by Julie Miller
“You kissed me.” Jolene’s chest rose and fell with the same deep, uneven gasps that marked his own breathing.
Guilty as charged. “Yeah. I did. And, uh, you kissed me back.”
“Men don’t…” Her voice trailed off. She lowered her gaze to a spot near his chin.
Nate noted the sudden pallor in her cheeks. He frowned at the uncharacteristic confusion in her tone. “Men don’t what?”
“Not even Joaquin. We never…” She licked her tongue along the rim of her lips as if finding something unfamiliar there. Nate had to look away. There was something completely innocent and totally seductive in the way she tasted herself.
“Never what?” Despite the interest swelling behind his zipper, he reminded himself this was apology time, not round two of kissing his frustrations into submission. “I didn’t hurt you, did I? I’m sorry if I overstepped any boundaries. I imagine you’re still grieving—”
She snapped her attention back to him, perplexed and alert. “Why did you kiss me?”
Huh? Nate studied the disbelief in her expression. He didn’t think this was about intruding on grief or over-stepping boundaries. She hadn’t recognized his lusty response to her. Wasn’t aware that she’d given it back in spades. Had it been that long since he’d kissed a woman?
“California?” Her fingers pinched the hair on his chest as she clutched a fistful of his shirt, urging him to answer.
“Ow.” He gently plucked her hand away, hating the nickname but resigning himself to the distance it forced between them. He splayed her fingers apart and slipped his in between, binding them in a more comforting, less painful position against his chest. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. It’s been a long couple of days for me. I acted without thinking and just did what felt right.”
“So you’d do it again?” Her fingertips curled around his. Was that hope in her eyes? Or trepidation?
Nate honestly didn’t know how to answer. He hadn’t come to Texas looking for anything beyond the chance to do his job. But he’d found a sexy, confounding angel who pushed buttons in him he never realized he had. Yeah, he’d kiss her. He stroked his thumb across the backs of her fingers. Even the skin there was smooth like velvet. He’d touch her again. Hold her. Do whatever it took to see her beautiful smile and keep her safe.
Safe. Hell. Nate’s out-of-control libido came to a grinding halt. He shouldn’t be having this conversation. He was here to make sure she got back to her father in one piece, not to piece together a relationship with her. She was so young and full of energy, she probably wouldn’t even be interested in a relationship with a gimpy old soul like him, anyway.
Steeling himself, Nate gave Jolene the only answer he could under the circumstances. “No. That won’t happen again.”
Her audible gasp cut deep into his conscience. She was either insulted or relieved. “I…well…” Jolene snatched her hand away as if the appendage had betrayed her. She rubbed her belly and tilted her chin. Nate braced himself. The fire was back and she picked up the argument right where they’d left off. “Well, good. I have things to do, anyway. You’d better keep it in check next time, Kellison.”
He bit down on the impulse to defend himself. She was right. He couldn’t lose control like that again. One of them had to be responsible. As usual, he volunteered for the job.
Before she could make good on whatever foolhardy idea she’d hatched, Nate reached around her shoulder, picked up the reins of the sorrel gelding and retied him to the stall gate.
“What were you doing with Sonny, anyway?” he asked, reading the name-plate beside the stall. “Please don’t tell me you were going after that bull in this weather.”
Oddly enough, the abrupt change in topic didn’t seem to phase her a bit. But then, he was quickly learning to expect the unexpected from this woman. “I want to get back to the Double J and make sure I’ve battened down all the right hatches.”
“Is that so?” Removing the heavy bags she’d draped behind the saddle, Nate peeked inside to find a variety of tools and supplies that could mean only one thing. Her heart might be in the right place, but she had no sense of survival. “And if you happen to run into Rocky along the way, you’ll just herd him back here before checking the old homestead?”
