The Great Montana Cowboy Auction

by Anne McAllister

  Polly didn't reply. She seemed to be mulling it over and Sloan didn't want to push her, unless of course she was mulling her way toward throwing him out again.

  "I didn't come back for Celie," he said finally when she still didn't speak. "I came for you. It's always been you."

  She pressed her lips together and held herself quite still. But she wasn't trying to pull away anymore. She stayed where she was, inches from him. He could see the rise and fall of her breasts beneath the sweatshirt she wore. There was a pulse beating at the base of her throat. Her lips were slightly parted and he wanted—needed—to taste them.

  He edged closer, bent his head and prayed she wouldn't bolt as he touched his lips to hers.

  Sloan had kissed a lot of women. They'd fill a veritable Who's Who of the world's most beautiful actresses, gorgeous models, heiresses, high-society belles. But not one of them kissed like Polly.

  There was a sweetness to Polly, a tenderness that he'd felt with no other woman. She was strong—good Lord, was she strong!—but she was vulnerable, too. And that very vulnerability was there in her kiss. It made him go slow when he wanted to go fast. It made him take care when he simply wanted to plunge ahead. It made him savor every moment that their mouths touched, that her body leaned almost imperceptibly into his. It made his grip on her arms loosen and his hands slide in and around to bring her body next to his. He'd wanted this so much, for so long!

  She was responding. Opening. Kissing him with the eagerness with which he kissed her.

  Now, he thought. Now she could go upstairs and he would go with her. He would join her in the bed where he'd lain alone before, and he would know the wonders of her body and her love—at last.

  And then Polly raised her hands between them and pressed against his chest, creating space between them, pushing back. "That's enough," she whispered shakily.

  "It's not," Sloan said, and knew it was the truth. "It's not nearly enough."

  Polly's smile was strained. "But it's all there's going to be."

  "You want it, Pol'," he argued. "You want me."

  She didn't deny it. But still she shook her head. "We don't always get what we want."

  "I'm not some schoolboy. I don't need a lecture," he said sharply.

  "Then think!" Her eyes were bright. "Even if I wanted to, I wouldn't sleep with you here!"

  "Why not?"

  "Because my children are here! I'm not going to have them thinking their mother just hops into bed with movie stars."

  "That's what they'd think, huh? You get a lot of movie stars in this neck of the woods wanting to sleep with you?"

  "You know what I mean!" Spots of color were high in her cheeks. She glared at him, then abruptly looked away. "Besides," she said in a low voice, "I haven't slept with anyone since Lew died."

  He hoped his gratification didn't show—or his frustration. He should have realized, of course. Polly was not the sort of woman who would sleep around. She might have slept with Lew years ago without benefit of marriage. But there was no doubt she had loved him deeply, and no doubt that her commitment had been total.

  That's what lovemaking was to Polly McMaster. Total. Complete. Wholehearted giving. And sharing.

  It wasn't casual or recreational. It was far more profound.

  And, realizing it, Sloan realized that what he'd thought he wanted, what he'd told Polly he wanted—closeness, intimacy, warmth, sharing, home and family—wasn't what he wanted at all.

  Or maybe it was, but it was only part of it.

  What he really wanted was more. He wanted the connection that existed between two people whose love embraced more than each other. He wanted to live in a world whose driving force was that love. He wanted Polly to share that connection, that love, with him.

  And he knew what that meant.

  He sighed. "I'll bunk with Jack."

  The world was, indeed, a very strange place, Joyce thought as she tried to get comfortable in her bed. Ordinarily she came home from work and hit the pillow and was out like a light.

  Not tonight.

  Tonight she was thinking about what Walt Blasingame had said.

  He'd been sitting with Artie when she'd dropped by during her dinner hour to visit the old man. She'd been surprised to see Walt. He'd looked glad to see her.

  "Hoped maybe you'd stop by. Thought maybe we could practice," he said. "During dinner?"

  "Order dinner in Vietnamese?" Joyce had said. "I don't think there are any Vietnamese restaurants in Livingston."

