by Marin Thomas
Okay, she was attracted to Wade and she wanted to kiss him. There. She admitted it. Now what?
Nothing. She shifted into Drive and headed to the county road, Wade’s Beamer eating her dust. There could be no future for her and Wade because of Luke, and a sixth sense insisted Wade didn’t do flings. Shoot, she didn’t do flings.
Once the truck tires hit pavement Sam increased her speed. She glanced in the rearview mirror and noticed the Beamer growing smaller. She checked the speedometer, then yanked her foot from the gas pedal. Eighty was a bit too fast even for a rural road.
There was nothing left for her and Wade but friendship, which stunk. The more she saw of Wade Dawson the more of him she wanted. He was different from the men in her past—less intimidating. His quiet stares and calm demeanor tempted her to believe she could trust him not to use her weaknesses against her. And she admitted that she was developing a soft spot for those goofy glasses he wore. Not to mention she found Wade flat-out sexy.
Sam’s pulse jumped as her mind conjured up an image of Wade’s toned chest. Unlike the other cowboys who tripped over their muscles, Wade’s body moved in a smooth, stealthy manner and she suspected his talent in bed was skillful and practiced.
Four years after her accident Sam had succumbed to the flowery speech of a cowboy and had ended up sharing his saddle blanket—big mistake. Her memory had failed her the following morning when she’d awoken in a panic next to the naked man. Not until Bo had come along a few years later had Sam been ready to test the waters again. This time she’d been honest with Bo from the onset and had explained her accident and its lingering effects on her memory.
Bo had been supportive and understanding and hadn’t pressured her into a physical relationship. Eventually their friendship advanced to the bedroom, but sex had been awkward. Bo had acted tense and uncertain—as if he’d expected Sam to suffer a nervous breakdown in his arms. Before they’d had a chance to work out the kinks in their lovemaking, she’d botched things with Emily and Bo had ended the relationship.
Making love with Wade would be different. Better.
Whoa! Aren’t you jumping the gun? He hasn’t even kissed you.
Sam responded to Wade in a way she hadn’t with other men. He tempted her to let down her guard—maybe because she’d witnessed a vulnerability in him that matched her own. Regardless of why she was drawn to him she believed their lovemaking would be an experience she’d remember forever.
Forever? You can’t recall one day from the next.
Today she’d noticed that she hadn’t worried over her forgetfulness. Hadn’t feared repeating herself or asking the same question more than once. Miraculously she hadn’t felt the need to hide her shortcomings. The thought was both joyous and sad. Why did the one man she could see herself taking a chance on have to be a father?
She hated admitting she was jealous of her brothers, Duke and Matt. Both had found their own happy-ever-after with the woman of their dreams. And both were fathers. Sam wanted at least half that dream—a man of her own to love and grow old with. She ached to be a mother, to experience the special bond between mother and child but the risks were too great. She’d have to settle for enjoying the time she had with Wade.
Forty minutes had passed when Sam parked in front of the main house on the Lazy River Ranch. Wade pulled alongside her truck. Neither spoke as they climbed the porch steps at the side of the house.
“I’d like to wash up,” he said when they stepped into the kitchen.
“Sure.” The raucous laughter of cowboys splashing in the pool filtered through the screen door that led outside to the patio.
“Juanita,” Sam said when the housekeeper entered the room. “Meet Wade Dawson. He’s helping me with the Peterson homestead.” She’d sworn Juanita to secrecy about the horse sanctuary. If she didn’t confess her whereabouts every day the housekeeper would send the state patrol searching for Sam.
“Pleasure meeting you, Juanita. I hear your barbecue is famous.”
“There’s plenty, señor.”
“Bathroom’s down the hallway on the right.” Sam pointed to the doorway.
As soon as Wade disappeared, Juanita elbowed Sam in the side. “He’s handsome, no?”
“He’s also nice.” Sam washed up at the kitchen sink. “I like him a lot.”
“Be yourself, mi pequeña querida.” Juanita wrapped an arm around Sam’s waist.
