Cowboy's Kiss

by Victoria Pade

  Ally shook her head in amazement at herself.

  Sure, the things both she and Meggie had encountered here had been unnerving, but it suddenly seemed very suspicious that she’d been able to take the first ones in her stride. Her fears and worrying had only grown out of proportion at about the same time her feelings for Jackson had blossomed, when she’d begun to lose the battle against her attraction to him, when she’d let down her guard completely and made love with him.

  “Camouflage,” she muttered, wondering if it was possible that rather than confront her very real and potent fear of a new relationship, a relationship with Jackson, and maybe a repetition of what had happened with Doug, she’d focused all of her fear on the ranch itself.

  It was not only possible, it suddenly seemed more than likely.

  Not that there weren’t real perils in living here. Things and situations that needed more care than she or Meggie had given them. But life-threatening danger didn’t wait around every corner as she’d begun to think.

  Only Jackson did.

  And the truth was, she realized, she was really afraid of being let down by love, by another man, more than she was afraid of anything else.

  “Really smart, Al,” she said out loud. “And while you were hiding it from yourself you walked right into it.”

  The numbness receded and a wave of pain as powerful as what she’d felt at the end of her marriage washed over her.

  So much for protecting herself.

  Then it occurred to her to wonder if protecting himself was what Jackson was doing by sending her away.

  But she didn’t have to wonder long, because too much of what he’d said in the kitchen told her that was exactly what he was doing. He’d seen her waffling about staying on the ranch and, before she could walk out on him the way his ex-wife had, he was ending it himself.

  Or was that just wishful thinking?

  What if he really didn’t love her?

  But how could that be with all that had happened between them the past few days...and nights?

  At the end of her marriage Doug hadn’t touched her. Not for months before. He hadn’t even had a kind word for her or a moment to spare to spend with her.

  But with Jackson the exact opposite was true. He’d wanted her—as urgently, as intensely as she’d wanted him. His attitude toward her had vastly improved from what it had been when she’d first come here, not deteriorated the way Doug’s had. Now kind words were all he had for her—even this morning when he’d been rejecting her. And as for spending time together, he’d wanted more of that, not less. He’d barely left her side at the naming ceremony and he’d even tried to get her to go with him in the helicopter afterward, just to have her company.

  And more than all of that, just this past night together, when he’d made such sweet love to her, told her he loved her and held her close as they’d fallen asleep, there hadn’t been anything in one moment of it that said he didn’t really love her, didn’t want her.

  No, there had been tenderness and care. He’d cherished her with every caress. And though he might have been saying goodbye to her, savoring what they’d shared and filling up on memories to carry with him, there hadn’t been a lack of feelings for her. And nothing he’d said since could convince her otherwise.

  So where did it leave her?

  Could she assure Jackson she was here for good? That nothing would ever drive her away?

  Thinking about Meggie’s accident still had the power to send a shiver up her spine. As did thoughts of the brushfire and all the other things that had happened during their time on the ranch.

  But then she thought of Meggie’s state of mind, and how her little girl had taken to life on the ranch—and to Jackson. Ally had thought the improvements in Meggie’s mood had been only temporary, but since they’d all reemerged after a single day and night of what had looked like a relapse, now it seemed that it was the relapse that was only temporary. Country life suited her little girl. And if anything would ever allow her to get over her father’s desertion, Ally suddenly admitted that being here had the best chance.

  Which only left the bottom line. The real issue.

  “Okay, so what about me?” she whispered, wondering if, when it came down to brass tacks, she could face what actually frightened her most—loving Jackson, giving herself, her heart, completely, freely, to a man again. Committing herself totally to a future with him.

  Because that was the real question.

  She could find another countrylike environment in which Meggie would thrive—this ranch wasn’t the only solution to her daughter’s problems. But giving in to her feelings for Jackson, taking a chance on another relationship, on love again, that was the more daunting prospect.

  Daunting or not, she realized that she was coming to this question too late. Because no matter how much it scared her, she did love him. Completely, with all her heart and so deeply that the thought of not having him in her life was too awful to bear, fear or no fear.

  So she’d actually already taken the risk.

  And lost.

  Unless she could repair the damage.

  * * *

  “But why is it best?” Meggie’s voice echoed in the barn as Ally went in in search of Jackson.

  “It just is, darlin’,” she heard him answer her daughter, sounding every bit as morose as the little girl as Ally headed for where they stood near a pile of hay. Jackson held a pitchfork in one hand; he was stroking Meggie’s hair with the other to comfort her.

  Jackson noticed Ally first, looking up at her as she reached them. But it was to her daughter that Ally spoke. “Meggie, honey, I want you to go into the house and fix yourself a bowl of cereal.”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “Do it anyway. I need to talk to Jackson.”

  “Will you make him let us live here?”

  “Just go up to the house.”

  “I want to stay.”

  “I’ll be up in a minute.”

  “I mean I want to stay on the ranch. With Jackson. Forever.”

  “Meggie...” Ally said only that, but very firmly, in a motherly warning tone.

  Her daughter pouted and hung her head and kicked at the hay on the barn floor, but finally sulked off.

  For the time it took her to get out the great door, both Ally and Jackson just watched her go.

  Then Ally turned to Jackson and gave his shoulders a mighty shove. “That’s just to let you know that I won’t stand for you making my decisions for me.”

  She’d surprised him, but he recouped quickly and frowned at her. “What decisions did I make for you?”

