“Watched what show, damn it?”
“‘Oh, Clay,’” she mimicked, “‘my horse won’t stand still. Oh, Clay, my stirrup is crooked.’ And you!” she said scornfully. “Going along with the charade just so you could get your hands on those nitwit floozies and—”
Clay’s nascent anger vanished. “You’re jealous,” he said, his sudden grin one of pure unalloyed delight.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” she scoffed, vehemently denying the fact that he’d nailed it in one. “Jealousy has nothing to do with it. I just don’t want you leering at my guests. It’s undignified and unprofes—”
“I don’t leer.”
“Yeah, well, you were giving a good imitation of it when that blonde stuck her boobs in your face.”
“I’m a guy, for cryin’ out loud. A woman sticks her chest in my face, I’m going to look. But that’s all I did was look. I didn’t leer at her.”
“Ha!” she said eloquently. “You were leering so hard you were practically cross—What the hell do you think you’re doing?” she demanded as he wrapped his hand around her biceps and began quick-stepping her away from the open barn door.
“Keeping you from making a spectacle of yourself.”
“Keeping me from making a spectacle of myself? You’re the one who was drooling all over the ménage à trois twins.”
He yanked open the door to an empty stall and half dragged, half shoved her inside. Using his forward momentum and his hand on her arm as fulcrum, Jo Beth pivoted on her booted heel and headed back out the door. Clay pivoted with her, whirling around in a complete circle so that she ended up inside the stall again. He kicked the door shut and shoved her up against the wall, hard enough so there was a soft thud as her back made contact with the unpainted wooden planks.
Jo Beth snarled and pushed away from the wall, intent on escaping him.
Clay pushed her back and slapped his hands up against the planks on either side of her head, caging her where she stood. “Rein it in, Jo Beth,” he said, his mouth next to her ear.
“You rein it in, cowboy.” She shoved ineffectively at his chest. “And back off. I’ve told you before. I don’t like to be crowded.”
“I thought you were dead set on keeping your private life private.”
“Yeah. So?”
“So pitching a jealous hissy fit in front of the dudes isn’t the best way to do that.” He jerked his head toward the open barn door. “You caught Miz Branson’s attention when you started yelling at me.”
“I didn’t yell at you,” she said furiously. “And I am not jealous.”
Clay grinned at her. “You are, too,” he said. “You’re pea-green with jealousy.” His grin widened. “I think it’s real cute.”
“And I think you’re an egotistical, womanizing son of a—”
He stopped her words by leaning down and covering her lips with his.
She tried to twist her head away.
He followed the movement, bringing his hands to the sides of her face to hold her, keeping his lips sealed to hers until, finally, she stopped struggling and stood still, letting him have his way. But she didn’t surrender. Her body was stiff. Her lips were sealed.
He deepened the kiss and gentled it at the same time, his lips parting over hers, his tongue teasing, his big hand cradling her face. He used all his skill to entice her to respond, giving her soft, moist, heated kisses that coaxed and cajoled.
She kept her lips stubbornly closed.
“Kiss me,” he murmured urgently, feeling a sudden uncomfortable kinship with all the cowboys he’d known who got tied up in knots over women. “Kiss me, Jo Beth.”
She kept her hands flat against the wall behind her, her fingers pressing into the wood, refusing to yield to the passion of his kisses and her own growing desire to return them.
He lifted his head slightly, just enough to look into her eyes. His expression was warm and melting, brimming with practiced persuasive charm. “Jo Beth,” he breathed seductively, his breath warm against her lips.
She stared back at him, resolute and implacable. “You’re still crowding me, cowboy.”
Clay dropped his hands from her face and stepped back. Obviously, seduction and charm wasn’t going to work with her the way it had with every other woman in his life. He was going to have to rely on the truth.
“I didn’t come on to either of those women,” he said. “I’ll admit I looked but—”
“You did more than look.”
