“Listen,” he said. “I suspect that your family is real curious about the guy you’ve been spending so much time with, and I have no reservations about going over there with you and showing them that I hold no threat in taking away your title.”
“Title?” Somehow, she doubted that he was talking about Miss Frontier Days.
Jackson laughed. “You know that one you wear so proudly? Miss Fiery Independence?”
Oh, yeah. That one.
She kept the smile on her face. He had just outright told her not to think that, just because he would undergo a day with the family, this was the next step in a developing relationship.
She had been an idiot to think anything like that could ever happen.
“Good,” she said, acting as if none of it was chomping away at her heart. “We’ll show them that there’s no chance you’re going to steal me away.”
He agreed. “Yup, serves them right for being nosy enough to invite me over.”
She laid her head on his shoulder, almost believing the fibs, too.
Sometime before Jackson awakened from sleep, he dreamed of red flags.
They had flown like warning banners that snapped in a brutal wind, surrounding him, whipping out at him, leaving welts on his arms.
Meet the family, he had heard in the wind. Slip a ring on her finger, march up the aisle…
Then, in his nightmare, those flags suddenly disappeared, leaving him standing in a void. But when he peered down at himself, he saw that he had been returned to normal—he was even back on his ranch now, in front of his cabin, wearing jeans and spurs on his boots while he carried a saddle.
He saw himself walking up the stairs to his door, and in a surreal haze, he knocked on it, as if he didn’t even live there anymore.
The door opened, and all that emerged was a hand, palm up, as if some kind of phantom was asking for something.
Inexplicably, Jackson knew just what it was, too, and he bent down, put his saddle on the porch and stripped off his spurs.
Somewhere, he heard the resurgent moan of the wind, as if it was saying, “Noooo.”
He heard the snap of those red flags.
But he handed those spurs over, anyway, and, in return, those ghostly hands gave him a bunch of sharpened pencils.
At first, Jackson didn’t know what was what—not until he looked down again to see that his jeans and boots had turned into a business suit and polished designer shoes.
A pencil-pushing geek…?
With a start, Jackson opened his eyes. Sweat cooled on his skin as his gaze found Laila sitting up next to him in bed, the covers bunched down around her waist, revealing the eyelet-flowered nightgown she was wearing. Her blond hair fell loose and wavy past her shoulders.
“Jackson?” she asked, touching his arm.
He glanced around, seeing that he was in Laila’s cream-and-peach wallpapered bedroom, where nothing had changed.
And nothing would ever change.
Relieved, he ran a hand through his hair, then sat up to give her a kiss good morning. But, just for good measure, he checked Laila’s ring finger.
Nothing there.
“What’re you doing?” she asked. “Are you okay?”
“Not really.” He gave her another kiss, then pulled her onto his lap. “Just had a bad dream is all.”
“Must’ve been a doozy.”
“It was. But it’s over.”
She bit her lip, as if wondering if she should ask about the details. Or maybe she was even about to tell him that she’d had a bad dream, too.
Apparently, she decided against pursuing whatever it was, then ruffled his hair, scooting out of bed. His heart seemed to follow wherever she went.
He leaned back against his pillow, feeling as if this was the flip side of a dream—the good part.
But then he thought about those red flags again. Was he afraid that committing to Laila was going to make him into someone who would have to give up his thrilling playboy life for a much more sedate one?
Yeah. That was a pretty logical conclusion.
As they got ready for the morning—with her taking her usual jog to the market and him reading the paper as Lord Vader dillydallied in his fishbowl—Jackson wondered if he should still go to the Cates’ ranch for Football Day.
After all, that dream had been his subconscious warning him off after yesterday, when her family had asked her to bring him over.
But Jackson thought of how Laila might feel if he stayed away. Strangely, he couldn’t stand the notion of making her sad or embarrassing her, and that far outweighed any discomfort he might undergo.
Hell, he could handle the Cates family and come out of the experience unscathed.
When Laila came back from her jog/walk with chips and dip in her grocery bag, he was already showered and dressed. It didn’t take her all that long to ready herself, too, and that shocked the sugar out of Jackson since he had always surmised that a beauty queen would take much longer than anyone else to primp.
Then again, if Laila had taught him anything, it was that she wasn’t any normal Miss Fiery Independence.
They arrived at the Cates Ranch about a half hour before kickoff and, just before climbing out of the truck, Laila smoothed out her Bobcats sweatshirt and adjusted Jackson’s shirt collar under his coat.
“When they inevitably grill you,” she said, “I predict it’ll be with finesse. You won’t have to worry about my brother or dad—they’ll no doubt be talking about the football. Besides, I’m sure they’ll respect that Man Code you all have going. But my mom and sisters…?”
“Wait—Man Code?” he asked.
“Yeah. Where it’s pretty much agreed that the women of the house will take care of all the jawdroppingly intrusive questions.”
“How do you know this if you’ve never invited a guy over before?”
Laila smiled, and his eyes were drawn to that beauty spot near one upper corner of her lips. His stomach tumbled, the rest of him wishing he could get her out of here and alone for the rest of the day.
