“Sounds like you don’t like him.”
She groaned. “Like him? I loathe him. I hope I never have to lay eyes on him again.”
“Did you rely on him for money?”
Suddenly his nearness was bothering Violet far more than his questions. Even though he wasn’t exactly touching her, she could feel the heat and the hardness of his body, and everything inside her wanted him with a vengeance.
“No. I have money of my own.”
This caused his brows to lift, and she knew she’d said too much.
“I mean, Brent’s insurance left me secure.”
His fingers reached out and stroked her bare upper arm. “Then why the need for a job to get your car going? You told me you didn’t have enough money.”
Her green eyes darkened with apprehension, and she nervously licked her lips. “I don’t. Not...with me. It’s...in a bank in Amarillo.”
His fingertips stilled against her skin. “If you were a suspect, I’d have to say you’re not sounding too convincing.”
That’s exactly what the sheriff back in Georgia had said when she’d tried to explain that the items she’d taken to the pawn shop had belonged to her drunken father and not her.
Groaning, her eyes dropped to the middle of his chest. “I know I sound crazy. But...I don’t want to write any checks until I’m forced to. Rex will get my bank statement in the mail and then...well, he’ll know where I am.”
“Hellfire, Violet, you make the man sound like he’s a demon who’s out to kill you.”
Rex would never harm her physically. He wasn’t the sort. As far as Violet was concerned, the pain he could inflict on her would be far worse than death. Without Sam she wouldn’t have anything to live for.
She tried to laugh and lighten the moment. “If I sound that way it’s because I left angry. Rex would never do anything so violent.”
As Charlie touched her warm skin and watched an array of lights and shadows play in her eyes, he couldn’t help thinking how Lupé Valdez had once been as certain about her relative as Violet was now.
Charlie had only known Lupé briefly. He hadn’t been attracted to her in a man-to-woman way. Yet he had admired her courage and her desire to see her drug-running uncle put behind bars. As the Texas Rangers and other law enforcers drew closer to an arrest, Charlie had talked her into going to Fort Worth to give a deposition, and he’d promised she would be under constant surveillance and no harm would come to her. He’d left her in a motel, safely guarded by two local policemen. But she’d never seen the sun come up the following morning. Lupé had been killed, and Charlie had taken full blame.
“Charlie? What’s the matter? Are you—”
Violet’s voice finally penetrated his tormented thoughts, and he stared at her blankly. “What did you say?”
Puzzled and wary, she repeated, “I was asking you if something was wrong. Are you feeling okay? You look like you’ve just seen the gates of hell.”
He had. He’d seen Lupé’s lifeless body, but the face had changed to Violet’s pale, beautiful features. Rocked by the image, he grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her until her dark hair fell wildly over her face.
“Violet, you’d better not be lying to me. If this codger is dangerous I want to know it, and I want to know it right this instant!”
The growl of his voice filled the little kitchen, and she was glad Sam was asleep. Charlie’s behavior would probably frighten him.
“I just told you!” she flung at him. She placed her hands against his chest and tried to lever a few inches between them. But her efforts were futile. If anything he was closer, his chest and hips pressing her back against the cabinets.
“You haven’t told me everything,” he countered. “You’re scared of this man. I can see it on your face.”
Yes, she was scared, but not for the reason Charlie was thinking.
“I’m not,” she denied. “I just want to...avoid him.”
His hands left her shoulders and stabbed into her hair. With his fingers pressed against her scalp, he held her face up to his. “You’re lying. You want to do more than avoid the man! You’re planning to put several states between you!” His grip against her scalp suddenly eased, and so did his expression. “Violet,” he softly coaxed, “if you’re frightened he’s going to hurt you, tell me. I’m in a position to help you. And I will.”
“Why?”
He looked taken aback. “Why? Because you need help. Because it’s my job.”
“Oh.”
The one word came out like a defeated sigh, and he studied her with new eyes. “You didn’t think it was for personal reasons, did you?”
“Maybe. I don’t expect you to go around getting this close to all the women you find in peril.”
His brows lifted and Violet watched his lips move as he spoke. “I’ve come in contact with a lot of people since I’ve become a Ranger. Many of them were women. But none of them have made me feel as foolish as you do.”
Somehow her thudding heart kicked into an even faster rhythm. “Foolish?”
His hands slid down to cup her face, and Violet felt everything inside her wilt as his tough palms pressed against her skin.
“I can’t be in the same room without touching you,” he said huskily. “Right now I want to toss you onto the kitchen table and make love to you.”
The image his words created caused heat to flare deep inside Violet. “Maybe it’s not Rex I should be worried about,” she said shakily. “Maybe you’re the one who’s liable to wind up hurting me.”
“How could you think I would ever hurt you?” he murmured. “I’d kill any man who tried to.”
