Anne McAllister - Blood Brothers

Standing there, unknown to either of them, he grinned at his own folly in thinking of Claire as a damsel in distress who needed his help. What a right hook she must have! What a girl!

Claire’s voice grew clearer, as though she’d followed Dave inside. “You get out of here right now,” she raged. “And don’t ever come smarming around me again.”

“Hell, I’m sorry,” Dave mumbled. “I just thought-”

“No, you didn’t,” she said crossly. “You don’t know how. All you can do is jump to conclusions. Get this straight. I’m in no danger from Randall. Maybe he is just passing the time, and maybe so am I. Lord knows, he looks enough like Gabe!”

“You mean-”

“Yes, I do. It’s always been Gabe for me, and it always will be. I’m telling you that to get rid of your stupid ideas, and if you repeat it to a living soul I’ll box your ears so hard your head won’t stop ringing for a week. Now get out.”

When Dave had scuttled away to the bunkhouse Claire shut the outer kitchen door firmly behind him. She was shaking, and on the verge of tears, but she refused to cry.

Dave’s words about Randall had struck home so painfully that she’d said the first thing she thought of to put him off the scent, not knowing whether it was true or not.

She’d always loved Gabe. But it was the memory of Randall’s lips on hers that made the fierce heat start up inside her. Gabe had never kissed her, never looked at her with the ardor she’d seen in Randall’s eyes. Perhaps if he had…

Oh, she couldn’t think of Gabe right now. He seemed so far away, not just in distance, but as though he was no more than a vaguely remembered dream. It was Randall who mattered, Randall who was here now, whose kisses sent her mindless with need, and who was waiting for her upstairs now…

As she stood in the darkness, trembling with the force of her emotions, she thought she heard a sound from the next room, but when she went in and switched on the light, there was nobody there.

Because he was no saint, but a very human man, Randall’s reaction to the news that Claire’s heart still belonged to Gabe contained as much pique and annoyance as pain.

She’d been teasing him. And after his good resolutions about her! Not that they had amounted to much. But for what he’d overheard he knew he would have taken Claire to his bed and made love to her until they were both exhausted. The thought of it made him ache still.

The next day, Claire didn’t mention the fact that he hadn’t gone to her room that night, and nor did he. He could hardly tell her that he’d heard what she said to Dave. She was probably relieved that he hadn’t showed up.

The one he was really mad at was Gabe, who’d gotten in the way just when he wasn’t wanted.

He called his cousin on his bedroom phone, and reached him easily enough. But Gabe bent his ear with a long description of Freddie Crossman and her children. Randall liked the Crossman family but he hadn’t thought there was so much to be said about them. He wondered if Gabe knew that he said Freddie every second word.

He came off the phone, thoughtful.

Downstairs he found Claire struggling with the computer.

“I’ve just called Gabe,” he said, when he’d finished sorting out her problem.

“Oh, yes. Has he bankrupted you yet?” she asked cheerfully.

“If he has, he was careful not to mention it.” A thought struck him. “I’m not sure I really care. It all seems a long way away. It’ll feel strange to go back.”

“Did Gabe mention when he was coming home?”

“No, we never got around to that.” He was suddenly reluctant to pursue that subject.

“He can’t leave it too long,” Claire said. “It’ll be spring soon, and that’s when the real work starts.”

“What we’ve been doing isn’t real work?” Randall asked plaintively.

“You think this is work? Just wait until we start calving. Then it’s up at all hours, checking, fretting, delivering calves when the mammas can’t do it on their own. We’re always exhausted. But there’s nothing like it. Nothing like being there when a newborn calf takes its first breath, when you’ve made a difference, when-” She checked herself. “Of course, you won’t be here, will you?”

“No,” he said abruptly.

Then, because he couldn’t think what to say next, he went away.

That became the pattern over the next few days. They would talk about something that seemed safe. Then one of them would stumble and bring the conversation to an abrupt end. She never asked him why he hadn’t come to her room that night, and he never broached the subject. Everything between them was unresolved, and likely to remain so forever, as the day of his departure neared.

Strangely, it was easier to communicate when they were not alone. He discovered that when she came in late one evening, when he was talking to North about the MBbar.

“I understand now why Gabe once told me he couldn’t live anywhere else,” Randall was saying. “I feel that way about my own land.”

“Yours? Thought you were just the heir,” North said.

“I am, but I rent one of my grandfather’s farms. I hardly see it because I’m chasing newspapers all the time, but I keep promising myself I’ll go back to farming for good.”

“Why don’t you?” Claire asked, pouring them both whiskey, and settling down on the floor, by the fire.

“Well, I can hardly let the old man down. His publishing empire means so much to him. So I let it drift, promising myself, next year, and next year.”

He sighed, looking into the drink.

“Now I feel like a man who found the right woman, deserted her, then found he’d made a mistake.”

The words hung between them. North looked from one to the other, but Claire’s eyes were on the fire, not Randall.

“It’s easy to make some kinds of mistakes,” she said.

“And some you spend your life paying for,” Randall agreed quietly. “It can be hard to know what you really want, and sometimes you only find out when it’s too late. And you think-if you’d done something sooner-”

“But maybe you can’t,” Claire interrupted. “We don’t really have any say, do we? Things happen, and we react, but it’s never really up to us. It’s like someone’s pulling the strings and having a good laugh.”

“Hell, Claire,” North said in alarm. “You’re a philosopher.”

She laughed shakily. “Nobody ever called me that before.”

“Philosophy doesn’t solve any problems,” Randall said. “Only feelings do that.”

It seemed a good moment for North to slip away, leaving them alone. And he did. But when he’d gone, Claire said awkwardly, “Well, I suppose it’s about time to be turning in.”

“Yes, it must be. Goodnight, Claire.”

“Goodnight, Randall.”

That’s how it was between them these days.

On the night of the dance Randall presented himself downstairs, hoping he looked right.

North was there, sunk deep in Jane Austen, which he’d carefully covered in brown paper. He jumped, but relaxed when he saw it was only Randall. Randall grinned.

North eyed the soft flannel plaid shirt. “That’ll do.”

“It’s Gabe’s.”

“I know. Claire gave it to him last birthday.”

“Oh, lord!” But before Randall could go up to change it Claire appeared on the stairs and both men turned, dumbstruck.

She’d swapped the flowered cotton for an olive-green silk that followed the lines of her figure with flattering emphasis. North indulged in a long, fervent wolf whistle.

“Claire, when you buy a new dress, you sure buy a new dress!” he exclaimed.

“It’s not new,” Claire said quickly. “I’ve had it over a year.”

North frowned. “Could have sworn I saw it in that catalogue you got two weeks back, and-”