Clint had grown up in what he considered to be a large family, plenty of brothers and sisters to make holidays chaotic, if stressful, even a handful of cousins on his mother’s side to fill up the house. He’d always thought that was one reason he’d moved to such a small town in Montana and chosen an isolated ranch. He’d longed for some peace and quiet.
He now knew with absolute certainty that the one thing he would never get with Angela in his life was peace and quiet, not on holidays spent in Texas, anyway.
By three in the afternoon he’d lost count of the number of people who’d arrived for the pre-Christmas party. Harlan Adams presided over the celebration with as much pride as any clan patriarch in a state filled with larger-than-life men. He commanded the respect not only of his sons, but his daughters-in-law and of all the grandchildren. They deferred to him in most matters, teased him unmercifully about others and always, always showed their love with every word and action.
Clint knew it took an incredible man to earn so much adoration. He’d never had a male role model of his own. He’d thought when he first met Luke Adams that Luke might be the man to emulate. Now he realized that Luke was simply his father’s son: a strong, honest man shaped by a strong, honest father. Cody and Jordan were, as well. Parenting such fine men was a legacy Harlan Adams could be proud of.
Watching their interaction made Clint feel the kind of gut-deep envy that he’d never before experienced as child or adult. Sure, as a kid he’d wanted a dad around for the simple stuff, a father-son dinner at school, a game of catch in the backyard, an afternoon of fishing. He’d regretted not having something that even his own brothers and sisters had experienced. But he hadn’t felt this wrenching sense of having missed something powerful and meaningful in his life.
He had no idea what kind of man his father had become when he’d left them, but the fact that he’d gone said quite a lot about his character. It was obvious to Clint that his father hadn’t come from the same sort of stock that Harlan Adams had. Even if he’d stayed, his influence on Clint’s life probably wouldn’t have been as sharply defined as Harlan Adams’s had been on his sons.
It was rare for Clint to feel that he wasn’t another man’s equal, but in this crowd he began to have his doubts. His own code of ethics was decent, his own brand of loyalty deep, but he wasn’t at all sure it measured up to what he was witnessing at this family gathering.
Having doubts about himself always made him edgy. As a kid he’d taken swings at anyone who’d suggested he was less than they were. As an adult he’d learned to avoid situations that would put him at a disadvantage.
Now, feeling decidedly edgy, he retreated outside after Consuela’s gargantuan feast. He figured it would be hours before anyone even noticed he’d gone. If they did notice, they’d probably be relieved since his presence had created more than one awkward, stressful moment.
Angela surely wouldn’t miss him. She was finally and totally caught up in her reunion with her family, just as she should be. Whatever questions anyone had raised had been silenced, probably by stern admonitions from on high. In the absence of such probing, she had relaxed. Her smile had come more frequently, twisting his insides with the innocent beauty of it. He thought she looked happier than he’d ever made her. That made him edgy, too.
“Too overwhelming?” she asked, suddenly appearing at his side as if he’d conjured her up. Her hair was whipping around her face in the icy wind. That same wind had put patches of color in her cheeks. She was desperately tugging at her coat, trying to close the ever-widening gap over her expanding tummy, but it was a losing battle.
He smiled at the futile effort and drew a responding scowl.
“You try adding an inch a day to your waistline and see how long clothes fit,” she grumbled.
“You shouldn’t be out here,” he said curtly. “The sun’s about to go down and the temperature’s dropping.”
“I needed some air and a chance to let my face muscles relax.”
He grinned at that. He’d felt much the same way himself. Still, he couldn’t resist the urge to taunt. “Too much smiling?” he inquired. “Didn’t I read somewhere that it takes fewer muscles to smile than it does to frown?”
She chuckled. “Have you been reading those beauty magazines I left behind?”
It was closer to the truth than he wanted to admit. She’d cluttered the whole darn ranch house with her romance novels and her magazines. After she’d gone, he’d felt closer to her when he’d glanced through them. Silly nonsense, for the most part, at least when it came to the magazines.
The books had been another story. Some of those writers could weave a fascinating story, and the steamy sex in a few of them had left him downright hot for days afterward. He’d regretted not peeking at them when Hattie had been around to satisfy the urges they stirred.
“You have, haven’t you?” she demanded, laughing. “I don’t believe it.”
