Memories for Eternity

Seeing him only reminded her of her behavior with him last night in his office. He had once again kissed her mindless, engulfing her with a degree of passion she thought was possible only in those romance novels Aunt Claudine read. Alyssa had gone to bed dreaming about him, their kiss and the things she wanted to do with him beyond a kiss. She had awakened mortified that such thoughts had entered her mind. She would need to take steps to make sure her dreams never became a reality.

For her own sake and well-being, she had reached the conclusion that setting ground rules with Clint would be the only way they would survive living under the same roof. Otherwise, she was setting herself up for many tiring days and disturbing nights, Alyssa realized.

“Where’s Chester?” she asked.

Clint leaned back in his chair. “He’s off on Wednesdays. At least, he takes off after breakfast and then returns at dinnertime. It’s the day he’s at the children’s hospital being Snuggles the Clown.”

Alyssa lifted a brow. “Snuggles the Clown?”

“He spends his day in the children’s ward making the kids laugh. He’s been doing it for over twenty years now and he’s a big hit. That’s how he and Uncle Sid met. Chester used to be a rodeo clown,” Clint said.

At first Alyssa couldn’t picture Chester as a clown, but then as she thought about it, she changed her mind. He had a friendly air about him and would probably be someone who loved kids. She didn’t know any clowns and found the thought of him being one fascinating. “You have to love kids to do something like that,” she said.

“He does. It was unfortunate that he and Ada never had any of their own.”

“Was Ada his wife?”

“Yes. They were married over thirty years. She died six years ago from an acute case of pneumonia,” Clint explained.

“That’s sad,” she said quietly.

“It was. He took her death pretty hard. They had a very strong marriage.”

A very strong marriage. Alyssa wondered if that meant the same thing as the two of them were deeply in love. “So he’s been working at the ranch a long time?”

“Yes, Chester’s been working here since before I was born,” Clint said.

Alyssa could hear something in Clint’s voice that went beyond a mere liking for Chester. It was easy to tell that Clint considered Chester more than just a housekeeper and a cook. He considered the man an intricate part of his family. While giving her a tour of the outside of the house, he had introduced her to several of the men who worked for him. Some of them were older and full of experience in the taming of the horses. The younger ones were learning the ropes, but everyone, as Clint had been quick to point out, played an important part in the running of his operation. The men had been friendly and respectful and when he had introduced her as nothing more than a good friend, it was apparent they had accepted his word.

“You’d better dig in while the food is warm,” Clint said.

Taking his statement to mean he was tired of answering her questions, she walked over to the stove to fix her plate and pour a cup of coffee, feeling Clint’s gaze on her with every move she made.

“I’m glad you know to do that,” he said.

She turned and looked at him, bewildered. “Do what?”

“Fix your own food.”

At her confused look he said, “A lot of women wouldn’t. They would expect to be waited on hand and foot.”

Alyssa turned back around to scoop eggs onto her plate wondering if he’d ever met Kim. Her cousin would definitely be one of those type of women. Uncle Jessie still called Kim his princess and she took it literally. “Well, I’m not one of them,” she said when she came to the table to sit down. “I’m used to fending for myself.”

She had barely taken her seat when Clinton folded his arms across his chest and asked, “Okay, what have you decided?”

Instead of answering him, she stared down into the dark liquid of her coffee for a moment before glancing up at him. “Do you have to know this minute?”

“Any reason you can’t tell me this minute?” he countered, with a little irritation in his voice.

She set her cup down knowing the last thing they needed was to get agitated with each other. Besides, he was right. There wasn’t a reason she couldn’t tell him now. “No, I guess not.”

She didn’t say anything for a few moments and then met his gaze. “Before I commit to anything, I want you to agree to something,” she said.

He lifted a dark brow. “Agree to what?”

“Agree that you won’t try to get me into your bed.”

He smiled. “My bed?”

“Or any bed in this house.” She thought it best to clarify. “And to be more specific, I want your word that you won’t try to seduce me into bed with you.”

He laughed softly and held her gaze for a long moment. “Define seduce,” he said.

Alyssa was aware that he was toying with her, but she was more determined than ever to make sure he understood her position. “You’re a man, Clint. You know very well what seduction entails,” she said.

