Cowboy For Hire

by Victoria James

  She laughed and raised her glass. “To new friendships.”

  Something flashed across his eyes, and she hoped it wasn’t surprise. He’d agreed they were friends, after all. “To new friendships.”

  “So what do we do now?”

  He shrugged, leaning back against the dresser. “What do you want to do?”

  “Me? I don’t know how to have fun, remember? Why don’t you lead the fun charge? What would you do right now for fun?” The second the words escaped her lips, she became frazzled because of how that sounded. What would Cade do for fun? She could imagine all the things he might do for fun with someone else in a hotel room. Well, no, she probably couldn’t imagine all the things, but just the bare few things were enough to make her feel giddy and embarrassed.

  He cleared his throat and walked across the room. “How about we find a movie and start eating our way through this pity party of junk?”

  She nodded, relieved that he hadn’t answered her question in a different way. “Perfect,” she said, joining him on the bed. He sat on one side of the bed, making a mountain out of the food between them. He looked comfortable enough, with his legs stretched out in front of him and one ankle crossed over the other. The only thing was, it looked as though he went out of his way to make sure they were as far from each other as possible.

  He was currently flipping through channels and drinking his whiskey. “What do you want to watch?”

  “Any movies?”

  He shook his head. “Unfortunately, the Highwayman doesn’t have any new releases.”

  He was pointing the shopping-bag-covered remote at the television and mumbling something under his breath as the plastic crinkled.

  “Oh, are you having problems through the hermetically sealed plastic?”

  He slowly turned to look at her, and she smiled.

  He pulled the plastic tighter, and finally the television turned on, the nightly news filling the screen. “Not that. Anything but the news.”

  He smirked. “Right. You wanted adult movies.”

  Her face burned. “No, I meant”—she cleared her throat—“like, movies. New releases. Not…other things.”

  He finished off his whiskey but didn’t turn to her. The television suddenly went black.

  “What!”

  He groaned and tossed the remote to the foot of the bed. “Well, there goes that idea.”

  “I’m sure someone at the front desk will be able to fix this.”

  Giving her a look, he rolled over, yanked a tissue from the Kleenex box, and used it to pick up the phone and dial. She held back her laugh when she noticed he didn’t put the receiver right to his ear. She was trying not to notice the forearms that were roped with muscle that led to more muscle as her eyes wandered up the length of his body. She downed her whiskey, even though it may not have been the wisest of moves, but it really seemed like the only move she could make in a situation like this.

  He sat up. “So Carl will be over soon. Maybe. If Carl’s wife brings him dinner. If not, he can’t leave the desk. But, according to Carl, his wife is pissed at him for not going home last night. She’s also mad at him for never spending time with her and the kids and doesn’t think he respects her role as a stay-at-home mom.”

  “Oh. Well, he should do better. Not good. I can understand her position,” she said, fluffing up a pillow behind her back to make sure she was sitting upright. He refilled both their glasses while she spoke. “Don’t you agree?” she asked when he didn’t answer.

  He frowned. “About Carl?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Uh, yeah? You should have said something to him.”

  He shook his head. “Uh, no. And I’m not qualified to give marital advice to a stranger. Considering Carl’s T-shirt was stained and it looked like he hadn’t showered in a week, his wife might be better off with him not going home.”

  He had a point. “See, you already know half of what’s wrong with Carl’s marriage. Do you have cards?”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Cards?”

  She nodded, crossing her legs. “I’m good. A shark.”

  His mouth curled up slightly, and he leaned on his side so that he was facing her. “You are probably the worst liar I’ve ever met.”

  She inhaled sharply. “What? I’ve mastered my poker face.”

  He gave her a full-on Cade grin, and it should really come with some kind of warning. “Your face goes red.”

  She shook her head. “No.”

  He pointed at her forehead and cheeks. “Yep. Blotchy, too.”

  She clenched her teeth. So while she was thinking about how his smile was deadly good, he was thinking about her blotchy face. This was her life now. “You’re just saying this because you don’t want to play poker with me.”

  He rolled his eyes and flopped back on the bed, tucking one arm behind his head. Dear God, he was like some kind of model, just lying there casually beside her. Don’t look anywhere but his face. Unfortunately, his face was all kinds of perfect, too. There was nowhere safe to look. “You gotta work on that poker face,” he said gruffly, staring at the ceiling.

  Oh no, what did that mean? He knows. She had ogled. Never in her twenty-six years had she ogled. She needed Carl to hurry up and get here so she could stop being so awkward. “Is there more whiskey?”

  “Maybe we should just go to sleep. It’s late enough, and tomorrow if we leave early, at least the entire day won’t be wasted.”

  “Oh.” If it had been freezing temperatures in here, she bet she would have been able to see the cold form an O around the word as it whispered out of her mouth. How was she going to save face? It was a Friday night and she had dragged this man—this man of all men, a man who could probably choose to spend his Friday night with almost any woman—to a motel in the middle of nowhere, with nothing but liquor and candy and the offer of a card game. How had this become her life? At least her old life was pathetic only to herself. With this new life, Cade was witnessing it.

