LITMIR.BIZ

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road that joined the two houses. The time it would take her to do that would be about as long as the dawn coolness would last.

      She had covered more than half the distance to her brother-in-law’s spread when she realized there was a horse standing near the river, almost at the ford. The animals Chase and Samantha raised were too valuable to be running loose out here, and she knew it wasn’t one of her horses. They were accounted for back at the ranch, even Rio’s big black, which she had agreed to keep until he had time to make some other arrangements.

      She was still trying to figure out what the horse was doing out here when she realized the animal was saddled—and, more important, that it had a rider, a man who had dismounted and was bending down to examine something on the ground.

      She pulled up her mount, trying to recognize either man or beast. The rider apparently sensed that he was no longer alone. Even as she hesitated, watching him from this distance, he straightened and turned toward her, the horse’s reins held in his left hand.

      Since she had been seen, she realized that her options had narrowed: Confront the rider or turn tail and run. She’d be damned if she’d leave, she thought, damned if she’d be the one to run away. This was McCullar property, and he was the trespasser.

      She urged Spooner forward. The man made no attempt to remount. Obviously, he didn’t intend to leave any more than she did. He simply waited for her as she closed the distance between them. Finally she was near enough to recognize the animal he was holding.

      It was one of Samantha’s—her beloved Lighthorse Harry, a stallion that she’d brought from the Kincaid ranch when she’d moved out here. Horse thief? flitted through Jenny’s head, but that was pretty unlikely, given the fact that the man would have had to saddle and ride that valuable animal out, under Chase and Samantha’s very noses.

      By the time Jenny had come to that reassuring conclusion, she was also close enough to recognize the rider. Her identification was instantaneous, with no doubt in her mind as to who he was. Not a single doubt, not even given the poor quality of the dawn light and the distance. It was the man from the wedding.

      And he was watching her, she realized. Although she was not yet near enough to distinguish his features, she felt his gaze focused on her with the same intensity as yesterday. Her own reaction was almost the same as it had been then—a slow, hot, roiling in the lower part of her body.

      There was no shock from seeing his face to explain that feeling, as there had been before. But still there was reaction, undoubtedly a reaction to him. She put that realization aside for the time being, promising herself that she would take it out and examine exactly what her reaction was. Later, she thought, taking a breath and pulling her horse up in front of him.

      “You’re on private property, I’m afraid,” she said. “This is McCullar land.”

      “’Morning, ma’am,” he responded. His voice was just as she had remembered it, deep and pleasant, despite the graveled hoarseness. And it was calm. Obviously, he wasn’t disturbed by her unwelcoming comment.

      She had chided Rio for calling her “ma’am,” making her feel like his mother because she was a few years older than he. But that wasn’t the case with this man. You, I’m not older than, she thought, and that falsely polite butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-my-mouth “ma’am” had grated. Far more than it probably should have. Despite her teasing comments to Rio, Jenny McCullar hadn’t really considered her age in relationship to a man’s in a long time.

      “Private property,” she said again.

      “This is your land, Mrs. McCullar?”

      He pushed the Stetson he was wearing upward, off his brow, with his gloved left thumb. The thumb of his right hand, the hand he had told her didn’t work, was hooked into one of the belt loops at the front of his jeans.

      He was wearing a denim shirt that looked as if it had been washed as many times as his faded Levi’s, which fitted the long legs like a second skin. The jeans covered the tops of worn boots. Her eyes must have traced down the length of his legs, she realized, to have discovered those. She fought the almost-unbearable urge to allow them to retrace that journey, moving upward this time. Moving upward to…

      Out of an instinct for self-protection, she glanced instead toward the road that connected the two McCullar ranches, although she could see nothing of either of them from here. Only arid desert grassland stretched toward the horizon. And of course, technically, she admitted, this part of it wasn’t hers.

      She looked back down and met the impact of that single dark eye. She reacted even to that, breath faltering, gloved fingers trembling against the reins as they had trembled yesterday.

      The strengthening light of the morning sun was less kind to his face than the subdued lighting of the reception-room hallway had been. She had been right about the scars. Her throat tightened as she tried not to think about what might have caused that kind of scarring.

      “This belongs to my brother-in-law,” she managed.

      “Then it’s okay,” he said. “I have Chase’s permission to be out here.”

      “You have…Chase’s permission?” she repeated. Was he someone from Chase’s days with the DEA? Or someone associated with his security firm? The possibilities about where her brother-in-law might have known this man were almost endless, given the aura of danger and quiet strength that clung to him, that fitted him almost as well as those worn jeans.

      Neither Chase nor Samantha had mentioned to her that they were expecting a houseguest. That in itself was surprising, considering their closeness.

      “Yes, ma’am,” he said.

      “You’re a friend of Chase’s?”

      Why did everything she said to this man have to make her sound like a half-wit? First that fascinating dissertation on rice and now the implication that Chase might give a stranger permission to ride on his land.

      “Chase and I go back a long way,” he acknowledged.

      “I thought I knew everyone who went ‘back a long way’ with Chase.”

      “And he’s never mentioned anyone like me,” he suggested.

      His voice was amused again, and some of the tension seeped out of her back and shoulders. “No,” she agreed.

      “Probably ashamed to own up to knowing me.”

      “If you know Chase McCullar at all, then you know that’s not true.”

      He nodded, and then he smiled at her. That same slow half smile he had given her yesterday. With the growing clarity of the morning light, she realized for the first time why it was one-sided.

      The muscles on the right side of his face weren’t very mobile. They moved, but not much. That partial paralysis would probably have been much more noticeable if his eye hadn’t been hidden by the patch. She wondered suddenly if that was why he wore it, and then rejected the idea. This man wasn’t vain. And whatever was wrong with him was really none of her business, she admonished herself.

      “You must have made quite an impression on Samantha,” she said, groping for something to say and deciding Harry was a safe subject. Then, seeing that one-sided smile suddenly disappear, she could have bitten out her tongue.

      He had certainly reacted to that, the dark gaze freezing into ice. Belatedly, she remembered her sister-in-law’s vaunted beauty, something Jenny never even thought much about anymore. Dear God, could he possibly think she was making a reference to the way he looked?

      “I was talking about your horse,” she explained. “Samantha doesn’t let just anyone ride Harry.” Apparently her explanation worked. The tightness in his face eased, and he looked at the big bay standing beside him.

      “She asked me if I could ride.”

      He had been insulted by that question. The memory of that offense was clear in his voice, and Jenny wondered about the impairment that would prompt

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