“Okay. So, I’m not a great cook, but I haven’t starved.” He shrugged and took a forkful of food. “It’s no worse than some of your concoctions.” After swallowing, he gave her a squinted look. “In fact, this is one of your concoctions.”
“I suppose it is.” He’d really cooked for her? She ate the meal he’d made. Leon had brought her food from some of the most expensive restaurants in Dallas, but none of those meals had warmed her as much as this fare of burned bacon and too-cheesy omelet did.
When he pushed his plate away, she glanced at the uneaten food. “You can’t be full already.”
He took a sip of his coffee. “I ate supper earlier. This was just a snack.”
“Some snack.” When Dylan wasn’t drinking, he had quite a healthy appetite. “What did you have?”
“Tracy brought burgers from Ella’s. We took Artemis and Ceres and went for a ride. Hope you don’t mind.”
“Not at all. Tracy and I had lunch a couple of weeks ago at Ella’s.” Watching him closely, she paused and took a sip of the milk he’d poured for her. “I met your ex there.”
Dylan stiffened and looked away. “Her parents and sister still live in town.”
“She was meeting her mother.” She swallowed when he picked up his coffee mug, only to set it down again. “She had her baby with her.”
He sniffed and looked at her.
“I decided I don’t like her much.”
Dylan snorted and picked up his mug. This time he took a drink. “Brenda always was high-maintenance, I guess. But she wanted kids, and I didn’t.”
“Dylan.” She waited for him to meet her gaze. “I’m sorry this happened.”
He gave her a crooked smile. “Hey, I think I’m as much to blame as you are. As the old saying goes–it takes two to tango. If anyone should be sorry, it’s me.” He glanced down into his mug. “I acted like a jackass afterwards.” He met her gaze. “I guess I freaked.”
“I understand.” She ate a few more bites of the omelet. “I wonder if this is how my mother felt when she found out she was pregnant with me.”
He set his mug on the granite counter. “Have you ever looked up your father? You said you know his name.”
She shook her head and rubbed her hands on her thighs. “No.”
“He didn’t want anything to do with you?”
She shook her head. “He didn’t know about me.”
“Your mother never told him?”
“No. He went back to his rodeo life and his wife.” Sighing, she leaned over her folded arms on the countertop. “I did a Google search and found he had a ranch near Paris, Texas. I thought about contacting him last year after I found the box of letters, but then found out he was dead.” She sighed. “It’s for the best. Meeting him would have only caused a tabloid mess.”
His brow wrinkled, then his eyes widened slightly. “He’s someone famous?”
She would have laughed if her heart didn’t squeeze so painfully. “He won a few silver buckles, but he’s not famous. My half-brother is. Country singer Nate McConnell.”
“Ah, that’s why you like him so much.” Dylan finished his coffee.
She nodded and sipped from her cup. “I wish I’d have known my father.”
Maybe she wouldn’t have ever ended up in trouble if she had.
He faced her. “Our son or daughter will never wonder who I am. Even if…” He swallowed so hard his Adam’s apple bobbed. “Even if things don’t work out, I’ll be there for our kid.”
She blinked at the sudden wash of tears. “I know.”
“You should ask Tracy who her doctor is. I know it’s someone local.”
“I suppose I should go soon. You don’t mind me telling her?”
He smiled, and her heart stuttered over a beat. “No. Tracy and I have never kept secrets from each other. She’ll be thrilled she’s going to be an aunt. Let me know when you get an appointment.”
“Why?”
“Because I want to be there.”
His interest in her pregnancy filled her chest with hope and wonder. He might not want kids, but he wanted to be involved. Her mother had been all alone in her pregnancy. She’d lived at home, but her parents had refused to have anything to do with her. They’d wanted LeAnn to give her up for adoption. At least, Dylan hadn’t wanted her to do that–or worse, have an abortion. She couldn’t ever do that either.
“If it’s what you really want.”
