The Girl with the Golden Spurs

by Ann Major

  She didn’t care if she was naked. She didn’t care if her body writhed against his and her nipples became instantly tender and erect. Her eyes blazed. “You cad. You beast. You slept with me! And all the time—”

  “Stop it!” He grabbed her shoulders and pushed her into the white tiled wall, which felt cool against her burning skin.

  “For God’s sake, Lizzy, just stop it.” He drew a deep breath. “I should have told you, okay. I’m sorry. But things happened so fast. And then later it seemed pointless to make you worry about Caesar an extra day. He’s stable. And he’s damn sure not going anywhere. But we’ve got to hurry now.”

  Suddenly she was aware that the combination of her fury and grief and her body being mashed into the heat of his was arousing them both. Enraged, she let out a low animal sound. “Let me go!”

  His hands fell from her shoulders and he backed up a step.

  Still carrying her towel, she raced into the living room.

  “This isn’t all my fault you know,” he said, following her. “If you’d answered your damned phone, your mother wouldn’t have had to send me. We wouldn’t be standing here naked in your apartment having this idiotic quarrel. I didn’t want to come, you know.”

  The logic of his statement served only to make Lizzy feel angrier and more guilt-ridden, so naturally she made him her scapegoat. “Well, you certainly made the most of it.”

  “So the hell did you. What results did you expect with that hooker act?”

  “I don’t have to take this!”

  “Joanne told me to bring you and Vanilla home. She needs you to help her run the ranch until your dad’s better…or this divorce thing is resolved. She’s at her wit’s end. She needs you there.”

  “Me? Run the Golden Spurs?”

  “You.”

  The situation was worsening by the second. “I don’t know anything… What about Hawk or Walker?”

  “Your father kicked them off the ranch. He doesn’t want them.”

  “Anybody would be better than me.”

  “Not as long as your father’s alive. Look, you know more than you think. Ranching is in your blood. Your daddy spent years training you. You have that college degree. I’ll help you. Lots of people will help you. The suits in San Antonio are full of ideas.”

  Dazed, she shook her head. “I don’t believe any of this. You fly up here and then you don’t tell me about Daddy… Just for the record, I don’t want any more help from you. You’ve done more than enough to screw my life up royally.”

  “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry, Lizzy. Sorry for everything. For last night, too, since you regret it so much. But believe me, I intend to keep my distance from now on. I don’t like waking up in the morning to a fight. I’m in here over my head, too.”

  Something in his low, sincere voice, maybe compassion, touched her heart more than she wanted it to.

  “You go to hell, Cole Knight,” she whispered, hoping he wouldn’t hear her fear and the aching need beneath her bluster. She felt like a scared, heartbroken little girl who needed to bawl her eyes out in his arms. She was mad at him, but she needed him, too. She almost hated him for making her feel pulled two ways.

  He swallowed. That muscle in his jaw ticked furiously.

  Good. He hadn’t seen through her. She’d managed to hurt him.

  “Get dressed! Now!” His face changed. “Or would you rather me do it for you?”

  “What?”

  “Hey, maybe we could start the day with a dress-tease. Get the juices flowing so to speak.”

  “How dare you! I do hate you!”

  “You’re repeating yourself, darlin’.”

  “Don’t call me—” Just as she was about to launch into a rather passionate and in-depth explanation as to why she disliked him so much, her doorbell buzzed.

  Lizzy gasped. “Oh, God. Mandy’s downstairs with Vanilla. They’re early.”

  “No kidding. Guess she got tired of baby-sitting. My first thought was she didn’t much look like the baby-sitter type.”

  “Nobody asked you.”

  Cole strode toward her and pressed the button that unlocked the doors downstairs. “I’ll stay here and get the door. You get dressed.”

  “But you’re stark naked.”

  “So the hell are you, darlin’.”

  They stared at each other. He was broad-shouldered, tanned and virile—a hunk if ever there was one. Blood pounded in her throat. In spite of herself, she shivered.

