With a toss of her head that sent her blond hair flying over her shoulder, she took Will up on his invitation. “I’d love to dance with you, Will.”
Taking her hand, Will led Brianne over to the lantern-lined area that had been set aside for dancing just as the band began another, even livelier set.
It looked to him as if everyone his parents had invited to this impromptu celebration of Hank and Fiona’s engagement had shown up and brought a friend along with them. The area behind the house was teeming with people. Voices raised in conversation or laughter mixed with the rhythmic music of the guitars and drums.
As he took her into his arms, Will let his eyes skim along the dress Brianne had on. Hugging all her curves, it made a man’s mouth water. Her long, straight hair poured over her shoulders like a golden shower and gleamed in the lantern light. Kent had no idea what he was missing.
“Don’t misunderstand,” Will began, trying his best to make a case for his irrational brother and excuse his behavior, “I love Kent—”
“Like a brother,” she teased with a grin.
“Yeah—” He laughed. “At times.” Other times, like now, he was tempted to do a number on Kent’s numbskull. “But I’ll admit he can be very pigheaded and set in his ways.”
“Tell me something I don’t already know.” She’d had two glasses of punch before Will had found her, and maybe because it had chased away any inhibitions she might have still held, Brianne found herself wanting to confide in Will. She needed an honest opinion. Leaning into him even though the song that was being played was not a slow ballad, but a fast number, she whispered against his ear, “Will, can I ask you a question?”
Lord, how could Kent find it in himself to resist this woman? “Shoot.”
“Is there anything wrong with me?”
Will frowned, drawing his head back so he could look at her. “What do you mean?”
Wasn’t she speaking clearly? Brianne forced herself to focus and hang on to her spinning head. “Just that. Is there anything wrong with me? Something that might make someone keep away from me.”
The question was so ridiculous, Will could only laugh. “Lady, if there was anything more right, it’d be illegal for you to go outdoors.”
“Then why is Kent—?”
He spared her the embarrassment of going on. “Not here?”
She sighed, then rested her cheek against his shoulder. “Among other things.”
Very fraternal feelings nudged at Will. For Brianne, not his brother. There was no reason for Kent to make her feel so bad. He debated having Kent horsewhipped. “Because he’s afraid.”
That’s what she had said to Kent last night, but Brianne was beginning to have her doubts that she’d been right. Maybe it had just been overconfidence doing the talking. Kent’s no-show had certainly shot her overconfidence to smithereens.
“Your brother doesn’t strike me as the kind of man who’s afraid.”
Will thought that over carefully. “Not of much,” he agreed. “But when it comes to matters close to the heart, I think he might be spooked.”
That didn’t bear out, either. “But he kissed me,” she protested.
Will chuckled as he turned around on the floor with her. “More than once, so I hear.” He grinned when she didn’t raise her head to look at him, or offer a protest. “You’re not surprised I know.”
She lifted a shoulder in a half shrug. “People talk in small towns. Everyone except for Kent,” she amended. “Kent doesn’t do anything the way he should.” The punch wasn’t through with her yet as she felt another wave of emotion spike. “If he’s so damn self-contained, why did he kiss me?”
“Because he isn’t so self-contained as he wants everyone to think he is. Because there’s something going on between the two of you that he can’t control.” Will guided her between two couples, out of the way of a collision in the making. “Maybe that scares him, too,” he considered. He saw her eyebrows rise in a silent question. “The fact that he’s attracted to you even though he doesn’t want to be.”
“Why can’t he just simply enjoy the attraction and let it go at that?”
She’d known so many men like that, men who lived for the moment and gave no thought to tomorrow. She’d never thought of that as a particularly commendable quality, until just now. She wanted Kent to loosen up, to enjoy the time they had left rather than turn it into a silent war of wills.
