CHAPTER 8
Evan’s eyebrows shot up and he stopped walking. Harden had never once asked anything about his real father. He hadn’t even wanted to know the man’s name.
“What brought on that question?” he asked.
Harden frowned. “I don’t know. I’m just curious. I’d like to know something about him, that’s all.”
“You’ll have to ask Mother, then,” Evan told him. “Because she’s the only one who can tell you what you want to know.”
He grimaced. “Wouldn’t she love that?” he asked darkly.
Evan turned. “She’ll die one day,” he said shortly. “You’re going to have to live with the way you treat her.”
Harden looked dangerous for a minute, but his eyes calmed. He stared out over the land. “Yes, I know,” he confessed. “But she’s got some things to deal with herself.”
“I have a simpler philosophy than you,” Evan said quietly. “I believe that the day we die is preordained. That being the case, I can accept tragedy a little better than you can. If you think Theodora played God that night, think again. You of all people should know that nobody can interfere if God wants someone to live.”
Harden’s heart jumped. He scowled, but he didn’t speak.
“Hadn’t considered that, had you?” Evan asked. “You’ve been so eaten up with hatred and vengeance that you haven’t even thought about God’s hand in life. You’re the churchgoer, not me. Why don’t you try living what you preach? Let’s see a little forgiveness, or isn’t that what your religion is supposed to be all about?”
He walked ahead of Harden to the house, leaving the other man quiet and thoughtful.
* * *
Supper that evening was boisterous. Donald and Jo Ann were live wires, vying with Evan for wisecracks, and they made up for Harden’s brooding and Theodora’s discomfort.
Donald was shorter and more wiry than his brothers, although he had dark hair and eyes like Evan. Jo Ann was redheaded and blue-eyed, a little doll with a ready smile and a big heart. They took to Miranda at once, and she began to feel more at home by the minute, despite Harden’s lack of enthusiasm for the gathering.
After the meal, Harden excused himself and went outside. He didn’t ask Miranda to join him, but she did.
He glanced back at her, startled. “I thought you were having the time of your life with the family.”
She smiled at his belligerence. It was uncanny, how well she understood him. He was the outsider; he didn’t fit in. He was on his guard and frankly jealous of the attention she was getting from the family he pretended he wasn’t a part of. She couldn’t let on that she knew that, of course.
She moved to join him on the porch swing, where he was lazily smoking a cigarette.
“I like your family very much,” she agreed. “But I came here because of you.”
He was touched. He hadn’t been wrong about her after all. She seemed to know things about him, emotionally, that he couldn’t manage to share with her in words.
Hesitantly he slid his free arm around her and drew her close, loving the way she clung, her hand resting warmly over his chest while the swing creaked rhythmically on its chains.
“It’s so peaceful here,” she said with a sigh.
“Too peaceful for you, city girl?” he teased gently.
She started to tell him about her background, but she decided to keep her secret for a little longer. He had to want her for herself, not just because she could fit in on a ranch. She didn’t want to prejudice his decision about marrying her until she was sure of his feelings.
“I travel a good deal. And I’ll keep the apartment in Houston. You won’t get too bored,” he promised her. He stared at her dark head with new possession. “Lift your face, Miranda,” he said, his voice soft and deep in the quiet. “I’m going to kiss you.”
She obeyed him without conscious thought, waiting for his mouth. It was smoky from the cigarette, and still warm from the coffee he’d had with supper. But most of all, it was slow, and a little rough, and very thorough.
A soft moan broke the silence. She lifted her arms, startled by the onrush of passion that made her desperate for more of him than this.
If she felt it, so did he. The cigarette went over the banister as he lifted her across him, and the kiss went from a slow exploration to a statement of intent in seconds.
She heard him curse under his breath as he fought the buttons of her shirtwaist dress, and then his hand was on her, possessive in its caressing warmth.
“Miranda,” he whispered into her mouth. His hand was faintly tremulous where it traced the swollen contours of her breast.
