Читать книгу Her Private Bodyguard - Gayle Wilson - Страница 13

Valerie stuck her fork into the pork chop on her plate, making another neat row of holes. When Grey Sellers hadn’t shown up for dinner, she had sat down at the table a few minutes after nine, feeling righteous. And indignant. And then nauseated.

I rode too far in the afternoon heat, she told herself.

You acted like a jackass, her conscience jeered, because a man had the nerve to take the saddle off a horse for you.

Which he did for all the wrong reasons.

Feminist bull. Since when is it a crime for a man to help a woman?

When he does it for the wrong reasons.

You’re a mind reader? You know for sure why he was moved to do that terrible thing to you?

Tired of the internal conflict and especially of trying to answer that last question, Val pushed back her chair, picked up her plate and carried it over to the garbage can. She opened the can with the foot pedal and dumped the battle-scarred pork chop, the roll and green beans in. Then she set her plate in the sink and turned to look at the serving bowls on the kitchen table. It’s a shame to waste all that food, she thought.

Especially when there’s a hungry man out in the bunkhouse who would probably be more than willing to take care of it for you. A man you invited to dinner under the guise of hospitality and then attacked because he reciprocated with what was possibly nothing more than an act of kindness of his own.

Some act of kindness. He grabbed my shoulders hard enough to bruise, she reminded herself, determined to hold on to her anger because she hadn’t found a way to let go of it without admitting she’d been partially at fault in the situation.

She advanced on the table and began to pick up dishes and carry them over to the counter. She didn’t open the garbage can again until she had everything transferred, but even then she couldn’t bring herself to throw the food away.

Instead, she took another plate out of the cabinet, almost slamming it down on the counter, and piled two pork chops, three rolls and the rest of the green beans onto it. She set the plate on a tray, along with the bowl of fruit salad and a fork, a spoon and a knife. Then she took a clean napkin out of the drawer and spread it over the top.

She stood looking down at the covered food for a few seconds before she reached across the sink and turned on the lights out in the yard. She picked up the tray before she could change her mind and carried it through the door, pushing the screen open with her hip.

When she rounded the corner of the barn, she could see a dim light coming from the bunkhouse. The patch of ground where she was standing was still in darkness, however, out of range of the lights from either building. Safe, she thought, grateful for the concealing shadows. Safe from what? the voice of her own logic, which she was beginning to despise, taunted.

Still reluctant to face the man she had yelled at this afternoon, she had to make herself walk over to the door and knock, balancing the tray on her hip. There was no sound from inside the bunkhouse, and no answer to her rather tentative tap. After a couple of minutes she knocked again, more forcefully this time, and then she turned the knob, pushing the door inward.

“Mr. Sellers?” she called.

There was still no response, so she pushed the door wider and stepped inside. The bunkhouse appeared to be empty. Maybe he was out doing another security check, she mocked mentally. She had been aware that he was making a check of all the windows and doors while she had been cooking dinner. She had already locked them as soon as she had come inside, of course, so he hadn’t had any reason to complain about her security measures.

She set the tray down on the table in front of the potbellied stove and turned to leave. For a moment her eyes surveyed the building her father had built. Pretty primitive by any standard. There were six bunks, three on each side; the table she had put the tray on and its four chairs; the stove; and bookshelves that held a variety of puzzles, games and books.

All of it was covered by a fine layer of silt that the desert wind had brought in. She hadn’t cleaned out here in a long time because no one had lived in the bunkhouse in years, which was exactly the way she wanted it.

Her father had accused her of being a recluse. Maybe she was. But the confrontation with Grey Sellers this afternoon made her know she didn’t regret the life she had chosen. She didn’t need that kind of upheaval again, especially not now.

That kind of upheaval. She repeated the phrase, wondering why she had used it in relation to Sellers. There was nothing in this situation that was anything like the other.

Her eyes rose, sheer instinct maybe, and found him watching her from the doorway that led to the bunkhouse’s communal bathroom. His black hair was wet, glistening with blue highlights under the glare of the bare, swaying electric bulb. Obviously he had just gotten out of the shower, which was why he hadn’t answered her knock or her call.

