Against the Rules Read online

  It was obvious that Rule desired her physically. Why not? She wasn’t a raving beauty, but she was passable in most areas and many people found her leggy grace and exotic coloring attractive. Rule was a normal male with all the normal male needs and responses, so there was no reason why he shouldn’t want her. It was when she delved below the surface that she became overwhelmed by doubts and possibilities, none of them pleasant.

  As well as she knew Rule, as intimate as she was with every line of his body and nuance of his expression and voice, she was violently aware that he kept a great deal of himself locked away. He was a man who had lived through hell and emerged from the fires with nothing of value left, no illusions or dreams to buffer him from the stark reality of what he had experienced; and he had returned “home” to find that in fact he had no home, that emotionally he had been cast adrift. The hand that Ward Donahue had extended to him had literally saved his life, and from that moment he had poured his devotion into the ranch that had sheltered him and allowed him to rebuild the blasted ruin of his life.

  She could marry him, yes, but she would never know if he had married her for love of herself or for love of the ranch that came with her. She was a package deal, and for the first time in her life she wished that the ranch weren’t hers. Leaving wouldn’t solve the problem for her, but it would give her the opportunity to decide in a rational way whether she could marry Rule and live with him in any sort of serenity, able to accept that she would never know for certain. She couldn’t be rational around Rule; he reduced her to the most basic responses.

  It was an old problem, one that heiresses were traditionally troubled with: Did he want her or her possessions? In this case it wasn’t a question of money but of security and dark emotions buried so deep in Rule’s subconscious that perhaps even he wasn’t aware of his motivation.

  Cathryn finally got out of bed and listlessly began packing. She had barely begun when the door opened and Rule stood there.

  He was dressed in fresh clothing, his expression blank, but lines of weariness scored his face. He said evenly, “Come riding with me.”

  She looked away. “I have to pack—”

  “Please,” he interrupted, and she quivered at hearing that unaccustomed word from him. “Come riding with me this one last time,” he coaxed. “If I can’t convince you to stay, then I’ll take you to wherever you want to go to catch a flight out of Texas.”

  She sighed, rubbing her forehead in an agitated gesture. Why couldn’t she just make a clean break? She had to be the world’s biggest glutton for punishment. “All right,” she gave in. “Let me get dressed.”

  For a moment he looked disinclined to leave, his dark eyes telling her that that was a silly thing to say to a man who had made love to her as he had the night before. But then he nodded and closed the door. With her senses acutely aware of him, she felt his presence and knew that he was leaning against the wall outside her room. Quickly she dressed and brushed the worst of the tangles from her hair. When she opened the door, he straightened and extended his hand to her, then let it drop before she could decide whether to take it or not.

  They walked in silence to the stables, where they saddled the horses. The early morning was pleasantly cool and the horses were full of energy, impatient with the slow walk that the firm hands on the reins held them to. After several minutes of silence Cathryn kneed her horse closer to Rule’s and said abruptly, “What did you want to talk about?”

  His eyes were shadowed by the battered black hat that he habitually wore low as protection against the fierce Texas sun, and she could read nothing in the portion of his face that was exposed to her gaze. “Not now,” he refused. “Let’s just ride and look at the land.”

  She was content enough to do that, loving the well-tended look of the pastures, and aching inside at the thought of leaving all of this again. The fencing was sturdy and in good repair; all of the outbuildings were clean and freshly painted. Rule’s stewardship had been nothing short of outstanding. Even when her resentment had been at its hottest she had never doubted his feelings for the land. She had acknowledged that even in the depths of adolescent confusion.

  They were away from the paddocks and barns now, and crossing a pasture. Rule reined in his horse and nodded in the direction of the ranch buildings. “I’ve been holding this place for you,” he said harshly. “Waiting for you to come back to it. I can’t believe you don’t want it.”

  She swallowed a flash of anger and cried indignantly, “Not want it! How can you think that? I love this place; it’s my home.”

  “Then live here; make it your home.”

  “I’ve always wanted to do that,” she said, bitterness lacing her tone. “It’s just that...oh, damn you, Rule, you must know that you’re the reason I’ve stayed away!”

  His mouth twisted as her bitterness was reflected back at her. “Why? Do you believe everything that was said about me when I came back from Nam?”

  “Of course not!” she denied hotly. “Nobody does!”

  “Some did. I have a vivid recollection of several people trying their level best to make me pay in blood for everything they thought I’d done.” His face was stony, cold, as he brought one of his black memories up into the fresh and sunny morning.

  Cathryn shuddered and reached out to grasp his muscular forearm, bared by the rolled-up sleeve of his denim work shirt. “It was never anything like that, believe me! I...at the time, I resented you so much that I couldn’t think straight.”

  “Do you still resent me?” he demanded.

  “No.” The confession was made in a low voice; she looked at him with troubled, doubtful eyes. Somehow she couldn’t just tell him that she was afraid that he wanted the ranch more than he wanted her. She knew that if she exposed her doubts to him, he would be able to talk her out of them using her weakness for him to railroad her into doing whatever he wanted. She didn’t just want him physically. She wanted his emotional commitment, too.

  “Will you reconsider?” he rasped. “Will you think about staying?”

  She had to force herself to look away, to keep him from seeing the longing in her eyes. If only she could stay! If only she could be content with what he was offering her, what she suspected was all he was capable of offering to any woman. But she wanted so much more than that, and she was afraid that she would destroy herself if she tried to compromise on that. “No,” she whispered.

  He danced Redman around to face her and closed his gloved hand over her reins. His dark face was taut with frustration, his jaw set in a grim line. “Okay, so you leave. What if you’re pregnant? What then? Are you going to insist on handling that on your own? Will you even tell me if I’m going to be a father, or will you just get rid of my baby and pretend that it never existed? When will you know?” he said fiercely.

  The words, the idea, stunned her almost as deeply as his unexpected proposal of marriage had done a few hours before. Helplessly she stared at him.

  One corner of his mouth curled upward in a smile that was a travesty of amusement. “Don’t look so surprised,” he taunted. “You’re old enough to know how it happens, and neither of us did anything to prevent it.”

  Cathryn closed her eyes, shaken by the sweetness she felt at the thought of having his child. Against all common sense, for a moment she prayed with wild longing that it was so, that she was already harboring his child. A tiny, otherworldly smile touched her lips and he cursed between clenched teeth, his gloved hand moving up to grip the nape of her neck.

  “Get that look off your face!” he growled. “Unless you want to be on the ground with me, because right now I want you—”

  He broke off and Cathryn opened her eyes, devouring the sight of him, unable to control her expression. A muscle flexed in his cheek as he repeated, “When? When will you know?”

  Silently she counted, then said, “In a week or so.”

  “And if you are? What will you do?”

  Cathryn swallowed, facing the inevitable. She really had