Craving the Cowboy

by Liz Isaacson

  He normally parked his truck in the four-bay shed on the ranch and took the ATV to his house. So he only had that vehicle for transportation. Dwayne swung into the open-air seat and started the engine, his heart thrumming along with the vehicle.

  Kurt kept the updates going on the radio, so by the time Dwayne arrived in sector nine, he knew exactly what to expect. Three downed cows that needed veterinary care, and a length of fence that needed to be repaired.

  Kurt stood over one of the cows with Austin, and Dwayne was not prepared for the blood, though he should’ve been. His stomach turned as he climbed from the ATV and saw the clawed flank and bit hind legs on the cow.

  “Still alive?” he asked, taking in the absolute stillness of the animal.

  “Barely,” Kurt said. “Doc just got to the ranch. She’s on her way out now.”

  Dwayne nodded and scrubbed his hand up the back of his neck. “And the coyotes are gone?”

  “Shane shot one,” he said. “The others scattered.”

  “And Gabe is bringing out the fencing supplies?”

  “Shoulda been right behind you.”

  Dwayne nodded, clapped Kurt on the back, and headed toward the next cow lying on the ground. The rest of the cattle had moved away and watched from a distance. The purr of a motor met Dwayne’s ears just as he reached the cow. Without nearly as much blood, he wasn’t as worried about the survival of this animal.

  Gabe arrived, and Dwayne helped him unload the chicken wire and staple guns. He got to work on fixing the fence by following Gabe after he cut away the broken wire with a pair of metal cutters. Austin and Dwayne pulled the new section of wire tight, and Kurt stapled it into place.

  Ka-chuck, ka-chuck, ka-chuck. The echo of the staple gun tore through the otherwise serene countryside.

  Dwayne exhaled and reached for another roll of wire. His arm scraped along the top of it and pain shot through his system. He yanked back and touched the back of his forearm, his fingers coming away sticky with his own blood.

  His head swam, and he drew in a long, deep breath of oxygen to center himself. The blue sky blurred with the golden ground, and he reached out to find something to hold onto. There was only empty air.

  His empty stomach turned, and he wiped his dirty fingers on his jeans. It’s just a little scrape, he told himself. He could tolerate the torn up flesh of one of his cows, but not the sight of his own blood.

  The ATV. He stumbled in that direction like he’d had too much to drink. Kurt called to him, but Dwayne couldn’t locate the location of the sound. In the next moment, a hand landed on his elbow, steadying him.

  “You’re bleeding,” Kurt said.

  Dwayne kept moving toward the ATV, collapsing into the driver’s seat when he arrived. “Just a scrape,” he said. “On the chicken wire.”

  Kurt wouldn’t relinquish his arm, and he peered at the wound. “This is more than a scrape, boss.”

  Dwayne didn’t look at it, but tried to get his vision to focus, the horizon to still, his head to re-attach to his body. After thirty seconds, he started to feel more normal—just in time for the vet to arrive.

  Another cowboy, Sawyer, helped carry her bags toward the most injured cow, and Dwayne got up to do what the owner of a ranch did—make decisions and pay bills and be responsible for everything.

  “He’s bleeding,” Kurt said, never more than a foot from Dwayne.

  “I’m fine,” he said. “Hey, Lis.”

  Alyssa Turner, the veterinarian who always came out to Grape Seed greeted him and then glanced at his arm. “Let me wrap it, and that should keep it until you can get back to your house.” She pulled out a roll of gauze and had him fixed up in no time at all.

  Then she and Dwayne faced the panting cow.

  Felicity didn’t see Dwayne when she arrived at Grape Seed Ranch. There were surprisingly few cowboys hanging around, and something hung in the still, silent air. As she glanced to the homestead and then back to the pasture where the horses waited, she realized there were no dogs either. No movement. No activity.

  It was almost as if the entire ranch had sucked in a breath and held it.

  “Hello?” she called.

  No one answered.

  Her nerves knotted, and she watched as all four horses in the pasture ambled over to the fence and lifted their heads over the top rung.

