Duncan's Bride Read online

  She felt a little breathless, and not just from climbing the stairs. The thought of having his children weakened her.

  He opened a door directly across from the top of the stairs and ushered her into a large, pleasant bedroom with white curtains at the windows and a white bedspread on the four-poster bed. She made a soft sound of pleasure. An old rocking chair sat before one of the windows, and what was surely a handmade rug covered the smooth, hardwood plank flooring. The flooring itself was worth a small fortune. For all the charm of the room, there was a sense of bareness to it, no soft touches to personalize it in any way. But he lived here alone, she reminded herself; the personal touches would be in the rooms he used, not in the empty bedrooms waiting for his children to fill them.

  He stepped past her and put her bag on the bed. “I can’t take the whole day off,” he said. “The chores have to be done, so I’ll have to leave you to entertain yourself for a while. You can rest or do whatever you want. The bathroom is right down the hall if you want to freshen up. My bedroom has a private bath, so you don’t have to worry about running into me.”

  In the space of a heartbeat she knew she didn’t want to be left alone to twirl her fingers for the rest of the day. “Can’t I go with you?”

  “You’ll be bored, and it’s dirty work.”

  She shrugged. “I’ve been dirty before.”

  He looked at her for a long moment, his face unsmiling and expressionless. “All right,” he finally said, wondering if she’d feel the same when her designer shoes were caked with the makings of compost.

  Her smile crinkled her eyes. “I’ll be changed in three minutes flat.”

  He doubted it. “I’ll be in the barn. Come on out when you’re ready.”

  As soon as he had closed the door behind him, Madelyn stripped out of her clothes, slithered into a pair of jeans and shoved her feet into her oldest pair of loafers, which she had brought along for this very purpose. After all, she couldn’t very well explore a ranch in high heels. She pulled a white cotton camisole on over her head and sauntered out the door just as he was starting downstairs after changing shirts himself. He gave her a startled look; then his eyes took on a heavy-lidded expression as his gaze swept her throat and shoulders, left bare by the sleeveless camisole. Madelyn almost faltered as that very male look settled on her breasts, and her body felt suddenly warm and weighed down. She had seen men cast quick furtive glances at her breasts before, but Reese was making no effort to hide his speculation. She felt her nipples tingle and harden, rasping against the cotton covering them.

  “I didn’t think you’d make it,” he said.

  “I don’t fuss about clothes.”

  She didn’t have to, he thought. The body she put inside them was enough; anything else was superfluous. He was all but salivating just thinking of her breasts and those long, slender legs. The jeans covered them, but now he knew exactly how long and shapely they were, and, as she turned to close the bedroom door, how curved her buttocks were, like an inverted heart. He felt a lot hotter than the weather warranted.

  She walked beside him out to the barn, her head swiveling from side to side as she took in all the aspects of the ranch. A three-door garage in the same style as the house stood behind it. She pointed to it. “How many other cars do you have?”

  “None,” he said curtly.

  Three other buildings stood empty, their windows blank. “What are those?”

  “Bunkhouses.”

  There was a well-built chicken coop, with fat white chickens pecking industriously around the yard. She said, “I see you grow your own eggs.”

  From the corner of her eye she saw his lips twitch as if he’d almost smiled. “I grow my own milk, too.”

  “Very efficient. I’m impressed. I haven’t had fresh milk since I was about six.”

  “I didn’t think that accent was New York City. Where are you from originally?”

  “Virginia. We moved to New York when my mother remarried, but I went back to Virginia for college.”

  “Your parents were divorced?”

  “No. My father died. Mom remarried three years later.”

  He opened the barn door. “My parents died within a year of each other. I don’t think they could exist apart.”

  The rich, earthy smell of an occupied barn enveloped her, and she took a deep breath. The odors of animals, leather, manure, hay and feed all mixed into that one unmistakable scent. She found it much more pleasant than the smell of exhaust.

  The barn was huge. She had noticed a stable beside it, also empty, as well as a machinery shed and a hay shed. Everything about the ranch shouted that this had once been a very prosperous holding, but Reese had evidently fallen on hard times. How that must grate on a man with his obvious pride. She wanted to put her hand in his and tell him that it didn’t matter, but she had the feeling he would reject the gesture. The pride that kept him working this huge place alone wouldn’t allow him to accept anything he could interpret as pity.

  She didn’t know what chores needed doing or how to do them, so she tried to stay out of his way and simply watch, noting the meticulous attention he paid to everything he did. He cleaned out stalls and put down fresh hay, his powerful arms and back flowing with muscles. He put feed in the troughs, checked and repaired tack, brought in fresh water. Three horses were in a corral between the barn and stable; he checked and cleaned their hooves, brought them in to feed and water them, then put them in their stalls for the night. He called a ridiculously docile cow to him and put her in a stall, where she munched contentedly while he milked her. With a bucket half full of hot, foaming milk, he went back to the house, and two cats appeared to meow imperiously at him as they scented the milk. “Scat,” he said. “Go catch a mouse.”

  Madelyn knew what to do now. She got the sterilized jugs she had noticed on her first trip through the kitchen and found a straining cloth. He gave her a strange look as she held the straining cloth over the mouth of the jug for him to pour the milk through. “Grandma Lily used to do this,” she said in a blissful tone. “I was never strong enough to hold the bucket and pour, but I knew I’d be an adult the day she let me pour out the milk.”

  “Did you ever get to pour it?”

  “No. She sold the cow the summer before I started school. She just had the one cow, for fresh milk, but the area was already building up and becoming less rural, so she got rid of it.”

  He set the bucket down and took the straining cloth. “Then here’s your chance for adulthood. Pour.”

  A whimsical smile touched her lips as she lifted the bucket and carefully poured the creamy white liquid through the cloth into the jug. The warm, sweet scent filled the kitchen. When the bucket was empty she set it aside and said, “Thank you. As a rite of passage, that beats the socks off of getting my driver’s license.”

  This time it happened. Reese’s eyes crinkled, and his lips moved in a little half grin. Madelyn felt more of that inner shifting and settling, and knew that she was lost.

  CHAPTER THREE

  “THERE ISN’T MUCH nightlife around, but there is a beer joint and café about twenty miles from here if you’d like to go dancing.”

  Madelyn hesitated. “Would you mind very much if we just stayed here? You must be tired, and I know I am. I’d rather put my feet up and relax.”

  Reese was silent. He hadn’t expected her to refuse, and though he was tired, he’d been looking forward to holding her while they danced. Not only that, having people around them would dilute his focus on her, ease the strain of being alone with her. She wasn’t right for him, damn it.

  On the other hand, he’d been up since four that morning, and relaxing at home sounded like heaven. The hard part would be relaxing with her anywhere around.

  “We could play Monopoly. I saw a game in the bookcase,” she said. “Or cards. I know how to play poker, blackjack, spades, hearts, rummy, Shanghai, Spite and Malice, Old Maid and Go Fish.”

  He gave her a sharp glance at that improbable l