  “Too bad we don’t have more time,” he said knowingly. “You look good. Too good. And your soap smells like roses.”

  “You swore you’d keep your distance, remember?”

  “Thanks for the reminder.”

  His black gaze raked her. Not that she cowered like a Victorian maiden or even covered herself with her towel—much as she was tempted. No, she stood frozen like a deer caught in a pair of headlights and endured his knowing, insolent eyes as he assessed her charms. She endured his slow, appreciative grin, too.

  Not that she grinned back. But she looked at him with equal fascination.

  Finally he broke the spell by leaning toward her and snatching the towel she’d been holding. As he tightened the thick cotton folds around his waist, he shot her a smile that was so sexually charged, she almost kicked him.

  Not wanting to give him the satisfaction of knowing how much he goaded her, she gritted her teeth.

  She did not want him. She couldn’t.

  “If looks could kill,” he teased, grinning charmingly at her again as he finger-combed his black hair.

  “Exactly. You’re a cad.”

  “Cad? That word’s old-fashioned. You need to expand your vocabulary when it comes to insults—city slicker.”

  “If you stick around, I probably will.”

  “So, there’s a chance for us?” He winked at her.

  “No. Hell, no.”

  “Darlin’, we both know all I’d have to do is touch you.”

  “Shut up. Just shut up. And you’d better remember to stick to your promise to keep your distance.”

  “I hear your friend. They’re almost up the stairs,” he said warningly. “You’re still standing there naked.”

  Lizzy scampered into the bedroom at the exact moment he opened the door for them.

  “Where’s Bryce? Who the hell are you?” Mandy demanded upon seeing Lizzy’s handsome, towel-clad guest.

  “Cole Knight. Bryce is history. I’m here to take Lizzy home to Texas.”

  “Well, you’re fast. I’ll give you that. Did you two meet at the party or what?”

  “You know Lizzy—never a dull moment.”

  Lizzy sagged against her bedroom door and groaned.

  “Hi, there little darling,” Cole murmured, his voice so sweet and tender, Lizzy ached. “Do you want to come to Daddy? Long time no see, little love.”

  You don’t even remember her—cad.

  Think up another word.

  Jerk. Jerk. How’s that for a more modern word?

  The last thing Lizzy heard as she dug through the clothes heaped on her floor for something decent to wear was Vanilla clapping.

  The little traitor!

  BOOK TWO

  Smart Cowboy Saying:

  Don’t worry about bitin’ off more than you can chew. Your mouth is probably a whole lot bigger than you think it is.

  —Anonymous

  Ten

  “Hi there.” Cherry’s voice sounded soft and excited.

  He smiled at her as he pushed the door open and walked inside her small, rented apartment. No sooner had he shut the door than the dingy walls seemed to close in on him. He preferred open spaces to cities. He would never have come here if it weren’t necessary. A man had to do what a man had to do.

  Cherry was wearing her glittery cowgirl outfit and her silver sequined hat just like he’d told her to. The only bit of brightness in the drab room, she was so pretty, it was kinda sad. All she’d ever wanted was to be a star. How she’d loved
the media attention she’d gotten as a result of her engagement to Caesar.

  She was too pretty and too young to die.

  “I put these on just for you,” Cherry purred, wiggling so that her breasts bounced.

  She damn sure knew all the tricks.

  “You look good,” he said as he turned on the music just in case something went wrong. “Now, will you take them off—just for me, too?”

  “I can’t wait, baby. Did you bring the money?”

  He held up his briefcase. “You did good.”

  “How is he?”

  “Later, baby.” He turned the pounding music even louder. “Dance for me.”

  She began to strip, slowly, the way he liked it, showing her big boobs first, jiggling them for him, and then her silver, Texas-shaped pubic hair. Flirtatiously she combed the hair with her fingers.

  When she was naked, he told her to come to him, spread her legs and sit on his lap, which she did.

  She began to kiss him, first his lips, then his throat. Next she stood him up and pushed him against her wall, pulled his jeans down and licked his erection with her velvet, pulsing, talented tongue. She kissed him everywhere until she had him breathing hard.

