Dream's End (8 page)

Her ears caught the mingled sounds of cows crying for their calves, calves bawling in fright, cowboys laughing and talking in a mingled potpourri of English and Spanish as they coped with the day's work.

The team at the end of that chute, which included the thin, blond-headed vet, was experienced and fascinating to watch. The calf's neck would be clamped in the trough and within one minute he'd be branded, earmarked, castrated, as most male calves were, vaccinated and tattooed—all in one smooth operation. The air was thick with smoke and dust and the smell of burning hair, but Eleanor had
seen this many times before, and she didn't even flinch as she watched—which seemed to amuse Curry to no end when he glanced at her from the branding corral.

One small sick calf was separated from the rest, and Curry brought it out in his arms.

“It's going on dinner time,” he told Eleanor, nodding for her to get on her horse. “We'll have a bite to eat and come back.”

“All right.” She mounted, taking the reins in her hand and steadying the horse as Curry handed the small calf up to her. She swung it over the saddle horn and smoothed its silky coat with a smile.

“Poor little thing,” she cooed. “Going to put him in the barn until he heals?”

He didn't answer her. He was looking up into her face, one hand on the saddle horn, the other on the horse's flank, and she doubted if he'd heard a single word. He just looked at her, his eyes steady and
unblinking, with an expression in them she couldn't decipher. They sparkled like diamonds, vibrant, piercing.

“Curry?” she asked softly, unaware of the picture she made with her hair just slightly windblown, her cheeks full of color, her eyes lovely in the sunlight.

“You look right at home,” he remarked with a half smile. “As natural on that horse with a calf in your arms as a frontier woman might have looked a century ago.”

“Frontier women,” she reminded him, “were wrinkled and tough as leather and could outshoot, outdrink, and outcuss their menfolk. And besides, they got married when they were barely thirteen and had twelve kids.”

“Would you like to have twelve kids?” he asked.

She looked down at him, her eyes involuntarily tracing his angular face and firm, chiseled mouth, the curve of his dark brows, the thick hair that made tiny
waves at the nape of his neck. A man like Curry would have sons as tall and tough as he was, as handsome as himself.

“Green and gray,” he murmured thoughtfully as he searched her eyes. “What color would their eyes be?”

“Gray,” she said softly, as if she knew.

He jerked his eyes away suddenly. “Let's go.”

She blushed to her heels as she realized what he'd been saying, what she'd replied…She watched him swing into the saddle, but whirled her mount before she had to look him in the eye.

They went back to the ranch house long enough to eat the thick ham sandwiches Bessie had waiting, but the silence at the table was unusual to say the least. Bessie kept glancing from one of them to the other, trying to puzzle out what was wrong.

It was almost a relief to get back to the turmoil of roundup, Eleanor thought as
they made their way once again to the holding pens on fresh mounts.

The strain between Curry and Eleanor was almost tangible. Even the busy ranch hands seemed to sense it. There was an ominous feel about the afternoon as calf after cow after steer was run through the gate into the branding corral. It all went smoothly until one big, enraged Hereford bull managed to escape the men and tear his way into the branding corral without being snared.

Bill Bridges, one of the more experienced cowboys moved quickly to throw a rope on the bull, but he reckoned without the animal's frightening speed. In seconds, the rope was torn from Bridges' hand and the bull was charging at him furiously.

After that, everything seemed to happen at once. Bridges suddenly went down with the bull snorting and hooking its horns at him as he rolled frantically trying to dodge the thrusts.

Curry went over the rail like a track star, a gunny sack held in one lean hand, and started to distract the bull.

“Get him out of here!” he yelled to two of his men, who promptly jumped into the corral and dragged the white-faced cowboy out.

Curry flicked the sack at the bull, and turned to leap back over the ring, but a quick jerk of the snorting animal's head caught him in the side. Eleanor saw him grimace tightly with pain, and he went down like a crumpled bag.

Terrified, without even thinking, Eleanor slipped between the rails and ran to him, picking up the gunny sacks as she did.

“You stupid beast!” she raged at the bull, whapping it across the rump with all her strength with the sack, taking out the terror and fury she felt on it.

Distracted, the bull turned away from Curry, tossing his big head, his red and white coat wiggling with the motion as
his big eyes stared at the pale young woman.

Meanwhile, the other hands dived into the corral and got to Curry, ignoring his feverish curses as he ordered them to “get that damned woman out of the corral!”

Jed Docious settled the problem by slinging a hard, wiry arm around Eleanor's slender middle and half carrying, half dragging her to safety while the others danced around to keep the bull from charging. Two other cowboys dragged Curry to safety.

Once outside the ring, Eleanor made a beeline to Curry, who was stretched out on the ground with blood oozing from the wound in his side as one of the men worked to stem the bleeding by applying pressure with a clean handkerchief.

