Runaway Temptation

by Maureen Child

  Seriously, what was wrong with her? She had just run from one man and now she was getting all fizzy over another one? Maybe this was a breakdown. Some emotional outburst to relieve the tension she’d been living with for weeks.

  He shrugged out of his suit jacket and slung it over one broad shoulder, hanging it from the tip of one finger. He tipped his hat back farther on his head and gave her one last, long look. Then he turned and walked away.

  His long legs moved slow and easy and Shelby’s gaze dropped to his butt. A world-class behind, she thought and swallowed hard. Whatever was happening to her, it hadn’t hurt her eyesight any. Dragging in a deep breath, she fought to steady herself and hadn’t quite succeeded by the time he disappeared around a corner.

  Leaning back against the wall, Shelby sighed a little. What was it about a cowboy?

  * * *

  Rose was waiting at the oak the next day when Gus arrived. True to his nature, he was a good fifteen minutes late. Back in another life, when she was young and in love, his tardiness had always irked the hell out of her. But then he’d smile and kiss her and every thought in her head would just melt away.

  But that was then.

  “You’re late.”

  “And you still like to point out the obvious,” Gus said, taking a seat beside her on the bench he had built for the two of them nearly fifty years ago. He slapped one work-worn hand onto the wood, rough from surviving years of wind and rain and sun. “Nice to see this held up.”

  “You were always good with your hands,” Rose agreed.

  He glanced at her and one graying black eyebrow lifted. “You used to think so.”

  She flushed and was surprised by it. Who would have guessed a woman her age was even capable of blushing? Taking a breath, she smoothed her hands across the knees of her khaki slacks and found herself wondering when her hands had aged. How was it the years flew past so quickly?

  A lifetime ago, she and Gus would meet here beneath this oak tree. On summer nights, the wind whispered through the leaves, the stars shone down on them like points of flame and it had been as if the two of them were alone in the universe. The present had been exciting and the future looked bright and shiny.

  Then it all ended.

  Frowning to herself, she looked out over the land. This part of her family ranch hadn’t changed much in the last fifty years. There were still cattle grazing in the distance beneath a steely blue sky and the thick canopy of leaves overhead muted the sun’s power and lowered the temperature a good ten degrees. And here she was again. With Gus.

  “Why did you pick here to meet?”

  “Because I knew it would bother you,” he admitted with a shrug.

  That stung. “At least you’re honest about it.”

  “I put a great value on honesty,” Gus said, his voice deep and meaningful as he stared into her eyes. “Always did.”

  And Rose knew what he was talking about. Once upon a time, she’d promised to love him forever. Then she’d later turned him away and told him she would never marry him. That she didn’t love him and never had. And the lies had cost her, slicing at Rose’s soul even as they tore Gus’s heart apart while she was forced to watch.

  “We’re not here to talk about the past,” she said, dragging air into tight lungs.

  “No, we’re damn sure not,” he retorted. “So let’s get to the point. You tell your grandson to keep his hands off my girl or there’s going to be trouble.”

  Rose laughed shortly. “Don’t use that ‘lord of all you survey’ voice on me. It won’t work. And it won’t work on Daniel, either.” She lifted her chin and met her old lover glare for glare. “My grandson is made of tougher stuff than that. You won’t scare him off, Gus, so don’t bother trying.”

  “Well, what the hell do you want me to do, then?” He pushed up from the bench, walked a few feet through the dry brush, then spun about and came back to stand in front of her. “I assume you’ve got a plan. You always did have more ideas than you knew what to do with.”

  She sniffed a little, but stood up to meet him on her own two feet. He was still taller than her, but thanks to her Italian-made boots with a two-inch heel, she didn’t have to crane her neck to meet his eyes.

  “As it happens,” she said, “I have been thinking about this.”

  “And?”

  He was irritated and impatient, and she couldn’t help but remember that he hadn’t always been so anxious to get away from her.

  “What we have to do is find each of them someone else.”

