Emmett (7 page)

“You're efficient,” he remarked.

She smiled. “Oh, I'm very domestic. I had to learn early. My mother was an invalid for years before she and Dad died. Randy and I would have starved if I hadn't been able to cook.”

His face closed up at the mention of his ex-wife's new husband.

Melody put detergent into the dishwasher and started it running. Her eyes flicked to Emmett and away. “Yes, I know, you hate my brother as much as you hate me.”

His green eyes were completely without hostility for once as he studied her. The black dress she was wearing suited her fair complexion. Its fit emphasized her full breasts and hips and small waist, and the milky-white softness of her shoulders with their scattering of freckles. He liked what he saw when he looked at her, even if it was against his better judgment.

“I don't hate you,” he said quietly.

“Pull the other one, Emmett.”

She'd turned and was starting out the door when he moved with surprising speed and blocked her way. “I like the way you say my name. Say it again.”

His arm was across the doorway, almost touching the tips of her breasts. She tensed at the sensual threat of it. “This isn't wise,” she said seriously, meeting his green eyes levelly.

One eye narrowed. His gaze on her face was intent, curious. “Isn't it? Maybe not. We're years apart—almost
a generation. Funny, I always thought you were older. I don't know why. You seem very mature for a woman just barely out of her teens.”

“I had to grow up fast. May I get by, please?”

He could see her breathing quicken. “Why are you afraid of me?”

Her eyes darted up and down again. Her cheeks colored. “Am I?”

He reached out and caught her by the waist. He tugged, pulling her slowly to him, so that her mouth was poised just under his.

“Maybe intimidated is a better choice of words,” he murmured. His hands slid up her rib cage with slow sensuality, making her flinch at the sudden pleasure of their touch. “I know a hell of a lot more than you do about this, don't I, little one?” His breath was warm on her parted lips. “Is that what's wrong?”

“Yes,” she whispered breathlessly.

He looked at her mouth instead of her eyes. It trembled, pink and soft like some pastel flower, waiting to be touched. She was so young, he thought. She really was off-limits to a man his age.

But even as he thought it, his lips moved the scant inches necessary to bring them right down over her whispered gasp, and took possession of that petal-pink mouth.

She grasped his shirtfront and stiffened in surprise.

“Shh,” he whispered against her lips while he worked with sensuous mastery at parting them. “You're safe. You're perfectly safe. There won't be anything to regret. Relax for me.”

She'd been kissed. She'd been kissed plenty of times, and even by him! There was certainly no reason why
Emmett's mouth should be so different from any other man's.

But, it was. Her whole body felt as if it contracted while Emmett's warm, strong arms enveloped her and his tongue slowly, tenderly impaled her mouth as it had once before. She stiffened again as the throbbing pleasure began to make her feel unwanted, unwelcome sensations. She fought them.

He felt the resistance, as slight as it was, and lifted his dark head.

“You're still holding back from me,” he said, his voice tender if a little unsteady. “I'm not going to hurt you.”

“It makes me feel funny,” she replied dizzily.

His nose brushed lazily against hers. “Where?”

“In my stomach…”

“Good,” he whispered. His lips eased back down and brushed hers apart, teasing them to make her mouth follow his in a sensual daze. His hands slid to her hips and contracted in a strangely arousing rhythm, pulling and pushing, brushing her legs against his.

She shivered. He felt that and lifted his head to search her wide, curious eyes.

“You're so young,” he said quietly. He took a slow, steadying breath. “And so responsive that I'm likely to take advantage of it.”

Desire had her in its grip. She wasn't afraid. She was hungry. “How?” she asked in a breathless whisper, and her eyes clung to his hard mouth as she spoke. “What will you do to me?”

His fingers eased up her rib cage and came to rest against the soft swell of her breasts. He nibbled at her mouth. One lean hand slowly cupped her and began to caress her with tender mastery. She started to stiffen
until the dark delight of it made her go boneless in his embrace. She could have resisted his desire, but not her own. He was years beyond her in experience, and she reacted with helpless curiosity and need.

