LINE OF FIRE

Only one thing stood in the way of Wynn Ascot’s marriage-her legal guardian, McCabe Foxe. The tough war correspondent returned from Central America with an injured leg-and with the force of a cannonball invaded her home, her life, and her heart.

A hard-headed journalist, Wynn was uncharacteristically devastated by the new, disturbing feelings McCabe aroused. But he was a man who made no commitments and asked for none. With Wynn it was all or nothing, and though her heart had already been captured, the surrender would have to be on her terms.

Roomful of Roses

Diana Palmer

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter One

It was the most wonderful kind of spring day—warm after the recent rain, with butterflies gliding around a puddle beside the porch of the weathered old country store in southern Creek County. Camellias were blooming profusely, their pink and red blossoms stark against the deep, shiny green of the leaves that framed their delicate faces. A dusty road led off beside the worn wood building, and a tractor could be heard breaking ground nearby.

Wynn Ascot left her camera and equipment on the back seat of her Volkswagen and slid out of her yellow sweater before she went up the cracked concrete steps onto the dusty porch and through the screen door. The store smelled of bananas and onions; overhead was a fan that whirred softly amid the homely clutter of groceries. Wynn shook back her long dark hair and lifted its weight as she walked into the store, feeling the heat abate. The swirling blue-patterned cotton skirt was cool enough, but she was wearing a long-sleeved white blouse with it—she hadn’t expected the day to heat up this much! The suede boots were just about as confining as the blouse, making her long legs hotter.

Mrs. Baker was leaning over the dark wood counter next to a cheese hoop, talking to old Mr. Sanders. But she looked up when she spotted Wynn.

“Loafing, huh?” the white-haired woman teased.

Wynn grinned at her, pausing to say hello to the stooped little man talking to Mrs. Baker. “Well, can I help it that it’s spring?” she laughed. “This is no day to be stuck inside slaving over a typewriter. You won’t tell on me, will you?” she added in a conspiratorial whisper.

The older woman pursed her lips. “You do a story about my boy Henry and I’ll keep your guilty secret,” she promised.

“What did Henry do?”

“He caught a fifteen-pound bass this morning over at James Lewis’ pond,” Mrs. Baker said proudly.

“You tell him to bring it by my office about two o’clock today and I’ll get a picture of it for the paper,” Wynn agreed. “Now, how about a soda? I’m parched!”

“What was it this time?” Mr. Sanders asked with a smile, leaning heavily on his cane. “A fire? A wreck?”

“Water,” Wynn corrected, pausing long enough to take the icy soft drink from Mrs. Baker and toss down a swallow before she continued. “John Darrow had the soil-conservation people help him design and build a pond on his farm to store water in case of drought.”

“Mr. Ed says the early rain means we probably will have a drought this summer,” Mr. Sanders agreed, quoting his next-door neighbor, a farmer of eighty-two whose claim to fame was that he was more accurate than any south Georgia weatherman.

Wynn took another long sip from the soft drink before she replied, “I hope he’s wrong.” She grinned at the wrinkled old man. “Now, there’s a story. I think I’ll go take his picture and get him to predict the rest of the summer.”

“He’d love that,” Mrs. Baker said, and her blue eyes looked young for a minute. “He’s got grandkids in Atlanta. He could send them all a copy.”

“I’ll put it down for first thing tomorrow.” With a sigh, Wynn sank down beside the wooden fruit bin into a comfortably swaybacked cane-bottom straight chair. “Just think. I could be sitting in a normal office working a lazy eight-hour day, and nobody would ever call me at night to ask how much a subscription was or how to get a picture in the paper.”

“And you’d hate it,” the older woman laughed. She lifted her face to the ceiling fan with a sigh. “Funny how these fans are just coming back into style. This one’s been here since I was a young woman.”

“I remember sitting here on lazy Fridays in the summer with Granddaddy, just after the fish truck came up from Pensacola,” Wynn recalled. “Granddaddy would buy oysters and cook them on a wood stove while my grandmother fussed and swore that I’d burn myself up trying to help him. Those were good days.”

Mrs. Baker leaned on the counter. “How’s Katy Maude?” she asked.

“Aunt Katy Maude is up in the north Georgia mountains visiting her sister Cattie.” The young woman grinned. “She lives near Helen, that little alpine village that looks like Bavaria, and the two of them have been threatening to ride an inner tube down the Chattahoochee this summer.”

Mrs. Baker burst out laughing. “Yes, and I’ll just bet Katy would do it on a dare! Say, when are you and Andy getting married? We heard Miss Robins say it might be this summer.”

Wynn sighed. “We think we’ll wait until September, and take a week off for a honeymoon.” She smiled, trying to picture being married to Andrew Slone. They had a comfortable, very serene relationship. He made no demands on her physically, and they spent most of their time watching television together or going out to eat. She could imagine their marriage being much the same. Andy wasn’t exciting, but at least he wouldn’t be rushing off to cover wars like McCabe....

“Will McCabe come back to give you away?” Mrs. Baker asked, as if she had looked into Wynn’s mind and picked out the thought.

Hearing his name was enough to cause volcanic sensations in Wynn. McCabe Foxe wasn’t her guardian in any real sense. He only held the administrative keys to her father’s legacy, doling out her allowance and taking care of her investments until she was either twenty-five or married. At her next birthday, she’d be twenty-four. But before then, she’d be married to Andy, and McCabe would fade away into the past where he belonged. Thank God, she added silently.

“I don’t think so,” she replied finally, smiling at Mrs. Baker. “He’s down in Central America right now, covering that last skirmish for the wire services. And getting fodder for his next adventure novel, no doubt,” she added with a trace of bitterness.

“Isn’t that something?” the elderly woman sighed, her eyes suddenly dreamy. “Imagine, a famous author whose father was born here,” she said. “And he lived just a couple of houses away from you for all those years. Right up until he went into wire-service reporting with your father.”

