Debra Cowan - Whirlwind Wedding

“Wait—”

His leg gave out. She clutched at him as he grabbed for the wall behind her. Agony wrenched his leg, rattling his teeth.

“Damn,” he muttered raggedly. Nausea rolled through him and sweat broke out across his forehead.

After long seconds, his breathing still uneven, he leaned against the wall.

Not the wall. Catherine Donnelly.

Bracing his weight on his good arm, Jericho eased back enough to look at her. She stood motionless, her gaze trained on his bare chest. Beyond the pain of his leg, a different kind of throbbing moved into his groin. Well, he could rest easy about the question of his manhood.

He felt every inch of her, and those inches felt damn good. The reason for his being here jumbled with the quicksilver reaction of his body to hers. Hard man to soft woman. Through the light fabric of her wrapper, her breasts teased his chest, while her hips and thighs pressed to his. Her breath fluttered against his throat, making his blood pound. He wanted to kiss her, peel down the straps of her nightdress and see the breasts shadowed beneath the fine lawn fabric. He wanted to run his hands through her hair, over her body.

“You are so sweet.” It took a second for him to realize he’d whispered the words. In that instant, he registered something else, too.

Though she stood rigid against him, she trembled—not fighting him, but warning him off all the same.

He shifted so that moonlight fell over his shoulder. She stared straight ahead, her face ghostly pale, her lips compressed.

“Catherine?” His whisper sounded harsh in the silence.

Her gaze lifted slowly to his and Jericho drew back. Terror swam in her eyes. He recognized that fear, and it had nothing to do with what he knew about her brother and the McDougals. She didn’t fear him as a Ranger. She feared him as a man.

C atherine wasn’t going to scream; she wouldn’t panic. She needed to breathe.

At first Jericho had sagged against her in pain, but that had changed. Even with her limited experience she recognized the awareness that thickened the air between them. She tensed. His body was no longer rigid with agony. Now his hard lines molded to her curves; his thighs caged hers.

She had to be smart. She could get away if she were smart.

She didn’t think Jericho would hurt her, but she hadn’t believed that man in New York City would, either. Until it was almost too late.

Panic exploded inside her. “Get off,” she said dully, dragging in air. “Get off.”

The Ranger eased back until he was no longer touching her. His arms still kept her against the wall. “Catherine?”

She thought she might be sick. Not from the way his body had felt against hers—it hadn’t been entirely unpleasant—but from the way her stomach rolled over. “Get off. Please.”

“You better do it, mister.”

Both Catherine and Jericho jumped at the sound of Andrew’s voice in the doorway. The sharp cock of a shotgun ripped through the room like the crack of a whip. She jerked toward her brother and saw pale light skimming the barrel of their father’s shotgun. “Andrew!”

“Put that gun down, boy.” Jericho lifted his injured arm. “There’s no call—”

“Back away from her or I’ll shoot.”

He slowly pushed away from the wall and Catherine saw pain slash across his face. Sweat gleamed at his temple. She realized he had truly needed her support. “Andrew, everything is all right. Lieutenant Blue hurt his leg again and I was helping him back to bed.”

“That ain’t what it looked like. It looked like he was trying to take advantage of you.”

“I wasn’t.” Jericho hobbled back a step, his hands raised to shoulder level. “Son, you shouldn’t be pointing that gun. See, I’m moving away.”

“Not far enough.” Andrew gestured with the weapon, indicating Jericho should go farther.

“Andrew, please.” Catherine went to him, shaken as much by what she had felt with Jericho as she was that her brother held a gun on her patient. “Lieutenant Blue is in no shape to harm me. Certainly the gun isn’t called for.”

Andrew glared up at her.

Jericho reached the bed and sagged down upon it with a grunt.

Catherine turned toward him, concerned at the paleness of his face.

Agony carved his features. “Your sister’s right, Andrew.”

“Then what were you doing to her?”

“I fell. She was between me and the wall. That’s all.”

“He heard a noise and got up to check,” Catherine said. “Please put that gun down.”

Andrew kept the weapon leveled at the Ranger.

Though Jericho sat and Andrew stood, neither broke eye contact. She stood between them, trying to decipher their silent communication. “The lieutenant hit his injured leg on the table in the kitchen and I was helping him back to bed.”

Her brother’s gaze narrowed suspiciously on the big man behind her.

“I wouldn’t hurt your sister.” Jericho’s voice was gritty with pain, his silver gaze locked on the boy. “Not after all she’s done for me.”

Finally Andrew lowered the weapon, and Catherine let out a deep sigh. She felt Jericho’s relief as keenly as her own. Her heart thundered in her chest as she considered whether to hug Andrew or shake him until his teeth rattled.

She had never seen her brother be protective of her. Since her arrival three weeks ago, he hadn’t appeared to care about her. Why now? Did Andrew feel Jericho was a threat because he had witnessed her own panic?

“Let me have that thing.” She took the gun from him and gingerly carried it to its place behind the front door. “You scared me to death.”

“Sorry,” he mumbled.

She returned to find him still eyeing Jericho with distrust.

“I think you should apologize to Lieutenant Blue.”

Andrew’s chin came up.

“No,” the Ranger said. “He was protecting you, and there’s nothing wrong with that.”

Her brother’s eyes widened and Catherine searched the Ranger’s face. Compassion was something she hadn’t expected from the rough-looking man. But perhaps she shouldn’t be surprised. The death of his friend, Hays, the Ranger who had arrived with him, had visibly affected Jericho.

“Very well. You don’t need to apologize, Andrew.” The Ranger’s pallor was too marked for further argument. She would have words with Andrew alone, though she wouldn’t be harsh. He had been protecting her, and she wondered if perhaps they might develop a closeness, after all.

She slid an arm around his shoulders, surprised when he allowed her touch. “I think we’ve had enough excitement for tonight,” she murmured. “Let’s get back to bed.”

“All right.” Her brother gave Jericho one last warning look before letting Catherine nudge him toward his room.

Even though her pulse slowed, she still felt the imprint of the Ranger’s body against hers. Chills rose on her arms. They had nothing to do with fear, a fact that unsettled her to no end.

In Andrew’s room, she straightened his sheet and patted the husk-filled mattress. “I appreciate what you did, Andrew—”

“But you’re mad at me.”

She paused. “I’m concerned. You held a gun on a man.”

He frowned as if he couldn’t understand why she worried.

“What if that weapon had gone off?”

“I know how to use it.”

“Would you have?”

He shrugged. “If I had to.”

“Oh, my.” She paced around his bed. “Are you saying that you could kill if necessary?”

“If that Ranger had hurt you, I would have,” he said fiercely.

“But he didn’t.”

“You acted like he did.”

“I was taken aback when he fell against me.” She didn’t want to recall the pleasant warmth that had spread through her after the initial jolt of panic. His entire body had hardened against her. As he was clad only in his lightweight drawers, Catherine had been keenly aware of his body’s reaction. Every rigid inch of it.