Текст книги "Tempt Me If You Can"
Автор книги: Джанет Чапмен
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Текущая страница: 3 (всего у книги 16 страниц)
Chapter Three
“S on of a bitch!”
Emma heard an animal’s loud snort, and knew Benjamin Sinclair had just met Pitiful. She shoved her homing pigeon back in the coop and started running for the front of the house. If Pitiful got playful Ben would be right back in bed, this time with more than just a few cracked ribs.
There was a loud crash, another curse, and the sound of pounding hooves just as Emma rounded the corner of the house and barreled straight into Benjamin Sinclair. The man didn’t even break stride. He simply tucked her under his arm and ran for the closest cover, which turned out to be the toolshed.
Bouncing like a sack of grain, Emma began to understand what cracked ribs actually felt like. She lost her breath completely when she was tossed against the inside wall of the shed and suddenly plunged into darkness. Her rescuer’s yelled curses were now just muttered expletives, no less colorful for their lack of volume.
Emma didn’t ask if he had rehurt his ribs, figuring it was hard to pant and curse and talk at the same time. The toolshed suddenly shuddered as if a truck had rammed it, and loud panting came from the other side of the door.
“There is a deranged moose out there, Miss Sands. It only has one antler, and it’s got a huge orange bow tied around its neck. It charged at me just as I was stepping off the back porch.”
The shed door shuddered again. Ben stepped back and pinned her against a rusty old water tank, apparently trying to protect her from harm.
Emma felt like laughing, but didn’t dare. Lord, he was big. And warm. He even smelled nice, too. Thank God it was dark in the shed. His broad shoulders blocked any light that might reach her blushing face. Medicine Creek was getting warmer by the minute.
“That’s just Pitiful, Mr. Jenkins.”
His eyes caught the light from the dusty window as he looked at her with consternation. “I know. I was just minding my business when this animal ran out of the woods like a maniac. It was bellowing at the top of its lungs, its eyes rolling back in its head, that orange bow flapping like a cape.”
“It’s Pitiful.”
“I know that! It must have tick fever or something. We’ve got to shoot it.”
Emma snorted in an attempt to stifle a laugh. “No, Mr. Jenkins. That’s my pet moose, who’s named Pitiful.”
He looked at her as if she were the deranged one, then suddenly cursed again.
The shed vibrated with another bang and Ben snapped his head toward the door. The latch was failing. He looked around, then suddenly lifted her onto the water tank as if she were a sack of feathers.
“Crawl to the back of the shed,” he said, reaching for a broken oar leaning against the wall. “If he gets in here, he could kill us with that antler.”
Emma doubled over in laughter.
“Goddammit! Don’t get hysterical on me! If that crazy beast gets in here, you crawl out the window. Emma!”
She instantly sobered when she saw he might try to shake some sense into her. She opened her mouth to explain, but the shed door finally caved in, splintering the casing and ripping the door off its hinges. Ben swung around with his weapon raised, putting himself between her and danger.
Emma jerked the oar from his hands and threw it to the back of the shed.
“What the—”
“Pitiful! You bad boy! Stop that!”
The startled moose cocked his head to the side, looking at them from only one eye, then let out a bellow that shook the rafters.
Emma shoved at her rescuer’s back and jumped off the water tank. “Pitiful! You stop that hollering this minute. Now get out of here, you silly bull. Go on. Get!”
If ever a moose could look contrite, with an orange bow around its neck and one heavy antler tilting its head, Pitiful looked sorrier than a kid caught raiding the cookie jar. Startled to have her scolding him, he took a step back, shook his head, then bolted for the forest. Clods of muddy earth spewed up behind him, showering the shed and slapping Ben smack in the middle of his heaving chest.
Emma silently peeled the dirt off his expensive canvas shirt. Darting a curious look at his face, she quickly snapped her eyes back down and industriously began to brush at the mud that was left, fighting to keep her shoulders from shaking and her giggles from bursting free.
She lost the battle. The picture of his wild tangle of dark brown hair, his cheeks crimson, and his eyes widened in shock was indelibly burned into her brain. A giggle erupted before she could catch it.
Then the broken door slammed shut and she found herself pressed between it and a hard, unyielding chest.
It seemed Benjamin Sinclair was not amused.
“I just lost ten years of my life, and you think it’s funny?”
Emma frantically shook her head, not raising her eyes above his chest, which vibrated like a deep-rooted oak weathering a gale. Two large hands came to rest on her shoulders, their thumbs nearly touching across her throat.
