Ride the Thunder (37 page)

Jordanna started to walk in until she saw him standing
at the sink. “Sorry. I didn’t know anyone was in here,” she apologized.

His senses leaped at the sight of her in that dressing gown. Ho remembered vividly the night he had taken it off her and let his hands roam her creamy smooth flesh. Turning back to the mirror, he rinsed the lather from the razor blade with the running water from the faucet.

“I must have forgotten to lock the door.” His hand didn’t feel very steady when he touched the blade to his jaw.

She started to leave, then hesitated for an instant to watch him. “Why do men always make such funny faces when they shave?” she wondered aloud.

In spite of himself, a faint smile touched his mouth. “To entertain the spectators.” He managed to avoid cutting himself as he stroked the razor along his jaw. “I’ll be through shortly. Then you can have the bathroom.”

Jordanna didn’t leave. Instead she took a step into the room and reached out to lightly touch her fingertips to his muscled shoulder. As they traced a diagonal line from the point of his shoulder to the shoulder blade, Brig stood motionless, the razor poised near his cheek.

“You took the bandage off. Is your shoulder better?” Her gaze sought his reflection in the mirror.

“It’s much better.” After briefly meeting her glance, Brig avoided and needlessly rinsed the razor again under the running tap water. His voice was low and stiffly controlled. “Do you mind leaving? I would like some privacy.”

“Of course.” It was a subdued reply.

Turning away, she bent her head. Her brown hair was gilded with scarlet under the light of the bare bulb above the sink. He watched her in the mirror until her reflection left its smooth surface. The door closed and Brig lowered his hands to the sink, gripping its porcelain edge and hanging his head. She was tearing his guts out. She was a willing accomplice to Fletcher’s
plans, if not more than that, but Brig still felt that gnawing desire to love and protect her. And she needed his protection about as much as a fully clawed tigress would.

Jordanna lay in bed and tried to sleep, but she couldn’t force her eyes to close. The only light in the darkened bedroom came from the single window where the dimness of a partially obscured moon made a square patch of dark gray and gave the room’s furniture dark shape. It was late, nearly midnight, and she needed her sleep, but it wouldn’t come. Restlessly, she turned, punching her pillow and trying to find a more comfortable position.

After another fifteen minutes, she gave up. It was no use. She wasn’t going to sleep. Jordanna threw back the covers and swung her feet to the floor. Reaching for her robe, she slipped it on and zipped it closed. When she couldn’t sleep as a child, Tessa had always brought her a glass of warm milk. As near as Jordanna could recall, it had always worked.

Trying to be as quiet as possible, she opened her door and carefully closed it behind her. There were sounds of someone snoring in the living room. Not Brig—Jordanna didn’t even remember hearing him snore. But he was in there. She hesitated, magnetically pulled in his direction. She resisted it and glided silently to the kitchen door. Not until the door was shut did she reach for the light switch. The sudden flood of light hurt her eyes. She blinked, shielding her eyes from the glare until they adjusted to the brightness.

The milk was in the refrigerator and Jordanna found a small pan in the bottom drawer of the stove. While it warmed on the burner, she searched the cupboards for a glass, trying to make as little noise as possible. In the cupboard by the sink, Jordanna found the glasses setting on the second shelf. Stretching on tiptoes, she reached one of them.

Out of the silence, Brig’s low voice demanded to know, “What are you doing?”

Startled, Jordanna pivoted around. The glass slipped
through her fingers tumbled to the floor, shattering on impact.

“Don’t move!” Brig ordered harshly.

But it was too late. Instinct had already prompted her to try to catch the glass before it hit the floor. Her reflexes were way too slow and the sole of a bare foot came down on a piece of glass. Immediately Jordanna lifted her foot, gasping at the sharp stab of pain. She tried to twist her foot around so she could see whether the piece of glass was still in the bottom of her foot.

“I thought I told you not to move.” Glass crunched under his boots as Brig strode impatiently toward her.

Since it was obvious she had, the comment didn’t warrant a reply. It wasn’t easy balancing on one foot, but she didn’t dare move. Splinters of glass were all around her. She was leaning against the kitchen counter. Distracted by the sharp pain in her foot, she was only half-conscious of Brig crossing the width of the room to her side. Jordanna was forcibly reminded of it when he scooped her up in his arms Momentarily stunned by the sudden contact, her reaction was automatic. She clasped her hands around his neck for support, suddenly realizing that he was dressed only in Levis and boots.

