Those times she’d been angry, not sad.
“Look, the wind has blown most of the snow off the pond and it’s frozen. Want to go ice skating?”
He stopped the tractor. “I don’t have skates. Do you?”
“No, but a pair of old socks pulled over your boots makes a pretty good substitute. Let’s go have some dinner and then come back this afternoon. I was in junior high the last time the cold lasted long enough to freeze up the pond.”
***
Creed would have moved heaven and earth to make her happy right then. Her tears had practically brought him to his knees. He’d felt a loss when his grandmother died and again when they lost his grandfather. But he’d still had six brothers, sisters-in-law, his mother and father, and a whole support team to comfort him. When her Grand went, April would be there and the neighbors. But they weren’t real kinfolks.
“Only if you promise not to laugh at me. I’m not real graceful on the dance floor.”
“What’s that got to do with ice skating?”
“Honey, a dance floor is not as slippery as a greased pig. If I can’t master the dance floor, it’ll be tough to master an icy pond.”
Her laughter was music to his ears.
He went on, “If you could shake a little cornmeal or saw dust on the pond, it might help me stay upright. Or maybe I could rig up a pillow to my ass.”
Her eyes twinkled. “That visual is beyond funny. We could just get Grandpa’s old sled out of the hayloft and play with it. It’s wide enough for both of us. We could drag it up the hill.”
“What hill?”
“The roads are still icy so they aren’t open yet,” she said.
“Are you serious?”
“It’s that or skating.”
He weighed the options.
“Neither. Let’s make popcorn and hot chocolate and watch an old Western movie on television. We can cuddle up together under a nice warm quilt on the sofa and Noel and Angel can check on us if we fall asleep.”
“Right now that sounds like a wonderful plan. You ever seen McLintock! with John Wayne?”
“Only about twenty times. It’s one of my favorites.”
“It always reminds me of Lawton and Eva. We’ve got it on DVD so we could watch it this afternoon.”
“Sounds a lot better than bustin’ my butt on the pond or breaking my neck with your grandpa’s sled. Why does it remind you of Lawton and Eva?”
“Well, Lawton is kind of like a young John Wayne. He doesn’t look like him. Lawton is a whole lot more handsome. But he’s got that bigger than life force about him. And Eva, well, she’s this fiery redhead with a flaming hot temper to go with her hair. They’re clashing all the time over April.”
“Think they’ll ever get back together?”
“Oh, no! She’s settled into her real estate business and he’s a cowboy. And she hates the canyon. I mean she really hates it. It would never work, but still the movie kind of reminds me of them.”
Creed would watch a musical chick flick that afternoon if it would take Sage’s mind off the cemetery and the empty space between the mound of snow where her grandfather was buried and the next one over where her dad’s remains had been put to rest. And Creed did not like musicals or chick flicks.
For their noon meal they had grilled cheese sandwiches and hot tomato soup that she’d spiced up with some garlic powder and a dash of Worcestershire sauce. Afterwards she arranged a dozen cookies on a platter and set them in the middle of the table.
“Toes about thawed out?” he asked.
“They’re tingling,” she answered.
“Won’t be long then. Let’s take a cup of hot chocolate to the living room and watch Lawton and Eva.”
“Wait until you meet them both. I swear this could be their story, only theirs doesn’t have a happy ever after ending.”
“You believe in happy ever after?”
“Only in books and movies.”
She pulled the quilt from the back of the sofa over them. He put an arm around her and pushed a strand of electrified hair out of her face. She pushed a button on the remote and the music at the start of the movie began. Until that moment, Creed had never realized that the movie was a chick flick before chick flicks were even popular. The first song talked about birds and bees, flowers and trees, until they were up to their knees in love.
The first scene showed a hat on the weather vane and two cowboys arguing about whether it was the sixth or seventh time that week that the boss had arrived home snockered and thrown his hat up there.
Women could drive a cowboy to drinking for sure, but Creed wasn’t sure in his drunkest state that he could have landed his hat on the weather vane on the top of his folks’ house.
The second scene was the sound of cattle bawling as John Wayne’s character rode his horse into the middle of the herd. Cowboys rode horses and drove bawling cows down a mountainside. The terrain in the movie reminded him of the canyon. The mountains weren’t as steep, but the Palo Duro had ridges and backbones just like the scene in the movie.
Her hand snuck inside his flannel shirt and rested on his chest. He covered it with his and kissed the top of her head. She raised her head and their lips met in a clash.
“This is not slowing down a wagon, Sage. It’s letting it go full blast down the sides of the canyon walls.”
***
“I want you,” she said simply. Visiting the cemetery that day reminded her that the past was gone. The future was just a dot on the horizon. Today was all she had and she wanted Creed.
His arms tightened around her. Today, she reminded herself again, was all she had and she wanted Creed to make love to her. She wanted to feel the excitement of sex. She wanted to see if the afterglow she’d read about could be a reality with the right man. She wanted to make memories that would keep her warm when he was gone. And she didn’t want to think about him not being there.
His arm moved from her shoulders to her butt, cupping it gently.
