At Close Range (6 page)

Instead of withdrawing, he plundered, his tongue thrusting into her, demanding, taking. One of his hands tangled in her hair, spilling it free of her loose twist, while the other ran surely down her arm only to plunge into the warmth beneath her duster. His hand against her thin blouse felt as cold as ice, and made her gasp as it slid around her back to pull her even closer to him.

As though the forceful side of him had won whatever battle he'd waged earlier, he ground her against him, letting her know with absolute certainty how strongly she affected him.

Corrie's experience with men had been limited to a few relationships with colleagues in the news business, men who lived for the next story, the next big assignment, and the camera lens or the microphone. As they did in work, they only skimmed the surface of relationships. Their approach to life was that too much information killed a good story; skill, charm and knowing when to wrap things up were all that really mattered. They applied the same reasoning to personal relationships.

Mack's passion was the complete antithesis of casual. His breathing was ragged, his body tense and hard. His hands shook with the need that raged through him. And it sparked something in Corrie that she'd never encountered before, an ache that came from her very soul.

A little voice deep inside her seemed to cry out in relief—
“Ah, at last”
—and with such desire and sincerity she literally throbbed from it.

He could have lowered her to the ground beneath them and she wouldn't have raised a protest. He could have led her to his room and she would have gone willingly.

Instead, he yanked his head back, as if snapping awake. He held on to her shoulders, keeping her at arm's length, confusing her, making her want to push back into him.

“You scared me,” he said.

If she were Leeza, she might make some quip, like “boo,” and step right back into his embrace. If she were Jeannie, she might try verbally analyzing the reason she'd scared him and why that fear translated into
a kiss of such passion that she was still gasping for breath.

As it was, she was only Corrie and didn't know how to ask for more. She never had. So she stood there, an earthquake survivor in the midst of violent aftershocks.

Mack waited for Corrie to say something, anything that would douse the fire that raged inside him. Instead, she gazed at him with unblinking dark eyes, unreadable in their vulnerability. She could have been outraged, though God knew she'd responded. She could have been hurt, though he could see no pain in her eyes. She might even have laughed it off, but he could detect no sign of humor.

She looked like a doe caught in the headlights of a speeding car, neither fearful nor alarmed, but rather simply and acutely
aware
of a certain something about to happen.

He couldn't, in all honesty, apologize. He didn't feel the least sorry for the kiss. In some wholly id-driven portion of his mind, he realized he'd been waiting for this hero's reward for two long years. Through the long, lonely nights of recovery, listening to her voice over the radio, she'd spoken to the best part of him. That the worst part had wanted to drag her to the ground and tear her clothing free of her glorious body couldn't pull the apology from a mouth that still could taste her.

He slowly drew her to him again. She came without the slightest resistance. Her body molded to his. Her hands slid around his waist and held him close. Her breath played on his collarbone.

“Ah,” she said, as if finding something she'd lost sometime.

“It's late,” he said raggedly, pulling back from her.

“Yes,” she agreed, letting him go, with her hands if not her eyes.

“I'll walk you back to the house.”

“I'm fine.”

“I'm not leaving you out here.”

Something flickered in her gaze and her lips parted slightly, as if she were reviewing things to say, comebacks that might leave him lying on his face in the middle of a child's riding ring. But all she said was “Halfway, then.”

He reached for her arm to take her elbow, but she stepped forward first, dodging him. He moved back to have her walk through the barn door ahead of him. Her hair, silky soft folds of it, spilled down the back of her duster, as dark as the coat itself, and he caught the light, lemony scent of it. His hands tingled in memory of how tresses of it had fallen across his fingers, ribbons of satin he'd bunched in his fist.

“What are you looking for at night?” she asked.

“Excuse me?”

“When you come out and walk along the fences, what are you looking for?”

He couldn't see her face in the darkness of the barn, but he suspected she would be wearing her radio-interviewer face. “Just walking off dinner,” he said.

“Checking the main gate locks? Making sure the well-house door is barred?”

He hadn't realized he'd been so obvious or that anyone had noticed. Even though she couldn't see him,
he shrugged. “I don't want the kids getting into mischief.”

“Ah. That makes sense,” she said, but her tone let him know she didn't believe that to be the only reason he patrolled at night.

