Exiting the ranch safely involved a little ritual the brothers had developed by trial and error. Though bison were herd animals and could mostly be relied upon to stick together, the young bulls who hadn’t established their place yet sometimes grazed on their own. And, every year, a couple of them seemed determined to make a live-free-or-die dash for the gate.
The gate could be controlled from the house, but each of the brothers’ pickups had a remote for it, like a garage door opener. After a couple rough experiences, they’d learned not to roll the gate open until they had their trucks right there. It turned out, if they tried opening it fifty yards out, so they could roll right through it, a distant bull that had looked like it was doing nothing but enjoying a little snack of prairie grass could take a notion to make a run for it.
Three times, they’d had to chase an ornery critter down before they figured out how to prevent the issue.
When it came to Harpers v. bison, Harper ingenuity won. Mostly.
Now, they drove right up to the gate, came to a complete stop, opened it, drove through, stopped again with the rear of the truck or trailer just outside the gate keeping it mostly blocked—because, yeah, the last escapee had lit out as Orion had driven off, letting the gate roll closed behind him—and not pulling out until the gate was all the way shut.
Keegan was on the tail end of that process before he looked over at Liberty. He’d watched in the mirrors as the gate closed, keeping his foot on the brake, then waited until the woman gave up acting like there was something worth looking at outside her window and faced him.
He thought they’d been developing a good friendship. Now, Tag had said to him what he’d said, and Keegan had to guess he’d said something similarly screwy to Liberty. Because she seemed about as edgy and awkward as Keegan felt.
Those blue eyes looked at him, and he looked back, and neither one of them appeared to think of anything to say.
So he drove. The silence got a little heavy, and he thought about putting some music on. But, a day ago, if he’d put music on, they’d have ended up smiling at each other and singing, and he couldn’t see that happening at the moment.
He took 210 out of Cheyenne, because he didn’t want to spend the whole drive on I-80. After nearly an hour of quiet, he broke the silence by telling the story of why 210 was called Happy Jack Road. The scenery got prettier on the other side of Laramie, along Medicine Bow there, and by that time, Liberty seemed willing to play along. She smiled and responded and even initiated a conversation or two.
They stopped for lunch at a diner in Purple Sage, and Keegan thought they were feeling fairly comfortable with each other by then. Though he hadn’t touched her, not in that natural way he might have done before Tag had gotten all weird. He opened doors for her, but didn’t put out a hand to help her down from the truck or settle it on the small of her back as she went into the restaurant ahead of him.
At Green River, he took them off the highway to the very most northern end of Flaming Gorge. They got out to stretch their legs along a trail there, but it was chilly, and Keegan wasn’t about to wrap his arm around her and tuck her under his shoulder for warmth, so they didn’t spend long at it.
Now they were here, yet another awkward moment in the hotel room that had been meant as a sexy getaway for her and Tag.
Hadn’t it?
And a dinner reservation at the area’s swankest restaurant, tickets for the coolest stage show ever, and a promise to take his brother’s girl out dancing after.
How the hell had all that happened?
Keegan had worried the deal through the whole day on the road, like niggling a sore tooth. But he finally stopped to look at what he was doing—really, what was he complaining about? He had a pretty girl he liked a lot, plans for a hot night he didn’t even have to pay for, and, what? He was complaining?
Fuck it.
“Nope,” he said now. “We’re doing the town, baby. Two hours. In the lobby.” He put a knuckle under her chin, lifted her face, and touched his lips to hers. “And you’d better look good. Because, you know, you’re my date.”
* * * *
“There’s nothing you can do that will make me not love you. Really. Nothing.”
Liberty closed the door at Keegan’s back, closed it on the grin and the wink he’d given her, and wondered what she was doing. What they were doing.
