The Forgotten Cowboy

by Kara Lennox

  Though she couldn’t go computer shopping with him, she’d agreed to come to his house and help him set up the machine. Not that she was any expert, but she could read instructions and follow them.

  It was only after she took the cobbler out of the oven that she realized that, for the first time since she’d started work at the camp, she hadn’t had to constantly refer to a recipe card to remind herself what to do next.

  Her momentary elation was quickly dampened when she landed on the most logical explanation. She’d watched her grandmother make this dessert dozens of times. Though she’d never consciously taught herself the recipe, she’d probably absorbed the knowledge subconsciously and stored it in long-term memory. Short-term memory was the problem.

  The dinner was a raging success. Wade had invited his family over—his dad and grandfather, both his brothers, their wives and assorted offspring, so the campers could get a good look at how a healthy family functioned.

  Willow marveled at how different this campfire was than the first one, when most of the kids had been either hostile, scared or nonverbal. Now they teased one another in a show of good-natured camaraderie. When little Freddi expressed doubt about her chances in tomorrow’s rodeo, several others jumped in to encourage her.

  As the fire died to embers and the kids quieted down as fatigue overtook them, Willow sat with a sleeping Olivia in her lap. She did love kids. But it would be years before she could have any of her own. And the only man she had ever thought about having children with would have moved on with his own life.

  That was if she stuck to her life plan. Before today, it had never occurred to her that she wouldn’t follow that plan unerringly until she had achieved every one of her goals. But did she want to postpone being happy until then? Planning for the future was in general a good thing. But had she taken it too far? Could Cal have been right about her never having time for the present?

  For a few more minutes, she practiced living in the moment, enjoying the feel of Olivia’s plump, warm body relaxed against her, the smell of the campfire, the feel of the night breeze as the heat of the day gave way, and the sound of children laughing.

  “Don’t you have some place to go?” Anne asked, breaking into Willow’s reverie.

  “I can’t leave you with this mess.”

  “Oh, yes, you can. We have plenty of helpers tonight. Go put on some lipstick and get out of here.”

  Willow smiled and returned Olivia to her mother’s arms. “You’re an angel.”

  “No, I’m not. I still want you back by seven tomorrow morning. Sleep or no sleep.” She winked and turned away.

  Willow said quick good-nights, then ran back up to the house to get her things. Anticipation ran hot in her veins as she brushed out her hair and spritzed on a bit of perfume. Hopefully the wood-smoke smell wouldn’t compete.

  On the drive over to Cal’s house, her mind kept trying to make sense of what she was doing. Was it stupid? Was it selfish? Was she putting her future at risk? Those paths of thought were so well worn, it was hard not to go there. But each time she caught herself ruminating, she would sternly chant, “Live in the moment. Live in the moment.”

  She wasn’t sure she knew how to live in the moment, but she was determined to try.

  Willow parked in the street in front of Cal’s house, then walked around to the back staircase. He must have been watching for her, because he opened the balcony doors before she even knocked.

  “Hello, beautiful.”

  Willow took one look at him and screamed. She stepped back so quickly she almost toppled over the balcony railing. “Did you know you have a bat on your head?”

  “Oh. Oops, forgot he was there. Sorry, Willow.” Cal gently disengaged the small, brown rodent from his hair, then held it out to her. “Meet Frank.”

  She shuddered with revulsion. “H-Hello, F-Frank.”

  “Okay, I’ll get rid of him.” Cal turned and disappeared down the hallway. Taking a few deep breaths, Willow stepped inside. What else was she going to find in the Wild Kingdom?

  Cal returned moments later. “Sorry,” he said again. “October caught it last night. I took it away from him, but he’d already injured its wing.”

  She folded her arms. “Are there any more surprises? Orphan tarantulas in the ficus tree, perhaps?”

  “There are a few more. But they stay in the attic.”

  “Please don’t tell me you have more bats up there.”

  “No, not bats. Hawks. They’re asleep.”