They cleared the barn. The main house seemed ablaze in lights across the broad dirt drive. One of the four lab-cross pups barked once and subsided immediately as if recognizing them in the dark.

“It's amazing to think that only a year ago there was nothing here but a few broken-down buildings and some owls and field mice,” Corrie said, looking at the ranch house. “Now it's more home than anywhere I've ever lived.”

Mack thought her statement sad but didn't say so.

She turned to him and held out a hand. She waited until he took it in his. “Halfway,” she said.

“Corrie…”

Her eyes, which had been leveled somewhere around his chin, lifted swiftly to his. “That's the first time you've used my name since that first afternoon you came here. Why do you have such a hard time saying it?” she asked. “You use everyone else's on a daily basis. But not mine. Why is that?”

He could hear no accusation in her tone, only a puzzled question. He thought of her deer-in-the-headlights awareness and answered truthfully, “Because I don't want to kiss
them.
”

Her eyes widened and for the first time that night he caught a hint of total surprise, as if he'd said the last thing on earth she'd expected.

“Good night, Corrie,” he said.

“Okay,” she answered abstractedly.

He turned away from her and started toward his quarters. A few paces from his front steps, he looked back at her. She was still standing where he'd left her, her gaze locked on her outstretched hands, her forehead furrowed in a considering frown, her lips parted and smiling faintly.

C
orrie tried revising some of her lyrics until the early hours of the morning, but the light in the bunkhouse held more allure than the awkward rhymes and rough rhythms. She didn't don her coat and fill her pockets a second time. She merely watched the muscled silhouette walk the floor, remembered the feel of his lips on hers, and sadly wondered what kept him from his bed, driving him from sleep.

And wondered if he knew that when he'd kissed her, he'd driven all hope of sleep from her.

Corrie studied him the next morning and again later that afternoon and could see no signs of insomnia on his chiseled features. His eyes were shadowed but not by lack of sleep, just by whatever demons haunted him. Unlike her, his hands were steady and sure and his gait even and deliberate.

“Pablo was right about him.” Jeannie came to the corral fence and leaned against it beside Corrie.

“Right about what?”

“The kids. The way they take to Mack. Look at them. They're like filings to a magnet, a few at a time, until suddenly they're all there, leaning and tugging on him.”

“Yet he holds them at arm's length.”

“Do you think so?”

“Look at him. It's as if he's somewhere else. His thoughts, anyway.”

“They don't seem to mind,” Jeannie said.

“They trust him,” Corrie said slowly, and with no small amount of admiration. It was rare that a group of orphaned or abandoned children would so readily take to a stranger, especially one who was their teacher.

“So do I,” Jeannie said.

“Why?”

“Why don't you?”

“I didn't say I didn't. I just want to know what it is about him that makes you trust him. What do you know about him?”

“Aside from excellent credentials and references, he's a natural with the kids. A pure natural. And I like the way he takes his job so seriously. He hasn't even asked whether or not he has weekends off, did you know that?”

Corrie grinned. There were no days off at Rancho Milagro. Jeannie claimed there were no days off from family. There were getaway times, vacations, excursions, but no one punched a clock or logged overtime.

“I keep getting the feeling I should know about him,” Corrie said.

“Like what?”

“Like—something. I don't know.”

“Well, Ms. Prizewinning Journalist, you could always do some research on him. Or maybe you don't want to know too much and just don't want to admit it,” Jeannie said.

“And this bit of oracle-esque speech means what?”

“Ah…the oracle knows all, reveals but a crack in the large picture frame of life.”

“Gag.”

Jeannie laughed and relented. “I think you're curious about Mack because he appeals to you. And you don't want to play Corrie the journalist, but Corrie the woman.”

Corrie couldn't mask the blush, but said, “You can be inexpressibly corny sometimes, Jeannie.”

“And you can be blind as the proverbial bat. When was the last time you indulged in a little romance?”

Corrie thought of Mack's intense kisses the night before. A little romance didn't feel possible with him. If she indulged, as Jeannie called it, she would be engulfed, swamped, enveloped. There would be nothing lighthearted about it.

She watched the children gathered around Mack. Almost exactly as Jeannie had described, first two had come, then a third, until within the time it took to tell about it, all the Milagro kids were there, leaning on him, tugging at his sleeves or his jeans, all talking at once, except Jenny, who seldom spoke.