  "We can go to Sage's," Walt said.

  "Well, I—" Joyce hesitated. She felt awkward all of a sudden.

  But Artie looked pleased. "Good idea. Bring me a beer."

  Walt winked. "I'll see what I can do."

  Sage's wasn't crowded on weeknights. They had a table in the corner where they sat with their phrase books and tried to read them in the flicker of candlelight. Neither of them could do it easily even with their bifocals.

  "Ain't life grand?" Walt muttered.

  Joyce laughed softly. "Gil always said it's better than the alternative."

  "Well, I ain't ready to find out." Walt went back to the phrase book, squinting at it, mumbling, then saying, "How d'you reckon you pronounce this?"

  "We need tapes," Joyce said. "I think the language is tonal. Do you remember?"

  "A little. There was a teacher I knew there…"

  And then he told her about a woman called Sue, and gradually Joyce began to understand Walt's fixation on Vietnam: he had a daughter born to a Vietnamese woman.

  "I met her mother before I married Margie," he said. "She was a teacher. Called her Sue. She taught me a little of the lingo. Used to laugh at how bad I was. She was a sweet lady." He got a sad smile on his face. "Kind to a homesick G.I. I was a long way from home. Lonely as hell."

  "You don't have to explain," Joyce had said.

  But Walt had. He told her about Sue, about his relationship with her, then about going to Hawaii for R&R and Margie, against all odds, meeting him there—marrying him there.

  "Then I got back to Saigon and found out Sue was pregnant. I didn't know what to do."

  Joyce could well imagine.

  "I couldn't tell Margie. And Sue wanted the baby." He shook his head. "She said she understood." He shrugged. "What else could she say? I was gone before the baby was born."

  "You never knew her? At all?" Joyce couldn't imagine having a child she'd never known.

  "Never even knew she was a girl until couple of months back. Sue died—I knew that much—but I went back last year hopin' to find out somethin' more. Didn't happen. When I got home Charlie helped me write more letters. But nothin' happened. An' then outa the blue a couple a days ago I got this." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a thin airmail letter that already looked as if it had been opened and read many many times. He passed it over to Joyce, who opened it and scanned it.

  It was an official document, translated, giving the birth name and parents of a child called An, a young woman about the same age as her Polly, who was entitled to call Walt Blasingame Dad.

  "Charlie's got someone lookin' for her," Walt said. He paused and got a faraway look in his eyes for a long moment, and what he was seeing, Joyce was sure, was half a world and thirty-some years away. Then slowly his gaze returned to her, and in it she saw light and hope. "I might really find her."

  And Joyce smiled. "Yes, you might."

  "So I gotta learn this." He tapped the book.

  "Yes." She understood his urgency now and his need to find his daughter. She thought, too, about An, the daughter who had never known her father.

  Perhaps, of course, she'd had some sort of father in her life. But perhaps she hadn't.

  Joyce knew what that was like. Her own father had died when she was just a few months old. She'd never known him. She'd only wished.

  For Walt, for An, for herself—for the child she had been and the woman she was—Joyce had nodded. "I'll help."

  Some things were just too
cool.

  Like getting a new puppy or hitting a home run or dragging yourself out of bed on a frosty February morning and discovering that the guy snoring in your bottom bunk was Sloan Gallagher.

  Jack was wide-eyed in disbelief, then giddy with joy. "Whhoooo-eee," he breathed, creeping close and peering down at the famous stubble-jawed face. "Coo-ool."

  Sloan's eyes opened. He blinked, squinted, then finally got his eyes focused on Jack.

  Jack beamed. "Hi! Does Aunt Celie know you're here?"

  "Celie?"

  "She said she was seein' you again."

  "She is," Sloan said around a yawn. He shoved himself to a sitting position. "Seeing me. But I'm not here because of your aunt."

  "You aren't?" Jack's face fell.

  Sloan shook his head. "I came to court your mother."

  Some things were even cooler than a guy could imagine.

  It was all over town by lunchtime.

  "Sloan's come courting, I hear," said Alice Benn when she came to pick up her mail.

