Laura and Seth Parker? Who are these people? And why would Jacey send me the woman’s belongings? Laying down the age-yellowed pages, smoothing her hand over the journal’s ragged spine, Glory frowned, wondering why the words on these pages brought a lump to her throat. Wondered why she felt a kinship with this long-dead Laura Parker. Wondered why she felt like crying for the woman and her little family. It was all such a mystery. And just like Jacey to present her with one.
Thinking of her sister, Glory picked up Jacey’s accompanying letter and reread it. In it, she introduced the young courier, James McGinty, and wrote that Papa had Señor Estrada keep these papers for him all these years. She went on to say, with no further explanation, that she felt Glory should have them. Glory shook her head and huffed out a breath laden with curiosity and frustration—and no small amount of fear for her sister. Because Jacey confirmed James McGinty’s words of last evening—she was riding for Mexico with Zant Chapelo, The Kid’s son.
Glory looked up from the troublesome words and flopped into a slumping posture that matched her mood. Perched cross-legged atop her bed in her morning-sunshiny bedroom, she stretched, trying to work out the remaining soreness in her muscles from fighting her attacker three nights ago. But it seemed her mind could wander to no place that offered her comfort. Certainly Biddy wouldn’t console her once she learned that her precious baby had kept their visitor and this packet a secret from her all last evening.
Glory pushed aside that coming scene and found herself again reading through Jacey’s words—which she figured she must’ve read twenty times between last night and this morning. But still no light had shed itself from her first reading to this one. Because, she admitted, reading Jacey’s letter was like talking to her. Abrupt, unemotional, and short on details. Except to echo Hannah with regard to watching out for strangers.
Jacey also wrote of trackers, saying they’d been hired from Tucson, and that she was riding with Zant Chapelo to find out the who and the why of it. One less thing I have to worry about—Jacey knows about the trackers, so she’ll have a care for herself. Glory put a hand to her thudding heart and stared at the far wall. What a turn their lives had come to, when she couldn’t be certain that either of her sisters was alive.
A sigh escaped Glory as she looked around herself at the jumble of letters atop her quilted bedspread. She fingered a sheet or two of age-yellowed writing paper, but didn’t realize she’d left her mind open to errant thoughts until … It’s too bad that Riley fired Abel Justice and Carter Brown before James McGinty arrived. After all, they’re the only two strangers to come around since Mama and Papa were … murdered. And James is from Tucson—where Jacey says the trackers were hired. It sure would have been interesting to see if he recognized one—or both—of them. Especially in light of me being nearly killed the other night.
She allowed that notion free rein, wondering if it was merely a coincidence that Riley and those men left before James arrived. Glory put her hands to her suddenly warm cheeks. She was sitting here casting doubts onto Riley, half-believing that he was in cahoots with the two suspicious drifters he’d hired—without consulting her or Smiley.
Glory shook her head, refusing to believe she was even entertaining these thoughts. Because how, she argued with herself, could they have known James was coming? Well, the answer was … they couldn’t have. Besides, had they known, and if they were guilty, they’d have killed him long before he ever showed up on her doorstep.
A gasp escaped Glory. Her mind seemed determined to point a finger of guilt at Riley. But she refused to believe it. Riley involved with those two men? Why, it was a ridiculous notion. What reason would he have to want her dead? None, of course. Unless you think about the land feuds, Glory. Remember what Biddy said Smiley told her about the other ranchers?
Glory clutched at her head, as if she could squeeze out her awful doubts. Stop it. Riley is not guilty of anything. Think about something else. Forcing herself to do just that, she spread out the packet’s contents over her quilted bedcover and eyed them. She couldn’t deny it—they struck a deep chord inside her. In some very personal way. Some way that made her feel sick at heart.
Why couldn’t Jacey just tell me why she thought I should have them? Why just me? The more she thought about it, the more frustrated she felt with her sister, and she blurted, “Oooh, I’d give you such a smack if you were here.”
“And who is it yer talkin’ to, child?”
Her heartbeat leaping at the unexpected sound of Biddy’s voice, Glory pivoted on her bed to face the open door. “You startled me. Come in. I was talking to Jacey.”
