The Hopechest Bride (8 page)

He especially needed to hear it now, now that he'd felt himself dangerously sliding into that same trap Toby had embraced so eagerly. A trap laid by a riot of chestnut curls, a pair of large, innocent blue eyes and a matched set of dimples in her sweetly beautiful face.

She was no china doll, not the least bit fragile-looking. Her build was fairly athletic, with good shoulders and narrow hips. Dolly Parton wouldn't have to worry about any competition in the bust-size department, and yet…and yet there was just something about the way she moved that was so entirely female, so enticing….

Josh shook his head, shook himself back to reality.
He was here because this woman had caused the death of his brother. Not deliberately, but caused it just the same. By the sin of omission, the sin of not being straight with Toby, not telling him who she was, why she was hiding in Keyhole—not telling him that she might be bringing danger to Keyhole.

And she'd left him. She'd let him rescue her, take a bullet for her, and then she'd left him.

Josh wasn't about to forget that.

Having run out of chores, and his resolve back in place, Josh returned to the campfire to see Emily trying to arrange the opened sleeping bag over the layered ground sheets.

“Here, let me help you,” he said, grabbing onto the sleeping bag and spreading it carefully. “Nice material. Light, and yet probably warmer than it looks.”

“It's new,” Emily said avoiding his eyes as she gave the material a two-handed pat, as if making sure it wouldn't move, fly away. “Right or left?”

Josh hadn't been paying attention. “Pardon me?”

“I said, right or left?” Emily repeated. “I sleep on my right side, so I'd like to be on the right, if that's okay with you?”

He also slept on his right side, and had a quick mental image of the two of them sleeping, spoon-like, his belly to her back, his arm snug around her waist, their legs entangled underneath the covers.

“Left,” he said, longing to clear his throat, which had suddenly gone tight—almost as tight as his jeans. He dropped his hands, clasped them together in front
of himself, hoping the dark of the cave would do the rest. “I'll take the left side. But we'll have to lose one of the saddles, share one, or else we'll be too far apart. Body heat, remember?”

“We'll try it first my way, which means you on your side, and me on mine,” Emily told him stiffly, even as she crawled across the sleeping bag, her bent head nearly colliding with his knees. She pulled back the cover, slid beneath it, her head resting on the seat of the saddle. “Man,” she said, moving about, clearly trying to get comfortable, “I haven't done this in a long time.”

“Slept with a man?” Josh winced, his mouth moving way too much faster than his brain.

“I've never—” Emily covered her face with both hands for a moment, then angrily yanked the covers up and over her shoulders. “I haven't slept here in the cave for a long time. Get your mind out of the gutter, please, Mr. Atkins. Your
brother
was a gentleman.”

“Yeah,” Josh grumbled, stepping over Emily's body and sitting down on his saddle, ready to remove his boots. Damn, the woman was a virgin. How the hell had that happened? Was the whole male world blind? Doggedly, he kept insulting her. “He sure was a gentleman. And look where that got him.”

Emily remained silent, which was probably a good thing, and Josh tossed his boots to one side, then slid his long body under the sleeping bag.

He lay on his back, looking up at the dark roof of
the cave, one arm bent behind his head as he wished himself anywhere but where he was at this moment. The dying fire cast strange, moving shadows against the craggy roof, and an ever-changing wind often blew smoke back into the cave, to hang high against the rock.

Ghost riders in the sky. Josh could see them up there, shades of old cowboys, riding their ghostly horses through eternity. Was that his destiny? Without Toby around to settle him, ground him, would he spend the rest of his life following the rodeo circuit, taking odd jobs in the off-season, growing old and tough and doing it all alone?

What else was out there for him? A home, a family? Toby had been his family—did he really want another? Could he survive losing another? Losing Toby had damn near destroyed him.

Josh turned his head to the right, unable to see the color of Emily's hair in the darkness, but able to discern the outline of her slim body beneath the sleeping bag. Emily Colton had a family. A large family. Where had that gotten her?

She couldn't take too much comfort from them, or she wouldn't be here, hiding away in a cave rather than staying safe and warm with her loved ones. Hell, her loved ones had damn near gotten her killed.

Maybe there was something to say for his solitary life, a life without entanglements.

So he'd end up with arthritic knees and a bad back. He'd wear his scars, and his injuries, and he'd soon
spend more time in bars tossing back beers and reminiscing about the good old days than he would in the ring. The rodeo was a mistress, a tough mistress, a demanding mistress.

