Reckless Promise (11 page)

She couldn't do this. "Alice," she said. "I'm
not a threat—" The disbelief on Alice's face stopped her and she
lost her temper. "He bothered me. And you should be bothered too.
Even though you clearly don't care if he hurt me, it would be just
as bad, publicity-wise, for you. Think about it."

As soon as the words were out, she regretted
them. Her usual practical self didn't blurt out things like that.
Didn't react so emotionally. But Tom made her mad. Alice made her
guilty. Mac made her hot.

Not a good combination.

When she reached the stable, Mac and Tom had
disappeared. Two horses tied to the hitching rack in front of the
stable lounged hipshot, drowsing in the early morning sun. She
raised an eyebrow at the bulky western saddles. She rode nice,
simple English saddles. She'd like to see anyone take a five bar
fence with one of these rocking chairs tied to the poor horse.

"Mornin', Ma'am." An unsmiling Moses came out
of the barn carrying another one of the huge saddles. "Tom's in the
barn." The chill in his voice could cause frostbite.

She leaned against the corral, rubbing her
arms for warmth, to watch Moses saddle another horse and stalk back
into the stable just as Tom came out. Moses's look of disapproval
should have withered Tom in his tracks. Evidently Moses had an
opinion about Tom's supposed interest in her. She sighed. And Tom
had said this would be so easy.

"Hey, Poppy." Tom radiated good cheer.

"Hey, Tom." She didn't even try to look
enticing.

"Smile." Tom whispered. "Alice's coming down
the path."

"I can't."

Tom raised one eyebrow. "Jase said you were
dependable. I'm depending on you."

Nausea roiled in her stomach when she
realized that until she had a chance to talk him out of this
charade, she'd have to keep up her act. "We can't do this. I can't.
No more."

Mac shot out of the barn before Tom could
answer. "You thinking about giving Poppy old D here?" He ran his
hand down the horse's shoulder.

Her gaze followed as if hypnotized. He had
beautiful hands. Big and strong and hard, like the rest of him. Big
and strong and hard and male. That same hand had been on her last
night. An itch started under Poppy's skin.

"D?" She ignored the sudden thunder of her
heart and surveyed the shaggy brown horse. If she kept looking at
him, she might throw herself at him and beg. "As in A, B, C?

"D as in Diogenes," he said. "We're big on
honesty around here. Doesn't look like he'll find any honest men—or
women—today, though." The horse nudged his arm and his tight mouth
relaxed as he patted its nose.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Tom swung
around to look at Mac, his face darkening.

"Think about it." Mac glared at him.

"Get off my case, MacLean. Your brief stops
at the bedroom door."

"This isn't the bedroom."

They looked like a couple of dogs getting
ready to fight. Poppy edged back a step and cleared her throat.
"That's a strange name for a horse. I'm going to call him
Trigger."

Mac made a face.

"Come on, Poppy." Tom turned away from Mac.
"Let's get you set up with old—ah—Trigger here. You ever ride
before?"

Mac shouldered in front of Tom before she
could answer. "I'll take care of her," he said. "You go help
Moses."

"No—" Poppy said.

Alice overrode her protest. "Tom? Come look
at this cut."

Tom crossed to where Alice bent to peer at
the leg of a horse tied to the corral fence.

Poppy sneaked a quick look at Mac through her
eyelashes. Not sneaky enough, darn it.

"Too bad, honey. You're stuck with me." Mac
grinned down at her, that evil grin that had turned his mouth into
pure temptation last night in her cabin.

Her insides turned to mush.

"So, have you ridden before?"

Childishly, she wanted to say 'no', to let
him go through the whole beginner ritual, and then race off like
the Lone Ranger. But then, childish reaction had gotten her in this
impossible situation. "Yes, I can ride. But I've never tried a
western saddle." Her gaze followed Tom. Moses had joined Tom and
Alice, and the three of them bent over the horse's leg.

"Doesn't look like he's coming back," Mac
said. "You'll have to make do with me."

Anytime. She shrugged. "What do I do
first?"

"Come on over here and get on. I'll adjust
the stirrups."

