The Rancher Meets His Match

by Patricia McLinn

  “You’re a damned honest man, Dax Randall.” She smiled. First to last, he was an honest man.

  He looked up, their eyes caught and the air in her lungs suddenly burned.

  “It’s just all this stuff.” He spread his big hands in the water.

  “This stuff?”

  “This woman stuff. It’s like a different world.”

  “Mm-hmm,” she agreed. “That’s exactly how I feel about car engines. It’s not that I couldn’t learn about them if I wanted to, I just don’t want to. I’ll leave it to someone else, though I sure like it when it runs smoothly.”

  But Dax shook his head. “It’s more than that. It’s mysterious, all this stuff.” She thought he mumbled something about vanilla, but she couldn’t make sense of it. He drew in a breath and let it out slow. “Hannah, Will and I’ll be competing come Friday in the local rodeo like he told you, but I’m only doing team roping with him, so it’s not like I’m going to be tied up the whole time and I thought—if you’d like—we could go together. I mean, I’d take you.”

  “That sounds nice. Will said Theresa’s coming. We can all sit together.”

  He frowned, but didn’t argue. “I’ll pick you up at five, then. We can pick out a supper from church-group food booths and such.”

  “Are you asking me out for rodeo and dinner, Dax?” she teased.

  “No.” Both his answer and its brusqueness surprised her. “I’m asking you out for the whole damned Shakespeare Days weekend. We can go see the pro cowboys rodeoing Saturday afternoon and there’s a fair and fireworks Saturday evening.”

  “But Will and Theresa will be off at the country club dinner Saturday, night, so there’s no need.”

  “Nope, no need.” He challenged her with a perfectly level look and the slightest emphasis on the final word.

  He was asking her out for himself, not for Will’s sake. If she said yes, it would be saying yes to Dax, not the agreement they’d followed the past week.

  This would be her last weekend here. Her last opportunity to spend time with Dax. Ever.

  What could it hurt?

  “I’d be happy to go to the fair with you Friday and Saturday.”

  He grinned his heart-thudding grin, and a sliver of what-have-I-let-myself-in-for edged into her thoughts.

  She shook out the dishtowel and gestured to the pile of silver still on the counter. “But in the meantime, we have silverware to wash tonight and I have a table to set in the morning.”

  “Good Lord.”

  * * * *

  His kitchen didn’t usually see this much activity in a decade.

  He and Will were mostly one-skillet cooks, sometimes throwing in a pot—and that’s when they advanced from sandwiches or the microwave. Now a skillet and three pots sat on the stove, two covered, but one with some clear liquid bubbling gently. Various bowls and pans and a rolling pin were spread across the usually bare counters. And in the middle of it stood Hannah. With her hair tangled, her cheeks flushed, her eyes bright and a dab of flour high on her cheek.

  He nearly groaned out loud as his body shifted all attention to the vicinity of his jeans zipper. Next thing he knew he’d be getting hot over Betty Crocker.

  It was bad enough that he’d trailed Hannah around while she set up the dining room first thing this morning. He’d told her he wanted to help, but he couldn’t claim to have done much. He put the extra board into the table in the dining room he and Will rarely used. Maybe he could count holding the other end of the pale lacy tablecloth Hannah said was courtesy of Irene while she smoothed it out so carefully on the old table. But it would be pushing it to consider placing dishes or knives and forks where she told him to as helping. And when it came to folding napkins the way she wanted, he’d been no use at all.

  Especially since, when he held one of the frothy white squares in his awkward hands, he hadn’t thought that the lace matched the tablecloth like she pointed out, but that it resembled the delicate lace of her bra. Felt like it, too. Soft, the way it had felt when they were sitting on the little couch in her cabin, with her pressed against him, and his hands finding her skin, even softer and more delicate beneath the white lace.

  No, he hadn’t been much good to her getting ready. Just like he hadn’t been much good to himself lying in bed through the dark hours last night trying not to dream about her. And he wasn’t much good to either one of them, staring at her now with his body getting harder and his senses getting softer every second.

  “Hi, Dax.” Hannah said absently. Clearly she wasn’t thinking along the lines of wondering just how hard this tile floor would be.

