To Have And To Hold. Diana Palmer

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СКАЧАТЬ been looking forward to this all day,” she told Cabbage. “Sorry, girl, but it just isn’t enough for both of us, and I’m not sharing it.”

      If cats could grimace, the Siamese did, and gave her what really looked like a I-hope-you-drop-it look.

      Madeline went out the back door without paying much attention to her immediate surroundings. The fragrance of blooming shrubs and flowers was everywhere. The sun was low on the horizon, the skies were streaked with red and gold. It was, she sighed, such a beautiful afternoon. Her mind was on that beauty and that luscious steak she was about to cook, and she didn’t think about company. That was why she hadn’t noticed the large black Doberman pinscher who was walking slightly behind her, sniffing the air and licking his lips.

      Seconds later, lying on her back in the grass, staring up into the sharp, white teeth that were grinding up her thick, red steak, it was impossible not to notice him anymore. He was standing on her stomach with his front paws, and he felt like two bags of wet cement.

      Her eyes like saucers, the fear making her mouth dry, she gasped up at him breathlessly, wondering if the steak was going to fill up such a large dog. She felt like a large slab of fresh meat, and it was all she could do to make noise come out of her throat.

      “N-nice puppy,” she choked in a loud whisper, as he wolfed down the last tidbit of steak and licked his jowls noisily. “Oh, nnnnice p-puppy! Wouldn’t you like to go run it off now, puppy, hmmmm?” she managed.

      “Puppy? My God, are you blind?” came a rough, decidedly masculine voice from above her head. “Suleiman, down, you dammed glutton! Down!”

      The note of no-nonsense authority in that deep, impatient voice moved the dog immediately. Even Madeline responded to it, getting to her feet with a speed and grace that were a credit to her ballet training.

      “Are you hurt?” the voice demanded in a tone that said she’d better not be.

      She looked into the face that went with the voice and felt as if she’d been slammed in the stomach with a mallet.

      She was five foot seven in her stockinged feet, but he still dwarfed her. His leonine face was hard and uncompromising and was topped by waving dark hair threaded with silver. He had to be close to forty, but there was not an ounce of flab on that athlete’s body. He was all muscle, from the powerful legs in dark slacks to the massive chest and shoulders encased in a spotless white shirt. He was watching her through slitted eyes, eyes so deep-set and narrow she couldn’t even tell their color.

      “Will you answer me, damn it, or are you dumb as well?” he growled.

      Her dark eyes flashed fire at him, and she pushed back her disheveled auburn hair with a hand that trembled despite her attempt at poise.

      “The only dumb thing I did,” she said in a voice like a straight razor, “was walk out that door unarmed! Tomorrow, so help me, I’ll bring a shotgun!”

      Something glittered in those narrow eyes, although his face was as hard as a stone wall. He studied her as if she were a new breed of animal, quietly, insolently.

      “Well, that’s the first time I’ve ever known Burgundy to pack a punch,” he said, his eyes on her hair that was dancing with fiery lights in the late-afternoon glow. “I’m not used to women who fight instead of flirt.”

      She didn’t doubt it. He was attractive, in a rugged, dark sort of way. But years older than men she was used to, and far too domineering.

      “Are you and your horse,” she indicated the dog, who was now sitting on his haunches at the man’s feet, “visiting around here?” she asked hotly.

      “In a sense,” he replied. “Bess is in Europe and I’m looking after the place until she gets back.

      “Bess?” The name didn’t ring any bells.

      “Bess,” he said impatiently, gesturing toward the high hedge.

      Oh, Lord, the blonde! A friend of his, no doubt, and judging by the wear on the clothes he had on, he needed some friends. The collar of the shirt was slightly frayed.

      Her eyes went to her own clothes. There were two massive pawprints on the once-white slacks. She glared at him. “So, you’re the caretaker? May I express the sincere wish that her absence is short-lived?” she asked testily. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to get out of these clothes and finish what I started—my supper! Not that I had more than the one steak, but maybe I can find a moldy piece of bacon in the refrigerator!”

      One dark eyebrow went up. “Is that a subtle hint that I owe you a meal?” he asked narrowly.

      “It isn’t subtle, and it isn’t a hint,” she fired back. “Your four-legged garbage can ate my steak!”

      “If you didn’t expect him to,” he said, “why did you leave the gate in the hedge open so that he could come through it?”

      Her eyes widened as if they meant to pop. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “You think I left it open deliberately?” she gasped.

      “Why not?” he returned, one big hand jammed in his pocket. His dark eyes studied her slender figure insolently, boldly with a practiced deliberation that made her blood riot in her veins. “But you’re wasting your time,” he added. “I like my women fuller around the….”

      “How dare you?” she choked furiously.

      He snapped his fingers, and the big dog immediately came to heel. “Kindly keep that gate closed in future and turn your attentions in some other direction. I’ve got all the women I need, and I don’t like such obvious tactics.”

      “You . . . you . . .” she sought wildly for just the right word. “. . . Yankee!” she finished desperately, her face flushed, her hair and eyes wild.

      “Me?” He shrugged. “I was raised in Miami.” He started toward the gate. “I don’t want to have to follow my dog over here again. Ever,” he added with a cold flick of a glare.

      Her fists clenched at her sides. “If you do,” she replied harshly, “wear armor!”

      But he wasn’t even listening; his broad back insolent and uncaring was turned to her. With a muffled cry of anger, she turned and marched back into the house, slamming the door behind her with all her might. Her only comfort was that her co-workers couldn’t see her. The unflappable Miss Blainn was definitely flapped.

CHAPTER 2

      The black Mercedes was gone the next morning, and it didn’t reappear until Monday, much to Madeline’s relief. It had been an eventless weekend, and a lonely one, and it had been marred by the unpleasantness of its beginning.

      As Madeline got into her own car to start out to work, she mentally cursed a fate that had made her only close neighbor such a barracuda. Why couldn’t he have been some nice old retired man with a….”

      She was backing out of the driveway as she was thinking, and the sudden metallic thud that brought her small car to СКАЧАТЬ