A Cowboy's Charm

by Vicki Lewis Thompson

  “Give me five minutes to change out of these clothes. I don’t want you hanging onto me when I smell of gas.”

  “Want some help?”

  He laughed. “I’ll take a rain check. See you in a few.” His long strides carried him quickly down the hall to her bedroom.

  His footsteps on the wood floor, his voice, his laughter, his touch—she’d miss all of it when he drove away in the morning. Chances were good he wouldn’t be back for another four or five weeks. Weeks. But she’d help set the parameters, so she’d jolly well better be able to handle them.

  Well, she would, that’s all. He couldn’t come more often without piling extra work on his son and she’d made the choice not to visit him in Spokane.

  It wasn’t ideal, but it was that or nothing. In any case, anticipating future sadness and ignoring current pleasures made no sense. When Quinn started back down the hall, she unhooked her denim jacket from the coat tree. “I assume I’ll need this.”

  “You will, although I’ll block the wind so it shouldn’t be as cold for you.”

  “I can’t wait. I’ve never ridden on a motorcycle before.”

  He came to an abrupt halt. “Never?”

  “It’s a small town. Growing up I didn’t know anybody who had one. It’s still a small town and I still don’t know anybody with a motorcycle. Except you.”

  “I had no idea I had a virgin biker on my hands.”

  “Is that a problem?”

  “On the contrary. It’s a privilege and a responsibility.”

  She grinned. “It’s getting deep in here.”

  “I’m serious. If I do this right and you have a positive experience, there’s a chance you’ll become a champion of the sport. If I screw it up, you’ll tell your friends that you never want to get on that damned machine again and you might convince them not to try it, either.”

  “So much pressure!”

  “No worries.” He smiled and grabbed his jacket off the coat tree. “I’m not going to screw it up. You’ll love it. You have all the makings of a biker chick.”

  “How do you figure?”

  “You’re gutsy.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You love being outdoors.”

  “Yep.”

  “And you have a great ass.”

  She laughed. “Thanks. I’m so ready to plant my great ass on your bike so you can take my gutsy, outdoorsy self for a ride.”

  His gray eyes twinkled. “Right this way.”

  She walked out the door ahead of him and gave a little twitch to her hips.

  “Did I mention sexy as hell?”

  “No.”

  “Add it to the list.” He took her hand and laced his fingers through hers as they started down the flagstone walkway. His bike sat at the end of it, gleaming in the light from the porch.

  “What about the dirt road? Will that be tough on Cassandra?”

  “She’s used to it. My ranch road’s dirt, too.”

  The road she’d never drive on. The ranch she’d never see. He’d learned so much about her by staying here. She wouldn’t get that chance. Her choices were starting to feel like bars caging her in.

  “Ever worn a motorcycle helmet?”

  “Nope.”

  “Then I’ll help you put it on.” He unhooked one of the two secured to the bike. “The guy who had the fuel tank just broke up with his girlfriend and she didn’t want her helmet or her gloves. If they fit you, I’ll leave it all here for the next time I ride my bike down.”

  “Weren’t you taking a chance, buying a helmet without me there?”

  “A little. But after making love to you I know the shape of your head.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Not at all. Tilt your head toward me. That’s good.”

  “While we made love, you were measuring me for a helmet?”

  He chuckled. “No, ma’am. I was having the time of my life. But the info registered, anyway. Whenever I cradled your head in my hands. I just naturally—”

  “Is this a motorcycle geek thing?”

  “Probably.” He crouched down and fastened the chin strap. “How does it feel?”

  “Like I’m ready to rocket into space.”

  “Are you uncomfortable? Are your ears squished?”

  “I’m perfectly comfortable. I just feel like Buzz Lightyear.”

  “You don’t look like Buzz Lightyear.”

  “What do I look like?”

  “A Harley biker chick.” He strapped on his helmet and handed her the gloves. Then he gave her a quick course in the art of being a passenger on a motorcycle. “The best thing is to hold tight to me and follow the movements of my body.”

