THE STARDUST COWBOY

by Anne McAllister

  It was at dinnertime, when they were all back home, and she was watching Riley not watching her that she remembered what Jake had said.

  "He's, um … interested in you," he'd told her that afternoon.

  What did a not-quite-eight-year-old boy know about men being interested in women? she wondered.

  But the more she tried to catch Riley's eye that evening, the more she wondered if perhaps Jake could be right. When he was telling Riley about the swimming hole and about them lying out in the sun on the rocks after, then Riley had sneaked a quick look at her. Was he wondering what she'd looked like in her swimsuit?

  Oh, Dori, you dreamer, she chided herself.

  Well, she'd wondered what he would look like in his briefs. She was interested—for all the good it seemed to be doing her.

  He was, damn it, very good-looking. He didn't seem aware of it, though. Chris had always known his power over women. Riley was oblivious.

  But was he oblivious to her?

  Dori, don't!

  But she couldn't help it. She'd spent the entire time she'd been at the ranch aware of him—very aware of him. And Jake said he was "interested" in her. Was it possible?

  She owed it to both of them, she decided, to do a little experiment.

  "I want to show you something," she said to Riley as she was clearing the table. "After I'm finished here—if you don't mind hanging around."

  He looked surprised, then a little confused. But he said, "Er, no. Sure. I'll wait." But then he shrugged and went off with Jake to the corral. He and Jake were working with a young paint that Riley thought would make a good mount for Jake down the road.

  "He's young yet. Needs the kinks worked out. We'll see. We'll take it slow and see how it goes," he'd said when he'd proposed they work with this new horse.

  It had sounded good to Dori when he proposed it. So far it seemed to be going well. And as a method of operation, it wasn't that far different from what she was planning tonight.

  She and Riley would just "take it slow and see how it went."

  She booted up the computer and started the program she'd been using the past few days. She'd been entering the mamma cows and recording the bulls who'd been the daddies, and the estimated birth weights of their offspring. She really did have something to show him. And if she had an ulterior motive, well … she had an ulterior motive.

  "So, shoot me," she muttered.

  Then she brushed her hair, took a quick shower and put on clean clothes. It was when she was reaching for her bra that she hesitated. She stood there, holding it against her breasts, considering. Her breasts were her one asset. They had always been something of a drawing card where men were concerned.

  Where Riley was concerned?

  A small smile played on her lips. Maybe it wouldn't hurt to find out.

  She debated spraying just a hint of cologne on, then decided he would definitely "get wind that something was up" if she did that. She considered applying a little blush, too, but a look in the mirror told her it wasn't necessary. Nature had provided plenty of that.

  Then, drawing a deep breath, she opened the door and went out, heading toward the corral where he and Jake were working with the young paint gelding.

  When he saw her coming, he left Jake and ambled toward her with a look of curiosity on his handsome face.

  Handsome, in fact, didn't begin to cover it. He was gorgeous. In a rugged, intensely masculine way, Riley Stratton had all the most appealing adjectives covered. He should have been in one of those commercials with rough-hewn cowboys doing what they did best.

  The very thought brought the blush even more intensely to Dori's cheeks. "Cool it," she muttered to herself, rubbing her suddenly damp palms against the sides of her jeans.

  Getting close to Riley was like getting close to a wild animal. He was wary and innocent at the same time.

  And she was very likely an idiot to be doing this.

  But, idiot or not, she wanted to know

  She had to know if something could come of it … if she would be allowed her dreams, too.

  Because she realized then—or maybe she'd realized for a while, but only managed to articulate then—that Riley was the man of her dreams.

  As a young woman, she'd thought it was Chris. At least, Chris had come the closest to embodying what she thought she wanted in a man. He was a man of the land, a man of vision, of determination, of dreams.

  But his dreams were different from her own.

  Then she'd thought they could mesh them, could overcome the differences, could become not just lovers for a time, but a man and woman who would go through life together.

