His expression immediately turned deadly serious. "You may have a great sense of humor, Martina, but I have always taken you seriously – as a lover and now as the mother of my child."
Martina felt a shiver at the intensity in his expression. She often had the sense that by getting involved with Noah, she might as well be stepping into a hurricane. She was drawn to Noah's dynamic energy and the calm center he seemed to possess, but she always found herself wondering how she could put one foot in and keep her other foot out. She still wondered how she could be involved with him and keep herself.
"But you want to know about my brothers," he said. "Adam is the oldest. He is quiet and traditional. He manages the cattle on the ranch. His temper is more of a slow burn. He's very serious and could afford to lighten up every now and then. My brother Jonathan is the peacemaker. He raises and breaks horses. He rarely gets angry at anyone other than himself. Gideon is a pistol. He has a quick temper, but he doesn't hold a grudge. He loves a good challenge."
"It sounds like all of you stick together."
Noah made a wry face. "For the most part, we've had to, what with our dad's problem. But we've been known to use our fists to persuade."
Martina couldn't help noticing Noah's hands, which were clasped together. She knew that when he was a young teen, he'd gotten into many fights. Part of what intrigued her about him was the way he had left his anger behind. She wondered how he'd done that. "Your father's drinking problem?"
"Yep. That and some of the other things our forebears have done. The Coltranes have a reputation to live down and another one we want to build. All of us want that."
"What was it like being the black sheep of the county?"
"Good and bad. Mostly bad. Teachers, neighbors, mostly everyone expected the worst when a Coltrane came around. So we often lived down to the expectations. That just ended up causing more trouble. Then my dad hired a foreman. His name was Zachary and he taught us how to fence and turned us into modern-day knights."
Martina blinked. "Modern-day knights? I knew all of you fenced. People were always afraid one of you might stick a sword in someone who ticked you off."
"There's that Coltrane rep again. Zachary started us out with wiffel bats. It was a big deal when he let us use one of his swords, and the biggest deal was when he gave us each a sword. We had to earn it," Noah said with a faraway look in his eyes.
"How did you earn it?"
"Grades, self-control, attitude and skill with the sword."
It was difficult for Martina to keep her objections against Noah intact when she pictured his transformation from an angry teen to a man. "I never heard anything about this."
"Most people haven't. Zachary left the ranch a few years ago. He told us we had the tools. We would always know what to do."
"You miss him," Martina said in surprise.
Noah nodded. "Yeah, I do."
"You've described your brothers," she ventured, picking up her second slice of pizza. "How would they describe you?"
"Besides a pain in the ass," Noah said with a wicked grin, "the driven dreamer, the one who is always trying to do impossible stuff."
"Impossible stuff like what?"
"Like trading cattle futures and making money at it. Running weekend roundups and increasing the ranch's revenue. Starting a fencing camp." He paused and met her gaze. "Trying to marry the Logan princess."
Martina felt as if she'd been punched by the look of determination on his face. Her heart hammered against her rib cage. "You want to marry me because I'm carrying your … " She broke off, refusing to use the words that sent her into a spin every time. "Because the baby I'm carrying has some of your genes. You don't want to marry me because you love me. You don't want me to come live with you because you can't live without me."
His eyes flashed with anger. "It would be tough finding that out now. When you left, you didn't give either of us much choice."
Her chest tightened. "I was just a fling for you."
"Martina, you are not fling material." His nostrils flared slightly and he narrowed his eyes. "Was it so easy to leave?"
His words echoed inside her, sending her perspective in circles. She had survived the past seven months by believing that what she and Noah had shared was a fling. She'd chanted it to herself day and night. "One of us had to do it. It had to be done."
"Why?"
Martina fought the jittery feeling spreading throughout her. She stood and tossed her napkin into the trash. "Because of our families. One of us had to stop it before we got in too deep."
She felt Noah behind her. "Did you succeed? Did you stop before we got in too deep?"
His question taunted her heart while his breath teased the back of her neck. She closed her eyes and mentally put her brick wall back in place. She turned and lifted her chin. "I think the general consensus is that I didn't get out unscathed," she said, putting her hand on her abdomen. "You said something about a little treat? Is it a brownie?"
He tilted his head to one side and shook it. "No." He waved his hand toward the chair. "Have a seat."
Curious, she sat and guessed again. "Cookies?"
He shook his head.
"Not cake or pie?"
He laughed. "No more food this time." He knelt beside her, and shock and alarm crowded her throat.
"Oh, no," she said. "You're not going to ask-"
"-for your hand," he finished. "No. I'm asking for your foot."
She frowned. "My foot?"
He slipped her sandal off her foot before she could say, You are nuts.
"If you won't trust me with your hand, will you trust me with your foot?"
"As long as it doesn't involve any weapons."
"Just one," he said, pulling a bottle of nail polish from his pocket. "But it won't hurt."
* * *
Chapter 4
«^»
"Are you crazy?"
Noah held fast to Martina's foot as she tried to pull it back. "Not at all. You were crying over the fact that you couldn't reach your toes. What's a former lover good for if he won't paint your toenails every now and then?"
Martina gasped, her eyes wide with shock, her mouth moving, but nothing coming out.
It was a nice change, Noah thought. He liked her off balance. There was something incredibly sexy about the color in her cheeks, the spark in her blue eyes and the tremble of her full mouth. He knew how that mouth tasted.
She shook her head as if to shake herself out of her state of shock. "I wasn't crying," she said.
"Okay, whining," he corrected.
She opened her mouth again, then snapped it shut and glowered at him. "I don't like being called a whiner."
Noah pulled a chair over to sit down and prop her foot between his legs. "Good thing I didn't do that."
"You said whine."
"Big difference. Whiner is a noun that suggests a person who whines frequently. Whine is a verb that could indicate a one-time or infrequent occurrence." He opened the tiny bottle and lifted the brush. "Any tips? I've never done this before."
"First you wipe the excess off the brush inside the bottle. Why are you doing this?"
He painted her big toenail. "I told you. You," he said, dipping the brush again, "expressed unhappiness over not being able to paint your toenails."
"Why didn't you just pay for a pedicure?"
He glanced up at her and smiled. "That wouldn't be nearly as much fun. I bet a man has never done your toenails."
"Yes, a man has."
Noah paused, feeling a surprising slice of jealousy. He glanced up at her. "Who was that?"
"Tyler," she said, and smiled. "He always had a steady surgeon's hand."
A surge of relief trickled through Noah when he heard her brother's name. He wasn't at all comfortable with the range of emotions Martina generated inside him. As much as she should be his, she wasn't. He continued to paint her toenails in silence.
"Nice color," she said after he started on her other foot.
"I did research," he murmured, thinking that even her feet were sensual – long and delicate.
She jerked slightly. "Research?"
"Don't move," he warned. "You don't want azalea pink all the way up your foot. Yes, I did research, but I won't reveal my sources." Martina's sister-in-law Felicity had asked him as many questions as he'd asked her the day they'd shared coffee.