“Oh, hell! All right, yes, I did more than look. I flirted some, okay? But it was just a reflex action, like…” he searched for a metaphor “…like smiling at somebody who smiles at you. They flirted with me. I flirted back without even thinking about it. It didn’t mean anything,” he said earnestly. “It was just…” he shrugged uneasily. “It was nothing.”
“That’s not how it looked from where I was standing,” she said. “From where I was standing, it looked like you were setting up the time and place for your little three-way.”
“Well, so what if I was?” he said then, beginning to get just a little hot under the collar himself. He didn’t like being accused of something he hadn’t done. Of something he hadn’t even thought of doing. “We’re not exclusive. We haven’t made any kind of commitment to each other. We’re just having sex. So if I get the urge to do the horizontal tango with someone el—”
Something in her eyes brought him up short. They were still shooting sparks at him, but there was suddenly something under the anger. Not hurt, exactly, but something soft and vulnerable.
“Are we exclusive?” he asked incredulously.
“We’re sleeping together, aren’t we?” The expression in her eyes might have softened but her tone was as autocratic as ever.
“And that makes us exclusive?”
“In my book, it does.”
He eyed her consideringly. “That exclusivity work both ways?”
“Of course.”
“Well, then, I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?”
“For flirting with Arianna and Stacie. I didn’t realize we were exclusive. Now that I do, it won’t happen again.” He smiled ruefully, with no hint of seduction in his expression. “Forgive me?” He reached out and touched her face, very lightly, brushing the backs of his fingers against her cheek. “Please?”
Jo Beth felt something inside her melt at his softly spoken entreaty, at the warmth and sincerity in his brown eyes, at the hint of desperation in his voice. There was something very attractive about a man who knew how to grovel. It made him even more attractive to her than he’d been before.
“All right,” she said. “You’re forgiven. On one condition.”
“Which is?”
“Which is that you remember I don’t like to share my toys,” she said severely. “If it happens again you can just hitch up your trailer and hit the road, because I won’t forgive you a second time.”
12
IT DIDN’T HAPPEN AGAIN. When he left the barn that afternoon Clay resolved to treat the female guests with courtesy and consideration, but nothing more. They could flirt all they wanted but he wouldn’t flirt back—even if it killed him. His smiles were warm and friendly, his manner was solicitous and helpful, and any flirtatious advances were met with the polite indifference of a man whose interests and attentions were elsewhere. It turned out to be ridiculously easy to do because, much to his amazement, his interests and attentions were elsewhere.
The two buckle-bunny wannabes from New York were puzzled at first by his sudden disinterest, then annoyed, and then, predictably, they cut their losses and focused their efforts on a more receptive audience.
“They’re only booked through to the end of the week,” Jo Beth said lazily as she and Clay lay side by side on their backs in his bed, cooling off after a sweaty bout of vigorous sex, “so they can’t afford to waste time. They have to bag themselves a cowboy quick if they want to fit in a three-way rodeo before they head home.”
“It’s da
mned insulting to be so easily replaced,” Clay said with mock petulance. “Tends to deflate the male ego some.”
Jo Beth rolled over onto her side to face him and reached out, curling her fingers around his flaccid penis. She rubbed the pad of her thumb, very slowly, around the plum-shaped head. Predictably, it began to harden and swell in her hand.
She grinned with feline satisfaction. “It doesn’t look deflated to me,” she said and rose up on her knees to straddle him. She took him inside her and rode him hard to a fast and furious climax for both of them. And when it was over, she slipped from the bed and started to dress.
“Stay,” Clay said.
She shook her head. “You know I can’t.”
“Why?” The petulance in his voice wasn’t faked this time. He was getting real tired of her getting up and putting on her clothes as soon as the sex was over.
“It’s against the rules.”
“You made the rules. You can break them.” He propped himself up on an elbow and reached out, taking one of her hands in his. “Stay.”
She was tempted. Oh, Lord, she was tempted. It would be lovely to cuddle in his arms and drift off to sleep. It would be heaven to wake up next to him, to be able to reach for him in the daylight. But it was a luxury she couldn’t—wouldn’t—allow herself.
