Cook County Cowboys

by Crystal-Rain Love

  Cammie chewed her bottom lip. She didn’t have any experience in being married, but surely a groom should be more talkative than this. “We were lucky to find rings on such short notice.” Geez, stop rambling already.

  Lucky eyed the band on her left ring finger for a second before focusing back on the road. “I’ll get you a better one soon, one that’s all yours.”

  “This one is fine,” she quickly assured him, hoping she hadn’t made him feel bad. “This is the one you put on my finger after promising me forever. This is the one attached to that memory. Besides, it’s not the ring itself that matters, it’s the man who gives it.”

  He swallowed hard, and as Cammie watched his Adam’s apple bob, she swallowed down her own fear. Do you love me? The question danced along the tip of her tongue, where it had been since he’d proposed the night before, but she didn’t dare ask it. She was Mrs. Lucky Masters. Thousands of women, if not more, fell head over heels in love with men thought completely unattainable every day. How many of those women got to exchange vows with them? No, Cammie would not ask if Lucky loved her. He’d married her and promised to be faithful. He’d fulfilled a dream nearly two decades in the making. She wouldn’t shatter it by risking hearing him say no, or worse, cheapen the words by saying them as a lie.

  She would be happy with what she had. If he chose to tell her the words she desperately wanted to hear, she would rejoice in them whenever they came. If the words never came, she’d be satisfied waiting, hoping for them. Either option was better than getting a definite denial, so she swallowed down the question plaguing her mind and adjusted to the silence as they traveled to the ranch.

  “What the hell?” Lucky muttered as they approached, following Chance down the lane leading to the parking area. As they drove under the arch with the new hanging board sign identifying the land as the Calhoun-Masters Ranch, they noticed familiar faces waving to them from the front porch of Chance and Kenzie’s ranch house.

  Cammie’s heart took a little plummet as she saw Flo standing with her hands on the railing, awaiting their arrival. She hadn’t told her about the wedding, and had no idea when Kenzie had found time to notify her and the rest of the small group gathered. She’d been dreading announcing her news to the motherly woman, not wanting to hurt Flo’s feelings by not inviting her, but everything had been so rushed.

  If she were being honest, she’d been scared to tell anyone other than Kenzie and Chance. She’d spent every moment before the exchange of vows holding her breath and waiting for Lucky to change his mind and back out of the ceremony. Part of her had worried it was all just a dream, one that would leave her brokenhearted after awakening. That dreadful fear still clung to her mind as they pulled to a stop before the house.

  Cammie climbed out of the truck at the same time as Lucky, and together they met up with Kenzie and Chance.

  “I know you didn’t want a big fuss, but I had to have some kind of celebration for my best friend on her wedding day,” Kenzie explained as Chance stood silently, hands shoved deep in his pockets.

  “When did you have time to get everyone together?” Cammie asked as she took in the guests waiting on the porch.

  “Please.” Kenzie waved her hand dismissively. “Flo and Rhoda are practically on speed dial, and George works on the ranch. Somebody had to be here getting your reception together while the wedding was going on.”

  “Reception?”

  “Come on in here, lovebirds,” Rhoda called from the porch. “George and Flo worked up a good lunch, and I of course brought the alcohol!”

  Flo smiled as they neared, but it didn’t reach her eyes. Cammie knew the woman didn’t approve of what she’d considered a childhood crush on Lucky, and therefore would not approve of the marriage. She silently prayed that the older woman would accept Lucky and not say anything negative to him. Cammie was not so blinded by love that she didn’t realize this marriage would take work to last. Between her illness and Lucky’s tendency to run from anything serious, they needed all the positive reinforcement they could get.

  George shook Lucky’s hand as they approached, and nodded toward her with a warm smile, but was otherwise silent. Cammie didn’t know him very well, and it hit her how sad it was that Kenzie felt the need to invite a near stranger to her reception in order to fill space.

  She stepped into Kenzie and Chance’s kitchen, Lucky right behind her, and the cold sadness that had filled the center of her chest only seconds ago blossomed into warmth.