“Believe me,” she said. “I know my family well enough to make guesses about their behavior. But don’t worry—I’ll run interference and deal with all the over-excited woman queries. And I’m sure they’ll see early on that there’s nothing serious happening, and they’ll back away from the grilling and leave us alone within the first hour.”
“Boy—you’ve got this all planned out, don’t you?”
She kissed him on the cheek, then exited the truck, leaving him wondering why he felt a little empty because of this plan of hers.
Was it because it felt…unreal?
He recalled that awful dream he’d had this morning and decided that he would go along with her scheme, unreal or not.
Mr. Cates met them at the front door, and from the first second, Jackson could tell by the way he looked at Laila that her prediction had been very wrong.
She was clearly the apple of his eye—even if he had wanted a son so desperately that he and his wife had birthed five daughters to get there.
If she had said that the men of the family would be a piece of cake to deal with, Jackson dreaded what was in store with the women.
“Dad!” Laila said as she hugged him.
Meanwhile, Zeke Cates kept eyeing Jackson over her shoulder.
Jackson merely put on the charm, hoping it would work with the big man.
Laila broke away from the embrace, gesturing to Jackson, but before she could introduce him, Zeke stuck out his hand for a shake.
“I know who Jackson Traub is,” he said.
Jackson tried not to think that Zeke, like everyone else, had heard a thing or two about him around Thunder Canyon and was putting out a stern warning in the guise of a polite handshake.
When they gripped hands, Zeke’s shake was enough to crush bones.
Yup, Father Bear had kept his ears open in town.
“Glad to meet you,” Jackson said.
Laila laughed, then casually f
orced the two men’s hands apart.
“Dad,” she said.
Zeke took the hint from his daughter, then spread out his arm to welcome them into his home.
As Jackson and Laila entered, he could feel the older man’s eyes still lasering into him.
“Sorry,” Laila whispered.
They walked into a family room where Brody, the youngest of the Cates brood, greeted Jackson. He looked to be in his early twenties, and his welcome was hearty and easy enough to make Jackson semi-comfortable.
Then he heard a woman’s voice from behind him.
“This must be Jackson.”
Turning around, he found himself face-to-face with a beautiful woman who couldn’t be anyone but Laila’s mother.
She didn’t settle for a handshake, going in for a hug straight off.
As Jackson responded in kind, he glanced at Laila, who was shooting him an impressed yet confused look. She apparently had misread both her mom and her dad. Hell, Zeke was even behind his wife, trying to seem as if he wasn’t about to just take Jackson by the ear and drag him into the nearest private room for that grilling that was supposed to come from the Cates females.
Maybe the ladies in this family would be far stealthier in their social ways, Jackson thought. Laila had said there would be some female finesse involved.
Laila introduced him to her mom. “Evelyn Cates, Jackson Traub.”
“Great to have you here.” Evelyn was wearing a high ponytail, plus a frilly gingham apron swiped by flour over a pair of faded jeans.
“Thank you, ma’am.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake—no ma’ams, please.” Evelyn was undoing her apron and, judging by the heavy aroma of baked cake in the air, cooking time was done.
Jackson acknowledged her with a nod. He had taken off his hat, but now he shed his coat. Laila grabbed them, yet she didn’t leave the room.
And that was probably because of what came next—a whole fleet of lovely women, every one of them smiling at Jackson as if they had a list of questions for him.
For the first time in his life, he didn’t want to be in a room full of females.
With a stern expression—one that Jackson thought might serve to caution her sisters about getting fresh— Laila introduced him all around. He already knew some of their names, but, nevertheless, he could barely keep up with who was who. Maybe that was only because his mind was spinning, filled with the remnants of his psychotic dream from this morning. Any second, he expected one of the sisters to raise a red flag and another to hand him a bunch of pencils.
“Mom,” Laila said, standing in front of her sisters as if she could keep them at bay, then handing Evelyn her bag of chips and dip. Her mom took his coat and hat, too. “Can we help you in the kitchen?”
The other woman got a sly smile on her face. “Yes—I think we do need some help.”
As she urged Laila forward, she winked at Jackson. He hadn’t realized it, but Brody had disappeared during all the fuss.
“Come along,” Jazzy said, pushing at her siblings and laughing all the while.
The only Cates woman who remained a little behind was Abby, her long brown hair contrasting with all the blond in the room. She sent Jackson a long, considered glance, then turned around without comment.
All right then.
As they all entered the dining area, Jackson saw the reason that Brody had disappeared.
“Happy early birthday!” said Laila’s brother as he held a pink-frosted cake with a bunch of lit candles.
Everyone else yelled it out, right before launching into a lively version of the birthday song, clapping along. The Cates family had a crazy way of singing it, though, just as Laila had indicated, with some kind of harmonizing that came off as goofy and endearing.
When they were done, they hugged Laila, kissing her, making her laugh.
But as Jackson took his turn in embracing her—and he made sure it was merely a friendly hug—he saw something in her eyes that he doubted anyone else had caught in all the gaiety.
