With a Stetson and a Smile & The Bridesmaid’s Bet

by Vicki Lewis Thompson

  She took a long, shaky breath. “I absolutely refuse to allow you to get involved in my financial affairs,” she said.

  “Jo, don’t—”

  “But I’m looking forward to our brief but significant love affair. Never mind all that signaling nonsense. I’ll be at the barn at eleven with a blanket. Now go on out to the bunkhouse before Emmy Lou begins to wonder what we’re doing in here so long with the door closed.”

  He shook his head, but his ragged breathing indicated he was greatly tempted by her offer in spite of his noble intentions. “You’re making a mistake. Please reconsider.”

  She shook her head. “You don’t have to show up at the barn, though, if it would compromise your principles.”

  His laugh was dry as he gazed at her with fire in his eyes. “Sweetheart, I’m not that strong. I’ll be there.”

  QUINN didn’t intend to give up the idea of helping Jo create a workable financial plan before he left. But obviously the straightforward approach wasn’t going to work. He’d have to be more devious.

  He walked into the bunkhouse to find Benny and Fred playing a game of what Quinn used to call War when he was a kid. It was a simple game, the kind Benny could probably understand, and Quinn thought it was decent of Fred to play it with him.

  Fred glanced up. “Hey, Quinn.”

  “Hey, Fred.”

  “Hi, Mr. Hastings,” Benny said before returning his attention to the game.

  Quinn decided not to correct Benny about his name. Instead he faked a huge yawn. Yawns were supposed to be contagious. “Aren’t you guys tired?”

  Benny yawned, right on cue. “Guess so. You tired, Fred?”

  “Nope.” He glanced at Quinn. “Go on to bed if you want. We’ll be quiet.”

  “Okay, believe I will.”

  “I’m going to bed, too,” Benny said.

  Fred shrugged. “Okay. I’ll play solitaire.”

  One down and one to go, Quinn thought as he sat on the bunk assigned to him and pulled off his borrowed boots. The bunkhouse reminded Quinn of the cabin he’d been assigned to at Camp Washogee twenty years ago. He experienced no nostalgia—for a kid who hated wiggly things, summer camp had been a nightmare.

  The metal beds looked exactly the same as the ones at camp. There were four of them lined up against opposing walls, two on a side. A scarred dresser topped by a mirror was against the end wall between the beds.

  A table and four captain’s chairs took up most of the opposite end of the bunkhouse, and a door in the far wall opened into a small bathroom. Nails driven into the walls held jackets, hats, a rope or two and a bridle Fred was repairing in his spare time.

  Fred wasn’t working on the bridle at the moment, Quinn noticed as he shucked his pants and shirt and pulled back the blanket on his bed. Fred’s belt was undone, and the guy looked uncomfortable. Emmy Lou obviously knew Fred’s digestive system well.

  Quinn’s stomach felt fine, but the rest of him was a little beat-up. He groaned softly as he climbed into bed. Between bruises and sore muscles, he could be pretty well crippled by tomorrow, especially considering the activity he had planned for tonight. He took off his watch and set it on the windowsill next to the bed, where he could see the time by turning his head. An hour and a half before he was supposed to meet Jo.

  His groin tightened. In less than two hours, assuming he could sneak past Fred, he’d have Jo in his arms. He wondered what she’d wear to their rendezvous and if she’d bother with items like underwear. Underwear could be very erotic, but getting it off might take up valuable time. Quinn decided he’d rather she didn’t wear any.

  Maybe he wouldn’t wear any, either, although you had to be damn careful with the zipper in a case like that. Too careful, come to think of it. He’d wear his briefs. Considering how much he wanted Jo, he’d be shaking like a leaf, and sure as the world, he’d get something important caught in the zipper.

  Then he wondered if he should wear his hat to the barn. Of course he didn’t need that Stetson on his head, considering it would be dark and he was planning to climb to the hayloft and make love all night. But in another way he did need the hat. Wearing it made him feel more like a cowboy, and damned if that didn’t seem to add a certain something to his self-confidence.

  He also liked the idea that he’d meet Jo looking like a seasoned ranch hand, a devil-may-care stud of a wrangler. Maybe he ached all over from today’s activities, maybe he couldn’t sit a horse like a pro or rope a wild bull yet, but he could project the image darn well when he put on that Stetson. He knew because he’d checked it out in a mirror.

