The Most Eligible Cowboy

by Melissa Senate

  Engaged and married former classmates had said, “Cassidy, be sure to line up for the bouquet toss so you can be next.” Fake smile, giggle. Mariel Jones, a married accountant with two adorable twin toddlers, had said, “Oh, how sweet that you’re catering the desserts. A big wedding like this probably pays months of your bills over at that little shop of yours.”

  Why were people so rude? And, dagnabbit, yes, this gig would help cover the slide into the cooler fall months and winter when business tended to slow down. April through early November, everyone wanted their mango-berry smoothies and ice mocha lattes and, of course, one of her decadent treats to go with them. Now, with the still beautiful early September weather, she had brisk business. But come December, folks wouldn’t be venturing out as much in single-digit Montana temperatures. The fee for catering the Sanchez-Taylor wedding would be a nice boost, but she’d need more where that had come from.

  And despite the great gig, she couldn’t help but look around at all the accomplished, wealthy guests and wonder why she hadn’t been able to make her goals come to fruition. Yes, she had her own business, and it was popular in Bronco Heights. But back when she’d been twenty-five, full of grit and determination, she’d made a business plan that had impressed Bronco Bank and Trust enough for the small loan she’d taken out to open the shop. She’d intended to have a chain of Java and Juices across Montana to start, including in city hotels like down in Billings. But, nope, five years later, at age thirty, everything was exactly the same. Cassidy was grateful for what she did have, but she’d really thought she’d be able to expand by now.

  “Remember the bets we made?” Brandon asked, taking the bottle of champagne for a long slug and then handing it back to her.

  She gaped at him, shocked he actually remembered. They’d been boyfriend-girlfriend for a few months when she’d been a freshman and he a big-man-on-campus senior. Between her mom giving her a hard time about dating a boy “who is too old for you and very likely used to getting anything he wants, given his family name” and the girls throwing themselves at him, she and Brandon hadn’t really had a chance back then. She was constantly jealous of the older girls flirting with him and his friendliness back.

  Once, toward the end, she’d accused him of standing her up for a date and catching him with another girl in the library, and then realized she’d made the mistake—the wrong day and the girl was Brandon’s lab partner and already engaged to her own high school sweetheart. It had all just been bad timing back then and she’d been too young for Brandon Taylor in every way. She’d been in over her head and had broken up with him. But then he’d told everyone he’d broken up with her and, for some immature reason, that had rankled. She’d made a fuss, he’d shrugged, and they’d been antagonistic toward each other since, throwing little barbs that didn’t really sting.

  She’d tried to avoid him since, impossible in a town like Bronco, so the times they did run into each other, they’d just pretend they didn’t see each other.

  She thought back to that final day of their romance, the back-and-forth arguing in a back stairwell at Bronco High, Cassidy saying there was no way they’d make it as a couple to the end of the day, let alone the week. Brandon had agreed. That was when they’d flung their insult bets at each other.

  “You’d bet that I’d be on my sixth child at age thirty,” she said. “Well, I’m not even on number one. Hell, I don’t even have a man in my life.”

  He stared at her and seemed about to say something, but didn’t, just accepted the champagne bottle back from her and took another swig before handing it back. “And you’d bet that I’d be on my third marriage.” He laughed, but his big grin soon faded.

  “Instead, we’re both single, no kids, hiding out in the stables during your brother’s wedding. Whodathunk?” she asked.

  “Gimme back that bottle,” he said with a smile.

  But she could see he was lost in thought and she wondered about what. An ex-girlfriend who’d gotten away? His own unfulfilled goals?

  What were his goals, though? He was from the richest family in town, worked at Taylor Ranch in some cowboy-meets-executive capacity, and had everything he’d ever wanted. If Brandon Taylor wanted to be married, he would be.

  “Why are you here?” she asked, surprised that she really wanted to know what had driven him from the wedding.

  “The usual in-your-face questions from relatives I haven’t seen in months or years,” he said, his dark eyes on her. Then he looked toward the pretty horse in the stall across from them. “And my dad, as usual. One conversation with him and I need to decompress.”

