The Cowboy And The Debutante

by Stella Bagwell

  “But, Mr. Chavez,” one of the young cowhands spoke up, “we hired on here as cowboys. We don’t know nothin’ about racing stock.”

  Miguel’s dark eyes grew to dangerous slits. “I’ve got cowboys running out my ears around here. I need two grooms. If you’re too damn ignorant to learn what Miss Sanders shows you to do, then hit the road! I’ll find somebody that can.”

  The two young cowboys shuffled their feet, mumbled they’d do their best and headed back into the stables. A few feet behind Miguel a man cleared his throat loudly.

  “You don’t think you were being a little too hard on them, do you?”

  Miguel spun on his heel to see his old friend and the sheriff of Lincoln County, Roy Pardee. The sight of him lifted some of Miguel’s sour mood, and with a half grin, he stepped forward and reached to shake the older man’s hand.

  “Not nearly as hard as I’m going to be if they don’t shape up. I don’t have time for whiners.”

  “You said something about needing grooms. What’s Chloe done now, bought more racing stock?”

  Miguel shook his head. “Haven’t you heard? She and Wyatt have gone off on a second honeymoon.”

  Surprise crossed Roy’s face. “That’s news to me. I thought Adam had broken his leg and they’d gone to be with him.”

  “They did. He’s fine, so they decided to stay in South America and see the sights. Probably for a month.”

  Roy rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “What about Anna? I thought she was back here visiting? In fact, that’s why I stopped by. To say hello to her.”

  As soon as Roy mentioned his niece’s name, Miguel had the oddest urge to wipe the back of his hand against his mouth. He could still feel the imprint of her lips. Surely Roy could see it branded all over him.

  “As of yesterday Anna has taken over the care of her mother’s horses. And frankly I wish none of this was happening.”

  Roy shot him a puzzled look, then laughed. “What’s the matter? Anna been shaking you up?”

  Miguel frowned. “Shaking me up? How do you mean?”

  Roy’s laugh deepened, and Miguel was amazed to feel embarrassed heat fill his face.

  “The last time I looked, Anna was mighty pretty.”

  Miguel shot him a disgusted glance. “I’ve seen pretty women before.”

  “Yeah. Years ago. I’m not sure you ever see any woman now. Much less one that looks like Anna.”

  Miguel jerked his thumb toward the stable behind him. “You’ll probably find her in there.”

  Knowing his friend was deliberately putting an end to the subject, Roy grabbed him by the shoulder. “Good. Come along with me while I say hello.”

  “I have work to do.”

  “You always have work to do. It’ll wait.”

  If it had been anyone other than Roy, Miguel would have told him exactly where to go. But Roy had been his friend for many years, ever since he’d worked as a deputy back in Albuquerque. He respected and admired him and cherished his friendship. He would not insult him over Anna.

  The two men found her locking the chestnut away in his stall. The moment she spotted Roy, her face lit up with a joyous smile. She ran to him and flung herself into his arms.

  “Uncle Roy! It’s so wonderful to see you!” She kissed his cheek, then kissed it again, making the sheriff laugh.

  “Now that’s the kind of greeting I like,” he teased as he patted her back with a big, loving hand.

  Anna pressed her cheek against his broad chest, then leaned her head back to look at him. “How’s my favorite Texas Ranger?”

  His expression full of amusement, Roy glanced over at Miguel “How do you like that? She kisses me, then asks about my son.”

  “Charlie is my favorite cousin,” Anna excused her behavior. “And I haven’t seen him since his wedding to Violet.”

  “Charlie’s fine. But you’d better not let your other cousins know he’s your favorite or you’ll have the whole bunch mad at you. Did you know Violet was expecting a baby?”

  Anna nodded, while a few steps away Miguel was mesmerized by the sparkle in her eyes and the broad smile on her face. This was a totally different woman from the one he knew. This Anna was warm and giving. This Anna was hungry for the love and companionship of her family.

  “Yes. Mother told me the good news. I’m so happy for them. When are they coming home? I’d love to see them while I’m here on the Bar M.”

