Cowboy (The Busy Bean)

by L. B. Dunbar

  “Well, this is exciting. I’ve never been on a breakfast date.”

  I’ve never been on a breakfast date. My lips silently move to mimic her. Her voice is too high, and she sounds like Vermont Barbie. Only, I know that’s not fair of me. I’m jealous, and I admit it one hundred percent. I haven’t been with another man since Bull and don’t have immediate intentions to do so, but most of all, I’ve missed him—the strength of his body, the tenderness of his touch, and the incredible orgasms. On top of that, Bull was sweet. We laughed about silly stuff, never mentioning anything about our pasts or our futures.

  Only tonight, he said. Us and this bed are all we need in our heads.

  Only one night, and my chest aches when I think of him. It’s silly to consider, but the attraction to him was so strong. The way we moved. The way we connected. It was so different from Shelton, but then I chalk up the sensation to being with someone other than my husband after so many years.

  I tip my head to the back of the couch and then lean forward, hoping they didn’t feel the jostle.

  “So how do you know Dillard Barnes?” Bull asks as if picking up an unfinished conversation.

  “We’re old friends,” she casually states, and I’m shaking my head at the sound of things. Old friend, my ass. His friend didn’t keep her, or she didn’t keep him, and now Bull will be second-string. My lips purse, admonishing myself because I used Bull as a rebound, too. Although it didn’t feel like a rebound. He felt like the start of something new. He felt like my fresh start. My shoulders sag, though, as I recall waking alone that morning.

  “What should we do today?” Her voice is like nails on the chalkboard-painted beams around us. Why do older men always go for younger women? I don’t want to hear about their plans or what Bull will do to her later, especially if it involves maple syrup or a hotel desk. My eyes close at the memory.

  “Well, we’re just doing this right here,” he states, and I almost laugh. Bull isn’t simple, but he’s a simple man. He’s living in the moment, and I’m hoping this means he hasn’t thought past this coffee date.

  “A dark roast and a caramel macchiato with exactly five drizzles of caramel, fifteen pumps of vanilla syrup, whipped cream, and an extra shot.”

  What the . . .?

  Thank God, I did not take that order. I don’t even know what that is. There’s a pause of silence, and I’m wondering what’s happening when Bull says, “You have a little something . . .”

  I just want to die a slow death as I imagine him swiping at the corner of her lip or wiping off her nose, and that sweet, tender touch will be all the spark Vermont Barbie needs to want to pounce on this man behind me. Bull has these deep blue eyes and that silver-speckled scruff, plus his hair is artfully streaked with gray. He’s all-around sexy, and he doesn’t even know it. Then his touch. The soft strokes down my body and the delicate dips of his fingers, I just can’t—

  “Have either of you seen Scarlett?” Audrey asks.

  Frick.

  “Scarlett?” Bull chokes from his seat on the couch.

  “Yeah, Scarlett. She’s our newest barista, and I swear she was out here.”

  “I didn’t see anyone,” Vermont Barbie states. “But then again, I’ve only been looking at Bull.”

  Okay, that’s enough.

  “Found it,” I say, popping up from behind the couch and holding my fingers pinched together like I’ve just found gold in them there wood floorboards.

  “Scarlett?” Audrey blinks at me with those expressive eyes of hers. She’s a petite blonde with a lot of power behind her personality. I slowly stand but find myself dizzy as I do and grip the back of the couch for support.

  “Whoa,” I blurt, unable to stop myself as the room spins and my legs tremble. My skin runs cold, but I break out in a full-body sweat.

  “Scarlett, are you okay?” Audrey asks, rushing to the edge of the couch while Bull quickly stands to face me.

  “I . . . yeah, I just think I stood too fast.” However, that isn’t the full explanation because that rush to my head has now settled back down to my belly.

  “You sure you’re okay? You look a little gray,” Audrey asks.

  “I . . . excuse me.” Rushing around the couch, I fight the pull to look at Bull as I disappear behind the counter, bypassing our waiting customers with one finger in the air, and then press out the door to the grassy area behind the building for some much-needed fresh air. Once outside, I promptly bend forward and heave.