“That’s good. Because I don’t see anything funny about nearly getting killed by a deranged moose.” He used his thumbs to raise her chin. “Do you?”
Emma finally found the nerve to lift her gaze and immediately wished she hadn’t. Benjamin Sinclair sure as hell wasn’t in shock now. His eyes were narrowed, and his jaw could probably chisel stone.
The sound of crashing branches and a pitiful wail came from the forest.
A loud, exasperated sigh blew over her head, all but parting her hair.
“Look at me.”
She didn’t want to, but those two thumbs became insistent. Emma looked up again … into the eyes of a man whose agenda had suddenly changed.
“Don’t, Mr. Jenkins.”
His mouth descended as if she hadn’t spoken. His lips, which had looked so hard a minute ago, softly touched hers. His hands shifted to cup her head, holding her just firmly enough to deepen the kiss. Then he tilted her head back and used those so-handy thumbs to open her mouth and invade it with his tongue.
Warmth. Unholy heat. Emma’s knees went weak and she grabbed his shirt, steadying herself against his salacious assault. Her world began spinning, a charge of sensuous energy suddenly filling the shed. Damn, the man could kiss. Every nerve touched by him, from her knees to her hair, crackled to life as Emma fought to contain the passion building inside her.
He came here to steal my nephew.
He is huge and scary and not the least bit nice.
She wrapped her arms around his waist, going on tiptoe, turning her head and touching her tongue to his.
Pitiful bellowed again, the mournful sound pulling Emma back to reality. She tore her mouth free and rested her forehead on Ben’s throat, her eyes closed and her heart pounding so violently her ribs hurt. “Don’t, Ben,” she pleaded.
Every muscle in his body went rigid. His breathing suspended and Emma felt his own heart pounding with enough force to bruise her.
“What did you just call me?”
She looked up, meeting his gunmetal stare. “Ben. Michael’s father. The man who’s come to take my nephew away.”
She was suddenly back up against the shed wall, all signs of passion completely gone. “How long have you known?”
“Since I found you on the logging road.”
His hands went back to her shoulders, and those damn thumbs lifted her chin again. “Does Michael know?”
“Probably.”
He slammed a fist into the wall over her head, shuddering the entire building. She closed her eyes when that hand returned, this time wrapping ever so securely around her throat.
“My son was stolen from me fifteen years ago—and you, Miss Sands, are directly responsible for the last ten of them. Tell me why I shouldn’t hate you.”
“Because that would take your son from you forever, Mr. Sinclair.”
He pushed away from her, kicked the water tank, and spun back to face her. “Why didn’t you try to find me when Kelly left?”
“Because Michael wasn’t ready to know you yet. He was only five. Did you expect me to introduce a child to a father who had abandoned him before birth when he’d just been abandoned by his mother? Michael needed stability. He needed me.”
“I didn’t abandon him. I never knew about Michael! I never knew Kelly was pregnant! Why didn’t you contact me later?”
Emma just stared at him.
“Dammit! Who the hell do you think you are, playing God with my life!”
“Your identity has never been kept from him. I expected Michael to look you up himself, once he was grown. The decision is his, not mine.”
Emma turned and opened the door, then looked back. “I don’t know if I believe you. Kelly said she told you she was pregnant, and that you didn’t seem all that concerned. But I do know you have a wonderful, very precious son, Mr. Sinclair. And if you ever do anything to hurt Michael, I will hunt you down and kill you.”
It took every ounce of courage Ben possessed to walk into the kitchen that evening. He nearly faltered when he saw there were only two places set at the table, and that Michael was sitting at one of them.
The boy knew who he was. Maybe. Probably,Emma had said. Michael had probably known all along that the bastard who’d seduced his mother and then walked away sixteen years ago had sat across the table from him every day for the last seven days.
How had he done it? How did a fifteen-year-old boy look a father he had never seen before in the eye, and talk to him about the history of his home, his problems with a generator, his schoolwork, and the weather? Everyday things. Meaningless, casual conversation.
“Your aunt’s not joining us tonight?”
“Nemmy’s away.”
Ben stood behind his chair and looked at his son. “But her truck’s still here. So’s the plane.”
The boy stared back at him, his eyes a calm gray ocean of unreadable depth. “She’s gone into the woods.” He took Ben’s plate to the stove and filled it.
Ben pulled out his chair and sat down. “What does that mean, she’s gone into the woods?”
