Yes. She knew that. “What has your doctor said about your higher temperature? Other than you’re obviously tired.”
He shrugged. “I’m old, Sadie Jo.”
“But you’re tough as old boot leather.”
One corner of his mouth turned up a little. “Yeah, but I’m not what I used to be. Even before the accident, my bones hurt.”
“Then take it easier. Once you’re out of here, we should go on vacation.” She couldn’t recall a time they’d ever vacationed together. As a kid he’d always sent her off with her mama’s relatives or to camp. She didn’t think he’d ever left the JH unless it was business-related. “You said you wanted to travel the country. We could go to Hawaii.” Although she could never imagine her father in a floral shirt sipping umbrella drinks on the beach with his boots on. “Or you could come stay with me in Phoenix. There are whole retirement cities in Arizona.” Old people loved Arizona. “The JH will survive without you for a few weeks.”
“The ranch will survive long after I’m gone.” He looked at her, the whites of his eyes a dull beige. “It’s set up that way, Sadie Jo. We’ve never talked about it because I thought I had more time and you’d come home on your own. I—”
“Daddy, you—” she tried to interrupt.
“—got good people runnin’ everything.” He wouldn’t let her. “You don’t have to do anything but live your life, and someday, when you’re ready, it will be waitin’ for you.”
His words hit her in the chest. He never talked like this. Never about business or the ranch or someday when he was no longer around. “Daddy.”
“But you can never sell our land.”
“I wouldn’t. Ever. I never even thought about it,” she said, but she couldn’t lie to herself. She’d thought about it. More than once, but as soon as she said the words, she knew they were true. She’d never sell her daddy’s land. “I’m a Hollowell. Like my daddy and granddaddy and great-granddaddy.” She was a Texan and that meant deep roots. No matter where a person lived. “All my anchors.”
Clive patted her hand once. Twice. A rare three times. It was the most affectionate he got. It was like a big old hug from other fathers.
Sadie smiled. “It’s a shame I didn’t know Granddaddy.” By the time she’d been born, both her grandparents had passed.
“He was mean as a skillet of rattlers. I’m glad you never knew him.” He pulled his hand from hers. “He’d tan my hide for looking sideways.”
She’d heard rumors here and there that Clive Senior had been volatile, but like most rumors involving her family, she’d mostly ignored them. She had vague memories of her mother’s opinion of her grandfather, but her father had never said a word. Of course he hadn’t. Wouldn’t. She looked at her daddy’s profile. Closed and harsh, and she felt like a gauzy curtain was pulled aside for a moment, and the confusing love and longing and disappointment of her life became clearer. She’d always known he didn’t know how to be a father, but she’d assumed it was because she was a girl. She hadn’t known it was because he’d had a really shitty example. “Well, I’m glad you’re my anchor, Daddy.”
“Yeah.” He cleared his throat, then barked, “Where’s that damn Snooks? He was supposed to be here an hour ago.”
Typical. When things felt a little mushy, Clive got irritable. Sadie smiled. Their relationship might always be difficult, but at least she understood her daddy just a bit more than before. He was a hard man. Raised by an even harder man.
After she left the rehabilitation hospital that afternoon, she thought about her father and their relationship. He would never be a candidate for father of the year, but maybe that was okay.
She also thought about texting Vince. She wanted to, but she didn’t. She wanted to see his green eyes as he tilted his head to one side and listened to her talk. She wanted to see his smile and hear the deep timbre of his laughter, but she didn’t want to want it too much.
Instead, she went home and ate dinner in the bunkhouse with the ranch hands and went to bed early. She and Vince Haven were nothing more than friends with benefits. It’s what both of them wanted. She’d never had an FWB relationship before. She’d had boyfriends and a few one-night stands. And she really didn’t know if she could even call Vince a friend. She liked him, but at this point, he was more a benefit than a friend, and the last thing she wanted was to fall for her benefits man.
Vince parked his truck in front of the main house and walked around the side. In the light of day, the JH was alive with activity. Like a base camp, only with more animals and slightly less dust. And like a base camp, at first glance chaotic, but it was organized and well-orchestrated chaos.