  Yeah, he’d wear the hat, maybe even keep it on while he took his other clothes off. He hoped Jo would keep her outfit simple. A pair of pull-on shorts and a T-shirt sounded perfect to him. He could strip those off in no time, leaving Jo lying on the blanket, waiting….

  And then Quinn went cold. He had no condoms. He had no reason to expect Jo to be using any form of birth control, and besides, a stud didn’t show up at the appointed place with no protection for his lover. Dammit, what to do? Benny wouldn’t have any, but Fred…Fred might. But he couldn’t ask. He’d have to snoop, and if he hit pay dirt, he’d have to swipe. Normally he wasn’t a swiper, but this was an unusual situation.

  “You asleep, Mr. Hastings?” Benny whispered from across the room.

  “Not yet, Benny.”

  “I can’t sleep from thinking about the movie.”

  Quinn sighed. “I don’t think there will be a movie, so just relax and go to sleep, okay?”

  “I think there will be a movie. And I want to be in it.”

  “Benny, I’d give up the idea if I were you. Chances are—”

  “Will you promise me, if there is a movie, I’ll get to be in it?”

  Quinn hated to make a promise like that to a guy as trusting as Benny. What if the real Brian Hastings showed up some day? What if the damned movie actually got made? Dick and Doobie could go hang, but Quinn didn’t want Benny to be disappointed. “I don’t think I can make that kind of promise.”

  “Yes, you can. Jo did.”

  “She did?” Quinn thought about that for a minute. All along he’d been hoping that Hastings would come back and make the movie so Jo would get the money. Yet he suddenly pictured Hastings hanging out at the Bar None, interacting with Jo and granting her favors like giving Benny a part in the movie. If Jo was attracted to Quinn, who was a poor woman’s version of Hastings, then she’d probably fall head over heels for the real thing. Quinn felt a little sick to his stomach imagining Hastings putting the moves on Jo. With a guy like that, it would probably be an automatic reaction to a beautiful woman.

  “So can I be in it?” Benny asked again.

  “I guess so,” Quinn replied, feeling depressed. “If there is a movie.”

  “There will be,” Benny said with complete confidence.

  Quinn grimaced. Damn, he really wanted that movie to be filmed at the Bar None, for Jo’s sake. Of course he did. This morning she’d insisted that looking at Hastings’ bare butt hadn’t been the reason she’d jumped Quinn’s bones. Quinn wanted to believe her, but Hastings was America’s sexiest leading man. People magazine had said so. Quinn wondered why every single thing that would be good for Jo turned out to be the worst thing that could happen to him.

  “Night, night.” Benny yawned. “Sleep tight.”

  “Thanks, Ben.”

  “Don’t let the bugs bite,” Benny added in a sleepy voice.

  Quinn stiffened. “What bugs?”

  Benny’s reply was barely audible. “Dunno. People just say that.” Soon afterward he began to snore.

  Quinn lay rigid as a corpse and tried not to think about wolf spiders as big as his fist creeping under his bed, on his bed. Finally he cleared his throat. “Fred?” he called softly.

  “Yeah, Quinn.”

  “You get many of those wolf spiders in here?”

  Fred chuckled. “Ugly sons of bitches, ain’t they?”

  “I gue
ss.”

  “That’s how the creek got named, they say. Then the town after that. I picture some old prospector waking up in the middle of the night with one of those suckers sitting right by his nose. Musta scared the crap outta him.”

  Quinn swallowed. “Yeah, probably. I bet you don’t see them much anymore, though. Like in the bunkhouse and stuff.”

  “Oh, sure, we do. This place was built in nineteen-ten, and it’s not real tight. We get all kinds of critters in here. Last week it was a small rattlesnake.”

  “No kidding?” Quinn realized his voice had squeaked and deliberately lowered it. “That’s interesting.”

  “You’re turning into a regular chatterbox, aren’t you, Quinn? I thought you said you was real tired.”

  “I am. Good night.” Quinn didn’t want to discuss critters with Fred anymore. He lay there wondering what he was doing surrounded by poisonous snakes and ugly bugs. In Manhattan he could swim with the sharks, or face a bear market without blinking. In Manhattan he could be a hero.