She began to tremble, and her fingers clutched the folds of his dusty cotton shirt. “Why? Because it’s your job?”
No, he silently answered. It wasn’t his job that was making him so fiercely protective and possessive of her. It was his heart. He loved Violet O’Dell. He didn’t want to acknowledge it, but the revelation shot through him like a flaming arrow. He couldn’t ignore the thrill rushing through him. Nor the awful sense of foreboding quickly following it. Violet wasn’t going to return his love. She’d be leaving soon. And even if she wasn’t, she’d already been soured by a cheating man.
“Has my mother been...telling you things?”
His question caught Violet off guard, and her eyes widened with surprise. “Why, no. What sort of things? About you?”
Everything inside Charlie wanted to forget caution and simply crush her to him, kiss her lips and whisper how much he adored her. His heart was sure it was the right thing to do. But the logic in his brain screamed he should keep his feelings to himself. He’d already been hurt and humiliated by one woman. Why give Violet the chance to do it again? Especially when he knew his job and her mistrust in men would never work. Each time he walked out of the house, she’d be thinking he was with another woman.
“About me and my job.”
Violet’s eyes fell guiltily from his. “Only that it was making you unhappy. She thinks you devote too much time to it. She believes you’re so busy trying to keep everyone else safe and protected you’re neglecting your personal life.”
A month ago. Even a week ago, Charlie would have been infuriated hearing his mother say such things, especially to Violet. But now he could only wonder how she’d seen so much about him that he hadn’t seen until a few moments ago.
“Charlie? Are you angry? Your mother was only talking out of concern. Because she wants you to be happy.”
Realizing he’d been staring off in space, he glanced down to see Violet looking up at him. Her pretty features were marred with a worried frown.
“I’m not angry. I’m just amazed.”
She shook her head in confusion. She’d never seen him look as he did at this moment. As if he’d been gazing at the horizon and finally figured out what was there. “Amazed? I...what do you mean?”
Frustrated by the barrage of emotions sweeping over him, he groaned and turned away from her. “She’s been telling me the very same thing for more than a year now, and I always angrily cut her off. I thought my captain didn’t understand me, either. But all this time it was me who couldn’t see.”
She could hear self-recrimination in his low voice. The sound urged her to step forward and place her hand against his back. “What couldn’t you see? That you don’t like being a Ranger?”
His shoulders lifted and fell as he breathed deeply, and then he whirled around with a suddenness that startled Violet He grabbed the sides of her waist and stared at her with such intensity she grew dizzy.
“No, thank God. I was beginning to wonder if maybe I’d wasted eight years of my life. But now I realize—”
The abrupt halt of his words left her uneasy and almost afraid to prompt him to go on. But she had to. She had to know what had caused the dawning light in his eyes.
“What?”
He shook his head, and his mouth went dry with fear. “Nothing.”
She frowned. “Charlie, you’re not making any sense at all. You’re acting strange. What have you been doing today?”
An endearing little grin cocked one corner of his mouth. “Falling in love with you, Violet.”
Chapter Eight
“L
ove isn’t something you joke about, Charlie!”
The engaging grin instantly disappeared and his expression turned gravely serious.
“I’m not joking, Violet”
Violet didn’t know how stark fear and ecstatic joy could rush through her at the same time, but they did. For the next few moments all she could manage to do was stare at him in stunned fascination.
“You must be. You have to be,” she whispered, then, as the full meaning of what he was saying hit her, she struggled out of his arms and hurried across the room.
Charlie went after her. Once he’d reached her, he took her by the upper arm. “Look, Violet, I wasn’t planning on blurting this out to you. I...hell, I didn’t know until just a minute ago what my feelings for you were turning into. But I do now.”
Her eyes were full of skepticism as they lifted to his. “Do you know how crazy that sounds, Charlie? One minute you don’t even know what you feel for me and then the next you say you love me. I thought only oversexed high school boys spouted things like that.”
Her doubt angered him, and his hold on her arm tightened. “Damn it, Violet, I wasn’t asking for this. And I sure as hell wasn’t looking for it.”
Her nostrils flared as she jerked her arm from his grip. “You sure sound like a man who’s deliriously in love,” she said cuttingly.
“I didn’t say I was happy about it,” he snapped.
Maybe it was his anger or the shocked look on his face that made Violet realize he really had been telling her the truth, and the whole idea left her trembling and wondering where to turn next.
“Then why did you tell me? To get me in your bed?”
He mouthed a curse word. “I’ve had two weeks to get you in my bed. And I didn’t need to tell you I love you to do it. All I had to do was throw away my morals.”