  “Yeah?” she asked, her own father coming to mind. He’d left her mother—and her—when she was just shy of her first birthday. I’m really sorry, but I’m just not cut out for marriage or fatherhood, the cowboy had written in a note. He’d sent her mom money and a birthday card every year for Cassidy until she was eight, when he’d either completely forgotten she existed or had been just done with all that. Right or wrong, Cassidy had kept her distance from good-looking cowboys.

  Brandon Taylor might not have to get his hands dirty, but he was a cowboy through and through. Mega rich made it worse. The entitlement and arrogance.

  “He makes life on the ranch almost unbearable,” he said, staring down at the floor. “You’d think trying to boss his three brothers—all equal partners in Taylor Beef—would keep him satisfied. But no, he has to try to control his five adult children.” He shook his head and took another drink of the champagne, then passed it back. “Lately I’ve been thinking about what I really want out of life.”

  She stared at him, surprised he’d opened up. She didn’t have experience with a controlling dad, of course. Her late mom had always been so busy trying to make ends meet that she’d given Cassidy a lot of responsibility to make the right choices. Cassidy always had. “Yeah, me, too. I mean, I know what I want. I just can’t seem to make it happen.”

  “Those six kids?” he asked. “A husband?”

  She narrowed her gaze. “I was referring to my goals for Bronco Java and Juice. I thought I’d have expanded by now. But it’s just the one small place.” She shrugged, taking another drink of champagne, then handing it over to him. She truly wasn’t caught up in being thirty and single. Marriage wasn’t on her mind. Maybe because she’d never found the right guy. She’d had relationships, but one of them always left. Sometimes she thought her heart just wasn’t in the idea of marriage. She’d been too young to witness her mother’s heartache at being abandoned by her child’s father, but she’d grown up with her mom’s dictums. Never depend on a man... Make your own way... Be independent... Don’t expect anyone to rescue you. If you get in trouble, rescue yourself.

  So here Cassidy was, Miss Independence. With not as much to show for it as she’d planned.

  “I really did like you back in high school,” he said suddenly, sliding his gaze to hers. “Sorry I acted like an idiot. You did dump me and I wanted to save face.”

  Cassidy smiled. She wasn’t about to tell him how much she’d liked him then, that he was her first love and that she’d never really gotten over him. Yes, Brandon Taylor had been a golden boy. But a smart one who’d worked hard for good grades, who’d tutored classmates for free in math, his best subject, who’d been friendly to everyone instead of a stuck-up jerk like a few of his teammates on the football and baseball teams. He’d defended the picked-on from bullies. And the way he’d talk about horses, his admiration of them and knowledge and intention to make them his life’s work at the Taylor Ranch, had held her rapt. She used to ask him about his family and it had taken her a while to realize he only talked about his three brothers and sister, never his parents, who were clearly a source of agita. Those times she’d seen Brandon in town over the years? The words unfinished business always echoed in her head along with the red alert to avoid him.

  “Well,” she said, feeling a little Brandon
-size crack in her heart widen, “an apology fifteen years in the making. I’ll take it.”

  He laughed and passed her the bottle, which she raised to him and then drank from before passing it back. There wasn’t much left.

  “So about our bets,” she said. “You’re supposed to be on wife number three. Did you just never meet the right woman?”

  He leaned back in his chair, his eyes moving to the Appaloosa, then back to Cassidy. “Don’t much believe in it, I guess. Marriage hasn’t exactly worked out too well for my parents—my dad’s the one who’s been married three times, though he and Jessica do seem happy. For now. And my mom? Haven’t seen her since she left when I was five.”

  She almost gasped. She hadn’t known any of that. Brandon rarely talked about his parents back when they were dating. “I never knew my dad. And my mom never got married, which had once been a dream of hers. She fell in love with a ranch hand who sweet-talked her, and he left before I turned a year old. She kept asking where her ring was, and he kept saying he was saving up to afford a diamond worthy of her, with the next purse he won. He left instead. So, to be honest, I’m not much interested in marriage myself. Maybe I don’t believe in it, either. I don’t know anymore.”

