Cherish

  “Where is everyone?” she asked.

  “Mindin’ their business.”

  From that reply, Rebecca deduced that her husband had ordered the men to make themselves scarce. True to his word, Race cut a length of rope and fashioned her a belt. Then he bent down to roll up the pant legs so she wouldn’t trip.

  “There just ain’t a helluva lot to you, is there, darlin’?” he said, nudging his hat back to lazily peruse her body. By the time his gaze locked with hers, a smoldering shimmer had begun to warm his. “Mm-mm,” he declared with a wolfish grin. “You’re sure put together nice, though.”

  Rebecca’s face went hot. She glanced up to make sure no one had heard him. Mr. Grigsley was the only person in sight, and he was quite some distance away, doing something by the chuck wagon. “If you think I’m going to simply stand here and display myself, you’re wrong.”

  “That ain’t my plan.” He pushed to his feet to tower over her, his mouth kicked up at one corner in the crooked grin she’d come to love so much. “You ready?”

  “For what?” she asked suspiciously.

  “Well, now, there’s a question.” He grasped her elbow to tug her along beside him and led her to the edge of camp where he released her arm to face her in a half-crouch, his hands splayed on his thighs. He thrust his jaw at her. “Take your best shot, darlin’. Try to break my nose.”

  “Have you lost your mind?”

  “Nope. It’s part of the lesson. Take a swing at me. Then I’ll teach you how to do it right.”

  Rebecca gaped at him, completely incredulous. “What is the purpose of this lesson?”

  “I’m gonna learn you how to kick my ass, that’s the purpose.” He pointed to the bridge of his nose, which still sported a faint trace of blue. “Come on. Don’t be bashful. Swing at me.”

  “No! I might hurt you. I’m going back and change into my own clothes. This is silly.”

  A determined glint came into his eyes. “It ain’t silly. Bein’ in so close to the herd, we can’t start practicin’ with guns yet. We gotta save that for when we reach the ranch. But I can start teachin’ you how to defend yourself in other ways. If you can learn to kick my ass, honey, you’ll be able to kick just about anybody’s.”

  Rebecca leaned toward him and whispered, “I am not going to practice with guns when we reach your ranch. And I am not going to learn how to beat you up, end of subject. If you will recall, sir, I believe in only passive forms of resistance.”

  “In what?”

  “A cheek turner, I believe you call it.”

  “No, you ain’t. Not no more.”

  “I beg your pardon? Says who?”

  “Says me. Them cheeks of yours is mine now, darlin’. Every sweet inch. And you’re gonna learn how to keep other men’s hands off of ’em.” He pointed to his nose. “Come on. Swing.”

  “No. I want no part of this.”

  He flashed her a devilish grin. “Let me put it to you this way then. Either you try to kick my ass, or I’m gonna carry you back to the fire, jerk them jeans off, and have myself a fine time playin’ ticktacktoe on them cute little cheeks of yours in broad daylight.”

  Put to her like that, Rebecca decided to take her best shot. Luckily for him, he ducked.

  Late that same night, Rebecca was nearly asleep when Race, who lay on the pallet beside her, suddenly jackknifed upright and threw himself on her. Before she could even cry out, she was pinned, her arms anchored above her head, a heavy, muscular thigh angled across hers to keep her from kicking. For a horrible moment, she thought he meant to rape her.

  “Guess what?” he said huskily.

  “You’ve been overcome by your ungodly urges?” she said thinly.

  His face cast into shadow, he grinned, his straight, white teeth gleaming eerily in the dim firelight. “I was gonna say, ‘I gotcha,’ but I reckon that’s close enough.”

  Her heart started to pound. Until this moment, she hadn’t believed she could feel truly afraid of him ever again.

  “I got at least a hundred pounds on you. You ain’t gonna get your hands loose. I got a firm grip. And you can’t kick. What’re you gonna do to keep me from goin’ after you like you’re a plump little pigeon and I’m a starvin’ man?”

  Rebecca strained to get her wrists free from his grip, remembering once before how she’d twisted free. This time, however, his hands were like iron manacles. “Race, you’re frightening me.”

