A Heart Divided (18 page)

“Why, imported straight from Paris, of course,” Sarah smoothly shot back. She scanned the other woman’s gown. “Yours too, I assume?”

Allis’s mouth tightened in anger. “I hardly think we share the same couturier . . .”

She halted, apparently realizing how ludicrous arguing about dressmakers must sound to the two men standing there. Obviously deciding a snub was a more effective ploy, she turned her attention to Nick, and Gabe, completely ignoring Sarah until Cord finally returned.

“Oh, darling, I’ve changed my mind.” Allis accepted the cup of punch from Cord and immediately shoved it at Sarah. “Sarah looks so damp and mussed from dancing. She needs this much more than I. What
I
need,” she continued, taking his arm, “is a romantic waltz in your strong arms.”

Cord quirked a dark brow. “Is that a fact?” He turned toward the others. “If you’ll excuse me, it appears I owe Allis a dance.”

Sarah watched him lead the woman out onto the dance floor, then turned from the scene. The pain of seeing Cord hold another woman was suddenly too much to bear. To hide her misery, she forced herself to take a sip of her punch. The trembling of her hands as she raised the cup to her lips, however, wasn’t lost on the two men with her.

They exchanged a concerned glance, then Gabe firmly removed the cup from her hands. “Come on, Sarah,” the sheriff said. “We can’t have you whiling the night away standing on the sidelines. That music’s calling us.”

Before she could protest that she wasn’t in the mood, Gabe whisked her back onto the dance floor. Surprisingly, the next few hours passed with whirlwind speed. Sarah could hardly complete a set with one partner before another was stepping forward to claim the next one. Cord soon surrendered Allis into Spencer Womack’s waiting arms, and once more took up his position beside his brother. Yet the more he glared at her, the happier and more lighthearted Sarah’s actions became.

It was hopeless, she morosely told herself even as she kept up the happy façade. Cord would never declare his love, if that was even what he truly felt. His actions tonight had hardly been that of the besotted swain.

Well, let him get angry
, she thought as she twirled about the floor in the arms of yet another man.
He’s bound and determined to think the worst of me no matter what I do, and I’m not letting him ruin this evening for me. I’m tired of trying to please him. Nick’s not upset and he’s the only one whose feelings I need worry about. Let Cord stand there and fume until he explodes. It serves him right!

Almost as if her thoughts had drawn him toward her, Cord suddenly headed across the dance floor. The hard glitter in his eyes made Sarah momentarily quail before she turned her attention back to her partner. Cord wouldn’t dare cause a scene. Would he?

“This is my dance,” Cord cut in just then, firmly tapping the town pharmacist on the shoulder.

One glance at his smoldering look was enough for the other man. He released Sarah and backed away.

She glared up at the dark-haired man towering over her. “That was rude. And this isn’t your dance.”

An iron grip settled on her arm as she turned to walk away. “Oh yes it is.”

Something in the tone of his voice warned her not to argue. Sarah relented, going stiffly into the circle of his arms.

“Have it your way, but
only
for one dance.”

“We’ll just see about that,” he growled before leading her off in time to the music.

They danced silently for a while, the tension arcing between them with crackling force. Finally Cord spoke, his words harsh and brutal.

“What in the blazes do you think you’re doing, flaunting your flirtations here tonight in front of Nick? Don’t you have any feelings for him, to embarrass him like this? I swear, Sarah, if you don’t start acting like a lady, I’ll see to it that—”

“That what, Cord?” All the frustration of the evening watching him from the sidelines, glowering at her, was suddenly too much to contain. “That I don’t marry Nick? But I thought you wanted me to marry Nick.”

“Don’t play games with me,” he growled. “The issue here isn’t your marriage to Nick. It’s your behavior.”

She laughed unsteadily. “And who are you to dictate my behavior? You have no claims on me.”

As she spoke, reality finally broke through the fragile hopes and dreams for the evening, shattering her brave composure. Sarah jerked back, tears flooding her eyes.

“Why do you persist in constantly picking at me? Oh, I don’t care what the rest of them say! You hate me, don’t you? You hate me, and it’s never been anything more than that.”

Cord stared down at her, apparently oblivious to the fact they were now standing in the middle of the floor, the other dancers circling around them in time to the music. “I don’t hate you, Sarah. I . . . I only want for Nick to be happy. And I don’t want you to hurt him.”

For a tear-blinded instant, she stared up at him, her whole world crumbling around her. Then she took a step back. “Go to blazes, Cord Wainwright!”

Before he could respond, Sarah fled the hall, running out into the dark anonymity of the night. She stumbled once, a sharp stone ripping a hole in her gown, but she was past caring. All she wanted was to run away—far from the now false gaiety of the town hall, far from the man who once again had so cruelly dashed all her hopes onto the hard, unforgiving rocks of reality.

Silver moonlight illuminated the path out of town. Sarah ran on, seeking shelter from its prying light in the shaggy firs that clung to the hillside. All she wanted was to hide and cry her heart out once and for all, to rid herself of the last vestiges of her dreams—and bury forever her love. Then she’d return to the hall and face her future with no looking back, no regrets.

