Page 35 of Too Hot To Handle

„I’d do it again in a minute,“ Tory said, her face softening as she remembered the big-eyed, incredibly long-lashed, wobbly little calf butting at its mother’s belly in an instinctive search for milk. „To walk into a stall where there’s only one cow and to walk out later and leave two cows behind – that’s as close to a miracle as I’ve ever come.“ Her face changed as she focused on him again. „Except with you, Reever,“ she whispered. „When you make love to me, it’s not just the sun rising and setting in your eyes, it’s the whole world burning.“

For a moment Reever was very still. He searched Tory’s eyes as though trying to see right through to her soul. After a long silence he said, „It’s like that for me. Every time is better than the last until I can hardly wait to wrap myself around you again and wrap you around me until – “ He shuddered and his eyes darkened as the familiar wild heat began to sweep through him again. „Oh, God, little one. You’re in me hotter and deeper than my own blood.“

Abruptly Reever turned and mounted Blackjack. „I’d better see if Jed has managed to gnaw through that big pine yet,“ he said, reining around until he could look at Tory. „And I’d better do it now before I pull you down in the grass and love you until you cry and scream and come apart in my arms.“

„Reever,“ Tory said shakily, her breath shortening. „I want that No. I want yew like – like – “

„Hell on fire,“ he finished, his voice almost narsh. „I know. It’s the same way I’ve wanted you since the first time I saw you. Close your eyes, little cat.“

„Why?“ she asked, closing her eyes.

Reever bent over in the saddle, lifted Tory in nis powerful arms and kissed her with a thoroughness that left both of them aching.

„Keep those beautiful green eyes closed,“ he said hoarsely. „It’s the only way I’ll be able to leave you.“

Slowly Reever eased Tory back onto her feet, cook one more quick, biting kiss and spun Blackjack around. Tory didn’t open her eyes until the sound of the horse’s hooves had faded. Then she let out a long, tremulous breath and mounted Twinkletoes. She guided the gentle mare along a path leading to the beach that the hands had cleared along the lake.

„Hi, Dutch. How’s the fire ring doing?“

The wiry cowboy dropped a water-smoothed stone as big as a basketball into the ring he was building. „Slow, Tory. Real slow. Been trying to figure how to do it from the back of a horse.“

Tory smiled. She had learned that all the hands wanted only the work that could be done from horseback. „Are you going to be here for a while?“

„Yep. Going swimming again?“

„Sure am.“

Dutch shook his head. „How something as sweet as you don’t melt in all that water is beyond me. Ain’t natural.“

„I think someone I know is angling for peach cobbler again,“ muttered Tory.

He smiled innocently. „Cobbler? You making cobbler tonight? Did I ever tell you that peach is my favorite?“

„Really?“ she asked, feigning astonishment.

Dutch chuckled, winked and went back to sorting rocks for the fire ring. Tory tied Twinkletoes to a handy bush, pulled a rolled-up towel from her saddle bag and went toward a long tongue of granite that ran out into the lake. There she peeled down to the swimsuit she wore beneath her riding clothes.

Twelve days ago, when Reever had decided it was time to put the finishing touches on „Payton’s Folly,“ Tory had discovered that one of the springs beneath Wolf Lake was hot. That, and the lure of clean, deep water, had been too great to ignore after months of abstinence. The first time Tory had gone swimming there had been a line of appreciative cowhands watching her. While Reever hadn’t wanted her to swim alone, he didn’t figure that she needed every man within fifty miles as a lifeguard. When he couldn’t do the job himself, he had assigned Dutch to beach, fire ring and lifeguard duty because Reever knew that Dutch’s interest in Tory was strictly avuncular.

The water along the cobbled shoreline was decidedly brisk. The hot spring’s influence didn’t reach that far, and it was too early in the season for the sun to have made much impression on the overall temperature of the lake. Only at the base of the lower cliff was the water warmed by the hidden spring far beneath the surface of the lake.

Tory entered the water in a long, running dive and then swam toward the cliffs fifty yards away. The color of the water beneath her changed as the bottom dropped steeply away. Close to the cliffs she had no idea how deep the water was. That was one of the things she was going to find out today.

With the ease of someone to whom water is a second home, Tory jackknifed her body and dove straight down. The pressure around her built swiftly. Automatically she swallowed, letting her ears adjust. All around her was clear, very blue water. There were no rocks, no dead trees, no obstacles of any kind. She continued down until she was sure that she was beyond thirty feet, then she flip turned and headed back for the shimmering silver surface.

Tory slung hair out of her face with a casual motion of her head, pulled up her swim goggles and saw that Dutch was watching intently. She waved, swam about twenty feet, pulled her goggles into place and dove again. Methodically she quartered the area beneath the lowest cliff, looking for any surprises that might be hidden by the water. She didn’t expect to find any. Yesterday she had stood on the lower cliff and looked over the water very, very carefully, coming at different times of day to take advantage of different angles of sunlight penetrating the unusually clear water. She had seen nothing to suggest any danger to someone diving from the granite shelf that overhung the deep water.

Nor did Tory find anything dangerous as she physically inspected the area below the base of the cliff. The granite wall was smooth all the way down. It had a slight overhang, ensuring that no matter how badly botched a dive might be, there was no way of landing on rock. The water beneath the overhang was deep, clean and as free of obstructions as a diving pool.

Tory swam back to shore, pulled on the beach walkers she had carried in her towel and picked her way along the shoreline as it gradually humped up into the first of a series of steplike cliffs. The way to the top of the lowest cliff that she had found was short and quite safe, for the path didn’t come near the edge of the rock. She stepped out onto the smooth, nearly flat granite platform.

Shivering slightly in the breeze, Tory stood at the knife-edge of the cliff. To her right more granite rose steeply, notching the sky. To her left the granite merged gently with the beach. Below her the lake shimmered and rippled in shades of blue, whispering to her. She knew that the cliff was almost exactly ten meters high. She knew because all her senses had been attuned to that height by thousands and thousands of dives off ten-meter platforms. It felt…right…standing there, looking down into the lake.

The temptation to dive was almost overwhelming. Tory had been working her knee for at least an hour every night, often more. Time went quickly as she braced herself against Reever’s powerful arm and exercised while he talked about the ranch and his tangled family history. She had told him about her own family and her years spent around the swim club’s Olympic pools. And sometimes there was a sweet silence while he watched her with clear gray eyes, smiling gently, approving of her without saying a word.

Yet despite all the exercises, all the care that Tory had taken not to stress the knee again, she was afraid that it wasn’t as strong as her left knee. There was no way for her to be sure without diving.

For a long time Tory stood on the cliff looking into the depths of Wolf Lake as though it held the answers to her questions about the future. Wind ruffled the water’s surface, making ghostly silver patterns. Gradually Tory realized that she was shivering with something more than cold. She turned her back on the sapphire depths and hurried down the trail.