Patch had tried to grow into the kind of woman Ethan could admire. She had spent the past eight years trying to become his ideal. It hadn"t been easy.
She hadn"t minded giving up fighting. If she never got another black eye, it wouldn"t break her heart. She hadn"t minded giving up trousers. Too much. Although she still resorted to them when she needed to ride astride. She hadn"t even minded learning manners. Having courteous, preplanned responses to every situation helped her immeasurably to maintain her self-control. Because she loved Ethan, she had always thought the sacrifices she had made were well worthwhile.
But she wanted Ethan to notice the changes. And he hadn"t. Yet.
Patch pursed her lips, wondering why Ethan hadn"t come back inside. It wasn"t like him to sulk.
"Do you know where your brother is?" she asked Leah.
"He was out on the porch last time I saw him."
Patch stepped onto the front porch and closed the door behind her. It was that gorgeous soft pink and gray time between daylight and dark. Everything seemed to cast a longer shadow. Patch thought she saw something move beside the house. "Ethan?"
"I"m right here."
Patch whirled to face him. He had stepped onto the porch behind her. Her swinging skirt wrapped around her legs, holding her paralyzed for a moment.
"I"m ready to go," she said.
"You look beautiful." Ethan hadn"t known he was going to say the words until they were already out. He walked in a circle around Patch. She stood perfectly still, but he could feel the s.e.xual vibrations radiating from her. He wanted to pick her up and carry her off somewhere, to take his time undressing her and then bury himself deep inside her. He wanted to be as close to her as two human beings could be to each other. He stopped behind her and breathed in the scent of her, something sweet and soft, like she was.
"You can still change your mind," he murmured in her ear. "You can stay here with me."
It was all Patch"s dreams come true. Ethan admired her. He wanted her. But the timing couldn"t have been worse. "I have to go, Ethan. I won"t stay late."
Rationally, Ethan knew why Patch was going to supper at Jefferson Trahern"s house. But it was one more piece of straw in the load he had been collecting since he had gotten out of prison. Lately, it seemed like so much of what happened in his life was beyond his control. His mother dying. His persecution by Trahern. His desire for Patch Kendrick. It left him feeling riled and edgy. Loaded to the muzzle with tamped-down rage.
He stalked around her until he was looking her in the eye. "A real lady wouldn"t be haring off into the dark all alone," he taunted.
Because he knew Patch so well, his barb stabbed her where she was most vulnerable. "A real lady would never get involved with an outlaw!" she shot back.
"A rapist outlaw!" Ethan hissed. "Watch yourself, Miss Kendrick. You never know when I might go crazy and attack you!"
Ethan snaked a hand around her waist and pulled her snug against him. Patch felt more anger than arousal, but Ethan was exhibiting equal measures of both.
Patch could see he was on the edge. She didn"t want to push him over. "Let me go, Ethan."
"You came all this way to marry me. Are you saying you don"t want me anymore?"
"Not this way!" she spat at him.
He released her as suddenly as he had taken her in his arms. They stood glaring at each other, panting.
"You know why I have to do this, Ethan. It isn"t fair to blame me-"
"You"re the same reckless brat you always were, Patch. Just dressed up in finer feathers," Ethan accused.
"Durn you for a long-eared-" Patch clapped her hand over her mouth. How had she allowed Ethan to provoke her into swearing at him? "I don"t know who set a burr under your saddle," she said. "But I"m not going to hang around to get stomped. I"ll be glad to discuss this further with you at another time, when you"re calmer."
She tried to cross past him, her head held high, but he snagged her elbow and wrenched her back around.
"Don"t walk away from me."
There was something in his voice when he spoke, a layer of need beneath the anger and arrogance, that kept Patch from struggling against his hold. "What do you want from me, Ethan?"
She shouldn"t have asked, because he made short work of showing her exactly what he wanted. She was in his arms so fast it made her head spin. His mouth latched on to hers in a savage kiss, and his arms crushed her tight. His hand found her breast and kneaded it through the satin.
G.o.d help her, she did nothing to stop him.
No lady Patch knew would have allowed such liberties to a man who wasn"t her husband. So maybe Ethan was right. Maybe she was the same shameless hoyden she had always been, dressed up in finer feathers. But she had always known that if it ever came to a choice between meeting Ethan"s ideals for a lady, and being the woman in his arms, she would always choose the latter.
At the sound of a horse approaching, Ethan abruptly let her go and slipped back into the shadows closer to the house.
"Patricia? Is that you?"
Patch took a step closer to the edge of the porch. "Boyd? What a surprise! What brings you here?"