Will shrugged. “Kent’s an all-or-nothing kind of guy.” He tried to make her understand. “When he took over running the Shady Lady, the ranch had fallen on hard times again.” As the oldest, he remembered both extremes all too well. The peaks and the valleys. “We’ve had our up-and-down periods on the ranch because of the economy and such.” He wasn’t going to bore her with details about cattle prices and winters so cold they destroyed everything in their path. It was enough just to mention the outcome. “But Kent took it personally. He researched the problem, read all the latest books on ranching—”
“Kent?” She couldn’t picture the man who had moved so quickly through his chores each day having the patience to crack a book, no matter what the reason. A whip, certainly, but not a book.
“Kent.” Will knew what she was thinking. There was a deeper side to Kent that only the family was privy to. “Don’t let that hooded-eye cowboy exterior fool you. He’s got a bachelor’s degree from the university.” Kent could be damn dedicated and hardnosed about it when he wanted to be. “While the rest of us went off to try our wings in other directions, Kent devoted himself completely to putting the ranch in the black again—with a vengeance.”
Will nodded a greeting at someone behind her. Over to one side, people were line-dancing, but he preferred facing her and holding her in his arms.
“There’s a tradition behind the Shady Lady. The ranch has been in the family for over two hundred years and Kent means to get it thriving. Pretty much succeeded, as I see it.” He knew his parents would have sold the Shady Lady at one point, if it hadn’t been for Kent. That was right after his father had had his heart attack and the price of beef fell. Selling would have been a gross mistake. “You’ve got to give him a little more time.”
Maybe, if things were different. But that wasn’t a viable option for her. “Time is what I don’t have. I’m leaving at the end of the week.”
Five days, she thought, five short days. To Kent, they probably seemed endless.
Will studied her. “If he asked you to stay, would you?”
“No.” There wasn’t just herself to consider. She was a professional and there were people counting on her. “But I’d come back.”
“Then come back for the wedding,” Hank told her as he cut in. He’d approached them just in time to hear the tail end of the conversation. With a smile, he edged his older brother out of the way and took Brianne into his arms. “Mind if I cut in?” he asked Will after the fact.
Will pretended to look annoyed, but he knew that Hank was just as curious as he was to talk with this woman who had turned Kent on his ear.
Brianne’s eyes shifted toward Hank. When he’d first taken her hand, she’d thought for a second that he was Kent. Silly to react this way, she admonished herself, but her heart was playing a drum solo.
“He’s supposed to keep dancing with me until Kent comes,” she told Hank.
“That’s all right, I’ll take over.” Turning Brianne, he faced his brother. “I’m the best dancer in the family anyway.”
“Says who?” Will wanted to know as Hank danced Brianne away.
“Everyone,” Hank called back. He turned his attention to Brianne. The one or two times he’d looked her way, she’d seemed preoccupied. “So, is Kent giving you a hard time?”
That was putting it mildly, but what was the use of complaining? This was, after all, his brother. “He’s being Kent,” she answered vaguely.
Hank didn’t need a better explanation than that. “He’s giving you a hard time, all right.” That was Kent, by definition. “I
didn’t get a chance to ask before, but what have you done to him?”
The question caught her completely off guard. She blinked, wondering if Hank was pulling her leg, or if he’d had too much of the punch. Like she’d had.
“Excuse me?”
Hank grinned. “We speak our minds out here. Our hearts take a little longer.” And that was a shame, but it was the way things were in a land that tended to show little mercy. “Being away for a while, I can see the difference in him.” He’d noticed it immediately. Noticed, too, the source of it. And, because he was in love himself, could guess at the reason. “Kent looks like a calf that’s being led to the slaughter and is trying his damnedest to resist.”
The comparison made her shiver. “That makes me out to be a butcher. Not a very flattering image.”
There’d been cattle and cattlemen around him for as far back as he could remember. Hank forgot at times that not everyone was accustomed to the facts of ranching life.
