“Sounds good to me,” she said. “But after this day I might want a long bubble bath. I probably won’t have time to do much in the way of beautification tomorrow.”
Lucas looked up from the recliner. “What’s tomorrow?”
“Your Angus Association party.”
“Well, shit! I promised to take you shopping again for a pretty dress. I’m sorry, Natalie. We should’ve done that this evening.”
“No need to apologize. I’ll wear something in my closet.” She could hardly keep the excitement of the surprise out of her voice.
“Well, sweet cheeks, you could wear that nightshirt you had on last night and look better than anyone else there,” he said.
“Okay, okay, you can call me darlin’. Sweet cheeks sounds so…” She couldn’t find the right word.
“Redneck?”
“That would be high class compared to what I was thinking. I’m taking this boy to the bathtub and then it’s my turn,” she said.
“Take as long as you want in the bathroom. Me and Josh will be fine, but you will always be sweet cheeks to me.” He yawned.
Josh screamed like she was beating him the whole bath. He kicked and yelled while she dressed him and no amount of sweet-talk or even kisses appeased him.
“Looks like you got your momma’s temper,” Lucas said from the doorway. “I went ahead and got the bottle ready when I heard the fit.”
She handed Lucas the baby when she finished dressing him. Josh stared up into Lucas’s eyes and stopped crying immediately. Lucas shoved the bottle in his mouth, and the little rascal had the nerve to grin around the nipple.
***
Bubbles looked like heavy foam on a glass of cold beer when she sank down in the claw-foot tub. She leaned back on a towel and sighed. Did Hazel ever feel like she was worn to a frazzle after a day in the house?
She opened her eyes when the door hinges squeaked. Joshua wasn’t crying, so what could Lucas need?
He put the lid down on the toilet and sat down. “Those teeth are worrying him to death. I rubbed a little whiskey on them. He shuddered and went right to sleep.”
She sat straight up. “You put what in his mouth?”
“Whiskey. I called Gramps and he said that was better than any of the junk you buy on the market. I’m not making an alcoholic out of him just by rubbing it on his gums, so don’t go all pink pistol on me,” Lucas said.
He picked up the washcloth and said, “Lean forward and let me do your back.”
She leaned. “Pink pistol?”
“Sounded better than going ape shit on me, didn’t it?”
He massaged her back with the soapy cloth until the kinks were out and she felt like a wet spaghetti noodle. When she straightened up, he was holding a sprig of mistletoe over her head.
She stretched and he bent. Their lips met in a kiss that blended two souls together as tightly as if they’d been superglued.
“Thank you,” she said.
“For the back scrubbin’ or the kissin’?” he asked.
“Both,” she said.
“Does television noises wake Josh up?” he asked.
“That came out of the clear blue, but nothing much bothers him after he’s asleep,” she said.
“I moved his crib into my room. It’s on your side of the bed. Thought we’d just snuggle up and watch a movie in my bedroom until we fall asleep,” he said.
Chapter 17
Natalie worried that she might have overdone the whole dolled up issue as she got dressed for the Red River Angus Association Christmas party that evening. Over on her side of Texas, dolled up might mean something altogether different than it did in the north central part of the state.
“But it’s what I bought and since it’s all I’ve got other than jeans and boots and two Sunday dresses, it’s what I’ll have to wear,” she told Joshua as she put the finishing touches on her hair and makeup.
Someone knocked softly on the door and then it opened just a crack. “The guys are about to start a stampede back here to get Josh. Mind if I take him up front?” Lucas asked.
She swung the door the rest of the way open, started at Lucas’s shiny black boots and then let her eyes slowly travel upward. Jeans creased and stacked up over his boot tops perfectly, white Western shirt starched and ironed without a single wrinkle, dress jacket with a Western-cut yoke that hugged his frame, freshly shaven, and hair long enough to slick back with a little mousse.