Clearly, Tag had said something to Keegan as she’d sat in the pickup and the two men had walked around the trailer. Something that had made Keegan go unusually quiet and reserved, so unlike him. So different than she’d imagined—a cheerful road trip with him, an animated discussion of theater and their favorite experiences, a little singing, maybe even a few Hamilton numbers, which she just happened to have on her device.
Something that was as surprising, as unnerving, as suggestive as Tag’s last words to her. He wanted her to be happy, he’d told her. He wanted her to have whatever she wanted. And…that last.
She’d seen the burden of Tag’s words on Keegan’s face, and she’d seen the moment when he’d sloughed it off. That moment when he’d kissed her and grinned and winked. He’d decided then, she could tell, that he was going to enjoy their night. Their dinner. The show. The dancing that had been promised after.
Her.
There’d been a challenge there—she knew that, too. In the wink and the grin. In the kiss. For her to enjoy it, too. The night. Dinner and show and dancing.
Him.
She sighed and walked over to the window, took in the pretty skyline of downtown Salt Lake City. Then she reached for her phone.
Nice room, she texted. Wish you were here.
Me, too, baby, she heard back in just a few seconds. Meeting’s running long. And no one here has legs anything like yours. Good drive?
Hmm…sort of. Pretty, she texted back. We hiked along the Green River.
Nice, he wrote. Maybe you need a soak in that hot tub now. Maybe there’d be a selfie moment in that for me.
Liberty smiled. Yeah. So not going to happen. But it’s possible I’ll be thinking of you.
Do. He didn’t play any further, though. I’m up. Talk to you soon. Have fun tonight.
Keegan’s smile and wink. Tag’s gentle instruction.
She took another good, long breath and made her choice.
She would take a soak in the tub, she decided, but she’d do it after she spent an hour in the fitness center.
Almost, it wasn’t a surprise to find to find Keegan there, already sweated up on a treadmill. Alone in the place, he ran at a good pace with earbuds dangling and a quiet song on his lips.
She took the elliptical next to him. Looking over, he kept his pace up as she got started. She had her own earbuds, but, with his eyes on her, he began to sing louder. “Yorktown,” from Hamilton. With a smile, she backed him up and then answered with “Satisfied.” They did “My Shot” together, interrupting themselves for a small but spirited disagreement over some of the phrasing, and kept it up even as the fitness room crowded up. Liberty was laughing, and the two of them got a little round of applause when they finished with “Wait for It” and “The Schuyler Sisters.” Apparently, they weren’t the only two there who’d be seeing the show later.
Keegan moved to free weights, and Liberty went back to her room. It was just one of life’s little injustices that getting ready for a night out took more time and effort for a woman than a man.
She did spend a while in the hot tub and worked to keep her thoughts on Tag during that time. There was the potential for selfie or two he’d have enjoyed, but she left him to rely on his imagination. After, she groomed herself in the shower and told herself she was only doing what any woman prepping for a night out would do.
She was glad she hadn’t skimped when she met Keegan downstairs. He was stunningly handsome in a suit that was entirely Savile Row with not a bit of Western cowboy to it. No boots or bolo tie, either. His eyes lit when he saw her, and, when they exchanged cheek kisses, she learned he’d mad
e good use of a razor in the last hour, too.
He held her hand as she stepped back, and he lifted it in appreciation as he took her in and had her twirl.
“I think Tag is very, very sorry he isn’t here,” he said. “But I’m not. Not a bit.”
Liberty answered with a smile she didn’t have to fake at all, and, with that, she realized, they were decided. They were going to enjoy themselves and their evening together.
He held her hand casually as he took her outside. It stopped feeling casual, though, when he opened the door of a limo for her.
“Oh,” she said. But he looked a challenge at her, daring her to stick with the pact they’d just made. With a brief wonder at what she was doing, she scooted into the limo.
Chapter Eight
If a man had meant to arrange an ideal evening for another man to seduce the first man’s woman, he just couldn’t have planned better than the night Tag had set up.
