Loving Katherine

“Of course I…” She stopped. “No…you know I haven’t,” she admitted finally, fastening her eyes on his, afraid to allow them permission to look fully at the mouth that had plundered her own so thoroughly.

“You’ll do better with a little practice,” he told her cheerfully. “But for a beginner, you sure pack a wallop, lady.”

“A wallop?”

“A punch,” he explained, delighted by the color washing over her countenance once more. He looked at her assessingly. How had he thought her plain? The fine lines of her eyebrows cast a perfect frame above the brilliant blue of her eyes. Eyes that were viewing him with a wonderment that pleased him immensely. Her nose was almost too straight, only a small deviation at the tip marring its perfection, almost like a dimple. And then there was her mouth. He looked at it again, soft and swollen a bit, reddened from his caresses. He tugged her closer against him and she gasped, the sound a shocked whisper of his name.

“Roan!” She stiffened against him. Against her body, pressed tightly, with only the layers of clothing they wore separating her from its threat, she felt…Her eyes closed again and her lips tightened.

“Let me go.” It was quiet, but a demand echoed in those words, and he obeyed.

“I’m sorry, Katherine. I didn’t mean to…”

She stepped back once, and then again, until the wooden wall of the house pressed against her back. Her face was pale now. Gone was the becoming flush, the pink cheeks stained by her guileless innocence.

“I didn’t mean to frighten you,” he said quietly, allowing her the width of the porch, aware he had invaded unforgivably.

“I’m sure you have things to do in the barn or the pasture…or somewhere,” she managed to say, her voice high and breathless in her ears. Here she’d been worried about Evan Gardner coming around, giving her trouble, causing her grief. Somehow she knew Evan Gardner couldn’t hold a candle to Roan Devereaux when it came to causing problems for her.

In fact, if the sensations washing their way through her body were any indication, Roan Devereaux had already managed to cause more hassle than she was equipped to handle.

“And that’s a fact,” she mumbled beneath her breath as she watched him stride, with only an almost imperceptible limp, across the yard toward the corral.

Chapter Four (#ulink_7f54f766-b085-51a9-8dd2-3163927a1e8e)

“I’ll wash your clothes if you bring them to the house.”

He’d wondered how she would greet him this morning. After the general all-around mess he’d made of last evening, he hadn’t known what to expect. Certainly, Katherine knew what to look for from a man who was all hot and bothered. Or did she? Her total experience with males appeared to have begun and ended with horse breeding. Hell, that ought to have taught her something!

He looked at her finally, aware she’d been fidgeting about with her hands all twisted up in her apron, waiting for an answer to her offer. Her expression was calm, but a telltale tinge of pink stained her cheeks, and together with the knot she was managing to put in the front of her voluminous apron, he knew she’d dreaded this encounter.

“I reckon I’d appreciate havin’ my clothes washed up, Katherine,” he responded gently. “I can scrub them out myself, though, if you leave the water when you’ve finished your own things.”

“That won’t be necessary. I’ve done a passel of laundry in my day, keeping my menfolk clean,” she answered crisply. Her eyes met his gaze for a moment and then skittered off to fasten on the low ceiling of the barn, just over his head.

“I’ll bring them up to the house directly. Soon as I finish putting this stall door back together.”

She nodded briefly and turned to make her way from the barn. Roan’s eyes rested on the dark dress that hung so limply from her squared shoulders, and his mouth twisted in a smile of remembrance as he visualized the slim form she hid so well beneath the sturdy fabric. His hands had personal knowledge of her waist. It bore no resemblance to the length of the leather thong she had taken to using for a belt.

If any woman needed rescuing from herself, it surely was Katherine Cassidy, he thought idly, his lips twitching with humor. It’d be no small task for the man brave enough to take it on. And it was certain sure he wouldn’t be around to tend to the job.

“Breakfast is almost ready,” Katherine told him, calling the words over her shoulder as she stepped through the wide doorway into the early morning light. “Leave that door for later.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Obediently, he put aside his hammer, brushing his hands against the denim that covered his thighs. The grin he’d restrained for her benefit split his mouth and remained in place as he gathered up the few pieces of clothing he’d folded and stowed beneath his blankets on the cot—anything for a little padding.

That hayloft was looking better night after night. If it weren’t for the fact he’d be leaving shortly, he’d even consider building a bunk against the wall and stuffing a mattress with fresh straw.

Ah, no sense in getting too comfortable. Before long, his bed would be the bare ground. Maybe a few leaves or a good stand of grass for padding. The country between southern Illinois and River Bend was pretty green for a while yet. Autumn was late in coming to the south, and with a little hustle, he could miss the cold nights that would soon be heading this way.

He sauntered to the house, his dirty clothes tucked beneath one arm. Slowing long enough to drop off his bundle next to the washtub Katherine had dragged from the porch, he hesitated. A fire burned not far from the well, a metal pail hanging over it from a tripod, the water within steaming, catching his eye. Retracing his steps, he picked up his shirt and folded it compactly. Then, with casual ease, he reached for the pail, using the shirt to shield his palm from the hot metal handle. After emptying it into her washtub, he filled the bucket from the well, replacing it over the fire to heat.

“Thank you, Mr. Devereaux,” Katherine called from the doorway where she was watching. “I was about to come out and do that myself.”