He nibbled tenderly at her lower lip. “I know. It's forbidden territory, isn't it?” he whispered into her parting lips. “Nice girls don't let men do this. Except that they do, Melody,” he breathed as he drew her even closer. “This is part and parcel of being human.” His thumb drew suddenly, tenderly, across her taut nipple, a fiery touch that caused her whole body to clench. Her nails bit into him and she gasped. “If I hurt you, I want to know it,” he whispered. “Because it's only meant to arouse, not to bruise.”

She shivered, but she didn't back away. She felt as if she had pulses where she'd never suspected, throbbing and hot. “It didn't hurt, Emmett,” she admitted huskily, although she was too shy to look at him. She closed her eyes and hid them against his shirtfront. “Do it again.”

He hadn't expected this kind of honesty, or as much cooperation. It ate at his control. His hand swallowed her, making magic on her body. She gave in without a sound, and he felt ten feet taller. He paused just long enough to unfasten his shirt halfway down his chest and drag her hand inside it, against the damp tangle of hair over the warm, hard muscles.

The feel of his body like that made her pulse throb. “You're hairy,” she whispered.

“I'm like this all over,” he whispered roughly. His hand moved down to her hips. The other one joined it. He pulled her into the blatant arousal of his body and held her there firmly but gently. “It's all right. Be still,” he said when she tried unsuccessfully to pull away. He
searched her face, finding shy curiosity there. “Have you never felt a man's body in full arousal before?”

“No,” she managed to say, embarrassed.

“There's a first time for everything,” he said softly, lowering his head. “I need oblivion and you need teaching. Think of it as a…reciprocal exchange.”

“It isn't a good idea,” she said unsteadily.

“I know. But it will be sweet.”

And it was. The sweetest kind of exchange, savagely tender and violently arousing.

Her nails thrust gently into the hair at the back of his head while he kissed her and slowly caressed her breasts with hands that held a faint tremor at the license they were being given so generously.

In turn, she was learning about his body, enjoying the feel of the thick mat of hair over warm, firm muscles. She smoothed her hands sensually up and down his chest with delight while he taught her the intricacies of openmouthed kissing. By the time he began to brush against her rhythmically with his hips, she was whimpering with the same desire that was riding him. But it couldn't go on. He was fast reaching the point of no return, and seducing her was impossible.

She felt swollen from head to toe, throbbing, when he finally lifted his head to look into her misty, half-closed eyes. He was more aroused than he could remember being in recent years. His body throbbed painfully with the need for release.

He pushed her hips away from his and took her face in his hands before he kissed her again, with growing tenderness.

She started to move closer, but he caught her by the waist and kept her away.

Her eyes asked the question that her swollen lips wouldn't form.

“Does the term ‘playing with fire' ring any chimes?” he asked with forced, husky laughter.

“I don't care,” she said unsteadily. Her face colored, but she didn't look away. “I like the way you feel.”

His face tautened. “I like the way you feel, too, but a few minutes of feverish sex isn't going to improve our situation. And I did promise you that there would be nothing to regret.” He forced himself to let her go and move away. He lit a cigarette. He hardly smoked these days, but he needed something to steady his nerves.

“A few minutes of feverish sex?” she said with a feeble attempt at humor as she leaned back against the counter and stared at him from a face that held lingering traces of desire.

He glanced at her and laughed, too. “Yes, well, it may be crude, but it was all I could think of at the time. I had to save you from yourself. Not to mention, from me.” His eyes were bold on her breasts, assessing their taut peaks before his gaze lifted again to her flushed, excited face. “You're a quick study.”

“Is that what I am?”

“That, and alarmingly innocent, for all your response just now,” he added, the laughter leaving his eyes, to be replaced with quiet introspection. “Why are you still a virgin, Melody?”

She didn't bother to deny it. She knew all too well from what Kit had told her that he was definitely no novice. Women apparently fell over themselves trying to climb into bed with him. “I'm oversized and old-fashioned and plain, didn't you notice?” she asked, stung by the question.

“Don't take offense,” he said quietly. “It wasn't a
sarcastic question. If you want to know the truth,” he added, his voice going sensual and soft, and his green eyes glittery, as he looked at her, “it excites me to the point of madness.”

She drew a slow breath. “That's a new observation,” she replied. “Most people think I'm crazy or fanatically careful. The truth is that nobody ever put on enough pressure to make me careless.”

“Until now?” he asked gently.

She started to deny it, but that was pointless. He knew. She saw it in his eyes.