Thinking about that made Wynn uncomfortable. She didn’t like the memories of those days.

“Your dad was a good writer,” Mr. Sanders interrupted. “I remember those reports of his that Edward printed in your paper, with his byline.”

Wynn smiled. “I still miss him. I don’t know what I’d have done if Katy Maude hadn’t taken me in when he was killed. I’ve never felt so lost.”

“Good thing your father let McCabe handle the money,” Mrs. Sanders remarked. “Your mother left quite an estate, and you were still in your teens when your dad died. Only thing is, I do wonder why McCabe let you stay here.”

“He could hardly have taken me with him,” Wynn pointed out. She finished the rest of her soft drink and placed the empty bottle on the counter. “Well, I’d better get back to the salt mines, I reckon. It’s press day and if I know Edward, he’ll be calling all over the county any minute to find out where I’m hiding. Nobody escapes when we’re putting the paper to bed.”

“I’ve got to go, too,” Mr. Sanders sighed, standing up as Wynn did. “Mrs. Jones worries if I don’t march in and out on the hour. Amazing how I managed to crawl through trenches all over France by myself in the war without Mrs. Jones behind me to push,” he added with a twinkle in his eye.

“You just be grateful you’ve got a housekeeper to look after you who doesn’t charge an arm and a leg,” Mrs. Baker chided, pointing an accusing finger his way.

“Reckon you’re right, Verdie,” he sighed.

Wynn laughed at his hunted expression. “Aunt Katy Maude tends to worry about me, too,” she admitted. “That’s why I moved into the guest house when I got old enough. We get along just fine as long as we don’t live together.”

“It isn’t right for a young girl to live by herself,” Mrs. Baker began, “not with that huge house and only Katy Maude in it.”

Wynn glanced quickly at her watch. “Oops, got to run,” she interrupted with an apologetic smile before the older woman had time to get started on her pet subject. “See you later.” She tossed a quarter onto the counter and made a run for the door, laughing, her skirts flying and her pale green eyes shimmering with humor.

But the humor faded once Wynn had started the small car and was roaring away toward Redvale down country roads that seemed to go forever without a sign of another car or a house. This section of south Georgia was primarily agricultural, and it stretched out like Texas, the land flat or slightly rolling, with only a few farmhouses and country stores to break the rustic monotony.

Thinking about McCabe had upset her. It was ridiculous that it should, that she should let it. He was world-famous now, rich enough to retire and give up risking his life. But he kept on reporting, as if it was a habit he couldn’t break, and Wynn had stopped watching the newscasts because she couldn’t bear to see what was happening in Central America. She couldn’t bear the thought that McCabe might be badly hurt.

It shouldn’t have mattered, of course. They had never gotten along and their last confrontation had been sizzling. McCabe had hit the ceiling when Wynn announced that she was joining the staff of the Redvale Courier. It had been a telephone conversation, one of McCabe’s rare ones, and he’d threatened, among other things, to cut off her allowance. She’d told him to go ahead and do it, she’d support herself. The conversation had gone from bad to worse, and ended with Wynn slamming the phone down and refusing to answer when it rang again. A week later, there was a terse note from him, with a New York postmark, agreeing that a job with a weekly newspaper might not be too dangerous. But he warned her against covering hard news, and threatened to come back and jerk her out of the office if she tried it. “I have my spies, Wynn,” he’d written. “So don’t think you’ll put anything over on me.”

She leaned back hard against the seat, her foot easing down on the accelerator. Arrogant, hardheaded man—she still couldn’t believe that her father had legally had McCabe appointed executor of his will and Wynn’s estate. They were friends, they had been for years. But it seemed ridiculous somehow, when Katy Maude would have been the logical person to put in charge, since she’d had responsibility for Wynn since her childhood, while Jesse Ascot was off covering news.

Where was McCabe now? she wondered. There’d been a report a couple of days before about two reporters being killed in Central America. Wynn had sweated blood when she overheard a conversation about it. She’d butted in, asking if the men had heard who the reporters were. French, they’d replied. French. And she’d gone home and cried with relief. Ridiculous! She was engaged, her life was planned, and McCabe had never been anything to her but a big blond headache.

She drove by Katy Maude’s house on the way back to the office. Her eyes caught sight of a curtain fluttering in the guest house where she lived, and she wondered absently if she’d left a window open. Well, it wasn’t likely to rain again, so what did it matter?

When she got back to the Redvale Courier’s office, nestled between Patterson’s Mercantile and the Jericho Drug Company, Kelly Davis was rushing out the door.

“Hi,” Wynn greeted the tall, thin young man. “Remember me? My name is Wynn Ascot and I work here.”

“Really? You could have fooled me,” Kelly replied dryly. “I never see you, and neither does Edward, which means I get stuck with the really gruesome stories.”

“Like what?” she asked innocently.

“Like the wreck out on the federal highway,” he replied quietly. “One fatality, three injuries. The state patrol just got there.”

“Any names yet?” she asked.

He shook his head. “Hope it’s nobody we know,” he said with a faint smile, and she knew what he meant. This was the really bad part of working for a small-town paper. Two out of three times, you knew the victims, and many of them were friends or family.

“Let us know as soon as you find out, will you?” she asked.

“I’ll call before I come back,” he promised.

She watched him run for his old pickup truck, and prayed, not for the first time, that it would start. It did, with an ear-splitting roar, and she watched it jerk down the wide street that ran around the tree-lined square with its Confederation statue and old men in overalls sitting on park benches in the shade.

Edward Keene looked up when she came in. He was standing beside the young brunette typesetter at the computer, his heavy white brows drawn into a scowl over his weather-beaten face. His nose seemed to quiver as he clutched the galley proof in his hand. “I’ll wait to paste this up until you get that correction line, Judy,” he told the typesetter, aiming a glare at Wynn.