When he reached for the lariat she’d draped over the saddle horn, Jolene tried to snatch it from his grasp. “Look. I don’t know how they do things out in California, but down here in Texas, neighbors help each other. Lily’s a good friend. If there’s something I can do to help—”
“I know.” He’d heard this argument before and still didn’t like it. “You’re going to do it. Isn’t it enough that you helped deliver her baby? You made sure her children were taken care of and that Deacon had a chance to play grandpa. You’ve done more than most already. In California, we appreciate that kind of dedication and compassion, too. But you don’t have to personally handle every problem on the planet. Now let go of the rope and go back to the house.”
“But Lily still needs—”
“Go back to the house.”
“What about my ranch?”
“Jolene.”
Nate squared off and held on until she conceded this tug-of-war that was more about stubborn wills than physical strength. Lightning charged the air outside and flashed through the cracks around the barn’s doors and windows. An answering smack of thunder rattled the clapboard walls and Sonny danced between the two of them.
On the rumbling drumbeat that followed, Jolene released her grip on the rope. She could damn him with those big blue eyes all she wanted. He’d already surrendered to the inevitable.
Jolene Kannon-Angel had that effect on him—made him do crazy things. Made him want things he shouldn’t.
When she turned away to unsaddle Sonny, he went to work. Searching the next few stalls, Nate found Deacon’s horse, Buck. He passed another sorrel, then paused to scratch the inquisitive nose of a tall, muscular bay named Checker. He stroked the dark, red-brown hair along the quarter horse’s neck and flicked his fingers through the black mane. The big gelding would suit his purpose just fine.
“You’ll do,” he whispered. “Won’t be easy, though.” The horse bobbed his head, as if agreeing to the un-spoken challenge.
“I really should check the Double J.” He heard Jolene moving behind him. “Joaquin left it to me so his son would always have a home. It’s my responsibility to take care of it.”
Nate found a blanket and saddle for the bay and let her talk while he worked. He’d lasso her and haul her into the house over his shoulder if she wouldn’t listen to reason. “There’s still that pesky hurricane, remember? Would your husband want you to risk your life or your son’s?”
“Then I have to get there before the hurricane does.”
“No, you don’t.” Nate slipped the reins between his fingers and swung up into the saddle. He tested the limited flexibility of his knee, but already felt some relief just taking his weight off the joint. With a click of his tongue and a gentle nudge, he turned the bay toward the doors and tipped the bill of his cap to Jolene. “I’ll go.”
That tempting mouth dropped open and she eyed him as if he’d just sprouted wings. “You know how to ride a horse?”
“Looks that way. If I’m not back here before Damon hits, don’t come looking for me until it blows over. Understand?”
“But, how…?”
Nate almost grinned at her incredulity. She’d thought he was a fish out of water. She was the only thing he didn’t know how to handle here. “I grew up on a ranch. Competed in the rodeo until a bull busted up my knee in the ring. By the way, for your information, I know a helluva lot more about riding than I do about surfing.” When he reached the door, he leaned down and pushed it open. Horizontal rain instantly pelted him like hundreds of cold slaps in the face. “Hell.”
Checker shied beneath him, but Nate tightened his grip and reminded the horse who was boss. The next chapter in this crazy adventure was about to begin. “
You’re northeast of here a couple of miles, right?”
“More like three.” Too late, he realized Jolene had been repacking her gear instead of putting Sonny back in his stall. Once she remounted, she spurred her horse and bolted past him into the storm. “We’re a team today, right?”
“Damn it, Jolene!” Nate called out to her. “The whole idea is for you to stay put, stay safe and stay out of trouble.” But the wind swept away his words.
Or so he thought.
Jolene had already circled beyond the paddock. She glanced over her shoulder and taunted him as she became little more than a blur of red and gold amidst the camouflaging gusts of wind and rain. “You can’t make me if you can’t catch me!”
“Oh, I’ll catch you,” Nate muttered beneath his breath.
He’d made a promise to her father. And to himself.
He paused just long enough to latch the barn behind him before digging his heels into the bay’s sides. Adrenaline screamed in his veins, matching the force of the elements beating down around him—matching the lead-with-her-heart will of one crazy, stubborn, remarkably kissable Texas woman.
