Harden Read online

  “Stop that,” Harden said unexpectedly, his pale blue eyes flashing at her when he saw the expression on her face. “Agonizing over it isn’t going to change one damned thing.” He tossed his hotel key on the coffee table and motioned her into a chair. “I keep a pot of coffee on. Would you like a cup?”

  “Yes, please,” she said with resignation. She slumped down into the chair, feeling as if all the life had drained out of her. “I can get it,” she added quickly, starting to rise.

  He frowned. “I’m perfectly capable of pouring coffee,” he said shortly.

  “Sorry,” she said with a shy smile. “I’m used to waiting on Tim.”

  He searched her eyes. “Had you trained, did he?” he asked.

  She gasped.

  He turned. “Black, or do you like something in it?”

  “I…I like it black,” she stammered.

  “Good. There’s no cream.”

  She’d never been in a hotel penthouse before. It was beautiful. It overlooked the lake and the beachfront, and she didn’t like thinking about what it must have cost. She got to her feet and walked a little unsteadily to the patio door that overlooked Chicago at night. She wanted to go outside and get a breath of air, but she couldn’t get the sliding door to work.

  “Oh, for God’s sake, not again!” came a curt, angry deep voice from behind her. Lean, strong hands caught her waist from behind, lifting and turning her effortlessly before he frog-marched her back to her chair and sat her down in it. “Now stay put,” he said shortly. “I am not having any more leaping episodes tonight, do you understand me?”

  She swallowed. He was very tall, and extremely intimidating. She’d always managed to manipulate Tim when he had bad moods, but this man didn’t look as if he was controllable any way at all. “Yes,” she said through tight lips. “But I wasn’t going to jump. I just wanted to see the view—”

  He cut her off. “Here. Drink this. It won’t sober you up, but it might lighten your mood a bit.”

  He pushed a cup and saucer toward her. The smell of strong coffee drifted up into her nostrils as she lifted the cup.

  “Careful,” he said. “Don’t spill it on that pretty dress.”

  “It’s old,” she replied with a sad smile. “My clothes have to last years. Tim was furious that I wasted money on this one, but I wanted just one nice dress.”

  He sat down across from her and leaned back, crossing his long legs before he lit a cigarette and dragged an ashtray closer. “If you don’t like the smoke, I’ll turn the air-conditioning up,” he offered.

  “I don’t mind it,” she replied. “I used to smoke, but Tim made me quit. He didn’t like it.”

  Harden was getting a picture of the late Tim that he didn’t like. He blew out a cloud of smoke, his eyes raking her face, absorbing the fragility in it. “What kind of secretary are you?”

  “Legal,” she said. “I work for a firm of attorneys. It’s a good job. I’m a paralegal now. I took night courses to learn it. I do a lot of legwork and researching along with typing up briefs and such. It gives me some freedom, because I’m not chained to a desk all day.”

  “The man you were with tonight…”

  “Sam?” She laughed. “It isn’t like that. Sam is my brother.”

  His eyebrows arched. “Your brother takes you on drinking sprees?”

  “Sam is a doctor, and he hardly drinks at all. He and Joan—my sister-in-law—have been letting me stay with them since…since the accident. But tonight I was going home. I’d just come from an office party. I certainly didn’t feel like a party, but I got dragged in because everyone thought a few drinks might make me feel better. They did. But one of my coworkers thought I was feeling too much better so she called Sam to come and get me. Then I wanted to come here and try a piña colada and Sam humored me because I threatened to make a scene.” She smiled. “Sam is very straitlaced. He’s a surgeon.”

  “You don’t favor each other.”

  She laughed, and it was like silvery bells all over again. “He looks like our father. I look like our mother’s mother. There are just the two of us. Our parents were middle-aged when they married and had us. They died within six months of each other when Sam was still in medical school. He’s ten years older than I am, you see. He practically raised me.”

  “His wife didn’t mind?”

  “Oh, no,” she said, remembering Joan’s kindness and maternal instincts. “They can’t have children of their own. Joan always said I was more like her daughter than her sister-in-law. She’s been very good to me.”

  He couldn’t imagine anybody not being good to her. She wasn’t like the women he’d known in the past. This one seemed to have a heart. And despite her widowed status, there was something very innocent about her, almost naive.

  “You said your husband was a reporter,” he said when he’d finished his coffee.

  She nodded. “He did sports. Football, mostly.” She smiled apologetically. “I hate football.”

  He chuckled faintly and took another draw from his cigarette. “So do I.”

  Her eyes widened. “Really? I thought all men loved it.”

  He shook his head. “I like baseball.”

  “I don’t mind that,” she agreed. “At least I understand the rules.” She sipped her coffee and studied him over the rim of the cup. “What do you do, Mr. Tremayne?”

  “Harden,” he corrected. “I buy and sell cattle. My brothers and I own a ranch down in Jacobsville, Texas.”

  “How many brothers do you have?”