She walked over to the horse, patting his
neck and letting him whiffle over her hands. "Do I ride the same
horse every day?" she asked.

"Pretty much. Unless there's a problem." He
gave her legs a measuring look and adjusted the stirrup leathers.
"This looks about right. You know how to get on a horse?"

"Pretty much," she mimicked and moved to
stand at the horse's shoulder. Mac crowded behind her, so close she
could feel him.

Her temper simmered when she realized he
didn't believe her. She gave a mental shrug. He didn't mean it
personally. People undoubtedly lied—or were mistaken—about their
riding ability all the time. She stuck her foot in the stirrup and
swung up onto the horse.

The large warm hand he had somehow planted
right square on her bottom, 'helping' to guide her into the saddle,
now that was personal. She swallowed a whimper as everything inside
her went liquid.

"How does the length feel?" He looked up at
her, a devil twinkling in his eyes.

Wonderful. A tingle swept through her from
head to toe. Darn it, he knew exactly what his touch did to her.
And she wouldn't admit it for anything. "A-about right."

"Stand up and let me check."

Just the thought that he might run his hand
along the saddle under her produced such a rush of heat that the
saddle might as well have been on fire. Obediently, she stood in
the stirrups on trembling knees, grateful there'd only be an inch
or two to fall if she collapsed entirely. His hands were perfectly
steady. Maybe he played this teasing game with all the female
guests. Maybe he liked the turn-her-on-and-leave-her-hanging game.
She didn't want any part of that. Be honest. You like the game just
fine. It's the leave-her-hanging part you don't like.

And then he did it. Slid his hand along the
saddle, right under her. His fingers brushed the inside of her
thigh and she bit her lip to keep from moaning.

"Sit back down," he said, drawing his hand
out from under her. He lingered, cupping the curve of her bottom.
"I need to shorten the leathers."

She plopped down onto the saddle. The horse
shifted irritably and she patted his neck in silent apology. Mac
fussed with the stirrups. The process required that he put his
hands on her legs a lot, she noticed.

First he ran his hand down her leg. Then he
ran his hand up the inside of her leg to the knee. Then he ran his
hand between her thigh and the saddle. Just when she thought she
might scream in frustration, he lifted her leg out of the stirrup
and rested it on his shoulder. She grabbed for the saddle horn to
keep her balance. Trust him to find the most impossibly erotic way
to do anything, no matter what the results. Anyone else would just
have asked her to lift her leg out of the way.

She looked down at him, standing between her
wide-spread legs, and wondered if she might swoon. Forget that
there was a horse in there too, this was seriously intimate stuff.
Mac gazed back up at her, all innocence except for that devil grin
quirking one side of his mouth.

Just before she lost her head and did
something really stupid, like wrap her leg around him and pull him
closer, he bent his head and adjusted the stirrup one notch. He
lifted her leg from his shoulder and set it back in the stirrup and
she swore she could feel his hand through the leather of her new
boots. He walked around to the other side of the horse to repeat
the process and she slumped back in the saddle, boneless as a
cooked noodle. By the time he had satisfied himself that the
stirrups were the correct length, she could have passed for a bowl
of oatmeal.

"Okay," he said. "You're good to go. I'll
show you how to hold the reins." He took her left hand and brought
it to his chest, just as he had done the night before.

The memory of what had come next sent a wave
of lust through her. Her fingers tingled and her heart pounded.
Helplessly she glanced down at the front of his jeans. He chuckled
and burning heat rose in her cheeks.

She tried for stern professorial,
look-down-the-nose composure. "You are a truly wicked man."

"I know." His mouth took on an intimate
curve, and she discovered a whole new level of yearning. He put the
reins in her limp hand and showed her how to hold them. "Both reins
in your left hand," he said, his finger tracing across her palm as
he positioned the reins.

Electrical zings radiated from her hand
straight to where she squirmed in the saddle.

"And then you close your hand around them—"
He closed his big hand over hers.

She swallowed hard.

"To make him turn, you move your hand to the
side." He demonstrated, somehow managing to brush his hand along
the inside of her thigh on the left turn and across her breast on
the right.

