Sherryl Woods - Courting the Enemy

“I won’t do anything at all without talking it over with you,” she promised her father-in-law.

“That’s good enough for me. You take care of yourself, Karen. I don’t want you wearing yourself out at your age out of some misguided sense of loyalty, you hear me? If the time comes when you can’t do it or even if you just decide you want a different life, then you grab your chance. I love that land, but it’s just land. It’s not worth dying for, the way Caleb did.”

“I love you,” she said to him, tears stinging her eyes.

“You, too. You were a good wife to my boy and I will always be grateful to you for that.”

Karen slowly hung up the phone, not daring to look at Grady.

“The Hansons, I presume,” he said caustically. “Did they manage to restore your sense of purpose?”

“I’m not going to discuss them with you,” she said, already reaching for her coat. “I’ve got work to do.”

“Where are you going?” he asked as she pushed past him.

“To the barn. Not all of us have time to fritter away.”

He stopped her in her tracks. “Is that what you think I’m doing around here, frittering away my time?”

Her gaze clashed with his. “Isn’t it? You have plenty of people working for you, I’m sure, people who do whatever needs doing on your ranch. I don’t. If something needs to be done around here, I do it myself.”

She jerked away from his grasp and ran outside, tears streaking down her face, all but turning to ice in the frigid February air. She headed straight for the barn and Ginger’s stall, leaning against the horse for comfort, absorbing her body heat.

When her tears had dried and her nerves settled, she reached for a brush and began grooming the horse as a reward for her patience. The steady strokes were soothing to both of them. Eventually she was calm enough to think about what had just happened, not just on her phone, but in her kitchen.

She had taken Anna’s attack out on Grady, no doubt about it. She’d figured he deserved it, since he was the cause of it. The plain truth was, Anna had ladled on guilt and Karen had accepted it because she was riddled with guilt already. Then she had lashed out at the cause.

She owed him an apology. She was the one who’d agreed weeks ago and again the night before to his visits. She had known there would be talk, known deep down that sooner or later it would reach Caleb’s parents and that there would be a price to pay.

What was one more disagreement, one more disapproving lecture, from a woman who hadn’t been any less critical when Caleb had been alive?

Finished in the barn, Karen walked slowly back to the house, where she overheard Grady on the phone.

“I want it taken care of today, do you understand me? This has dragged on long enough.”

Her heart thudded wildly at the implication. Was he tired of trying to outwait her? Was he somehow going to force the issue?

She let the door slam behind her and stood in front of him, her pulse thundering. “What was that about?” she demanded. “What are you up to now?”

The dismay on his face seemed proof enough of his treachery.

“You will not get this ranch,” she said, jabbing a finger in his chest. Because it felt so good, she did it again, and then again, until tears were streaming down her cheeks and she was pounding on him with her fists. “You won’t, dammit! I won’t let you.”

Grady let her rant until she wound down. Then he gathered her close, murmuring soothing, nonsensical words. Slowly she relaxed against him. Every inch of her was suddenly awakened to the sensation of their bodies pressed together, of his arms tight around her, his breath fanning her cheek.

“It’s okay, darlin’. It’s okay,” he reassured her. “That call wasn’t about the ranch, I promise. It was about something else entirely.”

She wanted to believe him, wanted to believe she had misunderstood, but how could she? She lifted her head from his chest to look into his eyes. What she saw there was even more troubling than the treachery she’d suspected. There was hunger and yearning and the kind of seething passion she’d almost forgotten existed.

His gaze locked with hers, he tenderly wiped the tears from her cheeks. His thumb caressed her mouth. The flash of heat in his eyes turned brighter. The air around them suddenly felt charged with electricity…and with anticipation.

And then, before Karen could guess his intentions, his mouth covered hers. The kiss was everything she’d ever imagined-and feared. It was devastating. It was pure temptation.

And Grady had stolen it.

If he could steal a kiss so cleverly when she’d been furious with him only moments before, would stealing the land she’d grown to despise be any challenge for him at all?

The first time Grady kissed her, Karen reacted with shock and dismay. How could she have let it happen? Why hadn’t she stopped it, slapped him, done anything to show her displeasure?

A quick peck on the lips could be explained away as a hit-and-run gesture, hardly worthy of protest, but this had been more than that. It had gone on and on. There had been plenty of time for the act to register and draw an appropriate protest, rather than weak-kneed compliance.

The taste and feel of him was still on her lips as she took a step back and then another, trembling with what should have been outrage but wasn’t.

“Why did you do that?” she demanded, her back braced against the sink as she finally-belatedly-put as much distance as possible between them.

“Because I’ve been wanting to forever,” he said, not looking the least bit remorseful. In fact, he looked suspiciously as if he might intend to do it again.

And, God help her, Karen wanted him to. Her pulse was thundering like a summer storm. Her breasts ached. Any second the temptation to reach for him, to slip back into his embrace, would be too much for her.

There was no time to recite all the reasons why it was a terrible idea. Instead, she counted slowly to ten and back again, as if that alone would cool her yearning, as the same technique was used to temper anger.

She heard Grady’s low chuckle and her gaze snapped to his to find amusement lurking in his eyes. “What?” she demanded.

“It’s not going to work,” he told her, clearly understanding the mental war she was waging. “I’m not going away and I am going to kiss you again. There’s your fair warning. Never let it be said you didn’t get one.”

She swallowed hard, accepting the warning as pure truth. All that remained was the anticipation.

“When?” she asked, hoping that knowing that much would give her time to prepare, time to win the struggle with a desire that had caught her by surprise.

He tilted his head, studied her intently, then responded solemnly, “Now, I think. Before you work yourself into a frenzy worrying about it.”

She gulped even as he claimed her mouth yet again with even more ingenuity, more wickedly clever passion. This time Karen wasn’t simply an innocent bystander to the kiss, either. She kissed him back, responding to every persuasive nuance. All those protests and denials had been for nothing, because there was no mistaking that she was as caught up in the moment as he was.

Her head was spinning, her pulse racing. There was so much heat-too much. And the neediness, the overwhelming sense of urgency slammed through her with unexpected force, leaving her reeling. She had never expected to feel like this again, certainly never with Grady Blackhawk.

His name, his identity, finally snagged her attention, cutting through all the other commanding sensations. She was appalled and shaken that she was willingly in the arms of the enemy, though it was getting harder and harder to think of him that way.