  “Oh, baby.”

  “No, really. If you do that you’ll be safer and—”

  “More turned on?”

  “I have no control over that.”

  “Me, either. Fire her up.”

  He laughed and shook his head. “I have a feeling this will be a very memorable ride.” Straddling the bike, he started the motor and motioned her to climb on.

  Adrenaline pumping, she settled behind him, wrapped her arms around his waist and pressed herself firmly against his strong back.

  His voice rose above the grumble of the engine. “All set?”

  “Let her rip!”

  He took off slowly and she tightened her hold. She’d underestimated the erotic potential of riding behind a virile motorcycle man. Quinn Sawyer on a red 1983 Harley…booya.

  He took the dirt road at a leisurely pace, allowing her to look up at the stars. Spectacular. Two minutes into this ride and she was already a fan. She breathed in the earthy tang of spring grass mingled with the now-familiar scent of Quinn. She could identify him blindfolded.

  During his instructions, he’d explained that if she looked over his left shoulder, she could keep her body aligned with his. She didn’t need to do that. Instinctively she moved when he moved.

  When he reached the paved two-lane, he picked up speed. The air rushed past and her heart raced in time with the spinning wheels. Glorious! As he took each curve, she dipped and swayed with him as if they were dancing.

  The road was nearly deserted. A couple of trucks passed them on their way into town. Most people were settled in for the evening, leaving this stretch of road for her first-ever magical motorcycle ride.

  On the outskirts of town, Quinn slowed and executed a gradual U-turn. Homeward bound. She didn’t want the ride to end and yet she couldn’t wait to tell him how much she’d loved it.

  He’d brightened her life in so many ways and this was icing on the cake. No wonder he’d bought this bike and thank goodness he’d chosen to ride it down here. Had Trevor been psychic when he’d imagined her perfect man coming into town on a motorcycle?

  Like before, Quinn took it easy on the ranch road. Not as smooth a ride as the highway provided, but she had time to appreciate her surroundings more. Her beautiful ranch. How ironic that the place she loved was one of the reasons she couldn’t be with the man she….

  Oh, hell. Damn it, no! Please don’t let it be... But it was. Dear God, she loved him. Horrible news. The worst. The sharp pain started in her gut and moved into every cell in her body. What had she done?

  When she loved, she didn’t mess around. She didn’t make logical compromises—a little time together, a lot of time apart. The distance separating her from her beloved morphed into miles of barbed wire, endless stretches of parched desert, a rocky terrain filled with broken glass.

  As a young bride, she’d barely survived Ian’s tours of duty. She’d struggled to frame them as a noble sacrifice because he was serving his country. Hadn’t worked. Missing him had become a visceral, gnawing ache that filled every waking moment and spread misery through her dreams. Torture.

  She would never sentence herself to that kind of half-life again.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Best bike ride ever. Quinn had expected fun. He hadn’t expected transformational. He cou
ld have kept going for hours, but he didn’t want to overdo it on Kendra’s first outing.

  She might be hungry. Or turned on. He was, but not to the point that he’d need to drag her straight to the bedroom or go crazy. Not that she’d ever needed to be dragged.

  After she’d conquered her anxiety that first time, she’d been all in. God, how he’d miss making love to her, miss talking and laughing with her, miss…her.

  He pulled the bike up in front of the flagstone walk and waited until she swung down. After he turned off the engine, he nudged down the stand and climbed off.

  She was struggling with her chin strap.

  “I’ll get it.” He helped her off with her helmet and set it on the seat. “What did you think?”

  “I loved it.” But her voice sounded funny.

  He took off his helmet and gloves before he glanced at her. “You’re a great passenger.”

  “Thank you.” She handed him the gloves she’d worn. Her expression was subdued, which didn’t fit with her body language during the ride.