He feathered his fingers over her cheek, his gentle touch soothing. “Charli, I want to experience this with you.” He paused, and his eyes settled on her lips. “You make me feel things I haven’t felt in a long, long time.”
She held her breath and stared into his beautiful eyes. It wasn’t a declaration of undying love, but something in the way he looked at her made her heart take flight and soar. She turned on the stool and faced him.
Her bare knees and thighs brushed against his denim-covered legs and a shiver tickled down her spine. Unable to resist their closeness and her own needs, she reached up and skimmed her fingertips over his right stubble-roughened cheek and the scar at his jaw line. His eyes darkened with desire, and heat pooled in the pit of her belly.
“I want to be with you, too,” she whispered and laid her hand on his cheek. If the only part of him she could have was his lust, she was willing to settle for that. It was better than nothing at all. “Stay with me tonight. I don’t want to be alone.”
He wrapped his hand around her nape. Though his kiss was tender, it ignited a passion like no other. Her heart ached from her love for him. Before she could wrap her arms around him, he pulled back and took her hands into his.
Maybe he didn’t want her after all. He smiled and laced his fingers with hers. The simple act of holding his hands seemed as intimate as the kiss. His voice was rough with desire. “After I clean up this mess, let’s go outside and enjoy the evening.” He kissed the tip of her nose and chuckled at her puzzlement. “Then we’ll try out those new sheets.”
Once the kitchen was spotless again, he took her hand and led her out the front door and into the garden. They walked around a few of the garden beds hand-in-hand before he broke the silence.
“I’m surprised you got so much of the garden done.”
She looked over the beds as they meandered through, heading for the lake in the far front of the yard. “I had to stay busy after school was over. I guess it’s over for a while.”
“Charli?”
She looked up at him. “I just realized school will have to wait.” Even in the waning light of late evening, she saw his countenance melt a little. She tried to force a smile, but failed. Surprisingly, though, the reassurance rang true. “I didn’t say I was quitting. I’ll go back when I can. After the baby is older.”
Until then she’d be a mother, a rancher and whatever he wanted her to be to him. Only the threat to her promise to help Annie twisted her heart. She was still determined to do what she could for the girl. Something about Annie wouldn’t let her go.
“If you want to go back in the fall, I’ll be here. And after the baby is born, I’ll be here. I know how much being a social worker means to you.”
She squeezed his hand and this time the smile was easy. “Thank you.”
Once they got to the edge of the water, she warily peered around for snakes. He chuckled and the tension dwindled, at least a little. She glared at him.
Dylan pulled her down beside him on the stone bench. “Relax. I’ll protect you if one of the snakes decides to take a bite out of you.”
“If that was supposed to reassure me, it was a lousy attempt.”
His chortle filled the evening, and he wrapped his left arm around her shoulders. His right hand enveloped hers. He had big hands, work roughened and strong, perfect in their comforting warmth. She couldn’t help relaxing into the latent strength of his chest and shoulder.
They sat there for a few moments just watching the occasional ripple in the dark water as the evening turned to night. T
he purple sky swallowed the last rays of sun. While stars twinkled to life above the trees, fireflies danced closer to earth. Frogs and insects filled the night with a symphony of delightful music. A woodpecker added percussion, a trio of whippoorwills and an owl from the woods gave voice to the night song.
“It’s beautiful out here.” He didn’t bother keeping the awe from his rough voice.
“Yes, it is. I fell in love with this place during the day. If I’d seen it at night...” She let the statement trail away.
He took his arm from her shoulders and leaned his elbows on his thighs. He stared down at their hands clasped together.
She knew enough about Dylan Quinn to fall head over heels in love with him. But what made him tick? “Why do you believe you won’t measure up to your father?”
He glanced at her and drew in a deep breath. Concentrating on their hands again, he pressed hers between his palms as if he was sizing her much smaller one to his bigger ones.
