“Charlotte was a bad choice.” He stood watching her unload the drawer. “I shouldn’t have invited her out here. But I figured I should start somewhere.”
Despair washed over her. He’d never considered his next-door neighbor. Matty had never even crossed his mind. She’d kidded herself that he wasn’t ready yet, and that’s why he’d never approached her. But he was ready. She pulled the last sweater from the drawer to discover a box of condoms underneath. Boy, was he ready.
“Oh. Uh, I forgot I put those down there.”
She plopped the box on top of the stack of clothes and stood. “As I said, you’re a grown man. Where do you want this stuff?”
He looked very uncomfortable. “On the chair over by the window is fine.”
“Okay.” She turned and carried the clothes and the offending box to the ladder-backed chair by the window.
He followed her over there. “Listen, Matty, I know what this seems like, with me holding a baby who could be mine, and you finding solid evidence of what was likely to happen here tonight with Charlotte, but you’re getting the wrong picture. I’m not—”
“Interested in sex?” She set the clothes down and the box slid to the floor. She picked it up and placed it carefully on top of the pile. She even aligned it so it was straight.
“Of course I’m interested in sex.”
Just not with me. She didn’t look at him. The muted light in the bedroom, the rumpled sheets and the sound of his voice was getting to her. If Elizabeth hadn’t been there, she would have made a complete fool of herself.
“The truth is, I haven’t had sex since Barbara left, with the possible exception of that night in Aspen, which I can’t even remember. So, in a way, that doesn’t even count.”
“Don’t feel obliged to explain yourself to me, Sebastian.” She went back to the dresser. If she kept moving, she might avoid letting him know that she was interested in sex with him, anytime, anyplace. She reached for the drawer and started wrestling it loose.
“Do you need help with that?”
“Nope.” She kept tugging, but the dresser was old and the drawers sometimes stuck.
“Here, you take the baby and let me do that.”
“Never mind. I’ve got it.” The last thing she needed was to get cozy with him while they exchanged the baby. Teeth clenched, she gave a mighty pull. The drawer came out and she landed hard on her butt on the wooden floor.
“Now, see that? You probably bruised yourself, maybe even cracked something.”
“I’m fine.” Still holding the drawer, she got to her feet, determined not to wince. “Are the extra blankets still in the hall closet?”
“Yes, they are.” He followed her into the hall. “You know, Matty, you are the most stubborn, independent female I’ve ever run across.”
“I doubt that.” Matty thought of Barbara, who had been stubborn in her own way. She’d hated ranch work and had simply stopped doing it.
“You are completely stubborn.” Sebastian’s tone was not complimentary. “You would rather risk hurting yourself than ask for help, wouldn’t you?”
She turned from the closet, a soft blanket clutched against her chest. Then she gazed at him as the accusation shot home, along with a burst of insight.
He was absolutely right. She was terrible at asking for anything. And the way he put it, she could understand why he’d never considered rolling with her over that unmade bed. She was an idiot for not figuring it out earlier. He wasn’t attracted to her because she was too self-sufficient. And she didn’t think she could change that for anyone, not even Sebastian.
5
MATTY PUT THE blanket-padded drawer in the middle of Sebastian’s bed, and by some miracle he managed to shovel Elizabeth into it without waking her. Then they had to decide where to put the drawer.
“In the guest room, where you’ll be, is the logical place.” He grasped the sides of the drawer and started to lift it from the bed.
Matty laid a restraining hand on his arm. “Wrong. This isn’t a gender-based decision. I’m only the helper, remember? Jessica left her kid with you, not me. The drawer goes in your room. You can put it on the floor by the bed.” She pointed to a spot on the braided rug.
Sebastian eyed the spot and rubbed the back of his neck. “Except I won’t be in here to watch her. I have to go fetch Sadie and some clothes for you.”
She gaped at him. “Why on earth would you be the one to do that? I’ll go get Sadie and my clothes. In fact, I might as well leave right now.”