  “Oh my God, are you okay?” Audrey says behind me, and I close my eyes, embarrassed by my position in front of my boss. Audrey’s younger than me, but a good businesswoman and kind-hearted. She took me on without any prior experience in the coffee industry.

  “Yeah. Just something I ate, I think.” I honestly don’t know. It’s been a couple of weeks like this; nausea, fatigue, and then if I do get sick, which doesn’t always happen, I feel a million times better once I vomit. “I just have a little stomach bug, but I don’t have a fever. I’m so sorry about this.” I point at the grass, which holds the evidence of how my stomach felt. “And that.” I nod toward the café.

  Audrey’s brows crease as she examines my face. “What else is wrong? As far as how you are feeling?”

  I consider it a second and then answer. “My boobs hurt. My back kills. And I had a lobster roll for breakfast the other day. I think there was something wrong with the mayonnaise.” Then I reconsider what I’ve said. The other morning, that sandwich had been the best damn lobster roll in the world and the last thing I’d ever eat when it comes to a breakfast item.

  Audrey’s lips slowly curl, and her eyes spark like she knows something. “Scarlett, could you be pregnant?”

  “What? No. Heavens no. Absolutely not. I . . .” I stare back at her, horrified at the notion. I’m forty-two. I’m recently separated. I cannot be pregnant at this stage of my life.

  “No. I am definitely not pregnant.”

  Six Weeks and Counting

  Bull

  The next day, I return to the Busy Bean Café in hopes to find Scarlett.

  “Sorry, Bull. She asked for the day off,” Zara Rossi tells me. Zara is the second owner of the Busy Bean Café and a dark-haired beauty with a willowy body. She’s a tough one—married to a professional hockey player and running this coffee shop.

  Zara checks something and then assures me, “She’ll be in tomorrow.”

  Taking my dark roast coffee out to my truck, I sit a second, letting the steamy liquid cool as I try to collect my thoughts—again.

  Scarlett popping up from behind the couch in the café yesterday was more than a shock. I nearly had a heart attack, and it wasn’t just the surprise of seeing her. My heart did a two-step jig of excitement.

  She was still here.

  During our one night, Scarlett told me how she was visiting Rita and wouldn’t be staying in town long. I took the information as further evidence that a one-night stand with her was best. No point in getting attached when you know in advance someone is leaving, and attachment was the last thing I needed. I’d already been left behind too often without a hint the person was going. The night with Scarlett was a sign the boys were right, and one night would reset me.

  It’s a reason I finally gave in and contacted Louisa Miller. I won’t actually say I called her. More like stumbled into a conversation with her at the tractor supply store that left me agreeing to go out with her. After second-guessing that decision, I got Louisa’s phone number from Clayton, knowing somehow he’d have it, and worked my way out of dinner plans to a cup of coffee instead.

  Because I haven’t stopped thinking about Scarlett. That vibrant red hair. Those dark brown eyes. That sexy mouth of hers. Sinful is more like it, and she used that mouth on me twice. She also made these little noises that turn me hard just thinking about her, and I’ve been overthinking.

  I should have left her my number or gotten hers.

  I wanted to linger in bed that morning, take her out to breakfast, a
nd plan a day with her, but that defeated the purpose of a one-night stand, and that is all we agreed to. As soon as I felt that tug to stay, I knew I needed to leave. Even though I got out of two weeks of morning milking, which I did not take Clayton up on, I didn’t like the empty sensation I had after that night.

  My insides ached a little at walking away. Scarlett felt different than the women in my past. I couldn’t explain it, but it felt like she belonged in my arms and in my bed. She belonged with me, but then again, wasn’t that feeling always the first sign of my downfall.

  Then there she was, springing up from behind the couch when I was sharing coffee with Louisa.

  “Scarlett Russell works here?” I had asked Roderick, the baker, who stood behind the counter after Audrey followed Scarlett out the back door.

