by Liz Talley
“A few minutes ago,” she said, easing away from him, telling herself it was because he needed more shoulder room but knowing it was because she didn’t want to be any more tempted than she already was. She had a hang-up for a cowboy. Never in a million years would she have guessed boots and a cowboy hat were such crack.
“Looks like they got a good bit done. On the way to McKinney I called about the septic system, AC and the wells. We need to get those checked and repaired,” he said, setting his hat back on his head. Guess he took it off when greeting a lady. They sure were strange in Texas. But she was glad for it because she liked his hair. The locks were thick and shaggy. Perfect for running a woman’s hands through.
What was he talking about? Oh, yeah, wells and septic systems.
Everything was so overwhelming, and she had much to learn about a ranch and Texas and...snakes. She’d seen one of the native reptiles coiled in the middle of the road today. She needed a book to help her out. Like How to Run a Ranch for Dummies. Or maybe there was a YouTube video. Seemed to be one for everything. She’d learned how to fold sheets and fix a vacuum cleaner on there.
Her face must have portrayed her frustration because Cal patted her thigh. “Just one forkful at a time.”
His hand on her bared skin made heat slither into her belly. Correction. It made more heat slither into her belly. She was already hot as hell from her day of cleaning. And none too attractive she had to add. Maggie hadn’t sweated this much since she’d tried hot yoga. “What?”
“That’s how they say you eat an elephant, right? One forkful at a time.”
“Who eats an elephant, anyway?”
“Dunno.”
“Why are you going to therapy?” she asked.
He rubbed his hands against the worn denim of his jeans and stared out at the sun hovering over the horizon. “Shattered some bones in my left shoulder. Had surgery mid-May to fix it.”
“That sounds painful,” she said, wanting to peer around him to look at his shoulder as if she could see through the cotton fabric. “Was it a wreck?”
“Actually it was.” He smiled. “But it wasn’t in a car.”
“Motorcycle?” He’d look fine straddling a hog. She could see him riding with mirrored sunglasses and a badass smile. No clue how he’d manage to keep the cowboy hat on, though.
“Nah. Bull.”
“Bull? You ran into a bull?”
“More like it knocked me out cold and then stepped on me,” he said.
“Were you working with it? Like on a ranch?” Maybe he’d been a ranch hand. Or a real cowboy who drove cattle. But where did they drive cattle these days? From field to field? She hadn’t a clue. Another thing she needed to learn.
“Actually I was riding it,” Cal said, clasping his hands together between his spread knees.
“As in a rodeo?” Maggie asked, turning toward him. “That’s, like, superdangerous.” And it explained why he lived in a trailer on his mother’s land. She didn’t know much about rodeo, but she knew the cowboys who went town to town in search of rides didn’t have much money. She’d listened to Garth Brooks’s songs when she was a kid. Rodeo was a hard life.
“Yeah, it’s dangerous. I’ve been gored, tossed, stepped on, and I’ve had stitches. Look—” he pulled off his cowboy hat and showed her a white puckered scar near his hairline “—that came from Nitro II. Threw that big head back and nailed me good.”
“So you ride the bulls?”
“I ride the bulls. Well, some of the time.”
“Huh,” she said, lifting herself from the step. “I guess I shouldn’t ask if you’re any good after looking at those injuries. You want to join me for supper?”
He looked up, blue eyes amused. She hadn’t a clue why. He was the one who admitted to doing a completely asinine thing like climbing onto the back of a huge beast with horns. “What you having?”
“Well, you can have a ham sandwich, a turkey sandwich or Kraft mac and cheese. The Stop-N-Go had very little to offer in way of variety, though I did consider the wieners on the wiener-go-round.”
Cal stood. “Wiener-go-round?”
“You know, that little thingy that rotates the wieners,” she said, holding open the door.
“Is this sexy talk?” he asked, his eyes moving down her body.
“You sure you didn’t get kicked in the head? ’Cause I’m pretty sure overcooked hot dogs are not sexy. Never have been, never will be.”
