“Son, your poetry could use a little work.” Nathaniel picked up his plate and started for the door. He patted Trick on the shoulder as he passed, and Monica swore she heard him whisper, “Good luck.”
Time to nip this in the bud before her family got any more ideas circling around in their heads. She stood. Trick pressed the flowers and vase into her hands.
“I thought about roses, but decided something wild would suit you better than hothouse flowers.”
Monica automatically reached out to take the flowers. “If that’s your idea of a compliment-” The fresh scent tickled her nose, and she bit back a grin. He was right. She did prefer wildflowers. She should have made him take them back, but now that they were in her arms, the flowers were too pretty to turn down.
“Not a compliment, although we might get to that later. This is me, asking you for a date. Today. We’ll start with lunch — at a restaurant not in the Lockhardt city limits.”
“It’s barely breakfast time.”
“Hence the not-in-the-city-limits reference. It’s going to take a little while to get there. I might even throw in a movie, if things go well.” His smile widened, and Monica’s heartbeat picked up the pace again.
She told it to slow down. “Big spender, springing for a matinee.”
“You’ll have to come along to find out just how big a spender I can be.” He waited. Monica searched her mind for a reason not to go. Nothing.
“Or we might just go see a man about a horse.”
Success! A reason not to go. “I have rehab with Jinx today.” Monica set the flowers on the table and then immediately picked them back up again. She’d never been given flowers, at least not the kind she actually liked. Before the Senior Prom, Bobby Westham had snapped a perfumey corsage of lilies and lavender to her wrist. The smell had made her wish she could walk with her arm extended twenty feet in front of her all night long. She’d ignored most of the boys in college, and until five minutes ago, her relationship with Trick was about sex and fun, not flowers and … whatever he had in mind, showing up like this, unannounced.
She should be angry with him, but … oh, the flowers were perfect. Monica couldn’t resist. She pressed her face into the arrangement and drew in a long breath. Closing her eyes, she let the different scents mingle. It smelled like the meadow between the cattle and horse areas of the ranch. Under the clean smell of freshly cut flowers, she was also aware of Trick’s masculine scent.
Too late, Monica remembered not only was her family watching this interchange, but Trick was, too, standing not two feet away from her, looking like the cat who ate the canary. He knew she was on the edge of giving in. Monica swallowed.
“Rehab starts in just a few minutes. Kathleen needs me to be here and … ”
“Actually you’ll just be in the way.”
Damn. She should have known Kathleen wouldn’t play along with her little white lie. Ever since she and Jackson married, Kathleen had been hell-bent on marrying off everyone around her. Just look at what had happened with Vanessa and Matias — living together and committed, not even a year after Vanessa’s ex had dumped her. Monica beetled her eyebrows and turned her head, sending Kathleen a look that should have made her leave the room. Kathleen only grinned.
“The trainer is already scheduled and ready. I’ll be there to oversee. There’s nothing you can do from the side of the pool.” Kathleen came around the table, her pregnant belly knocking Nathaniel’s recently vacated chair against the tabletop with a loud bang and a screech of chair legs on the floor. She took the flowers. “I’ll have Vanessa see to these. She’s working at the barn this week, building a new website for the horse therapy arm of our little operation.”
Behind her sister, Monica saw a wide smile split Mitchum’s face, too, as he crossed his arms over his chest and sat back in his chair.
“And I’m supposed to go riding with Grandfather this afternoon.”
Mitch waved his hand. “I’m sure I can come up with something to occupy my afternoon hours. Go have some fun.”
Kathleen put a hand on Monica’s shoulder and pushed her toward Trick.
“I should be here, just to make sure,” Monica said, but her sister ignored her. Short of digging her heels into the hardwood floor, there was nothing she could do to stop this runaway dating train.
A train she shouldn’t want to board. A train she didn’t want to stop, Monica admitted. She needed to be on the road, far away from Lockhardt and Trick Samuels. But she wanted to sit beside him in that big truck and drive away the day.
“You two go. We’ll take care of everything here. Don’t worry about a thing.”
Trick looked triumphantly at her. “So, lunch and … whatever comes next?” He waggled his eyebrows at her. “What do you say, Monica, to a date?”
Chapter Four
Trick turned left at the city-limit sign, sending them farther north and into the Hill Country. He’d canceled the day’s appointments before going to the Double Diamond that morning and quickly followed those calls with one to set up what he hoped would be the beginning of a new phase in his relationship with Monica. If there was a relationship.
Who needed to hire staff when there was a beautiful woman just waiting to be shown a good time?
A woman who currently sat on the passenger seat of his truck as if she were being led to the Spanish Inquisition. She looked confused at how she’d gotten there. Good. Confused was a definite improvement over the control Monica usually demanded over everything.
“Don’t you have a veterinary practice to run?”
“It’s the beauty of being an intern for a vet who is only a few months away from retirement. There was nothing major on our call sheet today. So Dr. Vaughn is going fishing and I’m taking you on a date.”
“That’s a little cavalier, isn’t it? What if something happens at one of the ranches or to a pet?”
