Million Dollar Cowboy

by Lori Wilde

  Their first kiss would never come again. She closed her eyes and allowed every cell in her body to strum with the sweet hum of their music. To steep in the bubbling bliss.

  Everything about him stunned her. His strength. His scent. His taste. His sound.

  Sudden light illuminated them. Bright and startling. For one crazy second she thought maybe they were being transported straight up to heaven.

  Flood lamp.

  Someone had turned on the flood lamp and they were standing directly below it. The front door of the mansion opened behind them. Voices spilled out. Party was over. People heading home.

  Her instinct was to pull away, afraid of getting caught kissing him. Afraid her family would see and make a thing of it.

  But instead of letting her go, Ridge took her by the hand and led her to the other side of the plane, where they fell into darkness again.

  As he drew her into his arms for another kiss, she giggled. “Should we stop?”

  “You’re right,” he said, leaning his head back so he could peer into her eyes. “We shouldn’t be doing this.”

  “If we keep this up, we’re going to get caught.”

  “I know.” But instead of stopping, he threaded his fingers through her hair, held her face while he seized her mouth once more.

  Setting off that beautiful tumult of humming again. The One. The song sang. He’s The One!

  Resistance pushed through her veins. She tried to think of a dozen rational explanations for the humming, why Ridge couldn’t be The One. But her ears flooded with the sound, and her mouth filled with the taste of him, and it was all so overwhelming she could barely remember what her own name was, much less all the reasons why this couldn’t be happening.

  Bottom line? It was happening. Logical or not.

  Ridge made a guttural sound, low and deep at the back of his throat. In the distance, she could hear party guests calling out good-nights, car doors slamming, engines starting.

  Background noise. The real action was here, on the shadow side of the plane.

  He plundered her. A pirate taking over a listing ship.

  Glory!

  She welcomed it. Hungered for more. Wanted to go on kissing him until the end of time and beyond. She opened her mouth wider, tilted her head back farther, urging him on. She flicked her tongue, doing creative things that occurred to her spontaneously. Things she’d not tried before.

  He groaned, tugged his mouth from hers, breathing heavily. “Woman,” he croaked. “You’re a hazard.”

  Doubt zipped through her. She put a hand to her mouth. What had she done wrong? “Did I … um … did I mess up?”

  A chuckle slipped from his lips and his eyes softened. “No way, sweetheart. The last thing you did was mess up. You’ve just got me cocked and ready and no way to relieve the tension.”

  “Oh,” she said, dissolving into the murkiness of his dark eyes. “I thought I was doing a bad job of kissing.”

  “No, ma’am. Quite the opposite.” He glanced down and she followed his gaze, showing her how aroused he was.

  Her cheeks flushed. “I didn’t mean to …”

  “You are freaking adorable, you know that, Kaia Alzate? You make me forget all about my troubles.”

  “What troubles are those?”

  He gestured toward the mansion. “Family drama. But let’s not talk about that.”

  This time when he kissed her, he was incredibly gentle. Taking it soft and slow. Tender raindrop kisses that sent ripples of sensation surfing over her body.

  “We really have to stop this now,” he said.

  She moaned and leaned against his shoulder. “I know.”

  “We have to get up early tomorrow. All this wedding stuff.”

  “I know, I know.” The humming was ebbing, receding, soft echoes inside her head.

  “If it was another time, another place, things would not be ending here.”

  His words gave her heart wings. Oh how she wished it was another time and another place.

  “You gotta go home now,” he said. “And I have to go to Archer’s place. Otherwise, I can’t be held accountable for my actions.”

  “One more kiss?” she pleaded, and ran a hand over his chest. She wanted to stir the humming. Make sure it was still there. That it was real.

  He swore under his breath. “Kaia, don’t.”

  “Please …”

  “Home, woman.” He took her by the shoulders and turned her so she was facing away from him. “Go home before I forget all my scruples.”

