McKettrick's Choice - Linda Lael Miller [62]
Something flickered in his eyes—humor, perhaps—and Lorelei yearned to slap him again, with even more force than she had after he kissed her. He gave an insolent, barely perceptible shrug. “Suit yourself,” he said, and turned away.
At his orders, the cowboys mounted up.
John Cavanagh hoisted Sorrowful into the back of the wagon, and the dog lay down to sleep. Lucky creature.
Lorelei’s thigh muscles screamed in protest as she hauled herself back into the saddle. Once again, she wanted to weep, but she didn’t. She wouldn’t.
Rafe rode alongside her as they crossed the stream, holding Seesaw’s bridle with a firm hand. Lorelei’s boots filled with water, and she was wet to her hips. She was terrified, remembering her near-drowning the day before, and bit down hard on the inside of her lip to keep from crying out.
Once they’d gained the other side, Rafe left her on her own and spurred his horse to catch up with Holt. The younger man said something, gesturing angrily, and Holt shook his head.
Lorelei’s body hurt so badly that she retreated into a corner of her mind, wondering how Raul and Angelina were faring at Dr. Brown’s, and if her father’s temper might have cooled a little, now that he’d had some time to think.
“Lorelei?”
The voice startled her. She turned her head, and Melina’s face came into focus.
“Here,” Melina said gently, holding out something wrapped in a piece of cloth. “It’s bread and cheese. Mr. Cavanagh said to give it to you.”
Lorelei’s hand trembled a little as she accepted the food. Her stomach clenched, then churned. “Thank you,” she said, and tried not to shove it all into her mouth at once.
“You don’t have to prove anything to Holt, you know,” Melina persisted, in a quiet voice. “Why don’t you ride with Mr. Cavanagh?”
Lorelei looked with longing at the wagon, but she shook her head. “You’re the one who ought to take a rest,” she said, thinking of Melina’s pregnancy.
“I’ve been riding all my life. You’re pale, Lorelei,” Melina said, clearly worried. “You look as if you might pitch off that mule headfirst.”
Lorelei forced herself to nibble at the cheese, bit by bit. Never, in the whole of her life, had she ever been so ravenously hungry. “If I’m going to run a ranch,” she reasoned, feeling a frisson of oddly delicious alarm as Holt suddenly reined his horse around and started back toward the main party at a lope, “I’ve got to be strong.”
As Holt’s Appaloosa fell into an impatient stride beside her plodding mule, Melina drew back to ride with Tillie.
“You win,” Holt said, through his teeth. Rafe watched them from up the trail, glaring over one shoulder. “Whatever it is you’re trying to prove, you’ve proved it. Get into the wagon with John.”
Lorelei took a huge bite of bread, chewed it assiduously and swallowed before troubling herself to answer. “I’m quite all right,” she said, when she damn well felt like talking. “Thank you for your kind concern, however.”
Holt swept off his hat and whacked it once against his thigh. Dust flew. He jammed the Stetson back onto his head. “You are a trial to my patience,” he said, after a few moments of tight-jawed silence.
She smiled, though she wanted more than anything to lean forward and sob into Seesaw’s mane. “There’s always a bright side to every situation,” she observed.
“If I have to drag you off that mule and throw you into the wagon, Miss Fellows, I will.”
“I assure you, Mr. McKettrick, I will put up a fight if you make the attempt.”
“And I assure you, you little hellion, that if I make the attempt, I will succeed.”
“It appears we have reached an impasse,” Lorelei said, after finishing off the bread.
“It may appear that way from your end,” Holt retorted rigidly. “From mine, it looks like an easy win.”
“I despise you,” Lorelei informed him crisply.
“Good,” he replied. “I would not want my own sentiments to go unreciprocated.