Log Haven was, indeed, a romantic spot. There was warmth from a nearby fireplace, a table for two at a window overlooking a pretty forest and a little waterfall lit by fairy lights, outstanding food, and a staff no less attentive for their polite discretion.
Keegan enjoyed the hell out of Liberty over dinner. Through each course, she insisted on acting like she was out for a little lunch with a girlfriend, suggesting they order one thing and “share.”
How he got that worked out in the end was that he ordered what he wanted, ate it, and then “shared” what Liberty had on her plate. If she teased a couple bites out of him from his selection, well, that didn’t bother him at all, either.
Except the little scallops appetizer really was little—and very good. “Shall we order another one?” he asked, when she’d reached across the table for the third time.
“Oh, no. I just wanted a little…”
“Taste?”
She had the fork with its bit of scallop and bacon at her lips, holding it just there, her blue eyes looking up in what he was sure was fake innocence. “Did you want it back?”
She wasn’t really offering it to him, he noticed. She just kept it there at those red lips—
So far, he’d known Liberty as she’d been on the ranch—casual in jeans or skirts, natural in little visible makeup, sweet.
He should have guessed, though, that, with her background in theater, she’d know how to doll herself up.
The truth was, he’d about swallowed his tongue as she’d come off the elevator in the hotel lobby.
She could have been some very wealthy, older gentleman’s very high-class hooker. The sort he’d arranged with a madam rather than a pimp. The sort he’d rather have seen on his arm, dressed and classy, than naked, hot and sweaty, in his bed. Pretty much Julia Roberts’ Pretty Woman “after,” rather than “before.”
She wore heels that brought her up to nearly his height, and she rocked them. There wasn’t a thing wobbly or unsteady as she did a sultry catwalk across the lobby to him, eyes holding his in knowing amusement even as that sway in her hips was so obviously deliberate. Above the fuck-me heels were translucent black stockings, surely silk. And surely, he was convinced this wasn’t just his overactive imagination, they weren’t pantyhose. Surely, they ended in lace at a garter belt that he pictured as…well, also black, because that only made sense with black stockings, right?
The dress was more suggestive than revealing, but, boy, did it suggest. It was a soft rose in color, a bit shimmery, not too different from her skin. And it fit so closely, wrists to shoulders, shoulders to waist, waist to knees, almost impossibly closely—so it was about like watching her nude body walk toward him. The curves of breasts and hips were, well, really present. He had lots of lovely places to look, but he was especially drawn to that little vee that formed and disappeared with every step—right at, he’d have said, the juncture of her thighs. Though there’d have been another way of phrasing it. There would indeed.
Her makeup and hair said hot, sexy glamour. Her lustrous brown hair was mostly done up, a pretty, soft braid over her left ear and a cluster of curls at her neck there. Exactly the kind of thing that he knew he’d spend the night with his fingers itching to take down. Light tendrils curved along her face, and already he’d wanted to brush one back from her cheek. Her eyes were smoky and her lips—well, red.
The sort of red that a man could only wish he’d have to worry later about getting the stain off his shirt collar.
She was a tease, too, holding that fork there, not a millimeter from those lips, just daring him to insist she return it to his plate. Like there was anything that could be better than watching those red lips open and take in that morsel.
He wasn’t just thinking about lipstick stains on his collar either. Not only there.
They held there, Liberty teasing, Keegan totally falling for it, as he put up his hand for their waitress. There was just a brief break of eye contact as he requested another serving of the scallops. Then he got to simply watch and enjoy as Liberty smiled and opened her mouth, taking the bite from her fork.
Her eyes danced as she chewed it, and Keegan didn’t think he’d ever had more fun.
They enjoyed the rest of the meal, as well—two salads, and the last of hers was the only thing he didn’t finish. Two entrees, and, though he did finish hers, he had a little help from her on his. And two desserts. He’d caught on to her by then and knew enough to order more than one, so there’d still be a serving for him when she got done “tasting.”
