Harper Allen - Lone Rider Bodyguard

And detached was the right word, she thought unhappily now, taking in the straight line of his back and his precise movements as he set the coffeepot on the ancient cast-iron cook stove. She’d told Greta tonight—had it really been just a few hours ago? she wondered in tired amazement—that she’d done Tyler Adams a wrong. It was time to put that wrong right, if she could.

“Sugar-cured ham and sunny-side-up okay with you?” He threw the query over his shoulder as he opened the restaurant-size refrigerator and pulled out a bowl of brown eggs. “There’s not much point in going to bed now if I’m starting chores in a few hours, so I might as well make us some breakfast. Give me a second here and I’ll show you the spare first-floor bedroom. No cribs in the place as far as I know, but maybe we can rig something up with a dresser drawer for Danny to sleep in.”

“I’ll cook.” Rising from the table, she went to a hook on the wall and took down the striped cotton teacloth she’d noticed hanging there. It was big enough to serve as an apron and deftly she wrapped it around her waist, securing it with a neat knot. As Tye set a platter holding half a huge ham on the counter, she put a restraining hand on his arm.

Beneath her fingers was solid muscle. Warmth flooded through her before she tamped down the inappropriate reaction.

“Bannerman said you reported me missing. I—I’m sorry you were worried about us, Tye.” Her hand was still resting on his arm and she let it slip to her side. “I hoped you’d just put us out of your mind and continue on your way, I guess.”

This time the rush of warmth in her cheeks was shame. As her guilty gaze met his skeptical one, she shook her head.

“Oh, that’s a lie, and not even a white one,” she said, sliding her palms against the tea towel. “Granny Lacey used to say Mr. Scratch started with a body’s tongue first when he was trying to take over, and she was right. I knew you’d probably be looking for us, but when Greta showed up the way she did all I could think of was keeping Danny safe. It was like the story of baby Moses in the rush basket floating downstream out of danger,” she ended inadequately.

“Sorry, honey.” Under the once-white and now begrimed T-shirt he wore, broad shoulders lifted in a controlled shrug. “I’m far from being the Bible scholar you seem to be, so you lost me at the end there. But I’ll accept what you said about lying just now. You didn’t hope I’d forgotten you, Suze. You knew damn well I wouldn’t, just like I knew damn well you weren’t about to forget me anytime soon. Who the hell’s Mr. Scratch?”

“You swear too much.” Even as the automatic comment left her lips Susannah knew it was more of a defense than a reproof. Was it was her imagination or had the space between them, slight as it had been in the first place, lessened somehow? She took a step away from him, all her earlier misgivings suddenly flooding back.

Could you call a man beautiful? she asked herself, forcing a deep breath into her lungs in an attempt to dispel the unfamiliar edginess that was electrifying all her nerve endings. But breathing was a mistake. As she inhaled, the very scent of him seemed to rush into her—a scent compounded of cordite and skin salt and the faintest trace of the soap he’d presumably used earlier this evening.

He was beautiful. He was beautiful the way a stallion was beautiful, beautiful the way a timber wolf standing over its prey could be beautiful, beautiful because he was a perfectly built male animal.

And that overpowering maleness could make even someone like her forget everything else except the basic fact that she was a female.

“Mr. Scratch is the devil,” she said, making herself turn back to face him. “Bible scholar or not, you must have heard of him.”

“Red tail and horns, pointed beard?” He hacked off a couple of slices of ham, his question disinterested, and something about the careless tone of his voice roused a tiny spark of anger in her.

“I don’t think that’s what he looks like at all,” she said. “If he did we’d be able to recognize him, and he couldn’t do us any harm. If you’ll show me where Del keeps his skillets I’ll take over from here, Tye. I’m not partial to having a man in the way when I’m cooking.”

She started to move past him toward the stove, her posture rigid, but even as she took a second step he was in front of her, barring her way.

“Okay, so tell me, Suze,” he said, his tone edged. “How do you know him when you see him? What exactly does he look like, your Mr. Scratch?”

His hands were on her shoulders, and suddenly the worn cotton of her dress felt as insubstantial as shattered silk. He tightened his grip by a fraction, and at the barely noticeable adjustment she felt the fabric of her bodice tautening against the swell of her breasts. Instant heat suffused her, and this time when she tried to breathe she found she couldn’t. She stared up at him, her gaze painfully wide.

Steal the blue from the most perfect summer sky on the most perfect summer’s day and you’d have his eyes, she told herself. A woman could fall into that blue—fall straight in and never want to come out again. What would it be like to let those eyes see every inch of you, to feel that mouth everywhere on your skin, to forget everything you’d ever been taught and give yourself for just one sinful night to the de—

The breath she’d been trying to take slammed into her with the force of an arctic gale, sweeping away all heat and replacing the lassitude that had gripped her with cold awareness. She swallowed past the dryness in her throat, and he released his grip on her.

“I—I think he looks just like you, Tye,” she said unevenly. “That’s why he’s so dangerous.”

Just for a moment she would have sworn she saw something flash behind those eyes—something that could have been pain. Before she could identify the emotion it was gone.

Or maybe it hadn’t been there in the first place. A crooked smile lifted a corner of his mouth.

“What’s that expression about giving a dog a bad name?” This time it wasn’t her imagination. Without seeming to move at all, suddenly he’d lessened the distance between them to no more than a few inches. Behind her she felt the hard edge of the counter pressing into her back.

“Give a dog a bad name and he’ll bite?” she ventured. “Tye, I—”

“That’s it.” He bent his head, obliterating the last of her precious buffer zone. “You can call me off anytime, Suze,” he said, his tone velvety. “But maybe you don’t want to. Maybe after a lifetime of putting the devil behind you, just this once you’d like to be tempted.”

His last words were murmured against her lips. For the space of a heartbeat his gaze held hers, and during that heartbeat Susannah knew she should step away from him.

Her lips parted. Her veins felt suddenly as if they were filled with something much thicker than blood, something so heavy and hot she found it impossible to move her limbs. An identical heat pooled in the pit of her stomach and seemed to spill downward toward her thighs.

She heard herself sigh, the sound so light and insubstantial it was barely audible. His mouth came down onto hers before the soft exhalation was completed.

Tye’s tongue moved past her lips, past her teeth, and without conscious volition she felt herself opening up to him, her startled reaction based on instinct rather than experience. The next moment his palms were on either side of her face, pulling her closer to him and steadying her. His tongue went a little deeper, as if it were trying to coax her very soul from her, and some last spark of self-preservation flared desperately inside her.

With the half-formed intention of pushing him away she brought her hands up, but even as her fingers spread against the solidity of his chest he lifted his head.