Sleepless in Montana (11 page)

Surprise and temper stormed through her, but
Jemma understood: Hogan wanted to put her in her place and warn her
not to test him.

She glared at him and tossed her hair back
carelessly, just to show him that she could easily shed any
surprises he threw at her.

Dinah hugged Mitch and held Aaron tight,
because she’d seen them through the years, and Hogan, too. She
turned to Hogan and took his hand with both of hers.

“My son,” she whispered in a reverent
motherly tone that couldn’t be challenged.

Hogan’s body tensed; he wasn’t unaffected. He
glanced at Ben, who placed a hand on Dinah’s shoulder, but locked
his stare with Hogan’s. The impact jarred Hogan, the older man’s
emotion threading through his quiet deep tone, “I’m glad you’re
home. We all are. This is where you should be. You’d better come
rest now.”

Hogan stiffened, momentarily confused and
then angry. Ben was speaking to Dinah and the others, of course,
not to him. Ben was already setting the rules and defining Hogan as
an outsider....

“Ben? Rest? But I just got here— uh!” Dinah
jerked as Jemma nudged her with her elbow.

Then Ben bent and lifted Dinah in his arms,
walking toward the house. There was just that bit of hesitation as
his right boot settled onto Kodiak land, a slight hint that his
body wasn’t complete.

Clearly stunned, Dinah looked back, then
settled into Ben’s arms. Jemma, who couldn’t help giggling as she
hooked an arm around Carley. “Well, well, well. You Kodiaks ought
to see yourselves, all of you, standing with your mouths open.
You’re all so easy, and so emotional.”

“Dad doesn’t look sick at all,” Carley noted
quietly.

“Ben doesn’t want it to show. You know him,”
Jemma returned quickly, and hated the lie. Still. She’d do anything
for Carley—

Carley frowned. “But wasn’t that romantic? I
mean the way Dad picked her up? He’s still that strong, even though
he’s sick?”

Jemma hugged her friend. “So? They’ve got a
thing for each other. Looked pretty natural to me.”

“Look at Mom.... She’s all tucked in and
cuddling to him, the way she’s looking at him....” Aaron
murmured.

“God, I hope I’m still that strong at his
age,” Mitch added. “Wonder what that ‘rest’ means to him?”

Jemma moved to stand between the men, her
hands on their shoulders. “Magic moments, guys. Take a note. That
was the most romantic thing I’ve seen from any of you. Look and
learn.”

While Mitch, Aaron, and Carley were stunned,
Hogan scowled darkly at the man carrying Dinah into the house.
Jemma nudged him with her shoulder. “That frown has to hurt.”

Mitch, Aaron, and Carley hurried to unpack
the van and follow Ben. But Hogan remained standing, immovable,
arms crossed in front of him. Jemma was tired, riding on nerves,
and Hogan wasn’t making anything easy.

“You’re going to be difficult, aren’t you?”
she asked wearily.

“Little Miss Fix-It,” Hogan said tightly,
anger rimming the hard planes of his face, the tight, rhythmic cord
in his jaw.

“Look, you. I don’t want any fights straight
off, but if you’re asking, I can deliver. Just try to be sweet for
today, okay? If it isn’t too much of a strain?” she shot back. She
turned to look at the house, the new white paint and repaired
boards. In an attempt to remain cool and civil, she said, “I see
you’ve all been working.”

At her side, Hogan murmured, “Mitch bribed
the local high school teacher’s shop department. We had more
trouble than the teenage labor was worth. They expected beer and
didn’t get it. There’s a fair amount of spit and body fluids in
that paint.”

“Don’t tell me you don’t have Ben in your
blood, always mulling in the dark side,” she muttered.

But when she turned around, Hogan was
striding toward his pickup.

“Who needs you anyway, babe?” she asked
softly, and knew from the hard set of his broad shoulders that
Hogan’s emotions were tearing at him.

She couldn’t bear for him to be alone and an
outsider to the Kodiaks and yet torn by love for them. Jemma
hurried after him, hooking a hand in the back of his tooled Western
belt. A powerful man set on a fast getaway, Hogan caused her to
skid along behind him until he stopped and swung around to her.

“How about a ride in my new van?” she asked,
hoping to trim the edge off his stormy mood She slid him her best
thousand-watt smile. It hit Hogan and crumpled into the dirt at his
boots.

He swung a disdainful look at her golden
baby, all shining silver mud flaps and studded with antennas,
gleaming in the twilight and said, “I want to live.”