  That jolted him partly back to reality.

  She had her flour-caked hands full of some dough that seemed to be falling off the edge of a sheet-covered table she’d set up in the middle of the kitchen floor. He stepped forward to help her scoop it back up.

  “No! No, don’t touch it.”

  He halted at her command. “It looks like it’s falling.”

  “It’s supposed to. It has to stretch.”

  He looked at the dough that appeared as thin as paper, then at strips of thicker dough lying off to the side. “Why?”

  “It’s strudel,” she said, as if that explained everything.

  “Oh.”

  “It’s a good thing Irene had a recipe similar to the one I use. I know it pretty well, but—” She stretched the dough more and more. What happened if it broke? “I didn’t have it memorized. And her preserves will be perfect for filling.”

  “What’s it for?”

  “Dessert.” She didn’t turn. “Dax, I don’t want to be rude, but could you go away? This takes concentration and everything has to happen fast.”

  “I was so near the house—” after fording two streams and driving forty minutes “—I thought I’d make a sandwich for lunch.”

  “Give me half an hour? Okay?”

  She shifted her hands on the dough and his jeans got tighter. Her blouse gapped across her breasts, showing a sweet curve covered by white. It was his dream, waking and sleeping, come to warm, breathing life.

  “It’s all a matter of timing right now,” she continued. “But by then, I’ll be at a spot where I can get out of your way.”

  “Sure. Okay.” But he didn’t move.

  “Something wrong, Dax?”

  “You got a . . . there’s a button open.”

  “Oh!” She looked down. The movement made the material gap more. He swallowed. She straightened, caught sight of his face and turned partly away.

  She gently twisted the dough she held and placed it on the closest open spot on the table. But when she raised her hands toward the button, she stopped and stared at the coating of flour and tiny bits of dough.

  “I, uh, I’ll have to wash my hands.”

  “That’ll mess up your timing, won’t it?”

  “I don’t know.” She stepped toward the sink.

  “Wait. I’ll do it. It’ll be faster.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t—”

  “I wouldn’t —” Meeting her eyes, he changed his promise to, “I won’t.” Because they both knew that under other circumstances he sure as hell would.

  She hesitated.

  That was all he needed. He pushed off from the counter and came around in front of her.

  “Did this a million times when Will was little,” he reassured her breezily. But he had to wipe his suddenly sweaty hands down the sides of his jeans.

  The button was tiny. Delicate. And slippery as all get-out. He took it between thumb and forefinger of his right hand. Then took hold of the scrap of material with a buttonhole about the size of a pinhole in the other hand, holding it carefully away from her body.

  The first try was an abysmal failure. He felt like he was wearing boxing gloves to do brain surgery. A single drop of sweat slipped down his backbone, and felt just enough like the trace of a lover’s finger to make his jaw clamp hard at the effort not to think of everything he felt.

 
His second attempt was no better. The button slipped out of his hand just as he tried to push it through the hole. When he tried to recapture it, his fingers missed button and fabric and fleetingly encountered skin.

  They both jolted.

  “Uh, maybe I should—”

  “No.” He clipped the word when he saw how she stared off to the left like a patient carefully not watching the doctor approaching with a long needle. It was awkward, but she didn’t have to act like she’d rather have a dozen shots than the brush of his fingers.

  He grabbed the fabric around the button in a fist, so it stuck out like a cherry on ice cream. With more force than finesse, he rammed it through the buttonhole, tugged to make sure it was secure, then snatched his hands away before they got any ideas.

  “Thank you.”

  Her words were faint, and he realized why in the next second when she drew in a couple gallons of air. She’d been holding her breath.

  He had a sudden image of her breasts rising and falling under his touch. Not just an image in his mind, but in his hands and his gut.

  “Welcome.” He got that out, then a mutter about remembering he had an errand in Bardville, so he’d catch lunch at the cafe. He hightailed it for the door. But once in his truck, he sat for a long time before switching on the key and putting more space between them.

  * * * *

  Everything that could be done was done. The table set. The strudel made. The meat ready for the broiler. The other dishes ready for the table or a final warming.