Michael set a plate of stew and dumplings in front of him. “It means she’s troubled.” He sat down and picked up his fork, resting his arms on the table, looking at Ben with still calm but questioning regard. “Do you happen to know what could be troubling her, Mr. Sinclair?”
Ben picked up his fork. “She told you who I am.”
“No. I’ve known since you walked up to me at Smokey Bog.”
Ben snapped his gaze to Michael’s. “Then why the pretense all week? Why didn’t you say something?”
“You chose to come here under another name. It was your move.”
Ben took a deep breath and blew out a heavy sigh. “Only once I got here I couldn’t decide how to make that move. I didn’t know how to walk up to you and say, ‘Hi, I’m your father.’” He shrugged. “I still don’t know what to say to you.”
A slight grin crept into the corners of Michael’s mouth as he leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. “You could have said how glad you were to finally meet me.”
Well, hell. It seemed this boy—this man-child—didn’t resent him, but simply was glad to meet his father. “ Yousent me that letter.”
“What letter?”
Well, someone had sent that damn letter. “About a month ago a letter was sent to me, unsigned, from Medicine Gore. All it said was that I had a son, and that I should … I should come meet him.”
“So you came.”
“I’d have come sooner if I’d known about you.” He leaned forward in his chair. “I never would have leftif I’d known about you.”
“I didn’t send it.”
“Would your aunt have?”
Michael drove his fork into his stew. “Nope. Not Nem. She hates your guts.”
“So I gathered. Mike, do you believe me? That I didn’t abandon you?”
The boy shrugged as he took another bite. “Probably, knowing Kelly. She could be … self-serving sometimes.”
Which was why Ben had eventually been relieved when Kelly had turned him down sixteen years ago, when he’d asked her to come home to New York with him.
“Could Kelly have sent me the letter?”
The boy looked thoughtful, then shook his head. “Not likely. My mother hasn’t been heard from in over ten years. And you said it was postmarked Medicine Gore.” He looked toward the bank of windows over the sink, seeming to take stock of all the gifts adorning them. Ben saw a shadow of pain move over his face before he turned back. “Nem must have sent it.”
“But why? She loves you. She wouldn’t want to risk your leaving with me.”
“Because she doeslove me. Because this clear-cutting war scares the hell out of her. She would do anything to make sure I’m safe.”
Ben lowered his gaze. “I know about Emma’s father.” He looked back at his son. “Your grandfather was killed just before you were born.”
Michael stared directly into Ben’s eyes. “Someone blew up the dam the paper company was building. Grampy Sands got caught in the flood.”
Ben nodded. “It happened the day I left.”
“Yup. The very same day you disappeared.”
As he stared into his own young eyes, Ben suddenly realized what Mike was implying. “You think I had something to do with that dam blowing up?” He closed his eyes and rubbed his hands over his face. “Jesus. You and Emma and Kelly believe I’m responsible for Charlie Sands’s death?”
“The whole town thinks you’re responsible.”
“Good God.”
“I’d keep the beard and a low profile if I were you.”
“I didn’t do it. I didn’t blow up that dam!”
“Well, the loggers sure as heck didn’t.”
“Neither did the environmentalists. That would have been counterproductive. The flood would have damaged the very land we were trying to save.”
Ben stood up and stalked to the counter, leaning his hands on the sink and looking out the window. There was nothing but darkness outside and the reflection of the kitchen staring back at him. He could see Michael sitting in his chair, his back to Ben, his arms resting on the table. He spoke again, not turning. “Mike. I swear to you, I didn’t blow up that dam. And I would have known if anything like that was being planned.”
“It’s not me you have to convince. It’s the people here. Sixteen years is a long time for a suspicion to take root.”
Ben turned and looked at his son, who was now looking at him. “Charlie Sands was your grandfather. So more than anyone else, youhave to be convinced.”
“I already am.”
“Just like that? You don’t know a damn thing about me.”
Michael stood up and approached Ben, his stride confident, and stopped one step shy of touching him. “I know all about Benjamin Sinclair,” he said softly. “I can tell you how your grandfather, Abram, built his shipping company from nothing, and I can tell you what your personal net worth is. But most of all, I can tell you that my father never would have walked away sixteen years ago if he had been responsible for another man’s death.”
Ben could only stare back, frozen in awe.
Blind faith. Childhood loyalty. And a young man’s confidence in what he could determine from facts and figures and history.
And maybe a little help from Emma Sands? Even hating him, for fifteen years she had apparently not held judgment on her nephew’s father. She hadn’t betrayed his identity when he arrived, and she hadn’t interfered this past week. She had simply let them walk their own course to this moment—then disappeared into the woods to give them this time.
