Cowboy's Kiss

by Victoria Pade

  Ally’s steps slowed as she drew near and finally stopped just short of reaching them, shocked to the core by what she was seeing and hearing.

  Jackson was teaching her daughter to paint a doghouse. He was actually smiling and so was Meggie as the deep sound of his voice carried to Ally.

  There were certainly no harsh criticisms or rebukes coming from him, though he also wasn’t fawning over the child or talking down to her, either, the way some people who didn’t have any experience with kids did. Instead he was treating her with the same respect he would have an adult. And something about the way he took for granted that Meggie could do the job once he’d shown her how seemed to make Meggie respond with a new self-confidence.

  “See?” Beth said from beside her. “Nothing to worry about. Kids and animals—Jackson is great with them.”

  He caught sight of Ally and his sister just then, took a sweat-stained Stetson from the doghouse’s roof to put on his head, patted Meggie on the back, and crossed to them. As he did, his expression changed completely—sobering first, then turning fierce.

  “It’s about time,” he growled.

  Beth let out a laugh, turned and left as Jackson reached Ally to stand accusingly before her, his legs apart, his hands on his hips, his head slightly forward on his neck as if he were a drill sergeant berating a miscreant private.

  “How long does it take to make a few sandwiches?”

  Ally just stared at him for a moment, amazed by the transformation between what she’d witnessed of him with Meggie and what faced her now. Jekyll and Hyde, alive and living in Wyoming.

  Still, she was grateful that Meggie was seeing the Dr. Jekyll side.

  But she didn’t answer his question. Instead she set the saddlebags on the ground at his booted feet and stepped around him to go to Meggie to kiss her goodbye. Then she came back.

  “What are you waiting for?” she asked as brusquely as he had.

  His cornflower blue eyes narrowed at her as if the look alone could put her in her place. Then he blew out a derisive snort of a breath and headed for the barn. “Saddle up,” he ordered.

  Saddle up? Did he mean find a horse and mount it or did she actually need to put a saddle on one?

  She had to jog to catch up with him, because after having given the command he hadn’t waited for her to fall into step, and his long legs carried him away fast, even with the heavy leather bags slung over one broad shoulder as if they were no more than a towel he’d used to dry himself after a shower.

  As she followed, Ally wondered whether to tell him that all the horses she’d ridden had come already saddled or to try bluffing her way through the task if he’d meant she needed to do it herself.

  How difficult could it be? A bunch of straps and buckles. Like a pair of shoes. Just match up the right strap with the right buckle and that was that.

  Wasn’t it?

  Maybe.

  Or maybe not.

  But the one thing she was sure of was that if she told Jackson she’d only ridden the presaddled kind and didn’t know how to go about doing it from scratch, he’d bite her head off. So she decided to go with the how-hard-could-it-be theory.

  Still, she was not at all disappointed to find “saddle up” had been an order to get on an already saddled horse.

  She breathed a sigh of relief as they headed for two that were tied to the paddock fence waiting for them.

  “The men are already out rounding up the herd,” he informed her as if she’d asked, swinging easily up onto the taller of the animals after he’d attached the saddlebags.

  So much for gallantry or helping a lady mount.

  Ally was left standing beside a gray mare, her eyes barely level with the curve of the saddle seat.

  Somehow the camp horses had seemed shorter than these ranch horses. Plus there had always been a stable boy to offer a boot up. Or a tennis shoe up as it were, because Ally didn’t own any cowboy boots.

  But here she was on her own.

  “Whoa, girl,” she murmured, though the animal was only standing docilely in place, staring at the white rail in front of it.

  Hoping the horse was as calm as it looked, Ally pulled her knee nearly to her chin to get her foot into the stirrup.

  She missed.

  It was higher than she’d thought.

  She took a step backward and tried again.

  “Oh, for crying out loud,” Jackson barked when she missed a second time. “Move ‘er beside the fence and climb on from there if you have to,” he ordered disgustedly.

