Chapter Five
How would Chloe handle this?
It took Moira all of half a second to realize she didn’t give a darn how Chloe would’ve handled the dark lonely night, the strange man sneaking up on her. Chloe wasn’t there. She was. And for the rest of her life, if she didn’t screw up and get deported, she was going to have to figure out the best way to handle things on her own.
She was going to scream her head off if the guy laid so much as a finger on her.
“It’s me,” he said.
Now that she had time to breathe again, she recognized his voice.
“Ben.”
She’d seen him on a daily basis all week, spoken with him in the lessons. MaryAnne liked him, if the way she flirted with him was any indication. Friday’s growl indicated she didn’t trust him, though her opinion of all adults was so carved in stone as to be worthless.
Moira felt a measure safer. With a little luck, she might be able to talk her way out of looking as though she’d been trying to break in to the office. Which was pretty darned obvious, all things considered.
“You need to get in there?” he asked quietly.
She nodded, short little jerks of her head, which were safer than saying the wrong thing too soon.
“This way.”
Curious as to how he would know a way into the building, she followed him under cover of darkness, around the corner to the front door. “It’s locked,” she whispered.
“No problem.” He reached into his jacket and pulled out a small tool.
With great interest, Moira watched him work the lock with practiced fingers. She glanced around the quiet town square, as if she were the lookout.
“Got it.” The door swung inward.
“How’d you do that?”
“Hurry up. And leave that mutt out here. I don’t want my leg bit off.”
Before she knew it, she was in the dark office, the dog was firmly closed outside, and a small flashlight beam darted around the room.
Ben had come prepared for everything.
Moira suddenly realized that maybe her coming into the office with him hadn’t been the smartest thing she’d done lately. He seemed okay, if she discounted the fact that he hadn’t been totally honest about his riding abilities. Only someone really comfortable on horseback could pretend to be so inept. Why would he do that?
While the flashlight helped him find his way around the room, she looked for a weapon—just in case—in the dark. She felt her way over to the desk and lifted the telephone receiver. She weighed it in her hand, judging how hard she’d have to swing it to knock a man senseless. Especially a man as tough-looking as Ben.
When she turned around again, the flashlight rested on end on the file cabinet, pointing up at the ceiling, casting an eerie circle of light. The door clicked shut as she was left alone in the office. Friday’s growls escalated, then faded, signaling Ben’s departure.
Moira locked the door, as if that would stop him from letting himself back in anytime he wanted. But for the most part, it would leave her undisturbed to make her long-distance call to Chloe.
She pulled up a chair, leaned back and propped her feet up on an open drawer. It was time for a good, old-fashioned gabfest with her best friend.
Unable to get through on the first try, Moira shifted positions. She leaned on the desktop and prepared to wait awhile. She was tired, but she wouldn’t fall asleep. This was way too important.
She’d think about Dutch with whipped cream on his chest. No shirt, just a wide expanse of bare, tanned skin. And his touch. Oh, yes, his touch. That would keep her awake.
DREAMS OF WHIPPED CREAM and Chloe dancing through his head, Dutch lay on his back, the blanket crumpled around his waist, his chest bare. Beads of sweat dotted his upper lip. When a hand landed on his chest for real, he thought he’d died and gone to heaven.
Until he realized the hand was too small and light, and followed by three more. Not even in his wildest imagination did Chloe have four hands.
The mattress jiggled beneath Katie and Nicole’s assault.
“Is he awake?”
“I don’t know. His eyes are closed.”
“Well, open ’em.”
“How?”
“Like this.”
Katie’s and Nicole’s hot breath heated his face as their twenty determined fingers poked him in the forehead, pulled his eyelashes and pried at his eyelids.
“I can’t get mine open.”
“Keep trying.”
It was a sure bet these two little hooligans weren’t going to give up and go back to bed. “What the heck are—”
They screamed those piercing, eight-year-old-girl screams. Dutch was glad he didn’t have neighbors; they’d have called the cops and reported a murder for sure.