  She was too pretty to die.

  Then he thought about his mother and all the boyfriends she’d had when he’d been a kid. That got him angry.

  He carried Cherry to the bed, yanked his jeans and boots off, put on a rubber and buried himself inside her.

  “Oh, baby, that feels wonderful,” she said when he began to pump.

  Soon they were writhing to their own rhythm separate from the music. She made all the right moaning and cooing noises. Her pelvis arched in ever quickening spasms.

  “Don’t fake it,” he growled, seizing her wrists and pinning her down as he pumped even harder.

  “I’m not.”

  “Just don’t—I want this to be real. This time, it has to be real.”

  He thought about Caesar. He liked fucking her because Caesar had fucked her. Following in the big man’s footsteps, so to speak. But then wasn’t that the point? Hell, he’d selected her for Caesar. It was her rotten luck she’d looked so much like Electra.

  “Who’s better? Me or old Caesar?”

  She grinned. “Guess?”

  As his hands moved into her hair, he felt her relax and get wetter down there as he pounded ever more violently into her. When he felt himself on the verge of ecstasy, his hands slowly circled her throat, gently, caressingly, so as not to alarm her.

  She began to squirm to free herself, but he was stronger, far stronger. And he’d planned this, planned it so carefully down to the last detail. He was on top of her, his muscular body holding her down. The more she fought him, the more excited he grew, until the exquisite sensations were almost unbearable.

  His hands tightened. When her eyes grew huge with terror, he loosened his grip on her throat ever so slightly.

  “Relax, baby,” he whispered, kissing her quivering mouth. This was the part he liked the best, giving them hope. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  He eased off on the pounding, but only to make the thrill of it last. Only she felt so damn good, so hot and wet, so tight he couldn’t control his passion. He was furious—furious at her for using her whorish tricks to make his body shudder too soon.

  His fingers became talons. Gripping her neck again, he squeezed with all his might.

  Her mouth opened. She bucked against him and tried to scream. But he was stronger.

  No, this was the best part, when he knew they knew. When they knew he was all powerful. In the end, all she could do was gurgle helplessly and stare up at him with dumbfounded, frantic eyes that knew.

  “It’s okay, baby. It’s okay. It’s okay.” It was so much fun to lie to them.

  He stared into her eyes, plunging again and again, harder and faster until he finally exploded, filling the condom at the exact moment the blank terror in her eyes glazed over and her hands and legs went limp.

  He felt alive and all powerful, on the edge of something vast and grand. He lingered over her inert body, his member still swollen and rock hard inside her. When finally he pulled out of her, he stared down into her open, dead eyes for a long, delicious moment.

  Then he kissed her mouth one last time, wondering what it would be like to do it to a dead woman.

  He’d never done that before.

  But he had work to do.

  Eleven

  “You’re practically kidnapping me,” Lizzy said gloomily as she heaved herself into the seat behind Cole’s in his twin-engine Cessna. His pilot, John, who had spent his entire time in New York near the plane, was standing on the tarmac, going over the flight plans.

  “Drama queen,” Cole bit out. “Make my day, darlin’—fly commercial.”

  She snapped the ends of her seat belt together defiantly.

  “Did you ever reach your mother?” he demanded.

  “While you and John were talking to the weather guy. She was very understanding when I explained why I took my phone off the hook.”

  In truth her mother had been the cool, distant mother Lizzy remembered from her childhood—icily polite, but on some deep level utterly rejecting.

  Lizzy popped a white rectangular piece of sugarless chewing gum into her mouth and chomped guiltily. “I’ll never forgive you for last night, though. If you’d told me earlier, I would have called her sooner.”

  “Fine. Blame me.”

  “Why didn’t you just tell me about my father?”

  “Why’d you dress up like a hooker if you didn’t want some chump to seize the bait? Maybe you were lucky it was me.”

  “Ohhhh!”