He feigned a scowl. “Don’t let it get around, angel. You’ll ruin my reputation.”
She eyed him speculatively and he could see evidence of the insatiable Hattie in her expression. She had always been as eager as he to make love, as anxious as he for a stolen caress or a passionate kiss.
“Exactly what other tidbits of useful information did you pick up from your reading?” she asked.
Suddenly enjoying the game, he reached over and tucked a wayward curl behind her ear. He lingered to trace his thumb across her lower lip and felt the shock of his touch jolt through her. The flare of yearning in her eyes was unmistakable. Once upon a time he’d seen it often. That kind of longing was heady stuff for a man who’d always been odd man out with his own family. To have someone want him so desperately fueled his masculine ego and filled his heart. Only after she’d gone had he realized just how much he’d come to depend on it. Now she was openly offering him a chance to grab just a small taste of what they’d once shared.
“For starters,” he said quietly, his gaze pinned on hers, “I learned that sometimes a kiss is more devastating than sex, that the brush of a finger across a woman’s lips can make her toes curl.” He studied her quizzically as he suited action to words. “Is it true, angel?”
She swallowed hard, but never took her eyes from his. The bold look further inflamed him as he waited to see if she’d respond honestly or lie.
“It seems to be,” she said. “But I think one experiment is hardly scientific.”
Smiling to himself, he traced the outline of her mouth, lingering at the dip in the top lip, then skimming the bottom lip lightly with his fingernail. She trembled.
“Two for two,” he said with satisfaction. “Enough yet?”
“Not nearly enough,” she insisted.
“The experimenting’s getting dangerous,” he warned.
“You scared?” she taunted.
“No, but maybe you should be.”
“Nothing scares an Adams,” she retorted.
He laughed. “That’s definitely one part of your heritage you never denied. You were always game for any risk.”
“So were you. Some said it was what made us a good match,” she said.
“Still feeling intrepid?”
“Always.”
He slowly lowered his head until his mouth hovered over hers. “Still?”
With her gaze pinned to his, she simply nodded.
The touch of their lips set off a familiar blazing heat. Clint was no longer aware of the biting cold of the wind. Inside, his body temperature shot up. Perspiration broke out on his brow.
When Angela settled into his embrace, her lips molded to his, he felt as if he could strip naked, make love to her right here and right now, and never even notice the frozen ground beneath them. She could make him hotter faster than a wood stove set on high. Always could.
“Hey, Justin, is there steam rising from Angie?”
Reality slammed into him at the comment. Angela went absolutely still in his arms. He guessed the whispered question came from young Harlan Patrick, Cody’s son. He was twenty or so and had a smart mouth and a young man’s fascination with sex. That much had been evident from the moment he arrived.
“Maybe we should douse them with water,” Jordan’s son, Justin, whispered back. “That’s what Dad does to the cats when he catches them going at it.”
“You do and you are going to be two very uncomfortable young men for the rest of your visit,” Clint said. Angie shivered or so he thought. He glanced down and realized she was laughing and trying to keep her two cousins from catching her at it. She buried her face against his chest.
Justin and Harlan whirled to take off, but Clint released Angela with some reluctance and placed himself squarely in their path, one hand firmly on each boy’s shoulder. He regarded them steadily. “Now here’s the deal, guys. You keep very, very quiet about what you saw and I will keep my mouth shut about the cigarettes you were sneaking.”
Despite being plenty old enough to smoke the two teens exchanged guilty looks. They knew how vehemently their grandfather objected. Harlan had gone on about it earlier.
“Are we agreed?” Clint asked.
“Oh, yeah,” Justin said fervently. “Even at my age Dad would knock me from here to Dallas if he knew I was smoking.”
“From here to Kansas,” Harlan concurred. “We never saw a thing, Mr. Brady.” He dared a glance at his cousin. “Sorry, Angie. We didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“Yeah,” Justin said. “You guys go back to doing whatever it was you were doing when we showed up. Not that we noticed or anything.”
“Later, guys,” Clint said. “And ditch the cigarettes.”
They took off running. Away from the house, Clint noticed with amusement.
“How’d you know they’d been smoking?” Angie asked when they were out of earshot. “I never smelled a thing.”
