by Jule McBride
Especially when Emma Jane raised the bid. The competitor whipped off her straw sun hat, slapped it against her thigh and got down to business, shouting yet another offer.
And so it went. The bidding got so high that Luke finally stopped flexing a second time, crossed his arms over his bare chest and merely watched. Just seeing Claire’s sisters jump up and down like jackrabbits was starting to make his head hurt, so he was half relieved when they finally won.
Just as he was stepping down, the girls ran up to him. They were all tall and willowy, like Claire, and they had her straight light hair and blue eyes. For a second, they eyed him critically as if he were a horse they were considering putting to stud, then seemingly deciding their purchase was sound, they crowded around him as if he was a mama cat and they were kittens. “Well,” Luke said, glancing anxiously toward the bleachers where Tex was deep in conversation with another rancher. “Do you and your pa need some shelves built or something?”
“Shelves!” Josie, the youngest, squealed.
Luke raised an eyebrow. “Or some chores done?”
“Chores!” giggled Vickie.
They all started stammering, but Josie was the worst. She finally managed to say, “Oh, no, Mr. Lydell. We don’t need shelves built or any chores done, but since Tex said we could do whatever we wanted with you, Emma Jane came up with the great idea to buy you as a present for someone.”
“Does your pa know about this?” asked Luke.
“Of course not!” squealed Josie.
This didn’t sound good. Luke stared at Emma Jane, whose long, straight hair accentuated the fact that she was older and taller than her sisters, as slender as a toothpick. “Emma Jane,” he said, “you bought me as a present for...?”
Emma Jane sighed. “I’m so sorry. We’re getting ahead of ourselves. Let me explain. We bought you for our big sister.”
Luke could have choked. “Your sister?”
Vickie nodded enthusiastically. “Our big sis, Claire.”
He knew exactly who their sister was. He glanced toward his Harley in the parking grounds, considering escape routes. “I think you’d better have a talk with your pa about this. He’s paying, after all.”
“He said to do whatever we wanted,” Emma Jane defended.
“Tex just said to make sure we got our money’s worth,” added Rosie.
Josie was studying Luke curiously, with wisdom beyond her years. “You know Claire, don’t you?”
Better than you can imagine. Since she was the oldest, Emma Jane probably remembered it, too. Even though Claire had kept the youthful relationship from her parents, Emma Jane might have known Luke and Claire had once had feelings. “Girls,” Luke managed to say, “while we’ve never been formally introduced, I know you all by sight, and I know who your pa is—” Now Luke glanced toward Claire, feeling strangely helpless. She was still standing by the bleachers, looking concerned but pretending not to see him or her sisters.
“Claire’s getting married in six months,” Emma Jane continued pragmatically.
“We’re her bridesmaids,” added Vickie.
“We get to wear green velvet gowns with red sashes,” Josie put in.
“And the wedding’s on Christmas Day,” Rosie said with a sigh.
Luke had seen that much in the paper. The rest, he was afraid to ask. He realized they’d all paused, looking at him expectantly, so he said, “And?”
“And you’re such a...cowboy,” Josie said breathlessly, her cheeks turning bright pink.
As if she’d never seen one. “Josie, darlin’,” he couldn’t help but remind her, “you were born here in Wyoming, so you’ve seen cowboys.”
“Yes, but it looks like you’ve got some Indian blood, too.” Rosie paused, looking mortified. “I mean, Native American—”
“Don’t you worry about political correctness.” Luke shoved a hand in the back pocket of his jeans, thinking this was no time to discuss politics.
“What Rosie means is that you’re so—” Vickie blushed, too. “Well, you know.”
Luke was very afraid he did.
“Sexy,” Emma Jane continued, sounding particularly grown-up.
Luke wasn’t liking the tenor of this conversation one bit, so he held up a staying hand. “Whatever you think I am, girls, please feel free to keep it to yourself. Meantime, what’s this line of thinking got to do with me?”
