Love Me Some Cowboy

by Lisa Mondello

  "Here—show me where it is."

  "You don't have to—" But her voice was small and uncertain, her face white with pain.

  "I'll leave if you want, but it's hard to rub out a cramp in your hamstring on your own." After the other night, he didn't want to put his hands on her—yet he wanted nothing more. But Maddie was in pain, and he could control his response to her. There was no one else to help.

  He knelt beside her, and he could see the muscle bunched and knotting. With a hand that was more unsteady than he wanted to admit, he touched the skin that he thought of too often.

  It was indeed satin. But Maddie was in pain and he couldn't think about that now. "Lie down on your stomach."

  Her hands were clenched, her teeth digging into her lower lip. With a small, shaky breath, she nodded and complied.

  Boone stood up and slid the robe up out of the way—until he saw the sweet curve of her bottom revealed. His gut knotted. She was naked beneath the robe.

  But Maddie's thoughts were on anything but lust right now, and he had to do the same. He dipped his fingers into the liniment and rubbed it between his hands. Drawing a deep breath, he steeled himself to touch her again.

  It helped to stare across the room and knead her muscles by touch. Maddie sucked in a breath, and he responded as he would to any being in pain. "Sh-h-h, breathe slowly and try to relax," he soothed, using the tone he took with the horses, the one that calmed and reassured. "Relief is coming...it'll just take a minute. Breathe through the pain. Slow and steady now. That's my girl."

  His back ached from bending over so far, so he settled on the bed beside her, concentrating everything he had on slow, careful motions, working the knot out, little by little.

  The edges of it began to soften, and he heard Maddie sigh as the cramp finally let go. Knowing it could rebound, he continued the motions, moving from the one spot to cover the whole leg. As his fingers slid over the back of her knee, Maddie moaned a catchy little breath. Boone quickly shifted past the sensitive spot and down to her shapely calf, then down more to knead her long, slender foot.

  Maddie sighed, and Boone smiled, glad to be easing her pain. He turned his attentions to the other foot, then up that right leg. With every stroke of his hands, Maddie melted and relaxed.

  Until he reached her right thigh, and she moaned.

  But it was not a moan of pain.

  Boone froze, fingers wrapped around her thigh. He tried to swallow but his throat had turned to sand. Carefully, he removed his hands from Maddie's body, preparing to rise and leave.

  "Thank you," Maddie said dreamily, her husky voice even lower, its timbre reaching down to vibrate in his loins. She rolled over, brushing hair out of her face with a lazy feline grace. Her robe gapped at the neck, and he could see the shadowy curve of one breast.

  She saw where he was looking. Color was high in her cheeks, but her eyes were dark and knowing. Slender fingers dropped the satin fall of hair and moved to close the robe, her every gesture tempting him to stay her hand and replace it with his own.

  Neither one moved.

  The air crackled around them. Boone saw his own raging hunger reflected in Maddie's eyes.

  He clenched his fingers, denying them access to what he craved. He wanted Maddie like he'd never wanted anyone before her.

  "Boone..." she began.

  He could have her now. She was here, and she was willing. If only...

  No.

  He laid one finger across her lips, that one simple touch searing his skin, shooting fire through his blood. "Don't. Don't say it. Don't open that door, Maddie."

  "Maybe—"

  He shook his head. "No. Don't settle for less than you deserve."

  Her eyes widened at that. A tiny frown appeared between her brows.

  Before his control completely broke, Boone lifted his finger from her soft, tempting lips and rose from Maddie's bed. Drawing on every ounce of his control, he walked away from a woman who wanted him, too.

  Walked away knowing that he had done the right thing.

  But when he looked back and saw her curled into a ball on the bed, it was hard to remember why doing the right thing was so damn important.

  Chapter Eight

  MADDIE ROCKED ON the porch swing and drank her coffee, watching the sky lighten from the sunrise on the opposite side of the house. She huddled deeper into her peacock robe and wondered how she'd ever survive the next three weeks.

