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  “You want to know?” His eyes darkened and the muscle in his jaw twitched. “Then know this.” He moved suddenly and Emily found her face captured between his hard hands. He covered her mouth with his, forcing open her lips and sweeping inside.

  One hand went to her nape and held her still while he ravaged her mouth. By the time he lifted his head, Emily was trembling. She could taste the faint coppery tang of blood from her lip yet refused to cry. Though she wanted to throw herself on the floor and weep. Weep for all the pain she sensed in him. Pain that he kept hidden behind his rough actions.

  “I wanted to do that,” he said baldly. “When you were nineteen.” His hand was like iron about her neck. “Just looking at you made me hard.” He watched her cheeks pinken. Watched the tip of her tongue sneak out and touch her upper lip.

  “I wanted to tear off your shirt,” he growled. “I wanted to do this.” He dropped his hand to her breast and molded the fullness with a less-than-gentle touch. He leaned over, and his breath was harsh against her ear. “I wanted to tear off your panties,” he said, running his hand from her breast to the flat of her stomach. “I wanted to touch you.” He rotated his palm and his fingers arrowed lower. “There. I wanted to taste you. There.” His hard hand slipped between her thighs. “You were dreaming of roses and candlelight and all I wanted was to find a bed and bury myself in you. Right there. Hell, a bed wasn’t even necessary.”

  Emily swayed. His touch branded her. Then, just as suddenly as he’d swooped over her, he sat back, withdrawing his hands. His warmth.

  “You damn sure weren’t prepared for that when you were nineteen.” He picked up the scissors once again, not looking at her. “You still aren’t.”

  Shivers danced across her shoulders. They weren’t shivers of fear. “You’re not frightening me, Jefferson. You didn’t frighten me when I was nineteen. You didn’t frighten me in San Diego. And you’re not frightening me now.” She rose smoothly and walked away, dignity gathered around her like a cloak.

  The room was empty. Lifeless without her presence.

  Jefferson stared at his hands.

  “I frighten myself,” he murmured.

  But there was no one there to hear him.

  Chapter Six

  “What do you mean you’re not going to the hospital today?”

  Frowning, Emily finished securing her ponytail with a scrunchy and hurried out into the hall. Tristan had just stepped out of his room, looking curious.

  “Did you hear that yelling?” she asked.

  “Who didn’t?” he answered. “Sounds like someone got up on the wrong side of the bed. Betcha I know who’s planning to stick to the ranch today, though.” He dropped his arm across her shoulders and herded her downstairs. “You look very nice today,” he said as they entered the kitchen. He dropped a kiss on the top of her head and headed for the coffee.

  Emily glanced down at her well-worn blue jeans and thin, cropped white shirt. The clothes were clean, but hardly on the cutting edge of fashion. Just about to ask Tristan what had gotten into him, raised voices sounded just outside the mudroom.

  The screen door banged shut as Jefferson stalked in, Mat thew charging after him. “I don’t care what Squire said,” Matthew yelled.

  Jefferson swiveled on his heel, stopping his brother short. His fingers were white over the handle of his cane. “Back off!”

  Emily hastily filled a mug of coffee and stuck it into Matthew’s raised hand. “Have some coffee,” she muttered.

  He looked at her. At the mug of coffee. Some of his anger drained away. Despite its scalding temperature, he drank half of it down and set the mug on the table. “Look, Jeff, we’ve all got stuff we need to be doing. I’ve got fifty things that I’ve let slide since Squire went into the hospital. This place doesn’t run itself, even with Joe Greene’s help. But I’m going to the hospital this morning. Just like usual. We’re all going. And so are you.”

  Jefferson looked terrible. Emily could tell just by looking at the lines bracketing his eyes that he hadn’t slept much the night before. Tristan caught her glance and shook his head slightly, as if he knew she was ready to move between the two men. To take Jefferson’s arm and—

  “Not today,” Jefferson stated softly. He turned around, his eyes colliding with Emily’s. Lips tight, he looked away and went back outside.

  Matthew swore, but Tristan caught his shoulder before Matthew could take off after Jefferson. “Let him be.” His eyes sent the same message to Emily.