“Until now,” she echoed.

He lifted the cigarette to his lips and blew out a faint cloud of smoke. Half angrily, he turned on the faucet and held the barely touched cigarette under it, extinguishing it. He tossed the finished remains into the trash can and stood staring down at it.

“I used to smoke a pack a day. I've lost my enthusiasm for it. Addiction is unwise.” He turned and stared at her intently. “Any kind of addiction.”

“Smoking is bad for you. I never even tried it.”

“Good for you.” He took the almost full package out of his pocket and dropped that into the trash can, too. “I have to go.”

She didn't want that. She felt a sudden, acute sense of loss that was puzzling.

She moved out of the kitchen and preceded him to the front door. But when she would have opened it, his big, lean hand flattened on its surface and prevented her.

“What are you doing Sunday?” he asked abruptly, and against his better judgment.

M
elody felt the floor giving way under her feet, and realized that it was because her heart was beating so fast. For a minute she thought he might be joking. But he didn't look as if he were, and there was a new softness in his green eyes.

“Why?” Her voice sounded like a croak.

He'd buttoned his shirt and put his dinner jacket back on. He finished with his tie and picked up his Stetson before he answered her. “I want you to spend the day with us so that I can show you the ranch,” he said quietly. “Amy and Polk have talked about you since we left here. They actually asked if you could come and look after them when our housekeeper quit in San Antonio,” he added with a smile. “They think you're great.”

“I think they're great, too.” She hesitated. “I'd love to. But Guy wouldn't like it.”

“I know,” he said easily. “Guy's been distrustful of
everyone since his mother left.” He grimaced, remembering what she'd told him about Adell. “I wouldn't dare tell him she's pregnant—him or the other kids. Not until I have time to prepare them.”

“They'll adjust,” she said softly. “It's amazing what people, even little people, can do when they have to.”

“I guess so.” He searched her dark eyes for a long time and laughed softly. “I hated you that night you helped Adell meet Randy at the airport to leave me,” he recalled. “I said some terrible things to you. I guess I scared you pretty good, too, when I went after Randy.” He shifted restlessly. “I'm sorry.”

The belated apology was unexpected, as was the invitation to Jacobsville.

“People in pain lash out,” she said simply. “I understood.”

“All the same, you backed away from me when I first came to town with the kids.”

“Self-protection,” she mused. “Survival instinct.”

“Yes, well I notice that it's done a nosedive tonight,” he murmured, letting his eyes fall to the wrinkled black fabric of her bodice that his exploring hands had disturbed.

She cleared her throat. “What time Sunday?”

“I'll pick you up about ten. Or do you go to church?”

“I do, usually. But I'll play hooky Sunday. I could drive down,” she added.

“I hate the idea of having you on the roads alone,” he said. “It's a good long drive from Jacobsville to Houston.”

She smiled. He was being protective. She didn't mind one bit. It was nice to be cared about, to have
someone worry about her welfare. These days, that was unusual.

“Okay,” she said gently.

His chest rose and fell heavily. He smiled back at her. “Can you ride?”

“A little.”

“Play checkers?”

She blew on her nails and buffed them on her dress. “World champion class,” she informed him.

He lifted an eyebrow. “Well, we'll see about that!”

She grinned. “Okay.” Her eyes narrowed. “You'll be sure you take matches and ropes away from those kids before I get there?”

“I'll confiscate everything incendiary,” he swore, hand over his heart. “Also sharp objects, blunt instruments and listening devices.”

“They sound like a renegade branch of the CIA.”

He leaned close. “They are. Juvenile division.”

She laughed delightedly. “They're good kids, Emmett,” she said. “All three of them.”

“Guy was honestly sorry about the cat,” he said with emphasis. “He's never done cruel things. Mischievous, yes, but they always drew the line at deliberately hurting people. He learned something from it.”

“I'm glad.”

“Sunday, then?”

She nodded. Her eyes sketched his face with soft hunger. He returned the look, but he didn't touch her again. It was a wrench, because he wanted to. The feel of her body in his hands had made him weak-kneed. His eyes slowly dragged over her and he felt himself going taut. He had to get out of here before he did something stupid.

“I have to go. Good night,” he said softly.

“Good night.”