  She couldn’t attempt to train Spotlight when her own emotions were so tangled. Decision made, she stepped toward the homestead. She hadn’t been properly introduced to Dwayne’s parents yet, but there was no time like the present.

  She marched down the long, dirt lane and right up the front steps. After knocking, she swept her gaze across the ranch yet again. It was almost eerie, and she startled when the door opened behind her with a crack!

  She spun to find a honey-haired woman standing there. Dwayne’s mother, but Felicity couldn’t find a single feature in her face that she’d seen in Dwayne’s.

  “Hello, dear.” She leaned against the doorframe with a healthy smile on her face. She certainly didn’t seem concerned about the lack of activity on the ranch before her.

  “I’m Felicity Lightburne,” she said, stepping forward and extending her hand. “I train the horses here.”

  They shook hands, and she said, “I know who you are. I’m Maggie Carver, Dwayne’s mother.” She folded her arms and grinned again.

  “Do you—there doesn’t seem to be anyone out there.” She hooked her thumb over her shoulder toward the ranch.

  “Oh, some coyotes broke through the fence in the far-east sector. Our boys are all out there.”

  “Who is it?” a man called from within the house. He stepped beside his wife, and Felicity found the source of Dwayne’s bright blue eyes, his sloped nose, his square jaw.

  “You must be Chase Carver.” She extended her hand again to the man she’d spoken to on the phone, Dwayne’s father who’d hired her. “I’m Felicity.”

  Chase shook her hand and glanced at his wife. “Dwayne’s Felicity?”

  Dwayne’s Felicity?

  She blinked and a sense of vertigo surrounded her.

  “Chase.” Maggie laughed nervously and nudged her husband. “You hired her to train our horses.”

  Dwayne’s Felicity.

  “Oh, of course. Right. How’s that coming?”

  “Just—fine, sir. Just fine.” Felicity fell back a step, her mind reverberating with Dwayne’s Felicity.

  What had he told them about her? Would they be upset about the hand-holding and the Sunday barbeque run?

  They didn’t seem to be, as they both stood there beaming at her.

  “So I guess…I’ll get to work.” She went down the steps and turned back. “When do you think they’ll be back in?”

  Maggie squinted into the distance as if she could see them. “Oh, Alyssa just got here a few minutes ago. So probably not for a couple of hours, depending.”

  On what, she didn’t say. Felicity nodded like she knew, though she did not, and walked away from the homestead. Nor did she know who Alyssa was. Or where the far-east sector was.

  What she did know was how to get Spotlight to take the rope, so she set out to do that.

  A whole mess of cowboys returned just before lunchtime, looking worse for the wear. She’d just put the ropes in the barn and was going to run home to make herself a sandwich, but she turned and searched the crowd of weary faces for the one she wanted to see.

  She couldn’t find Dwayne.

  A buzz lifted into the air, and she twisted to find the source of it. A single ATV made a beeline toward Dwayne’s house on the north edge of the homestead property, but she couldn’t see if he drove it or not.

  “He got cut,” a cowboy said to her. “Kurt’s gonna get him all doctored up.”

  Felicity looked into the man’s face and found kindness there. “How bad is it?”

  “The doc thought it might need stitches. Dwayne’ll never do that, so.” The cowboy shrugged and moved into the barn, leaving Felicity
to argue with herself.

  He had his foreman to help him.

  He wouldn’t want her there.

  But she wanted to be there.

  She climbed in her car as planned, but instead of heading toward her house for lunch, she did what she’d been doing for the past week and went to Dwayne’s. Unsure of what she’d find on the other side of the door, she approached it slowly, nervous and excited at the same time.

  Felicity knocked and pushed open the door at the same time. “Hello? Dwayne?”

  “Back here,” he called from the direction of the bathroom. Male voices murmured, but she couldn’t make out any words.

  She poked her head into the bathroom to find Dwayne sitting on the closed toilet while Kirk stood slightly behind him, working on the back of his forearm.

  “What happened?” she asked, drinking in the full head of sandy brown hair Dwayne possessed. He was just as sexy and good looking without his cowboy hat, and she wanted to run her fingers along the nape of his neck and into that hair.

