by Неизвестный
"Something botherin' you, Jae-Sue? You didn't hear something about your pa and you ain't telling me, did you?"
"No, no," Jaelynn rushed to reassure her father's best friend. "I haven't talked to him since this morning, and I told you then he seemed fine." As fine as a seventy-year-old man could be after suffering through his third and most debilitating stoke a mere month before. She closed her eyes, saying a silent prayer though she didn't really know what to pray for anymore. For her father to be well, of course, and for her to find a way to keep what she had while taking care of him to boot. Suddenly the keeping what she had part had taken on a whole new view though.
No, the hell it hasn't, she thought firmly. You have the rodeo, you have Roscoe, and you have your father. The same as you've always had.
But, as her gaze flicked into the crowd and settled on Logan in the front row, she knew she had him too if only she would let herself keep him.
* * * *
Jaelynn's performance proved to be one of the best Logan ever witnessed. The woman knew how to handle a horse and how to take down a steer with pristine perfection. Not that he found that surprising. He might not be a horse or a steer, but he'd learned quickly enough she could handle him without fail. But the real entertainment came in watching her move. The way she swayed, leaned, and bounced with the horse's movements was a dance all its own. The way she hopped off at just the right moment, tackling the steer and taking it down with a strength that seemed impossible for a woman as slight as she to possess, merely added to the steps of the choreography. By the time she finished and joined him outside Betsy's stable, he felt horny enough to jump her right there. Who gave a shit how many of the townsfolk looked on?
He controlled himself, barely, and hooked an arm around her waist instead, pulling her into his embrace. "You looked amazing out there."
She tipped her head back, nearly catching him on the nose with the brim of her cowgirl hat. "Why, thank you. Now what do you intend to do to me?"
He chuckled. He had plans but hadn't been sure she'd go for them after all that transpired between them today. The gleam in her eye accompanying her loaded question proved to be all the confirmation he needed. "Come on, I want to take you someplace special."
She laced her fingers with his and let him lead her to his truck. "Where is this special place?" she asked, once they both got belted in and on the road.
"Just a little spot on the family ranch." He supposed that didn't sound so special, but the strip of secluded pasture he had in mind had always been his spot. He'd gone there most of his life to think, fume, escape, or simply to relax. Tonight, he wanted to share it with her.
"This is a nice spread," she commented as he drove through the iron gates. "Does all this belong to the Cartwrights?"
"It does, and has for over fifty years now. My grandfather worked this land as a ranch hand, learned all there is to know about the cattle and such from the old man who owned it. When the old man died, granddad bought it from the surviving family."
"No one wanted to carry on the business, huh?"
"They looked to get the hell out Dodge and that's exactly how they put it. It worked out for my family though. They sold the land to Granddad for a rock bottom price. He put his knowledge to use and turned it into one of the best spreads in these parts. By the time he got too old to run it, my father had gotten old enough to take over."
"And next it will come to you."
Logan brought the truck to a stop and cut the engine. "And next it will come to me." He reached over, caught her hand and brought it to his lips. He brushed a kiss to her smooth flesh. "Hungry?"
She raised a brow and shot a pointed look out the truck windshield. "What, are we going to dine on twigs and berries tonight?"
Logan smiled. "Actually, I have a basket in the back along with a six pack in the cooler. I thought we'd have a little picnic beneath the stars."
Both brows rose at that. "Mr. Cartwright, are you getting romantic on me?"
"Trying to, Miss Murphy. Are you up for a little romance tonight?"
"A girl's always geared for a little romance." She turned her hand over, catching his chin in her palm, and outlining his lips with the tip of her finger. "You're a good man, Logan. A sweet, tender man, not to mention you're sexy as all get out."
Logan didn't know what to say to that, so he said nothing. Instead, he watched as emotions swirled in her eyes and hoped with all his might that one of those meant she felt the same about him as he already felt about her.
* * * *
"Tell me about your father." Logan dug into a bag of rice chips and crunched on a handful as he put his other hand behind him and leaned back on the blanket they'd laid out over the grass for their picnic.