  “Yes. She’s been here about six weeks, I guess. She’s the worst barista ever but the best kind of person.” My head lowered, and my cheeks flushed. How did I not know this? How did I not know Scarlett stayed?

  Then again, it’s rare I head into Colebury during the daylight hours and even rarer that I give in to the luxury of coffee from a café. We’ve got a pot that works just fine for brewing the liquid gold at the farm.

  “Is everything okay, Bull?” Louisa had said from behind me yesterday, reminding me of where I was and why I was there.

  My head popped up, and I stared at the closed door leading out the back of the building.

  Crap. Crappity, crap, crap.

  “Yeah, I’m good,” I lied, scratching at the back of my neck. Roderick tilted his head, looking up at me, and I honestly didn’t know how to talk my way out of what was happening. Before Louisa interrupted me, I was about to ask Roderick if he’d take my number for Scarlett or maybe I could get hers from him, or just anything.

  “We should be going,” I’d muttered instead, ignoring my cup of coffee on the low table and the muffin I no longer had the stomach to digest. Louisa wasn’t happy, and I’d like to have said I’d make it up to her, but I knew I wouldn’t. I’d be chasing down a woman who I let slip away from me instead.

  Returning the following day, a startled Scarlett watches me stalk to the counter. Since two days prior, her color has returned. I’d never seen a person turn that shade of molten gray, not even my youngest brother, Blade, when he drank too much on his twenty-first birthday.

  “Scarlett.” My voice comes out a little breathless, considering I’m trying to play it cool and not rush to the questions hammering inside my head.

  “Bull. What can I get you?” Her voice is tight, pinched even, which is not how I remember her. She nods at the menu.

  You? “Dark roast, black only.”

  “Thank God,” she mutters, turning around and working a machine that looks like one of our milkers. An awkward silence fills the air around us as the only sound is the stream of coffee pouring into a mug. Scarlett turns back to me, hands shaking and coffee wobbling against the insides of the ceramic. Without thinking, I reach for it, steadying her fingers with mine over hers.

  “I got it,” I whisper. Scarlett releases the mug to me, rings up the order, and I pay, but I don’t take my eyes off her.

  Once my transaction is complete, Scarlett turns around to poke her head into the kitchen behind the counter. “Bathroom break,” she announces to someone. “Just a few minutes.”

  “Take ten,” Zara’s voice wafts out to the main café, and I watch as Scarlett quickly walks to the hallway where the restrooms are located.

  Oh no.

  Rushing after her, I catch the door to the ladies’ room, and Scarlett spins to face me.

  “You really need to go, sweetheart?” I nod toward the toilet.

  Her shoulders fall, and her face turns away from me. “Bull, I—”

  Stepping forward, confident she’s only avoiding me, I lock the door behind me and lean against it, watching her.

  “You stayed,” I mutter, keeping my eyes on her. She’d told me she wasn’t staying in town. Did she lie to me? Then again, we agreed on only one night. Still, I haven’t been able to get her out of my head, and here she is.

  “I can explain. Sort of.” I wait her out. “I didn’t think I was staying, but then I changed my mind. My life was falling apart . . . is falling apart . . . and this place just feels like a good fit for a while. Until I figure things out for my future.”

  “And your future is being a barista in Colebury?”

  “For now.”

  “For how long?” I ask, unease coming over me.

  “I don’t know, Bull, honestly. I’m confused about . . . a lot of things.” Her head pops up, and she swipes back at her hair, holding her fingers in those lush red strands on either side of her neck. She cut her hair a little shorter, and it springs in loose curls around her head. “You were gone the next morning.”

  “I had milking to do.”

  “Excuse me?” Her head tilts.

  “I need to be up at four each morning to milk the cows.”

  Scarlett turns her face away from me. “You left me alone in bed to milk some cows.” Her arms cross, disbelieving such a thing before she glances back at me. “That is the worst excuse I’ve ever heard. It’s like me saying I have to wash my hair to get out of a date.”

  I snort. “Do you say that?”

  “Say what?”

  “That you need to wash your hair to get out of a date.”