  She'd seen in Portland how wrong she'd been. She'd seen then how she'd endowed Chris with attributes he not only didn't have, but didn't want. Whether she wanted it or not, she knew then that they were destined to go through life as partners in having given Jake life, and that was all.

  Their paths had converged for a time, and then had gone in very different directions.

  But Chris's path had brought her here.

  He had brought her to his ranch, to his brother—to a man much closer to her dream man. To a man who might—or might not—be "interested" in her.

  And if he was?

  No. First she had to find out. Then … then… Then they would "see."

  She just prayed she hadn't fallen in love once more with the wrong man.

  Riley had spent the day trying not to think about Dori in a bathing suit.

  It was like trying to spend a day telling yourself not to think about elephants. Harder in fact. Riley's mind did not naturally gravitate toward elephants. It seemed to make a beeline for Dori Malone every time he wasn't determinedly directing it somewhere else.

  "You could have gone with 'em," he reminded himself over and over.

  Oh, yeah, what a great idea that would have been, a small sarcastic inner voice commented.

  Fortunately he had a little more willpower than that. And a little more common sense. She was his nephew's mother, for crying out loud! The woman who had loved his brother. She was a guest in his house.

  "She lives in your house, you idiot," he muttered to himself.

  Exactly. All the more reason to steer clear of her.

  Which was precisely what he had been doing. What he would continue to do—just as soon as she showed him whatever marvel she intended to show him on the computer.

  He had to admit she made sense of the computer. All his computer problems had been solved since Dori had taken over.

  Now she intended to do "queries," she'd told him. "Look for significant trends. See what the data can tell us." It always told him he was in way over his head. "Riley!"

  He had been putting Jake and the young paint through their paces, but he turned when he heard her call. She was coming toward them, the light wind lifting and teasing her dark hair, tangling it. And when she reached them, his hand suddenly took on a life of its own and reached out to brush a strand of hair away from her cheek.

  "You should tie it down when it's windy like this," he told her gruffly, annoyed with her for letting it blow loose and tempt him.

  Instead of gathering it back and fishing a rubber band out of her pocket, where he knew damned well she always kept a couple, she shook her head, making her hair billow all the more. "Sometimes I get a headache if I do," she said.

  Riley grunted, then jammed his hands into his pockets. "Do what you want."

  She gave him one of her glorious smiles. "I will, thank you."

  She actually sounded as if his permission, grudging as it was, meant something to her. He scowled. "So, what did you want to show me on the computer?"

  "If you're ready now, come on. I've been tracking the birth weights of the calves for the past five years."

  That sounded useful, at least. Riley told Jake to get down and take the saddle off the paint and walk him to cool him down. Then he followed Dori up to the house.

  She hadn't waited, and she was probably a good ten paces ah
ead of him. It gave him ample opportunity to study the curve of her backside as he walked behind her. Why the hell couldn't women just walk? Why did they have to sway so damn much? She wasn't on board a ship, for heaven's sake!

  "I brought a chair in from the kitchen so we could both sit down," she told him, glancing his way as she led him through the bedroom toward the little alcove office.

  On his way past, he noticed that her damned filmy nightgown was lying up near the pillows of the bed. His bed!

  He averted her gaze—and saw her swimsuit drying on a towel in front of the open window.

  He shut his eyes.

  And stumbled over the corner of the rug.

  "Damn!" He caught himself just as she turned and caught his arm. They stood there, staring at each other. Riley's chest seemed to be heaving, as if he'd run a mile. Dori's, interestingly, did, too. And it seemed very … available … somehow.

  He coughed and jerked back. "'M all right. Just clumsy. Bull in a china shop, y'know?"

  Dori didn't say anything. She just smiled again. Then she went and sat down at the computer and patted the chair next to her, indicating that he should sit there.

  Riley sat. He shifted. He fidgeted. He tried to get a little more room in his jeans. Inconspicuously, of course.