  “Kaia?” Ember’s voice called out into the night. “Where are you?”

  She glanced over her shoulder at him.

  “Your cue to go.” His face was unreadable. “Good night, Kaia.” Then he pivoted and walked off into the night.

  Chapter 11

  Her phone went off before dawn, playing barnyard noises, jerking Kaia awake. A cow mooed. Loudly. Followed by a braying donkey.

  “Gotta change that ringtone,” she mumbled, fumbling on her nightstand for the cell.

  Judging how dark it was outside her window and how groggy she felt, Kaia doubted she’d slept more than a couple of hours. She hadn’t fallen asleep until well after three o’clock, obsessed with the humming she’d heard when Ridge kissed her.

  She blinked at the phone—five twenty-five a.m. Archer’s name on the caller ID.

  “S’up?” she answered, stifling a yawn.

  “Are you hungover?” her brother asked.

  “Are you?”

  “Were you sleeping?”

  “Kinda.”

  “Is Ridge with you?”

  “Why would you even ask that? Why on earth would you assume Ridge was with me?”

  “I dunno. He likes you.”

  “A lot of people like me. That doesn’t mean they’re in my bed.”

  “He never turned up at my house last night.”

  “Ridge is missing?”

  “I’m getting married today. I need my best man. Ridge better not pull a disappearing act.”

  “Well, he’s not in my pocket.”

  “Last night was a disaster. What if he left town for good? Do you think he left town for good?” Archer asked on an extended exhale.

  “Is his plane still there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Settle down, Groomszilla. If the plane is there, Ridge is around,” she said logically. Normally Archer wasn’t one to freak out easily, but this was his wedding day. “Don’t panic. Ridge won’t let you down. He will turn up. Did you check his house?”

  “Yes. He’s not there either, and none of the beds have been slept in. Where else could he be?”

  “Did you try calling him?”

  “Duh. He’s not answering. I left a bazillion voice mails.”

  “Phone reception at the ranch can be spotty.”

  “He should have at least gotten my texts.”

  “Maybe he doesn’t have his phone.”

  “Why wouldn’t he take his phone? His phone is like oxygen to him.”

  “Speaking of oxygen, try taking a deep breath, big brother.”

  “This day has to be perfect, Ky. Casey deserves perfect.”

  “Calm down. I have an idea where he is,” she said. “I’ll check it out. In the meantime, chill. Drink some coffee. Or better yet, go back to bed and try to get a couple more hours of sleep. Your wedding isn’t until four o’clock. Plenty of time.”

  “Find him!”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  Kaia threw off the covers, upending Dart—the kitty she was fostering—who dropped gracefully to the floor for a morning stretch. Got dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, fed all the animals, let the dogs into the fenced backyard, and put out fresh kitty litter.

  She made coffee, filled two thermoses to go, and stuck a couple of power bars in her purse. “Later, dude,” she told Dart with a quick scratch under his chin and headed out the door.

  She climbed into the Tundra and took off. The first flush of dawn pinking
the crepuscular sky. She combed her fingers through her hair, trying to tame the thick mass.

  At this sleepy hour on a Saturday morning, it took her less than five minutes to get across town to the Brooklane Baptist Church.

  She pulled up to the cemetery. The gates were closed. She parked on the side of the road, stuck the power bars in her back pocket, and got out, balancing the thermoses in each hand.

  She slipped the thermoses through the wrought-iron rungs, then climbed the locked gate, dropped down on the paved road in the cemetery, retrieved the thermoses, and headed south.

  Long before she reached the tombstone, she spied him, in the muted dawn. He was dressed in the same black clothes he’d worn the night before, kneeling at the grave, his Stetson in hand, looking bleak as a raven in the rain.

  She stopped. Her heart tumbled to the soles of her boots, and she almost went back to the truck, reluctant to disturb him.

  He raised his head, and his navy blue eyes landed on her.

