Of course a picture of Cooper popped into her head. He wore that leather jacket and his cowboy hat and snow fell on his sexy facial hair. If only there was a button she could push to delete the damn scene, but it was burned into her brain as surely as if it had been branded there.
“Branded,” she groaned. According to Rusty, they’d have to help with that job, too. Her nose snarled at the imagined scent of burning hair.
A knock on the door brought her to a sitting position. The second one took her to her feet. There was no peephole, so she eased it open to find Cooper’s smiling face on the other side of the old-fashioned screen door. He held up two butcher-paper-wrapped packages.
“Thought I’d best knock, since I didn’t know if all y’all went to church. I figured the chicken was gone, so I brought steaks for dinner. Thought I’d have them all done and on the table when y’all came home, to repay Rusty for inviting me to dinner yesterday. Mind if I come on in and get busy?”
She threw the door open wide. “You cook?”
“Of course, don’t you?” His hip brushed against hers on the way through the door, creating a brand-new batch of sparks.
She refused to blink for fear she’d drag up another sexy picture of him. What was standing before her was enough to give her hot flashes. She didn’t need any help from her mind.
“Sure, I can make doughnuts that will melt in your mouth and biscuits and gravy, pancakes, and anything that has to do with breakfast. Past that, I do soup from cans and a mean Frito chili pie.”
“Well, I’ll just make myself at home and get busy.”
She followed him into the kitchen, where he laid the packages on the cabinet and went to work. “Can I help in any way?”
He slowly scanned her from toes to eyes. “Are we talkin’ about cooking?”
“What else would we be discussing?” She was flirting, but dammit, he’d started it.
“I just wanted to be sure we were on the same page.” He moved toward the pantry door with her right behind him.
He picked out five potatoes from a basket and turned around. “Help me. I can’t carry them all.”
She reached out to take them, and he laid one in each hand, fingertips touching her palms when he did. Desire flushed through her veins like she was hooked up to a moonshine IV. Granted, it had been a hell of a dry spell since the last relationship, but no man had ever made her go weak in the knees just handing off potatoes.
She backed out of pantry and carried the potatoes to the sink, where she washed them. Then he deftly wrapped each potato in foil and put them inside the oven. After that he seasoned the steaks and lined them in a row in a pan he’d gone back to the pantry to get. He wasted no movements, proving that he was as much at home in the kitchen as he was on the jogging trail or probably in the sheriff’s chair.
She braced herself on the cabinet and hoped to hell he didn’t realize it was out of necessity to keep from sliding right on the floor. Damn! Damn! Damn! Flirting was a bad idea. Anything else could and would be catastrophic. But she wanted him to kiss her, to hold her close. Hell, she wouldn’t even say no to a round of sex right there on the cabinet just to put out the fires in her body.
“We’ll get out yesterday’s leftovers, but steak needs a big old stuffed baked potato to make it good,” he said as he worked. “It’s still thirty minutes before the preacher winds down. Rusty and I are real partial to medium-rare steaks. You got any idea how your sisters like theirs?”
Hell’s bells, she didn’t give a shit how they wanted their steak. She wanted Cooper undressed and in her bed, or on the sofa, or the floor. The kitchen table even looked good.
“I like mine seared and hot in the middle,” she said.
“Kind of like sex?”
She blushed. Crap! Had she really said those words out loud?
Hell, yes, that smart-ass inner voice in her head yelled. You’ve been thinking of sex ever since you first laid eyes on him, but it’s a bad idea. Back away, Abigail Joyce. Back away right now or you’ll be sorry.
She turned away and looked out the window, focusing on Martha coming back from out near the barn. “Yes, I do like my steak just like sex.” She ignored that niggling voice and whipped back around to see what Cooper had to say next.
But he didn’t say a word.
He took a step forward and suddenly he was so close that she could count his eyelashes as his eyelids lowered and his lips came closer and closer. He pulled her closer with one arm while the other hand found its way to the back of her head, where he tangled his fingers in her hair and the kiss deepened. It was a kiss, for God’s sake, not an earth-changing experience, but the air around them became so thin that she was slightly dizzy. Her arms snaked up around his neck and she rolled up on her toes. Then his tongue found hers and it turned into something a hell of a lot more than a simple kiss. She had a split second to make the decision to step back or not. She chose to press even closer to his muscular body, feeling the evidence behind his zipper that said he was as turned on as she was.
One of his hands was suddenly under her shirt and against the bare skin on her back. Common sense screamed at her to end the kiss and talk dinner. He cupped her bottom with his hands and with a short hop, her legs went around his waist. Without stopping the string of scorching kisses, he carried her to the sofa and sat down with her in his lap.
The pearl snaps on his shirt made a long series of noises when she pulled the top one with enough force to undo them all the way to his belt buckle. One of her hands inched its way inside his shirt, feeling just the right amount of chest hair and muscles on the way around to his back. His hand made its way from her back to cup a breast. Skin against skin and she didn’t even remember him unfastening her bra. She felt as if they could light candles off the places where he’d touched her skin. His tongue continued to make love to her mouth as his other hand massaged her back in gentle circles, each one creating another ripple of desire.