Jaelynn sat with her arms around her legs, hugging her knees to her chest, her head tipped back as she gazed up at the stars. "There probably isn't much to tell that you don't know already. Not if you follow the rodeo circuit at all."
"I heard he had another stroke."
Jaelynn raised her head and looked at him.
He winced. "Sorry, that's definitely not real romantic conversation, is it?"
She smiled, surprised to feel it come naturally despite the gloominess of the subject. "No, you lose points on the quixotic meter for that one."
"The quixotic meter? I'm not even going to ask what that is. I didn't mean to put a damper on the mood. It's just, well, I've never met him, but all accounts have him as a good man, a helluva rodeo rider, and not a bad father either. I hate to see a good man go down that way."
"You and me both, and he is all of those things you said and then some."
An old George Straight song drifted through the serene night air from the cab of the truck, and Jaelynn stood and held out a hand for Logan's. "Let's dance, cowboy. None of that fancy stuff you do for your class at the bar. Just some good old fashioned slow dancing. Do you think you can handle that?"
Logan put his hand in hers and let her pull him to his feet. "I believe I can still remember how it's done."
He enveloped her, his arms snaking around her and drawing her in. He was warm and hard and felt so incredibly fantastic that Jaelynn sighed and lay her head on his chest as she lost herself in simply being with him, in the music that caressed the air around them, in a night that proved to be like no other she'd ever shared with a man.
As George sang about crossing his heart and making promises, Jaelynn wondered if fate had slipped into the booth at the radio station and picked out the CD. And as she eased back enough to look up at Logan, catching the gentle awareness in his gaze, she decided if it had been in her power to give all she had to make his dreams come true she would've done it for this man without any urging from fate.
Logan's hand moved to brush the backs of his fingers down her cheek, and she closed her eyes, angling her face into the touch.
"Make love to me, Logan. Right here, right now beneath the stars." She opened her eyes to see his glistening. She wouldn't accept that they were tears of an emotion neither of them should feel so soon after meeting. Despite her request, her choice of words for him to make love to her, what they shared couldn't be that serious. Could it? It wasn't possible to feel it so soon. Was it?
She pushed the questions aside without answer as he slowly nodded and covered her mouth with his. The kiss felt unlike any they'd shared so far, full of so much meaning and unspoken truth. His tongue slipped between her lips and licked her very soul. She'd told him to make love to her, and by God, he did, starting with her mouth. He caught her bottom lip between his teeth, pulled at it as he nipped, then licked to soothe.
"You know what's happening, don't you?" His voice grated the moistly sensitive flesh of her mouth, a hot abrasion that sizzled to her core.
"Yeah, I'm about to get you inside me again." She angled her head and bit her way along his chin and jaw to his ear. "That's all I need to know right now."
His hands glided from her hips, up her back and down again, their lower bodies still p
ressed firmly together, still swaying to the music. He gripped her shirt at her sides, pulled it free of the waistband of her jeans and delved his hands beneath. His palms were riddled with calluses, their roughness another tender abrasion to the smooth skin of her back. He tugged the shirt over her head, stopping when the neckline covered her eyes, the sleeves binding her arms, and his mouth dropped to the swell of one breast.
Jaelynn's shirt and the intensely exquisite things his tongue did to her chest blinded her. Colors exploded in the darkness behind her lids, offering evidence to her excitement, proof to her pleasure as his tongue moved beneath the edge of her bra and expertly found her hardened nipple. Not that she needed anything to highlight how utterly magnificent the things he did to her felt. No, she needed only the wicked sensations pulsating through her, the heady hunger clinching at her belly to know she might die from his having her this time, but what a way to go.
He growled against her breast, the sound vibrating her flesh. "Damn clothes." He ripped the shirt the rest of the way off, tossed it to the ground with one hand while the other made quick work of the fastening to her bra.
Jaelynn laughed, albeit breathlessly. "Having troubles, cowboy?"
