Cowboy at Midnight

by Ann Major

  His front door was open. As he ran through his living room, he tripped over something and fell forward into the dimly lit hall. He was picking up a black boot with little embroidered red roses when Mr. Beezee, the man who had the room across from his, opened his door and knelt to get his paper. Beezee’s gray hair was neatly combed. Even his blue-and-white striped robe looked pressed and starched.

  “Good morning,” Steve muttered grumpily, forgetting he was unshaven and holding an ill-fitting sheet wrapped around his waist.

  His neighbor’s jaw gaped open and he stared at Steve as if he was the devil incarnate. Seizing his newspaper, Beezee banged his door shut.

  When Steve shut his own door, his pulse hammered more painfully than ever. Hell. The last thing he needed before his meeting with the governor was trouble with Beezee again or a call from the hotel management evicting him for indecent exposure.

  The governor! Breakfast!

  Steve glanced at his watch and then at the high-heeled black boot. The boot was hand stitched and fashioned of the finest leather. It had to be custom-made and expensive. Two thousand dollars easy.

  Cinderella—or rather Sally Jones—shouldn’t be that hard to track down. Not for a modern-day prince who prided himself on his smarts.

  If you’re so damned smart, you’d have picked a brunette.

  A few phone calls to pricey boot makers, and he’d have Miss Jones’s address and phone number.

  But first—the governor.

  If Steve hurried, he’d be ten minutes late. Not an option. Tom Meyers didn’t like to wait. He was the busy and commanding sort who kept other people waiting.

  On his way to the bathroom, Steve tossed the boot onto his couch.

  Later.

  When Amy stepped out of her shower, she still felt tender from all the lovemaking. As she was rustling through hangers of clothes in her closet to find something to wear, Amy’s landlord’s dog started barking.

  Amy smiled. What was it this time—a bug or a leaf? Whatever it was, Cheryl’s wussy teacup poodle, Sparky, sounded every bit as ferocious as a bulldog, which was what Cheryl had meant to buy when they’d gone to the breeder. But her spoiled daughter, Kate, had fallen for Sparky, who was a bit of a nuisance, to say the least.

  Cheryl owned an immense limestone mansion in one of the plushest neighborhoods in central Austin. She was also, as luck would have it, one of Austin’s richest and most eligible bachelorettes.

  Amy’s mother, who was a social climber par excellence, had run into Cheryl at an art gathering right after her divorce and had arranged for Amy to rent the apartment over Cheryl’s garage, which had been built as maid’s quarters.

  Amy could just hear her bossy, persuasive mother using her courtroom tactics on Cheryl.

  “You and your daughter all alone in that big house? You don’t need a live-in. You need more security. Now, if my daughter, who’s looking for a place, were to rent your little apartment…”

  It hadn’t hurt that Cheryl and Amy used the same gym and were in the same spin class. Nor that they actually liked each other.

  It was so important to Amy’s mother that Amy live in such a neighborhood on a fifteen-million-dollar property she could brag about to her law partners that, to shut her up, Amy had finally moved out of an apartment she had loved.

  “How can you prefer your apartment to this?” her mother had demanded when she’d driven her by Cheryl’s for the tenth time. “Nobody at your apartment complex is anybody.”

  “I don’t care. I don’t hang out with them, anyway.”

  “My point exactly! Cheryl was married to that computer zillionaire. She’s exactly the kind of connection you need to get your life on track.”

  “But—”

  “You’ve been moping ever since college. Be nice to her and maybe she’ll introduce you to someone, dear.”

  “‘Someone’ being a man?”

  Her mother had dropped by the apartment with a hanging ivy right after Amy had finally rented it and moved in. Amy had been painting the apartment walls the color of golden honey.

  “You should have gone with white,” her mother had said.

  “I like this color.”

  Her mother, who was black-haired, tall and reed thin, had pursed her lips. Not that she’d overruled Amy’s opinion. Instead she’d moved about the apartment, her intense, burning black eyes, taking in everything. Finally she’d paused by a window and after a lengthy study of Cheryl’s mansion and the pool, she’d given Amy the look.

