After she parked, Frankie cut the engine and snapped her keys out of the ignition. A second or two later, she had her door open, and the warm south Texas breeze was whirling her shoulder-length red curls about her head like a mop. Not that she cared as she jumped lightly to the ground. She didn’t care about her hairdo any more than she cared for makeup, clothes or boys—all the things Aunt Susie was always telling her a normal pretty, twenty-year-old girl should be thinking about.
Boys! Or rather men! Frankie got all shivery and shy at the thought of them.
More than anything she wished Aunt Susie would forget that Vince Randal, a young vice president with Mission Creek First Federal Bank and one of the town’s most eligible bachelors, had started calling her.
Frankie had learned her lesson where men were concerned. “I’m not like her,” she said aloud. And she wasn’t referring to her aunt. She was thinking about her real mother.
An involuntary clutch of fear made her tremble as she remembered a grainy voice murmuring in the dark as a sinful mouth slid between her breasts. “There’s nothing to be so afraid of, darlin’….”
She drew a swift breath and stopped the memory before it could take hold.
I’m not like her.
Most ranchers did their errands on Saturdays. Still, Main Street was way more congested than usual. Everybody seemed to be fighting for parking places. From the street, two warring horns blared.
“That’s my space, buddy!”
Ignoring the man, a cowboy in a big, rusted red truck that was dangerously familiar swerved faster than Frankie could blink—straight at her own pickup. Before she could jump out of the way, huge black tires spewed sharp bits of gravel against her scuffed boots. Hot blasts of engine air enveloped her. Not that the reckless driver in his Stetson shooting like a rocket into the parking space right beside hers, much cared.
“Hey!” she shouted. “Watch where you’re going, cowboy.”
The other driver, who’d lost out, jabbed a finger at the sky. Then he burned rubber as he roared away.
Quickly, she slammed her door and scurried up to the sidewalk.
Not that there was any need now. Mr. Macho had parked with deft precision and had left her plenty of space.
The cowboy got out slowly, uncoiling each long denim-clad leg one at a time. In the next instant his feral eyes climbed her skintight jeans, and she began to shiver. She didn’t have to look at him to know his gaze lingered on her shapely thighs before burning higher to rake her T-shirt where it clung to her small, pointed breasts. She wasn’t wearing a bra. She always told herself she didn’t have enough up there to really need one.
Why hadn’t she worn a bra?
This man with the whiskey-gold eyes made her feel stark naked and had her nipples rock hard.
“Matt?” On a shudder, she sucked in a hot, mortified little breath.
The sun was behind his broad shoulders and tall, wiry frame, so she couldn’t see him all that well. He touched his hat with a tense brown fingertip, acknowledging her. She sensed that his dark lean face was as harsh and rigid as it always was whenever they chanced to meet. Even so, she could feel the heat from his wicked gold eyes lick her like flames, as she remembered…
“I’m not done with you. Not by a long shot….”
“What if I’m done with you…?”
Her cheeks reddened. He’d gone as white as if she’d punched him in the gut when she’d said that. Then his carved face, with those incredible knife-edged cheekbones hardened.
“You think you’re too good for a Dixon, don’t you? ’Cause I’m poor? ’Cause my daddy was a drunk? ’Cause my ranch wouldn’t even be a good-size pasture to your uncle? You Lassiters think you’re kings and queens of the county, don’t you?”
“My last name is Moore, remember?”
She’d been slipping out of his arms, buttoning her blouse, and then running from him, stumbling in her panic to escape.
“I’m not what your aunt would call a good catch, am I?”
“I’m not trying to catch anybody,” she’d yelled over her shoulder, stung.
He’d started his truck, driving up alongside her. “Hey, get in. I’ll drive you home.” When she’d kept walking, he’d braked, jumped out in front of her and held up his hands in mock surrender. “Hey…hey…. Sorry about the temper tantrum. Hey, I’m not some sex maniac either. It’s two miles to your uncle’s, for God’s sake. Maybe BoBo Dixon was my daddy, but I won’t touch you ever again. I swear it.” He’d hesitated. “Francesca, please just get in.”