"I came to make sure you get to Trahern"s place and back home safely," Boyd said as he stepped off his horse.
"Seems to me that"s asking the fox to guard the chicken coop," Ethan said as he emerged from the shadows.
Boyd laughed. "You"re just jealous."
"This is a very thoughtful gesture," Patch said, "but totally unnecessary. I don"t want to take you out of your way."
"It"s not out of my way." Boyd smiled, showing off his dimple. "You see, I"ve been invited to supper, too."
"You mean this wasn"t Ethan"s idea?" Patch asked, glancing at him from the corner of her eye.
"h.e.l.l, no, it wasn"t my idea!" Ethan bit out.
Patch turned to Boyd for an explanation, which he quickly gave.
"When Trahern mentioned that Merielle had asked you to join her tonight, I volunteered myself to be your escort."
"Why, thank you, Boyd, I guess," Patch said.
"You don"t mind, do you, Ethan?" Boyd asked his friend. "I promise to make sure Patricia gets home safe and sound."
Ethan leaned against the post that held the tin roof up over the porch. "No problem. I"m sure Patch-Patricia-will enjoy your company."
"Are you sure you don"t mind, Ethan?" Patch asked.
"Why should I mind?" Ethan smiled, but there was no joy in it that Patch could see. He had his hands stuck in the back of his Levi"s and his boots crossed at the ankle. It was a relaxed pose, but Patch could feel the hostility rolling off him in waves.
"Go on, Patch," Ethan said. "Boyd"s waiting."
Patch turned and walked away from Ethan. It seemed safer for Boyd if she stepped down off the porch, rather than have Boyd come up to get her. When she reached Boyd"s side, he put his arm around her shoulder. He made it seem like the most natural thing in the world. His touch was light, and Patch had the feeling that all she had to do was shrug the slightest bit and it would be gone. So she did nothing to make him remove it.
Boyd led her to the buggy Ethan had brought around to the front of the house and helped her step up to the seat.
"All right if I leave my horse here?" Boyd asked.
"I"ll put him in the barn for you," Ethan said.
Once Patch was settled in the buggy, she met Ethan"s eyes. They were fierce with emotions that changed from moment to moment. Anger, resentment, need, desire, then anger again.
"Good night, Ethan," she called to him as Boyd turned the buggy away from the house. She had the feeling she was leaving something important behind her. She looked back over her shoulder, wishing she were on the porch with him. Then Boyd said something to her, and she turned to answer him.
Ethan stood watching the buggy until it disappeared into the dark. He fought back the terrible jealousy he felt of his friend. Ethan had seen the look in Boyd"s eyes when they followed Patch. It had taken all his restraint not to lay Boyd flat.
But Ethan had to stop thinking about his own wants and needs, and start thinking about Patch. She belonged with a man like Boyd. Boyd could give her all the fine things Ethan couldn"t. Boyd would be good to her. If Jewell at the Silver Buckle was to be believed, Boyd was good with a woman in bed. If Boyd offered to marry Patch, she would have everything a woman could want in a husband. Except, that husband wouldn"t be him.
He wondered when and how his feelings for Patch had changed. He certainly hadn"t been aware of it happening. All he knew was that his need for Patch now didn"t all reside behind the b.u.t.tons of his jean"s.
When Ethan turned to go back inside, he found Leah staring at him from the doorway. His heart leapt to his throat. Ma. "What is it, Leah? What"s wrong."
"It"s Calico. Her babies are crying, but she hasn"t come to them. I"ve looked everywhere, but I can"t find her."
Ethan"s heart started beating normally again. From the distress on her face, Ethan had been afraid Leah was going to tell him their mother was dead. Instead, it was only a missing cat.
Ethan put a hand around Leah"s shoulder to rea.s.sure her. He was amazed at how thin she was. He pulled her close against his hip. "Let"s go look together. She can"t have gotten far."
In the first moments after they drove away from the ranch, when Patch realized she was all alone with a virtual stranger-a handsome, debonair man who had let it be known he found her attractive-she felt self-conscious. Boyd didn"t allow that feeling to last long.
He relaxed forward with the reins in his hands, spread his knees wide, leaned his forearms on his thighs, stared straight ahead between the horse"s ears, and said, "Do you know what my earliest recollection is of Ethan?"
As simply as that, Boyd relieved her discomfort, aroused her curiosity, and gained her complete attention. "What?"
"My pa was drifting around Texas looking for work, and we rode up to the Double Diamond, my pa sitting on this walleyed, goose-rumped, bandy-legged mare that couldn"t chase a cow if her life depended on it, and me perched up there behind him, my legs spread wide over the croup of that old cayuse.
