And the last time they'd made love, at the end, she'd cried.
"Did I hurt you, Princess?" he'd whispered.
"No," she'd said, "oh, no."
And she'd clasped his face in her hands, brought his mouth to hers and kissed him with a sweetness that had pierced his heart.
He'd smiled, and kissed her gently. Held her close, until her breathing eased, gone on holding her, looking at her, trying to figure out how he'd gone from wanting nothing more than a primitive act of dominating male vengeance to wanting everything from the beautiful stranger in his arms.
And then she'd opened those eyes of hers, looked at him as if he were a rattlesnake she'd found tucked in the sheets instead of a man, and told him, in no uncertain terms, to get his ass out of her bed, and out of her life.
He could feel the rage still pumping through his body. Never, not once in his entire life, not even when he'd come home and found his wife in bed with her damned tennis pro ...not even then had he been so plain-out furious at a woman. Hell, he'd never even imagined a man could be this angry at a woman.
Travis turned on the engine.
Okay. Yes. Definitely, the thing to do was to put some distance between Alex Thorpe and him.
Either that or drive back up the road, march into that mausoleum of a house, toss her over his shoulder, carry her back to bed and ride her until that snooty look tumbled from her face, until she arched her back and lifted her hips, wound her arms around his neck the way she had before.
Or he could gather her into his arms, hold her close to him, just hold her, with his face buried in her sweet-smelling hair, her lips against his throat, while the long afternoon turned into night.
Travis's jaw tightened. Man, he was losing it!
He reached for the key, slammed the car into gear and took the Porsche, engine screaming like a banshee, down the canyon road at a speed that would have astonished even him, if he'd been thinking about anything except the insanity of wanting to see Alexandra Thorpe again in this lifetime.
CHAPTER SEVEN
ALMOST two weeks later, Travis slipped off his headset, made sure everything in the cockpit of his Piper Comanche was secure and stepped out on Espada soil for the first time in close to two years.
It was a hot June morning, with the kind of airless and oppressive heat he remembered from his childhood. Insects buzzed and hummed in the grass alongside the parking area, just as they always had, He had the crazy feeling that his father was going to ride into view, look at him from under his bushy brows and say, "Boy, why're you here, lazin' around, instead of at the barns, doin' your chores?"
He wasn't in the mood for this, not for the old memories or for dealing with Jonas, or for being polite to the couple of hundred guests who were sure to be here by this time tomorrow. It seemed he hadn't been able to be polite to anybody lately. Even the guys at his office were steering clear of him, ever since he'd almost knocked Pete Haskell on his butt the Monday after the auction.
"Hey, Baron," Haskell said, "how'd it go with the Thorpe babe?"
"It went fine."
Travis's response had been clipped. Any intelligent man would have seen it as a warning and backed off, but nobody had ever credited Pete with a surplus of intelligence.
"It went fine," Pete had mimicked, with a leer. "Details, Baron. We want details. Is she as hot as she looks? Did you get into her pants?"
Travis had shoved him, none too gently, against the wall, which was pretty stupid considering that getting into Alex's pants was exactly what he'd wanted—and what he'd done.
"Watch your mouth," he'd snarled at Pete, after two of the other partners had pulled him back.
Nobody much had bothered with him since, and that was fine. He knew he was grumpy but hell, it had nothing to do with Alexandra Thorpe. He was busy, that was all. A corporate merger gone bad and a liability suit against another client looked as if it was headed for a jury trial. He was overworked, was all.
His bad mood didn't have a damned thing to do with Alex Thorpe. . .
"Cut the crap, Baron," Travis muttered.
It had everything to do with her, and why wouldn't it? No man wanted to be dismissed, the way he had. His mood was foul and spending a weekend with Jonas was not going to improve it.
Travis turned on his heel and looked at the Comanche. Nobody knew he'd arrived. All he had to do was climb into the plane, head west to the coast...
A hand clamped down on his shoulder.
"Do it," a familiar voice growled, "and I swear, I'll hunt you down and take that empty head of yours for a trophy."
Travis turned around and looked into the smiling face of his brother, Slade.
"You into mind-reading now, kid?"
"Not unless you expect me to believe you have a mind to read, big brother."