His smile deepened. “And you think I’d do something like that?”

She didn’t hesitate in answering. “Yes. I’m certain of it. In less than twenty-four hours we’ve kissed twice, which leads me to believe you would try seducing me.”

He stared at her for a moment, eyed her reflectively and then said, “You’re right. I would in a heartbeat.” And then he asked, “And we’ve kissed twice, you say?”

Like he didn’t know it. “Yes,” she said, now very annoyed.

“Want to go for three?” he murmured in a voice that was so husky that it sent shivers through her body.

She eyed him sternly. “I’m serious, Clint.”

“So am I.”

She stared into his deep, penetrating gaze. Yes, he was serious. He was dead serious. The very thought that he wanted to kiss her again, tangle his tongue with hers and taste her, made the breath she was breathing get caught in her throat. Had he just admitted that he enjoyed kissing her? Well, she could admit that she enjoyed kissing him, as well. There was something devastatingly mind-blowing about the feel of him thrusting his tongue deep into her mouth, moving it around, latching on to hers and...

“Anything else you want from me?”

She shot him a cool look. “Maybe I’d better add kissing to the mix. I think it’s a good idea if we refrain from doing it,” she said.

“That can’t happen,” he said. She noticed that his lips curved into an easy smile.

His response had been quick and decisive. Alyssa tried remaining calm. She felt a rush of blood that gushed through her veins. “Why can’t it happen?”

“Because we enjoy kissing too much. The best thing to do is to stay in control when we do kiss. Personally, I don’t see anything wrong with us kissing. It’s merely a friendly form of greeting,” he said.

Yeah. Right. It was a form of greeting that she could do without. Especially because kissing Clint Westmoreland made her want to indulge in other things. Things that were better left alone.

“Like I said, Alyssa,” he said, interrupting her thoughts. “The key is self-control. As much as I want you and as much as kissing you places temptation in my path, I promise I won’t take our attraction to the next level. I have too much work to do around here to get involved with a woman—in any way,” he said.

She admired his iron-clad control...if he really had it. He sounded so confident, so sure of himself, she would love to test his endurance level to see what it could or could not withstand.

“But I have to admit you bring something to the table a lot of women haven’t,” he said.

She glanced over at him and her pulse jumped at the way he was looking at her.

“And what might that be?” she asked softly.

“Although it’s only on paper, you’re my wife. Perhaps it is because I’ve seen things from a male perspective, but it’s as if knowing you’re bound to me is opening up desires and urges that I usually don’t have. The fact that we are married makes me crave things.”

She frowned. In other words, having a woman under his roof was making him horny, Alyssa quickly surmised. “Then I need to add another condition to my visit. That from a female perspective, whatever desires are opening up for you, I suggest that you take your time and close them. I may not have all the self-control you claim to have, but I have no interest in getting involved with a man—in any way. Besides, if I were to get involved with a man it would have to be serious. I’m not into casual relationships where the only goal is relieving sexual frustrations,” she said.

He was silent for a moment as he stared at her, and for a fraction of a second she thought she saw a challenging glint in his gaze. And then he said, “I won’t try getting you into my bed...or yours...but I won’t promise to keep my mouth to myself. I can’t see us denying ourselves that one bit of indulgence.”

“Why? When it won’t lead anywhere?”

He inclined his head. His gaze locked with hers. “I desire you. Kissing you is a way to work you out of my system. I believe the same could be said for you, as well. At the end of the thirty days I suspect you will be ready to leave as much as I’ll be ready for you to leave,” he said.

Alyssa held his gaze and read what she saw in his eyes. He really believed that and she would go even further to say he was counting on it.

“Because we would have kissed each other out of our systems by then?” she asked, needing to be sure she understood his logic in all of this.

“Yes,” he replied evenly.

“And you think you’re that elusive and wild at heart.”

He lifted a brow. “Wild at heart?”

“Yes. You don’t think there’s a woman who exists who’s capable of capturing your heart,” she said.

“I know there’s not.”

He had said the words with such venom that she was forced to ask. “Have you ever been in love, Clint?”

She could tell by the look that appeared in his eyes that her question surprised him. She saw the way his shoulders tightened, the firm grip he held on his coffee cup and knew she had waded into turbulent waters.

