Twin Cowboys for Tamara
Page 1
The Double R 1, Book 1
Twin Cowboys for Tamara
Like her absentee mother, Tamara Carpenter was never cut out for country life. But when her estranged father suffers a debilitating injury, she rushes back to her childhood home to find other things besides his health changed, namely the twin boys she practically raised.
Devastated by Tamara's exit, Jess has strived to make The Double R a success, burying himself working the ranch. Tamara's return upsets the emotional balance he's found in her absence and forces him to face his unresolved feelings for her, and his part in her older lover's firing years ago.
Open-minded and fun-loving, Jax prides himself on knowing how to have a good time and trying to get Jess to do the same. Tamara's homecoming is Jax's opportunity to show his brother what he's been missing by holding a grudge all these years, and bring two of the most important people in the world to him together.
Genre: Ménage a Trois/Quatre/Western/Cowboys
Length: 95,334 words
TWIN COWBOYS FOR TAMARA
The Double R, Book 1
Gigi Moore
MENAGE AMOUR
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
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A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK
IMPRINT: Ménage Amour
TWIN COWBOYS FOR TAMARA
Copyright © 2009 by Gigi Moore
E-book ISBN: 1-60601-604-0
First E-book Publication: August 2009
Cover design by Jinger Heaston
All cover art and logo copyright © 2009 by Siren Publishing, Inc.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.
All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.
PUBLISHER
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
TWIN COWBOYS FOR TAMARA
The Double R, Book 1
GIGI MOORE
Copyright © 2009
Prologue
The Double R – McCoy, Colorado – Eighteen Years Ago
Tamara Carpenter would be the first to admit she wasn’t thinking clearly when she dragged Noah Frost out into the barn. Her hot, throbbing core did all the thinking and talking for her, and boy, did it have some things to say about how much she wanted Noah on top of her, inside her, caressing her as he had the first time they’d been together.
Like a strung-out addict, she had been trying to recapture that first tingling blush of excitement and pleasure ever since they’d started seeing each other at the beginning of the summer. She’d finally given him her virginity a few weeks later.
Once Tamara and Noah got into the cozy, dim confines of the barn and closed the door behind them, her lust kicked into overdrive. She cleaved her lips to his, darting her tongue in and out of his mouth, and going at the buttons on his denim shirt with the ferocity of a raccoon rooting through last night’s garbage. If it hadn’t been for Noah’s earlier voice of reason, they probably would have been rutting like a bull and heifer in heat out behind the pond. It had taken all her enthusiasm and feminine wiles, such as they were, to convince him to come out to the barn with her instead.
Her teenage hormones had been flying off the charts ever since she and Noah had first made out in one of the ranch’s vacant guest cabins. She’d asked him to come with her on the pretense of helping her get the place in tip-top condition for the arrival of some newlyweds due the next day. She figured they might as well make good use of the time and pretty much jumped his bones before he could turn from closing the door.
Much like she did now.
“Christ, I want you,” he rasped. He kissed a path from the cleavage he’d bared by undoing two of the buttons on her flannel shirt to her neck and nestled his lightly whiskered cheek against her sensitive throat. She shuddered at the contact, the tangy scent of his after shave a pleasing counterpoint to the simple aromas of feed and grass.
“I want you too.” She pushed back from him for the moment it took her to situate herself as sexily as possible on top of a nearby haystack.
Noah paused in the midst of lowering himself to his knees and tilted his head in the general direction of the hayloft. “Did you hear that?”
“Probably just mice.” At least she hoped that’s all the snickering noises above were, but she half suspected those darn twins up to their usual shenanigans. She had half a mind to teach them a lesson and give them an eyeful if so, but she didn’t want to traumatize the young’uns beyond repair. Her lust had its limits.
So with budding trepidation, she let Noah's knee open her thighs as he settled himself between her legs. Hunger quickly replaced her nervousness when he unbuttoned her shirt down to her bellybutton and unsnapped the front of her bra.
Noah braced a hand against her stomach and caressed his palm over her ribs and farther up to cup one full breast. He paused, licking his lips before he bent his head to take one brown, turgid nipple into his mouth. He sucked voraciously before moving to the next, nibbling and licking as he moved his free hand down to cup the heated crotch of her jeans.
Her center ached for him like it never had before. She didn’t know desire could be so painful, make her so needy. Did she feel this way because of her youth or her lack of experience? Or did the inherent risk factor of any minute being caught in the act excite her?