  She painted on a bright smile as if they weren’t in a cemetery and he hadn’t spent the night at his mother’s grave.

  He got to his feet. He looked flattened. She wanted to run to him, to hug him and never let go. To tell him that everything was going to be all right. But of course, she did not.

  “Mornin’,” she chirped. Raised the thermoses. “Look, coffee.”

  “One for me?”

  She nodded, came closer. Handed him the thermos that held heat better than the one she kept for herself, and a power bar.

  He took a long sip, grinned like she’d given him gold bullion. “You remembered. Extra cream. No sugar.”

  “How could I forget? Same as me.”

  A hooded oriole sang a sharp, nasally “wheet, wheet” morning song, welcoming the rising sun. From a crack in the cement between tombstones, a small striped, whiptail lizard strolled out.

  “I see you’ve had company.” Kaia nodded at the lizard.

  “He’s not much of a conversationalist.”

  “Best pet for you since you’ve never been a big talker.”

  He smiled at that, a pat smile more automatic than authentic. “Archer send you?”

  “You didn’t come home. He worried.”

  “How did you know where to find me?”

  She shrugged. “Last we talked, you were feeling guilty about punching your dad. Put two and two. Figured you’d come to the place that reminded you of why he deserved punching.”

  He scratched his head, settled his hat in place. His right eye was less swollen this morning, but it was a striking purple color.

  “You’re too insightful for my own good.”

  “How did you get here?”

  “Walked.”

  “In cowboy boots?”

  One shoulder went up like a half-mast flag. “I might have some blisters.”

  “It’s fifteen miles from the ranch. It must have taken hours.”

  The other shoulder joined the first at his ears. “A baker gave me a ride on his way to open the doughnut shop.”

  “Archer is freaking out. I’m just going to text him and tell him I’m bringing you back.” She pulled out her phone, sent her brother the text, trying not to notice how extremely hot Ridge looked in black jeans, black T-shirt stretched over his biceps, black boots, and black hat.

  The man in black.

  “Ready?” she asked, unnerved to find she was breathless. This was Ridge. She’d known him all her life.

  But after last night, after those confounded kisses, after that sweet serenade of humming, she was a bundle of throbbing nerve endings.

  “Ready.” He put his palm against the small of her back. Bold. Intimate. Perfect.

  His hand was big and rough and she could feel the pressure against her T-shirt. Ludicrously, now his touch felt both comforting and petrifying. As if he was righting her on a slippery rug.

  That he’d just pulled out from under her.

  Her entire body tensed.

  He dropped his hand. Loosely, casually, as if it had meant nothing. It hadn’t meant anything, right? She was reading way too much into a simple touch.

  At the small of her back.

  Perilously close to her butt.

  Every spurt of blood passing through her veins bathed her in a fresh batch of heat and simmered like stew on a burner. Unnerved, she stepped away from him.

  Ridge took another sip of coffee, studied her over the thermos as he peeled open the power bar. The murky look in his eyes had her convinced he was feeling the shift between them, as well.

  “Um …” She cleared her throat. “Um, let’s get out of here.”

  She rushed to the truck, not even checking to see if he was following. But somehow he ended up opening the passenger side door at the same time she opened the driver’s side.

  As they drove through town, not knowing what else to say, she told him the local gossip, what things had changed over the past ten years, who’d gotten married, who was divorced, who’d had babies, who’d passed away.

  That loosened him up and he started talking about Calgary, and he told her how different it was from their hometown. Real mountains, not the foothills Texans called mountains. Green. Cool. Wet. Soothing.

  But he conceded there were things he missed about home. Balmorhea State Park and the cool artisan springs. Stargazing because nowhere else on earth had a night sky like the Trans-Pecos. The quirkiness of desert folk. Weird little desert trails and random salt lakes that sprang from nowhere. The incredible shift of colors and light at sunrise and sunset.

  “I’ve never really been anywhere except to A&M,” she said. “I have nothing to compare home to.”