"This boy about my age was sitting cross-legged on the front steps of a shiny white house like he owned the place. He was petting a black and white spotted hound dog, and oh, how I envied him!"
"For the house, or for the dog?" Patch asked with a grin.
"Both. And for the parents he had sitting in rockers on the porch behind him. His pa was smoking a pipe, just watching the sun go down, and his ma was knitting something yellow.
"Ethan jumped up and trotted down the porch steps, that hound b.i.t.c.h right beside him. His ma warned him off-my pa wasn"t much into shaving or baths, and we must"ve been a sorry-looking sight-but Ethan kept on coming. That"s when his pa joined him.
"Didn"t take me long to figure out that the reason Ethan hadn"t been worried about coming down those steps to meet us was because he knew his father would be there to help him out if he got into trouble.
"Ethan"s pa stood right next to Ethan, even put a hand on his shoulder. Ethan looked up. His pa looked down. Didn"t say a word, either one of them. But I could see they were having a whole conversation."
Boyd shifted his head from side to side, playing first one role, then the other.
"What do you think, son?"
"I wanta meet that boy, Pa."
"Don"t look too respectable, son."
"But I need someone to play with, Pa."
"We"ll see, son. We"ll see."
"Then the two of them turned to look at us, waiting to hear what my pa had to say."
Boyd slowed the buggy as they came to a particularly rutted section of the road. When they were past it, he flicked the reins and resumed his story.
"That"s the picture of Ethan I carried with me when he was gone all those years, running from the law and in prison. Him and his pa standing there together, the two of them against the world. When I was a kid, I used to imagine myself in his place.
"Anyway, my pa asked for work, and Ethan"s pa took another look at him and that pitiful excuse for a horse he was riding, and I could see he was going to turn him down.
"Ethan"s pa was already making apologies when Ethan"s ma interfered. She said sure they had some work for my pa and the two of us were welcome to bed down in a room in the barn."
Patch laid a hand on Boyd"s arm. "Your father actually worked for Ethan"s?"
Boyd nodded. "We stayed at the Double Diamond for three years. That was longer than my pa had ever been anyplace. You see, Mrs. Hawk took one look at me and saw a motherless waif who needed tending. She wasn"t about to send me off alone with my drunken pa.
"During that time, Ethan and I became fast friends. We shared everything." Boyd smiled. "Or rather, he shared everything he had with me. I didn"t have much of my own."
"Why did you leave?" Patch asked.
"Pa got drunk once too often and accidentally burned down the barn. We had no place to live anymore. But Ethan"s pa made sure my pa got work, and Jefferson Trahern let us use a line shack on the edge of his property to live in. That"s where I grew up."
"So Ethan"s family and the Traherns really were friends before all this happened."
"Sure were. That one night changed all our lives."
"You"ve come a long way from being the boy you just described to me. And you don"t strike me as being anything like your father. What made the difference?"
Boyd shrugged carelessly. "Funny how it all came about. I had an aunt who died and left me some money. I used it to buy a small place. Over the years, I"ve managed to make my nest egg grow."
"There"s something I don"t understand. If you"re Ethan"s friend, why did Trahern invite you to supper tonight?"
"Purely a business matter," Boyd said.
Because they had reached their destination, Patch didn"t have a chance to pry further.
The instant Boyd stopped the buggy, Merielle came running out of the house to greet Patch. "I"m so glad you"re here. I was afraid you wouldn"t come!"
Patch was impressed anew with Merielle"s beauty. She was dressed in an exquisite evening dress that showed off the woman she was. The short-sleeved gown was made of white tulle and trimmed with cloth zinnias of rich, bright colors along the square-necked bodice and in a trailing diagonal spray across the layered skirt. She wore a coronet of real zinnias around her upswept hair and a necklace of gold pendants set off her flawless skin.
The picture of a poised, confident young woman was not what it seemed. Merielle quickly stepped back as Boyd crossed past her on his way to Patch"s side of the buggy. Patch realized she was seeing, for the first time, Merielle"s reactions to a man she didn"t know well. The young woman had plainly put some s.p.a.ce between herself and the stranger.
Merielle waited until Patch had taken several steps away from Boyd before she approached and slipped her arm through Patch"s. She ignored Boyd and urged Patch inside. "Come on in. Father"s waiting for you in the parlor."
The way Merielle had greeted, or rather, not greeted Boyd made Patch wonder whether the girl had an aversion to all strange men, or just this one.