Maybe he'd been following that mistress for too long. If he'd only broken away sooner, turned his back, Toby might be alive now…and he wouldn't be here, in a damp cave, trying to keep his mind and hands off the woman who'd helped kill him.

Josh held his breath, listening in the dark for the sound of Emily Colton's breathing. The horses whinnied and blew softly, the fire crackled as it burned down and the wind continued to howl. Thunder rolled off in the distance.

And yet, through it all, he swore he could hear, not Emily Colton's breathing, but the chattering of her teeth. Not that she'd say anything, not that she'd complain.

Stubborn woman.

Idiot man. Idiot because he worried, idiot because he cared. He sat up, pushed his saddle out of the way, then lifted the covers up and over his shoulder as he turned on his right side.

He moved closer, until he felt the stiffness of her rigidly held body, then lay down, his head mashed uncomfortably on the high-rising back ridge of her saddle. It didn't matter. Being uncomfortable didn't matter. Because he'd never sleep tonight, not with the heat of Emily Colton's body burning into him, not with his arm wrapped around her thin waist, his fin
gers itching to touch what lay higher—her smooth stomach, the rise of her breasts.

He couldn't remember ever passing a whole night with a woman in his bed. He certainly knew he'd never spent the night with a virgin.

“G
randma's going to be so happy to see your new braces, Sparrow,” Meredith said, smiling into the rearview mirror at Emily, who did not smile back.

“I'm not going to show her,” Emily said, barely opening her lips to speak. “I'm not going to show anyone. Sophie called me Metal Mouth. And Amber said how now I could get in radio stations all the way from San Francisco. She said I was one big antenna head.”

“Sisters. They tease,” Meredith said on a sigh. “And remember, both Sophie and Amber had braces, and their brothers teased them. It's a family tradition, handed down from child to child, and just shows how much they love you.”

“Well, I don't like them much right now, and I hate these braces. They hurt and I can't chew gum and Inez wouldn't let me have corn on the cob last night. She sliced it all off the cob. It doesn't taste as good that way.”

“It's true, sweetheart, there are sacrifices to be made. But just remember that soon your teeth will be all nice and straight and that prettiest smile in the whole world will be even prettier.” Meredith took another peek in the rearview mirror. “Emily, push your seat belt lower over your belly, okay? It shouldn't be riding so high on your waist, in case we have an accident.”

Emily did as she was told then, because she was in a bad mood anyway, groused, “I don't see why I can't sit up front with you. I haven't sat in the back seat since I was a baby.”

“The seat belt up here is broken, Sparrow, and we're going to get it fixed tomorrow. In the meantime, pretend you're the lady of the manor, and I'm your chauffeur, okay?”

Emily brightened at that. “Does that mean I can give you orders?”

“Your wish, madam, is my command.”

Giggling, Emily folded her arms over her belly, tipped back her head and commanded: “To the ice cream parlor, my good man, and step on it!”

“What about your grandmother?”

“Oh, yeah. Well, we'll pick her up on the way. Grandma likes ice cream, too.”

“Yes, ma'am, anything you say, ma'am,” Meredith agreed, tipping an imaginary hat to her “employer” in the back seat, and Emily laughed, her smile wide, her braces forgotten.

A tune Emily particularly liked came on the radio and she asked Meredith to turn up the volume. They both began to sing along, Emily laughing when Meredith stumbled over a few of the words.

Happy. They were so happy. And then Meredith looked in the rearview mirror again, probably to see Emily's smiling face, and her hands tightened on the steering wheel.

“Now why is that car following us so closely? The road's deserted except for the two of us, and it's a passing zone. Oh, just go around me if you're in such a hurry,” Meredith said, addressing the occupant of the following car as if the driver could hear her.

Emily turned in her seat, trying to look out the rear window, but the seat belt restricted her movement. She sat forward once more, feeling the power of the car as Meredith stepped on the gas.

“Sit front, Emily, and hold on. There's barely any shoulder here in front of the ditch. I'm going to pull off up ahead, where there's a rest zone, and let this idiot driver by. He's so close I can't even see his grill.”

Emily did as she was told, reacting to her mother's calm yet deadly serious tone, closing her eyes as the scenery whipped by, the interior of the car quiet be
cause Meredith had pushed the button that turned off the radio.

And then it happened. A bump. A bump from the rear. Once. Twice.

“Hey!” Emily yelled, angry, but more frightened than anything else. “Hey—cut it out! Mom, make him cut it out!”

