“You’ll get the hang of it. And Teddy will behave when you’re out on the road.”
“I’m sure I will.”
Colt waved for Carolina to come closer. “You ready to learn the new part?”
“As ready as I’ll ever be,” she said because she really didn’t want to work with Chance. After their breakfast together, things had changed. Sure, it was one-sided. She doubted he felt anything other than mild annoyance that he had to babysit her. But she had developed a full-blown crush. And they’d be working side by side—for hours.
Carolina slipped between the rails of the wooden fence, glancing at the covered arena on the other side of the barn. Lessons were in full swing. Carolina heard Natalie calling to one of her clients as she schooled her horse over a jump. Something about weight in the heels and keeping her hips open—whatever that meant. The smell of dust and a water-soaked pasture filled the air.
“All right,” Colt said. “Chance, you’re up first. I need you to try and swing up on old Teddy here without a saddle.”
Chance eyed the animal skeptically. “He doesn’t have a bridle on.”
“I’m aware of that, Chance,” Colt said, deadpan. “Perhaps that’s why I want you to climb aboard, so you can practice riding him without a bridle.”
The skin between his brows wrinkled. “Won’t he run off?”
“Just do as I ask, please.”
Chance studied the horse as if contemplating the odds of his brother’s request being a prank. Satisfied with what he saw, he moved forward. “You know, the last time you told me to do as you asked, you blew the toilet seat off with me on it.”
Colt chuckled. “This is different.”
Chance grabbed a hank of mane. He shifted around a bit, as if trying to recall the position he needed to be in to complete his task. With a deep breath and a giant heave, he threw his leg over the horse, slipped, and almost fell to his knees. He shot them both a grimace before trying again. To Carolina’s complete shock, he swung up the next time as if he’d been doing it his whole life, and maybe he had.
“Wow,” his brother said. “Impressive.”
All week long, Carolina had told herself there was no way Colt’s idea for a new routine would work, not when his brother hadn’t ridden in years. And yet there Chance sat, staring down at her triumphantly, looking as if he belonged on an old Western movie poster with his black hat and denim shirt. All he’d need was a black eye mask to be a Western hero like the Lone Ranger.
“Okay, that was easy,” Chance said. “What’s next?”
“Bill the Barrel Man. He’s going to play the part of bad guy.”
“Yeah, but he’s not here.”
“You’ll have to use your imagination.”
“I didn’t know that man was still around,” Chance said.
“Still going strong after all these years. We follow the same rodeo schedule, which is why this’ll work out great. He actually seemed a little excited about joining in on our routine. Said we can practice it when we’re at the rodeo this next weekend.” Colt turned toward the middle of the arena and pointed. “Bill’s going to be off on the sidelines dressed as Dastardly Dan.”
“Who?”
Colt waved away his brother’s question. “You’ll be just finishing up your act with Teddy. The Galloping Girlz will be announced. Carolina will ride in as if all is well. She’ll stand up on Rio’s back, only Bill will jump out of his barrel and grab her horse’s bridle or something. We’ll have to work out the details of that. I want it to look kind of like Pitiful Pearl.”
“Pitiful Pearl?” Chance asked.
His brother released a long-suffering sigh of impatience. “You know, like those old black-and-white movies without the sound. Overacted skit. Lots of arm waving and facial expressions. Caro will be perfect.”
“Caro?” Chance asked, eyeing her anew.
She had a hard time meeting his gaze. “It’s what my friends call me.”
He smiled wickedly. “I could be your friend.”
Oh, dear Lord in heaven.
He was teasing, she knew that, just as she knew his words shouldn’t affect her, not after everything she’d been through. Yet they did. The man was too gorgeous for his own good.
“Anyway,” Colt said, eyeing the two of them askance. “Caro will be pulled from her horse...somehow. I want you to swing up on Teddy and rescue her.”
“Rescue her how?”