  “Three.” The question made him uncomfortable. They weren’t really his brothers, they were his half brothers, but he didn’t want to get into specifics like that. Not now. He turned his wrist and glanced at his thin gold watch. “It’s midnight. We’d better call it a day. There’s a spare bedroom through there,” he indicated with a careless hand. “And a lock on the door, if it makes you feel more secure.”

  She shook her head, her gentle eyes searching his hard face. “I’m not afraid of you,” she said quietly. “You’ve been very kind. I hope that someday, someone is kind to you when you need help.”

  His pale eyes narrowed, glittered. “I’m not likely to need it, and I don’t want thanks. Go to bed, Cinderella.”

  She stood up, feeling lost. “Good night, then.”

  He only nodded, busy crushing out his cigarette. “Oh. By the way, you left this behind.” He pulled her tiny purse from his jacket pocket and tossed it to her.

  Her purse! In her desperate flight, she’d forgotten all about it. “Thank you,” she said.

  “No problem. Good night.” He added that last bit very firmly and she didn’t stop to argue.

  She went quickly into the bedroom—it was almost as large as the whole of the little house she lived in—and she quietly closed the door. She didn’t have anything to sleep in except her slip, but that wouldn’t matter. She was tired to death.

  It wasn’t until she was almost asleep that she remembered nobody would know where she was. She hadn’t called Joan to come and get her, as she’d promised Sam she would, and she hadn’t phoned her brother to leave any message. Well, nobody would miss her for a few hours, she was sure. She closed her eyes and let herself drift off to sleep. For the first time since the accident, she slept soundly, and without nightmares.

  Chapter 2

  Miranda awoke slowly, the sunlight pouring in through the wispy curtains and drifting across her sleepy face. She stretched lazily and her eyes opened. She frowned. She was in a strange room. She sat up in her nylon slip and stared around her, vaguely aware of a nagging ache in her head. She put a hand to it, pushing back her disheveled dark hair as her memory began to filter through her confused thoughts.

  She got up quickly and pulled her dress over her head, zipping it even as she stepped into her shoes and looked around for her purse. The clock on the bedside table said eight o’clock and she was due at work in thirty minutes. She groaned. She’d never make it. She had to get a cab and
get back to her apartment, change and fix her makeup—she was going to be late!

  She opened the door and exploded into the sitting room to find Harden in jeans and a yellow designer T-shirt, just lifting the lid off what smelled like bacon and eggs.

  “Just in time,” he mused, glancing at her. “Sit down and have something to eat.”

  “Oh, I can’t,” she wailed. “I have to be at work at eight-thirty, and I still have to get to my apartment and change, and look at me! People will stare…!”

  He calmly lifted the telephone receiver and handed it to her. “Call your office and tell them you’ve got a headache and you won’t be in until noon.”

  “They’ll fire me!” she wailed.

  “They won’t. Dial!”

  She did, automatically. He had that kind of abrasive masculinity that seemed to dominate without conscious effort, and she responded to it as she imagined most other people did. She got Dee at the office and explained the headache. Dee laughed, murmuring something about there being a lot of tardiness that morning because of the office party the night before. They’d expect her at noon, she added and hung up.

  “Nobody was surprised,” she said, staring blankly at the phone.

  “Office parties wreak havoc,” he agreed. “Call your brother so he won’t worry about you.”

  She hesitated.

  “Something wrong?” he asked.

  “What do I tell him?” she asked worriedly, nibbling her lower lip. “‘Hi, Sam, I’ve just spent the night with a total stranger’?”

  He chuckled softly. “That wasn’t what I had in mind.”

  She shook her head. “I’ll think of something as I go.” She dialed Sam’s home number and got him instead of Joan. “Sam?”

  “Where the devil are you?” her brother raged.

  “I’m at the Carlton Arms,” she said. “Look, I’m late for work and it’s a long story. I’ll tell you everything later, I promise…”

  “You’ll damned well tell me everything now!”

  Harden held out his hand and she put the phone into it, aware of the mocking, amused look on his hard face.

  She moved toward the breakfast trolley, absently aware of the abrupt, quiet explanation he was giving her brother. She wondered if he was always so cool and in control, and reasoned that he probably was. She lifted the lid off one of the dishes and sniffed the delicious bacon. He’d ordered breakfast for two, and she was aware of a needling hunger.

  “He wants to talk to you,” Harden said, holding out the phone.

  She took it. “Sam?” she began hesitantly.

  “It’s all right,” he replied, pacified. “You’re apparently in good hands. Just pure luck, of course,” he added angrily. “You can’t pull a stunt like that again. I’ll have a heart attack.”

  “I won’t. I promise,” she said. “No more office parties. I’m off them for life.”

  “Good. Call me tonight.”

  “I will. Bye.”

  She hung up and smiled at Harden. “Thanks.”

  He shrugged. “Sit down and eat. I’ve got a workshop at eleven for the cattlemen’s conference. I’ll drop you off at your place first.”

  She vaguely remembered the sign she’d seen on the way into the hotel about a beef producers seminar. “Isn’t the conference here?” she stammered.

  “Sure. But I’ll drop you off anyway.”

  “I don’t know quite how to thank you,” she began, her silver eyes soft and shy.

