by JoAnn Ross
“A lot of guys have gone to that kind of operation,” he agreed. “But personally, I don’t subscribe to it because like so many other supposedly quick fixes, it’s not perfect. You miss too much while you’re sitting in a pickup, like a sick calf in the brush, or a cow hiding in a canyon.
“We also use draft horses hitched up to sleds to feed the cattle during the winter, which cuts down on labor costs because one man can feed the stock, whereas if you use a tractor or truck you need an extra man to drive it. There’s also the fact that using horses is good for the environment because it cuts down on fossil fuel.”
“Plus the fact that you like horses,” she suggested.
“Called that one right. Actually, I flat-out love the animals. Buck’s always said that there’s nothing better for the inside of a man than the outside of a horse.”
His gaze shifted out the barn door to the fields of hay illuminated by the full moon overhead. “And on a purely aesthetic basis, it’s impossible not to enjoy the scent of the grass or the sight of a red-tailed hawk or bald eagle circling in the sky overhead. Part of the trouble with the modern world is that people are hurrying too fast through life. They don’t take time to enjoy the scenery along the way.”
For not the first time since she’d arrived in Wyoming, Jude compared Lucky’s life with her own hectic lifestyle in New York and decided that they couldn’t be more different. It was, she reminded herself, a fact she’d be wise to keep in mind.
“But not every place has such spectacular scenery to appreciate,” she remarked.
“That’s true enough, I suppose,” he said with a faintly sheepish grin as he turned toward her. “I’ve always thought that red cattle grazing on green grass is one of the prettiest sights in the world. There’s just something about watching them munching the grass, flicking their tails at flies, the calves butting heads, that makes you feel as if everything’s right with the world.
“And speaking of pretty sights...” He tipped his hat back and studied her with unmistakable interest. “I’ve been thinking a lot about that kiss we shared.”
“Really?” It took an effort to keep her tone cool while desire was curling like a lazy cat inside her. “I never would have suspected that. Since you’ve hardly said two personal words to me during the entire roundup.” The complaint, which she’d never meant to reveal out loud, was edged with feminine pique.
“I’ve been a little busy,” he drawled unnecessarily. “And I seem to remember you saying something about not mixing work and play.”
“I did.”
His lips quirked. “Now why do I hear a but in that?” He put down the feed bag. “But now that we’ve got the bulls in, perhaps I can begin making up for lost time.” Her boots felt nailed to the floor as he took two steps to close the distance between them. “You want some pretty words?”
“No.” She didn’t utter a word of protest as he ran his hands over her shoulders, down her arms, then linked their fingers together. “Because even if we were to get involved, which we both know we shouldn’t, I’m a big girl, Lucky. I wouldn’t need them.”
“That’s what you say. But I’ve never met a woman who didn’t like being romanced.”
“I was brought up to be a realist.” And she was determined to remain one even if there was something about this wide-open land—and the one-of-a-kind man who obviously loved it so—that encouraged foolish romantic fantasies. “I understand that what we’re feeling has nothing to do with romance. It’s lust, pure and simple.”
“It may be lust.” He lifted their joined hands and brushed a light kiss against her knuckles. “But believe me, darlin’, there’s absolutely nothing simple about it.”
He wondered what she’d say if he admitted to the thoughts he’d had as he’d watched her ride over the meadows today: how strangely right she’d looked on his land. But just because she sat well on one of his horses didn’t mean she’d fit into his life, Lucky reminded himself. He’d never met a woman who was more city; he was country. He’d be wise to keep that in mind.
“You’re right, of course.” She reclaimed her hand with a sigh. “You’ll have to excuse me. I haven’t really been myself lately. The past few months have been a very stressful time for me and I think I may be having a nervous breakdown.”
“Sorry, New York.” He rubbed at the faint furrows that were etching their way between her brows again. “But we don’t allow people to have nervous breakdowns in Wyoming. It ruins our laconic cowboy image.”
Jude felt herself strangely torn between the need to laugh and the urge to cry. She was confused, exhausted and, she thought, stressed out to the max. This was absolutely no time to add the complication of an affair into the mix. Not that going to bed with Lucky would lead to a full-fledged affair, she reminded herself firmly. It would be more like an extended one-night stand, lasting only as long as her time in Wyoming.
For some unfathomable reason, it was this thought that caused her eyes to fill with the hot moisture that had been stinging behind her lids. An errant tear escaped to trail down her cheek. With a tenderness she’d never experienced from anyone, Lucky brushed it away with his knuckle.
“It’s late. And you’ve had a physically demanding few days. You’d better get into bed.”
She nodded. And, feeling ridiculously fragile, sniffled. “I feel so foolish. You undoubtedly think I’m a weak, overly emotional female.”
“No. I think you’re an extremely desirable female. I also think you’ve been too tightly wound for too long and it’s inevitable that you’d eventually start to unravel.”
His fingers trailed around her jaw and cupped her chin, holding her embarrassed gaze to his sympathetic one when she would have looked away. “Why don’t you sleep in tomorrow?”
