Rawhide and Lace. Diana Palmer

       Chapter Three

      It was all Ty could do to keep silent as he and Erin rode to the airport. There were so many things he wanted to say to her, to explain, to discuss. He wanted to apologize, but that was impossible for him. Odd, he thought, how much heartache pride had caused him over the years. He’d never learned to bend. His father had taught him that a man never could, and still call himself a man.

      He lit a cigarette and smoked it silently, only half aware of Erin’s quiet scrutiny as he weaved easily through the frantic city traffic. His nerve never wavered. Texas or New York, he was at home in a car even in the roughest traffic.

      “Nothing bothers you, does it?” she asked carelessly.

      “Don’t you believe it,” he replied. He glanced at her, his eyes steady and curious as he waited at a traffic light.

      “Six months,” she murmured, her voice as devoid of feeling as the green eyes that seemed to look right through him. “So much can happen in just six months.”

      Ty averted his eyes. “Yes.” He studied the traffic light intently. It was easier than seeing that closed, unfeeling look on her face, and knowing that he was responsible for it. Once, she’d have run toward him laughing….

      She turned the cane in her hands, feeling its coolness. Ty seemed different somehow. Less arrogant, less callous. Perhaps his brother’s death had caused that change, although he and Bruce had never been close. She wondered if he blamed her for his estrangement from Bruce, if he knew how insanely jealous Bruce had been of her, and without any cause at all.

      He watched her toying with the cane as he pulled back into the flow of traffic and crossed the bridge that would take them to the airport. “How long will you have to use that thing?” he asked conversationally.

      “I don’t know.” She did know. They’d told her. If she didn’t do the exercises religiously, she’d be using it for the rest of her life. But what did that matter now? She could never go back to modeling. And nothing else seemed to be worth the effort.

      “I didn’t expect you to agree to the stipulation in Bruce’s will,” he said suddenly.

      “No, I don’t imagine you did.” She glared at him. “What’s the matter, cattle baron, did you expect that I’d sit on my pride and let your whole crew lose their jobs on my account?”

      So that was why. It had nothing to do with any remaining feeling for him; it was to help someone less fortunate. He should have known.

      “You look surprised,” she observed.

      “Not really.” He pulled into the rental car lot at the airport and stopped the car, then turned toward her. “You were always generous—” his silver eyes held hers relentlessly “—in every way.”

      Her face colored, and she jerked her eyes away. She couldn’t bear to remember…that!

      “It wasn’t an insult,” he said quickly. “Don’t…don’t make it personal.”

      She laughed through stinging tears, a young animal at bay, glaring at him from the corner of her seat. “Personal! Don’t make it personal? Look at me, damn you!” she cried.

      His hand reached toward her, or seemed to, and suddenly retracted, along with any show of emotion that might have softened the hard lines of his face. He stared at his smoking cigarette, took a last draw with damnably steady fingers, and put it out carefully in the ashtray.

      “I’ve been looking,” he said quietly, lifting his eyes. “Every second since I’ve been with you. Would you like to know what I see?”

      “How about a burned-out shell; does that cover it?” she said defiantly.

      “You’ve given up, haven’t you?” he said. “You’ve stopped living, you’ve stopped working, you’ve stopped caring.”

      “I have a right!”

      “You have every right,” he agreed shortly. “I’d be the first to agree with that. But for God’s sake, woman, look what you’re doing to yourself! Do you want to end up a cripple?”

      “I am a cripple!”

      “Only in your mind,” he replied, his voice deliberately sharp. “You’ve convinced yourself that your life is over; that you can come down to Staghorn and draw into some kind of shell and just exist while everyone else prospers. But you’re wrong, lady. Because that’s something you’ll never do. I’m going to make you start living again. You’re going to pick up the pieces and start over. I’ll see to it.”

      “Like hell you will, Tyson Almighty Wade!”

      “If you come back with me, you can count on it,” he replied. He put a long hard arm over the back of the seat, and his silver eyes glittered at her, challenging, taunting. “Come on, Erin. Tell me to take my money and go to hell. Tell me to give Ward Jessup your half of the spread and put all those workers on unemployment.”

      She wanted to. Oh, how she wanted to! But it was more than her conscience could bear. She glared at him out of a white face in its frame of soft dark hair, her green eyes alive now, burning in anger. “I hate you!” she cried.

      “I know,” he replied. His eyes narrowed. “I don’t blame you for that. You have the right. I’d never have asked you to come back.”

      “No, not you.” She smiled coldly. “But if I hadn’t, you’d probably have come rushing up here to kidnap me and take me back by force.”

      He shook his head. “Not now. Not after what’s happened.” He let his eyes wander slowly over her frail body.

      She eyed him warily. “Mr. Johnson told you about the wreck, I suppose?”

      He looked down at the cane. “I read your last letter to Bruce,” he said in a voice that was deep and quiet…and frankly haunted.

      Her spirit broke at his tone. She could take anything from him except tenderness. Guilt. His. Hers. Bruce’s. And none of it any use. A tortured sob burst from her throat. She tried to stifle it but couldn’t.

      His eyes lifted, holding hers. “I wish I could tell you how I felt when I knew,” he said hesitantly. “The things I said to you that day…”

      She swallowed, slowly gaining control of herself. “You…you meant them,” she replied. “Reliving them isn’t going to do any good now. You saved Bruce from me. That’s all you cared about.”

      “No!” he said huskily. “No, that’s wrong.”

      He started to reach toward her, and she backed away until the door stopped her.

      “Don’t you touch me,” she said in a high, strangled voice. “Don’t you ever touch me again. If you do, I’ll walk out the door, and you and your outfit can all go to hell!”

      His face closed up. It was the first time he’d ever reached out toward her, and her rejection hurt. But he struggled against familiar feelings of wounded pride, struggled to understand things from her side. He’d hurt her brutally. It was going to take time, a lot of it, before she’d begin to trust him. Well, he had time. Right now, that and the hope that she might someday stop hating him were all he had.

      “Okay,” he said, his voice steady, almost tender. “Want something to eat before we get on the plane?”

      She shifted restlessly, staring at him, eyes huge in her thin face. “I…didn’t have lunch,” she faltered.

      “We’ll get a sandwich, then.” He got out and went around to open her door. But he didn’t offer to help her. He watched her put the cane down and lean on it heavily. “How