Best of Cowboys Bundle

by Vicki Lewis Thompson, Barbara White Daille, Judy Christenberry, Christine Wenger, Shirley Rogers, Crystal Green, Nina Bruhns, Candance Schuler, Carole Mortimer

  “It doesn’t hurt the cows if they stay away from it,” she said, and wondered where her dude wrangler was.

  He was supposed to be keeping the dudes out of her hair and out of trouble. He was obviously falling down on the job. Probably because he was too busy flirting with the two man-eaters from New York he’d been helping get ready for the trail ride today. Despite his protestations of the night before, he didn’t appear to be the least bit scared of them or what they had in mind.

  And why should he be? They were both exactly the type of woman stud cowboys like him usually went for—all flash and sparkle with curvy bodies, fluttering eyelashes and glossy wet-lipped smiles. They were obviously out for a good time and were looking to Clay to supply that good time. And he, damn him, was looking back.

  And why shouldn’t he? she asked herself as she dabbed more antiseptic on the Hereford’s wounds. He was a free agent, wasn’t he? He hadn’t made her any promises. And she didn’t want any. If he wanted to bed down with a couple of bimbos from New York, it was no skin off her nose. She’d thought he’d had more taste, is all. But if he thought he’d bed down with her again after rolling around with those two, well, he had another think coming. Even though their “relationship” was finite and destined to last only until he returned to the rodeo circuit, she expected it to be exclusive. Maybe she hadn’t made her position clear to him.

  Jo Beth Jensen didn’t share her men.

  At least, she amended, not when the sharing went on right under her nose. After all, she was certain both the Dallas cattle broker and good ol’ Todd had other women in between their infrequent rendezvous with her, but they didn’t carry on with those other women in front of her. Nor did she advertise the fact that she had other sexual partners in front of them. It was a matter of good manners and proper upbringing, is what it was. Both were something Clay Madison obviously lacked, because if he thought—

  “Is the cow hurt bad?” the Branson kid asked.

  “No.” Jo Beth bit the word off through gritted teeth, then paused and took a deep breath, reminding herself of what she had at stake. The dudes were her new bread and butter, the key to her financial security. She had to be nice to them. “She was hurt bad,” she said in a more moderate tone, “but it’s not bad now. She’ll be all healed up in a few days.”

  “Because of the purple stuff?”

  “Yes. Because of the purple stuff.”

  “Can I help you p—”

  “Don’t open that door!” Jo Beth barked as he lifted the latch to the stall door.

  The boy froze, his blue eyes widening in alarm.

  Jo Beth clamped down on her impatience. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to yell at you.” Where the hell was Clay? “I just don’t want you coming in here and getting hurt. Cows that’ve been injured can be unpredictable.” Even cows that hadn’t been injured were unpredictable, but it wasn’t the time to go into that. “You could get kicked or stepped on.”

  “You’re in there,” the boy said, but he dropped the latch back into place.

  “Yes, but I’m an experienced wrangler. I know what I’m doing. And, more importantly, the cow knows that I know what I’m doing, so she’s comfortable around me. She doesn’t know you and she might get nervous if you come in here.” She flashed a conciliatory smile at the boy and hoped she didn’t look demented. “And you don’t want to make a cow nervous, especially in such a small space. They can kick the sh—stuffing out of you.”

  “What’s a wrangler?”

  Jo Beth bit back another sigh. The kid was making her dizzy with all his questions. “A wrangler is another word for cowboy.”

  “You’re not a cowboy. You’re a lady.”

  “I’m a woman. And a woman can be a cowboy.”

  “Nah-uh,” he said. “A cowboy has to be a boy.”

  She lifted an eyebrow at him. “Says who?”

  “It says so right in the word,” he insisted. “Cow and boy. That means it has to be a boy. You could be a cowgirl, though,” he added earnestly, in an obvious attempt to placate her. “It’s almost as good as being a cowboy.”

  Jo Beth had to bite down on her tongue to keep from arguing that point with him. “Well, thank you very much,” she said shortly and bent her head back to her task, hoping he’d take the hint and go away.

  He didn’t.

  “What’s the cow’s name?”

  “She doesn’t have a name.”