She was trying, damn him. “What’s eating at
you? Come on, don’t be shy.”

Hogan’s dark eyes flicked at the house. He
had lots of memories and none of them sweet, except for Dinah
trying to hold him. He couldn’t allow that, a strange
sweet-smelling woman wanting to cuddle him. As Ben’s son, and a
motherless child, he didn’t understand gentleness, and he’d lashed
out at her. For a time, she’d softened Ben, especially when Aaron
and Carley came along.

“He’ll hurt her. She’s too soft for him.
He’ll start jabbing and hurting—”

“He will not. Any man who looks at a woman
like that is a man who feels blessed. He’s romantic, carrying her
into the house like that. My heart fairly flipped over. I thought I
might swoon.”

“The only reason you’d swoon is if someone
paid you.... What would you know about it? How a man feels? It’s
common knowledge that he’s sleeping with Maxi Dove. Now he wants
Dinah in his bed.”

“That is pure manure, and you know it. Ben
took Maxi in when she was pregnant with Savanna and her family had
turned her away. He’s raised Savanna as his own daughter. He paid
for her nurse’s training.”

“Maybe she is his daughter. Maybe he’s been
paid for that favor.” Bitterness curled around Hogan’s harsh tone,
his eyes glinting dangerously at her.

Jemma pushed her face up to his; Hogan wasn’t
intimidating her with tough looks. “Savanna hasn’t got that nasty
Kodiak streak, like you do. You’re just looking for trouble, and if
you want a whole lot of it, just try me.”

Hogan braced his hands on his hips. Tired,
nerves stretched too thin and aching to take him on, Jemma did the
same, lifting her face to his dark rugged one. “You are not going
to ruin this, Hogan. You are coming inside and we’re all going to
be civilized and then, after a time, you’ll excuse yourself and
leave quietly.”

Hogan reached past her to jerk open his
pickup door, but Jemma flattened herself against it. “Don’t even
think about it. I’ll make your life so miserable, you won’t be able
to breathe.”

He lifted a black, sleek brow. “This isn’t
your
family. Or have you forgotten?”

“I’m in it now, and I’m sticking,” she said,
and blinked at the slight softening of his mouth, the warmth of his
eyes. “So can you manage to be human, or not? I’ll lay off, if you
will.”

“Tell Dinah and Carley that I’ll be back in
the morning,” he said, and gently nudged her away with his
shoulder.

Hogan wasn’t setting his terms, when and
where he could be reached. Jemma narrowed her eyes. “You’re going
to start this shindig off right at the breakfast table tomorrow
morning. If you’re not here for breakfast and in a sweeter mood,
I’ll bring everyone over in the morning. I’ve got room in the van.
Ben will want a ride in it.”

She reveled in that quick black slap of
temper, Hogan’s stoic mask pulled aside. “The hell you will. You
stay out of this.”

“Brunch at eleven with sweet rolls, coffee,
and orange juice is okay. Stop at the grocery store and get some of
those bake-it-yourself ones. I like the thought of you cooking for
me,” Jemma said lightly, and, with a toss of her head, turned and
stalked back to the house. In another minute, she’d have her hands
around his big thick arrogant neck—

“Jemma.” The quiet solid thud of her name hit
her like a brick.

She stood still as Hogan walked to her and
tugged the ruffled band from her ponytail. She fought the quiver of
her senses as his scent and his body heat reached her.

Hogan leaned down to place his angular jaw
against her own and to whisper in her ear. “Don’t play games with
me, Jemma. I’m not being molded and packaged for the family plan
because you want it. It’s a little late for that.”

“See you tomorrow, bud, either really early
here, at the breakfast table— or later at your place. They’ll come
for a ride with me, and we’ll just happen to all land at your
house. But while you’re sulking over there in that fort don’t
forget this is for Carley... to protect her. If Dinah— or Ben— get
a few perks along the way, their family together again, then that
suits me, too.”

Jemma shot a solid elbow back into his
stomach, noted the satisfactory grunt and continued walking.

From the window, Ben spared a glance away
from Dinah, who was hugging Maxi Dove. He noted Hogan’s scowl, the
quick dark heat of his eyes on Jemma’s swaying hips, and the fury
written on the young woman’s face.

Hogan was snarling again, and Jemma wanted
her way. The girl had good moves, tearing away Hogan’s reserve, and
she wasn’t giving up. An old familiar pain shot through Ben’s chest
as he turned to look at the woman he’d always loved; he shouldn’t
have given up Dinah or Hogan.

