Wild Mustang Man (22 page)

Instantly she backed away from him as if she’d been burned and gripped the edge of a nearby counter to keep from falling on the floor or blurting something stupid like she was glad to see him. She forced her lips into the semblance of a smile.

He looked around the room at the crowds, the lights, the band, the posters. The muscles in his jaw tensed and then forcibly relaxed before he spoke. “I had to see for myself. What your life was all about. What it was you wanted. What drove you. Now I know. Congratulations.”

“Thank you. But this isn’t all of my life.” She gestured to the hot-air balloons in desert colors and the acres of people still milling around. “I do have a personal life, too.”

“Spend the night on my couch. I owe you.” She tried to sound casual and not as desperate as she felt. If he said no, she’d throw herself at him, beg him, plead with him, follow him home if need be.

He looked like she’d asked him to let her take target practice with him as the target. “I’m not spending the night on your couch,” he said.

“At least come for coffee. I-I’ve missed you.”

He shrugged, and before he could say no, she was trying to keep up with his long-legged stride as he walked out of the store and up the street to the Sutter-Stockton garage where he’d left his truck. Fortunately she’d left her car at home and come by taxi, because she was terrified that if she let him out of her sight, he’d disappear from her life forever. He might do that, anyway, but she was going to do her damnedest to keep that from happening.

She sat next to him in the passenger seat of his truck, her hands holding on to the edge of the seat for the white-knuckle ride to her Russian Hill apartment. He drove fast, expertly, up and over the steep hills as if he’d lived there all his life. He didn’t speak, he just turned where she said to turn and parked in the garage under her building.

The apartment seemed smaller than ever with him there. He filled the living room with his presence, overwhelmed the leather furniture, the lamps and the carpets—and especially, her.

“I’ve got to get out of these clothes,” she said, tossing the felt hat onto her desk and kicking off her boots. “I feel ridiculous. Here I am in Western clothes, while you look like you belong here.”

“Because you belong here,” he said, with a glance out the window at the sparkling lights of the city and the Bay Bridge in the distance. “Because you want what this life can give you.. .has given you. Don’t tell me you don’t want it I saw you tonight. I saw you the people congratulate you, the man who kissed you. I heard the music, I saw the band. I can’t compete with that.”

She stared at him in disbelief. “You think I want that? You think that means anything to me?”

“You told me it did.”

“I know I did,” she admitted, walking back into the living room. “Yes, I told you I wanted success. I couldn’t tell you I wanted love even more. You would have pitied me. I couldn’t tell anyone how much, all these years, I’ve wanted a husband, a house and a baby. Of course I needed money. I had no one to support me, and I had to prove it to myself and to everyone who didn’t believe in me that I could do it. Well, I did it. And now I want what I’ve always wanted more than anything. If I hadn’t come to Harmony I never would have known you. I might have gone on for years in this world, from ad campaign to ad campaign. But my life wouldn’t have been complete. There would have been a void in it ten feet wide. Because I never knew what it was like to belong to a place, a community, a family like yours.” She stopped and licked her dry lips.

“Not that I belong there...not that I’d ever belong there the way you do.” Oh, God, she was going to break down, to start crying before she’d even said what she wanted to say.

“So what are you going to do?” he asked. “Come back and set up shop on Main Street? How long do you think you’d last? No challenge, no business, no view, no adulation?”

“Would you stop that?” she demanded hotly. “I told you I’ve done what I set out to do, to prove I could make it on my own. Yes, I’m a success. Yes, I’m proud of myself. But I don’t need people telling me I’m wonderful every day. I just need...I just need—” She choked on the word she couldn’t say. The hot tears gushed down her face. She turned and ran to her room, not caring if he left in disgust or not. She had swallowed every bit of pride she’d ever had. She’d come as close as she could to confessing she loved him, to begging him to take her back to Harmony with him. And there he stood, stony-faced and unfeeling. Now it was up to him. She slammed the door behind her and threw herself on her bed, crying such anguished sobs that she didn’t hear him throw her door open.

She was only vaguely aware of his footsteps crossing the room, of him sitting on the edge of her bed, of his hands on her shoulders, soothing, calming, massaging gently. “What is it you need, Bridget?” he asked, when her sobs had died down to a mere torrent instead of a flood. “Tell me and I’ll get it for you.”