  He’d swear she’d been transported by the experience, too. He didn’t take the gloves. “Might as well keep them. And the helmet, too.” He picked it up and gave it back to her.

  She avoided looking at him as she accepted it and dropped the gloves inside.

  Yeah, something was seriously wrong. “Kendra, what is it?”

  She met his gaze at last. Before the ride her eyes had been filled with anticipation, happiness, excitement. Now…unreadable. “Would you please come inside and make love to me?”

  “You know I will, and gladly, but—”

  “Please don’t ask me anything, okay? I just…need you.”

  He nodded. Leaving his helmet and gloves with the bike, he took her hand for the silent journey along the flagstone, up the porch steps and over to the door. His head buzzed with a million questions she didn’t want him to ask. Maybe he didn’t want to know the answers.

  Inside he helped her off with her jacket and shrugged out of his. What a strange turnaround from the lighthearted woman she’d been earlier. Sliding his hand around her waist, he walked with her back to the bedroom where she’d left on a light as usual.

  No tropical music tonight, though. They’d deflated the palm trees and put away the leis. Nothing remained of their happy little party. Just as well. The mood had completely shifted.

  Cupping her face in both hands, he kissed her. Grasping his head, she kissed him back with an urgency that spoke of desperation. Then she backed away and began taking off her clothes. He got the message and started on his.

  She finished first. Throwing back the covers, she stretched out on the snowy sheet and watched him as he shoved off his jeans and briefs. She murmured something he didn’t catch.

  “What?”

  “You’re perfect.”

  “Hardly.”

  “Perfect for me, then.”

  He took a deep breath. “That’s great to hear.” And confusing. Perfect for her was good, right?

  He gazed into those blue eyes as he slipped in beside her. “You look so sad.”

  “Please make love to me, Quinn.”

  “I don’t have to be asked twice.” It was a lame excuse for a joke. The Kendra he was used to would have pointed out that clearly he did have to be asked twice because this was her second request.

  But she said nothing, just reached up and stroked his cheek with a tenderness that made him catch his breath. What was going on?

  Moving over her, he dropped soft kisses on her cheeks. When her eyelids fluttered closed, he brushed kisses there, too.

  Her touch was light but thorough as she caressed his shoulders, his arms, his back. Almost as if she wanted to commit him to memory because…no. He refused to go down that dark and dismal path.

  Instead he’d build a fire in her that would drive out whatever demons she was battling. He roamed the length of her warm body, stroking, nibbling and licking all those secret places that he’d learned could bring her to a fever pitch.

  Gradually she began to respond. Her breathing changed first, then the pressure of her touch. At last she began to moan and thrash beneath him.

  That was more like it. Capturing her mouth, he put everything he was reluctant to say into his kiss. He ravished her sweet lips until he was out of breath. Lifting his head, he sucked in air. “Tell me what you need.”

  Clutching his shoulders, she dug in with the tips of her fingers. “I need…please…I want…”

  He moved between her thighs and plunged deep. Then he leaned down and put his mouth close to her ear as he drew back and drove home again. “This?”

  “Yes.” She gasped the word and arched to meet his next thrust. And the next.

  He settled into the rhythm that worked for them. He could gaze into her eyes as they changed color, watch the flush of an impending orgasm suffuse her skin.

  “You’re perfect, too.” He changed the angle a little and she tightened around his cock. “Perfect for me.”

  The glow in her eyes intensified.

  “I never thought I’d find…someone like you.” She was close. He increased the pace. “But…here you are.” He bore down. “Come for me, sweet Kendra.”

  Faster now, and faster yet. She arched upward with a wail and her climax rolled over his cock as he continued to pump. Her orgasm triggered his and he claimed his release, adding his deep groan to her breathless cries. But she didn’t swear.

  His breathing slowed and he gave her part of his weight, just enough to let his chest nestle against her breasts. He kept his voice light. “What happened to the salty language?”

