The Texan's Bride (10 page)

“You’re wrong.” He wouldn’t be surprised to see smoke rising from them just then.

She mumbled her words. He picked up only “need,” “ready,” and “hot.”

“Hot?” he croaked.

“Boiling.” Katie nodded slowly, her voice husky and low. “Da told me you’re leaving. You confuse me. Branch Kincaid. I have the feeling that there is much more to you than you’ve ever let on, and I’ve attempted to understand why you’d make a deal with the vermin who burned our home. Are you trying to protect us still, Branch? Is that why you’re going to work for him?”

He didn’t answer. He couldn’t answer.

“I don’t want to believe that you’re one of the evil ones, Branch. But I don’t understand you. I hope you find whatever it is you’re looking for.”

“Holy hell, Sprite.”

“Since you’re headed to town… well, you’ve done so much for us, it’s the least I can do for you.”

He groaned hoarsely. “Sprite, I never thought you’d offer,” he said, crushing her to him. He took her lips in a long, lazy kiss, then pulled back in puzzlement when she struggled against him. “What are you doin?” he asked.

“Why… laundry!”

“Oh.” Undaunted, he rolled her beneath his taut frame and bestowed a kiss that rivaled the temperature of the wash water. By the time it ended, his own battling stick was anxious to agitate.

Weeks of frustration overwhelmed any chivalrous intentions he might have been fostering. She’d fought with him, played with him, talked with him, teased with him. The time had come for her to love with him.

He’d have her this one time before he left.

She didn’t fight. She was floating in a soap bubble besieged by a storm of sensation, aware that any moment now her filmy sphere of resistance would pop, leaving her victim to mutual desire. Sluggishly, she tried to rise above the tempest.

But the first, feather-light touch of his fingers as they slipped beneath the neckline of her dress burst the bubble. Although she didn’t trust him, she wanted him. He trailed wet kisses down her neck, following the path of his hand. She wanted to be a woman with him. He nuzzled the hard tips of her breasts through the thin calico. It’d been so long and he was leaving tomorrow.

He was leaving tomorrow
. The warning flashed through her mind, piercing her passion like lightning splits the sky. He’d take her, then leave her. He’d disappear just like everyone else.

Katie felt his arousal hard against her thigh. “No,” she said, pushing against his chest. She wouldn’t love him, she wouldn’t. She just might not survive it.

He didn’t stop; he wove magic that threatened her will as nothing before. Her thoughts became disjointed fragments. She drifted in a carnal haze.

Ironically, it was the very expertise of his seduction that pulled her back to reality. Steven never did this to her senses. Steven. Her husband.

As Branch’s overbold fingers swept beneath her skirt, the question flared in her mind. Did she really want the memory of a drifter she didn’t trust a whit to supplant the whispers from the past? No. She called upon the past to thwart the present and said, “We’ve got to stop,
Steven
. Oh,
Steven
, not here, not now.”

It took a moment, but Branch rolled off her, onto his back, and lay with his forearm flung over his eyes. The cords in his neck protruded, and Katie thought she heard his teeth grind. His chest rose and fell with deep, lung expanding breaths. He looked dangerous.

Katie sat up and straightened her clothing. She twisted the ribbon around her index finger as she edged away and stood. He never said a word.

Cautiously, she bent to collect his shirt. He shifted his arm and opened one eye to stare at her. His piercing gaze spoke volumes.

She looked away, out over the water. “I’ll… I’ll take th… th… this back and wash it. There’s a pair of man’s breeches in my trunk if you’d like to borrow them and add your pants to the laundry.”

A muscle in his cheek twitched. He ground out his words. “Wasn’t your husband’s britches I was thinking to wear. I’ll do my own damned wash.” He jerked to his feet, glaring, and dived into the winter-chilled waters of the river.

By the time his head broke the surface, Katie had fled.
Damn good thing, too
, he fumed. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt this kind of impotent rage.
No, not impotent. Definitely not impotent
.

He swam with angry strokes until the near-freezing water accomplished what he’d intended. Never, in all the years since he’d set out to do justice to the designation “rakehell,” had a woman, in the midst of amorous pursuits with him, with
him
, had the audacity to voice the name of another man right in the blessed middle of things.
Sonofabitch
!