She swayed. He put a hand at her waist to
steady her. It didn't help. She would burst into flame in another
second if he didn't stop.

"Come on, try it out," he said. All the way
to a large corral off to the side of the barn, he walked beside the
horse, his hand resting just above her knee.

His touch burned all the way to her back
teeth. He knew, knew exactly what his touch did to her. When he
grinned up at her, she remembered the feel of his teeth on her
earlobe and shifted restlessly.

Instantly his hands were on her hips. On her
stomach and butt. "You want to sit like this," he said, tilting her
pelvis. Oh, goodness. He gave a whole new meaning to pelvic tilts.
Aerobics class had never been like this. She concentrated hard on
breathing in and breathing out. She didn't want to think about the
tingling awareness, the dampness, between her legs. She wriggled
again, but he had left her side to open the gate to let her into
the ring.

"Okay," he said, closing the gate and coming
to her side. She tried to concentrate, but those hands, those
wonderful hands, were on her again, moving her, melting her into
mindless, boneless jelly. "Tilt a little," he told her. "More like
this." Heat streaked through her as he leaned close to push her
into position in the saddle. He stepped back, apparently oblivious
to her imminent meltdown. "Go ahead, walk him around and get the
feel of him."

In a daze, she touched her heels to the horse
and guided him along the fence. She had the feel of Mac's hands.
Trigger tossed his head and Poppy realized she'd automatically
tightened the reins.

"Looser reins," Mac called just as she
adjusted them. He gave her an approving—and surprised—look.

She had to pay attention. Not fair to yank at
the poor horse's mouth because of a lust-induced coma.

Experimentally, she settled deeper into the
saddle, letting her body adjust to the rhythm of the walk. The
western saddle cradled her more comfortably than she'd expected.
Without waiting for instruction she urged Trigger into a trot, and
discovered that posting didn't work as well in a western
saddle.

She tried to sit the trot and found herself
bouncing like a beginner. She pulled the horse to a walk and
glanced over at Mac. He didn't get the grin wiped from his face in
time, and she stuck her tongue out at him. "Go ahead and laugh. I'd
like to see you in a hunt seat equitation class."

"Not in this lifetime."

Poppy ignored him and nudged the horse into a
smooth lope. Much better. With her pride still smarting, she turned
the horse into a small figure eight, approving his quick change of
leads in response to her cue. She pulled to a stop and waited for
Mac's comment.

"You'll do," he said, one hand distractingly
warm on her knee. "As soon as you learn to sit the trot." The grin
came back. "You want to take up all the motion of the trot here."
His hands were on her again. One on her stomach and one at the
small of her back. "Just flex here." He pushed and her hips tilted.
She moaned. "Just like sex."

"You're looking good." The light female voice
startled Poppy out of her hormonal haze. Alice leaned on the corral
fence. How much of the riding lesson had she seen? Too much,
judging by her grin.

"Okay," Mac said. "I think you'll do just
fine. Go tie him up while we wait for the others." He opened the
gate.

Alice smiled up at her as she passed, such a
change from the tense grimace of earlier that morning that Poppy
stared. Could the woman be manic depressive? "Have a good ride,"
Alice said, and bounced off toward the house.

Poppy tied her horse and stood leaning
against his shoulder. What had just happened? And then she
understood. Of course. Not manic-depressive. Sneaky. Alice had sent
her brother to seduce Poppy away from her husband.

The squishy feeling in the pit of Poppy's
stomach combined lust, guilt, and hurt, with uncertainty and the
French toast Chickie had been so proud of weighing in like
cannonballs. What if Mac's interest was only pretense?

"Such a big frown so early in the day." Tom
tethered a horse to the rail next to her.

Duty called. She revived enough to give him a
thousand-watt smile. Oh, wait. No Alice. She let the smile
fade.

He leaned close enough to whisper in her ear.
"We need to make some plans. If there's a chance at lunch, let's
have a strategy session."

Bad idea. Their only strategy should be to
stop this idiocy. But Tom looked both demanding and pleading. She
nodded. "Good idea."

"What's a good idea?" Mac gazed across the
horse at Poppy with flint-hard eyes.