Read Online Mountain Man by Diana Palmer - Free Book Online

hundreds, she was sure.But the thought of him in bed with another woman made her feel jealous and angry. And it showed.
    He stopped, fingering the reins in one lean hand and waited for her to look up at him. His dark eyes, shadowy under the wide brim of his hat, watched her. “I’ll qualify that,” he said after a long exchange of eyes. “I don’t think it will cramp my style. I haven’t been with a woman since it happened.”
    Her breath caught, but she didn’t look away. It was such an intimate thing to know about him, and she struggled to think of a suitable reply.
    “That wasn’t fair, was it?” he asked with a slow smile. “And I can’t tell you for the life of me why I wanted you to know that. But I did. We’d better get home. It’s getting dark.”
    She lowered her eyes to the trail that led back to the house. His revelation shouldn’t have mattered to her, but it did. She smiled softly to herself, unaware that he saw the smile, and understood it.
    He lit a cigarette and rode along beside her with a carefully hidden smug expression while he smoked it. “How about dinner tomorrow night? I’ll drive you into Butte.”
    She felt chills to the tips of her toes and a wild excitement that was new, like the sudden tenderness between herself and Winthrop. “If Gerald doesn’t need me, I’d love to,” she said.
    He hesitated. He looked down at her curiously, but he didn’t speak. “Okay.”
    She wondered about the reason for his withdrawnexpression and the odd silence the rest of the way to the house. That was good, because it kept her from thinking about the way he’d kissed her. She’d never felt more threatened in her life, and the worst of it was that she wasn’t even afraid of what might happen between them.
    He glanced at her just once, shocked by the surge of jealousy he felt at her remark about Gerald. It was that, too. Jealousy. He was afraid that there was something between this woman and his brother, and his own sense of honor and family wouldn’t allow him to trespass on Gerald’s territory. He wanted her to be heart-whole. He wanted that desperately. Could she have kissed him that way and still belong to Gerald? Surely not!
    He pulled his emotions up short. It wouldn’t do to give in to this unexpected yen for her. He was playing with fire, and God forbid he should get burned a second time.
    Nicole, unaware of his thoughts, was having some difficulties of her own trying to figure out his taciturn somberness after the new and delicate camaraderie between them. She guessed, rightly, that he was holding back out of apprehension, and she even understood. But she didn’t want him to leave her alone. She was beginning to love him, and it was only when she admitted it that she realized how desperately she wanted him.

CHAPTER FOUR

    Winthrop wasn’t at the supper table. Nicole didn’t really expect him to be, because it was early November now, and according to Gerald, the boss was getting his management program in gear for winter. That included culling cattle; weaning, preconditioning and delivering calves; making the initial selection of replacement cattle and starting them on feed; and all the veterinarian-related chores that that entailed. With the sheer immensity of the cow-calf operation, it was a full-time job for the boss to keep up with what was going on. Mike, the foreman, relieved Winthrop of a lot of headaches, but even with a firm of accountants to do the paperwork, Winthrop still had to make the big decisions. No wonder he was putting in so many latehours, Nicole thought after Gerald had explained his absence.
    Later that evening, Gerald had some correspondence for her. They went into the study to work. The room had Winthrop’s personality stamped all over it. There was a bear’s head on the wall, and burgundy leather furniture. The rugs were Indian, and the huge stone fireplace was made of native rock in comparable colors. The desk was oak, the chairs man-size and