The chase was on.
“THAT’S ROCKY?” Nate asked, reining his horse in beside Jolene to study the arroyo turned river that cut across their path.
“That’s Rocky.”
The runaway bull bellowed and threw himself against the bank of the flooded gulley, desperately trying to pull his massive weight out of the chest-deep water that raced past him. But the red, weeping wounds on his rust-colored hide told of the twisted barbed wire that had tangled in his legs and trapped him as the water rose around him.
Nate shook his head. “This is not good.”
He and Jolene were both breathing hard after a wild ride across the perimeter of the Rock-a-Bye Ranch into Double J territory. Their chests rose and fell in deep gasps that matched the rhythm of the horses’ restless pawing and periodic efforts to shake the water from their skin. Jolene’s wind-whipped cheeks provided the brightest spots of color in a landscape where shrouds of rain turned land and sky into one endless gray horizon.
“Not good at all.”
Jolene had given up trying to keep the poncho’s hood up over her head. The rain had turned her hair a dark gold, and rivulets ran down her face from every loose strand plastered to her forehead. She shoved the tendrils away from her eyes, giving him a glimpse of the fear and compassion there. “We have to help him.”
“He may not let us,” Nate warned. But he was already assessing the force of the wind, the speed and depth of the instant river. The physical strength he had left after too much Texas and too little sleep.
Jolene raised her hand to shield her eyes from grit blowing on the tornadic gusts of air from the east. The sixty to seventy mile per hour winds probably marked the leading edge of Hurricane Damon. That meant the weather and Rocky’s chances of survival—and their own—were only going to get worse.
“I wonder how long he’s been trapped there. Maybe he’s been weakened by the struggle,” Jolene suggested. “If he’s tired, it might make him halfway amenable to being helped.”
Might. Halfway. Half a bull was still a mighty dangerous adversary to tangle with.
The animal’s mournful bellowing didn’t seem to phase the horses, but it was obviously having an effect on Jolene’s compassionate heart. “If we cut him free, maybe he can get himself out.”
“If he’ll let me get that close.” The last time Nate had gone head-to-head with an angry bull had nearly cost him his life. It had cost him his career. And it had damn well handicapped his entire perception of life—how precious it was, how easily it could be thrown away.
A soft hand on his thigh tore him from his thoughts. He glanced down at Jolene’s long, capable fingers—strong in intent, yet timid in their touch. He looked up into her eyes. She squinted against the wind and debris, but he saw no fight there. “You said a bull did the damage to your leg. Are you afraid of him?”
When she spoke in that same tender voice she used to soothe her baby, Nate understood how this woman could create a loving home—full of bright smiles and warm hugs, compassion and support, with strong roots that went right down into the Texas soil. All the good things a man wanted to hold on to and protect with his life.
Something he refused to name shifted inside him, and he recognized his longing to be a part of that world, so like the one he’d lost when his parents had died. The one he’d lost a second time when Grandpa Nate had passed away. The one he’d been unable to rediscover since his brother and sister had moved on with lives of their own.
But he was quickly learning that this woman would be just as kind, just as concerned to a stranger as she would be to the man she loved. Nate buried his own yearnings and accepted her compassion for what it was and nothing more.
“Nah, I’ve worked around cattle too long to fear them. I think of it more like a healthy respect for the enemy.” He laced his fingers through hers and gave them a reassuring squeeze, frowning when he realized how chilled they were. “You got a pair of gloves you can put on?”
She pulled away, tucking both hands around her saddle horn and ignoring his concern. “If this dredges up some bad memory, I can try to climb down there and cut him loose. I have wire-cutters in my bag.”
“No way.” He looked straight across at Jolene, then reached over and tucked her hair behind her ear, demanding her attention. His vow to keep his distance didn’t apply when it came to protecting her and the baby. “I will ride on past and let that bull drown unless you promise me you’ll stay at a safe distance with the horses.”