She knew he was right. If he’d really pressed her, she doubted very much that she could have resisted him. She’d never felt such a strong physical attraction for any man. But it was Charlie and his honorable beliefs—Charlie, the Durango Kid—who’d decided not to take advantage of her.
Suddenly swamped with emotion, she covered her face with her hands and turned away from him. “I don’t know what you want me to do. Or say,” she mumbled.
Both his hands dropped to her shoulders, and his fingers kneaded her soft skin. “I guess...I need to know if my feelings mean anything to you.”
Instantly Violet twisted around to face him. “Yes! Of course they do! But—” She broke off with an anguished groan. “I can’t...let anything grow between us.”
“Why? Because I’m a Texas Ranger?”
Yes! But not in the sense he was thinking. Oh, Lord, she prayed, how could she explain without hurting him or herself. She couldn’t let him find out about Rex! Or the trouble she’d been in back in Georgia. She’d rather die first.
“Charlie, if you’re thinking I’m like that other woman, I’m not. At least, I understand that your job is important to you and that any woman you choose would have to share you with it. But I...right now my life is...crazy. It has been for a long time. That’s why you found me on the highway like you did. I’ve got to make a place for myself and my son before I can ever think about letting a man into my life.”
“I could help you find that place, Violet. For you and Sam.”
She began to tremble. Every fiber of her heart wanted to believe and imagine she could have a life with Charlie. She didn’t know when the idea had taken root or why she was just now admitting it to herself. The only thing she did know was that she could never let it happen. Not even for a short while. Charlie was an honest, dedicated lawman. To hook up with her would only bring him embarrassment and possibly even trouble. She couldn’t do such a thing to him.
With a tormented groan she stepped around him and hurried through the screen door. The night had finally cooled, and a silver half-moon lit the wide sky above her. She stared up at it as she breathed deeply and tried to calm her raging senses.
The sound of the door softly banging behind her announced that Charlie had followed her. Somehow she’d known he would. She hadn’t come out here expecting to escape, just to find enough space to breathe and back away from him. If she could.
“Do you always run from everything?”
She glanced over her shoulder at him and a pain of regret stabbed her right in the middle of the chest. Why couldn’t she have met him years ago? she wondered. Long before Brent had ever taught her about betrayal and broken hearts.
“I’m not running. I’m thinking.”
He stepped closer. “About what?”
“You. I thought you never wanted to marry or have children,” she said pointedly. “You said your job was your life.”
“I know I said all of that. But it isn’t the way I feel now.”
She argued, “Those sorts of ideas can’t change overnight, Charlie.”
He took her hand and led her down the steps. Beneath the cottonwood was an old wooden bench worn smooth from years of use. He nudged Violet onto the seat, then sat down close beside her.
The night breeze was blowing, and just above her head the leaves rustled softly. It was a soothing sound, and this place was a peaceful spot in the desert mountains. But now she had to leave it and Charlie for good. She couldn’t continue to stay. It wouldn’t be fair to either of them.
After a moment he took her hand and she looked at him with tortured eyes. “Violet,” he said gently, “for the past year I’ve been... well, I haven’t exactly been myself. My job has consumed me. But I’ve let it. I wouldn’t take time off even when it was offered to me. I wouldn’t even come home to see my family. I was afraid that if I did something bad would happen.”
“Bad would happen,” she repeated with a puzzled shake of her head. “You mean something to your fellow Rangers?”
With a shrug he glanced away from her. “Partly. Or some victim we’d been working with. Or maybe a witness or anyone who’d ever met me on the job and needed me.”
“That’s quite a big area for one man to cover.”
He let out a heavy breath. “I know. Now.”
Violet didn’t urge him to say more. She sat quietly beside him, waiting, wondering what was going on in his head, what had been going on for all these months.
He reached for her other hand, and when she allowed him to take it, he looked at her. “For a long time I’ve been feeling pretty guilty.”
The desolate expression on his face tore at her, and she desperately wanted to make it vanish, to see him smile and hear him laugh. “‘Guilty,”’ she echoed softly. “I can’t imagine you being guilty of anything. Except maybe a little arrogance,” she tried to tease.
He didn’t smile. Rather he closed his eyes and tightened his hold on her hand. “I caused a young woman to die, Violet. A young woman like you. With her whole life ahead of her.”
Violet gasped. “Oh Charlie, no! I don’t believe that.”
His eyes opened on her face, and Violet realized this man knew what it was to be haunted by the past. “Believe it, Violet, because it happened.”
“How? Who was she? Was it...someone you loved?”
He shook his head. “I hardly knew her. We’d talked on the telephone a few times. I urged her to come to Fort Worth to turn over evidence about her uncle. We’d discovered he was trafficking a lot of drugs into the state. And we had enough to arrest him, but we weren’t sure we had enough for a conviction. Lup6 had the proof and she was willing to help.”
