A Tradition of Pride (10 page)

Her father was in the study this evening, going over what she had typed today and no doubt filling another tablet for more to be done tomorrow. Lara turned the hand held hair dryer onto her face, letting the hot air blow over her skin.

The night air was so heavy with humidity that she felt as sticky as she had before she had taken a shower and washed her hair. It could have been summer outside instead of spring. She ran testing fingers through her shiny hair. There was only a trace of dampness at the back of her head.

Turning off the dryer, she put it back in its box and carried it to the closet. Lara paused at the open window overlooking the pine woods at the rear of the house. A faint breeze gently stirred the needles, hardly a breath of it entering the room. A moth beat its wings against the screen, seeking the light from her bedside lamp.

With so much typing to do for her father, Lara hadn't been out of the house in the last few days except to take care of her horse. Usually she took time out for a morning ride on the bay hunter, Pasha, but the horse had sprained a muscle in his left from leg the last time Lara had ridden him.

There had been little swelling in the leg. Cato had looked at it and given Lara some foul-smelling liniment to put on it, decreeing that the hunter would be all right in a week or so. Cato was almost as knowledgeable as a veterinarian when it came to the equine species of animals.

With a sigh, Lara decided it was much too hot to even attempt sleep. Untying the sash of her robe, she walked to the closet and took out a pair of Levis and a white cotton blouse. She would walk to the stable and check on Pasha. Perhaps the night air would be cooler.

She opened the lingerie drawer of her dresser and closed it again without removing anything. When she had changed into the Levis and blouse, she turned to the mirror, winding her freshly washed hair atop her head. It was as slippery as silk, sliding through the pins that tried to hold it in place. Giving up, Lara secured it at the back of her neck with a tortoise-shell clasp.

Trevor was out that evening and her father was in his study working. There was no sign of Sara as Lara slipped out the front door. Few lights shone from the windows of the house, making it look dark and empty.

Stuffing her hands in the pockets of her Levis, she strolled along the brick sidewalk. The dense shadows from the pines made her feel very much alone. Only a few stars glittered through the tree-tops that blocked out all but the moon's halo. It wasn't much cooler but the air was fresh.

The bay whiskered curiously as Lara opened the stable door and switched on the light. The building was small, with stalls for three horses plus a tack and feed room Pasha was the only one. Her father had owned a horse at one time but he had never been much of a horseman. When age had claimed, his mount, he hadn't bothered to get another.

The horse stretched his blazed face toward her, nuzzling her shirt buttons as Lara rubbed his forelock. She crooned softly to him, meaningless words that were meant to soothe. A large mound of loose hay lay at the bottom of the ladder to the loft. She scooped up an armful and put it in the manger.

Leaning on the stall door, Lara studied the horse as he turned his attention to the hay. He was still favoring it slightly, not putting all of his weight on the front leg. Another application of liniment would help, she decided, and walked to the tack-room and took the brown bottle from the medicine cabinet.

"Whew!" she breathed, making a face she uncorked the bottle. "I'm going to have to take another bath when I get through putting this on Pasha."

As Lara reached to unlatch the lower half of the stall door, the stable door opened. She turned with start to see Rans MacQuade filling the opening. For a split second he paused there, his gaze raking the length of her body.

"What do you want?" Lara demanded, frostily meeting his look.

"I noticed the light was on and stopped to see if anything was wrong," he replied evenly.

"Not a thing," she retorted, but he stepped into the stable anyway and closed the door. His presence dominated the concrete corridor, making the quarters seem closer than they actually were. "I said nothing was wrong."

"What's the matter with your horse?" Rans was completely ignoring her answer.

As he walked toward her, Lara was nearly overwhelmed by an impulse to retreat. It was crazy. There was no reason to be intimidated by him.

"Nothing is the matter with my horse, Mr. MacQuade." She steadfastly held her ground, forced to tilt her head back slightly to look directly into his face when he stopped in front of her.

He held her look for an instant then let his gaze slide lazily to the bottle in her hand. Her knuckles were turning white from gripping it so tightly, a betrayal of the wary tension that claimed her.

"What's the bottle for if nothing is the matter with your horse?" Rans mocked.

A flash of anger raced through her veins, but Lara checked it to reply calm. "Pasha has a slight sprain, but I assure you it is nothing serious. I thought I'd put some liniment on it."

"I'll do it for you." His hand closed around the bottle, his fingers touching hers.

Lara's first instinct was to jerk her hand away from the burning contact and let him have the bottle, but she wouldn't give in to such a display of weakness.

"No, thank you. I'm quite capable of taking care of my own horse," she refused, not relinquishing her viselike hold, on the bottle.

"I'm sure you are, but the odor coming from this bottle hardly smells like perfume," Rans drawled lazily. "I wouldn't want the lady of the castle to have two baths in one night."

Her head jerked back as betraying warmth rushed to her cheeks. "What do you mean?" she demanded stiffly, wondering how he could possibly know she had stepped from the shower barely an hour ago.

Dark, spiky lashes veiled the wicked gleam in his velvet blown eyes as they roamed with insolent thoroughness over her shining hair and face, moving down her cotton blouse. The material clung to her sticky, skin, outlining the rounded fullness of her bare breasts. Flames licked her skin where he had undressed her with his eyes. Her breath came in agitated spurts of barely controlled temper.

He knew she was outraged by his action. It sparkled like a jewel fire in her eyes. Her reaction amused him, as if he had done it deliberately to get a rise from her.

"You have the fragrance of scented soap, Mrs. Cochran. It was only a guess. But an accurate one, wasn't it?" Rans taunted lowly.

Lara tore her hand away from the bottle, her arms held rigidly straight at her side. "Put the liniment on if you like," she said with a freezing dislike, "Then please get out of here."

