Heartbreaker Read online

  “So could you.”

  “Not as easily. Admit it; strength counts out there. I want you safe.”

  It was a battle they’d already fought more times than she could remember, and nothing budged him. But she couldn’t give up, because she couldn’t stand many more days like today had been. “Could you stand it if you had nothing to do? If you had to just stand around and watch everybody else? Edie won’t even let me help!”

  “She’d damned well better not.”

  “See what I mean? Am I supposed to just sit all day?”

  “All right, you’ve made your point,” he said in a low voice. He’d thought she’d enjoy living a life of leisure again, but instead she’d been wound to the breaking point. He rubbed her back soothingly, and gradually she relaxed against him, her arms sliding up to hook around his neck. He’d have to find something to keep her occupied, but right now he was at a loss. It was hard to think when she was lying against him like warm silk, her firm breasts pushing into him and the sweet scent of woman rising to his nostrils. She hadn’t been far from his mind all day, the thought of her pulling at him like a magnet. No matter how often he took her, the need came back even stronger than before.

  Reluctantly he moved her a few inches away from him. “Dinner will be ready in about ten minutes, and I need a shower. I smell like a horse.”

  The hot, earthy scents of sweat, sun, leather and man didn’t offend her. She found herself drawn back to him; she pressed her face into his chest, her tongue flicking out to lick daintily at his hot skin. He shuddered, all thoughts of a shower gone from his mind. Sliding his fingers into the shiny, pale gold curtain of her hair, he turned her face up and took the kiss he’d been wanting for hours.

  She couldn’t limit her response to him; whenever he reached for her, she was instantly his, melting into him, opening her mouth for him, ready to give as little or as much as he wanted to take. Loving him went beyond the boundaries she had known before, taking her into emotional and physical territory that was new to her. It was his control, not hers, that prevented him from tumbling her onto the bed right then. “Shower,” he muttered, lifting his head. His voice was strained. “Then dinner. Then I have to do some paperwork, damn it, and it can’t wait.”

  Michelle sensed that he expected her to object and demand his company, but more than anyone she understood about chores that couldn’t be postponed. She drew back from his arms, giving him a smile. “I’m starving, so hurry up with your shower.” An idea was forming in the back of her mind, one she needed to explore.

  She was oddly relaxed during dinner; it somehow seemed natural to be here with him, as if the world had suddenly settled into the natural order of things. The awkwardness of the morning was gone, perhaps because of John’s presence. Edie ate with them, an informality that Michelle liked. It also gave her a chance to think, because Edie’s comments filled the silence and made it less apparent.

  After dinner, John gave Michelle a quick kiss and a pat on the bottom. “I’ll finish as fast as I can. Can you entertain yourself for a while?”

  Swift irritation made up her mind for her. “I’m coming with you.”

  He sighed, looking down at her. “Baby, I won’t get any work done at all if you’re in there with me.”

  She gave him a withering look. “You’re the biggest chauvinist walking, John Rafferty. You’re going to work, all right, because you’re going to show me what you’re doing, and then I’m taking over your bookwork.”

  He looked suddenly wary. “I’m not a chauvinist.”

  He didn’t want her touching his books, either. He might as well have said it out loud, because she read his thoughts in his expression. “You can either give me something to do, or I’m going back to my house right now,” she said flatly, facing him with her hands on her hips.

  “Just what do you know about keeping books?”

  “I minored in business administration.” Let him chew on that for a while. Since he obviously wasn’t going to willingly let her in his office, she stepped around him and walked down the hall without him.

  “Michelle, damn it,” he muttered irritably, following her.

  “Just what’s wrong with my doing the books?” she demanded, taking a seat at the big desk.

  “I didn’t bring you here to work. I want to take care of you.”

  “Am I going to get hurt in here? Is a pencil too heavy for me to lift?”

  He scowled down at her, itching to lift her out of her chair. But her green eyes were glittering at him, and her chin had that stubborn tilt to it, showing she was ready to fight. If he pushed her, she really might go back to that dark, empty house. He could keep her here by force, but he didn’t want it that way. He wanted her sweet and willing, not clawing at him like a wildcat. Hell, at least this was safer than riding herd. He’d double-check the books at night.

  “All right,” he growled.

  Her green eyes mocked him. “You’re so gracious.”

  “You’re full of sass tonight,” he mused, sitting down. “Maybe I should have made love to you before dinner, after all, worked some of that out.”

  “Like I said, the world’s biggest chauvinist.” She gave him her haughty look, the one that had always made him see red before. She was beginning to enjoy baiting him.

  His face darkened but he controlled himself, reaching for the pile of invoices, receipts and notes. “Pay attention, and don’t screw this up,” he snapped. “Taxes are bad enough without an amateur bookkeeper fouling up the records.”

  “I’ve been doing the books since Dad died,” she snapped in return.

  “From the looks of the place, honey, that’s not much of a recommendation.”

  Her face froze, and she looked away from him, making him swear under his breath. Without another word she jerked the papers from him and began sorting them, then put them in order by dates. He settled back in his big chair, his face brooding as he watched her enter the figures swiftly and neatly in the ledger, then run the columns through the adding machine twice to make certain they were correct.

  When she was finished, she pushed the ledger across the desk. “Check it so you’ll be satisfied I didn’t make any mistakes.”

  He did, thoroughly. Finally he closed the ledger and said, “All right.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “Is that all you have to say? No wonder you’ve never been married, if you think women don’t have the brains to add two and two!”

  “I’ve been married,” he said sharply.

  The information stunned her, because she’d never heard anyone mention his being married, nor was marriage something she readily associated with John Rafferty. Then hot jealousy seared her at the thought of some other woman living with him, sharing his name and his bed, having the right to touch him. “Who…when?” she stammered.

  “A long time ago. I’d just turned nineteen, and I had more hormones than sense. God only knows why she married me. It only took her four months to decide ranch life wasn’t for her, that she wanted money to spend and a husband who didn’t work twenty hours a day.”

  His voice was flat, his eyes filled with contempt. Michelle felt cold. “Why didn’t anyone ever mention it?” she whispered. “I’ve known you for ten years, but I didn’t know you’d been married.”

  He shrugged. “We got divorced seven years before you moved down here, so it wasn’t exactly the hottest news in the county. It didn’t last long enough for folks to get to know her, anyway. I worked too much to do any socializing. If she married me thinking a rancher’s wife would live in the lap of luxury, she changed her mind in a hurry.”

  “Where is she now?” Michelle fervently hoped the woman didn’t still live in the area.

  “I don’t know, and I don’t care. I heard she married some old rich guy as soon as our divorce was final. It didn’t matter to me then, and it doesn’t matter now.”

  It