“Then she came to Forth Worth?”
He nodded. “I left her in a motel room with two armed policemen. I told her I’d be back in the morning to take her to the DA’s office. But morning never came for Lup6. During the night the policemen were distracted by a fracas across the street, later we learned some of the uncle’s cronies staged it. Anyway, the police were away from Lupé’s room for only a couple of minutes. Or so they swore. But no matter the time, it was enough for someone to silence the woman. I won’t go into details of how she was killed. Let’s just say I haven’t been able to forget, or forgive myself.”
For long moments Violet couldn’t speak. She didn’t know what she could say that could possibly ease the burden he’d carried so long in his heart. And then, as she thought about all he’d been through, all those things she hadn’t been able to figure these past two weeks began to fall into place. Charlie hadn’t necessarily rescued her from the highway because he’d taken an instant liking to her and Sam. He was truly, as her mother had called him, the Durango Kid. He was a modern-day cowboy hero, compelled to help any damsel in distress.
“You wouldn’t leave me and Sam in Ruidoso in the motel because of Lupé. Isn’t that right? You imagined the same thing happening to me.”
His expression turned a bit sheepish as his big fingers smoothed gently over the back of her hand. “Not entirely.”
“All this you’ve been doing for me, all this concern over Rex harming me is because of her, isn’t it?”
He stared at her with disbelief. “No!”
“Charlie,” she said with a groan, “be honest with me. All my life men have lied to me. Please, don’t you do it, too.”
“I’m not lying to you!”
She looked away from him and out toward the barn. The gray and sorrel were moving restlessly around the dusty corral. As she watched the beautiful horses nip playfully at each other, she wished she could jump astride one of them and ride far off into the mountains. Away from Charlie and his offer of love. But she had Sam to think of. Now and always.
“Violet, I’m not confusing
concern
for
love
. Hell, I admit I’ve been carrying around a load of guilt. For the past few months I’ve been trying to save the whole world and clean it up, and in the process made a mess of myself. But not once in that time did I bring a woman home with me. Or a child. Not once did I ever turn to a woman and tell her I loved her.”
The pain in Violet’s chest was like a heavy weight pushing her down, slowly stealing her breath. “Why are you telling me all this? Better yet, why did you wait until now to tell me?”
His free hand reached up and brushed the loose hair off her forehead. “Because tonight, when we were talking about your father-in-law and I saw fear on your face, I wanted to hunt him down and threaten him to within an inch of his life. And I knew I wasn’t feeling that way because I’m a Texas Ranger or because guilt is driving me to protect you.”
Violet wasn’t so sure. But it was exhilarating to think a man like Charlie could actually care about her. She’d loved Brent, and in spite of Leroy’s alcoholism, she’d loved her father, too. But ultimately both men had betrayed her in the worst kind of way. Could Charlie really be any different?
It didn’t matter, she told herself fiercely. She couldn’t stay and love Charlie. She could only move on and hope he never discovered the sordid background she’d come from.
Desperate to get away before her tears began to fall, Violet pulled her hand from the warmth of his and shot to her feet.
“Violet! Don’t you have anything to say?”
She shook her head as tears settled like a hot ball in her throat. “No. It wouldn’t make any difference.”
He snatched her hand as she started to move away, and she gazed down at him, imploring him with her eyes to understand and let it be.
“If you haven’t any feelings for me, tell me now,” he demanded.
She couldn’t do that. She’d felt something for the man from the first moment she’d seen him cross the road to her. She just hadn’t known how deeply that something was going to root itself inside her.
“Don’t do this to me, Charlie,” she begged.
He rose to his feet and slowly took her face between his hands. “You can’t tell me. Because you love me.”
If missing him while he was away, if wanting to put a smile on his face, if wanting to live the rest of her life with him meant she loved him, then she need not wonder anymore. She’d fallen in love with Charlie Pardee.
“What if I did? How would it change anything?”
“Love changes everything. It’s what kept my mother and father together for more than twenty years. It’s the reason they still can’t bear to be away from each other for one night. That’s what I want with you, Violet.”
She closed her eyes, but she could not stop the tears from slipping onto her cheeks. Charlie bent his head and pressed his lips against each salty drop.
“I used to think marriage was forever, Charlie,” she whispered shakily. “But I learned the hard way it isn’t. Right now I’m sure you’d tell me that I’m the only woman you could ever want. But two or five or even ten years from now I might not be enough for you. I might not even be enough two months from now. So please don’t ask me to try.”
Before he could reply, she pressed a kiss against his cheek, then pulled away from him and hurried into the house. Charlie watched her go, and as he did it dawned on him that Angela’s desertion hadn’t even scratched the surface of his heart. Whereas Violet had settled in and taken total control of it.