A Cowboy Summer (Harlequin Super Romance)

by Salonen, Debra

  “Tonight? After dinner? It’s movie night.”

  Will’s lips twitched. She couldn’t explain why, but his smile made her want to smile back. Or touch him.

  “Ah, yes,” he said, “a classic kung fu movie with kung pao chicken. I overheard the couple from Santa Cruz discussing it. They couldn’t wait.”

  Offering a themed dinner and movie once a week had been Anne’s idea. She had yet to see if it would pan out.

  “I just signed up for an online DVD service. Joy is having a blast planning future menus to go with certain movies. Pizza and pasta for the Godfather series. One of A.J.’s western barbecues to go with Unforgiven. The only one I refused to consider was Silence of the Lambs.”

  He made a face, but his chuckle let her know he wasn’t appalled. “Speaking of A.J., what does his card say?”

  Anne drew it from the stack on her lap and read aloud: “‘Dearest family, reached Jackson Hole last night. Couldn’t believe how much the place has changed. Esther wouldn’t have cared much for it—too many people. But the mountains are mighty pretty and the nip in the air reminds me of home. Yellowstone tomorrow. Love, Gramps. P.S.—bought Zoey a bear cub. Stuffed.’”

  Anne groaned without thinking.

  His questioning look made her explain. “Stuffed animals are problematic. The fake fur is a dust catcher and they don’t wash well.”

  Knowing she probably came off as an overprotective worrier, Anne changed the subject. “A.J. sounds a little disillusioned, doesn’t he?”

  Will shrugged. “Nothing stays the same. Nobody knows that better than A.J.”

  “True, but it’s easier to hold on to our illusions from a distance than face them point-blank.”

  Will looked at her for a few seconds, then nodded. “Can’t argue with that.” He nodded toward the paper sack by his feet. “If we hurry, I might be able to get the sink fixed before our guests return from their outing.”

  Anne could take a hint. Obviously, Will didn’t want to spend any more time in her company than absolutely necessary. Okay. She could live with that. In fact, she’d probably pay for this driving lesson with a week of steamy dreams. What a shame her libido couldn’t fixate on a more suitable subject—like some unattainable movie star. Will was just as handsome as Russell Crowe, but far too close for comfort.

  She stepped on the clutch and put the car in gear.

  WILL WALKED to his grandfather’s desk and sat down. Anne would be joining him in a minute and he needed to get his head focused on the business at hand. Ever since their driving lesson that morning, he’d been castigating himself for reading too much into Anne’s friendly attitude. She was loosening up around him and that was good—for business. It didn’t mean she was interested in him as a man.

  The door opened, and Anne slipped in, her hands full.

  Will quickly raced around the desk to help. The aroma of freshly popped popcorn and melted butter made his mouth water. He relieved her of a grease-stained paper bag and reached for one of the bottles pressed tightly to her chest, but decided against risking the touch.

  As he closed the door, he heard the sound track of a movie playing in the living room. “Is Zoey watching the show?”

  “Yeah, it’s summer. She can stay up later as long as she doesn’t get run down.”

  With a mischievous smile, she held up two amber bottles.

  “Beer?”

  His shock must have been obvious because she grinned sheepishly. “Root beer. I’m not much of a drinker.”

  That didn’t surprise him.

  She walked to the middle of the room and looked around. “I thought we could sit on the floor. Keep it casual. Formal business meetings can be counterproductive to creative energy. We want to keep this fresh, right?”

  Fresh? “Um…okay.”

  Anne flashed him a grin then set the pop bottles on the desk. “Let’s move these chairs out of the way,” she said, leaning over to push on the rolled arms of the smaller leather chair.

  Will set down the greasy bag and rushed to help. “Careful. Those are heavy. You’ll throw your back out and then where will we be?”

  “Don’t worry. I’m stronger than I look,” she said, grunting from the effort.

  “Well, you’re full of surprises. Root beer and popcorn aren’t exactly what I pictured when you suggested this.”