"Consider yourself lucky I'm not tearing them off of you." What he did was about as close as he could get without destroying the fabric. He yanked the bra off, and her breasts dangled free. Then his hands covered them, held them, weighed them. "God. Sweet God." He dipped his head and lifted one to his mouth.
Jaelynn buried her hands in his hair, her head falling back as his lips worked first one breast and then the other, his teeth joining for alternating bites that left her incensed and panting.
"So amazing. I never thought you would be this way, taste this way, feel this way. In all my fantasies, I couldn't have conjured this." Even as he spoke, as he continued his mindless exploits of her breasts, his lower body swayed in a move that tantalized and drove her to sheer madness.
She abandoned her hold on his hair for one on the button of his jeans. "Damn clothes," she managed to gasp as he sucked her nipple between his teeth for a particularly more pressured bite than before. Slight pain laced with delicious pleasure, and she fumbled in her haste to free his cock from his jeans.
He laughed and tipped his head to gaze up at her, his lips grazing like a feather to her brilliantly receptive nipple. "Having troubles, cowgirl?"
It was Jaelynn's turn to growl, the sound only succeeding in drawing a laugh from him that reverberated over her heated flesh. Then he eased his lower body back, creating enough space to work, and his hands started to move. In a haste both frenzied and crazed, they removed each other's jeans and underwear, both somehow managing to free themselves of their boots. Logan deserted his hands’ explorations of her body long enough to yank off his t-shirt and then, glory be to God, Jaelynn could touch too.
Mouths explored, tongues licked, hands teased, and the passion continued to build. The rhythm changed from slow and tender to fast and rough so many times in a single minute Jaelynn's mind lost all grip on reality, her body exasperated with need.
"Now, Logan. I need to feel you, now." She curled her fingers over his shoulders and pushed, taking the lead to guide him down to the blanket. She went with him, straddling his hips as he laid back, his gorgeous eyes heavy lidded, his lips swollen from his assault on her body, from her attack on his mouth.
His hands tightened on her hips and, for a long moment, they stayed that way, her body poised to lower on his erect cock, their gazes locked, breathing ragged. "Do I need a condom?"
His consideration to ask even though they hadn't used one earlier in the evening simply offered up one more example of what a truly amazing man he was.
Jaelynn shook her head. "I want to feel you, all of you."
He swallowed visibly but still he didn't loosen his grip on her hips so she could move. "Jaelynn, I—"
"Don't," she said quickly, cutting him off in midsentence. Fear of what he'd been about to say turned her blood to ice even as her core heated with the flaming need to have him.
"I won't," he whispered. "You already know." Using his firm grip, he pulled her down, impaling her pussy with his thick, wide rod, and she cried out, the pleasure a shocking bolt of white-hot lightning streaking through her.
She rode his cock, keeping with the same alternating tempo of slow to fast, tender to rough until neither could hold out any longer. They exploded together in a wash of cries and essence, and she collapsed on top of him, panting and exhausted.
Chapter 5
Logan stared up at the flickering stars in the sky and felt more alive than he'd ever been in his life. Exhausted, a little fuzzy in the brain, but alive and utterly content to be so. His arm wound around Jaelynn, his fingers dancing lightly over the bare skin of her shoulder. Her fingers kept tempo on his chest where her hand rested next to her cheek. She turned her face into his chest, planted a kiss on his left pec and rested her chin there as she looked up at him from beneath long lashes.
"What did you mean by what you said before, about conjuring fantasies?"
Logan didn't have the strength to move more than his eyes, but they rolled rather easily before settling to gaze back at her. Hell, his cheeks even burned as he caught the small smile playing at the corner of her lips. "I had my healthy share of fantasies where you're concerned."
"Oh, my God, you're kidding."
"No, ma'am. The rodeo magazines run some pretty great shots of you now and then. I'd love to tell you I buy the magazines to read the articles, but I think you'd see through that lie."