Two steps into the room at Glory’s invitation, Biddy stopped, stared at her, and then looked around as if she expected a spirit to be in the room. A hand to her blouse’s collar, she ventured, “Jacey, is it? And why would ye be fussing at yer sister?” Not giving Glory a chance to answer that, she pinched up her lips and narrowed her eyes. “Could it have something to do with the young man from Tucson who’s eating in me kitchen, even as we speak?”
Guilt brought a smile—a sickly one, she was sure—to Glory’s face. “I was going to tell you.”
Biddy folded her plump hands over her round, apron-covered middle. “When, pray tell? I’d not know yet if Sourdough hadn’t sent the boy inside for a late breakfast, seein’ as how yer tired guest slept through the men’s meal. He’s askin’ if ye have an answer for Jacey’s letter. Imagine me surprise upon learnin’ he’s been here since yesterday evening.”
Glory didn’t quite know how to answer all that, so she diverted her nanny’s attention with the letters and the journal. “Well, now you know. Come here. See what you make of these.”
Curiosity apparently getting the better of her insulted snit, Biddy waddled to the bed, her gaze riveted on the papers. “And what are they?”
“I’m not sure, except for Jacey’s letter. One good thing—she knows about the trackers. She writes that they were hired in Tucson.” Glory hesitated long enough to take a deep breath before telling her nanny, “And she’s on their trail.”
Biddy squawked and clasped her hands together over her heart. “That darned Jacey. She’ll not rest until she gets herself killed. And just ye wait until I get me hands on her, if she does.”
Fighting an ill-timed fit of chuckles, Glory bit down on her bottom lip and reached for the aged letter closest to her. Thinking to distract Biddy from a day-long, pot-banging, housecleaning tirade brought on by news of Jacey’s antics, Glory held it out to her nanny. “Here. Look at this. I have no idea what it is. Well, I know it’s an old letter. But what I don’t know is why Jacey would send it to me.”
Her face a mask of curiosity, Biddy took the offered letter and eyed it. “Well now, let’s see what Miss Jacey thinks is so important that she’d send that nice young man downstairs here at this time of year.” As she ran her gaze over the page, she perched an ample hip on Glory’s bed and then sank into a deep—somehow disquieting—quiet. After a moment, she flipped the page over to the signature, read it, and cried out, “Sweet merciful heavens.”
And then she fainted dead away, slumping off the bed and landing with a bouncing thunk on the braided oval rug. Squawking in shocked surprise, Glory jumped up and then knelt beside her nanny. Lifting the older lady’s gray-haired head onto her lap, Glory patted her nanny’s pale cheek, and cried out, “Biddy! What happened? What’s wrong?”
Nothing. Biddy was out cold. Glory thought frantically—she needed to get help. But who—? Then it came to her. James McGinty was downstairs eating. Carefully scooting out from under Biddy’s limp form and grabbing a lacy pillow from off her bed to place under her nanny’s head, Glory scrambled to her feet, lifted her skirt out of her way, and ran to the door. Tearing down the hallway to the head of the stairs, she leaned over the balustrade and called out, “James?! Come quickly. Biddy’s fainted. Hurry!”
Before she could’ve counted to ten, James’s long-legged bounds had him upstairs and helping her. Glory quickly gathered up the old letters and the journal, set them aside, and then helped James heft Biddy onto the bed. Leaving him sitting with the elderly woman, Glory hurried to the water closet at the hallway’s other end. There she wet a facecloth, and in only moments was back in her bedroom and applying the soft rag to Biddy’s forehead as she roused and thrashed about.
“What brought this on, Miss Glory, if I may ask?” James’s blue eyes were round with apparent concern.
Glory shook her head and coo-cooed to Biddy. “There now, Biddy dear. Just be still.” She then met James’s gaze. “I don’t know. I simply asked her to look at these letters Jacey had you bring me. She took one look, called upon the heavens, and then fainted dead away. I was hoping you could shed some light on all this.”
His eyes popped open even wider. “Me, ma’am? I don’t rightly know as I could. I cain’t read a’tall.”
