To Tame a Wild Cowboy

by Lori Wilde

“You want a beer?” he asked, pocketing the phone and opening the fridge. He grabbed one for himself, glanced over his shoulder at her.

  She was about to refuse, then decided, why not? She wasn’t driving home and she did feel pretty keyed up. “Yes.”

  “Lime?”

  “You remembered.” After her first broken heart when she was in college, she’d climbed up in the barn loft behind the mansion for a good cry. Only to be interrupted by Rhett, carrying a six-pack of warm beer he’d stolen from his father’s garage.

  He too was going through his first breakup.

  When Tara told him that she liked lime in her beer, he’d sneaked back into the house to fetch one. They’d split the six-pack and spent the next few hours talking, listening to breakup songs on his iPod, each taking one side of his ear buds, getting drunk and shouting out loud, “Love Stinks,” along with the J. Geils Band. Their racket brought Duke out of the house, and he yelled at them for drinking his beer.

  “You’re a hard woman to forget,” Rhett murmured.

  What did he mean by that? “I would have thought you’d have gotten my beer preference mixed up with your endless parade of women.”

  “My womanizing is exaggerated. I’m not as wild as everyone makes me out to be.” He twisted off the cap and handed her a long-neck Corona. Palmed a chilled lime and sliced it into wedges on a wooden cutting board.

  “No? Julie’s existence seems to suggest otherwise.”

  “I never said I was a choirboy.”

  She squeezed a lime wedge into her beer, pushed her back against the door leading into the dining room, drew one knee up, and propped her heel against the wall behind her. Maybe tonight wouldn’t be as bad as she feared. With Rhett looking after the baby, she could relax a little, and she hadn’t had a chance to kick back since she’d brought Julie home from the hospital.

  He picked up his beer and stepped over to her. Raised his bottle. “A toast?”

  “To what?”

  “Julie.”

  “I can drink to that.” She clinked the neck of her beer bottle against his, and they both knocked back a long swallow.

  “Thank you,” he said. “For being there for her.”

  “It was my privilege.”

  “When I think about Rhona running out on her . . .” His voice caught and his eyes misted, and his vulnerability punched her square in the solar plexus. “Well . . .” He raised his bottle in her direction. “You’re both a miracle worker and a saint in my book, Tara Alzate.”

  A warm, buzzy feeling rolled through her body. She blamed the beer. She lowered her knee, rested her foot on the floor, grounding herself.

  “Tell me, what do you do when you’re not taking care of babies?” he asked.

  “I volunteer on the Letters to Cupid Committee,” she said, referring to the local custom of answering the letters from the lovelorn that tourists and townsfolk alike left for the giant stalagmite in the Cupid Caverns that bore an uncanny resemblance to the Roman god of love. It was a fun way to increase tourism to Cupid.

  “How often do you do that?”

  “Once a month . . . or at least I used to before I became a foster mom.”

  “That leaves you with a lot of time on your hands.”

  “There’s Julie . . .”

  “Before Julie,” he said. “What did you do for fun?”

  “We don’t have to make small talk.”

  “No,” he said. “I’m really interested.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  “I enjoy reading.”

  “And that’s it?”

  “I used to hang out with my friends until they all got married and started having children. Now every time we set something up it seems to get canceled. A baby gets sick. Someone gets pregnant again . . .”

  “You feel left out.”

  “That makes me sound pathetic.” She took a pensive sip of beer.

  “Not pathetic,” he said. “Human.”

  “I used to like to go dancing. Until I met Kit, who had two left feet.”

  “Oh, really,” he practically purred. “I’m a pretty good dancer if I do say so myself.”

  “I recall.”

  “You do?”

  “I’ve seen you cut a rug plenty of times at Chantilly’s.”

  “May I ask you a personal question?”

  She hesitated. Not sure if she was up for personal questions. “If I can reserve the right not to answer.”

  “Okay.”

  “All right, shoot.”

  He was absolutely motionless, staring at her, fascinated. “Why did you stay at Kit’s side the whole time he was hospitalized?”

  “Where did you hear that?”