  Her sleep had been restless, though her soreness was much better, thanks to Boone's care. But another ache replaced the twinge of ill-used muscles.

  She had no name for this ache. Part was memory of his touch on her skin, how those hands had felt even better than she'd imagined. Strong, gentle...drawing a different ache from deep down inside her. Maddie shivered at the memory of what Boone's hands had made her feel. Once the knotted muscles let go, the pain had evaporated in the wake of a desire so powerful it had knocked Maddie for a loop.

  She would have welcomed him into her bed at that moment and forsaken every ounce of sense she'd ever possessed. She would have opened her body to him and paid the piper later.

  But Boone had turned her down flat. Maddie wasn't sure how she'd ever face him again. He didn't know the behavior was unlike her. She had never offered herself to a man before, never come close to pleading, yet twice now she had wanted nothing more. She was still shocked at how easy it would have been to do just that.

  Boone had wanted her, too. That much, she knew. Even if she'd been blind and deaf, if she hadn't seen his eyes go dark and hot or heard his voice turn husky, Maddie would still have felt the air vibrate with electric, roaring hunger.

  But Boone had had the control she had lacked, and Maddie was still puzzling over his last words. Don't settle for less than you deserve.

  Now she heard him on the stairs and held her breath, praying he wouldn't see her out here, wouldn't come near.

  When his steps headed toward the kitchen, Maddie exhaled her relief. Boone could get his own breakfast this morning. She'd been sorely tempted to pack up and leave in the middle of the night.

  But if she did, she would never be able to keep the promise she'd made to her father's memory. She'd never satisfy her own growing yearning to know her roots. And she couldn't break her promise to Boone, though she no longer kidded herself that she'd be welcome here once her term was up.

  Maddie thought about her naiveté in thinking she and Boone could be friends. Right now, she didn't see how she could even be in the same room with him.

  But she would do it, somehow. She wouldn't tuck tail and run. Her father had found the courage to leave all that he loved and make a new life. Her grandmother had endured dying alone. If Sam was right, her forebears had faced drought and disaster, survived the threat of starvation. Maddie would not be found lacking just because she was embarrassed.

  She wanted to give up today's riding lesson, but she wouldn't. She would face Boone somehow and keep going. Maddie Rose Collins wasn't a quitter.

  But she would never let such a lapse happen again. She had been right about Boone's hands. They were dangerous, so strong and skilled. She had been in such misery, and he had soothed her, had used his voice to reassure and his hands to heal. When the pain had let go, his touch had scatter-shot desire throughout her body. The memory of it made her shiver still.

  When she heard the back door close and Boone's steps head down the porch and away, Maddie sighed.

  Twenty-three days and counting.

  * * *

  THAT AFTERNOON, BOONE watched Maddie dismount, thankful that those long legs did the trick. He'd stood back and let her mount by herself earlier, not willing to risk touching her unless absolutely necessary. She'd settled into the saddle and pointedly ignored him.

  An unvoiced warning had surrounded her all day.

  Keep away.

  Maddie's voice could have shouted it, but her posture made that unnecessary. She had brought him lunch as had become her habit, but nothing else was the
same. Instead of peppering him with questions, her laughter quick and easy, Maddie had barely looked at him. Silent as a wraith, she had only spoken to tell him that she would be ready for her next lesson if he had time. That she even wanted to try surprised him.

  It was obvious she didn't understand why he'd pulled away from her last night, but nothing could be served by explaining. He had exactly the result he needed: Maddie had become a stranger again. Unfortunately, this time one who didn't smile.

  He should be happy. He had the distance he needed.

  He was happy, damn it.

  Muttering savagely, Boone dismounted from Gulliver. He and Maddie had passed the time silently, each lost in his own thoughts. The only conversation had been what he'd needed to say to guide her on proper handling of her horse. Maddie's responses had been short and to the point. Not rude or angry, just—

  Not Maddie.

  Keep away. He hadn't realized how much he'd miss her sparkle.