Her hands pressing against Biddy’s shoulders to keep her from falling off the narrow bed, Glory shot James a look. “Well, perhaps you can tell me what you know from Jacey and that Mexican saloon owner—”
“You mean Señor Estrada?”
Glory nodded. “I suppose. What do you know about all this, James?” Before he could answer, Biddy clutched at Glory’s hand, drawing her attention down to her. “Oh, thank the stars, you’re awake. What happened, Biddy?”
Red of face, hair all but undone, Biddy shook her head. “There’s naught he can tell ye, child.” Biddy then surprised Glory with a show of strength that sat her up. She focused a hard expression on young James. “Is there, young man? Ye know nothing.”
Completely stumped by this behavior, Glory frowned from Biddy to James, and saw him fidgeting about. He swallowed hard enough to bob his Adam’s apple. “Yes, ma’am. I don’t know nothing about them papers. I swear it. All’s I know is what I’ve heard all my life about J. C. Lawless and Kid Chapelo—”
A loud snort from Biddy cut off his words. She swung her short, skirt-tangled legs over the side of the bed. Her hands clutched at fistfuls of bedcovers. “And ye’ll not go repeatin’ idle gossip, now will ye, lad?”
James backed up, as if fearing an attack by the Lawless nanny. “No, ma’am. I shorely won’t. My grandpa’d skin me alive, if’n I did.”
Biddy relaxed … just a bit. “There’s a good lad. Now, go on about yer meal. I’m fine. Just a tetch of weakness from climbing the stairs. I’ll be along directly, and we’ll talk more.”
James was already on his way out the door. “Yes, ma’am. But you don’t need to hurry none. I’ve finished my vittles, and my horse is all saddled. I’ll just clear on out of yer house.” He turned to Glory. “I thank you for yer hospitality, ma’am. You got a reply for Miss Jacey?”
Unable to think straight at the moment, Glory shook her head.
“It’s probably just as well that you don’t,” James said. “Because I ain’t about to venture onto Calderon land to deliver it. Well then, I’m headin’ out.”
“But James,” Glory protested, extending a hand to him. “Wait. I want to talk with—”
But James had already rounded the door’s casing and disappeared from sight. Out in the hallway, his rapid footfalls, muffled only slightly by the woven runner carpeting the hardwood floor, told their own story—James McGinty was all but running away from Biddy’s wrath.
Glory swung her disbelieving gaze back to her nanny. “Margaret Biddy Jensen, you scared the life out of that young man. What’s gotten into you?”
Red-faced and perspiring, Biddy fluffed and pulled at her heavy skirt, and tucked her wispy hair back into its bun. “Nothing.”
Downstairs, the front door slammed. Glory put her hands to her waist and gave Biddy an accusing look. “Nothing? That’s all you have to say? Why, he fled from here. I wanted to ask him about those trackers. Jacey mentions them in her letter, as did Hannah.”
A wide-eyed look of relief claimed Biddy’s features. “Oh, the trackers. Is that all?”
“Is—?” Glory narrowed her eyes at her nanny. “Is that all? Biddy, those men are tracking me and my sisters. They could kill us. And all you can say is ‘Oh, the trackers’? I wanted to describe Brown and Justice to James. He might have recognized them both. Or at least one of them.”
Biddy blinked a few times. “And if he did, child? What then?”
Glory cast about for an answer. “Why, I suppose we could … kill them. Or something.”
Biddy sat up straighter, looking more and more sure of herself. “Kill them, is it? And who’re ye appointing to do that? Not yerself?”
It was Glory’s turn to straighten up. “If I have to. Papa always said a good leader’s willing to do the same as he’s asking his men to do.”
A whoop of disbelief shot out of Biddy. “And will ye look at her—she’s a leader of men now. You listen to me, Glory Bea Lawless. Those two drifters are gone from here. And good riddance. I’m glad. Riley took them with him when he left. ’Tis not our concern now—”
Glory grabbed Biddy’s arm. “What did you say?”
Biddy pulled back, studying Glory’s face. “About what?”
Glory tightened her grip. “Don’t play coy with me. You said Riley took those men with him, didn’t you?”
Her nanny’s expression crumpled into eyelash-batting and looking everywhere but at her charge. “Why, I don’t know that for sure. They were behind Riley as they rode off in the same direction. But they could’ve gone their separate ways at any point.”