  “That it was too dangerous around here for Meggie and me. That I was selling my share of this place. That I was not marrying you.” She shoved him again. “And while I’m at it, I’ll tell you another thing. I’m a person who knows a thing or two about commitment, and riding through rough patches, and working hard and sticking with things and people.” Another shove. “Now, tell me you don’t love me. Tell me you don’t want me in your life—not on your ranch—in your life. Say it right to my face. Because that’s the only reason I’m leaving this place today.”

  “That so?”

  “Yes, that’s so because I do love you. It just took a kick in the pants for me to see that’s what’s been scaring me more than anything around here and that I’ve just been using the other things as an escape hatch to protect myself. Just the way you’re ready to push me out the door to protect yourself rather than risk going on with what’s started between us.”

  “You have it all figured out, do you?”

  “Yes, I think I do. Or at least I have it narrowed down to two possibilities—it’s either that or you don’t love me and don’t want me and just proposed in some weak moment when passion had sapped the sense out of you.”

  A small smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. “When passion sapped the sense out of me?”

  She ignored the amusement in his voice. “Tell me you don’t love me. T
hat you don’t want me,” she repeated. “Because all you said before is that you don’t want to come home one day and find me gone. And that’s not the same thing.”

  He sobered. “But it’s the truth.”

  “But not wanting it to happen, being afraid of it, doesn’t mean it’s going to happen.”

  “Doesn’t it?”

  “No, it doesn’t. I like it here. And Meggie likes it here. But more than that, I love you enough to do anything I have to do to be a part of your life, even to go through the rest of my days working like a dog if that’s what it takes—”

  The smile came back. “You wouldn’t have to work like a dog. Or even a ranch hand. That was just me being ornery. You could cook at the honky-tonk if you wanted, or just stay around the house and raise babies.”

  “So what are you telling me, Heller?”

  He sobered yet again. “I guess if I was tellin’ you anything it would be to be sure about what you’re sayin’, Ally. And about what you’re thinkin’ about doin’.”

  “I’m sure that I love you. I’m sure that I want to be your wife and live here on the ranch with you, no matter how far away the next neighbor is, no matter how bad the weather or how much work. No matter how many new safety precautions I need to learn and teach Meggie. Because the only thing that really does matter is that I have a life with you.” She gave him one last shove for emphasis, but this time he saw it coming, let the pitchfork drop and caught her wrists.

  Still, she went on, just closer to him now. “Unless you tell me you don’t love me or want me. Or Meggie or—”

  He gave a tug that brought her up against him and cut off her words with a fierce, hard kiss even as his arms went around her and held her to him.

  And then, as abruptly as it had begun, he stopped kissing her. “I can’t tell you I don’t love you, because I do. And I want you—everywhere and every way—more than I’ve ever wanted anything or anyone as long as I’ve lived. And as for Meggie? Well, you know better than to think I don’t care for her as if she were my own. But—”

  “But nothing,” she repeated his earlier phrase to her. “Does that mean I can start thinking about marrying you again?”

  His blue eyes searched hers and Ally could see the thoughts running through his mind, the temptation to believe her, the fear that if he did he might be hurt the way he’d been before.

  “You said yourself that I’m nothing like your ex-wife. And I’m here to tell you that I’d never do what she did to you. I might fight to change something I don’t like, but I won’t run away from it.”

  “No, I don’t think you will. Not once you’ve made the commitment,” he agreed quietly. And then his expression eased into another smile and she knew.

  She knew he was taking the risk again, too.

  “So. Shall I start thinking about that proposal of yours or not?” she asked.

  “No, ma’am,” he answered in a slow drawl. “I think you just ought to pick a date so we can do it.”

  It was Ally who smiled then, but only for the moment before he kissed her once more, softly, sweetly, this time.

  “I won’t ever leave you, Jackson,” she promised very solemnly when it was over.

  “Good, because I figured we were both signing on for life.”

  “Unless of course you ever make me climb that windmill again. Then you may find yourself kicked off my ranch,” she joked.

  “Your ranch now, is it?”

  “Mmm.”

  “I’ll try to keep it in mind,” he said with a crooked grin that went straight to her heart. “Unless of course you ever come shovin’ me again. Then you just might find yourself up that windmill quicker than you think.”

  Ally gave him the same kind of grin as he kissed her a third time, only this one was deeper than the others and much, much longer.

  But just when sparks of that passion she’d mentioned before began to light, Jackson stopped. “Much as I’d like to give you a taste of a real, live roll in the hay, I think we have a mighty upset little girl in the house who doesn’t need to be mighty upset anymore and we’d best see to her.”

  Ally reached up and kissed him one short peck, loving him enough to burst, wanting him, but so, so grateful that he cared enough about Meggie, too, to think of her even at a time like this.

  “What was she saying to you before I came in?” Ally asked.

  “That she wanted me to convince you to stay.”

  “Well, you have,” she teased.

  “I’m just irresistible,” he agreed, keeping one arm around her as they headed out of the barn.

  On the way to the house that Shag Heller had built, Ally knew she was doing the right thing. The right thing for herself and for her daughter—she and Meggie and Jackson would be a family.

  And in her heart she thanked the old man who had left her so much.

  So much more than he’d ever known.

  For over and above the money and land, the holdings and assets, Shag had given her the gift of his son.

  And a whole lifetime of love.

  * * * * *

  ISBN: 978-1-4592-8813-3

  Cowboy’s Kiss

  Copyright © 1995 by Victoria Pade

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