by Starla Kaye
“Because….”
She scooped up her T-shirt and tugged it on, looked at him for a half second. Furious with his stubbornness, with herself, she spun toward the door and stormed across the room. Jerking the door open, she glared back at him. “You’re an ass.”
She stalked into the hallway, stopping just outside the door, fighting back tears. From behind her, he grumbled, “Yes, I know.”
Chapter Eleven
He’d never been so damn sick in his life, or at least that he could remember. Calhoun crawled back into bed for what seemed like the hundredth time in the last three days. Three god-awful long days. He must have drunk a gallon of the nasty pink stomach medicine, which he hated. But he almost felt human this evening. He didn’t have the strength to get dressed and leave his bedroom. Tomorrow, though, he would haul his ass out of here and get back to helping with the ranch chores.
Heaving a disgruntled sigh and shifting onto his side, he considered his sorry life at the moment. He had a ranch to run, but he had a foreman and reliable ranch hands to take up his slack. His attorney had called to tell him the neighbor finally agreed to his conditions and offer for the purchase of the other ranch, so he needed to finish that up. He also needed to set things right with Daniel over the issue after he’d mentioned the news to him. Lord, what a mistake! They’d argued until Daniel stormed out of the room and had avoided him ever since. But, as far as he knew, his friend hadn’t left the ranch. He was thankful for that, even if they weren’t speaking right at the moment.
He closed his eyes, frowning, and annoyance tore through him. Talking about not leaving the ranch, Ruby hadn’t driven away either. She hadn’t come to see him since the disastrous mistake he’d made of taking her to his bed. He’d told her what they’d done complicated things and he’d been dead right. He needed her gone, wanted her out of his thoughts, and didn’t want her coming between him and Daniel in any way.
But she was. Hell, she was coming between them and his men.
Rolling to his other side, he went over the upsetting conversation with his foreman the next morning. He’d been barely able to think straight and stay more than two seconds away from the bathroom when his foreman came to see him about plans for the ranch until he could function again. The man admitted Daniel had already been to the stable with Ruby checking on Starbright. He’d cursed and complained about that. He’d attempted to get dressed with the intention of going to deal with the matter. But he’d ended up being helped back into bed and told to stay put by his angered foreman. Plus, the man told him to stop being so dang pigheaded and to give her a chance. Evidently, she’d already won him over.
He’d been furious with her going against his warning about not being anywhere near his traumatized mare without him there. Worry for her safety ate at him, too. So when Daniel stopped in to check on him, he went ballistic. He’d started to lay into his friend about the matter when he had to make a rush trip to the bathroom. When he’d returned to the bedroom, he’d found Daniel glowering and holding up his notes about the call from his lawyer. The argument shifted focus, and he’d not gotten back to the problem of Ruby.
Since that day, everyone had avoided him. He didn’t blame them anymore. The idiot part of him felt irritated and relieved every time he passed by the window and saw her ridiculous pink rig still parked by the stable.
He ground his teeth and vowed to himself that first thing tomorrow he would send her packing. She didn’t belong here. Even if he hadn’t been notified of any serious issues with her still visiting his horse, he couldn’t keep worrying about her getting hurt. He would pay her for her time, unhook the electricity from her trailer, and send her on down the road. Then he would contact another man to come work with Starbright.
Footsteps in the hallway near his room snagged his attention. Ruby? No. The sound was heavier.
“Cal,” Daniel said, and knocked on the closed door. He didn’t come on inside without being invited as he once would have. That concerned him.
“Come in,” he called out, tugging the sheet over his naked body. Before their latest argument, he wouldn’t have done so. But he honestly wasn’t sure where they stood—another depressing thought.
Daniel glanced at him, his expression uncertain. “Feeling better?”
He nodded, hating the emotional distance between them. “I believe I’ll live. Wasn’t sure at first.”
“The bug sure hit you hard.” The other man stepped farther into the room. “We’ve all been worried about you.”