He was wearing the same jeans he’d worn this afternoon, but he was barefoot. And he was in the process of rebuttoning the chamois-colored shirt. As he did, those gray eyes, which had taken her breath this afternoon, rested inquiringly on her face.

His long fingers continued to work the buttons through their holes, one after the other, not seeming to hurry over the task. The open edges of the shirt revealed a flat brown stomach, centered by an arrow of dark hair. Her eyes had time to trace down it, all the way to where it disappeared into the waistline of his low-riding jeans, before he got to that last button, pulling the shirt together and destroying her view.

“I brought your dinner,” she said, forcing her gaze back up.

For some reason, her mouth had gone dry, so that the words were hard to articulate. She hoped he wasn’t aware of the effect that glimpse of his body had on her normally guarded emotions.

He glanced at the tray of food she had set down on the table, and then back at her. “Thank you, ma’am,” he said.

“And I wanted to apologize for…flying off the handle at you this afternoon,” she said, forcing the words out and hearing their clipped coldness.

It was a grudging apology at best, but her people skills were rusty. And this man seemed to have the ability to throw her off balance, just by looking at her. Just by that subtle movement at the corner of his mouth, which was happening again.

As if he knew something amusing, but didn’t intend to share. As if he were laughing inside. Laughing at her? she wondered. Paranoia, she chided, pulling her eyes away from his lips.

“I don’t like people assuming I can’t do whatever I set out to do,” she continued doggedly, determined to get this out of the way, to offer some explanation as to why she had reacted as she had this afternoon, without getting too close to the painful truth that she hated being treated as if she were handicapped.

“I didn’t assume anything about what you can or can’t do, Ms. Beaufort,” he said, his voice without inflection. “I told you. I was raised to be a gentleman. Old-fashioned, I guess. At least nowadays. But since you were obviously offended, I apologize. For…everything,” he finished softly. “I assure you, nothing like that will ever happen again.”

His eyes held on her face, saying more than his words. Those were probably meant to make up for the fact that he had put his hands on her. Except he hadn’t even mentioned that. There had been no apology for manhandling her.

Of course, she acknowledged, he wasn’t the only one who was not explaining everything. Usually she just ignored people who made a point of noticing her disability. With him, she had made a big deal of it. And if she were honest, she would have to admit that she knew why.

This was the first man she had been attracted to in years—more years than she wanted to remember. The first one to affect her with this subtle sexual tension since she had broken her engagement to Barton Carruthers.

Nothing like that will ever happen again, he had promised. The “that” carefully unqualified or defined. And she was equally unwilling to pursue a discussion of that physical contact. Grey Sellers would be gone in the morning. She would see to that, even if she had to drive him into town herself and then send someone out here to tow his truck off her property.

When she had, she’d talk to Wallace or to the insurance company, and all of this nonsense would be over. Maybe she had overreacted this afternoon—she wouldn’t deny that—but there was no need to continue to do so. Grey Sellers had chosen to ignore the fact that he’d touched her, and she would, too.

“And thanks for bringing the tray out,” he said, his voice low. “I figured the invitation to dinner had been rescinded.”

Rescinded. As strange a choice of words for the man he seemed to be as untoward had been. But the soft sincerity in his voice made her conscious again that she didn’t feel threatened by him. She hadn’t, not even when he’d shaken her. His action had been only a reflex, a reaction to her anger and her accusation.

“Good night,” she said, deliberately breaking the connection that was growing between them. She didn’t want to know any more about Grey Sellers than she already did. She didn’t want to think about him any more than she already had.

She limped across the room, conscious that her footsteps echoed unevenly on the old boards. Conscious that his eyes were on her, even if she couldn’t see them. Let him watch. Let him get a good look, she thought, suddenly angry and unsure why.

After tomorrow, she told herself again, things would go back to normal. At least, as normal as they could be until she had gotten rid of the albatross that was Av-Tech.