  “It’s a big wide world out there.” He was watching the road ahead, his chin high, his angular lips parted slightly. “You gotta get out more.”

  “Maybe someday I’ll get a chance to explore. I’ve never even ridden in a plane before.”

  “Would you like to go up in the Evektor?” he offered.

  “Wow, that would be awesome.” She clapped her hands briefly before putting them back on the wheel. “But I doubt we’ll have the opportunity before you have to go back to Calgary.”

  “We could go up this morning.” He checked his watch. “Before the hubbub of the wedding hits. It’s not even seven yet.”

  That thrilled her. “Really? Do we have time?”

  “We should be able to squeeze in thirty minutes.”

  “That would be … so … so amazing.”

  He smiled. “I love the way your face lights up when you’re excited. It makes me feel happy.”

  She grinned at him, happy that she’d made him happy. Especially after the troublesome night he’d had.

  Fifteen minutes later, they were back at the ranch. They placated Archer, assuring him they would return by eight a.m. Ridge gassed the plane with fuel from a tank used by the crop dusters and did a preflight check.

  When he was finished, he turned to Kaia and grinned like a man accustomed to having the world on a string. “Ready to soar?”

  “Oh yes.” A thrill chased up Kaia’s spine, and she squinted against the morning sun, wished for sunglasses. As if reading her mind, Ridge settled his sunglasses on her face.

  “Hey, you’re the pilot,” she protested. “You need these worse than I do.”

  “I have another pair in the plane,” he said.

  “Always prepared, huh?”

  “Never know what might come up.” He nodded. “It’s always good to stay ahead of the competition.”

  “Who are we competing against?”

  “In this case? The wedding.”

  The sky had taken on an opalescent orange glow as the sun banked off a column of dense white clouds, shooting bands of light poking through in spots like magical fingers.

  He held out a hand to help her up the steps. Once they were belted in, he turned to her and said with a wicked grin, “I’m glad I’m your first.”

  For a startling second, she thought he meant her first love,
but realized he was talking about the plane trip. “Me too.”

  He started the engine and her stomach fluttered. Her first time in a plane.

  Giddily, she curled her fingers into her palms. She cast a glance at Ridge as he fiddled with the controls. She’d pulled her hair back into a ponytail and the tip of it rubbed across her shoulders as she turned.

  His face was alight, his eyes bright, lips drawn into a smile, body relaxed. He was happy in the cockpit. The happiest she’d seen him since he’d returned.

  “Excited?” he asked, engines churning loudly.

  “Beyond.” She grinned helplessly, part of her scared to death, the other part yearning to fly.

  “Me too,” he confessed as he taxied down the narrow airstrip.

  And then they were off. Rising up in the air, the buildings below growing smaller below them.

  It was very smooth, the climb. It was just the two of them enclosed in a whole new world together. Or at least it was new to her.

  She assumed he’d taken many women up in his plane. She had no illusion that she was special on that score. He was rich and good-looking. He owned his own plane, his own business, his own house—hell, two houses—one here and one in Calgary.

  Honestly, his wealth intimidated her. She didn’t own anything besides a yard full of animals and a passel of student debt. She rented her home, and she was still paying on the eight-year-old Tundra she’d bought used after her old Chevy was totaled in the accident.

  The engine hummed sharp and smart and it reminded her of another humming. The ground looked so faraway, her Tundra little more than a blue dot parked beside the landing strip.

  It made her sad. Seeing everything fall away. Kaia pressed a hand to her stomach, felt a slosh of loneliness.

  “Don’t look down,” he said. “Eyes on the sky.”

  She raised her head, looked out the windshield. “What do you call the windshield on a plane?”

  “Windshield.” He laughed. “Although some people say windscreen.”

  Sky stretched all around them. Wide-open. Inviting. “How long have you been flying?”

  “Five years.”

  “Is there anything you don’t know how to do?”