  Wishing she’d thought of that herself, Ally took his advice, finally making it into the saddle. She felt good about it until she realized she couldn’t reach the reins to untie them.

  Jackson realized it, too, at about the same time.

  “Damned woman,” he muttered under his breath. And with that, he reached over to yank the reins free and handed them to her.

  Then he nudged his own mount and headed away from the barn, leaving Ally to play catch-up again.

  “Oh, this is going to be loads of fun,” she grumbled to herself so softly she didn’t think he could possibly hear her.

  She was wrong.

  “We aren’t out here to have fun. We’re here to work,” he barked at her.

  And though she knew it was childish, she couldn’t help sticking out her tongue at his back.

  His broad, straight back...

  She hated herself for noticing that. For admiring the magnificence of the man in the saddle. For appreciating the graceful way he rode, flowing with the rhythm of the animal so smoothly horse and rider could have been floating on air.

  And it didn’t help matters at all that her wayward gaze slid to the jeans pockets that so snugly hugged his great derriere, then slipped right on down the thick, hard thighs that finessed the horse with subtle pressure to do his bidding.

  Ally suffered a sudden horribly delicious image of those same thighs on either side of her, nudging, guiding, riding....

  Her mouth went dry, her heart raced, and beads of perspiration erupted on her upper lip.

  Could she be suffering heatstroke already?

  But she knew better.

  Hunk stroke was more like it.

  And it would never do. She had to fight it. To keep her thoughts—and her eyes—off him.

  It helped that about then they reached the section of the range where the ranch hands were.

  It didn’t help that Ally couldn’t keep herself from comparing the other men to Jackson or that they came up short as he did a cursory, first-names-only introduction.

  Then he solved the problem of distraction for her.

  “You’ll take up the rear,” he told her. “That means you keep an eye out for any of the herd that try to stray, and don’t let them.”

  At that, one of the cowboys grimaced and exchanged a glance with the man beside him.

  Ally wondered why but didn’t say anything as she waited for Jackson to explain how she was supposed to keep a cow with wanderlust from roaming.

  But further instructions never came. Instead he shouted, “Let’s move ‘em out of here,” to the ranch hands and they all took off.

  For a moment Ally just sat there, watching them go and feeling like an idiot for not knowing what to do. Then she realized the only way she was going to learn was by trial and error, because Jackson was not likely to fill her in. So she set her horse to a canter and followed along, taking up a place behind the herd as the cowboys hee-yawed them into motion.

  It didn’t take long for Ally to understand the reason she’d been given the rear position, or the cowboys’ reaction to her being relegated to it. Driving cattle on a dry, ninety-five-degree day was dirty, dusty work. And Ally got the worst of it as she rode straight into the clouds the cattle and horses stirred up.

  By the time they stopped near a stream for lunch, she felt as if she’d personally experienced the dust bowl. She was covered with grit from head to toe. It crunched beneath her teeth, clogged her nose an
d scratched her eyes. Every fold of her clothes carried enough soil to pot houseplants; it had settled into the creases of her skin and sifted through her hair to her scalp. Even her ears were full of it.

  Off their horses the men all went to the stream to wash their hands and splash water on their faces.

  Ally joined them and then—though she hated having to do it and turned away from them when she did—she had to use some of the canteen water to swish in her mouth and spit out, and blow her nose on the tissue she’d luckily stuffed into her pocket before they’d left.

  And still she was dirtier than she’d ever been in her life. Which was no doubt exactly what Jackson had had in mind.

  “What the hell is all this?” he demanded as he started to unload the saddlebags of the food she’d packed.

  Ally hiked from the stream to the shade of a huge tree where they were sitting to eat. “I believe those are the sandwiches you told me to make,” she answered him evenly rather than allowing a hint of how awful she felt.

  “With the crusts cut off?” he asked incredulously.

  “Trimmed, yes.”

  Jackson rolled his eyes. “Froufrou food, boys. She’s packed us froufrou food.”