And the sooner she did that, the better, she decided, shutting the door of the bunkhouse firmly behind her. All the way back into the house, however, it seemed she could feel the force of those silver eyes, still watching her.

“IT’S OKAY,” Valerie crooned to the stallion, keeping her voice low and soothing. “Easy now. Easy, boy. Everything’s okay now, you big old bad boy.”

This on top of everything else, she thought, feeling the tension, which she had spent most of the nearly sleepless night trying to destroy, seep back into her neck and shoulders.

Being tense wasn’t a real good thing, of course, when you were dealing with a spooked horse. And despite her continued attempts at reassurance, the black was still upset, head up and ears forward.

One reason she had chosen Kronus as her first stallion was because of his disposition. For a stud horse, he was remarkably well behaved. She had watched him work, and his previous owner had vouched for him. And since she had owned the stallion, he had never given her any cause to question that reputation.

Until today. As soon as she’d come out of the house this morning, shortly after dawn, she had heard him banging in his stall. He had even splintered one of the rails, which meant she didn’t want to leave him in the tiny holding pen until she could make repairs.

Probably better to put him into the corral, she had thought. The other horses were all in the pasture that surrounded the spring, so there would be nothing to bother him out there. Nothing beyond whatever it was that had made him so edgy already.

He’d be in a less confined space and less apt to do himself damage. She took her eyes off the black long enough to glance back into the stall she had just led him out of. It was inside the simple enclosure that she had built herself when she decided she needed to buy her own stud. Granted, the building was very small, but it had seemed plenty secure, and it was far enough from the barn that he didn’t cause problems with the other horses.

She could see nothing in the stall to provoke this kind of display. However, a lot of things could spook a horse, from an unexpected or unfamiliar noise to a piece of plastic blowing along the ground.

Maybe Kronus sensed there was a stranger on the property. As she led the jittery stallion by the bunkhouse, her eyes focused briefly on the door, still closed against the growing light. She realized that she had been aware of that door the whole time she’d been in the yard.

Anticipating when her uninvited guest might open it? she wondered, leading the stud toward the corral. If so, it was an anticipation she didn’t want to feel. Despite her resolve, however, she remembered the impact of Grey Sellers’ eyes. And that small tug of amusement at the corner of his mouth.

She had been momentarily distracted by that memory, but her attention was abruptly brought back to Kronus, where it should have been all along. He had been nervous throughout the short journey. Now he threw up his head, jerking against the lead, and jigging to the side.

She shortened the nylon rope by changing the position of her hand, intent on controlling his head. She was by his shoulder, right where she needed to be. Even so, she could sense the gathering of muscle in those powerful hindquarters, his front hooves even seeming to lift a fraction from the ground.

Val knew that he just wanted to be gone, just to get away from whatever was frightening him. That flight instinct was highly developed in horses, and that’s exactly what Kronus wanted to do. Just get the hell out of here.

Although she was talking to him the whole time, she could feel his tension building. And she still couldn’t understand why. There was nothing—

He jerked his head up, pulling strongly against the lead she held, the whites of his eyes showing. She stayed with him, fighting to keep control. They were so near the safety of the paddock. If she could just get him through that gate and inside.

She reached for the gate with her free hand, and Kronus crow hopped, trying to pull away. He dragged her a few inches away from the fence before she was able to get his head back down.

She could feel her bad knee beginning to tremble, however, as it always did under strain. She ignored it, gritting her teeth against the pain, and grimly hung on as he jumped to the side again.

It would be dangerous for the horse to let him get loose, as crazy as he was acting. Although her land was fenced around the perimeter, there were too many ways he could do damage to himself if he got away out there.

Where it wasn’t covered with the dust he’d kicked up, Kronus’ ebony hide gleamed, his eyes still showing white. He reared again, and she held on for dear life, grateful for the leather gloves that kept her hands from being burned by the nylon rope.