Cold replaced the tension in his muscles created by the pressures of the past weeks, and he hauled himself onto the riverbank. He peeled the wet denim from his body. Standing, shivering, he looked around for something he could use to dry himself.

Mrs. Starr had left his shirt. He picked it up and rubbed the absorbent cotton across his chest. He remembered how she looked wearing it the day he got friendly with the briars. Teasing witch. She’d wanted him then. Hell, she wanted him today. He knew it.

The idea slithered into his thoughts. He grinned. Grabbing his boots and soggy clothing, he walked back toward the cabin and the laundry kettle. Naked. Whistling his battle hymn.

A NORTHER blew in overnight, and the morning dawned gray and lifeless. Katie remained closeted in her room, where she’d retreated after yesterday’s final confrontation with Branch Kincaid. He’d been naked as a newborn when he dropped his clothes into her laundry kettle. After he’d kissed her thoroughly and said, “The name’s Branch, don’t be forgettin’ it,” the rope that had tied her tongue tasted suspiciously like regret.

Now she heard stirring in the outer room, and something stronger than regret, she couldn’t put a name to it, filled her heart. He was leaving.

The rumble of muffled male voices reached her ears. She smelled the aroma of strong coffee.
I should have cooked him breakfast
, she thought. He liked her hoecakes. But he’d make Nacogdoches by noon, and last night’s leftover biscuits would hold him till then.

Nothing would ever hold Branch Kincaid.

Wood creaked as the front door opened. Katie sat on the edge of her bed, her hands clasped in her lap. Minutes passed as she pictured him walking to the barn and saddling Striker.

A gust of wind buffeted the kitchen, and she rose and walked to the window, telling herself she merely checked the weather. Bitter winter air swept into the room as she cracked open her shutter.

He was in the yard, mounted on the dun, his brightly colored poncho the single vision of warmth in the world outside. He wore his hat pulled low on his head, and a kerchief wrapped his nose and mouth. She saw nothing cold in his eyes, however, as his gaze met hers.

He nodded once, and then, as he gigged Striker and rode away from the remnants of Gallagher’s Tavern and Travelers Inn, sleet began to fall.

CHAPTER 6

THE DAY FOLLOWING BRANCH’S departure, they had come armed with axes and saws and hammers, what seemed like an army of men ready to attack the task they’d been hired to accomplish. With them they carried supplies to last the length of the job: food, canvas tents— one man even brought his wife. The wages were good, with bonuses promised for speed and quality work.

Behind them had rolled wagon after wagon loaded with expensive milled lumber. Now, after weeks of constant toil in weather that ranged from pleasant to bitter cold, Gallagher’s Tavern and Travelers Inn existed once more.

Katie, Daniel, and John anticipated a month or more of hard work ahead readying the hotel for guests. The Gallaghers would make many of the needed supplies themselves—some of the furnishings, mattresses, and decorative touches like window curtains—but many of the necessities were on order out of Jefferson, where riverboat traffic gave access to imported goods. Some had arrived already, but most were due within the next month.

With a little luck and a lot of hard work, the Gallaghers hoped to reopen the inn by midspring, when East Texas saw the greatest number of travelers.

While the workmen readied for their departure, Katie wandered from the parlor to the dining room, picturing the rooms filled with furniture and guests. Never had she imagined such splendor for Gallagher’s Inn; it was too extravagant, too costly.

It was financed by a stranger named Finian Trahern. She crossed the wide hallway that ran through the center of the structure to the long room that would serve as the new tavern. Da stood behind a long, polished wooden bar, whistling as he lined up bottles of liquor delivered from Jefferson earlier that morning. He went about his work with a vigor that had been absent from his movements for weeks, and the sight dissuaded Katie from mentioning her doubts yet again. Instead, she asked, “Da, where’s Daniel?”

“He’s upstairs. Our order of linen arrived with the whiskey, and he’s looking for a place to store it. Most likely he’ll be needing your help, Katie-love.”

“I’ll keep the sheets in that wardrobe Mrs. Craig sent us from Nacogdoches House. You know, Da, I don’t believe her claim that she had too much furniture in her boardinghouse. It’s charity.”

“Now, Katie,” Da said, frowning a rebuke. “I have the same sort of opinion as you about charity, but Martha Craig is simply being neighborly. Don’t be reading problems into kindnesses.”

“Yes, Da.” But as she made her way upstairs, she grumbled, “Just like I’m not questioning the largess of Mr. Finian Trahern. I swear Da is wearing blinders.”

