush against his sweat dampened chest. She didn’t care about the damp. Didn’t care about anything but holding him, tasting him, feeling the heat in him raise an answering heat in her this one last time. For if she was wise, if she didn’t want to end up destroying him, she would make certain this was the last time he got near enough to kiss her.
But God, how would she ever let him go?
In the end, it was Matt who let her go. With a deep groan, he tore his lips from hers and pushed her away until he could see her face. “I love you,” he said, his chest heaving. “Look me in the eye and tell me you don’t feel the same.”
She couldn’t. She knew she couldn’t. She squeezed her eyes shut and fought the sting of tears.
“You can’t do it, can you?” Anger mixed with triumph in his voice. “You can’t tell me you don’t love me because it isn’t true. You do love me. Don’t you.” There was no question in his tone, only certainty.
When she didn’t answer—dear God, she couldn’t—he squeezed her shoulders. “Don’t you,” he demanded.
“Yes,” she cried. She forced her eyes open and felt a tear streak loose. “Yes, I love you. Yes, I want you. But it can’t work, Matt, don’t you see? This is all my fault. I’ve made Daddy and Pace hate you. Daddy and Mama are barely speaking. Mama’s snapping at everybody. This whole family is tearing itself apart, all because I couldn’t keep my feelings for you to myself. If this keeps up, you’re going to end up hating me. I couldn’t stand that, Matt. I couldn’t. They want—”
“I said it once as a joke,” Matt said fiercely, cutting her off. “This time I’m not joking. To hell with them, Serena. I don’t care what they want.”
“We’re talking about Mama and Daddy and Pace. You can’t ignore them,” she cried.
“I can. I can ignore them and what they want. I’ve got wants of my own. I want to be able to walk up to you and touch you whenever I want. I want to hold you and kiss you right out in the open and not give a damn who’s w
atching.”
His words made her pulse pound. He pulled her close again, until his chest almost, almost, brushed her breasts. The intensity in his eyes took her breath away. And his voice, so strong and sure, filled her heart to near bursting.
“I want you beside me,” he said, “to hear Joanna’s prayers. I want you next to me every night in my bed. I want your arms around me in the dark. I want to be able to lay my head on your breast and know you’ll always be there for me, the way I’ll be there for you. I want to make love to you, bury myself so deep inside you we can’t tell where one of us starts and the other stops. I want to wake up every morning with your hair streaming across my chest.”
Ruthlessly, Serena ignored the longings evoked by his impassioned words. “And do you want to face your father and my brother every morning over breakfast and have them glare their disapproval at you for the next twenty years?”
“No,” he said calmly. “I want to marry you.”
On a sharp intake of breath, Serena closed her eyes and watched her dream come true. And then watched it crumble around her.
“Think of what we could have, Rena.”
Her eyes flew open. “I am thinking of what we could have,” she cried. “We could have our whole family torn apart. Forever. I could have you hating me for coming between you and them.”
The pain that flashed across his eyes cut her to the quick. In an emotionless voice, he said, “So I’m just supposed to let you go, is that it? I’m supposed to forget that for a few weeks, I actually felt something inside me besides pain, something other than that great, black emptiness that nearly swallowed me? I’m supposed to forget what it feels like to have you touch me, forget your taste, forget the way you flew apart in my arms that night in Mexico? I’m supposed to forget you love me, that I love you?”
Serena trembled violently, knowing this was the end. The end of everything. Another tear slipped past her guard. “Yes,” she whispered. “For both our sakes.”
Without another word, Matt turned and walked to the door. It was locked. He took a deep breath and crossed the room, rounded the desk, and retrieved the key from the floor. As he put it in the lock and opened the door, he turned back and looked at her. “I won’t forget. Not any of it. Neither will you, Rena. You know where to find me when you change your mind.”
As he left, he closed the door softly behind him.
With careful steps, Serena relocked the door and returned to her chair behind the desk. There, she sat and leaned her head against the back of the chair and let the tears come.
Matt braced both arms against the corral fence and let his head droop between his shoulders. He was in hell. He’d been there before, spent three whole years there. Now, here he was, back again, only this time it was different. This time, instead of dying inside with the knowledge that he would never again see the woman he loved, the pain came when he did see her. Different woman, different reason, different love. Different pain. But just as sharp.
He and Serena lived under the same roof, for God’s sake. How was he supposed to survive like this? Seeing her every day, but not touching her. Hearing her voice but not her laughter. Catching a whiff of that sweet mixture of wildflowers and some unique fragrance that was strictly Serena, yet not tasting her. Thinking of her, but not being able to hold her.
Damn, but he was losing his mind.
He tugged off his gloves and tucked them under his belt. With his grimy bandanna, he wiped the sweat from his face and neck.
He was going to lose more than his mind if he wasn’t careful. He’d done smarter things in his life than climb atop a wild mustang when his mind was elsewhere. That dun who’d just bucked him off had come a shade closer than comfort to giving Matt a broken neck.
“Losin’ your touch, old man?” Pace taunted from the shade of the barn.
“Cram it, kid.”
Pace hooted and sneered.
That was another little problem Matt didn’t know how to deal with. According to Rena’s logic, his dad and Pace should have backed off Matt by now. They’d had plenty of time to see he hadn’t been anywhere near Serena in weeks.