Wade returned to the kitchen—hair slicked back with water, the wet strands transforming the geek into a bad boy. “The house looks the same as I remembered,” he said, pushing his glasses up his nose.
Had Wade visited the ranch before? Oh, God, Sam couldn’t remember. Her breath burning in her lungs, she glanced at Juanita. Where was all her newfound confidence now?
“Ah, I remember you, señor.” Juanita clasped Sam’s hand. “You were the young man who fell from the tree and broke your arm years ago.”
The air in Sam’s lungs escaped in a loud whoosh. Wade had mentioned the tree-climbing incident when they’d first met at Dawson Investments and again at the Peterson property. Why did she keep forgetting?
“I’m afraid I didn’t make much of an impression on Samantha.” Wade grinned. “She doesn’t recall that day.”
Juanita waved her hand. “Sam cares only about horses. Horses this, horses that.”
Grateful for the housekeeper’s support, Sam joked, “Horses are smarter than men.”
Wade chuckled, his eyes shifting nervously about the room. That he was uneasy calmed Sam’s nerves. “I’m starving. Let’s sample the barbecue.” She led the way to the outdoor patio. The cowboys shouted greetings and a few called Wade by name. Pleased that her brother’s friends had made Wade feel welcome, she said, “Drinks are this way.” They stopped in front of a wheelbarrow filled with ice and cold beverages. Sam chose a diet soda and Wade selected a beer.
“For a greenhorn you did a good job today.” Connor helped himself to a beer. The cowboy was one of a handful of Matt’s friends who knew how severe Sam’s head injury had been. She appreciated his big-brother concern but suspected he’d hover over her until he was convinced Wade meant no harm.
“If you’ll excuse me for a minute.” Sam walked off to thank the others for their help, leaving Wade at the mercy of Connor. If the cowboy’s interrogation didn’t send him running, then that would add more proof that Wade was as special as she believed.
Wade resisted the urge to call Samantha back to his side as he faced off with the cowboy.
“Sam’s never mentioned you before.” Connor rubbed the perspiring longneck against his forehead.
“She’s never mentioned you, either.” Why the hell had Wade gone and said that? He acted as if he was staking a claim on Samantha. Aren’t you?
“Are you and Samantha a couple?”
Yes. “No.” Maybe. Wade guzzled his beer. The alcohol fed his courage. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
“Are you and Samantha…”
Connor’s laughter drew stares, including Samantha’s from the other side of the pool. “Hardly. I’m her adopted big brother.”
A sudden spell of light-headedness hit Wade and he blamed the feeling on the beer and not the relief he felt at the cowboy’s declaration.
“Matt and I traveled the circuit together,” Connor continued. “Matt was considered one of the top ten tie-down ropers the past few years. I bust broncs.”
“Matt’s the brother who recently married?”
“Yep. Went and tied the matrimonial noose around his neck.”
Wade grinned. “You’ve never been married.”
“Nope. And I’m not looking to walk down the aisle anytime soon.”
“I’m divorced,” Wade said. “I have an eight-year-old son.”
“Can’t remember Sam ever dating a married man.”
“I’m not married.” Was the guy hard of hearing? “And Samantha and I aren’t dating. We’re…” he hesitated “…friends.”
&n
bsp; “Sam said you were her accountant.”
“Financial adviser.” Accountants were dweebs. Wade wasn’t a dweeb.
“Then you’re aware she’s worth a fortune.”
A fortune Wade had worked tirelessly to expand over the past few years. “Her trust fund is in good hands.” He hoped his expression didn’t expose the lie.
“Glad to hear that.” One of the men in the pool hollered for Connor to join their water basketball game. “If you hurt her—” the cowboy invaded Wade’s space “—I’ll stomp you flatter than a bull’s hoof. Are we clear?”
“Crystal.”
Connor set his beer on a table, whipped off his shirt, then did a canonball into the pool next to Wade, drenching him.