  “Oh, stuff it, hard case,” she heard herself shout back before she even realized she was going to. “If you don’t like it, don’t eat it.”

  That brought a few smiles and at least one laugh disguised as a cough from the other men, who accepted their sandwiches without comment.

  Ally took over from there, explaining what everything was as she opened each container.

  Besides the cucumber pinwheels there were marinated green beans, chick peas and carrot curls; crackers she’d seasoned and toasted, and a vegetable pâté to go with them; and a flour tortilla torte layered with refried beans, onions, olives, peppers, tomatoes, spicy sour cream and cheese, and cut into triangles that sent Jackson into another muttering of “froufrou.”

  But everyone—including Jackson—ate heartily. The ranch hands were effusive in their praise of the picnic, wanting to know what the special flavor on the ham and turkey club sandwiches was, and arguing over who got the last of each dish as it disappeared.

  Jackson, on the other hand, grumbled between mouthfuls about the ridiculousness of having food like that on a cattle drive, as if she’d ruined some centuries-old tradition.

  Once they’d all finished eating and drinking, it was back to work.

  The ranch hands headed for the horses where they grazed near the stream, but Jackson held back, handing Ally a handkerchief scarf. “Tie it around your nose and mouth. It’ll block out some of the dust,” he advised as if he were doing it against his will.

  “Thanks,” she said, accepting it and wondering if froufrou food had won her the concession or if his conscience was just getting the better of him. But either way, she’d take what help she could get.

  “Come on, let’s get going,” he ordered then.

  The afternoon was more punishing than the morning, mainly because the temperature climbed and, besides the heat and dust, Ally’s backside began to protest the abuse of the saddle. Half-hour joyrides at camp had not prepared her posterior for the kind of prolonged punishment it was getting.

  Of course, none of the men seemed disturbed, but then clearly they were all accustomed to it. For Ally, as the hours passed, that saddle became a private torture all its own.

  And then the call of nature struck, too.

  For a while she tried to ignore it, but she’d had more to drink than to eat at lunch and ignoring it became less and less possible until she finally accepted the fact that she was going to have to slip away from her dusty position at the back of the herd and find a discreet bush. Fast.

  No one would miss her, she thought, since the cows were a cooperative lot and, besides having to urge on a few laggers periodically, she really didn’t do much.

  So when she spotted a likely clump of bushes amid a stand of trees, she steered her horse off in that direction.

  By then she was so stiff and sore that getting out of the saddle was more a fall than a dismount. Not that she cared at that point. She was less concerned with gracefulness than with just hitting the ground and running for the foliage.

  It was hardly a luxurious accommodation but she got the job done and then hurried back out of the bush as quickly as she could.

  Getting into the saddle again was not an easy proposition, however.

  Lifting her leg high enough to reach the stirrup just couldn’t be done with muscles that were crying out for mercy. Fleetingly she considered walking rather than riding, wondering if she could keep up, but of course she knew that wasn’t really an option, just wishful thinking when anything seemed preferable to sitting in that saddle again. If she could even get there.

  She searched for something to use to boost herself up, spotting a tree stump on the outskirts of the small clump of bushes she’d just availed herself of.

  She took her horse to that spot; though she still could have used a bigger lift, with a moan of misery, she managed it.

  For a moment she closed her eyes, swallowed hard and waited for the pain to pass. Barring that, she at least waited for it to ease up.

  Then she opened her eyes, pulled up the scarf that was tied around her neck to cover her nose and mouth and went around the trees and bushes to return to work.

  There was only one problem.

  There wasn’t a cow or horse or cowboy or so much as a cloud of dust anywhere to be seen.

  Thinking that maybe she’d just lost her bearings and was facing the wrong direction, Ally made a full circle of the stand of trees and bushes, searching the distance for signs of the herd.

  But there weren’t any.