“But he’s unpredictable as it is. If he’s hurt, there’s no telling what he’ll do. You’ll need my help.”
“I know what one of those creatures can do to a man. I know how he can tear your body—your whole life apart.” Her knuckles turned white as she grasped the horn. He wanted to touch her again, to apologize for his harsh tone. But this was too serious to muddy his intentions with anything other than his words. “You can drive your truck fast, ride a horse through a hurricane, or hate my guts. But I will not budge on this.”
“But it’s too dangerous. What if we rope him and I tie him off on the saddle—”
“Jolene!” Her mouth snapped shut on a weak sigh. She looked so pale. Her shoulders sagged, and the unguarded moment of defeat revealed her fatigue. When she turned her head away, a shiver cascaded from her shoulders down through her hips and legs, shaking her hard enough to disturb Sonny beneath her. “Jolene?”
How long had she been running on pure bravado and willpower? Screw this. Nate pulled off his cap and plunked it on top of her head in an effort to conserve whatever body heat she had left. He leaned across his saddle, reaching for the blanket she’d tied behind her. “We need to get you home. Get you warm and dry and get some food into you. You and the baby need to rest.”
“No.” She grabbed his wrist to stop his efforts. Her icy fingers held on with surprising strength. “Help Rocky if you can. Please. Not just for Lily, but for his sake. He’s in pain and he’s scared. I’ll stay with the horses. I promise.”
Those blue eyes were damn near impossible to resist. Nate quickly debated the merits of physical health versus mental anguish. But if he worked fast, he could help her with both. He looked deeply into her eyes, verifying her promise. She hadn’t said anything she didn’t mean yet.
But Nate was already breathing deeply, in through his nose, out through his mouth, slowing his pulse, clearing his mind, cinching his courage firmly into place. “You got a pen at your ranch that’ll hold him?” Jolene nodded. “If I can fish him up out of that arroyo, we’ll herd him to your place until this blows over. But once we get there, I’ll take care of whatever needs to be handled. You change your clothes and get straight to bed. And we don’t try to save anything or anybody else until Damon is gone. Understood?”
She nodded. Her fingers eased their grip ever so slightly so she could take his hand and squeeze it tight. “T
hank you.”
He raised her hand to his lips and kissed the soft, wet skin. “Don’t thank me yet, angel.”
He had to survive the rescue first.
His knee protested the climb to the ground. Judging by the stiffness, he had some major swelling going on. That knock on the dashboard, the twist in the ditch—as well as fatigue and weather—had definitely exacerbated the injury, which normally didn’t give him such fits. But Nate gritted his teeth and bore the pain the way he did every other day of his life. He handed Checker’s reins over to Jolene, pulled the wire-cutters from the saddlebag and prayed.
Leaving Jolene and the horses a good twenty yards behind him, Nate limped toward the arroyo, speaking softly into the wind. “Easy, boy. I think you should know that I’m smarter than you. And if you work with me, I can help you.”
Rocky spotted him halfway there and made another valiant effort to free himself.
Nate paused, propping his hands on his hips and shaking his head. “Now what did I tell you?” Other than twitching his cream-colored ears and snorting hot, steamy breath through his nostrils, the bull didn’t move.
“You and I don’t have to become friends, but we do need to cooperate.” Nate moved closer, keeping his voice calm. “The little lady seems to think you deserve a hand, and I volunteered. That’s what I do, you know. Volunteer. Help out where I’m needed.” He was almost to the edge of the arroyo now. “To tell you the truth, you and the lady have a lot in common. Well, sure, she’s a lot prettier than you are, and believe me, she smells a might better. But she’s stubborn when it comes to letting somebody take care of her. Even when it’s in her best interests and the man’s willing to do it.”
Rocky had been weakened by his effort to escape. He tried to spin around when Nate came too close, but the force of the water hit his flanks and nudged him back to the side of the ditch.