His torso was bare from his hair-roughened chest to the hard, flat muscles of his stomach. The easy way his arms carried her weight revealed his physical strength. An intoxicating breathlessness attacked her lungs at the warm, male scent of his flesh. She was conscious of the rippling play of his muscles as he carried her to the kitchen table. Lifting her gaze, she studied his lean, rugged features through the sweep of her lashes. The darkness of his thick hair, eyebrows, and mustache blended with his sun-browned complexion. His face was so very close to hers. The lines feathering out from the corners of his eyes drew her gaze inward to meet his look.

Her heart began regularly skipping beats when his attention shifted to her lips. In the next second, Brig was setting her down on the table top and dragging
his gaze away from her mouth. Pulling a chair alongside, he concentrated on her injured foot. The rumpled thickness of his dark brown hair invited fingers to run through it and Jordanna curled her own around the edge of the table to resist the invitation.

“Is the glass still in it?” Her voice was husky and disturbed, reflecting her inner feelings.

The heel of her foot was cupped in one large hand while the other examined the small wound where the faint trickle of blood had originated.

“Yes.”

An instant later, she was wincing as he pulled it out. With the piece of glass removed, the blood flowed more freely from the wound. Brig took a handkerchief from his pocket and pressed it against the bottom of her foot. His gaze sliced to her face.

“What did you think you were doing?”

Under the disconcerting directness of his look, Jordanna lifted a hand to push her touseled auburn hair away from her face, and avoided his look. “I couldn’t sleep. I thought if I drank some warm milk it might help me relax.” Her nose caught the tell-tale scent of scorched milk. “The milk! It’s still on the stove.”

“Stay right where you are,” Brig ordered sternly. Tying the handkerchief around her foot, he rose and walked across the broken glass to the stove. Removing the pan of milk, he turned off the burner and carried the pan to the sink. Jordanna saw, when he poured the milk down the drain, that the bottom of the pan was coated with the black-brown scum of burnt milk. Filling the pan with water, Brig left it in the sink to soak. Instead of walking back to the table, he went to the pantry and brought out a broom.

“I never thought of you as domestic,” Jordanna murmured as she watched him sweep up the fragments of glass. Domestic, but never domesticated, she thought to herself. Brig would never be tame. He was too much his own man to ever jump at the bidding of others.

“A case of necessity,” was his indifferent reply.
When the glass was swept into a dustpan, Jordanna started to get down from the table. His sharp gaze swung to pin her. “I told you to stay there.”

The underlying current of anger in his voice more than the order kept Jordanna from moving. When the broom and the dustpan were put away, he cast one glance at her, then walked out the door to the bathroom. Jordanna heard the sounds of the medicine cabinet being opened and explored. Then Brig was returning to the kitchen with disinfectant and a band-aid.

Again her injured foot was the prisoner of his hand. She drew in a hissing breath as the disinfectant stung the wound. The band-aid was applied next. The roughness of his calloused fingers smoothed the adhesive over the sensitive skin on the bottom of her foot. When it was done he continued to hold her foot in his hands and lifted his gaze to her face.

“How is that?”

“It’s fine. Thank you.” There was a disturbed tremor in her voice. It felt oddly intimate for him to hold her foot like that, one hand resting on her arch and the other curved around her slender ankle. Her heel was supported by his solid thigh.

“It doesn’t look serious, so it shouldn’t give you any problems.” His gaze continued to hold hers with all the appearance of total indifference to her, but Jordanna felt his fingers absently stroke the calf of her leg.

The sensation sent tingles over her skin. He must have seen her reaction to his touch because his eyes darkened to a smoldering brown. Her breath was stolen as his hand slid further up her leg to grip the side of her knee, inching toward her inner thigh, beneath her long robe. Abruptly he withdrew his hand, tearing his gaze from her face as he pushed back his chair and straightened.

“That should take care of it, then,” Brig stated.

