“It’s nice that you can be philosophical about it,” he said dryly. “I wish you were a meek little hen. It would make things a good deal easier for me.” His hands were suddenly cradling her face. “Listen, I don’t know where you got the idea you’re not attractive, but it’s not true. Do you know what I see when I look at you? I see character, sensitivity, and vitality.” His thumbs rubbed the lines of her cheekbones with a soothing, mesmerizing motion. “And I see eyes I could look into for the next hundred years or so and never get tired. Your skin is velvet-soft and meant to be touched, and your body …”
She didn’t think she’d have the breath to speak but somehow the words came out. “I knew we’d come to the brown-hen part eventually.”
“Because you’re not built like Raquel Welch?” He slowly shook his head. “I’ve never had a fondness for Amazons. You’re as soft and delicately made as a robin. I’m half afraid to touch you for fear you’ll break.” His voice lowered to just above a whisper. “Do you know how tempting it is to touch and handle something that’s exquisitely formed and fragile? In museums they’re careful to put those pieces under glass. Not only because of their value, but because it’s natural to want to touch, to run your hands over every curve and hollow, to feel the texture and the sleekness.”
Again she felt she was drowning in his eyes. “We’re back to birds again. I’m a robin, not a brown hen?”
“You’re a robin,” he said gently. “And I meant every word I said to you, even though I shouldn’t have said it. Because robins should have safe, secure nesting places, and I’ll never be that, Sierra. Not for any woman. I’m too restless to ever settle down. The minute I feel the walls closing in, I run to a place without walls.”
Renegade. The thought pierced the haze of intimacy he had woven about her. He was warning her. She was tempted to deny the warning was necessary. Such denial might salve her pride, but she couldn’t do it. He was trying to help her, and the warning was necessary. She was trembling on the brink of something she knew was entirely outside the bounds of her experience. “I’ll remember that.”
“And I’ll remember to try to keep my hands off you.” His fingers moved gently, compulsively, on the soft hollows of her cheeks, then dropped away. “It won’t be easy. Now I know why the Greeks become so obsessive about their worry beads. I think I could get the same sensual pleasure from running you through my fingers.”
Instinctively she looked at his hands. They were very strong, tanned, and graceful with long sensitive fingers. She could imagine those fingers moving with pleasure over smooth amber beads, caressing the texture, enjoying the solid shape. They would move just as sensitively over a woman’s body, weighing the softness, the tips of his fingers tracing a pattern.…
“What are you thinking about?” His eyes had narrowed with heated intensity.
Wild color flooded her cheeks. “Worry beads.”
He muttered a curse. “The hell you were.” His hand impulsively reached out toward her, then stopped in midair before he touched her. “You’ve got to help too, dammit. We could go to bed together and have a fantastic time and progress toward an equally fantastic affair.” His expression was hard and unflinching. “And that’s exactly what I want to do. But I couldn’t promise you it would last forever and I don’t know if you could survive a breakup, Sierra. You’re not cut out for short, meaningful relationships that are really elongated one-night stands.” He took a deep breath. “And I’m not cut out to watch you suffer because I can’t be what you want me to be. So help me, okay?”
“Okay,” she whispered. She was silent a moment, then forced a smile. “Well, will you help me down off this cabinet? I promise I’m not trying to seduce you.”
His hands grasped her waist and he lifted her to the floor. His palms were warm through her cotton T-shirt and she felt an odd tingling spreading through every vein. The pulse was jumping erratically in the hollow of his throat and he drew a deep shuddering breath as his hands dropped away. He took a step back. “It’s becoming more than clear that you don’t have to try.”
Her eyes slid away and she turned away with a jerky little movement. “I’ll just put the ladder back in the utility shed where I found it. I won’t need it anymore today. I’m going to do some furniture polishing next.”
“Furniture polishing,” he repeated. He watched her in bemusement as she began to fold up the ladder. “No!” He was beside her, taking the ladder from her. “I’ll take it out to the shed. You go into the parlor and sit down and rest.”