  “Kaia. She was worried about you.”

  Tara folded her arms over her chest. “Why do you want to know?”

  “I’m just trying to get to the bottom of why you have this need to take care of everyone you love. Kit had a mother and sisters to help. Why did you stay at the hospital 24/7?”

  That pissed her off and she glowered at him. “Kit was my fiancé.”

  “Many women would have cut bait when he got meningitis.”

  “Maybe the women you’ve been tangled up with would run, but not the women in my world. I’m a nurse. If you can’t depend on a nurse to help you when you’re sick, who can you depend on?”

  “Nursing is your job,” he said. “Not your identity.”

  She clamped her lips shut, stared at him as if she could reduce him to a speck of dust with her glare. “You’re all about Rhett Lockhart. You don’t get what it’s like to live for someone else.”

  “Isn’t that kind of codependent?”

  Was it? Tara paused, rattled by his question. “No. I’m a caregiver. That means I make a conscious choice to help someone. I do not need to take care of them. I do it because I see it as the right thing to do. Taking care of people is not my raison d’être.”

  “You sure?”

  She lifted her chin. “I am.”

  “So, your way is best, huh?”

  “It’s best for me. Satisfied?” she asked.

  “Not yet.”

  He pulled out his cell phone again, thumbed through it, found the music of his choice. Propped the phone against his beer bottle, which he rested on the top of the refrigerator. Hit play. The sound of Tim McGraw’s “I Like It, I Love It” poured into the room.

  “The music,” she protested. “It’ll wake Julie.”

  Ignoring that, he moved with breathtakingly sexy grace, swaying toward her, rolling his shoulder, shuffling his boots over the hand-scraped wood floor, and closing the gap between them. He took her beer, set it on the fridge beside his.

  Turned back, extended his hand.

  Her brain shied, cringing against the door to the dining room, but her body started swaying in time to the music.

  He took her hand, pulled her into his arms for a spin around the room. Her head felt dizzy and giddy. Her body stiff, rusty, and unfamiliar.

  “Relax.” His voice was dangerously husky.

  Tara took a deep breath, let the music carry her away, her feet acting of their own accord, happily following his lead. She liked dancing with him. Liked being in his arms. It was fun, exciting . . .

  “That’s right, sweet cheeks. Let go.”

  Sweet cheeks? The generic term of endearment he used on his buckle bunnies. Starch shot up her spine, and she pulled away.

  “I warned you once. Don’t you dare call me that again,” she said. Hell, she deserved being called sweet cheeks. Letting herself get sucked in by a man as slick as Rhett Lockhart. What was wrong with her?

  His face reddened. “I’m sorry, you didn’t deserve that. Bad habit.”

  Tara’s heart whipped up tumult. “Damn straight.”

  He took a step toward her. She backed up.

  “A bad habit . . .” he said, still moving forward, “I intend on breaking.”

  She backpedaled until her butt bumped against the doo
r again. There was nowhere else to go, unless she opened the door and fled, and doing that would give him too much power. “Is it? Or are you lumping me in with your other conquests?”

  “You’re not a conquest, Tara.” His voice was quiet, his tone melancholy. “I just wanted to dance with you.”

  “Why?”

  “You looked like you could use some fun.”

  “I’ll take care of my own fun, thank you very much.”

  “Can you?”

  “Yes.”

  “But you don’t.”

  “By choice.”

  “All right.”

  “Good. Glad we got that settled.”

  He took another step, then another. They were as close as PB&J on bread. He was the peanut butter, all smooth and creamy. She was the jelly—messy, sticky, shaky.

  Her breath lodged in her throat. Her lips—the disloyal things—pursed of their own accord. She was both hot and cold. Her pulse sped through her veins, heated her insides. Goose bumps chilled her outsides.

  Yep, she was a gooey, feeble mess.

  And yet she did not walk away.

  Why not?

  Rhett’s eyes drilled into her, dark and sultry. His mouth crooked up in the sexiest of smiles. Energy and eagerness radiated off his body as if he were back in the rodeo arena, cocked and ready for a thrill ride.

  As if she were something special.

