Forever in Love (Montana Brides) (11 page)

“I’m fine.”
 

His muffled voice made her feel sick to her stomach.
 

“What’s going on in here? I thought someone had been murdered.” Sean stood in the doorway, scratching his sleep-tousled head. He frowned at Nathan. “What’s wrong with your…” He looked at Amy. “I’ll get an icepack.”

Jenny walked across to Nathan, holding his hand gently in hers. “You’ll need a bandage. I’ll be back in a minute.”

Amy gazed around the room. She’d made a fool of herself. But more than that, she’d hurt Nathan. Her body shook. She could still feel his body pushing her into the mattress, his hand heavy against her face. Acid rose in her throat as she remembered another man, another night, terrifying her beyond anything she’d ever known.
 

Her gaze settled on Paul, standing quietly in the room. His kind eyes calmed her, reminded her that she was safe. All through her teenage years, Nathan’s dad had shown her that good men still existed. He had been gentle and patient, not making a big deal out of her odd behavior. But sometimes the past came back uninvited, leaving a deeper mark with each visit.
 

Sean returned with his mom.

Jenny sat beside Nathan and unrolled a bandage. “I’ll get your hand wrapped up and then you can put the icepack on it.”
 

“Take these.” Sean passed Nathan a couple of pills. He swallowed them whole without an ounce of water.

Amy tried to reach out, to apologize, but her body wouldn’t cooperate.
 

“It’s okay,” Sally sighed. “You got a fright when you woke up, that’s all. Are you alright now?”

She nodded. God knew she didn’t deserve to be okay. Not after nearly biting through Nathan’s hand or waking the whole house up with her screams.

“Do you want me to stay with you?” Sally pulled the blankets around her shoulders.
 

Too hot, much too hot. She shook her head.
 

Sally kissed her cheek. “I’ll leave the light on in the hallway. Goodnight.”

“All bandaged up.” Jenny stood up and gazed down at Nathan. “Do you want me to stay with Amy?”

He glanced over his shoulder. His blue eyes were deep and unreadable, searching for something in Amy’s face. She stared at him, hoping he wouldn’t leave.

“I’ll stay, mom. You go back to bed.” A tight smile pulled at his face. “One of us will yell if we need help.”

Jenny frowned. “Take care. Both of you. Come on Sean, no one’s been killed so you can go back to bed.”

“I can’t believe Matthew slept through all the action. That guy wouldn’t wake up if the house fell down around him,” he grumbled.

Paul gave his son a gentle push toward the door. “Out, and don’t even think about waking him up. Matthew wasn’t the only one to stay asleep. It looks as though Catherine inherited the same genes.”

Amy’s heart lurched in her chest. She’d forgotten about her sister. She tried to get out of bed to check on Catherine, but her body felt like it had forgotten how to move.
 

Nathan moved across the room. “Stay here, I’ll go and check on her.” He looked exhausted. Black rings wrapped themselves under both his eyes and blonde stubble shadowed his jaw. But the frown on his face worried her the most.

He disappeared out of Sally’s room, reappearing a few seconds later. “Catherine’s fine. She’s snoring like a seasoned pro.”

Amy nodded. “Thanks.”

“Is there anything you need?”

“W-water.”
 

He sat beside her, holding a cup up to her lips. “Take a small sip.”

Water dribbled down her chin. She lifted her hand, only Nathan managed to catch the water first. Her arm felt like a lead weight attached to a fishing line. “I’m sorry.”
 

He raised his eyebrows.
 

“Your hand.”

Nathan glanced down at the dressing. “It’s nothing.”

Silence filled the room, heavier and more suffocating than the blankets wrapped around her body.

 
“What the hell were you doing driving through a storm? You should have stayed at the Andersons not driven back to the ranch.” His voice sounded as rough as the weather pounding the windows.
 

“It wasn’t so bad when I left.” She took a deep breath, pushing at the blankets on top of her. Nathan pulled them back up. “I’m too hot.”

“You’re still cold. And I wouldn’t push those blankets down if I were you.”

“Why not?”

“You’re as naked as the day you were born, so unless you want to give mom something to yell about you’d better stay still.”

