“You’re going to need a computer of your own, especially if you do more business like this.”
“I can’t afford one right now.”
“You’re welcome to use my laptop. It’s usually on the dresser in my bedroom. It’s more up-to-date than the one in the barn that we use mainly for record keeping.”
It was in his bedroom.
She thought about standing in there with him. She thought about possibly lying in his arms in there. Scott Donaldson might have all the qualities that Ty had just mentioned, but he wasn’t Ty Conroy. Her feelings for Ty were growing deeper, but she wasn’t sure she should let herself fall for him all over again.
“I left my flash drive down at the barn,” she explained. “I’ll just use that computer for now. But I’ll wait until after I put Jordan to bed.”
“You don’t need to wait,” he said. “I know you want to take care of business. I’ll give Jordan his milk and another cookie if he wants it. Go take care of business.”
“Thank you,” she said, meaning it. “Not for just giving Jordan his snack, but for taking him upstairs earlier. If I do start planning events outside of Raintree Winery, I want my dealings to be professional. I could do that tonight because of your help.”
“Marissa, I want you to succeed as much as I want the Cozy C to succeed. Remember that, okay?”
She would.
The signed proposal was still in her hand, and she couldn’t help but be excited by the opportunity. With luck Scott Donaldson would throw more business her way. She was starting on her brand-new future—with or without Ty. Yet tonight, when Scott had asked her the question whether her staying at the Cozy C was temporary or permanent, in the bottom of her heart, she wished her stay was permanent.
* * *
Late the following Saturday morning, Marissa had joined in a conversation between Hannah and Eli in the living room. Hannah had brought a cake she’d baked from a new recipe as well as another casserole.
Jordan tugged on Hannah’s arm. Hannah smiled at him and scooped him up onto her lap.
“Do you want in on this conversation?” she asked, tickling his tummy.
He giggled.
Suddenly the kitchen door opened and Ty came in. He looked like a man on a mission.
After greeting Hannah, he turned to Marissa. “How would you like to come with me to cut down a Christmas tree? We’ll take the buckboard.”
“So we’re going pretty far?” she asked.
“Far enough to find a good one. I wouldn’t want to bring one back and have you say it’s too small, or it has a bare spot on the side.”
“I’m not that particular,” she protested.
His brows lifted. “I have a feeling you’re going to want this one to be perfect.”
Eli chuckled, too. “He’s right, Marissa. You know he is.”
“I’m not doing anything particular this morning. I can stay and babysit,” Hannah offered. She nuzzled the baby. “Jordan and I get along just fine.”
Instinctually, Marissa trusted Hannah and her kind, nurturing way. “Thanks. I’ll change him and give him a snack before I go.”
But Hannah was already shaking her head. “Nonsense. You don’t think I remember how to change a baby? Then we’ll have fun with our snack. Eli and I can have another cup of coffee.”
“I’ll get my jacket.”
Minutes later as she zippered her jacket over her pink blouse, she watched Ty harness Bruno, one of the larger horses, to the buckboard. His hands worked expertly, so strong and capable. But as she watched them, she imagined them on her skin. Whenever he touched her, he did it with such sensual gentleness. Whenever he kissed her, her universe rocked. Falling in love with Ty again seemed so natural that she didn’t know if she could stop it. She had fallen in love with him that night they’d made love, yet she’d known it was a love that had no future. Now she was afraid to believe it could.
Ty laid a tarp in the buckboard bed, then climbed up on to the seat and patted the bench next to him. She climbed up too and sat, leaving about six inches of space between them. He jiggled the reins and clucked to the horse. Bruno started walking.
“Unc and I got our invitations to Donaldson’s party. They were a surprise, especially mine.”
“You both were on his list.”
“Does he think some party is going to convince Unc to sell the Cozy C?”
From what she’d seen of Scott Donaldson, he was just covering the bases. “I think this party is about his business associates and contacts he’s made. Whether or not you and Eli sell, you’re contacts.”
Ty was silent as he drove the buckboard over a rutted path just wide enough for it. It was bumpy but he didn’t seem to notice. He seemed lost in thought.
Finally she said, “I feel like a pioneer crossing the plains.”
“They weren’t going in search of a Christmas tree.”
“I don’t know, Ty, they were searching for dreams. Aren’t we doing the same thing?”
He made eye contact then, but didn’t respond.
Suddenly he said, “Unc isn’t talking to me about Donaldson’s offer.”
“Maybe he’s not considering it.”
“Selling the Cozy C would give him immediate security.”
“Not necessarily long-term security, though,” she suggested. “Whatever the amount is, it could seem like a lot, but Eli could live a long life. I just can’t see him happy in a retirement home or living in a condo somewhere. Can you?”
“No, I can’t. But this is going to be his decision to make. It’s not a decision he’s going to make now, but I imagine he’ll think about it in the next year or two.”
And just what would Ty do if Eli did sell? With rodeoing out of the picture, what would he want to do?