He’d opened the door for her. She’d stopped walking, still not sure she could trust him. Then he’d smiled and said please.
They’d driven in tense silence to her ranch, but at the gate, he’d said in a low, low tone that had hurt somehow, “I won’t even talk to you, Frankie. Not unless you start it up. Understand? But if you do, you be careful, darlin’. ’Cause like I said, I’m not near done with you.”
What had he meant? That sex was like an appetite? That a girl wasn’t special to him? That she was just like a meal in a life of many meals? That when he had gobbled his fill of one, he went on to the next?
Back on Main Street, Frankie chewed her lip and tried not to look at him. Matt took off his Stetson and awkwardly finger-combed his unruly golden hair. Maybe he felt bad, too. Maybe he was remembering that awful night, the things they’d done, the things they’d said. His dark face certainly had a reddish cast to it.
Matt Dixon. Why did his intense amber eyes burn her skin and make every nerve in her body tingle? His large hands fisted in his pockets. His wide shoulders were sort of hunched as if he felt uneasy around her, too.
Why did she still feel so mixed up about him? Why couldn’t she forget him? She’d spent that awful year at Vanderbilt trying to.
“What are you doing in town today?” he demanded, breaking into her thoughts.
She lifted her pert nose and stared down the length of it because once he’d told her not to look down her nose at him like he was a nobody and she was a queen. “I’m here to get fitted for my debutante gown.”
His insolent, long-lashed eyes flicked to the sign above Mission Creek Creations. “Well, now that figures. Rich girl like you. You’ve got to bait your hook to catch yourself a rich guy. Somebody like Vince Randal, maybe?”
“I’m not out to catch anybody, Dixon.”
“Not me, anyway. You made that clear.”
“Not you,” she agreed.
His nostrils flared above his perfectly carved mouth.
Oh, the things that mouth knew how to do. She shivered. “Mind your own business, Matt Dixon.”
“You ever wonder why you’re still so mad at me, Francesca?”
“I could ask you the same question.”
“But I know the answer. And so do you.”
Her toes actually curled up inside her boots.
“How come you’re talking to me today? And looking at me like that?”
“Like what?”
“Trying to start something—darlin’?” he whispered, luring her somehow with the pleasant rumble of husky sound.
In the end it wasn’t the teasing innuendo in his deep baritone that sent her skittering into the dress shop for safety. It was the trill of excitement that coursed through her.
His harsh laughter boomed behind her.
She’d had a huge crush on him all through high school. Maybe because he was older and a loner and forbidden. Maybe because somehow because of her own mother, she’d understood about his no-good daddy and his alienation.
Maybe she was a rich girl, at least in his eyes. But her parents hadn’t cared about her any more than his daddy had cared about him. They’d run off and left her with Aunt Susie, Uncle Wayne and Grandma Ellie, hadn’t they?
What kind of parents did that? Or was it her? What was wrong with her? How come they didn’t want her?
Matt Dixon was definitely not somebody her Aunt Susie approved of. She’d made that plain. He was five yea
rs older than she was and poor to boot. He came from a bad bunch, who were wild and no good, she said. That was another reason, Frankie, who’d been in one of her rebellious phases, had snuck out to meet him.
The things she’d let him do still shamed her.
Even as they still secretly thrilled her when she lay in bed sometimes, thinking about him. She was as bad as he was. Or maybe he just brought out the badness in her. Always, always he made her think about her real mother. Made her wonder…
No.
Frankie had to stay away from him.
For no reason at all, no sooner had she shut the front door, than she peeked out the shop window to see what he was up to.
He was leaning against the passenger side of his truck talking to a boy that looked about fourteen. Funny, that she hadn’t even noticed he had a kid with him. Funny, how the only person on the busy street who held her attention was that ogre, Matt Dixon.