  “He got gouged by chicken wire,” Kurt said. “This needs stitches.”

  “It’s fine,” Dwayne said, his eyes never leaving Felicity. His gaze burned a path through her bloodstream, and she smiled at him and ducked her head.

  “It needs stitches,” Kurt repeated.

  “I’m not goin’ to the hospital.”

  “You aren’t going to fall into another coma.”

  “Kurt.”

  “Whatever.” The man threw down the medical supplies he’d been holding. He moved toward the door, and Felicity backed into the hall. “Maybe you can talk some sense into him.” Kurt gave her a growly look and marched down the hall. A moment later, the back door slammed.

  Felicity turned back to Dwayne, her eyebrows raised. “Seems like your foreman is upset with you.”

  “I’m sure it’s not as bad as he says. I can barely feel it anymore.” He twisted his arm to look at the wound.

  Felicity nodded like she agreed with him and moved around to look at his arm. The wound was at least six inches long, and it did gape open in the middle. She sucked in a breath through her teeth, which created a soft whistle. “Dwayne, I hate to say it, but I think he’s right.”

  Dwayne stood and filled the doorway with his tall frame and broad shoulders. “Would you want to go to a hospital right now?”

  She thought of the last time she’d been in a hospital and couldn’t conceal the involuntary shudder. “I get it, Dwayne, I do. Maybe an out-patient emergency care clinic?”

  He took a step toward her. “You’re beautiful. A sight for sore eyes after the morning I’ve had.”

  Warmth flooded her, escalating to pure fire when his fingers stuttered over hers before they latched on. He smelled like blood and antiseptic and the wide open range.

  “My parents gave me the third degree last night.” He chuckled and pressed closer. “My mom was worried we’d gone to Vegas and gotten married.”

  Felicity laughed but it was a bit forced. “In one afternoon?” She edged into Dwayne’s personal space too. “No wonder she was looking at me with such a wide smile.”

  “When did you see her?”

  “This morning, when I got here. The ranch felt…stale. Abandoned. I went over to the homestead.”

  “I had everyone out in the fields.”

  “That’s what I heard.” She ducked her head and touched his arm near his wound. A thrill shot through her, originating from his bare skin. “Gettin’ all roughed up.”

  He brushed her hair back, his fingers trailing down her arm. “Felicity,” he said, placing his steady, strong fingers under her chin and gently pushing up.

  She looked up at him, the sparks between them morphing into explosions. Without waiting, or asking, or speaking, she lifted up on her toes and pressed her lips to his.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Everything Felicity had imagined about kissing Dwayne was true. His right hand trembled as he held her face in his palm, and he tasted like mint and something nutty, and he kissed her like he meant it. Like he’d thought about kissing her too. Like she was his.

  He broke the kiss after only a few seconds, and Felicity couldn’t quite catch her breath. To hide that fact, she smiled and pressed her forehead to his collarbone.

  He wrapped her in his arms and murmured, “That was nice.” His voice rumbled through her face and sounded husky, filled with emotion.

  “Nice enough to let me take you to an emergency clinic?” She gripped the fabric of his shirt and peered up at him. “It hurts, doesn’t it?”

  “Little bit.” He half-shrugged like it could go either way.

  She tipped her head back and let him hold onto her hips while she laughed. He joined in a couple of seconds later, and Felicity enjoyed the sound of their voices—one high and one low—harmonizing.

  “So I’ll drive you in the mustang.”

  “Oh, boy,” he said, still chuckling. “I don’t know if I can get in and out of that thing.”

  “It’s not that bad.” She giggled and slipped her hand into his.

  “How do you feel about driving a truck?”

  “That thing you drive? If you want to end up in the ditch, sure, I’ll drive it.” They left the house hand-in-hand, and with the sun shining down on them, and the sound of Atlas panting on the front porch, Felicity experienced a moment of happiness—pure happiness—she hadn’t expected to feel here in Grape Seed Falls.

  “All right.” Felicity sighed, kept both hands on the steering wheel, and peered through the windshield. “You ready to go in?”