  But Jo wasn’t in Manhattan. She was in Montana, and so, for the moment, he had to do his best to be a hero in Montana.

  He stared at his watch and willed Fred to go to sleep. Not only did he want to slip out of the bunkhouse so he could meet Jo, he also wanted to spend the night somewhere besides a place with cracks big enough to drive a truck through, or at least a herd of wolf spiders.

  After what seemed like eternity squared, Fred began to snore in his chair. Quinn leaned over and checked the floor before swinging his feet down. He dressed in record time but left his boots off. He took the blanket off the spare bed and rolled it up before arranging it under his own blanket to approximate the bulk of a person lying in the bed. Then he padded to the dresser.

  The top two drawers belonged to Fred. Quinn figured the top drawer was his best bet. He eased it open and felt cautiously among the socks, briefs and T-shirts. Nothing. Finally, in a back corner, his fingers closed over some foil packets.

  He counted four. Decided to take two. If and when Fred discovered the loss, he might chalk it up to losing track of his inventory. Feeling like a seventeen-year-old raiding his dad’s supply, Quinn shoved the condoms in his pocket with a little prayer that they were the right size.

  There was just enough light from the lamp on the table for him to see a shadowy version of himself in the rippled old mirror over the dresser. He put on his Stetson, gave it a rakish tilt and headed out carrying his boots. He would have given his best Armani suit for a flashlight.

  JO CHANGED clothes eleven times between ten o’clock and ten forty-five. Quinn was probably used to fancy lingerie and soft little dresses that came undone with a quick pull on an invisible tie. At least that was the way Jo imagined a Manhattan woman dressed for a late-night meeting with a lover.

  She didn’t have anything like that. Cotton underwear made sense when you lived in jeans and Western shirts. In winter she wore thermal long johns, even less romantic. She had exactly two dresses, one full-skirted for dancing and the other a sedate linen thing that buttoned up to her neck. Neither of them qualified for a secret rendezvous.

  Dammit, when Quinn looked back on this episode she didn’t want him to think of it as the night he spent with the hayseed. She rummaged through all her drawers, tossing things on the bed. Then she went through her closet one more time, swishing hangers along the rod in her impatience. At the far end of the closet she found a box she couldn’t remember putting there. She opened it and started to laugh. Perfect.

  In an abortive attempt to put some romance into her relationship with Dick, she’d bought herself red silk boxers and a chemise. But before she’d had a chance to try them out, Fred had seen Dick kissing a waitress at the Ugly Bug Tavern and forced him to confess he was having an affair. Jo had filed for divorce and had forgotten all about the sexy outfit.

  The silk felt good against her bare skin. She’d have to wear something over the outfit, of course, or she’d freeze to death walking to the barn. The slicker hanging by the front door would work. She stood in front of the mirror and admired herself in the red silk while she imagined Quinn’s reaction. Her breath quickened.

  Smoothing the material over her breasts, she closed her eyes. She craved his touch so desperately it scared her. Maybe meeting him tonight wasn’t the wisest thing she’d ever done, but logic wasn’t in charge at the moment. Deep in her heart she knew that if she didn’t make love to him before he went back to New York she would regret it for the rest of her life.

  She slipped on a pair of sneakers and picked up a folded quilt before creeping downstairs. As she made certain to avoid the steps that squeaked, she shivered as much from excitement as the chill in the air. The house was dark and quiet as she made her way to the front door and took down the slicker. She picked up the flashlight they kept on the entry hall table and reached for the knob of the front door.

  As she started to turn it, she felt resistance, as if…as if someone was turning the knob from the other side.

  Heart pounding, she stepped away from the door. Maybe Quinn had become impatient and decided to come to the house to get her. After the incident with Benny, he knew they didn’t lock doors at the Bar None.

  The door opened, but the man silhouetted by the glow from the porch light wasn’t Quinn. He squinted in the darkness. “Jo, is that you?”

  Jo pulled the slicker tight around her and swallowed. “Hi, there, Fred.”

  12

  JO DIDN’T KNOW who was more embarrassed, she or Fred. She was glad the light wasn’t very good, because she was sure her face was bright red. They both started a sentence of explanation at the same time, then stopped and stared at each other.