“So, the last debutante has finally showed up,” said a sweet voice right behind her. “What’s so interesting out there anyway?”
Frankie jumped as if she’d been caught with her hand in the cookie jar.
“Mary!”
Matt was still shaking a little from the encounter with the one young lady he always worked hard to avoid. Nevertheless, he shouldered his way past a knot of men just inside Luke Finnel’s hardware store with a false air of nonchalance.
Frankie was so damned pretty. Even if she was a tomboy, who didn’t dress right or ever do her hair. She was sexy as hell in those tight jeans and that T-shirt. And her hair—all those wild undisciplined red curls that made her look like she’d just climbed out of a man’s bed. Even her small breasts were voluptuous.
Why couldn’t she ever wear a bra? For him she personified sensuality. He knew just how good she’d be if he ever got her in bed.
She took after her mother. Princess Heather.
Damn Francesca Moore and her blue blood. She didn’t have to do one damn thing to get him hard and hot. He was mad as hell about it, too.
He headed blindly down an aisle. Why had he come inside, anyway? Where the hell was his list? He jabbed a hand in his shirt pocket. No list!
Why the hell couldn’t he stop thinking about that sexy brat? And what possible use did he have for that other brat out in his truck, Lee. How the hell had he let Sheriff Jordan saddle him with a hellion for an entire week?
Not an hour ago, the sheriff had cornered him. “There’s a new community service program. Small ranchers can get cowboys free….”
That had gotten Matt’s attention. Until he’d figured out the sheriff was hell-bent on emptying his jail. Still, he’d let himself be strong-armed into meeting Lee, who hadn’t even looked up when he’d said hi.
“No way,” Matt had told Jordan out of the kid’s earshot.
“It’s either your ranch or jail.”
“I’ve got enough problems of my own.”
“Lee’s fourteen. I don’t have anywhere else to put him. He serves time. Or he does community service. Your choice. Besides, it’s no secret, you could use the help.”
“I don’t need anybody’s help.”
“Like you said, you’ve got problems.”
Somehow the sheriff had sweet-talked him into it.
“Hey, Dixon,” said a hard, familiar voice behind him. “You’re just the man I need to speak to.”
“Vince—”
Matt’s palms got sweaty and his heart raced faster. Vince Randal was his banker.
“About your daddy’s old loans—”
‘Not here,” Matt whispered.
Vince lowered his voice, too. “You haven’t answered my letters, Dixon.”
“Haven’t had time to go through the mail.”
“Or my calls.”
Matt jammed his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his boot heels. “Haven’t had time to check my machine, either.”
They stared at each other, each man pushing at the other with hard eyes.
“Call me. Monday. We need to talk,” Vince said, relenting a little.
Matt nodded and turned away.
“Dixon, you friends with the Moore girl?” Vince called after him.
“I know her.”
“Frankie’s got the same bad habit you do. She doesn’t return my calls either.”
“Is that right?” Matt replied mildly.
“Did she ask you to be her escort?”
“What?”
Vince sighed with visible relief.
So, she was playing hard to get, trying to catch herself a rich one this time around. She’d damned sure hooked him with that game.
Matt had done everything he could think of to forget her, but she still crawled into his dreams, even when he was damn near dead with exhaustion. Just the sight of her on the sidewalk today had lit a raw fuse.
He wasn’t rich enough. Or good enough. If he dated her openly, everybody would say he was after her money.
Maybe he was poor. Maybe he owed money on every cow, fence post and acre. But he was his own man, and he planned to stay that way.
What he’d better do was find another woman—fast.
Maybe tonight he’d go to the Saddlebag Bar. He’d pick up a girl and take her home. He’d forget about Frankie—once and for all.
Chapter 2
The white satin ball gown ballooned into the mirrored fitting room and crammed Mary and Frankie together into one tiny corner.
Mary was on her hands and knees behind Frankie, struggling with the hooks of Frankie’s black lace merry widow.