“Guesswork,” he admitted. “They looked guilty as sin when your grandfather was talking about cigarettes. My brothers and I used to sneak out and try to catch a smoke after some family gathering, so we could feel grown-up. It was my mother who caught up with us the second or third time we tried it. She was not pleased. She threatened to shred the tobacco like a salad and make us eat it for dessert, if she ever caught us with a cigarette again. She said if we were going to put that foul stuff into our bodies, we might as well chow down on it. Said it would kill us quicker that way.”
“Did she do it?”
“Never had to. We’d gotten the message.”
She studied him, her expression thoughtful. “You never talked much about your family when we were together,” she said.
“Neither did you,” he pointed out.
“Touché. Maybe we should start all over again, pretend we just met.”
He glanced at her protruding belly. “That’s a little hard to do, don’t you think?”
Suddenly she gasped and grabbed her stomach.
“What?” he demanded at once. “Are you OK? Sweet heaven, you’re not going into labor, are you? It’s too soon, isn’t it? Have you even seen a doctor since you got here?”
“Whoa. Relax.” She grinned. “Your kid was just making his presence felt. I think he’s practicing for the NFL already.”
“You’re convinced it’s a boy?”
“No, but Consuela is. She’s almost never wrong.” She regarded him shyly, then took his hand and placed it on her stomach. “Here, feel.”
For several seconds he felt nothing at all, then suddenly he felt the thump of a very solid kick. The rush of feelings that came over him was mind-boggling. For the first time, the baby was a reality, not just part of some grand lie that stood between them.
“A field goal kicker, for sure,” he said, feeling the unexpected sting of tears in his eyes.
He’d missed months of this. He’d been cheated of hearing his baby’s heartbeat for the first time, of seeing Angela’s body change to accommodate the child she was carrying. OK, so that was partly his fault, but she was the one who’d impetuously taken off. She was the one who’d kept on running.
“Damn you,” he said softly.
She stared at him in shock. Her eyes filled with hurt and confusion at the harshness of his words. “What?”
“You’ve robbed me of so much.”
Never one to take an accusation lightly, she scowled back at him. Temper flared in her eyes. “You had a choice,” she reminded him stiffly. “You could have reacted like a man and accepted responsibility from the beginning.”
It was the same old story, dragging them back to square one. Clint sighed. If he were entirely honest, he’d have to admit they shared the blame. There was more than enough to go around. Even so, he couldn’t resist one last dig.
“Is that all you expected, for me to accept responsibility? I never questioned that this was my baby. Not once. I was always under the impression what you really wanted was for me to declare my love and marry you.”
“It’s the same thing,” she said defiantly.
“Not quite, angel. And if you were being entirely honest, you’d admit that back then you and I were nowhere close to sorting out our feelings for each other. You didn’t even trust me enough to tell me the truth about who you were.”
Her lips compressed into an angry line before she snapped, “Don’t talk to me about honesty, Clint Brady. You’ve never once owned up to what you’re really doing here.”
He went absolutely still at the unspoken accusation behind the words. “Meaning?”
“Just how did you find out who I was and where to find me? Was finding out that I came from a wealthy family enough to drag you down here after me?”
She had hinted at as much earlier, but Clint still couldn’t believe his ears. The unfairness of her charge apparently never crossed her mind. Quick-tempered retorts came into his head, but he knew if he spoke even one of them, ugly words would start flying fast and furiously. Their tempers had always been their downfall. There was no such thing as a quiet, rational conversation between Hattie and him over even a small difference of opinion. They shouted whatever came to mind at full volume.
When the dust settled, there were always hurt feelings and fences to mend. He suspected it was the one area in life that didn’t improve with practice. He suspected the cuts just went deeper and the fences grew harder and harder to mend. Maybe it was time to break the cycle and find a new way of getting along. Since he didn’t have an imagination vivid enough to figure out how to do that on the spur of the moment, he decided some distance was called for.
“Go back inside, Angela,” he said abruptly, backing away from her. “It’s too damned cold for you to be out here.”
“I will not,” she said, digging in her heels literally and regarding him with fire in her eyes. “You don’t make decisions for me.”
“Oh, for pity’s sake, can’t you do one thing because it’s sensible and stop worrying about the fact that the suggestion came out of my mouth?”