“Lie beside me,” she said.
He stretched out beside her on a sofa that was barely big enough for them.
She smiled and straddled him, kicking the cover off to one side and lying on top of him. There was noise in the background from the movie going, but it was a blur when she deftly removed her shirt and bra and unbuttoned his shirt.
“I love the way your chest feels on my boobs,” she said.
“Do you have any idea what you do to me?”
“You do the same thing to me,” she told him. “Every nerve in my whole body is tingling.”
“Well, my body is hot as hell. It wants you too, Sage.”
“Then let’s give it what it wants.” She undid his belt buckle and unzipped his jeans. “Time to come out of the clothes. We’ll cover up with the quilt.”
“I don’t need any covers. I’m really hot,” he said.
She pointed across the room. “Yes you are, darlin’, but we can’t have sex in front of the children.”
“Then we’ll cover up with the quilt,” he said.
They quickly undressed and she gave a hop and wrapped her legs around him. He caught her with one hand firmly on her naked butt and the other around her waist.
He backed up and sat down and she wiggled until he had slid inside her. Then she tasted his lips. She didn’t kiss him with a passionate force but tasted gently, feeling the heat rising and meeting throbbing desire as she began a steady rhythm.
The quilt was around them. She wasn’t sure when he’d wrapped them into a cocoon, but only their heads were visible. They’d gone from kissing to truly exciting sex during the first ten minutes of the movie. She wondered if the credits would roll before they finished.
He flipped her over on the sofa and took control of the rhythm, speeding up until she thought she’d fly right off the top of the mountain, and making love to her with his fingertips and his tongue. And then he would slow down and gently kiss her eyelids, her ears, and the tip of her nose.
�
�Tell me what you want, Sage,” he said hoarsely.
“I want you to never stop. You are doing everything I want right now,” she said.
He grinned and she reached up to touch the corner of his mouth.
“You have a sexy mouth, Creed. But your eyes are your… oh my God, don’t stop doing that with your fingers.”
His fingertips teased the soft skin below her ear. “Like this?”
“Dear God.”
“Don’t tell Him. Tell me.”
“Yes, yes,” she said.
His mouth covered hers in a blistering hot kiss. “And this.”
In her other relationships there had been no sweet talk—just a few kisses, shed the clothes, get it done with a couple of oh, babies muttered, and then he would collapse on top of her. Afterwards there was very little cuddling because he fell asleep or wanted to get right up and make sandwiches or order pizza.
She loved the sweet-talking. She even loved the loud music playing on the television as the movie kept running.
“I feel like I’m making out in a movie theater,” she gasped.
“Darlin’, they don’t have sofas in the theaters I went to.”
She smiled and bucked against him.
“Now?” he asked.
She raked her nails across his back and wrapped her legs more firmly around his waist.
“Please, now!” she whispered.
“I’m not ready for it to be over,” he said.
“It doesn’t have to be over for good, just this time!” Her voice sounded squeaky in her ears.
One firm thrust and she felt herself floating, then the afterglow settled around them like warm sunlight. He shifted his weight until they were face to face on the narrow sofa and he pulled the quilt more firmly around them.
“Sleepy?” she asked.
“Too fired up to sleep, darlin’. I just want to hold you and whisper sweet things in your ear the rest of the day.”
She cuddled even closer to him on the narrow sofa. “I could stay right here forever. I am so sleepy.”
It was there. It wasn’t a myth that writers talked about. There was really afterglow and it really did wrap around them like golden sunshine.
He picked up her hand and kissed her fingertips. “Then nap, sweetheart. I’ll be here when you wake up.”
“Promise?” she asked.
“I’m not going anywhere, Sage.”
She awoke to G. W. McLintock’s buddy saying something about him knowing what Katy’s temper was. She opened her eyes to see a dark-haired woman sitting on McLintock’s lap and he had a whiskey bottle in his hand.
Creed would be dead if he ever cheated on her. Her predominant genes had gotten the upper hand with her body, but the hot-tempered Irish genes ruled her heart. Creed’s chest shook with laughter. She watched him for a long time, being very still and studying his cheekbones, his full sexy mouth, his heavy dark lashes. How could she ever let him go?
The movie was near the end and McLintock was chasing the flaming redhead, Maureen O’Hara, through the streets when Creed looked down and realized she was awake.
“Well, hello, sleepyhead. The movie is about over and it’s even better than the last time I watched it. Would you get that mad at me over lipstick on my collar?”
“Number one, we are not married. Number two, you don’t want to test my mettle.”
“You’ve seemed pretty tame to me,” he said.
“Honey, cowgirls can’t be tamed and this cowgirl has some pretty hot Irish blood in her.”
“But you are a painter, not a cowgirl.”
She reached up and patted him on the cheek. “You can take the cowgirl out of the canyon. You can put paintbrushes and sketch pencils in her hands. You can even put a dress on her. But you can’t take the canyon out of the cowgirl and all this old canyon knows how to produce is cowgirls. A mealymouthed, sissified woman wouldn’t last two weeks in this place.”