He lifted his head and drew the dress away from her body, but the porch was too dark to suit him. He stood up with Miranda in his arms and moved toward the settee against the wall, where the light from the living room filtered through the curtains onto the porch.
“Where are we going?” Miranda asked, dazed by the force of her own desire.
“Into the light,” he said huskily, “I have to see you.” He sat down with Miranda in his arms, turning her so that he could see her breasts. “I have to look at you… Yes!”
“Harden?” She barely recognized her own high-pitched voice, so shaken was she by the look on his face.
“You’re beautiful, little one,” he whispered, meeting her eyes. His hand moved and she shivered. His head bent to her mouth, brushing it tenderly. “Do you have any idea what you do to me?”
“The same thing you do to me, I hope,” she whispered. Her body arched helplessly. “Harden,” she moaned. “Someone could come out here. Oh, can’t we go somewhere…?”
He caught his breath and looked around almost desperately. “Yes.” He got up and buttoned her deftly back into her dress, only to catch her hand and lead her along with him. His mind was barely working at all. Nowhere in the house was safe, with that crowd. Neither was the barn, because two calving heifers were in there, being closely watched as they prepared to drop purebred calves.
His eyes found his car, and he sighed with resignation as he drew Miranda toward it. He put her inside and climbed in with her, turning her into his arms the instant the door was closed.
“Now,” he breathed against her waiting mouth.
He unbuttoned the dress again and found her with his hands, and then with his mouth. Her arms clung to him, loving the newness of being with him like this, of enjoying physical intimacy. She slid her hands inside his shirt and found the hard, hair-roughened warmth of his chest, liking the way he responded to her searching touch.
“Here,” he said curtly, unfastening the shirt all the way down. He gathered her to him inside it, pressing her soft breasts into the hard muscles of his chest. He lifted his head and looked down at where they touched, at the contrasts, in the light that glared out of the barn window.
He moved her away just a little, so that he could see the hard tips of her breasts barely touching him, their deep mauve dusky against his tanned skin. His forefinger touched her there, and his blue eyes lifted to her silvery ones when she gasped.
“Why do you…watch me like that?” she whispered.
“I enjoy the way you look when I touch you,” he said softly. “Your eyes glow, like silver in sunlight.” His gaze went to her swollen mouth, down her creamy throat to her breasts. “Your body…colors, like your cheeks, when I touch you intimately. Each time is like the first time you’ve known a man’s lovemaking. That’s why.”
“It’s the first time I ever felt like this,” she replied. “It always embarrassed me with Tim. I felt…inadequate.” she searched his narrow eyes. He looked very sensuous with his shirt unbuttoned and his hair disheveled by her hands. “I’ve never been embarrassed with you.”
“It’s natural, isn’t it?” he asked quietly. “Like breathing.” His forefinger began to trace the hard nipple and she clutched his shirt and shuddered. “Addictive and dangerous,” he whispered as his mouth hovered over hers and his touch grew more sensual, more arousing. “Like…loving…”
His mouth covered hers before she could be certain that she’d heard the word at all, and then it was too late to think. She gave him her mouth, all of her body that he wanted, abandoned and passionately in love, totally without shame.
“No, don’t!” she wept frantically when he pulled back.
He stilled her hands and drew her close, rocking her against him. He was shivering, too, and his voice was strained. “I hurt, little one,” he whispered. “Be still. Let me calm down.”
She bit her lower lip until she almost drew blood, trembling in his arms. He whispered to her, soothed her with his voice and his hands until she calmed and lay still against him, trying to breathe.
He let out a long breath. “My God, it’s been a long time since I’ve been that excited by a woman. A few more seconds and I couldn’t have pulled back at all.”
She nuzzled her face into his hot throat. “Would it be the end of the world if we went all the way?” she whispered boldly.
“No. Probably not. But as my brother Evan reminded me about something else tonight, it’s time I started practicing what I preach. I want a ring on your finger before I make love to you completely.”
“You’re a hopeless Puritan,” she murmured dryly.