Cal moved toward her. His previously damp T-shirt had been replaced by a short-sleeved polo that hung up on his biceps, and she’d be willing to bet he’d showered somewhere because his dark hair curled beneath the cowboy hat, glinting clean in the sun like a new penny. He moved like a man who was accustomed to taking what he wanted. A flare of something ignited in her stomach and suddenly she couldn’t take her eyes off his mouth. He had a thin upper lip, but that bottom one was so sensual. Gave her an urge to lick it, maybe bite it.
“I know, but you know what is sexy?” he asked, stopping right in front of her.
Could he hear her heart beating? Or maybe smell how turned on she was? Because she was. Like a light switch flicked. “You’re defining sexy now?”
“I think we should,” he said, shifting even closer. She could see the buttons on his polo had four holes. He smelled vaguely of lemon and, yeah, some kind of liniment. Even that turned her on.
He dragged one finger across her lips. And just like that, the smiles were gone. Because that was the single sexiest move she’d ever experienced. “These lips.”
Maggie swallowed hard. “Uh...”
“No, don’t say it,” he said, running his finger lightly back across her bottom lip. “I know you think it’s a bad idea to mix business and pleasure, Maggie. Thing is, I don’t really care.”
He slid his hand across her jaw and cupped the back of her head, his fingers tangling in the hair pulled tight in the ponytail. Tilting her head back, he studied her face.
And she studied his. Long dark eyelashes totally wasted on a man framed eyes the color of a Caribbean surf. His broad cheeks angled down and she bet his nose had been broken more than once. Lean jaw, firm chin and those damn lips she wanted to feel on her body...everywhere.
“I don’t need this job, Maggie.”
She inhaled deeply. “So why did you take it?”
“For this,” he said, lowering his head, his lips covering hers.
4
HE HADN’T MEANT to kiss her.
But after .008 seconds he was happy as hell he did. Because kissing Maggie was like raindrops falling on the parched earth. Exactly what he needed.
She tasted like spearmint gum and sweat—an oddly potent combination.
He held her firmly, but there was no need because she didn’t pull away. A soft sigh escaped against his lips as if she’d been waiting for him to do exactly what he’d done—take control of the situation. And that thought stoked his ego.
So he reached for her with his bad arm and hauled her against him, ignoring the pain because her soft body against his overshadowed the twinge in his shoulder. His hand cupped her ass, pulling her hard against him and she opened her mouth, letting him inside.
Make no mistake, Maggie could hold her own, but after a few seconds of heaven, he pulled back.
Her topaz eyes widened. “You kissed me.”
He grinned. “Couldn’t help myself. Those sexy lips begged me to.”
“You’re blaming my lips?” She swiped her hand over her mouth and stepped back. “We can’t do this...uh, that. I’m your boss. You can’t go around kissing your boss.”
“Why not?”
“Because we have to work together. That’s the first thing you learn in the corporate world.”
“Do you see a corporation out here?”
“Look, I need this ranch completed so I can list it and move on with my life. I can’t have you running out on me because we screw up by getting...physical.”
“I wasn’t planning on screwing a
nything up except maybe y—”
“No,” she interrupted holding up a finger. “We’re not going there.”
But they already had. Her breathing was labored, her eyes slightly dilated and the nipples beneath the tank were hard. Her body said yes no matter what her mouth said. Her body’s reaction told him all he needed to know. This would take patience. “Okay.”
“Okay?” She sounded surprised.
“Yeah, okay. Now, how about that sandwich? I’m going for the turkey. No, the ham.”
Maggie stared at him for a few seconds. “You can have both.”
He slapped his hands together, hung his cowboy hat on the hooks inside the door and headed toward the kitchen. The living area of the Triple J had been cleared of the junk the teenagers or cats or whatever had busted windows had brought in. The furniture looked worn and stained and the whole place needed scrubbing. But it could be really nice. The fireplace was a native stone with a rustic mantel and the flooring was wood, and according to HGTV—which his mother watched with religious fervor—was desirable. All the dark molding looked intact and the horrid red paint could be changed to something tamer.