  “She doesn’t have a name?” His tone was faintly incredulous. “How come?”

  “Because she’s a cow, that’s why. You don’t name cows.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because…ah…” How in the hell was she supposed to answer that? Tell him the truth? Tell him it wasn’t smart to get on a first-name basis with an animal that was destined to become hamburger when her usefulness as a breeder was over? And where the friggin’ hell was Clay? It was his job to answer the dudes’ annoying questions. “There are nearly two thousand cows on the Diamond J,” she said, finally. “If I gave this one a name, I’d have to give them all names. And I haven’t got time for that. Besides, I’d likely run out of names before I ran out of cows.”

  “Do you have a horse?”

  “I have lots of horses.”

  “Do they have names?”

  “Some of them do. Some of them don’t.”

  “How come only some of them ha—” The word ended in a surprised whoosh of air as a lasso dropped down over the boy’s bright red head and circled his shoulders.

  It had come silently, seemingly out of nowhere, a stiff “hoolihan” loop thrown with the wrist turned backward without a preliminary swing through the air. The technique was commonly used to avoid alerting or startling the animal being lassoed. It had floated over the boy’s head without ruffling so much as a strand of his carrotyred hair or disturbing his hat.

  He shrieked in excitement and immediately started to wriggle around like a roped calf, trying to get free of the lasso.

  The Hereford rolled its eyes and tossed its head, shying away from the piercing, unfamiliar sound.

  Jo Beth took a quick sideways step and put her free hand out, pushing against the animal’s flank to let it know she was still there so she wouldn’t get stepped on by 1,200 pounds of agitated beef.

  “Hey, there, Spencer.” Clay flicked the rope so that the loop slid down around the boy’s torso to midchest. “Don’t you know any better than to bother the jefe when she’s working?”

  “I’m not bothering her,” the kid said, giggling as he squirmed to get free.

  “Now that’s where your plumb wrong, pard.” Clay pulled the rope tight with another quick flick of his wrist, trapping the boy’s arms at his sides. “She’s doing delicate veterinary work there on that cow.” He coiled the free end of the rope, slowly pulling Spencer backward, away from the stall door, as he did so. “She needs to give it all her attention and concentration to do the job right.”

  “But I’m not bothering her.” The boy stopped squirming for a minute and turned around to look up at Clay with an earnest honest-to-God look on his freckled face. “I was just watching.”

  “Well, how ’bout you come on out to the corral and watch me an’ T-Bone for a while? We’re fixin’ to have a ropin’ class and show everyone how to throw a lasso.”

  The boy’s eyes lit up. “Can I throw one? Will you show me how to throw one?”

  “That’s the idea, pard.” Clay looked over the boy’s head at Jo Beth and flashed her a grin, expecting to see an answering smile of approval for the way he’d stepped in and rescued her from the kid’s unwanted attentions.

  Jo Beth shot him a venomous glare in return.

  He half turned, making a show of looking behind him to see whom she was trying to slay with her gimlet-eyed gaze. There was no one, of course. He glanced back at her and raised his brows questioningly, his grin still firmly in place. Surely she couldn’t be glaring at him?

  She jutted her chin at him, leaving no doubt it was him she was
pissed at, then deliberately turned away and resumed dabbing antiseptic on the Hereford’s wounds, despite the fact that the animal had already been well and thoroughly medicated.

  Clay’s grin faded and he took a half a step forward, bumping against the boy who stood between him and the stall. He reached down automatically, cupping the boy’s shoulder to keep him from toppling over.

  “Are we going to throw lassos now?” Spencer asked anxiously, obviously afraid the promised lesson was about to be canceled.

  Clay hesitated for a second, his gaze questioning as it rested on Jo Beth’s bent head. She refused to look up. Clay turned his attention back to the boy. “Yes, indeed,” he said, “we are definitely going to throw lassos now.”

  Her head still down, Jo Beth flicked a furtive sideways glance at the pair to see how Clay was reacting to her snub.

  He was grinning his cocky cowboy grin, as nonchalant as if he hadn’t even noticed that she’d given him the cold shoulder. He reached out and playfully tapped the brim of the kid’s straw cowboy hat so that it fell down over his eyes.

