She drew her thoughts up sharply. Married! What made her think that Rule would ever consider marriage? She was beginning to understand that he could control her easily enough by other means, and the realization was sharply humiliating. Unless he did want the ranch legally...? He was a man with a dark past; who could guess at the importance of the ranch to him? She could well imagine that to him it represented his salvation, both physically and emotionally.
Whatever happened, she didn’t want to let herself become embroiled with him. And whatever his motive, she was certain that she wouldn’t be able to shield herself from harm. She was so frighteningly vulnerable to him....
Cathryn had intended to get up early, but her intentions weren’t strong enough to do the job and it was after ten when she rolled over groggily and pushed her hair out of her face to peer at the clock. She yawned and stretched, cutting the motion short with a wince of pain. Easing gingerly out of the bed, she decided that she wasn’t as sore as she had feared she would be, but she was still sore enough. As Rule would have been out of the house for hours by now, she felt safely able to have that hot bath, and she gathered up her clothes, then beat a path to the bathroom.
An hour later she felt considerably better, though still stiff. She rubbed the liniment into her muscles again, then decided to ignore the pain. Despite the night’s uncomfortable beginning, the long sleep had completely refreshed her and her dark eyes were sparkling, her cheeks delicately pink. Her hair was pulled back on each side with a matching pair of tortoiseshell combs, giving her the look of a teenager. For a moment as she looked in the mirror she had a disturbing sense of looking into the past, as if the reflection she saw was that of the young girl she had been on a hot summer day, gleefully planning on a ride to the river. Had she smiled that way? she wondered as her lips curved in a faint smile of secret anticipation. Anticipation of what?
She studied the face in the mirror, searching for an answer. The delicate features revealed nothing; she saw only the elusive smile, a certain mystery in the dark eyes. Her coloring was unusual, inherited directly from her father; dark fire in her hair, a shade neither red nor brown but with the sheen of mahogany; dark eyes, not as dark as Rule’s, but a soft deep brown. Her skin, thankfully, had no freckles. She could tan lightly, but had never been able to acquire a deep tan. What else was there? What else would attract a man’s attention? Her nose was straight and dainty, but not classical. Her mouth looked vulnerable, sensitive; her facial bones were delicate, finely drawn. Fairly tall, slender and long-legged, with narrow hips, a slim waist and rather nice, round breasts. She didn’t have voluptuous curves, but she did have the long, clean lines of good breeding and a certain grace of movement. Rule had compared her to a long-legged filly. And Rule had always wanted a red-haired woman.
No great beauty, the young woman in the mirror, but passable.
Passable enough to hold Rule Jackson’s interest?
Stop it! she told herself fiercely, turning away from the mirror. She didn’t want to hold his interest! She couldn’t handle him and she knew it. If she had any sense at all she’d take herself back to Chicago, continue her rather boring job and forget the nagging, incessant ache for the home where she had grown up. But this was her home, and perhaps she didn’t have any sense. She knew every plank in this old house, had never forgotten anything about it, and she wanted to stay there.
She went downstairs to the kitchen. Lorna turned from the stove as she entered and gave her a friendly smile. “Have a good sleep?”
“Marvelous,” Cathryn sighed. “I haven’t slept this late in years.”
“Rule said you were worn out,” said Lorna comfortably. “You’ve lost some weight, too, since your last visit. Are you ready for breakfast?”
“It’s almost lunchtime, so I think I’ll wait. Where is everyone?”
“Monica is still asleep; Ricky went out with the men today.”
Cathryn lifted her eyebrows questioningly, and Lorna shrugged. She was a big-boned woman in her late forties or early fifties, her brown hair showing no trace of gray, and her pleasantly unremarkable features revealed only contentment with her life. Acceptance was in her eyes as she said slowly, “Ricky’s having a rough time right now.”
“In what way?” Cathryn asked. It was true that Ricky seemed even more highly strung than before, as if she were only barely under control.
Again Lorna shrugged. “I expect she woke up one day and realized that she doesn’t have what she wanted, and she panicked. What has she done with her life? Wasted it. She has no husband, no children, nothing of any importance that she can say belongs to her. The only thing she’s ever really had is her looks, and they haven’t gotten her the man she wanted.”
“She’s been married twice,” said Cathryn.
“But not to Rule.”
Shocked, Cathryn sat silently, trying to follow Lorna’s reasoning. Rule? And Ricky? Ricky had always alternated wildly between rebelling against Rule and following him with slavish devotion, while Rule had always treated her with stoic tolerance. Was that the basis for Ricky’s sudden outbreak of hostility? Was that why she didn’t want Cathryn to stay? Once again Cathryn had the uneasy thought that somehow Ricky knew that Rule had made love to her when she was seventeen. It was impossible, but yet...
It was all impossible. Ricky couldn’t be in love with Rule. Cathryn had known what it was to love, and she could see none of the signs in Ricky, no gentling, no caring. Her reactions to Rule were a mixture of fear and hostility that bordered on actual hate; that, too, Cathryn understood all too well. How many years had she stayed away because of those same feelings?
Agitated, she felt a sudden, powerful need to be alone for a while, so she said, “Does Wallace’s Drugstore still stay open on Sundays?”
Lorna nodded. “Are you thinking of driving into town?”
“If no one else needs the car, I will.”
“Nobody that I know of, and even if they did there’s other means of going,” Lorna said practically. “Would you mind picking up a few things?”
“I’ll be glad to,” Cathryn replied. “But to be on the safe side, write everything down. No matter how careful I try to be, I always forget one item unless I have a list, and it’s usually the most-needed thing that I forget.”
With a chuckle Lorna pulled open a drawer and extracted a notepad from which she tore the top sheet. She handed it to Cathryn. “It’s already done. I’m guilty of the same thing, so I always write things down as I think of them. Let me get some money from Rule’s desk.”
“No, I have enough,” Cathryn protested, looking at the list of items. It was mostly first-aid things such as alcohol and bandages, nothing very expensive. Besides, anything bought for the ranch was her responsibility.
“All right, but keep the sales receipt. Taxes.”
Cathryn nodded. “Do you know where the keys to the station wagon are?”
“Usually in the ignition, unless Rule took them out this morning to keep Ricky from disappearing as she sometimes does. If he did, then they’ll be in his pocket, but since Ricky went with them he wouldn’t have had any reason for taking the keys.”
Cathryn made a face at that information and went upstairs to get her purse. Was