“Your skin is like warm water on a cold day,” he said.
“And yours is like fire.” She laughed.
He unbuttoned her shirt a little at a time until he could slide it off her shoulders. Kissing each piece of bare skin as he unwrapped her body like a Christmas present, he maneuvered her backward until she was stretched out on the sofa with him on top of her.
In the military they had a code. Red light meant stop right now. Yellow light meant to put the skids on it and take a step backward. Green light meant go right ahead at whatever speed worked best.
All she could see was a big green light when she reached to tug the rest of his shirt from his jeans.
“Abby, darlin’, if you are going to say stop, do it now, please.”
“Cooper, darlin’, I’m not going to say stop,” she whispered softly in his ear.
“Dear Lord,” he rasped hoarsely.
“It’s damn sure not a time to pray,” she said as she undid his belt buckle and unzipped his jeans.
He jumped up off the sofa and said, “Boots.”
She nodded and two pair of boots landed somewhere over beside the door in a pile. In seconds their jeans and underwear joined the boots. She did notice that her bra hung on the door handle and was damn glad that all three dogs were outside. One of them might think it was a new toy.
“I want to play, but it’s been a long time,” he drawled.
“This doesn’t have to be our only playdate.” She wrapped her legs around him and arched her back until her breasts brushed against that luscious hair on his chest.
She gasped when he filled her and started a steady rhythm.
“Did I hurt you?”
“No.” She rocked with him, matching every stroke with her hips, his kisses on her lips, eyelids, and forehead driving her insane. She locked her legs tightly around him, dug her nails into his back, and tried to melt her whole body into his in that instant.
“Oh, my God,” he whispered in a rasp.
He tried to roll to one side but that only sent both of them tumbling to the floor. His strong arms held her tight as she landed right on top of him.
“You okay?” he asked.
She tried to say something, but there wasn’t enough air in her lungs for anything other than panting so she just nodded.
He pulled a throw from the sofa and covered them with it and pulled her close to his side.
When she could finally talk, she gasped. “This was one hell of a big mistake, Cooper.”
“Probably so,” he agreed.
“It’s going to make things awkward and it can’t happen again.”
“Probably not,” he yawned.
“Holy shit! It’s past noon. They’ll be coming home any minute.”
“Guess we’d best go make the tea, hadn’t we? Unless you want to take this to the bedroom and have another go at it just to be sure that it was a mistake,” he said.
Her hand went to her mouth to see if it was actually as warm as it felt. She was surprised to find her lips were cool to the touch.
“We’ve got to get dressed,” she said. “Church will be over soon.”
She pushed away from him, gathered up all her clothing, and headed for the bathroom. He followed right behind her and turned on the shower. “We’d best take one together since we’re pressed for time.”
She gasped. “We can’t do that.”
“I’d say we’d have to. They’ll be here any minute and one whiff of either of us and they’ll know what we’ve been doing. Oh, and I need a lemon,” he said.
“What the hell for?” She turned on the water.
He adjusted it. “To suck on so I can wipe this smile off my face. It might have been a mistake, but honey, that was amazing.”
“Shit!” she said. “It is going to be awkward.”
“Probably. Want me to wash your back for you?”
“Hell, no! That would start something we don’t have time to finish.”
Chapter Five
Cooper had just turned thirty-one and he’d dated since the eighth-grade Valentine’s Day dance seventeen years ago. He’d had a couple of relationships but nothing serious since his granddad died. That was the year he’d won the election for sheriff, and he’d been busy with taking care of that business, plus the ranch, so he hadn’t had a lot of time for dating. He’d had the occasional fling that usually started in the Sugar Shack on a Saturday night and most of the time ended by Sunday morning when he went home to do chores.
What in the devil had he just done? He’d only known the woman a couple of days. It was too soon even to be kissing her, and yet they’d just had amazing sex. They’d wanted it. They’d had it. Now they had to suffer the consequences.
He kept letting his eyes shift around the kitchen to catch glimpses of her. Sure, she was cute as a newborn baby kitten, but she’d been through a lot the past twenty-four hours. That was probably the only thing that made her vulnerable. It’s a wonder she hadn’t whipped out some martial arts skills and knocked him colder than an ice cube when he’d kissed her.
“You do realize that there’s lots of single guys living in the canyon and in Claude and Silverton,” he said.
She brought two casserole dishes from the refrigerator and popped one into the microwave to heat it up. “And that is supposed to mean?”
“Think, Abby. This isn’t a big ranch, but it would be a real nice living for a cowhand who’d like to move up in the world. Someone who hasn’t got, nor will ever have, the money to buy his own place. I’m sure that Shiloh and Bonnie have already been sized up at church and bets are being made as to which cowboy will make headway with them. Wait until they see you when they come callin’ with their hats in their hands.” He smiled.
“I’m so sure they’ll be fallin’ all over themselves to flirt with a woman who lives in her old army camo. And if they did, I’ve got too much on my plate to deal with a relationship right now. With anyone, Cooper.” She looked right into his eyes.
“I get your drift, Abby, but it doesn’t have to be strange between us. We can be friends and neighbors even if we don’t have sex again,” he said.