“Michael. What is it you want?”
“A father.”
He was going to drown in a puddle of emotion. Ben forced himself rigid, but the tremors began anyway, starting deep inside and working their way outward.
This boy scared him to death. He wasn’t ready to be a father. Hell, until now, he hadn’t really believed it was possible. From the moment he’d read the letter, Ben had been sure it was all a dream—that he’d conjured up a long-lost child because he’d needed something to cling to after his grandfather’s death.
Ben realized he was standing as still as a statue, sweating bullets, and staring at empty space. Michael was sitting at the table again, quietly eating his supper.
As quietly as his son, Ben walked back and sat down. “I never would have left, Mike, if I had known about you. My God. It never even entered my mind that Kelly might be pregnant. She seemed so … she seemed like she knew what she was doing,” he finished on a whisper, heat climbing up the back of his neck. He shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “It’s not an excuse, but I was barely nineteen. I thought I had the world by the ass and my whole life ahead of me.” He leaned forward. “I asked her to come away with me, but she refused.”
Michael finally looked up, a sad smile on his face. “I love my mother very much, Mr. Sinclair, and I came to terms with who she is many years ago. But Emma was the anchor that held my world together.”
“And you’re worried that if you come to New York with me, she’ll be alone.”
Michael nodded. “Yes. But that’s not the only problem.”
“Then what is?”
“Remember the guy who stopped in here Wednesday evening?”
Ben snorted. “Galen something. He’s got the personality of Pitiful.”
“Well, Galen Simms thinks he’s courting my aunt, which is why he was such a bastard to you. He didn’t like finding you staying in the lodge.”
“So if Emma marries him, she won’t be alone.”
“He’s not courting Nemmy as much as he’s courting Medicine Creek Camps and my aunt’s reputation as a guide,” Michael said. “Simms has a set of camps on a lake twelve miles north of here. But while our business is booming, his is sinking in red ink. He’s looking to marry himself a business manager.”
“Your aunt is astute enough to see that. Besides, she didn’t seem all that enamored with Simms.”
“But Nem might think about marrying him anyway, so I don’t feel obligated to stay. What she doesn’t know is that if I leave here with you, I intend to take her with me.” He tossed a smile across the table. “Kicking and screaming if I have to.”
Ben blinked, then rubbed his hands over his face, several times, to wipe away his shock. “Excuse me?”
“You finally came, and it’s time for me to leave Medicine Gore. But I’m not leaving here without Nem—and if I have to torch the Cessna, the cabins, and all one thousand acres, I will.”
Chapter Four
B en gaped at hisson.
“Once we get home, she can start a new life, like me. You have a big house, don’t you?”
Home. The boy wanted to go home. Just hearing him say it made Ben break into a cold sweat. “Have you mentioned this little plan to your aunt, by any chance?”
Michael snorted.
“Then she won’t be kicking and screaming. She’ll be going for her shotgun.” Ben stood up and planted his hands on the table. “Michael, you can’t tell a grown woman what to do. I know you don’t like being reminded of the fact, but you areonly fifteen years old. Your sense of authority is all screwed up.”
Michael also stood. “Come with me. I have something to show you.”
Ben grabbed the edge of the table, wanting to upend it, but closed his eyes and counted to ten. This was not at all going well.
He finally followed Michael through the great room and into what he knew was Emma’s bedroom. He stopped in the doorway and watched Michael walk over to a window and reach up on the top of the casing, pushing the curtain aside to feel along the molding. When his hand returned, it held a key. He walked over to a long, scarred, unadorned chest and unlocked it.
“Michael—”
“Come here. You need to see this.”
Ben took a guilty look back at the great room, then stepped into Emma’s private domain as the boy lifted the lid on the chest.
It appeared to be full of … frilly things. Woman stuff—doilies, fancy bedsheets, a handmade quilt. And household goods—a teapot and matching sugar and creamer, a dark green candle, a sprig of dried flowers, a crystal vase.
“This is where my aunt keeps her dreams.” Michael lifted the quilt and pulled out a silver picture frame. “She bought this in Portland when she and Kelly took me there for my fifth birthday. Nem said it was for her wedding picture.”
Lovingly rubbing the frame, Michael smiled. “I told her she couldn’t ever get married, that I wouldn’t let any man take her away.” He looked up, and Ben took a step back from the pain he saw in the boy’s eyes. “She told me not to worry, that she’d only marry a man worth loving, and that he would be very hard to find.”