  “I, uh, thought I’d get something for my upset stomach,” Fred said, his usual bluster completely gone.

  “I…wanted to go check on Betsy.” It was a transparent fib. She’d checked on Betsy two hours ago, and the mare had shown no signs of going into labor. Fred knew that as well as she did.

  But he nodded as if that was a brilliant idea. “Sure.”

  “There’s…there’s probably some of that pink stuff in the downstairs bathroom,” Jo said.

  “I figured.” He glanced at the blanket. “How long you planning to, uh, spend time with Betsy?”

  “Well, I wasn’t sure.” He probably knew what the blanket was for, she decided, but she wondered what he thought of her slicker. It wasn’t raining. “A couple of hours?”

  “Sounds about right.”

  “Then I guess I’ll be getting on down there.” She had no idea if Quinn would be waiting. With Fred prowling around, Quinn might have decided to stay put until the coast was clear.

  “Yeah, might as well get on down there. Check on Betsy,” Fred said.

  “Fred, you’re blocking the door.”

  “Oh!” He came all the way into the house, and they sashayed around each other in the narrow hallway like two people do-si-doing at a square dance.

  “See ya,” Jo said as she hurried out of the house.

  “Yep.” Fred closed the door quietly behind her.

  Once she was headed down the porch steps, Jo began to grin. Shoot, those folks had probably been carrying on like this for years. Josephine might have known about it but couldn’t find a good way to inform her young grand-niece. Jo wondered why they’d never made their romance public and gotten married.

  But she could guess. Fred might enjoy having Emmy Lou nearby, and she no doubt felt the same, but Jo couldn’t picture Fred becoming domesticated enough to live in the house, which would probably mean giving up his chewing tobacco and his occasional trips to the Ugly Bug Saloon.

  Jo swept the ground with her flashlight, checking for snakes. She didn’t expect to find any. The nights were still too cold for them to be out and about at eleven o’clock. Finding nothing, she started around the house toward the barn and glanced quickly at the entrance lit by a dusk-to-dawn light.

  No Quinn.

  Although Jo told herself he was probab
ly waiting until he was sure Fred wouldn’t see him, her self-confidence slipped a notch. Maybe he’d reconsidered and wasn’t coming, after all. Or even more humiliating, maybe he’d fallen asleep, his ardor for her forgotten once his head touched the pillow. She’d rather be rejected outright than forgotten like some dentist’s appointment.

  The more she considered it, the less she liked the idea of hanging around the front of the barn for God knew how long before Quinn decided to show up, assuming he would show up and wasn’t sawing logs at this very minute. Quinn wasn’t following the script. He was supposed to be so excited that he’d arrive early. Eager and nervous, he would then pace back and forth until the appointed time. When he first glimpsed her, he’d rush to meet her, and she would drop the quilt and flashlight (gracefully) and run to meet him, except the moment would be drawn out in slow motion, with appropriate background music.

  Instead Quinn was late. He would arrive, if he arrived at all, to see her standing in the unflattering glare of the dusk-to-dawn light wearing her yellow slicker and clutching an old quilt. She probably looked like a refugee. Or a flasher.

  On impulse she stepped into the shade of a large oak. When she saw him coming, she could hurry forward as if she’d just arrived, as if she’d lost track of the time and had suddenly realized that it was past eleven. Yes, that was a good line. She’d say she’d been reading a wonderful book and hadn’t realized how late it was. That should put Mr. Quinn Monroe in his place.

  Assuming he showed up at all.

  If not she’d have to stay here for two hours because she’d subtly promised Fred she wouldn’t interrupt him and Emmy Lou any sooner than that. From Jo’s perspective Fred and Emmy Lou had the ideal relationship. It sure beat marriage, from what Jo had seen of that institution. She envied their comfortable, no-strings arrangement. This standing out in the cold waiting for some guy to meet you was for the birds.

  She used to play in this tree when she was a kid, she remembered. The trunk branched off about three feet from the ground, providing a crotch that was a perfect place to put your foot and heave yourself into the tree for a good climbing experience. The oak had leafed out in the past couple of weeks, and it provided dense enough shade to camouflage her until Quinn arrived or…he didn’t. If the rat didn’t show, she’d find some way to get revenge.