by Home Fires
He shrugged, a single lift of one lean-muscled shoulder. “I’ve known where babies come from for quite a while, Case.”
“Oh, you’re funny.”
He laughed. “Always have been.”
“Night, Casie,” a voice rumbled from the darkness. A man passed by on her left, little more than a shadow carrying a toolbox.
“Oh …” She cleared her throat. “Good night. And thank you.”
He raised a hand and vanished into the darkness.
Dickenson blinked after him. “What’s Will Sommers doing here?”
She shook her head, rarely sure what any of the myriad men were doing who roamed through the Lazy. She only knew that the bunkhouse had been restored, the arena fence was solid as a rock, and the new porch was a sight to behold. Of course, all of her neighbors’ efforts weren’t charity. She’d offered Sommers and a dozen others free booths at her symposium. Emily gave away her wares like cider was river water, and the daughters of half the people in town had gotten a free riding lesson or two.
“Listen …” she said, getting back on track with some difficulty. “I’m going to take a look at the horses. Then I’m going to bed.”
“Is he here a lot?”
“What? Who?”
“Will. Geez, how many other men are floating around here in the dark?”
She stared at him a second, then said, “Don’t be an ass.”
He gritted his teeth. “Well, not everyone can be the upstanding citizen Hedley is.”
She shook her head at him, honestly confused. “What have you got against Brooks? You two fight over the same buckle bunny or something?”
“Why? You want us to fight over you?”
“I couldn’t care less if you—” she began, but in that second he kissed her.
CHAPTER 4
His lips touched hers, firm and warm. She knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that she should do something drastic. She should slap him or curse him or duck and cover, but she was too shocked to move, and then he was slipping his hand beneath her hair, pulling her closer, and suddenly the air was sucked out of her lungs, and every flickering brain cell went limp. For a moment she teetered on the edge of uncertainty, and then her body made an executive decision. Dropping the gun belt, she curled her fingers into his shirt and shoved him up against the pickup truck like a bag of crimped oats.
His left hand was on her butt. She scrabbled with the buttons on his shirt. But they were so damned small. One popped into the air and pinged off the cab like an errant bullet, but she was light-years beyond caring.
He had a chest mounded with muscles that ran down toward abs that bumped a toboggan’s course to the silver buckle cinching his jeans. She flicked his belt open with one simple motion.
“Geez, woman!” The words were little more than a breath of air against her face. “You—”
“Shut up!” she growled and kissed him harder.
He fumbled with the door handle behind her. She stood in the opening, not quite lucid enough to climb inside as she clawed at the zipper on his jeans.
“I’m taking off,” said a voice from the abyss. It took her muzzy mind a full second to recognize the voice as Ty’s.
She gasped and jerked her hands from Colt as if stung. He hissed a curse. Ty strode toward them through the darkness.
“You might want to check on Tangles,” the boy added, just coming into view. “He was acting a little funny.”
“Funny?” Casie’s voice sounded like she was possessed by a demon, and maybe she was. Good God, had she just torn open Colt’s shirt? She slammed the thoughts away and ran a shaky hand over her hair. Colt remained facing his truck, making her wonder if she’d ruined his zipper, too. “Funny, um …” She shot her gaze toward Colt. He was buttoning his shirt with lightning-quick fingers. She refrained from closing her eyes. Refrained from groaning. Refrained from hiding under his truck. Holy crap, she was mature. “Funny how?” And what the hell had they just been talking about?
“I don’t know. Maybe it was nothing,” Ty said. “He was just lying down.”
“The dun?” Colt asked.
Casie shot him a glance, hoping like hell that they couldn’t see her blood-infused face.
“Yeah.” Ty shuffled his feet and glanced at Colt as he faced them. “We turned them all out to graze after the shindig was over. Thought he’d be hungry, but he didn’t eat more than an hour or so before he laid down.”