He put the frame back under the quilt and ran his hand over the contents of the chest, touching everything, disturbing nothing. “She told me she’s had this chest since she was ten. I was often with her when she would find something that caught her eye, and she would buy it, bring it home, and it would disappear. It was a long time before I discovered she was squirreling her purchases away in this chest.”
“Why are you showing me this, Michael? A lot of young girls start a hope chest. All of them plan for the day they’ll set up their own home.”
“Nemmy stopped buying things after Kelly left. Once, when we were in a store and I caught her looking at some china, I asked her why she didn’t buy it. She told me there was no more reason to.”
The boy slowly closed the lid and stood to face Ben, his eyes clouded with emotion. “It took me several years to figure out what she meant. Now, I intend to see she gets her dream.”
“Does she blame herself for your mother leaving?”
“In some ways, Nem feels responsible for everything. If a sport comes here and expects to catch a boatload of fish and it rains all week, she feels responsible. If I get caught driving to town, it’s Nem’s fault, not mine. If I run the plane up on a rocky shore and tear the pontoons all to hell, it’s because she didn’t teach me well enough.” Michael lifted his arms and let them fall back. “So she probably thinks she could have done something to prevent Kelly from leaving.”
“So as penance she’s given up her dream of having a home of her own? But this is her home.” Ben pointed to the chest. “Those things should be out, being used.”
Michael shook his head. “No. Nem’s dream wasn’t some unfocused hope. I believe it was aimed at one man in particular. And I realize now that she’s probably loved him since before I was born.”
“Who is he?”
The boy cocked his head and looked directly at Ben. He was silent so long, Ben didn’t think he would answer.
“If I draw you a map, do you think you could find my aunt without getting lost?”
That wasn’t an answer!
And he wasn’t going to get one, Ben realized. This boy was going to dump the problem of his aunt right in his lap, and he wasn’t going to give him a clue.
It was a test. Michael wanted to see if he had a son’s right to ask for help from his parent. He wanted to know if his father intended to take up his battles—not for him, but with him.
So Ben was going to have to find Emma Sands, discover who the woman was in love with, and get her married to the guy. Then he could have his son.
Damn if the boy couldn’t give lessons to Solomon.
“I guess that would depend. Did your aunt take her shotgun?”
“Yup.”
“And that addled moose of hers?”
“Probably.”
It was a diabolical test. A gauntlet of heroic proportions. “You got a compass I can borrow? And a sleeping bag?”
The smile Ben received could have blinded the sun.
The cold, wet forest floor seeping through her wool pants made her uncomfortable, but it was nothing compared to the anger Emma felt as she watched the deliberate desecration of the woods she loved.
Tree huggers were driving spikes into the trees. There were six men, and they didn’t at all look like the fancy environmentalists who had been hounding the state house and the nightly news for the last two months. These men were grubby, disgusting jackals with their own agenda for gaining their objective.
She’d heard about the terrorist act of spiking trees, but that problem had been a distant one, usually in the northwestern forests of the country. Loggers, most of them friends of hers, would come here to harvest these trees, and be ripped to shreds when their chain saws hit those spikes. The saws would disintegrate on contact, sending missiles of sharp, jagged chain into unprotected flesh. Innocent, hardworking men would be maimed and possibly killed.
Emma owned a thousand acres of prime forest herself, and had spent the last ten years adding to the acreage surrounding Medicine Creek Camps. It was to be Michael’s heritage. Whatever decisions the state government made would ultimately affect her, but she couldn’t take sides in this issue. She sold stumpage off her land to the paper and lumber mills, but she was careful what was cut.
That wasn’t enough for the environmentalists. They wouldn’t be happy until all the forested land was rendered untouchable. They were targeting clear-cutting this time, but Emma feared it was just the first of several calculated steps aimed at turning millions of acres of woodland into another forest reserve or national park.
She’d been minding her business this morning, headed for a crystal spring she knew had the sweetest drinking water in the area, when she’d heard the echo of metal thunking against live wood. It was a distinct sound that had rattled around in the forest, and it had taken her a good twenty minutes to find the source.
Now she was wet, and cold, and getting madder and madder the longer she watched. But she couldn’t go charging in, like when she’d rescued Ben. These men were out-of-staters, not neighbors, and they didn’t look as if they would like being discovered.
Yet she couldn’t walk away, either. There was no way she could point out all the vandalized trees, and no way the loggers could take metal detectors to all these trees.
