Heartbreaker

Susan shook her head. “No way. Maybe half and half, but certainly no more.”

“These modern women,” Michael complained. “Life was simpler when we could just kidnap them and drag them off to join the male’s clan.”

“In some tribes, the male joined the female’s family,” Susan said, quick to point out this fact.

A cry from the bedroom had Josie leaping to her feet and fleeing the room, Flynt right behind her.

“Lena,” Rose explained.

The couple returned to the dining room carrying a bundle of pink. The baby girl blinked sleepily at the adults, then puckered up again.

“The bottle,” Flynt said, and rushed to the refrigerator. He brought a baby bottle to Josie. “Would you like me to feed her so you can eat?”

Josie shook her head. “Please, all of you, don’t let your food get cold. This will only take a few minutes.”

The surrogate mother fed the hungry little girl while the other adults watched in open fascination.

“How old is she now?” Susan asked.

“About six months, we think,” Josie told her. “The doctor said she wasn’t more than eight to ten weeks old when she was found. How could her mother bear to leave her?”

Susan pressed a hand to her chest as fresh pain surged there. How, indeed, could anyone leave a child?

“I operated on a six-month-old in June,” Michael said, a pensive look on his face. “He had a hole between the chambers of his heart.”

Flynt gave his friend a worried glance. “How did he do?”

Susan’s heart did a little dance against her breastbone when Michael smiled.

“Fine. He was a fighter from the start. Now his mother says she can’t keep him out of trouble. He crawls all over the house and gets into everything.”

Susan was surprised at how relieved she felt at the happy ending to Michael’s story concerning the child. Her eyes were drawn to Baby Lena. Her own mother had almost given up on grandchildren. Justin, her brother, had once been married, but that had ended in divorce and no children. Now they had Rose’s baby to look forward to.

At ten, when Rose served coffee and dessert, Susan realized she was really tired. She’d have to wait until everyone left, though, so Matt could drive her home.

As if on cue, Matt spoke up. “Uh, Michael, would you mind dropping Susan off at her place on your way home?”

“Not at all.” Michael leveled a sardonic glance on her. “I probably should go since I have to return to Houston in the morning. If you’re ready, Susan?”

She realized there was absolutely nothing she could say but yes. She hugged her sister, told Josie what a lovely job she was doing with Lena, bid the Carson brothers good-night and allowed Michael to escort her from the house.

In the car, with moonlight softly illuminating the landscape and the cool night air flowing through her hair, Susan fumed silently, determined not to quarrel or even speak for the duration of the ride. Thank goodness it wouldn’t be long, for the Wainwright ranch adjoined the Carson spread along one side.

“Is it too windy?” he asked. “Shall I put the top up?”

“I’m fine.”

“It was a good thing Flynt took the baby, wasn’t it?”

“I suppose.”

“The foundling brought Josie into his life. She’s been good for him, I think, just as Rose had been good for Matt.”

“Mmm,” she said.

Michael enjoyed needling her into conversation, such as it was. He had to fight a grin as her answers grew shorter and shorter. “Why don’t you say what you’re thinking before you explode?” he suggested.

“And what is that?” she asked haughtily.

“That you’d rather ride on a bony mule than in a car with me.”

“Personally, I can’t see much difference.”

That did it. He burst into laughter while she flashed him a killing glance from those cool green eyes. “I’ve always been attracted to a woman of quick wit and a fiery temperament,” he murmured.

He was certainly attracted to this woman, he admitted. Flames singed his insides as they rode through the balmy September night. He had the feeling she wasn’t indifferent, either, although she pretended he didn’t exist at the moment, focusing her attention on the moonlight-flooded fields.

“Beautiful night, isn’t it? If we were a couple of kids on a date, I’d be looking for a parking spot about now. Maybe under those pine trees over there.”

“You’d get pine sap on your car,” she informed him.

“For you I’d chance it,” he goaded, his voice lowering to a sexy, husky level that he hadn’t intended.

Arriving at the entrance to the Wainwright ranch, he turned in, then stopped in front of a sprawling white ranch house reminiscent of South Fork on the old TV series, Dallas. He wondered which bedroom was hers.

She had the door open almost before he stopped. When she headed for the house entrance, he was hot on her heels. With a deliberately casual air, he grasped her arm as if to make sure she didn’t stumble and fall into the lush landscaping bordering the front walk.

“Thanks for the ride,” she said politely. It was an obvious dismissal.

Something stubborn reared up inside him. “No trouble,” he murmured, then did something he’d never done before: he kissed an unwilling woman.

Bending slightly forward, he lowered his head and brushed his mouth over hers, softly, teasing her and perhaps himself because of the sparks that flashed between them now and that had from that first encounter in the street.

If he had any sense, he’d run as fast as he could in the opposite direction from this beautiful young woman with her lithe dancer’s body and her fierce anger at the unfair hand she’d been dealt.

Instead of slapping his face as he half expected, Susan stood perfectly still during the first brief kiss, then another…and another.

It was hard to stop, to give up the softness of her mouth, to ignore the tremor in her sensitive lips or the unconscious invitation when they parted in an audible sigh. Caressing her neck, he felt the telltale pounding of a pulse that spoke of the danger she was determined to deny.

“You can’t fight fate,” he advised gently as he finally surrendered her mouth. “You’ll only hurt yourself.”

Her chin shot up. “So you say. How much do you get for performing heart surgery?”

“A lot,” he admitted, not taking offense at her intended insult.

She went inside and closed the door quietly but firmly in his face.

Michael drove home, no longer aware of the moonlight, but thinking instead of the precarious nature of life itself. There was a sense of urgency in him, as if he needed to do something right away.

Like make love to Susan Wainwright before she disappeared into a wisp of moonlight?

He gave a wry grimace at the absurdity of this notion as he parked and depressed the remote to close the garage door behind him. Two shadows stepped out of the gloom of the dim interior.

“Easy, Doc,” one of them said. “We need to have a little talk.”

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