His agitation grew. “I think I should go. You can stay here with her while I run over and get your stuff.”
“That’s plain silly.”
He sighed. Matty’s logic was winning the argument. “Okay, it’s silly. But…the truth is I don’t feel right being alone with her yet.”
“She’ll probably sleep the whole time.” Matty gazed at him. “It’ll be good practice for you. You have to get used to taking care of this kid, eventually, Sebastian. I’ll only be gone a little while. Thirty minutes, tops. You can handle it.” She started out of the room.
He grabbed her arm. “Wait.”
She turned, her lips parted as if in protest.
For a split second he wondered what would happen if he pulled her close and kissed that wide, generous mouth of hers. He’d been wanting to do it ever since she arrived tonight. That would take her mind off leaving him in the lurch. But she’d probably think he was completely crazy, not to mention sex-starved, so sex-starved he’d hit on his neighbor and best friend.
So he released her arm. “Let me run over to your place. I’ll be glad to try staying alone with Elizabeth tomorrow, but after going through hell alone tonight while she lay there and screamed, I’m feeling kinda raw. I don’t think I could face anymore of that right now.”
“So what if I’m here alone and she screams?”
“It wouldn’t scare you the way it did me.”
She surveyed him quietly for a long moment. “Bring her out in the living room, then, and I’ll stay here. We’ll move her into your room when we go to bed.”
He wasn’t comfortable with that idea, either, but at least he was temporarily off the hook. “I appreciate it more than you know.” He picked up the drawer and followed her down the hall.
“I’ll make a list of what to bring over for tonight. The rest we can worry about tomorrow when we go feed the horses.”
“Okay. Should I put Elizabeth by the rocking chair?”
“That’s fine.” She paused. “You know, I always wondered where that chair came from. It doesn’t look like something Barbara would choose.”
“It was my grandmother’s, and I remembered it from when I was a kid. When she died, I asked for it.” He’d had some idea Barbara would like it, but she hadn’t taken to the chair or the idea of rocking babies, for that matter.
“It’s a great chair,” Matty said. “Well, I’d better go make that list for you.”
As Matty went into the kitchen in search of paper and pencil, Sebastian gazed after her, touched that she liked the rocker. Once again he had the urge to draw her into his arms. Must be gratitude working on him.
Then again maybe not. Maybe he was finally seeing what a fine woman Matty was. He set the drawer next to the rocker and sat down. He leaned his head against the back and rocked slowly, thinking about the way he was reacting to Matty, compared to the way he’d reacted to Charlotte.
Although Charlotte was attractive and he’d been turned on, the evening had felt more like an exercise than the joyous occasion it should have been. Still, Charlotte had done him a favor by getting his mind running on that track again. Now that it was, he saw Matty in a whole new light.
But he hadn’t the foggiest idea what to do about it, if he did anything at all. First off, he didn’t know how a guy made a move on a no-nonsense woman like Matty. She wasn’t the candlelight, wine and roses type, and all his old techniques and lines seemed silly when applied to her. Besides, if he went so far as
to kiss her, what then? He was risking a lot. They needed each other as neighbors and friends, and if he screwed that up so they felt awkward with each other, they’d both lose out.
“I think that should do it.” She came into the living room with the piece of scratch paper she’d found in the kitchen.
He stood and walked over to take her list. It was short, which didn’t surprise him. Matty didn’t fuss with herself, which might be one of the reasons he’d never thought of her in sexual terms. She didn’t do anything to call attention to her womanly charms. But somehow the baby had done that for her, and now he couldn’t seem to think of anything but her womanly charms.
She’d noted where everything was that he needed to pick up, but he probably could have found it, anyway. They were both familiar with each other’s homes and living habits.
“Want a book?” he asked. She always took at least one on roundup and read by the light of the fire before going to sleep. She’d sit on a stump, her blanket around her shoulders and her golden hair catching the light from the fire as she sat totally absorbed in some fictional world. He’d liked watching her while he pretended to be asleep. He’d never realized how much he treasured that mental picture of Matty reading by the campfire.