“The Cozy C website is getting hits,” she told him, “and we’re acquiring more social media followers now.”
“Thanks to you. I think you brought everybody over from Raintree.”
“I’ve checked the profiles of some of the followers. We even have some on the East Coast. We’re getting there, Ty, really.”
“I want to take more photographs of the Cozy C to post,” he said. “That should create even more interest. The inside of the cabins, the horses in the pasture and the barns.”
“People would be interested in the food you’re going to serve, too. I could bake a few pies and take photos, get one of our beef stew and your uncle’s chili.”
“You do have good ideas.”
“Just remember that when we can’t agree on which tree to cut down,” she teased.
Most of the time, Marissa forgot that Ty had had a knee replacement. Only when he came back from PT looking worn-out and heading for an ice pack did she wonder if he was in pain more than he was letting on. Today she thought he favored that leg a little as he got off the buckboard and carried the saw toward a grove of firs.
“I’m going to help,” she said.
“Doing what?” he retorted.
“There has to be something.”
“You pick out the tree and I’ll cut it down. We’ll be all set.”
She knew that wasn’t the bottom and top of it. She knew they’d have to drag the tree to the buckboard, and she could possibly help with that.
They dawdled around the trees, sizing them up. One grew against another and didn’t have a back. Too many had big gaps in them that would be a problem for hanging ornaments. She was surprised at Ty’s patience as she tried to decide.
The scent of fragrant pine surrounded them as they stepped between two rows of firs. Suddenly she saw it. The perfect tree.
“That one,” she said with an excited note in her voice.
Ty looked toward where she pointed. They walked over to the seven-foot-tall tree and made a
circle around it, studying it from every angle.
“I think you found a good one,” Ty agreed. “Once we put it in the tree stand, it will almost reach the ceiling. It will be perfect in the stairway corner. We can mound Jordan’s presents all around it.”
“Do you have a tree stand?” she asked.
“I do. I got it last week. So we’re all set. We can put it up when we get back.”
She liked the idea of decorating the tree today and starting their holiday. “While you’re sawing down the tree, I’d like to collect some pine boughs.”
“I thought you might want to do that,” he said with a smile. “I brought clippers. They’re in the tin box in the buckboard bed.”
Marissa fetched the clippers and began snipping pine boughs as Ty began sawing the fir close to the ground. She heard the tree fall.
“I can help you carry it to the buckboard,” she called.
He called back, “No need.”
She must have had her eyes on Ty, the breadth of his back, the straightness of his spine, the muscles in his arms that rippled under his long-sleeved T-shirt. She must have been admiring the slant of his jaw and noticing the tilt of his Stetson, because as she clipped an upper branch, she lost hold of it and it fell, scraping her cheek. She’d been intending to clip the softer boughs from it, but evidently distracted, she’d cut the branch, and now it bounced on her shoulder and fell to the ground.
She must have let out a little squeal because Ty immediately left the tree and came over to her.
“What happened?” he asked.
“Nothing major.”
“You scraped your cheek,” he said. “We should clean that off. I have bottles of water in the buckboard.”
“Ty, really. I’m fine.”
He took her hand and pulled her toward the buckboard, coaxing, “Come on.”
Leaving her pile of boughs behind, she followed him, liking the feel of his hand enclosing hers.
At the buckboard he reached over the side to a six-pack of water. He tore one free and opened the top, then he pulled a folded red paisley handkerchief from his pocket.
“It’s clean,” he said with a smile.
“I don’t need first aid,” she protested again.
“We’re just going to wash it until you get back to the ranch. Then you can put some antiseptic and salve on it. Your face is too pretty to have it marred by a scrape.”
When she studied his face, she realized the compliment was sincere. “You really think I’m pretty?”
“I’ve always thought you were pretty. You were the prettiest girl in high school.”
She scoffed at that. “Back then I didn’t know what to do with my hair. It was just a fuzz of curls. I always thought my mouth was too wide and my nose was too short.”
He put a finger over her lips. “Don’t tell me those teenage insecurities still plague you.”
“The night we hooked up...” she murmured, trailing off. Then she continued, “Why did you want to?”
“Why did you want to?” he tossed back at her as he gently wiped the scrape with the handkerchief.
“I thought you were funny and sexy and exciting.”
He leaned away for a second. “Really?”
“Really.”
“Seeing you all grown-up, more mature than you were in high school, I thought you were elegant, sexy and warm. When we talked, I felt good being around you.”
“So it wasn’t just attraction.”
“Not then and not now. Besides, you’re the mother of my son. That makes me look at our attraction in a new light. The closer we are, the better it is for Jordan.”
She wasn’t sure she believed that, but she could see Ty did.
He poured more water on the handkerchief and held it to the side of her face. Even with that cold water on her cheek, she felt her face growing warm. She was thinking about kissing Ty. She was thinking about doing more than kissing Ty.
