“I am a good worker, a good companion. I promise to be of much value to you on your ranch. That is the life I most enjoy, the life I know best.”
“Don’t you ever dream of seeing more than a Podunk community in the middle of Montana?”
“Montana is my home. Why would I wish to leave the place where I have found my most profound happiness?”
It was hard to argue with profound happiness. It was also hard to argue with an unsophisticated thinker like Rachel. “Trust me on this, honey. Give Tall Timber a chance. You won’t have to answer to anybody. I’ll walk you through finding a job and a place to live. Then you’ll have a chance to be on your own.”
“You are to leave me alone there?” She sounded shocked and looked it, too, with her eyes widening, making him think of storm clouds moving across a brilliant blue sky.
“Tall Timber is not a big city or anything. Believe me, it won’t be as hard as you think.”
“This is not right. Husbands and wives are supposed to stay together. This is not what I agreed to, when I said my wedding vows.”
“You’re not exactly in a position to refuse.”
“Of course I may refuse. I will not allow myself to be abused in this way.”
“Abused! I’m trying to help you, for God’s sake.”
“For God’s sake? I think not. You aren’t interested in my welfare. You said my happiness is of so little consequence that I should give it up in favor of living among strangers. I return to you my selling price. Please take me back to The Community so I may be sold to someone else.”
“Put your money away, Rachel. You’re not going back.”
“Then take me to your ranch.”
He inwardly counted to ten, all patience gone. He didn’t care how new to the modern world she was; he wasn’t taking her to his ranch. “We’ll take a drive through Tall Timber. You’ll see what a nice town it is. Who knows, you may change your mind.”
“I never change my mind.”
He sent her a sharp glance. “There isn’t a woman alive who doesn’t.”
“Then you have never met a woman like me.”
He gave her a good once-over, but she was staring out the window, ignoring him, which made him all the more impatient with her. What was her problem? She had to recognize the fact that living in town was going to be plenty easier than living with a wild goodol’ boy on a windswept ranch in the middle of nowhere.
If he was going to change her mind, he needed to give her his full and undivided attention. The kind of attention she might not particularly like, but it would definitely change her mind. Without warning, he pulled the truck over to the side of the road.
“Why are you stopping?”
The tiniest bit of alarm flickered in her eyes. Finally, he thought. “Why do you think you can trust me—a man you know nothing about?”
“You are my husband. I trust you because of it.”
“You just met me. Maybe I bought you for the worst of reasons.”
Her expression softened, blossoming into one of complete understanding. “Linc, if you were a man of unsavory character, you would not have bothered to purchase me, a complete stranger to you.”
Such unshakable conviction was going to land her in plenty of hot water if she wasn’t careful. “Maybe I’m not as noble as you think.”
He wound strong fingers around her wrist and guided the tips of her fingers to his mouth. Baring his teeth, he let the edges caress each fingertip. Only it wasn’t a caress. Her whole body stiffened at the flood of sensation. Every pore seemed to ignite, licking her skin like candle flame, leaving moisture in its wake in the same way his teeth left moisture, and his tongue. The tip tickled the pads of her fingers and slid between them, the heat of him equal to the heat breaking out on her brow.
Her heart heated, too, pounding like a hammer on an anvil, singing in her ears. Breathing became impossible, much less speaking. Besides, what was there to say? Every fiber of her being felt fired from within. She scarcely knew what to do, where to look. In spite of the fact that she was seated, support fled her limbs. Most shocking of all was the urge to bring his fingers to her lips and bare her teeth to him as well.
Loath to show her complete ignorance as to how to respond to him, she licked dry lips. The forest color of his eyes, so near, pooled with sudden obsidian.
All breath fled from her then. Suspended by the oddest sense of anticipation, her whole body shivered in awareness of him. And he of her, she instinctively sensed.
His grip on her wrist diminished as his thumb stroked the inner skin. His muscles coiled like her own, readying for what, she didn’t know. But she wanted to find out. Oh, how she wanted to find out.
The sharp bang of hooves hit metal. Rachel jumped, but it was Linc who understood what was happening. He shot from the truck before Rachel could get her limp legs moving.
“Summer!” she gasped.
By the time she levered the door open and leaped to the ground, Linc had slid open the trailer’s paneled window and peered inside. “Damn horse.”
“Is she all right?”
“She’s restless as hell. We better get moving. I don’t want to take a chance on her injuring herself.” Without wasting a moment, Linc grasped Rachel by the elbow and hoisted her into the truck. “You’re going to get your wish, little lady. To the ranch we go. I don’t have time to fool around with you and the filly, too.”
Was that what he was doing? Making a fool of her? she wondered.
Linc was gratified to have finally hit on a strategy that left her speechless, and he filed the information away for future use. He wasn’t sure what was going on in that incomprehensible mind of hers, but he aimed to do whatever was necessary to ensure her prompt departure from his life.
He certainly wasn’t going to let her stay at his ranch. It was a good thing, too. He had no intention of letting this woman get close to him. Normally he didn’t go for the naive type. Rachel, however, presented an interesting combination of traits. Twenty-eight-year-old virgins didn’t grow on trees, especially virgins with her head-turning looks. In fact, he might have questioned the virginity claim—until he had kissed her. Rachel didn’t know how to kiss. She didn’t know how to hide that fact, either, despite her apparent determination to hold onto her poise and ignore the slings and arrows of a bunch of narrow-minded hicks.
Rachel still blushed for heaven’s sake. Her eyes still widened in sensual awareness. Linc felt his own eyes narrow at the prospect of helping her discover where such awareness could lead. He was, after all, a normal, red-blooded American male. Those shallow, excited pants she took when he had kissed her damn near burst the buttons on his jeans.
A stolen moment or two was the only satisfaction he was going to get from this deal, however, and he knew it. The confinement of committed relationships didn’t appeal to him in the least. It was bad enough he had to go through with the charade of a wedding ceremony to get her out of The Community.
Unfortunately, he was getting the feeling that she was taking the marriage bit way too seriously. His work was cut out for him. Even though he had taken great pains before the wedding ceremony to explain his intentions—or lack thereof—he was unsure if Rachel understood how little the wedding vows meant to him. The whole idea of staying committed to one person for an entire lifetime didn’t make sense. Human beings just weren’t built that way. His wild and wooly days on the rodeo circuit proved it—or more accurately, his wild and wooly nights. Harsh experience told him that most women were no more inclined toward fidelity than he was, a lesson he’d learned the hard way.
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