  A beautiful, white, three-tiered round cake with a basketweave design done in buttercream rested in the center of the kitchen table, atop a white lace tablecloth. Baby blue buttercream roses topped the cake and adorned the border on the bottom tier. Despite being three tiers, the size of each one was scaled down enough to make the cake just the right size for the small party.

  “Oh my goodness…” Tears stung the backs of Cammie’s eyes as she realized how much trouble it must have been for Flo to whip up a wedding cake within the short amount of time she’d been given.

  “I figured this was a more appropriate lunch than salad and sandwiches,” Flo said brightly as she stood to the side of the table, beaming down at the cake. “I never would have finished on time without George’s help. I tell ya, after this, I think I could go on one of them shows on the Food Network, where they make those big ole cakes in just a few hours.”

  “I believe you could,” Cammie agreed, still surprised Flo had managed the feat. She hugged the older woman, touched by the trouble she’d gone to despite the many times she’d warned her away from Lucky.

  “And I hope you fellas don’t mind trading in the longnecks for the good stuff,” Rhoda interjected, eyes on the Masters brothers as she brandished a bottle of wine in one hand, two long-stemmed glasses in the other.

  “That’ll do,” Lucky answered, offering the bartender who’d threatened to cut him off on numerous occasions a small smile of gratitude. “Thanks, all of you. You didn’t have to do this.”

  “Nonsense.” George waved them off as he helped Rhoda pass around the wine glasses. “This is a day to celebrate. We’re honored to celebrate it with you and look forward to celebrating the anniversaries and births!”

  Cammie’s hand instinctively went to her belly, but quickly dropped away as she noticed Flo following the action, a deep frown etched into her wary face. A quick glance to her left showed Lucky, standing stiff at her side, until a nudge from Chance shook him out of it.

  “I think we should cut the cake.”

  “Hold your horses, cowboy.” Rhoda raised her glass. “First, we toast.”

  Cammie dutifully raised her glass, joining her friends and husband. She expected Kenzie to toast, or Rhoda, since she’d been the one to remind them it should be done first, but it was Chance who cleared his throat.

  “Here’s to the bride and groom. Lucky, you’ve been a pain in my ass since the day you were born, and I don’t know what I’d do without you. Cammie, you’re my wife’s best friend, and that tells me all I need to know about the type of person you are. I am beyond happy that my brother found himself blessed with a good woman to give the family name to.”

  Cammie felt Lucky’s hand tighten around hers and looked over at his profile to see his jaw tightly clamped. He rarely showed emotion, and no one else in that room may have noticed, but she’d been paying close attention to him long enough to know his brother’s toast was tugging at his heartstrings.

  “My brother and I…we don’t come from much, but we found a pot of gold when we found our brides. Here’s to Lucky and Cammie.” He raised his glass higher. “May your new life together be full of joy and blessings.”

  “Here here,” their friends toasted, all of them smiling, clearly moved by the sweet and unexpected words from Chance.

  But as she raised the glass to her lips, Cammie just couldn’t find it in her to smile through the fear that this happy little moment was going to be followed by a lot of heartbreak.

  Chapter Eleven

>   Hell’s Belle was crowded with lonely women and horny men, the usual for a spring night in Cook County. Lucky glanced around at the pickings just as he had always done, but this time his radar didn’t zone in on anyone of interest. Shrugging it off, he made his way to the bar.

  Go back home!

  Warning himself was never of any use. He’d had this dream what had to be over two hundred times since that night, and it never worked. Still, he mentally screamed the words as he fought to wake from the nightmare, but karma was hell bent on making him relive that horrific night over and over until it eventually succeeded in driving him mad.

  His dream-self sat at the bar and signaled to Rho, who already knew what he wanted. She deposited the frosty longneck in front of him and sauntered over to the other end of the bar to refill Earl Brown’s empty mug.

  Lucky stared down at the bottle before him, contemplating whether he should leave it where it sat and go back home, pack his bags and leave his mother to fend for herself. He was so sick of coming home to the shitty trailer in that disgusting trailer park and hearing her and some scumbag in the middle of one of her sex marathons.