When he came down, she was forced to back up a little to get out of his way. Her bad knee buckled, throwing her to the side. As she tried to regain her balance, the stallion lurched into her. The move was not deliberate, but it was effective. Still off balance, and hanging on to the lead for dear life, she fell, banging the side of her head on one of the rails of the corral before she hit the ground.

Even with the impact of her skull against the wooden post, she didn’t lose consciousness. The air around her thinned and darkened, however, and as she fought to stay conscious, she realized that she was still clinging to the lead. Instinct, maybe, but probably a foolish one, given the horse’s panic.

She couldn’t seem to will her muscles to release it and let Kronus go. Her only thought was that he could be seriously injured out on that rock-strewn terrain.

Of course, she could be even more seriously injured lying almost under his feet. She edged to her right, hunching her shoulder, as the horse reared again, almost jerking the lead out of her hand. Just then, a flash of long, blue-jean-clad legs appeared in her peripheral vision.

“Let it go,” Grey Sellers commanded, as the horse reared again, totally panicked now.

Knowing she had no choice, she released the rope. Grey had already wrapped his arm around her body and now he lifted, pulling her up and back, just as the horse came down, hooves striking the ground, too close to where Val had been only a heartbeat before.

Then the stallion whirled and took off toward the open and away from the two humans who were still on the ground. It took a second or two for Val to realize the potential for danger in what had happened. Another couple to become aware that she was practically sitting in Grey Sellers’ lap, her back against the solid muscle of his chest, his arm still around her, just beneath her breasts.

He was holding her so tightly it was hard to breathe. Or maybe that was simply delayed reaction to the events of the past few seconds. And that’s all it had taken for everything to get out of control.

Weak and disoriented, she leaned her head against his shoulder, fighting a wave of nausea. She looked up at the turquoise sky, breathing through her mouth.

“All right?” Grey asked, his voice at her ear, his lips so close that the warmth of his breath touched her cheek.

She nodded, turning her head a little so she could look at him. As she did, the abrasiveness of his early-morning beard brushed her temple. After a moment, he turned to look in the direction in which the stallion was rapidly disappearing, thundering over the dry ground.

Val knew he could run for several miles without encountering any fencing. As for the other obstacles he might tangle with on that high desert range, that was in the hands of fate. She said a quick prayer for the horse’s safety, watching him grow smaller and smaller as he raced toward the backdrop of the mountains.

When the stallion was no more than a dark speck, Grey turned to her, his voice touched with the same humor she had heard in it yesterday. “Is he always like that? ’Cause if he is, lady, you’ve got a hell of a lot of nerve.”

“He’s never done anything like that before,” Val said truthfully.

“Any idea what set him off?” Sellers asked, echoing her own questions.

She shook her head, trying to think what could have happened in the stall to make him so edgy. And there had been nothing at all on the way to the corral that had called for that reaction. She had no explanation for the horse’s uncharacteristic antics.

“All I know is, he’s going to get hurt out there,” she said, struggling against Grey’s hold. His arm was still wrapped around her rib cage, her small breasts resting on top of it.

He loosened it at her first movement, and she began to push awkwardly off his lap, embarrassed by the intimate position of their bodies. Emergency, she told herself, determined not to overreact as she had yesterday.

He would think she was some kind of neurotic. Afraid of men. Afraid of having any contact with them.

She got to her feet, but when she put weight on her leg, a shard of agony lanced through her damaged knee. The vertigo closed in again. When the world swam back into focus, seconds later, thankfully she wasn’t back on the ground. She was still standing, but she was leaning against Grey. His arm was around her again, supporting her competently and impersonally.

“I hit my head,” she explained, looking up into his eyes.

In the morning light they were like smoke, less opaque than last night. Suddenly he took her chin in his hand and turned her head. She was too surprised to resist, despite the flutter inside that his touch set off.

She quickly realized Grey wasn’t looking at her face, however. He was examining her temple, the one that had struck the wooden railing when Kronus had knocked her down. She watched his eyes widen slightly before they came back to meet hers.