For a while she thought he wasn’t going to respond, but then he did.

“No,” he said.

For some reason she didn’t believe him. Not that she thought he was lying to her, but she figured that the love he might have had for someone had been so effectively destroyed that it was hard to recall when that emotion had ever gripped his heart. It had been that way for her after she’d discovered what Kevin had done. It was as if her love had gotten obliterated with that one single act of unfaithfulness. She couldn’t help wondering about the woman who had crushed Clint’s heart.

“Are you satisfied with our agreement?”

Alyssa dragged in a deep breath. The issue of them kissing hadn’t been fully resolved to her liking, but the way she saw it, he was not a man to force himself on anyone. If she resisted his kisses enough times, he would find some other game to amuse himself. “Yes, I’m satisfied,” she said.

“So, are you agreeing to remain here for thirty days, live under the same roof with me?”

Intimate images flooded her mind. She forced them out. His home was humongous. His bedroom was on one side of the house and hers on the other. Chances were there would be days when their paths wouldn’t even cross. “Yes, I’m agreeing to do just that,” she said.

He nodded. “I’ll call Hightower and let him know. By the way, what about more clothes for you? You only brought an overnight bag,” Clint said.

“I spoke with my aunt yesterday and she told me if I decided to stay she would send me some things.”

“Your aunt is the only family you have?”

She might as well be, she wanted to say.

“No, I have an uncle and several cousins,” she said instead. “My mother sent me to live with my grandfather and Aunt Claudine when I was thirteen. Over the years Aunt Claudine has become a surrogate mother to me,” she added.

“And your grandfather?”

A pain settled in her heart. She wanted to correct him so badly.

“My grandfather died four years ago,” she said softly.

“That was about the same time I lost my mother,” he said, looking down at the coffee in his cup. She could hear the sadness in his voice. He glanced up and at that moment an emotion passed between them—a deep understanding of how it felt to lose someone you truly cared about.

“Were you close to her?” she asked.

“Yes. Casey, Cole and I were her world and she was ours. She and Uncle Sid, along with Chester and the other old-timers on the ranch were our family. What about your mother? You said she sent you to live with your grandfather and aunt when you were thirteen. Do the two of you still keep in touch?”

In a way Alyssa wished he would have asked her anything but that. That her mother could so easily send her away and not stay in touch was still a pain that would occasionally slither through her heart.

“No. I haven’t seen or heard from my mother since the day she sent me away,” she said.

Deciding she didn’t want to subject herself to any more of his inquiries about her family, she stood. “I need to make a few calls. In addition to contacting my aunt, I need to make sure I have everything I need to continue my business while I’m here. That means I will need to use your computer a lot,” she said.

“I don’t have a problem with that.”

Alyssa nodded. “Okay. I’m sure you have a lot to do today, as well,” she said, picking up her plate and cup and carrying both over to the sink. “And since today is Chester’s day off, I’ll take care of the dishes as soon as I’ve made those calls.”

With nothing else to say, Alyssa walked out of the kitchen.

* * *

Clint continued to sit at the table. From the moment he had gotten the letter from the bureau advising him of his marriage to Alyssa, he had simply assumed that getting out of the marriage would be easy—a piece of cake. He had miscalculated on a number of things. First, the bureau being so hard-nosed over such a blatant mistake and second, his attraction to the woman who was legally his wife. Now, he was fully committed to go to extraordinary restrictions to keep his hands off of her. In other words, to stay out of her bed and to make sure she stayed out of his.

Neither would be easy.

That was what made the thought of the next thirty days so disconcerting. A part of him wanted to rebel. Why not have sex with her? After all it was just sex, no big deal. They were mature adults who evidently had healthy appetites with no desire to get caught up in anything other than the moment. Right? Wrong.

He couldn’t help but recall her words about not being one to indulge in casual affairs, which gave him a glimpse into her character. While engaging her in conversation, he had taken in everything she’d said—even some things she hadn’t said, especially about her family.

The Texas Ranger in him could detect when someone was withholding information. He hadn’t wanted to pry, but she’d deliberately omitted mentioning a few things. Such as why her mother had given her up at thirteen and had never once come back to see her. And when she had mentioned her cousins he hadn’t heard that deep sense of love and warmth he’d felt whenever he spoke of his. Granted, he didn’t expect every family to be like the Westmorelands, but still he would think there was a closeness there. He had heard the deep love and affection in her voice when she had spoken of her grandfather and aunt.