  He was even sicker of the men she picked calling her demeaning names. But what really got to him, what pissed him off royally, was the fact that she would defend them over him.

  Tonight wasn’t that much different than any other night he’d come home from being on the rodeo circuit, tired as hell and desperate for a long stretch of uninterrupted sleep, only to see that vision go up in a cloud of smoke as he opened the door to the trailer to find his mother half-naked on the couch with a shirtless pig in oil-stained blue jeans dry-humping her.

  “What are you doing here?” Charlene screeched, not bothering to grab the shirt that had been tossed to the floor. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t seen her in worse than the lacy black bra she wore. The woman loved to pour herself into the skimpiest string bikinis she could find and sunbathe nearly every day of the summer.

  Still, he turned his face away. “I live here. Left a message I was coming home. You must not have gotten it.” He knew she probably had and had already planned how to spend the money he’d won. “I’ll be in my room, out of the way.”

  “That your kid?” the meaty man asked as he left the room. “Still lives at home?”

  “You know kids these days,” Charlene said dismissively. “Just can’t leave the nest and make it on their own.”

  Lucky bit back every word that came to his mind as he closed his bedroom door behind him. He already knew the fat douchebag was trying to figure out how much money he took from the household funds, which would seriously reduce the amount he himself wanted to milk out of Charlene. He smiled briefly, imagining the look on the jackass’s face if he discovered the reality was that Lucky was the breadwinner. Charlene hadn’t worked in years. Her “job” was sleeping with men who’d pay the bills, and once her sons came of age, she just had them support her.

  Chance had tired of it and left for good ten years earlier. Well, Lucky had his suspicions that his leaving had a lot to do with Mark Calhoun’s daughter, but it didn’t change the fact that once he left he stayed gone. Other than some phone calls here and there and meeting up with him every now and then on the circuit, his big brother had vanished without even looking back.

  Lucky couldn’t do that. He couldn’t leave his mother behind in the trailer park knowing the woman would keep bringing home abusive men. Someone had to protect her from herself. Yes, he was in his thirties and in a sense living at home with his mother, but there was no mistake about who was really supporting who. If protecting his mother was considered lowly by people, then screw them. Lucky would rather be looked down upon for that than to live with the knowledge that his mother had fallen prey to the wrong man.

  His dream-self tried to tune out the sounds around him as he lay face first on the bed, desperate for sleep, but between the squeaking springs of his mother’s mattress in the next room and the vile things the husky man she’d chosen for the night ordered her to do, Lucky just couldn’t take it any more.

  He pulled the white T-shirt he’d discarded back on, shoved his feet into his battered brown leather boots and grabbed his keys off the nightstand as he left his room. He’d made it all the way out the front door, one hand on the knob, ready to pull it shut behind him when he heard the unmistakable slap of a meaty hand hitting flesh and his mother’s whelp of pain.

  Stepping back inside, he slammed the door shut and ran to Charlene’s room, kicking the door down when it failed to open. Charlene sat in the corner of the room, balled up to protect herself as her flavor of the night stood naked over her with a belt looped in his hand.

  “You better start praying to God for my mercy,” Lucky warned before he lunged. The rest was a blur of punches, growls, screams, shouts, and a bone or two snapping.

  Without even remembering how he got there, he found himself standing outside the trailer, watching the naked bastard who’d hit his mother crawl to his truck with one hand over his nose, blood oozing through his pudgy fingers. Sound slowly came back to him and he recognized his mother’s voice. He turned to see her standing in the doorway, tying the sash of her red satin bathrobe around her as she screamed at him for chasing the man away.

  “What is wrong with you? You ruin everything!”

  Lucky turned back around and took in his surroundings. Neighbors stood outside their trailers, shaking their heads and rolling their eyes. They’d seen scenes like this a hundred times. Charlene didn’t seem to even notice. All she cared about was having a man, preferably one dumb enough to support her, whether it be for a night or a year. She’d overlook beatings, police records…even wives, as long as she got something out of the deal. Lucky himself was a con she’d attempted, but the man who’d fathered him hadn’t fallen for it. And Charlene would never stop reminding him of it.