“Are you all right?” she asked him breathlessly. She dropped to her knees pushing at a strand of gritty, damp hair as she looked down into blazing silver eyes in a face gone white under its tan.

“You hotheaded little mule,” he began slowly, the whip in his voice was so sharp that it cut. “You empty-headed, idiotic, stupid little fool! You could have been killed in there, you damned lunatic!” He was warming up now, and what followed was louder, rougher, and laced with language like nothing she'd ever heard him use before. Her face had gone red and tears were rolling down her cheeks before he finally stopped to take a breath.

“Boss,” Docious interrupted hesitantly, “we need to get you to the saw-bones and have him patch you up before you bleed to death.”

“What the hell do I need with a doctor?” Curry wanted to know, flashing his blazing glance in the tall cowboy's direction. “Get me the hell in the house and call Jake in off the fence line. He can patch me up.”

“Curry, he's good at patching up animals, but…”

“Don't tell me what he is, Docious, I know damned well what he is, just get him, will you?” Curry growled. He glared up at Eleanor, whose face was white as paste. “Let Eleanor take over riding fence,” he added sarcastically. “Since she's decided she's one of the hands!”

That was the last straw. She turned with a sob and ran for her horse, tears streaming down her cheeks. She rode away without a backward glance.

E
leanor stayed in her room for the rest of the day, refusing Bessie's offer to bring her supper up, doggedly refusing to even ask about Curry even though she was aching to be reassured that he was all right.

Night came, and she turned on the small lamp by her bed, taking up her seat in the armchair by the window to stare blankly out of it with eyes that burned from too many tears.

She heard the door open, and one quick glance showed her that it was Curry. She bit her lip, feeling the tears come again, warm and wet and salty, trickling into the corners of her mouth.

Curry came and knelt in front of her. His shirt was open down the front, and she could see the stark white bandage against the bronzed flesh of his rib cage, his chest with its mat of dark, curling hair. His hands went to her waist and he held her gently, looking straight into her misty eyes, his own gaze dark and quiet with what might have been pain.

“You scared the hell out of me, little girl, do you know that?” he asked softly. “I died twice watching you in the ring with that bull, knowing that any minute the horns could catch you, the way they caught me. You sweet, crazy little fool, what if he'd gored you in the stomach? You might never be able to bear children, did you even think about that?”

She bit her lip, shaking her head softly.
“I…I thought he was going…to kill you,” she said simply, and her tear-filled eyes met his, shimmering like spring leaves in the rain.

“Honey,” he whispered softly, “what the hell good would it do me to live if your life was the price I had to pay?”

A tear worked its way down her flushed cheek. His hands went to her cheeks, drawing her forward, and his lips sipped away the tear, following it back to her closed eyelids, his tongue gently brushing the long, wet lashes in a silent intimacy that throbbed with emotion.

“Curry?” she whispered unsteadily, her hands going involuntarily to his broad shoulders.

His breath came hard and heavy. “What?” he whispered in a voice that wasn't quite steady as his mouth began to explore, to touch and lift and taste the contours of her face.

“Are…you hurt bad?” she asked.

“I'll have a scar out of it,” he murmured absently.

“You…you bled so much,” she whispered. Her fingers dug into his hard shoulders as the lazy, brief caresses began to work on her like a narcotic.

“It wasn't any more than a cut and a bad bruise,” he murmured. He looked into her misty eyes, searching them in a silence that burned, with an intensity like nothing she'd ever experienced. His gaze dropped to her parted lips and studied them for such a long time that her heart pounded in her chest.

“I'm going to make you want it this time,” he whispered huskily. “I'm going to make you ache for it.”

Before she could find the words to answer him, his mouth was brushing softly, lazily, against hers, teasing her lips apart, his whiskey-scented breath mingled with hers as his practiced mastery brought a moan from her throat.

His teeth nipped gently at her lower lip, his tongue probed the soft, tight curve of her mouth with a slow, stroking mo
tion that made the trembling start in her untutored body.

She drew back quickly, her eyes wide with surprise as they looked directly into his. She expected to see mockery there, but there was only a vague, patient tenderness.

“It's all right,” he said softly. “I'm not going to force you this time.”

The tears were drying on her cheeks, the unhappiness being replaced by a wild kind of excitement as his lean hands tightened on her waist.

“I don't know very much,” she murmured uneasily as her hands went to his broad shoulders and rested there.

“Forgive me, little one,” he said with a slow smile, “but it shows.”

She searched his pale, glittering eyes. “Curry, do men really like to kiss like that?” she asked.

“Oh, yes,” he murmured, studying the puzzled little face so close to his.

“Why?” she asked.

“If you'll relax and let me do what I want to for the next minute or so, I'll show you.”

She sat very still as his dark face came even closer. Her eyes closed, her breath sighed against his firm mouth as it touched and caressed and began to open, pressing her trembling lips apart with a slow, sweet, relentless pressure. She felt the intimacy of it right through her body. It made feelings stir deep inside her that she'd never felt, and as they grew and grew, her sharp nails involuntarily bit into his hard shoulders as she felt his mouth deepen the kiss to an intimacy that brought a choked moan from her throat.