Amy concentrated on the feel of the sheets against her skin. She frowned. If she had her pajamas on she wouldn’t be able to feel the cotton. And she did, from the top of her shoulders to the tips of her toes. A new rush of heat prickled every square inch of her bare skin. She tried to glare at him, but it took too much effort. “I got a flat tire.” As if that would explain the extra layer of color shooting across her body.

“Why didn’t you call us? We would have come and got you.”

She tried to wiggle to the side of the bed where it was cooler. Nathan stuck his hand out, trapping her beside him.
 

“Cell phone was flat.” She closed her eyes. Nathan had looked at her like she was an idiot. A naked idiot. She knew she’d go to the top of the class on both counts. No one in Montana traveled anywhere on their own with a flat cell phone. Especially at this time of the year.

“Why didn’t you keep driving? A stuffed tire is better than being dead.”

“Don’t yell.” She meant to sound annoyed, but her voice squeaked like a rusty hinge. “I didn’t want to damage the truck.”

“You could have died and you were worried about a tire rim?”

She felt tears spill down her cheeks. She never cried. Never. A sharp pain lodged deep in her chest. She turned on her side, away from the anger vibrating through Nathan’s body. Taking a deep shuddering breath, she tried to release the misery choking her until she couldn’t breathe.
 

He didn’t need to tell her she could have died. She’d known that. As soon as she’d slid out of the truck she knew she had to get the tire changed fast. But she hadn’t counted on the freezing temperatures slowing down her muscles, making her fumble with the wheel brace and drop each nut on the icy road.
 

“I didn’t mean to yell,” Nathan sighed. “I seem to be doing too much of that these days.”
 
The mattress moved. Nathan stroked the side of her face, pushing a strand of hair off her cheek.

She froze. It was too soon, she couldn’t handle his gentle touch, didn’t know what to do with the panic racing through her body. Dear God, when would it end?

 
His hand left her body like he’d touched a hot skillet. “We were worried about you.”

She squeezed her eyes tight. Old memories twisted with the fear she’d felt as she stood shivering on the side of the icy road. She bit down on her lip, desperate to feel something other than self-pity. It didn’t work. Fresh tears slipped beneath her lashes.
 

“Hey, don’t cry. You’re okay.” Nathan reached forward, then stopped. “Sean was right. You sounded like someone was trying to murder you. What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“It must have been a pretty big nothing to make you scream like that.”

She clamped her lips tight. He didn’t need to know. She’d never told anyone apart from her mom, and she’d reacted the same way she did about every bad thing in their lives. She’d run, taking a scared kid halfway across the country from Alabama to Montana. Swapping one trailer park for another recycled set of problems.
 

“Who was he?”

“It doesn’t matter. It was a long time ago.”

“Sure didn’t feel like it twenty minutes ago. Look at me, Amy.”

She burrowed deeper into the bed. “It’s late. We can talk about it another time.” Try never, her mind screeched. He wouldn’t understand. It had taken her years to realize it hadn’t been her fault. That no one deserved to be mauled like an animal. Her mom’s boyfriend had touched her, done everything he could to push his drunk body into hers. But she’d fought back and hadn’t stopped fighting every single day of her life.
 

Her fingers gripped the sheet, winding the cotton tight around her hands. She swallowed her fear, anchoring herself in the room with Nathan and not in a cupboard sized bedroom in Alabama. Nathan’s weight shifted off the mattress.
 

A quiet sigh left her lips. “Could you leave the light on?”

“I’m not going anywhere.” He moved around the bed, sitting in front of her. “Did he rape you?”

Amy stared at the quilt lying on top of her. She couldn’t tell him, wouldn’t tell him about her past.

“Amy?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“I’m not leaving until you do.”
 

She waited, hoping he’d give up and walk away. She waited some more. He didn’t move. Amy focused on the sound of the rain hitting the windows, the wind howling over the house. Anything other than the steady gaze of the man sitting beside her.
 

She took a deep, shuddering breath. “I wasn’t raped.” Tears blurred her vision. He hadn’t needed to rape her to destroy a part of her that she’d never been able to fix.
 