“Looks like you’re going to need a few stitches,” he said.

She put her fingers over the injury, finding it unerringly, although she hadn’t been conscious of pain. She winced as she touched the gash.

Vertigo threatened once more, and, determined not to faint in his arms like some stupid Victorian, Val bit the inside of her cheek hard enough to compete with the burn at her temple and the ache in her knee. Although it hurt like hell, the sharpness of the bite had the desired effect, clearing her head.

“It’s nothing,” she said, more worried about her stud than about herself.

“Might leave a scar if you don’t get it sewed up.”

When she laughed, his eyes widened again. Did he really think she cared about a scar? Of course, he couldn’t know how many of those she already had. And she sure wasn’t concerned enough about this little cut to drive into civilization to get it stitched up. She had more important things to attend to. Like seeing to her most recent investment, whose black hide was at this moment very vulnerable, as he ran like a mad thing over some pretty rough territory.

“I have to catch him,” she said, pulling away from Grey’s hold. Thankfully, there was no vertigo when she moved this time.

Limping heavily, each step sheer torture, she made it as far as the fence, a matter of two feet, before she realized that catching the black was going to be an impossibility. She could barely walk, much less do what she needed to do to find him and bring him back.

“By the time you get mounted,” Grey said, “he’ll have disappeared. And you aren’t going to track him on that ground.”

It was possible she could still ride, she decided, assessing the pain in her knee with the ease of long practice, but he was right about the other. Even if that rocky ground lent itself to tracking, she couldn’t manage the dismounting and remounting that process would almost certainly require.

“I can’t just let him go.”

“You can until we get that tended to,” Grey said.

“But he’s my animal. My responsibility,” she protested.

“And you’re mine, Ms. Beaufort,” he said quietly. “Or have you forgotten?”

She had. She’d forgotten that this man had been sent out here to be her bodyguard. Bodyguard, she thought again, ridiculing the concept. And she never responded well to being told she couldn’t do something. At least, not since her accident.

“This is different,” she argued, her eyes drawn back to the fading trail of dust.

“Nothing in my instructions said there were things I’m not supposed to protect you from. I think that covers concussions and possible bleeding inside the skull. And I told you,” he said, “I’ve already spent their retainer. I’ll go get the car.”

She grabbed for his arm, jarring her leg again, and got sleeve instead. “I can’t just leave him out there.”

“I don’t think you’ve got much choice,” Grey said.

She didn’t, she admitted. At least, not as far as getting on a horse and hunting Kronus down was concerned. However, there was nothing to say that Grey couldn’t do that for her.

Of course, he wasn’t getting paid to look after her stud. That was not why Beneficial Life had given him that retainer he kept talking about. But what did she have to lose by asking him? she thought. Except maybe her pride. And she would gladly trade that to have Kronus safe and sound.

“You could go after him,” she suggested softly.

“I could. If I didn’t have you to look after.”

“You don’t need to look after me. I’m not in any danger. He’s the one who could get hurt. And,” she added, thinking this might sway him, “he’s a very valuable piece of horseflesh.”

That was the absolute truth. The stud represented every bit of the profit she had made last year. That wasn’t the primary reason she wanted Grey to go after him, of course. She just didn’t want the horse to be seriously injured. Maybe he’d calm down after he’d run himself out, and then—

“My responsibility is doing the job I was paid to do,” Grey said.

“Meaning you’d want to be paid to go after the horse?” she asked. “I think that can be arranged. Will you take a check? I’m afraid I don’t have much cash on hand. Of course, I may not have enough for you in my bank account. Just how much is it going to cost me, Mr. Sellers, to get you to go after my horse?”

There was a silence before he said, “It must be hell to be that cynical.”

“Not cynical,” she denied. “Just experienced. Money seems to have an almost mystical influence on people.”

“Not on me, Ms. Beaufort. Sorry to disappoint you. And the sooner we get that place on your head treated, the sooner I can get back out here and try to track your horse.”

“By then it may be too late.”