Glory let go of Biddy and headed for the doorway. “They didn’t. And you know it.”
As Glory turned into the hallway, Biddy called out, “Where are you going?”
“To the Thorne place. And don’t you try to stop me.”
“The Thorne place?” came Biddy’s screech. Heavy, hurrying footsteps told of her pursuit. Indeed, no more than a few steps down the hall, Glory’s arm was grabbed and she was spun around. “Ye cannot go there, child. ’Tis one thing for Riley and his mother to come here, where they’re welcomed. But another matter entirely for a Lawless to set foot on Thorne property. No tellin’ what might happen.”
“Biddy, let go of me,” Glory warned. “I’m going, and I’ll be fine. No Thorne’s ever hurt any Lawless before.”
Biddy took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and opened them again. “Aye, ’tis true enough, they haven’t. But the Lawlesses have injured the Thornes. Think of the old man’s crippled leg. And think on this—yer father’s not here to protect ye and to make them think twice. Besides, there’s talk of—”
“The land feud. I know. I’ll be careful—I swear it. I just want to talk to Riley. I have no intention of losing my temper and shooting anyone.”
* * *
More than three hours later, and nearing the dividing line between Lawless and Thorne properties, Glory reined in her chestnut mare, stared at the unbelievable words scrawled on the crude wooden sign stuck into Lawless dirt, and thought back to her parting words to Biddy. I have no intention of losing my temper and shooting anyone.
The unusually warm and windless day seemed to pale as she sat there staring, absorbing. Someone—no doubt a Thorne—had proclaimed this land to be Thorne property. As the shock of discovery melted away, an aching sickness of the heart had Glory’s hands shaking. Surely, the merest gust of wind could blow her off Daisy. As if the mare read her mistress’s thoughts, she stomped a foot, signaling her impatience. Glory tightened her grip on the reins, glared at the contentious property marker, and dismounted.
Thorne land? We’ll just see about that. She stalked over to the sign and two-handedly gripped the wooden stake, much as she would someone’s throat. Then, with grunting effort and much pushing and pulling, she finally exerted enough temper and strength to yank the hated sign up out of the hard ground and heave it as far as she could.
She watched the marker hit the ground and slide—words down—into a dry gully. A smile of grim satisfaction narrowed her eyes. With that—and once her breathing returned to normal—she mounted Daisy and rode hard for the Thorne place.
Only when their homestead loomed into view did she slow her mare. Then, steeling her courage with a deep breath and a check of her sheepskin-coat pocket for her pistol, Glory guided Daisy into enemy territory. Past the weathered corral, the red barn, the wagon yard. Right to the front door, where she reined in. Immediately, the door opened. Glory’s grip on the reins tightened as she waited to see who was coming out to greet her.
Mr. Thorne and his four younger sons stepped outside and, in watchful silence, ranged themselves across the front porch. Zeke, John, Caleb, and Henry. As Glory looked them over, she experienced the strangest feeling, as if she were seeing Riley at different stages of his growing-up years. When she settled her gaze on Henry, she noted that he bore the bruises and swellings of a recent fight. Then she nodded to Ben Thorne. “Morning, Mr. Thorne. I’m looking for Riley.”
“He ain’t here.” With that, Ben stepped to the edge of the porch and spat in the dirt, right in front of Daisy.
Stiffening with shocked offense, Glory forced herself to look directly into the older man’s eyes, so much like Riley’s that it hurt. “I see. Well then, can I speak with Mrs. Thorne? I’ve come a long way—”
“I know exactly how far you’ve come from your place to mine, young’un. Now just turn that horse of yours around and get off my land. Ain’t no one hereabouts that wants to speak with you.”
Despite her roiling guts and sweating palms, Glory kept on. “Perhaps I could speak with Mrs. Thorne?”
“Mrs. Thorne ain’t at home. She’s over to the Sutfields. Will be all day.”
After that, except for a shifting of weight or the occasional sniff from one of the sons or their father, no one said anything. Glory exhaled a breath laden with defeat and no small amount of fright. “All right. Well, I’ll just be going then. Tell them I came by, please.”