“Yes, I am,” he agreed. He raised his cheek from her dark hair. “And a pretty desperate one. Name a date.”
She stared at him worriedly. She was sure. But it was his body that wanted her most, not his heart. “Harden, you have to be sure.”
“I’m sure.”
“I know how badly you want me,” she began, frowning uncertainly. “But there has to be more than just that.”
He didn’t listen. He was looking down his nose at her with glittery blue eyes. “You can have two weeks to make up your mind.”
“And, after that?” she asked slowly.
“After that, I’ll pick you up, fly you down to Mexico, and you’ll be married before you have time to argue about it.”
“That’s not fair!” she exclaimed.
“I don’t feel fair,” he shot back. “My God, I’m alive, really alive, for the first time in my life, and so are you. I’m not going to let you throw this away.”
“But what if it’s all just physical?” she groaned.
“Then it’s still more than four out of five couples have. You’ll get used to me. I won’t pretend that it’s going to be easy, but you will. I’ll never lift a hand to you, or do anything to shame you. I won’t stifle you as a person. All I’ll expect from you is fidelity. And later, perhaps, a child.”
“I’d like to have a family,” she said quietly. She lowered her eyes. “I suppose sometimes we do get second chances, don’t we?”
He’d been thinking the same thing. His fingers touched her cheek, smoothing down to her mouth. “Yes. Sometimes we do, Miranda.” He brushed her lips gently with his before he rearranged their disheveled clothing and led her back to the house.
* * *
Miranda felt like an actress playing a part for the next few days. Determined to find out if Harden could accept her as he thought she was, she played the city ingenue to the hilt. Leaving the jeans and cotton shirts she’d packed still in their cases, she chose her best dress slacks—white ones, of course—and silk blouses to wear around the ranch. She did her makeup as carefully as if she were going to work. She acted as if she found the cattle smelly and frightening.
“They won’t hurt you,” Harden said, and it was taking a real effort not to react badly to this side of her. He didn’t know what he’d expected, but it wasn’t to find her afraid of cattle. That was a bad omen. Worse, she balked when he offered to take her riding.
“I don’t like horses,” she lied. “I’ve only been on them once or twice, and it’s uncomfortable and scary. Can’t we go in the truck?”
Harden had to bite his tongue. “Of course, we can,” he said with gentlemanly courtesy. “It doesn’t matter.”
It did, though, she could tell. She clung to his arm as they walked back from the barn, because she was wearing high heels.
“Honey, don’t you have some less dressy slacks and some flat shoes?” he asked after a minute, frowning down at her. “That’s really not the rig to wear around here. You’ll ruin your pretty things.”
She smiled at the consideration and pressed closer. “I don’t care. I love being with you.”
His arm slid around her, and all his worries about her ability to fit in disappeared like fog in sunlight. “I like being with you, too,” he said quietly. He held her against his side, aware of mingled feelings of peace and riotous desire and pleasure as he felt her softness melt into his strength so trustingly.
“It bothers you, doesn’t it, that I’m not a country girl?” she asked when they reached the truck.
He frowned. His pale blue eyes searched her gray ones. “It isn’t that important,” he said stubbornly. “After all, you won’t be expected to help me herd cattle or pull calves. We have other common interests.”
“Yes. Like walks in the park and science fiction movies and quiet nights at home watching television,” she said, grinning up at him.
The frown didn’t fade. He couldn’t put it into words, but it was a little surprising that a woman who liked the park and loathed parties wouldn’t be right at home on a ranch.
He shrugged it off and put her into the cab of the truck beside him, driving around to where Old Man Red, their prize-winning Santa Gertrudis bull lived in air-conditioned luxury in his own barn.
Miranda had to stifle a gasp of pure pleasure when she saw the enormous animal. He had the most beautiful conformation she’d ever seen, and she’d seen plenty in her childhood and adolescence on her father’s South Dakota ranch. She knew Old Man Red’s name from the livestock sale papers, from the annual breeders’ editions. He was a legend in cattle circles, and here he stood, close enough to touch. His progeny thrived not only in the United States, but in countries around the world.
