“No. I’m not into mutual-benefit preening.” Michael’s tone said he was just as immovable as when he’d tugged her off that bucking mechanical bull, plopped her over his shoulder and packed her out of the tavern to take her home.
Payback for the bucking bull incident and other matters would have to wait as Kylie dealt with her immediate healing process. She settled for needling him. “Mmm. Sun weathered skin. Tiny white lines at the corners of your eyes. You’re only thirty-four, Michael. Your women will have you turned into an old man before your time. You’ll have hair on your shoulders and be in the old men’s turkey-neck club pretty soon. Moisturizers can help. I hope you’re using a sunscreen.”
He smiled slightly before Kylie stuffed a cheese topped cracker against his lips. There was just the slightest resistance before he accepted the companionable gift, and his lips opened. The heat from his mouth burned Kylie’s fingertips as she drew away. A nervous little tingle shot through her as he studied her.
The trembling of her fingertips shot through him, surprising him. Other women had fed him, flirted with him, but Kylie wasn’t on his list of potential bedmates.
“Okay, here’s the scoop,” she said, preparing to use Michael’s ears to the fullest. He’d always been a good listener, despite his own rough life. Even then, he hadn’t let too many people close to him, except Anna who thought of him as a son. “My mother would have adopted you,” Kylie said softly, remembering how Anna cared for Michael.
He studied the strands flowing through his fingers, considering the light dancing upon them. “I know, but she had enough problems. I wasn’t going to add to the mix. Keep on track. You’re still running in all directions at once… I like the way your hair feels, the way it ripples against my hand.”
“Now that is jumping tracks and not keeping to one direction.” She’d tied her hair on top of her head with a blue ribbon, keeping it free of the various face masks. “I wasn’t lucky enough to have Tanner’s deep waves or Miranda’s sleek, straight hair. Oh, no, I have this stuff, too curly if it’s short. You could cut it for me, so short it couldn’t curl. If it weren’t so cold, I might try to shave it.”
“No, thanks. I like long hair and the sky-blue color of this ribbon. It matches your eyes.” Michael gently tugged the ribbon free and her hair spilled around her shoulders.
“I just haven’t had time to deal with my hair or anything else—like a really good pedicure. It’s been a busy year.” Kylie settled deep into her thoughts, allowing Michael’s toying with her hair to soothe her. “I thought when I got married, it would be forever.”
“Did he hurt you?” Michael asked slowly, almost too carefully.
“He was a wimp. What can I say? Leon knew better. I’m in better shape than he was, faster and more flexible.” Kylie pushed back the sleeve of her flannel robe to flex her muscle. The robe gaped, her breast leaped against the plastic and Michael sucked in his breath. She supposed this was because he was impressed with women who kept themselves in shape. She’d had to be physically active to stave off the emptiness of a sexless marriage. “But it didn’t help my ego to work like a dog, try to build our business and then find him layered on my massage table with his girlfriend under him. The next thing I know, the company is belly-up, we’re bankrupt and getting a divorce. He’s married to Sharon now, a very good aerobics instructor. I sent a toaster, the wide-enough-for-a-bagel kind, but I really couldn’t live with his suggestion—a communal sort of thing. I grew up here and though I married outside the permission of the Women’s Council and The Rules for Courting, my values are still pretty much those of Freedom Valley. You know me—I just jump into life. Well, this time my instincts—that I could make this marriage work—were dead wrong.”
Long ago she’d discovered the deep basic instinct she had for nurturing, sometimes unwisely. Leon had been a user, knowing how to push her need-to-help buttons. To be truthful, much of what had happened was her fault. She knew that she should have made him take more responsibility, but in a misguided sense of wifeliness, she’d taken most of the work load…and Leon, of course, was only too happy to give his share to her. “I can’t place all the blame on Leon. By doing too much, I took away some of his feeling of accomplishment that his ego required. He’s perfectly capable of running a spa. I just gave him too much time to play.”
Her head was a little heavy now, and Kylie rested it on Michael’s shoulder. “I tried college, because it was important to Mom and Miranda and Tanner. After two years, I knew I wanted something else. I met Leon while working in a San Francisco health spa and retreat. I was studying for my license and met him at a Shiatsu conference…he’s excellent at Shiatsu and reflexology, women used to praise his technique, though I never experienced it. Our interests were the same and I considered us to be Yin and Yang. Not an argument in our entire relationship. Leon never argued. He considered it beneath him. Now I’m thirty-two—was married for nine years, and worked so hard to build a business. I should have come home to see Mom more. Leon didn’t want children and I agreed to wait—looking back, I don’t think I would have wanted them to have his jaw. Leon had a really weak jaw and we hadn’t had sex for years.”
Beneath her head, Michael’s heartbeat seemed to have picked up pace. “I need sex, Michael. I’m a physical woman with needs. My clock is ticking and she’s pregnant with my baby!”
“Your baby?” Michael asked in that very wary tone as if he were picking his way through a field of land mines.
“Well, the baby that I eventually wanted. I wanted to be like Mom, to have a family and care for them, and to make her a grandmother. Leon wasn’t up to par, and sex with him wasn’t that good, and it’s my only experience. Instinctively I knew his performance might lack as a baby-maker. I’m a nurturer, a loving woman, I need sex, and I’ve got nowhere to go with all my energy. It’s frustrating.”
“Don’t drink any more wine, Kylie,” Michael said rather shakily after a long hesitation.
“I’m just mellow, not drunk. I never drink. It’s the ring,” she said, flopping back on the sofa to rest her head upon a pillow. Michael’s shoulders were too hard for real relaxing.
“Ring?” he repeated slowly, looking at the flannel robe that had just parted full-length to reveal her plastic coating.
“Ring! Wedding ring!” Kylie waved her left hand and the gold band that had symbolized her marriage in front of him—because he didn’t seem to be following her logic easily. His eyes slowly drifted from her body to her hand as Kylie said, “I can’t seem to just take it off. I mean what would I do with it? It’s got to be a ceremony of sorts. A burial in a tin can, that sort of thing.”
“What’s this mummy act?” Michael asked, his fingertips smoothing the plastic on her thigh. They dug in slightly and his expression did that tight, darkening thing again. “Take it off.”
The deep, raw edge to his order was unfamiliar. The dark, rich tone curled around Kylie, and she got that odd prickly feeling again. She studied Michael closely and pushed away the warning signals. Tonight, wrapped in plastic and dealing with the past, her logic could be akilter. She was having an off-night and not about to be intimidated by his order. “I have to take care of the man-catching equipment. Moisture is good for old divorced women who have to rebuild their lives. The prune look isn’t appealing to potential sex-partners.”
“You’re thirty-two, Kylie, not ninety,” Michael said roughly. “Take it off, dress in something else and I’ll take you down to Valentina Lake where you can throw in the damn wedding ring and do what you have to do.” Michael’s voice was dark and rich, almost a growl. He scowled at her, poured another glass of wine and this time downed it quickly.
The idea appealed to Kylie, like the perfect maraschino cherry atop the nuts atop the banana split. She considered going to the lake, the drama of September winds sweeping across the lake as she hurled the ring into the dark mysterious depths. Michael was perfect for drama and late night adventure.