The men said nothing, gave no sign that they’d relay her message. Quirking her mouth, Glory edged Daisy into turning around. But her next thought had her reining the mare. Once again, she faced the tall, white-haired man that was Ben Thorne. “I’ll thank you not to put up signs on my property. I took down the one I found on the way here. When I get home, I’ll be sending my men out to ride the line and look for more. Let’s hope they don’t find any.”
Her words had the Thornes standing tall, looking ready to reach for their guns. Wondering if what gripped her belly was sadness for this turn of events or smugness for having stirred a reaction from them, Glory kneed Daisy, turning the mare back the way they’d just come. Showing the Thorne men her back, she nudged her horse into a canter that quickly gained them the safety of the open prairie. Only then did she give in to a hateful thought. Darned Thornes. Riley and his mother are the only ones worth a—
Two men, not too far away and laboring over a fence post two hilltops away, caught Glory’s attention. Their hobbled horses grazed nearby. Glory’s breath hung in her throat. She wrenched back on the reins, bringing Daisy to a dust-raising halt. The men straightened up, stared right at her. Saw her. Exchanged a look with each other.
Glory knew in her heart she should put her heels to Daisy and send her flying over the ground for the safety of the Lawless holdings. But she couldn’t move. All she could do was stare at Carter Brown and Abel Justice, working on Thorne land. Finally, she wrenched around in her saddle and stared back in the direction she’d just come. It was true, then, all the talk she’d heard from Biddy and Smiley. The Thornes were somehow behind the trouble at home.
That thought, when no other one could, galvanized Glory. She spared the two men another look, saw they hadn’t moved any, but still felt a need for speed and distance. Digging her boot heels into Daisy’s tired sides, she urged the little mare into a gallop. Glory kept the mare’s hooves flying over the hard, uneven ground until she outran her panic. Only then, and knowing she had to spare the animal or end up on foot when the mare’s heart gave out, did Glory slow her to a canter and then a walk. Belatedly, she realized she’d reined Daisy at the exact spot where earlier she’d uprooted that property marker.
In a heartsick cold sweat that sickened her stomach, Glory slid off Daisy and collapsed onto the hard ground. Sitting in the billowing heap of her skirt, she cried. Just sat there, holding Daisy’s reins, hearing the mare blow, feeling the horse’s hot breath in her hair, and cried. Great, wrenching sobs with fat, hot tears. Not caring about passing time. Or the sun’s path in the clear sky. Not caring about anything but the agonizing hurt in her heart.
“Glory?”
With a startled gasp, she twisted around, saw who was standing there, and took another moment to absorb that it was really him. She swiped at her eyes and rubbed her sleeve under her runny nose. “Leave me alone, Riley Thorne.”
But he didn’t. “I just came from home. My father said you’d been there, that you asked for me.”
“I did.”
“What’d you want?”
Glory sniffled, shook her head, watched him threading his horse’s reins through his gloved fingers. Looking at him was painful, so she looked down at her skirt. “It doesn’t matter now.”
She heard Riley huff his breath out, heard him mutter, “Dammit.” Then to her he said, “It matters to me.”
Glory looked up at him, challenging him. “Does it?” But her heart thumped with his flesh-and-blood nearness, with his air of belonging to this land, to owning this very patch he stood upon … and in a way that she, as a woman, would never be able to claim. “I was just told to get off Thorne land.”
He firmed his lips together and then said, “I know.”
Glory raised her chin. “Then you’ll also know I mean it when I tell you to get off Lawless land. You’re standing on it now—no matter what your … damned sign said. So if you’re out here looking for it, I threw it in that ditch.”
Riley eyed her from under the brim of his Stetson. Then he pivoted, billowing his ankle-length saddle coat, to glance back at the depression she indicated. Finally, and trailing Pride behind him, he came to her and squatted in front of her … near enough for her to push him over, if she so chose. “I don’t care about any sign. I’m out here because of you. I want to know what’s wrong.”
His question was so absurd that she could only chuckle. “What’s wrong? Look around, Riley. Look what I’m doing. And where I’m doing it. A better question would be what’s right.”