Sadness? The reflection of thirty plus one-to-grow-on candles burning in her gaze…the specter of a future that she wasn’t so certain about.
As her family celebrated around her, Jackson also realized that none of them really understood what this birthday meant to Laila.
His heart cracked a bit at that, and he rested a hand on her shoulder, letting her know that he, of all people, got it.
But it didn’t seem to be enough. Not to him, anyway.
Sending a smile to him, Laila turned toward the cake, closed her eyes, made a silent wish. What it was, he had no idea.
He wasn’t even sure he wanted to know.
She blew out the candles with the help of her sisters, and they all applauded as her mom took the cake to the table.
“Let’s dig in,” Brody said, rubbing his hands together and grabbing a plate just before he began to load it with food. “The game’s gonna start soon.”
As the family buzzed around Laila, she kept looking at that cake with its guttered candles, and in that moment, Jackson vowed to make this as painless a birthday as possible for her.
Monday, after work, Laila went straight home.
Jackson had asked if it was okay for him to come by before Dana and a few of her other friends arrived to pick her up for a low-key dinner that they had planned a while ago, long before Jackson had come to Thunder Canyon.
Funny how things changed, Laila thought as she locked up her car. Funny how, now, she only wanted to spend this night—the first one of her new decade—with him, even if they weren’t a true “couple.”
She could tell that, after yesterday, her family wasn’t as sure as they had been that Laila had finally found a man to settle with. She and Jackson had persuaded them during the day that he was merely one of her casual suitors by being friendly yet a bit distant with each other.
Had he decided that she would want him to act that way?
Maybe it was for the best, though. Yes, her sisters—and even her dad—had tried their darnedest to juice information about Laila and Jackson’s dating status out of them. But by the end of the first game, after she and Jackson had sat in separate chairs and kept their hands off each other, it was obvious that the brood had run out of questions for them, thinking that Laila was just being Laila and would lose interest in Jackson within a few weeks.
It was a relief, because that was what she and Jackson had been aiming for, right? And, even though Dad had eventually warmed up to Jackson during the day and her sisters, Brody and Mom had clearly liked him, Laila had kept reminding them about how he wasn’t intending to live in Thunder Canyon, for the long term.
That was the part that had put the lid on any more speculation from Laila’s sisters—the part that had reemphasized that the relationship would go no further than a fling.
And that was the part that weighed on Laila every time she thought about it.
She got to her door, opened it, stepping inside to a semidark room, lit only by the hint of light from her kitchen.
“Jackson?”
Without a word, he walked into the family room and when she saw what he was holding, her chest constricted.
It was a lopsided cake with one burning candle on it.
The lone flicker lit the smile on his face. “Happy birthday, Laila.”
She didn’t trust herself to speak through the sudden, sharp tightness in her throat.
He set the cake on the end table by the sofa, near Lord Vader’s bowl, then dug into his jeans pocket, producing a little wrapped box.
He seemed almost shy, the smile on his face uncertain, as if, maybe, he had overstepped the boundaries they had set with each other.
After handing that box to her, he said, “It’s nothing big.”
“You shouldn’t have gotten me anything.”
Still, she tore off the wrapping to find a black velvet box. Inside, there was a silver bracelet with intricate whirling designs. Tiny rubies were embedded within it.
She recognized the work from a custom boutique in Old Town, and their items weren’t cheap.
“Jackson…”
“It was pretty. It’ll look great on you.”
He didn’t say any more than that and, after she slipped on the bracelet, she glanced back at the cake. A bittersweet pain pierced her. So sweet, so thoughtful. He had gone to some effort, and that was what mattered the most.
“One candle,” he said. “That’s all I put on the cake because this is the start of something new for you. The first year of the rest of your life. We should all be able to start over every so often.”
His words had a hopeful ring to them. It wasn’t that he merely understood all the reasons that she had gotten quiet when she had seen all those candles on the cake yesterday—Jackson knew what it was like to want to start over, too.
She wished she didn’t have to blow out the candle. Yesterday, when she had done it, it had been as if she had been extinguishing the birthday wish she had made—the fervent hope that he would stick around, and that she could be enough to make him want that.
“You made this for me?” she asked, the words catching in her throat.
“I tried.” He chuckled. “Can’t say my future lies in the direction of baking, though.”
“It’s…beautiful.” She bit her lip, afraid that she might start to cry, because it was beautiful. More than she dared to let him know.
“I realize,” he said, “that Dana and the girls are going to pick you up soon and you’re probably going to be having more cake tonight, but I just wanted…”
She went to him, enveloping him in a grateful hug. He had known just what she needed on this birthday.
He wrapped his arms around her, too—so tight, so comfortably.
“I wish I could just stay here with you tonight,” she said into his chest.
She thought she felt his arms tense, and she remembered the bad dream he’d had yesterday morning. She had been watching him sleep, and he had never known that she had seen the emotions crossing his face—the wary lines, then the panic.
A bad dream. She had been having them, too, with her literally strolling around Thunder Canyon, barefoot and pregnant.
But it had dawned on her that it wasn’t such a nightmare.
The Hard-to-Get Cowboy Page 14
