The Cowboy’s Hidden Agenda

only imagine the unnatural stillness, as if he held himself, his temper, his emotions, even his life force, under a tight rein? The thought sent pulses of excitement through her, and her heart, already beating hard and fast, seemed to thunder in her ears.

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Her voice came with less force behind it than she might have wished. Trying to recapture her bravado, she shoved her feet belligerently toward him and waggled them back and forth.

He did glance at her cuffed ankles finally, then, taking his time, let his gaze travel upward from there until it reached her face. A shiver rippled over her skin, as if his fingers had made that slow journey rather than his eyes.

The tilt of his warlike eyebrows was sardonic. “I didn’t forget. I’m thinking maybe I ought to leave ’em on you, considering…” He nodded toward the saddlebags still draped across her thighs.

“What did you expect me to do?” she snapped. “Sit here and twiddle my thumbs?”

To her surprise he gave a soft grunt of laughter. “You’re pretty mouthy for a prisoner of war, you know that?”

Her laugh was a sarcastic echo of his. “Oh. A prisoner of war. Is that what I am? Okay, if that’s the case, I demand the rights to which I am entitled under the Geneva Convention. Food, medical attention, access to sanitary facilities, humane treatment…” She ticked them off, one by one, on her fingers.

Without comment, he handed her an insulated mug with a lid, set one aside for himself, then took the saddlebags from her lap and placed them just out of her reach. There was no expression whatsoever on his face as he picked up his wallet from the blanket beside her and held out his hand for the photograph.

She hesitated, curiously reluctant to give it up. Instead of doing so immediately, she turned it so he could see it and touched the image of the boy with the tip of her fore-finger. “This is you, isn’t it?” Without waiting for his reply, she moved her finger until it rested on the man’s dark shirt. “And this is your father?”

“That’s him.” Bronco’s voice, like his face, held no expression. Long straight lashes veiled his eyes as he took the photo from her and returned it to its place in the wallet, closed the wallet and slipped it back into the saddlebags.

That done, he took a key from his pocket and made an imperious gesture with it toward her ankles. “Let’s have ’em.”

She shifted her feet and, as he bent over them, felt her skin prickle with awareness-in anticipation of his touch.

But in less than an instant she felt the tension on her ankles released and he was already moving away from her, tucking the cuffs into his back pocket. She murmured, “Thank you,” with exaggerated courtesy as her pulse slowly returned to normal.

“What was his name?” This she managed in a casual conversational manner as she picked up her coffee.

Bronco was once again occupied with taking things out of the box and didn’t look up, so she was surprised when he answered, “John.” And after a moment added, “He was Big John, I was Johnny.”

Lauren acknowledged that with a vague sound while removing the mug’s screw-on lid. Then for a moment she said nothing at all but simply sat gazing at what she’d uncovered. It smelled like strong coffee, but it was the color of caramel. Could it be? It was. Cream. She took a cautious sip. And sugar.

The mug and its contents wavered and disappeared in a haze of unexpected tears. She wanted to hurl the whole thing at him. How dare he remember! How dare he be kind! And what was she supposed to do, thank him? She wanted to hate him. She had to hate him. Didn’t she? He was her kidnapper! What did it say about her if she began to like him?

Casting about in the emotional jungle that had taken the place of her brain, looking for any distraction, she came once more to the photograph. His mother. Ask him about his mother.

Before she could, Bronco’s voice penetrated the humming in her ears. She blinked him into focus and barked testily. “What?”

He was crouched before her, balanced on one knee with a first-aid kit in one hand, a foil-covered plate in the other. “I said, which do you want first, food or medical attention?”

Grudgingly, she took the plate and lifted an edge of the foil. A spicy aroma invaded her nostrils, making her mouth water and her stomach growl. She decided the wounds could wait.

It occurred to her that she was about to share a meal with a man, in a tent, while wearing nothing but underpants and a sweatshirt, and that normally her mental response to that would have been, so what? She was as covered as she’d ever be at a public pool or a trip to the beach. In college she’d lived for two semesters in a coed dorm where, according to her best recollection, she’d consumed large quantities of pizza in the company of members of the opposite sex while dressed pretty much as she was right now. Besides, Bronco didn’t appear to care one way or the other about the way she was dressed, so why should she?

And if all that was so, why did she still feel so…bare?

The only possible conclusion she could come to was that the awareness was all on her part. Probably residual effects of that appalling attraction she’d felt when she’d first danced with him in Smoky Joe’s Bar and Grill. And hadn’t she known then that he was bad news? Hadn’t she told herself that charming Johnny Bronco was the last man on earth she should have anything to do with if she knew what was good for her? The embers of that traitorous flame needed to be smothered once and for all.

“This looks like a good place to start,” she said, peeling back the foil to reveal four plump tortilla rolls. She picked one up and bit into a greasy and utterly delicious mixture of scrambled eggs and sausage. She chewed with her eyes closed, trying not to croon, then nudged the plate in Bronco’s direction. “Have some-they’re good,” she murmured graciously.

Yes, she thought, that’s much better. Hating him was too dangerous. Too…passionate. She’d read that all passions were related to one another, and that there was only a fine line separating hate from…other things. Maybe it would be better to think of him as…what? Brother? Uncle? Priest? Eunuch?

Bronco felt a frown building inside him as he watched his prisoner devour the sausage-and-egg burrito. Dammit, he wished he knew what she was thinking; she looked way too pleased with herself for his liking. The way she kept humming and moaning over her food, licking the grease off her fingers and wiping her lips with the back of her hand. Reminded him of something his grandmother Rose used to say: “You know the food’s good when people sing to it.”

He didn’t think the burritos were all that good. It was more like she was making a show of it for his benefit. And that gleam in her eyes that looked so much like laughter…it just didn’t seem to him that a hostage, POW or whatever, ought to be enjoying herself quite so much. What was going on in that fertile brain of hers? He reminded himself again that he’d do well not to underestimate her.

“That was good,” she said with a replete sigh as she dropped the last bite of tortilla back onto the plate and wiped her fingers on the front of her…of his sweatshirt. “Now let’s have that medical attention.”

Bronco hurriedly swallowed his last bite of burrito and wiped his fingers on his pants, then reached for the first-aid kit. “Sure you want to do this?” He gave her a mocking look. “So soon after eating? You’re not gonna throw up, are you?”

He didn’t know what made him keep needling her. Especially as, based on the way she’d managed to keep those sores a secret from him yesterday, she probably had a higher pain threshold than most of the tough guys he knew. He supposed he was just trying to get a rise out of her, get her mad at him again-though why that was he didn’t know, either.

Anyway, if that had been his intent, it didn’t work. Lauren smiled serenely at him and murmured, “I have a pretty strong stomach. What’ve you got in there?” She leaned closer, peering over his arm with exaggerated interest as he opened the box of medical supplies.

He scowled at its contents. He wished she wouldn’t get so close. His heart was pounding again. “Ointment or spray?”

“Oh…ointment, I think. Don’t you?”

What did she think he was-a damn doctor? He thrust the tube at her and concentrated on the search for sterile gauze pads and adhesive tape. After a moment he looked up and saw that she was just sitting there, holding the tube of ointment and biting her lip. “Well,” he growled, “are you gonna do it, or you want me to?”

She exhaled in a rush and handed the tube to him. “I think maybe you’d better do it.” And then she leaned back