  “You’ll meet our kind of people here.”

  “Cheryl’s way older than me, Mother.”

  Her mother’s brows had arched wickedly. “She doesn’t look it.”

  “Ouch.”

  Like a lot of really rich women, Cheryl did whatever it took to stay young looking. Her present lover was even younger than Amy.

  “She certainly married well, didn’t she?” her mother said in her sweetie-sweet tone as she continued to look out at the pool, studying the imported Italian lawn furniture, the fountains, the red canopies and the lush landscaping.

  “He divorced her.”

  “Which means she has his money and doesn’t have to put up with him.”

  “That’s marrying well?”

  “You missed a spot, dear.”

  Amy raised her paintbrush and swiped the place her mother was pointing at.

  “The next best thing to marrying well is divorcing well,” her mother said. “She’s got money, a cute lover, a fabulous house and she looks great. Take notes, dear.”

  Amy loved Cheryl now and her blue-haired daughter, Kate, but not because she saw them as connections. They were just a mother and daughter with way too much money, who were struggling with all sorts of issues. For one thing, Kate’s rich father wanted nothing to do with either one of them. To get his attention Kate constantly rebelled. She chose friends “normal” kids considered weird, wore rags and dyed her hair every color of the rainbow. Right now it was a startling neon blue. Not that her daddy had even noticed.

  Amy knew all about rebellion, about fathers never noticing. Except, her rebellion had been caused by her mother’s tyranny, not her father’s benign neglect. She’d wanted her parents’ approval more than anything, so her rebellion had been a secret thing, like a deadly drug that had destroyed her and her parents. Not just them. Lexie, too.

  She’d been a happy kid before adolescence. Her mother hadn’t known what to do with small kids, so she’d been raised by her father and kindly nannies. It was only when Amy had turned thirteen that her super-compulsive mother had suddenly taken a much more active role, picking her friends with the attention of a dictator choosing his generals, because the choices Amy made even at that early age could affect her future.

  When Amy had argued, her mother had dominated and crushed Amy’s independent spirit by grounding her and making her a virtual prisoner. Slowly a deep anger to be something other than the successful, well-dressed, popular robot her mother approved of had begun to burn inside Amy. When she’d gone to her father at sixteen and pleaded for the freedom to date a certain cowboy, he’d said her mother was in charge. Her mother had even wanted her to stop riding.

  Amy had felt if she didn’t do something, her mother would destroy everything she was. So she’d started playing the dutiful daughter, coming home at the right hours, appearing to run with her mother’s choices of friends, making good grades, but all the while she’d been sneaking out. And so had Lexie.

  Amy went to her mirror and pulled her long blond hair back into a ponytail. This morning there was no trace of that rebellious young girl. Her face was lightly made up. She looked very professional in cream-colored slacks and a matching long-sleeved silk blouse that she’d buttoned all the way to her throat. She wore no jewelry, and her beige pumps were low and sensible.

  Not that beige was her color, but then, that was why she wore it. Unlike her mother, who always, even when she was in the courtroom, dressed with dramatic flair, Amy didn’t want t
o look flashy or stand out in any way.

  Never again!

  Except for last night.

  Unbidden came a vision of herself in Rasa’s low-cut black spandex. She shivered at the jolt of heat she felt even as she remembered Steve mouthing the little L on her left breast outside the Hyatt. He’d thought she was a bad girl for sure.

  She felt hot. In spite of her best intentions, a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. Then she lifted her chin up and told herself that the new, reformed Amy would not think about him—ever again.

  On her way to the door, the reformed Amy grabbed her briefcase and purse and her cup of coffee, but just as she touched the doorknob, a timid hand tapped lightly on the other side of her door.

  Had Steve followed her somehow? Her heart thumped eagerly until she raised her shade and saw that it was her father. She laughed because in his black spandex shorts, fluorescent-red riding shirt, mirrored sunglasses and skull-shaped black bicycle helmet, he looked like an alien from another planet.

