She Dreamed of a Cowboy

by Joanna Sims

  Skyler continued to smile at him, and when he didn’t say anything, just kept right on looking at her, she dropped her arms and asked, “What?”

  “What?” He was snapped out of his own thinking by her question.

  “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “I think you’re beautiful. Can’t I admire you?”

  “If you must,” she said with a flirty, sassy tone she was just beginning to use with him. She came over to where he was sitting and made a noise that let him know she had felt some pain when she bent down, which made her laugh at herself before she kissed him playfully. “I hope you don’t mind if I admire you, too, cowboy.”

  * * *

  That night, Hunter had an odd feeling in his gut. He wanted to savor every moment of their lovemaking, really take his time, memorize the gentle curve of her hip, how soft her skin felt in contrast to the roughness of his own. He loved the firm pertness of her breasts; he loved to suckle those pert nipples until Skyler was panting and digging her fingernails into his arm. He loved the scent of her, the taste of her.

  Hunter kissed her between her thighs, lingered there to ready her body to take him in. Then he kissed a trail across her flat stomach and dropped one last kiss on the small, round, puckered scar where the chemo port had brought her life-saving medicine that had saved her and allowed her to come into his life. It had crossed his mind more often than he liked that he could have been robbed of ever having known this incredible woman at all.

  “I don’t want to hurt you.” Hunter was on his side.

  “I think it will be better if I’m on top,” she agreed.

  Hunter rolled onto his back, rolled on a condom and held his arms out for Skyler. Her legs on either side of his body, she sank down on him and they both moaned in unison. He hugged her to him, body-to-body, skin-to-skin, rocking gently together as he covered them with the blanket. He wanted to wrap them up in a cocoon and shut out the world completely. He closed his eyes, focused on the feelings of being enveloped by her warmth, the tightness of her body, how incredible it felt to be inside her, pleasing her as he pleased himself.

  It was quiet, her first orgasm. She held on to him, her head tucked into his neck, his hands on her back. He was careful not to run his hands over her backside, as he loved to do. The noises she made as he brought her to climax made him want to join her, but he forced himself to hold off. He didn’t want this to end.

  “Yes, my love.” He held her tightly while she shuddered in his arms.

  She was still for a moment, catching her breath.Then she kissed his chest and pushed herself upright. She wanted more of him; she always wanted more. And he knew, more than ever before, that this was the first time in his life that a woman was truly making love to him, with him. Skyler was loving him with her body, showing him with every kiss, every moan, every time she caught his gaze and let him see her in her moment of climax, that it was an act of love.

  The blanket slipped down her back as she lifted her hands to put them flat on the low roof above the bed. Her breasts white and round, her nipples looking like small rosebuds, she bore down on his shaft, taking him in as deeply as she could and rocking her hips while her strong thighs anchored her to him. He put his hands on her hips and watched his love take her pleasure. Just before she reached another crest, she fell forward into his arms, whispered “I love you” in his ear, and they both rode a glorious wave together. Hunter dropped kiss after loving kiss on her face, on her lips, on her chin, on her cheek.

  “You are my first love.” Hunter wanted her to know this. He wanted her to carry this knowledge with her always, no matter what happened. “My very first love.”

  * * *

  That night, by the campfire, Skyler felt a particular form of contentedness. Yes, her body ached, but her heart was full of love for the cowboy. They loved each other—that was undeniable now. The question remained: What would they ultimately do about it?

  “This place seems familiar to me. I can’t put my finger on it.”

  Hunter stoked the fire for a moment before he said, “We filmed Cowboy Up! here for several episodes.”

  Skyler sat up with the realization. “That’s it! That’s why it seems so familiar.”

  “We used this same firepit,” he added.

  She loved the fact that she was sitting at one of the locations of the show. She didn’t express her feelings, sensitive to Hunter’s dislike of his history with the show.

  Hunter sat back on his haunches, staring into the fire, lost in his own thoughts. After a moment, he chuckled to himself and then sat back on the ground.

  “What?”

  “I was just thinking back to something that happened during filming one season,” Hunter said with another laugh. “I went off into the woods to relieve myself—I went pretty far out in the woods because we had the film crew with us and I don’t know...” He shrugged. “I didn’t really trust them—they were from LA.”

  “City folk can be suspicious,” she interjected teasingly.

  He smiled as he continued. “I was just about done and I look down and realize that I had been relieving myself on a snake.”

  Skyler wasn’t expecting him to say that. “Oh, no!” She laughed, surprised.

  “I jumped back like I had been bitten for real,” he said. “I didn’t have to pee anymore, I can tell you that. The snake was about four feet long, impressively thick...”

  “Venomous?”

  He nodded. “I had taken a whiz on a prairie rattlesnake.”

  “Was it asleep? Why didn’t it move?”

  “I was wondering the same thing,” he said. “So I found a sharp stick and poked it. Probably not the smartest idea, but that’s what I did. It was dead, so I stabbed it with the stick and carried it back to camp. Told everyone that I killed it.”

  Skyler laughed along with him, enjoying this storytelling side of Hunter.