Mack seemed almost oblivious to the noise, the jostling, even the attention. He merely kept walking toward the barn, four or five children hanging from his arms and legs, as if he did this every day and had done so for centuries.

“Do you suppose he was an orphan, too?” Corrie asked.

“Why would you think it?” Jeannie asked back.

“I don't know. The way he keeps his emotions in check, maybe. The way he doesn't share much of himself.” She thought of his saying he'd been the class clown, how serious he was now. She remembered the internal war over kissing her, the few things he'd said afterward.

“He's got kids hanging all over him,” Jeannie pointed out.

“Yes, but it's more like he's allowing them to be close to him physically, but he's not hugging or holding on to them.”

Corrie thought about her own background. Raised without brothers and sisters, spending years in an orphanage and a series of foster homes, striving to stay in the background, not make waves, she'd chosen a sideline lifestyle, hiding behind a notepad and a microphone. She'd kept her world colored with facts and data, not personal opinions. She'd completed assignments, never initiated them.

She understood the children, because she connected with them on a child's level, knew their fears of rejection, their terror of the unknown. But she didn't believe Mack went into teaching for the same reasons. Teaching wasn't a solitary profession.

“Give him a chance,” Jeannie said softly.

Corrie turned surprised eyes in her direction. “I didn't mean I wanted him to go—”

Jeannie flashed a grin. “I didn't think you did. I just don't want you to worry about him too much.”

“Deal,” Corrie said.

“Speaking of deals…I came out here because we've just had a call from the Eddy County Human Resources Office and they have a little boy who needs to be picked up this evening. They're still searching for his mother so they want us to wait until after dinner. Poor baby was abandoned at the office itself. His name is Pedro. He's a youngling, just a smidge older than Analissa. That'll be good for her, she won't be the only tiny tot.”

“Someone abandoned him at the office?”

“That's about the size of it. It's food-stamp day and the place was packed. When everyone cleared out, there was one little boy left. They've called everywhere they can think of. We're the last resort, I'm told.” She gave a half moue. “At least there's an option for these kids now.”

“Do you want me to go pick him up?”

“Would you, honey? Leeza's packing to go back to D.C. tomorrow.”

“What? So soon? I thought she'd be out here at least another month or two before leaving again.”

“She's calling it the last merger—she says it like ‘The Last Supper.'” Jeannie chuckled then sobered abruptly as she said softly, “And we're going back, too, remember?”

Corrie had forgotten. She supposed she'd wanted to forget. Jeannie's first family, her husband and baby daughter, had been killed by a drunk driver three years before and the anniversary was upon them. She wanted to take her new family to the graves in D.C. and have the families meet in a rather unique nostalgic and welcoming ceremony.

Before Corrie could comment on the ramifications
of that trip, Jeannie continued briskly, “Chance has patrol tonight and I'm supposed to be getting ready for our trip. Pablo has some hot date. Jorge can't drive for a week until his new glasses are ready and Clovis—”

Corrie chuckled. “It's okay. I don't mind.”

“But I don't want you driving alone at night with a new little one. Can you take Mack with you?”

Corrie thought of his hands roaming her body, the fire in his kisses. “I'll be fine by myself,” Corrie said quickly.

“Please? I'd feel so much better. That's a long way to walk if the Bronco breaks down or something. And it'll be cold.”

Corrie put up her hands to forestall further exhortations. “Fine. If he's game, so am I.” She'd never been able to resist anything Jeannie wanted. It was part of the reason she'd agreed to be a partner in what Leeza had called No Rancho Yetto.

Less than an hour later, the minute dinner was over, she and Mack were seated side by side in the front seat of the ranch's Bronco, the children gaily waving them off.

The silence in the car was worse than heavy; it seemed a physical presence was sitting fatly between them, blocking any attempt at casual conversation.

Mack's arm rested on the seat back, his fingers nearly touching her shoulder. She could have sworn she felt his proximity and her body tingled in anticipation of his touch. His scent seemed to take over the interior of the Bronco, a rich, sunshine smell mingled with a faint exotic spice.

If he moved at all, the sound of his jeans rasping
against the seat commanded her full attention and she had to fight not to look his way, to keep her eyes from dropping to those same jeans. When he leaned forward to adjust the vent, she stilled, imagining him leaning into her to place his warm lips against the soft curve of her neck.