“Who are you?” he asked his girl reporter. “Do you work here? Do you know what day it is? Do you realize that I’m making this paper up alone and trying to help Judy proof copy and set ads...”

“I got photos,” she said, holding up the camera with a grin. “Big ones, they’ll fill up space.”

“Pix of what?” he grumbled. “A pond?”

“And a house fire and that new bypass bridge they just finished in Union City.”

He beamed. “Really?”

“Well,” she sighed, “at least that cheered you up for a minute. Kelly will get the wreck, so that gives you at least four pix for the front page, and we could blow them up to four columns each...?”

“That’s why I hired you.” He nodded with a grin. “You know how to spread news out. Okay, with what I’ve already got, that’ll fill ’er up.”

“I’ll take it back to Jess in the darkroom,” she said, and started into the other office.

“Uh, after you do that, come into my office for a minute, will you?” Edward hesitated.

Wynn glanced at him, puzzled. He looked strange for an instant. She shrugged and rushed to the back with the film. It was press day, she told herself. Everybody looked strange then.

She handed the film to Jess with a grin at the harassed look that immediately appeared on his thin, aging face. “Yesterday?” he muttered.

“Please,” she said, agreeing on the delivery date. “All you have to do is three halftones, though, four columns each—one of the fire and one of the new bridge and one of the pond.”

“I get to pick them out?” he asked with raised eyebrows.

“Sure! See how good I am to you?” she asked as she headed toward the door.

“Good! Here I am with three rush jobs, one to get out by two o’clock, I haven’t made the first negative...” He kept right on muttering, and she dashed back into the newspaper office and closed the door.

Edward was sitting behind the heavily loaded desk, which contained a much-used manual typewriter, half a dozen daily newspapers from which he pirated leads, and some scratch paper. He pulled off his glasses and whipped out a spotless white handkerchief to clean them with.

“Well, sit down,” he said impatiently, leaning back with his hands crossed over his ample stomach.

“What is it?” she asked, getting scared. He looked...really strange.

“Feel okay?” he asked.

“Sure.” She eyed him warily. “Why? Do I look like a potential stroke victim?”

He cleared his throat. “No.”

“It’s Katy Maude!” she burst out.

“No,” he said quickly. His shoulders lifted and fell. “Why don’t you keep up on what’s happening in Central America? Then you’d know and I wouldn’t have to stumble all over myself.”

Her blood actually ran cold. She gripped the arms of the chair hard enough to numb her fingers. “McCabe,” she gasped. “Something’s happened to McCabe!”

“He’s alive,” he said. “Not badly injured at all.”

She leaned back with a sigh, feeling herself grow weak. All these years, she’d expected it, until today, and she’d been knocked sideways. “What was it? A sniper?”

“Something like that.” He tossed an issue of the Atlanta morning daily over to her. “Notice the sidebar.”

She looked away from the banner headline to the accompanying story. “WAR CORRESPONDENT INJURED.” There was a small, very dark photo of McCabe and she strained her eyes to see if he’d changed much over the long years, but she couldn’t even make out his features. She read the copy. It stated that McCabe had been hurt while covering a story, and there was some speculation as to whether the incident was connected to the deaths of the two French correspondents that had been reported earlier that week. According to the story, McCabe had been roughed up and had a torn ligament in one leg and a trace of concussion, but he was alive.

“It doesn’t say where he is now,” she murmured.

“Uh, I was afraid you’d wonder about that. Be kind of hard to miss him, of course,” he mumbled.

She stared at him. Her mind was only beginning to work again after its shock. “Hard to miss him?”

“Yes. When you walk in your front door, that is,” Edward volunteered. “Big man...”

“He’s at my house?” she burst out. “What’s he doing at my house!”

“Recuperating,” he assured her. “Well, the motel’s closed down for remodeling. Where else could he stay?”

“With you!”

“Nope,” he replied calmly. “No spare room.”

“He could sleep on the couch!”

“In his condition? Couldn’t ask an injured man to do that,” he said.

“I could,” she replied coldly. “I can’t have McCabe in the house alone with me. Katy Maude’s not due home for several more weeks, she’s just getting over her heart attack, and she couldn’t take the excitement of constant arguing.”

“You and Katy don’t argue,” he observed.

“But McCabe and I do,” she reminded him. “Constantly. On every subject. And Andy will go through the ceiling!”

“Oh, him,” Edward said, dismissing the other man with a wave of his hand. “Andy’s one of those liberal city fellows. He won’t think a thing about it.”

“Are we talking about the same Andrew Slone?” she asked. “My fiancé, who went on local television to protest a theater advertisement in the Ashton Daily Bugle because it showed a woman’s bare bosom?”

Edward looked at her over his glasses. “Hmm. You might have a problem there, sure enough.”

“You set me up,” she accused. “You invited McCabe here.”

“Well, he suggested it,” he admitted. “Called to ask if we’d seen the story in the paper, mentioned what bad shape he was in...I knew you wouldn’t mind,” he added with a grin. “After all, he’s your guardian.”

“Guardian! My tormentor, my inquisitor, my worst enemy, and you’ve put him under my own roof!’ she wailed. “Why didn’t you send him to Katy Maude’s house?”

“Because there’s no one in it,” Edward said reasonably. “He can hardly walk at all, Wynn,” he reminded her. “How would he get along?”

“He’s a reporter,” she ground out. “He’s lived on pure nerve for so long that he’d probably survive without water on the desert! Doesn’t his mother live in New York now? Why didn’t he go stay with her?”

“She left the country when she found out he was coming back from Central America,” Edward laughed. “You know Marie, she’s scared to death to let him get a foothold in her house. He’d have the servants fired and the house remodeled in two days’ time.”

“Not my house, he wouldn’t,” she muttered. “Marie always did find excuses to hide out from his father and from him.”

“He’s hurt,” he reminded her. “Poor wounded soldier, and you’d turn him out in the cold!”