“Not that any of you have come to see me.” He winced at the pitiful complaint. Before the other man could respond, he shook his head. “I can’t say as I blame you.”
A hint of a smile slipped over Daniel’s face. “But you’ve felt neglected, haven’t you?” He sobered. “I’m sorry, Cal. I should have—”
“You should have left me alone just like you did.” He eased up into a sitting position, the sheet draping across his thighs. He watched Daniel’s gaze drift to where his cock lay barely covered. The way his lover’s eyes heated went a long way to making him feel better. “I acted every bit the ass she claimed I was.”
Daniel chuckled. “She did mention as much. Actually, she said so more than once.”
He didn’t want to argue, but he needed to deal with the touchy subject. “She needs to leave.”
“Because…?”
“Because she doesn’t belong here.” He supplied the same line he’d been telling himself for days.
“Because?” Daniel walked closer, his nostrils flaring, still watching the cock he so often pleasured.
His erection grew, and he struggled to focus on what they were discussing. “I worry about her being too close to Starbright.” For a second, he scowled at him. “Her doing so is your fault.”
“She’s good with the mare, Cal. You should trust in her.” Daniel moved next to the bed, his heated look distracting him.
His shaft jerked, pushing the sheet away. “I don’t want her to come between us,” he admitted. “We’re good together.”
Daniel bent down, cupped his face, and tilted his head up enough to lower his lips until they met his. As he sucked in a ragged breath, the other man ran the tip of his tongue along his teeth. Quivering in anticipation, his mouth parted. Their tongues danced against one another, and the kiss turned hotter and hotter, needy, demanding.
By the time it ended, Daniel sat on the edge of the bed. Releasing his face, he met his eyes. “I’ve missed you.”
He missed their being together, too. Yet guilt curdled inside him. He couldn’t look at the man he’d betrayed. “We…. I…. Ah, hell.”
“I know you made love with Ruby.” Tenderness and understanding echoed in Daniel’s voice.
He blinked at him, frowning. “She told you?”
Once more his friend chuckled and shook his head. “No. But she’s not the quiet type when she comes.”
“God, I’m so embarrassed.” He remembered the way she’d exploded around him, the way she’d yelled out his name. He’d gotten so lost in the moment he’d forgotten all about it.
Daniel studied him for a second, not looking the least bit upset. His hand moved to encircle Calhoun’s throbbing cock. He stroked up and down, gently, gradually faster. “I knew you two would be good together,” he said as Calhoun lifted his hips in encouragement.
Daniel’s thumb teased the slit on his cockhead, and he groaned, protested, “But you and I—”
“We’re still all right.” His head dipped, holding Calhoun’s shaft, taking it into his warm, moist mouth.
His eyes squeezed shut in ecstasy. He raised his hips again, craving the intensity of the experience. “Damn, I needed this.”
His lover worked him with the ease of long-time skill. He panted, gripped the sheets, ground his teeth by the time his lover brought him to the point of release. Sometimes, Daniel would remove his mouth and have him spurt out on his stomach. Other times he swallowed every last drop, which he did this time.
When he sat ba
ck, he smiled, and all of the tension between them disappeared. While his thoughts settled once more, he knew they would be okay.
Their gazes were locked when the front door downstairs opened and heavy boot steps sounded on the tiled foyer. Daniel stepped quickly back, and Cal jerked the sheet over his lower body.
“I’m taking Ruby to the clinic in town,” the foreman yelled up the stairs.
Chapter Twelve
Ruby sat on the examining table in the Townsend Emergency Center and swore under her breath at the two men pacing outside in the hallway. Even though she’d protested, tattletale Jason, Calhoun’s foreman, insisted on informing his boss he was taking her into town to a doctor. Of course, Calhoun and Daniel went Wild-Men-of-Borneo crazy. They’d overruled Jason about who would drive her here. Then they’d fought over whose vehicle they would use. They’d even argued about who would carry her—yes, not let her walk on her own—to Daniel’s SUV.
