Texas Sizzle

by Lori Wilde

  Texas Sizzle

  Cowboy Country, Volume 3

  Lori Wilde

  Published by Lori Wilde, 2021.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  TEXAS SIZZLE

  First edition. June 11, 2021.

  Copyright © 2021 Lori Wilde.

  ISBN: 978-1393288268

  Written by Lori Wilde.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Epilogue

  Further Reading: Montana Blaze

  Also By Lori Wilde

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  Naked yoga?

  Texas Ranger Field Agent Abel Black—on special top-secret assignment from the governor—pressed his eyes to the state-of-the-art, wide-angle binocular-telescope mounted on a tripod. He frowned at the same time his pulse kicked up.

  His target was doing yoga in the nude.

  Warrior pose if he wasn’t mistaken. Not that he knew much about yoga, but he was a warrior.

  He had no business staring at the woman once he realized what she was doing. His surveillance assignment was limited to her comings and goings and those of her guests. He was violating her privacy. She had a right to do naked yoga in her own living room if she chose.

  Never mind that she hadn’t quite pulled the drapes all the way closed. With this kick-ass telescope, he could spot a fly in a sandstorm from two miles away.

  And he could see every incredible detail of Poppy St. John’s lush, supple body. Those pert breasts, narrow waist, lean legs, and luscious ass.

  Fascination dried his mouth. Lust drained the blood from his face and drove it straight to his dick.

  Move, dammit. Step away from the telescope.

  Transfixed, he fisted his hands and clenched his jaw. He was going to stop this. Right now. Except what guy could move with a boner the size of the Port Isabel lighthouse?

  Shake it off, Black.

  How could he, when such a glorious sight met his eyes? Right, that was nothing but an excuse. He hated what he was doing. Totally disgusted with his caveman behavior. And yet, he did not move.

  He was caught off guard. Knocked for a loop. Who would have expected the woman to strip off all her clothing and jump into the lotus position without any warning? He was too rattled to even blink, much less take a step back from the telescope.

  Neanderthal. Troglodyte. Ape.

  Yeah, sure, calling himself names would work. His toes curled inside his cowboy boots anchored on the hardwood floors of the rented apartment in South Padres Island. His eyes were practically bugging out of their sockets as he watched the oh-so-perky Ms. St. John do something with her body he hadn’t thought humanly possible.

  Her skin glistened with perspiration, her adorable blond ponytail swishing as she moved. Hi Ho, Silver.

  He licked his lips gone Sahara-desert dry. Man alive, it was hot in here in spite of the breeze blowing in through the open window, bringing with it the smell of the Texas Gulf Coast and rustling the curtains. Almost as hot as Arizona where his cousin, Luke, lived. He’d just gotten back from visiting Luke and his new wife, Jane, when the governor had called with this whacked-out undercover gig.

  Here she was stretching and bending and twisting, naked as the day she was born, without a clue that she was being watched. She thought she was safe in her own home, protected from prying eyes. Free to express herself with that body bestowed by the gods. She had no idea that she was under scrutiny by the premier law enforcement agency in Texas.

  That got through to his lusty thoughts when nothing else had. He could not afford to forget why he was here or whom he represented. Government secrets had been stolen and if they fell into the wrong hands, American lives would be in peril.

  Then she turned and he spotted something on her left shoulder that seemed to flitter in the flickering glow from the candles she’d lit before starting her erotic exercise. Something silvery and blue. He fiddled with the focus, homing in.

  A tattoo.

  Of a handsome blue-and-silver butterfly, wings unfurling, ready to fly free.

  He should have figured. Everything in her dossier pointed to a free-spirited, no-regrets type. That made her his polar opposite in every way. According to her file, St. John had grown up without a father and trailing after her nomadic, hair-stylist mother from town to town.

  Abel had been raised as the oldest of three kids in a stable family on a Montana cattle ranch that set the bar high. His father had also served in law enforcement and upon his retirement, had followed the family tradition of going into politics. Abel was expected to follow suit, marry a woman who could navigate that world with ease and aplomb, all the while exhibiting the highest moral conduct.

  And yet, here you are staring at a naked woman through a telescope.

  She stretched to the side, giving him a perfect view of the butterfly. Body art hadn’t much turned him on before, but something about that tattoo on this woman stirred an unexpected reaction inside him.

  Sweat broke out on his brow and he sank his top teeth into his bottom lip, suppressing a groan.

  She dropped like silk panties to the floor, pressing her belly down flat on the yoga mat stretched over the hardwood flooring, while at the same time angling her fantastic butt into the air.

  Holy crap! What was this new pose? The erection that had already been straining against his zipper tightened and grew. His blood ran red-hot through his veins and his breath shot out in quick, hard rasps.

  The bottom of her ponytail grazed the middle of her back just above where her sexy little waist tucked inward. She arched her spine, shifting her position again, putting that impressive little fanny right in his face.

  His throat constricted. The muscles of her sweet rump were tightly defined, but at the same time utterly feminine. His gaze tracked from the curvy rump to where it joined her thighs that tapered down into long shapely legs. Her peachy skin glistened with the glossy sheen of exertion. Abel wanted to touch her so badly his hands shook. A woman like that could lead a good man straight to hell with a big grin on his face.