In the distance to his left, calves were herded into a metal chute one by one. The clang of heavy metal carried across the distance. He couldn’t see what the men were doing or hear if the calves objected.
It was half past four, and he’d been working all day ripping up old floor tiles inside the Gas and Go. About an hour ago, Sadie had finally texted him. He hadn’t seen or heard from her for four days. Not since the morning she’d accused him of expecting a blow job. He wasn’t going to pretend that hadn’t annoyed him. He wasn’t that kind of bonehead, but neither was he the kind of bonehead who sat around waiting for a woman who said she’d contact him and didn’t.
He’d spent the past few days working hard, demolishing the store and filling up the Dumpster. At night, he’d hit a few local bars. He’d raised a Lone Star at Slim Clem’s and shot back tequila at the Road Kill, and both nights he’d returned home before midnight. Alone. He could have brought someone back with him if he’d stayed long enough, but as much as he hated to admit it, he’d been tired from hours of hard physical labor. There’d been a time when he’d survived on little or no sleep for days on end. When he’d hiked or jogged or swum against the current for miles, in unbearable heat or bone-numbing cold, often packing sixty to a hundred pounds of essentials, but he wasn’t in that kind of physical shape these days, and as much as he hated to admit it, years of pushing his body beyond its limit had taken a toll. These days his pain reliever of choice wasn’t tequila. It was Advil.
After four days of not hearing from Sadie, she texted him and invited him to the JH. Clearly she just wanted sex. That was it. He’d never known a woman who just wanted sex and nothing more. Not after he’d been with her a few times. He didn’t think he was being egotistical. He liked to excel. To be the best. There was no quit until the job was done. Women appreciated that and always wanted more. But not Sadie. She didn’t want more, and he didn’t know how he felt about that. He should be thrilled. It was perfect. She was beautiful. Interesting. Good in bed, and only wanted to use him for sex. Perfect.
So why did he feel mildly pissed? And if all she wanted to do was fuck, what was he doing here in the light of day? With all the ranch hands around? Why hadn’t she asked him to drive out this evening after dark?
He had a lot he could be doing right now. A lot before his buddy Blake Junger finished up his own business and got his ass to Lovett. Blake was a master of many trades. Deadly sniper and licensed carpenter just two among them.
“Vince!”
He turned his attention to the right and spotted Sadie standing beside a corral attached to a big barn. She wore a pair of jeans and black T-shirt with something on the front and a pair of boots. A blond ponytail was tied at the back of her neck, and she wore the same white cowboy hat she’d worn the night of the Lovett Founder’s Day. He hadn’t seen her in four days. Damn, she looked good. Just standing there like a beauty queen, and for some reason, that just pissed him off a little more.
Not enough to turn on his heels and leave, though. There was something about Mercedes Jo Hallowell. Something more than her looks. Something that made him drop his pry bar when she’d texted him. He wasn’t sure what it was about her. Maybe it was nothing more than that he wasn’t done.
Not yet.
“Hey, Vince.” Next to Sadie stood a tall, lean man wearing a blue-and-w
hite striped shirt and a wide Stetson. He was a cowboy. A real cowboy. Tanned from the sun and tough from the life. He looked to be in his fifties and his name was Tyrus Pratt.
“Tyrus is our horse foreman.” Sadie introduced the two.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you.” Vince shook the man’s hand. His grip and the look in his brown eyes were as tough as his hide. Vince had stared down drill sergeants and knew when he was being sized up.
“Vince is Luraleen Jinks’s nephew.”
The hard line around Tyrus’s eyes softened. “The new owner of the Gas and Go?”
“Yes sir.” He wasn’t surprised that the foreman knew. He’d been in town long enough to know that news traveled fast.
“You were a Navy SEAL.”
Now that surprised him. “Yes sir. Chief petty officer with Team One, Alpha Platoon.”
“Thank you for your service.”
