My Kind of Trouble

by Becky McGraw

  MY KIND OF TROUBLE

  By

  Becky McGraw

  SMASHWORDS EDITION

  Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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  * * * * *

  PUBLISHED BY:

  Becky McGraw on Smashwords

  MY KIND OF TROUBLE, Copyright @ 2012 by Becky McGraw. All rights reserved under International and Pan American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the author.

  CHAPTER ONE

  The wrench in Cassie Bellamy's hand slipped off the nut she was trying to loosen, and she rapped her knuckles, then cursed a blue streak. Thanks to the crusty cowhands shooting the breeze in the barn at the Double B, she knew plenty of curse words to throw into that streak too. But she didn't bring them out often though, Imelda's Ivory soap had taught her well that ladies didn't curse.

  In Cassie's estimation though, the hot Texas sun burning the back of her legs and her broken down pickup were just cause right now. Shifting her boots on the bumper, she leaned farther under the hood to get better traction on the heater hose clamp nut.

  With no one around for miles, her cell phone dead, and the odds of someone traveling down the dusty road that led to her daddy's ranch slim, Cassie knew fixing the damned truck was all on her. Even after she got the hose off, she had a seven mile hike back up the road to Bowie, so she could get a replacement hose.

  Usually organized, Cassie was angry at herself for not charging her cell phone before she left the hotel in Amarillo this morning. Not that she thought they'd have service out here in the middle of the boondocks anyway, but at least there would have had been a chance.

  The uneventful drive she'd had from Phoenix to Bowie had lulled her into a false sense of security. But once she'd hit the old Farm Market Road, Bessie, the old pickup she'd had since she was sixteen, gave up the ghost and left her stranded on the side of the road. She should have driven her new Beamer convertible, but she told herself she didn't want to rack up the miles on it. Deep inside though, she knew she'd driven Bessie for sentimental reasons.

  Her old truck had taken her out of Bowie ten years ago to her new life in Phoenix, and now it seemed appropriate that the old girl bring her back to her daddy's ranch, which she hadn't visited since she left. But she sure wasn't visiting Bowie for nostalgic reasons.

  If her daddy didn't need her, she wouldn't be here now.

  Any warm and fuzzy feelings she had for her hometown were thoroughly snuffed out from her last memories of the place. Her boyfriend who said he loved her, the one she'd given her virginity to, tangled up with a half-naked girl by the lake on her graduation night, had replayed in her mind like a bad movie for the first year after she left Bowie.

  Luke Matthews and Becca Harvey had done her a favor though. If not for them, she wouldn't have her freedom, and wouldn't have had the gumption to leave Bowie to find a better life. Maybe she should look them up and thank them.

  Her life in Phoenix didn't include a passel of kids or a husband, like most of the girls who'd stuck around Bowie. No, hers included a successful career and a business, which gave her independence, a nice little house, and as many toys as she wanted, like her Beamer. These days, Cassie depended only on herself, and she liked it that way.

  Well, there was James, but she tried not to depend on her fiancé too much either, even though he was her business partner too. Depending on other people meant letting down your guard to heartache and disappointment. Cassie hadn't been disappointed in ten years...not since she left.

  But she wasn't here to dig up old bones. Carl Bellamy needed her help at the Double B, and so did the woman Cassie called Mama Melda, the closest thing to a mother Cassie had known since her own mama died when she was ten. And until she got this hose off and got back to town, she wasn't going to be able to help them.

  Moving her hand a little deeper into the engine compartment, she adjusted the wrench again and twisted with a grunt. It budged a little and gave her hope that maybe she could get the darned thing off.

  The fact that Imelda had waited a month to call her, pissed Cassie off. It was probably her stubborn old dad's fault, she knew. He most likely forbid Imelda from calling when it happened. Until three days ago, when Imelda finally called, Cassie hadn't known her dad had been thrown from a horse and had broken his leg in two places.

  The last time she'd seen him had been at Christmas when he flew to Phoenix to see her. Although he'd looked older, maybe a little more bent, the crotchety old fart was still full of piss and vinegar. How the hell had he let himself get thrown off a horse? The man had been riding since he could walk.

  He's getting old, and shouldn't be riding anymore, that's how. Cassie gave the wrench another vicious twist. Stubborn old cuss.

  He should just sell the damned ranch and move to Phoenix with her. Cassie had tried to convince him of that last Christmas when he'd come to see her. That hadn't gone over well...at all. Carl Bellamy had told her firmly that his place was, and always would be, on his ranch outside of Bowie, Texas. Told her she could bury him there.