With that he scooped her up in his arms and headed for the house. After a moment of stunned silence, she blistered the air with protests loud enough to wake the dead. Half the family was standing in the kitchen watching by the time he deposited her unceremoniously on her feet inside the door. Thank heaven no one laughed or she probably would have grabbed the carving knife lying in plain sight by the turkey and come after them.
He turned on his heel, then, and struck off for a very long walk. He glanced at the sky, hoping for signs of an impending blizzard. He’d figured no less than a foot of snow was likely to cool his temper anytime tonight.
He’d been walking for the better part of an hour, his face chilled, his hands jammed into his pockets, the wind cutting through his coat, when he saw Luke Adams walking slowly in his direction. He had the feeling Angela’s father would either go or stay at a signal from him. He gave the older man a curt nod that was apparently accepted as welcome enough.
“I suppose you’ll be wanting me to leave now,” he said eventually.
He thought he caught a glimpse of Luke’s smile in the moonlight.
“Not unless you want to,” Angela’s father said. “You’re going to have to make up your own mind what the best solution is to this. You and Angela. If you decide to stay, we’ll welcome you. If you decide to go, we’ll look out for Angela and the baby.”
“And hate my guts for the rest of your days,” Clint concluded.
“Hating is a waste of time and energy,” Luke said.
He said it with such passionate conviction that Clint stared at him. “You ever hated anyone?”
“Myself for a long time,” Luke said candidly. “My father for a bit.”
The response stunned Clint. If Luke could hate a man like Harlan Adams, then there was no word for the depth of his own feelings toward his father. “You hated your father? How’d that happen?”
Deeply felt sorrow seemed to etch new lines in Luke’s rugged face. “I figured between us we killed my brother,” he explained, echoing the story that Angela had told Clint earlier. “I also resented the hell out of the fact that he was trying to control my life. Jessie was the one who made me see that the only thing in life that really counts is family. When you love people, you work out your differences, no matter how difficult it is or how long it takes. I was never a big talker, so it was always harder for me.”
“I know what you mean,” Clint said. “I always figured actions ought to speak loudly enough.”
“I’d say yours do,” Luke said with a grin. “They were loud and clear earlier tonight.”
“Sorry,” Clint apologized again. “That woman can make me angry quicker than you can set off a rocket on the Fourth of July.”
“So I noticed, but that wasn’t what fascinated me so.”
“Oh?”
“What I saw was a man who cared enough about a woman to make sure she was in out of the cold, even when he was mad enough to throttle her. That’s the kind of man I could respect.” He gave Clint a direct look. “It’s something to think about, isn’t it?”
Before Clint could respond, Luke headed for the barn and left him with nothing but his thoughts for company.
At least there was one member of the Adams clan that didn’t think he was here with an ulterior motive, he concluded bitterly. Too bad it wasn’t Angela.
Where she’d gotten the nut-brained idea that he was after the Adams fortune was beyond him. He hadn’t even known she had a dime to her name when he’d traced her to Dallas and met Betsy. If he was an ambitious, money-hungry kind of man, would he have been scrambling to make ends meet on a broken-down ranch in Montana? There were far easier ways to make a buck.
He just happened to love ranching. He liked the exhausting work and the never-ending challenges and the intellectual stimulation of figuring out how to better his herd from year to year. It might never make him rich, but fulfillment was all he was after. It was enough to have something of his own, something he could take pride in. If Angela hadn’t seen that much in their months together, then she hadn’t really known him at all. And it was damned sure he hadn’t known her.
“Well, that was certainly humiliating,” Angela said, when she’d finally calmed down enough to speak. Most of the family had discreetly slipped away, leaving her in the kitchen with two of her cousins and Consuela.
“I thought it was romantic,” Sharon Lynn said with huge eyes and an exaggerated sigh.
Sharon Lynn was less than a year younger than Angela, but she’d stayed in Los Pinos her whole life, surrounded by family, content with running Eli Dolan’s Drugstore, where her mother had once worked and where her mother and Cody had carried on much of their highly irregular and high-volume courtship. Maybe that explained why she thought that Clint’s he-man act was so romantic. She wasn’t worldly enough or liberated enough to know better.
“You want him, you can have him,” Angela snapped.
Her cousin laughed. “Not on your life. I’m not wasting my energy chasing after a man who’s already hooked.”