  “But what about Carl?”

  “Ten bucks says his wife isn’t giving him dinner.”

  “Can you pass the bottle of whiskey?”

  He refilled her glass.

  “Thank you. Listen, I’m sorry I dragged you into this anyway. It sounded like it was going to be an adventure, and now you’re stuck here wasting your Friday night with me.”

  She downed her glass and watched as he stared at the ceiling.

  “It’s not a waste.” His voice came out clipped and not at all like the warm, sexy voice she’d heard all night. Fine. Well, there was no point in sitting here crying over this cowboy. She had a giant pile of food that she normally never allowed herself to eat, and the whiskey was making it very easy to speak her mind and indulge her cravings. He didn’t say anything, so she helped herself and grabbed the bag of Peach Rings. Maybe he’d fall asleep right then and there.

  “Are you going to stop crinkling that bag soon?”

  She made sure she crinkled it extra-loud and extra-long for being so rude. The bag finally opened, and she tossed one of the sugar-coated rings into her mouth. Then she remembered the last person she’d shared these with, and a wave of loneliness swept over her, even though she wasn’t alone.

  “All done crinkling,” she choked out, cringing slightly at the way her voice sounded. It was either choke on her own tears or choke on the Peach Ring. Josh would always end up eating way faster than she would, and then she’d get mad at him for eating most of the bag.

  The memory and the ache left her sitting there with her hand in the bag and her mind in the past. At least she didn’t have to worry about actually crying in front of him. When she finally raised her eyes, it was to witness the hottest man she’d ever known punching his pillow before settling back down on it, his back to her. Was it sad that she really wanted him to say something? Anything so that she wouldn’t fe
el so alone? She shoved another Peach Ring in her mouth and stared out the window into the parking lot.

  “Are you also going to keep making that smacking sound with your mouth?”

  That was it. Hot or not, he was being a jerk. “These are chewy candies,” she said, her words garbled because of the amount of candy in her mouth. She threw a Peach Ring at his head.

  He flipped over, looking at her. “Did you just throw candy at my head?”

  She rolled her lips inward and started to slowly shake her head and then turn it into a nod. He let out an exasperated sigh.

  “I think it’s rude of you to just check out on our plans just because Carl is having marital issues. If I had hired you as an escort, I would have fired you by now. Also, I get that your Friday nights are probably filled with lots of…lurid things and this is really tame and boring for you, but you should at least try and be polite.”

  His eyes were wide, and for a second she didn’t know what he was going to do. But he burst out laughing. A really deep, throaty laugh that almost made her smile. Except she didn’t because she was mad at him and he was laughing at her. “Lurid?”

  She shoved a few more Peach Rings in her mouth and washed them down with whiskey. The whiskey really did make everything better. “That’s it? I tell you all that, and all you can do is point out my vocabulary choice?”

  “I haven’t heard that word since I watched a black-and-white movie when the cable went out.”

  “You’re funny, Cade. You know what I mean,” she said, hating that she’d used the dated word. This is what happens when your only friends are over seventy-five, Sarah.

  “Why don’t you tell me what you think I do on Friday nights?”

  “Uh, this isn’t a game show. I’m not going to sit here guessing what you do for one hundred points.” She grabbed a Peach Ring and carefully placed it on the tip of one finger, then continued to do the same until each finger had a Peach Ring on the tip, just like she’d done when she was a kid.

  He stared at her and then laughed again. She had never seen him laugh so much. He grabbed her hand, and she stopped breathing as he dipped his head, pulled a Peach Ring off one of her fingers, and ate it. Dear God. Nothing in her life had prepared her for Cade’s mouth on her finger, and even though it happened so fast, she was pretty sure she’d never be the same. She was also pretty sure her face was as red as a tomato. “That was mine,” she managed to say, waiting for him to laugh.

  “I’m not wasting my Friday night,” he said in a voice she hadn’t heard from him before; it was deep and gravelly and stirred something unknown within her.

  She peeled her eyes off his face and stared at the contents of the bag. She was reassured that even if she choked on the Peach Ring in her mouth, the opening would prevent her from suffocating to death. “Thank you for saying that.”

  He shrugged and sat up. “Are you sharing?”

  She nodded, holding the bag in his direction, torn between relief and disappointment that the moment was over.

  “I’ve never had these.”

  “Really? They used to be my favorite as a kid. I haven’t had them in years.”

  He refilled their glasses. “So. Why don’t you tell me why you didn’t want to go home tonight?”

  “Because that’s the only place I ever go,” she said with a shrug.

  “Why?”

  She put down the bag of candy and traded it for the whiskey. “My parents were extremely overprotective people, and I wasn’t really allowed a social life unless it was one they orchestrated.”

  “Like how?”

  “I’ve been out with three different guys, each one worse than the other. But all three were from families they thought were suitable.”

  He grabbed a handful of Peach Rings. “So they set you up on dates? What was the criteria for these dates?”

  She held up her hand. “Money, ranching family, upstanding citizens.”

  He looked away for a moment, his jaw clenching. “And what was wrong with the guys?”