  Gotta stop this. Gotta stop this now.

  Otherwise, he was going to unzip his pants and do what came naturally.

  No. No way. No how. He was known throughout the Rangers for his self-control. He wasn’t about to pleasure himself over the woman he’d been hired to keep under surveillance. That would be unethical and sleazy and... and...

  He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, straightened, and finally stepped back from the telescope. He paced the floor, ran a hand over his close-cropped hair, and took several deep breaths to calm his soaring temperature.

  If she was going to put on that floor show every night, Abel didn’t know if he’d survive this assignment. Maybe he could ask Rogers to take the night shift—

  No!

  The minute the thought entered his mind he squelched it. The only thing worse than having to watch her nude yoga routine was the thought of his partner watching her. Never mind that Tim Rogers had just gotten married and was madly in love with his new bride. Abel didn’t want the other Ranger ogling Poppy.

  And why the hell was tha
t?

  Abel surely didn’t know. It was a strange, possessive feeling gnawing at his gut. He didn’t want anyone seeing her naked but him.

  It shocked him. That sudden thought.

  The door to the apartment opened and Abel jumped in front of the telescope, arms behind his back, guilt punching him. Tim Rogers came through the door carrying a greasy white paper bag that smelled of sauteed onions and two foam drink cups cradled against his body.

  Rogers could have posed for a Texas Rangers recruitment poster. Tall, dark eyes, hawkish nose. He possessed a wide, welcoming smile and dark-brown hair that he wore slightly longer than Abel’s but still short enough to meet regulations. Rogers shot him a sly glance. “How’s the peep show?”

  “P-peep show?” Abel stammered and felt the top of his ears burn.

  “Don’t get offended. I know you’re Mr. Straight Arrow,” his partner said, clearly misreading Abel’s embarrassment as disapproval. “But come on, we are playing peep-eye with a beautiful woman. Sooner or later, we’re going to see her partially dressed if not completely naked.” His grin widened.

  You have no idea, Abel thought, the image of Poppy’s sexy bare body vividly fresh in his mind.

  “Have you told Lisa about our assignment?” Abel asked, shifting the conversation off the woman next door and on to Rogers.

  “Do I look like a crazy man?” Rogers chuckled. “I told her I couldn’t discuss the case, which is true.” He rifled through the sack and pulled out a foam container. “Here’s your rabbit food.”

  Rogers shoved the container into Abel’s hand, then went back to the sack to retrieve a hamburger dripping with grease.

  “How do you eat that stuff?” Abel shook his head and reached for a plastic fork to dig into his garden salad with low-cal dressing.

  Rogers sank his teeth into the burger. “With relish. Not all of us grew up with a gourmet chef at our beck and call.”

  “You exaggerate. Yes, my family had a little money, but my mom was the chef.”

  Roger held up a French fry. “Still, not the norm, Richie Rich. Wanna bite? I’ll share.”

  “No, thanks.” Abel had given up eating fast food years ago. A disciplined man controlled himself in the face of temptation. No matter how delicious.

  And then he thought of Poppy St. John again. Talk about temptation of a wholly different kind.

  “So,” Rogers said, dabbing at his mouth with a napkin. “What do you think we did to piss off the powers-that-be?”

  “What do you mean?” Abel frowned.

  “This is just a lame babysitting duty. I mean, c’mon, if you were Barksdale, would you come dragging back to your ex-girlfriend if you were under investigation for gunrunning? Me? I’d make a beeline for Mexico, ASAP.”

  Keith Barksdale had once been an aide de camp to the governor. While Abel—with his degree in cybersecurity—had been working to encrypt classified documents for the state, Barksdale had remotely hacked into the Texas Ranger’s computer and stolen the files before Abel had realized what was happening and raise the alarm.

  It had taken him and his team almost half an hour to discover where the invader had come from. Once they’d tracked the hacker to the Brownsville area, the Rangers had run checks on all the employees who could have been potentially involved in the theft. They’d instantly red-flagged Barksdale when they learned he’d been taking a yoga class with a Mexican national who had ties to shady arms dealers—and that Barksdale owed several hundred thousand dollars in gambling debts.

  Barksdale had been taken in for questioning, but they’d been unable to prove his involvement—he’d been an expert at covering his tracks—and they’d been forced to release him. The Rangers kept him under close surveillance, restricting his computer access and monitoring his every move, but then the slippery Barksdale had absconded, and no one had seen him for three weeks.

  The Rangers believed he had downloaded the information to a microchip, but that he hadn’t yet passed it to his contact. For one thing, there had been no large deposits in Barksdale’s bank account before they’d frozen it. For another thing, the suspected buyer was still in the country and taking yoga classes at Ms. St. John’s studio.

  Abel knew exactly why he’d been given the assignment. Even though he’d followed security protocol to the letter, Barksdale had taken the data right out from under his nose and the governor was highly embarrassed. This was Abel’s chance to make amends.