  "Here's what I've done," Dori began.

  He tried to pay attention. Really, he did. She showed him a list of all the mamma cows in the herd, then a list of each cow's calves and their birth weights. Then she brought up a screen that showed which bulls had impregnated which cows and the weights of the calves that had resulted. It was all very logical, Riley was sure.

  Well, he would have been sure, if he hadn't been distracted.

  But how the hell could he not be distracted when she was sitting inches from him, raising her arm to point out this field and that weight, and he kept noticing how she, well, bobbed when she did so.

  And suddenly he realized why. She wasn't wearing a bra.

  He almost said the words out loud. Then he almost gasped for air realizing what her reaction would have been if he had! Cripes!

  "It is pretty amazing, isn't it?" Dori said.

  "What?" He stared at her, dumbstruck.

  "It's so obvious when you just look," she went on blithely.

  His jaw must be dragging on the ground.

  "Clear as anything, this bull is not doing the job." Her arm came up again and she stabbed a finger at the screen. Her breasts jiggled. Riley swallowed.

  "So then I began to think," she said. And damned if she didn't start comparing the relative virility of the bulls.

  His mind reeled. His body had other things to do.

  "He wasn't one of our bulls," she said, "and I was curious if other ranchers had recognized the same thing, so I called Robert Tanner and—"

  "You did what?"

  She'd talked to Tanner about … about that?

  She looked worried. "Is that a breach of rancher etiquette?"

  Riley shut his eyes. He prayed for strength, for fortitude, for the earth to open up and swallow him whole. Any—hell, all of the above!

  "Riley? Did I … do something … wrong?"

  He opened his eyes. Hers were scant inches away. When she blinked, he could almost count her individual lashes. He could count her freckles. He could kiss her mouth.

  No! No, he couldn't do that. Not if he wanted to preserve his sanity.

  "Did I, Riley?" she persisted. She wetted her lips.

  Riley began to think that sanity was highly overrated. He shook his head.

  "Riley?" Her brow furrowed. "Are you … all right?" She leaned closer.

  Wrong way, babe. Wrong way, he wanted to tell her. Unfortunately he wasn't capable of words or, apparently, rational behavior.

  His mouth did what his mind told him was a very bad thing indeed. It closed the space between them and touched hers.

  And his mouth wasn't alone in its betrayal. His arms went around her, pulled her off her chair and onto his lap, needing to get her closer, to feel the warm weight of her body as well as the soft touch of her lips.

  And he got it—he got it all. The warmth, the weight, the softness.

  She seemed to want it as much as he did. Her hands traced the line of his shoulders, then one cupped the back of his neck and the other played in his hair. And her lips—they moved, too, and opened under his. Her tongue touched his. A tremor ran through him as the heat of need, long denied, demanded release.

  The kiss was long and sweet and reminded Riley of things he had been missing for years—like the sweet taste of a woman's lips beneath his, the soft press of her breasts against his chest, the way her bottom curved to fit neatly against the hardness of him. It was heady, intoxicating. It reminded him of the way he felt when he'd kissed Tricia.

  Tricia…

  The door banged, Jake's footsteps pounded down the hall. "Mom! Uncle Riley!"

  Dori yanked herself back, off Riley's lap, out of his arms, onto her own chair. She shuddered and gulped air. Her face was blazing.

  Riley reckoned his was, too.

  "Mom!"

  "In … here, dear," Dori's voice cracked a little. She cleared her throat. "I was just talking to Uncle Riley about … about a bull."

  Jake skidded to a stop in the doorway. "Neat." He looked from one of them to the other, his eyes narrowing for a just a second. Then, whatever he thought, he seemed to recall what he'd come for. "Come look," he demanded. "I just saw a coyote!"

  Yes, it would be coyote, Riley thought.

  Coyote was the trickster. Befuddling men's minds. Shifting shape and bending reality.