She found Daniel playing marbles in room number eight, a stack of sheets beside him on the floor. “Hard at work, I see,” she commented in a wry tone. His guilty grin made her smile, and her pleasure at watching him move without pain prompted her to ruffle his hair and challenge him to a game.

She was on her hands and knees with her head lowered near the ground lining up a shot when a voice behind her groaned, “Good Lord, woman. Offer a man a target like that, and he’s liable to misfire his shooter.”

Marbles scattered everywhere as Katie flopped over, protecting her backside by sitting on it. Daniel shouted gleefully, “Mr. Branch! You’re here!”

“In the flesh,” he replied, never taking his gaze off Katie.

Her pulse hummed like honeybees swarming a sunflower. The very last person she had expected to see today was Branch Kincaid.

He wore his blue chambray shirt beneath a fleece-lined vest. Her stare snagged on the tin star pinned to the leather, and her stomach sank as hopes she hadn’t realized she harbored were dashed. He
had
gone to work for the sheriff. What was he doing here today? Why did he come back?

Katie forced herself to meet Branch’s gaze. His topaz eyes gleamed as he drawled, “Howdy, Sprite. Daniel.”

He shouldn’t have come here. Not now. Not when she’d been working so hard to forget him. Slowly, she climbed to her feet, paying careful attention to the dust she brushed from her skirt. “What brings you to Gallagher’s,” she paused and emphasized snidely, “
Deputy
?”

He frowned down at the star on his vest, then back at Katie. He opened his mouth to reply when Daniel interrupted, “Wow, a turkey!”

She hadn’t noticed the bird dangling at Branch’s side. His hands were not what attracted her attention. “Yes, Daniel,” she said cattily, “it is a turkey, and it looks as though he’s brought dinner with him.”

Branch retaliated with that slow, wicked grin. He laid his free hand against his chest, batted his eyelashes, and chirped, “Why, Miz Starr, you do say the sweetest things to a man.”

Her throat was as dry as the West Texas wind. “Pluck it, Kincaid.”

“Only if you have me for dinner,” he shot back. He held the bird out. “Now, Kate, I’ve hauled my turkey a far piece to visit with y’all, and I’m lookin’ for an invitation.”

Sometimes silence was a speech. Eventually Branch’s expectant expression faded. He shoved his burden into Daniel’s hands and took a step toward Katie. “Come on, Kate. Let me stay.”

“We don’t serve Regulators here.”

“I should hope not. They’re a whole lot tougher than turkey.”

“You’re disgusting, Mr. Kincaid,” she said, lifting her chin and squaring her shoulders. “I thought we’d seen the last of you. What brings you back?”

He grimaced. “Careful, now, you’ll hurt my feelings. I’m a tender sort of man, you know. Anyway, to answer your oh-so-sweet question, the talk in town is all about this place y’all are buildin’ out here. I wanted to see it for myself. You see, I once worked for Finian Trahern. He’s a right nice fella.”

“You know Mr. Trahern?” Katie asked, her pique forgotten at his words.

“Yep, right well, if I say so myself. You gonna cook for me, Kate?”

She wanted to, she really did, and she hated herself for it. Nodding slowly, she said, “Yes, I’ll roast your turkey for you. It’ll be my pleasure. Excuse me now, I have work to do.” She brushed past him out of the room, aware that he moved to lean against the doorway and watch her descend the stairs. She exaggerated the swing to her hips for good measure.

They sniped at each other all afternoon. After John gave Branch the grand tour of the new inn, the deputy appointed himself kitchen assistant and nearly drove Katie mad. He made an art of innuendo and a science of innocent touches. She considered shoving a drumstick down his throat and taking a carving knife to roaming hands.

He made her feel so alive.

By the time they sat down for dinner, Katie had mellowed just enough to call a truce. Her curiosity had yet to be satisfied. As she passed him the platter piled high with roasted turkey, she commented, “Earlier you mentioned Mr. Trahern. Tell us what you know of him, won’t you?”

John Gallagher’s brows lifted. “You know Trahern?”

Branch nodded and took a long draw on his tankard of ale. “Prince of a man. I worked for him awhile. He’s got a huge place down near Refugio in South Texas. Cotton mostly, some sugarcane. Racehorses are his passion.”