 
“How old were you?”

She lifted her gaze. “Fourteen,” she whispered. He gasped and she looked away, too ashamed to deal with the shock written all over his face.
 

Nathan’s footsteps echoed on the wooden floor. He walked across to the window, yanking back the curtain. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Amy rubbed her face with the edge of the sheet. “I couldn’t tell anyone.” Her body felt like a coiled spring, ready to snap and break into a thousand pieces. She watched his still, silent body for a few more minutes. She closed her eyes, hoping exhaustion would pull her into a deep and dreamless sleep. She wasn’t so lucky.
 

The edge of the bed moved beneath Nathan’s weight. “Look at me. This is important.”

Nothing was important except keeping her sister safe. Nothing. And the sooner she remembered that, the better off everyone would be.
 

“You’re acting like a five-year-old.”

Her gaze shot to his face. “I am not.”

“Got your eyes open though, didn’t it?”

His lopsided grin tugged at her heart. She wished it didn’t. She wished she was the type of woman who could throw herself into the emotions swirling in his gaze. The comfort, the kindness, the acceptance. Everything that had always been there only she’d been too blind to see it. But learning to trust anyone had been almost impossible. And the reason she’d left Montana nine years ago.

“I’ll always be here for you, you know that don’t you?”

Deep down she wanted to believe him, to be able to ask for help. When she was eighteen she’d thought she could finally trust someone with her heart and her body. But then she’d overheard the latest parcel of gossip handed around town.
 

You didn’t give damaged goods to someone as a gift. She had nothing of value to offer Nathan. If she had trouble dealing with what had happened, she couldn’t expect someone else to wade into her messy life looking for emotional leftovers.

“Amy?”

“I’m okay. I just over-reacted.”

Nathan shook his head. “You’re too stubborn for your own good. If you’re not ready to deal with your past are you ready to get some more sleep?” He stood beside the bed, hands on his hips and braced for battle with someone he’d never know.

“Remember to leave the light on in the hallway.”

A grim frown settled on his face. “I’ll see you in the morning.” He turned the bedroom light off and left her room.

She gazed into the hallway, listening to the tread of Nathan’s feet on the stairs. The rain had stopped thundering down. The house slept in quiet silence, waiting for the mayhem of the morning.
 

She closed her eyes and drifted between the present and the past, not sure whether a six-foot cowboy from Montana could ever fit into her life. Or if she wanted him to.

CHAPTER FIVE

The first rays of morning light were breaking across the ranch when Nathan looked up from the computer. His dad stood in the doorway with a worried frown on his face.
 

“Did you get any sleep last night?”

Nathan glanced back at the spreadsheet in front of him. “Some.”

His dad didn’t bother telling him he made an awful liar. Before Nathan had stumbled into the shower he’d taken a look at his face. No amount of spit or polish would turn him into anything other than the wreck he saw reflected back in the bathroom mirror.

“I’m glad I caught you before you headed outside.” His dad’s gaze shifted to the desk. “Did you track down the email Trent sent us about the ranch vacation business they’re starting at the Triple L?”

“Not the email, but I saw him in Bozeman last week. They’ve nearly finished converting the old barn to bunkhouse accommodation. Gracie’s driving him insane with all her interior decorating ideas.”
 

At five-foot-one, Gracie hardly reached the buttons on her husband’s shirt, but she managed to keep the whole McKenzie house on their toes. Not to mention the mischief she got up to with Sally if half the tales he heard were true. “Dave and Ian have already said they’d open up their ranches for some of the activities they’ve got planned.”

“Do you think it’s something we could get involved in?”

“I don’t see why not. We had a group out here last year and it went well. Stan Lewis wants us to offer another ranch vacation in this year’s hospital auction.”

His dad nodded. “How’s the hand?”
 

“I’ll live.” Nathan sat back in his chair. It still hurt like hell. But that was nothing compared to the anger that almost swallowed him whole when he thought about the bastard that had attacked Amy. “Did you know?”

“About Amy?”

Nathan nodded.

“She never said anything, but we thought something had happened. We tried talking to her about it, but she wouldn’t listen. Her mom told us to mind our own business.”