But now this wretchedly handsome cowboy seemed determined to coax her into selfish, irresponsible behavior that could make her stray from the path she had set for herself. Whether that meant indulging in casual sex or abandoning her beliefs about her duty to the ranch, the end result was the same.
Rory was dangerous.
The two of them met up on the front porch. He held a small duffel bag. “Make yourself at home,” she said, the words short and stilted. “The bedroom at the top of the stairs, first door on the right, is a guest room if you want to change clothes. You’ll find sandwich fixings in the fridge.”
He grabbed her wrist when she turned to walk away. “You haven’t eaten lunch.”
“I have things to do.”
* * *
She went about her routine on autopilot, desperately aware that Rory was in her house. In...her...house. Dear Lord. Even as she chatted with her foreman, made sure feed orders were processed and called a breeder about renting out one of her stud bulls, her mind was only half-engaged.
She’d told herself righteously that she would not be used simply because Rory needed to establish a residence in the district. He had enough money to persuade somebody to sell, but would she really shoot him down if that was all he wanted from her? Truth be told, she wasn’t sure she had the fortitude to turn him away. Spending the night in his arms—well...nights plural—had been the most exciting thing she’d ever experienced. Rory Fentress was focused and driven, whether in regard to his career or in proving to a woman that she was the most desirable female he’d ever met.
Those breathless hours and days in his arms had proven to her that chick flick movies and steamy romance novels were not entirely fiction. Turns out, there were men who could make a woman do crazy things...things like falling in love with the wrong man at the wrong time.
She snorted aloud and then winced, hoping none of her crew had overheard. She wasn’t in love with Rory Fentress...surely she wasn’t. More like an intense infatuation built on sizzling sexual attraction. Of course that didn’t explain why she ached for the man constantly. But if she ever she gave him what he wanted, there was a good chance he would walk away, leaving her with nothing. No home, and certainly no one to love.
Argh. She was not ready for this. Not at all.
As she washed up in the mudroom and changed from her work boots into soft slippers, she found her hands trembling. What did he expect from her? Were they supposed to slip up to her bedroom and make wild passionate love in broad daylight?
Her stomach flip-flopped. Lord, give her strength.
At the kitchen, she paused in the doorway, drinking in the sight of him. He was now wearing old faded jeans, scarred cowboy boots and a white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Gone was the sophisticated politician. In his place was an even more virile and appealing Texas cowboy, one who had grown up in Royal, though he’d been a couple of years ahead of Shannon in school.
She forced herself to enter the room. “I’m starving. Thanks for putting this together.” He had found plates and glassware in the cupboard. The ham sandwiches were larger than she would have made, but he’d probably fixed them according to his appetite.
He held out her chair, making her feel like a lady rather than a woman who had recently worn muck-covered boots. Her throat tightened when she spotted the clear-glass mason jar in the center of her worn table. Somewhere in the yard he’d scrounged up a bouquet of halfhearted wild daisies. The water in the container had revived them a bit, but they still looked as if they were clinging to life. The gesture affected her deeply.
“Dig in,” Rory said, taking his own seat. “I suggest we call a truce for the moment. It’s too pretty a day to argue.”
They ate in silence for several minutes. He had poured her a tall glass of cold milk. Vividly, she remembered him teasing her repeatedly about her preference for the childhood beverage. He had promised to help her acquire a taste for champagne, and had fulfilled that promise by dribbling the bubbly liquid over her naked breasts and making her writhe and moan as he licked every drop from her tingling skin.
It had happened the last weekend he was in town....
She panted, inches away from an exquisite orgasm. “I don’t see how that helps,” she complained. “You got all the benefit from that bottle.”
“All?” He lifted an eyebrow, his gaze teasing. “Not to worry. I have more for you.” Popping the cork on a second bottle, he poured a couple of inches in a glass and handed it to her. Perhaps what she’d had in the past was a cheap vintage, because this golden liquid was like nectar of the gods, its crisp sweet bite rolling over her tongue like ambrosia.
Eyes hooded, Rory watched her as she downed his offering recklessly. Her little hiccup at the end made him grin.
“I feel like I’m debauching an innocent,” he said, apparently unrepentant.
Leaning over to where he lay sprawled on the sheets, his magnificent body buck naked, she tilted the glass and let the final few drops run out and fall onto his semi-erect sex. “I may never drink milk again,” she said, her chest heaving as she tried to control her breathing. “Close your eyes and let me enjoy the last taste.”
* * *
Rory had served Shannon milk simply because he knew how much she liked it. But if her glazed eyes and flushed cheeks were any indication as she picked up her glass, she was remembering the one time he had convinced her that champagne had merits as well.
He shifted in his seat, surreptitiously adjusting himself beneath the table. “I thought you were hungry.”
She stared at him blankly, the drink halfway to her mouth. “I am.” She took a sip and set down the tumbler, rapidly picking up her sandwich and taking a bite. When she choked, he offered the milk again.
Waving him away, she blushed beet-red. “I’m fine. Eat your lunch.”