  It wouldn’t have mattered if Tristan had pinned her to the floor, if she’d wanted to follow Jefferson, she would have. Unfortunately, she didn’t have a clue what she’d say to him, so in the kitchen she stayed. Well, the mudroom, at least. Where she watched him walk toward the bunkhouse.

  Matthew shrugged off Tristan’s hand. “Does he think this is easy for any of us?” His fingers raked through his hair. The phone jangled and he yanked up the receiver. “Yeah? Oh, sorry, Maggie. What’s up?” Matthew’s expression tightened as he listened. “No, sure, that’s fine. Yeah…fine…okay…yeah. Bye.” He waited until he’d hung up before losing his temper. “First Squire. Then Jefferson, and now this?” He slammed his palm flat against the door frame. “How much is a person supposed to stand?” Without looking back, he headed outside.

  “Well, that was enlightening,” Tristan commented, tongue firmly in cheek. The phone rang again and he picked it up. He spoke briefly, then hung up just as Daniel came in. “Hey, Dan, isn’t Jaimie Greene Joe’s little sister?”

  “Yeah.” Daniel flipped on the faucet and stuck his head beneath the cool water. Emily pushed a dish towel into his groping hand. “Ahh,” he sighed thankfully, catching the dripping water with the towel. “Damn but it’s already hot out there. What’s this about Jaimie?”

  Tristan nodded toward the telephone. “That was Maggie just now on the phone. She said she forgot to give Matthew Jaimie’s flight number.”

  Daniel lowered the towel from his face. “Jaimie’s coming? Here?” His lips pursed and his eyes lit with an unholy gleam. “And Matt knows?”

  “Apparently. He’s picking her up at the airport this afternoon.”

  Daniel started laughing. “Man, oh, man, this ought to be good.”

  “Who is Jaimie Greene?” Emily asked.

  “She’s Joe’s little sister,” Dan said. “Oh, that’s right. You guys haven’t met her. Well, anyway, she worked here for a while last summer. I’ll bet Matt’s shorts are in a knot but good.” He laughed again, shaking his head. “Never thought she’d come back here,” he said, once he’d gotten control of himself. “I guess you could say that she and Matt rubbed each other all wrong.”

  “I didn’t know there was anybody that Matthew didn’t get along with,” Emily said.

  “Normally I’d agree,” Dan answered. “But, I swear, those two took one look at each other—” He broke off when a horn blasted through the air. He tossed the towel on the table and looked out the window to see Matthew leaning on the horn. “He acted like a wet hen all summer long, and it looks like we’re in for more of the same this year.” He grinned again and headed for the door. “Didn’t help his mood any that he couldn’t look at her without slobbering all over himself. Tris, you coming?”

  “Yup,” Tristan quickly drank down his coffee and left the mug in the sink. “Don’t know why though,” he grumbled, following in Daniel’s wake. “I hate haying.”

  Truck doors slammed and they drove off, leaving an unnatural silence behind. Emily peered out the window for a long moment. She knew that they wouldn’t have turned down an offer of help from her, if she’d expressed one. She also knew that they didn’t need her help, and if the truth were known, she hated the hot chore worse than Tristan did.

  Turning her attention to the kitchen, she busied herself washing and putting away the few dishes the men had left in the sink.

  It was still early in the morning, and they wouldn’t be driving out to see Squire for a few hours yet. Retrieving
her organizer from her bedroom, she returned to the kitchen and opened it to her calendar. Settling at the big table, she called her office in San Diego. It wasn’t a particularly satisfying call. She made a few notes on the calendar, and called Luke Hawkins where she stabled Bird. He assured her he was exercising Bird regularly and that the horse was doing just fine.

  She hung up, tapping her pen against the open calendar. You’d think that her horse, at least, would have the decency to miss her. Tossing down the pen, she slammed the organizer shut, grabbed an apple from the bowl on the counter and went outside. The ever-present breeze drifted over her and she breathed in the distinctive scent of open fields. Of cattle and horses.

  Her mood lifted somewhat. Who needed offices and computers and spreadsheets when a person had all this? The horse barn was the closest building to the big house and that’s where her boots took her. More than half the horses were out, but she found a nice gray mare. Crooning to the sleek animal, she fed her the remainder of her apple and slipped into the stall.

