He unfastened both seat belts and pulled her across the wide bench seat to his side. He cupped her cheeks with his hands and lowered his lips to hers.
“It’ll take more than that to be called makeup sex,” she whispered.
“Oh, darlin’, that was just a teaser. We’ll get around to the real thing later tonight. Lester said supper is at eight so rather than having pickup sex we’d best go on inside. Most of the time supper is at six, but he and the twins were making hay all day.”
Gemma sputtered. “You did not tell me we were invited to dinner. I didn’t even change clothes.”
He kissed her again. “You look like a million bucks. Hungry?”
She looked down at her shirt and jeans. At least she hadn’t spilled anything on them that day, even if they were wrinkled. She pulled her hair loose from the braid and pulled the sides up with a clamp from her purse leaving the rest to fall in soft waves down her back. She checked her reflection in the rearview mirror and applied a bit of lipstick and mist of perfume.
“Best I can do on short notice. You could have told me this morning,” she said grumpily.
“I didn’t know it until an hour ago when Lester called and invited us. Then you got all huffy and had to drive.” Trace slid out of the passenger’s seat and held the door for her. “You look beautiful, as always. Just don’t let those cousins of mine take you away from me.”
“Hmmph,” she said. “You’d have to own me first and that ain’t damned likely, cowboy.”
Lester met them at the door and motioned them inside. He was as tall as Trace but his hair was blond and his eyes clear blue. They definitely shared DNA from the shape of their faces and their muscular bodies, but Gemma thought Trace was by far the more handsome of the two.
“Lester, meet the woman I told you about. This is Gemma O’Donnell. Gemma, this is the oldest one of my cousins.”
“Right pleased to meet you, ma’am, and thank you for agreeing to sponsor in our girls’ cabin this week. Supper will be ready in a few minutes. Y’all come on in and make yourselves at home,” Lester said.
“I’m looking forward to meeting the girls, and it’s nice to meet you,” Gemma said.
“I need to put Sugar in the boys’ cabin,” Trace said.
“Still travelin’ with that glorified rat.” Lester laughed.
“Shhh, you’ll hurt her feelings,” Gemma told him.
Lester smiled. “Take her on down there and turn her loose. Hill has supper just about ready to set on the table.”
“Come with me, Gemma?” Trace asked.
“You’ve got about five minutes.” Lester disappeared through a doorway off the foyer.
Trace snapped the leash on Sugar and let her make a couple of stops on the way from the house to the first cabin. He turned on the lights and put her inside and then laced his fingers with Gemma’s.
“You do look beautiful, Gemma. I’m not shootin’ you a line,” he said when they reached the house again.
“Yeah, well, it’s dark out here so you can’t see what I really look like,” she told him.
“Honey, all I have to do is shut my eyes and I can see what you look like clothed, half-dressed, or naked,” he whispered as he opened the door and stood to one side to let her go into the house first.
She poked him on the arm. “Shhh, Lester will hear you.”
“Did I hear my name?” Lester appeared from a room with delicious food smells following him.
“You did,” Trace answered.
“But you don’t want to know what it was about,” Gemma said.
“I know Trace, so I’ll listen to the lady. We’ve heard all about your folks up in these parts. Any time you want to sell Glorious Danny Boy, me and the boys will hock the ranch and sell Trace on the auction block as a slave to buy him.” His voice wasn’t as deep as Trace’s, and it didn’t have that slow Texas drawl.
“Momma would sell me before she would that horse.” The door opened right into the living room, which looked masculine with its soft leather furniture, plasma television, and hefty oak coffee table.
“How much?” Trace whispered low enough for her ears only.
Stairs went up off to her right and doors opened to her left. Another tall blond cowboy came out of the nearest door wiping his hands. “Hi, Trace, and you have to be Gemma. I’m Hill Coleman. Trace told us you were beautiful, but he didn’t do you justice. Come on in and set up to the table. Harper will be down in a minute. He had to go wash up a bit.”
Like part of a country song on a continuous loop, Gemma kept replaying what Hill had said: “Trace told us you were beautiful.”
Harper yelled from the top of the stairs, “I’m on my way. Don’t be startin’ without me. Trace will get all the best parts.”
Boots made a rat-a-tat noise on the steps as he hurried down.
Gemma looked up at still another handsome blue eyed, blond-haired cowboy and then back at Hill. They were so much alike that she couldn’t tell them apart.
“Twins, remember?” Trace said. “Hill is an inch taller and Harper has longer hair.”
“I do not, and he’s only half an inch taller.”
“And there’s the way you tell them apart.” Trace chuckled. “Harper will always argue that point. I’ve known them since they were born and sometimes I can’t even tell who is who, but if I mention their height then Harper argues and I can tell them apart that way.”
“It’s on the table,” Hill said. “And if you really want to tell us apart, then remember I cooked tonight. Harper does a pretty good job of simple things, but you won’t ever get yeast bread when he cooks. He and Trace, neither one could make a pan of biscuits that couldn’t be used for skeet shootin’.”
Harper led the way to the country kitchen. “Come on now. Stop telling tales.”
“So you all cook?” Gemma asked after Trace held her chair for her.