“He’s so big,” she said, sighing with unconscious delight.
“Our pride and joy,” Harden replied. He reached out and smoothed the animal’s muzzle affectionately. “He’s been cosseted so much that he’s nothing but a big pet these days.”
“An expensive one, I’ll bet,” she said, trying not to give away her own knowledge of his value.
“He is that.” He looked down at her. “I thought you didn’t like cattle, city girl,” he murmured. “Your eyes sure sparkle when you look at him.”
She reached up to his ear. “Roast beef,” she whispered. “I’m drooling.”
“You cannibal!” he burst out, and laughed.
The sound was new, and pleasant. Startled, she laughed, too. “I’m sorry. That was unforgivable, wasn’t it?” she mused.
“I’d rather eat my older brother Evan than put a fork to Old Man Red!”
Her eyebrows went up. “Poor Evan!”
“No, poor me,” he replied. “He’d probably take weeks of tenderizing just to be digestible.”
She slid her fingers into his and followed him down the wide aisle of the barn, happier than she could ever remember being. “Did you grow up here?”
He nodded. “My brothers and I used to play cowboy and Indian.”
“You always got to be the Indian,” she imagined.
He frowned. “How did you know that?”
“You’re stoic,” she said simply. “Very dignified and aloof.”
“So is Connal. You’ll meet him tonight. He’s bringing Pepi and the baby over.” He hesitated, staring at her expression. “It’s going to hurt, isn’t it?”
She turned, looking up at him. “Not if you’re with me.”
His breath caught. She made him feel so necessary. He caught her by the arms and drew her slowly to him, enfolding her. He laid his cheek against her dark hair and the wind blew down the long aisle, bringing the scent of fresh hay and cattle with it.
“I suppose you played with dolls when you were a little girl,” he murmured.
“Not really. I liked to—” She stopped dead, because she couldn’t admit, just yet, that she was riding in rodeos when she was in grammar school. Winning trophies, too. Thank God Sam had kept those at his house, so Harden hadn’t seen them when he came to her apartment.
“You liked to…?” he prompted.
“Play dress-up in mother’s best clothes,” she invented.
“Girl stuff,” he murmured. “I liked Indian leg wrestling and chasing lizards and snakes.”
“Yuuck!” she said eloquently.
“Snakes are beneficial,” he replied. “They eat the mice that eat up our grain.”
“If you say so.”
He tilted her face up to his dancing eyes. “Tenderfoot,” he accused, but he made it sound like a caress.
“You’d be happier with a country girl, wouldn’t you?” she asked softly. “Someone who could ride and liked cattle.”
He drew in a slow, even breath and let his eyes wander slowly over the gentle oval of her face. “We don’t get to pick and choose the qualities and abilities that make up a person. Your inner qualities are much more important to me than any talent you might have had for horseback riding. You’re loyal and honest and compassionate, and in my arms, you burn. That’s enough.” He scowled. “Am I enough for you, though?”
“What a question!” she exclaimed, touched by the way he’d described her.
“I’m hard and unsociable. I don’t go to parties and I don’t pull my punches with people. There are times when being alone is like a religion to me. I find it difficult to share things, feelings.” His broad shoulders lifted and fell, and he looked briefly worried. “Added to that, I’ve been down on women for so many years it isn’t even funny. You may find me tough going.”
She searched his eyes quietly. “You didn’t even like me when we first met, but you came after me when you thought I might be suicidal. You looked after me and you never asked for anything.” She smiled gently. “Mr. Tremayne, I knew everything I needed to know about you after just twenty-four hours.”
He bent and brushed his mouth over her eyelids with breathless tenderness. “What if I fail you?” he whispered.
“What if I fail you?” she replied. She savored the touch of his mouth on her face, keenly aware of the rising tide of heat in her blood as his hands began to move up her back. “I’m a city girl….”