The youngest, Josie, was now too flustered to speak, and Vickie was staring at Luke with eyes the exact dark blue color of Claire’s. Because she was college-age, Emma Jane seemed to be the designated spokesperson. She sidled closer, rose on tiptoe, cupped a hand around her mouth and continued in a hushed tone. “See, we bridesmaids need to get Claire a gift,” she explained. “And you know how they always have those strippers and such at bachelor parties?”
Luke’s eyes widened. “I’ve—uh—heard that, yeah,” he admitted cautiously. “But that’s something guys used to do, Emma Jane.”
She didn’t look convinced.
“Used to do,” Luke emphasized. “Way in the past.”
Josie hadn’t heard the whole conversation, but she crossed her arms in dissatisfaction. “We bought you, so you have to do whatever we want.”
“Within reason,” Luke murmured.
Emma Jane ignored him. “We decided to...procure you for Claire because...” The sudden mischievous sparkle in Emma Jane’s eyes said she was completely aware he and Claire shared a history. But why would Emma Jane force them to be together now, when Claire had just announced her engagement? Any unfinished business between Luke and Claire was obviously meant to stay that way.
“Yeah, Emma Jane?” Luke prodded, his patience at a minimum. “You procured me because?”
Emma Jane smiled sweetly, leaned closer and very softly whispered, “Because our big sis used to have such a big crush on you, and before her wedding, she deserves a last fling with a dangerous man.”
CHAPTER TWO
“I SWEAR, I’M GOING to wring Emma Jane’s neck,” Claire Buchanan vowed under her breath, her soft husky voice taking the venom out of the threat. “Emma Jane has to be the ringleader. Josie, Rosie and Vickie couldn’t have come up with this.” Only Emma Jane knew Claire had once had feelings for Luke, and Emma Jane was also convinced that Claire’s marriage to Clive was going to be a mistake.
“I’m happy about the engagement, sis,” Emma Jane had announced loftily yesterday, glancing over the top of a novel with a bare-chested man on the cover. “But I’m not sure you and Clive share enough passion to make it work.”
“As if anyone asked your opinion, Emma Jane,” Claire had shot back. As far as Emma Jane was concerned, no relationship was worth its salt unless the woman was being continually ravished. Still, all Claire’s little sisters were tarred with the same darkly mischievous brush, so naming the key culprit wasn’t really the issue. What had the girls been thinking?
We bought you Luke Lydell, they’d said.
“Talk about the gift from hell,” Claire whispered on an exasperated sigh, wondering how she could best do damage control. Lifting a hand to push back the damp tendrils of hair that kept escaping her braid and falling onto her forehead, Claire speeded her steps, her long-legged strides bringing her closer to where Luke was waiting for her in the parking grounds, leaning lazily against his motorcycle. Waiting for me, as if I’m still some little schoolgirl hanging around, wanting his attention.
If Claire knew what was good for her, she’d let Luke lean his tall, dark, rangy, half-naked body against that fool motorcycle until kingdom come. Or until Christmas, by which time she’d be safely married off to Clive.
Trouble was, after six years of studying art and psychology, Claire still didn’t know what was good for her.
Whatever it was, though, it definitely wasn’t Luke.
Usually when she felt like this, she’d pause, examine her pique and take ten deep breaths, but just the mention of Luke’s name had a way of making her irrational. Ignoring the angry thump of the braid against her back and keeping her furious blue eyes fixed on him, Claire wended around pickup trucks that were pulling from the lot, then passed some cute, rowdy kids who were circling the booths where crafts were being raffled. As she sidestepped an iced-down vat of soft drinks and long-necked beers, the sudden scent of spicey chicken and ribs assaulted her, making her stomach growl, reminding her she was hungry.
“And thank you, global warming,” she whispered, wishing sweat wasn’t beading on her upper lip. Leave it to fate to have her confronting Luke with dripping armpits. She shoved a hand deeper into the back pocket of her jeans and squinted against the dry clouds of dust stirred by her Justin boots. Her breath suddenly caught, and mortification shot through her. What if Luke thought she’d put her sisters up to this?