He walked into the kitchen and winced.
This would need to be gutted. Or not. Cabinets looked in good shape. Good coat of white paint would lighten them up and he could drive into the McKinney Home Depot and pick out some new stainless-steel appliances that seemed to be popular. He looked at the ugly black and white tile. That would need to go.
“The floor is ugly,” Maggie said behind him.
“Just what I was thinking,” he said, turning when she came inside the kitchen, looking calm and not so turned on. He was good with that because he’d tucked her earlier response to him in his back pocket. Now wasn’t the time for seduction. But it would come. Maggie needed to know him better, trust him a little, before she let herself go. Cal was a patient man in many ways. It was an attribute on the tour. Be hungry but be patient. Bull riders knew timing was everything.
“I hate the idea of ripping up floors, but it will have to go. And there’re some broken tiles in the master bathroom along with a cracked shower door. Whoever came here to party threw beer bottles. Not to mention the carpets in one bedroom are soiled,” Maggie said.
“Soiled?”
“Someone couldn’t handle his liquor.”
Cal made a face. “I don’t get kids these days.”
Maggie snapped her finger. “You just did it.”
“What?”
“Officially became old.” She smiled and moved toward the refrigerator. “When you start complaining about ‘kids these days,’ that’s when it happens. Wrinkles appear and gray hairs start pushing toward the surface.”
Cal smiled. “I already have some gray.” He pointed to his temples and smoothed his hair down. Definitely had hat hair.
“But that’s sexy on a guy. On women?” She shook her head and started pulling out packages of lunch meat.
“I knew you thought it was sexy,” he said, reaching for the paper sack sitting on the counter by the sink and pulling out the loaf of bread.
Maggie pulled out a butter knife. “You’re not supposed to mention that word.”
“What word?”
“Sexy.”
“I never agreed to avoid it,” he said, unwinding the bread tie. “I like that word ’cause it has one of my favorite things in it.”
She grabbed a jar of mayonnaise from the depths of the bag along with cheese puffs and a package of Oreo cookies. “I don’t see much gray.”
“I’m thirty-five years old. It’s there.”
“You’re thirty-five?”
“I’ll be thirty-six in August.”
“You don’t look that old,” she said, narrowing her eyes as if she could figure out his secret. There was no secret. He had good genes. His mother still looked like she was in her thirties and she’d turned fifty-four a few months ago. “I’m twenty-seven.”
“And I thought you were older,” he joked.
She narrowed her eyes at him again. This time it was in mock aggravation. “Just what a woman wants to hear—‘you look old.’”
“Don’t go putting words in my mouth,” he teased, opening the Cheesy-Os. “And I’ll chalk it up to your sophistication and need to play by the rules.”
Maggie unpeeled the slice of cheese. “Play by the rules? How’s that? I canceled my return flight to stay here and clean up roach turds. I’d say that was a risky decision.”
Cal had to admit it took gumption to do what Maggie was doing. Most city slickers would have put the ranch up for sale sight unseen. Washed their hands of the whole thing and taken what they could get. But Margaret Stanton had been cut from a different cloth. She saw an opportunity that with a little elbow grease and a bit of cash could become a solid basis to build a future on. Perhaps that’s why he’d volunteered to help her. He admired the way she latched on to spit and polishing up the place. Or it could have been the way she filled out those shorts and halter top thing. Probably the second one but he’d still acknowledge the first.
“Sweeping up roach turds is definitely an out-of-the-box action. No cheese for me.” He popped a cheese doodle into his mouth.
“You’re weird. Everyone likes cheese singles.”
“Not me,” he said, crunching the chip. “Tastes like plastic.”
“And why are you standing there watching? Open the paper plates and make yourself useful.”
“That’s woman’s work,” he joked, not moving. Instead he ate another cheese doodle and watched her dander rise.
“Don’t tell me you’re one of those backward idiots who still thinks it’s the 1800s? I can’t believe—” She snapped her mouth closed when she saw his grin. “You’re intentionally ruffling my feathers.”
