The Rancher and the Runaway Bride and The Bluest Eyes in Texas Part 10

"Do you mean to say that you and Philips-"

"My relations.h.i.+p with Adam is no concern of yours."

Jesse's dark eyes narrowed speculatively. His little sister glowed from the inside out. He was mentally adding one and one-and getting three. "Honey said she met you in the parking lot of Doc Kowalski's office, but she didn't say what you were doing there. What were you doing there, Tate? Are you sick?"

Jesse was just fis.h.i.+ng, Tate thought. He couldn't know anything for sure. But even a blind pig will find an acorn once in a while. She had to do something to distract him.

"Honey's a really beautiful woman, Jesse. How did you meet her?"

"Don't change the subject, Tate."

Jesse had just grabbed Tate by the arm when Adam stepped into the living room from the kitchen. "I thought I heard voices in here." Adam spied Jesse's hold on Tate, and his body tensed. He welcomed the long overdue confrontation with Tate's brother. "h.e.l.lo, Jesse. Would you mind telling me what's going on?"

"I'm taking my sister home," Jesse said.

Adam searched Tate's face, looking deep into her hazel eyes. "Is that what you want?"

"I want to stay here."

"You heard her, Jesse," Adam said in a steely voice. "Let her go."

"You b.a.s.t.a.r.d! It'll be a cold day in h.e.l.l before I leave my sister in your clutches."

Adam took a step forward, eyes flas.h.i.+ng, teeth bared, fists clenched.

"Stop it! Both of you!" Tate yanked herself free from Jesse's grasp, but remained between the two men, a human barrier to the violence that threatened to erupt at any moment.

"Get out of the way, Tate," Jesse said.

"Do as he says," Adam ordered.

Tate put a firm, flat palm on each man's chest to keep them apart. "I said stop it, and I meant it!"

"I'm taking you home, Tate," Jesse said. But his words and the challenge were meant for Adam.

"If Tate wants to stay, she stays!" Adam retorted, accepting the summons to battle.

Tate might as well not have been there for as much attention either man paid to her. She was merely the prize to be won. They were intent only on the conflict to come.

There was a loud knocking at the door, but before any of them could move, it opened and Honey stepped inside. "Thank goodness I got here in time!"

Honey stepped between the two men who fell back in deference to her pregnant state. "What are you two doing to this poor girl?" She slipped a comforting arm around Tate's shoulder. "Are you all right, Tate?"

"I'm fine," Tate said. "But these two idiots are about to start pounding on each other!"

"He's got it coming!" Jesse growled. "What kind of lowdown hyena seduces an innocent child!"

"Jesse!" Tate cried, mortified as much by his use of the term child as by his accusation. Jesse might still remember her as a child, but she was a woman now.

Adam's face had bleached white. "You're way off base, Whitelaw," he snarled.

"Can you say you aren't sleeping with her?" Jesse demanded.

"That's none of your d.a.m.n business!" Adam snapped back.

Honey stepped back a pace, taking Tate with her, beyond the range of the animosity radiating from the two powerful men.

Tate turned to plead peace with her brother. "I love Adam," she said.

"But I'll bet he hasn't said he loves you," Jesse retorted in a mocking voice.

Tate lowered her eyes and bit her lip.

"I thought not!" he said triumphantly.

Tate's chin lifted and her eyes flashed defiance. "I won't leave him!"

"He's just using you to get back at me," Jesse said. "The reason I know he can't love you, is because I stole the woman he wanted right out from under his nose."

"What?" Confused, Tate looked from her brother to her lover. Adam's eyes were dark with pain and regret.

Tate whirled her head to look at Honey. The pregnant woman's arms were folded protectively around her unborn child. Her cheeks flamed. She slowly lifted her lids and allowed Tate to see the guilt in her lovely cornflower-blue eyes.

It couldn't be true! Adam wouldn't have done something so heinous as to seduce her to get back at her brother for stealing the woman he loved. But none of the three parties involved was denying it.

Her eyes sought out Adam's face again, looking for some shred of hope that her brother was lying. "Adam?"

Adam's stony features spoke volumes even though he remained mute.

"Oh, G.o.d," Tate breathed. "This can't be happening to me!"

Jesse lashed out with his fist at the man who had caused his sister so much pain. Adam instinctively stepped back and Jesse's fist swung through empty air. Before Jesse could swing the other fist, Honey had thrown herself in front of her husband.

"Please don't fight! Please, Jesse!"

It was a tribute to how much Jesse loved his wife that he held himself in check. He circled his wife's shoulder with one hand and held out the other to Tate.

"Are you coming?" he asked.

"I...I'm staying." At least until she had a chance to talk with Adam in private and hear his side of this unbelievable story. Then she would decide whether to tell him that she was going to have his child.