But they hadn’t let up. Especially Pace. The censure, the disapproving glares were as strong as ever.
Even more so since Dani had left last week for the Sanchez’s. The minute she’d kissed his dad good-bye and headed down the valley to help Señora Sanchez with her new baby, Pace and Travis had dropped all restraints.
Matt cursed Señor Sanchez for his untimely disappearance. Dani wouldn’t normally have stayed more than a few days at the Sanchez ranch, but the señora had five other children and no one to help her. Dani wasn’t expected home for another week or two at the soonest.
And Dani was the only one who could come close to controlling Travis and Pace. Matt figured he’d just about had all he was going to take from the two of them.
As Pace sauntered toward him, Matt ground his teeth.
“What’sa matter, Matthew? If I didn’t know better, I’d swear you went and lost your sense of humor. What happened? Did little sister cut big brother off?”
Fury, sweet and hot, burst through Matt’s brain. With one hand he grabbed Pace by the shirt front and slammed him up against the corral fence. “If you ever talk about your sister like that again,” he spat while Pace’s feet, a good six inches off the ground, kicked his shins, “I’ll beat you to a bloody pulp.”
Matt gave Pace a final shake for good measure, then let go and turned to walk off, before he did something he might really be sorry for.
“You and what army, you piece of shit?” Pace taunted.
Before Matt took another step, he found himself face down in the dirt with Pace punching him in the kidneys. His breath left him in a hard oomph. By the time he could suck in air again, Pace was all over him and the dust was thick enough to eat.
Matt spat to clear his mouth of grit, wincing and grunting with each blow. “Goddamn.” He heaved, trying to toss Pace’s weight off his back. Pace might not have Matt’s bulk, but he was damn sure heavy enough. Matt heaved again and Pace fell off.
The two rolled in the dirt, Pace reining blows, Matt trying to protect himself. “Goddamn,” he said again. Where the hell had the kid learned to fight? “Back off, Pace.”
Pace landed a solid blow to Matt’s jaw. Pain exploded.
“I mean it,” Matt said harshly.
Pace ignored him and swung again.
Chest heaving, breath rasping in his throat, Matt finally landed a punch of his own to Pace’s gut. “I said back off, damn it!”
“Go to hell.” Pace caught Matt in the eye with a left jab.
More pain. And rage. He was scrambling around in the dirt letting his kid brother beat the crap out of him. To hell with it. He lunged and wrapped both arms around Pace and held on.
A pair of dusty boots appeared next to his nose. Damn. Dad.
“What in blue blazes do you think you’re doing?” Travis bellowed. He then made the mistake of trying to break up the fight.
Matt and Pace both gained their feet. Their father tried to keep them apart. In the ensuing struggle, boots kicked, fists punched, elbows jabbed. And curses flew like chaff on the wind.
Serena gave her hair a final swipe with the brush and braced herself for another ordeal—the nightly torture of facing Matt at supper.
Nothing was going as planned. Her father and Pace should have stopped treating Matt like an outsider by now. He hadn’t been near her in weeks. In that time, nothing more personal than “Pass the potatoes” had gone between them.
Yet every day, the tension and animosity still vibrated with every look, every word her father or Pace uttered to or about Matt. If possible, things seemed even worse since her mother had left for the Sanchez spread.
Why, why wouldn’t Pace and Daddy leave Matt alone? Why did they insist on blaming him for what was her fault?
Oh, she had tried talking with them, but neither had listened. Pace acted as though she had lost her mind, and her fath
er treated her like a bird with a broken wing. A mentally impaired bird, no less.
“It doesn’t matter what you did or didn’t do, Princess,” her father had said. “You’re a sweet, innocent young girl. Matt is a grown man. He should know better.”
Serena twisted her hair into a knot at her nape and tried not to grind her teeth at the memory. She’d been grinding her teeth so much lately her jaw was developing a permanent ache.
How much longer, she wondered, would it take for her father and Pace to accept Matt again? To stop blaming him for something that never really happened anyway?
How much longer before she would be able to see Matt, hear his deep voice, watch those hard yet gentle hands smooth his daughter’s hair, without this piercing ache in her belly?
She’d been a fool to think she could live in the same house with him. It wasn’t working, would never work. Every time she thought about what the two of them could have, were it not for family interference, she died a little inside. Soon, there would be so many little dead pieces floating around, there would be no part of her left alive.
Oh, Matt, what am I going to do?
But she couldn’t back down. Not now. By refusing to marry him, she had hurt him. Hurt him something awful. He barely looked at her these days. Which was just as well, because whenever she got near him, she had all she could do to keep from throwing herself against that broad chest and begging him to love her again.
Whatever he had felt for her, however, had died that day in the office. And it was her fault. She had killed it.
She gave her hair a final pat, then took a deep breath. It was time to face him across the table again. Time to pretend she could be that close to him and actually swallow food and not have it sit like a rock in the pit of her stomach.
Time to pretend she didn’t want him any longer, didn’t love him.
God, help me.
Travis, Matt, and Pace were the last to arrive at supper. Serena kept her gaze stuck firmly on her plate. She prayed the sight of the gravy covering her mashed potatoes wouldn’t make her sick, but she would not, could not, look at Matt. Not without giving away all her feelings.
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