  “Maybe the end of June,” Roy told her. “Will you still be here then?”

  The end of June was more than seven weeks away. Anna had only planned to stay on the ranch for six weeks, and one of those was nearly past.

  Not daring to glance at Miguel, she said, “I don’t know, Uncle Roy. I’m not sure about my concert schedule yet. But I’ll try.” She looped her arm through her uncle’s. “Come on, let’s go down to the house and I’ll make you a cup of coffee.”

  “Well, I was on my way home. But I guess Justine will wait a few more minutes. Besides, it worries her more when I come home early than it does when I’m late.” He glanced at Miguel. “Come have coffee with us, Miguel. I’d like to hear how roundup is going.”

  Miguel looked from the older man to Anna. The coolness he was accustomed to seeing was back on her face, and he felt a sharp slice of disappointment. He didn’t want Anna’s frost. He wanted her warmth.

  “I have some things waiting—”

  “Don’t tell me you have things to do,” Roy interrupted him. “There’s always things to do on a ranch. I’m sure Anna makes good coffee. If she doesn’t, we’ll find some of Wyatt’s brandy to pour in it.”

  “Uncle Roy!” Anna scolded teasingly. “I make delicious coffee. And sheriffs aren’t allowed to drink.”

  Laughing, Roy urged his niece out of the stables and motioned for Miguel to join them. Miguel felt he had little choice but to follow.

  An hour passed before Roy eventually said his goodbyes and headed on home. Normally Miguel thoroughly enjoyed visiting with his old friend. But this evening he could hardly relax with Anna’s presence filling the kitchen.

  The more he tried not to notice her, the more he caught himself staring, recalling the kiss they’d exchanged at the stables.

  Touching her had been a mistake. But when he’d walked up and seen her racing around the track on a horse even he would be leery to climb on, he’d been enraged. And he’d been frightened. Memories of Charlene’s reckless indifference to his wishes had come rushing to his mind, filling him with helpless anger. Anna wasn’t Charlene, but in Miguel’s eyes, she was too damn close to the same mold.

  “Miguel? Do you hear me?”

  He glanced up to see Anna staring at him from across the room. “Did you say something?” he asked as he tried to shake away his deep thoughts.

  “I asked if you were hungry. Do you want to stay and eat?”

  Clapping his hat back onto his head, he rose from his seat at the table. “No. I’ve got things to do. I’ll...see you in the morning.”

  Anna watched him head on out the door without giving her so much as a second glance. Well, that was the way she wanted him to be, she told herself. But her traitorous gaze flew to the windows and continued to watch him until his long strides carried him through the courtyard gate and out of her sight.

  Miguel prepared himself a steak for supper, but he left half of it on the plate and refilled his wineglass instead. As he walked through the house, he couldn’t ever remember feeling so restless.

  He’d never been a man who needed much company other than his own. Usually he was content to switch on the television, prop his feet up and enjoy what was left of the evening before bedtime.

  But tonight thoughts of Anna kept pestering him, refusing to let him do anything but think about her. He was attracted to her. He’d be a fool to try to convince himself he wasn’t. Just looking at her was enough to make desire burn deep in his gut. Miguel knew firsthand what wanting a woman like Anna could do to a man. But he was beginning to think tonight he nee
ded a reminder of the devastation.

  Tossing off the last of his wine, he set the empty glass on a low coffee table and walked into his bedroom. In a desk wedged in one corner was a locked drawer. He opened it with a small key, then pulled out a heavy manila envelope.

  The snapshots inside were all sizes. Some of them were clear, some fuzzy and many yellowed with time. He shuffled through them slowly, each one of them conjuring up a different memory. There was only one of the pompous wedding Charlene had insisted on. Miguel had wanted to be married in the same old church and by the same Catholic priest who’d baptized him as a child. But that would’ve been an insult to Charlene and her wealthy family, so Miguel had given in and endured a wedding in the Grant family mansion and a guest list of nameless people he’d never met in his life.