Honey saw that her husband was ready to argue further and intervened. "She's a grown woman, Jesse. She has to make her own choices."

"Dammit, this is the wrong one!" Jesse snarled.

"But it is my choice," Tate said in a quiet voice.

Honey slipped her arm around her husband's waist. "Let's go home, Jesse."

"I'm leaving," Jesse said. "But I'll be back with Faron and Garth." He yanked open the door, urged his wife out of the house and quickly followed, slamming the door after him.

Tate felt her stomach fall to her feet. She had been surprised to see Adam stand up to her brother-overjoyed, in fact. But if all three of the Whitelaw brothers showed up, there was no way Adam would be able to endure against them. Her brothers would haul her back home before she had time to say yeah, boo, or "I'm pregnant."

"You might as well say goodbye to me now," she said glumly. "When Faron and Garth find out where I am they'll be coming for me."

"No one-your brothers included-is going to take you from the Lazy S if you don't want to go," Adam said in a hard voice.

"Does that mean you want me to stay?"

Adam nodded curtly.

She didn't want to ask, but she had to. "Is it true, what my brother said? Did you love Honey?"

That same curt nod in response.

Tate felt the constriction in her chest tighten. "Would you have married her if Jesse hadn't come along?"

Adam shoved a hand through his hair in agitation. "I don't know. I wanted to marry her. I'm not so sure she was as anxious to marry me. I asked her. She never said yes."

That was small comfort to Tate, who was appalled to hear how close Adam had come to marrying her brother's wife.

"Is that why you can't love me?" Tate asked. "Because you're still in love with her?"

The tortured look of pain on Adam's face left Tate feeling certain she had hit upon the truth. But she didn't despair. In fact, she felt a great deal of hope. Adam must realize that he could never have Honey Whitelaw now. Time was the best doctor for a wound of the heart. And time was on her side.

She very carefully did not bring up the subject of Jesse's accusation that Adam had made love to her to get revenge on her brother. In her heart she knew Adam would never use her like that. He might not be able to say he loved her-yet-but she was certain that one day he would.

"I need a hug," Tate said.

Adam opened his arms and Tate stepped into them. She snuggled against him, letting the love she felt flow over them both. But his body remained stiff and unyielding.

"Adam, I'm..." The word pregnant wouldn't come out.

"What is it, Tate?"

His voice sounded harsh in her ear, his tone still as curt as the abrupt nods with which he had acknowledged his love for another woman. Maybe Tate would just wait a little while before she told him she was carrying his child.

"I'm glad you want me to stay," she said.

He hugged her harder, until his hold was almost painful. Tate felt tears pool in the corners of her eyes. She blamed the phenomenon now on the heightened emotions caused by her pregnancy.

But the devil on her shoulder forced her to admit that unsettling seeds of doubt had been planted concerning whether everything would turn out happily ever after.

Chapter 9.

TATE SPENT THE NIGHT in Adam's arms. He couldn't have been more comforting. But for the first time since they had begun sleeping together, they didn't make love.

When they met across the kitchen table the next morning, an awkwardness existed between them that had not been there in the past.

"You must eat more, senorita," Maria urged. "You will not make it through the day on so little."

"I'm not hungry," Tate said. Actually, she had already snuck in earlier and had a light breakfast to stave off the first symptoms of morning sickness. Under Maria's stern eye, she dutifully applied herself to the bowl of oatmeal in front of her.

Tate's concentration was so complete that she paid no attention to the subsequent conversation Maria conducted with Adam in Spanish.

"The senorita has been crying," Maria said.

Adam glanced at Tate's red-rimmed eyes. "Her brother came to visit yesterday, the one she hasn't seen since she was a child."

"This brother made her cry?"

"He wanted her to go away with him."

"Ah. But you did not let her go."

"She chose to stay," Adam corrected.

"Then why was she crying?" Maria asked.

A muscle worked in Adam's jaw. At last he answered, "Because she's afraid I don't love her."

"Stupid man! Why don't you tell her so and put the smile back on her face?"

Adam sighed disgustedly. "I don't think she'll believe me now."

Maria shook her head and clucked her tongue. "I am going to the store to buy groceries. I will not be coming back for two-no, three hours. Tell her you love her."

Adam's lips curled sardonically. "All right, Maria. I'll give it a try."

Tate had been making shapes with her oatmeal and had only eaten about three bites when Maria whisked the bowl out from in front of her.

"I need to clear the table so I can go shopping," Maria said. She refilled Tate's coffee cup. "You sit here and enjoy another cup of coffee."

She refilled Adam's cup as well and, giving him a suggestive look, said, "You keep the senorita company."

Maria took off her ap.r.o.n, picked up her purse and left by the kitchen door a few moments later.

When she was gone, the silence seemed oppressive. Finally Adam said, "What are your plans for today?"

"I guess I'll input some more information on the computer. What about you?"