“Folks ’round Park, folks with the rodeo won’t forgive her for leaving you a second time.”
What if she doesn’t leave ? Thank God, he didn’t say it out loud. It would show too damn clearly just how far-gone he was.
“Even if you make it clear you’d known all along that she’d be leaving in the fall.”
And he did know that. Because he knew the difference between dreams and reality. Come fall, Kalli would return to the life she’d created back East. And he’d stay here, with his life. Still loving her.
So why did it feel like a bull’s horn had just gutted him to hear it said out loud?
“...they won’t forgive her. They protect their own, and they’ll shut her out any time she comes to visit. And she’ll know. Even with Jeff and me loving her, it won’t be enough. So if folks see what’s happening, see how you two are, you’ll be making sure Kalli can’t ever come back. Don’t do that, Walker. Don’t do that to Jeff and me, because we love her, too, and we need to have her coming here. And don’t do it to Kalli. Because she needs this place. She needs the peace it gives her.”
Grimly, he hung on to the wheel and the words that shouted in his head.
What about me? What about what I need?
He didn’t say the words. He didn’t say anything as he parked the truck and escorted Mary into the restaurant. And Mary didn’t allude to that subject again, not during the meal and not later, when they said goodbye outside the hospital. Though he did catch both worry and mistiness in her eyes when she gave him a strong hug, a kiss on the cheek and her usual order to take care of himself because they loved him.
But her words never left his head as he drove back toward Park for that night’s rodeo.
What if he’d told Mary he needed Kalli the way he needed to breathe, the way he needed to ride? Would she have understood? Would she have believed him? Would she have shaken her head at his folly?
What if he’d told Mary he couldn’t give up this remaining month with Kalli, no matter what it cost any of them?
Because it would have to last him the rest of his life. Dammit all to hell.
He slammed his palm against the steering wheel.
“Then I’ll just have to make sure folks don’t see what’s happening with us.” He curled his hands around the wheel, holding on tight, as he added harshly, “Because I’ll be damned if I’ll give her up before I have to.”
Chapter Ten
* * *
KALLI TOOK A customary scan to make sure everything was in order, clicked off the lights and locked the office door from the outside.
The night air sifted around her, and she raised her face to the breeze and moonlight. After the bustle and noise of the evening, the rodeo grounds seemed preternaturally quiet, and utterly deserted.
Until a shadow detached from the darkness in the vicinity of the ranch station wagon. Urban instincts tightened her hand around her keys, points bristling out.
“Didn’t think you were ever going to call it a night.”
Her hand eased, but her tension didn’t evaporate entirely.
She hadn’t seen Walker since this morning. She’d awakened to the sound of her shower running. He’d come out almost immediately wearing one towel around his hips and rubbing another one at his hair.
When he saw that she was awake, he paused a moment, then walked slowly to her side of the bed. Without a word, he dropped the towel he’d been using on his hair.
Then he dropped the other towel.
Almost an hour later, as she headed to the shower, Walker kissed her a final time and said he was going to Billings to see Jeff and Mary.
She knew from others’ passing comments that he’d arrived at the rodeo grounds in midafternoon, but he hadn’t made an appearance in the office.
“Had some things to clear up,” she said.
“So, you finally ready to head home?”
She could feel the thud of her heart against her ribs. ‘‘Yes.”
“Good. You go on ahead, then.”
She looked at him, trying to see his face in the irregular illumination from the moon and the security lights, then quickly turned away. “I see.”
But before she’d gone three steps, he spun her around with a hold on her arm. “No, you don’t see, Kalli.” He took two deep, impatient breaths. “You go ahead to Mary and Jeff’s. I’ll come by later. I’ll be there.”
And this time she really did see.
“Don’t you think it’s a little late for discretion? The ranch hands aren’t any different from anybody else around here. News of your truck being at the ranch all night probably reached the cafe two hours before you left.”
“Nobody saw the truck. Parked in the garage.”
“Oh.” She didn’t know how she felt about that precaution. “Okay, Walker. If that’s the way you want it.”
In the gloom, she thought he winced, but his voice was normal when he said, “It’s best, all things considered.”
For the solitary ride back to the ranch, the brief, refreshing span of her shower and in the minutes waiting in the dark of her room, she wondered what things he’d considered in deciding to keep their relationship secret. Propped up by pillows, she plucked a fold in the mid-thigh silk gown she hadn’t worn since leaving New York.
But then, a shadow filled the open doorway, and all that was forgotten.
“Kalli.”
“Yes. I’m here.”
Something about the way he moved in the dark, sitting on the edge of the bed with a tired sigh, made her move up so she knelt just off his right hip. She put her arms around him from behind. One of his hands came up to pull her arm even farther around him. With her cheek against the thickness of his hair, she tightened her arms’ hold while her hands stroked softly.
He gave another sigh, but this time she could feel tension go out of the muscles she pressed against. His mood had shifted.
“Take your boots off, cowboy.”
He responded to her mock sternness with a humble “Yes’m.”
He bent to yank off one boot with a grunt. Straightening, he let it drop to the throw rug. Before he could bend for the second one, she leaned over his shoulder to kiss the side of his mouth.