Tamara closed her eyes and arched her neck, losing herself in the feel of his weight on top of her, and by now, had convinced herself that the darkness would keep the boys from seeing anything except indistinct shapes if they indeed occupied the loft.
But the twins became the least of her worries several seconds later when her father burst into the barn in full fire-and-brimstone, overprotective father mode.
Chapter 1
The Double R – McCoy, Colorado – Current Day
Jess Reynolds left his father’s office, all balled up after the news the old man had just delivered in his usual matter-of-fact way.
Her Highness was coming home.
His heart skipped a beat at the thought of Tamara’s imminent return, that after eighteen years of living in the big city, she had finally deigned to grace the ranch with her presence.
Jess mentally kicked himself for his bitterness. He told himself he would have to put his best foot forward and portray his customer-is-always-right persona with the utmost skill. Treat Her Highness like
any other ranch guest deserving the best service and care possible.
Except that she wasn’t a guest. Up until almost two decades ago, she had been family, like a big sister to him and his twin brother, Jax, and like a daughter to their dad, Jeremiah.
Then she’d gotten too big for her britches, as his dad and Bailey would say, and caught the first thing smoking out of McCoy to go to law school in New York. Like they didn’t have perfectly good law schools in Colorado, or at least closer than half-way across the country.
Jess shook his head, castigating himself for his resentment. He acted like a jilted lover, which was ridiculous since he had never had Tamara. She’d deserted him and his brother when they’d been nine and just barely over the death of their mother.
True, their mama had died when they’d been four, and they barely remembered her but for the stories their dad affectionately passed on about her. But in the absence of a suitable stepmother, as Dad hadn’t dated since Mama’s death, or aunts, since Dad was an only child, Tamara had been the most constant and stable female influence he and Jax had had in their lives for as far back as either of them could remember.
Jess smiled now at the way Tamara teased them after they’d gotten older, about how she used to help change their diapers when they were little tykes. She didn’t let them forget, too, how, she had to catch their naked, slippery tails to dry them off when they ran from her and through the house fresh from their evening bath.
“Catching you two critters wasn’t the highlight of this gal’s life, I’ll tell ya.”
He chuckled at the memory of her soft southwestern twang, wondered if she still had traces of it after all this time.
Jess decided to focus on the good memories rather than the gloomy ones of Tamara leaving. He and Jax had tearfully clung to her at the airport before her departure, and Tamara promised them to write and call as often as she could.
As often as she could had been a couple of times a week, which turned into once a week, which eventually became once a month, until they barely heard from her except on major holidays and their birthday.
Jess understood she had nine years on them. She had a grown-up life to live and important work to do with her studies, but as a kid with his first crush, he really didn’t want to hear anything about logic and studies. Back then, Jess's jealousy of the things that had taken Tamara away ruled him. To this day, he saw New York as this big city of wickedness and sin that had deprived him of someone he loved, drawing Tamara away from him and the family fold.
He realized now that he had never gotten over his first crush, namely because he had been in denial that it even existed up until an hour ago when his world caved in with his Dad’s news.
Jess wished he could be as happy about Tamara’s arrival as his dad seemed to be. The ol’ man had sat behind his big shiny mahogany desk with his hands folded across his slight paunch and a right, full-of-himself smile plastered on his face.
Suspicion, however, tempered Jess’s own happiness.
Would she even be coming home if Bailey hadn’t been hurt? Why should he get excited about her homecoming when she would probably be leaving as soon as Bailey got well and truly up and on his feet again?
He needed to find Jax. Not just to let him know what came down the pike, and that he would be on his way to pick up Her Highness in a couple of hours. He needed Jax because his brother had the uncanny ability of making Jess see the bright side of things when no one else could.
Really, Jax had this effect on everyone with whom he came into contact. He had a way about him, never took life too serious, whereas Jess took everything serious. At least Jax and the rest of their family and friends on the ranch always told him this.
Well, someone had to take things serious. They couldn’t all be like his nonchalant, fun-loving brother who acted like he didn’t have a care in the world half the time and flitted from passion to passion and project to project at the drop of a dime. His stint at the ranch this last year-and-a-half, in fact, had been the longest time that Jax had stayed with anything except his days playing college football at their alma mater Colorado State, or doing the rodeo circuit.
At least Tamara had some focus. She’d known what she wanted from an early age and resolved to get it, not letting anyone, not even the little boys who cared about and loved her, get in the way.
Yeah, he definitely needed to talk to Jax. Jax hadn’t taken Tamara’s departure nearly as hard as Jess had. Maybe Jax had the right idea not taking life too serious.
