The Winter Man (30 page)

He faltered. His cheeks went ruddy as the words penetrated, touched him, excited him. Except for his mother and Elliot, nobody had ever said that to him before Amanda had. “Do you?” he asked huskily. “Still? Even after the way I walked off and left you there at the lodge that night? After what I said to you on the phone?” he added, because he'd had too much time to agonize over his behavior, even if it had been for what he thought was her own good.

“Even after that,” she said gently. “With all my heart. I just want to live with you, Quinn. In the wilds of Wyoming, in a grass shack on some island, in a mansion in Beverly Hills—it would all be the same to me—as long as you loved me back and we could be together for the rest of our lives.”

He felt a ripple of pure delight go through him. “Is that what you really want?” he asked, searching her dark eyes with his own.

“More than anything else in the world,” she confessed. “That's why I couldn't tell you who and what I really was. I loved you so much, and I knew you wouldn't want me…” Her voice trailed off.

“I want you, all right,” he said curtly. “I never stopped. Damn it, woman, I was trying to do what was best for you!”

“By turning me out in the cold and leaving me to starve to death for love?” she asked icily. “Thanks a bunch!”

He looked away uncomfortably. “It wasn't that way and you know it. I thought maybe it was the novelty. You know, a lonely man in the backwoods,” he began.

“You thought I was having the time of my life playing you for a fool,” she said. Her head was beginning to hurt, but she had to wrap it all up before she gave in and asked for some more medication. “Well, you listen to me, Quinn Sutton, I'm not the type to go around deliberately trying to hurt people. All I ever wanted was somebody to care about me—just me, not the pretty girl on the stage.”

“Yes, I know that now,” he replied. He brought her hand to his mouth and softly kissed the palm. The look on his face weakened her. “So you want a ring, do you? It will have to be something sensible. No flashy diamonds, even if I could give you something you'd need sunglasses to look at.”

“I'll settle for the paper band on a King Edward cigar if you'll just marry me,” she replied.

“I think I can do a little better than that,” he murmured
dryly. He bent over her, his lips hovering just above hers. “And no long engagement,” he whispered.

“It takes three days, doesn't it?” she whispered back. “That
is
a long engagement. Get busy!”

He stifled a laugh as he brushed his hard mouth gently over her dry one. “Get well,” he whispered. “I'll read some books real fast.”

She colored when she realized what kind of books he was referring to, and then smiled under his tender kiss. “You do that,” she breathed. “Oh, Quinn, get me out of here!”

“At the earliest possible minute,” he promised.

The band showed up later in the day while Quinn was out buying an engagement ring for Amanda. He'd already called and laughingly told Elliot and Harry what she'd done to him, and was delighted with Elliot's pleasure in the news and Harry's teasing. He did buy her a diamond, even if it was a moderate one, and a gold band for each of them. It gave him the greatest kind of thrill to know that he was finally marrying for all the right reasons.

When he got back to the hospital, the rest of the survivors had been airlifted out and all but one of them had been treated and released. The news media had tried to get to Amanda, but the band arrived shortly after Quinn left and ran interference. Hank gave out a statement and stopped them. The road manager, as Quinn found out, had gone on to San Francisco to make arrangements for canceling the concert.

The boys were gathered around Amanda, who'd been moved into a nice private room. She was sitting up in bed, looking much better, and her laughing dark eyes met Quinn's the minute he came in the door.

“Hank brought a shotgun,” she informed him. “And Deke and Johnson and Jack are going to help you down the aisle. Jerry's found a minister, and Hank's already arranged a blood test for you right down the hall. The license—”

“Is already applied for,” Quinn said with a chuckle. “I did that myself. Hello, boys,” he greeted them, shaking hands as he was introduced to the rest of the band. “And you can unload the shotgun. I'd planned to hold it on Amanda, if she tried to back out.”

