Emmett Read online

  “No,” she managed to say, embarrassed.

  “There’s a first time for everything,” he said softly, lowering his head. “I need oblivion and you need teaching. Think of it as a…reciprocal exchange.”

  “It isn’t a good idea,” she said unsteadily.

  “I know. But it will be sweet.”

  And it was. The sweetest kind of exchange, savagely tender and violently arousing.

  Her nails thrust gently into the hair at the back of his head while he kissed her and slowly caressed her breasts with hands that held a faint tremor at the license they were being given so generously.

  In turn, she was learning about his body, enjoying the feel of the thick mat of hair over warm, firm muscles. She smoothed her hands sensually up and down his chest with delight while he taught her the intricacies of openmouthed kissing. By the time he began to brush against her rhythmically with his hips, she was whimpering with the same desire that was riding him. But it couldn’t go on. He was fast reaching the point of no return, and seducing her was impossible.

  She felt swollen from head to toe, throbbing, when he finally lifted his head to look into her misty, half-closed eyes. He was more aroused than he could remember being in recent years. His body throbbed painfully with the need for release.

  He pushed her hips away from his and took her face in his hands before he kissed her again, with growing tenderness.

  She started to move closer, but he caught her by the waist and kept her away.

  Her eyes asked the question that her swollen lips wouldn’t form.

  “Does the term ‘playing with fire’ ring any chimes?” he asked with forced, husky laughter.

  “I don’t care,” she said unsteadily. Her face colored, but she didn’t look away. “I like the way you feel.”

  His face tautened. “I like the way you feel, too, but a few minutes of feverish sex isn’t going to improve our situation. And I did promise you that there would be nothing to regret.” He forced himself to let her go and move away. He lit a cigarette. He hardly smoked these days, but he needed something to steady his nerves.

  “A few minutes of feverish sex?” she said with a feeble attempt at humor as she leaned back against the counter and stared at him from a face that held lingering traces of desire.

  He glanced at her and laughed, too. “Yes, well, it may be crude, but it was all I could think of at the time. I had to save you from yourself. Not to mention, from me.” His eyes were bold on her breasts, assessing their taut peaks before his gaze lifted again to her flushed, excited face. “You’re a quick study.”

  “Is that what I am?”

  “That, and alarmingly innocent, for all your response just now,” he added, the laughter leaving his eyes, to be replaced with quiet introspection. “Why are you still a virgin, Melody?”

  She didn’t bother to deny it. She knew all too well from what Kit had told her that he was definitely no novice. Women apparently fell over themselves trying to climb into bed with him. “I’m oversized and old-fashioned and plain, didn’t you notice?” she asked, stung by the question.

  “Don’t take offense,” he said quietly. “It wasn’t a sarcastic question. If you want to know the truth,” he added, his voice going sensual and soft, and his green eyes glittery, as he looked at her, “it excites me to the point of madness.”

  She drew a slow breath. “That’s a new observation,” she replied. “Most people think I’m crazy or fanatically careful. The truth is that nobody ever put on enough pressure to make me careless.”

  “Until now?” he asked gently.

  She started to deny it, but that was pointless. He knew. She saw it in his eyes.

  “Until now,” she echoed.

  He lifted the cigarette to his lips and blew out a faint cloud of smoke. Half angrily, he turned on the faucet and held the barely touched cigarette under it, extinguishing it. He tossed the finished remains into the trash can and stood staring down at it.

  “I used to smoke a pack a day. I’ve lost my enthusiasm for it. Addiction is unwise.” He turned and stared at her intently. “Any kind of addiction.”

  “Smoking is bad for you. I never even tried it.”

  “Good for you.” He took the almost full package out of his pocket and dropped that into the trash can, too. “I have to go.”

  She didn’t want that. She felt a sudden, acute sense of loss that was puzzling.

  She moved out of the kitchen and preceded him to the front door. But when she would have opened it, his big, lean hand flattened on its surface and prevented her.