  He searched her face for a long, long moment before he was able to drag his eyes back to his plate. “I don’t care much for women, Miranda,” he said tersely. “So call this a momentary aberration. But next time, don’t put yourself in that kind of vulnerable situation. I didn’t take advantage. Most other men would have.”

  She knew that already. She poured herself a cup of coffee from the carafe, darting curious glances at him. “Why don’t you like women?”

  His dark eyebrows clashed and he stared at her with hard eyes.

  “It won’t do any good to glower at me,” she said gently. “I’m not intimidated. Won’t you tell me?”

  He laughed without humor. “Brave this morning, aren’t we?”

  “I’m sober,” she replied. “And you shouldn’t carry people home with you if you don’t want them to ask questions.”

  “I’ll remember that next time,” he assured her as he lifted his fork.

  “Why?” she persisted.

  “I’m illegitimate.”

  She didn’t flinch or look shocked. She sipped her coffee. “Your mother wasn’t married to your father.” She nodded.

  He scowled. “My mother had a flaming affair and I was the result. Her husband took her back. I have three brothers who are her husband’s children. I’m not.”

  “Was your stepfather cruel to you?” she asked gently.

  He shifted restlessly. “No,” he said reluctantly.

  “Were you treated differently from the other boys?”

  “No. Look,” he said irritably, “why don’t you eat your breakfast?”

  “Doesn’t your mother love you?”

  “Yes, my mother loves me!”

  “No need to shout, Mr. Tremayne.” She grimaced, holding one ear. “I have perfect hearing.”

  “What business of yours is my life?” he demanded.

  “You saved mine,” she reminded him. “Now you’re responsible for me for the rest of yours.”

  “I am not,” he said icily.

  She wondered at her own courage, because he looked much more intimidating in the light than he had the night before. He made her feel alive and safe and cosseted. Ordinarily she was a spirited, independent woman, but the trauma of the accident and the loss of the baby had wrung the spirit out of her. Now it was beginning to come back. All because of this tall, angry stranger who’d jerked her from what he’d thought were the waiting jaws of death. Actually jumping had been the very last thing in her mind on that bridge last night. It had been nausea that had her hanging over it, but it had passed by the time he reached her.

  “Are you always so hard to get along with?” she asked pleasantly.

  His pale blue eyes narrowed. Of course he was, but he didn’t like hearing it from her. She confused him. He turned back to his food. “You’d better eat.”

  “The sooner I finish, the sooner I’m out of your hair?” she mused.

  “Right.”

  She shrugged and finished her breakfast, washing it down with the last of her coffee. She didn’t want to go. Odd, when he was so obviously impatient to be rid of her. He was like a security blanket that she’d just found, and already she was losing it. He gave her peace, made her feel whole again. The thought of being without him made her panicky.

  Harden was feeling something similar. He, who’d sworn that never again would he give his heart, was experiencing a protective instinct he hadn’t been aware he had. He didn’t understand what was happening to him. He didn’t like it, either.

  “If you’re finished, we’ll go,” he said tersely, rising to dig into his pocket for his car keys.

  She left the last sip of coffee in the immaculate china cup and got to her feet, retrieving her small purse from the couch. She probably looked like a shipwreck survivor, she thought as she followed him to the door, and God knew what people would think when they saw her come downstairs in the clothes she’d worn the night before. How ridiculous, she chided herself. They’d think the obvious thing, of course. That she’d slept with him. She flushed as they went down in the elevator, hoping that he wouldn’t see the expression on her face.

  He didn’t. He was much too busy cursing himself for being in that bar the night before. The elevator stopped and he stood aside to let her out.

  It was unfortunate that his brother Evan had decided to fly up early for the workshop Harden was conducting on new beef production methods. It was even more unfortunate that Evan should be standing in front of the elevator when Harden and Miranda got off it.

 
“Oh, God,” Harden ground out.

  Evan’s brown eyebrows went straight up and his dark eyes threatened to pop. “Harden?” he asked, leaning forward as if he wasn’t really sure that this was his half brother.

  Harden’s blue eyes narrowed threateningly, and a dark flush spread over his cheekbones. Instinctively he took Miranda’s arm.

  “Excuse me. We’re late,” he told Evan, his eyes threatening all kinds of retribution.

  Evan grinned, white teeth in a swarthy face flashing mischievously. “You aren’t going to introduce me?” he asked.

  “I’m Miranda Warren,” Miranda said gently, smiling at him over Harden’s arm.

  “I’m Evan Tremayne,” he replied. “Nice to meet you.”

  “Go home,” Harden told Evan curtly.

  “I will not,” Evan said indignantly, towering over both of them. “I came to hear you tell people how to make more money raising beef.”

  “You heard me at the supper table last month—just before you volunteered me for this damned workshop!” he reminded the other man. “Why did you have to come to Chicago to hear it again?”

  “I like Chicago.” He pursed his lips, smiling appreciatively at Miranda. “Lots of pretty girls up here.”

  “This one is off-limits, so go away,” Harden told him.