“I can’t. Now that you’ve finally gotten the bulls in, we need to get started shooting—”
“There’s still time. I promise, Jude, you’ll get your shots. But a few hours one way or the other aren’t going to make any difference in the entire scheme of things.”
“It must be nice to be able to be so cavalier about work and deadlines and live so apart from the petty problems the rest of the world has to deal with,” she snapped.
Personally, Lucky decided that if Jude thought her work at Hunk of the Month magazine had anything to do with the problems of the world, she was in a sorrier mess than he’d suspected. But he decided that this wasn’t the time to get into an argument over the subject.
“Cowboys don’t spend a whole lot of time sitting around worrying about the meaning of life,” he countered easily. “Or talking about it. We live it.”
Then, because it had been too many days since he’d kissed her, and because he’d awakened each morning as hard as a damn ramrod because of his hot dreams about her, Lucky ducked his head and covered her mouth with his.
Unlike his first kiss, when he’d coaxed her slowly, inexorably into the mists, this time Jude found herself instantly dragged into the flames. His mouth was hard, demanding, and hers yielded.
Lucky ached as he’d never ached before. And not just the physical ache that had him as hard as a boulder, but a deep grinding need that went all the way to the bone. He wanted her as he’d never wanted another woman. Lord help him, he needed her as he’d never needed any other woman.
The fact that she was totally wrong for him—in every way—did not matter to his throbbing body, reeling mind or tumbling heart. The fact that there would not be—could not be—anything permanent between them meant nothing. As he tasted a passion sweeter than honey, the future held no meaning, all his yesterdays spun away and there was only now. Only this frozen perfect moment with this incredible female who matched him as no other ever had.
Jude didn’t know how it had happened. One minute they’d been discussing ranching techniques, the next minute she was being swept away by a force as wild as the surrounding land. Struggl
ing to keep her equilibrium, she grasped hold of his upper arms and felt muscles like granite clench beneath her fingertips. His thumb tugged, not forcefully, on her chin, coaxing her mouth open to the invasion of his tongue. She tasted coffee. And the cinnamon gum he chewed in place of the tobacco so many of the other cowboys favored. She also tasted a male hunger that had her moaning in response.
When he wrapped an arm around her, pulling her closer, holding her against him, hard chest to soft curves, she went, willingly. Eagerly. Her hands fretted up and down his back, then knocked off his hat in their desperate need to tangle in his hair.
Even as needy as she was, Jude couldn’t help stiffening at the feel of his hands on the front of the western-style shirt.
“It’s okay,” he crooned, in that same coaxing voice she’d heard him use to talk his mare into crossing a rushing icy stream. “I just want to touch you, Jude.” His lips skimmed up her face, nuzzled that unbearably sensitive spot behind her ear. “I’ve been going crazy, imagining the feel of your body.”
“You haven’t been the only one.” She voiced her compliance on a soft, ragged moan. “I’ve been imagining the same thing.”
When she heard him exhale a deep breath of relief, she realized, on some distant level, that he was not as self-confident, as cocky, as she’d believed.
The overhead lights in the barn were blindingly bright compared with the star-spangled darkness just outside. He didn’t take his eyes from hers as he unfastened each white plastic button with a deft touch that made her wonder how many women he’d undressed in this very same barn. Jude found herself longing for the flickering glow of candlelight, or perhaps the flattering light of a crackling fireplace.
“I knew it,” he murmured as he folded back the teal-black-and-white patterned material.
“Knew what?” she managed to gasp. As his hands cupped her breasts, causing the nipples to strain against the lace, she could barely breathe. Hardly think.
“That you’d be absolutely perfect.” He lowered his head, warming her aching breasts with his breath. Then, when he opened the front clasp of her bra, his tongue dampened flesh that was so burning hot Jude was amazed she couldn’t hear it sizzle.
Wanting, needing to touch him, as he was touching her, to taste as he was tasting, she ripped at his shirt, blessing whoever had put snaps on cowboy shirts. She splayed her hands against his chest, felt the heat emanating from his hard male body and hungered as she’d never hungered for anything or anyone in her life.
As his mouth scorched her breasts and his hands, delving between denim and skin to cup her in an intimate way that made her feel as if she were burning from the inside out, Jude knew that need this intense could not continue to be reined in. Pleasure this rich could not be contained.
For days he’d been chipping away at her restraint, like the jagged mountains ringing the ranch had been chiseled away by eons of harsh environmental forces. Although she’d been unnerved by the way her rigid, hard-fought-for self-discipline seemed to have been eroding ever since Lucky O’Neill had sauntered into her office, she was terrified by this devastating lack of control.
If he took her control, he’d take everything she’d worked to become. And then, Jude thought, there’d be nothing left. Nothing but an empty shell.
Lucky’s whole being was focused solely on pleasuring this woman. She was so hot. So ready. As the wet warmth flowed like liquid sunshine over his caressing fingers, Lucky felt Jude tremble. At first he thought it was from desire, but then, as he felt the soft flesh beneath his mouth chill, he realized that somewhere, somehow, along the way, passion had metamorphosed to anxiety.