Her full lips pouted at him. “You don’t know McCabe like I do,” she argued.

“He wants to meet your fiancé,” he continued. “He’s concerned about your future.”

“He wants to dictate it, that’s why,” she growled, standing. “Well, he won’t get away with it. He’s not going to wrap me around his thumb!”

“Where are you going?” he called.

“Off to war,” she called back. “Where’s my elephant gun?”

“But the paper—”

“I’ll read it later,” she grumbled.

“Our paper,” he thundered. “The one we won’t get out if you don’t get in here and help me make it up!”

“I’m taking my lunch hour late,” she told him. “I’ll be back in an hour.”

Edward threw up his hands. “An hour. We’re already an hour behind schedule and she’ll only be gone an hour. Judy, I tell you...”

But Wynn wasn’t listening. She was running for her car, with sparks flying from her green eyes. If McCabe thought he’d been through a war, he hadn’t seen anything yet!

Chapter Two

Wynn could sense McCabe watching her even as she opened the unlocked door of the white frame cottage behind Katy Maude’s monstrous Victorian house on Patterson Street. She stormed in, her hair flying, her step sounding unusually loud on the bare wood floors and area rugs.

“McCabe!” she yelled, tossing her camera, purse and sweater onto the chair in the hall. But only an echo greeted her.

She turned to go into the living room, which she’d redecorated the year before with western furniture and Indian rugs. She stopped short just inside the doorway and caught her breath.

McCabe was sitting quietly in her big armchair by the fireplace, one big foot propped on the hassock, wearing leather boots and a safari suit that would have looked comical on any native of Redvale. But it suited his dark tan, his faintly tousled thick blond hair, which needed trimming badly.

All the years rolled away. He looked just as Wynn remembered him, big and bronzed and blond—larger than life. His craggy face looked battle-worn, and the light eyes that were neither gray nor blue but a mixture of the two narrowed as they roamed boldly over her slender body.

She stared helplessly, trying to reconcile her memories with the man before her. He seemed to find her equally fascinating, if the searching, stunned expression on his usually impassive face was anything to go by.

“You’re older,” she said in a tone that was unconsciously soft.

He nodded. “So are you, honey.”

Casual endearments were as much a part of him as his square-tipped fingers, but the word caused an odd sensation in Wynn. She didn’t understand why, and she didn’t like it.

“What are you doing here?” she asked reasonably.

He raised both eyebrows as he lifted the smoking cigarette in his hand to his chiseled mouth. “My plane was hijacked,” he said with a straight face.

She pursed her lips. “Try again.”

“You don’t believe me?”

“Very few planes are hijacked to south Georgia, in my experience,” she murmured. The words were just something to keep her mind occupied while her eyes helplessly roamed over him and she tried to fire up the old antagonism.

“What experience?” he asked carelessly, narrowing his eyes as he studied her. “How old are you now?”

“Just months away from my inheritance,” she reminded him with a smile. “When Andy and I marry, I’m a free woman.”

“Andrew Slone,” he muttered, leaning back in the chair with a sigh. “How in hell did you get landed with him? Is he blackmailing you?”

She gasped. “I love him!”

“Elephants fly,” he scoffed. He ground out the cigarette in the ashtray on the table beside his chair. “You’d stagnate married to a man with his hang-ups.”

“What do you know about his hang-ups?” she challenged.

He met her eyes squarely and a wild little tremor went through her stomach. “Enough to know I’m going to stop you from making the mistake of your young life. I grew up with Andrew, for God’s sake, he’s a year older than I am!”

“I like older men,” she shot back. “And he’s just thirty-six, hardly a candidate for a nursing home!”

She stopped herself abruptly. Why should she justify her feelings for Andy to McCabe, for heaven’s sake? “What do you think you are, McCabe, the Spanish Inquisition? You don’t have any right to burst in here and start grilling me...and what are you doing here, anyway?”

“Don’t get hysterical,” he said soothingly. “I’m here to help you sort yourself out, that’s all. Just until I recuperate.”

“I don’t need help, and why do you have to recuperate here?”

“Because my mother left the country, servants and all, when she realized I was on my way back,” he said nonchalantly. “I let the lease on my apartment expire and the only quarters I have at the moment are in Central America.” His eyebrows arched. “You wouldn’t want me to go back there to heal?”

She averted her eyes before he could read the very real fear in them. “Don’t be absurd,” she said.

“Then ‘here’ was the only place left.”

“You could stay at Katy Maude’s,” she offered. “She has plenty of bedrooms—”

“All upstairs,” he reminded Wynn. “And before you think of it, the love seat she had the last time I came home was two feet shorter than I am. You do remember that I’m six-foot-three?”

How could she forget, when he towered over everybody? “Ed’s sofa is plenty long,” she grumbled.

“His brother-in-law is visiting him next week.”

She moved closer to the chair, her arms folded across her chest, her eyes narrowing suspiciously. “Odd that he didn’t mention that when he told me you were here.”

“It’s press day,” he observed. “He’s out of his mind. Probably cursing you already. Surely you can’t be spared right now?”

“I’m on my lunch hour,” she began.

“Great. I’m starved. How about a sandwich or two?”

“Now, just a minute, McCabe,” she said forcibly. “We haven’t decided where you’re staying yet, much less—”

“I didn’t have any breakfast,” he sighed, laying a big hand on his flat stomach. “Hardly any supper last night. The press hounded me to death at the airport—” he peeked up to see how she was reacting “—and I was too tired to go out.”

She felt herself weakening and cursed her own soft heart. “Well, there’s some ham in the fridge, and I bought potato chips yesterday.”

“Ham’s fine,” he agreed quickly. “Thick, mind, and with lots of mustard. Got some coffee?”

She threw up her hands. “I can’t argue with you!”

“You never could, and win,” he reminded her. He moved and winced, and his face went oddly pale.