“But I’m not tired. Why should I—” York wasn’t listening. He was already out the screen door, carrying the ladder down the porch steps.
She frowned as she watched him cross the yard. Then she turned back to the cabinet in which she had earlier found the shelf paper. She was sure she had seen a bottle of furniture polish on the second shelf.…
She had finished polishing the ornate newel post at the foot of the stairs and was sitting on the third step, running the cloth over the rich oak of the rails, when he strode back into the hall. He crossed the distance between them in four strides. “I said no. Don’t you ever take orders?” He took away the furniture polish and dustcloth and set them on the step. “You just left your sickbed this morning, and Deuce tells me you’ve already scrubbed the kitchen floor and cleaned the bathroom. Why do you think he came hotfooting it down to the mine office to get me?”
“Because he’s a tattletale,” she said crossly. “And because he couldn’t inveigle me into another game of poker.” She looked up to meet his eyes. “Is that why you decided to honor us with your presence after ignoring us for the last week? I don’t need your pity, York. I don’t need anyone’s pity.”
“If I feel any pity, it’s for myself and Deuce. We don’t know how to cope with pigheaded youngsters like you.” His fingertips swiftly covered her lips as she started to speak. “And it is pigheaded. The doctor said you were to take it easy for the next month.”
“He didn’t say I was to be an invalid. It was only bronchitis, for heaven’s sake.”
“Combined with exhaustion.” His lips tightened grimly. “Brady may have been willing for you to work yourself to death for him, but I’m not. You’re my guest while you’re here at Hell’s Bluff. Accept it, Sierra.”
“I can’t.” Her hand impulsively closed on his arm. “Don’t you see I’d be perfectly miserable if I did? I have to earn my own way. I get a little panicky at even the thought of taking and not giving. I owe you too much already. I know I can’t pay you back for all the trouble and medical care I’ve been given right now. I’ll have to get a job and earn decent wages before I can begin to do that, but I can at least earn my keep until I’m strong enough to get that job.” She smiled coaxingly. “And acting as housekeeper is a job that needs doing. One good housecleaning a week isn’t nearly enough in a mining town like this.” She paused, puzzled. “I can’t understand why you sent your housekeeper away. She couldn’t have been worse than putting up with a dingy house.”
“Oh, no? You ought to talk to my brother Rafe sometime. Kathleen’s got to be the worst housekeeper under the sun, but Deuce and I could put up with that. We’ve been accustomed to roughing it under a lot worse conditions. It was her cooking.” He shuddered. “I had indigestion from the minute she moved in until the second she left.”
Sierra smiled. In that moment, she thought, he was like an endearing little boy. “Couldn’t you retire her? Deuce mentioned she was an old family retainer.”
He shook his head. “That would have hurt her feelings. She and her sister, Bridget, are part of the family. They’ve both lived on Killara most of their adult lives. My older brother, Burke, inherited both of them when he assumed control of the business when our parents were killed in a plane crash. Bridget is the shining example of the perfect housekeeper, but Kathleen …”
“Night and day?” Sierra suggested with a grin.
He nodded. “Burke could stand it as long as he was spending most of his time
on Killara, but when he became involved in high finance, he moved to a penthouse suite in Tucson. Bridget and Kathleen got together and decided it was only fitting that one of them should go with him. Kathleen made the supreme sacrifice, and Burke put up with her for as long as he could.”
“And how did you acquire this gem?”
“When I took over the mine interests of the corporation and moved to Hell’s Bluff, Burke convinced her that I needed her and shipped her off to me.” He growled. “He even had the nerve to tell me it was my punishment for running wild all over the world and not assuming my proper family obligations sooner.”
Sierra laughed. She couldn’t help it. So even the mighty Delaney clan had their little family rifts, she thought. It was difficult to imagine the Shamrock Trinity hamstrung because of affection for an old family servant. “And you shipped her off to brother Rafe?”