But Meredith didn't answer except to say, “Cover your face with your hands, Sparrow! Protect your face!” because a third bump, harder than the others, had sent the car onto the small shoulder of the road, the right rear tire blowing as it dropped down from macadam to gravel. Meredith struggled to regain control, but couldn't get the two right wheels back up on the macadam.

They kept going, but now they were going sideways, sliding, heading hood-first into the ditch…then stopping all of a sudden, so that Emily's body was shoved forward, roughly pulled back by her shoulder harness. Her head was jarred to the right as the car tipped onto its side, and she hit the side window, and everything went black…

“Mommy…” Emily blinked, and just blinking made her head hurt so badly. “Mommy…”

She opened her eyes again, fighting the pain, and looked toward the front seat. There was her mommy, still sitting in the driver's seat, her forehead bleeding.

No. There was her mommy, pulling open the drivers' side door, leaning in, looking at Emily.

Two mommies?

Oh, her head hurt. Emily's head really, really hurt. “Mommy, something's wrong with me. I can't see right. Mommy, my head hurts. And my belly's sick. I'm going to be sick.”

“Shut up, you whiny little brat!”

Emily looked at her mother, at both of her mothers, and began to cry. One of the mommies had yelled at her. Shocked—in shock—Emily watched as one of the mommies opened the back door and crawled in beside her.

“Here, drink this. It will make you feel better.”

“Don't want…don't want…”

Emily felt her head go back as her mommy pulled hard on her hair, and the next thing she knew she was choking on a horrible-tasting liquid…which was also the last thing she knew until she woke up in the hospital, hours later, to see one of the mommies looking down at her in the bed.

“Which mommy are you?” she asked, her mouth dry, her head aching.

The mommy looking down at her just smiled….

“No! You're not the right one, you're not the right one! Where's my mommy? What did you do with my real mommy? Mommy? Mom! Mom!”

“Wake up, Emily. Come on. You're having a dream. Just a dream. Wake up for me, wake up now.”

Emily opened her eyes and looked straight into the piercing blue eyes of Josh Atkins as he hovered just above her. His shaggy hair fell forward over his forehead, and he had a heavy, golden-brown stubble on
his cheeks. His mere closeness made her pulse leap, her mouth go dry.

Emily's heart still pounded hurtfully in her chest, but she was coming awake now, the nightmare was fading. She wasn't in the hospital. She wasn't eleven years old. She was in her cave. She was lying down, and Josh Atkins, who hated her, was leaning over her, his body pressed close to hers.

“Get off me!” she ordered, pushing at his shoulders with both hands. “Just get your big, stupid self
off
me!”

He stayed where he was. “Not exactly a morning person, are you?” he asked, then slowly withdrew, to lie down beside her as she shivered at the withdrawal of his body heat. “Want to tell me about it? That must have been one hell of a dream.”

Emily would have gotten up, except that she was already chilled, and the fire was out, and it was still raining outside the mouth of the cave, the dawn gray, forbidding. “No-o-o, I don't want to tell you about it. I'm too busy wishing you on the other side of the world.”

“Nice. Real polite of you,” Josh said, pulling his saddle forward from where he'd pushed it last night and settling himself against it, half lying, half sitting. “You were calling for your mother. Your
real
mother. I'm not a rocket scientist, but I have read all the newspaper stories that have been out there lately. You were in the car, weren't you, the day Meredith Colton's sister ran her into a ditch, then changed
places with her? How'd she do that anyway? The papers were sort of vague. I mean, that St. James place was more than a half hour's distance away from the crash site. How did she get Mrs. Colton there, and then get back to the car where you were? Didn't anyone pass by? Didn't anybody stop?”

Emily's hands closed into fists at her side. She didn't want to talk about this, just wanted to forget it. Yes, her questions had been answered, all of them, but the dreams, instead of fading, had only become more clear. Used to be, she couldn't remember Patsy climbing into the back seat, couldn't remember having medicine poured down her throat. That memory had come back after Patsy's confession. Maybe that was why the dreams wouldn't go away. Maybe she had to live through the whole thing, just one time, before she could tuck her memories away, lock them behind a closed door in her mind.

She pushed herself up a little, dragging part of the sleeping bag with her as she leaned against her saddle. She should be telling Martha Wilkes what she remembered now, not Josh Atkins. Still, the nightmare was so vivid, still scaring her, and if she didn't tell someone, anyone, soon, it would probably haunt her all day.

