Elizabeth Lowell - Only His

But if Caleb asked that, Willow would have questions of her own. The answers would insure that she never told him where her fancy man was holed up, waiting for his fancy woman and a fortune in fancy horses to arrive.

Disgusted, Caleb threw in the cards he had just dealt.

Willow watched, but said nothing. She didn’t understand what was riding Caleb, but she sensed the savagery in him with great clarity.

«Answer me,» Caleb snarled.

«Why does it matter when I last saw Matthew?»

The slight trembling of Willow’s hands belied the composure of her voice, but Caleb wasn’t looking at her hands. He was looking at her mouth. Her lips were smooth and full, pink as her tongue. Their curves fascinated him. There were other curves he longed to touch, to taste, to test the softness of her breasts; but most of all he longed to strip off buckskin and flannel and explore the nest of golden hair that concealed her feminine secrets. The memory of that thick triangle pressing against her drenchedpantelets had haunted him mercilessly.

In that instant Caleb knew if he stayed cooped up with Willow a minute longer in the enforced intimacy of the shelter, he was going to demand more than useless information from her soft lips. A few minutes ago she might have given him the kiss he hungered for, and more besides. But not now. Now she was almost frightened of him. Now she was longing for the fancy man who told her lies about love.

Caleb knew he had only himself to blame. He had let the hunger burning within him erode his self-control until he could barely call his body his own. That was stupid. Reno hadn’t seduced his girls with the rough edge of his tongue — he had whispered loving lies while he unfastened laces and plundered the soft heat beneath. That was what Willow was missing, all the smooth lies and smoother manners of a gentleman.

If Caleb wanted to sheathe himself within Willow’s body, he would have to control his savage anger at her lover. Then, maybe, Caleb would be able to control the passion that was eating into the very marrow of his bones.

With a muttered curse, he grabbed his hat and rifle and left the shelter in a coordinated rush of power. Behind him, Willow let out her breath slowly, wondering why the subject of marriage and Matthew Moran always put a razor edge on Caleb’s temper.

«I’m going to look around,» Caleb said from outside the shelter. «I’ll be gone for several hours. Don’t build a fire.»

«All right,» Willow answered.

She waited, listening, hardly daring to breathe, remembering the savagery of Caleb’s voice. She heard nothing but the fitful windunravelling the last of the storm. When she emerged tentatively from the shelter, she was alone and the sun was pouring a cataract of golden heat over the land. Clouds retreated with each passing minute, revealing newly whitened peaks.

«Caleb was right,» Willow said aloud, hoping the sound of her own voice would hold loneliness at bay. «It snowed. But then, Caleb is always right, isn’t he? That’s why I hired him.»

Willow shivered as she remembered Caleb’s savagery when he questioned her about Matthew. It was as though the very fact of her brother’s existence somehow offended Caleb.

«Not my brother,» she corrected herself quickly. «My husband. I have to remember that. Matthew is my husband, not my brother.»

Yet what Willow remembered was the intensity of Caleb’s eyes when he watched her lick honey from her fingertip, and the huskiness of his voice when he asked her if she was going to kiss his small hurts and make them better. She had been tempted, so tempted, and he had seen that. He wanted her, she was drawn to him, and he thought she was married.

Scarlet burned suddenly from Willow’s breasts to her hairline as she realized that he must think her a flirt at best, and at worst…

Fancy lady.

Willow took a deep, steadying breath. It would be for only a few more days. A week, perhaps. Then they would be among the five peaks and Matthew would find them and they could all laugh about her necessary disguise as a married woman. Until then, she needed the disguise more than ever.

Caleb was a wild, sweet fire in her blood.

With a curious, tingling shudder, Willow forced herself to think of something other than the man whose uncertain temper and crooked smile kept throwing her off balance. She concentrated on the sunlight beating heavily down all around her, stripping veils of mist from the wet land. Although the ground was cool, the air was rapidly becoming almost hot.

The horses had emerged from the cover of the forest and were grazing. They ate hungrily, looking up from time to time, but otherwise relaxed. Their calm told Willow that no one was nearby. For a few minutes she watched their coats steam in the rapidly heating air, reassured by the familiar presence of her Arabians. Within an hour the horses would be dry, and so would the meadow.