She inhaled and let it out slowly before she spoke. “I’m like those cowboys you are talkin’ about. I’ve always wanted my own piece of dirt—granted, I never pictured it being as desolate as this. I’m an only child, which means I don’t share too well, and I’m not going to play nice with Ezra’s other two daughters. Not even if I do feel sorry for Bonnie.”
He crossed his arms over his chest, more to keep from wrapping them around her than anything else. “Who are you trying to convince? Me or you?”
“I’m stating fact, not trying to talk anyone into anything,” she protested.
“Didn’t sound like it to me,” he argued.
“Frankly, Cooper . . .” She smiled.
He quickly threw a palm out to stop her. “Don’t finish that line. I saw the movie.”
“You watched Gone With the Wind?” she asked.
“Grandpa loved it. He took Granny to see it on the big screen when they were dating, and every time it was rereleased, they went again. Then when DVDs came around, he bought it for her one Christmas and they watched it together once a year on the anniversary of their first date in 1947. He was seventeen that year and she was sixteen.”
“That is so romantic,” she said.
“We Wilson men tend to be romantics. He also watched it every year after she passed away on the anniversary of their first date.” He grinned.
“That’s what I want when I settle down. A love like they had,” she said.
“So you’re ready to settle down?”
“I have no idea,” she said.
The minute church was over, Loretta brought her daughter, Nona, up the aisle to Shiloh and Bonnie. “Where’s the third one?” she asked.
“Abby stayed home today. Maybe she’ll come next week,” Shiloh said. “I’m pleased to meet you, Nona. You’ll have to stop by the ranch and visit with us sometime.”
Nona sure didn’t look like she could ever be Loretta’s daughter—or her sister, or even kin to her. They were both lovely women, but Nona was a short blonde who reminded Shiloh of Abby in girl clothing. She had big blue eyes and a small frame, a beautiful complexion, and a little bit of sass in her attitude. Yes, sir, she looked more like Abby’s sister than she did Loretta’s daughter.
“And this”—Nona pulled a man away from a group of people—“is my husband, Travis. We’ve only been married a few weeks. Y’all ladies want to come to Sunday dinner at Lonesome Canyon with us today? There’s always plenty and we’d love to have you.”
“Not today,” Rusty said. “I got a text message from Cooper that said he was taking steaks over to the Malloy Ranch to cook dinner for us. Maybe we could take a rain check.”
“Anytime,” Nona said. “Oh, wait a minute. Waylon, come on over here and meet two of Ezra’s girls.” She motioned toward a cowboy on his way out the door. He turned around and waved, then made his way back through the crowd to where they were standing in a group near the front pew. Shiloh’s chest tightened when she saw his blue eyes.
“This is Shiloh and this is Bonnie. The oldest one, Abby, stayed home today, but you’ll meet her before long. They all three have Ezra’s blue eyes,” Nona said.
He shook Bonnie’s hand first and then Shiloh’s. “My pleasure, ladies. I live across the road from Malloy Ranch. Drop by anytime.”
“Guess we’d better be going,” Nona said. “Maybe we can have a girls’ day out some Sunday afternoon.”
“Know where there’s a good spa?” Shiloh asked.
“Oh, yes, I do. I’ll call you or come
by and we’ll make some plans,” Nona said over her shoulder as Travis escorted her toward the door with a hand on her back.
Shiloh wished Waylon had his hand on her back. As handsome as he was, she would have let him lead her anywhere.
“Steaks?” Bonnie asked Rusty.
“That’s what his text said.”
“I hope Abby didn’t scare him off or kill him. I could sure eat a big juicy steak,” Bonnie said.
“Sounds like they are here. We’ll see how your sisters like their steaks, and then I’ll start cookin’. I hope they didn’t invite cowboys home with them, because I only brought five.”
“I’m not sharing a single bite of my steak. If one of them brought home a gold-digging cowboy, then she gets to share hers,” Abby said.
A cold north wind pushed its way inside along with three adults and three dogs when the front door slung open. The dogs headed straight to the rug in front of the fireplace, even though only embers still burned there.
Cooper and Rusty had played on the same football team, had been in Future Farmers of America together, and had tied more than once for the grand champion steer at the county livestock show. Rusty had proven to be a damn fine quarterback for the Silverton Owls even as a sophomore for their six-man football team. He had an arm that could put a ball into the hands of a receiver every single time.
“I just need to know how y’all like your steaks and dinner will be on the table pretty quick,” Cooper said. “I’m talkin’ to Shiloh and Bonnie. I know that Rusty likes his medium rare.”
“Same,” Shiloh said.
“Me, too,” Bonnie said.
Rusty removed his coat and hung it on the back of a wooden rocking chair that had been drawn up to the fireplace. “While Cooper plays chef, there’s something we should discuss.”
Shiloh had been on her way to her room but she stopped, came back, and tossed her denim duster over the back of the sofa. Bonnie unzipped her leather jacket but kept it on. They sat down on opposite ends of the sofa and waited.
Abby rested her elbows on the back of the sofa between the other two women and snapped half a dozen pictures of them, Rusty, and Cooper, with her phone.
Daisies in the Canyon Page 6