“She drugged me, then somehow got both Mom and me into her own car. She tied a white handkerchief around the antenna of Mom's car, so that it just looked like a disabled vehicle, abandoned and await
ing towing, which is why nobody stopped. Who stops to look inside an empty car?”

“Smart, I suppose. Then what?”

Emily pushed a hand through her hair, then tugged at the band holding it, pulling it off, then shaking her head so that her curls tumbled around her shoulders. She raised a hand to pull the curls forward, to cover her cheeks, hide her expression…then stopped. Sophie had made her too aware of her “ostrich” mannerism for Emily to take any comfort in it anymore.

“Patsy—that's my mom's sister—said she drugged Mom, then put her out of the car on the St. James grounds, where the authorities would find her, recognize her as Patsy because Patsy had once been an inmate—patient—there, and treat her. Lock her up. Which they did. And with Mom having amnesia? Well, it certainly didn't help Mom, but it sure helped her sister.”

“And you?”

“I don't remember, of course, but Patsy explained that she went back to the scene—the whole thing must have taken about two hours—parked her car down the road, put a white handkerchief on
that
antenna, then carried me back to Mom's car. Actually, she didn't make it back to the car before someone came along to help her, but she just acted all dazed and confused, saying she'd been in an accident and was trying to take me somewhere to get help. She's quite an actress, Patsy is, and wearing Mom's clothes,
carrying me…well, it worked. It shouldn't have, but it did. It worked for ten long years.”

“Nobody ever checked on Patsy's car? The one that was left on the side of the road? Saw the damage? I mean, there must have been damage to the front end, where she rammed your car.”

Emily turned her head, looked at Josh. “Deductive reasoning,” she said, smiling ruefully. “Now I know where Toby got it from. Yes, they checked on that car, but it was stolen—Patsy had stolen it—and it had been wiped clean of prints. The conclusion was that some teenagers had stolen the car, gone joy riding and then panicked, run, after hitting our car.”

“Panicked. But took the time to wipe off any fingerprints. You know, Emily—Miss Colton—if anyone ever wants to go handing out blame or feeling guilty about how easily Patsy Portman carried this whole thing off, there'd be a long, long line of candidates for the honor.”

Emily nodded. “I know. But you have to remember something else. This was Joe Colton's wife. Senator Joe Colton's wife. All he cared about was Meredith, and me. We were all right, and an investigation, even an arrest, would have plastered the whole thing all over the newspapers. Mom—Patsy—asked him to let it go, told him the only thing that mattered was that she and I were all right. He listened to her, and the police listened to him. Case closed. Oh, and you can stop calling me Miss Colton. I think we've gone beyond that, don't you?”

“Don't you,
Josh,
” he answered, throwing back the sleeping bag and reaching for his boots. “All right,
Emily.
How about you get the camp stove lit and boil us some water for coffee, while I take care of the horses. As you might have noticed if you lifted your nose a fraction, it's time to muck out the cave.”

Emily smiled evilly, somehow feeling much better. Good enough to tease. “Gee, I thought that was you,” she said, then pulled the covers over her head until he'd grumbled, then walked away. Only then she did dare to emerge from under the sleeping bag cover, find her own boots and warm coat, and then go search out the travel packets of instant coffee she'd luckily packed in her backpack.

Fifteen minutes later, she and Josh were sitting cross-legged on the sleeping bag, sipping steaming coffee. “I hope you don't need cream, because I don't have any. I always take mine black.”

“This is fine,” Josh said, taking another sip from one of the chipped ceramic mugs Emily kept stored in the plastic container. “I guess it's time for that inventory now. I've got beef jerky, some packs of instant oatmeal—although we might want to check the expiration date—and a bag of M&M's.”

“A bag of M&M's? That's all you have?”

He shrugged rather sheepishly, and Emily had to look away, because he looked so damn appealing, even with—or maybe because of—his morning beard.

“Hey, I didn't plan on being out here. The way I
figured it, I'd see you, talk to you, and be back in my bunk at Rollins Ranch before nightfall.”

Emily tipped her head to one side, looked at him closely. “Yes, about that. How did you know I was coming up here? Did you
follow
me?” She sat back. “You did. You
followed
me. I sort of thought you might have, and maybe you even said something about it. Yes, I'm sure you did. But I was too upset and cold last night to give it much thought. You
followed
me, Josh Atkins. How could you
do
that?”