When he cleared his throat, she almost groaned aloud.

She couldn't seem to think of a single thing to say that wouldn't reveal how dramatically he affected her. All her journalistic training deserted her, letting her know full well she'd done the right thing by abandoning that career—she only had skill, had never done it by instinct. It had been daily torture to question others.

Here in the darkened car with Mack, she felt too confined, too restless. Why couldn't she be like Leeza and just coolly announce she wanted to have an affair with him, state the time limits and be done with it? She had to choke back a bitter laugh. If she did such a thing, she would literally die of embarrassment. It simply wasn't in her nature to state her own needs, her own wants, no matter how much every particle of her seemed tuned to Mack Dorsey. Besides which, she wasn't sure she had it in her to enjoy a casual affair. And there was nothing casual about Mack. Nor the confusing way she felt about him.

If he didn't say something soon, she thought she would likely start screaming.

 

Mack felt the thirty-mile ride to Carlsbad lasted at least a decade. Every time Corrie moved her hand from the steering wheel to her lap or to adjust the radio, he had to steel himself against the feel of her
touch. He berated himself for wishing she would brush those slender, trembling fingers across his arm or his leg and put him out of his misery.

He ached to say something to her, anything that would break the tension that saturated the cab of the Bronco. At the same time, he was afraid to open his mouth for fear he would blurt out every nuance of his past, of the tragedy that ripped apart his life and any hope of a future.

Even if he managed to keep the past buried, he still had a thousand things he wanted to tell her. Something about her compelled a man to talk. He wanted to tell her that he admired the way she truly listened to the children and didn't talk down to them. He could reveal that he'd listened to almost every report she'd ever made from inside or outside the United States. Or that he liked the way she giggled like a little girl herself. Or that she tasted like honey and wine and smelled of lemons and that he hadn't thought of anything else since he'd held her in his arms.

But he said nothing and blamed the kiss the night before for the silence that pummeled them, for the very air between them that seemed filled with static, crackling with his past, his lost hopes, and all the wild fantasies he harbored about her.

He only had to move his hand a few inches and he would be able to stroke her satin skin. He didn't have to move at all to take in her delicate scent.

At the junction for the highway, she changed gears and her knuckles grazed his thigh. He jumped as if she'd burned him and she shied away as painfully. Had he been able to chuckle about it, the moment might have passed without notice. As it was, the si
lence between them seemed to gain even greater dimension.

The sheer proximity of sitting so close to her drove him crazy and her skittishness only made it worse. It made him too conscious that she was all woman, all alone, and most of all, alone with him.

When she finally pulled up to the Eddy County Human Resources Office, the notion of escaping the Bronco filled him with abject relief. He reached for the door and was already out of the car when he realized Corrie wasn't moving. He turned to look a question in her direction and found her as he did the first time inside Rancho Milagro headquarters, her head averted, her eyes closed, and whispering to herself. At the end of her little prayer or whatever it was, she drew a deep breath, held it, then let it out in a rush.

“What do you whisper to yourself?” he asked, speaking for the first time since they'd left the ranch. His voice, damaged by the disaster two years before, seemed raspier than usual.

She turned to him as if surprised he stood in the door of the cab. Even in the waning evening light, he could see the blush rising to her cheeks. “I—nothing important.”

He knew she was lying. Whatever she whispered, it was vital, but something she didn't want to reveal. Strangely, considering how desperately he wanted to avoid delving into another's life, he found himself hungry to know more about her. Everything about her.

“Ready?” he asked, just as desperate to end this little trip down torture lane. For it was torture to just think about her, let alone be this close to her without touching her.

“I hope so,” she said solemnly, and opened her door.

He followed her from the shadows of the parking lot into the low-ceilinged, brightly lit office. He rested his hand against her back as he held the door for her. He both saw and felt her stiffen slightly. Though he knew it was impossible, he was certain he could feel her warmth through her long duster and the clothing she wore beneath it. She raised a shaking gloved hand to weave a strand of her long chestnut hair into the mass slipping from its tether at the back of her head and, in doing so, exposed her long, elegant nape.

He deliberately let the door fall into his back, jabbing his hipbone with the door handle, jarring him free of the impulse to lower his lips to her bare neck, to taste her, to soothe her, or perhaps, selfishly, just to know that he had stolen yet another belated reward.