  “Well, aren’t we a pair,” he said, tilting the bottle back. He handed it to her. “I saved you the last few sips.”

  She smiled. “Huh. I’d sarcastically called you thoughtful earlier, but you do seem to be just that.”

  “Not the bad guy you thought I was the last fifteen years.”

  “No,” she said, finding herself leaning toward him just a bit, her gaze on his mouth. She’d kissed those lips many times ages ago. She remembered exactly how every nerve ending in her body had lit up when he’d held her close. That was Brandon the teenager. Brandon the man? Whew. She let her eyes travel down his long, muscular body in that black tux. Maybe too much man for her. Too much cowboy. He might be a good guy in general, but she’d seen him with a lot of different women over the years, one prettier than the next. Just last week she’d spied him through the window in Bronco Brick Oven Pizza with a gorgeous redhead. “When it comes to women, I’m sure you haven’t changed a bit, Brandon Taylor.”

  He smiled that dazzling smile of this, the one that had always made her forget where she was—and all rational thought. “All I know for sure about you is that you’re as beautiful as ever, Cassidy Ware.”

  Maybe she’d needed a compliment tonight on her thirtieth birthday. Because she was suddenly warming to Brandon. A little too much. She couldn’t stop staring at his lips.

  “What did we bet?” he asked. “I mean, what was the winner and loser supposed to get? That I actually can’t remember.”

  She grinned. After they’d made their bets, she’d realized they were really just proclamations without anything to win or lose, and she’d demanded he eat his words if what he said about her didn’t come true. “You said, and I quote, ‘Fifteen years from now, whoever wins their bet gets bragging rights. Whoever loses has to wallow in being wrong. And if we both end up wrong, we’ll have to kiss and make up and then go our separate ways forever.’”

  “Well, we were both wrong,” he said, holding her gaze, which dropped to her lips, then back up to her eyes. For a moment, she caught him slide a glance along her silky pale-pink cocktail dress.

  Kiss and make up. Kiss and make up...

  Before she could even blink, the bottle was on the floor, empty, and they were kissing, Brandon’s hands in her hair, her hands splayed against his chest, moving up to his neck and to his chiseled face.

  He pulled back slightly. “Tell me to go back to wedding. Or we might do something you’ll probably regret. I haven’t changed a bit. And we’ve had way too much to drink, Cass.”

  She liked how he used to sometimes call her Cass.

  “We have,” she agreed, the intoxicating scent of his cologne enveloping her. “But I don’t think I’ll regret anything.”

  Yes, she was tipsy. But it was her birthday and she’d been feeling sorry for herself not an hour ago. A secret birthday rendezvous with the man she’d never forgotten? The one who’d gotten away? Finished business after all these years?

  “Me, either,” he whispered. “But that might be the moment talking for both of us. You sure about this?”

  He looked at her, his dark eyes probing and sincere instead of flirtatious and glib, and she knew he was giving her another moment to come to her senses.

  She grabbed the lapels of his tux and kissed him hot and heavy on the lips. She would not regret this. After all, tomorrow, all kissed and made up, they’d go their separate ways—forever.

  But tonight? She needed this.

  Chapter Two

  Oh, yeah! Cassidy thought, eyes closed, back arched, lips ready for more. Happy birthday to me!

  She opened her eyes when she realized she was wasting precious seconds of not looking up close and very personal at Brandon. She’d already unbuttoned his fancy white shirt when they’d moved into an empty, clean stall, and he’d flung the garment into a heap by the door.

  Her gaze roamed over his gorgeous face, down the strong cords of his neck to his magnificent rock-hard chest and farther down to where a line of soft dark hair disappeared into the waistband of his tuxedo pants.

  Brandon kissed her lips, her forehead, her neck as both of his hands reached behind her to unzip her dress, and she shimmied out of it. The straw under her was both soft and rough, which was fine with her.