  “What are you doing Sunday?” he asked abruptly, and against his better judgment.

  Chapter 7

  Melody felt the floor giving way under her feet, and realized that it was because her heart was beating so fast. For a minute she thought he might be joking. But he didn’t look as if he were, and there was a new softness in his green eyes.

  “Why?” Her voice sounded like a croak.

  He’d buttoned his shirt and put his dinner jacket back on. He finished with his tie and picked up his Stetson before he answered her. “I want you to spend the day with us so that I can show you the ranch,” he said quietly. “Amy and Polk have talked about you since we left here. They actually asked if you could come and look after them when our housekeeper quit in San Antonio,” he added with a smile. “They think you’re great.”

  “I think they’re great, too.” She hesitated. “I’d love to. But Guy wouldn’t like it.”

  “I know,” he said easily. “Guy’s been distrustful of everyone since his mother left.” He grimaced, remembering what she’d told him about Adell. “I wouldn’t dare tell him she’s pregnant—him or the other kids. Not until I have time to prepare them.”

  “They’ll adjust,” she said softly. “It’s amazing what people, even little people, can do when they have to.”

  “I guess so.” He searched her dark eyes for a long time and laughed softly. “I hated you that night you helped Adell meet Randy at the airport to leave me,” he recalled. “I said some terrible things to you. I guess I scared you pretty good, too, when I went after Randy.” He shifted restlessly. “I’m sorry.”

  The belated apology was unexpected, as was the invitation to Jacobsville.

  “People in pain lash out,” she said simply. “I understood.”

  “All the same, you backed away from me when I first came to town with the kids.”

  “Self-protection,” she mused. “Survival instinct.”

  “Yes, well I notice that it’s done a nosedive tonight,” he murmured, letting his eyes fall to the wrinkled black fabric of her bodice that his exploring hands had disturbed.

  She cleared her throat. “What time Sunday?”

  “I’ll pick you up about ten. Or do you go to church?”

  “I do, usually. But I’ll play hooky Sunday. I could drive down,” she added.

  “I hate the idea of having you on the roads alone,” he said. “It’s a good long drive from Jacobsville to Houston.”

  She smiled. He was being protective. She didn’t mind one bit. It was nice to be cared about, to have someone worry about her welfare. These days, that was unusual.

  “Okay,” she said gently.

  His chest rose and fell heavily. He smiled back at her. “Can you ride?”

  “A little.”

  “Play checkers?”

  She blew on her nails and buffed them on her dress. “World champion class,” she informed him.

  He lifted an eyebrow. “Well, we’ll see about that!”

  She grinned. “Okay.” Her eyes narrowed. “You’ll be sure you take matches and ropes away from those kids before I get there?”

  “I’ll confiscate everything incendiary,” he swore, hand over his heart. “Also sharp objects, blunt instruments and listening devices.”

  “They sound like a renegade branch of the CIA.”

  He leaned close. “They are. Juvenile division.”

  She laughed
delightedly. “They’re good kids, Emmett,” she said. “All three of them.”

  “Guy was honestly sorry about the cat,” he said with emphasis. “He’s never done cruel things. Mischievous, yes, but they always drew the line at deliberately hurting people. He learned something from it.”

  “I’m glad.”

  “Sunday, then?”

  She nodded. Her eyes sketched his face with soft hunger. He returned the look, but he didn’t touch her again. It was a wrench, because he wanted to. The feel of her body in his hands had made him weak-kneed. His eyes slowly dragged over her and he felt himself going taut. He had to get out of here before he did something stupid.

  “I have to go. Good night,” he said softly.

  “Good night.”

  He opened the door and turned, silhouetted in the hall light. “Wear jeans and boots,” he cautioned. “If we go riding, it’s safer.”

  “I’ll remember.”

  He winked at her, producing an odd jerky sensation in the region of her heart. Then he tipped his Stetson down over his thick, dark hair and walked away, whistling to himself.

  Melody closed the door reluctantly. She could have stood watching him all the way to the elevator with the greatest pleasure.