She could scare them off. Stay hidden and blast the air with birdshot, making them think the calvary had arrived. Maybe even find Pitiful and get him to introduce himself, the way he had to Ben yesterday.
Emma checked her shotgun, making sure both the chamber and the magazine were full, then patted her pocket to make sure she had more shells so she could quickly reload. She raised the butt of the gun to her shoulder, aimed it ten feet above the men’s heads, and clicked off the safety.
A large, powerful hand suddenly covered hers, muffling the click of the safety being replaced. Another large hand covered her mouth as a crushing weight landed on top of her, pinning her on the wet forest floor.
She usually wasn’t one to panic, but Emma wildly struggled to dislodge her heavy assailant. Her shotgun was ripped from her hand and pushed away, and she was roughly grabbed by the shoulder and rolled over. Still pinned and her mouth still covered, Emma stopped struggling when she looked up into the iron gray eyes of a very angry Benjamin Sinclair.
He didn’t speak. He didn’t even offer a curse word.
She didn’t even squeak, she was so stunned. The face less than a foot from hers didn’t belong to a city sport or corporate executive. She was looking at a man ready for battle, who didn’t intend to let her win it.
He lifted off her and grabbed her shotgun and pack. He kept his other hand latched on her jacket and pulled her to her feet with one swift, powerful jerk, then started dragging her down the hill.
Unable to do anything else, Emma stumbled after him. She tried to dislodge his grip on her jacket, but Ben Sinclair didn’t break stride, turn around, or even acknowledge that she had to run to keep up. He did start with his infamous cursing again, once they were far enough away they couldn’t be heard.
Emma gave him a few choice words in return. When he stopped, she stumbled into the fist shackling her.
“Lady, if you don’t shut up and quit struggling, I promise you won’t be able to sit down for a week.”
Emma snapped her mouth shut and glared back at him. He turned and started along a brook, once more dragging her behind him.
“How you and my son have survived this long is the eighth wonder of the world.”
“What are you doing here?”
He stopped again and turned to her, his scowl darkening even more. “I’m on a fool’s mission.” That information given, he pushed her ahead of him and then prodded her back. “Keep going until I tell you to stop.”
Emma thought about planting her feet, but he was a head taller, sixty pounds heavier, and definitely stronger than she was. So she walked.
“You were going to go charging right in there, weren’t you? You were going to take on six men with a four-shot gun and not a soul to help within twenty miles. You’re more insane than your moose.”
The lecture continued and Emma learned that she was impulsive, irresponsible, and lacking the brains of a chipmunk. She discovered she was too brave to rush in where even fools wouldn’t go, and that she needed a keeper. And then he asked her again how she’d managed to raise his son to manhood without getting either of them killed.
Emma suddenly sat down on a rock beside the brook, put her chin in her fists, and scowled at the water.
Ben loomed over her.
“Are you through yet?” she asked, still not looking at him.
“Not by half.”
“Should I be taking notes?”
Her pack and shotgun fell to the ground with a heavy thud, and the legs standing beside her bent at the knee, bringing an even angrier face within an inch of hers. “You could have gotten killed.”
Emma smiled at him. “That would have solved a lot of your problems.”
He lunged for her and Emma pulled back. He caught her shoulders and followed her down off the rock. Ben was back on top of her, and Emma was starting to get more than a little angry herself. “If you don’t quit manhandling me, I’m gonna make sure you never father another son.”
Completely ignoring her threat, he grabbed her hands pushing against his chest and pinned them over her head with one of his own. Then he took his other hand and gently brushed the hair from her face.
“Emma Sands. Such bravado you show the world. Such a scam artist you are.”
“Get off me.”
He used his knees to spread her legs, and Emma sucked in a surprised breath when she felt him nestle far too intimately between her thighs.
“That was the wrong direction!”
“But the safest, if I want more children.”
“How did you find me?”
“Michael drew me a map.”
“You’re supposed to be getting to know your son, not interfering in my business.”
The gentleness left his face as suddenly as it had appeared. “Someone had to interfere. You were about to let your cannon loose on those men, weren’t you?”
“They were spiking the trees.”
He growled a nasty word.
“If I ever get you near a bar of soap, I’m going to use it to wash out your mouth.”
He suddenly grinned. “You have my permission to try.”
“Are you planning to get off me any time soon?”
He wiggled, settling himself even deeper against her. “I’m rather comfortable.” His grin turned sinister. “You’re nicely padded in all the right places.”