His breath grew unsteady. “I don’t care,” he said roughly. His mouth began to search for hers, hard and insistent. His hands went to her hips and jerked them up into his. “My God, I don’t care what you are!” His mouth crushed down against her parted lips, and his last sane thought was that she was every bit as wild for him as he was for her.
Heated seconds later, she felt his mouth lift and her eyes opened slowly, dazed.
“Harden,” she breathed.
His teeth delicately caught her upper lip and traced it. “Did I hurt you?” he whispered.
“No.” Her arms linked around his neck and she lay against him heavily, her heartbeat shaking her, her eyes closed.
“We can live in Houston,” he said unsteadily. “Maybe someday you’ll learn to like the ranch. If you don’t, it doesn’t matter.”
Her mind registered what he was saying, but before she could respond to it, his mouth was on hers again, and she forgot everything….
* * *
Connal and his wife, Pepi, came that night. They brought along their son, Jamie, who immediately became the center of attention.
Pepi didn’t know about Miranda’s lost baby, because nobody had told her. But she noticed a sad, wistful look on the other woman’s face when she looked at the child.
“Something’s wrong,” she said softly, touching Miranda’s thin hand while the men gathered to talk cattle and Theodora was helping Jeanie May in the kitchen. “What is it?”
Miranda told her, finding something gentle and very special in the other woman’s brown eyes.
“I’m sorry,” Pepi said afterward. “But you’ll have other babies. I know you will.”
“I hope so,” Miranda replied, smiling. Involuntarily her eyes went to Harden.
“Connal says he’s never brought a woman home before,” Pepi said. “There was something about an engagement years ago, although I never found out exactly what. I know that Harden hates Theodora, and he’s taken it out on every woman who came near him. Until now,” she added, her big eyes searching Miranda’s. “You must be very special to him.”
“I hope I am,” Miranda said earnestly. “I don’t know. It’s sort of like a trial period. We’re getting to know each other before he decides when we’ll get married.”
“Oh. So it’s like that,” Pepi said, grinning.
“He’s a bulldozer.”
“All the Tremayne brothers are, even Donald, you just ask Jo Ann.” Pepi laughed. “I used to be scared to death of Harden myself, but he set me right about Connal once and maybe saved my marriage.”
“He can be so intimidating,” Miranda agreed. “Evan’s the only even-tempered one, from what I see.”
“Get Harden to tell you about the time Evan threw one of the cowboys over a fence,” Pepi chuckled. “It’s an eye-opener. Evan’s deep, and not quite what he seems.”
“He’s friendly, at least,” Miranda said.
“If he likes you. I hear he can be very difficult if he doesn’t. Don’t you love Theodora?”
“Yes, I do,” Miranda replied. “We got off to a rocky start. Harden brought me down without warning Theodora first, but she warmed up after we were properly introduced. I’m enjoying it, now.”
Pepi frowned. “I thought you didn’t like ranch life.”
“I’m getting used to it, I think.”
“You’ll like it better when you learn to ride,” the other woman promised. “I hear Harden’s going to teach you how.”
Miranda’s silver eyes opened wide. “He is?” she asked with assumed innocence.
“Yes. You’ll enjoy it, I know you will. Horses are terrific.”
“So I hear.”
“Just never let them know you’re afraid of them, and you’ll do fine.” The baby cried suddenly, and Pepi smiled down at him, her eyes soft with love. “Hungry, little boy?” she asked tenderly. “Miranda, could you hold him while I dig out his bottle?”
“Oh, of course!” came the immediate reply.
Pepi went to heat the bottle, and Miranda sighed over the tiny laughing face, her own mirroring her utter delight.
She wasn’t aware of Harden’s stare until he knelt beside her and touched a tiny little hand with one big finger.
“Isn’t he beautiful?” Miranda asked, her eyes finding his.
He nodded. His eyes darkened, narrowed. His body burned with sudden need. “Do you want me to give you a child, Miranda?” he asked huskily.
Her face colored. Her lips parted. Her soft eyes searched his and linked with them in the silence that followed.
“Yes,” she said unsteadily.