  Her soft whimper was his first clue that he’d asked the wrong question. Then he glanced into her eyes. Uh-oh. Tears quivered there, ready to spill out. “Kendra? What’s wrong, sweetheart?”

  “I love you.”

  He stared at her, stunned. And elated. And some other emotions he didn’t have the brain power to process yet.

  “I’m sorry.”

  That snapped him out of his confusion. “Sorry? What’s to be sorry about? That’s wonderful!”

  “No, it’s not! It’s terrible!” The tears spilled out from the corners of her beautiful eyes.

  He was undone. He’d fight dragons to stop those tears. “How can it be terrible? Don’t cry, please don’t cry. We’ll work it out. I’ll fix this. Just tell me what—”

  “It’s not your fault. Well, it is, because you’re so great. I should have resisted, but I didn’t and now we have a huge mess.” She pushed at his chest. “You need to move so I can get a tissue.”

  “Stay put. I’ll bring the box.” She loved him. How did he get so damn lucky? She loved him. How terrific was that? He returned to the bed with a renewed sense of purpose. “You love me?” He still couldn’t believe it.

  “Yes, damn it.” She pushed herself to a sitting position and took the box of tissues he offered.

  “Hey, it’s okay. I love you, too.” He climbed back into bed and sat facing her.

  “You do?” She looked horrified. “That’s even worse!”

  “You’re confusing the hell out of me. How can it be bad that we love each other?”

  She blew her nose and gazed at him with such despair in her eyes that he reached for her. She scooted back. “I guess I need to explain.”

  “I guess you do.” That little scuttle movement away from him hurt. She’d always wanted to come toward him, not back off.

  She used up several more tissues as she talked about Ian and the pain of his absences while he was deployed. “I never got used to it.” She blew her nose again. “That yo-yo of being with the man I loved and then not, and then with him again for a little while, and then he’d be gone again. Horrible.”

  He was getting the picture and it wasn’t pretty.

  She wadded up a tissue in her fist. “Maybe you’d be fine with it. Maybe being in love with me and only seeing me every month or so would work for you.”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never tr
ied an arrangement like that. But I’m willing to, because the alternative—”

  “That’s just it. I’m not willing to.”

  The bottom dropped out of his world. “We’ll shorten the time to three weeks. Let’s do that and see how it goes.”

  She shook her head and reached for another tissue. “I love you, Quinn.”

  “And I love you, Kendra. That’s why—”

  “I can’t love you only a couple of nights every three or four weeks and call that a life. I just can’t! It’s too hard!”

  “So you’d rather have nothing?”

  “Yes.”

  He sucked in a breath. Not much to say to that, was there? He gestured to the rumpled sheets. “Then why this?”

  “I’m weak. I wanted to make love with you one more time because it’s the most wonderful thing that’s happened to me in—”

  “Damn it, Kendra!” He grabbed her whether she wanted him to or not. “Can you hear yourself?” He gave her a little shake. “The most wonderful thing that’s happened to you in years! That’s what you were going to say, isn’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s the most wonderful thing that’s happened to me in years, too.” He loosened his grip on her arms and rubbed them gently. “I can’t believe you don’t want to at least try this arrangement. If you hate it, then—”

  “Then I’ll be even more in love with you than I am now. I’ll have tortured myself and made it even worse when the breakup comes.” She took a shaky breath. “I never told Ian this, but if he’d chosen to stay in the military and make it his career, I was going to divorce him.”

  That was a conversation stopper.

  “When this all started, I convinced myself that it could work because you’d only be a diversion, a fun, amusement park experience that I could look forward to every month or so, like a massage or a pedicure. But you’ve become way more than that.”

  “So have you.”

  “Then take it from me, Quinn. We’re not the kind of people who can settle for scraps when we want the full meal. That’s probably why we clicked. You might not have discovered how bad our solution was until you’d lived with it for a while. But when you did, you’d have wanted out, too.”