Trying to pick a fight. Well, he’d called that one. Once Monica was away from the family and had time to think about what he’d done, Trick knew she’d come up fighting. He wasn’t disappointed. But he wasn’t biting, either.
“I called Doc Hartnett in the next county and alerted the emergency vet that the Lockhardt practice is closed for the day. I checked on the animals in the clinic before coming to see you.”
Monica scratched at her knuckles. She opened her pretty, pink mouth once and then closed it, as if she couldn’t think of another excuse.
“The animals will be fine. It was a light day at the office; I promise.” He just hoped he hadn’t called everything wrong when he’d planned this little excursion at the last minute, that there was a chance for whatever this had been to become something more.
“Thank you for the flowers,” she said, hands tightly clenched in her lap. Her next words came in a rush. “But you didn’t have to do that. I’m not the cards-and-flowers kind of girl. Big displays of emotion aren’t necessary or practical. Especially between us.”
She’d never gotten flowers. He’d seen the joy in her eyes. For a split second, before she’d remembered to summon control, there’d been pure excitement that the bouquet was for her. How could a girl as beautiful as her have reached twenty-four without receiving flowers from someone?
Maybe he should have sprung for the roses. No, better the wildflowers. Wild and beautiful and free, just like Monica.
“You’re welcome. And the point of giving flowers is to be impractical.”
She was quiet for a long moment. Slowly her hands unclenched and she looked at him across the cab. “Why make a big deal of me in front of my family?”
“Because you started something different last night at the Longneck. Maybe even before last night.” Trick turned down the radio volume. “I don’t like these rules you’ve put on … whatever this is between us.”
“So coming to the ranch unannounc
ed, giving me flowers and inviting me to lunch was a little backlash because … ” She drew out the last word.
Trick turned onto the highway that would lead to Canyon Lake.
“Not backlash at all. I like you Monica. I like spending time with you, I like watching you ride, and I like the first night when you’re back here or in Austin after a long road trip. I don’t like sneaking around, like we’re Romeo and Juliet about to get speared by the warring factions. We’re not teenagers.”
She looked out the window and drew in a deep breath. “I don’t do relationships. I don’t know how to be someone’s girlfriend. I don’t even know if I want that.”
“Good. I don’t know that I want you to be my girlfriend.”
“They why bring my family into this at all?”
He reached across the console and chuffed his hand under her chin. “Because I can see the possibilities.”
“And if it doesn’t work?”
He shrugged, hoping she took the gesture as confidence that he knew exactly where this was going. In reality, the question chilled him to the core. Because if romancing Monica into a relationship didn’t work, he would lose both the possibility of an actual relationship and the comfort of the fling they’d engaged in for the past few weeks.
“Nothing ventured, nothing gained, right? Why don’t you sit back, relax, and watch a little bit of Texas go by? We’ll be there in another hour or so.”
She settled against the leather seat. “Be where?”
“You’ll see.”
Just over an hour later, Trick turned off the highway onto a gravel road that looked a lot like the driveway to the Double Diamond. Green, rolling hills stretched to the horizon spotted with a few head of cattle and a few packs of glittering coleche. The bluebonnets were mostly gone, but a few hearty flower-souls remained on the hillsides, beckoning them down the lane.
“Are you still sticking with the mystery or do I get to know where you’re driving me?”
“Canyon Lake.”
“Yeah, I got that from the five hundred billboards on the highway. Where at Canyon Lake?”
“A secluded little place I know that packs the best picnics in the business.”
A hint of fire twinkled in her eyes when she turned to him. “So you outed us to my family, but a hundred miles away from Lockhardt you take discretion seriously?”
“First, I didn’t ‘out’ anything. As far as your family is concerned we’re going on a first date. As far as I’m concerned they don’t need to know anything else about the past seven weeks.”
“You’re splitting hairs.”
Trick ignored that and continued as if Monica hadn’t said a word. “Second, we aren’t a hundred miles away.” Trick grinned. “And where we’re going has nothing to do with discretion and everything to do with wanting some time — alone — with the prettiest girl in Texas.”
A blush spread over her cheeks, and the fire brightened in her eyes. Monica tossed back her hair. “I don’t do things on a first date.”
He chuckled. “Sweetheart, by the time we’re finished with lunch, you’ll be begging for it.”
“Is that a dare, Mr. Samuels?”
Trick thought about his dare from the night before. Daring Monica to kiss him had awakened a side of himself he hadn’t known existed. Today was a challenge to himself as much as it was to her. Monica didn’t do relationships. Until eighteen hours ago, Trick had been content to stick with her no strings rules. Ready or not, they were about to find out if there was more to the spark between them than sex.
“I believe it is, Miss Witte. What are your terms?”
• • •
Trying not to be charmed by Trick was hard work. And Monica had a feeling he wasn’t even half trying. She blamed the fall in Utah. Living twenty-four years without receiving flowers from a man. Being too attached to a veterinarian she should never have noticed.
Pick your poison, she told herself. Any of the reasons would do.