“I like to watch your face get red. And you start breathing hard which draws my eyes to your chest.” He looked pointedly at her breasts.
“You’re a pervert,” she said, slapping cheese onto both the sandwiches like that would teach him to mess with her.
“It will only get worse,” he said, pulling the package of paper plates out of the bag from the Stop-N-Go, Coyote Creek’s finest in gas-station grocers.
Maggie snorted and slathered the bread with mayonnaise, not even bothering to ask him if he liked it on his sandwich. He did, but she didn’t know that. This sandwich was a lesson to a man who stroked a cat the wrong way. She smushed the two pieces of bread together and grabbed a plate from his hands. The action struck him as domestic, and for a brief second he wondered what it would be like to have a woman smarting off to him in the kitchen every night. What it would be like to have the elusive family he’d once dreamed about as a child when his mother was working late and he lay in the twin bed made with threadbare sheets his mother had brought home from the motel. What would it be like to live somewhere other than his trailer or hotel rooms with another cowboy snoring in the adjacent bed? What would it be like to have a place to belong?
But as soon as the thought flitted through his mind, he chased it away.
Real cowboys didn’t have families or worry about crown molding and rain showerheads. Oh, sure, some of the guys he knew had wives and kids, but even they found comfort in Jim Beam and a soft body when they were on the road. It was the cowboy way. Charlie had been wrong about a lot of things, but when he told Cal cowboys didn’t do well strapped down, he wasn’t lying. Cal knew that firsthand. His own father had been a cowboy, hadn’t he? And where was he?
Cal knew who and what he was. Standing in the dated, dusty kitchen of the Triple J was a lark, something he did only because he was bored and wanted to be with Maggie. By mid-August he’d be in Mobile at the first event on the second leg. And Maggie would be back on the East Coast, hopefully a fine memory for him. If she played nice.
“Here,” she said, jabbing the paper plate with the lonely sandwich on it toward him.
“Thanks. You got a beer or something?” he asked, loading the plate with half the Cheesy-Os
.
“No.”
“You want one? I can run out to my trailer.”
She shrugged. “When in Texas.”
“Right,” he said, toasting her with a cheese doodle.
* * *
AFTER THE SANDWICH SUPPER, Maggie pulled out what was left of the dinnerware and filled the sink with soapy water. Some of the pieces had been broken by the kids who’d busted in the back door so they could party. She’d put in a call to the sheriff’s office regarding the vandalism, but they’d told her Charlie had already filed a complaint and they’d investigated to no avail. But they would send deputies by for the next week or so until word got out that the Triple J was now occupied. Deputy Riser felt sure that the occupancy would eliminate the ranch as a go-to party zone.
Cal sat at the table, frowning at his phone. “Signal’s crap.”
“Well, since you can’t play on your phone, you can dry,” she said, tossing him a drying cloth.
“Hey, I’m an eight-to-five guy. I’m off.”
“Pay for your dinner,” she said, setting a stack of plates into the dishwater.
“That means I have to dry only one plate. Maybe a cup.” But she heard the chair scrape against the floor. He moved behind her, prickling her nerve ends, making her want to lean back and feel him pressed to her.
That kiss.
That kiss had been so good. Like the first lick of mint chocolate chip ice cream. But going there was walking a tightrope and if there was one thing she didn’t need at the moment, it was a combustible relationship turning sour in the ninth inning. She needed this place fixed up and ready to sell. That meant she needed Cal to stay focused on the job she’d hired him to do. No hanky-panky, no matter how incredible he kissed or how much she loved his aw-shucks sexiness. “So tell me about bull riding. How’d you get started?”
“When I was ten years old, my mom won tickets off the radio to a PRCA event in Fort Worth. All of it was exciting—roping, bronc bustin’ and even the barrel events. But when the end rolled around and those bulls hit the chute, I felt something electric. I’ll never forget the way my stomach dropped when that gate opened and that cowboy rode that big sucker. I decided right then and there, I wanted to do that.”