  “Hey...wait. I remember that episode. They filmed you with that snake.”

  He nodded, his smile dropping just a bit. Then he flashed her a self-effacing half smile. “I never did tell them that I found it dead. You’re the only one who knows that secret.”

  She crossed her heart with her finger. “I’ll never tell.”

  After a minute, Hunter added, “You know, the first thing that I thought when I saw that I was peeing on a snake?”

  “What?”

  “That if I got bit by a venomous snake on the head of my snake, as it were—” he grinned at her with good humor “—there wouldn’t be anyone back at camp who would be willing to suck the venom out.”

  Skyler laughed so hard that her stomach hurt a bit.

  “Not one of them would have taken pity on me,” he told her.

  “Not even Chase?” she asked, still laughing.

  “Heck no,” Hunter said. “He’d say ‘Sorry, bro—you’re dead.’”

  They continued to laugh together and then Skyler asked, “Wait. Wasn’t there a girl on the show? What was her name?”

  Hunter stopped laughing and she regretted even bringing it up. Up until then, they had been having a great time. “Sarah.”

  “That’s right,” she said. “Sarah.”

  The cowboy breathed in deeply and then let it out. He stared into the fire for a good long while before he seemed ready to talk again. She could read Hunter well—as well as she could read Molly or her dad, but it had happened in a much shorter amount of time.

  “You asked me once why Jock let you come here.”

  She nodded. She had always wondered that. It would have been so easy to cancel on her.

  Hunter looked at her over the fire, his brilliant blue eyes catching the yellow and orange light from the fire. “He let you come because of Sarah.”

  She didn’t understand and she told him as much.

  “Sarah was one of my best friends—we grew up t
ogether. She was the daughter of Jock’s best friend.” He was staring at the fire now. “She was also Chase’s girlfriend.”

  Skyler’s stomach tensed as she anticipated something she didn’t necessarily want to hear. Why would Jock let her come to Sugar Creek because of someone named Sarah?

  “Sarah wasn’t there to film that show—the one with the snake—because she had just been diagnosed with cancer.”

  “Oh,” Skyler said softly. “I see.”

  “Brain cancer.”

  “I’m so sorry, Hunter.” She said it and she meant it. “I am so sorry.”

  He swallowed hard, lowered his head and gave her a quick nod.

  “It wasn’t six months later and we lost her,” Hunter continued, his head still down. “We all lost Sarah. Sarah’s father took it the hardest and it wasn’t too long before he joined her in the grave.”

  Skyler put her hand over her mouth, saddened for Hunter and his family. His friends.

  Hunter looked up at her then. “I believe Jock invited you here to help me.”

  “To help you?”

  “I’ve never quite gotten over Sarah’s death. She was my sister...” His voice had a catch in it. “Not by blood but choice.”

  The picture came into focus for Skyler—Hunter hadn’t been able to save Sarah, but Jock believed that he could find some closure by helping her heal.

  “Did it work?” she asked.

  He looked up again this time with a question in his eyes.

  “Did I help you?” she persisted.

  Hunter stared across the fire, his eyes so intent on her face. “You’ve helped me more than anyone in my life, Skyler. For the first time, I feel like I can finally let Sarah rest in peace.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Skyler had difficulty sleeping that last night they were away from home base. Hunter slept beside her—he seemed to fall asleep so easily—while she stared up at the low ceiling, thinking. The subject of Molly and Chase’s relationship had still not been broached. After the discussion about Sarah, something that seemed to be a gut-wrenching subject for Hunter, Skyler had decided to not raise the question she had regarding Chase’s sudden attachment to Molly. But there were many questions on her mind.

  The next morning, they had packed up the campsite and loaded the horses. Their work was done and so was their minibreak from the routine of their ranch chores.

  “Time to go.” Hunter got behind the wheel. He glanced over at her. “Ready?”

  She had her elbow resting on the open window, taking one last look around, wanting to commit it to memory. “Ready.”

  Once they had crossed the stream and Skyler knew the toughest terrain was behind them, she turned her body slightly toward Hunter.

  “Can I ask you something?”

  “You can ask me anything you want.”

  “Do you know about Chase and Molly?”

  He hesitated, and in that hesitation, she knew that the answer was yes. He did know.

  “Yes. Chase told me.”

  She waited a moment to see if he would say anything else. When he didn’t, she prompted, “And...?”

  Hunter shook his head as if he was having his own conversation with himself. Then he said, “I don’t know what to think about it, to be honest.”

  He glanced over at her. “What about you?”

  “I think it’s too fast.”

  “I think so, too.”

  “I think that they’ve never been in the same place at the same time.”

  “I said that to him.”

  “I said it to her.” She braced her hand on the dashboard when they hit a deep bump in the rustic road.

  “And?”

  “She says she loves him.”

  “He said the same.”

  They were both quiet for a moment before Skyler asked, “Last night you told me about Sarah.”

  He nodded.

  “Do you think Chase has told Molly about her?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I don’t want to offend you, Hunter, I just want to protect my friend...”

  “You won’t offend me.”

  “Do you think that Molly is some sort of rebound for him? I know it’s been years, but time doesn’t always heal.”