Asshole. Wade removed his eyeglasses and used the backside of his shirt to dry the lenses.
Ignoring the Neanderthals in the pool, he joined Samantha and an elderly Hispanic man. Her eyes widened at his soaked clothes. He offered his hand to the older gentleman. “I’m Wade Dawson, Samantha’s financial investor.”
“Armando Garcia.”
“Armando is Juanita’s husband. He takes care of the pool and the grounds,” Samantha added.
“I’ve heard your wife’s barbecue pork is the best this side of the Red River.”
Armando grinned. “Sí, señor.”
“Hungry, Samantha?” Wade wanted to whisk her away from the buffoons at the party.
“Starved.” They headed to the buffet table, where they loaded their plates with meat, beans and potato salad.
“Why don’t we eat on the front porch,” Wade suggested, having remembered seeing a hanging swing when they’d arrived. They strolled to the front of the house, then climbed the porch steps and sat on the swing. After his first bite he moaned. “This is unbelievable.”
“Told you so.” Samantha winked. A cute, sassy blink of the eye that stole Wade’s breath.
He ate another bite of pork and chewed slowly until his heart rate slowed to normal. “How long has Juanita worked for your family?”
“Since my mother ran away.”
“Didn’t your mother die in a car accident a few years ago?” His uncle and aunt had attended the funeral.
“That was Laura. My stepmother. Duke’s mom.”
“I’m sorry.” All this time Wade had believed Matt and Duke were Samantha’s biological brothers.
“My real mother took off when Matt and I were toddlers. I don’t remember her at all.” Samantha stared into space, her food forgotten.
Time to change the subject even if his admission bordered on unprofessional, considering Sam was his client. “You were the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen.”
Startled, she gaped. At least his declaration had erased the desolate look in her eyes. “The afternoon I visited the ranch with my uncle you wore your hair loose, the strands falling down your back like a silky waterfall…And then you opened your mouth and cursed me.”
Samantha’s face flushed.
“I suppose you don’t remember that, either.” He chuckled. “I should have confessed that I’d never climbed a tree before, but I refused to be shown up by a girl.”
“I won’t believe you if you tell me you didn’t have a tree to play in when you were a kid.” Samantha quirked an eyebrow.
Wade rarely spoke about his childhood—not even Carmen had been interested in Wade’s life before his uncle had taken him in. “It’s a long story.”
“I’m in no hurry.” The honesty in her gaze assured him that she wouldn’t judge his mother harshly.
The Samantha sitting next to him on the swing was such a contrast to the young woman he’d met years ago. The old Samantha wouldn’t have cared about anyone but herself.
“My mother was Uncle Charles’s younger sister and she was a rebel. She fell in love with a guy who rode into town on a Harley. He took off at the end of the summer, leaving my mother behind. When she discovered she was pregnant with me she left town in search of my father.”
“Did she ever find him?”
“Nope. We were on the move, living in motel rooms, apartments and city shelters until I turned five.” He had few memories of those years—probably a good thing. We stopped looking for my father when I entered kindergarten.” The school district had forced Wade’s mother to take him to a medical clinic for vaccinations before allowing him to attend school. His arms had been sore for a week afterward.
“Did your mother ever marry?”
“No.” Wade believed his mother had loved his father even as she took her last breath. “She died of cancer when I was ten.”
“Oh, Wade. I’m sorry.”
“When she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and learned she had only a few months to live, we returned to Tulsa and she asked my uncle to raise me.”
“Where were your grandparents?”
“They’d passed away years earlier.”
“Was it difficult adjusting to a new family?”
“Yes.” His aunt and uncle had afforded Wade little time to mourn his mother before they’d demanded nothing less than his best behavior and effort in school. “My uncle enrolled me and my cousin in a boys’ private school, and I worked hard to earn good grades.”
Samantha nudged his side with her elbow and smiled. “So the glasses are just for show? You aren’t a brainiac?”