  You’re not special, she scolded herself, not to him. To Rhett Lockhart, women were nothing more than a pleasant way to kill time. That was the old Rhett, something loony inside her whispered. He’s grown up.

  But had he? Had he really?

  “Tara,” he whispered, his deep voice mesmerizing her like a hypnotist’s watch.

  “Rhett,” she said, intending for it to come out crisp and no-nonsense. But good gosh if she didn’t sound like Scarlett O’Hara, flirtatious and sassy.

  He rested his arm on the door frame above her head. The door solid against her back. He leaned down, his eyes pinning her to the spot. His mouth widened, and his eyes softened. He touched the tip of his tongue to his upper lip.

  A quick, hungry gesture.

  She was trembling. Waiting for the kiss she prayed was coming.

  He dropped his arm from the door frame, slipped it around her waist, pulled her flush up against him as if they were about to dance the tango.

  Tara sucked in her breath, an audible gasp in the quiet room. She wanted this. Wanted him. The longing inside her was acute. She hadn’t wanted anything so overtly sexual since high school when she’d done Cole Nielson’s math homework in hopes he’d ask her to the prom. He had not. He’d gotten a B on the assignment and told her that wasn’t prom-worthy work.

  But this wasn’t high school, and the man in front of her was not Cole Nielson. This was Rhett Lockhart. His hair fell rakishly over his forehead and his breath smelled of Juicy Fruit and Corona.

  Tingles raced up and down her spine.

  It bothered her that she was so easily losing her head. She was known for her ability to stay calm when those around her were losing their shit. Rhett’s older brother Remington had once told her that she’d missed her calling. That with her single-minded focus, attention to detail, and ability to know her place in the grand scheme of things, she should have been a soldier. She’d pointed out those qualities fit nurses just as well.

  Rhett reached out and traced her bottom lip with the pad of his thumb.

  Brazenly, she snagged his thumb between her teeth, and gently bit down.

  A low, rough groan tumbled from his lips.

  Spooked, she gulped. Was this happening? Their first kiss? She didn’t raise a hand to resist. Why not? Snap out of it!

  “Rhett,” she whispered again, in what she thought was protest, but it sounded far more like entreaty.

  His lips hovered above hers. He held her by her shoulders, his warm fingers sinking into her skin. The room was darkened, lit only by the light from the Vent-A-Hood and his phone, which was now playing Faith Hill’s “This Kiss.” The sun had set while they’d been in the kitchen.

  Her knees wobbled, buoyant and bouncy. She felt as if she were a tumbleweed, blown willy-nilly across the desert floor, flowing with the wind, unable to control her own destiny. It was concerning . . . and oddly freeing.

  Here she was, at the whim of fate. Trembling on the verge of something monumental, if she but dared. Great no-strings-attached sex.

  Audaciousness was not her strong suit. Well-thought-out, calculated risk was more her thing. Weighed. Studied. Researched to the nth degree.

  Sleeping with him would be the worst move ev-er. She knew it in her heart, blood, soul. But her body, oh, her stupid body, had other ideas. Her toes tingled, nipples tightened, womb warmed.

  She would not be one of his casual conquests, no, no, no.

  The curtain blew in the breeze, the night air coming inside through the open window, carrying with it the scent of sand and hummingbird mint. Her mouth watered—from the aroma, his nearness, her anticipation, she couldn’t rightly say. Maybe all three.

  Julie whimpered from the living room.

  Grateful, oh so grateful, for the interruption, she ducked underneath his arm. Grabbed for the formula they’d prepared for the baby and thrust the bottle into his hand. Said breathlessly, “Chow time. You’re up, Daddy.”

  Chapter 13

  Into his hand: When a bull is spinning in the same direction of a rider’s riding hand.

  Rhett fed Julie while Tara supervised and sipped her beer.

  The room was masculine with a Texas cowboy motif. The walls behind the couch and the fireplace were both limestone. The other two walls were paneled with dark mahogany wood. Hand-scraped hardwood floors. Hat rack in the corner. Thickly padded leather furniture. Plush sheepskin rug. French doors led out onto a luxurious composite deck, and a wide cathedral window let in the yellow glow of a full moon.