  “They’re just covering all the bases,” Abel said mildly. “At least we didn’t get the chore of staking out Barksdale’s grandmother in her Iowa nursing home.”

  Rogers gave an exaggerated shudder. “Yeah, you’ve got a point. But how come we didn’t get a more active assignment, like shadowing Barksdale’s contact?”

  “This is an active assignment.”

  “Uh-huh.” Rogers took a long swig from his drink. “Keep telling yourself that. Higgins put his glory boy Kilgore on the buyer,” he said, referring to their Captain, George Higgins, and their nemesis, Miles Kilgore, who seemed to get all the plum assignments.

  “Higgins called it as he saw fit,” Abel replied. “Barksdale could very well contact Ms. St. John. We’ve got the heat on him hard. He’ll have trouble getting out of the country or even finding a safe house in Texas. It’s natural to assume he could turn to her for help.”

  “Would you go to your ex-girlfriend if you were in trouble?”

  He thought about Kirsten, the woman he’d almost married. They’d been so much alike. She was dutiful, dedicated, calm, and controlled. It was that self-control that had torpedoed their relationship. She’d broken things off after three years, telling him she needed someone who stirred her passion.

  That had been a kick in the teeth. Abel winced at the memory. It would be difficult, but sure, yeah, if he were in trouble he’d go to Kirsten. They might not have had a grand passion, but they had mutual respect and admiration.

  He shrugged. “Depends on the girlfriend I suppose.”

  “You don’t think Barksdale is smart enough to figure out that we’d have all his family and friends under surveillance? The assignment’s lame and you know it. In the meantime, I’m a newlywed stuck clear across the state from my bride.”

  “Comes with the territory.” Abel offered no sympathy. “You knew what you were getting into when you joined the military.” Duty to country often came before family. It was the nature of the beast. He’d had that drilled into him from toddlerhood.

  “Well,” Rogers said, crumpling up the paper bag and tossing it into the trash can. “I’m hitting the sack. Have a good night.”

  They ran two surveillance shifts. Rogers kept watch from seven a.m. to seven p.m. Abel had drawn the short straw and pulled the night shift. Now that he saw what Poppy did with her late evenings, he was glad.

  Rogers yawned, stretched, and ambled toward the back of the two-bedroom apartment. The place came furnished with the typical beach décor. But most of the living room was covered with their surveillance equipment—wires, cameras, cords, telescopes, recorders, and listening devices. In the bedrooms, twin-size mattresses lay on the floor.

  They were stuck here until the assignment was over. How long it lasted depended on how long it took the Rangers to nab Keith Barksdale. Unless something more pressing happened and the brass decided it was not worth the money or manpower to keep tabs on St. John.

  Abel went back to the telescope, but Poppy was no longer in her living room. She’d blown out the candles and the light was now on in her bedroom. Disappointment settled over him and he realized he’d been hoping to see her naked again.

  “Pervert,” he chastised himself.

  He kept watching, imagining her getting ready for bed, taking a steamy shower, blow-drying her hair, brushing her teeth. He saw the light in her bedroom wink out, and he envisioned her sinking that slinky body of hers underneath the sheets.

  A rush of heat spread through his groin.

  Dammit. This had to stop. He had to find a way to
turn off his desires. Otherwise, he didn’t know how long he could stay honorable.

  And Abel Black was nothing if not an honorable man.

  Chapter Two

  Whenever Poppy St. John got the blues, she pulled the drapes, put Enya on the iPod, lit aromatherapy candles, shimmied out of her clothes, and let yoga whisk her away.

  And today, she was bluer than blue.

  It was her twenty-ninth birthday and no one had remembered, but honestly, the funk had really started three weeks ago when her boyfriend, Keith Barksdale, had ditched her.

  She didn’t know why she was letting Keith get to her. Their relationship hadn’t been serious. Most likely it was because he’d dumped her before she had a chance to dump him. It was the first time Poppy had ever been on the receiving end of a breakup.

  The whole thing had gone down really weirdly. Keith had shown up at her yoga studio one morning and given her a beautiful platinum locket clearly worth a lot of money. “I’ve been thinking of you,” he’d said, “and wanted to get you something really nice.”

  She’d been touched. It was the first time in two months of dating that he’d bought her a gift. Then he’d disappeared for a couple of days and when he returned, he told her that he was breaking things off, that he’d realized they weren’t a good match and he wanted the locket back. She’d agreed to return it, but at that exact moment a black SUV had pulled up in the parking lot. Three men in dark suits and sunglasses had gotten out.

  Keith had taken one look at them through the big picture window of her studio that overlooked the ocean, paled, and run out the back door. The men had come in, flashed badges, and identified themselves as Texas Rangers and asked her to answer a few questions about Keith.

  She’d had nothing to hide, so she’d agreed to an interview and told the truth. She had no idea where Keith had gone when he left the yoga studio, and she didn’t expect to ever hear from him again. It had been disconcerting, however, to learn he’d been involved in some kind of illegal activities. They wouldn’t give her details of course, but just knowing Keith was capable of such things put her judgment in question.