His eyes flashed, glittering down at her. “Then you’d better make up your mind to marry me, hadn’t you?”
“Admiring your nephew?” Pepi asked as she joined them, breaking the spell.
“He’s the image of Connal,” Harden mused.
“Isn’t he, though?” Pepi sighed, smiling toward her husband, who returned the look with breathless tenderness.
“Stop that,” Harden muttered. “You people have been married over a year.”
“It gets better every day,” Pepi informed him. She grinned. “You ought to try it.”
“I want to, if I could get my intended to agree,” he murmured dryly, watching Miranda closely. “She’s as slow as molasses about making up her mind.”
“And you’re impatient,” she accused him.
“Can’t help it,” he replied. “It isn’t every day that a man runs across a girl like you. I don’t want Evan to snap you up.”
“Did you mention my name?” Evan asked, grinning as he towered over them. “Nice job, Pepi,” he said. “Now, how about a niece?”
“Don’t rush me,” she said. “I’m just getting used to making formula.”
“You’re a natural. Look at the smile on that little face.”
“Why don’t you get married and have kids?” Connal asked the eldest Tremayne as he sauntered over to the small group.
Evan’s expression closed up. “I told you once, they trample me trying to get to him.” He stuck a finger toward Harden.
“They’ll have to get past Miranda now, though,” Connal replied. “Harden will go on the endangered species list.”
“Evan has been on it for years,” Harden chuckled. “Except that Anna can’t convince him she’s serious competition.”
“I don’t rob cradles,” Evan said coldly. His dark eyes glittered, and his usual good nature went into eclipse, giving a glimpse of the formidable man behind the smiling mask.
“Your mother was nineteen when she married, wasn’t she?” Pepi asked him.
“That was back in the dark ages.”
“You might as well give up,” Connal said, sliding a possessive arm around his wife as he smiled down at her. “He’s worse than Harden was.”
“Meaning that Harden is improving?” Evan asked, forcing a smile. He studied Harden closely. “You know, he is. He’s actually been pleasant since he’s been home this time. A nice change,” he told Miranda, “from his first few days home from Chicago, when he took rust off old nails with his tongue and caused two wranglers to quit on the spot.”
“He was horrible,” Connal agreed. “Mother asked if she could go and live with Donald and Jo Ann.”
Evan chuckled. “Then she took back the offer because I threatened to load my gun. She’s fonder of Harden than she is of the rest of us.”
Harden’s face went taut. “That’s enough.”
Evan shrugged. “It’s no big family secret that you’re her favorite,” he reminded the other man. “It’s your sweet nature that stole her heart.”
Once, Harden would have swung on his brother for that remark. Now, he actually smiled. “She should have hit you harder while she had the chance.”
“I grew too fast,” Evan said imperturbably.
“Are you sure you’ve stopped yet?” Connal mused, looking up at the other man.
Evan didn’t answer him. His size was his sore spot, and Connal had been away long enough to forget. He turned back to Harden. “Did you ever get in touch with Scarborough about that shipment that got held up in Fort Worth?”
“Yes, I did,” Harden said. “It’s all ironed out now.”
“That’s a relief.”
The men drifted back to business talk, and Pepi and Miranda played with the baby until Theodora rejoined them. Dinner was on the table shortly, and all the solemnity died out of the occasion. Miranda couldn’t remember when she’d enjoyed anything more.
Harden noticed how easily she fit in with his family, and it pleased him. She might not be the ideal ranch wife, but she was special, and he wanted her. They’d have a good marriage. They’d make it work. But one thing he did mean to do, and that was to show Miranda how to ride a horse. Tomorrow, he promised himself. Tomorrow, he was going to ease her onto a tame horse and coax her to ride with him. Once she learned how, she was going to love it. That would get one hurdle out of the way.
The rest would take care of themselves. He watched Miranda with an expression that would have knocked the breath out of her if she’d seen it. The flickering lights in his pale blue eyes were much more than infatuation or physical interest. They were the beginnings of something deep and poignant and real.