“I stood it for a year,” he said defensively. “It was either get her out of my kitchen or take off for South America again. I told Rafe he had a choice of accepting Kathleen or dividing his time between his precious horse ranch and tending the corporation’s mining interests in Hell’s Bluff.”
“So why couldn’t you get another housekeeper?”
“The only way I could get her to leave me without hurting her feelings was to persuade her that Rafe needed her and that it was a great sacrifice for me to give her up.” His lips twisted ruefully. “I got a little carried away and told her she was irreplaceable. Now I can’t replace her.”
“Well, then you should take advantage of my being here and make use of me. I’m only temporary help, so Kathleen shouldn’t mind if she should hear about it.”
His gaze fell to her hand still clasping his arm. “There’s only one way I’d be tempted to make use of you,” he said quietly. “And we’ve already discussed that. You’re not to do any other housework while you’re on my premises, Sierra. I mean it.”
“So do I.” Her hand fell away from his arm. “I’m sorry, I know you only intend to be kind, but you’re defeating your purpose. It will mean I have to leave your premises and find a job that much sooner.”
“You’ll find that hard to do in Hell’s Bluff. I own this town. Give it up, Sierra,” he continued softly. “When you’ve regained a little more of your strength, I’ll send you to Tucson to Burke, and we’ll find you some light clerical work to do.”
“So you can continue your charity project as a family affair?” Her chin lifted. “No way, York.”
He muttered something Sierra guessed was obscene. “Just look at you. So thin, a breath of wind could blow you away and shadows as deep as canyons beneath your eyes. You’re already so tired, you’re ready to collapse, but you won’t be sensible.”
“I’m not tired—” She wouldn’t lie. “Well, maybe a little, since it’s my first day out of bed, but I’ll be fi— York!” He had risen to his feet and was pulling her to hers. “What are you doing?”
“Escorting you to your room for a nap. Forcibly if necessary.” He half pushed her up the stairs. “And once there, you’ll not scrub floors or wash windows. You will rest. Is that understood?”
“No, it’s not understood. I’ll do—” She broke off. “Who’s that? I didn’t notice it when I came downstairs.”
His gaze followed hers to the painting on the landing. “Rising Star.”
She frowned in puzzlement. “It looks very familiar. Could I have seen it in a magazine or a gallery somewhere?”
A curious smile touched his lips as his gaze moved from the painting to Sierra’s face. “No, it’s never been exhibited. It’s one of the family portraits from Killara. When I set up housekeeping here, Burke told me to take anything I wanted from the homestead. This was the only thing I wanted.”
“Why?” she asked, looking up at him.
“I’ve always liked it. I used to stand and stare at it for hours when I was a boy. She was the only one of my motley crew of ancestors for whom I felt any real sense of kinship.” His smile was melancholy. “Perhaps because she was as out of place at Killara as I was.”
“Who was Rising Star?” she asked softly.
“The daughter of an Apache chief. Joshua Delaney took one look at her and decided he wanted her. It was during one of the powwows that took place infrequently to try to make peace between the Apaches and the Delaneys. According to legend those Delaneys were often more savage and renegade than the Indians. The Apaches were tired of fighting the Delaneys and the cavalry, too, and decided to seal the peace with a blood bond.” He nodded to the portrait. “Rising Star.”
“They just gave her to him? No wonder she looks so lost. Did she ever come to love Joshua?”
“Who knows? She had two children by him and never returned to her people. Perhaps she did love him. Or perhaps she just endured because it was her duty to honor the agreement. She looks as though she would be strong enough to endure almost anything.”
“Weren’t there any records? Journals, diaries?” For some reason she had an urgent desire, almost a need, to know if the woman in the portrait had ever lost that expression of loneliness and isolation.
York shook his head. “There’s nothing much about Rising Star. We do know she died before Joshua and he never remarried. Neither of them kept a journal. I don’t even know if Rising Star knew how to read and write.”