  She pulled the cushion from the chair and dropped it on the rug in front of the fireplace. “Actually, whatever you imagined is probably right. I’m usually very staid and conservative—” A blush accented her rueful grin. “Actually, I think anal is the word.” Motioning him to bring the popcorn, she collapsed in a cross-legged pose on the cushion. “But I’m trying to be more like my mother this summer. Doesn’t root beer sound like an Esther idea?”

  “Esther would have brought real beer.”

  Her laugh went belly deep. It made him want to kiss her.

  Instead of the shorts she’d had on earlier, she wore loose drawstring pajama bottoms and a sloppy khaki sweatshirt that revealed a white tank undershirt. Her feet were bare. She looked sixteen.

  “Come on,” she said, prompting him to join her. “We’ve only got two hours to come up with a plan.”

  He started to comply, trying to decide whether or not to kick off his boots. “Oh, wait,” she said, pointing to the desk. “Could you grab those papers for me, please? And the colored marking pens.”

  Will put the popcorn bag between his cushion and hers, then returned for the writing utensils. Fearing he might have donned socks with holes in the heels, he opted to leave his boots on. After settling himself with far less grace than Anne displayed, he took a healthy swig of his soda, ruing its lack of alcohol.

  “Let’s start with the basics,” Anne said, selecting a neon-green pen from the pile. “We’ve got our staff in place. We have history on our side. How hard can it be?”

  “History?”

  She nodded. “I was thinking this morning, that we could poll returning guests for their Best Silver Rose Memories. I could tell them we want to put together a memory book for A.J., then we could pilfer as we like.”

  Will nodded. “That’s a great idea, Anne. Gramps would be really touched.”

  She frowned. “Um… I hadn’t actually planned to do a book, but I suppose I could. Or maybe a video. Does A.J. have a camcorder?”

  “Yes, although he might have taken it with him. Esther and Gramps came to a couple of events and recorded my rides.”

  “Really? I wonder if the tape is around. I’d like to see you in action.”

  “No, you wouldn’t. I’m pretty sure the last one shows me getting hung up then stomped on.” Instead of a pleasant weekend escorting his family around Fort Worth, he’d been stuck in the hospital getting MRIs and CAT scans.

  Anne took a handful of popcorn and shoved the whole thing in her mouth. Another surprise. He had her pegged as a nibbler—one kernel at a time. When she finished chewing, she asked, “How long ago was that?”

  “Last fall.”

  “Hmm. So, let’s brainstorm. All we have to do is keep eighteen couples and the occasional single happy for twelve weeks. How hard can it be?”

  Her upbeat manner made him smile, but Will had a feeling guest services was going to be the easy part of this partnership.

  In broad, fluid strokes, Anne jotted down her ideas. “Joy suggested we put on a weekly ice-cream social. I found two hand-crank ice-cream freezers in the pantry. Maybe if we buy one more electric unit, we could handle the demand.” She wrote that down, then added pink ice-cream cones. “And what if we invite some local cowboy poets and storytellers to give a presentation? Joy said she has several names.”

  “How much would they charge?” Will asked, sampling the salty snack. “I don’t remember seeing anything in the budget for performers.”

  Anne nodded. “True, but usually that kind of artist has audiotapes or books to sell, and they’re grateful for the exposure.”

  “Good point. Something like that could easil
y take care of one day a week. And your dinner-and-movie night appears to be a big hit, so there’s another day covered.”

  Her cheeks colored slightly. “Thank you. Joy gets most of the kudos. It was my idea, but she ran with it.”

  Will liked the way she shared the credit. Will liked her. Period.

  “Oh,” Anne said, waving a fistful of popcorn. “The last time he called, A.J. asked if we’d planned a barbecue yet. A weekly old-fashioned barbecue would be great, wouldn’t it? Outside when the weather is nice. Or in the barn. It could be our big Saturday-night send-off.”

  Will wiped his fingers on his jeans then picked up a red marker to add her suggestions to the pad. It amazed him how in sync their minds were. Before long they had ten items on the list.

  Anne flipped onto her back. “Some of these ideas are great, Will. Like turning a trail ride into a high-meadow picnic.”