  A tight grimace on his face, he tossed the photo to one side. He should have thrown it in with all the rest Charlene had taken after they’d divorced. The frozen image meant nothing to him now.

  But there were many photos he did cherish like those of his parents and sister. And most of all there were those of his son, Carlos. The majority of them had been taken when he was a very young baby, before the divorce had separated them. Of course there were the yearly school photos right up to the sixth grade. But it was the early pictures of his son that Miguel related to the most. Back then he’d been able to see his son, to touch him, love him, father him. But that had all changed.

  To look at Carlos as a sixth-grader, a soon-to-be teenager, both saddened him and reminded him why he could not let himself love Anna Sanders.

  Anna had thought she was hungry, but by the time she’d eaten two thirds of her supper, her appetite had vanished, along with her determination to finish everything on her plate.

  After scraping her plate, she cleaned off the countertop, then carried a cup of coffee with her into the living room. The house was as quiet as a tomb, and she tried to remember any other time she’d had the place to herself, but she couldn’t think of one.

  Instinctively she switched on the television, but after a quick run through the channels, she turned it off again. Eventually she wound up on the piano bench.

  She was staring at the closed lid, wondering why she had no urge to play, when a voice suddenly sounded behind her.

  Startled, her head whipped around, then a small breath rushed past her parted lips. “Miguel!”

  “I didn’t mean to frighten you,” he said as he walked into the room. “I knocked at the kitchen door, but you didn’t answer.”

  “Is something wrong?” she asked quickly.

  As far as Miguel was concerned everything was wrong. He could not eat, sleep, rest or work without Anna intruding into his thoughts. Hell, tonight he hadn’t even been able to stay in his own house. Something had drawn him back down here to the ranch house and her.

  “No. I thought you might need help doctoring your hands.” He knew it was a lame excuse for being here, but thankfully Anna didn’t seem to notice.

  She studied his face as he walked toward her. “I’m surprised you thought of my hands. You were pretty angry at me earlier.”

  Miguel couldn’t help but notice she’d changed her dirty work-clothes for a printed gauze skirt and sleeveless sweater. Her long hair was collected with a huge barrette atop her head. The flame-colored curls spilled against her neck and brushed her delicate collarbones.

  When he reached her, he couldn’t stop his hands from closing around the mane of hair, tangling his fingers in the silken web of waves.

  “I was angry,” he admitted in a husky voice. “But that doesn’t mean I want your hands to be neglected.”

  Even though Miguel had kissed her several times, on those occasions he’d always touched her out of provocation. Never had he reached out to her with such slow, deliberate intimacy as he was now. The feel of his fingers in her hair was flooding every inch of Anna’s body with heat, stealing her breath and sending her heart into a mad gallop.

  “I...uh, put some bandages on them after I got out of the shower,” she murmured.

  He eased down beside her on the piano bench and was suddenly consumed by the sweet scent of gardenia on her skin, the slight tremble of her lips as she met his gaze.

  “Actually, I was already here before I thought of your bandages,” he admitted. Then with a wry twist on his lips, he lifted one of her hands and opened the palm to his gaze. “I mainly come down to...tell you I shouldn’t have gotten so bent out of shape when I saw you on that horse. I was wrong to assume you didn’t know how to handle him.”

  Never in her wildest imaginings would Anna have ever dreamed of getting any sort of apology from this hard man. Much less one that seemed so genuinely sincere. And for once she didn’t know what to think or say.

  “For all you knew I’d never been on a racehorse before,” she said, trying to meet him halfway. “And I do understand, that, as foreman of this ranch, you feel responsible.”

  Suddenly he chuckled softly, and Anna was shocked at how much she adored the sound of pleasure coming from his throat.

  “After Roy left and I went home, I decided I was finally going to have to admit you are capable of doing more than play the piano.” He shook his head, and the expression on his face went suddenly grave. “But riding racehorses is very dangerous. I hope you realize just how dangerous.”