While Jordanna was still trying to recover from the sudden removal of his touch, his hands spanned her
waist to lift her to the floor. She wasn’t prepared for the sudden adjustment from sitting to standing. Her fingers gripped the flexed muscles of his upper arms for support as she sought her balance. The tenderness of the wound on the bottom of her foot didn’t help.

“Sorry, I . . .” She tipped back her head as she started the apology, but the unmasked desire in his look stopped the words.

Jordanna shuddered with longing. His hands tightened, almost imperceptibly, on her waist to draw her closer. She spread her fingers upward to his bronzed shoulders. His mouth opened over hers, taking her lips in a hungry, demanding kiss. Jordanna gave herself willingly to the man who already owned her, heart and soul. The molding hands at her hips and back shaped her to the hard contours of his length. The ragged tempo of his heartbeat was a glorious sound, so like her own. His mouth moved to explore the curve of her neck.

“I lied to you, Brig,” Jordanna whispered with aching love.

There was a momentary stillness before he lifted his head and allowed a small amount of space to come between them. She met his penetrating gaze and its hint of wariness. Her fingers traced the smoothness of his shaven jaw in a tender caress.

“When?” It was a sharp demand.

“When I told you that I only pretended to like your touch,” she answered in a soft, throbbing voice. “It wasn’t true. You make me come alive when you hold me in your arms and make love to me.”

“I already guessed that.” His look demanded that she tell him something he didn’t know.

“Brig, I want to be more than just your lover. I want you to feel something more than just lust for me. Her tone became tight with the depth of her need. “I want you to care about me. Let me be your friend, your confidante, maybe even your wife and the mother of your children some day.”

Grim disgust thinned his mouth. The sight of it
slashed at her heart like a knife blade. Hurt, Jordanna turned out of his arms and took a quick step away. It was a searing pain that went deep. She had thought if she explained that she truly cared, he might reciprocate with a similar admission.

“Jordanna . . .” His hands touched her shoulders. She eluded their grasp with a flinching shrug.

“No,” she denied with a flash of hurt anger. “It isn’t enough for me to share your bed. I guess I’m just naturally a greedy person, Brig. I want to share the boredom, the monotony of day to day routine. I want to share the good times and the bad. I want to work with you to build this ranch. I want to argue with you—and make love with you.” Pivoting, Jordanna proudly lifted her trembling chin to meet his closed look. “I love you, Brig McCord. I didn’t lie about that either.”

“Sometimes you are very convincing,” he murmured with sufficient skepticism to prove he didn’t believe her. “But I can’t imagine you being satisfied for long, stuck out here in these primitive surroundings.”

“It’s where I belong. Not just because you are here,” she qualified. “This is my kind of place, not the city, but here in the outdoors where there is nothing to block out the sun but the mountains. Where it’s wild and untamed. Like hunting, it’s the kind of life that demands something from you—physically and mentally. Here, there is constant challenge and I . . .” There was a sudden lump in her throat. Looking away, she swallowed before tightly completing the sentence. “. . . would love to live here with you. I love you. You do love me,” she accused. “I know you care. I’ve seen it in your eyes, felt it when you held me. Why won’t you admit it?” She turned her hurt, questing eyes to him.

His look was unreadable as his hands moved to rest on either side of her neck. There was a certain grimness that seemed permanently implanted in his rugged features. Jordanna didn’t resist the light grip of his hands or the pressure of his thumbs on her collarbones.

“I could love you, Jordanna,” he muttered, “if I didn’t know better.”

Before she could question what he meant by that, he was curving her into his arms and his mouth was blotting out her token resistance. His embrace was almost cruel in its demand for gratification. Jordanna might have struggled if she hadn’t felt the tremors of desperate longing that shuddered through his hard, male frame. She couldn’t deny him satisfaction any more than she could deny herself.

Without another word said, Brig picked her up and carried her from the kitchen. Unerringly, he found his way to the bedroom in the darkened house. In the black velvet shadows of the bed, the fire their kisses had kindled blazed into full flame, and consumed them both with its rapture.

Hugging his arms more tightly around her, Jordanna basked in the warm glow of satisfaction. She felt almost completely content. She looked up to him and smiled, knowing he could see her expression and she couldn’t see his, and that it wasn’t necessary.