“Well, well, you sure do dress up real fine.” She was astonished that her voice sounded normal. Her insides were humming so loudly that she figured it would affect her tone for sure.
“And you, ma’am, look like you just walked off a model’s runway. God, Natalie, you are absolutely stunning,” he said.
She turned around slowly. The lace dress had a high Victorian collar and long-fitted sleeves but the back had a heart-shaped cutout that started at the collar and ended with a point just above her bra. The hanky hem flounced over the tops of her boots and when she moved the lace swayed to the sides showing off the brown crosses on her boots.
“We can’t go,” he said hoarsely.
“What! I bought all this for the party and we can’t go? Why?”
The corners of his mouth turned up slightly. “Because I will lose you. One of those good-lookin’ cowboys will sweep you off your feet and I’ll be left with nothing but a broken heart and a handful of beautiful memories.”
She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him hard. “Now that’s a lovely line if I ever heard one.”
“Ain’t no line,” he said. “It’s the God’s honest solid truth. Promise you won’t leave me stranded and run off with one of those rich cowboys.”
“Promise you won’t leave me and run off with one of those cheerleaders,” she shot right back.
He stuck out his hand. “Shake on it.”
She put her hand in his and he pulled her to him. Her body molded against his and he gently cupped her cheeks with his palms, leaned down just slightly, and kissed her deeply, exploring her lips and her mouth.
“Keep that in mind all evening,” he whispered when he broke the kiss and stepped back. “Josh, your momma will be the prettiest woman at the party. The only reason she’ll come home with this ugly old cowboy is because she wouldn’t want to leave you behind.”
“Oh, hush. Ugly, my ass.” She blushed.
“Now you are telling lies. Your ass is not ugly. Matter-of-fact, I think it’s pretty damn cute,” he teased.
“And yours looks so fine tonight that maybe I’d best take along my pistol to keep the women from carryin’ you off to do wicked things to your body,” she flirted.
Lucas chuckled. “If that’s a compliment, then thank you.”
He crossed the room in a couple of long strides and picked up the baby. “Smells like you’ve already had your bath, Josh. Don’t let those old farts spoil you too much, and you tell them if you get tired of all that smothering.” He cradled the baby in one arm and crooked the other one toward Natalie.
She slipped her arm through it and together they went up the hall and into the den where Henry, Grady, and Jack all waited.
Grady whistled and said, “You two look like you’re goin’ to a weddin’, not a party.”
Henry chuckled. “And Natalie could be the bride in that dress. You better strap on your six-gun so them other guys will know that you ain’t going to abide no funny business, Lucas.”
Jack stood up and took the baby from Lucas. “Y’all have a good time and don’t hurry home. We’ll have lots of fun takin’ care of Josh. And Natalie, you look like a million dollars. Lucas, you’d best stick to her like glue, or you could lose her tonight.”
“Yes, sir,” Lucas said.
“Your coat?” Lucas looked at Natalie.
/> She nodded toward the back of the rocking chair. He picked up the cape and swung it around her shoulders.
“Oh my Lord!” Henry gasped. “Now she looks like a queen. She needs one of them fancy diamond things in her hair.”
“No, she needs a good-lookin’ buff-colored cowgirl hat,” Grady said.
“With a diamond hatband. That’d be a mighty fine Christmas present for her.” Henry nodded.
***
“It worked,” Henry said the minute they were out of the door.
“What worked?” Jack asked.
“It’s the baby just like you thought and just like Hazel said and Ella Jo told me. I made Lucas take me for a ride and them feisty hounds got out again and come runnin’ right in here and hid under my chair and Crankston’s goats got out of their pen and came right over here. I made him take Joshua to see the animals and not a one got out today, and Crankston’s old goats and jackass stayed home too. So Hazel and Ella Jo was right. It’s this precious baby that was drawin’ the animals.”
“It was the storm,” Grady argued.