He opened the door and turned, silhouetted in the hall light. “Wear jeans and boots,” he cautioned. “If we go riding, it's safer.”

“I'll remember.”

He winked at her, producing an odd jerky sensation in the region of her heart. Then he tipped his Stetson down over his thick, dark hair and walked away, whistling to himself.

Melody closed the door reluctantly. She could have stood watching him all the way to the elevator with the greatest pleasure.

 

Amy and Polk had been looking forward to Melody's visit all week. When she drove up with Emmett, they opened her car door and ran into her arms, laughing and talking together. Guy didn't move off the porch. He stood there, a little belligerent, with his hands tight in his jeans pockets, glaring.

Melody noticed him there, and thought how like his father he looked. It wounded her that she and Guy were enemies. It was going to make any relationship she tried to form with Emmett impossible. Emmett probably knew it, too, she thought. But perhaps friendship was all he had in mind. Then she remembered the way he'd kissed her and what he'd said about her innocence. No. Friendship wouldn't be all of it.

Fielding Amy and Polk, Emmett opened the door for all of them. Mrs. Jenson, looking harassed, stayed just long enough to meet Melody and then beat a hasty retreat to the kitchen.

“What did you do, try to tie her to the television?” Emmett asked his angelic brood.

“Not at all, Emmett,” Amy assured him, smiling up at them. “Melody, how do you like our new house?”

“It's very nice, Amy,” Melody replied. “Hello, Guy,” she added coolly.

Guy only shrugged and didn't look at her.

He pretended to be watching television intently while Polk and Amy showed Melody all their treasures and school papers. Just as if she was already their mother, he thought bitterly. Well, he wasn't going to show her anything of his! Melody hated him, and he certainly hated her. She wasn't
his
mother. She wasn't ever going to be!

He glanced at her from his pale eyes, and his mind began working. It wasn't certain yet. He had time. He had to remember that, and not panic because his father had brought her down to the ranch. He could get her right out of his father's life if he just kept his head. The one thing he couldn't afford to do was let things get serious between them. His mother would come back one day. She'd get tired of her new husband and come home, and they'd all be a family again. Guy was sure of it. He just had to stop his father from getting involved with any other woman until that happened. And he would, too.

Melody was blissfully unaware of Guy's plotting, and frankly glad when he wandered off later to play with his dog, Barney.

“We can go riding after lunch, if you like,” Emmett said, smiling at her while Amy and Polk turned their attention back to a nature special on television.

“I'd like that.”

“Come on. I'll show you my horses.” He held out his hand. She put hers into it, tingling at the contact. He looked good, she thought, in jeans and a blue-checked
shirt and boots. He was tall and lean and she loved looking at him, touching him.

He was doing some looking of his own. She was wearing yellow jeans and a matching yellow knit sweater that suited her fair complexion. She walked just in front of him toward the front porch and his eyes narrowed on the fit of those jeans. He had to do some quick mental exercises to stop the physical reaction his interest provoked.

“It's beautiful here,” she said, gazing lovingly around at the long, bare horizon and the white-fenced acreage thick with red-coated cattle. There were live oak and pecan trees all around the house, along with pines and thick glossy-leaved bushes.

“I guess it is. I miss my own place.” He stuck his hands into his pockets and stared out at the barn. “I guess this place will be lush and green when spring comes. Right now, it looks a bit barren. And there's no mesquite,” he muttered.

“Don't tell me you miss the thorns on the mesquite,” she teased.

The light in her face made him hungry for things he didn't realize he wanted. He took his hands out of his pockets and captured one of her hands in his. “Come on and see the horses.”

“Okay!”

He smiled and led her out to the barn. A small calf was resting in a stall by himself. Emmett explained that the calf's mother had died and he was malnourished before he'd been found. They were feeding him up before they went through the process of trying to pair him with a foster mother.

Down the aisle from the calf in a separate section of the huge barn, he had several saddle horses and a stud
Appaloosa stallion in separate quarters. The stallion wasn't kept with the other horses. Emmett explained that it was because he was too volatile.

“I love Apps,” he said wistfully, gazing at the big animal, which was mostly splashy red with white spots. “They're beautiful, but they have unpredictable qualities.”

“Just like people,” she teased.