He held utterly still a second and a half before he turned his head to meet her lips fully.
“Open your mouth, Kalli.”
She parted her lips, and he slid his tongue along them before slipping inside. Their tongues met lightly, retreating and circling. Without releasing her mouth, he made another demand.
“More, Kalli. More.”
She gave him more.
The kiss grew deep, rhythmic, intoxicating. The sleek friction of his tongue against hers—sliding in, withdrawing, delving again—created a new pulse in her, commanding the opening and closing of her heart, the movement of her blood. All to his beat.
Dipping his shoulder and twisting, he brought his knee up on the bed so he nearly faced her. She started to drop back on her heels, but his powerful hands at her sides held her. Instead, he used the one knee on the bed to balance with her as they kissed again and again, until their bodies swayed together in the same beat.
He broke away from her mouth and dropped back to a half-sitting position, but again prevented her from doing the same by his grip on her sides.
Even in the shifting shadows, she could see the way he looked at her. The way his eyes traveled over her. No hurry. No pretense. His gaze touched her skin through the thin barrier of silk. And he enjoyed it.
So did she.
It was the reason she had put on this gown, with its thin straps and its skimming fit. The way she felt right now, she wouldn’t have argued if someone told her it was the reason she’d packed it back in June. She could almost believe she’d bought it on a rainy March day all those months ago in New York with this moment in mind.
And then Walker did more than look.
At first, it was no more than a slow sweep of his thumbs across her midriff. His thumbs reached nearly to the top of her hipbones
before starting up, almost meeting across her waist, then continuing up to brush the undersides of her breasts.
Again and again he created an arc of sensitivity on her body, until she had to hold on to his shoulders for balance.
By the time he moved his hands up, her breasts were aching, the nipples straining against the silk. When he finally touched them, sweeping his thumbs across their tips with the same movement, she swallowed a moan.
“Walker.”
“Lots of time,” he murmured. “Lots of time, Kalli.”
He rose briefly to fit himself against her, as if to both give her support and let her know the state of his body. As he pulled away, she slid her arms inside the curve of his so she could unbutton his shirt, though she had to fight the distraction of his lips on her neck, the curve of her ear, her throat.
She finally succeeded and started on his pants. Before she could do more than open the belt buckle and the snap at his waist, he’d shrugged out of the shirt and come to her again, his hands roaming her back and buttocks, contributing to the slide of silk caught between her skin and his.
His fingertips traced the back of her thighs below the gown’s hem, then the sides, then the front. Breathless, she forfeited more breath to a deep, lingering kiss that earned a sound from him that she cherished.
Openhanded he started a path up her legs, gathering the loose gown in folds that floated across his bare forearms. His thumbs lazily skimmed her inner thighs, across her stomach, her midriff, lingered tantalizingly on the fullness of her breasts, pausing to circle the hardened tips, once, and again.
Finally, his fingers reached her shoulders, his thumbs meeting where they tested at the pulse point at the base of her throat. Unable to stay even this far from him, she leaned in, needing the feel of his hard chest against her aching breasts. She heard his sharp breath, and felt it.
She withdrew only enough to see his face. It was drawn tight with the emotions she’d felt in his body, but also with something less easily defined.
“Kalli, I never meant to hurt you.”
“I know, Walker.”
“I won’t do anything to hurt you now. You can trust me not to hurt you.”
She slowed her response this time so he knew the words weren’t simply automatic.
“I know that, Walker.”
His thumbs still a gentle pressure on her throat, he kissed her. Not harshly, not deeply, not ending the kiss until the need for air broke them apart.
Some dark mood in him seemed to have broken. He scooped the gown over her head, flung it away with a whoop, and bore her down to the bed with his weight, holding her there for a series of kisses that wandered from her mouth to her throat to her collarbone, to her nose, to her cheek, to her shoulder, to her ear and back.
He felt heavy and oh, so right, cradled against her body.
When his knee parted her legs, she cooperated willingly. That left just one problem.
“Ow!”
“Wha— Oh, sorry.”
He sounded so sheepish, she couldn’t help but tease him. “If you’re not going to hurt me, you better get that belt buckle out of this bed, cowboy.”
“Yes’m.” He propped himself on one elbow in order to slide the open belt through the loops and toss it aside. The heavy metal of the championship buckle clanged on the floor. The change in position ignited a new course of fire through her system.
Her voice dropped low on the next command. “And you better get all the way out of those pants.”
He shifted so he loomed over her, staring directly down at her. Even in the shadows, she could see the glint in his eyes.
‘‘I can’t.’’
“You...can’t?”
“I’ve still got one boot on, Kalli.” The half of his voice that wasn’t laughing rasped with desire.
“Then you better hurry up and get it off, cowboy.”
The sound he made combined a chuckle and a growl. He rolled off her and the bed lithely, and in less time than it took to blink, she heard the boot clunk to the floor.
“Have to get a bootjack in here, lady, so we don’t have these kinds of delays.”
