It didn’t.
Chapter Thirteen
He took her to the most beautiful place on earth. An old farmhouse nestled atop a grass-covered bluff, the whitewashed home having been converted into a five-star restaurant. She knew the instant she sat down it would be good.
“Bren,” said a man wearing a white smock and one of those puffy chef’s hats that always looked slightly ridiculous. “You made it.”
“We did.” He turned to her. “Lauren, this is Leland.”
He couldn’t be much older than Bren, she thought, smiling at the dark-haired man with the light blue eyes. He took her hand and, in the most gallant of manners, bent down to kiss it, his hat nearly poking her in the face.
“Charmed,” he said in a French accent.
“Oh, please,” Bren said, shaking his head at his friend. “It’s all an act. Leland worked in the mess hall back when we were in the Army.”
The twinkle turned on Bren. “Shh,” he said, glancing around the crowded restaurant. “Don’t give me away.”
He seemed nice and she was happy to meet one of Bren’s friends. The man turned his attention back to her. “I am pleased to have such beauty sampling my food,” he said in his fake accent.
She snorted.
Leland leaned in toward Bren. “Where’d you find her? She’s a bit young for you, isn’t she?”
She happened to be staring right at Bren when the words were said, and so she saw him freeze, but for only a moment, and for the first time she wondered if he was sensitive to their age difference. She’d never given it much thought.
Bren had obviously prickled. “She’s a fourth-year nursing student about to graduate with her RN.”
She loved him in that instant. He said the words with such pride that she felt a lump form in her throat.
“Beauty and brains.” Leland smiled at her again. “Lucky you.” He patted Bren on the back. “Enjoy your meal.”
And he was off, leaving them sitting at their little table up against a glass window that overlooked the ocean and a low-hanging sun.
“He’s a character,” she said, admiring the single red rose that sat in a small crystal vase, the only sign that it was Valentine’s Day. Its fragrance filled the air.
“He’s one of the best chefs in the nation.”
“Really?”
A woman wearing a black apron came over, a wide smile on her face as she poured her some wine, but not for Bren, she noticed. Clearly Leland knew Bren well.
“Compliments of the chef,” she said, disappearing as silently as she’d come.
“Do you mind?” she asked.
“Not at all. Leland might be offended if you don’t drink, actually. He’s a nut about matching wine with a meal. We won’t be allowed to order, either. He’ll choose for us.”
“Amazing,” she said, but she was talking about the wine. It was delicious. “How did he go from the army to this?” She motioned with her hands to the white linen and crystal glasses.
“He won a cooking show.”
She couldn’t stop the huff of laughter. “What?”
Bren smiled, too. “He was a cook the whole time he was in the army. When he hung up his camo, he tried out for one of those cooking shows and he got on. The rest, as they say, is history.”
“From mess hall to master chef.”
“Something like that.”
They chatted about his eight years in the military. He’d been a member of the Army Special Forces, she learned, the Green Berets. He’d been highly decorated, too, although she’d had to pry that bit of information out of him. Their food arrived later, although how much later she had no idea, and the beef Wellington was so good she could have died right then and been happy.
“You look like you’re in heaven.”
She nodded. “I was just thinking that.” She pointed with her fork. “Your friend’s talents were wasted in the army.”
“Not anymore.”
She stared at the sun, admiring the way it turned the ocean the same color as the sky—fiery red—and how the waves seemed to twinkle beneath it.
“You couldn’t have timed this more perfectly.”
“You can thank Leland for the dinner reservation.”
She nodded. “I will.”
He held her gaze. “Happy Valentine’s Day.”
Lauren felt the hairs on her neck begin to tingle. Suddenly she didn’t feel like eating. It didn’t matter how good the food was. The look in his eyes was ravenous and it made her ravenous, too.
“How is it?”
They both jumped. Leland stared down at them in amusement.
“Fantastic,” she said.
“Good.” He turned toward Bren while their waitress poured Bren some coffee. “You still doing that thing for dessert?”
Bren touched his napkin to his chin. “I am.”
“I’ll have Glenda package it up, then.”
“Package what up?” she asked as Leland walked away.
“We’re doing dessert down on the beach.”
Her toes curled into her high-heeled shoes.
“I have blankets and pillows in the truck.”
She knew what he planned then, and it had nothing to do with eating dessert. She could say no, she told herself. He would understand if she asked to go home instead. She knew that. Bren was an honorable man. But she didn’t want to say no. Maybe it was the wine and the amazing dinner or the sunset and his soft smile as he relayed funny rodeo stories from his past, but she didn’t want the evening to end.
“Sounds like fun.”
His eyes heated up, and she knew she hadn’t mistaken the intention in his gaze. Glenda came up with a white bag. He never looked up.
“Check,” was all he said.
* * *
HE COULDN’T GET her out of there fast enough. All through dinner he’d been fantasizing about peeling the straps of her dress off her shoulders and wondering what she’d taste like.
“Bren!”