  That left only being nervous.

  Other than those few moments when Dax had been in the kitchen with her, this day was a blur of quarter-of-a-cups and three-minutes-left and stirring-until-just-before-boiling. Those minutes with Dax were like an exotic oasis—hot, steamy, seductive and unhurried—in a vast desert of timers, temperature gauges and burner dials.

  Spending most of these past twenty-four hours in Dax’s house had been surprisingly easy.

  The time she and Will had spent alone yesterday had let her see the wonderful kid she’d caught glimpses of before. Then Dax had come in, and her heart had taken on an entirely different rhythm. Still, they’d worked well together. And she’d been touched all over again by his willingness to do what made him so uncomfortable to try to ease his son’s way.

  Which made it all the sadder that he was so uncomfortable.

  And that was why she’d done what she did. Not on impulse, precisely. But perhaps not with as much thought to the possible reactions that now ran through her mind in vivid, horrifying Technicolor.

  If she’d asked him, he’d have said no. Maybe she should have warned him. Would he have stayed away? Maybe she should have risked it.

  But when she’d left for her quick dash to her cabin to shower and change to a blue silk shirtdress and black blazer, Dax hadn’t been back to the house yet. And when she returned, he was showering and changing. When he came out—looking so nice yet still so much like himself in new jeans, white shirt and a gray heathered sport jacket—Will was pacing the floor, waiting for Dax to drive him to pick up Theresa.

  And now that the three of them—Dax, Will and Theresa—were coming in the door, it was too late. Because the other guests—the surprise guests she’d invited without asking and without telling Dax—were already here.

  “Will, after you take Theresa’s jacket, why don’t you two go into the living room,” Hannah suggested, trying to keep nerves out of her voice. “I’d like a moment with your father.”

  “Sure. Theresa, may I take your jacket?” Will asked, as Hannah had coached him yesterday.

  Dax, who’d trailed the two youngsters into the front hall, tried to catch Hannah’s eye over their heads. She busied herself with shepherding Will and Theresa toward the living room, then squared her shoulders and faced Dax.

  “Dax, there’s something—”

  But his focus had shifted to over her shoulder, toward the dining room doorway.

  “June,” he said, and Hannah spun around to see that his sister was, in fact, standing in the doorway. Alone. His tone tried for irritation but mostly sounded amused. “Should have figured you’d get yourself included in this shindig.”

  “I’ll have you know, I was invited by someone with a sight more manners than you’ll ever have.” The older woman gave her brother’s upper arm a light backhanded thump as she passed him. “And now I’m going to earn my keep by helping with the serving.”

  “Mind you don’t spill anything on Irene’s tablecloth.” His grin was trying to get out as he faced Hannah. “Is June being here what you wanted to tell me, because—”

  A sound from the dining room behind him stopped him. It was a small sound. A faint shuffle, as if someone not totally steady had stood, perhaps holding tightly onto the back of a chair that moved slightly under the pressure. Even before he turned to face the dining room, Dax flinched, then quickly took on a barrier of cold that made his dark eyes bleak.

  He moved toward the dining room doorway as if in slow motion.

  “Dax.” Sally Randall’s voice was so soft Hannah barely heard it.

  Dax stopped. Hannah held her breath, but her heart hit double speed. When he backed up, two slow strides, then pivoted toward the kitchen doorway where she and June stood, her stomach sank to her toes.

  “June.”

  Hannah moved between his dark stare and his sister. ‘”It wasn’t June. It was me.”

  Vaguely, she knew that June stood behind her and Sally Randall stood behind Dax, but all of her focused on the man who remained at arm’s length from her, but seemed to retreat with every heartbeat.

  “I invited June and your mother for dinner. I shouldn’t have without asking you, but I did it, and I gambled that you wouldn’t hurt your son—or the rest of us. That you wouldn’t ruin this for Will and Theresa or for June and Sally or . . .” She took another breath, gathering her gumption. “For me.”

  “Dax-—”

  “Shut up, June.”

  “One evening, Dax,” Hannah said, trying to make it easier for him, when she’d known all along it couldn’t be easy. She was asking him to give up a lifetime habit of self-protection. Even for one night, that was a lot to ask.