Claire quickly assured herself he didn’t know she’d once filled notebooks with his name and sketchbooks with drawings of his face, though he damn well knew that their run-ins years ago at the feed store hadn’t exactly been accidental. Claire had always gotten Tex’s ranch foreman, Ely Brown, to take her into town with him on Saturdays, since she knew Luke would come with the foreman from Lost Springs.
That was how she’d started talking to him. Not much at first, just enough to realize that Luke knew about more than beef prices and rodeos, and that he happened to share her interest in western art. Just enough that it led to countless stolen kisses, and to longer talks where she’d begun to share her dreams for the future. Just enough that she’d made the girlishly foolish mistake of thinking he wanted a lot more from her than simple conversation.
Now Claire came to a standstill about ten feet away from him. It seemed close enough. Less dangerous. But even from here, all her muscles tensed, and she wound up tossing her head like a prancing mare.
Luke simply stood there, calmly watching her, and Claire suddenly wished she’d worn something other than jeans and a plain white T-shirt. She wished she had more control over her reaction to him, too.
But of course she didn’t.
It was hard to say why she was so drawn to him. Just as it was hard to say who he really was or where his folks were from, since he’d been found on the doorstep of the Lost Springs Ranch one Christmas, and no birth record was ever discovered. While the sleek, jaw-length blue-black hair that he tucked behind his ears and his sharply chiseled features announced Native American blood, he had Anglo eyes that were as boldly blue as the cloudless western sky behind him, and he talked like the countless cowboys who’d been his father figures. Already, at thirty, age and the sun’s touch were giving Luke a weathered look, making wrinkles form around his eyes and bringing a hard, pragmatic set to a mouth that was usually locked thoughtfully around a toothpick. Claire let her gaze drift over his ropy arms and then his naked torso, which was as smooth as washed stone, made dark and hot by both nature and the sun, and alive with muscle.
Luke wouldn’t bother wearing a shirt to the auction, Claire thought, feeling a sudden rush of irritation as her eyes dropped to where sun glinted off a rectangular silver belt buckle. Her gaze followed his long legs down to where they were crossed at the ankles, the boot-cut bottoms of his jeans resting easily over new-looking boots. Suddenly, she remembered a time when Luke didn’t have such good boots, when they’d been of cracked vinyl, not leather, and dusty and worn down at the heels, and Claire’s heart suddenly pulled with an unwanted ache for the little boy he’d once been.
Now his shoulders were strong and broad, his hips lean and narrow, and his stomach flat and dark. His narrowed eyes were a little too hard and watchful, the seemingly lazy pose of his body just a tad too still. No wonder my sisters bought him. Her heart pounding, Claire blew out a quick puff of breath, nervously toyed with the engagement ring on her finger and braced herself for the heated annoyance that was bound to mark their encounter. “So, we meet again, Lydell,” she forced herself to say.
He nodded. “Hey, Claire.”
It had been a good long while since she’d heard Luke’s slow, terse cowboy drawl, and something in it made her stomach constrict. Except for a few accidental run-ins, they’d avoided being this physically close for years, and now Claire could swear his eyes held fire, the kind that said he’d thought of her more than he’d ever let on.
She cleared her throat. “Don’t worry, Luke, I just hopped over to say I won’t be needing your—uh—services.” Hopped. She’d tried to make it sound as if the long, sweaty trek over here was inconsequential, but she’d only made herself sound ridiculous.
A dark eyebrow lifted. “Do I look worried?”
“No.”
His eyes suddenly sparked with devilment. “You hopped all the way over here to tell me you’re not looking for a man?”
He was right, she realized. She should have gotten into her Jeep and driven home. Maybe she should instruct him to come to the ranch tomorrow to do some chores to fulfill his obligation regarding the auction: she could beg Mama to deal with him. Shoving a hand deeper into the back pocket of her jeans, Claire stared at him for an uncomfortable second. “I didn’t say I needed a man, Luke,” she assured him. “I have a man.”