  Hawks. Well, that was kind of cool, she supposed. Better than bats and snakes.

  “I brought you a piece of cobbler from dinner,” she said, holding up a paper sack.

  He looked at the sack, then at her. “Is it Nana’s recipe?”

  “Uh-huh. I’ll put it in the fridge for later. Then you can show me the new beast.”

  The beast was a top-of-the-line PC with a lot more memory than Willow had these days, high-speed Internet capability and a flat-screen monitor. There was also a color laser printer. Cal had already set everything up in his spare bedroom. It was plugged in, humming and ready to go.

  “Mmmm, it smells like Christmas in here,” Willow said, admiring the shiny machines.

  “Christmas?”

  “Yeah. That new-plastic smell.”

  “What about pine trees and peppermint?”

  “You have your memories, I have mine. Brand-new Barbie dolls smell just like this. It looks like you have it all together and working.” She noticed some test pages he’d printed. “Guess I’ll just have to go home, since there’s nothing left for me to do.”

  Cal came up behind her and slid his arms around her waist. “No, I don’t think so.” He nuzzled her neck. “There are lots and lots of things you can help me with.”

  “Oh, really?” She was surprised by how her voice came out, all husky. The feel of his mouth on her neck, his warm breath tickling her hair, made her go warm and melty inside.

  Abruptly, he released her. “Look at all this other cool stuff I bought.” He opened a huge red-and-white plastic shopping bag and pulled out several colorful boxes. “You can design and print all kinds of business stationery with this one. And this is a program for home businesses. Shows you how to set up your accounts and keep everything straight for tax purposes. Oh, and look at this one. Design and maintain your own Web page. There’s even a program for creating your own logo. And check this out, a digital camera. I figure I’ll need to get someone to take pictures of me working with animals, to put on the Web page and the brochures. And a kit for doing your own incorporation.”

  “I think for some of us this is Christmas,” she said, feeling a small thrill of excitement herself. “C’mon, let’s play with your toys.”

  For the next two hours they took turns hunching over the keyboard, trying out the graphics program, brainstorming names for Cal’s business, playing with logo designs.

  At one point, Willow printed out a sample invoice. When she plucked it from the printer and showed it to Cal, she found him staring at a wall, obviously having traveled to some other place.

  “Cal?” She nudged him.

  He refocused his gaze on her, and this goofy, almost beatific smile overtook his face. “This is really happening, isn’t it?”

  “Of course it is.”

  “I had two more calls today. A lady in Tyler wants me to work with her daughter’s show horse. He doesn’t like to load into his trailer. Another guy adopted a wild Grand Canyon burro for his kid. He didn’t realize it would be completely unsocialized. I really do have something people want.”

  “You have something I want.” Willow almost slapped her hand over her mouth. After running from Cal so hard for so long, she couldn’t believe she was actually trying to seduce him. But suddenly he was just so incredibly sexy, with his sun-streaked hair all wild from running his fingers through it, and the way those faded-to-white jeans looked so comfortable on his skin.

  Even his hands, hunting and pecking on the keyboa
rd, looked graceful and…sexy. There just was no other word.

  He grinned at her. “Could it be the peach cobbler I have in my refrigerator?”

  She shook her head. “Something a little less fattening.”

  He held his hand out to her, and she took it. “You’re right, we’ve done enough work for one night. Let’s go raid the refrigerator. Then we’ll talk about this other craving of yours.”

  Talk? Had she misread what was going on here? No, there was no question in her mind that he wanted her every bit as much as she wanted him. And there hadn’t been any ambiguity as to what they were agreeing to. They were going to be together, in every sense of the word.

  So what was this talking all about? She felt a little stab of apprehension. Was he having second thoughts about her, about having a relationship? Maybe all he really wanted was her help with his new venture.

  And there she was, obsessing again, analyzing every little nuance of the situation. Why couldn’t she just wait to see what he had to say?