“She would have known,” Sierra said, gazing at Rising Star’s serene face. “I think she would have learned everything she could, been everything she could be.”
He smiled faintly. “Do you think perhaps she tried to learn one new thing every single day?”
Was he mocking her? Her gaze moved swiftly from the portrait to his face. She saw nothing there but gentleness and understanding. “It wouldn’t surprise me,” she said with an uncertain laugh. “I like your ancestress, York.”
“So do I.” He held out his hand. “And I think she’d be the first to tell you that strength should never be expended on trivial battles. Come and rest.”
She stood looking at him. Such a warm smile on that beautiful face. Slowly she put her hand in his. “For today.”
He nodded and started climbing the stairs, still holding her hand. “That’s a start anyway. You rest this afternoon, and I’ll be back this evening and see if we can’t work something out.”
“And how are we going to do that?” She didn’t really care at the moment. His hand felt warm and caring holding her own, and he was still smiling at her with a tenderness that started a sweet trembling deep within her.
His sidewise glance was suddenly glinting with mischief. “How about a nice game of poker?”
Five
“Can we turn this off now?” York asked. “In these past few days I’ve had all I can stand of nighttime soap operas. Dallas and Falcon Crest, and then Dynasty.…”
Sierra’s face was stricken as she turned to look at him. “Why didn’t you tell me you minded?” She jumped up from the couch and ran over to turn off the television set. “You said it didn’t make any difference to you what we watched. I’d never have had you sit—”
“Okay. Okay.” His tone was soothing. “Don’t get so upset. I didn’t mind watching them.” He smiled. “Though I admit I enjoyed watching you watch them more than I did the programs themselves. Your concentration fascinated me. What do you find so enthralling about them?”
She smiled uncertainly. “I suppose I do get a little absorbed. It’s really not the shows themselves.”
“Then what is it?”
She hesitated. For a moment she was tempted to evade answering the question. It might sound foolish, even childish, and she had never spoken of it before for that very reason. Yet York’s face held no hint of mockery and his smile was gentle. She drew a deep breath. “It’s because everybody in them has a place.”
“A place?” he asked, puzzled.
She nodded. “I know the reason people are supposed to like those shows is because of the glitz, but I don’t think that’s the only reason. I watch them becaus
e it makes me feel kind of warm inside. The characters on those soaps are so assured and secure within themselves.” She walked slowly toward him. Instead of sitting back down on the couch, she dropped to the floor in front of him and crossed her legs tailor-fashion. Her expression was very intent as she tried to find the words. “They have roots.”
“You mean those palatial family estates?”
“Partially.” She gnawed at her lower lip. “But not entirely. Having a place isn’t just having a house or a family background. It’s what you are inside. There’s a serenity and inner confidence when you know what you are and your niche in the world.” Her voice was suddenly wistful. “All my life I’ve wanted to have that confidence. I’ve always tried to make a place for myself by working and giving. I thought that was the secret, but the places I’ve made for myself have never lasted long. Something always happens, and I have to move on.”
York’s throat tightened painfully. She looked like a fragile child sitting there with her enormous dark eyes fixed so pensively on him. “You’re young. Give yourself a chance.”
“Maybe some people aren’t meant to have a place,” she whispered, almost to herself. “Maybe there’s not a place for everyone.” She was silent a moment, then gave herself a little half shake and straightened. “Well, I can usually find a place for myself for a little while anyway. What difference does it make if it doesn’t last? There’s always another chance tomorrow.” She brushed a lock of hair from her temple. “You have a place, York.”
“Do I?” He found his voice was a little husky. “My brothers would argue with you there. They think I have more of a tendency to wander than Johnny Appleseed did.”
“Maybe you do. I guess I don’t know you well enough to argue. But even if it is true, you carry your place around with you.” Her smile was radiant. “And that can be pretty wonderful, you know. I wish I could.”
“Why can’t you?” he asked gently. “You’re one of the strongest women I’ve ever met, Sierra. There’s no reason why you shouldn’t have confidence.”