He used his spoon to block hers, though, when she first reached across and made a stab at his crème brûlée. “You going to share that away from me, too?”
She smiled like she knew he’d indulge her in anything, and she was damn straight right about that. He managed to defend a fair portion of it for himself, even so.
They’d had wine, and she was relaxed in the limo on the ride to the theater. It was a pretty, sunset-lit ride, and he spent a little of it with Liberty’s head on his shoulder.
She smelled good. He took more time with his eyes closed, savoring that, than watching the land around them.
The show met their every expectation, and he couldn’t have had better company for it. Liberty watched with enthusiasm, occasionally looking up at him with a happy smile on her face. She nudged him—waiting for it—when the cast got to the phrasing in “My Shot” that they’d argued over earlier, in the hotel fitness center.
He nudged back. He was at least as right as she was.
Keegan had dismissed the limo at the theater, because they were close enough to walk back to the hotel—and, yes, he’d checked that with Lib, because…heels. But it was a little cool out and she had only a light wrap, and so, this time, he did put his arm around her and tug her into his body.
For warmth.
Very conveniently, there was a nightclub along the way, and she didn’t resist him when he took her in for a dance. They sat at a tiny table with another glass of wine first, and he lifted a brow when she looked up after giving her glass a long, speculative stare.
For a lengthy moment, he didn’t think she’d explain. Finally, she quirked a corner of her mouth. “The last time I had a second glass of wine, I ended up spending the night with a stranger.”
Tag, he knew she meant.
“You won’t spend tonight with a stranger,” he said. And if he said it with flat-out determination, well, it was nothing but the truth.
Her eyes searched his for a good bit before she nodded.
He waited for her to drink most of the wine before he took her hand and led her to the dance floor. Then he held her in his arms as a dude with a decent pianist behind him and a fair Tony Bennett croon sang for them.
Well, for the others who were out there, too, but Keegan looked at Liberty and pretty much imagined they were alone in it.
He’d known she could dance, of course. He’d seen her, the first night she was on the ranch, do some fantastic choreography with Tag as her prop. And he’d seen the way her body moved with her music, even
as she sat at the piano composing.
He’d danced before, too, with other women who could dance.
But he really hadn’t experienced anything like this. They started out swingy and jazzy, grins on their faces and a fair bit of attention from the small crowd—and from the performers on stage, he noted. Attention on Lib, at least.
They ended slow—almost no more than swaying to sweet ballads. The kind of dancing where bodies pressed close, where a guy’s hand might brush up against a woman’s breast or slip down toward her ass.
If a guy were dancing with someone besides his brother’s girl, that was.
When the duo took a break, Keegan’s feet had pretty much stopped moving. After a long moment of holding her, he left her standing there. He went to the table for her wrap, put a couple twenties into the band’s tip jar, because—worth it—took Liberty’s hand, and walked her out.
He walked fast, maybe not entirely considerate given the heels. But he wasn’t letting go of her hand, so she was just going to have to keep up.
He strode through the hotel lobby—she was skipping a little now to stay with him—and up the elevator. He took her to her room, fetched her key card out of her clutch—he’d seen her put it there—and ignored her little huff of indignation at what might seem highhanded to some but could also just be considered a matter of urgency. He flicked the card to the floor when he got the door open, pulled her through, shoved the door closed, then pushed her up against it.
Nothing had ever felt better than his body pressing into hers. He was hard already, like he had been half the night. And her soft belly seemed like the best place ever for his cock to find home.
Roughly, his hands holding her head, fingers working pins out of her hair like he’d wanted to do all night, he kissed her. Kept kissing, like he was dying for it, which he was.
He had her hair down and ran his fingers through it, loving the silky feel of it. When his left hand had followed its length to the very end, well, it was right there at her breast.
Three Men and a Woman: Liberty (Siren Publishing Menage Amour) Page 9