At last, he heaved another long sigh. “Robert Quinn is a retired brigadier general who now works in Homeland Security. He’s had the kind of career most officers wish for. Dad has done so much. He was in Nam at the very end, and in Germany during the fall of the Berlin Wall, he was a battalion commander in the Gulf War and was sent to Bosnia. There he helped track down war criminals as a commanding member of the security force.”
He met her gaze. She rested her free hand on his forearm. The muscle bunched under her touch. “On Nine-Eleven, Dad was in the Pentagon, and he was one of the first to deploy to Afghanistan, where he was a senior officer under General McNeill during the early days. That’s where he pinned on the star. From there he took a divisional command in Iraq.”
Dylan got a faraway look in his eyes. His pride in his father was evident, but there was something resentful under it. “I was in Iraq at the same time and went to the change-in-command ceremony. Dad introduced me to a few of the brass. When they asked me what class I’d graduated from, you would’ve thought Dad’s officers had asked how long I was in the state pen by the look on my father’s face. He was ashamed when I told them I didn’t go to West Point.”
She was only about half following the military lingo. “Why?”
He snorted. “I’m my father’s number one disappointment. Not only didn’t I graduate from his school, I’m something of a hothead. So, I didn’t rise up the ranks as fast as Dad would’ve liked either.”
“But why should he be disappointed? You were in the Army and served the country well.”
“My family can trace its military history like a rancher can trace cattle breeds back to the first sire and heifer.”
He paused and she thought he was finished, but then he sighed again. “Dad never wanted Mom to come back here. He would’ve preferred she stayed in Washington with his family. Dad considered Granddad Ferguson a bad influence on me in particular. I loved horses as a little kid, and on our visits to Oak Springs, I practically glued myself to Granddad’s side, learning everything I could about the ranch. Granddad had taken an instant dislike to Dad. Thought he was a pompous Yankee ass.” Dylan chuckled and looked at her.
“You see, my dad had been raised in the military. His father lived and breathed it. Granddad Quinn would’ve pinned on a star if a heart attack hadn’t killed him during the waning days of the Cold War. I have roots clear back into the Revolution and beyond. One of my ancestors supposedly fought in the Crusades beside King Richard the Third.”
He pressed his lips together. “All I ever wanted to do was be a rancher.”
“There’s nothing wrong with ranching. Besides, you were in the Army and an officer. Your father should be proud of you. I know I am.”
His face softened, and he kissed her fingers. “I only joined the Army because my grandfather willed Oak Springs to his stepson instead of to his daughter.”
He let go of her hand and stood, shoved his hands into his pockets, and stared out over the dark lake, leaving her bereft of his touch.
She clasped her hands between her thighs. “You were hoping to run Oak Springs, weren’t you?”
He nodded, but didn’t look at her. “When Mom moved back here, I hated this place at first. This place just seemed so...I don’t know...backward. I’d lived all over the world, had just spent three years in Germany and before that we lived in D.C.”
She looked down at her clasped hands. “I understand perfectly. I felt the same way when I was fifteen and my grandfather took me back to the Long Arrow after Momma died.”
Dylan turned. “You know we probably have more in common than either one of us would like to admit.”
“I doubt that. Other than both being fifteen when we were plucked from our lives to be dumped on a ranch.” They stared at each other for a moment, and she thought about his guilt over the deaths of his men. She remembered her own role in the murder of Tyrone Hodges and his guards. Maybe he was onto something with his assessment.
She cleared her throat. “So, when did you decide ranching was what you wanted to do with your life?”
“I was only here for a few weeks before I fell in love with the place all over again. Granddad was happy to teach me about the ranch. It was the unspoken assumption Mom would inherit Oak Springs. Leon was away at Harvard, and I assumed I’d run the place when Granddad retired. Mom didn’t want the ranch, and Dad was more interested in war strategy than breeding cycles.
