She cleared her throat carefully, placing another cup on top of the others. “I’m proving that I’m still coordinated.” She pointed at Hayley and Kyla. “Doubts have been expressed.”
“Want me to help you prove it?” He reached out a hand, head cocked in challenge, eyes crinkled with amusement.
“By dancing with you?”
“What better test would there be?”
“Oh, sweet honey. Hayley? Do we have any more?” Jess sorted through the empties, finally coming up with one they hadn’t slurped yet.
Cole smiled. “Sure you want to do that?”
“Yes. Yes, I am.” Jess squeezed the shot into her mouth, then placed the empty carefully on the table, where it promptly fell off the edge. “Oops.”
“Come on, cowgirl. Let’s dance.” Cole waited until she put her hand gingerly in his, and then pulled her gently toward the dance floor, where people were already forming lines.
“Oh, no, you don’t. This is one of those line dance things.” Jess cringed.
He put his hands on her shoulders and positioned her in one of the lines. “Just follow the people in front of you. Do what they do, and you’ll be fine.”
“You say that now. What’s the penalty here for tourists stepping on local toes?”
“No worries. You’re not a tourist.”
“I totally am, Cole. And I have cowgirl boots on.” She pointed down, like he couldn’t see them for himself. “Serious toe-crushers.”
He laughed. “You’ll be fine.” The music started, and he grinned at her. “Here we go, cowgirl. Let’s dance!”
Fifteen minutes later, Jess was laughing and sweaty and had somehow managed to completely tangle herself up in Cole’s arms as they did some complicated spin that she never quite mastered. The quick beat of the line dance faded into the slow tempo of a country love song, and although she knew she should let go, her arms weren’t cooperating.
Neither were his.
Her back was pressed against his body, and his arms crossed under her chest as his chin almost rested on her head.
“Want to slow-dance?” His low voice sent shivers cascading down her neck as he spoke close to her ear.
“Um—” She swallowed.
“You have to think about it? I’m hurt.” His feet shuffled gently, back and forth, swaying her in his arms. “If it helps you decide, think of it as a charity mission.”
She laughed. “You’re hardly the type to need charity, Cole. I imagine pretty much anyone in this place would dance with you if you asked. Or even if you didn’t.”
“Maybe.” He ducked his head lower, spinning her ninety degrees to the right. “But there is one particular woman who has her eyes firmly on my arse, and I need protection. Check out the blonde over by the Budweiser sign.”
Jess looked toward the sign, catching sight of a familiar face and an all-too-familiar strut. “Oh God. Is that that Marcy woman who tried to break up Decker and Kyla?”
“The very same.”
“And now she’s set her sights on you?”
“Well, I am single.”
Jess laughed. “Is that her only requirement?”
“Not really.” Cole chuckled. “She has sort of a warped definition of the word.”
Jess turned her head to look up at him. “So me dancing with you—that’d get you out of dancing with her? That’s what you’re saying?”
“Yes. No.” He shook his head. “I mean, yes, it would. But that’s not why I want to dance with you. I want to dance with you because I—want to dance with you.”
Jess laughed as he shook his head again. Was he—nervous? Couldn’t be. Nervous wasn’t an emotion Cole did.
“All right, cowboy. I’ll dance with you.”
“Thank you.”
“I’ll even pretend to like it, but that might cost you.” She closed her eyes, leaning her head back against his shoulder. He was so strong and solid, and yet the way he was holding her made her feel like she was a baby kitten he was trying not to hurt.
He laughed close to her ear, sending more shivers flying. “I’ll pay whatever price you’re asking.”
Then he took her hands in his and spun her slowly out from his body, making her practically ache to return. When she looked back at him, his eyes had lost their laughter, and she saw an intensity that should have sent her flying for the door. Instead, she felt heat flush her cheeks and make its way south as she struggled to swallow.
He pulled her back toward him, taking both of her hands in his and sliding his fingers to link with hers. She felt her pulse in her ears, pounding relentlessly as she registered the scent of his soap and aftershave in the same breath.
But the moment she was struck with an indescribable desire to step closer to him—to meld herself to him—he smiled, somehow breaking the intensity of the previous moment.
“Want to try that tricky spin again, cowgirl?” He started to twirl her, but the drinks were catching up with her, and she grabbed his arm.
“I think I’m not quite sober enough for spinning, cowboy.”
“Gotcha. Want to head back to the table?”
No. No, I want to stay out here on this sticky dance floor all night long, just feeling your heat and smelling your soap and wanting you.
“Or would you rather stay out here and dance?”
“Um—”
“I know. It’s a tough call. Go back to a too-small table with too many people already at it, or keep dancing with Mister January.”
“Mister Jan—” She sputtered out a laugh.
He sighed. “Kyla made me and Decker flip for it. He got December.”
“Because?”
“Because we refused to take off our shirts and wax our abs, so we couldn’t be the summer guys. Which is just fine with me. I’m already mortified to be on a frigging calendar.”
Jess laughed. “I really need to see this calendar.”
“Yeah, so do I, so I can buy up every single copy and never let them off the ranch.”