  He heard a car come up the road and stop in front of the house. Glancing at Maddie, he saw that she didn't recognize it, either.

  "Want me to see who it is or stay with the horses?" she asked.

  The day was too hot. He'd unsaddle the horses first. "You go ahead. I'll be right there."

  Boone made short work of unsaddling the horses and turning them out. With long strides he made his way to the house.

  When he opened the back door, he heard the sound he'd been missing.

  Maddie's laughter.

  The black-haired man looked up from his glass of tea, green eyes sliding from laughter to wariness.

  "Boone," Maddie spoke. "This is Devlin Marlowe."

  Marlowe rose and held out his hand. He was not quite as tall as Boone, lean but with an air of muscles waiting to explode into motion. He reminded Boone of a boxer, and his nose attested to at least one break. But he hadn't taken many blows to the head if he did box—his eyes held keen intelligence, looking at Boone with too much knowledge, too much advantage of who knew what conversations with Sam.

  "Boone Gallagher," he replied, taking Marlowe's firm grip in his own.

  Then they stepped back to their corners and each studied the other.

  "Would you like some iced tea, Boone?" Maddie asked.

  He jerked his gaze away and nodded. "I can get it."

  Maddie's tone turned formal when speaking to him. "Just sit down. I have a glass right here." She handed Boone his tea, then turned to Marlowe, offering the pitcher with a smile. "More tea, Mr. Marlowe?"

  "Thank you. Please call me Dev, Ms. Collins."

  Maddie's smile brightened. "Oh, let's don't stand on ceremony, Dev. Call me Maddie." She turned to Boone and her eyes sparkled. "Dev was in my restaurant once, he tells me."

  Marlowe's smile widened. "Best food I ever put in my mouth."

  "What did you have?" she asked.

  They began discussing the menu as though there was nothing more important in life than fine food. It irritated the hell out of Boone how the two of them smiled and laughed like old friends.

  He cleared his throat. "What do you need from me to find my brother?"

  Marlowe appeared startled at the brusque interruption, casting a quick, apologetic smile at Maddie. "Anything you've got. I don't always know until I see it. Your father just handed me what he thought I needed."

  The mention of Sam turned the atmosphere strained. Boone wondered exactly what his father had told this man about him. Nothing too good, from Marlowe's manner toward him.

  It didn't matter. Sam was dead, and it was none of Marlowe's business what had happened between Boone and his father.

  "We'll go through his office first, then you might want to go through the attic. There used to be boxes of stuff up there. I don't know if there's anything that could help you, but my mother never threw anything away, even items that were here when we moved in."

  Maddie's quick gasp caught his attention. "Before you moved in? You mean, there might be something of my grandmother's up there?"

  Boone nodded slowly, sorry he hadn't thought of them before. "I think I remember a trunk or something that was in the attic when we first started putting stuff up there."

  Maddie looked poised to race up the stairs that very minute.

  Boone held up a hand. "Maddie, I don't know if Sam kept any of it."

  Maddie rose. "I'd like to see."

  "It's too hot up there right now, in this afternoon heat. I wouldn't recommend either of you going up there until morning."

  "What about tonight when it cools down?"

  "There's no electricity up there."

  "What about a flashlight?"

  "I don't know how good the footing is, but there's a big window if you can wait until morning."

  Impatience jittered in Maddie's expression.

  Marlowe spoke up. "I second Boone. I've had to crawl through attics more than once. The heat is usually at least ten degrees higher. It's already a hundred degrees outside. You're talking heatstroke up there."

  She subsided, clearly disappointed.

  "What are you looking for?" Boone asked.

  "Anything I can find that would tell me something about my grandmother or my father."

  "I'll show you what I've gathered in my files, Maddie," Marlowe offered.

  She turned a grateful smile on him, the wattage blinding.

  He's her kind, Boone. He comes from her world, the world you made Helen leave. Boone could see the writing on the wall. Marlowe would find Mitch. Maddie would gratefully return to her life. Hell, they might even wind up in New York together, for all he knew.