“You know, ride up to her at breakneck speed, clasp her hand, then swing her up behind you. Like in the movies. Then you’ll ride back to the trailer and Caro will grab a rope. She’ll stand up on the back of Teddy and the two of you will set off, and she’ll rope Bill and drag him back to his barrel, or maybe out of the arena. I haven’t decided yet. And not really drag. He can sort of be walking, but pretending to fight you the whole time. We’ll have to see what looks best.” He turned toward his brother. “My biggest concern is your riding skills. We’ll need to work on them. It might take a while before you’re in the proper shape to lift Caro up from a run.”
“Nah. I’m in the best shape of my life.” He patted his abs.
Carolina realized she chewed on the end of her hair again and flicked the strands away, thinking Chance was right. She remembered what he’d looked like without his shirt on, and it still gave her hot flashes.
Colt didn’t seem as convinced. “I don’t doubt for a minute you can run a mile, but riding a horse is different.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Don’t get your knickers in a twist—”
Chance dug his heels in Teddy’s sides. It was like a scene straight out of an old Western. Teddy shot off, though quite frankly, the horse probably bolted more out of shock than anything else. The biggest surprise was how well Chance rode. Well, for about five seconds. Teddy turned right. Quickly. Chance listed to the left.
“Oh, no!”
He landed with an oomph.
Colt’s laughter filled the air. Carolina almost ran toward Chance, but Colt stopped her, the sideways look he shot her full of amusement. “This is going to be fun.”
* * *
IF HE LANDED on his butt one more time, he would shoot himself. God bless it. And in front of Caro, too.
Caro. He liked the nickname. Just as he enjoyed watching her eat bacon.
Ump. Stop it.
He’d told himself he would keep his mind out of the gutter today. Had convinced himself it was just his long hitch in the army that had him practically combusting on the spot when he’d watched her slide that damn piece of pork in her mouth.
“Just let go of the mane,” his brother ordered.
Focus. You’ll fall on your ass again if you keep thinking about Caro’s mouth.
“You’ll never get better if you use your hands to hang on and not your legs.”
Chance released an oath of frustration, although if he were honest, it wasn’t simply because of his trouble riding. “I told you. I can’t hold on unless I’m grabbing the mane.”
They’d been at it for over an hour, and Chance had lost count of how many times he’d fallen off. Everything was fine at a walk and a trot. There was just something about Teddy’s lope that threw him off balance, especially in the corners.
“Maybe we should work through things at a walk,” Carolina suggested, looking like a pink candy cane in her curve-hugging spandex suit, which reminded Chance there was other things she could stick in her mouth.
STOP!
He needed to get control of his wayward thoughts.
“Yeah, you’re right,” his brother said. “At this rate, you and I will be old and gray before he learns how to ride again.”
“I know how to ride.”
His brother turned to Carolina, so Chance couldn’t see his face, but he must have made a dero
gatory expression, because Carolina bit her lip, then looked at the ground—as if she didn’t want him to see the amusement in her eyes.
“Fine.”
Okay, so yeah, it was humiliating to keep falling off in front of the oh-so-gorgeous Caro, but at least he got back up and tried it again.
Colt turned back around to face him. “Let’s do a run-through of the act.”
Carolina still wouldn’t look up at him, not even when he rode up next to her and Colt.
Colt patted Teddy’s neck. “Let’s take it from the part where Caro swings up behind you.”
“Good. Fine. Whatever.” What did it matter if she was privately laughing at him? It wasn’t as if he was trying to impress her or anything.
His brother turned toward Carolina. “When you get on, stand up. Chance will do a big circle around me. If you’re feeling brave, Chance, try it at a trot. Maybe Caro can help keep you balanced.”
Chance held out his hand. Carolina played peekaboo with her eyes, glancing at him once, then twice, but never holding his gaze. She slapped her palm into his, and as Chance wrapped his fingers around hers and pulled her toward him, he experienced the strangest sensation. He froze for a moment—something that seemed to keep happening around her—and it made him wonder if the jet lag had affected him worse than he’d thought.
