City Girl (5 page)

Her quick inhalation stung her chest with cold air, making her cough as she looked at the sky arching overhead, a high, pure dome of blue. Here and there groups of tall, slender, leafless trees held delicate puffs of snow aloft, as if about to toss them into the air out of sheer exuberance. Mountains stood like a first line of defense on both sides of the flat, open valley with a silver river running its length. The inner defense, short, broad-based, dark-toned evergreens, stood stiffly at attention on the near side of the valley floor, wearing white busbies. Closer at hand and visible between the white trunks of poplars were several outbuildings and a pasture. A reddish brown horse pranced through the snow in the pasture, tossing his long black mane and tail as he kicked up flurries. Liss’s gaze swept back and forth as she mentally photographed each scene.

The clean cover of the yard was marred only by a line of footprints leading through the trees to the larger barn. From that direction came the sound of childish laughter and, to her horror, one deep throated bark.

Coatless, bootless, Liss flew along the narrow track of footprints, snow gathering on the fuzzy material of her slippers. She coughed again against the cold invasion of her lungs, her hand going to her throat even as she lunged through the door into the dimly lit, warm barn. Instantly spotting Jason, she snatched him away from the huge shaggy dog rolling with him in a pile of yellow straw. Holding Jason up and away from the animal, she backed toward the door. The dog stood up and grinned at her, tongue hanging out, head cocked to one side as if in question.

“Mom-mee,” Jason protested indignantly. “He’s a nice doggy. He likes me. I hug him.”

The dog ambled over, licked Liss’s hand, and she felt her legs turn to water. “Yes,” she said, putting Jason back on his feet. “So I see. Sorry, Jase. I was a little worried when I heard him bark.” One thing she didn’t want to do was impart her own fear of dogs to her children. “Where is your brother?”

“Right here,” Kirk said.

Liss whirled at the sound of his voice and saw him poking his head around a wall behind which he—and Ryan—were hidden. She walked through a wide doorway, wondering what they could be doing. Under the light of a dangling bulb, Kirk sat on a low stool and milked a cow. At the sight of him, dressed in a thick green sweater, a down vest, and faded jeans, and clean-shaven—a jolt went through her not unlike the shock of the icy air. She tried to ignore it, but when he spoke again in that deep, soft voice of his, goose bumps raced over her arms and her stomach quivered.

“Good morning, Liss,” he said, giving her a long look over his shoulder. The smile on his lips reminded her of how they’d felt on hers Friday night. She wished, suddenly, that she was wearing something other than the comfortable, faded yellow track suit she’d gotten in the early fall from Value Village, and of course, her shaggy slippers with little balls of ice clinging to their fake fur. His smile broadened, and she felt heat rising in her face. She was glad she stood with her back to the sunlit doorway so he couldn’t see her clearly.

Ryan, crouched in the straw beside Kirk, could scarcely spare her a glance. “This is the milking parlor, Mom, and I’m gonna get a turn milking,” he said importantly. “In just a minute. You want to watch?”

She did not. The very idea of her child going that close to an animal ten times his size made every one of her instinctive fears stand on end. “Um, I’m not sure that’s such a good idea,” she said quietly. She wanted to snatch him up as she had Jason, but what if a sudden move startled the cow and it lashed out with its feet? Cows were known to kick people. Even a city girl knew that. “You’ve never milked a cow before. You might . . . hurt it.”

Kirk grinned as he swept another glance over Liss. Lord, but she packed a big wallop for such a little thing, he thought. Even dressed in baggy sweats, she was so shapely, he wanted to strip her clothes off and run his hands all over her. Would her body be the same creamy ivory color as her face, her nipples as pink as the tip of her nose, or a dark, rosy color? He swallowed hard and forced his mind back to the issue at hand. She was cute as a bug, but also scared to death of the cow. Her slanted eyes were huge as she stared at it, and her white teeth gnawed on her lower lip. He nearly laughed at her statement “You might hurt it.” It wasn’t the cow she was afraid for, but her child.

Well, that was okay, he reminded himself. It was a mother’s place to fear for her kids. Or so his mother had told him repeatedly when she’d thought he was about to do something dumb or dangerous or both.

“It’s all right, Liss,” he said in the calm, soothing voice he always used around cattle. “This is Coco. She’s very gentle. I promise she won’t hurt your son. She’s never hurt anybody in her life.” The milk never stopped its rhythmic splashing against the side of the pail.