“Well, Doc, how bad is it? Are you sending her to the hospital in Manhattan? Checking her in there?” Calhoun verbally pounced on the poor middle-aged doctor, as he must be returning from reviewing the X-ray of her wrist.
She rolled her eyes. Her left wrist hurt like the devil, but she knew it wasn’t broken. The bump on her head was just that, a bump. No big deal. She’d had worse.
“I can make whatever arrangements are necessary,” Daniel blurted.
Their show of protectiveness was kind of sweet, but also annoying. She started to tell her two men to back off and to leave the attending physician alone. Her two men? Where did that come from?
While she mulled over the crazy notion, the doctor heaved an irritated sigh she’d heard numerous times already in connection with the cowboy and the CEO. “You shouldn’t be here,” he grumbled to his friend. “You look worse than your lady friend does.”
Calhoun had been pale and somewhat shaky when he’d stormed out to the barn with Daniel not two steps behind him. She’d told him to go back to bed, but, naturally, he ignored her dictum. If the doctor was calling him on how bad he looked, then….
“I’m fine,” he growled, although he sounded less emphatic than earlier.
Time for an intervention. She slid off the table, cradled her wrist against her chest, shoved aside the throbbing pain of her head, and marched out of the examining room. As she stepped around the doctor, she caught his concerned yet amused glance. She took in his even paler face and huffed.
“If anyone needs to check into a hospital, it’s you.” She stood in front of the big cowboy and glowered at him.
His wide shoulders stiffened, and his mouth pinched in pure mulishness. “Doc’s not done checking you over.” He focused on the arm she cradled and reached out to thread his fingers into her hair, gently locating the small lump on the side of her head. The fight seemed to go out of him. “God, I hate you got hurt because of that damn horse.”
Daniel, too, tensed. “What were you doing out there alone? You—”
Inching backward, she focused on both men, holding up a hand to stop the comment. Warmth curled through her at their clear concern for a woman they barely knew and who came into their lives and upset it just with her presence.
“Starbright had nothing to do with what happened. A fact I tried to explain in the car, which neither of you would accept.” She blew out a breath to keep from losing her temper with them. She also intended to give Jason a huge talking to the next time she saw him. But then she remembered where the man found her—slumped against the mare’s stall door. He, too, must have assumed the worst. So wrong assumptions all around.
His scowl returned. “I’m getting rid of her.” The pain of that pronouncement reflected in his eyes.
“The hell you will!”
He blinked at her furious tone. “I’ve made my decision.”
She tilted her head back to meet him eye-to-eye, a movement that made her a bit light-headed. “Unmake it.”
The doctor put a hand on her shoulder. “Maybe you all can have this discussion later, in private.”
She glanced around and discovered they had gathered an audience of several medical staff and a couple of people in the waiting room. She nodded, blushing. “Right. In private.”
“Let’s go back into the examining room, so I can wrap up your sprained wrist.” The kind-sounding doctor nodded in the other direction.
“Just a sprain?” Relief echoed in Daniel’s tone.
“What about her head? Shouldn’t you do a CT scan or something?” Calhoun pursued.
“Guys, I’m fine.” She shifted her gaze from one still-worried-looking man to the other. “Really.”
He didn’t look convinced.
“Her head will be sore for a few days, but there are no signs of a concussion,” the doctor stated in a calm tone, leading her back into the other room.
As she headed for the table, two more sets of footsteps followed behind her. She sighed, but accepted their presence. The first time, an intern had helped her onto the table. This time, she stood studying it, trying to decide how to get up there without hurting her injured wrist.
Daniel took the matter into his own hands, picked her up at the waist, and set her carefully down. Stepping back, he gave her a satisfied smile.
“Thanks.” She glanced toward Calhoun, who appeared disgruntled he hadn’t come to her rescue.
The doctor did his best to ignore the two towering men watching his every move. He went about the business of applying an elastic wrap to her wrist. At first, she winced and finally chose to distract both herself and the other men. She went into more detail of the accident. “I went to the barn to check on Starbright.”