The food could have been cardboard in his mouth for all he noticed. His only intent was to make Shannon remember...even if reminiscing drove him insane. With a deep breath and a mental shake of his head, he decided it would be in both of their best interests, for the moment, to reduce the sexual tension to a more manageable simmer. She needed to understand and accept that he wanted more from her than sex.
“Tell me more about the ranch,” he said. “All I know is that your parents are gone and you run this place by yourself.”
Shannon wiped her lips with a napkin and sat back in her seat, regarding him with suspicion.
It was no wonder. The times they had been together, they’d mostly indulged in the here and now. Getting to know each other had been pushed aside in favor of laughter, kisses and feverish sex.
He was aware that she didn’t like chocolate and that she liked to sleep with the windows open, but beyond such trivialities, they had barely scratched the surface of their individual pasts. So he waited her out, his own gaze bland.
Finally she relaxed. “I’ve had the responsibility four years. Since I was twenty-six. Mom and Dad were caught in bad flash flooding while trying to rescue a calf from the creek. They were swept away and drowned.”
“I’m sorry.” His heart ached for her.
“It was pretty awful. But when I began to recover emotionally, I decided that the best thing I could do to honor their memory was to keep the Bar None alive. It came down through my mom’s side of the family. The original deed goes way back to the 1800s. I’m responsible for a lot of history.”
“I envy you,” he said simply. “I own some beautiful property outside of Austin, but it’s not the same as what you have. There are no roots.”
“Maybe not yet,” she said, with that charming tilt of her lips that had first caught his eye. When she smiled, her face went from pretty to stunningly beautiful, lit from within by a personality that was bubbly and flirty and full of fun.
He looked away for a moment, tamping down his impulse to drag her across the table. Clearing his throat, he took a long swig of his tea. “What’s your specialty here on the Bar None?” If she kept looking at him l
ike that, he was going to have a hard time staying on track.
“I run a fairly large herd of Santa Gertrudis. They’re a sturdy lot, and they keep a roof over my head. In the last couple of years I’ve even begun to hope we might make a decent profit in the near future.”
“Was the ranch always so close to the edge?”
“Oh, no. When my dad was alive, things flourished. But the year I took over, I made some dumb mistakes. Lost a number of animals to illness. Didn’t sell at the right times. Also lost calves that should have lived. But I learned slowly.” She grimaced. “That’s enough of me. I know your childhood wasn’t the greatest. Tell me about it.”
He shrugged, standing up to pace her small kitchen, uneasy with rehashing the years that had nearly wrecked his life. “My dad was a drifter. He hung around long enough to give me a legal name and then he hit the road. My mom was one of those women who lived in hope that her man would come back someday. She drank a lot. Most of the time I raised myself. By the time I was a teenager, I was pretty much angry all the time.”
“But you got past that.”
“Eventually. I worked for Old Man Pritchard for a while as a ranch hand...right after I graduated. Remember him? He took a liking to me and after that first year, sent me off to school...helped me with scholarship applications, job searches, all that stuff. In college I no longer carried around my reputation from being a badass in Royal. Suddenly I had a clean slate and the chance to be who I ought to have been long before then. I realized that I wanted to use my brain and make something of myself.”
“I’d say it worked.”
“I was lucky. I could have ended up on another path pretty easily.”
“Is it true that you want to run for governor one day?”
Her blunt question took him aback. Not really a topic he wanted to discuss. At least not yet.
He leaned against the counter. “Let’s save that for later. I’d rather you show me your bedroom at the moment.”
Her eyes widened and her lips parted. “I...uh...”
“I know you remember what it’s like with us. Trust me, Shannon. I’m not going to hurt you. Can you do that?”
Two
Shannon’s stomach pitched. There was no teasing glint in his eye. No crooked smile to woo her. Only a blunt question.
“You’re a hard man to forget,” she admitted, her voice wry. He had said nothing more about his desire to buy the ranch, but his questions had been pointed and thorough.
“That’s not exactly an answer.” His scowl was dark. She shivered instinctively. Rory was completely masculine. Utterly sure of himself. Clearly her reticence displeased him.
But did she trust him? Or should she? Lacking the inclination to lay her heart on the line and have it crushed, she decided that if she went into this extremely impermanent relationship with eyes wide open, he couldn’t hurt her. She would indulge in his lovemaking one last time. Make one more memory. But she wouldn’t be stupid... or gullible. She had learned her lesson. Taking his hands in hers, she went up on tiptoe and kissed his chin. “My bedroom’s small. The tour won’t take long.”
He gripped her fingers hard enough to bruise, his pupils dilated. “I’m sure we can think of something to fill the time.”
The trip up the stairs seemed to take forever. She was shaking and so very aware that he was right behind her. Earlier, she’d sent him to the right side of the landing in search of the guest quarters. Her room was in the opposite direction, a sunlit, simply decorated space that looked much as it had for the last five years. Cotton curtains billowing at the open window. A chenille bedspread that had been her grandmother’s covering the queen-size bed. Cheerful rag rugs underfoot.
She had redecorated when her parents died, needing an activity to fill the hours when all she could do was grieve.
Rory was the first man to ever set foot in this room. She’d had a couple of serious boyfriends, one in college and another when she returned home to Royal and lived in her own apartment. That last relationship had ended in an engagement. And almost a wedding.