Harper answered, “We take turns. Momma said boys had to learn to cook just like girls.”
“You have sisters?”
“No, ma’am,” Harper said. “Momma said after she had three boys she was afraid to try for a girl because she might get another mean boy. You got sisters?”
“One sister, Colleen. Three brothers.”
“Bless your momma’s heart,” Hill said.
“She’s pretty tough and she believed in boys being able to cook and girls being able to ride a bronc or pull a calf,” Gemma said.
“Wise woman,” Lester said.
“Pardon me for changing the subject here, but how is Uncle Teamer?” Hill asked Trace.
“Doin’ good. He’s ready to retire and I’m ready to buy him out soon as I get the money together.”
“He’s been ready for a couple of years,” Hill said.
“Little bit of history, Gemma.” Hill smiled. “There are three brothers in the Coleman family. Teamer, our father, and Trace’s dad are brothers. Trace’s dad didn’t take to ranchin’. He’s a lawyer in Houston and Trace is the only chicken in that nest. Teamer never married and didn’t have any kids, so he wants to give Trace the ranch, but Trace has a stubborn streak a mile wide and won’t take it without paying for it. My daddy and momma retired about five years ago and turned this place over to the three of us.”
There Gemma sat with three blond cowboys that fit the fortune Liz told just fine and yet not a one of them made her heart do double time.
“I can believe that about a stubborn streak.” She smiled.
“Oh, yeah! He’s got the worst one of all of us,” Hill said.
“Hey, now.” Trace smiled.
“Okay, change of subject. We want to make another offer now that we got you here. How about staying on two weeks? Kids one week and senior citizens the next?”
“Senior citizens?” Gemma asked.
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“I like the kids, but I love the old folks when they are here a week. The same ones have been coming the past five years. Youngest one is about seventy and they are a hoot,” Lester said.
“You could drive up to Cheyenne for the rodeo and come back the next day. That’s when they arrive and they’ll stay a week. You’d have three days to go from here to Dodge City for the next one, and it’s only six hundred and fifty miles,” Hill said.
Trace looked at Gemma and she shook her head. She’d had more than one major brain malfunction since she met Trace, but she wasn’t going to succumb to any more.
“I’m going home between Cheyenne and Dodge City. I’m homesick and I got to tell you, this supper is delicious, but it’s not helping cure my homesickness. Every bite tastes just like my granny’s cookin’, and I swear these hot rolls are as good as Momma’s. Sorry, guys. Why would you need counselors for senior citizens anyway? Aren’t they considered adults?” she asked.
Hill chuckled. “Well, thank you for the compliments. It don’t get no better than that, darlin’. We were just hoping to hang on to Trace another week. We don’t get together nearly often enough.”
“Thanks, but no thanks,” Gemma said. “Can’t stay away from Ringgold, Texas, too long or I get all melancholy, but you can keep Trace if you want. He doesn’t have to go where I go or even take me to the airport. I’m a big girl.”
Trace snorted. “You? Melancholy? More like another M word.”
“And what would that be?” she asked.
“Mean. Don’t let her fool you, guys. She’s meaner than a junkyard dog.”
“Are you calling me a bitch?” She accentuated every word with a poke of her fork.
“No, ma’am. I’m not nearly that brave,” he said.
Hill laughed. “Man, you done backed yourself up in a corner. You’d best do some sweet-talkin’ or we’ll have to call the undertaker when she kills you with that fork.”
Gemma laid her fork down. “Darlin’, you’d best never get that brave or I won’t need a fork. I’ll take care of you with my bare hands. And I am homesick. I like getting away from Ringgold, but that’s where my roots are. I love traveling and the excitement of the rodeo, but what I really like is my chunk of north Texas dirt.”
Trace felt the same way about Goodnight, Texas. He’d never want to leave there permanently. But hearing her say those words put a whole new spin on their relationship. She wouldn’t ever leave Ringgold. He’d never leave Goodnight, and there was two hundred miles between the two small towns.
After supper the brothers shooed them out of the house.
“Y’all got unpacking and settlin’ in to do. We’ll take care of cleanup,” Hill said.
“He means I’ll take care of cleanup,” Harper teased. “But you do both need to check the agenda for next week to see if you want anything changed, so get on out of here.”
“Thank you for supper, for the cleanup, and for everything else,” Gemma said.
Trace nodded in agreement. “We don’t mind helping.”
Lester shook his head. “You go on and get your beauty rest even though you don’t need it.”
“Be careful, she’ll be accusing you of shootin’ her a line,” Trace said.
“Darlin’, that’s the gospel truth. Ain’t no bullshit to it.” Lester grinned.
“Thank you,” Gemma said.
Trace looped her arm into his. “And now we are going.”
Once they were out on the porch, he removed her arm and said, “I’ll walk down to your cabin. You can drive and then I’ll unload your baggage.”
“Hey,” she called out when he’d gone three steps.
He turned in time to see something flying toward him. He reached up and grabbed the keys before they hit him in the face.
“You drive. I’ll walk. I need it after that meal.”