And then he could very well be reading more into it than was there. It could be that she was a private person and hadn’t felt the need or wasn’t stirred by any desire to tell him any more than she had. Wife or no wife, it wasn’t “expose your soul to Clint” day.

He rubbed his hand down his face. Why did he even care? he wondered. What was there about Alyssa that made him want to dig deeper and unravel her inner being, layer by layer? With that thought in mind, he was about to get up from the table when his cell phone went off. He stood to pull it off the attachment on his belt. “Hello,” he said.

“So what’s this I hear about you having a wife?”

He couldn’t help but smile when he sat back down. He could envision his sister with her long black lashes lifting in a way that said she had every right to know everything she asked him.

“I see Chester’s loose lips have been flapping again,” he muttered, thinking he needed to have a talk with the old man. Of course, Clint knew that all the talk in the world wouldn’t do any good with Chester.

“He knew I had a right to know,” Casey Westmoreland Quinn said in a serious tone. “So tell me about her.”

He sighed. Since she hadn’t asked what happened to make him have a wife in the first place, he could only assume that Chester had covered that information with her already. “What do you want to know?”

“Everything. What’s her name? Where is she from? How old is she? Is she someone that you used to work with who I’ve met already? And so on and so forth.”

Clint frowned. Alyssa reminded him of Casey with her endless questions.

“Her name is Alyssa Barkley. She’s from Waco and she’s twenty-seven. And no, you’ve never met her. She became a Ranger right out of college and then left not long after that assignment we did together. She was only with the Rangers for a year,” he said.

“So you didn’t make a good impression on her then, did you?”

“I wasn’t trying to. I was all into Chantelle at the time,” he said.

“Please don’t mention her name,” Casey said in feigned terror.

Clint chuckled. Casey and Chantelle had never gotten along from day one. His sister had warned him about her but he wouldn’t listen. Now he wished he had. But at the time he had been thinking with the lower part of his body and not his brain. Chantelle caught the attention of any man within one hundred feet. But then so did Alyssa. However, it had taken only a few moments spent with Alyssa to know she and Chantelle were very different.

Alyssa wasn’t all into herself. She didn’t think she was responsible for the sun rising and setting each day. Chantelle had thought she was all that, and like a testosterone-packed fool, he had played right into her hands without considering the consequences.

“So what have the two of you decided to do since the bureau won’t annul your marriage?”

Casey’s question reeled his thoughts back in. “Do what they want and live together for thirty days,” he said.

“That’s asking a lot of the two of you. Maybe you ought to seek out the advice of an attorney,” Casey said.

“We thought of that, but in the end it might only delay things,” he said, and his conversation with Jared last night had only confirmed his suspicions. “Alyssa thinks it will work since she’s able to do her job from anywhere. She’s a website designer.”

“Um, maybe you can get her to design the website for Uncle Sid’s foundation that we’re setting up,” Casey suggested.

“I mentioned it to her briefly, and you’re right. It might be something she can do while she’s here if she has the time.”

“She’ll be at the ranch when McKinnon and I visit in a few weeks,” Casey said as if thinking out loud. “I’m looking forward to meeting her.”

Casey’s intonation immediately sent up red flags. He knew his sister. After that Chantelle fiasco she had gotten a little overprotective where he was concerned. He found it rather amusing although not necessary. “Don’t forget who’s the oldest, Casey,” he decided to remind her.

Over the phone line he heard her unladylike snort. “But only by a mere fourteen minutes. I would have been the oldest if it wasn’t for Cole holding me back.”

Clint laughed. That’s the reason Casey liked telling everyone for her being the last born. She had gotten that tale from Chester, who had convinced her she was in position to be born first. “Whatever. Look, Case, I have a lot of work to do around here today. I’m expecting another shipment of horses,” he said.

“Wonderful. McKinnon and I will talk with you later to let you know the exact day we’ll be arriving.”

Moments later Clint ended the call with Casey thinking that she was usually a good judge of character. He wondered what she would think of Alyssa.

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