Shannon had been young and naive. She’d fallen—and fallen hard—for a man with blond good looks and a smooth smile. Discovering her beau’s duplicitous nature had devastated her. Because apparently, her fiancé was more interested in one day owning the Bar None than in loving Shannon. Finding out the truth had been a painful and salutary lesson about her inability to judge a man’s motives.
After that heartbreak and later the tragedy that took her parents, Shannon had withdrawn, not willing to risk her heart again. The night she met Rory at the Cattleman’s Club was the first time in years she had made the effort to “glam up” her usual casual style.
He’d been wearing a tux. Her black dress had been simple, but daring. Seeing the admiration in his gaze had awakened something inside her. Had made her believe that she could find happiness again. But Rory was glitz and glamour when she needed common sense and dependability. She ought to look for someone who shared her values and interests. Someone who could stand beside her as she kept her family’s dream alive.
Even knowing that, she had been unable to resist him.
She paused on the landing, out of breath though she climbed these stairs several times a day. Rory took her in his arms, his mouth finding hers with masterful confidence. His tongue slipped between her teeth to taste the moist recesses of her mouth. The bold possession lit a fire low in her belly.
When she moaned helplessly, he lifted her off her feet, pressing her to the wall. “I may not make it to your bedroom,” he said, the words muffled as he kissed his way from her ear to the sensitive curve where her neck met her shoulder.
“I forgot to make my bed.”
“Good,” he muttered. “That will save time.”
Scooping her into his arms, he carried her the few steps down the hall and across the threshold. As he dropped her onto the mattress, he came down beside her and began unbuttoning her blouse with haste.
She suddenly ran smack into an unpalatable thought. “Um, Rory...?”
“Hmm?” He dealt with the last button and peeled back the sides of her utilitarian blouse.
“I think I smell like cow. Will you give me a minute to take a shower?”
He froze, his lips hovering over her lace-covered breasts. Groaning, he dropped his head to her flat belly. “Will you believe me when I say it doesn’t matter?”
“It matters to me.” For the first time in weeks she was with the man she wanted beyond words, and she really didn’t want to make love to him without at least a few moments to prepare.
Rory sat up, cheekbones flushed, jaw hard as iron. “Two minutes,” he growled. “After that I’m coming in there to speed things along.”
She scrambled off the bed. “I would invite you to share, but it’s a really old bathroom, and it’s really small.”
He put a hand over his eyes as if the sight of her lace-clad curves was more than he could handle. “Go,” he said. “While I can still let you.”
Throwing open a drawer, she grabbed a set of lingerie and scooted into the bathroom. Not trusting Rory’s patience, she locked the door, wincing at the loud snick. Thankfully, she had washed her hair that morning, so she turned on the water, grabbed a bar of soap, and climbed into the old-fashioned tub, even though it was barely a quarter full. Soaping and scrubbing, she washed stem to stern and shut off the water, glancing at the clock on the wall with trepidation.
The chemise and bikinis she had chosen were navy blue with tiny yellow ribbons for trim.
She jumped when he pounded on the door. “Ten-second warning.”
“Almost done,” she cried, hopping on one foot as she pulled the pieces of nylon over damp skin.
She glanced in the mirror and smoothed her hair. No time for makeup or even a dash of mascara. This was as good as it was going to get. Throwing open the door with a flourish, she practically knocked Rory on his butt.
He regained his balance and glared at her, hands fisted at his
hips. “You’re forty-five seconds late.”
Everything in the room seemed to pause and slide into slow motion. She could hear the grandfather clock downstairs in the foyer chiming the quarter hour. Outside, from one of the far fields, came the gentle mooing of cows. Shifting from one foot to the other, she met his hot gaze boldly. “Then maybe you’ll have to chastise me, Mr. Fentress.”
* * *
Rory felt dizzy as every drop of blood in his brain rushed southward to his erection. Shannon was rumpled, damp and utterly adorable. There had been many a night in the last months when he asked himself if he had exaggerated her appeal. Maybe in his memory, she was sweeter, hotter, more entertaining than any woman could be.
But no...now that he had seen her again, he knew that his mental pictures of her were completely accurate. She was genuine. And though that word didn’t really satisfy him, it was the best he could come up with at the moment. She was a natural beauty, a woman comfortable in her own skin. It was a testament to her hard work and drive that the Bar None still existed and that the Texas Cattleman’s Club had inducted her as a full member. She deserved their recognition and acceptance, even if it had been long overdue, and even if it had been an obligatory nod to her dead father.
Shannon stared at him curiously. “For a man who was in such a hurry, you sure are taking your time.”
He chuckled, his chest tight with a maelstrom of emotions he was hard-pressed to identify. First and foremost was hunger. For Shannon. Her skin glowed from her recent bath. And she smelled of strawberries. His hands trembled, so he shoved them in his pockets. His whole world was in flux, all his neat, well-defined plans in danger of crumbling like a house of cards. “I haven’t been able to forget you,” he said bluntly. “And believe me, I tried.”
A Very Tempting Texan (Texas Cattleman’s Club: The Missing Mogul) Page 2