  “Besides, darlin’, I couldn’t tell you. I had to catch you first, remember? I went into that room intending to tell you, but you came on to me like a real hooker, offering to indulge my wildest fantasies. Let me clue you in about the male mind, sweetheart. A man like me can have the best of intentions, but when a woman does something like that, she derails a guy—big-time.”

  “I don’t want to talk about last night.”

  “Then why do you keep bringing it up?”

  “You didn’t have to sleep with me,” she muttered.

  “Neither the hell did you.”

  “I didn’t know about Daddy. You did.”

  “Right.” Cole turned around and began checking the instruments.

  In response, she clenched her hands together in utter exasperation.

  It never occurred to her he might be on a guilt trip, too. He took another long breath. When he looked over at her again, his eyes were blazing blue. “So, is the baby buckled up? Does anybody besides me want to get this mother airborne?”

  John climbed inside and began discussing technical questions with Cole. Lizzy faced forward, notched her chin up and chewed her gum. Every time she caught a glimpse of Cole, his face was even darker and more closed than it had been during their quarrel before Mandy’s arrival earlier. He was more like the old Cole—guarded, demanding, less giving. Everything he’d said and done in the past two hours had been abrupt, mechanical and cold.

  He’d made her pack in such a hurry she’d probably forgotten everything she needed. He’d put up walls—against her.

  Good. This is good. She wanted walls. She unclasped her hands. She munched her gum a little too loudly, liking it when it annoyed him so much that a muscle in his jaw jumped.

  She was too susceptible to that other Cole—the sexy, teasing Cole of last night. She didn’t want to go back to Texas. Not with the vengeful, bitter Cole when she couldn’t forgive herself for last night.

  When he turned to check Vanilla, who was buckled into a car seat as well as the airplane’s seat belt, his face softened. Vanilla put her hands together and beamed at him adoringly. If he’d been a marshmallow roasting over a bonfire, he would have dripped white goo all over the ground.

  “You gonna clap for me, little darlin’?” he whispered playfully, patting his hands together.


  When she did, he clapped, too. “Patty-cake,” he said.

  Vanilla batted her eyelashes at him and squealed in delight.

  When Cole looked at Lizzy again, the warmth in his dazzling blue eyes froze. When he turned back to John without another word to Lizzy and focused on the plane and what the two men had to do to get it airborne, Lizzy’s throat constricted. She wished she could tune him out as easily, but every time she cast a furtive glance his way, the sight of his square, determined jaw unnerved her.

  What was he thinking? Would he brag to every hand on the ranch that she’d thrown herself at him? Would he share the embarrassing details of her costume and racy underwear with Kinky and Eli?

  She remembered Cole coming into the shower. How incredibly warm and tender his big, rough hands had felt gently caressing her breasts. Against her will, a vision of his sleek, brown, muscular body arose in her mind’s eye. The memory of the sexual gleam in his eyes as he’d stared back at her taunted her, too.

  She sighed, despising herself. First Bryce, and now Cole Knight—again. She didn’t know which was worse.

  Swallowing, she tightened her own seat belt and stared straight ahead. If he could ignore her, she could try to do the same.

  John took off without incident. For the next few hours the two men continued to concentrate solely on flying the airplane. Fortunately cars and apparently planes put Vanilla to sleep, so the baby didn’t distract her.

  Determined to ignore Cole, Lizzy looked out her window at the blue sky and puffy clouds and the rumpled green earth beneath them, as if she found the view fascinating.

  Despite the vastness beneath her and the sunny skies, she felt trapped inside the small cabin and too dependent on Cole. She remembered that night almost a year ago when her daddy had called and Cole’s plane was lost over the gulf. Cole had been on his way to Mexico to check on a herd of prize-winning cattle owned by a friend down there. Caesar had told her he should have been on the plane, not Mia, who’d just had a baby the month before. He’d even hinted at murder and sabotage.

  Then Cole had been found by shrimpers. There had been an investigation. Cole had been exonerated, and gradually the talk had died down. But his memory of the event—or any leading up to it—had never returned.