As if he read her thoughts, he balled the handkerchief into his palm, leaned in and set his lips on hers. Every time they kissed, her knees grew weak. Every time they kissed she wanted more of him. Did he feel that way, too? She wanted to ask but she didn’t want to stop kissing him.
He wrapped his arms around her, bringing her tight against him. Before she could guess his intent, he broke the kiss, swung her up into his arms and lifted her to the back of the buckboard onto the tarp he’d laid out for the tree.
He sat her on the edge and ran his hands through her curls. “I want you, Marissa, and there’s no one around for miles.” Leaning into her neck and kissing her, he murmured, “I have protection in my pocket.”
Ty was exciting...so exciting. Only he would think about making love here on the buckboard with pine trees all around them, and the sun shining down on them. He had protection, and she wanted him with an urgency that overtook her in a huge overwhelming wave.
She wrapped her arms around his neck. “Lay in the buckboard with me?” she asked.
His eyes sparked, the blue becoming deeper. “The wood’s too hard. We can do it right here.”
He meant to take her while standing right there, in front of the buckboard?
Before she could ask him, he unzipped her jacket and began kissing her all over again, and she lost her train of thought. As she dug her fingers into his hair, she flipped his Stetson forward. He laughed, swiped it off and tossed it into the buckboard.
“I don’t need my hat and we’d better get rid of your jeans.”
She knew her eyes were wide with anticipation and excitement as she became breathless at the thought of what they were going to do.
“No one’s around for miles,” she repeated, assuring herself of that fact.
“Just let go, Marissa. Forget about rules and standards and what you’re supposed to do. Just go with it.”
Kissing him, she could just go with it.
He unsnapped her blouse, unhooked her bra, and her breasts were bare to the warm sun and the breeze and the freedom that Ty seemed to embody. He traced her breasts with his fingers, and then brought his lips to her nipple. Teasing around it, he palmed her other breast, and she knew she was his no matter what he wanted to do.
She clasped his shirt, eager to feel his skin, too, and insinuated her hands underneath, sliding them up his chest, playing with his chest hair.
He groaned. “This isn’t going to last very long with you doing that.”
“It doesn’t have to last very long to get us where we want to go.”
He chuckled and she felt the rumble of it under her palm.
He unfastened her jeans and she unfastened his. When he pushed hers off, she could feel the cool tarp under her. He brought her closer to the edge of the buckboard. His jeans were unzipped but still hanging on his hips. He used his fingers in a most tempting way, arousing her, inflaming her, increasing her hunger for him until it was as great as his for her. When she didn’t think she could withstand much more, he stopped, tore open a foil packet and prepared himself.
“Open for me,” he said, and she did as he commanded. He gripped her backside, and then entered her swiftly, taking her breath away. She held on to him as he thrust harder and deeper. When she wrapped her legs around him, he kissed her so deeply she knew they had to be one.
Making love with Ty was like reaching up and finding a place among the stars. As he thrust into her again and again, she found pleasure like nothing she’d ever known. She called his name and with a groaning release, he murmured hers.
And as she held on to him, she knew she wasn’t falling in love with Ty Conroy again, she’d already fallen. The question was—what was she going to do about that?
Chapter Ten
That evening, Marissa put supper dishes away while Ty set up the tree. Jordan played nearby in his
saucer.
Eli called to her from the living room, “Can you come here, Marissa?”
She and Ty had avoided eye contact at supper—or maybe only she had. The pull toward him was so strong, she could hardly fight it. But she had to until she figured out what making love with him again had meant.
Had Eli noticed something different between them? He’d shot them curious glances but every time he had, she’d steered the conversation in another direction to keep him distracted from the electricity sizzling between her and Ty.
Maybe they were the only ones who could feel it.
“Be there in a minute,” she called, folding the hand towel she was using and placing it on the counter. Scanning the kitchen, she saw there wasn’t anything else that could delay her. And she knew if she didn’t go into the living room, Eli would probably come get her.
When she scooped Jordan up and carried him into the living room, she was surprised by what she saw. Ty was threading lights all over the tree. She could tell they were those small twinkle lights that looked like tiny stars when they lit up. There were also two shopping bags overflowing with boxes containing shiny balls. She appreciated the holiday he was trying to create.
Could shiny balls and twinkle lights do it?
Only if what they were feeling for each other was as bright as those lights.
But Eli wasn’t paying attention to the bags and new boxes or Ty threading lights on the tree. He motioned to a dingy old carton whose flaps were worn as he unfolded them.
“I know Ty bought that shiny new stuff, and you’ll probably use it. But I wanted you to see these old ornaments. These are the ones I had when Ty was a boy.”
Ty mumbled, “They’re probably falling apart.”
“You know that’s nonsense,” Eli said. “Things were made better back then than they are now. I bet you don’t even remember most of them.”
Jordan was wriggling by then to be let down. There was so much for him to get into.
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