“Is Ma going to make them available on the website?” Jess pretended to think. “They’d make a great present for my gals back in Boston.”
“I mentioned the part about how much I hate this idea, right?”
“Yes. Yes, you did.” Jess tried not to smile, but couldn’t bite her cheek before one slipped out.
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
She shrugged. “Maybe? A little?”
“Right.”
“Okay, a lot. Yes, I’ll admit it. But think about it: Women have been degraded for decades on these ridiculous calendars. I’m kind of okay with a hot cowboy one for a change.”
“Even if I’m one of the cowboys being degraded?” He nodded, smiling through his attempt at a serious face. “I see where this is going.”
“Kyla’s a very talented photographer. I’m sure her shots are classy and respectful.”
“Well, you let me know when you see them. She refuses to let any of us look until the damn calendar’s printed.”
“Ooh.” Jess manufactured a concerned expression.
“What does ooh mean?”
“Nothing.” She smiled brightly. “I’m sure it’s all fine. She definitely wouldn’t have dug up old pics from the past, right?”
Cole stopped moving. “What kinds of pics?”
“Oh, I don’t know.” She shrugged, picturing one particular shot Kyla had showed her last year of Cole hosing himself down after a long, dusty afternoon on the trail. “Certainly not one of you…with a hose…and no shirt.”
He growled and pulled her back into his chest, laughing as he swayed back and forth with her nestled in his arms. “There better not be one of those in circulation.”
She rested her cheek against his chest, feeling the reassuring thump-thump of his heartbeat through his shirt. His arms tightened around her back, but instead of inciting her panic reflex, it made her sigh in contentment. When she felt his hands slide to brace her rib cage, she didn’t flinch.
When he pulled a few inches away and tipped up her chin with his fingers, she—for the first time in years—didn’t try to run.
But he did.
Chapter 15
“Shit.” Cole thumped the steering wheel with the heel of his hand as he drove out of the Salty’s parking lot half an hour later.
“Oh, boy.” Decker rolled down his window, laying his arm on the frame. “What are you so worked up about?”
“Nothing.”
“Okay. Not Jess, then.”
Cole sighed, frustration coursing through his body. “I was trying to do the right thing.”
“Looked to me like the right thing might have been to kiss her.”
“She’d been drinking, Decker.”
Decker shook his head. “She was a little tipsy. Not drunk.”
“Same thing.” Cole growled as they pulled onto the highway, heading back to Whisper Creek. The girls were two cars ahead of them, with Daniel at the wheel. “She had liquid courage on board. Tomorrow morning, she would have regretted it.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yeah, Decker. Somehow I do.”
Decker drummed his fingers on the window frame, whistling as they followed the taillights of Daniel’s truck. “So what are you gonna do now?”
“I don’t know. That woman has my head completely spinning.”
Decker smiled. “Scary, eh?”
“Shut up.”
“Well, for what it’s worth, I say you should go for it. I might be an old married guy now, but it’s dead obvious that Jess wants you just as much as you want her.”
Cole shook his head. “Did you get a chance to talk to Kyla yet?”
“No.” Decker turned his head. “You are really in deep here, aren’t you?”
“No. Yes. No. Maybe.” Cole sighed, thumping the wheel again. “Yes.”
Decker laughed. “Wow. My little brother. In love.”
“Not in love.”
“In serious, unrequited lust?”
Cole reached across and socked him. “You’re going to be in serious, unrequited shit if you don’t stop.”
Decker turned back to face the windshield. “I think you might be right.”
“Right about what?”
“About Jess. You’re right. She’s been off. Can’t put my finger on it, but something’s different.”
“Exactly.”
“So the question is—are you going to try to find out what’s going on?”
“Hell, I don’t know. I have a feeling once she sobers up, she’ll be a closed book again.”
“Then maybe you need to get to her before she sobers up.” Decker raised his eyebrows. “We’ll be home in five minutes. Maybe you oughta check and make sure she gets to her cabin all right?”
Cole grimaced. “Right. Because that wouldn’t be transparent.”
“You’ll hate yourself if you don’t, Cole. Maybe she’ll talk. You never know. But if you don’t give it a try, she might be on a plane again next week, and maybe you won’t get another chance, right?”
“You and Danny have the same playbook tonight.”
Cole sighed as he put his blinker on to exit the highway. As hard as he was trying to ignore it, he couldn’t stop thinking about how her body had felt nestled against his, how her smile had lit a fire deep down inside him, how the feel of her soft skin just made him want to caress every inch of her.
And that was getting him nowhere but frustrated.
An hour later, he’d finished up the nighttime rounds and was still debating whether to go knock on Jess’s cabin door when he spotted a twinkle of light coming from one of the windows in the empty spa building. Was Jess in there again?
He battled with himself for a few long moments, then headed toward the spa. He knew he shouldn’t go near her, but what if it wasn’t candles burning in the windowsills? What if the new electrical system had sparked and he was seeing the starting flickers of a fire?
His throat closed as he thought back to the barn fire they’d had two years ago. It had started with a careless ash dropped from a careless guest ignoring the No Smoking rule, and had almost ended with another damn funeral.
Yeah, he had to check.