  “Oh,” he said, laughing, “is that all?”

  Rose scowled at him. “You might hear me out before you start mocking the whole idea.”

  “Fine.” He folded his arms across his wide chest. “Tell me.”

  “I was thinking we could do something in Royal. An event. Something big. Something that would attract attention not just here, but in Houston, too.”

  “Uh-huh.” Frowning, Gus said, “And what’ve you got in mind?”

  “Well, nothing. Not yet. But you could throw out a few ideas you know.” She tapped the toe of her boot against the ground. “This affects both of us, remember?”

  “Wouldn’t if you could just control your grandson,” he muttered.

  “Or if you could get your granddaughter to stop looking at Daniel with stars in her eyes,” Rose countered.

  His scowl deepened, but he gave her a grudging nod. “All right. So something that would involve the two of them, but throw them at other people.”

  “Exactly.”

  He scrubbed one hand across his jaw and Rose watched him, seeing not just the powerful man he was now, but the man he had once been. The man who’d stolen her heart when she was only sixteen years old. The man she had thought she’d be with forever.

  The man her father had stolen from her.

  The irony of this situation wasn’t lost on her. Her own father had kept her from the man she loved and now she was scheming to do the same thing to her grandson. But she didn’t have a choice. Claytons and Slades were just not meant to be together.

  “All right,” Gus said, his voice low and deep and somehow intimate. “I’ll do some thinking on this, too. We can meet up again in a few days. See what we come up with.”

  “Fine.” She nodded, refusing to acknowledge, even to herself, that she was glad she’d be seeing Gus again.

  They stood only a few feet apart, separated by fifty years of mistrust and pain. A soft wind rattled the leaves overhead and pushed through Rose’s hair like a touch.

  “Well, I’ve got to be getting back,” Gus said abruptly, and Rose jolted as if coming up out of a trance.

  “Of course. Me, too.”

  Nodding, Gus said, “So we meet here again in three days? Same time?”

  “That works,” she agreed and watched as he turned to walk to his truck. Rose felt a sting of regret, of sorrow and spoke up before she could rethink it. “Gus.”

  He stopped, turned and asked, “What is it?”

  Looking into those eyes that were at once so familiar and so foreign, Rose said something she should have told him two years ago. “I’m sorry about Sarah.”

  His features went tight, his eyes cool at the reminder of his wife’s death. Sarah had once been Rose’s best friend, closer than a sister, but Rose had lost her, too, when she had broken things off with Gus. Then lost any chance of reaching out to her at all when she died two years ago.

  “Thank you.”

  Rose took a step closer because she couldn’t stand that shut-down look in his gaze. “I should have said something before, but I thought you wouldn’t want to hear it from me.”

  He studied her for several heartbeats before saying softly, “Then you were wrong, Rose.”

  When he walked away again, she let him go.

  Four

  For the ne
xt couple of days, Caleb did his best to avoid Shelby Arthur. It wasn’t easy though because every time he turned around, there she was. She came out to the stables or the barn every so often with a question about one of his mother’s “treasures.”

  He’d been ignoring the problem of his mom’s collections since her death a couple of years ago. Hell, with the ranch to run, cattle to see to and the new oil leases to oversee, who had time to clear out furniture? Besides, Caleb didn’t know anything about antiques and had no interest in learning.

  But now, Shelby was determined to, as she put it, “earn her keep,” so he was bombarded with questions daily. She had even enlisted the help of his housekeeper, Camilla, with the job of hauling furniture out to the front porch and covering everything with tarps.

  Raina Patterson, the owner of Priceless, the antiques store at the Courtyard shops in Royal, had already been out to the ranch once. She’d looked everything over and bought a few pieces right away. Soon, there’d be a truck rolling up to take most of it away. But Shelby wasn’t half-finished. She was working with Raina to catalog the smaller things Caleb’s mother had been hoarding for years.