She giggled. "That line stopped working decades ago." She laid her head back down on his chest. "Wow, I'm glad I didn't know that before. I guess it's safe to assume I've lived up to your expectations?"
"Sweet thang, you dug a grave for those expectations and buried them six feet under the moment you walked into the bar."
She fell silent for several heartbeats before she sighed and shifted slightly. "I should be getting back."
Logan closed his eyes, knowing it was coming but not yet ready to face the reality of it. "What's next for you?" He felt her shrug.
"We'll move onto the next rodeo, the next town on Monday."
"And start it all over again by the weekend?"
"Actually, no. We have almost two weeks off between shows this time. Most everyone will take a break, go home, visit family or whatever, and we'll hook up again the day before the rodeo kicks off."
"Where will you go? To see your father?"
She nodded and pushed herself to her elbow, though her gaze and her hand remained on his chest. "Yeah. I have to. God, it's not going to be a fun trip. He's not doing so well, Logan. This last stroke, well, he can hardly see for himself anymore."
"I didn't realize it was that bad." All accounts he'd read put Buster Murphy in rough shape but, hell, the man was seventy-two and lived through two previous strokes before this last. Who wouldn't be in rough shape after that?
Jaelynn started to sit up, and he let her go, his hand on her shoulder falling to her waist. She nodded again and then shook her head. "It's worse than I've wanted to admit. He needs someone to care for him. He can't live alone anymore. It's bad enough he had to give up the little ranch he'd bought after the first stroke, but now I'm going to have to move him to the city, find a place for him, a nursing home that can give him what he needs." She sighed and squeezed her eyes shut. "He's going to hate that. He'd likely rather die than live in a nursing home, but the only other choice is for me to…" She trailed off and opened her eyes to look at him. "Is it okay if we don't talk about this anymore right now?"
Logan sat up and pulled her into his arms. He kissed the top of her head. "Yeah, it's okay." He held her for a long while before he spoke again. "You could spend a few days here. Maybe I can even help you figure out a different solution to this problem with your father, one that will make both of you happy."
Jaelynn looked up at him, a world of unidentifiable emotions swirling in her eyes
. "You just want a partner for the dance thing on Wednesday."
He forced a smile even though his heart lodged in his throat. She hadn't immediately said no. It had been a long time since he'd prayed to the man upstairs, even longer since he'd asked for divine assistance, but right about now a million pleas and promises flittered through his thoughts, the loudest of which was, Please, God, let me keep her. "You bet your sexy ass I do."
"And where would I stay?"
"With me. I have a place behind the main house. It's not much, but it's private."
"I didn't think there was any privacy at your place right now. Don't you have family running amok on the land or something?"
He chuckled. "You're not far off with that description, but they'll be gone tomorrow."
She stared at him, her gaze dancing over his face. "I do already know," she whispered finally, and Logan's heart nearly stopped beating. "I just don't know what to do with it."
He squeezed her, closing his eyes as he tucked her head beneath his chin. "Then stay and maybe we'll figure that out too."
* * * *
The dance-off, as Logan's students liked to call it, turned out to be three hours of some of the dirtiest bumping and grinding Jaeylnn had ever witnessed and certainly ever been a part of. It all took place on the dance floor of the Double Horn Saloon before a crowd of gathered onlookers who, Jaelynn had been told, would vote on the best couple by the volume of their applause. The going census among the dancers was that she and Logan had it licked before they even stepped foot on the floor, but that didn't stop anyone from showing their stuff.
Nearly two hours of brisk moving and hard gyrations passed before Jaelynn managed to sidestep her way out of Logan's embrace and off the dance floor. She wiped a bead of sweat off her forehead with the back of her hand and smiled all the way to the bar, where she ordered a tall glass of ice water.
She leaned back, preferring to admire her man's moves rather than rest her buns on the nearest stool. It had been four days since the rodeo left Sunset, four days she'd spent in the sole company of Logan Cartwright, and four days since she faced the fact that she loved the man clean to her toes.