“Me, back out? Heaven forbid!” she exclaimed, smiling as Quinn bent to kiss her. “Where's my ring?” she whispered against his hard mouth. “I want it on, so these nurses won't make eyes at you. There's this gorgeous redhead…”

“I can't see past you, pretty thing,” he murmured, his eyes soft and quiet in a still-gaunt face. “Here it is.” Quinn produced it and slid it on her finger. He'd measured the size with a small piece of paper he'd wrapped around her finger, and he hoped that the method worked. He needn't have worried, because the ring was a perfect fit, and she acted as if it were the three-carat monster he'd wanted to get her. Her face lit up, like her pretty eyes, and she beamed as she showed it to the band.

“Did you sleep at all?” Hank asked him while the others gathered around Amanda.

“About an hour, I think,” Quinn murmured dryly. “You?”

“I couldn't even get properly drunk,” Hank said, sighing, “so the boys and I played cards until we caught the bus. We slept most of the way in. It was a long ride. From what I hear,” he added with a level look, “you and that Hale fellow had an even longer one, bringing Amanda out of the mountains.”

“You'll never know.” Quinn looked past him to Amanda, his dark eyes full of remembered pain. “I had to decide whether or not to move her. I thought it was riskier to leave her there until the next morning. If we'd waited, we had no guarantee that the helicopter would have been able to land even then. She could have died. It's a miracle she didn't.”

“Miracles come in all shapes and sizes,” Hank mused, staring at her. “She's been ours. Without her, we'd never have gotten anywhere. But being on the road has worn her out. The boys and I were talking on the way back about cutting out personal appearances and concentrating on videos and albums. I think Amanda might like that. She'll have enough to do from now on, I imagine, taking care of you and your boy,” he added with a grin. “Not to mention all those new brothers and sisters you'll be adding. I grew up on a ranch,” he said surprisingly. “I have five brothers.”

Quinn's eyebrows lifted. “Are they all runts like you?” he asked with a smile.

“I'm the runt,” Hank corrected.

Quinn just shook his head.

* * *

Amanda was released from the hospital two days later. Every conceivable test had been done, and fortunately there were no complications. The doctor had been cautiously optimistic at first, but her recovery was rapid—probably due, the doctor said with a smile, to her incentive. He gave Amanda away at the brief ceremony, held in the hospital's chapel just before she was discharged, and one of the nurses was her matron of honor. There were a record four best men; the band. But for all its brevity and informality, it was a ceremony that Amanda would never forget. The Methodist minister who performed it had a way with words, and Amanda and Quinn felt just as married as if they'd had the service performed in a huge church with a large crowd present.

The only mishap was that the press found out about the wedding, and Amanda and Quinn and the band were mobbed as they made their way out of the hospital afterward. The size of the band members made them keep well back. Hank gave them his best wildman glare while Jack whispered something about the bandleader becoming homicidal if he was pushed too far. They escaped in two separate cars. The driver of the one taking Quinn and
Amanda to the lodge managed to get them there over back roads, so that nobody knew where they were.

Terry had given them the bridal suite, on the top floor of the lodge, and the view of the snowcapped mountains was exquisite. Amanda, still a little shaky and very nervous, stared out at them with mixed feelings.

“I don't know if I'll ever think of them as postcards again,” she remarked to Quinn, who was trying to find places to put everything from their suitcase. He'd had to go to Ricochet for his suit and a change of clothing.

“What, the mountains?” he asked, smiling at her. “Well, it's not a bad thing to respect them. But airplanes don't crash that often, and when you're well enough, I'm going to teach you to ski.”

She turned and looked at him for a long time. Her wedding outfit was an off-white, a very simple shirtwaist dress with a soft collar and no frills. But with her long hair around her shoulders and down to her waist, framed in the light coming through the window, she looked the picture of a bride. Quinn watched her back and sighed, his eyes lingering on the small sprig of lily of the valley she was wearing in her hair—a present from a member of the hospital staff.

“One of the nurses brought me a newspaper,” Amanda said. “It told all about how you and Mr. Hale got me out.” She hesitated. “They said that only a few men could ski that particular mountain without killing themselves.”