  Despite the fact Willow said she didn’t want any dessert, Cal got out two bowls, cut the enormous chunk of cobbler she’d brought him in half, added a scoop of ice cream to each.

  They sat cross-legged at the big square coffee table. Willow managed to eat a little.

  “You look worried,” Cal said. “What are you thinking?”

  “That you’ve changed your mind.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Paranoid girl. You know better than that. I was just thinking, though, that we’ve made love exactly twice. Both times ended in disaster.”

  “True,” she agreed.

  “So I just don’t want to rush it. We can take our time. We’re living in the moment, right? No need to make up for lost time. We can do whatever feels right, without worrying.”

  She knew what felt right to her. She wanted to jump his bones this instant. But, as she was gradually learning, this wasn’t just about her. Maybe Cal wanted to move more slowly. From her limited experience, he would be an atypical guy if that were the case, but it was possible.

  “I’m okay with waiting, if that’s what you want,” she said, trying not to sound too disappointed.

  “I didn’t say it was what I wanted. Just throwing out the possibility that we don’t have to break our necks sprinting to the bedroom.”

  Okay. The ball was in her court.

  He scooped up the last bit of cobbler. One of his cats—October, she thought—sat patiently on the arm of a chair, watching Cal’s every move just as Willow was. There was a little bit of melted ice cream in the bottom of his bowl. Cal set the bowl on the floor. The cat jumped down for his treat.

  During the few seconds Cal’s attention was on the cat, Willow unbuttoned the little blue cotton shirt she was wearing and shrugged it off her shoulders. When Cal returned his gaze to her, his eyes widened.

  “Or, rushing is okay,” he said.

  She pushed herself to her feet, slung the blouse over her shoulder, and headed for the hallway. “Your bedroom’s to the left?”

  He scrambled to follow.

  Chapter Ten

  Cal’s shirt was off, too, by the time he reached the bedroom door. No matter how many times he told himself that he should go slow, that he should make this time with Willow perfect, he knew it wouldn’t be slow. Not when Willow was tearing off her clothes as fast as she could get them unfastened. It was dark in his bedroom, and neither of them bothered with lights. But enough ambient light filtered through the blinds that he could see her sliding her jeans down those long, long legs. Her pristine white bra and panties almost glowed.

  This heat had been building since this afternoon, he realized. He’d been walking around with his jeans feeling too tight ever since, and even a discussion of Pentium chips and megahertz with a computer salesman hadn’t taken the edge off.

  He was really glad she didn’t want to wait. They weren’t supposed to be thinking about the future, but in little more than two weeks Willow might be moving to Dallas. He didn’t want to waste any time, despite what he’d said.

  “Here, let me.” He reached behind her to unhook her bra.

  “Of course.” She smiled, her teeth glowing white, too. He slid his arms around her, but he kissed her long and slow before he finished undressing her.

  Her hair was everywhere, hanging long and wavy all the way to her waist. He buried his hands in it, then wrapped the long strands around her, around him. It felt incredible against his skin. Comparing it to silk would be too mundane. Her hair was less of Earth, more of heaven.

  “I’m glad you wore your hair down.”

  “I did it for you. It’ll be a tangled mess.”

  “I’ll comb out the tangles. You’re not allowed to ever cut your hair.” He slid her bra off her shoulders, then tumbled her back on the double bed and buried his face between her breasts. Her nipples were small and neat, dark and rosy, and hard as little marbles. He took one into his mouth and gently sucked, earning tortured little moans from her when he teased with his teeth.

  Suddenly, she pushed him away.

  “Willow? Did I hurt you?”

  “No. Oh, no.” She pushed him again, this time onto his back. She straddled him and went to work on his shirt buttons. “I just want you naked.” She attacked his belt buckle with less skill than enthusiasm.

  “Uh, Willow, you don’t want to—oh, my.” She’d un-buckled, unbuttoned, unzipped and freed his erection, which she held reverently in both hands, staring as if she’d never seen it before.