“You want to chase down dogs and goats, I can go with Lucas tomorrow and leave Joshua at home.” Henry narrowed his eyes. “It’s a Christmas thing, and we was just too dense to see it. We was given this special little boy to live on the ranch with us, and now we got to make sure we make them two kids see that they was made for each other.”
“That much I’ll agree with.” Grady nodded.
***
Lucas settled Natalie into the passenger seat of his truck and whistled “I Only Want You for Christmas” as he rounded the tailgate and opened the driver’s door. “Tie a ribbon around yourself,” he singsonged as he started the engine.
“What color and where?” she asked.
They were flirting like teenagers and it felt even better than good—it felt right.
“Anywhere, but it really should be bright red.”
“How many folks will be at this party?”
“Maybe a hundred. There’s about fifty members, and the party is for member and guest. Top is one hundred, low count would be around ninety. You’ll meet Colton, Greg, and Mason. The four of us joined the association at the same time. Rest of the group is quite a bit older than we are. Dad is a member, but he quit going to the social functions when I joined. He hated them anyway. He’s a big voice in the association and goes to all the meetings but not the parties. Anyway, we four guys formed a friendship. Greg Adams is from over around Ravenna. Colton is the billionaire cowboy who lives up close to Ambrose, and then Mason Harper is from out east of Whitewright.”
“All unmarried?”
“Until Colton married last spring. The women were chasin’ him for his money, so his folks and his best friend cooked up the idea that a woman who worked on the ranch would pretend to be his girlfriend. They even went so far as to get a big gaudy engagement ring to make it look real. It backfired and he fell in love with her. I can’t wait to meet her. Hazel says that she doesn’t give a damn about money and can run all the equipment on the ranch as well as Colton.”
“And Greg?”
“Darlin’, it’ll take a helluva woman to bring him to the altar. That cowboy is gun-shy when it comes to women. He lives, breathes, and eats ranchin’, and there ain’t many women out there who’d put up with that.”
“My momma does,” Natalie said.
“And so do you. That’s why I intend to keep you as far away from Greg tonight as possible.” He laughed.
“And who was the other one—Matthew?”
“Mason. He was married and his wife passed on when his girls were barely a year old. He’s got twin girls, Lily and Gabby. I’m not sure he’ll ever find a woman who would take on the raisin’ of those two. Lord, they could scale a glass wall on a rainy day. What one can’t think of the other can, and it’s never any good. You can talk to him all you want. I’m not a bit afraid of that cowboy taking you away because you’d never trust those two little heathens around Josh.”
Natalie turned in her seat. “Are you telling me who and who not to talk to tonight, Lucas Allen?”
He smiled. “I’m not that stupid. You might have that pistol strapped to the inside of your leg.”
She giggled and turned back. “I’ll talk to whomever I so please, but rest assured there won’t be a one of them that turns my insides to a boiling pot of hormones every time they touch my skin like you do.”
He reached across the console and laid a hand on her thigh. “Like this.”
She picked it up and put it back on the steering wheel. “Just like that, but you keep your eyes on the road and your hands on the wheel. I didn’t buy this dress and boots to get them all nasty helping you get a truck out of the ditch.”
***
The country club was already buzzing when Lucas and Natalie arrived. He removed her cape and handed it to a coat lady behind a counter and ushered Natalie toward the bar with his hand on the small of her back.
She was looking ahead and not paying a bit of attention to her surroundings when his hand slipped around her waist and they came to a stop in the middle of a group of people. He introduced her to Mason Harper and Greg Adams. Both did one of those traveling looks that started at her boots and went to her face, hesitating just a second longer at breast level.
“We heard that you brought a woman and a son home from the war. We didn’t expect her to be so tall or so…” Harper paused.
“Or so Texan?” Lucas finished for him.
“Where are you from, darlin’?” Greg asked.
“Silverton. Out in the Panhandle.”
“Natalie Clark. Kin to Isaac Clark?”