  “No.” She snorts, scrunching up that elegant nose, which accentuates her freckles at bit. “I don’t date.”

  “Why not?”

  “What do you mean ‘why not’?”

  “Why aren’t you dating someone?” She’s fucking beautiful, and men should be lined up to date her. Hell, I’m grateful I got one night with her, and the reason I’m standing in the women’s bathroom is because I wanted a second night.

  Scarlett takes a deep inhale and then slowly releases the air. “I’m newly divorced . . . or nearly divorced.” Her arms flail out from her sides before falling to her hips.

  “Which one is it?” I ask, hating how my insides twist with the idea of being with a married woman.

  “Nearly. I have roughly six more weeks before it’s finalized. There’s no contest, though. I don’t want anything, and he got what he wanted.”

  “What’s that? What’d he want?” What kind of fool wants something other than her?

  “A med student who he got pregnant while still married to me.”

  “Shit.” My head tips back, knocking softly against the door. Fucking idiot.

  “What about you?” she snaps. My head pops forward, and I blink at her. “You were here on a breakfast date the other morning, and I’ve heard about you and all your proposals.”

  “Oh yeah, and how many am I up to now?” I snark, hating the rumor mill around my history, and feeling as if she went right for the jugular with her snarky tone.

  “Five.”

  I snort. “It’s a small town. Stick around a little longer, and I’ll probably be up to seven before you leave.”

  She glares at me, something unreadable in her eyes. Wait? Is she jealous?

  “Do you do what you did with me often?” It’s wordy, but my tongue ties with her looking at me the way she is. Our eyes lock together as her dark ones swirl. She’s a red blanket, and I’m ready to charge, living up to my namesake.

  “Bull, I know you don’t know me, but I swear on a stack of coffee menus I have never had a one-night stand in my life.”

  I press off the door and stand taller.

  “And I’ve never felt the way I felt when I was with you,” she adds, her chest heaving as if she’s ready to charge me.

  Something in me snaps with those words, and I step toward her. Or maybe she steps toward me because we collide in a crash of lips. My hands slip into her hair, and hers clutch at my broad back. We kiss and kiss, and she makes that little noise I can’t describe, but I’m instantly hard.

  “Bull,” she mutters in a soft whimper of want.

  “What do yo
u need, sweetheart?” I ask between kisses under her ear and along her jaw. She’d told me that night she just needed to feel wanted, and I was more than willing to want her.

  “This is crazy.” She groans against my cheek as we can’t get enough of each other.

  “Tell me. I’ll give you anything.” My lips crush hers before she can immediately answer. Our mouths move like they never want to be separated again, and I’d be happy kissing her the rest of my days. The thought forces me to abruptly break from her, but then she speaks.

  “I need you inside me.”

  Holy shit.

  Next thing I know, I’m unbuckling my belt, and she’s hitching up her skirt. Her panties slip to her ankles, and I shove down my pants a bit. I pick her up by the back of her thighs, spinning her for the door, and her legs wrap around me. Her hand comes between us, positioning me where I need to be, and I thrust upward as her back hits the door.

  “Jesus,” I mutter, pressing my lips to hers as my hips dance. She’s freaking wet and warm and clenching at me. Scarlett breaks the kiss and scrapes her fingernails through my hair.

  “God, I’ve missed you,” she admits, and I hammer into her harder, wanting to remind her of what she missed.

  “You should have looked for me.” I grunt, surging upward, and she softly gasps, covering my mouth with hers again. Her hands cup the back of my head, and she kisses me like I’m the air she needs to breathe.

  “Bull,” she gasps, pulling back once more. “It’s gonna be so quick. It’s happening fast. I’m . . . ermygawd.” Her mouth comes to my neck, stifling the scream as I rock faster than I ever have.

  “That’s it, sweetheart,” I mutter to her ear, clutching at her ass until my own telltale signs occur. My lower back tingles. My balls stiffen. I thrust one final time before stilling and emptying into her. Jolting within her, I give into the glory of all things good and holy shit.