  She studied him in the muted lighting from the bronze floor lamp with an Edison bulb on the lowest wattage. Shadows fell across his handsome face as he leaned over Julie, his concentration fully on his task.

  For the first time, Tara saw in him the dedication he brought to his sport. The determined set of his mouth, the ability to sit in the moment without losing focus, how his entire body said he was all in.

  A tiny circular bite, like the quick snick of a hole punch, perforated her heart.

  She was going to lose Julie to him. The way he looked at his daughter, with awe and tenderness, told the story she did not want to hear.

  He was hooked.

  But so was she.

  Although she was sitting across the room from him, it was still dangerously close. She could feel the enigmatic pull squarely in the center of her stomach.

  The man was flat-out beautiful, and she was alone with him in the middle of nowhere. If she strained her ears, she could hear the far-off howl of coyotes. She’d grown up on the ranch, so coyotes didn’t scare her, but other things about this situation alarmed her.

  The isolation.

  Her unexpected and unwanted attraction to Rhett.

  The crazy rise of sexual desire she’d feared long buried with Kit.

  Julie finished her bottle. He lifted her to his shoulder, gently patted her back to burp her. “There, there, sweetheart—”

  Tara was just about to tell him to put a blanket over his shoulder, but before she could get the words out, Julie spit up all down the back of his shirt.

  “Oopsy,” he said, taking it in stride. Such a light, child-friendly word she doubted he’d ever used before.

  Tara started to get up and take Julie from him, so he could get cleaned up, but Rhett raised a stop-sign hand.

  “I’ve got this.” He reached for a wet wipe from the box Tara had arranged on the table before he’d started feeding Julie. He cleaned off her little face and eased her into her baby carrier sitting on the floor beside him.

  Then Rhett stood, straightened, and stripped off his shirt. Right there in front of
her. Giving her a full-frontal view of his exquisite bare chest.

  Tara gulped and her lungs spasmed.

  He wadded up the shirt and tossed it onto the floor, his honed muscles bunching and broadening under sleek, burnished skin as he moved.

  Her jaw dropped. Mesmerized, she could not have looked away if a herd of wild bulls had come charging through the door.

  Completely at ease, he raised his arms over his head, interlocked his fingers, and stretched. Revealing super-sexy armpits and even more hot muscles. Arching his back, he leaned to first one side and then the other, working out kinks. Every muscle in his chest and abdomen clearly delineated. Lean. Toned. Six-pack. The coveted V. Seven percent body fat.

  Yummy, yum, yum.

  Her breathing slowed.

  Her ears flushed hot.

  Her stomach quivered.

  Rhett Lockhart should be classified as a Schedule 1 drug. Dangerous and highly addictive. No wonder women fell for him. He was the perfect specimen of physical manhood.

  Dazzled and dazed, she felt as if she’d floated outside her body and was seeing herself sitting there from a great distance. A lonely woman desperate for the tender touch of a man. Her senses scrambled. She smelled colors, tasted music, heard textures. A mad conglomeration of synesthesia.

  What was going on? It had to be the beer. She didn’t drink much, and surely it had gone to her head. This man’s body was the stuff of romantic fantasies.

  She closed her eyes. Pipe dreams. Come back down to earth, Tara. She felt a solid jolt as she reconnected with herself, settled back into her body. Her eyes flew open.

  He was staring at her, and immediately something intangible hit like a thunder crash between them. “Is it just my imagination?” he asked, his voice gruff. “Or is there chemistry bubbling here?”

  Tara stopped breathing, and the hairs on her nape lifted while goose bumps spread up her arms the way they did when she experienced something particularly moving, like when a NICU baby suddenly took a turn for the better. “Cheesy, Lockhart. Super cheesy.”

  “I’m not—”

  “Do us both a favor and save your pickup lines for the buckle bunnies. I’ve got no time for your silliness.”

  His eyes narrowed, and his mouth flattened out. “Too bad you feel that way. Because I was definitely feeling something brewing.”