  Spencer giggled with childish delight.

  “Come on, pard.” Clay grabbed the lasso where it snugged up against the boy’s back and hoisted him off his feet. “It’s time for your first roping lesson,” he said, and walked out of the barn with his confident cowboy strut, his chaps flapping gently around his lean horseman’s legs, his spurs jingling with every step, the giggling kid dangling from his fist like a sack of potatoes.

  Jo Beth dropped her forehead against the cow’s warm red hide. “Damn. Damn. Damn,” she said, bouncing her head against the animal with each word. After a minute, she lifted her head and looked at the cow. “What in the hell is the matter with me?”

  The cow didn’t answer.

  But Jo Beth knew without being told.

  She was jealous and had been ever since 6:00 a.m. when she’d stood in the shadow of the barn door and watched Clay help those two buckle bunny wannabes from New York get saddled up for the trail ride.

  “Oh, Clay,” the one called Arianna had cooed, looking all big-eyed and helpless, her mascaraed eyelashes fluttering like agitated butterflies. “Could you help me here? My horse won’t stand still so I can get on.”

  Clay had grinned his wicked cowboy grin at her, wrapped his big, calloused cowboy hands around the smooth expanse of bare skin exposed between the hem of her midriff-baring baby T-shirt and low-slung jeans, and hoisted her up into the saddle.

  Jo Beth saw his grin widen when he came eyeball to navel, as it were, with the shiny gold ring adorning her exposed belly button. Arianna saw it, too. She arched her back to give him a better view, sticking her boobs out at the same time. The outline of the nipple ring on her left breast was clearly visible beneath the fabric of her bright pink T-shirt. Clay lifted his gaze to her face, taking in all the sights so blatantly displayed along the way, his eyes warm with masculine approval, his wicked hey-there-darlin’ cowboy grin firmly in place.

  “Could you give me a hand, too, Clay?” Stacie simpered. She was blond, busty and flagrantly feminine; everything, in fact, that Jo Beth wasn’t. “My right stirrup is all tangled up somehow and I can’t get my foot in it.”

  She leaned down in the saddle as Clay approached her, ostensibly to show him what the problem was, affording him an up-close-and-personal view of her very generous and grossly overexposed cleavage. He gave it the same lustful appraisal as he had her friend’s pierced navel.

  Jo Beth had stiffened—with disgust, she told herself—and turned away, stalking off into the interior of the barn with her teeth gritted tightly together and her hands fisted. She was standing the same way now, just outside the stall where the wounded Hereford resided, her hands clenched around the bottle of antiseptic and the soiled rag she’d used to apply it. Deliberately, she unclenched her fingers and set the bottle and rag on the storage shelf outside the stall door before she could give in to the temptation to heave them against the wall.

  She still didn’t know whom she was more frustrated with or what made her the angriest: those two simpering hussies with their obvious come-hither lures, Clay for being so easily lured, or herself for letting the three of them turn her into a quivering mass of insecurity and hurt feelings.

  It wasn’t supposed to be this way. She wasn’t supposed to care what he did or with whom he did it. And she didn’t, she assured herself, not really. It wasn’t as if she had any real emotion invested in him. She and Clay were nothing but convenient sex partners. That was it. That was all.

  It wasn’t anything like the time when Tom Steele had come home from his final rodeo season with sexy, sassy feminine-to-her-painted-toenails Roxy in tow and broken their nonexistent engagement. She wasn’t in love with Clay…. Well, she hadn’t been in love in Tom, either, as it turned out, but that wasn’t the point. The point was, she had nothing invested in Clay Madison except a few nights of hot sex. Not even her pride was at stake this time around because no one knew about their relationship—not that there was a relationship!—and, therefore, no one would feel sorry for her when it ended.

  Seen in that light, it was obvious that what was bothering her was purely and simply rampant sexual jealousy. He was, after all, the best piece of ass she’d ever had. What woman wouldn’t be upset at the thought of losing him to a pair of sexual adventurers from the big city?