  Her enthusiasm was contagious, but Will felt compelled to warn her of the downside. “Don’t forget that we’re billed as a working cattle ranch. A lot of the guests plan to participate in the day-to-day business of ranching. We can offer a few special events, but mostly we just need to feed ’em and work ’em.”

  Anne closed her eyes. “I wish it were that easy where I come from.”

  Will kicked his legs out in front of him and eased back on his elbows. Their bodies formed an L on the Persian rug. “I would have thought the hotel business was easier than a B&B,” he said truthfully. “You only have to feed people if they come to your restaurant.”

  She opened her eyes and stared at the ceiling. “WHC has venues all over the world. A fluctuation in the dollar or a strike in Japan or a monsoon in China can compromise our bottom line. We don’t just think up a new idea and implement it. First, we need market studies, focus groups and earnings projections. It’s complicated.”

  Complicated. What in life wasn’t? Will had a very big complication in mind at the moment.

  He reached out and took a lock of her hair between his fingers. The color, he decided, was actually a multitude of shades, ranging from white blond to reddish gold. She turned her chin, slim eyebrows arched in question.

  “I want to kiss you.”

  Her mouth dropped open, but Will could tell this wasn’t an invitation. “That’s not a good idea, Will.”

  “Why?”

  She sat up but didn’t scoot away. “For a number of reasons, but the first that comes to mind is that we tried this before and it didn’t go anywhere.”

  Will didn’t reply, because that wasn’t the answer he’d been expecting. “You don’t remember, do you?” she asked, her tone slightly miffed.

  Will remembered, but before he could say anything, Anne prompted, “High school. A few weeks before your graduation. There was this unusual heat wave, and A.J. hadn’t installed central air yet. My room was stifling so I was reading on the porch. You came up to the house for something. We shared a soda. We talked. You kissed me. Then you left. Something about a date with your former girlfriend.” She shrugged. “No big deal.”

  “If it wasn’t a big deal, why are we talking about it?”

  She sighed. “Okay. I’ll admit, I was a little heartbroken for a few days. I’d been nursing this crush on you for months, so when you kissed me, I thought…well, it doesn’t matter. But later, when I saw you and Judy in school, and you were laughing and I…”

  “You thought we were laughing at you?” he finished. “You pegged me as a kiss-and-tell kind of guy?” Will was more put out than he thought possible. Why should he care about something that happened—or rather, didn’t happen—fifteen years ago?

  She made a supplicating gesture. “I didn’t know many boys, Will. I barely knew you—even though we’d lived in the same house for six months. You were so far above me in the high-school caste system I’m surprised you even acknowledged me in the hallway.”

  Now he was pissed. “You’re saying I snubbed you?”

  “No. But our paths didn’t cross too often.”

  “Because you ate lunch in the library instead of hanging out in the commons. And you rode the bus instead of riding with me. I did offer. Remember?”

  She had a shocked look on her face. “How do you know where I ate lunch?”

  “I knew. Gramps asked me to keep an eye on you when you first moved here. I tried to be friendly, but you’d run the other direction anytime you saw me coming. I decided you didn’t like me.” He shrugged. “Not that I blamed you. You were a Level One kid. Smart track. French Club. I was a jock—worse, a cowboy jock. It’s not like we had a lot in common, but I still kept an eye on you.”

  She moved into a fully seated position, her legs to one side. “I didn’t know that.”

  Will sat up, too. They were only an arm’s length apart, but he made no move to touch her. Maybe the old barriers were too great to overcome.

  After a moment of awkward silence, Anne said, “I didn’t dislike you. I was afraid of you—your popularity, your visibility. Maybe I even envied you a little, but I always thought you were a good person.”

  He made a skeptical sound.

  Her cheeks colored again. “A little wild, I guess. But underneath all the hoopla I thought you were nice.”

  “Hoopla?”

  “Scads of friends, rodeo events, people phoning day and night. Girls,” she added with a chuckle. “Mom used to shake her head and say, ‘Girls didn’t behave that way in my day.’ I wondered if she thought I was weird because I never called any boys.”