  “I don’t think it’s a rebound,” Hunter insisted, but she still didn’t feel reassured.

  “Do you think he really loves her?”

  “He sounded like it.” He glanced over at her curiously. “Do you think she loves him?”

  She breathed in on the thought, then exhaled and said, “Yeah. I think she does. Or at least she thinks that she does.”

  The conversation waned and neither of them seemed too eager to pick it back up. As they approached the settled part of the ranch, with Bruce and Savannah’s small stake appearing in the far-off distance, Hunter said, perhaps as a way to button up the subject, “I hope it works out for them.”

  “So do I,” she agreed and she meant it sincerely. Molly deserved to have a lifetime of love and she hoped that Chase turned out to be the man who could give that to her.

  “We are sitting in a glass house,” she openly mused.

  “Meaning?”

  “Maybe we don’t have much of a leg to stand on, really. We jumped in pretty quick without much of an exit plan.”

  That brought his eyes, a bit narrowed, to her face. “Yes, we did.”

  There was an odd silence between them, but it wasn’t comfortable, like most of their lulls in conversation were. This felt different.

  “Maybe we need to fix that.” Hunter’s hands had tightened on the wheel, the knuckles on his hands turning white. Then he loosened his grip.

  She waited, holding her breath for a second before letting it out. Did he mean “fix it” as in figure out their exit plan? Or was this the beginning of some sort of proposal?

  He turned them toward Liam’s cabin, his eyes steady on the ranch road. “Do you think that you could ever see yourself here...full-time?”

  It was a question she had asked herself so many times and recently she had gotten to yes. Geography couldn’t be the reason for the love she felt for Hunter to be lost—the only thing that really gave her pause was the idea of leaving her father entirely without family. He was a widower and she was his only child—the thought of leaving him alone hurt her heart.

  She was formulating her response when her phone started to go crazy. She fought to fish it out of her back pocket and then looked at the screen. A slew of text messages and emails from several days ago were loading into her phone now. And there were missed calls.

  “Oh, no!” Skyler read the first text message and then the next.

  “What’s wrong?” Hunter’s phone was chiming, as well.

  “My father.” She was already dialing Molly. “They think he had a stroke.”

  * * *

  Hunter felt unmoored and odd as he pulled up to Liam’s cabin for what would be the last time he would come to pick up Skyler. He reflected back on the first time he had brought her to what she called her oasis in the world. He had resented her; he had wanted to be rid of her. And now all he wanted to do was hold on to her, to keep her close.

  He shut off the engine and studied Skyler sitting on the front porch, her antique-wallpaper luggage stacked near the steps. Daisy was curled up in her lap. Skyler looked over at him, caught his eye, but her usual smile was not present.

  “Everything set for today?” he asked when he reached the porch.

  She nodded. “They couldn’t get a charter on such short notice but I got a seat on a commercial flight.”

  The doctors had confirmed that Chester Sinclair had experienced a stroke and Skyler didn’t hesitate to cut her time in Montana short.

  “You’ll be okay?” he asked, picking up two of her bags to load in the truck.

>   “I’m stronger now,” she said. “I’ll be okay. I have to get home to my father.”

  He packed up her luggage and she was still on the porch with Daisy curled up on her lap. There were tears in her eyes when she looked up from the cat. “I shouldn’t have started a relationship that I couldn’t finish.”

  It struck him that the same could be said for their relationship, and perhaps, she was saying that, too.

  “How will she be okay without me?”

  “I will take her to Oak Tree Hill with me,” he promised. Daisy had become a part of Skyler, so naturally, she was a part of him.

  “Okay,” she said, hugging the cat to her chest. She kissed her on the head, then put her down next to the rocking chair. Daisy meowed loudly and gazed up at Skyler.

  “She knows something’s wrong,” she told Hunter.

  There wasn’t anything he could say to make it better, so he remained silent. Skyler stood up and looked around.

  “What about the horses?”

  “I’ll take them back up to the main barn.”

  “Even Zodiac?” she asked. Liam was still monitoring him and hadn’t cleared him for work.

  Hunter wrapped his arms around her, rested his chin on the top of her head, as he liked to do, and gave her a shoulder to lean on.

  “Don’t worry about the animals right now. I’ve got them covered. Let’s just get you home to your dad.”

  Holding hands, Hunter escorted Skyler down the stairs to the truck.

  She paused and looked back at the barn. “I wonder if I should just say one more goodbye to the horses.”

  “No.” He coaxed her forward. “It will never be enough.”

  “No,” she echoed, looking around, seemingly to make a mental recording of her ranch oasis. “It will never be enough.”

  He opened the door for her and waited for her to get in and buckle up. Then he shut the door firmly behind her. He didn’t feel as strong or confident as he was showing to Skyler; she needed him to be the backbone for them both right now. Inside, he was torn in two. He hadn’t expected to say goodbye so soon. Hunter hadn’t had time to prepare himself; he hadn’t had to time to work through their geography problem. And now she was returning home and he had no idea if their romance, so new and unexpected for both of them, would be able to survive the distance.