“I wanted you,” she said frankly. “I…couldn’t feel that for anyone else. I’d rather have been frightened by you than pleasured by the greatest lover living.” She laughed coldly. “So I guess I’m in the same boat that you are.” She clutched her purse. “I really do have to go,” she said after a long, quiet moment during which he stared at her without saying anything at all.

He escorted her down the porch steps. “All right. I’ll walk you to the woods and watch you through them. Sarah Jane will be all right until I get back, and the house is in full view the whole way.”

“Sarah is very much like you,” she said.

“Too much like me,” he replied. His fingers brushed hers as they walked, accidentally or deliberately she didn’t know, making her all too aware of him. “She almost got trampled the other day, climbing into the corral to retrieve a handkerchief.”

“She told me. I suppose you were livid.”

“Mild word,” he said. “I blew up. Scared her. I found her hiding in the closet, and I felt like a dog. I went to town the next day and bought her half a toy store to make up for yelling at her.” He sighed. “She scared me blind. I kept thinking what could have happened if my reflexes had been just a bit slower.”

“But they weren’t.” She smiled. “You were always quick in an emergency.”

He looked down at her and his fingers lazily entangled themselves in hers. “Luckily for you,” he murmured darkly, watching her flush. “I haven’t had an easy life,” he said then. “I had to be tough to survive. They weren’t good days before I came here to live with my uncle. I got in a lot of fights because of my illegitimacy.”

“I never heard you talk about that,” she said.

“I never could.” His fingers tightened in hers as they got to the small wooded area and stopped. “I can’t talk about a lot of things, Meredith. Maybe that’s why I’m so damned alone.”

She glanced toward Bess’s house. Bess and Bobby must have come home, because their car was in the driveway next to hers. She hesitated, not eager to leave Blake in this oddly talkative mood. “You’ve got Sarah now,” she reminded him gently.

“Sarah is getting to me,” he confessed ruefully. “God, I don’t know what I’d do if I could sit down in a chair without crushing a stuffed toy, or go to bed without running monsters out of closets.” He smiled mockingly. “It cut me to pieces when she started crying after I raged at her about getting in with the horse.”

“She doesn’t seem that sensitive at first glance, but she is,” she replied. “I noticed it that first day, at the children’s shop, and again when she played with Danielle. I gather she was neglected a lot before they sent her to you.”

“I got the same feeling. She had a nightmare just after she came here,” he recalled quietly. “She woke up in the early hours, screaming her head off, and when I asked what was the matter, she said they wouldn’t let her out of the closet.” His face hardened, and for an instant he looked relentless. “I’ve still got half a mind to send my lawyers after that housekeeper.”

“A woman that cruel will make her own hell,” Meredith said. “Mean people don’t get away with anything, Blake. It may seem that they do, but in the end their meanness ricochets back at them.”

“The way mine did at me?” he asked with a mirthless laugh. “I scarred you and pushed you out of my life, married Nina, and settled down to what I thought would be wedded bliss. And look where it got me.”

“You’ve got everything,” she corrected. “Money, power, position, a sweet little girl.”

“I’ve got nothing except Sarah,” he said shortly. His green eyes glittered in the faint light. “I thought I needed money and power to make people accept me. But I’m no more socially acceptable now than I was when I was poor and illegitimate. I’ve just got more money.”

“Acceptance doesn’t have anything to do with money.” She stared down at the big, warm hand clasping hers. “You’re not the world’s most sociable man. You keep to yourself and you don’t smile very much. You intimidate people.” She smiled gently, her eyes almost loving despite her reluctance to give herself away. “That’s why you don’t get a lot of social invitations. This isn’t the Dark Ages. People don’t hold the circumstances of their birth against each other anymore. It’s a much more open society than it was.”

“It stinks,” he returned coldly. “Women propositioning men, kids neglected and abused and cast off….”

“They don’t burn witches anymore, though,” she whispered conspiratorially, going up on tiptoe. “And the stocks have been eliminated, too.”

His face cracked into a reluctant smile. “Okay. You’ve got a point.”

“Who propositioned you?” she added.

He cocked his head a little to study her. “A woman at the workshop in Dallas I just came back from. I didn’t believe she meant it until she put her room key in an ashtray beside my coffee cup.”

“What did you do?” she asked, because she had to know.

He smiled faintly. “Took it out and handed it back.” He touched her cheek gently, running a lean finger down it. “I told you on the porch. I don’t want anyone but you.”

She lowered her eyes to his chest. “I can’t, Blake.”

“I’m not asking you to.” He let go of the hand he was holding. “I’m archaic in my notions, in case it’s escaped your notice. I don’t seduce virgins.”

Her body tingled at the thought of making love with Blake. It was exciting and surprising to know how much he wanted her. But her own conscience wasn’t going to let her give in, and he knew that, too.

“I guess you’d rather I got my autographing over and left town…” she began.

He tilted her chin up so he could see her face. “Sarah and I are going on a picnic Saturday. You can come.”

The suddenness of the invitation made her blink. “Saturday?”

“We’ll pick you up at nine. You can wear jeans. I’m going to.”

Her eyes lifted to his. “Blake…”

“I like having things out in the open, so there aren’t any more misunderstandings,” he said simply. “I want you. You want me. But that’s as far as it goes, and there won’t be any more of what happened on my porch tonight. I’ll keep my hands off and we’ll give Sarah a good time. Sarah likes you,” he added quietly. “I think you like her, too. She could use a few good memories before you go back to the life you left in San Antonio.”

So he was going to freeze her out. He wanted her, but he wasn’t going to do anything about it. He wanted her for Sarah, not for himself, despite his hunger for her.

She hesitated. “Is it wise letting her get used to me?” she asked, her voice echoing the disappointment she felt.

His hand on her chin became faintly caressing. “Why not?” he asked.

“It will be another upset for her when I leave,” she said.

His thumb moved over her lips, brushing them, caressing them. “How long are you going to stay?”

“Until the first of the month,” she said. “I do the autographing a week from Saturday.”

His hand fell just in time to keep her from throwing herself against him and begging him to kiss her. “Then you can spend some time with Sarah and me until you leave. I won’t force you into any corners and we can help Sarah find her feet.”

Her eyes searched his night-shadowed face. “Why do you want me around?”

“God knows,” he muttered. “But I do.”

She sighed audibly, fighting her need to be near him.

“Don’t brood,” he said. He didn’t smile, but there was something new about the way he was looking at her. “Just take things one day at a time and stop analyzing everything I say.”

“Was I doing that? Okay, I’ll try.” She wished there were more light. She managed a smile. “Good night, Blake.”

“Go on. I’ll watch you.”

She left him standing there and went running down to the house, her heart blazing with new hope.

If there was any chance for her to have Blake, she’d take it willingly, no matter what the risk. She now understood the reasons for his actions. And if she went slowly and didn’t ask for the impossible, he might even come to love her one day. She went to sleep on that thought, and her dreams were so vivid that she woke up blushing.