  “She knew you were shy. And you were busy studying, too, Miss Straight-A-Summa-Cum-Something-or-Other.”

  She blushed and looked down. “I guess.”

  He brushed the back of his hand across her cheek and lifted her chin. “For the record, there never was a Judy. Other than one date at the prom, we were just friends. She was an excuse I made up that night to leave. I didn’t forget that kiss, Anne, but I wanted to.”

  Her lips formed the word why? but no sound came forth.

  Oil from the popcorn glistened at one corner of her mouth. He was tempted to lick it, but instead he answered her question. “Because kissing you made me think about sticking around. I even picked up an application for college from the guidance office.”

  “Really? Why didn’t you go?”

  “Because of my loss at Nationals,” he said bluntly. Even now his ignominious defeat—the sense that he’d not only let down himself and his team, but also his father’s memory—twisted in his gut.

  Anne moved back. “Second place isn’t exactly losing, Will.”

  “It was to me. That loss put everything into focus, or so I thought.”

  “You didn’t even make it back for Christmas. Or…anything.”

  He nodded. Those early years had been hard. He made a ton of stupid mistakes and poor business choices, the kinds of things he might have avoided if he’d gone to college. “I gave up a lot to claw my way to the pros, but I still haven’t won the title.”

  She frowned. “You had top points two years ago.”

  The girl did her homework. “Points, yes. Money, no. I came in second place. Again.”

  “Why is it so important to be number one?”

  He shrugged. “No doubt Dr. Freud would say it’s wrapped up in my dad dying. People have told me he might have won Best All-Round Cowboy the year he died. My folks were on their way home from a rodeo when their truck rolled and went into a ditch.”

  In an effort to brush away the sadness in her eyes, he said, “Or, as your mother liked to say, it could be cussed orneriness. She said I inherited it from my grandfather. Bull riding is what I do.”

  “Even if it kills you?”

  Will startled. Did she know about his doctor’s report? He knew rumors had been circulating before he left, but surely Anne couldn’t have heard anything. “What’s that mean?”

  “You’re getting older. Your body isn’t as malleable as a young kid’s. You could land wrong and break your neck.”

  He released the breath he
’d been holding. “Actually, I may not look it, but I’m in better shape today than I was fifteen years ago. I lift weights and run. And my timing is sharper.”

  She took a deep breath. “I wasn’t casting aspersions on your body.” The compliment seemed to loom between them and she quickly added, “So, you’re planning on going back to the circuit this fall.” It wasn’t a question.

  “Definitely.”

  She rose to her knees and started to gather up their mess. “And, I’m taking a new job, too—a promotion that’s long overdue. It sounds like we have our futures all lined up and ready to go. To get involved on an emotional level would be terribly foolish, don’t you agree?”

  “When you put it like that…but—”

  She didn’t let him finish. “We’re adults, Will, not kids. Proximity and unresolved lust just aren’t good enough reasons to risk involvement.”

  Will agreed on an intellectual level, but the shimmer on her lips was speaking to him at a different level altogether. “So, we won’t get involved, but one kiss every fifteen years isn’t going to kill us.”

  She started to disagree, but Will knew a proven way to distract a woman. He pulled her into his arms and kissed her.

  Anne gave a token resistance—a mumbled uh-uh that almost immediately turned to uh-huh. There was a small clattering sound as the colored pens scattered on the floor. Her arms encircled his shoulders, her body flattened against his as her mouth opened.

  She tasted salty and sweet. Popcorn and soda, plus an intangible quality that made him groan. And as their tongues met, Will knew he’d made a serious mistake. Fifteen years hadn’t been enough to make him forget, and now he had nowhere to run.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ANNE WOULD HAVE LIKED to credit her willpower for stopping the kiss, but she was honest enough to admit that she was putty in Will’s hands right up to the second she heard her daughter shout, “Mommy.”

  As Anne’s mother once told her, some subliminal connection was established at birth to inform a child when his or her mother was preoccupied. Nothing like a passionate kiss from the wrong man to prompt a formerly occupied child to demand attention, Anne thought.