  Dwayne hadn’t been able to keep his hands to himself. Thankfully, she didn’t seem to mind holding his hand. “One thing first.” Dwayne met her eye when she looked at him, and he leaned toward her. “How about a kiss for good luck?”

  She smiled and dropped her eyes to his mouth. Dwayne kissed her, enjoying the softness of her lips, the butterfly-touch of her fingertips along his jaw, the way she seemed to fill the void that he hadn’t even known was in his life.

  A week passed. The fences stayed fixed on the ranch. Dwayne’s shoulder healed. Payday accepted the bridle, and Felicity kissed him as soon as they entered his house and the door was closed behind them.

  Two weeks passed. The summer heat intensified. Dwayne’s stitches came out. Spotlight and Payday took a bit, and Felicity had been detailing her neighborhood block party for three solid days before Dwayne asked, “Can I come?”

  She’d paused in putting the tack away and glanced over her shoulder. “Yeah, you should come.”

  “It’s on the third, right?” he asked, though he knew her block party was on Monday night. Grape Seed Falls had scheduled their annual fireworks show for Tuesday, the fourth.

  “Starts at seven.”

  “Should I be fashionably late?”

  She laughed. “Do you even know how to be late?”

  He’d endured two Sundays at church without her, always going to pick her up immediately following the services. They’d gone out to Honey’s Hickory three weekends in a row now, and no, he’d never been late.

  “I’m sure I can figure it out,” he said, hanging up the reins and facing her.

  Felicity nudged the door closed with her foot and came toward him. “You could come early if you want. Watch me bake cookies.” She slipped her arms around him and gazed up into his face. “Help me get the tables set up and the food out.” She shrugged slightly. “If you want.”

  He wanted to spend all day, every day, with her. Dwayne held her close, bent over to kiss her, fell a little further in love with her. “Let me check with Kurt and make sure I can sneak away. If I can, I’ll come early.”

  She smiled, her mouth only an inch from his, and kissed him again.

  A couple of days later, Dwayne arrived at the gray and white brick church on Elberta Street, a sigh hissing from his mouth. He wanted to be here. he just didn’t want to be here alone. Not anymore, not when he could be sitting beside Felicity, holding her hand, sharing t
his part of himself with her.

  She hadn’t said anything more about her father’s death or her fractured faith. The Lord hadn’t whispered to Dwayne what to do to help her—if she even needed help. Maybe she didn’t. She seemed to enjoy Dwayne’s company, liked holding his hand, and kissed him back with as much passion as he poured into his kisses.

  She appeared happy to be at the ranch, calm with the horses. She laughed at his dumb jokes, and their conversations were sometimes serious and sometimes playful.

  Someone knocked on his window, and Dwayne glanced over to find Levi standing in the parking lot. He got out of the truck. “Mornin’, Levi.”

  “I realize now how serious you looked,” he said. “I probably interrupted you thinkin’ about something important.”

  “Not really.” But now all Dwayne could think about was Heather, and what she might see in Levi. So he was tall, dark, and handsome. Dwayne supposed his sister would like that.

  “You still planning to go to Austin at the beginning of October?” Levi asked.

  “Of course.”

  “Want to ride together?”

  They’d been making the trip for the horse auction together for a couple of years now. “Sure. If we can take your four-horse trailer.”

  “As long as you promise not to fill it up yourself.” Levi reached the door first and opened it.

  Dwayne returned his grin. “Please. I’ve never bought four horses at once.”

  “But you wanted to.”

  “One time.” Dwayne made his way toward the right side of the chapel. “And just because I wanted to doesn’t mean I did.” He sat on the back row, moving all the way against the wall. Sally Stewart already sat at the organ, filling the two-story space with beautiful music that soothed the ragged edges of Dwayne’s soul. How Felicity didn’t need this in her life, he didn’t understand.

  Levi sat next to him. “Should I save space for your family?”

  An idea shot to the front of Dwayne’s mind. “Just Heather.” He pulled out his phone and texted his sister about sitting next to him. He stared at the name right under hers, wondering if he could message Felicity too.