  “That’s plumb silly. You know I ain’t gonna hurt you. But if it was another man, you’d flat be in trouble. Right?”

  She conceded the point with a mute nod. It felt to her as if she were flat in trouble now.

  “Reactin’ fast is everything,” he said softly. “Give me an edge at all, and the first thing I’ll do is”—he caught both her wrists in the grip of one hand—“that, which leaves you helpless and me with a hand free to play or slap you senseless. You don’t wanna let that happen.” He took one of her wrists in each hand again. “So…pretendin’ I just now jumped you and knowin’ you gotta strike at me while you got a chance, what’ve you got left to get at me with?”

  When she only lay there, gazing up at him, nonplussed, he sighed and said, “Your teeth, honey.” He showed her the different positions a man might assume as he wrestled her into a body pin. “In this position, go for the arm,” he said. “Bite to take a hunk, and he’ll let go of at least one hand to knock you loose.”

  “Lovely. Bite him, and then he gets to beat on me?”

  He chuckled. “The second he turns loose of one of your hands, go for his eyes.” He showed her how. “No scratchin’. Jab with your finger at the inside corner with all your strength.”

  “What will that do? Put his eye out?”

  “Onto his cheek.”

  “Oh, mercy.”

  “You can’t be fainthearted, darlin’. Not if you’re fightin’ for your life. You go for the bastard’s eyes.”

  He glared down at her so fiercely that Rebecca smiled. “Yessir.”

  He went on to show her other places to bite, one being the shoulder, after which he said, “He’ll rear back. Only for a second, so you gotta be ready. As soon as he does, he’ll let go of a hand, like before, so go for his eyes. And if he lifts his hips, knife up with your knee and get him in the balls.”

  She closed her eyes. “Race, must you be vulgar?”

  “What d’you call ’em?”

  She slitted one eye open. “His manly parts?”

  He rolled off of her onto his back and angled an arm over his eyes, his chest jerking with silent laughter.

  “What is so funny about that, may I ask?”

  He finally caught his breath and said, “Sweetheart, if you wanna call ’em my ‘manly parts’ when you’re talkin’ with me, that’s fine. But if you’re ever facin’ down a man, say with a gun? It just loses somethin’ if you say, ‘Not one step closer, mister, or I’ll blow off your manly parts!’” He began to laugh again, this time until tears ran from the corners of his eyes. When at last his mirth subsided, he sighed and said, “You gotta say balls. Ain’t no two ways about it. Otherwise he’ll take the gun away from you, sure as shit.”

  Rebecca rolled onto her side facing him with her arm tucked under her head. “I think the whole point is silly, anyway. If I were going to shoot a man, I’d never shoot him there. I’d aim for something vital.”

  Race laughed until he was weak. Then, after explaining that “manly parts” were “pretty damned vital,” he took Rebecca into his arms.

  “Do you know,” she whispered, tracing light patterns on his bare chest with a fingertip, “that almost from the first, I’ve always loved to have your arms around me?”

  He trailed warm, silken lips over her forehead. “That’s because this is where you was always meant to be,” he whispered.

  Chapter 17

  This is where you was always meant to be.

  Those words that Race had whispered to Rebecca came back to her the following afternoon when she finall
y got her first glimpse of his ranch. Home. That was her first thought. She had finally come home.

  Situated in the foothills of the Rockies, his land stretched to the horizon, encompassing countless grassy meadows bordered by steep, forested slopes. As the small caravan of wagons and the slow-moving herd traversed the winding, rutted trail that led to the central part of the ranch, Race kept up an almost continuous monologue, familiarizing Rebecca with the terrain. Directing her gaze to towering stands of fir and pine, he rattled off the names of the different trees, the only two of which she managed to recall being the ponderosa and lodge pole pine. He also called her attention to some of the wildlife he spotted, a mountain chickadee, a mule deer, a bounding cottontail, a marmot, and a cougar on a distant ridge.