  Reality was that he was a hardened bachelor—in more ways than one—and she was a woman who had been way too long without a man.

  He dragged in a harsh breath and looked at Dori.

  He knew it was his turn to apologize. But he also knew that, mistake or not, just this one time he wasn't really sorry at all.

  * * *

  Eight

  « ^ »

  They didn't see the coyote.

  Riley wasn't surprised. Coyote was a tease, a tempter. He would have appreciated the discomfort Riley endured that night.

  Coyote would have said it served him right for kissing a woman he had no business kissing. Or he would have, if coyote was given to righteousness. Riley wasn't sure about that.

  He was sure he'd made a damned fool of himself where Dori was concerned.

  Even if he wasn't sorry about the kiss, he was sorry that it was going to complicate their lives.

  Now she'd think he was going to jump her bones every time he looked her way. She'd think he would try to take advantage of her. She'd think he wanted her!

  Well, he did. But only physically. Only because she was there.

  He didn't love her.

  He was like his father, a one-woman man. And that woman was Tricia.

  He stayed away from Dori as much as he could for the rest of the week. He didn't want her to get the wrong idea. He didn't want to take advantage. Much.

  But he couldn't help lying awake at night remembering the taste of her lips, the warmth of her body, the fullness of her breasts. He didn't get much sleep thinking about them. Thinking about her.

  She had been Chris's lover. He told himself that over and over. She had doubtless reacted that way with Chris, too. Maybe she was like that with all the guys. It wouldn't surprise him.

  Probably she would be all over the guys at the barbecue on Saturday.

  He'd have to tell her it wasn't appropriate, tell her that Wyoming men didn't appreciate their women snuggling up to other women's husbands. Because that was who was going to be there—married men. Tanner and his brothers. Sam Gallagher. Both the Walkers. Mose from the welding shop. Jeff Cannon.

  There might be one or two single fellows there, too, but she'd have to learn that it wasn't right to come on to them, either. It would be a reflection on Jake.

  More, it would be a reflection on him.

  Everybody would think h
e had brought a hussy into the neighborhood.

  Yeah, he'd have to mention it to her.

  But he couldn't seem to figure out when.

  He was interested.

  At least his body was. Dori wasn't as sure about his mind. Assuming that he had one. Men's minds had always been something of a mystery to her. Starting with her incomprehensible father, who seemed not to have anything other than ledger sheets and purchase orders on which to base his decisions, and moving on to her brother, Deke, whose responses were generally gut emotion, to Chris, who had been so bloody single-minded in pursuit of his dream, men had often seemed an alien—albeit occasionally intriguing—species.

  Riley was more intriguing than most.

  The kiss he'd given her intrigued the heck out of her. It was so … so … out of character. For as long as they'd been living here, he had appeared cool and practical and collected—a quiet, shy almost, but very competent cowboy. Determined to within an inch of his life. Honorable past that. But ultimately he'd seemed the epitome of balanced, measured, steady.

  That kiss was anything but. It was not the kiss of a measured man. It spoke of passion and desire and deep, intense involvement. It was the sort of kiss one might associate with volcanic explosions.

  But volcanoes didn't explode like that without a lot of internal seething having gone on underground first. It made her wonder just how long Riley had been smoldering.

  And why.

  She wished she dared ask.

  But for all his passion, Riley was still quiet, still circumspect. Now—since the kiss—more than ever. He actually seemed to be avoiding her, watching her warily from afar, afraid to get close.

  No, she couldn't ask Riley—and she didn't dare ask anyone else.

  Perhaps she would hear something at the Tanners' barbecue. She was looking forward to that. She was counting on it being a way to get to know her neighbors and to find her place in the community. But she was also crossing her fingers that seeing Riley with these people who knew him so well would help her understand him.

  She tried to get him to talk about them beforehand. "They'll be strangers," she'd said on Friday night. "I need you to help me know who's who."