He froze.
“Our illustrious sheriff and...”
Bren turned and faced city council member Frank Farrell, a man who’d never been friendly in all the years he’d been sheriff of Via Del Caballo. He clearly tried to place Lauren, but his thoughts were just as clearly consumed by her cleavage based on the way his gaze shifted downward and stayed there.
“Lauren,” she said. “Lauren Danners.”
And all the romance went out of the evening because Frank’s wife stared at Lauren as if she were a stripper at a preschool. Her gaze swept her up and down, her lips, already too thin, pinching together. The coldness in her gaze matched the ice of her blue eyes.
“Well, now,” Frank said with his best Southern accent, an affectation that drove Bren nuts. The man was a native Californian, but he loved to wear cowboy hats and boots and act like a bona fide rancher when he was anything but. “I don’t believe we’ve ever met.”
“I don’t believe we have, either.” Lauren’s smile was kind and friendly and he admired that about her. Surely she noticed the lasciviousness in Frank’s gaze. The man’s wife sure did. But she held her chin high.
“And you must be Bren’s younger sister.”
Okay, now, look, he wanted to say. There was no way in hell Lauren was his sister. Not when she was on his arm and coming out of a restaurant on Valentine’s Day. The man knew it, too. He was just making a veiled reference to the age gap.
“Way younger sister,” he thought he heard Frank’s wife mutter.
Lauren’s eyes zeroed in on the woman.
“No, I’m not,” she said before he could shut them both up with a rude comment. She turned back toward him, long dark hair flipping over one shoulder. “Are these your grandparents, Bren? The ones you were
telling me about earlier?”
He about choked on the words he was about to unleash on Frank’s wife. It took him a second to gather his thoughts, but then he said, “No, no,” playing along. “These aren’t them.”
“Too bad.” She smiled at the couple, even though there was no way on earth either one of them could be considered old enough to have grandchildren Bren’s age. Frank’s wife glared daggers because she understood all too well that things had been turned around on them. Bren didn’t care. He just wanted out of there.
“Nice to see you,” he told them both, tipping his head and wishing he had on his cowboy hat. “Enjoy your dinner.”
He waited until they were out of earshot before whispering, “Sorry about that.”
“What jerks,” Lauren said as they walked toward his truck. “Why were they looking at me like you’re a choirboy and I’m trying to corrupt you or something? Is this dress really that bad?”
He didn’t trust himself to speak for a moment because it upset him that those two losers had her doubting her own looks. “Your dress is perfect. That was all aimed at me.”
And their age gap.
“Who is he?”
He didn’t want to think about that. Not now. “He’s on the city council.” They’d reached his truck and he swiped a hand through his hair. Talk about a good evening gone bad. He hated that A-hole for dragging Lauren into his political agenda. “He thinks I don’t do enough as sheriff. That I’m a figurehead, not a leader. He’s been my biggest opponent when it comes to staying sheriff. It’s because of Frank Farrell that I’m always having to watch my back. He’s never liked me since the moment I won my first election and he’ll never like me so long as I keep being sheriff.”
She looked just as perturbed as he felt and the fight drained out of him. What a remarkable woman she was. It’d taken her 2.9 seconds to reason out that she’d been insulted and 1.9 seconds to dish it back.
He cupped her face with his hands. He saw her eyes widen, saw her mouth press together for an instant before her lips relaxed and he felt a nearly irresistible urge to kiss her. In front of God and everybody.
But he didn’t kiss her.
“He’s a jerk and I’m not going to let him ruin our night.”
Those soft lips smiled. “Neither am I.”
He didn’t have time to analyze why he held back, because the sun was about to go down and he wanted to be on the beach before that happened.
“Come on.” He turned to his truck. Inside, he’d stashed a blanket, which he grabbed after he handed their special dessert to Lauren. “There’s a path to the right of the restaurant.”
“As long as we don’t have to bump into those people again.”
“We won’t.”
Don’t let it ruin your night. But it was impossible not to think about. Lauren hadn’t been exposed to his political life. She’d never had to watch him run for office. It could get nasty, and Frank Farrell had just played into his worst fear. The man wouldn’t hesitate to use Lauren’s age against him somehow.
What did it matter?
He’d just had an amazing dinner with an amazing woman who was twice the person of Frank or Victoria Farrell. A single mom who’d lost her husband. Who’d put herself through college and raised a fine young man. To hell with them. But he knew, he just knew, they were probably watching them as they walked toward the beach.
“You’re going to get sand in your boots.”
He turned back to her. They’d just crossed over a big dune and he realized they couldn’t be seen through the glass of the restaurant. She stood there, framed by the sky behind, a breeze blowing her hair back, the sound of the ocean booming in the distance, and he knew he would never forget the moment.
She was, in a word, beautiful.
“I was just thinking I should take them off.”