“Sorry, comes with the territory. Seriously, I don’t remember ever seeing Kent behave like this.” The music stopped, then began again, as a new tune filled the air. “I think it’s safe to say that he’s got it bad for you.”
“No, you’ve got that wrong. He has it in for me because I invaded his sacred space,” she corrected. “He really resents the fact that I’m following him around, taking photographs, asking questions.”
Hank knew better than anyone that no one could force his brother to do anything. Steel was less set in its way than Kent once he’d made up his mind about something.
“That’s just his act. If Kent doesn’t want to do something, he won’t. It’s as simple as that. No ifs, ands or buts. Kent’s not the type to be forced to do anything against his will. Take it from me, I’ve tried.”
Maybe it was the punch, but suddenly it was very important to her that Hank was right. “So if he kissed me—”
“He damn well wanted to, no matter how much he fought against it.” Seeing the questioning look in her eyes, Hank hurried to explain. “Oh, the fight has nothing to do with you, it has to do with him. Kent doesn’t want to get involved with a woman.”
Brianne looked at Hank curiously. Quint had alluded to some failed romance in Kent’s past when she’d first met him, but she’d thought it was just talk. “Is this some bachelor thing, some pact he made with himself years ago?”
“No, it’s not.” The answer came from behind her. The next moment, Quint was cutting in on his younger brother. “You’ve had her long enough, ‘Henry.’” He grinned, knowing how much Hank hated being called by his given name. “It’s my turn. You go keep your fiancée company before she comes to her senses and runs off with the first decent man she sees.”
Hank drew his hands from Brianne. “Then I’d better get to her before Dad does.” He inclined his head toward Brianne before leaving her with Quint. “Brianne, it’s been a pleasure.”
“Likewise.” Fiona, she thought, was one lucky lady. As were all the women who would eventually number themselves among the Cutler brides.
Except for Kent’s, of course, she added. The woman who got him got a prickly pear. If he ever let a woman close enough for that to happen.
“Kent didn’t make a pact with himself, exactly.” Never skipping a beat, Quint picked up the thread of the conversation he’d interrupted. “He just plain swore off women, after Rosemary.”
She knew Kent would never tell her anything about himself, least of all about a woman who’d been in his life. Brianne jumped at the opportunity to find out about the mysterious Rosemary when Quint presented it to her.
“Just who is Rosemary?”
“Rosemary Taylor.” Tucking her hand inside his, Quint pressed it to his shoulder. Dancing with Brianne, he thought, was like dancing on air. Kent was a lucky son of a gun, if only he’d realize it. “Kent had a crush on her all through school.”
Try as he might, Quint had never been able to understand what Kent saw in the girl. She was too thin and sharp-featured for his taste. But then, he’d been in the minority.
“They went together when they were in high school.” He quoted what others had said about Rosemary, rather than his own assessment. “She had to be the prettiest girl around here. Trouble was, Rosemary didn’t want to be around here. She wanted to go off to Hollywood and get a movie career. Kent wanted to stay here. It’s where his heart was.” The set of Quint’s jaw hardened just a little, though his smile remained. “So she ripped it out of him. Rosemary turned down his proposal, left town without him and Kent swore off women permanently. Said they were a puzzle that wasn’t worth the trouble of his trying to put together. End of story.” He looked at Brianne pointedly. “Until now.”
If she’d meant the slightest thing to Kent, even in the way of a casual flirtation, he would have been here by now. The party had begun almost two hours ago. Will, Hank and now Quint were just trying to be nice.
“I think he’s just feeling restless, that’s all.”
Quint knew better. “And whose fault is that?” he pointed out. “He wouldn’t be feeling restless if he wasn’t feeling something.”
The punch had taken the edge off her patience. She didn’t want explanations, she wanted Kent. “Then why isn’t he here?”
“He’ll be here,” she heard Jake tell her.
Moving between them, the older man looked at his son expectantly. Quint released Brianne with an accommodating smile.