He wiped the tears from her cheek with the pad of his thumb, and she started in again. This time so touched by his tenderness she was unable to stop crying. He stretched out next to her on her blue-and-white handmade quilt, facing her across the pattern of hearts and flowers.

He dug his elbow into her quilt, propped his head on his palm and looked at her. His expression had softened, a hint of a smile tugged at one comer of his mouth. His eyes were no longer ice-blue; they flickered with pinpoints of light “You still haven’t told me what you need,” he prodded.

She hesitated. What did she have to lose? Just Josh and Max and her whole future, that was all.

“I need you,” she said so softly he would have missed it if he hadn’t leaned forward, if his lips hadn’t been so close he could feel the words as she formed them.

“To what, Harmony? Would you really consider living with me, with us, on the ranch?” Josh asked, rolling over so she was lying on top of him, her breasts cushioned against his chest, her hips pressed invitingly against his, her full lips only a breath away from his. He thought he knew the answer to his question. But she didn’t speak. She just lay there looking at him, her expression dazed, her eyes glazed with disbelief.

“Are you sure, sure you’re ready to take a chance with me?” she asked anxiously.

“Sure. Very sure. I tried to ignore you. I tried to pretend I didn’t love you. I tried to put you out of my life and out of my mind and out of my heart. But you refused to budge. Molly will always be a part of my past. But you, you’re my present and my future. My life. Say yes, would you?” he demanded. “Would you just say yes? Because my heart has stopped beating, and my watch has stopped running. Nothing works without you. I need you, Bridget, don’t you see that? And I love you. More than anything.”

She exhaled lightly, and her smile lit her face. “I love you, too,” she breathed. “So the answer is yes, I’ll consider it.” She twined her arms around his neck and kissed him. Then hungrily and deeply, showing him better than words, how seriously she would consider living with him forever and ever.

“Another thing,” he said, coming up for air, minutes or maybe hours later. “Would you consider taking on the public relations for the Wild Mustang Association? It’s time for the world to know about them.”

“Josh,” she said, sitting on the edge of the bed, wide-eyed, her hair tousled, her eyes glowing, her heart spilling over with love. “You wouldn’t.”

He stock his head out the open window. “I’m in love with Bridget McCloud,” he said into the night air. “And she’s in love with me.”

Bridget jumped up and joined him at the window. Horns honked, sirens shrieked and lights went on and off as the whole city seemed to celebrate their love. Bridget sighed happily and closed the window.

“Absolutely,” she said loosening his tie and tugging him toward her until his face was so close she could see into the depths of his eyes and his mouth was just a kiss away from hers. “The sooner the better.”

* * * * *

The day was hot, the trail was long and her suitcase was so heavy she almost regretted packing her portable espresso machine. But a summer without good coffee? Unthinkable. Especially a summer where the days are warm but the nights are cool. Chloe rested her fanny against a pine tree to catch her breath and unfolded a piece of tattered, yellowed paper that she took from her pocket.

"Where is the stagecoach?" she muttered. "And where is the genial host?" She knew the answer to that one. Great-Grandpa Horatio Hudson was dead at age ninety-seven. And Paradise Springs was hers now. If she could find it. There had been one hand-carved wooden sign that pointed the way, and then nothing. Just a narrow trail overgrown with blackberry thorns and nettles.

After another two hours of wading through a shallow creek, spanning fallen trees and climbing at least another thousand feet in altitude, Chloe was dripping with perspiration and gasping for breath. For two cents she would have thrown her suitcase over a cliff, coffeemaker and all.

But then she saw it in the distance. Steam rising in the clear blue sky. With one last burst of energy she dragged herself forward to the end of the trail. And there it was: Paradise Hot Springs in all its glory.

She set her suitcase in the clearing, left her camera on top of it, and walked to the bathhouse. From the looks of the place, this was the end of the road. And the end of her dream.

She pushed and the door swung open on rusty hinges. She gasped. In her bathhouse, in her old enameled bathtub, was a cowboy. He was up to his neck in hot thermal water, wearing only a hat tilted low over his forehead. Shafts of sunlight poured through the cracks in the roof, illuminating his broad shoulders and large feet. The rest she could only imagine.