“Take it or leave it,” he said, stooping to pick up the black Stetson from the ground and beating it against his leg to knock the dust off.

“I should have known a horse wouldn’t mean much to someone like you,” she said angrily. She wasn’t even sure what she meant by that, but it felt good to make the accusation.

She began to limp away from him, heading toward the pasture and using the fence for support. Her leg seemed to get tighter and more painful with each step.

“I think you can probably afford another horse, Ms. Beaufort. Your life is another proposition. You only get one shot at that.”

The edge of sarcasm in that first sentence was obvious, just like his comment about being sorry her father’s policy wasn’t the kind that paid out cash. Both remarks said “rich bitch” so loudly he didn’t have to. It was a tone Val had heard most of her life, at least until she had moved out here, and, furious, she turned to face him.

“Kronus represents every bit of profit I made last year, Mr. Sellers,” she said. “Just for your information. But this isn’t about money. Not everything is, you know.”

She regretted saying that as soon as the words came out of her mouth. Like yesterday she didn’t seem to be able to control her tongue when she was around him. Somewhere deep inside she knew why. That knowledge wasn’t something she wanted to deal with right now, however.

“I want to look at his stall, so maybe you better join me,” she said instead, injecting sarcasm to keep her voice from betraying her. “If whatever spooked Kronus is still in there, you’ll be right there, ready to protect me from it.”

THEY DIDN’T FIND ANYTHING in the stall to explain the horse’s actions. Grey wasn’t really surprised. If something like a snake had spooked the stallion, it would have been long gone. And somehow he didn’t think that would have caused exactly the reaction he’d just seen. Maybe the horse would have been upset, but he wouldn’t have been out-and-out loco once he was away from the danger.

His eyes were examining the broken board when he became aware that Valerie Beaufort was sitting on the ground of the stallion pen, her back against its rough boards, eyes closed. As he watched, she put her head down on her bent knee.

She didn’t move, even when he walked over to stand in front of her, although she must have heard his footsteps. “You okay?” he asked.

Her head came up, eyes open, wide and very dark. Pupils dilated? Or did they just look that way because her face was so pale? Shock? Or concussion? he wondered. The gash at her temple was still bleeding sluggishly. The hair around it was matted with blood and even the shoulder of her shirt was stained.

“A little dizzy,” she said, putting her forehead back on her knee. The other leg, the one that she favored when she walked, was stretched straight out in front of her.

“Come on,” he said, holding out his hand.

She lifted her head enough to look at it and then up at him, but she didn’t reach for his outstretched fingers. She shook her head once, and then rested her forehead on top of her knee again.

“We need to have somebody take a look at that cut,” he said. “You may have a concussion.”

“I’m just dizzy.”

“All the more reason—”

“I told you I’m not driving into town for this scratch,” she said, overriding his attempt to make exactly that suggestion.

He watched her a moment more, weighing his options. He knew a fair amount of first aid. Even if she did have a concussion, all a hospital would do would be to keep her overnight and observe her. He could do that here, of course.

However, observing Valerie Beaufort all night wasn’t something he was eager to do. Whenever he looked at her, something happened in his gut that he didn’t understand.

Maybe it was her vulnerability. That little-girl-lost look. Or maybe she had been right before, although he didn’t like the idea any better than he knew she would. Maybe it was the fact that she limped. All he knew was that the thought of her being injured or in danger had become far more personal than any assignment should be.

“You can walk. Or I can carry you,” he said harshly. “It’s strictly up to you.”

Her eyes came up again at that. Widened first with shock that he would talk that way to her, then becoming defiant. He meant what he said, however, and something in his face or in his voice must have told her that. Her mouth tightened, but finally, after a long moment of studying his eyes, she put out her hand.

As his fingers closed around it, there was again that unwanted frisson of emotion in the bottom of his stomach. Maybe because her life was his responsibility, and because it had been in danger this morning. Or maybe, he acknowledged bitterly, it was because he knew he wasn’t good enough anymore to handle that kind of responsibility.