“Saved you a few steps,” he answered, washing his hands at the horse trough. He splashed the water over his face and used his wet hands to plaster his hair down, running his fingers through it to groom the dark length into a semblance of order. Katherine tossed him a towel as he mounted the steps, and waited until he had dried his face and hands.

“Thank you, ma’am.”

“Ma’am?” she asked with a lifting of one eyebrow.

“Matches the ‘Mr. Devereaux’ you’ve been spoutin’ this mornin’,” he reminded her with a rakish smile. “Thought maybe you were tryin’ to put me on my best behavior, Katherine.”

“Not much chance of that, is there?” she asked, crossing to the stove to dish up the oatmeal she’d had simmering on the back corner. A pan of biscuits and a plate of sausage from the warming oven up top completed the meal, and Roan settled down to the business of eating, blithely ignoring her final gibe.

“Tell me,” he said between bites, his fork held upright as if he commanded her attention. “Tell me how you got those yearlings out there with not a mare in sight? They got birthed somehow, but I sure haven’t figured out where, or what you did with their dams.”

She lifted one of her eyebrows in a gesture of triumph, and a dimple showed high on her left cheek as she suppressed a smile. “One of my better deals—actually three of them. My father and I offered his stallion for breeding at three different farms hereabouts and asked for a foal from each of the farmers. They all had mares they wanted bred, more than a dozen between them, and Pa’s stud was the best-looking horse in the area. They jumped at the chance. They ended up with free stud service for their mares, and we got the three foals for nothing, once they were weaned from their mamas.”

Roan eyed her with new respect. “Your idea?” he asked.

She nodded. “One of my better ones. We needed new blood, and we didn’t have much money available. Pa’d sold off everything we’d trained and saddle broke, and he was getting itchy feet again. It was hard for him to stay in one place. I think he bought this farm for my benefit, knowing how sick of roaming the countryside I was. He said it was time to put down roots and find me a husband.”

“I expect you didn’t look very hard, did you? Seems to me you wouldn’t have much trouble finding a man if you put your mind to it.”

She sniffed and turned her head aside. “I’ve seen enough men in my time to know for a fact I don’t need one to warm my bed at night. Never could see much benefit for a woman in marriage anyway.”

“Maybe you looked at the wrong men,” he suggested mildly.

“Men are men,” she stated, as if that were the final word on the subject.

His nod was agreeable and he set to eating, accepting her decree. Katherine watched him with furtive glances as he made his way through the abundance of food before him. The man did appreciate good meals, she thought, her eyes focused on the hands that wielded his fork and spoon with innate grace. Well formed and darkly tanned, those hands held eating utensils with ease, as easily as they used the tools from the shed.

With as much skill as they’d demonstrated touching her body last evening, she thought, remembering the heat of his palms against her waist. Even through the heavy homespun of her dress, she’d felt the warmth of him, the bold touch of his fingers tugging her against his hard body. She shivered suddenly, shifting in her chair as her errant thoughts tread the dangerous ground that lured them. Maybe she’d not have been so dead set against getting married if someone like Roan Devereaux had come along when she was more amenable to the idea.

Roan’s eyes speared her quickly, snagged by the quick lift of her breasts as she gained a deep breath, fastening on the flaring of her nostrils and the dark awareness shining in her eyes. He chewed methodically, his gaze narrowing as he watched her…noting the faint flush painting her throat and creeping upward.

Wiping his mouth with the edge of his hand, he picked up his coffee, eyes never veering from the woman across the table. Damned if she didn’t look flustered to beat all.

Things would be better all the way around if she didn’t keep looking at him the way she was right now. He wasn’t the man she needed. And heaven knew he’d got an awful itching urge to cart her off to her bed…and then she’d be compromised, but good. And he wouldn’t be as good for her as Evan Gardner. At least Evan wanted to marry her.

Hell, he couldn’t sit around here any longer, he decided. She had him going in circles and she hadn’t even touched him. Except with the bluest eyes he’d seen since the day he met Charlie Cassidy.

His chair scraped against the plank floor and he rose hastily. “I’ll just get back to the barn, Katherine,” he muttered, groping with one hand for his hat as he turned toward the door. “Mighty fine meal,” he called back as he strode across the porch, his steps long and hurried.

“Here’s your hat…what’s your hurry?” she said beneath her breath, relieved to have him gone. “He stirs me up, and I don’t like it.” Her mouth pursed as she considered him, glaring at his long legs, which carried him quickly across the yard. He was limping a bit this morning. “Not that I care,” she grumbled. “He can limp all the way to Timbuktu and back, for all it matters to me.”

He managed to stay out of her way for the rest of the week, making his way to the house for meals and tending to his business otherwise. The pasture fence took on a new look, the posts erect once more, the poles firmly attached and anchored in place. He’d hung a new gate, after viewing the old one with a shake of his head. Sagging and swinging from handmade hinges with half the nails missing, it was a wonder she’d been able to handle it at all. The ruts were deep where she’d been dragging it across the ground to lead the yearlings in and out, and he frowned at the thought.

How much more had she put up with on her own? he wondered. He hadn’t even looked around much inside the house, not enough to spot the places that needed repairing, anyway. And sure as the sun rose and set every day, she wouldn’t be asking him to spend any time in her kitchen. Leastways, not any longer than it took to eat a meal and vamoose out the door.