“I was a cocky teenager who thought I had it all. I went to college and majored in ag-business, all ready to take over once I graduated. Then Granddad had a stroke my junior year of school and died.”
“And he left Oak Springs to your uncle and not to your mother.”
He looked at her. She didn’t need to see his eyes to know how much pain would be in them. His voice quivered with it. “I didn’t know what to do, so I joined ROTC and when I graduated was commissioned into the Corp of Engineers. Dad was disappointed when I didn’t want to be a career military man, but he hated his only son chose to become an officer by not going to West Point. I broke a tradition going back as far as West Point’s first class.”
His father wasn’t the only one he was trying to live up to. From the sounds of it, he was trying to live up to a standard set beyond too high by his whole family tree. She stood and put her arms around his waist.
He looked down into her face, and she held him close, loving him, wanting him. “Dylan, you are your own man. You have to do what feels right for you, not your father–or anyone else.”
“Psychoanalysis mumbo-jumbo?”
She shook her head. “No, my grandfather. When I came home after running away, I had to find myself. I felt like a complete failure, always comparing myself to my mother. Despite her mistakes, she was a great woman who succeeded. She had nothing when she got to Tulsa, except a month-old baby and a few thousand bucks, but she got a job in a bank because they had a daycare, and she saved and learned. By the time she died, she was the manager.”
He smiled. “You take after your mother, I see.”
She shook her head. “No, I may have learned from her, but it happened only after I stopped comparing myself to her–or to anyone else, for that matter. I can’t be my mother any more than you can be your father.”
Dylan stared at her for a long time with a light in his pewter eyes she’d never seen before, and then he captured her lips with consuming passion, sweeping her away.
He ended the kiss and brushed his lips over her temple. “Let’s go in and try out that fancy bed.”
Chapter 14
Charli led Dylan into her bedroom, paused in the middle of the room, and turned to face him. A vibrating energy slivered through her, quickening her heart with a forbidden desire melting her insides.
She’d never stripped for a man who she truly desired–except Ricardo. However, she’d never loved him as much as she did Dylan, and she wanted to do something sexy and seductive.
She puckered her lips into a wanton pout she’d perfected so many years ago. It felt a bit rusty,
but she must have pulled the seduction off if the sudden fire in his eyes was any indication.
When he took a step toward her, she backed away, shaking her head. “Uh-uh. I want to do something for you.”
“You’re already doin’ plenty,” he said in a perfect Texas drawl. “You’re driving me crazy. What do you have planned?”
“You’ll see, cowboy.”
He grinned. “I like that.”
“Good,” she purred and gave him a sassy smile, backing away by placing one foot directly behind the other so that her hips swayed in a slow roll. “Because it’s exactly what you are.”
She pulled the rubber band from her hair. With a careless flick of her fingers, she tossed it in the general direction of the dresser. She fluffed the curls with both hands and gave the mess a toss.
She kicked off her sandals–one at a time–then grabbed the bottom of her tank top and slowly lifted it over her head. She flung the shirt at him, hitting him in the chest. He held it to his nose, taking a deep breath.
“You always smell like peaches.” His gruff voice snagged over her nerves, causing her to shudder.
After a few belly dancing moves, she ran her hands over the satin bra and down her stomach, drawing his eyes down. She gave her hips a provocative shake and turned around. He wanted to protest; she heard it in his groan. But when she shimmied out of the denim shorts, he hissed in a breath of sweet torture. Her bra fell to the floor, and she danced to imaginary music. She looked over her shoulder as she slipped her thumbs under the elastic of her panties and pushed them to her ankles, letting her hair fall to the floor and shaking her ass.
A primitive growl escaped him. He moved behind her, his hands pulling her up and turning her into his arms. His mouth consumed hers as a starving man might a feast. By the time they came up for air, she feared she’d melt into a puddle.
“Your turn.”
She grabbed the bottom of his t-shirt, pushed it up over his chest, and ran her hands through the dark curls.
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