  Within minutes, she’d made a fast friend and the horse willingly let Emily slide a halter on and they went out into the sunshine. The mare was the picture of good health, but Emily wasn’t about to just take her pick of a horse without checking with Matthew or Dan first. Unfortunately they were nowhere in sight, obviously out on the tractors somewhere.

  She led the horse past all the buildings. She found Maggie in the huge, commercial-type kitchen attached to the bunkhouse.

  They visited for a while and then Maggie asked about San Diego and her job.

  Emily shrugged. She didn’t want to talk about work. If her employers had their way, she’d be returning to it all too soon. “Do you know where the guys are working this morning?”

  Maggie dragged a large stockpot off a high shelf. “I think Matt and the boys were headed out toward Dawson’s Bend.” Puffing a lock of pale blond hair out of her eyes, Maggie maneuvered the big pot into the extra deep stainless steel sink. She pressed her palms to the small of her back and straightened again, seeming to sway for just a moment. “They’ll probably be back in an hour or so. You all are heading out to the hospital, then, aren’t you?”

  “Mmm-hmm.” Emily reached out and touched Maggie’s elbow. “Are you feeling all right?”

  A wan smile spread across the other woman’s face. “Yes. Just a bit of morning sickness.”

  “You’re pregnant?” Emily stared at the gargantuan pot the woman had just wrestled all by herself. “What on earth are you doing moving things like that around? Does Matt know?”

  “I’m doing my job,” Maggie said dryly. “As for Matt, I have no idea. Joe and I just found out a couple weeks ago. Don’t worry. I’m fine.”

  Emily wasn’t so sure, but she held her tongue. For now. But she’d make darn sure Matthew knew what kind of strenuous tasks Maggie was completing. Lord, there were enough men around the place that she shouldn’t have to be pulling pots and pans off ten-foot-high shelves.

  She reminded herself of the reason she’d come into the bunkhouse in the first place and looked out the long side window overlooking the corrals situated across the gravel road. “Do you know anything about that gray? I thought I’d take her out for a ride.”

  Maggie followed Emily’s pointing finger. “Oh, sure. Daisy’s the mare Jaimie used last summer. I ride her pretty regularly, myself, now.” Her hand touched her still-flat abdomen. “Well…” She smiled faintly. “Take her out,” she encouraged. “She’s a real sweetie.”

  Emily watched Maggie turn toward the double-wide freezer and pull out a large package. She plunked the butcher-paper-wrapped bundle on the wide butcher block. “I’m fixing roast beef for dinner tonight,” she said. “I’ll bring it up to the house before six, if that’s all right.”

  Emily tugged at her earlobe. “You know, Maggie, I could cook for us….” The other woman’s expression fell slightly, and it occurred to Emily that Maggie Greene was probably only a few years older than herself. “Not that your cooking isn’t wonderful,” she added hastily. “But, you know, if you’re not feeling well, or…or something. I’d be happy to, uh, help out.”

  Level blue-green eyes looked out from Maggie’s pale face. She seemed to relax slightly and a smile flitted across her mouth. “Thanks. I’m sure I’ll be fine. But…thanks.”

  Nodding, and still feeling like she’d just taken a huge bite of her own foot, Emily left Maggie to her duties. Using a rung on the fence for a boost, she slipped onto Daisy’s bare back. Emily didn’t really have a destination in mind. But she gave Daisy her head and after a meandering romp, ended up at the swimming hole that lay about two miles east of the big house.

  She dismounted and let the reins fall. Daisy didn’t wander. Obviously familiar with the spot, she bent her graceful head and nibbled at the lush grass surrounding the tiny lake, affectionately termed the hole. To please his wife, Squire had fenced it off from the stock, and as far as Emily knew, he’d only had to bring cattle down for the water once or twice.

  It had been Sarah Clay who’d planted the lilac bushes that still grew in such profusion around the spring-fed swimming hole. She’d nurtured the clover and wildflowers that still came back each spring, almost before the snow was gone. It was a place that Squire’s wife had obviously loved. It was fitting that her headstone lay on the far side.