He always had a hard time with that. There were a lot of men like him who served for the love of country, not for the glory. Men who didn’t know the word “quit” because they felt a purpose, not so the world could thank them. “You’re welcome.”
Tyrus dropped his hand. “Were you in on the raid on bin Laden?”
Vince smiled. “Negative, but I would have loved to have been there.”
“Tyrus just brought Maribell home,” Sadie said, and pointed to a black horse standing at the fence. “She’s been in Laredo breeding with Diamond Dan. The horse that kicked my daddy in the ribs.”
“How is he?” Vince asked.
She shook her head, and the shadow of her hat’s brim slid across her mouth. “He had a high fever that indicated possible infection, but his lungs are still the same. As a precaution, they put him on more aggressive antibiotics, and he seemed more like himself today. Back to being cranky and crabby. But I’m still worried.”
“He’s tough,” Tyrus assured her. “He’ll be right as rain.” He returned his attention to Vince. “It was nice to meet you. Good luck with the Gas and Go, and tell Luraleen I said hey when she gets back from Vegas.”
“I will and thank you.” He turned slightly and watched Tyrus walk into the barn. “Special Forces have nothing on this town. Do you all have your own Lovett CENTCOM operating in the basement of the library?”
Sadie laughed, and he knew her well enough to know it was the kind of fake laugh she used when she didn’t think something was very funny. “I think there’s something in the water, but we have our own well out here, so Daddy and I miss out on the gossip. Not that we like it anyway.” She looked out across the flat Texas plains and Vince lowered his gaze to the front of the “Cowboy Butts Drive Me Nuts” print on her T-shirt. “It’s weird being back. In some ways, it feels like I never left, and at the same time, I feel like I’ve been gone forever. I don’t know a lot that goes on around here these days.”
He pointed to the herd of calves. “What’s going on over there?”
“Just one of the hundred or so things that has to be done on a routine basis.” She adjusted the brim of her hat. “The hands herd each calf into the squeeze chute, tag their ear and weigh each one. Then they enter the information into their computers so they can keep track of them and make sure they’re healthy.”
“You just said you don’t know what goes on around here.”
She shrugged. “I lived on the JH for eighteen years. I’ve picked up a thing or two.” Her brows lowered as she looked out over the property. “Now I’m back, and I don’t know when my daddy will be well enough for me to leave again. I’d fooled myself into thinking it would be just a few weeks. Maybe a month and I’d be back to my real life. Selling houses, going out with friends, watering my plants and flowers. Now I don’t have a job. All my plants are dead and I’ll be stuck here through June. At least. June is castration season.” The corners of her mouth turned down and she shuddered. “God, I hate castration.”
“Good to know.”
She laughed as the horse hung her head over the top rail. A real laugh this time. The kind that slid across his skin and made him want to kiss her throat. Right there in front of half a dozen cowboys. In the light of day. When he was still half pissed for no reason.
“You have nothing to worry about, sailor. I like your balls.”
He looked into her face. At the corners of her tilted pink lips and smooth cheeks. He couldn’t recall if he’d every really noticed a woman’s smooth cheeks before. At least not the cheeks on her face. Nor did he remember why he’d been even mildly annoyed with her. “I like a couple things about you, too.”
One blond brow rose up her forehead and she turned toward the corral. “Which two?”
The two that filled his hands and bounced nicely when she rode his lap. He smiled. “Your blue eyes.”
“Uh-huh.” Sadie raised her hand and scratched the side of Maribell’s head beneath the blue halter. “Tyrus says you’re gonna be a mama again. You doing okay, Maribell?”
The horse nodded as if answering.
“Diamond Dan is a rude asshole. We hate him, don’t we?” The horse didn’t nod and Sadie patted her nose.
Vince leaned a hip into the fence and crossed his arms over the T-shirt covering his chest. “I don’t know anything about breeding horses, but shouldn’t there be some sort of precaution. Why was your dad close enough to get kicked?”
“ ’Cause he’s set in his ways.” Sadie pulled off her sunglasses and set them atop the brim of her hat. “Have you ever seen horses breed—old school?”