  Her gaze searched his face for long moments, and her heart surged as she realized he was actually concerned for her safety and not just his job. The knowledge had her looking at him in a whole different light. “Believe me, Miguel. I do know the dangers. I have a friend who’s confined to a wheelchair because he fell on the track. It’s not a job I take lightly. But for the next few weeks it is my job and I plan to do it as best and as safely as I can.”

  He had to be satisfied with that. He had no right to say more. He was not Anna’s husband, lover or even her friend. And even if he was, she was not the sort of woman to bend to a man’s demands. And a part of Miguel admired her independence. The other part of him hated it For more than a year he had tried to deal with Charlene’s independence, and in the end he’d come to the realization that she would never really need him.

  “Then I’ll try to keep my mouth shut,” he said.

  Her eyes drifted to his lips, and like the ebb of the ocean, longing flooded through her, momentarily robbing her of breath. Of all the men she’d ever encountered, this one and only this one had the ability to make her forget everything. Her common sense, her morals, her vow to guard her heart from all men.

  “Maybe I should put that down in writing,” she said with a husky little laugh.

  He smiled faintly, then to Anna’s foolish disappointment he turned his gaze on the closed lid of the piano. “Are your hands too sore to play?”

  She stared down at her hands and then at the old mahogany wood covering the keys. “I’m...not sure. I haven’t tried.”

  Anna could feel his head turn slightly and his eyes glide over her profile. “Why not? I thought musicians had to play all the time to stay at their best.”

  “That’s true. But this is my vacation. I don’t want to practice.”

  The faint resentment he picked up in Anna’s voice surprised Miguel. He’d figured all along the piano was her first love. Was she trying to imply it wasn’t?

  “What do you play?” he wanted to know. “Classical music?”

  She nodded. “Sometimes. I can play most anything. Jazz, country and western, Broadway melodies and big band. I think big band—like the old Glenn Miller tunes—is my favorite.”

  “Would you play something for me?”

  For a moment her heart stopped, and her breath caught in her throat. Though she didn’t understand why, she felt as if he’d just asked her to make love to him.

  “I don’t—” She broke off with a hesitant shake of her head.

  “Believe me, I won’t notice if you make mistakes. Just play something you like. Something soft.” Like you, he wanted to add, but didn’t.

 
; He could see the indecision behind her face, and he said nothing as he waited patiently for her to make up her mind. Finally she pushed up the lid and ran her fingers in a testing way over the keys.

  “My parents bought this piano when I was only five,” she told him in a wistful voice. “It was old and cheap, but I loved it. Later after I learned to play pretty well, Daddy offered to buy me a baby grand. But I was already too attached to this one.”

  Miguel would have never thought of her as being sentimental. But he was beginning to see he could not second-guess this woman. There were obviously layers of her he’d not yet seen. And he hated to admit just how badly he wanted to see and know all of her.

  “If your blisters are too sore, forget about playing,” he told her.

  Anna glanced at him, and in that instant she knew it would give her joy to play for him and only him. It felt as though she had practiced and studied all these years just so she could give this man a few moments’ pleasure.

  Before she could analyze where her feelings were headed, she began to play a love song. Her fingers were stiff, but to a novice she played flawlessly, and the beautiful notes filled the room.

  Once she was finished, Miguel sang a few snatches of the words, and Anna looked at him in surprise. “You know the song?”

  A wry smile on his face, he said, “Yes. ‘Night and Day.’ Cole Porter wrote it back in the forties, didn’t he?”

  Impressed, she nodded, then with a shock of pink filling her cheeks, she admitted, “I didn’t think you’d know it.”

  “I know very little about composers or lyricists. But I watch a few old classic movies from time to time. You pick up a lot about music from them.” With a wry twist to his lips, he reached up and rubbed his forefinger against her heated cheek. “I don’t think this blush is because you thought you affronted me, though. It’s because you thought I didn’t know you were playing me a love song.”

  Anna stared at the ivory keys, while beneath her breast her heart hammered erratically. “You said play something I like. So I did. I wasn’t expecting you to know the words. Or to...read anything into them.”