  Caleb already knew his brother, Mitch, wasn’t interested in their mother’s things, and Meg had taken the few pieces she wanted to remember her mother-in-law by. So the road was clear to clean out the house—and Shelby seemed determined to get it done fast.

  Leaning on the rail fence surrounding the corral, Caleb watched the woman working on the front porch of the house. Even from across the yard, Caleb felt that hot zip of something tantalizing shoot through his blood and settle in his groin. Shelby was still wearing Meg’s jeans, and they were a little tight on her, which worked fine for him. She’d also asked Caleb for a couple of his T-shirts, and she was wearing one of them now.

  The shirt was way too big, but she’d fixed that by tying it off under her breasts so that her midriff was bare and he could admire that swath of tanned skin and daydream about seeing more of her. Her curly auburn hair was pulled up into a ponytail that danced across her shoulders, and the wedding sandals she wore looked both out of place and enticing on her long, narrow feet.

  Caleb gritted his teeth as Shelby bent in half to tug a table out the front door. Her butt looked good in those faded jeans and he’d give a lot to see it naked. To touch it. To stroke down the curves of her body and then to—

  “She’s a hard worker, you gotta give her that.”

  Squeezing his eyes shut briefly, Caleb willed away the tightness in his jeans and turned his head to watch his foreman, Mike Taylor, walk up to join him.

  “Yeah, she’s busy enough. Driving me nuts with all the questions, though.”

  “I can see that,” Mike allowed, bracing both arms on the top fence rail. “But gotta tell you, Cam’s happy as hell that Shelby’s getting all that extra furniture out of the house. She’s been grumbling about keeping it all dusted and clean.”

  Caleb nodded and turned his eyes back to Shelby. She’d moved on from tugging the furniture outside and now she was stretching to cover it all with yet another tarp. Of course, stretching like she was bared more of her midriff and had her extending one leg out like a ballet dancer.

  Clearing his mind of every wicked thought currently gleefully tormenting him, he said only, “Will be nice to be able to walk through that room again.”

  “Uh-huh.” Mike glanced at him, then grinned when he followed Caleb’s gaze. “She’s a good-looking woman.”

  “And you’re a married man.”

  “Don’t make me blind,” Mike said, grinning. “Couldn’t help but notice you noticing her.”

  “Is that right?” Caleb pushed off the fence and stuffed both hands into his jeans pockets. “If you’ve got so much extra time to spend ‘noticing’ things, maybe we should find you more work.”

  “You could do that,” Mike said, teasing tone still in his voice, letting Caleb know he wasn’t the least bit intimidated. “Or you could admit that woman’s got you thinking.”

  “What I’m thinking is, we need to call the vet back out to check on the mare again.”

  “Yeah. You know, Cam tells me Shelby’s not only beautiful, but she’s smart, too. Hell, she has to be. Got herself out of marrying Jared Goodman.”

  “Got herself into it, too,” Caleb reminded him. And in spite of the attraction he felt for her, that was the one thing that kept nibbling at his mind. Yeah, she was gorgeous and had a body that haunted him day and night. God knew she could talk the ears off a statue. And she wasn’t afraid of work, so that was another point for her.

  But bottom line was, she’d run out on her own wedding and left her groom—even if it was Jared Goodman—standing at the altar looking like a fool.

  And that hit way too close to home for Caleb. He’d been in Jared’s position and he knew firsthand just how hard it was. Yes, Meg had run off the night before their wedding, so Caleb hadn’t actually been caught standing in front of a roomful of people looking like a jackass. But close enough. How in the hell could he be with a woman who had done to a man what had been done to him?

  Caleb had been keeping his finger on what was going on in Royal over the failed wedding. The Goodmans were handling all of this a lot differently than he had, of course. They’d spun the story around until Jared was a damn hero who’d cut a gold digger loose before she could marry him.

  Shelby hadn’t heard any of that yet and he had a feeling she’d be furious when she inevitably did. Most people in Royal weren’t buying the story, but enough folks were that he’d heard all kinds of ugly rumors about Shelby when he’d gone into town the day before.