  That was not something Cassie wanted to think about. He, Imelda, and Bud his ranch foreman were the only family Cassie had left. Even though she hadn't been able to make herself come back to Bowie for ten years, they knew she loved them. She made sure of it with calls, letters, cards and gifts. Maybe it wasn't the same as being here, but it was the best she'd been able to do. And she'd made sure her daddy came to see her in Phoenix, at least twice a year.

  Cassie knew one thing, and that was she did not want to become a rancher. She'd grown up with that life, and saw what her daddy had sacrificed to raise her by himself, the hard work he'd done to keep them going. She intended to pay him back for those sacrifices now, by coming back to help him while he was down. But there was no way she was going to stay in Bowie. Her life was in Phoenix now, and that's where she'd return. Once it got to the point of him not being able to run the ranch anymore, he'd have to move there as well. As much as it pained her to think of how it would hurt her daddy if she sold the Double B, Cassie was not going to take over permanently. She'd made that perfectly clear to him.

  Things happen for a reason had always been Cassie's motto, and so far her life had proven that. Her mother's death, her finding Luke with Becca, her move to Phoenix, and now her dad's injury, all had meaning, and purpose to teach her something.

  Her mother's death had made her a stronger, more independent woman. Luke's cheating had taught her not to put her happiness or heart in the hands of a man. Her flight to Phoenix had put her where she needed to be to find a more successful life than being a small-town housewife with a bunch of kids. And now, her dad's injury might help him find some rest and enjoyment in his golden years, instead of working himself to death on that damned ranch.

  Cassie shook her head to clear out the cobwebs spinning up there then put her weight behind the wrench to give it one more forceful twist. The rusty nut popped off then steam rushed up from the loosened h
ose to hit her in the face with a hot blast. Surprised and blinded, she reared up and banged her head on the hood, and cursed. Her boot heels slipped on the bumper and then she felt herself falling backward into empty air.

  ***

  Luke Matthews passed a rusty old grayish-green pickup truck broken down on the side of the road, as he headed toward the Bellamy farm to check up on old Carl. He'd seen Imelda in town this morning and she'd told him that Carl had been thrown from a horse a few weeks ago, and had broken his leg pretty badly.

  Imelda had told him that they'd operated on Carl and put pins in his leg, but he'd be laid up for a long time. The man should be in a rehab hospital, not trying to run a cattle farm from a wheelchair. Luke planned on telling him that, and offering to help if he needed it.

  He knew the man's only kid, Cassie, was in Phoenix and she didn't seem to care about anything in Bowie...not even her father it seemed. She hadn't been back to the ranch in ten years to see the old man. Anger surged up inside of Luke, but he tamped it back down. What Cassie Bellamy did was no business of his, he reminded himself.

  Slowing his cruiser to a crawl, he looked inside the cab of the old truck. It was empty, so sped up a little and passed on by, but then looked up in the rearview. Lust slammed into his gut when he saw the finest ass he'd ever seen in a pair of cutoff jean shorts sticking out from under the hood. The owner of that fine behind and illegally long legs was standing on the bumper in cowboy boots leaning under the hood struggling with something under there.

  Without his consent, Luke's hands twisted the steering wheel and he made a u-turn, then pulled up in front of the truck, and shut off his engine. He opened the door to get out, just as he saw steam billow out from under the hood, and saw the woman jerk upward and hit her head on the hood right before her boots turned loose of the bumper and she started falling backwards.

  Quickly skirting around the front of his car, Luke saw her go horizontal toward the ground and ran to catch her in his arms before she hit the ground. "Whoa, there," he chuckled and pulled her against his chest, then set her down in front of him.

  Her face was hidden by a beat up straw hat that had slipped down over it, but he saw a mass of wilted sunshine yellow curls around her shoulders. Beautiful hair, he thought, his interest peaked, then his eyes traveled down to take in her full breasts showing clearly under her sweaty grease-streaked tank top. Luke's mouth watered, even sweaty and dirty this cowgirl had his full attention. That is until she pushed back her hat and he saw sky-blue eyes rimmed by smudged mascara set in a face he knew he'd never forget.

  "Cassie Bellamy..." he said in shock then took a step back.

  Her gaze flew to his and she looked as shocked as he was, but she recovered quickly. With a smug quirk at the corner of her full lips, she ran her eyes down his body and back up, leaving a scorching path. Luke shifted his stance as his uniform pants got a little tighter. It seemed this particular woman would always have that effect on him, and it irritated the hell out of him.

  With an haughty tip of her chin, Cassie snorted and dismissed him, then turned on her heel and climbed back up on the bumper to work on the truck. Luke just stood there staring at the spectacular view she was giving him.