“Oh, Curry!” she whispered brokenly against his mouth.

“Don't talk,” he replied, in a voice she didn't recognize.

His lean hands moved under her cotton blouse to caress her bare back, and the touch was like fire. She pressed closer suddenly, her mouth hungry for his, her
body blazing under the lean, sure hands that moved with an urgent pressure from her back to the silken curves of her breasts and the length of her slender body.

With a suddenness that left her hanging between paradise and reality, he tore away and stood up. He went to the window without a backward glance and drew in a harsh breath while he pulled a cigarette from his pocket and lit it.

“I didn't mean to go that far,” he said finally, in a voice rough with self-contempt.

Her stunned eyes went over his long back, loving him, needing him, still burning from the fever of his ardor.

“Did I do something wrong?” she asked in a subdued tone.

“No, honey, I did.” He stared out the window. “Little innocent, don't ever let a man touch you like that again unless you're willing to accept the consequences. It's too arousing.”

She blushed. It embarrassed her to talk like this, to feel like this. He made her feel ashamed of her own breathless response and as the bitter words sank in, her cheeks flamed with the memory of what she'd let him do. How could she tell him that she could only have felt that kind of abandon with a man she loved? She dropped her shamed eyes to her lap.

There was a movement as he turned, and she felt the piercing gaze on the back of her neck.

“God, Eleanor, don't look like that!” he growled shortly. “You're out of the nursery!”

She jumped out of the chair and went madly toward the door, feeling like some hunted animal trying to escape the hunter's bullet.

“Baby, don't,” he said in a calmer voice as her hand reached for the doorknob. “I didn't mean to snap at you.”

She hesitated, hearing the soft thud of his boots on the carpet as he came up
behind her and caught her by the waist, drawing her rigid back against the length of his body.

“Men get like this sometimes,” he explained patiently, “when they're hungry for a woman they can't have. Call it frustration, Jadebud. I wanted you very much and because of it, I let things get out of hand. I won't let it happen again.”

She relaxed a little against him, her mind fighting to cope with the upheaval of her emotions. He had her so confused, she barely knew her own name, and the newness of what she was feeling, added to the embarrassment of the liberties she'd allowed him, brought the tears back to her eyes.

He felt the sob that shook her and turned her into his arms, holding her tight against him while she cried.

“Hush,” he whispered at her ear. “God, I'm sorry. I had no right to touch you like that. I'm a man, Eleanor, long past my adolescence. It's damned hard
for me to accept limits, if that's any excuse. But what happened…happens between men and women,” he added, searching for words. “It's a very natural part of lovemaking, and nothing to be ashamed about. You're a normal, warm and responsive woman, and there's not a frigid bone in your body. And for the record, I'm damned glad I was the first.”

She buried her hot face against his chest, and he chuckled softly.

“We'll keep it low key from now on, little girl,” he said gently. “Come back out with me tomorrow. We'll stop by the store after we get through with the last of the breeding herd and pick up some canned sausages and soft drinks and have lunch on the river.”

“I'd like that,” she said softly. Her fingers pressed patterns into his blue-checked shirt, feeling the warmth and hardness of his chest through the soft material.

One of his hands came down to still
the movement. “Don't tempt fate,” he said quietly.

Her fingers curled into a tight ball. “I'm sorry,” she said quickly.

“So am I,” he murmured. “If you were a little more sophisticated, I'd strip the damned shirt off and show you how I like to be touched.”

She tried to avert her face, but he caught her in time to see the slow burn on her cheeks and he grinned down at her wickedly.

“Little spring bud,” he whispered. “You're a far cry from my usual kind of woman.”

“So is Amanda,” she reminded him quietly, feeling the hurt as she suddenly remembered that flashy diamond Curry had given his new fiancée. Fiancée!

“Is she, Norie?” he asked seriously. His eyes searched hers. “I wonder. It takes experience to try and seduce a man. I don't think you'd know how.”

She averted her face. “I think it would
come naturally if a woman loved the man.”

“Amanda loves my money, all right,” he agreed. “But not enough to put up with the ranch twelve months of the year.” He drew in a deep breath. “Would you be happy several hundred miles away from a man you loved?” he asked.

She shook her head without thinking, her soft, misty green eyes tracing every hard line of his face, lingering on his square jaw and the firm curve of his mouth.

“When you look at me like that, you're asking for trouble,” he said in a husky voice, his hands tightening like steel bands on her slight rib cage.

Her breath came fluttering, the look in his eyes made her hungry and reckless. “What kind of trouble?” she whispered shakily.

He bent, lifting, curving her body into his arms as he trapped her there. “What kind of trouble do you think, you little witch?” he murmured as he caught her mouth roughly under his.