  The thought turned his voice curt. "I'll show you Sam's files, Marlowe. Then I've got to get back to the barn."

  "You'll stay for dinner, Dev?" Maddie asked.

  Marlowe beamed. "You're cooking?"

  She nodded.

  He turned to Boone. "This woman is feeding you? Do you know how lucky you are? A top-notch chef here in Morning Star, cooking in your kitchen?"

  For some reason, Boone remembered radish roses. He glanced at Maddie, seeing her as the outside world knew her instead of a barefoot woman in cutoffs with flour on her cheek.

  And he realized that he'd been a fool to entertain the idea that there would ever be a decision for Maddie to make. She wasn't the woman who'd been living here with him, who petted calves and swung on the porch. That woman was an illusion, just like any person who's on vacation assumes a persona that isn't real.

  He'd never even met the real Maddie Collins.

  With the force of a sledgehammer, it hit Boone that somewhere deep inside he'd been harboring the tiny seed of a dream that could never happen.

  Shaken, he retreated. "I have to get back to work. The files are this way."

  With a determined step, Boone crushed the tiny seed into powder.

  * * *

  MADDIE STARED OUT the kitchen window at the still-dark sky, her coffee cooling while her thoughts tumbled, unable to land on anything but how much she wished the sunlight would hurry.

  Above her, she heard Boone's steps heading for the shower. She glanced at the clock, judging when to put the biscuits into the oven. She'd been up for two hours. Boone might not want anything she'd cooked, but she'd needed to stay busy.

  Too bad Dev hadn't accepted their offer to stay here last night. He would talk to her, unlike Boone, who had reverted to the silent stranger she had first met.

  Too bad Dev wasn't the person she really wanted to know.

  It was better this way, though. Hearing Dev's enthusiastic response to her food, even when she didn't have access to the ingredients she would have liked, had reminded Maddie that there was a whole world of people out there that would welcome her back from Nowhere, Texas. Maybe it was only because of her cooking, but that was all right.

  She knew people. She would be fine.

  But Boone would stay here, locked in his self-imposed prison, haunted by ghosts, some he wouldn't discuss. He could die an old man here, never venturing farther than
fifty miles away.

  Stop being fanciful, Maddie. Boone was a grown man who had traveled the world. He would find someone to marry. He would have children. He would be just fine.

  But something deep inside Maddie knew different. And that something ached for the man who had taken a couple of steps toward his prison door until the other night.

  Now he had slammed the door shut. The Boone who had begun to smile just a little was long gone.

  And Maddie missed him.

  The shower shut off.

  Maddie shut off her thoughts, too. She had one priority right now, finding out about her family. Proving her father's innocence to everyone.

  She opened the oven door and placed the biscuits inside.

  * * *

  Boone smelled bread baking and inwardly groaned. No slipping out of the house without encountering her this morning. When he entered the kitchen, he could see the restless night in her eyes. He nodded and headed for the coffee.

  "Two eggs or three?" she asked.

  His back turned to her, he sipped carefully. "Maddie, I told you not—"

  "I couldn't sleep. The sun isn't up yet. Humor me."

  He faced her, studying the lines of strain on her face. "This means a lot to you, doesn't it?"

  She nodded. "Two eggs or three?"

  "Three. But there might not be anything up there."

  She shrugged. "If there isn't, there isn't. But I have to look. I won't prowl through your family's belongings any more than I must to find my grandmother's things."

  Boone frowned. "I don't care about that." But he did care about her almost certain heartache. Sam might not have kept any of it, and anyway, Boone had no idea what had been in the trunk he thought he'd seen so long ago.

  "Do you want me to wait for Dev?" she asked.

  "Do you think you need a chaperone?"

  A quick smile curved her lips. "I imagine I can behave."

  His own lips did the same. "I doubt that, but go ahead."

  Maddie's head lifted, her gaze searching his. Boone realized that it was the first time she'd really looked at him since the other night.