He headed across the stable yard and up the hill toward the spa, watching the flickers as he went. They weren’t growing. But still he kept walking. And when he got close enough to see through the windows, he sighed.
It was Jess. Of course it was Jess.
Sitting in a pool of moonlight, legs crossed under her and head tipped toward the ceiling, she looked like—a goddess. Her creamy neck looked iridescent in the moonlight, her features outlined in soft relief, her skin soft and inviting.
She was praying—or meditating—whatever she called that New Age hoodoo stuff. He could see her chest rising with every slow breath she took, but the rest of her body was perfectly still. He watched, unable to move, even though he realized he was probably in plain sight, out here in the moonlight. She’d changed into a black leotard thing with a light skirt over it, making her look like a movie-version yoga or ballet teacher, all toned and trim.
Slowly, gracefully, she unfolded her legs and stretched herself into an arc with both feet and both hands on the floor, then flipped one leg up and over, followed by the other. She ended in a standing position, then leaned all the way over and hugged her head to her knees, like she was folded right in half.
Thinking about her level of flexibility was something he should probably not be doing as he watched her, but good God. He was a red-blooded male, wasn’t he?
And then she spotted him through the screens.
“Are you going to stay out there all night, cowboy?”
Was it his imagination, or was her voice shaky?
He stepped closer and opened the door. “Just doing my nightly rounds. Saw the candles and thought maybe some of the teenagers had decided to sneak in.” Right.
“No. Just me. I’m sorry. Just couldn’t sleep.”
“Again?”
She nodded. “Seems to be a problem lately.”
“So you come up here and—do yoga?”
“Yeah.” She hugged her arms around her midsection, looking defensive at the same time the color in her cheeks made her look—aroused. “Or dance, I guess. It’s what I do at home when I can’t sleep. Benefit of living over my own studio.”
“Gotcha.”
“Want to—try it?”
“Try—” His voice ended on a question.
“Yoga.”
He cringed inwardly. “Not sure I’ve ever imagined myself doing yoga.”
“You’ve never tried it?”
“Nope. Not a lot of call for it out this way. It’s kind of a city thing.”
She laughed, and the sound made him want to keep amusing her. “Yoga is not a city thing. Come here, cowboy.” She motioned to him with her index finger, and he felt like a sailor to the Sirens. His damn feet were walking toward the woman, without his permission.
No frigging way would he be caught dead doing yoga.
Twenty minutes later, Jess’s low voice had almost soothed him to a dead sleep as he lay on a yoga mat in the middle of the studio. The tone of her voice as she walked slowly around him was both seductive and calming, and that combination made him alternately want to sleep—and pull her down on top of him so he could kiss her silly.
She placed some sort of cushiony thing over his eyes and pressed down gently, and he felt like he could smell the north meadow. Then she ran her fingertips lightly over his shoulders, up over his scalp, and down his cheekbones. He’d be damned if she didn’t hit every damn nerve he owned along the way.
He lay still, just letting her trace his features, drinking in the scent of her body and the feel of her skirt swishing against him as she leaned to rub one shoulder, then the other. After a few minutes, he was so relaxed that he was afraid he might not be able to actually stand up.
“Still hate yoga?” Her voice was low, soft near his ear.
“Never
said I hated it.”
“There was definite disdain in your voice, cowboy.”
“I was uneducated. But now I know better.” A strange feeling down low made him wonder whether she treated all of her clients like this.
“And?”
“It’s got its pluses. I’ll give you that. Do all of your clients get this sort of—attention?”
She laughed again. “No. You’re getting the super-deluxe private-edition lesson.”
“Sounds pricey.”
“Oh, it is. It’s going to cost you.”
He smiled, still only able to hear her, not see her. “What, exactly, is it going to cost me?”
“A dance.”
He pulled the cushion off from his eyes. “A dance? Haven’t you had enough dancing?”
She shook her head slowly, hands now clasped in her lap as she sat by his side. Was there fear in her eyes?
“What kind of dancing would you like to do?”
Her face flushed, and her hand fluttered to her throat. “I liked how we were dancing at Salty’s. At the end. Before we—stopped.”
He looked at her, long and hard, then took a deep breath. “I’m sorry about that. I just—I don’t know. Didn’t know how much—Jell-O—you had on board. Didn’t want you to wake up with regrets.”
“From dancing?” Amusement started to crowd out the fear in her eyes.
“Well? Having you in my arms like that? I have to admit, I wasn’t thinking about just dancing.”
“You were just afraid of Marcy.” She smiled.
“Exactly. That’s what it was.” He rolled his eyes, standing up and reaching for her hand. “All right. I’ll dance with you, cowgirl. You have music?”
Jess nodded, reaching down to grab her phone. She tapped the screen nervously, scrolling through list after list, but never settling on anything.
“How much music do you have on that thing?”
“Kind of a lot,” she admitted, still scrolling.
He reached out a hand. “Can I see?”
“Nope.”
He laughed. “Why not?”
“Because.” She cupped her free hand over the phone so he couldn’t see the screen. “My music choices may tell you things about me that I’m not ready for you to know.”
Once Upon a Cowboy Page 12
