his hands, and he brushed her fingers away with laughable ease. His fingers bit into her upper arms as he hauled her out of her seat until she was lying sprawled against him. His mouth was hard, hot, well remembered, the taste of him as familiar as if she’d never gone away. Her slim hands curled into fists and beat ineffectively at his shoulders, but despite her efforts at resistance she found that nothing had changed, nothing at all. A hot swell of sensual excitement made her heart beat faster, made her breath come in panting gasps, her entire body quiver. She wanted him. Oh, damn him, how she wanted him! Some curious chemistry in her makeup made her respond to him like a flower to sunlight, twisting, seeking, even though she knew he was no good for her.
His tongue probed slowly into her mouth and her hands ceased their beating to suddenly clasp his shoulders, feeling the hard muscles under her palms with instant delight. Pleasure was filling her, pleasure comprised of the taste and feel and smell of him, the slightly rough slide of his cheek against hers, the intimacy of his tongue on hers that vividly recalled a hot summer day when no clothing had been between them.
His anger was gone, turned into desire that glittered plainly in his dark eyes when he lifted his mouth just the fraction of an inch necessary to demand, “Did you ever forget what it was like?”
Her hands slipped up to his head, trying to pull him across that delicious, intolerable tiny space to her own mouth, but he resisted and her fingers wrapped in his silky, vibrant dark hair. “Rule,” she muttered huskily.
“Did you?” he insisted, and drew his head back when she tried to raise her own to allow her mouth to cling to his.
It didn’t matter; he knew anyway. How could he not know? One touch and she melted against him. “No, I never forgot,” she admitted in a whisper of sound that slid away into nothing as at last his mouth came down and crushed hers and she drank again of the sweet-tart freshness of him.
It was no surprise when she felt his long fingers close over her breast, then slide restlessly down her ribs. The thin silk of her sleeveless summer dress was no barrier to the heat of his hand, and she felt burned as his touch sleeked down her body to stop at her knee, then began a slow, stroking journey up her thigh, lifting her skirt, exposing her long legs. Then abruptly he halted, shuddering with the effort it cost him, and he removed his hand from her leg. “This is no place for making love,” he whispered hoarsely, lifting his mouth from hers and sliding his kisses to her ear. “It’s a miracle we haven’t already crashed. But I can wait until we’re home.”
Her lashes lifted to reveal dazed, slumberous dark eyes, and he gave her another hard kiss, then shifted her back into her own seat. Still breathing hard, he checked their position, then wiped the sweat from his forehead and turned back to her. “Now we know where we stand,” he said with grim satisfaction.
Cathryn jerked herself erect and turned her head to stare out at the sweeping ranchland below. Fool! she berated herself. Stupid fool! Now he knew just how powerful the weapon he had against her was, and she had no illusion that he would hesitate to use it. It wasn’t fair that his desire for her didn’t leave him as vulnerable as she was, but the basic fact was that his desire was simply that, desire, without any of the accompanying emotions or needs that she felt, while the mere sound of his voice submerged her into so many boiling needs and feelings that she had no hope of sorting them out and understanding them. He was so deeply associated with all the crises and milestones of her life that even while she hated and feared him, he was so much a part of her that she couldn’t fire him, couldn’t kick him out of her life. He was as addictive as a drug, using his lean, hard-muscled body and educated hands to keep his women under control.
I won’t be one of his women! Cathryn vowed fiercely, clenching her fists. He had no morals, no sense of shame. After all her father had done for him, as soon as Ward was in the grave, Rule had taken over. Nor was that enough. He had to have the ranch and Ward’s daughter too. In that moment Cathryn decided not to stay, to return to Chicago as soon as the holiday was over. Ricky’s problems were not hers. If Rule didn’t like the way things were, he was free to seek employment elsewhere.
Then they were circling over the sprawling, two-story frame house to signal their arrival to the ranch, and Rule banked the plane sharply to the left to line up with the small runway. She felt stunned at how little time it had taken to reach the ranch, but a glance at her watch told her that more time had elapsed than she’d thought. How long had she been wrapped in Rule’s arms? And how long had she been lost in her thoughts? When she was with him everything else seemed to fade out of her awareness.
A dusty red pickup came bouncing across the field to meet them as Rule took the plane in for a smooth, shallow landing; they touched down so lightly that there was scarcely a bump. Cathryn found herself looking at his hands, strong and brown and competent whether they were flying a plane, mastering a fractious horse or soothing a flighty woman. She remembered those hands on her body, and tried not to.
As Cathryn went up the three steps to the porch that ran the width of the house she was surprised that Monica didn’t come out to greet her. Ricky didn’t come out, either, but she hadn’t really expected Ricky. Monica, on the other hand, had always at least kept up appearances and made a big show of affection when David was alive and visited with her. She opened the screen door and went into the cool dimness; Rule was right behind her with her luggage. “Where’s Monica?” she asked.
He started up the stairs. “God only knows,” he grunted, and Cathryn followed him with rising irritation. She caught him as he opened the door of the bedroom that had always been hers and went inside to drop the bags by the bed.
“What do you mean by that?” she demanded.
He shrugged. “Monica ranges far and wide these days. She’s never been too keen on the ranch anyway. You can’t blame her for hunting her own amusements.” He turned to leave and Cathryn followed him again.
“Where are you going?” she asked sharply.
He turned back to her with exaggerated patience. “I’ve got work to do. Did you have anything else in mind?” His eyes strayed to the bedroom door, then back to her, and Cathryn set her jaw.
“I had finding Monica in mind.”
“She’ll show up before dark. I noticed that the station wagon is gone, and she hates driving after dark, so she’ll be here by then unless she has an accident.”
“You’re so concerned!” Cathryn lashed out.
“Should I be? I’m a rancher, not a chaperon.”
“Correction: you’re a ranch foreman.”
For a moment his eyes flared with temper; then he damped it down. “You’re right, and as the foreman I have work to do. Are you going to stay here and sulk, or are you going to change clothes and come with me? There’ve been a lot of changes since the last time you were here. I thought you might be interested, boss.” He stressed the last word slightly, his eyes mocking her. He was the boss, and he knew it; he had been for so many years that many of the ranch hands had been hired since Ward’s death and had no loyalty to a Donahue, only to Rule Jackson.
She wavered for a moment, torn between her reluctance to spend any time in his company and her interest in the ranch. The years she had spent away had been an exile and she had suffered every day, longing for the vast spaces and the clean smell of the earth. She wanted to see the land, reacquaint herself with the things that had marked her earliest days. “I’ll go change,” she said quietly.