  And though a part of him wanted to defend her, he’d kept quiet because hell, he didn’t even know the woman who’d taken up residence in his house. All he knew for sure was that he wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anyone and he couldn’t have her.

  “True enough,” Mike concurred. “She did agree to marry him. But the important part is, she was smart enough to see the mistake before she made it permanent.”

  Caleb turned his head to look at his friend. “And that makes it okay?”

  Mike frowned, squinted into the afternoon sun and shook his head. “Didn’t say that, Boss. But you’ve got to admit this situation isn’t like yours was.”

  He hated it. Hated that everyone knew what had happened and could drag it up and toss it at him when he least expected it. But memories were long in Royal.

  “This isn’t about me.”

  “Isn’t it?” Mike smiled now. “I’ve seen the way you watch her.” He laughed a little. “Hell, like you were watching her a minute ago—until she went back in the house.”

  Caleb shot his friend a hard look. “Since when is looking at a pretty woman a crime?”

  “Since never. Yet, anyway,” he added. “I’m just saying, she’s single, you’re single—what the hell, Boss?”

  “It’s complicated and you know it.”

  “I know you can untangle any knot if you want to bad enough.”

  Caleb ground his teeth together, took a long, deep breath and said, “Don’t you have somewhere to be? Something to do?”

  “Sure do. Just came over to tell you Scarlett’s coming over later to give the mare another checkup.”

  Scarlett McKittrick was the town vet and there was nobody better with every animal—from puppies to cows to stallions. “Fine. Let me know when she gets here.”

  “You got it. Hey...” Mike jerked his head toward the long, oak-lined drive. “What’s the sheriff doing here?”

  Caleb turned his head and watched Nathan Battle’s black Suburban approach the house. “Guess I’d better find out.”

  Rather than walk around and go through the gate, Caleb hopped the fence and was waiting when Nate brought his car to a stop and parked opposite the ranch house front door. The sun was hot, the air was still and dripping with humidity. And the l
ook on Nate’s face promised trouble.

  “Hey, Caleb,” he said as he climbed out of the car. “Shelby around?”

  “Yeah. She’s in the house. What’s this about, Nate?”

  Nathan tugged his hat off, swept one hand through his hair and grimaced. “The Goodman family’s making some noise about suing Shelby.”

  “What?” Behind him, the front door opened, slammed shut and Shelby’s quick footsteps sounded out in the stillness.

  She moved up to stand beside Caleb and he could have sworn he felt heat pumping from her body into his. Probably just the Texas sun—or at least that’s what he was going to tell himself.

  “They’re going to sue me?” she asked, dumbfounded.

  “Didn’t say that, miss,” Nate told her, turning his hat in his hands. “Said they’re making noises about it.”

  “Sue me for what?”

  Caleb was interested in hearing that, too.

  “Well, miss,” Nate winced and looked as though he wished he were anywhere but there. “They say defamation of character. That you’ve made Jared look bad in his hometown.”

  Caleb snorted. “Jared’s looked bad since he was in grade school.”

  Giving Caleb a wry smile, Nathan nodded. “I know that, but his mother sure doesn’t seem to.”

  “They can’t sue me,” Shelby whispered and turned her gaze up to Caleb. “Can they?”

  Why in the hell he would feel like protecting her, he couldn’t say. But there it was. In the couple of days he’d known her, he’d seen fight and spirit and joy and relief in her eyes. He didn’t much care for the worry he saw there now.

  “They can,” he said firmly, “but they won’t.”

  “I wish I could believe that,” she said softly.

  Nate and Caleb exchanged a long look that Shelby saw. “What? What is it you two know that I don’t?”

  Giving a sigh, Caleb turned to her. “To Margaret Goodman, the only thing that matters is how something looks to someone else. It’s all about appearances with her. Margaret’s not going to drag Jared into a court battle where every woman in town would testify on your behalf that he’s a weasel and you were smart to back out.”