“Maybe not so far,” she said, “but Ryan’s never milked a cow. He might do something wrong, hurt her accidentally. And he’s a stranger to her. How do you know she’ll let a stranger touch her ni—uh—whatevers?”

Kirk’s eyes laughed into hers for an instant. “Don’t be anthropomorphic, Liss.”

To her annoyance, heat rose in her cheeks again. “I wasn’t.” But she knew she had been. Still . . . Stepping gingerly into the milking parlor, she reached out and took Ryan’s hand, pulling him up. “Ry, come on, honey. Maybe you can learn to milk a cow when you’re bigger.” He pouted, about to argue, and she set her chin stubbornly. “Ryan. Now. “

Kirk flicked another quick glance over her before returning his attention to the cow. Liss felt as if she’d been fully assessed and found not quite up to standard. “Do what your mother says, buddy,” he said quietly.

Ryan, with uncustomary docility, went with Liss. With a silent sigh of relief, she was about to escape from the warm, dim building, with its odors of straw and animals, when a shadow filled the doorway. From out of the blinding sunlight came an apparition that made the big dog and the placid cow look like residents of the petting zoo.

With a squeal, Liss grabbed her children, one under each arm, and whirled. She darted back inside the milking parlor and flung herself at Kirk as an enormously tall horse stepped daintily into the barn.

* * * *

 “Dammit,” Liss said to herself a couple of hours later. Though she was nearly done cleaning the entire main floor, she was still steaming over her own idiotic behavior. “I wasn’t scared,” she assured herself. °I was merely startled. I didn’t need him and his girlfriend laughing at me, making me look like a fool.”

It hadn’t been Kirk and Kristy Chandler who’d made a fool out of her, though, she had to admit. It had been herself. She would never forget the way Kirk’s chest had vibrated with laughter as he’d gathered her and her armsful of children into a tight, protective embrace and spoken soothingly through his irrepressible chuckles. It was simply easier to try to blame them rather than herself. She had never flung herself into a man’s arms in her entire life! At least not for that kind of reason.

Liss rammed the business end of the vacuum cleaner against the baseboard at the end of the hallway before turning and heading back the other way on her final pass. She remembered all too clearly Kristy Chandler’s dancing green eyes, her tousled blond hair, and her giggle when Kirk scolded her for “scaring a poor city girl,” as if the term were synonymous with “stupid.”

She sniffed. “All right,” she muttered, “so the cow didn’t hurt Ryan, and yes, the dog turned out to be a nice, gentle animal that adores kids, and horses don’t eat people now any more than they did when I was a child, but I didn’t grow up here, riding horses and milking cows and spending weekends with Kirk Allbright on his damn ranch like that rosy-cheeked Kristy Chandler.” She wondered why Kristy wasn’t spending that weekend with Kirk, then cringed at the memory of Kristy’s expression of disbelief when Kirk told her he couldn’t go for a ride because he had to help Liss clean the house.

Kirk. A glance over her shoulder showed him hard at work in the entry-hall. He’d finished in the living room where bright sunshine lighted the place, revealing old but comfortable furniture, a scarred coffee table, and many bookcases stuffed with hardcovers, paperbacks, and journals. A Franklin stove, in which he’d built a fire, sent a steady, homey warmth through the room, in addition to that which came from the basement furnace. The boys were kneeling by the coffee table, coloring industriously in their books. Kirk had declared that the room she’d designated as their playroom was too cold until he could get carpet laid in there, and it wasn’t comfortable with only pillows and blankets to sit on. Mrs. Healey would have to share the living room no matter how much she objected.

He looked up and saw her, and smiled that slow smile of his, the one that crinkled the corners of his eyes and creased his face. The one that made her insides quiver and her breasts tingle. He wielded a can of spray-on furniture polish and a rag, yet he appeared about as domesticated as a sleekly muscled cougar. She wondered if he knew how good he looked, wondered if he knew how quickly and powerfully she responded to him. She flicked a glance over his broad shoulders, his narrow hips, and his long legs, and found herself flushing at the memory of the way he’d felt when he held her, so solid and strong and masculine. Swallowing hard, she turned her back on him, trying not to remember the feel of his mouth on hers. Of course he knew how she responded, she chided herself. By his own admission, plenty of women responded to him. She recalled the words he’d growled to Lester Brown, when he’d objected to having her and Mrs. Healey in “his” house.