Calling her the prettiest girl in Texas. Come on. No one fell for lines like those any longer. Especially girls who knew frizzy hair and freckled complexions were the farthest things from pretty. But he had sent her flowers and now he was driving her into the Texas wilderness and daring her not to have a good time, and she was falling for the scenario hook, line, and sinker.
Bright sunlight in the cab picked out the sun-bleached highlights in his hair. He reached for the radio knob, turning up an old Alabama song as they continued down the narrow road. He wore an old tee shirt and jeans, the same brown boots he wore on vet calls, and had a straw cowboy hat on his head. For a guy who wanted a ‘real’ date, he hadn’t dressed up at all.
They rounded a bend in the road, and a pretty clearing spread out before them. A few horse rails sat at odd junctures, and a path led into the trees. A trail ride? It would be easy to avoid Trick if they were on different horses, but already her sore hip throbbed at the thought of spending even a few minutes on horseback.
He pulled to a stop beneath a leafy oak and parked. In a flash, he was around the truck and standing in the open doorway.
“Now, here’s where you have to trust me.” He looked into her eyes for a long moment, and Monica felt herself slipping farther and farther into the fantasy of a first date and a real relationship. His big hands rested on her knees for a moment and then turned her so that her legs were outside the truck. Heat from his hands seared through her jeans, warming her after the coolness of the air-conditioning. “Take off your boots.”
The world snapped back into focus.
“Take off my what?”
“Your boots. Where we’re going you won’t need them.”
“Needing and wanting are two very different things.” Like how she needed her freedom, but wanted to be with him. Yeah. Two very different things.
He leaned a fraction closer to her, his lips a hair’s breadth away from hers and his fingers playing with the backs of her knees. Monica fought to keep her eyes open and on his. She curled her toes against the hard bottom of her boots as if that would keep them on her feet. She was not going on a trail ride without shoes.
“I’m very aware of the differences,” he said in a low voice. “So how about this: if you want to win the dare, you need to lose the boots.”
“We didn’t settle the stakes yet.”
A grin spread across his face. “Eager little thing, aren’t you?” He waggled his eyebrows and tossed his cowboy hat onto the back seat. Then, he opened the suicide door to the rear of the cab and pulled out two pairs of hiking boots. He held the smaller pair up for her inspection. “You’re an eight, right?”
He knew her shoe size? How did a man she didn’t let into her life know her shoe size? Curious, she took the hiking boots, slid the Luccheses off her feet, and tied the new, clunky pair around her ankles.
“So we’re going hiking? In the Hill Country when it’s ninety and blazing? I think your date-planning abilities need a little work.”
“Maybe. Terms?”
“Okay. If I survive this date without succumbing to heat stroke, I’ll cook you dinner sometime.”
“You can do better than that.” He lifted Monica down from the high seat and took her hand, leading her toward a trailhead. “I thought heat didn’t bother native Texans?”
“I didn’t say it bothered me. I just said it’s hot and probably not the best day for a hike.”
He nodded and then tilted his head to the sky as if considering the sunshine. “Well, I suppose we might need a little shade before long. Come on. Let’s go find some.”
Monica followed Trick at a leisurely pace. He didn’t have a picnic basket or backpack filled with water or food. So wherever they were going had to be close. She’d expected him to drive to a secluded beach at Canyon Lake, but the lake was nowhere to be seen. Excitement ti
ckled her belly.
“How about this: if, by the end of this date, you haven’t changed the way you look at Texas, we’ll go back to the no-dinner-no-movie-just-sex kind of dating?”
“Why would I want to change the way I look at Texas? It’s my favorite place in the world.”
He shrugged one shoulder and took her hand so they were walking side by side along the trail. “What do you like best about Texas?”
“It’s familiar. Comfortable. It’s home.”
He nodded. “Maybe Texas can still surprise you. What do you say? Want to change your view of Texas just a little bit?”
Monica thought about that for a long moment. No, she didn’t want to change her view of Texas. It was hot and noisy and beautiful and quiet. She liked things just the way they were.
Still … She’d never known Trick to go for big gestures or to plan dates. Coming to the ranch, with flowers no less, and driving more than fifty miles to Canyon Lake in the middle of a workday had to mean a plan. A man with a plan was a dangerous thing. The single excited butterfly in her stomach morphed into an even dozen.
“And if I have changed the way I look at Texas?”
He looked down at her, his eyes darkening with some emotion she couldn’t quite read. An emotion that made her catch her breath.
“Then you know what happens next.”
Monica swallowed and concentrated on breathing normally. Yeah, she knew what happened next. This was a gauntlet. If she enjoyed a real date with Trick, it meant their relationship was changing whether she wanted it to, whether she was ready for it or not. They watched one another for a long moment. She didn’t want things to change, not with Trick. Already, the rest of her life was changing: her sisters were having babies; her horse was in rehab, her chance at winning a rodeo title this year off the table. And none of those reasons touched the deeper scars on her soul. Could she survive an actual, long-term relationship with Trick? Who would she be then? And what if he got to know the real Monica and found her lacking?
Texas Wishes: The Complete Series Page 38