*** ***

Jemma shoved her body up the steps of the
ranch house and forced her fist to uncurl before she took a deep,
steadying breath and opened the new door. She pasted a smile on her
face.

As a survivor and making her way too soon in
the world, she’d had plenty of practice in covering her emotions.
Hogan could be a beast, when he wanted, but he wasn’t getting to
her— he wasn’t.

She pushed aside her anger at Hogan and
slowly studied the house she’d come to think of as her real home.
The Kodiak house would always stand like this, solid, battered by
weather and years and yet it remained, big, clean, and neat,
clearly masculine. Ben’s old leather chair was near the huge stone
fireplace, the flickering flames adding to the sheen of the
varnished floors.

The dangling crystals of an imitation Tiffany
lamp speared a myriad of light into the room. Ben would have
brought it down from the attic upstairs, where it had been stored
since Dinah left. A huge battered pigeonhole desk was layered with
paper, Aaron’s sleek little laptop closed by the telephone. Old
Aaron’s portrait and Jubal’s sprawling horns over the fireplace
were gone, the ancient buffalo gun remaining.

She turned to the stairway she’d loved as a
child, perfect for sliding down the bannisters. The bedrooms
upstairs were meant to accommodate a family and had before Ben’s
accident. He’d slept downstairs since then. When Carley and Jemma
had come home, he’d ordered the “Sasquatches” to the bunkhouse.

“The boys will be staying here in the house,”
Ben was saying quietly to Dinah. “It’s better that way.”

Her blue eyes met his. “Yes, it is. Thank
you, Ben.”

“I want you here,” he said, and looped an arm
around Carley and Jemma, drawing them close.

“How are you, Dad?” Carley asked, snuggling
close, her flyaway straight blond hair almost silver, contrasting
with Ben’s crisp, dark blond-and-gray waves.

“Better,” he said, with a meaningful
thank-you look at Jemma. “Much better.”

When Dinah exclaimed about the new linoleum
floor in the large family kitchen, Ben scowled. The way he settled
back into the shadows, reminded Jemma of Hogan.

“Cost a fortune,” Ben grumbled. “I’ll have to
sell off the place to pay back Hogan. He likes that, me indebted to
him. Why the hell didn’t he stay? Maxi fixed a special dinner, and
this is Dinah and Carley’s first night home. Hogan should
have—”

“Not beef?” Jemma asked hopefully, hurrying
to break Ben’s dark tirade against Hogan. “I really hate the
thought of those poor little calves—”

“Beef,” Ben stated firmly, a Montana rancher
protecting his life and income against marauding bean-curd
vegetarians.

Jemma nudged him with her shoulder. “You’ll
have to manage by yourself, handsome. Hogan isn’t here to protect
you. I’d really like you to teach me something about guns.”

His blue eyes lit with humor. “Don’t
sweet-talk me. I’m not teaching you how to shoot. Putting a gun in
your hands would be asking for another missing leg.”

Jemma resented the way Ben could head off her
plans. Since Carley and Dinah had gone into the kitchen, she
settled into argue quietly. “I’m not that bad, and what if Carley
needs me—”

“Carley can handle a gun, if she needs to.
You’re too hot-tempered. But don’t let her go anywhere by herself.
The boys and I are sticking close— one of us will be with her.
Thank you, Jemma, for helping us.”

“I’m good at wicked plans. The Kodiaks are
too honest for plotting. I love you, Ben,” Jemma said, meaning it
and watched the shy, embarrassed flush creep up his face. She
kissed his weathered cheek. “Get used to it.”

Dinah hurried past them, her eyes shimmering
with emotions. She peered out of the window. “I have to— Where’s
Hogan?” Dinah asked.

“Gone,” Ben stated flatly, bitterness curling
around his tone.

“He’ll be back in the morning.”
Or I’ll
drag him back
, Jemma thought. “Let’s eat. I’m starved.”

Mitch grinned and eyed her lean body. “You’re
always starved. Where do you put it?”

“Calories can’t move fast enough to catch
her. Mine come to stay,” Carley said cheerfully.

“Girls upstairs— Aaron, too. He’s taking the
corner room. Jemma, you and Carley have to share a room this trip.
Mitch and I will bunk downstairs,” Ben stated. “Go wash up.”

“Great, now I’m with the girls,” Aaron
muttered. Everyone but Carley knew his presence was more for
protection than for accommodations. The “corner room” had been
built as a lookout by the first Kodiak, with a small tower that
overlooked the entire Bar K.