“That would be my brother.” Natalie smiled at Greg. Lucas had been right. He was a cowboy from his boots to his drawl.
“Met him at the statewide Angus meeting last fall,” Greg said. “Small world. You’ll have to meet my grandmother, Clarice, before the night is done.”
“I’d love to,” Natalie said.
“So what do you think of our part of the state?” Mason asked.
“Texas is Texas. Land changes. People, not so much. Ranchers, never,” she answered.
“They ought to put that on a bumper sticker,” a woman said as she and another cowboy joined the group.
“Y’all meet my wife, Laura. I’m Colton Nelson from over around Ambrose,” he said.
Laura extended her hand. “I heard that Lucas brought home a bride and a baby.”
Natalie shook and fought a blush. “Rumors do travel fast.”
“We’ll have to get together and have a visit when this weather clears off. You can bring your son. Joshua, right?”
Natalie nodded.
“We’re having a baby in May. You can give me some pointers. I’ve never been around little babies in my whole life, but I’m looking forward to being a mother,” Laura said.
“We’re on our way to the bar. Can we get anyone anything?” Lucas asked.
Mason held up a beer. Greg nodded toward a glass holding whiskey sitting on the table. Colton shook his head. “We’ll be drinking club soda this evening or sweet tea. Since Laura can’t drink until the baby is born, I’ve given it up too.”
“It was nice meeting y’all,” Natalie said as Lucas led her away.
They had both claimed a bar stool before she realized that she’d sat down beside Sonia. That night her blond hair was twisted up into a crown of curls with red baby rose buds worked into the curls. The hem of her skintight red satin dress stopped at her ankle but the slit went all the way to her hip. The material fell to the side to reveal a muscular leg and her signature four-inch red platform high heels.
“Hello, Lucas, darlin’. Noah just left to make a trip to the little boys’ room. He’ll be back in a few minutes.”
“What are y
ou drinking?” the bartender asked Natalie.
“We’ll have two Coors. Longneck, in the bottle please,” Lucas said.
“How’s the wedding coming along?” Natalie asked Sonia.
“Just fine and dandy. It’s going to be the biggest thing Savoy has ever seen. All the girls from my old cheerleading squad are my bridesmaids and there will be six flower girls and six little boys to carry my train. Noah is going to be speechless,” she said. “Bartender, I’ll have another chocolate martini, pronto.”
The bartender set two beers on paper coasters in front of Natalie and Lucas then started making Sonia’s martini. Natalie took a long swig and turned her back to Sonia.
“Good and cold, just the way I like them,” she said.
Lucas flashed a brilliant grin. “We talkin’ beers or…”
Sonia leaned forward and looked past Natalie at Lucas. “I heard a rumor that you two were married already. Is that true?”
Lucas shrugged.
“When?” Sonia asked.
Noah sat down on the stool beside her and asked, “When what?”
“Nothing, Noah. I was just telling Lucas and his new wife about our wedding and how it’s going to be the talk of the whole state.”
“Wife?” Noah raised both eyebrows.
Lucas raised his left shoulder again. “Dance, Natalie?”
“Love to,” she said.
He led her to the middle of the floor and drew her close, wrapping his arms loosely around her waist. They were the only couple, but Colton and Laura joined them when Alan Jackson hit the first guitar licks at the beginning of “When Somebody Loves You.”
Lucas was so smooth that Natalie felt as if her new boots were floating. Alan sang that they should put aside their foolish pride because when somebody loves you, it’s easy to get through those hard times.
“I love you, Natalie Clark,” Lucas whispered in her ear when Alan delivered the last words of the song.
She leaned away from him and stared into his eyes. His eyes said that he was not joking. “Are you sure about that?”
“Oh, yeah.” He laughed. “And you don’t have to say it right now just because I did. When you get ready, it’ll be the right moment. I can wait.”
The Cowboy’s Christmas Baby Page 23