“Besides, she already has eyes for Kyle Mason,” Dani said. She gave Angela a sympathetic look. “Are you OK?”
“Just peachy.”
Dani, who was now a veterinarian in town, urged Angie toward the kitchen table. “Sit down. Your hands are like ice.” She glanced around the kitchen until her gaze found Consuela. “Could you make her some tea, please?”
Angela accepted the tea and the solicitude. Dani hadn’t been born an Adams. She’d been adopted by Jordan when he and her mother, Kelly Flint, had married. She was older than Angela by four years, but it seemed to Angela that something had changed in her cousin.
Angela studied her intently, trying to figure out what it was exactly. Once exuberant and outgoing, Dani now seemed shy and quiet, even as she managed to take charge of the situation. Obviously her veterinary training had enabled her to cope well with unexpected emergencies, but there was a vulnerability about her that was out of character.
When she handed the cup of tea to Angela, her worried gaze shifted away the instant Angela made eye contact with her. Angela put the cup on the table and caught her cousin’s hand. “You OK?”
Dani’s responding smile seemed forced. “Hey, you’re the patient, not me.”
“It must be nice having a patient who can tell you what’s wrong for a change,” she teased. “I’m just cold. It’ll pass.” She sobered and added quietly, “There’s something else going on with you.”
“Don’t be silly. I’m perfectly fine.”
Sharon Lynn stepped in and circled an arm protectively around Dani’s waist. She met Angela’s gaze evenly. “Let it go,” she said quietly, but firmly.
Angela was taken aback by the fierce joining of forces. The cousins had all been close growing up. There’d been no way around it, with family gatherings as common as Texas bluebonnets in summer. They’d never taken sides back then. In fact, the girls had all been amazingly compatible, practically as close as sisters. Had things changed since she’d been gone? Was she now viewed as an outsider? Were there secrets that would never be shared with her?
“I’m sorry if I pushed,” she apologized.
Dani gave her hand a quick squeeze. “Don’t worry about it.” Her expression turned briskly professional and her gaze warmed. “How are you feeling now? Better?”
“I’m warmer,” she said.
“But still unsettled,” Dani guessed. “Clint strikes me as the kind of man who could keep a woman unsettled.”
“He is a royal pain in the—”
“Whoops,” Sharon Lynn said with a laugh. “Don’t get her started again. There won’t be enough chamomile tea on earth to calm her down.”
“Maybe you should go upstairs and rest,” Dani said.
“No,” Angela protested.
“A few more weeks and you’ll be begging for rest,” Dani warned.
“Not with me around,” Consuela said. “I cannot wait to hold this child in my arms. Angela will have to fight me for a chance to take care of the little one.”
“You’re still spoiled rotten, I see,” Sharon Lynn said to Angela, even as she reached up and squeezed Consuela’s hand. She eyed her cousin speculatively. “Have you ever actually held a job?”
“Don’t be mean,” Dani said.
The familiar bickering made Angela smile, even though she was the butt of the teasing. “Actually, I’ve held quite a few jobs.”
“Couldn’t keep one, huh?” Sharon Lynn taunted.
“You just wait until this baby is born. I’ll take over the soda fountain for you one day and my milk shakes will have the residents of Los Pinos weeping.”
“Have you ever actually worked a soda fountain?” Dani inquired skeptically.
“No, but I worked a bar. How different can it be?”
“My customers are sober,” Sharon Lynn pointed out. “They know what they’re getting.”
Angela grinned at her. “Oh, how I’ve missed you two. Nobody could ever put me in my place the way you do.”
“Not even Clint?” Sharon Lynn asked.
The back door slammed open just then, caught by the wind as Clint tried to enter. “Not even Clint what?” he asked, his gaze fixed on her.
“Not a thing,” Sharon Lynn said.
“See you,” Dani said, dragging her cousin out of the room.
Consuela snatched up a silver coffee service and slipped out behind them.
“Et tu, Brute?” Angela muttered.
“I do not know this Brute,” Consuela said, then leaned down to whisper, “Talk to the man, niña. Do not stop talking until you have reached an understanding. ¿Si?”
Angela glanced up into Clint’s stormy eyes and shuddered. She had the distinct impression that quiet conversation was the last thing on his mind.