  The very thought of what she was being forced to give up made her want to scream. She kicked a bale of hay, instead, swearing under her breath at the injustice of it all. She was going to have to cut him loose and send him on his way. There was no other option. It wasn’t only her unwillingness to share his sexual favors that was at issue; there was also the significant matter of the sorts of problems that could arise from a Diamond J cowhand indiscriminately boinking the guests. It was unprofessional on his part and, worse, it could conceivably lead to all sorts of unpleasant legal issues for the Diamond J.

  She kicked the bale of hay again just because she was so damned mad, and visualized the toe of her boot making contact with the perky little butts of Arianna and Stacie. It was a very satisfying image, so she did it again. And again.

  “You want to tell me what’s got you so riled up?”

  Jo Beth halted midkick and whirled around to see the primary object of her fury standing just inside the open barn door. Or rather, she saw his silhouette in the open door. Like that day at the water tank, the sun was at his back, outlining his broad shoulders and lean hips and casting his face in shadows beneath the flared brim of his black hat.

  Her chin jutted out. “Aren’t you supposed to be showing off for the dudes?” she said nastily.

  Clay sighed. She was as mad as a wet cat, with her back arched and all her claws out. And he had absolutely no idea why. She’d been purring like a kitten when she left his bed last night and, as far as he knew, he hadn’t done anything since then to warrant the sharp side of her tongue. Quite the contrary, in fact.

  He’d had his nose to the grindstone all day, catering to the wants and the whims of the Diamond J dudes, and doing a damned fine job of it, too, even if he did say so himself. He’d even been enjoying it, which, when he took a minute to think about it, actually made perfect sense. He’d always liked playing to an appreciative audience and giving the fans a good show. Dude wrangling was just more of the same except on a smaller scale. He was still the star—and he didn’t have to risk getting roughed up or stomped on to win the crowd’s approval.

  Well, not by a bull, anyway, he thought wryly, as he thumbed up the brim of his hat and locked eyes with Jo Beth. She looked ready to stomp the living shit out of something—and she was a damned sight meaner than any bull he’d ever faced in the rodeo arena.

  “T-Bone is handling the roping lessons,” he said, his voice and manner deliberately, almost condescendingly, calm.

  It was, in his experience, the best way to push an angry female over the edge so she’d spit out what was bothering her. Nothing riled a woman more than a man who staye
d patronizingly calm when she was itching for a fight.

  “Shouldn’t you be out there helping him?” she said. “That is your job, isn’t it? To help with the dudes?” Her posture was tight with tension. Her voice snapped like a whip. “So why aren’t you out there doing your job, cowboy?”

  Clay propped a shoulder against the door frame. “As a matter of fact, it isn’t,” he said mildly. “My job, that is. I’m doing you a favor, remember?”

  “Well, don’t,” she said fiercely. “I don’t need any favors. I don’t want them.”

  “What do you want, darlin’?” The smirk in his voice was designed to push her one step closer to the edge.

  It worked.

  “I’ll tell you what I want.” She stalked up to him, her eyes narrowed, her expression turbulent. “What I want is for you—” she jabbed him in the chest with her index finger “—to stop hitting on every passably good-looking female guest as if she were some hot-to-trot buckle bunny at a roadside honky-tonk. That’s what I want—” she jabbed him again “—cowboy.”

  Clay was so flabbergasted he couldn’t speak for a full five seconds. He honestly didn’t know what she was talking about. She was the one and only woman he’d “hit on” since the run in with ol’ Boomer, and that was only because she’d snapped him out of the sexual doldrums with her solo performance in the water tank.

  “You didn’t think I noticed, did you? Well, let me tell you—” she jabbed his chest again “—everyone has noticed.”

  He grabbed her finger, stopping her midjab. “Noticed what, for cryin’ out loud?”

  Jo Beth jerked away from him. “Oh, that’s right,” she jeered. “Pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about. Pretend—”

  “I don’t have to pretend,” he protested, beginning to feel the tiniest bit angry now himself. Being accused, tried and found guilty of something he wasn’t even aware he’d done rubbed him the wrong way. “I don’t have the slightest idea what the hell you’re talking about.”

  “Oh, please! I saw you. I stood right here—” she pointed down to the brushed cement floor between their feet “—and watched the whole sorry show.”