She looked at the big leg resting on the hassock. Ed had said something about a torn ligament, but the shape of a thick bandage was outlined against one powerful thigh under the khaki fabric. A bandage.

Her eyes went slowly back up to his. “That’s no torn ligament,” she said hesitantly.

His shaggy head leaned back. “Hard to fool another journalist, isn’t it, Wynn? You’re right. I didn’t pull a ligament. You know how the press can make mistakes.”

Her own face paled. “You’ve been shot.”

He nodded. “Bingo.”

She could feel her heart going wild, her knees threatening to buckle. It was an odd way to react. She drew in a slow breath.

“You were with those journalists who were killed, weren’t you, McCabe?” she asked with quiet certainty.

His darkening eyes fell to his leg. “I’d just left them, in fact,” he said. “We were going to follow an informer to a meeting with a high-level government official. Very hush-hush. It blew up in our faces. I got away by the skin of my teeth and spent the night in a chicken house. I nearly bled to death before I was able to get back to town.”

Her heart was hurting now. No one had known what a close call he’d had. It was just dawning on her that he could have died. She felt oddly sick.

“How far did you walk?”

“A few miles. The bullets did some heavy damage, but I was flown to New York and treated by a very apt orthopedic surgeon. I’ll have a limp, but at least I didn’t lose the leg.”

She stared at him, memorizing every hard line of his face. It had been a compulsion, even years ago, to look at him. She enjoyed that even when she imagined she hated him. It was a effort to drag her eyes away.

“I’d better get lunch,” she said numbly.

“I’m all right, Wynn,” he said quietly, watching her, “if you’re concerned with the state of my health. There were times when I imagined you might not mind if I caught a bullet,” he added calculatingly.

She avoided his eyes. “I don’t want you to die. I never did.”

She walked into the kitchen and made the sandwiches automatically, wondering at her own horrified reaction to his wounds. He was in a dangerous business, she’d always known that, and why should it matter? But it did! Her eyes closed and she leaned heavily against the counter. Life without McCabe would be colorless. She had to know that he was somewhere in the world, alive.

With an effort, she loaded a tray with coffee and chips and the sandwiches and carried it back into the living room. McCabe was still sitting where she’d let him; his face was drawn, a little paler than before.

“You’re in pain,” she said suddenly.

He laughed mirthlessly. “Honey, I’ve hardly been out of it for the past week, and that’s God’s own truth.”

“Do you have anything to take?”

“Aspirin,” he said with a grin. “You know I don’t like drugs, Wynn.”

“You might make an exception in cases like this,” she burst out, sitting across from him on the sofa.

“I’m a tough old bird. My hide’s just about bullet-proof.”

She handed him the plate with his sandwiches and chips. “How long will it take for it to heal?”

“Another month or so,” he said with obvious distaste. “The bone has to knit back properly.”

She stared at his leg again. “Are you wearing a cast?”

“No. The bone’s not broken clean through. But it aches all the time, and I don’t walk well. There’s a lot of me for that bone to support.”

Her eyes ran up and down him quickly. “Yes, there is,” she agreed.

“I really do need a place to stay,” he said over his coffee. “It’s not easy for me to get around in this condition. Surely even in this little town, people will be able to understand that. I don’t care about gossip, but I imagine you do.”

“Yes,” she agreed, glancing at him warily. “Andy’s going to go right through the ceiling, regardless.”

“Let me handle Andy,” he said generously. “Man to man, you know.”

That didn’t quite ring true, but perhaps she’d misjudged McCabe. She hoped so.

“Won’t you be bored to death staying in Redvale for a whole month?” she asked as she finished her sandwich and washed it down with coffee.

“If I didn’t have anything to do, I might,” he agreed. “I don’t have another book due for six months, and I was between assignments, so I took a job here in town.”

She stared at him with dawning horror. “What job?”

“Didn’t Ed tell you?” he asked pleasantly. “I’m going to edit the paper for the next month while he goes on vacation.”

Chapter Three

Wynn felt as if she’d been kicked in the stomach. She simply stared at him.

“Edit the paper?” she echoed. “Ed’s paper? My paper? You’ll be my boss?”

“You got it,” he said pleasantly.

“I quit.”

“Now, Wynn...”

“Don’t you ‘now Wynn’ me!” she said, setting down her coffee cup with a loud crack. “I can’t live with you and work with you for a solid month and stay sane!”

He lit a cigarette and watched her with an odd, quiet smile. “What’s the matter, honey, afraid you won’t be able to resist seducing me?”

She went scarlet and started to jump to her feet. Unfortunately, in the process, her knee hit the tray and knocked it off onto the floor. Bits of ham and bread floated in a puddle of coffee at McCabe’s feet while he threw back his head and laughed uproariously.

Her slender hands clenched at her hips and she counted to ten twice.

Before she could think up something bad enough, insulting enough, to say to him, the phone rang. Gritting her teeth, she grabbed up the receiver.

“Hello!” she said shortly.

There was a hesitation and a cough. “Uh, Wynona?”

“Andy!” she gasped, glaring at McCabe. Her hand twisted the cord nervously. “Oh, hi, Andy, how are you?”

“Ed said you’d gone home for lunch,” her fiancé said suspiciously. “He said you had a visitor. A guest,” he emphasized. “Wynona, have you gone crazy? McCabe may be your guardian, and an older man, but he’s a bachelor and we’re not married and you simply can’t let him stay there!”

His thin voice had gotten higher and wilder by the second, until he was all but shouting.

“Now, Andy,” she said soothingly, trying to ignore McCabe’s smug grin, “you know how it is. McCabe’s been injured and he’s not even able to walk!”

“Then how is he going to get to bed? Are you going to carry him back and forth!”

She started laughing. She couldn’t help it. First McCabe appeared out of the blue with bullet wounds, and now Andy was hysterical....

“Wynona?” Andy murmured.

“Have you got a wheelbarrow I could borrow?” she asked through tears.