  She threw the door open. “Daddy!”

  Mike Sinclair handed her a small silver-wrapped box with a white bow on it.

  “This is a treat, Daddy. You never come by without Mother.”

  He shrugged sheepishly. “Happy birthday, sweetheart.”

  She pulled at the white bow on her present. “This is for me?” she whispered. “From you?”

  “I hoped I’d catch you before you left for work. Usually you’re gone when I come by.”

  “You’ve come by before?”

  His quick nod both thrilled and surprised her.

  “I had no idea.”

  “I’ve been worrying about you more and more.”

  “You have?”

  He nodded.

  “I’m fine, Daddy.”

  “You always say that. Because you’re like me. Because you want to believe it. You think if you just keep on keeping on, things will work out.”

  What did that mean, she wondered. Was he unhappy?

  “Sometimes you have to do something…to change….” He stopped. “But who am I to give advice?”

  Suddenly she wished he wasn’t wearing those mirrored sunglasses so she could read his eyes. He shifted as if he suddenly felt uncomfortable. “I’m probably keeping you—”

  “No.”

  Her father was an exercise addict. He biked or jogged for miles every morning before he went into his office to pull teeth, build bridges and preach dental hygiene to the hordes in need of conversion to daily flossing. Exercise time was the only time he had for himself. Luckily Mother approved of exercise.

  He turned. “I’ve got ten more miles to—”

  “Don’t you want to see me open your present?” Like a greedy child she tore the paper off, gasping when she discovered an exquisite miniature silver horse wrapped in tissue.

  She fingered the fine workmanship of the gleaming figurine. “Why, it’s beautiful, Daddy! How sweet of you to remember.”

  He pulled his mirrored sunglasses off, studying her face too intently. Usually he was her absentminded father. Today his kindly blue eyes burned with fierce protective pride, just as they had the day he’d finally taught her to parallel park.

  “You used to give me a horse on every birthday when I was younger.”

  “Until your mother said the last thing you needed was more horses.”

  “I…I could never have enough little horses. Not if they were gifts you picked out.”

  “When you were a little girl, it was so easy to love you.” He hesitated. “I’ve missed you.”

  “I know.” The gift and his saying those words made her long for that innocent time before she’d become a teenager, when she’d been so sure of her parents’ love and pride in her, especially his. But life marches on. She was an adult now. And she’d disappointed them. There was no going back.

  “It’s just that I’m so busy,” she said.

  “You’re just like your mother in that way.”

  His words stung.

  “I…I’d rather be like you.”

  “Your mother’s a whirlwind, a real mover and a shaker.”

  “You’re as easygoing as she is uptight.”

  “I used to be. She keeps me moving,” he continued. “That’s for sure. She puts a weekly calendar on the fridge. If I don’t look at it every morning, I can get into lots of trouble. But enough about your mother.”

  Amy sighed in relief.

  “I’d better let you get to work.”

  “Thanks for coming by, Daddy.”

  He backed down the steps. She glanced at the little horse one last time before rewrapping it in tissue and setting the box on her kitchen windowsill. By the time she’d closed her door and dashed down the stairs, he was a lone figure biking down the trail into the woods of Pease Park.

  Sometime today she had to call Mother. As always, Amy dreaded her mother’s critical questions and demands.

  Amy stared out at the sparkling turquoise pool. What was Steve doing right this moment? If only she had the right to call him and find out.

  What was his life like? Who was he really? Her chest tightened. What did he care about? What were his quirks? His passions? She swallowed against a sudden lump in her throat and was surprised how much it hurt that she would never know.

  When she reached her Toyota, a hot wind blew through the trees and made her ponytail flutter against her nape. She remembered Steve’s burning mouth there. Memories of his mouth, hot and seeking in even more intimate places, made her tender pelvis ache. How was she ever going to get through her day if she kept thinking about last night?