  Amy and Polk had been looking forward to Melody’s visit all week. When she drove up with Emmett, they opened her car door and ran into her arms, laughing and talking together. Guy didn’t move off the porch. He stood there, a little belligerent, with his hands tight in his jeans pockets, glaring.

  Melody noticed him there, and thought how like his father he looked. It wounded her that she and Guy were enemies. It was going to make any relationship she tried to form with Emmett impossible. Emmett probably knew it, too, she thought. But perhaps friendship was all he had in mind. Then she remembered the way he’d kissed her and what he’d said about her innocence. No. Friendship wouldn’t be all of it.

  Fielding Amy and Polk, Emmett opened the door for all of them. Mrs. Jenson, looking harassed, stayed just long enough to meet Melody and then beat a hasty retreat to the kitchen.

  “What did you do, try to tie her to the television?” Emmett asked his angelic brood.

  “Not at all, Emmett,” Amy assured him, smiling up at them. “Melody, how do you like our new house?”

  “It’s very nice, Amy,” Melody replied. “Hello, Guy,” she added coolly.

  Guy only shrugged and didn’t look at her.

  He pretended to be watching television intently while Polk and Amy showed Melody all their treasures and school papers. Just as if she was already their mother, he thought bitterly. Well, he wasn’t going to show her anything of his! Melody hated him, and he certainly hated her. She wasn’t his mother. She wasn’t ever going to be!

  He glanced at her from his pale eyes, and his mind began working. It wasn’t certain yet. He had time. He had to remember that, and not panic because his father had brought her down to the ranch. He could get her right out of his father’s life if he just kept his head. The one thing he couldn’t afford to do was let things get serious between them. His mother would come back one day. She’d get tired of her new husband and come home, and they’d all be a family again. Guy was sure of it. He just had to stop his father from getting involved with any other woman until that happened. And he would, too.

  Melody was blissfully unaware of Guy’s plotting, and frankly glad when he wandered off later to play with his dog, Barney.

  “We can go riding after lunch, if you like,” Emmett said, smiling at her while Amy and Polk turned their attention back to a nature special on television.

  “I’d like that.”

  “Come on. I’ll show you my horses.” He held out his hand. She put hers into it, tingling at the contact. He looked good, she thought, in jeans and a blue-checked shirt and boots. He was tall and lean and she loved looking at him, touching him.

  He was doing some looking of his own. She was wearing yellow jeans and a matching yellow knit sweater that suited her fair complexion. She walked just in front of him toward the front porch and his eyes narrowed on the fit of those jeans. He had to do some quick mental exercises to stop the physical reaction his interest provoked.

  “It’s beautiful here,” she said, gazing lovingly around at the long, bare horizon and the white-fenced acreage thick with red-coated cattle. There were live oak and pecan trees all around the house, along with pines and thick glossy-leaved bushes.

  “I guess it is. I miss my own place.” He stuck his hands into his pockets and stared out at the barn. “I guess this place will be lush and green when spring comes. Right now, it looks a bit barren. And there’s no mesquite,” he muttered.

  “Don’t tell me you miss the thorns on the mesquite,” she teased.

  The light in her face made him hungry for things he didn’t realize he wanted. He took his hands out of his pockets and captured one of her hands in his. “Come on and see the horses.”

  “Okay!”

  He smiled and led her out to the barn. A small calf was resting in a stall by himself. Emmett explained that the calf’s mother had died and he was malnourished before he’d been found. They were feeding him up before they went through the process of trying to pair him with a foster mother.

  Down the aisle from the calf in a separate section of the huge barn, he had several saddle horses and a stud Appaloosa stallion in separate quarters. The stallion wasn’t kept with the other horses. Emmett explained that it was because he was too volatile.

  “I love Apps,” he said wistfully, gazing at the big animal, which was mostly splashy red with white spots. “They’re beautiful, but they have unpredictable qualities.”

  “Just like people,” she teased.