“A what? Oh, I see.” He chuckled politely, and then sighed. “I’m jumping to conclusions, of course. But I remember McCabe. Can I help feeling threatened?”

“I’m engaged to you,” she reminded him, furious at McCabe’s open eavesdropping.

“Yes, I know,” Andy said, softening audibly. “It just hit me sideways, that’s all.”

“McCabe is my guardian,” she said, glaring at McCabe, who was watching her with a wicked smile. She looked away quickly. “Anyway, he’s old.”

“He’s a year younger than I am,” Andy murmured.

“I didn’t mean that!” Wynn twisted the telephone cord viciously. “It’s press day, Andy, I’m just not thinking straight.”

“It’s just another Tuesday,” her fiancé said shortly. “I don’t know why you make such a big thing about Tuesdays.”

“You’d have to be a reporter to understand, I guess,” she said generously. “Look...”

“Invite him to supper,” McCabe said sotto voce.

She gaped at him. “It’s Tuesday!” she burst out.

“I heard you the first time!” Andy shouted.

“I’ll cook,” McCabe said simultaneously.

“Don’t be absurd, you can’t even stand up!” she threw back at him.

“Are you implying that I’m drunk?” Andy asked, aghast.

“Not you—McCabe, McCabe!” Wynn ground out.

“McCabe’s drinking, and you’re there alone with him?” Andy gasped.

Wynn held out the receiver and cocked her head at it threateningly.

“Don’t do it,” McCabe advised. “I can manage to get something together before you come home. I’ll sit down and cook.”

She eyed him warily. The old McCabe was arrogant and commanding, not pleasant and cooperative, and she was immediately suspicious. “You wouldn’t mind?”

“No,” he said. “I’d love to see Andy again. Invite him over. About six.”

She felt as if she were walking obligingly into a shark’s mouth, but it had been years since she and McCabe had spent any time together. Perhaps his experiences had changed him. Mellowed him. She was even in a forgiving mood. Didn’t he seem different?

“Andy, come to supper at six,” she said, holding the receiver to her ear.

“Supper?” Andy brightened. “Just the two of us?”

“McCabe’s here, too,” she observed.

“We’ll just ignore him,” Andy said. There was a pause. “He isn’t going to stay for the wedding, to give you away?”

“If he does, we’ll let him be bridesmaid,” Wynn said darkly.

Andy giggled. “That’s cute, McCabe in ruffled satin...”

She started laughing and had to say a quick good-bye and hang up before she really got hysterical.

“Bridesmaid?” McCabe murmured with pursed lips. “Remember that old saying, Wynn—I don’t get mad, I get even?”

“I can outrun you,” she reminded him.

“Yes. But I’m patient,” he returned. His eyes narrowed and ran over her slender body in a way that made her frankly nervous. “I can wait.”

“I’ve got to get back to work. After supper,” she continued, moving toward the kitchen to get a towel to mop up the spill, “we’ll discuss your new lodgings.”

“Suits me,” he said obligingly.

That really worried her. McCabe never obliged anybody.

She went back to work with a frown between her wide-spaced green eyes. It deepened when she saw Ed.

“You didn’t mention that you were taking a vacation,” she said with grinning ferocity. “Or that your brother-in-law was coming to stay in your house. Or that—”

“Have a heart, could you say no to McCabe?” he groaned.

“Yes! I’ve spent the past seven years doing just that!”

“He’s like a son to me,” he said, looking hunted as he paused in the act of pasting up the last page of the paper, the front page, with a strip of waxed copy in one hand and a pair of scissors in the other. “He’s been shot to pieces, Wynn.”

She straightened wearily and the fight left her. “Yes, he told me.”

“I just hope he’ll give himself time enough to heal completely before he goes back down there.”

She felt the blood leaving her face. “You can’t mean he’s talking about going back?”

He shrugged. “You know McCabe. He loves it, danger and all. It’s been his life for too many years.”

“He could stay home and write books!” she threw back. “He’s a best-selling author, why does he need to risk his life for stories someone else could get?”

“Ask him.” He cut off another column of copy and pasted it around another story in neat pieces, just right for a two-column headline. “I think it’s the lack of an anchor, Wynn. He doesn’t have anyplace that he feels wanted or needed, except at work.”

“His mother loves him.”

“Of course she does, but she’s spent her life avoiding his father...and now, McCabe. She’s independent, she doesn’t need him. And who else is there?” he added.

She stared blankly at the half-made-up page. “At his age, there must be a woman or two.”

“No.”

She looked up. “How do you know so much about him?”

“I helped raise him, remember? He used to hang around my house as much as he stayed at his own. We’ve kept in touch all this time.” He glanced at her over his glasses and smiled. “I always wanted to be a war correspondent, you know. But I had a family, and I didn’t feel I had the right to take the risk. McCabe’s shied away from permanent relationships for much the same reason, I imagine. Rough thing for a woman to take, having her man on the firing line most of their married lives.”

Wynn had thought of that, but she wasn’t admitting it. Neither was she admitting how many newscasts she’d chewed her fingernails over before she stopped watching them altogether, or the kind of worrying she’d done about McCabe over the years. He shouldn’t matter, of course, he was only her guardian.

“Wynn, are you listening?” Ed asked shortly. “I said, I’ve still got a hole on the front page. Go call the fire chief and see if they’ve had any fires overnight, okay?”

“Sure thing, Ed.”

The hectic pace kept her from thinking about McCabe any more until quitting time. The phones rang off the hook, people walked in and out, there were additions and deletions and changes in ads and copy until Wynn swore she’d walk out the door and never come back. She threatened that every Tuesday. So did Ed. So did Judy. So did Kelly and Jess. It was a standing joke, but nobody laughed at it on Tuesday.

