Sutton's Way. Diana Palmer

A sip of wine wasn’t likely to be that dangerous anyway, and it might help the sore throat she was sure he had.

      “Here’s the cocoa,” Harry said, joining them with a tray of mugs filled with hot chocolate and topped with whipped cream.

      “That looks delicious. Thank you so much,” Amanda said, and smiled shyly at the old man.

      He grinned back. “Nice to be appreciated.” He glared at Quinn. “Nobody else ever says so much as a thank-you!”

      “It’s hard to thank a man for food poisoning,” Quinn rejoined weakly.

      “He ain’t going to die,” Harry said as he left. “He’s too damned mean.”

      “That’s a fact,” Quinn said and closed his eyes.

      He was asleep almost instantly. Amanda drew up a chair and sat down beside him. He’d still need looking after, and presumably the boy went to school. It was past the Christmas holidays.

      “You go to school, don’t you?” she asked Elliot.

      He nodded. “I ride the horse out to catch the bus and then turn him loose. He comes to the barn by himself. You’re staying?”

      “I’d better, I guess,” she said. “I’ll sit with him. He may get worse in the night. He’s got to see a doctor tomorrow. Is there one around here?”

      “There’s Dr. James in town, in Holman that is,” he said. “He’ll come out if Dad’s bad enough. He has a cancer patient down the road and he comes to check on her every few days. He could stop by then.”

      “We’ll see how your father is feeling. You’d better get to bed,” she said and smiled at him.

      “Thank you for coming, Miss…Amanda,” Elliot said. He sighed. “I don’t think I’ve ever been so scared.”

      “It’s okay,” she said. “I didn’t mind. Good night, Elliot.”

      He smiled at her. “Good night.”

      He went out and closed the door. Amanda sat back in her chair and looked at the sleeping face of the wild man. He seemed vulnerable like this, with his black eyes closed. He had the thickest lashes she’d ever seen, and his eyebrows were thick and well shaped above his deep-set eyes. His mouth was rather thin, but it was perfectly shaped, and the full lower lip was sensuous. She liked that jutting chin, with its hint of stubbornness. His nose was formidable and straight, and he wasn’t that bad looking…asleep. Perhaps it was the coldness of his eyes that made him seem so much rougher when he was awake. Not that he looked that unintimidating even now. He had so many coarse edges….

      She waited a few minutes and touched his forehead. It was a little cooler, thank God, so maybe he was going to be better by morning. She went into the bathroom and washed her face and went back to sit by him. Somewhere in the night, she fell asleep with her blond head pillowed on the big arm of the chair. Voices woke her.

      “Has she been there all night, Harry?” Quinn was asking.

      “Looks like. Poor little critter, she’s worn out.”

      “I’ll shoot Elliot!”

      “Now, boss, that’s no way to treat the kid. He got scared, and I didn’t know what to do. Women know things about illness. Why, my mama could doctor people and she never had no medical training. She used herbs and things.”

      Amanda blinked, feeling eyes on her. She found Quinn Sutton gazing steadily at her from a sitting position on the bed.

      “How do you feel?” she asked without lifting her sleepy head.

      “Like hell,” he replied. “But I’m a bit better.”

      “Would you like some breakfast, ma’am?” Harry asked with a smile. “And some coffee?”

      “Coffee. Heavenly. But no breakfast, thanks, I won’t impose,” she said drowsily, yawning and stretching uninhibitedly as she sat up, her full breasts beautifully outlined against the cotton blouse in the process.

      Quinn felt his body tautening again, as it had the night before so unexpectedly and painfully when her hands had touched him. He could still feel them, and the brush of her long, silky soft hair against his skin. She smelled of gardenias and the whole outdoors, and he hated her more than ever because he’d been briefly vulnerable.

      “Why did you come with Elliot?” Quinn asked her when Harry had gone.

      She pushed back her disheveled hair and tried not to think how bad she must look without makeup and with her hair uncombed. She usually kept it in a tight braid on top of her head when she wasn’t performing. It made her feel vulnerable to have its unusual length on display for a man like Quinn Sutton.

      “Your son is only twelve,” she answered him belatedly. “That’s too much responsibility for a kid,” she added. “I know. I had my dad to look after at that age, and no mother. My dad drank,” she added with a bitter smile. “Excessively. When he drank he got into trouble. I can remember knowing how to call a bail bondsman at the age of thirteen. I never dated, I never took friends home with me. When I was eighteen, I ran away from home. I don’t even know if he’s still alive, and I don’t care.”

      “That’s one problem Elliot won’t ever have,” he replied quietly. “Tough girl, aren’t you?” he added, and his black eyes were frankly curious.

      She hadn’t meant to tell him so much. It embarrassed her, so she gave him her most belligerent glare. “Tough enough, thanks,” she said. She got out of the chair. “If you’re well enough to argue, you ought to be able to take care of yourself. But if that fever goes up again, you’ll need to see the doctor.”

      “I’ll decide that,” he said tersely. “Go home.”

      “Thanks, I’ll do that little thing.” She got her coat and put it on without taking time to button it. She pushed her hair up under the stocking cap, aware of his eyes on her the whole time.

      “You don’t fit the image of a typical hanger-on,” he said unexpectedly.

      She glanced at him, blinking with surprise. “I beg your pardon?”

      “A hanger-on,” he repeated. He lifted his chin and studied her with mocking thoroughness. “You’re Durning’s latest lover, I gather. Well, if it’s money you’re after, he’s the perfect choice. A pretty little tramp could go far with him…Damn!”

      She stood over him with the remains of his cup of hot chocolate all over his chest, shivering with rage.

      “I’m sorry,” she said curtly. “That was a despicable thing to do to a sick man, but what you said to me was inexcusable.”

      She turned and went to the door, ignoring his muffled curses as he threw off the cover and sat up.

      “I’d cuss, too,” she said agreeably as she glanced back at him one last time, her eyes running helplessly over the broad expanse of hair-roughened skin. “All that sticky hot chocolate in that thicket on your chest,” she mused. “It will probably take steam cleaning to remove it. Too bad you can’t attract a ‘hanger-on’ to help you bathe it out. But, then, you aren’t as rich as Mr. Durning, are you?” And she walked out, her nose in the air. As she went toward the stairs, she imagined that she heard laughter. But of course, that couldn’t have been possible.

       Chapter Two

      Amanda regretted the hot-chocolate incident once she was back in the cabin, even though Quinn Sutton had deserved every drop of it. How dare he call her such a name!

      Amanda was old-fashioned in her ideas. A real country girl from Mississippi who’d had no example to follow except a liberated aunt and an alcoholic parent, and she was like neither of them. She hardly even dated these days. Her working gear