“Did he seem restless or anything?” Casie’s voice sounded a little more normal, though she could feel her heart beating against her ribs like an overzealous blacksmith.
“Not really. Just thought I’d let you know.”
“Oh, okay.” She cleared her throat again and wished she’d quit doing that. “Thanks. I’ll check on him right away.”
“Sure,” Ty said and shoved his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. The movement was reminiscent of Colt, or maybe he’d picked up the idiosyncrasy from Colt’s father. The boy had been living on the Dickensons’ neighboring ranch ever since Casie had had a run-in with his mother some months before. The fallout from that debacle was still falling out, something Casie was careful not to let Ty know about. Despite his carefully maintained veneer, the boy had wounds too raw to be ignored. “Well, good night.”
“Yeah,” Casie said. “Thanks for your help today.”
“Sure,” he said and backed away.
“I’ll, um … I’ll see you tomorrow.”
He nodded once and then he was gone, swallowed into the darkness. Since the Dickensons’ Red Horse Ranch was less than a half mile down the road, he often insisted on walking.
Casie stared at the spot where he’d disappeared until her eyes watered.
“You okay?” Colt’s voice sounded a little funny.
“Yes. Sure. Of course. Well …” She backed away, knees wobbly. “I’m just going to …” She jerked a thumb over her shoulder. “… check on …” Holy Hannah. She couldn’t remember the horse’s name. “On …”
He tilted his head at her. “Tangles.”
“Yes!”
“I’ll go with you.”
“No!” The word exploded from her lips. She tried a smile. It didn’t feel any steadier than her knees. “It’s been a long day. I’m sure you want to get home.”
“I don’t,” he said and made an odd noise.
She stared at him. Was that laughter? Was he laughing? Because this situation was not funny. This situation was light-years from being funny.
But when she studied him with narrowed eyes, she realized she could just make out the slant of his devilish grin.
He cleared his throat, fought down the grin before she had a chance to slap it off his face, and shifted his attention toward his scruffy boots. “You sure you’re okay?” he asked, glancing up past the brim of his hat. “Cuz you seem kind of …” He shrugged. “Embarrassed.”
She inhaled through her nostrils. “I’m fine,” she said again and turned away. For one exhilarating second she almost thought she’d escaped, but then she heard his footsteps on the gravel behind her. She closed her eyes and walked faster, but the horses weren’t far away. Just past the windmill she could see their dark shapes. She ducked between the twisted wires and approached them, hoping, at least, that the fence would slow her stalker down, but it didn’t. She pulled a peppermint candy out of her pocket and offered it to the nearest animal. Reaching out, Tangles took the treat between his teeth and munched, nodding happily as the others gathered around.
“They all here?” Colt asked.
She scanned the two herds, separated by gender to prevent problems, four males on one side of the fence, five females on the other. Nine horses in all. “Looks like it.”
“Everybody seems okay.”
“Yeah.”
“Maybe the dun was just tired.”
“Maybe.”
“Sophie rode him kind of hard.”
“Yeah.”
“I never saw a western dressage performance befor
e.”
“It’s a pretty new discipline.”
“She’s a heck of a rider.”
She closed her eyes, remembered to breathe, and pulled out another piece of candy. The night was quiet. Somewhere not far away an owl called for its mate.
“You’re not embarrassed, are you?” There was laughter in his voice. She gritted her teeth and tried to make herself turn toward him. No go.
“Casie?”
“No,” she said and offered Blue the peppermint. The gray colt snatched it from her hands and trotted away, knees lifting in a jaunty manner that belied the sorry condition in which he had arrived at the ranch. “Of course not.”
The other horses were beginning to crowd in hopefully.
“Cuz you shouldn’t be. I mean, it was just a kiss, right?”
She tried to speak. Failed again.
“Case?”
“Right,” she said. “Of course. Just a …” She couldn’t force out the last word.
“Kiss.” He finished for her. “And the … and the shirt thing. You didn’t see where that button went, did you?”