“Daddy, you—”
“—scared us.”
He opened his eyes and yanked the blanket up to his chin. “What are you girls doing up?”
“It’s morning.”
“Three o‘clock is not morning. It’s the middle of the night. And little girls are supposed to be in bed, sound asleep.” He hoped he sounded grumpy enough to send them skedaddlin’, but they didn’t. He closed his eyes and hoped they’d give up.
“We been thinkin’—”
“—about my new saddle—”
“—an’ about me learning to stand up on Buck.”
Dutch turned on the lamp and cocked one eye as menacingly as possible. “Little girls who don’t sleep don’t get privileges.”
“We can’t—”
“—sleep.”
“Would a story help?”
“Is it about—”
“—a princess?”
He scooted up and leaned back against his headboard. “Are horses the only thing you two disagree on?”
“We don’t disagree on horses, just on—”
“—how to ride ’em.”
“Uh-huh. Okay, once upon a time, there were two princesses. And one night, after all the candles were out and the whole castle was asleep, they got out of bed.”
“What were their—”
“—names?”
“Katarina and Nicoletta.”
“Dad-dy. We want a—”
“—real story.”
“This is a real story.”
“But we bet it won’t have a happy ending—”
“—like a fairy tale.”
“Depends on whether you fall asleep,” Dutch groused.
Katie jumped off the bed and took off running. “I’m gonna go get a storybook.”
“Aren’t you going with her?”
Nicole shook her head.
“What? You don’t talk unless you’re together?”
“The Princess and the Pea!” she hollered to her sister.
“Again? But you know that one by heart.”
“We want you to splain how the princess could—”
“—feel the pea under all the mattresses,” Katie finished as she returned.
He held out his hand for the book. “Let’s read it again and see if we can figure it out.”
With one daughter snuggled on either side of him and the book in his lap, Dutch settled in and forgot it was three o’clock in the morning. He’d been totally focused on his daughters ever since he’d learned about them. He was halfway through the fairy tale before it occurred to him that his bed was big enough to hold another adult.
Maybe it was time to look after a little well-being of his own.
MONDAY MORNING, Dutch realized he’d known Chloe a whole week and only kissed her once. And having kissed her once, he wanted to do it again; had dreamed about it, as a matter of fact.
He’d missed a golden opportunity last night behind the counter in the General Store. He could kick himself now. All that was left to do to rectify the situation was to find her and create another opportunity. Pronto.
He knocked on her dorm door. When he got no answer, not even a penetrating growl, he peeked in and saw that she and the dog were both gone. Though it was such a pigsty, it was hard to tell. The woman needed a maid.
For her to be up and gone already, she must’ve finally figured out how to work the alarm clock. That, or someone else had decided to “make an opportunity” and gotten her up for an early-morning rendezvous. Who knew what arrangements she’d made with one of the wranglers during all the hours she’d spent with them yesterday? A rendezvous in the barn? A predawn ride in the national forest? Watch the sun come up over Eagle Ridge?
Well, if any of those were the case, he had to do a better job at letting her know he was interested. No sense giving those young cowboys the edge. When she showed up for the morning lesson, he’d make it a point to flash her what his agent called his charmtheir-panties-off grin.
Until then, he’d catch up on paperwork. MaryAnne had complained that his “In” basket had piled up this past week. Something about him not keeping his mind on business since the new riding instructor had arrived. When he unlocked the office door, he found Chloe curled up, asleep on his desk.
Talk about an “In” basket!
He tiptoed soundlessly over to where she lay, then just stood there and drank her in like a thirsty man. For once she was without her ball cap and ponytail. Her hair cascaded in golden waves over her ear, caressed her neck. He reached out and stroked it, found it to be as silky soft as a kitten’s fur.