“Ouch!” Mary said, shaking a bruised finger. “I hooked myself! Could you please quit squirming and just stand still.”
Mary sucked her finger and then pushed her thick glasses higher up her nose.
“But it’s so itchy.” Frankie stuck out her tongue and jumped up and down. On an impulse she plucked a yellow and a red rose out of the vase on the low table and stuck them between her teeth.
“Frankie!” Mary plucked the roses out of her mouth and jabbed them back in the vase. “You’re acting like a great big baby. Margaret left me in charge. If I handle you, she’ll be so proud.”
“You mean Witch McKenzie. So, even she can’t stand her own little shop of horrors any more than I can.”
The silver bells on Mrs. McKenzie’s front door tinkled a warning.
“Shhh,” Mary whispered. “Customers! Behave.”
“What is this awful torture device anyway? It’s way worse than a bra. It sucks in at the waist so tight, I can barely breathe.” Frankie began flipping the cups of the black, boned corset contraption up and down, giggling rebelliously as she revealed her rosy tipped breasts and then covered them up again. “Now you see them. Now you don’t. Not that I’ve got all that much to strut.”
“Quit. They’ll hear you!”
“I don’t even have boobs. See.” Frankie resumed flipping the black merry widow up and down again.
You’ve got big nipples. He’d said that.
Frankie swallowed at the hard lump in her throat. Just the thought of him made her stay still through the rest of the fitting, her only comment being that the voluminous white dress made her look like a redheaded marshmallow.
“You look like a princess,” Mary said.
Frankie gasped. “You know better than to ever ever call me that.”
“Sorry.”
Only when Frankie was zipping herself back into her jeans and threading her belt through the belt loops, did both girls smile and relax again.
“See, that wasn’t so bad,” Mary said.
“It was torture. Sheer torture. Against all my principles. And the ball will be even worse. I can’t wait ’til it’s all over. Aunt Susie gave me this awful list of stuff I have to do. I’ve been putting it all off, hoping it would go away. But she really got on my case this morning, so I’m going to try to get everything done I can today. Then I’ll just put this whole nightmare out of my mind.”
“Until the ball,” Mary said.<
br />
Frankie pulled out her list. “You know how every deb has to participate in some type of community service for twenty hours—”
“Laura is making cheesecakes for her church’s cake sale.”
“Well, Aunt Susie has it in her head that it would be good for me to work in the gift shop she runs for the hospital. She wants me to put on lipstick and do something ladylike for a change. She actually wants me to sell flowers and candy.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“You know how Vince’s mother is there, like, all the time—”
“So—”
“Well, Vince has been calling me.”
“Vince? You and Vince?”
“No! That’s what I’m trying to tell you! But Aunt Susie wants me to date him. She wants me to get to know Mrs. Randal better. And since Vince usually drives his mother to the hospital, I’d probably have to see him and talk to him.”
“Vince is so cute.”
“That’s what Aunt Susie says. So, she should date him. Or maybe you—”
Mary blushed. “She’s married to your Uncle Wayne.”
“Which means she should let me lead my own life. She wants me inside the house, cooking and sewing and primping. Or working in a gift shop…selling flowers, chasing a man she thinks is a good catch. I want to be outside…or in the barn with Jez and the other animals.”
“She only wants what’s best for you.”
“What she thinks is best. She and I are nothing alike. Everything Uncle Wayne and I love, she hates.”
“She loves both of you.”
“Yes. To distraction. She’s always wanting Uncle Wayne to take her to a party just when he needs to be trapping cows or something else that’s vital. She has no understanding of ranch work.”
Mary picked up Frankie’s list. “Oh! Look! She didn’t note even half the stuff Laura had on her list that counts for community service.”
“Just the awful ladylike things she wants me to do.”
“Did you know that working on small ranches in Lone Star County qualifies as community service this year?”
“What?”
“There’s this cool new ranch program you can sign up for at the library.”
Lone Star Country Club: The Debutantes Page 19