  "I see Sloan's back," Cloris remarked twenty minutes later.

  Loney Bates said, "See yer feller's back in town," when he came midmorning to pick up a package.

  Mary Holt came in with baby Mac during the lunch hour. She gave Polly a thumbs-up and a smile. "Good for you."

  "What?" Polly said. "What are you talking about?"

  Of course she knew. The whole town knew. Short of taping Jack's—and Sloan's—mouths shut with duct tape, there was no way she could squelch the rumors.

  "Sloan's back," she agreed.

  "And courting you," Mary said cheerfully, cradling Mac in one arm as she opened the post office box.

  "He's not courting me," Polly objected.

  The door to the post office opened and Sloan came in just in time to hear her protestation. "Sez you," he said easily.

  Mortified, Polly glared at him.

  He gave her an unrepentant grin, leaned through the window and planted a quick kiss on her lips. "I am," he told Mary with a wink, "courting her."

  "Celie—" Polly started to object.

  "—has given me her blessing," Sloan said firmly. "She thinks I'll be a dandy brother-in-law."

  "I'll spread the word," Mary promised. She waggled her fingers at Polly on her way out. "Have fun."

  Sloan grinned. "We will."

  Jace didn't see Celie Monday night when she got back. But that night at the Dew Drop he heard that she'd had a terrific time. He heard she'd seen the sunrise from Sloan Gallagher's deck. He did his best to rationalize all that, though it wasn't easy and he felt pretty grim.

  But when she showed up for work Tuesday morning, smiling brightly at him as he broke up crates in the back room, his spirits sank even lower.

  "Had a good time, did you?" he muttered, because he had to say something to her, and it was obvious from her damnable humming that she wasn't contemplating doing herself in.

  "Wonderful," she said, giving him the sunniest smile he'd ever had from her.

  "Lived up to your dreams, huh?" Jace said, whacking apart one of the crates.

  "Actually it was better."

  He took a mighty swing and nailed his other hand with the hammer. "Hell!"

  Protesting didn't do any good. Polly discovered that pretty quickly. Sloan Gallagher hadn't become a success just because he was a good actor. He'd succeeded because he was determined. He was equally determined, it seemed, to "court" her.

  It was such an old-fashioned term that she found it vaguely embarrassing. But as days passed, she found it surprisingly endearing as well. He brought her lunch. He told her jokes. He rubbed her shoulders when she flexed them tiredly at the end of the day. He drove her down to see Artie in the evening and took her to dinner after. Just the two of them.

  "It's what you call a date," he told her. "In case you'd forgotten."

  She laughed, but in fact she didn't think she and Lew had ever gone out, just the two of them. Before they were married they hadn't been able to afford it, and after they were married, they'd had kids. "It's very nice, thank you," she'd said politely.

  She thought he'd get bored and go away, but he never did.

  Finally on Friday, when she got home from work and was immediately set upon by Jack needing her to sign his spelling test and Daisy clamoring to tell her about Joneses' new foal, she looked up and saw Sloan coming downstairs with his duffel bag in hand.

  The sight gave her a kick in the stomach. Stop it, she told herself. It's only what you expected. He can't stay here forever. "Do me a favor?" he asked.

  Prepared to give him a ride to the airport, Polly nodded. "Of course."

  "Spend the weekend at my ranch with me."

  "What! But I can't do that!"

  He raised his brows. "You promised," he pointed out guilelessly.

  "Out of the question," Polly said. "Jack … Daisy…"

  "All of you," Sloan said. "Naturally."

  "Cool!" Jack shouted.

  "Really?" Daisy's eyes were like saucers. "Can we ride horses?"

  Sloan smiled beatifically. "Of course. If your mother agrees."

  Tricked.

  She'd been tricked. She glowered at him.

  He smiled. "You don't want to teach your children that your word can't be trusted, do you?"

  God, he was sneaky. There was no way Polly could wriggle off his neatly baited hook.

  "Fine," she said grumpily. "We'll come."

  He'd see just how much fun having a passel of kids could be.

  Sara couldn't go.