“I inherited bad eyesight but not a high IQ.” Wade suspected his birth father had possessed more charm than intellect. “My son inherited the genius gene from Carmen’s side of the family.” Her brother was a physicist, the other a bio-medical engineer and her mother had been a concert pianist. Carmen was a smart woman but preferred shopping and socializing to using her brains. “Luke amazes me. He’s a walking encyclopedia with a photographic memory.”
They ate in silence for a minute, then Wade said, “To make a long story short, I studied and earned good grades because I wanted to make my mother proud of me.” At least Wade had begun with that mindset. As years passed, pleasing his deceased mother had shifted to earning his uncle’s respect and securing a foothold in Dawson Investments.
“How about your cousin. Is he an investor, too?” Samantha asked.
“Jarrod’s a dentist. He lives in California with his life partner, Richard.”
“I see.”
“Jarrod calls around the holidays but his relationship with my aunt and uncle is strained.”
“That’s too bad.”
Wade agreed. His mother’s death had driven home the point that life was too short to allow rifts to grow between family members. His uncle had stopped short of disowning Jarrod when he learned his son was gay, but he’d asked Jarrod to leave Tulsa, fearing his son’s lifestyle would negatively impact Dawson Investments’ reputation.
A reputation that was at risk if Wade didn’t recover Samantha’s trust fund.
“So…” She waved a hand in the air. “What was the reason again you couldn’t climb a tree?”
“Guess I got sidetracked.” He grinned. “There weren’t any opportunities to climb trees at the boys’ private school. I did take a fencing class but my glasses slipped too often and I usually ended up on the losing side of a saber.”
“What about horseback riding?”
“Tried that, too, but couldn’t stay in the saddle.” The horse had bolted as soon as he’d put his foot in the stirrup. Wade had clung to the saddle horn for almost a mile, one foot dragging against the ground. When the animal finally slowed and he’d been able to free his foot, he’d twisted his ankle and had ended up on crutches for a month. From that day forward, Wade stuck to studying during his free time. “I don’t remember my uncle ever mentioning where you went to college.”
The fork hesitated midway to her mouth, then she shoveled the food inside, chewed and swallowed. As if she hadn’t heard his previous statement, she said, “I’m debating whether or not to build a storage barn in addition to a large horse barn on the property.”
Dollar signs flew around in Wade’s head. “How man
y barns do you need?”
“A smaller structure would be nice to store extra feed and farm equipment.”
“You mean tractors?”
“Plows and harvest machines. I intend to use half the land to plant hay and alfalfa.”
Farm equipment would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. “Why go to all the trouble to grow crops when you can buy the feed?” Samantha’s sanctuary ranch was turning into a huge financial commitment that would require her to hire hands to manage.
“Rescued horses need more than hay and grain. They need to graze grass to put on weight.” Her expression softened. “I want the horses that come to my ranch to have the very best.”
The conviction in her voice proved that Wade’s initial impression of Samantha had been off the mark. This wasn’t a pet project she’d tire of after a while. She genuinely cared about rehabilitating horses and providing a safe environment for the animals to recover from the neglect they’d suffered. “You’re a special woman.” His heart thumped hard inside his chest when her gaze dropped to his mouth.
Did she want to kiss him as much as he wanted to kiss her?
He inched forward, tilting his head. Then paused when her breath puffed against his face. He waited for a signal that he should proceed. When her dark lashes fluttered closed, he brushed his lips across hers. Gentle…slow…He tested the waters. Her mouth tasted of tangy barbecue and a heady…dark…erotic flavor. He pressed his lips harder against hers.
“Ouch!”
He jerked upright. “What happened?”
“Your glasses.” She rubbed her cheekbone below her left eye.
He brushed the pad of his thumb across the red mark marring her flawless skin. “Sorry.”
She removed his glasses. “That’s better.”
Says who? Samantha’s image blurred before his eyes.
Clasping his face between her hands, she whispered, “I’ll guide you.” Her lips drew a rumbling groan from his chest as she slid her tongue inside his mouth. Then Samantha shifted toward him and her plate tipped over on his lap.