Then she heard another sound, a harmony of denim dropping to the floor and a rustling of foil, in the instant before he returned to her. In his arms again, she shivered at the heat of his nakedness against her. And firmly put aside the voice that whispered a sliver of disappointment that he wasn’t quite totally naked.
Hot and urgent, he pressed against her. But he paused for another kiss, a union of lips and teeth and tongue. His mouth still pressed on hers, he slid his hands under her hips and lifted her as he joined them with one, deep stroke.
And she gave herself up to the heat and the touch and the blue, blue eyes that she had carried in her soul even through the darkest nights.
* * *
THEY TOOK THE ranch pickup and drove together to Billings the next week, leaving with the light still new and tender. It reminded her of some trips they’d made the year they’d been married, following the rodeo circuit.
Except this time Walker had asked if she wanted to drive. Ten years ago, she’d driven only when he’d been too exhausted to withstand her arguments. She smiled slightly as she glanced over and saw he’d leaned his head back and pushed his hat forward and fallen asleep. Maybe some things hadn’t changed all that much.
But the reason for this trip was different. They’d discussed it with Roberta and decided the Jeffrieses should know about the rodeo committee’s ultimatum.
The early start allowed them to catch Mary at her cousin’s house, before she went to the hospital. She could decide how best to approach Jeff.
When Alice ushered them into the roomy kitchen where Mary sat finishing her breakfast, she started to rise, a reflex of alarm.
“It’s okay, Mary,” Kalli said quickly, going to her side.
“Jeff...”
“We haven’t seen Jeff.” Kalli had argued to Walker that they should ease into the conversation, but now she saw the benefit of giving Mary the facts fast instead of letting her wonder. “There’s a problem with the rodeo. We’re working on it, but we thought you and Jeff should know. And we thought we should tell you first, and let you decide how to tell Jeff.”
Mary settled back, though her look missed nothing.
“What kind of problem?”
Kalli took the lead explaining the situation, what they’d done to meet the goal and how close they were, with Walker filling in now and then.
When they were finished, silence held for a moment.
“You keep saying ‘we,’ Kalli. Who do you mean?”
It wasn’t the question she’d expected. “Walker and me. And, of course, Roberta and Gulch and Tina and all the rest. Everybody’s pitching in. But it’s really our responsibility.”
Mary followed the movement as Kalli gestured from herself to Walker, then she released a long sigh that sounded to Kalli like acceptance.
Looking at Walker, Mary said, “I suppose I knew all along it would be this way.”
“But we’re not giving up, Mary,” Kalli protested, a little alarmed at Mary’s fatalistic reaction. “We’re a long way from finished. I think we can top last year’s ticket sales, and then you and Jeff will have the rodeo back next year just like before.”
“Not quite just like before,” Mary murmured enigmatically.
“People being what they are,” Walker started slowly, meeting Mary’s eyes, “I suppose you’re right. But I promise you—you and Jeff—I’m doing the best I can.”
Kalli frowned. Why did Mary seem to be blaming Walker for this? It didn’t make sense. “We’re both doing the best we can,” she inserted, sharing the blame if there was blame to be taken.
Mary gave a nod that seemed to be directed solely at Walker, then looked over at Kalli and put a hand on hers. “I know you are. I know. And I’ll be praying that will be good enough.”
Then she stood and her tone altered, as if she’d just changed the subject.
; “Now, don’t you worry about the rodeo. I’ll take care of telling Jeff, and soon, but he’ll agree that we know you’ll do everything you can. And if that’s not enough...” Her eyes glinted with a martial light. “Well, we still have a string or two we could pull with that committee.”
Back in the truck and headed to Park, with Walker driving this time, Kalli studied his profile.
“Did you have the sense Mary was talking about something beyond the rodeo?”
He looked out his side window at a passing car, watched it move safely into the lane in front of them, then glanced at her.
“Mary always did see the big picture.”
Kalli got nothing more out of him on the topic. Feeling dissatisfied and even slightly alienated, she stared out her window for a good ten minutes.
Then she felt Walker’s hand slide up her shoulder, under her hair and around the back of her neck. He released a long breath and said, “You have to sit way over there?”
He sounded like the loneliest man on earth, but when she looked over her shoulder at him, humor and mischief mixed in his eyes. Unable to resist the combination, she slid across the seat toward him.
After that, it was hard to feel dissatisfied or alienated with Walker’s arm around her shoulders, her hand resting lightly on his thigh and their sides pressed together.
* * *
KALLI LEANED AGAINST the arena fence and indulged in a moment’s satisfaction.
True, they still lagged on ticket sales, but they were making up ground. Inch by painful inch. She studied the projections every day. With slightly more than three weeks left, today’s had indicated that if they kept at this pace, they would top last year’s figures by three tickets. Not much of a cushion if something—anything—went wrong, but considerably better than coming up several hundred short as her first projections had shown.
And everything else kept clicking along. The competitors’ lot held a hodgepodge of trailers, trucks and campers, with a good mix of out-of-state plates showing they were drawing entries from distances, which meant tougher fields, which meant better shows, which meant bigger crowds.
Rodeo Nights Page 16