“I know my sons,” Jake told her. Seeing them all take turns dancing with Brianne, he’d decided to try his own hand at it. “Zoe thinks she’s got a lock on that.” He winked knowingly at Brianne. “But she doesn’t. I understand them because, one time or another, I felt like they did about things.”
He knew she didn’t want to hear an old man recount memories, no matter how polite she was. Jake got down to the part she’d be interested in.
“Kent was always the most stubborn. Even more than Morgan. Too bad she couldn’t have been here tonight.” He digressed for a moment, wishing that his family could be all together, the way they once had been. Back then, he’d been too busy to enjoy it. Now he knew it was an occasion to savor and celebrate. “They say a man’s most partial to his daughter, but it’s not true. I think I’m partial to all of them, one way or another.” He thought of his middle child. Middle children were supposed to be easygoing. Kent went against all the rules. “Kent’s like a tough piece of meat You’ve got to tenderize it some before it releases its flavor.”
She liked his simile, but there was a problem with it. “Tenderizing takes time.” She told him what she’d told Will. “I don’t have any.”
Her deadline. Jake remembered Brian saying something about that when he’d called to make the initial arrangements for his daughter. “Can’t you get an extension? Stay a while longer?” He knew Kent couldn’t hold out forever. If he tried to, there were his brothers around to beat some sense into his thick head.
Brianne shook her head. “No, my editor was very firm. Besides, Kent made it clear that I’ve overstayed my welcome—from the first day.” And a woman could only make herself so available before it became pathetic.
“Don’t you believe it. That’s just his way. If he wasn’t acting like that tough cowboy you see, he wouldn’t know how to behave. He doesn’t quite believe that it’s all right to let your guard down. Kent’s still trying to figure it all out.”
A lot of good that’d do her after this week. “By then, we all might be dead,” she quipped.
Jake laughed. He liked this one. The girl had spunk, something that always came in handy around these parts. Maybe he’d see about giving Kent a well-placed nudge. “He’s slow, but he’s not that slow.”
* * *
Enough was enough.
His eyes on Brianne, Kent cut through the crowd between him and his goal. He’d arrived quietly some time ago, and had been looking on long enough to see every man in his family take a turn on the floor with Brianne. He’d watched them dance and talk.
Just like she couldn’t leave his mind alone.
Well, at least he could put a stop to her asking questions. He made his way over to where his father was dancing with Brianne.
If you could call it dancing, he thought. His father’s idea of dancing was standing in one place and lifting his feet up and down while someone played music.
“Dad, Ma’s looking for you,” Kent said to him, purposely ignoring Brianne.
He had no idea what had made him say that to his father, only that he didn’t want Brianne dancing with anyone else, even Jake Cutler. Didn’t want her dancing with anyone else, didn’t want her laughing with anyone else in that way of hers, or even placing her hand on their arm. Most of all, he didn’t want her head resting on their chest with the sweet scent that was trapped in her hair wafting up to them. Stirring them the way it stirred him.
Jake looked at Kent knowingly. He’d seen him arrive earlier and hang back. Took you damn long enough, he thought.
“Well, then I’d better let her find me.” Taking Brianne’s hand, he placed it in Kent’s. “Here, take over for me. Dance with the lady,” Jake urged as he walked away.
Brianne dropped her hand. She didn’t need anyone begging Kent on her behalf. If he’d wanted to dance with her, he would have cut in, like all the others. “That’s all right, I’m all danced out.”
Kent caught her hand again before she had a chance to get away. Brianne tugged once, but he just tightened his hold. She looked at him questioningly.
“What is it, you dance with all the men in my family but me?” he demanded.
She stared at him. She thought he’d just gotten here. Apparently not. “How did you know I danced with them?”
He drew her into his arms as the music began again. She fit easily, as if she belonged there. He didn’t want to think about that. “That’s a fool question. How would I know? I saw you.”
Cowboys Are For Loving Page 9