He shrugged as if to remind her that he wasn’t responsible for any of this, and somehow, she wished she wasn’t quite so aware of how amazingly blue the slivers of his eyes looked against his dark skin. “Well,” he said, “those wild little sisters of yours obviously weren’t convinced. They think you need a fling with a dangerous Indian.”
Her heart hammered, but she wasn’t about to let him rile her, nor give in to the urge to close the distance between them. Just what had her fool sisters said? Praying they hadn’t really referred to him as a “dangerous Indian,” Claire tried not to sound overly concerned. “They said I needed a what?”
“You heard. That’s why they procured me.” Luke glanced away and when his eyes seared into hers again, their liquid blue heat ran right through her veins. “Procured,” he continued. “I think that’s the word Emma Jane used.”
“They...” Claire’s cheeks suddenly felt boiling hot, and she stared at Luke, taking in his irritating, mildly bemused expression, and how the breeze lifted his fine blue-black hair. “Procured you...”
“Like a stud bull, Claire.”
His lips suddenly twitched and, as much as she fought it, Claire almost smiled, herself. Her sisters had said Luke was going to help with some wedding preparations. That was bad enough, but this was worse. “They wanted us to go on a...like a...date?”
Date was definitely better than whatever “stud bull” implied. Still, one look at Luke and Claire’s mind started running to hot, musty haylofts and steamy summer nights in the grasslands. Luke wasn’t exactly the type to wring his dark, broad, callused hands over midnight curfews imposed by a girl’s pa.
That was why Claire had been shocked years ago to find out he cared about western art. Not that he lacked sensitivity. She could see it plainly in his eyes. Eyes she was staring at too intently, she realized. Softening her focus, she barely heard him over the insistent pounding of her heart. He was shaking his head. “Not a date, Claire. They said they were paying for a fling,” he continued, his lips still curled in faint bemusement. “There’s a difference.”
“As if I didn’t know.” Ignoring the crazy jitters of her insides, Claire shrugged. She wasn’t about to allow Luke to rile her passions again, just so he could watch her flounder like a fool. “Well, just consider yourself off the hook.”
“Mighty kind of you.”
“I’m not kind,” she tossed back mildly. “I’m engaged.”
“So I hear.”
He looked as if the news hadn’t affected him a bit, and she hated the fact that she wanted it to. Raising her hand, she waved away a bu
zzing fly more energetically than was necessary. “You could at least say congratulations.”
“Congratulations.”
Something unexpectedly terse in his tone made her say, “You have a problem with my getting married?”
“None whatsoever. Girls get married.”
Girls, she noticed, not women. Now she definitely knew he was trying to goad her. He was thirty, not that much older than she. “I’m twenty-six.”
“All grown-up.”
“Grown-up enough not to let you take potshots, Luke.”
“Sorry,” he said, squinting those incredible eyes at her. “But you came barreling over here like you had an ax to grind, Claire.”
“Maybe I do.”
“Now, don’t go having a conniption fit. It’s not my fault your sisters bid for me.”
She felt more unwanted heat pour into her cheeks. “Well, the way you were parading around, Luke, I guess you were asking for it.”
He surveyed her another long moment. “Was I?”
Her heart fluttered as she remembered how good he’d looked flexing his muscles. “Yes,” she returned, thinking it was the wrong time to remember they’d been near this spot the last time they’d been together. It was years ago, after another fund-raiser, but even now, Claire could feel both the heat of his kisses and the sting of his rejection. Watching him sober, Claire felt her throat ache with something she couldn’t quite name—maybe regret for what she’d once thought they might share, maybe longing.
He said, “Been a while since we’ve talked, hasn’t it?”
Her lips lifted at the corners. “Hmm. And I thought we were just baiting each other.”
He chuckled softly.