“I doubt I’ll need it tonight,” she said. “But sure, just in case insomnia strikes. The one I’m reading is on my bedside table.”
“Who did you have the date with?”
She looked confused.
“The date,” he reminded her. “I asked if you’d had a date since Butch died, and you said you’d had one. I was wondering, although he never said anything, if you dated Travis.”
Matty grinned. “No. I may be the only woman in the valley Travis hasn’t dated, but the truth is, there’s no chemistry between us. We’ve even talked about it. He said that was one of the main reasons he decided to take the head wrangler job at the Leaning L. Neither of us would be tempted to do something stupid and louse up a good working relationship.”
“Makes sense.” Sebastian was relieved. Travis was a good friend, and he’d rather not have a good friend dating Matty. “So who was it?”
She hesitated only a moment before giving a little shrug. “I went to the movies with Cyrus from the feed store.”
“Cyrus?” Heated indignation rushed through him at the thought of that young stud going out with Matty. “Isn’t that robbing the cradle? He can’t be a day over twenty-three.”
A dangerous light came into her eyes. “He’s twenty-seven, and you’d better watch yourself. Charlotte Crabtree just turned thirty, and I’ll bet you didn’t even consider the difference in your ages when you asked her out.”
Damn. He’d been caught with his hand in the sexist cookie jar again. He cleared his throat. “Sorry. You’re right. So, did you and Cyrus…get along?”
“Not really.”
He was delighted to hear it. “Why not?”
“He had some idea that a widow would tumble into bed with the first man who asked, out of pure gratitude. He wasn’t the least bit subtle about it, either. Halfway through the movie he suggested we leave and go back to his place so he could give me some relief from my frustration. I told him I’d rather see the end of the movie.”
Sebastian smiled. Poor Cyrus, shot down by the Widow Lang. He loved it. “Must have been a good movie.”
“Not very.”
“Oh.” Grinning wider, he glanced at the list again. “Well, I’d better get on over to your place, so I don’t waste any more of the time Elizabeth’s conked out. I’ll be back as soon as I can make it. Feel free to help yourself to anything if you want a snack or something to drink.”
“I always do.”
“Yeah, that’s the nice thing about being neighbors all these years.” He backed toward the kitchen. “We’re right at home in either house.” And he wanted to keep it that way, which meant he’d better really know what he was doing if he decided to change things between them.
On his way to the back door, he glanced over at Fleafarm gazing expectantly at him from under the dining table. “Stay there, girl. Watch out for Matty and Elizabeth.”
Fleafarm thumped her tail and put her head on her paws.
Sebastian grabbed his sheepskin coat and Stetson and headed out into the cold, dry air of a Colorado night.
Matty would have liked her book now instead of later. She needed to get her mind off the warmth of Sebastian’s hand on her arm, the look in his eyes when he’d stopped her from leaving the bedroom. She’d probably misinterpreted that look, but for a few seconds she’d thought he wanted to kiss her.
Well, he hadn’t kissed her, so that probably meant she’d been wrong.
After glancing at Elizabeth to make sure she still slept, Matty wandered into the kitchen. She wasn’t hungry or thirsty, but she needed something to do. But damned if she’d wash Sebastian and Charlotte’s dinner dishes.
She prowled back into the living room and considered whether to build up the fire. Probably not. They’d all be going to bed soon.
To bed. She’d spent the night with Sebastian during roundup, but that had been in a crowd, not much intimacy involved. This didn’t feel like roundup. And something about Sebastian was different tonight. Maybe it was second-hand desire courtesy of Charlotte.
Now that was enough to keep Matty riled for a good long while. She wasn’t apt to do something stupid if she remembered that Sebastian was probably only giving off sexual vibrations that were leftover from Charlotte’s visit. Unfortunately, that made perfect sense. If Sebastian had ever been interested in her body, he would have demonstrated his interest before tonight. It was no coincidence that his heated looks came a couple of hours after he’d been wrestling on the couch with Charlotte.