At five o’clock, the pages were pasted up and Kelly was driving them the thirty miles to the printer. The wreck Kelly had covered earlier took up a fourth of the front page. It had been a tragic one involving people from out of town, two carloads of them. Wynn was sad but involuntarily relieved that no one from Redvale had fallen victim. It was harder to do obituaries when you knew the victims.

She dragged herself in the door at a few minutes past five, weary and disheveled and feeling as if her feet were about to fall off from all the standing she’d done. She already missed the air-conditioning at the office. She didn’t have it at home, and it was unseasonably hot.

“Is that you, Wynn?” McCabe called from the kitchen.

“It’s me.” She’d forgotten for an instant that he was here, and her heart jumped at the sound of his deep voice. She tossed aside her purse and paused to take off her suede boots before she padded in her hose onto the tiled kitchen floor.

He glanced up from the counter where he was perched on a stool, making a chef’s salad.

“Long day?” he asked, glancing down at her feet.

“You ought to know,” she returned. “Can I help?”

“Make a dressing, if you don’t have a prepared one.”

“What’s the main course?” she asked, digging out mayonnaise and catsup and pickles.

“Beef bourguignon. Do you like it?”

She stared at him. “You didn’t mention that you did gourmet dishes.”

“You didn’t ask.” He turned on the stool to study her. His shirt was open down the front, and she kept her eyes carefully averted. McCabe, stripped, was a devastating sight. She’d seen him that way at the pool, of course, wearing brief trunks that left his massive body all but bare. He was exquisitely male. All bronzed flesh and hard muscle with curling thick hair over most of it. Wynn didn’t like seeing him without a shirt. It disturbed her. Seeing Andy the same way didn’t, and that disturbed her, too.

“You look bothered, honey,” McCabe commented, flicking open another button, almost as if he knew!

She cleared her throat. “I need to change first, before I start this,” she said, leaving everything sitting on the counter while she escaped to her bedroom.

She closed the door and slumped back against it heavily. What was wrong with her, anyway? McCabe was the enemy. Unbuttoning his shirt wasn’t going to change that, for heaven’s sake! Was she an impressionable girl or a woman? She shouldered away from the door. A woman, of course!

Ten minutes later, she went back into the kitchen and McCabe stopped with a spoon in midair above the stew and just stared.

The dress was emerald-green jersey. It had spaghetti straps that tied around her neck and across her back, leaving it bare to the waist behind. It outlined her high breasts, her small waistline and the deep curve of her hips with loving detail, and clung softly to her long legs when she walked. With her long hair piled atop her head and little curls of it hanging around her neck and temples, she was a sight to draw men’s eyes.

“Do you wear dresses like that often?” McCabe asked, scowling.

“Of course I do,” she said softly, and turned away. “Are you through with supper? I’ll finish making the dressing.”

“Not in that dress you won’t,” he said curtly. He moved, leaning heavily on his stick, and was behind her before she knew it. One big warm hand caught her waist firmly and held her away from the counter. “It would be a crime to ruin it.”

Her body tingled wildly under his hard fingers, as if she’d waited all her life for him to touch it and bring it to life. She felt herself tremble and hoped he wouldn’t feel it.

“You...shouldn’t be standing,” she reminded him.

“You sound breathless,” he murmured, and she felt his warm breath in her hair, like a heavy sigh. His fingers moved experimentally to her hip and back up again, as if they were savoring the feel of her. She wanted to lean back against him and let them inch up, slowly....

She gasped and moved jerkily away from him. “I...I’ll get an apron,” she faltered. “Andy will probably be here any minute, he’s almost always early!”

McCabe didn’t say a word. He stood quietly by the counter, leaning against it and the cane, and watched her with darkening eyes that didn’t leave her for a second.

She glanced at him nervously as she fumbled with jars and bowls and spoons. “Say something, will you?” she laughed.

“What is there to say?” he asked softly.

She tried to speak, tried to find words to diffuse the tension between them, but instead she looked into his eyes and ached all the way down to her toes.

Before she could move, or run, the doorbell rang sharply and saved her the effort.

She turned and walked like a zombie to the front door and opened it.

Andy’s brown hair was rumpled, as if he’d been running his hands through it angrily, and his dark eyes were troubled. He stared down at Wynn, but didn’t really seem to see her at all.

“Hi,” he murmured. “Supper ready? I’m starved.”

She sighed and led him back toward the dining room. “Come and say hello to McCabe first,” she said.

Andy made an irritated sound. “Does he really cook?”

“Of course I do, Andy,” McCabe said from the kitchen doorway, leaning heavily on his cane. He’d done up his shirt and looked presentable again, the picture of the courteous host. Like a lion bleating, Wynn thought wickedly.

“Good to see you again, Andy,” he said. He extended his left hand, the right one being busy with the cane.

Andy automatically put his own hand out, but reluctantly. “Hi, McCabe,” he said coolly. His eyes ran up and down the bigger man. “Got shot, I hear.”

McCabe’s eyebrows went up. “Did you? I thought it was a torn ligament in the paper.”

Andy flushed and glared at Wynn. “You said...”

“No, I didn’t,” she said curtly. “Did you call Ed? You did, didn’t you? You couldn’t take my word—?”

“Now, children,” McCabe said smoothly, “suppose we dispense with the squabbling until after supper? Heated-over beef bourguignon is so tacky, don’t you think?”

Andy gaped at him. “Beef bourguignon?”

“In my humble way, I enjoy gourmet cooking,” the bigger man said with disgusting modesty, almost blushing. Wynn was ready to choke him. McCabe, sounding like a society leech...

But Andy was falling for it headfirst. He laughed easily and grinned at Wynn. She could read the thoughts in his mind, the sarcasm. Big-time war correspondent. Adventure novelist. He-man. And he makes beef bourguignon and uses words like “tacky.”

“Sit down and I’ll bring it in,” McCabe told them.

But Wynn was horrified at the thought. “You sit down,” she said coolly, glaring at him. “I don’t want stew all over my floors. How in the world do you expect to manage a tureen of that plus your cane?” She went into the kitchen, still muttering.