He glanced down at her from under the wide brim of his gray working hat. “Just like people,” he agreed. He let his eyes run down her body boldly. “You bother me in tight jeans. I didn't know you were going to look so sexy.”

She laughed self-consciously. “Well, I never,” she murmured.

“I know you've never,” he murmured dryly. “That's another thing that excites me.”

“You'll turn my head if you aren't careful,” she said, trying to lighten the atmosphere.

“I'm tired of being careful.” He drew up a booted foot and rested it on the lowest rung of a gate. “In between work and more work, you're all I think about lately,” he said matter-of-factly, watching her with glittery green eyes. “I don't look at other women. I haven't slept with anyone since long before I got thrown off that bronc.”

She was almost afraid to ask, but she had to know. “Because of…me?”

He nodded slowly. “Because of you.” He sighed heavily. “Melody, you're barely twenty. It's a hell of a jump from your age to mine, and I've got a built-in family. I can't seduce you because my conscience won't let me. I can't stay away from you because you're obsessing me. Know that old saying about being caught be
tween a rock and a hard place? I don't have any trouble understanding it these days.”

She met his eyes steadily. “You want to sleep with me.”

He frowned slightly, his expression whimsical. “I hadn't thought about
sleeping,
exactly,” he said meaningfully. He scowled and his eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “On the other hand, I wouldn't mind holding you all night in my arms. I haven't wanted to do that since I was courting Adell.” He pushed his hat back from his forehead, and his level stare didn't waver. “In fact, to be brutally frank, what I wanted to do with Adell was pretty limited. It's…different with you.”

That was nice. She began to smile. She felt a delicious kindling of joy deep inside herself. He had to care a little, for there to be a difference. She wanted him, too, but it was much more than a physical need. The thought of lying close in his arms all night gave her a warm, comforting sort of pleasure.

“You don't wear pajamas,” she said absently.

His eyebrows went up.

She flushed, remembering how he looked without clothes. “Sorry! I guess my mind was wandering.”

“Oh? Where was it wandering?”

She traced the grain of the wood on the gate. “I was thinking about sleeping with you,” she said quietly. “I haven't been held in a long time. Not…by anyone who cared about me.”

“Neither have I.”

She glanced at him. “Oh?” she said with a cold, speaking look, because she'd heard about the rodeo groupies of the past year.

His broad shoulders lifted and fell. “Being held in a sexual frenzy isn't the same.” He scowled. “And I think
there has to be more to a marriage than good sex. That's new for me. Adell and I had nothing in common except desire and a love of children.”

“That's pretty important, isn't it?” she asked.

“Yes. But common interests, mutual respect—those things make a relationship last.” He smiled wistfully, studying her. “Funny, I could never talk to Adell the way I can to you. She liked sex, but she was ice-cold in the daylight, as if it embarrassed her that she had physical needs.”

“I think a lot of women are like that,” she said.

He tilted her chin up. “Are you going to be?” he asked, smiling indulgently. “Will you want the lights out the first time?”

She considered that. “I haven't let anybody see me without my clothes, except my doctor,” she said. “I think it will be embarrassing, and I'll be self-conscious, because I'm big and a little overweight…”

He touched her mouth with a lean forefinger. He wasn't smiling. “You aren't overweight or oversized. You look like a woman should,” he said. “I don't know why you think men should go lusting after skin and bones. There are exceptions, but most of us like a well-rounded figure with big breasts.”

She flushed, but he wouldn't let her look away.

“Don't be embarrassed,” he said gently. “There's nothing wrong with you. Nothing at all.”

“Thanks,” she said huskily. It was unusual to feel smaller than an Amazon. She smiled at him. Her eyes turned toward the doors of the barn, toward the outside, which was sunlit and peaceful. “It must be nice to live on a ranch,” she said with unconscious wistfulness. “I know it's hard work, but you're so far away from technology.”

He laughed uproariously.

“What's so funny?”

“Wait until you see the mainframe computer in my office,” he mused dryly. “Not to mention the state-of-the-art jet printer, the fax machine, the color hand scanner, the photocopier and the modem.”

She stared at him blankly.

“I have to buy and sell cattle, keep up with sales reports, tally information about the herds and the cross-breeding program. I'm in constant contact with breeders and buyers, the National Cattlemen's Association, the Texas branch of it, not to mention veterinarians and state officials—”