  After a minute, she emerged from under the hood and hopped down from the bumper holding a heater hose and wrench with a look of victory on her beautiful grease-smudged face. She should have looked ridiculous so sweaty, dirty and grease-streaked, but she didn't. She looked sexy as hell. Good enough to eat. And damn if he didn't realize, even though it galled him, that he was still hungry for this gorgeous, but heartless woman.

  Luke let his eyes take a journey down her slim sweat-slick throat, across her full breasts in the lacy bra he could see through the wet tank top, then down to her small waist and curvy hips, to her toned thighs and calves all the way to where they stopped at her cowboy boots. He dragged his gaze back up to her blue eyes and swallowed hard, then said, "You haven't changed a bit."

  A message he couldn't decipher sparkled in her blue eyes. "That's where you're wrong, Sheriff," she told him in a throaty purr then spun on her heel to sashay over to the cab of the truck where she reached inside and jerked out a large purse then slung it over her shoulder. Without another glance in his direction, she headed up the road toward Bowie, her ass swinging, taunting him, with each long loose stride.

  Cassie pushed her hot stringy hair over her shoulder and huffed in a lungful of the dusty dry Texas air. She pulled her tank top away from her breasts where it had suctioned, then frowned at the grease on her shirt, her broken nails, dusty shorts and boots.

  This was sure not how she wanted to look when she saw Luke Matthews again. She imagined he must be still laughing his ass off at the sight she made. Oh well, what the hell did she care what he thought, she thought, but an inner voice whispered that she did care...because she wanted him to eat his heart out.

  A Sheriff? Bad boy Luke Matthews was a deputy now? She almost stopped in her tracks to howl laughing. The same boy who had gotten thrown in the pokey for underage drinking? For kicking Jimmy Jones' ass for slapping hers? For breaking curfew to try and sneak into her window? That last one had almost got his ass filled with buckshot by her daddy, but instead he'd settled for calling the cops, thank god.

  Cassie shook her head again...a deputy.

  Time had been good to him, she admitted grudgingly. He was still as handsome as sin with his dark hair, square beard-stubbled jaw and whiskey brown eyes. Tall with the hard-packed muscles of manhood now, instead of lean and rangy like he'd been as a younger man, he looked even better than he had back then. All that manliness wrapped up in that uniform made him even more delectable. But Cassie wouldn't be partaking of Luke's all-night buffet, that was for sure.

  She was over Luke Matthews...had been for years now. Her sole purpose in Bowie was to help her dad get back on his feet, and maybe to convince him to retire. Besides, she was an engaged woman, engaged to a man who really loved and respected her. She twisted the two carat diamond on her left hand around in circles.

  James Barton was her friend, business partner and lover. Although he could be a little shallow and a lot clingy at times, he was steady and dependable too. They understood each other. She'd met him three years ago at a Realtor convention, and they'd hit it off, then went into business together in Phoenix. One lonely night they'd progressed to a friends with benefits relationship, then six months ago he'd told her he loved her and asked her to marry him. And she'd said yes.

  He might not be her idea of a dream lover, as good looking as he was, but wasn't all that bad. When he wasn't being selfish he got the job done...sometimes. So what if he didn't set off wildfire inside her gut, he was a good man and he treated her well.

  Cassie figured she loved James as much as she would ever allow herself to love any man again. Her heart had been out of the dating and relationship equation, since she'd left Bowie. It still was. But she was ready to start a family, and not a single-parent one like hers had been after her mother had died.

  When a horn blew behind her she jumped then spun around. Luke eased up beside her on the road and rolled down the window. Cold air wafted through the opening and she saw the hair on his forehead lift in the cool breeze from the vent. She swallowed thirstily, and used her forearm to wipe away a bead of sweat that trickled down her temple.

  "Hot out there?" His asked, his brown eyes twinkling with amusement. He gave her a smug smile that caused the dimple that always drove her crazy to dent his cheek then told her, "Hop in, I'll give you a ride to town."

  "I'd rather roast, but thank you." She turned and marched down the road again and had gone about ten steps when he pulled up by her again, idling along as she walked.

  "C'mon, cupcake. I won't bite...just nibble a little," he drawled in that lazy honeyed voice of his she remembered so well.

  Her heart kicked a little at his use of the nickname and line that had made her agree to go out with him the first time he asked. It kind of touched her that he
remembered, but then she reminded herself it was probably a well-worn line. One she'd fallen for just because she was a naive teenager who had a crush on him.

  She growled her frustration, then narrowed her eyes and hissed, "I don't think so...and don't call me that again!"

  Cassie started walking again and then a dust tornado swirled in front of her kicking dust and pebbles into her mouth and eyes. Raising her hand, she tried to protect her face from the onslaught and then coughed when she inhaled the gritty air. She glanced back over her shoulder and saw that Luke was still tailing her at an idle.