Riley tilted his Stetson back on his head and narrowed his brown eyes at her. “All right. What’s right?”
Glory tilted her head in consideration of this Thorne man and his question. Reflected sunlight dappled his dark eyes with golden flecks, emphasized his wide, firm mouth. She took a deep, chest-expanding breath and slumped further into her heaped posture. “There’s nothing right, Riley. Not in this world. Not where I live.”
Remaining quiet, offering no solutions, he merely nodded, suggesting by his frowning stare that he was giving due consideration to her words.
And that annoyed her to no end. How dare he be so … so understanding, so reasonable? Without warning, and releasing Daisy’s reins, Glory shoved Riley back onto his butt. His long legs jerked out in front of him, raising dust and Cain as he yelled and cussed out his shock. Pride startled, whinnied out his shock, and jerked back against Riley’s hold on his reins.
Beyond caring, Glory leaped onto Riley’s chest and, with doubled-up fists, began pounding on him. “I hate you, Riley Thorne! Do you hear me? I hate you. How dare you hire those two men? How could I have trusted you, how could I have let you in my house?”
* * *
Caught off guard by Glory’s attack, Riley lost his Stetson and his grip on Pride’s reins. The panicked horse bucked wildly, mere death-dealing inches away. Crabbing sideways on his back, trying to take them out of range of Pride’s sharp hooves—and praying the animal shied in the opposite direction—Riley captured her wrists and bellowed, “Dammit, Glory, you’re about to get us killed.”
“Don’t you dammit-Glory me, Riley Eugene Thorne. I will never forgive you. How dare you make me love you, you—” She froze in position atop him. Surprise flared in her green eyes, widening them as she stared down at him and finished, “You … bad man, you.”
Aware that Pride chose that moment to bolt away, but more concerned with the feel of her weight atop him, with her breasts pressed against his chest, with the look on her sweaty little face, framed as it was by her rat’s-nest hair, and with her words, Riley took a moment to catch his own breath. Then he encouraged, “I’m listening. Go on. You were saying—”
“You shut up.” Glory wrenched herself free of his grip and inched down his length until she was between his spread legs. There she pulled herself up to her skirt-covered knees, rested her hands atop them, and glared. Her shoulders, under her heavy sheepskin coat, rose and fell with each rapid breath.
Riley hoisted himself up onto his elbows and returned her look for look. He’d waited his whole life to hear her say she loved him, and now she had—while kicking his ass. Suddenly, his heart soared—with joy, with love for her, and at these ridiculous circumstances. He grinned. And then chuckled. And then laughed out loud, throwing his head back.
“There’s not one danged thing funny about this,” Glory fussed as, a hand pressing down on each of his thighs, she levered herself to her feet.
Riley knew he’d better not let her get away. So, almost before she was on her feet, he was on his. And standing in front of her, gripping her shoulders. “I love you, too, Glory Bea Lawless.”
When she opened her mouth—no doubt to protest—he wrenched her resisting body against his and claimed her mouth. A muffled squawk accompanied her stiffening in his arms. But kissing her now, Riley was lost. She tasted so damned good, even gritty and salty like she was. Tasted like the earth itself. The inside of her mouth was warm and slick … and hungry. Riley deepened their kiss and she began to yield to him. But again she stiffened, warning him with a gradual clamping down of her teeth—
Riley jerked his head back and stared down into her anger-puckered face. “You don’t have to do that, Glory. All you’ve got to do is tell me. Tell me you don’t want me to kiss you, and I will stop. Just say the words.”
Tears sprang to her green and glaring eyes, her kiss-moistened mouth twisted, and her chin dimpled. But Riley’s words, delivered in a voice huskied with want, hung in the air, remained unchallenged as she kept her silence.
“Well? Tell me to stop. Tell me you don’t want me.” He tightened his grip on her arms. “If you don’t say the words, I’m going to see this through to its end. I’ve never felt before like I could tell you, but I love you, Glory, and I want you. You’re in my blood, like a river carving out a valley in my soul. So if you think you’re going to tell me you love me and then just walk away, you’re crazy.”