  In fact, there wasn’t anything but wide-open countryside. Quiet. Beautiful. Empty. And she had most definitely lost her bearings, because she didn’t have any idea which direction she’d come from or where to go to get back.

  “Oh, boy,” she said as reality sank in. Then, as loud as she could, she called, “Hey, is anybody out there?”

  No answer. Not even her own voice echoed back to her.

  “You don’t think we’re lost, do you?” she said to her horse, the only living thing within earshot.

  It didn’t answer.

  It didn’t need to. They were in trouble and Ally knew it.

  Still, she had to try to get out of this. Keeping her fingers crossed, she took a guess and ventured as far as she could without losing sight of the trees.

  Nothing.

  Back she went, trying another direction. And then another and another, always keeping the trees as home base. But still there was no sign of the herd. It was as if they’d disappeared into thin air.

  Which left her with the camp rule applying to lost hikers—stay in one place. So for the last time she went back to the trees and bushes, thinking that when Jackson realized she wasn’t bringing up the rear, he’d backtrack and find her.

  Wouldn’t he?

  A sinking feeling washed through her with the doubt.

  Maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe he’d figure it served her right and she was on her own. That she could find her way home or die trying.

  The vast expanse of the open countryside seemed to stretch out even farther than before, all around her. And she had an overwhelming sense of how completely vulnerable she actually was.

  “Thank God, Meggie didn’t come with me,” she murmured when that thought occurred to her, her own voice sounding loud in the silence.

  But then she realized she was being silly. Surely Jackson wouldn’t just leave her. Or even if he would, someone else would come looking for her.

  She just needed to wait awhile.

  But she didn’t need to do it sitting on the back of that horse.

  “Unless, of course, you know your way home. Any chance of that?” she asked, bending over the animal’s mane to speak into its ear.

  The horse snorted and shook its head as if to rid itself of a fly.

  N
o help there.

  “Okay for you,” she said. “No horsey treats when we do get back.”

  She slid to the ground again, groaning the whole way and longing to be anywhere but where she was—preferably in a bath full of bubbles. At home in Denver where there wasn’t so much dust and dirt and grime. In the middle of the nice, familiar suburbs where a person couldn’t get lost if she tried...

  But since that was nothing more than a pipe dream, she led the horse to the shade of the tree farthest away from the others so she could be seen from nearly any direction and slipped down the trunk to sit on the prairie grass. She didn’t really feel afraid. At least not of being alone in the countryside. Or even of spending the night out there, if it came to that.

  But the thought of Jackson Heller when he did find her, now that was something else again....

  * * *

  “Ally? Ally? Are you all right?”

  Oooh, nice voice. Ally thought she was dreaming it. Deep, rich, resonant, masculine. It rolled over her like warm syrup, seeped into her pores and made her moan.

  “Ally! Are you okay?”

  The voice was louder this time.

  But it wasn’t a dream, she realized as she drifted awake. It was real.

  And she wasn’t in bed asleep. She was on the ground with a tree root for a pillow and waning sunshine for a blanket.

  And the voice belonged to Jackson.

  Her eyes flew open and there he was, standing over her, tall, gorgeous, and, surprisingly, not glaring at her. Instead he’d taken off his hat and held it down next to his knee, leaving his eyebrows bare so she could see that they were pulled together, almost as if he were worried about something.

  “Are you hurt?” he asked. Asked, not demanded.

  It was very nice. Why couldn’t he always be this way?

  “No,” she finally answered, sitting up, though not without flinching when she landed on her sore seat. “I’m okay. I just left the herd so I could use the bushes and when I came out you guys were gone. Completely. And I couldn’t figure out what direction to go to find you again, so—”

  “What about your horse? Where’s the mare?”

  She didn’t realize until he’d said that that the horse was gone. She glanced around to confirm it. “I asked it if it knew the way home. Guess it did. All I know is that I sat down to wait for someone to come back for me and I guess I dozed off. The horse was standing right here before that. It must have wandered away while I slept.”