By the time she had everything organized and started carrying in the filled coffeepot and service, the heated rolls and beef bourguignon and salad, there was an odd silence in the dining room. McCabe was leaning back, smoking a cigarette, and Andy was looking...

“What’s wrong, Andy?” Wynn asked quickly.

He glanced at her and blushed. “Uh, nothing. Can I help?”

“No, I’ve only to bring the dressing.” She shot a glare at McCabe as she went to fetch it.

Supper was a quiet affair. She nibbled at her beef bourguignon—which was truly excellent, wine red and thick and full of melty bits of beef and vegetables and salad—and wondered why Andy was so quiet.

“We had a bad wreck today,” she mentioned, trying to break the cold silence. “Some out-of-state people—”

“For heaven’s sake, not while I’m eating!” Andy burst out, making a face at her.

McCabe’s eyebrows went up sharply. “Are you still squeamish, Andy?” he asked politely. “Yes, I seem to remember that you never enjoyed our biology class coming just before lunch.” He leaned back with his coffee in hand and pursed his lips. “The formaldehyde was nauseating, wasn’t it? And those dissections...”

Andy had turned green and was putting down his spoon. He grabbed his ice water and drank and drank.

“Stop that, you animal,” Wynn growled at McCabe. “How could you?”

“I like science,” he replied imperturbably, watching Andy. “Did I ever tell you about the food I had in South America when I was covering the conflict down there a few years back? I went deep into the Amazon with some soldiers and we camped with a primitive tribe in the jungle. We had snake and lizard and some kind of toasted bugs—’

“Excuse me,” Andy gasped, leaping to his feet with a napkin held tightly over his mouth. He ran toward the bathroom and slammed the door.

“McCabe!” Wynn burst out, banging the table with her hand.

He sipped his coffee. “If he can’t stand to hear about your work, what will you talk about when you’re married?” he asked politely. “Or do you plan to stick to conversation about textiles from now on?”

“You don’t understand—”

“I understand very well.” He held her eyes and frowned.

“What’s wrong?”

He leaned forward and turned her face toward his. “You’ve got a smudge, just here.” His big warm hand pressed against her cheek while his thumb ran roughly back and forth across her lips.

It was the most sensuous thing she’d ever experienced in her life, more sensuous than Andy’s most ardent kiss. Her lips parted helplessly as she looked into his darkening eyes, and his thumb crushed her upper lip and then her lower one. She felt her eyes narrowing helplessly, her breath coming wild and fast, her mouth parting, trembling, at the blatant seduction of his touch.

“Like it?” he breathed huskily, watching her mouth.

She caught his hand and started to pull it away, but he brought her palm up to his mouth and caressed it softly, tenderly, while his eyes held hers.

Oh, don’t, she pleaded silently. But she was going under, and her eyes went helplessly to his mouth and she wanted it with a shocking hunger.

“Come on,” he whispered, tantalizing her. “Come on, Wynn.”

She was actually leaning toward him across the scant inches that separated them when the sudden sharp click of the bathroom door opening sent her jerking back into her own chair.

Andy came back into the room looking pale and furious. He sat back down in his chair and took a long sip of his ice water.

“Feeling better?” McCabe asked pleasantly.

Andy glowered at him. “No thanks to you.”

“Reporters do bring the job home, Andy,” the taller man commented. “It’s pretty hard not to, in this business. You’ll find that there are going to be times when Wynn will need to tell you about things she’s seen, to save her sanity.”

Andy looked at him uncomprehendingly. “Wynn and I understand each other very well, thanks,” he said curtly. “She knows I’ll listen if she needs to talk.”

“Of course I do,” Wynn began placatingly, stilling her trembling hands in her lap.

Andy turned to speak to her and his eyes went homing to her swollen mouth, devoid of lipstick and looking as if it had been hotly and thoroughly kissed. His face flamed and he drew in a harsh breath.

Wynn put a hand to her mouth, as if she could cover up what McCabe’s thumb had done to it. “Andy, it wasn’t what you’re thinking,” she said shortly.

“Sure it wasn’t.” Andy stood up, almost knocking over his chair. “He’s only been here a day, for heaven’s sake!”

“I’m a fast worker,” McCabe said with a wicked smile. “And Wynn is a dish. Can you blame me? Especially when she’s so...responsive.”

Andy seemed to puff up. His face reddened and he gave Wynn a killing glance. He whirled and slammed out of the house. A minute later, the roar of his car filled the silence.

“You troublemaker,” Wynn accused hotly. “What was the point of that lie?”

“It wasn’t a lie,” he said calmly, lighting a cigarette. His eyes shot up and held hers. “You’d have let me kiss you.”

She shifted restlessly. “All right,” she admitted, “I probably would have. We go back a long way and I’m as curious about you as you seem to be about me. But I’m engaged to Andy, I’m wearing his ring. And what’s a kiss, these days, McCabe?”

“It depends on the people involved,” he said quietly. His eyes scanned her hot face. “You and I would make more of it than a meeting of mouths.”

She flushed and dropped her eyes to her empty coffee cup. “He’ll pout for three days before he even speaks to me again. That is, if he doesn’t break the engagement.”

“You’d be better off.”

“I don’t want to be an old maid,” she burst out, glaring at him. “It may suit Katy Maude, but it wouldn’t suit me. I don’t like being alone, living alone!”

“You aren’t,” he reminded her. “You’re living with me right now.”

“Not in the sense I mean.”

“Not yet,” he agreed, and it was a threat.

She stood up. “I’ll do the dishes.”

“Running?” he asked, studying her. “I won’t go away. And neither will the problem.”

“I’ll ignore you both,” she promised him. She gathered the dirty dishes, but as she started by him, to add his plate to the pile at the end of the table, he caught her around the waist and turned her, pressing his open mouth to her backbone.

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