The line of his mouth quirked mockingly as she stepped away from the stall gate to let him enter. The bay's ears pricked at the stranger. For once in his well-mannered life, Lara wished her horse would decide to bite. It wasn't to be.

The caressing deepness of Rans MacQuade's voice seemed to assure the horse that the man meant him no harm, and the bay submitted readily to the stroking firmness of the hand on his sleek neck.

"The left front?" Rans inquired, running a hand along the horse's withers and across his chest.

"Yes," was Lara's clipped answer.

Ducking under the horse's neck, Rans moved to the left side, squatting to run an exploring hand over the injured leg. The bay shifted uneasily as he probed the sore area.

"Hold his head for me will you?" It wasn't request.

Loathing the necessity to obey, she reluctantly took hold of the halter, crooning softly to settle him down. "Cato has already examined him," she said when Rans continued testing the extent of the injury.

He poured some of the liniment on the leg, and the powerful odor filled the air. "I'd say this is one of Cato's homemade remedies," he muttered, turning his head away.

Lara concealed a smile, knowing how vilely strong the liniment was from her own experience. For several minutes Rans rubbed the liniment in while she held the bay's head. Finally he straightened, patting the horse on the haunches as he walked around him to the stall door.

"That ought to do it," he remarked absently. "Where's the top to this?"

Mutely Lara pointed to the cork balanced on a wide manger board. He stuffed it in the bottle top and glanced inquiringly at her.

"Where does it go?"

"In the medicine chest in the tack room. I'll put it away," she answered.

He handed it to her without voicing any objection. Lara took it, carefully avoiding any accidental contact with his hand. As she started toward the tack room on the opposite side of the corridor, Rans followed. It was in the same direction as the stable door.

When he followed her into the tack room, she realized he wasn't leaving. The medicine chest was just inside the door. Lara stopped in front of it, tilting her head to a challenging angle as she turned to confront Rans.

The words to dismiss him formed on her lips, but he walked by her without a glance straight to the work sink on the far wall. Pressing her lips tightly together, Lara faced the medicine cabinet, listening to the sound of rushing water from the tap as he washed the liniment from his hands.

"I noticed the light on in the study when I walked by the courtyard." Rans turned off the faucets. "Is your father working tonight?"

"He's hardly stopped in the last few days." Lara set the liniment bottle on the shelf and closed the cabinet.

"That means a lot of typing for you," he remarked, drying his hands on a towel and hanging it over its rack.

"Yes, it does." She removed the curry rake and brush from their hooks and walked into the corridor.

Grooming the hunter would be an excuse to remain in the stable when Rans left. Impatiently Lara waited in the corridor while he took his sweet time about joining her.

"Do you resent it?" He stopped in the doorway, leaning a hand against its frame and lazily studying her marble smooth face.

Why didn't he take the hint that she wanted him to leave—quickly? The answer flickered that he probably had taken the hint and was lingering just to irritate her. He was succeeding.

"Resent what?" Briefly Lara inspected his tanned features, roughly chiseled in aggressively male lines.

Tobacco-brown hair waved with thick carelessness on his forehead. His white shirt was opened at the throat, accenting the sun-browned column and revealing the curling golden brown hairs on his chest. Muscles rippled beneath his shirt. His masculinity seemed to wrap around her with suffocating intensity.

"The book demands a lot of your father's time. It doesn't leave him much to spend with you," Rans replied.

An eyebrow arched haughtily. "I'm a big girl now, Mr. MacQuade. I no longer need to be entertained by my daddy."

"Nor by your husband, it would seem," he suggested dryly.

Breathing in sharply, Lara checked the flow of temper and allowed a sugar-coated smile to curve her lips. "That's correct, Mr. MacQuade."

"Where is your husband tonight?" He tilted his head curiously to the side, sardonic amusement glittering behind the lazily veiled lashes.

"He's part of a foursome that plays golf every Wednesday after work. They have dinner and drinks at the club afterward. A weekly 'boys' night out,'  " she answered coolly.

"Do you believe that?" The grooves deepened around his mouth.

"Does it matter?" Lara challenged.

"Not to me." The wide shoulders lifted in an indifferent shrug. "I was wondering if it mattered to you."

"Not in the slightest." She studied the polished enamel on her fingernails, wishing they didn't itch with the desire to scratch that arrogantly mocking expression from his face.

"You must sleep in a very cold bed, Mrs. Cochran." His voice laughed at her as he slowly straightened.

Lara tipped her head back, the overhead light flaming over her hair at the new angle. Boldly she met his challenging look, not intimidated by his superior height as he towered before her.

"And your bed—what's it like, Mr. MacQuade?" she jeered with a freezing scorn.

A wicked gleam danced in his brown eyes with seductive overtones. "Would you like to find out?"

"That's a typical male response," she laughed abruptly. "You men are so convinced that you are great lovers that you never realize how miserably you fail."

"And you feel your husband failed?" Rans inquired, a brow quirking.

"Miserably," Lara answered evenly.

"The solution is simple. Get a divorce instead of prolonging the cold war."

Pride drew her up another inch. "Alexanders don't get divorces, Mr. MacQuade," she informed him.

"Another tradition of long-standing," he mocked. "And so they lived miserably ever after." He eyed her cynically. "An Alexander makes a wrong decision, and he lives with it the rest of his life without a second chance, a martyr to tradition."

"I'm not interested in a second chance, as you put it, once is enough for me," Lara declared loftily, the tip of her nose tilting slightly upward in disdain.

"So you remain married, drifting into a series of bitter affairs," Rans concluded with a taunting curl of his lip.

"I'll leave the affairs to Trevor. He already has the experience." Bitterness coated her tongue.