  She hadn’t been expecting anyone to see her in her sexy pale pink lacy bra and matching undies tonight, but she was darn glad she’d worn them.

  “Oh, Cassidy,” he breathed, looking her up and down, down and up. “You are still so damned beautiful.”

  “You, too,” she whispered, taking his face in her hands and kissing him, softly, passionately, and then with all the desire coursing through her body.

  He let out a groan and his fingers were suddenly inside her bra, which was then quickly removed, his mouth on her breasts, her hands in his hair. She was kissing his neck when she felt her undies being inched down her hips. They could not come off fast enough.

  As he kissed his way down her stomach, she almost screamed with pleasure before she remembered, barely, where she was. She practically had to bite down on her fist.

  She reached for the button on his pants and the zipper, which elicited another groan from Brandon. In moments they were naked on the hay, this man she’d never been able to forget lying on top of her. She heard him grab his pants and take something out, followed by the unmistakable tear of a condom wrapper.

  And then he looked at her, his dark eyes intense, before he kissed her with so much passion she had to have him inside her, one with her, immediately.

  “Cassidy,” he whispered. “You’re everything.”

  I’m everything, she thought tipsily and happily. I’m everything to someone... And not just someone. Brandon Taylor, still special to her after all these years, no matter what she’d said or thought.

  But suddenly she couldn’t form another thought. Because for the first time ever, Brandon Taylor was making love to her. And the reality was even hotter than her traitorous fantasies since her school days.

  * * *

  “You have a piece of hay in your hair,” Brandon said on a smile, reaching to pluck it out.

  Cassidy grinned. “You, too.” She grabbed it from near his ear and tossed it on the floor.

  Being with Brandon, even though they were tipsy, was like nothing she’d ever experienced.

  It wasn’t just the insane levels of passion. But the unexpected tenderness. The way he’d stop for a second and just looked into her eyes, gently holding her face. Like that old song said, it was in his kiss. It was in everything Brandon had done to her. And she’d given it back with everything she’d had.

  Now they lay on the floor, the scratchy hay
not exactly Egyptian cotton sheets, but she couldn’t be any more comfortable or relaxed. She could lie there forever. They both were looking up at the ceiling, at the wood beams of the barn with the dangling electric lanterns, and as if he felt exactly the same way she did, he clasped her hand.

  He’d said he hadn’t changed, but he sure had. She could tell just in the way he held her hand, a silent acknowledgment of something. Though, of course, they hadn’t had sex back in high school for her to make any comparisons, but there hadn’t been much in the way of poetic gestures back then.

  “Well,” he said, turning his head to face her before letting go of her hand and suddenly sitting up. “I guess we’d better get back to the wedding or someone might send a search party for us.” He reached for his white shirt and slipped it on, then found his bow tie half buried in the hay.

  Dismissed. Could the splash of water over her head feel any icier?

  She forced a fake chuckle and reached for her dress, suddenly feeling very exposed. She turned and put on her bra and undies, then slid the dress over her head and popped up, dusting herself off.

  “Do I look like I was rolling around the floor of a barn?” she asked, trying to make light.

  He studied her for a second. “No. You look absolutely beautiful, as always. No one would ever guess what went on here.”

  I barely would, she thought, turning away so he wouldn’t see whatever strange expression was on her face. Disappointment. Embarrassment—for wanting more from him right now.

  A half hour ago, she’d liked how earnest he could suddenly be, the sincerity in his voice moving. Now, a chill ran up the nape of her neck. This was Brandon Taylor. He could make you feel like the only woman in the world and then, a second later, remind you who he really was when it came to relationships.

  A man who wanted to get the hell away from said woman and back to the wedding he hadn’t been able to escape from fast enough.

  That she really was slightly singed over this made her feel even worse. Stupider. What had she expected or wanted? Brandon to magically announce he was madly in love with her and carry her back to the wedding, where they’d dance every dance?