“Not in person. Maybe on a nature show when I was a kid.”
“It’s violent. The mare is tethered and lead ropes hold the stallion. He mounts her from behind, and there’s a lot of screaming and thrashing about.”
Sounded like a few women he’d known. He looked into the horse’s big black eyes set in her shiny black head. She didn’t appear to have suffered. “Maybe she likes it a little rough.” Horses mated in the wild. It couldn’t be too horrible for the mares or they’d run away. No way a stallion could mount a moving target.
Sadie shook her head and her ponytail brushed the backs of her shoulders. “She hated it.”
“Bet I could make you scream if I tied you up.” He lifted a brow. “You wouldn’t hate it, either.”
She looked up at him from within the shadow of her hat. “Does that line usually work for you?”
He shrugged. “It did the last time I used it.”
She turned her head to one side and bit her lip to keep from smiling. “I assume that since you are a military man, you can shoot straight.”
“Are you talking about weapons?” His expertise with weaponry was wide and varied with the situation, but his own weapon of choice was an automatic Colt pistol. The ACP was accurate to one inch at twenty-five yards and held eight deadly full metal jackets.
“Shotguns. I thought we could shoot trap.”
He tilted his head just to make sure he heard her clearly and dropped his gaze to her mouth. “You shoot?” The last shotgun he’d held had been the short version with a pistol grip.
“Is a frog’s butt waterproof?” She rolled her eyes. “I’m a Texan and I grew up on a ranch.” She shoved the glasses onto her face. “Traps and skeet are two things that Daddy and I did together.”
A beautiful woman who was good in bed and wanted nothing from him but sex? A woman who could lock and load and was wrapped up in one soft package? Had he died and gone to heaven?
“I thought that since the benefits part of our friends-with-benefits situation is good . . .” She put a hand on the letters on her T-shirt. “At least I think it’s good. I thought we might try the friends part.”
Is that what they were? Friends with benefits. “You wanna be friends?”
“Sure. Why not?”
“Ever have male friends?”
“Yes.” She raised her eyes to the heavens as if counting. “Well, no. Not really.” She returned her gaze to him. “Have you? Had a female friend, I mean.”
“No.” He slid his
hand to her waist and pulled her closer. He didn’t believe it was really possible, but he liked spending time with her more than anyone else in town. So, what the hell? “Maybe I could give you a try.”
Chapter Fourteen
Sadie stumbled out of bed and stepped over her black lace panties, which lay on the floor. A smile tilted her lips as she reached for her robe and remembered Vince shoving her underwear down her thighs the night before. “You didn’t notice my underwear,” she’d complained as she’d reached for his belt buckle.
“I noticed,” he’d answered, his voice rough with lust as he’d pushed her onto the bed. “I’m just more interested in what’s beneath your underwear.”
The fact that they’d lasted until after traps before they’d torn at each other’s clothes had been a miracle. A frustrating, sexually charged miracle.
She threaded her arms through the purple satin sleeves and tied the belt around her waist. She was competitive, but Vince was super competitive. She supposed she should have guessed that about him. He’d missed the first two clay targets, but once he got the hang of the long barrel and adjusted his shots for accuracy, the guy was deadly. He’d hit forty-one out of fifty pigeons.
Sadie had been shooting clay pigeons for as long as she could recall. She was rusty, which accounted for her score of thirty-three.
She moved into the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror above the sink. Her hair was a tangled mess from Vince’s hands and she looked like crap. Once again, she’d fallen asleep before he’d left, and she was glad he wasn’t around to see her so scary.
Eyes still a little bleary, she walked down the hall and back stairs to the kitchen. The ends of her robe flapped about her calves and she came to a dead stop on the last step.
“More coffee, Vince?”
“No thank you, ma’am.”
“Oh you. I told you to call me Clara Anne.”
Sadie slid her bare feet to the hardwood floor and squinted across the kitchen to the cheery breakfast nook. Bathed in golden morning light, Vince sat at the table, the remnants of a feast in front of him.
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