Oh God.
“Well, never mind, maybe one of the kids will find it. I’ll ask them tomorrow when—”
“Don’t you dare!” She swung toward him like a missile.
He was grinning, which meant he was probably teasing her. She hated it when he teased her. She crunched her hands into fists.
“Now don’t go getting all riled up,” he said. “This is no big deal.”
“Not to you!” She practically spat the words.
He tilted his head a little, Stetson cocked to the right. “But it was to—”
“I’m their …” She waved a hand. The motion may have seemed a little wild as she tried to think of appropriate words. “Their mentor. I can’t be seen …” She sputtered a little.
He nodded, as if trying to help her spit out the applicable words. “Kissing,” he said.
She closed her eyes and groaned. He laughed out loud. “Geez, Casie, ease up. It was just a kiss. Don’t get all cranked out of shape. I’m sure the boy’s seen people kiss before. It’s just—”
“You think he knows?!”
“What?”
“You think he knows I … we … were …”
“Kissing?”
“Yes.”
For a moment she thought he would laugh again, but the man wasn’t, apparently, a complete idiot. Besides, they’d known each other for a score of years. He’d seen her at her craziest and probably didn’t care to witness such a thing again. He shook his head. “No. Naw. Probably not.”
“Really?” She was grasping at straws, desperately searching his face for sincerity. But in that instant she realized that his collar was off-kilter. Skimming her gaze down his chest she saw now that his entire shirt was kittywampus. She quit breathing.
“What?” he asked and glanced down.
“Your shirt’s buttoned wrong.”
“What?”
“Your shirt is buttoned wrong.” Her voice had risen a couple of octaves and a number of decibels.
“Now just settle down,” he crooned. “You’re scaring the horses.”
“The horses are fine! Emily’s fine!” She leaned toward him, anger erupting. “You’re the problem!” She stabbed at his chest, which she remembered as dark and broad and hard as granite. How the devil was she supposed to think coherently when his chest was … his chest?
“Me?” He sounded genuinely confused. Maybe she had been wrong. Maybe he was a complete idiot. “How do you figure?”
“How do I—” She threw up her hands. Had she really torn open his shirt? “You disappear for months on end, then show up like some knight in—” She stopped herself with an effort.
He was staring at her. She pursed her lips. He narrowed his eyes.
“You said you didn’t want me here, Case.”
“I didn’t.”
“You didn’t say that or you didn’t want me here?”
“I said I didn’t need you here.”
“But you do want me?” His voice was breathy. He took a step forward.
She stepped back. Was he out of his mind? She’d torn a button off his shirt in her haste to … “No. I …” She shook her head, trying to joggle out the unwanted thoughts. “You’re twisting my words.”
He took another step forward, eyes narrowed. “Then say what you mean, Case. Now’s the time.”
She swallowed, found his eyes in the darkness. “I don’t … Men …” She paused, trying to think, trying to breathe. “Bradley … My fiancé,” she explained, as if he might have forgotten the name of the man whose nose he had broken not six months earlier. “I thought I’d be with him forever. But he’s … he’s gone.”
“Brad’s a moron.” His words were absolutely level, earnest, matter-of-fact. And very likely correct.
“You left, too.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Seemed to me like maybe you had a few things to figure out.”
“Don’t put this on me,” she said.
He watched her.
She gestured wildly, then managed a wheezy laugh. “Geez, Dickenson, you’re a rodeo cowboy. There couldn’t be anyone less likely to settle down.”
“That your opinion or your ex-fiancé’s?”
She exhaled sharply in disbelief. “Are you saying this doesn’t scare you?”
“This?” he asked.
She swung her hand sideways. “Money troubles, pregnant teenagers, pending lawsuits, rank horses …” She laughed. It sounded maniacal. “Choose your poison.”
He watched her in silence for a moment. “Lawsuits?” he asked.