  He glanced down at her from under the wide brim of his gray working hat. “Just like people,” he agreed. He let his eyes run down her body boldly. “You bother me in tight jeans. I didn’t know you were going to look so sexy.”

  She laughed self-consciously. “Well, I never,” she murmured.

  “I know you’ve never,” he murmured dryly. “That’s another thing that excites me.”

  “You’ll turn my head if you aren’t careful,” she said, trying to lighten the atmosphere.

  “I’m tired of being careful.” He drew up a booted foot and rested it on the lowest rung of a gate. “In between work and more work, you’re all I think about lately,” he said matter-of-factly, watching her with glittery green eyes. “I don’t look at other women. I haven’t slept with anyone since long before I got thrown off that bronc.”

  She was almost afraid to ask, but she had to know. “Because of…me?”

  He nodded slowly. “Because of you.” He sighed heavily. “Melody, you’re barely twenty. It’s a hell of a jump from your age to mine, and I’ve got a built-in family. I can’t seduce you because my conscience won’t let me. I can’t stay away from you because you’re obsessing me. Know that old saying about being caught between a rock and a hard place? I don’t have any trouble understanding it these days.”

  She met his eyes steadily. “You want to sleep with me.”

  He frowned slightly, his expression whimsical. “I hadn’t thought about sleeping, exactly,” he said meaningfully. He scowled and his eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “On the other hand, I wouldn’t mind holding you all night in my arms. I haven’t wanted to do that since I was courting Adell.” He pushed his hat back from his forehead, and his level stare didn’t waver. “In fact, to be brutally frank, what I wanted to do with Adell was pretty limited. It’s…different with you.”

  That was nice. She began to smile. She felt a delicious kindling of joy deep inside herself. He had to care a little, for there to be a difference. She wanted him, too, but it was much more than a physical need. The thought of lying close in his arms all night gave her a warm, comforting sort of pleasure.

  “You don’t wear pajamas,” she said absently.

  His eyebrows went up.

  She flushed, remembering how he looked without clo
thes. “Sorry! I guess my mind was wandering.”

  “Oh? Where was it wandering?”

  She traced the grain of the wood on the gate. “I was thinking about sleeping with you,” she said quietly. “I haven’t been held in a long time. Not…by anyone who cared about me.”

  “Neither have I.”

  She glanced at him. “Oh?” she said with a cold, speaking look, because she’d heard about the rodeo groupies of the past year.

  His broad shoulders lifted and fell. “Being held in a sexual frenzy isn’t the same.” He scowled. “And I think there has to be more to a marriage than good sex. That’s new for me. Adell and I had nothing in common except desire and a love of children.”

  “That’s pretty important, isn’t it?” she asked.

  “Yes. But common interests, mutual respect—those things make a relationship last.” He smiled wistfully, studying her. “Funny, I could never talk to Adell the way I can to you. She liked sex, but she was ice-cold in the daylight, as if it embarrassed her that she had physical needs.”

  “I think a lot of women are like that,” she said.

  He tilted her chin up. “Are you going to be?” he asked, smiling indulgently. “Will you want the lights out the first time?”

  She considered that. “I haven’t let anybody see me without my clothes, except my doctor,” she said. “I think it will be embarrassing, and I’ll be self-conscious, because I’m big and a little overweight…”

  He touched her mouth with a lean forefinger. He wasn’t smiling. “You aren’t overweight or oversized. You look like a woman should,” he said. “I don’t know why you think men should go lusting after skin and bones. There are exceptions, but most of us like a well-rounded figure with big breasts.”

  She flushed, but he wouldn’t let her look away.

  “Don’t be embarrassed,” he said gently. “There’s nothing wrong with you. Nothing at all.”

  “Thanks,” she said huskily. It was unusual to feel smaller than an Amazon. She smiled at him. Her eyes turned toward the doors of the barn, toward the outside, which was sunlit and peaceful. “It must be nice to live on a ranch,” she said with unconscious wistfulness. “I know it’s hard work, but you’re so far away from technology.”