“I’m sorry.” He removed his hand from her jeans, refastened her bra, tucking her breasts away with a look of regret, and began buttoning her shirt with fingers that were far more steady than hers. “I didn’t have any right to do that.”
“That’s funny.” Her laugh was weak and shaky. “It sure felt as if you did.” The admission caused a flare of hot flames in his eyes, a reaction that drew a groan from her. “I’m sorry. I can’t believe I keep giving you these mixed messages. Kiss me. Don’t kiss me. Touch me. Don’t. It’s only business. It’s lust.” She dragged her hands through her tousled hair. “I’m not only going crazy, I’ve regressed to sixteen years old.”
He surprised her by laughing at that.
“Would it make you feel any better if you knew that I had more control over my body—and my mind—when I was a randy boy of seventeen than I do whenever you get anywhere within kissin’ distance?”
“I don’t know.” She forced herself to meet his friendly gaze when, coward that she’d become, she would have preferred to look away. “I’ve never been one to take sex casually.”
“Yet another thing we have in common,” Lucky said. “If we were counting. Which we’re not,” he said before she could. The hell they weren’t, he thought.
“No. We’re not.” Great. Jude groaned inwardly. After three days of relative honesty, she’d reverted back to lying. So much for progress.
“This can’t go anywhere,” she said firmly, making Lucky wonder which of them she was trying to convince. “Our lives are light-years apart.”
“In every way,” he agreed helpfully.
“It’s foolish—and dangerous—to have an affair with someone you work with.”
“Especially if you’re working with other cowboys, horses and cattle.”
She laughed. “I finally understand why Kate loves her big brother so.” The instant she heard the L-word escape her lips, she longed to pull it back. “I mean, I can see how anyone would like you, admire you—”
“You don’t have to explain.” Her hands, which he’d noticed were seldom still, had begun fluttering in the air between them like sparrows caught in a hurricane. He gathered them into both of his. “I know what you mean.” He lifted her hand to his mouth as he had earlier, the light touch of his lips feeling like sparks against her skin.
“I have a suggestion,” he offered.
As she looked up into his warm brown eyes, Jude once again felt as if she were ceding control. And once again, the thought terrified her.
“You’ve got a point about mixing work and fun. So, the next couple of days, while Zach takes my picture for your magazine, why don’t you and I spend our spare time just getting to know one another? Trading life stories. Comparing favorite books, movies, that sort of thing. The way a man and a woman who are attracted to each other might do if they were going out on a normal date.”
“That sounds like a sensible suggestion.”
“I kinda figured you’d think so.” He bent down, retrieved his hat from the floor between them, dusted the straw dust off and put it back on his head. Then he gave her a slow, sexy wink. “And then, once we’ve dispensed with the formalities, and finished up with the work, we can get naked and roll around in the hay.”
She felt the uncharacteristic color flood into her face yet again. And it was ridiculous the way he could fluster her with little more than a seductive suggestion or sexual innuendo. Deciding it was time to garner some scant control over the situation, she lifted her chin and returned his teasing gaze with a calm look of her own.
“I’ll think on that,” she said, using his words.
His grin was quick, pleased and warm enough to make her feel in danger of melting into a little puddle of need. “Why don’t you do that?”
He ducked his head and gave her another quick kiss that was as gentle as the fluttering touch of butterfly wings, as warm as buttery July sunshine, and managed to start up the trembling all over again.
“Sweet dreams, New York. I’ll see you in the morning. And sleep in. Because believe me, you’ll be needing your energy.”
There’d been a time, only days ago, when Jude would have taken Lucky’s words for a threat. But as she slid between the newly laundered sheets that smelled of fresh mountai
n air and sunshine, she decided to take them as a promise.
CHAPTER TEN
JUDE COULDN’T BELIEVE it when she looked at the clock the following morning and realized she’d slept a full ten hours. Embarrassed at being thought of as lazy, she showered and dressed quickly. Buck was alone in the kitchen, cutting up stew meat, when she entered.
“Good morning,” she greeted him.
“Morning.” His bright eyes narrowed as they skimmed over her face. He nodded his approval. “You’re looking a lot more chipper this morning.”
She was grateful to him for not pointing out that it was nearly afternoon. “I can’t remember the last time I slept this late.”
He shrugged in a way that reminded her of Lucky. “I’ll bet you can’t recall the last time you pushed your body as hard as you have the past few days, either.” He poured coffee into a mug and put it in front of her. “Cowboying is hard work. It takes some getting used to.”
“I’m finding that out.”
“But you’ve been a real trooper. A lot of women would have quit the first day.”
“I’m not a quitter.”
“Seems not,” he agreed. “Your folks must be mighty proud of you.”
“My parents aren’t living.”
“Now that’s a real shame.” He rubbed his jaw and studied her for a longer time. “You got family back east? Brothers, sisters, aunts or uncles?”
“No. I was an only child. And what relatives I do have I never see. We weren’t exactly a close family.”
And that had never bothered her. Until now. She took a sip of Buck’s black battery acid and wondered if he’d made it a bit weaker this morning. Or perhaps she was actually getting used to it.
“Coffee too strong for you?” he asked, as if reading her mind.