“You should.” She held up her own shoes, smiling. Lord. Could she look any more young? Such a girlish grin and such a pretty smile. The sun had gone down to the point that the earth chipped away at its roundness, tingeing everything around them red. In her dress and with her dark hair streaked by golden light, she looked like a Greek goddess come down from above.
“Man, you’re beautiful.”
Her mouth dropped open a bit and he could tell it’d been a long time since a man had told her that.
“Thank you.”
He walked toward her and he knew he was going to kiss her and that the kiss might change everything, but he didn’t care. He had to taste her right then, maybe as a way to convince himself she was real.
Her eyes grew wide. He set the blanket down. She stared up at him. He cupped her chin. She still held the bag with the dessert, but he heard it drop just before his lips connected with hers.
God help him.
He’d known how she would taste. He remembered the feel of her lips. Nothing could have prepared him for the jolt to his soul when she yielded to his mouth, her lips nuzzling, then opening a bit, then nuzzling him again, and he knew if she opened her mouth, if she let him taste her like he’d wanted to taste her for weeks now, he’d really lose it.
He pulled back.
She followed him forward a bit, her eyes snapping open.
“I didn’t buy a dessert to let it go to waste.”
“We don’t have to eat it here.”
He froze. “What do you mean?”
He watched as her lips tried out words, discarded them, then tried them again until she finally said, “We could go back to your place.”
Her words were like the jab of a hot wire. They electrified every nerve ending in his body, charging his blood and making him want to do things he hadn’t done in, well, a long while.
“Are you sure?”
She lifted her chin, swallowed and—ah, hell—looked even more young.
“Yes.”
Don’t do it. Don’t say yes. Wait until after election, when men like Frank Farrell can say whatever they want instead of trying to make this thing with Lauren work against him.
But he knew he was a lost cause. He’d been lost ever since he’d seen her walk out in the red dress. And then later, when he’d watched her eat, loving the way her eyes lit up and her body gave a little wiggle when she tasted something she really liked.
“Bren?”
She’d lost her self-confidence while he’d stood there waffling. He could see in the way her shoulders sagged and the sparkle began to fade from her eyes. She had the wrong idea about his hesitation.
“Let’s go.”
She smiled softly. “Okay.”
Chapter Fourteen
What are you doing? What are you doing? What are you doing?
The words were a litany in her head. She hadn’t been with a man in years. Heck, she hadn’t been with anyone other than her husband in well over a decade. What if she’d forgotten to shave? Had she shaved? Darn it, she couldn’t remember.
I’ve changed my mind.
The words hovered on her lips. Two things stopped her. One, she’d wanted him to kiss her since the moment she’d spotted him standing near her front door, eyes sparking to life when he’d seen her in the red dress. Two, the look on Frank Farrell’s face. It was as if he didn’t approve of her, which was ridiculous. What wasn’t there to approve of? Was it the red dress? Or was it the age difference? If so, that was ridiculous. She wasn’t that much younger than Bren. Okay, maybe he was a little older, but only a little. Bren was sensitive about it, though, so she would just prove to him there was no reason to be. She wouldn’t let Frank Farrell ruin their night.
“I can’t say what it’s going to look like inside,” he told her as they pulled into his drive. “I mean, it could be a complete mess.”
She glanced over at him. It was dark, the lights of the dash illuminating his fa
ce. “I don’t care.”
And that was the other reason why she stuck to her guns. She didn’t care. She was tired of worrying about what other people thought. Tired of watching all the other women at school go out on dates and have fun and actually enjoy life. She wanted that, too.
At least for a night.
“I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
But was she talking about his house being clean? Or herself being fine? She didn’t know and frankly didn’t care. Even by the light of his dash she could see the heat in his gaze. It hadn’t waned since they left the beach, the tension in his truck bubbling closer to the surface the nearer they were to his house until, like a vat of liquid desire, it spilled over.
He opened his door. She watched for a moment because even though she’d made her decision, it didn’t mean her heart didn’t pound and that she had the courage to follow through, because, darn it all, it’d been so long. What if he was disappointed? What if he took one look at her baby belly and changed his mind? What if...
Honey, this is a man we’re talking about, said the little voice.
True, but...
He was coming around to her side of the truck. He’d done that earlier, too. He’d let her out at the restaurant. A courtly gentleman with the softest of lips and the sweetest of eyes, and with every step her heart began to beat even harder.
This is it. This is it. This is it.
He opened the door. Courage deserted her. He held out a hand. She took a deep breath.
“It’s okay.”
It would be, she reassured herself. She needed to have faith. He would never treat her as Paul had treated her. She knew that with the same certainty that she knew the sun would rise.
She slipped from the truck.
He caught her. She used his forearms to steady her. He scooped her up into his arms.
“Bren,” she murmured.
He nuzzled her neck for a split second and her whole body quaked in response.
She didn’t know when he started walking or even how he kept nuzzling her hair and her ear while managing to hold her close. All she knew was one minute she was at the truck and the next she was slowly sliding down the length of his body while he flicked on a light.
Her Cowboy Lawman Page 12