“That what happened to Mrs. Lawton?”
“Eva? No, she was a cowgirl from Claude, Texas. You ever seen a baby chicken right out of the egg?”
He grinned and kissed her on the nose. “Of course. Baby chickens, baby geese, and baby ducks.”
“They don’t have much in the way of wings until they’re a few weeks old. Eva was just getting her wings when she got pregnant and had to marry Lawton. When they came in full strength she wanted to fly but she had a husband, a ranch, a mother-in-law from hell, and a new baby all tied around her neck.”
“So she flew away?”
“That’s right. She did.”
“What happens if I test your mettle?” he teased.
“You’d better make that doghouse real comfortable.”
***
There had been no doubt in Creed’s mind that he was going to buy the ranch when Ada Presley came back. He liked it. The price was more than right. And he’d fight Sage to the last breath to have it.
And then he lost his heart to her.
And then she cried.
He laid aside his book and turned out the lamp on his nightstand. He’d rather be curved around her body in her bed, but she hadn’t asked him to spend the night with her. They’d had glorious daytime sex twice, but when it was over they’d gone on about the business of running a ranch or in her case, painting a picture.
He wanted to wake up with Sage in his arms. The time between that Wednesday night and the day Ada would come home was so short. In two weeks it would be over and he’d be driving up the road out of the canyon.
Sage deserved happiness and he loved her enough to give it to her.
He laced his fingers behind his neck. With the curtains opened, he could see the Christmas lights burning brightly on the barn and barbed wire fence. He imagined Sage as a child running down the short hallway, slinging open the door and jumping on the bed on Christmas morning.
The room went from semidarkness to instant light. He threw a hand over his eyes and sat straight up in bed. Electricity could plunge the house into darkness but he’d never heard of it flashing on when the switch was off.
The bed bounced when Sage jumped in the middle of it.
“Creed, wake up, you’ve got to see!”
Things came into focus slowly when he uncovered his eyes. She was sitting in the middle of the bed in his red and black plaid shirt. It had been in the laundry and he’d hung up all his shirts after they’d dried, so why was she wearing it?
“Look!” She was fairly well bouncing. “Wake up, Creed.”
He looked where she was pointing. She’d made a hollow in the bedspread and there were three wiggling kittens. Where had she gotten more kittens? Was she going to be one of those old eccentric women who took in cats by the dozens now that she’d found how much she liked them?
He rubbed his eyes. “Where did you get those?”
“In the barn,” she said happily.
“Why were you in the barn this time of night?”
She touched his forearm. “Creed! These are Angel’s babies.”
Angel landed in the middle of the bed, made sure her kittens were all right, turned around a couple of times on the spare pillow, and then lay down.
She held Rudy. “And their eyes are open. Look, they can see!”
Sure enough the kitten’s eyes were wide open but it wasn’t Rudy’s eyes that made him smile; it was Sage’s. If she got that excited about kittens, what would she do the first time her child did something fantastic—like clasp her finger or make goo-goo noises?
“Well, I’ll be damned. They’re some really smart kittens to open their eyes this early.”
“You think so? I thought he looked a little slow,” Sage said.
Creed’s laughter bounced off the bedroom walls and the cows out in the feedlot probably heard the commotion. “He’s got to get adjusted to the world. Right now everything is probably one big blur, even his momma. By Christmas, they’ll be playing and biting each other’s ears.”
“They’ll fight?” she asked.
&n
bsp; “Yes, ma’am. That’s what siblings do.”
“Did you bite your brothers’ ears?”
Creed threw back his head and laughed again. “Not exactly, but that didn’t mean we didn’t spit on our knuckles and have it out.”
He took Rudy from her and held the cat close to his chest. “You aren’t going to have to take special classes at the kitty school, are you, Rudy? You’ll learn how to catch barn rats and climb trees and get As on all your report cards. Yes, sir, you’re going to be a smart kitten when you go to school.”
Sage shivered.
“I promise,” Creed said.
“It’s not that. My feet are cold.”
“Then get under the covers and sit beside me.”
She handed the other two kittens to him and repositioned herself so that she was covered from the waist down. He laid the kittens back in her lap and kissed her on the cheek.
“You’re going to make a great mother, Sage.”
“I’m not so sure about that. I’ve never been around babies in my life except at church, and then there was April, but I was just a little girl back then,” she rambled. “I’m going to put them back in their bed now.”
“And then you’ll come back to bed with me?”
She shook her head. “Not in Grand’s bed. You can come over to my room but Grand would haunt me if I…”
“I’m not asking you to have sex with me. I just want you to feel your body next to mine,” he said.
She looked at the four bedposts as if hunting for something.
Creed laid a hand over hers. “She hasn’t haunted me one single night, but I’ll gladly come to your room.”
“Thank you,” she whispered.
Chapter 14
Sage was always glad to see April. They talked weekly when she wasn’t at the ranch and when she was they saw each other often. But on Friday morning when she showed up with a big flat box and an even bigger smile, Sage wanted to kick her off the front porch.
Mistletoe Cowboy Page 18