She shook her head and slumped in his grip. “I have to walk away, Riley. Don’t you see? I can’t love you. I just can’t. You’re a Thorne. And I’m a Lawless. Our families would never allow it.”
Her words were a knife piercing his skin, stabbing through muscle, embedding themselves in the bone underneath. “I’m a twenty-five-year-old man, Glory. I don’t give a damn what my family thinks. All I think about, all I care about, is you. You’re all I’ve ever wanted. You’re the only reason I’ve hung around this godforsaken no-man’s-land all these years. I’ve just been waiting on you to grow up. And now you have.”
Riley’s heart sank when Glory shook her head, swirling her reddish-brown and tangled curls about her face and shoulders. “Don’t say these things to me, Riley, please. It’s so hard. I have to think of my family. Don’t you see that? I’m a Lawless. Maybe even the last one alive. It’s up to me to keep the ranch going. It’s my parents’ dream. My sisters’. Mine. I care, and I’m not leaving it.”
Her words cooled Riley’s blood, settled it in his veins. But hardened his soul. He released her and stepped back. “All my life I’ve heard the land comes first. And maybe it does. I’ve watched my father trying to hang onto it. I’ve stood by while it twisted his soul, Glory. I don’t want to be like that. And I wasn’t asking you to leave. I just wanted you to put me first, like I have you. But you can’t. And it’s right sorry I am for that.”
Through saying his piece, Riley turned away, going to retrieve his Stetson. The intense quiet of the oppressive prairie settled over him, etching his features with disappointment as he bent over and snatched his hat up off the ground. He hit it against his thigh to shake the dust loose, and then reformed it with cutting motions of his hands. Finally, he fit it to his head and turned back to Glory. She hadn’t moved or said or done anything to stop him from leaving.
Adding that hurt to his belly full of emotions, Riley suddenly blurted, “That land you care so much about doesn’t give a damn about you, girl. It won’t keep you warm at night. It won’t give you those babies you want. And it sure as hell won’t hold you in its arms in that big old chair in your daddy’s office and promise you that everything’s going to be okay.”
Glory flinched. He saw it, but refused to muster any sympathy for her. With one long, last stare, he turned his back on her and headed for his horse.
“Riley?”
He stopped, didn’t turn to look at her. “What?”
“Kiss me.”
A shuddering breath escaped him. He put his hands to his waist, bent a knee, and stared out over the tan-brown and rolling hills of the Lawless holdings. And thought about what she’d just said. Then he spoke over his shoulder. “No.”
“Yes. Kiss me. I want you to.”
“This isn’t a game, Glory. It’s forever.”
“I know. Kiss me.”
“There’s no stopping. No going back.”
Silence. And then, “Kiss me.”
His heart pounded, urged him to turn around. His legs and feet were already doing just that. Feeling like so much stone on the outside, but fluttering like a wind-borne feather on the inside, afraid to believe, more afraid not to, Riley faced her, narrowed his eyes. “You understand what this means? I want more than your kisses. I want all of you—your heart and your soul. Nothing less.”
Glory never looked away from him as she jerked her father’s heavy coat off and flung it to the ground. “I told you to kiss me, Riley Thorne.”
Still … Riley hesitated, glancing at J. C. Lawless’s coat lying in a lifeless heap on the cold, hard ground. Just like the man himself. The thought unnerved him. He sought Glory’s gaze, saw her Lawless chin come up a notch. No—she wasn’t a Lawless. What would she do when she found out? Would her spirit be crushed? Probably.
But maybe not—not if she had someone at her side to help her through. And by God, that someone was going to be him. She was offering, and he was taking. Out of love. Not hatred or bitterness. But love.
It was that simple. Riley chuckled, ducked his head in sudden embarrassment. He’d never had a woman seduce him before. Hell, he’d never had a woman kick his ass before, either. But he’d survived that, hadn’t he? Hands again to his waist, his knee bent, Riley grinned at her. “Say it one more time, sweetheart.”
Glory shifted her weight, looked uncertain. But then that stubborn chin came up. “Kiss me.”
Riley ripped his hat off and sent it flying in the cool but windless November air. With long-legged, determined strides, he advanced on her. “Baby, I’m going to kiss you and one hell of a whole lot more.”