  She shrugged, knowing exactly what was wrong, everything that was missing in this scenario. Not that she’d tell him that, but the buzz that was rippling through her that had nothing to do with the liquor she was drinking was exactly what had been missing. “Well, they were kind of boring. Remember, I’m the girl who had no life, so if I think someone’s boring, they’re definitely boring.”

  One corner of his mouth tilted up, his eyes sparkling with something. “For someone who hasn’t had a lot of freedom, you’re not boring at all, sweetheart.”

  Her mouth dropped open slightly, and her stomach swirled at the endearment and how softly he said it, how deep and rich his voice sounded. She frantically thought of something to say to him, knowing that she was one of many who’d probably been on the receiving end of that endearment but not wanting to dwell on that. For now, this was her night with him, and he made her feel more alive than she ever had as an adult. “That’s sweet.”

  “I’m not being sweet; I’m just telling you the truth. This is…fun.”

  Her heart started beating frantically in her chest. “So what was the last fun night you had?” she blurted out, wanting to know more about what he actually enjoyed doing.

  He ran a hand through his hair. “I, uh, I’m not sure.”

  “Liar.”

  “Hey, I may be lots of things, but I’m not a liar. Fine, let me think. I didn’t know I’d have to come up with an actual example. Oh, I’ve got one. Tyler and Lainey’s wedding.”

  Her mouth dropped open again.

  He frowned. “What?”

  “That’s also really sweet.”

  He shut his eyes and lay his head back on the pillow. “Clearly you’re getting the wrong impression of me.”

  She picked up the square decorative pillow at the foot of the bed, intending to smack him with it, but without even opening his eyes, he’d anticipated her movement and grasped her wrist. “That had better not be one of those decorative pillows that are filled with germs.”

  She laughed, but her voice came out breathy because the feel of his hand wrapped around her wrist was making it hard for her to breathe normally. “I cannot get over how much of a germaphobe you are. No wonder you carry hand sanitizer. Not many cowboys I’ve met do.”

  He let go of her wrist, and she put the pillow back down, flustered and giddy at the same time. “If you knew what I knew about motels, you’d feel the exact same way. Can I ask you something?”

  She nodded, trying to hide her embarrassment and disappointment that he was distancing himself. “Sure.”

  “We’ve worked together for a few weeks now, and you’ve kept up with all of us, have worked hard and haven’t backed down from anything. I was worried about you on the cattle drive, and I didn’t need to be—you were amazing. Why wouldn’t your family let you get involved with the ranch? It couldn’t really just be that you’re a woman?”

  A pang of remorse stabbed her in the heart. She hated talking about this. It was one thing for it to be there in the back of her mind, but it was another to have to talk about it aloud. But he was the first friend she’d had in years. The first person who listened to her without shooting her down or mocking her. He brought her here, just because she asked him to. Cade was so much more than the most attractive man she’d ever known.

  Suddenly, all those years of holding everything in, of keeping it all together, seemed so wrong, seemed so heavy, and she wanted nothing more than to rid herself of all of it. She wanted to share it with someone.

  She stared at him, the pile of junk food between them on the bed, and knew that once she opened up to him, she was going to let herself fall for him. Even though she sensed he wasn’t a man who was going to give her happily-ever-after, maybe all she needed was right now.

  Chapter Ten

  “It’s a long and complicated story,” Sa
rah said, ripping open his Snickers bar, breaking off half, and offering it to him.

  He shook his head. He shouldn’t be asking her this. But none of this should be happening tonight—not that he’d ever let them get further than this…sharing of stories. This crap-ass hotel room felt too small, too intimate, for two people who had no business being together to spend the night in. Especially not when, over the last two hours, he’d found himself craving the way she laughed, the way she got irritated with him, the sound of her voice.

  This wasn’t what he wanted. He never tried to get to know about people’s lives other than his two best friends. Except he found himself wanting to know what had turned this intelligent, capable, gorgeous woman into someone so sheltered and introverted. He wasn’t going to care about the fact that when she was with him, she didn’t seem introverted at all. He also was only going to look straight into her eyes and keep that pile of food between them.

  His first mistake had been letting himself touch her, to pull that stupid Peach Ring off her finger, even if it was just to keep himself from getting that pillow on him. His second mistake was taking in her features up close as she spoke, teasing her and laughing with her.

  All around, this entire night was a mistake. And yet, here he was, the guy who never wanted to know anything about anyone, wanting to know everything.

  “Long and complicated sounds just about perfect for two people sharing a room with no television.”

  She popped half the chocolate bar in her mouth and shut her eyes, making some moaning sound that had him pouring himself another whiskey and looking out the window at the view of the parking lot. At least his truck was still there.

  “I can’t believe I’ve been missing out on this all these years.”

  “You don’t eat chocolate?”

  “No dairy, no gluten, no sugar.”

  He blinked. “Is there a point in living?”

  She shrugged, her hair falling around back in a cascade of honey-colored curls, and he smiled watching her. “It was worth it, I guess. Maybe not, jury’s still out. But that’s a story for another day.”