“Good choice,” she said, and feeling inordinately tired suddenly, glanced toward the soothing hills that had framed her world for most of her life.
“What lawsuits?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Probably nothing will come of it. I mean … it’s been months already. It’ll probably never go to court.”
“What lawsuits?” he repeated.
She scowled into the distance. “She’s claiming I’m unstable.”
He remained silent.
“Said I gave her a concussion. Says she’s in constant pain, that she has to medicate to relieve the agony.” She laughed. “Holy Hannah, she was three sheets to the wind at seven o’clock in the morning.”
“Ty’s mom,” he guessed.
She didn’t respond. Hadn’t she learned not to depend on a man for help? Wasn’t she better than that? She inhaled carefully. He stepped toward her, curled his hands around her arms.
“The boy’s parents are suing you?”
She winced despite her resolve to be strong. “Guess his mom is kind of carrying a grudge.”
She could feel his gaze on her, and when she shifted her eyes to his, she scowled. Was he grinning?
“Is something funny?” she asked.
“You did beat the living crap out of her,” he said.
“This is not amusing!”
“No. It’s … amazing!” he said.
For a second she was mesmerized by the light in his eyes, by the warmth in his voice. Did she see admiration there? she wondered, but she shook the thought away. “What’s wrong with you?” she snarled and jerked out of his grip. “I attacked another woman. A mother! I must have been nuts. Bradley was right. This place is making me crazy.”
“She beat Ty,” he said. “Left bruises. Left scars!” There was danger in his voice suddenly, anger in his face. “Does it really seem crazy that you’d try to protect him?”
“I …” Why did he make it all sound so logical? She wasn’t a violent person. Usually. “He’s so young.”
“I know.” He nodded. “But he’s doing okay. He’s a hard worker, dependable, good with the livestock.”
“He deserves better.”
“Dad’s doing the best he can.”
“I didn’t mean …” She shook her head, feeling manic. “Your parents are fantastic. I can’t thank them enough f
or taking him in. I mean … I’d keep Ty at the Lazy if I could, but with the girls here …”
“Things are working out okay.”
“Are you kidding me? Holy crap, Dickenson, I assaulted her! What was I thinking? I should have never gone to their farm. I should have never—”
“I think you should have.”
She snapped her gaze back to his. He shrugged. His lips curled up a little at the corner. “Kicking her in the ribs that last time may have been a little over the top, though.”
“Oh man …” She groaned. “I should be locked up.”
“Is that what they’re saying?” The humor had disappeared from his voice.
“They don’t want me seeing Ty.” Her voice sounded broken to her own ears.
“They’re the ones that should be locked up, Case. Anyone who would do that to a kid should be put away forever.”
“Maybe they’ll settle out of court.”
“Does Ty know about this?”
She shook her head, thinking about the last phone call she’d received from the Robertses. So far there had been only threats of legal action, but that could change at any time. “I hope not. He thinks everything’s his fault as it is.”
Colt scowled. “I know a good lawyer in Sioux Falls. I’ll give him a call. I think he’ll be able to—”
“No,” she said. “This isn’t your problem.”
“Hell, Case!” He ground out the words, shook his head, glared into the distance. “If this goes to court, you might never be able to take in another guest.”
Worse, she could lose the right to see Ty. And Emily. And Sophie. Her throat closed up. Her heart squeezed tight in her chest. “You think I don’t know that?”
“You could lose the ranch.”
She stifled a wince, glanced at the ancient windmill. “I’ll be all right.”
“Let me help you.”
She shook her head. “Thank you.” She cleared her throat, shoved her hands into the back pockets of her jeans. “I appreciate the offer, but I …” She allowed herself to glance at his chest for one moment again before returning her attention to his face. “I don’t seem to be real … sane when you drop by.”
“Maybe if I quit dropping by …” He was staring at her. “Maybe if I were around on a more permanent basis.”