  Not for the first time, Emily wondered about the woman who had borne Squire’s five sons. Her portrait hung in the living room above the fireplace. She’d been a lovely woman with golden blond hair and deep blue eyes. With a gently rounded chin and a dimple in one cheek. It was Jefferson and Tristan who resembled her the most, at least coloringwise. All the Clay sons, as anyone with a speck of vision could see, had acquired their strong facial features from Squire.

  Emily kicked off her boots and socks and stepped up on the flat boulder that stuck out over the water, serving as a rough-hewn diving board. She sat on the end, letting her toes dip into the cool water. Her eyes were on the opposite bank, and even though she couldn’t see the small granite headstone because of the bushes and trees, she still felt the aura of love and happiness left behind by Mrs. Squire Clay.

  “How did you handle all these males, Sarah?”

  The only answer she received was the ripple of water as she lifted her feet up to rest on the rock. Sighing, she lowered her cheek to her knees. She had no idea how long she sat there before the sound of a twig breaking brought her head up. She looked over to Daisy, but the horse was contentedly munching her way closer to the water’s edge.

  “You always did like it out here.”

  Her breath caught and held. She swallowed and turned around to see Jefferson leaning against a tree. “Yes. I did.”

  His hand wrapped around the thick rope hanging from one of the high branches, and he swung it out over the water. “You used to swing on this rope and drop off right in the middle of the water. You and Tristan. You were like two little monkeys playing in the trees.”

  “I remember.” Through her lashes, she watched him step over a fallen branch. If he could behave like their encounter in the kitchen the day before had never happened, then so could she. “You did your share of swimming here, too.”

  “That I did.” Ducking beneath a branch, he walked over to the boulder.

  “How’d you get out here?”

  “Walked.” He grimaced. “Limped.”

  “Where’s your cane?”

  The corner of his mouth twisted. “Somewhere in the middle of a field, where I pitched it.”

  Her eyebrows rose. “You threw it into the middle of a field.”

  “Yup.” He lowered himself onto the rock and lay near the edge projecting farthest over the water. A solid foot of space separated them. “Course I’ll be regretting it come this afternoon when I get all stiffened up again.”

  Emily found herself responding to his faint, dry smile. “Perhaps you should have taught Matt’s dog to play fetch-the-cane before you went off and did it.”

  They
both smiled, then fell silent. Emily’s teeth worried the inside of her lip, and she looked at him over her arms, folded across the tops of her knees. Before she knew what she was doing, she’d reached out to run her finger along his angled jaw. “What’s this scar from?”

  Jefferson caught her finger in his. “My stupidity,” he answered. Which was no answer at all.

  She tucked her hand back over her knee. “Jefferson—”

  “Shh,” he said, his eyes dark pools. “Don’t.”

  “You don’t even know what I was going to say.”

  “Yeah, I probably do. And it’s a bad idea.”

  “Your ego is monstrous.” She turned her head to look out at the water. She’d only been toying with the idea of trying to persuade him to go to the hospital.

  “Don’t.” He tugged lightly on her ponytail. “Let’s just enjoy the morning.”

  “Oh, so you can enjoy something, can you? How refreshing.”

  “Snot.”

  “Yup.”

  Jefferson sighed. He shifted on the boulder until he was lying on his back. Just to see if he could, he wiggled his toes. And was relieved when he felt the inside of his boot. The numbness seemed to be gone. For now. “Tell me about your job,” he said.

  “My job.”

  “Your job.”

  “Ohhh-kay,” she murmured. She stretched out her leg and dipped her toe in the water. “Well, let’s see. I’ve been there a few years now. I guess you know that already.” She went on to tell him a little of her daily routine.

  “And who’s the CPA you’re dating?”

  “Stuart? I’d hardly call it dating. Well, of course we did go to Mexico just before I flew up here, but that hardly—”

  “You went to Mexico with him?”

  Emily chastised herself for the twinge of satisfaction she felt at Jefferson’s obvious displeasure. “Just for the weekend,” she elaborated.

  “Just you and this Stuart guy? What the hell was Tristan doing, letting—”

  “Hey,” she shot him a glare. “Tristan doesn’t let me do anything. I make my own decisions.”