  Upon spying the cougar, Race slowed the wagon to a stop and slipped his arm around her shoulder. Following his gaze, she stared in amazement at the huge cat. Never had she seen anything like that—a fiercely wild predator, outlined against the powder-blue sky like an animated carving limned in gold. Even at a distance, the creature’s great size, power and grace of movement, and sheer beauty were absolutely stunning.

  Next to her ear, Race whispered, “Now, darlin’, you know why I don’t question the existence of God.”

  She turned to look up at Race’s burnished face, thinking that if she needed proof of God’s existence, she need only to look at this man. In the space of a few violent minutes, she had been stripped of everything that truly mattered to her except life itself—her parents, her relatives, her friends, her self-confidence, her world. Even her God. There had been absolutely nothing left. On that fateful evening in the arroyo, it might have been anyone who found her, kneeling in the middle of that bloodbath, mindless with shock. But by some wondrous twist of fate—or perhaps by the hand of God Himself—it had been Race Spencer, a man who was, in every way, a consolation for all that had been taken from her.

  Looking at him, she knew she would eventually heal, and until she did, he would provide her with the support she needed to stand. He was also offering her a world to replace the one lost to her, as well as a chance to love and to be loved. He had given her so very much, this man. And he was still giving, trying to make her believe in God again, trying to restore her self-confidence, making his home her home. Thus far, all she’d done was take from him. Taking and taking, giving nothing in return.

  With her gaze, she traced the features of his face—the high forehead, the bladelike nose, the high cheekbones, the strong line of jaw and chin, those eyes that always seemed to see to her soul, and the firm yet mobile mouth that fascinated her so. He was so very like the mountain lion, big and intimidatingly powerful, his body roped with muscle. There was also a wild, savage aura about him—an indefinable something that marked him as different, possibly the Apache blood that ran in his veins. Yet for all of that, he was beautiful in a raw, purely masculine sort of way, as rugged and dauntless as the landscape around them.

  Needing to touch him, she reached up to stroke the strands of ebony that fell like glistening silk threads over his collar, then she trailed trembling fingertips to his cheek. He had touched her just like this, so many times, almost reverently, as if he were trying to commit every angle of her features to memory.

  His were already carved upon her heart.

  “What?” he asked softly.

  Rebecca realized she was looking up at him through tears. Over the course of the month-long journey to this pocket of paradise, how many times had she sat in the back of her wagon, her gaze fixed on the lumbering cattle behind the caravan of wagons, trying to spot this man at the edge of the undulating herd? For all their leathery ruggedness, the other cattlemen fell short by comparison, failing to sit a horse with his ease of movement, all of them smaller in stature, none of them possessing his lethal edge. Race, swinging a rope with the same precision that he handled his guns. Race, singing out to the cows, his deep, resonant voice drifting to her on the afternoon air. Race, whistling and waving his black Stetson, as he cut his horse back and forth through the herd.

  How many times had the mere sight of this man soothed her—slowing the frantic beat of her heart, easing the constriction of her windpipe, a balm to her frayed nerves. Countless times. So very many times, in fact, that the incidences were a confusing jumble of images in her mind, the only clear detail about any of them being that this man, and this man only, had the power to set her tilting, spiraling emotions back on their axis. This man’s smile, and only his, could reach across a distance and embrace her in warmth. How could she have sought him out so frantically, needed him so desperately, and basked in the comfort of his presence so completely without sensing deep within herself that she loved him with all her heart?

  “Oh, Race,” she whispered shakily.

  “Sweetheart, what?” He glanced out over the rolling hills around them, looking for all the world as though he was ready to do battle with whatever might be distressing her.

  “I’m just thinking how very much I love you.”

  His face went utterly still, as if the muscles beneath his skin had turned to granite. His gaze held hers, his dark eyes taking on a suspicious brightness. After a long moment, he said in a gruff voice, “Rebecca Ann, don’t tell me that unless you mean it. It means too much to me for you to say it lightly.”

  In that moment, Rebecca knew how very much he loved her in return, and that he was almost afraid to believe she cared for him in the same way. “I mean it from the bottom of my heart,” she assured him. “I love you, Race Spencer.”