A sound—her name—whisked by on the vestiges of a breeze. Sarah froze.

“Sarah,” the low voice called again, and she knew it was Cord. She halted and turned to face him.

He drew up to her, his dark eyes glinting shards of onyx in the moonlight. Before she could say anything, he pulled her to him.

“When we first met in town I called you a little wildcat,” he said, his voice barely more than a throaty rasp. “But I was wrong. You’re a little witch, and you’ve put every man here tonight under your spell. Every man . . . including me.”

“Well, don’t let it worry you,” she retorted with cold sarcasm. “The spell fades at sunrise. It’ll have no lasting effect.”

“You think so, eh?” Cord pulled her closer, his gaze hungrily scanning her, his words rough with unbridled desire. “Well, I’m not so sure anymore.”

At the husky timbre of his voice, Sarah’s pulse quickened, her skin tingling with the awareness of his perusal. Warmth flooded her. With it came a strange surety in what she must do.

Standing on tiptoe, she molded her slim frame to his hard-muscled one. With both hands, she cupped his face and pulled his mouth down to hers.

“Then let me end the uncertainty,” Sarah murmured. “For the both of us . . . once and for all.”

10

She kissed him softly, tentatively and, for a moment, feared his response as he stood so stiffly before her. Something inside her quailed, but Sarah forced herself to go on.

Her lips traced the firm contours of his mouth, then moved to the strong line of his jaw and down the side of his neck. Burying her face in the corded hollows, she breathed a kiss there. Only then did she feel him tremble, know at last with any certainty that she’d pierced his defenses.

“Curse you, Sarah,” Cord groaned, whispering the words into her hair as he lowered his head in defeat. “This isn’t right . . . You’re not mine . . .”

“Hush, my love.” She looked up, silencing him with a gentle finger. “It
is
right. I’ve always been yours.”

He stared down at her, the battle of wild hope over disbelief playing out in his dark eyes. “Then why . . .” Cord paused. “It was me all along, wasn’t it? I was too blind to see what was right there in front of me.”

She angled her head back and smiled. “Well, I guess you could say that. Being too blind to recognize the truth, I mean. Guess that was why Nick felt compelled to stage our sham engagement.”

“A sham engagement?” Understanding slowly dawned, and Cord’s mouth twisted ruefully. “Guess I should’ve listened to him to begin with. Instead, I was so intent on forcing you on Nick, that I never . . .” He sighed, his hands slowly moving up her arms. “So, what do we do now?”

An impish grin played about her mouth. “Oh, I don’t know. Want to get to know me better, cowboy?”

The light of remembrance flared in Cord’s eyes. “And what exactly did you have in mind, little lady?” he replied, repeating the words of that first hot September day.

Sarah chuckled softly. “Anything you like, cowboy. I only want to make you happy.”

“Well, then how about a kiss?” His ebony head lowered to her.

She came to him willingly, eagerly this time, melting into the hard contours of his body. “I thought you’d never ask,” Sarah whispered, her lips a warm breath from his.

This time there was no doubt of his desire. Cord’s mouth slanted over hers with demanding mastery. A shock of delight coursed through her.

Sarah responded, returning his ardor with equal ardor of her own. Her hands moved to the sinewy strength of his upper arms, reveling in their taut power, before rising to entwine about his neck.

Cord’s kiss deepened, taking on a savage intensity. His breath rasped hard and heavy now.

“Oh, Sarah, Sarah,” he breathed on a sigh. Gently, he disengaged her arms from him and pushed her away.

She stared up at him, all the old doubts rushing back to coil their clammy tendrils about her heart. She knew it wasn’t right to take this any further but feared he was also telling her he still intended to step aside in deference to Nick.

He must have seen the uncertainty in her eyes. “Calm your fears. I’m not fool enough to think I could ever deny my feelings for you again. I just think a proposal of marriage might be the next step, don’t you? If you’ll have me, of course.”

Pure, sweet bliss surged through Sarah.
A proposal? Cord wants to marry me?

Sudden doubt followed quickly on the heels of her happiness. Cord had yet to speak of love. But surely he loved her. His actions hadn’t been those of a man not in love. Or had they?

Everything paled in light of that last, lingering doubt. Passion she knew he felt, but that could never be enough for her. A comfortable life, better than she’d ever known or hoped to know, he could offer her. But so could Nick, and at least the absence of that love wouldn’t hurt as much as it would with Cord. No, she had to know, and know now, or there was little hope for a life together.

Sarah stepped back. “Do you love me?”

For an instant Cord stared down at her, taken aback by the unexpected bluntness of the question. She never ceased to amaze him with her sharp changes in mood. One minute she was a warm, passionate woman and the next, somber and strangely withdrawn. But then, he hadn’t mentioned anything about love, had he? The realization sent a small twinge of unease spiraling through him.

Gazing down at Sarah, so luminous, so lovely in the silver moonlight, he knew he loved her. Yet why the lingering hesitation to say the words, to make that final commitment? The pain, buried deep in his soul until now, rose with gut-wrenching intensity to his consciousness.