  Midterms, she said. She looked worried and distracted and Polly understood.

  Lizzie couldn't go, either.

  Play practice, of course. How could Polly have forgotten?

  Daisy herself forgot that she had promised to baby-sit Hannah Nichols and C. J. Callahan all day Saturday while their dads taught bull and bronc riding at Taggart and Noah's rodeo school and their mothers did the flowers for a wedding down in Livingston.

  "Can't I tell 'em something came up?" she moaned.

  And Polly wished she could say yes because her passel of kids was dwindling rapidly. But she shook her head. "You made a commitment—just like I did," she muttered as Sloan grinned at her.

  "You can come another time," Sloan promised Daisy.

  Polly wanted to tell him to stop making promises, but unfortunately, so far he seemed to be keeping them.

  At least Jack didn't have other plans.

  He was delighted at the prospect of spending the weekend on the ranch. "This is so cool," he said over and over, ripping around the house, getting ready, then reappearing to ask Sloan question after question.

  "Can we ride horses?"

  "How many cattle do you got?"

  "What do they eat?"

  "Can I rope one?"

  If Sloan thought he was in for a nice relaxing romantic weekend, he was wrong.

  Where Polly was concerned, Sloan had stopped expecting romantic anythings. In fact, he'd stopped making plans.

  Loving Polly was like the improv class he'd signed up for when he finally decided to take acting seriously. It was like cowboying—riding out on the range where on any given day you never knew what to expect.

  He'd liked improv. He'd thrived on cowboying.

  He loved Polly.

  This weekend he was determined to show her how much.

  If Polly had given any thought to Sloan's ranch, she would have expected it to have a modern log house, state-of-the-art appliances, to be the sort of showplace befitting a Hollywood star.

  Unlike Celie, Polly hadn't ever read Mariah Kelly's definitive article, Will the Real Sloan Gallagher Please Stand Up? If she had, she'd have known that in Sloan's "modern log house", modern meant indoor plumbing, the logs had all been sawed by his ancestors, and that his state-of-the-art appliances ran to a refrigerator run off a generator and a hundred-year-old wood stove.

  All the "improvements" he'd made since he'd bought the place back had been on the barns, the fences and
the herd.

  "That's what makes it pay," he'd said as he pulled to a stop in front of the house. "I'm a rancher. I'm not just throwin' money down a bolt hole."

  Polly had been first bemused, then charmed.

  There were electric lights, run on the same generator that ran the refrigerator. But he often, he told her, used kerosene.

  "Just seems to fit," he said as he ushered them in. "Makes me feel at home. Reminds me of my roots."

  Sloan's roots, she discovered, were all here.

  "Five generations of 'em," he told her. "My great-great-granddaddy built that barn." He pointed out the window toward the biggest one. "He and his brothers ran cattle up from Texas, did a little horse trading at Miles City, liked the summers here better than in Texas, hadn't really seen the winters yet—" he grinned "—but they decided to stick around. Bought some land when it came up for sale. Wintered over some cattle. Built their herds. They did all right for a fair number of years." He paused and she felt there was a fair amount he didn't say before he went on. "An' now we're doin' all right again." He waved a hand toward the horizon where the snow-covered Bear's Paw rose up above the valley. "What do you think?"

  "It's beautiful."

  It was.

  She would have said Celie was the only one of them who had dreams. But this ranch reminded Polly of her own dream—long forgotten—of a ranch like this of her own. All at once she remembered being a teenager and daydreaming about a place like Ward and Maddie's—a ranch where she and Lew would raise kids and cattle. That was what they'd been working toward.

  "Ain't gonna bullfight my whole life," Lew had said. "Reckon we can get us a ranch like that when I retire."

  But with Lew's death, the dream had died, too. Polly hadn't even remembered it—she'd never had time. Until now.

  She tried to resist it—to resist Sloan. It was a fantasy, she told herself, the sort of thing that Celie had had—and had grown out of. But it was hard to withstand being courted by one of the world's sexiest, most charming men. Especially when he wasn't only charming to her but to her son.