When his expression tightened, she pinned him with a stop-it-right-now look. “I wasn’t going to do more than say hi to the mare. But she walked toward me, cautiously. I stood still, not wanting to spook her. She reached out to me.”
Again, Cal frowned.
“Not physically, not in a threatening manner. She looked at me with her big wounded eyes.” She remembered the exact moment and what she’d known instinctively. “Starbright trusts me. Your mare wants my help.”
She winced as the doctor finished with the wrapping.
“So, how did you end up getting hurt?” Daniel pressed. He studied her, hope in his gaze. It was obvious he knew how much the horse meant to Calhoun, but he also knew his friend would put her down in a second if his mare had been the one responsible for her injury. She understood that, too.
“Actually, it had something to do with Sampson.”
“The cat goes!” Cal gritted out.
She shook her head, which made her dizzy. “He didn’t mean me any harm. He was just doing his cat thing.”
At the men’s puzzled looks, she explained, “You know you have a mice problem, right? At least a small problem maybe.” When Cal gave a tiny nod, she continued, “I saw this mouse out of the corner of my eye when Sampson leaped from the windowsill in Starbright’s stall. Starbright scrambled back to the corner, eyes flashing in fright at the sudden movement. Then the cat raced across the stall, slid under the door, and tore off after the mouse.”
Seeing the whole incident in her mind’s eye, she finished the story. “I whipped around to watch, and that’s when I tripped over my own feet.” She looked down at her scuffed pink boots. “I knew I was falling and put my left hand out to catch myself. My wrist took the brunt of it. Plus, I thumped my head hard on the thick stall door as I went down. End of story.”
She lifted her gaze to Calhoun. “See? Starbright is innocent. And so is Sampson.”
***
“What am I going to do about her?” Calhoun asked Daniel as they stood looking out the great room’s window toward Ruby’s trailer several hours later. When they’d returned from town and she’d been exhausted, she’d insisted on resting in her own bed there instead of in the guest room she’d been using. That still rankled him.
“She’s gotten to you, hasn’t she?” Daniel didn’t look at him as he spoke. He sounded thou
ghtful and confused.
He considered his friend and the way he’d helped her onto the examination table and into the backseat of his SUV. When he decided she might be too cold, he’d taken off his jacket and draped it over her. For a second, he believed Daniel would lean down and give her kiss. He hadn’t, but he’d appeared tempted.
Watching a spattering of snow falling once more, he thought about the sassy, determined young woman. Lord a’mighty, she’d crossed threads with him time and again since she’d shown up on his doorstep. No other female had attempted to take him on, butted heads with him…and made him rethink a decision he’d made. Certainly not his ex-fiancée Katherine.
He focused on the sticker-covered pink trailer and delved deeper into his comparisons. Katherine had been part of his life for years before they’d gotten engaged. But after five years of her trying to get him to pick a wedding date, he’d called things off. He’d realized she wasn’t the right person for him. Oddly, she’d accepted his decision without a lot of complaint. They’d remained good friends, and he’d gone to her wedding. He’d been happy she’d moved on with her life, but he struggled to do the same.
Daniel’s familiar scent drifted to him, called to him, aroused him. Although meeting the businessman and realizing he was sexually drawn to him had shocked him, he had long ago accepted his new lifestyle. He’d figured his days of making love to a woman were over.
Then Ruby McMurtry had burst into his world.
Both women in his life were cowgirls, although Katherine was more of a city woman these days. She’d moved away from the area and ranching when she’d married Tom, a well-respected attorney in Kansas City. Even her folks, his neighboring ranchers, were moving on and forgave him for what he’d done to their daughter. They were selling him their ranch…maybe. He didn’t want to cause a real problem between him and Daniel, so he was reconsidering that plan. Maybe he did have more than enough ranch responsibilities already.
His thoughts returned to Ruby. She didn’t live on a ranch, but he’d never met a female more at home on one. A cowgirl to the bone. A damn stubborn one, too. Gifted, at least as far as working with horses. She’d make a real good rancher’s wife.