  Steve was only five minutes late to the governor’s office; however, Tom kept him waiting because he’d had to fit an important state senator into his schedule before their breakfast meeting.

  “Crisis about school funding,” his secretary had said rather wearily as she’d handed Steve coffee. “But you’re lucky. The later it is in his day, the farther behind he runs.”

  While Steve sipped black coffee in the waiting room, he thought about Miss Sally Jones. Strangely, he kept remembering her haunted blue eyes more than he did the red-hot sex. Which meant if he really were the smart triplet, he’d forget about playing detective. He was probably lucky as hell she’d run.

  Rescuing damsels in distress was a bad habit of his. You couldn’t save people. He knew that from Jack and Madison. People had to save themselves. When a man tried to save a woman and failed, the woman usually repaid him by hating him for having gotten her hopes up.

  At least, Madison had.

  Okay, you got off easy this time. You had a night of uncomplicated sex.

  Like hell.

  He wanted her again.

  Was he a wimp or what? Women were supposed to feel romantic after sex. Not men.

  He wanted her again.

  He got up and asked the secretary for the yellow pages. Opening the thick book, he flipped pages until he landed on boot makers.

  Don’t even think about jotting a number down.

  He scribbled a few names and numbers just for the hell of it. Not that he was about to call any of them. He was still trying to talk himself out of calling as he reached for his cell phone.

  Hell.

  She’d run out on him. If it was that easy for her to walk out, he should forget her. He wadded up the paper with the boot makers’ numbers, got up and stalked to the trash can.

  It was hard to walk back to his chair without that crumpled ball of paper, but he was through being a self-destructive sap who thought he could save people.

  No more Madisons!

  No more Sallys!

  It was high time he remembered he was the smart triplet and started acting the part.

  But what if she needed him? Really needed him to—

  He leaned forward and breathed deeply. Then he clenched his hands and raked through his dark hair. Again he thought about those phone numbers in the trash can.

  Somehow he stayed put in his chair.

 
; Breakfast with the governor was in a tacky back room at a little taqueria on Congress Avenue. Tom was a big bear of a man with a voracious appetite, at least where food was concerned. He was addicted to these particular taquitos.

  “I have to have at least one a week,” Tom had said during their short, brisk walk to the taqueria. The governor had glad-handed every stranger he met on the sidewalk, even the homeless beggars. His security men had followed them like a pack of nervous guard dogs.

  One taquito—hell! Tom had gulped down four already.

  Steve shoved his empty plate aside. After eating three of the giant taquitos smothered in hot sauce the governor had ordered for him, Steve felt too full and wished he’d reined in a little.

  Meanwhile Tom was still firing questions at him in between bites, demanding details about the layout of the Loma Vista Ranch where the Hensley-Robinson Awards Banquet to honor Ryan Fortune for his charitable works on environmental issues was to be held come next November.

  “Since my office is sponsoring this event to honor Ryan, it has to go off without a hitch,” Tom said, wiping his lips with a napkin. “We’ll have a lot of high-profile guests. My reputation is at stake. You can’t be too careful about security these days, either. Not to mention November is election month. I have enemies. Lots of them.”

  “I have a meeting with Ryan and Lily at the ranch around eleven if you’re free today to see the place for yourself,” Steve said.

  “Short notice. Probably can’t make it,” Tom said brusquely. “Overcommitted on talking to people about this school-funding issue. Not that it matters. I pay for eyes and ears and brains, too.” He grabbed his cell phone. “What if I send my events planner out today? She can report back to me with the answers to all my questions. I’ll send along some security people, as well.”

  Before Steve could say it didn’t have to be today, Tom was on the phone barking at the obviously overworked, overpressured Burke so vigorously Steve almost felt sorry for her.

  Odd name for a woman, Steve thought, imagining a tough, masculine, schoolteacher type. Who else could handle Tom full-time?

  “So, cancel your meetings,” Tom growled when Burke apparently balked at being ordered to be at the ranch by eleven.