Or maybe he’d simply bumped his head one too many times during today’s rehearsal.
“Ready?” he asked Caro.
She nodded. He pulled, and with an ease that left him in awe, she slid on behind him. Seriously. It was as if she had a magnet on her butt. The feel of her warm body up against his own, the suit she wore so thin it was like having her naked...
STOP.
He needed to take a deep breath. Big mistake. She smelled like Downy fabric softener. He’d always loved the smell of that stuff.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“Fine.”
One. Two. Three.
He did the same thing when he was out on the gun range. Counted down to calm his mind and get his brain focused.
“You’re just really good,” he added. Good to feel up against him, he privately added.
“She’s a professional,” Colt said, staring up at them both. “Caro, go ahead and stand.”
Chance felt hands on his shoulders. There was a moment when he caught a whiff of her perfume or body cream or whatever it was she wore, and it blended with the smell of her hair. It had been a long, long time since he’d smelled something that smelled like, well, a woman.
Honeysuckle.
That was it. The kind that used to grow alongside what was now the hay barn. His mom had loved that honeysuckle. Chance had loved it, too. His dad had ripped it down in a fit of anger.
“Okay, good,” Colt said. “Chance, go ahead and walk.”
He was so deep in his thought, it took him a moment to hear Colt’s words. Caro was all business, already standing up behind him.
“Let’s trot instead.” Chance dug his heels into Teddy’s side.
“No,” Caro said. “Wait. Maybe we should—”
Whatever she’d been about to say was cut off by the fact that he’d started to slip off to the side again. He pulled himself toward the middle. Carolina clearly thought he was in trouble, though, because her hands gripped his denim shirt, as if she planned to physically hold him in place.
“I’m all right,” he told her.
She let go. He somehow managed to stay put, because he’d be damned if he fell off while she stood up—actually stood up on two feet—behind him. Talk about humiliation. He wondered if she knew how often he got up in the middle of the night to check on her, just in case that crazy ex of hers showed up. He might suck at riding, but nobody better mess around with him when it came to protecting what was his. Well, not his, but his responsibility. That’s for sure.
“That’s good,” Colt said. “Caro, quit worrying about him. He’s not going to fall off. Chance, use your body weight to guide Teddy toward me. See if Caro can grab the rope.”
Rope? What rope? Somewhere in the middle of all this Colt had snatched a rope from the horse trailer. He held it out. Chance shifted his weight to the left, relieved when Teddy obeyed the silent instructions and headed for his owner. Chance’s legs were growing weak, and though he hated to do it, he grabbed Teddy’s mane. Maybe the horse sensed Chance’s growing desperation to prove himself in front of Carolina, or maybe he was hanging on so hard Teddy became confused, but one minute they were trotting and the next Teddy was in a lope.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” he told the horse, pulling back on the animal’s mane as if it were the reins.
“Lean back,” Colt yelled.
He couldn’t lean back. Carolina was there. “Teddy, whoa!” he heard her order.
But it was no use. Worse, he could feel himself slipping. Carolina clutched the fabric at his shoulders, and damned if she didn’t hold him in place for a stride or two, but he was too much deadweight.
“Caro, let go!” Colt shouted.
The stubborn woman refused to listen, and Chance knew they were both going down.
“Shit.”
It was the last word he said before he fell. Caro said something, too, but he didn’t catch it because he hit the ground hard, and he’d somehow managed to land on his back, and then, in that strange way that time seemed to slow down when something bad happened, he saw Carolina fall toward him. He reached for her, used his arms to absorb the impact, but she still landed on top of him with an oomph.
They both lay there, trying to catch their breath. She lifted her head, and the world did that freezing, dizzy thing. She peered into his eyes, inches away, and it didn’t matter she had a crazy ex-boyfriend and Chance had no intention of sticking around. Nothing mattered except the color of her eyes, the way the sunlight touched her skin, turning it as translucent as a pearl. Nothing mattered except how her body felt in that skintight costume and the way his body responded.