She didn’t dare.
Because she knew, come the end of the summer, if not sooner, he would leave. It was going to be hard enough to see him go as it was. It would be unbearable if he walked away from her with everyone watching. It would be just like the humiliating debacle with Tom Steele all over again, only it would be worse because she was older now and supposedly wiser and should know better than to get mixed up with a rodeo cowboy.
She could hear the whispers of her neighbors, those clacking tongues that would suddenly still when she walked into Bowie First Fellowship Church or the Come On Back Café or the feed store. She knew exactly what they would say, because she’d heard it before when Tom dumped her.
Poor Jo Beth, bless her heart, she hasn’t got what it takes to hold on to a man like that.
The only way to save herself from all the pitying gossip was to make sure her friends and neighbors didn’t have anything to gossip about. And the only way to do that was to make sure no one ever knew she’d fallen for another wandering cowboy.
“It’s late.” She disengaged her hand from his and resumed buttoning her shirt. “And I need to get some sleep.” She smiled flirtatiously in an attempt to soften her refusal. “And you and I both know that won’t happen if I stay here with you.”
“What if I promise to be good?”
“Honey, you are good.” Her smile warmed another few lascivious degrees. “That’s the problem.” She snagged her hat from the top of his dresser and put it on, pulling it down low over her forehead so it shaded her eyes. She touched two fingers to the brim, unconsciously copying his habitual salute. “See you in the morning, cowboy.”
Clay lay there in the rumpled bed and fumed, feeling ill-used and unappreciated. It was a disquieting feeling, made all the more so because he didn’t understand exactly why he was feeling that way. Or, maybe, he thought morosely, it was because he understood the reason all too well.
The sex, as always, had been great. Jo Beth was an uninhibited and inventive lover, who gave as good as she got. Unlike most women he’d been with, she didn’t want or need any romantic trappings to enjoy sex. She liked it straight up and unadorned, with no strings and no promises and no commitments. And it wasn’t just something she said she wanted, like a lot of women did because that’s what they thought he wanted to hear. She meant it.
The problem was, he was a man who liked the romance of sex almost as much as he liked the act itself. He liked the stolen kisses and the accidental touches and the slap-and-tickle in a shadowed corner. He liked the butt patting and the pet names and the sly, teasing glances. All that was part of what made the mating dance so much fun.
But that wasn’t really the problem. It wasn’t what was causing the uneasy feeling in his gut and making him so uncharacteristically moody. What really fed his growing disquiet was the thought that maybe—just maybe—he wanted the other, more serious stuff that went with an intimate relationship. The strings. The promises. The commitments.
And that was as scary as hell.
It would mean huge changes in his life, bigger even than the changes that had come after ol’ Boomer got finished tap-dancing on his carcass. A steady woman was a greater deterrent to a life on the rodeo circuit than any injury, especially if that woman was a wife.
He let the word rattle around in his mind. Wife. Was that really what he wanted from Jo Beth? Marriage? Settling down? Starting a family? Was that where his feelings were leading him? And if it was, was he ready for all the changes it would mean?
It seemed kind of crazy to think so. After all, it had only been a week since he spied her through the lenses of a pair of high-powered binoculars. Only six days since their first sexual encounter in Tom’s barn. A man couldn’t fall in love in a week, could he? No, that was crazy!
There had to be some other reason for the way he was feeling. Maybe all the pain medication he’d been taking since the wreck had finally fried his brain.
THEY HAD a cowboy competition and a campfire supper planned for the dudes’ last full day. Jo Beth had sketched the broad outlines of the final festivities based on the literature supplied by the Dude Ranchers’ Association, but Clay had been the one to take those sketchy plans and flesh them out so there was something for everyone. During the daylight hours there was a roping competition, a horseshoe tournament, a pie-eating contest and an exhibition of newly acquired horsemanship skills.