He feared the rejection of reaching out to another, of sharing the warmth of his heart and finding only coldness in return. It was amazing how just one shattering experience when he was young could cast its shadow upon the rest of his life. He had his father to thank for twisting his soul into such knots, knots that now seemed hopeless to untie.

Yet maybe there was still a way. Like the Gordian knot of old, said to be impossible to unravel, was it instead feasible to slice through it all with one sharp blow—with the piercingly keen edge of love?

She was the first woman who understood him and what he wanted most in the world. How he wanted, how he loved and needed her!

But would her love and devotion be enough to heal all those years of painful betrayal? And was he man enough to take the risk?

He couldn’t waste a lifetime not knowing, a lifetime without her.

Cord inhaled a long, shuddering breath. “Yes, Sarah. I love you.”

“And I, you, my love.”

She came to him then, a joyful cry on her lips. They clung to each other, almost desperate in their need, each battling the last remnants of their doubts and fears. And, bit by bit, the gnawing uncertainties faded. A warm contentment engulfed them.

They stood there a long while, basking in each other’s love and the silken splendor of the night. A gentle breeze, pungent with the scent of pine, caressed them. The low, mournful hoot of an owl soothed their souls. Moonlight bathed the land in velvet silence, as if time suddenly ceased to exist. It was a night made for lovers. Only after what seemed an eternity did they finally, reluctantly part.

Cord grinned, a rueful light in his eyes. “We’d better get back to the dance before tongues begin to wag. Neither of us made a very surreptitious exit, if you recall.”

Sarah chuckled. “So you think they noticed our departure, do you? And do you really care?”

“For my reputation, no. But I’ll not have people making snide remarks about my future wife.” He took her by the arm. “Come along, my dear. You know as well as I there’s another, more pressing reason to leave while we still can.”

“I suppose you’re right.” Sarah giggled at a sudden thought. “I’ve already got some explaining to do to Emma about the sorry state of my gown. And that, I think, is quite enough for one night.”

“That it is.” Cord led her back down the path toward town. “That it is, indeed.”

As they neared the town hall, a sudden commotion caught their attention. Several riders had pulled up before the building. As Cord and Sarah watched, they hurriedly dismounted and ran into the hall. The music abruptly died. Agitated voices could be heard from within.

Cord’s grip on Sarah’s arm tightened. “Come on. There’s trouble.”

Edmund Wainwright nearly collided with his son as they entered the hall. “Blast it all, Cord!” his father cried. “Where have you been? We need to get back to the ranch pronto!”

“Why? What’s happened?” Cord released Sarah’s arm. He stepped forward to confront his father.

The action wasn’t lost on the older man. His glance raked Sarah, and a knowing look flared in his eyes. Then he turned his gaze back to his son.

“While you two were dallying outside,” he replied, “her family was busy rustling over fifty head of our cattle.”

No sooner had they returned to the ranch that evening than Cord and Edmund, along with most of the hands, saddled up and rode back to town to join Gabe Cooper and his deputy in pursuit of the stolen cattle. Sarah, left behind at the ranch, was beside herself with worry, not only for the possible involvement of her father and brothers in the cattle thieving but also for Cord’s safety. Chasing down cattle rustlers didn’t always turn out well—for the rustlers
or
their pursuers.

After shedding her ball gown and dressing in plainer clothes, she first tried to soothe her jangled nerves by reading one of the books she’d chosen from the library. Lighting the oil lamp on the little table beside the rocking chair in her bedroom, she took her seat, opened the book, and then spent the good part of the next half hour staring at the page, her thoughts winging their way out into the night, mentally riding along with Cord and the others.

Finally, with a disgusted sigh, Sarah closed the book and laid it on the table. Her glance moved to the bed, where Danny slept on, totally oblivious to the drama being enacted this night. She preferred to keep it that way. Her brother’s asthma was easily triggered by stress or too much excitement. Better he not be privy to the danger his father and brothers might well be in this night.

She closed her eyes, trying to shut out the memory of the moments before the men had ridden out. Edmund’s face had been livid with anger and an unsettling look of revenge. Cord’s had just appeared weary, as if he was mightily tired of the unending trouble the Caldwell family seemed to cause. He couldn’t spare much time to say his farewells to her, but after some brief words with his brother on the front porch, he managed to steal a few minutes with her before his father came downstairs.

“It may not be your family,” he said, taking her by the arms and pulling her close. “Spence seems to think it might be some renegade Utes who’ve been causing all the problems. So I don’t want you to worry. We really won’t know who rustled our cattle until we catch up with them.”

“I know.” Gazing at Cord, Sarah couldn’t help but drink in the sight of him, still overwhelmed with the heady knowledge that he loved her. Just being close to Cord helped assuage some of her fears. “I . . . I just don’t know what my father is capable of these days. And I don’t want anything to happen to anyone.”

He crooked a finger beneath her chin. “Especially me, I hope.”

She smiled. “Especially you, of course.”

Then Edmund was hurrying down the stairs and out onto the front porch. His glance was unreadable as he took in Cord and Sarah standing there.