  Switching the leather leads into the grip of his left hand, he reached over to thumb a tear from beneath her eye. Then he tipped his hat back and bent his head to lightly brush his lips over hers, the contact so airy she wondered if she had imagined it. When he drew back, she followed him as if attached to him by invisible strings, her heart slugging in her chest like a labored piston.

  Glancing at Pete and Corey, who were just then riding past the wagon on their horses, he grinned and nudged her erect. “Behave yourself. You know what I do with wantin’ women, don’t ya? I leave ’em wantin’ more.”

  “‘Wantin’ women?’” Rebecca repeated. “As in ‘wanting’?”

  He arched an eyebrow. “Ain’t you ever heard of wantin’ women?”

  Rebecca started giggling.

  “What’s so funny?”

  She hugged his arm and rested her head on his shoulder. “Nothing! Just take me to my new home, Mr. Spencer. I have a feeling I’m going to love it there.”

  For the remainder of the ride into the main part of the ranch, Rebecca was breathless with wonder. She’d never seen such a beautiful place. Dense thickets of Gambel oak wove between the stands of trees, splashing the hillsides with red and orange, forming a brilliant contrast to the azure Colorado sky. Race pointed out occasional wild roses on the lower slopes, from which he said she could collect petals to make medicinal teas. He also assured her that the creeks and narrow streams that ribboned the meadows were plentiful with fish, just in case she tired of eating beef and wild game. It seemed to Rebecca that even the air smelled different there—fresher and more invigorating.

  She hauled in deep breaths, feeling almost giddy. “Oh, Race, I love it!” she said, letting her head fall back and closing her eyes. “It’s absolutely divine.”

  “The cabin ain’t much,” he warned her. “Next spring and summer I’ll start the house, but you’ll have to make do where we’re at for at least a year, maybe even two.”

  Rebecca braced her hands on her knees, so excited she was unable to settle her gaze on any one spot. “I don’t need a fancy house to be happy. Especially not with so much beauty around me.”

  When she glanced at him, his gaze snagged hers, and for several long seconds they stared into each other’s eyes. Then his mouth tipped into one of those grins that always made her heart catch. “Darlin’, any time you wanna see somethin’ that’s truly beautiful, take a gander in the mirror.”

  Just as he said
that the wagon crested the hill, and before them lay the small valley where the main part of his ranch was situated. Off to the right, nestled among tall pine and fir, a log cabin perched on a gentle rise, below which lay a smattering of outbuildings and a large log barn. Beyond that stretched velvety green pastures, tidily fenced with split rails. Two creeks, sparkling in the sunshine like silvery satin ribbons, ran the length of the bowl, one of them trailing over the slope where the cabin sat, the water a stone’s throw from the dwelling’s front stoop.

  “Like I said, it ain’t much,” he said.

  “It’s beautiful. More beautiful than I imagined, by far.”

  “It’s nowhere near as beautiful as you,” he said softly. “Once we get down there, I’ll be busy till almost dark.”

  Her gaze fixed on her new home, Rebecca curled her hands over the edge of the wagon seat. It was well past time that she begin performing her wifely duty. The fact that he’d postponed the consummation of their union for this long was probably nothing short of a miracle. In as matter-of-fact a tone as she could manage, she said, “I’ll still be a wantin’ woman when you get back, Mr. Spencer. There’s no need to hurry.”

  He drove the wagon off into a deep rut. The conveyance lurched and tipped sharply to the left. Cursing, he grabbed hold of her arm to keep her from pitching off the seat. As he loosened his grip and turned his attention to getting the wheel out of the hole, he said, “Jesus H. Christ, Rebecca Ann! Are you tryin’ to make me have a wreck?”

  Bent forward over her knees before the cheerful blaze in the stone fireplace, Rebecca ran the brush through her long hair, lifting as she reached the ends to separate the nearly dry strands. From outside, she heard the muted sound of men’s voices, a reassurance that Johnny and Corey were still standing guard over her. Race had given them orders not to leave her alone for even a second while he was away.