“But I take them home on Sunday night and leave them there,” she mimicked, “because I’m a bachelor and I like it that way.”

“How come you’re muttering at the vacuum cleaner?” Kirk asked from directly behind her. “Isn’t it working right?”

Liss straightened abruptly and switched the vacuum off, finished at last. “It’s working fine,” she said, giving him and his furniture polish an unfriendly glance as he sprayed the arms of a wooden coat rack. “I wish you’d leave that alone and go and do some—some ranching, or something. I told you there’s no need for you to do housework.” She glanced at the stairs to see if Mrs. Healey was in sight. “If you-know-who catches you at it, she’ll probably deduct your wages from my quarterly payment. “

He grinned as he wiped the first arm of the rack, rubbing until it shone. “You let your son help me milk, so I owe you one.”

She snorted. “Two little squirts of milk hardly constituted help, so go. Leave it. This is Sunday, isn’t it, one of the days you reserve for your women?”

He stared at her, seeming undecided whether to laugh or scowl. “For my what?”

“Women,” she explained earnestly. “You know, girlfriends like Kristy and whoever else there is? In Lester Brown’s office you said you have ‘guests’ nearly every weekend, but take them home on Sunday night and leave them there. I feel bad that my being here is interfering with your lifestyle.”

Oh, for the love of Mike! Kirk thought. Trust a woman to remember, almost word for word, his largely exaggerated statement. He’d just been trying to make a point . “Don’t you give my lifestyle another moment’s consideration,” he said, grinning. “I’m not complaining.”

When her expression failed to soften, he sighed and said with careful patience, “Look, if we’re going to live together in relative harmony, then we’ll both have to make adjustments, Liss, and try to get along.”

He turned back to the coat rack, working his way down its intricately carved base. Watching him, Liss knew exactly what “adjustments” he’d have to make. He was a nice man, and with a couple of little kids in the house, to say nothing of Mrs. Healey, whom Lester Brown had described as a chaperone, he wouldn’t be able to bring his women home.

Mrs. Healey herself broke into her thoughts, coming down the stairs in a green satin robe that could have covered the roof of a stadium.

“Am I permitted to walk where you have vacuumed, miss?” she asked waspishly.

Liss bowed and swept her arm out. “By all means, please do, Mrs. Healey.” The older woman sailed on by into the living room, where she ignored the children’s greetings and changed the TV channel to an evangelical program.

Kirk cocked his head to one side. “What was that all about?”

Liss had to laugh, albeit a trifle weakly. “It started earlier this morning. She came downstairs when I was halfway through washing the kitchen floor and ordered me to leave it and go make her bed, at once, so she could get back into it and be comfortable. And then I was to bring her four pieces of French toast, lightly browned, six slices of bacon, and a pot of coffee.”

Kirk stared. “What did you do?”

Liss unplugged the vacuum and began winding up its cord. “What could I do? I laughed at her and told her I wasn’t her servant. If she wanted to eat, she’d have to be downstairs at mealtimes and accept what I put before her. Otherwise, she could cook for herself and clean up afterward. She would have to wait for her breakfast, though, since the floor was wet and I didn’t want her walking on it.”

He laughed. “Good for you. And what did she do?”

“She tried to call Lester, but of course it’s Sunday and she only got the answering service. Since then, she’s been in her room.” Liss frowned. “She still hasn’t eaten.”

Kirk tossed the spray can up and caught it as it came down. He tucked it under one arm, then put the other one over her shoulders, steering her, and the vacuum cleaner she wheeled, toward the utility room. “It won’t hurt her to miss a meal or two.” He shook his head ruefully. “Lord, what a creature she is. What are we going to do about her?”

Liss shrugged herself out from under his heavy, muscled arm and moved away, ostensibly to put the vacuum in its cupboard. “There’s nothing we can do except put up with her.”

“Oh, I don’t know.” He set the spray polish on a high shelf and tossed his rag into the laundry hamper. “Maybe we could stake her out on a snowdrift the way the Eskimos did with their old people.”

“That’s gruesome,” Liss said, shuddering. Still, she was unable to suppress a grin at the picture the idea created in her mind: Mrs. Healey, green satin, and snow . . . Heavens, search-and-rescue aircraft would come zooming in from all directions thinking she were a distress signal!  “And wasn’t it the Indians,” she went on, “who staked people out, only not their old folks, but their enemies? And they did it on anthills.”