  He looked into her eyes for an instant then, and she almost cried for him.

  “For Will,” he said, then turned on his heel and strode into the living room, his boot heels striking sharp thuds against the carpeted floor.

  Not for her.

  Hannah turned to the dining room doorway, where Sally stood, one hand to her pale cheek, her faded eyes moist.

  “I’m sorry. Sally. I’d hoped—”

  “It’s all right, Hannah. I didn’t hope, not with Dax. But to have dinner like this with my grandson is more than enough.”

  June’s brisk voice got Hannah moving again. “Well, c’mon now, we’ve got a dinner to get serving, don’t we, Hannah?”

  “Yes, we do. We most certainly do.”

  * * * *

  The food was a success. Everyone said so.

  The marinated London broil introduced Will to something new without being too different. The wild rice with mushroom sauce and the broccoli florets provided mild dining challenges that, successfully overcome, visibly built his confidence.

  After one false start toward the dessert fork when they started their salads. Will’s table manners were flawless.

  The conversation didn’t come close to that, at least not to Hannah’s ears.

  June and Theresa sounded natural, but they were the only ones. Dax’s only contributions had to do with passing dishes and praising Hannah’s cooking in the fewest words possible. Will concentrated too fiercely on not making mistakes to allow much leeway for idle chatter. And Sally periodically seemed to get lost in the contemplation of a piece of china or a portion of the room or her son’s stony profile.

  Hannah did her best to keep up, but her attention kept wandering. Like Sally’s, it tended to migrate to Dax.

  His stubbornly cold respon
se to his mother’s presence provided the sharp reminder she needed, and needed badly. She’d made the same damned mistake as she had with Richard, thinking she could change someone. And of all people, hardheaded Dax Randall.

  She might have really made a fool of herself over this man. In that way, it was a good thing this had happened. Dax wouldn’t change his outlook—not about his mother and not about having a woman in his life.

  She tried to ease the clench in the pit of her stomach at that thought with a sip of ice water.

  No matter what, though, Hannah couldn’t regret including Sally.

  Despite an underlying sadness. Sally seemed so pleased to be here. And Will obviously enjoyed his grandmother and aunt. Hannah wondered how many teenage boys would like having their relatives along on what amounted to a date, no matter how much Will denied that description. Probably only the ones who’d had so few family gatherings in their lives.

  Now that they’d finished dessert and the adults were drinking coffee. Will relaxed enough to take a greater share of the conversation. He told Theresa the history of the family china and silverware. “In fact, it’s a Randall table from floor up,” he finished with pride.

  “Tablecloth belongs to Irene Weston.” Dax’s flat correction was dampening and unexpected, since he hadn’t said a word since joining the appreciation for the ice-cream-topped strudel.

  “Uh, you might have misunderstood what I said, Dax.” Hannah was talking too fast, and she knew it. She’d let him misunderstand, fearing one more piece of the Randall past might be too much for him. “I did bring it from the Westons, but that’s because Irene volunteered to wash and iron it for tonight. But—”

  “It’s not Irene Weston’s.” Sally’s declaration brought every eye to her, even her son’s for a moment. “My mother made it for my wedding chest. I brought it with me here as a bride. I used it in the old house and I used it on this very table the first meal we ate in this house. Plastic covered the windows instead of glass and nothing was painted, but we had the lace tablecloth and the good dishes out for Sunday dinner.”

  Sally seemed to see things in the room not apparent to anyone else.

  “Oh, I was happy enough here, especially as a young bride. When we were first married.” She looked at Dax, who didn’t look back. “Your father had come home from the war—that was World War II. He’d been to Europe— fighting and struggling for his life, but I’d just graduated high school and all I could think about was he’d seen London and Paris and other places I’d read about. He was so dashing, so handsome and brave in his uniform, and I thought he was the most glamorous thing I had ever set eyes on.” She laughed, and for an instant they could see the high school girl who had adored a victorious soldier-come-home. “He was the most glamorous thing I ever set eyes on. And I’m not certain to this day if he swept me off my feet or I did it to myself.”