  “You are so useless! Why don’t you just leave?” she screeched as the neighbors watched.

  “Why don’t I?” he muttered as he hopped into his truck and left.

  Chance had asked him that same question many times before. Charlene was a user, and always would be. She would never stop looking for the easy way out, would never hold down an honest job and support herself. If not for the fact that he gave her a large portion of his winnings, hoping it would keep her away from dirtbag men like the one he’d just thrown out on his naked ass, she wouldn’t care less if Lucky left like Chance had. But he just couldn’t do it. Unlike Chance, he was born with a need to protect her. She was his mother and she was weak. So, he stayed in the trailer park she refused to leave and repeatedly failed at saving her from herself.

  “Penny for your thoughts.”

  Lucky grunted, having always hated that expression. It reminded him of his stupid middle name and the reason behind it. Yet, he didn’t tell that to the curvy redhead who slid onto the stool next to him.

  “Hey, cowboy. Why so grumpy?”

  Lucky took a long, slow draw off the bottle Rho had served him as he studied the beauty at his side. Long, fiery red hair, somewhere between straight and curly. Sparkling green eyes set in a pretty face with full red lips and flawless skin. Ample cleavage displayed by the deep V in her snug pink tank top and jeans so tight if she had a quarter in her pocket he’d be able to tell whether it was on heads or tails.

  “I suddenly find myself unable to remember.”

  She smiled and leaned in. “I bet you say that to all the girls.”

  “I bet you don’t really mind.”

  She laughed. “Buy me a drink, and I’ll tell you my name.”

  Lucky signaled Rho. He knew this woman’s type, could see it in her eyes she was fishing for a one-night stand and would tell him her name whether he bought the drink or not, but he played the game.

  Tell her goodnight, pay for her cab ride home and leave.

  As with all the nightmares he’d had of the night, Lucky didn’t listen. He stayed there, ordering too many drinks for both of them, and when it was time to g
o, they left together. He paid for the room at the cheap motel just on the edge of town and immediately lost his cares in the comfort of her warm, willing body. Even in the dream, it was quick and emotionless, just two lonely, damaged people finding temporary peace in the arms of a stranger.

  “That was amazing,” she said as she draped her arm over him, pressing her breasts against his back.

  Lucky agreed in order to be polite. Truth was, he’d had better, but there was no need to share that. “Yeah, it was, Cindy,” he mumbled, sleep closing in fast.

  “It’s Sylvia,” she corrected, her tone obviously hurt.

  “That’s what I said, babe,” Lucky quickly saved himself. Nothing worse than a one-night stand going all uptight on your ass when you just wanted them to roll over and go to sleep. “You misheard me.”

  “Oh.” She snuggled closer. “I’m sorry. I must have just imagined it. My fear getting the better of me. When you find something so good, you don’t want to lose it.”

  Seconds from falling asleep, Lucky grumbled an unintelligible agreement. He’d agree with anything she said if it got her to shut up and sleep.

  The dream fast-forwarded to the moment he woke to her kissing his back and shoulders. Rolling over onto his back, he grumbled, “Time to sleep, honey.”

  She chuckled. “Such a grumpy bear. Is this what it’s going to be like when we’re married?”

  Lucky’s eyes popped wide open. “Married? What the hell are you talking about?”

  Her eyes widened for a moment before she blinked three times. “You said you cared about me.”

  “What?” Lucky tried to replay the conversation they’d had at the bar, but the memory was lost in a drunken haze. “We’re both drunk, honey. Sleep it off. Nobody’s getting married. You’ll thank me in the morning.”

  The next time he woke up it was to the sound of water pouring. He looked over and found the bed empty. An awful feeling of foreboding gnawed at his gut as he sat up and looked around the room. All he could see in the darkness was a sliver of light coming from beneath the bathroom door.