“Sorry.” He abruptly thrust her away.
“You guys okay?” Colt asked, running up to them.
“I’m done,” Chance said, hopping to his feet. He held out a hand for Caro. He didn’t want to, but he did it anyway. She took it, and he actually felt relief.
Relief!
It was in that instant Chance realized he might have a problem. A big problem—and her name was Carolina Cruthers.
Chapter Six
Clearly, the man didn’t like her, or maybe he was just embarrassed by his lackluster performance. Carolina didn’t know, but a week later, as they set to depart for a rodeo, she realized she missed the Chance who had teased her in the kitchen.
“You ready?” he asked, slamming the door of Colt’s truck. She glanced back at the Rodeo Misfits trailer hooked up behind them. The competition didn’t start until tomorrow. She and Chance were to go ahead and set up camp and settle the horses. The other girls would make their own way north later in the afternoon.
Colt’s plan was to perform with Carolina this weekend, then for Chance to take over next weekend, but she feared that wouldn’t happen. Every time they’d practiced, Chance had fallen off. Not as much as he had that first day, since he’d been practicing with his old rope horse, Frosty, to get himself in better shape. But he wasn’t quite ready. If Chance fell off just once during the performance, it would ruin the act. Her boss knew it. Chance knew it, too, and Carolina wondered if that was what had soured his mood.
“Let’s hit it,” she said with a smile.
He didn’t respond, and she tried not to feel offended again. No matter what bothered the man, she still owed him a huge debt of gratitude. She hadn’t seen James in over a week, and she felt reassured by the can of pepper spray in her purse and the Hello Kitty on her key chain. He hadn’t been by the ranch, either, and she’d taken ma
tters into her own hands and changed her cell phone number, which had stopped the texts. With any luck, he’d given up on his scare tactics, too. She could go back to her own place on Monday and quit having to depend on others for help.
Quit having to be around Chance. Well, except on weekends. And during their practice sessions. And when they traveled to rodeos together.
Okay, maybe she wouldn’t be able to avoid him.
“Listen,” she said as they pulled out of the driveway, light dots of water sprinkling the windshield. Coastal fog—common in the fall—had pushed its misty fingers inland and covered the land like a kid hiding his eyes. It would be like this every morning until spring came along. “I don’t think I ever really said thank you.”
He glanced at her quickly. She kept her gaze off him, too. They were leaving Misfit Farms behind them, the white fences on both sides of the road a muted gray.
She sighed. “I’m sure this wasn’t how you hoped to spend your time Stateside, babysitting me.”
He shook his head. “I’ll tell you how I didn’t plan to spend my time.” His expression was wry as he glanced at her again. “Falling on my ass every five minutes.”
Was that what bothered him? Wounded male pride?
“It’s not every five minutes,” she said, smiling again. “It’s every ten.”
His expression said it all. Great. Thanks.
“But you’re doing good considering it’s been nearly ten years since you’ve ridden.”
“It’s not the riding that’s the problem,” he said. “It’s when you climb onboard that I get into trouble.”
It was true. He’d been able to lope Teddy around on his own for the past two days, but when she jumped up behind him, it threw him off.
“You’ll figure it out.”
“Better be soon. Colt doesn’t want to have to leave the ranch again, what with Wes and Jillian’s upcoming wedding and Natalie about to pop. Colt’s the best man and has too much to do. They should have done a shotgun wedding in someone’s backyard like Colt and Natalie did.” Carolina had heard about the infamous wedding. They’d surprised everyone after a charity event held at the ranch. They’d been married in front of every A-list celebrity in Hollywood, many of whom still popped by, including Rand Jefferson. But that was to be expected, Caro reminded herself. Rand had married her friend Sam, one of the former Galloping Girlz, and Sam couldn’t resist coming out and riding with the girls from time to time. Carolina had gotten used to having a world-famous actor as a friend.
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