By the time she arrived, he’d unlocked the door and her bags were sitting inside the door. She stepped inside to find a long rectangular room lined with bunk beds on either side. An open door at the very end showed a bedroom with a king-sized bed. She headed straight for it. Trace followed her into the enormous room with a recliner, television, private bathroom with the big claw-foot tub that Trace had promised, and a stacked washer and dryer combination.
“This is great,” she said. “And this bathroom is all mine? I don’t have to share with the girls?”
“All yours,” Trace said. He laced his fingers in hers. “Come with me and I’ll show you the one that they use.”
It was enormous with several stalls and five divided showers with pink shower curtains. Vanities had plenty of outlets for hair driers and mirrors above that stretched the length of the whole wall for primping.
Trace led her back out into the main room where the walls were rough-hewn logs, and area rugs separated the living area from the bedroom space. Two deep leather sofas in a dark brown color, a plasma television, and a computer station took up space on one side. Comfortable chairs and a wall filled with books were on the other side. She wondered which area would entice her girls the most: books or entertainment.
Between the sofa area and the beds there was a small kitchen area with a stove, cabinets, and a refrigerator. She pointed at it and asked, “Do we cook some of our meals here?”
“No, three meals a day are served in the dining cabin. The kitchen is for night snacks or whatever you want to do with the girls, like craft projects or popcorn.”
He picked up her laundry bag and carried it to the bedroom at the end, came back, and got her duffel bag and set it on the bed. “What do you want to do first?”
She raised a dark eyebrow. “You’re asking and not telling?”
“I am,” he said.
“Then I’d like to take a bath in that tub over there. I’d like to lie back in it and not get out until I look like a prune.”
Trace smiled. “Your wish is my command, darlin’.”
“You’ve got a wicked look in your eyes.”
“You think that big old tub would hold both of us?”
She smiled. “Oh, yeah.”
He slipped his shirt over his head and reached out to help her remove hers. “You ever had sex in an old-fashioned bathtub?”
She shook her head. “Not any kind of bathtub. You?”
“No. That makes us both bathtub virgins, but I betcha we can figure it out.”
She kicked off her boots and peeled her jeans down over her hips while he started running the water. When he turned around she was wearing only bright red lacy underpants.
“Nice outfit there, Miz O’Donnell,” he said.
“Thank you, Mr. Coleman. I wore it just for you,” she flirted.
He started humming “Your Man” by Josh Turner as he pulled his shirt over his head and kicked his boots over next to the vanity. Her blood pressure shot up when the lyrics came to mind. It went up another ten points when he removed his jeans and wasn’t wearing underwear. One of those huge Mexican sombreros could have hung on what was behind his zipper.
After three nights of glorious sex, it would be a miracle if she could even stay on a horse eight seconds at the rodeo. Was that what Trace was attempting to do—wear her out and give her too much to think about to win the purse in Colorado Springs?
He dropped down on his knees and ran his hands up her legs from ankles to waist. She expected him to peel her lacy underwear in one long sliding swoop, but he kissed her belly button and then moved around to her hip where he latched on to the edge of the lace with his teeth and tugged them down a quarter of an inch at a time.
Ripples of goose bumps rose up on her body and she shivered.
“I thought you didn’t like kinky.”
“Honey, this ain’t kinky. It’s just plain old foreplay. You like it?” he mumbled.
“Mmmm,” was the only sound that would come out of her mouth.
When she was totally naked, he picked her up and put her into the water and then crawled in the tub with her. She straddled him and picked up the washcloth from the chair beside the tub.
“My turn.” She nibbled on his earlobe. “You have to sit perfectly still and let me give you a bath before the sex starts.”
“You are killing me, Gemma.”
“But what a way to go, right?”
He reached up to wrap his arms around her and she shook her head. “It’s like a lap dance. You can’t touch, but I can.”
He stretched an arm out on either side of the tub and gave himself over to her. She lathered his body with soap and then slowly rinsed it by squeezing the washcloth over him until the soap was gone. Then she rose up on her knees and washed his hair, massaging his scalp with her fingertips until he groaned.
“You are so damn sexy,” she said.
“Is that a line you use on all your boyfriends?”
“Darlin’, I don’t shoot lines of bullshit. I state the gospel truth.”
But the word boyfriend did not escape her. Was that what Trace was at this point? If so, how did she deal with it?
“God, woman, I’m not going to even be up for a dash. Forget the sprint and the marathon,” he growled.
“I’m so damn hot that I was thinking about an eight-second ride to start with,” she said.
“That I think I can manage,” he said.
She wrapped her legs around his body and lowered herself onto his wet erection. She measured the washcloth like a rein and then nodded as if the chute was about to open and they started the ride. He was the bronc and she only had to stay on for eight seconds. The buzzer should’ve sounded long before it did. Eight seconds soon grew to eight minutes with her meeting him thrust for thrust until it ended in a blast that came close to blowing her eardrums out.
He wrapped his arms tightly around her and buried his face in her shoulder. “Many more nights like these past three and I’ll be dead.”
“I’ll wear black to your funeral and take home the prize in Vegas,” she said breathlessly.
Just a Cowboy and His Baby Page 11