  If she had any idea how turned on he was, she wouldn’t play with fire. “Willow, I don’t really think—” And then he didn’t think anything, because his brain shorted out. She’d leaned down and taken him in her mouth.

  He’d once tried to persuade Willow to pleasure him this way, when he was a stupid, insensitive college kid. Then, she had politely demurred, declaring the whole idea not to her liking and a bit icky. Now, she took to the act as if it were instinctual.

  “Willow, please, you’re killing me.” He was ready to explode, and he hadn’t even finished undressing her.

  She paused only long enough to say, “Shut up and take it like a man.”

  “But…you’ll end things before—”

  “Live in the moment.”

  And he did. He’d known it would end fast, but he hadn’t been prepared for exactly how fast. While he panted with the aftereffects of ecstasy, she just grinned at him.

  “I am so angry with you,” he said, though of course she knew he wasn’t. “Just how are we supposed to make love now?”

  “I expect we’ll manage. We’ve got all night.”

  “No. I mean, you can’t spend the night with me.”

  Her face fell. “Oh. I didn’t realize—I’m being pushy, aren’t I? You probably didn’t mean for—”

  “Oh, baby, no, that’s not what I mean at all. It’s just that your grandmother will worry.”

  “She knows I’m with you.”

  “Then she’ll know you spent the night, that we…Come to think of it, I’d rather have her worry you were kidnapped by terrorists.”

  “I already told her I might not be coming home.”

  Cal’s quickly receding pleasure turned to full-fledged panic. “You told her that? You can’t—we can’t—given our history—she’ll hate me.”

  “Oh, Cal, lighten up. We aren’t kids anymore, and Nana is very modern. She was delighted, and all she said was, ‘Use protection.’”

  “Nana said that?”

  Willow swung her slender legs to the floor and stood beside the bed to shimmy out of her panties. “I think she was something of a wild girl in her youth. So, not to belabor the point, but we’ve got all night.”

  Cal eagerly shucked the rest of her clothes. The sight of Willow, naked in the shadows of his very own bedroom with that crazy hair in a cloud all around her, had an amazing effect on him. He actually felt himself stirring, just slightly, but enough for him to know that they wouldn’t need all night. Another ten minut
es and he’d be raring to go.

  He had a pretty good idea of what to do with those ten minutes, too.

  He opened his arms. “Come lie down with me.”

  “Thought you’d never ask.”

  Willow settled in beside him, wiggling to get comfortable. It was warm, so they didn’t need any blankets. She had no idea what had suddenly prompted her to do what she’d just done. She’d been kind of crazy and lustful the last time they’d made love, but not quite so…wanton. But when she’d freed his manhood from the confines of his clothes, she’d just been struck by how beautiful he was, how strong and virile. And suddenly she’d felt this flash of heat inside, like heat lightning, and she’d wanted to possess him.

  It had pleased her that she could bring him so much pleasure, make him lose control. Yet she knew he could do the same to her without breaking a sweat.

  She sighed as he stroked her, his fingers performing a featherlight dance on her sensitized skin. She turned her head slightly and kissed his cheek, rough with a day’s growth of beard. His eyes were closed.

  “You’re not going to sleep, are you?” She’d heard her girlfriends in college complain about partners who immediately conked out after reaching a climax.

  He gave a low, throaty laugh. “Not on your life. Just recovering, mentally preparing for the roller-coaster ride this night is gonna be.” He shifted onto one side and propped his head against his arm so he could study her. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you looking so beautiful.”

  “It’s the naked thing,” she quipped.

  “No. It’s your face. There’s something glowing about you.”

  Willow wasn’t surprised to hear that. The joyful anticipation inside her was probably oozing out her pores.

  She trailed one finger over his chest, reveling in the feel of his chest hair, springy but soft. Cal was so interestingly textured—rough here, scratchy there, hard and smooth elsewhere. Everything about him fascinated her. She gently caressed his healing scar, then moved down his belly.