Sebastian wasn’t the only one who was a bundle of frustrated hormones, Matty thought. Cyrus from the feed store had been partly right. She longed for a sexual relationship, but she was extremely picky about the person she had it with. In fact, she’d only considered one candidate, the man who was currently going over to pick up her undies. She wished she had some sexy ones.
With a sigh she turned toward the two cardboard boxes filled with Elizabeth’s supplies. Maybe taking inventory and putting some of the items away would take her mind off that killer grin of Sebastian’s when he’d discovered she hadn’t wanted Cyrus’s attentions. Male arrogance in all its glory. Sexy as hell. At that moment he’d been thinking that he could convince her to leave halfway through a movie. She could see it in his face. She couldn’t let him know that with Sebastian, the pretense of going to a movie at all would be unnecessary.
Kneeling by the first box, Matty started pulling out terry sleepers, wash cloths and two hooded towels. At least the sleepers were all the same size, Matty noticed. Sleepers in graduated sizes would have been an alarming signal. But apparently Jessica expected to be back before the baby outgrew what was in the box.
Matty still couldn’t imagine what would prompt a woman to leave her baby like this. Sebastian seemed to think Jessica was a wonderful person, but on the subject of women, he could be dense, as evidenced by his interest in Charlotte Crabtree of the manicured nails and salon-styled hair. Anyone with half a brain could see that Charlotte would never fit in with Sebastian’s way of life. And Barbara had definitely been a bad choice.
Or maybe not. Both women had one thing that Matty didn’t. They were both ultra-feminine, taking great pains to pamper themselves. On some level that must have appealed to Sebastian. They weren’t common-sense women, either, which probably made him feel macho.
Taking a stack of sleepers, Matty stood and carried them into Sebastian’s bedroom. Getting Elizabeth’s clothes in there would go a long way to establishing where the baby would stay. Matty wasn’t planning to be a glorified nanny, not even for Sebastian.
As she was laying the sleepers on top of the dresser, the phone rang. It made her jump and her heart pound faster until she realized it was probably Sebastian calling to ask about something on her list. Still
, late-night phone calls gave her the creeps. She’d gotten the phone call about Butch’s plane crash late at night.
She set down the sleepers and walked to the bedside table to pick up the receiver. “Forget something?”
“Uh, who is this?”
A female voice. God, did Sebastian have women stashed everywhere? If so, Matty decided it was time to record her own presence in his life. “I’m Matty Lang. Who are you?”
“Oh, Matty. Sebastian’s neighbor. This is Jessica.”
Matty almost dropped the receiver. “Where the hell are you? And what do you mean, leaving—”
“Matty, I had to.” Her voice quivered. “It’s killing me. Is she okay?”
“For now. But she needs you. Come back. I’m sure the problems can be worked out if you’ll just—”
Click.
“Wait! Don’t hang up!” Matty jiggled the disconnect button. “No! Come back on this line, dammit! I want to know if you…” The dial tone buzzed in her ear. “…if you slept with Sebastian,” she finished softly. Then she replaced the receiver and stood staring at the rumpled sheets of his bed.
Sebastian might be dense about women, but he was the most honorable man Matty had ever met. She didn’t believe that he was in love with Jessica, but if he’d fathered that baby, love wouldn’t figure into it. He’d want to marry the mother of his baby. And Matty would lose him forever.
ON THE DRIVE over to Matty’s, Sebastian couldn’t stop thinking about her date with Cyrus. So she’d had a chance to go to bed with a virile young guy like Cyrus and had turned him down. Sebastian was immensely pleased that she’d done that, but he wondered if that only made the point that she wasn’t very highly-sexed in the first place.
His first thought, and it was a dangerous one, was to accept that unspoken challenge. Where Cyrus had failed, Sebastian figured he could have convinced Matty to leave that movie, or whatever activity they were engaged in together. But what if he wasn’t able to? What if she really wasn’t very interested in sex?
The Colorado Kid Page 6