“I've been skiing it for years,” he said simply. He took off the dark jacket of his suit and loosened his tie with a long sigh. “I knew that the Ski Patrol would get you out, but they usually only work the lodge slopes—you know, the ones with normal ski runs. The peak the plane landed on was off the lodge property and out-of-the-way. It hadn't even been inspected. There are all sorts of dangers on slopes like that—fallen trees, boulders, stumps, debris, not to mention the threat of avalanche. The Ski Patrol marks dangerous runs where they work. They're the first out in the morning and the last off the slopes in the afternoon.”

“You seem to know a lot about it,” Amanda said.

“I used to be one of them,” he replied with a grin. “In my younger days. It's pretty rewarding.”

“There was a jacket Harry showed me,” she frowned. “A rust-colored one with a big gold cross on the back…”

“My old patrol jacket.” He chuckled. “I wouldn't part with it for the world. If I'd thought of it, I'd have worn it that day.” His eyes darkened as he looked at her. “Thank God I knew that slope,” he said huskily. “Because I'd bet money that you wouldn't have lasted on that mountain overnight.”

“I was thinking about you when the plane went down,” she confessed. “I wasn't sure that I'd ever see you again.”

“Neither was I when I finally got to you.” He took off his tie and threw it aside. His hand absently unfastened the top buttons of his white shirt as he moved toward her.
“I was trying so hard to do the right thing,” he murmured. “I didn't think I could give you what you needed, what you were used to.”

“I'm used to you, Mr. Sutton,” she murmured with a smile. Amanda slid her arms under his and around him, looking up at him with her whole heart in her dark eyes. “Bad temper, irritable scowl and all. Anything you can't give me, I don't want. Will that do?”

His broad chest rose and fell slowly. “I can't give you much. I've lost damned near everything.”

“You have Elliot and Harry and me,” she pointed out. “And some fat, healthy calves, and in a few years, Elliot will have a lot of little brothers and sisters to help him on the ranch.”

A faint dusky color stained his high cheekbones. “Yes.”

“Why, Mr. Sutton, honey, you aren't shy, are you?” she whispered dryly as she moved her hands back around to his shirt and finished unbuttoning it down his tanned, hair-roughened chest.

“Of course I'm shy,” he muttered, heating up at the feel of her slender hands on his skin. He caught his breath and shuddered when she kissed him there. His big hands slid into her long, silky hair and brought her even closer. “I like that,” he breathed roughly. “Oh, God, I love it!”

She drew back after a minute, her eyes sultry, drowsy. “Wouldn't you like to do that to me?” she whispered. “I like it, too.”

He fumbled with buttons until he had the dress out of the way and she was standing in nothing except a satin teddy. He'd never seen one before, except in movies, and he stared at her with his breath stuck somewhere in his chest. It was such a sexy garment low on her lace-covered breasts, nipped at her slender waist, hugging her full hips. Below it were her elegant silk-clad legs, although he didn't see anything holding up her hose.

“It's a teddy,” she whispered. “If you want to slide it down,” she added shyly, lowering her eyes to his pulsating chest, “I could step out of it.”

He didn't know if he could do that and stay on his feet. The thought of Amanda unclothed made his knees weak. But he slid the straps down her arms and slowly, slowly, peeled it away from her firm, hard-tipped breasts, over her flat stomach, and then over the panty hose she was wearing. He caught them as well and eased the whole silky mass down to the floor.

She stepped out of it, so much in love with him that all her earlier shyness was evaporating. It was as new for him as it was for her, and that made it beautiful. A true act of love.

She let him look at her, fascinated by the awe in his hard face, in the eyes that went over her like an artist's brush, capturing every line, every soft curve before he even touched her.

“Amanda, you're the most beautiful creature I've ever
seen,” he said finally. “You look like a drawing of a fairy I saw in an old-time storybook…all gold and ivory.”

She reached up and leaned close against him, shivering a little when her breasts touched his bare chest. The hair was faintly abrasive and very arousing. She moved involuntarily and gasped at the sensation.

“Do you want to help me?” he whispered as he stripped off his shirt and his hands went to his belt.

“I…” She hesitated, her nerve retreating suddenly at the intimacy of it. She grimaced. “Oh, Quinn, I'm such a coward!” She hid her face against his chest and felt his laughter.