Rawhide and Lace

“Not really.” He pulled into the rental car lot at the airport and stopped the car, then turned toward her. “You were always generous—” his silver eyes held hers relentlessly “—in every way.”

Her face colored, and she jerked her eyes away. She couldn’t bear to remember…that!

“It wasn’t an insult,” he said quickly. “Don’t…don’t make it personal.”

She laughed through stinging tears, a young animal at bay, glaring at him from the corner of her seat. “Personal! Don’t make it personal? Look at me, damn you!” she cried.

His hand reached toward her, or seemed to, and suddenly retracted, along with any show of emotion that might have softened the hard lines of his face. He stared at his smoking cigarette, took a last draw with damnably steady fingers, and put it out carefully in the ashtray.

“I’ve been looking,” he said quietly, lifting his eyes. “Every second since I’ve been with you. Would you like to know what I see?”

“How about a burned-out shell; does that cover it?” she said defiantly.

“You’ve given up, haven’t you?” he said. “You’ve stopped living, you’ve stopped working, you’ve stopped caring.”

“I have a right!”

“You have every right,” he agreed shortly. “I’d be the first to agree with that. But for God’s sake, woman, look what you’re doing to yourself! Do you want to end up a cripple?”

“I am a cripple!”

“Only in your mind,” he replied, his voice deliberately sharp. “You’ve convinced yourself that your life is over; that you can come down to Staghorn and draw into some kind of shell and just exist while everyone else prospers. But you’re wrong, lady. Because that’s something you’ll never do. I’m going to make you start living again. You’re going to pick up the pieces and start over. I’ll see to it.”

“Like hell you will, Tyson Almighty Wade!”

“If you come back with me, you can count on it,” he replied. He put a long hard arm over the back of the seat, and his silver eyes glittered at her, challenging, taunting. “Come on, Erin. Tell me to take my money and go to hell. Tell me to give Ward Jessup your half of the spread and put all those workers on unemployment.”

She wanted to. Oh, how she wanted to! But it was more than her conscience could bear. She glared at him out of a white face in its frame of soft dark hair, her green eyes alive now, burning in anger. “I hate you!” she cried.

“I know,” he replied. His eyes narrowed. “I don’t blame you for that. You have the right. I’d never have asked you to come back.”

“No, not you.” She smiled coldly. “But if I hadn’t, you’d probably have come rushing up here to kidnap me and take me back by force.”

He shook his head. “Not now. Not after what’s happened.” He let his eyes wander slowly over her frail body.

She eyed him warily. “Mr. Johnson told you about the wreck, I suppose?”

He looked down at the cane. “I read your last letter to Bruce,” he said in a voice that was deep and quiet…and frankly haunted.

Her spirit broke at his tone. She could take anything from him except tenderness. Guilt. His. Hers. Bruce’s. And none of it any use. A tortured sob burst from her throat. She tried to stifle it but couldn’t.

His eyes lifted, holding hers. “I wish I could tell you how I felt when I knew,” he said hesitantly. “The things I said to you that day…”

She swallowed, slowly gaining control of herself. “You…you meant them,” she replied. “Reliving them isn’t going to do any good now. You saved Bruce from me. That’s all you cared about.”

“No!” he said huskily. “No, that’s wrong.”

He started to reach toward her, and she backed away until the door stopped her.

“Don’t you touch me,” she said in a high, strangled voice. “Don’t you ever touch me again. If you do, I’ll walk out the door, and you and your outfit can all go to hell!”

His face closed up. It was the first time he’d ever reached out toward her, and her rejection hurt. But he struggled against familiar feelings of wounded pride, struggled to understand things from her side. He’d hurt her brutally. It was going to take time, a lot of it, before she’d begin to trust him. Well, he had time. Right now, that and the hope that she might someday stop hating him were all he had.

“Okay,” he said, his voice steady, almost tender. “Want something to eat before we get on the plane?”

She shifted restlessly, staring at him, eyes huge in her thin face. “I…didn’t have lunch,” she faltered.

“We’ll get a sandwich, then.” He got out and went around to open her door. But he didn’t offer to help her. He watched her put the cane down and lean on it heavily. “How long has it been since they took out the rod?” he asked.

Her eyes widened. She hadn’t realized he knew so much about her condition. “A couple of weeks,” she told him.

“Were you taking physical therapy?”

She avoided his probing look. “I could use some coffee.”

“Therapy,” he persisted, “is the only way you’ll ever walk without a cane. Did they tell you that?”

“You’ve got a lot of nerve…!” She glared up at him.

“I busted my hip on the rodeo circuit when I was twenty-four,” he told her flatly. “It was months before I stopped limping, and physical therapy was the only thing that saved me from a stiff leg. I remember the exercises to this day, and how they’re done, and how long for each day. So I’ll help you get into the routine.”

“I’ll help you into the hospital if you try it,” she threatened.

“Spunky,” he approved, nodding. He even smiled a little. “You always were. I liked that about you, from the very beginning.”

“You liked nothing about me,” she reminded him. “You hated me on sight, and from there it was all downhill.”

“Are you sure?” he asked, watching her curiously. “I thought women had instincts about men and their reactions.”

“As you found out the hard way, I knew very little about men. Then.”

He didn’t look away. “And as you found out, the hard way, I knew very little about women.”

She flinched, just a little, then searched that gray fog in his eyes, wondering what he meant. It sounded like a confession of sorts, but it just didn’t jibe with the picture Bruce had painted of him—a womanizer with a reputation as long as her arm.

“Pull the other one,” she said finally. “You’ve probably forgotten more about women than I’ll ever know. Bruce said you had.”

His jaw tensed. “Bruce said one hell of a lot, didn’t he? I heard what you thought of my ‘fumbling,’ too.”

She stiffened and froze. “What?”

“He said you thought I was a clumsy, fumbling fool. That you described it all to him, and laughed together about it….”

Her lips parted, and her face went stark white. “He told you…he said that…to you?”

“Erin!” He leaped forward just in time to catch her as she collapsed. He lifted her, feeling the pitiful weight of her in his arms, feeling alive for the first time in months. He held her close, bending his head over hers, drowning in the bittersweet anguish of holding her while all around them traffic moved routinely and tourists milled indifferently on the sidewalks.

“Baby,” he whispered softly, cradling her in his hard arms as he dropped into the passenger seat of the car and looked down at her. He smoothed the hair from her face, caressing her pale cheek with a trembling hand. “Erin.”