Willow went into the shelter and came out carrying the shotgun, a blanket, lavender soap, Caleb’s cavalry shirt, and her clean camisole andpantelets. Watching Ishmael for any sign that she wasn’t alone in the meadow, she went to the creek and followed it downstream from the camp until she found a patch of willow bushes growing right next to the water. Behind the screen of bushes she undressed until she wore only the scarlet flannellongjohns.

When Willow knelt and put her hand in the water, she barely bit back a shriek. The creek was colder than the streams she was accustomed to in West Virginia, much less one of the sun-warmed farm ponds where she had bathed whenever she could sneak away.

«The sun will warm you up,» she told herself firmly. «Now get to it before Caleb comes back.»

Willow temporized, washing in reverse of her usual order rather than stripping down right away. Still dressed, she wetted her hair and worked it into a lather. The soap fairly seemed to explode into bubbles when it hit the water. Very quickly she had lathered and rinsed her hair twice. Sitting on her heels, she wrung out her hair and shook it over her back to dry. Then she peeled off the cotton flannel and washed herself to the accompaniment of gasps and gritted teeth whenever cold water hit a particularly sensitive part of her body.

After blotting herself dry as best she could with the flannel, Willow stepped into herpantelets and camisole. She shook out Caleb’s big shirt and pulled it on over her head, lifted out her hair, and settled into shivering herself warm. It took only a few minutes. She gathered everything she had brought and walked out of the willows, looking for a warm, sunny place along the brook to wash her clothes.

A hundred yards away, Ishmael’s head came up and his ears pricked together as he saw Willow emerge from cover. He watched her walk along the stream for a minute, then went back to grazing. Certain that no one would be able to sneak up on her — except, perhaps, Caleb — Willow knelt near the water, set the shotgun within reach, and began washing her flannel underwear. When she was finished, she spread the flannel underwear on the meadow grass to dry.

The heat of the sun amazed her. Already the snowline was visibly melting up the mountain peaks, retreating with every passing minute. The air was almost hot. Its silky dryness was like a tonic after the days of overcast and rain. It was difficult for Willow to believe that she would be wanting heavy clothes when the sun went down. At the moment, even with wet hair, she was warm enough to consider peeling off Caleb’s heavy woof shirt and lying down on a blanket in the sun while her hair dried. She compromised by unbuttoning one of the rows of buttons and allowing the cavalry shirt to flop open on the right side.

The horses continued to graze quietly, assuring Willow that she was alone in the meadow. She shook out the blanket, set the shotgun nearby, and began combing snarls out of her hip-length hair. It was a tedious job, but in time most of the water-darkened strands hung freely down her back. With a sigh of relief she stretched out on her stomach to let the sun complete its work of drying her hair. Then she would finish grooming the thick mass with her brush.

The light breeze, the hum of insects working over the meadow, the muted song of birds, and the hot sun combined to unravel Willow. With a long sigh, she slid into sleep.

When Ishmael nickered, she awoke with a start. Even as her hand closed around the shotgun, she recognized Caleb approaching her with long, easy strides. Hastily, she sat up and flipped the blanket across her legs. Her hair slid forward over her shoulders in an untamed fall of gold. Frantically, she groped around the blanket but couldn’t find the brush and comb.

«Good thing nobody is nearby,» Caleb said. «Between that red stallion and your underwear drying on the grass, it would take a blind man to overlook us.»

«You didn’t tell me to keep the horses in the forest,» Willow muttered as she rearranged the blanket to cover her bare feet.

«I didn’t tell you to keep your pants on, either.»

Caleb’s voice was neutral, giving no indication as to his mood. Willow looked cautiously at him through the screen of her dark amber eyelashes. His smile flashed crookedly against the black backdrop of his beard.

«Don’t worry, honey. If I wanted the horses in the forest, I would have picketed them there myself. As for your clothes,» he said, his eyes crinkling at the corners, «they don’t stand out nearly as much as that red stud.»

Relieved, Willow smiled up at Caleb. The day was too warm and too unexpectedly wonderful to spend arguing. His own smile widened as he bent and scooped up the brush and tortoiseshell comb that were peeking out from the meadow grass.