During preparations for the exhibition, Jo Beth came up behind Clay while he was helping the oldest Branson boy saddle up. “It’s José,” she said, standing up on tiptoe to whisper in his ear.
“Hmm?” Clay muttered vaguely without looking up from the cinch he was tightening. He was still mulling over last night’s startling revelations and hadn’t come to any firm conclusions yet. It made him a tad in-communicative where she was concerned. “That should do it, Zac,” he said and patted the boy’s leg. “Remember to keep your back straight and your feet centered in the stirrups.”
“José,” Jo Beth repeated, as the boy trotted away on his horse to show what he’d learned over the past week. “He’s your replacement.”
That got Clay’s full attention. He turned to look at her. “My what?”
“Your replacement.” Jo Beth tilted her head toward the good-looking Hispanic cowboy who was helping Arianna Moore saddle her horse. “The third participant in the proposed ménage à trois.”
Clay grinned. “Heaven help him,” he said. “Those two will eat him alive.”
Jo Beth grinned back at him. “Let’s hope his shots are up to date.”
After the stars came out there was a campfire supper followed by ghost stories, cowboy yarns, and a sing-along. T-Bone played a mean fiddle and one of the other Diamond J hands was proficient on the harmonica, so there was music, too.
“Tonight’s the night,” Jo Beth said when Clay plopped down on the bench next to her after leading a line dance. “But, then, it would have to be, wouldn’t it? Since it’s the last night.”
He plucked her mug of coffee out of her hand and took a sip. “The last night for what?” he asked, as he handed it back.
She gestured toward the cozy little group on the other side of the campfire with a tilt of her head. Three people—Arianna, José and Stacie—were sitting on a bale of hay meant to seat two. José was in the middle. “I think he’s about to get lucky,” Jo Beth said, as Arianna rose and took the good-looking cowboy by the hand. Stacie waited thirty seconds before she followed them.
“Better him than me,” Clay said with an exaggerated shudder, and got up to demonstrate another set of steps to another country line dance.
Jo Beth remained where she was on the wooden bench, her back against the lon
g wooden table, her hands curled around the heavy white ceramic mug, and watched him. His leg didn’t seem to be bothering him tonight much at all—he’d gone easy on it during the day—and he moved gracefully across the bare wooden planks of the makeshift dance floor, making the complicated series of steps look easy. He was the star of the show out there among the dudes and other Diamond J cowhands, just like he was everywhere else. Dressed from head to toe in unrelieved black—black hat, black shirt, black jeans, black boots—he sparkled. He shined. He drew every eye in the place, male as well as female. People where drawn to his larger-than-life persona, his swaggering cowboy charisma, the innate physical appeal that went beyond sex to something even more basic and universal.
If they’d met in any normal sort of way, at a rodeo arena, say, he’d never have looked twice at her. He hadn’t looked twice at her, not until he saw her buck naked and playing with herself in the water tank. In the normal everyday course of things a hardworking, wholesome, girl-next-door rancher like her wouldn’t stand a chance with a sexy four-time PRCA champion bull rider.
Not that she wanted a chance, she reminded herself. Not really. She liked things just fine the way they were. It was all fun and games, and when it wasn’t fun anymore, well, then it was over. That’s the way she wanted it and that’s the way it would be. No fuss. No muss. And no messy emotional attachments to come back and haunt her.
Jo Beth sighed and sipped her coffee and wondered how long it would be now before he’d go, and how she would manage when he did. Somehow, in only a week, he had become…well, not essential to her happiness—she’d only known him a week, after all—but important, nonetheless. He wouldn’t break her heart when he left, she assured herself. Not that. Never that. But she would miss him. She’d miss his sly, roguish grin, and that wicked gleam in his hot-coffee eyes and his unbridled, uninhibited passion. She’d miss his easy way with the dudes, and his easy good humor and the sight of his tight cowboy butt encased in snug jeans as he went about his daily routine on the Diamond J. She sighed again at the thought of all she would be losing.
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