Through slightly parted lips, she took a deep breath, as if she’d felt his touch. Other than that, she didn’t stir. Her cheek remained pillowed on one hand, while the other was tucked snugly between her thighs, probably for warmth. He couldn’t help thinking how warm that might be.
In a sweatshirt and jeans, she wasn’t really dressed for the crisp morning air. She needed a jacket until the sun climbed a little higher or she got to moving. He didn’t feel the cold, though. Not now that he knew she’d been waiting for him.
Gently, starting at her knee and working upward, he ran the tip of his finger along the outside seam of her jeans. When he reached the high point of her hip, he spread his fingers, fanned them out until his hand cupped her slender curve.
“Chloe,” he whispered hoarsely. “Chloe, wake up.”
She popped up to a sitting position and grabbed the telephone receiver, brandishing it like a weapon and sending him on a giant step backward. Wide-eyed, her gaze darted around the office, then settled on him.
“Hey, it’s okay,” he said soothingly. When he knew that she wasn’t going to start swinging, he stepped close again, wrapped his arms around her in a snug circle and hugged her against his chest.
“Oh, it’s you.”
He thought she sounded more confused than the other morning when he’d sat on the end of her bunk. In her ear, he murmured, “What’re you planning on doing with that phone?”
“Oh.” She tugged it out from between their chests and hung it up. “Nothing.”
He chuckled, loving the way her warmth melded with his own. “Good. Getting hit upside the head this early in the day might give me a headache.”
She yawned against his shirt, creating a hot spot right over his collarbone. “Maybe you wouldn’t sneak up on me again.”
“Heck, don’t let that scare you. This ranch is probably the safest place in the world. Why do you think I let Katie and Nicole run around like they do?”
She tipped her head up to him. “Dutch...”
Her soft voice and her trusting expression pushed him over the edge. He whipped his hat off and tossed it in the general vicinity of the file cabinet, not caring in the least where it landed.
He didn’t give her much of a chance to continue with whatever she’d been about to say. It was clear she hadn’t been out on a morning ride with one of the wranglers. She’d been waiting for him, right there on his desk. He tilted his head and feathered light kisses on her temple, working his way over her cheekbone and down to the corner of her lips.
Her skin was so soft, especially for a cowgirl who’d spent years in the sun and heat of Texas.
When her arms slipped around him, when he felt her hands spread tentatively across his back, he responded in the most basic way. Her fingers glided over muscles that had gone too long untouched by a woman who genuinely cared what was inside the package.
He drew her legs off the edge of the desk and eased himself between her thighs. They were chest-to-chest and had entirely too many clothes on, but he relished the moment for what it was. A testing of the waters, for each of them. He scooped his hand beneath the hair at her nape, which left his thumb right over the pulse throbbing in her neck. Maybe throbbing was the wrong word. Anything pounding that fast and hard and erratic had to be...erotic—for him anyway.
“Dutch...” When she licked her lips and tilted her mouth up to him, he answered her sweet invitation. He dragged her hips against him until he was cradled close enough to make himself suffer.
If this didn’t tell her he was interested, he didn’t know how to get the message across. Invite her to move out of the dorm and into his lodge? Normally the twins slept as soundly as bears in a blizzard.
“Daddy! Daddy!”
Which was more than he could say for them at the moment.
The door slammed against the wall as Katie and Nicole charged into the office. Dutch refused to spring apart from Chloe as if they were teenagers caught by their parents. He continued to hold her tenderly, even as the twins each clamped on to one of his legs.
“Oops,” Chloe said with a shy smile.
He grinned, when what he wanted to do was scoop her up and carry her off to...to...
Hell, there was nowhere private to go that wasn’t ten minutes away. A long ten minutes.
“Daddy, Daddy—”
“—you gotta come outside.”
“In a minute, girls.”
“No, Daddy, right now—”
“I’m talking to Chloe right now.” He’d be sure to get a few words in so that wouldn’t be a lie.
“—’cause there’s a dead man in the bushes.”