Jess went to the stable and saddled up his prize bay stallion Clipper. He took the scenic route past the trout pond, petting zoo, roping and riding arena, TeePeeVillage and trading post. He finally reached the make-believe, all-inclusive western town-target range that Jax had masterminded a couple of years back. It had been built on the outer reaches of the main lodge and dining area under Jess’s ever-evolving expansion program.
The town consisted of several convincing facades—a bank, saloon, church, hotel, general store, post office—,pop-up targets, horse-drawn wagons, and other props and special effects to give a Hollywood lot a run for its money.
The pop-up targets proved true to life but nothing beat the real thing. Jax and several of The Double R’s working wranglers and cowboys provided that with their staged shoot-outs scheduled throughout the day from late morning to early evening every other hour.
Veering left, Jess made it into the town proper at the tail end of one of his brother’s famous shoot-out episodes.
Heart in his throat, he paused to watch his brother take a header off the roof of the town’s bank into a cushioned bale of hay like a top-notch Hollywood stuntman.
His brother’s eye for detail and realism never failed to impress Jess. Jax had a real feel for the dramatic and knew exactly what the customer wanted, especially when the customer came in the form of a kid. Jax had an uncanny way with kids and critters.
Jess dismounted Clipper, quickly tying the horse to a nearby hitching post. Shaking his head and laughing, he trotted over to where Jax was busy hamming up his latest death scene.
Several of the ranch guests’ kids surrounded Jax with their make-believe guns drawn. They took him down with blanks electronically synched with several small bags of fake blood that Jax wore beneath his shirt.
Jax lay coughing and gurgling, hands splayed over his blood-soaked shirt as he winced up at his pint-sized conquerors. “Ya got me, varmints. Ya got me…cough, cough…good.”
One of the kids pointed his gun at Jax’s torso and pulled the trigger. Fake blood exploded beneath Jax’s denim western shirt where the kid had hit his target true. Jax jerked and grimaced as if in great pain. “I’m a goner for sure, you sidewinder.”
The kids laughed, all drawing their guns now and firing to get in on the act.
The special effects and Jax’s timing and over-the-top performance made the shoot-out so much more fun and authentic than a regular paintball game.
The western town-target range and its scheduled shoot-outs proved the most popular attraction for kids who visited The Double R. Even some of their parents got into the act and couldn’t help but be swept up by Jax’s infectious enthusiasm for the scenes.
After one last convulsion and coughing spasm, Jax finally lay still with his eyes closed.
Jess stepped in and showed the kids his marshal’s badge, another of Jax’s bright ideas deputizing several of the cowboys and appointing Jess the town marshal. “You’ve taken down one of the most dangerous fugitives in the west, pardners. I’ll take it from here. These fellas will escort you over to the bank to claim your bounty for bringing down Jumping Jax Flash.”
He watched as Carson and Sam Quarry led the boys away to the town bank where they would be issued official Double R currency that they could redeem at the ranch’s video and game arcade. The two brothers had recently been added to the buckaroo crew as of several months ago and liked to take part in Jax’s cowboy games as much as the guests.
As soon as they dis
appeared from view, Jess turned and squatted beside his brother’s supine form.
Jax opened one eye and peeped up at Jess. “Coast clear?” he stage-whispered.
“Get up, porky.” Jess chuckled and proffered a hand. He remembered the fake blood a second before Jax clasped his hand to let Jess help him up. “Ugh.” Jess grimaced and wiped his bloody palm down the front of Jax’s jeans.
“Hey, a guy’s got to make sacrifices for his art.”
“You missed your calling.”
An expression of misery flickered across Jax’s face so briefly, Jess wondered if he had actually seen it, but before he could ask his brother about it, Jax clamped a hand on his shoulder and started to walk Jess back toward his horse.
“So what brings you out here? Surely not to see my three o’clock show.”
Jess looked at his brother and couldn’t stop thinking about the expression of loss he’d seen. He wondered about those days off his brother had taken lately. He shook his head as if to clear it and said, “Dad just gave me some interesting news.”
“Can’t read anything past that stern poker face of yourn. Good or bad interesting?”
“Depends on how you look at it.”
Jax arched a brow and waited.
“Tamara’s coming back.”
“Well, shucks! That’s great news and definitely a cause for celebration if I’ve ever heard one!” Jax took off his chocolate Stetson and waved it in the air before putting it firmly back on his head and gawking at Jess. “Why do you look like you just found a rattler in your boot? Aren’t you glad?”
“Should I be?”