She followed him into Marvin’s hallway, slowed by his halting progress.
“Let’s see what you did, Josh,” Dusty said, easing himself onto the old couch. “Sit here.”
Josh did, showing off his thumb like a war wound.
While Max retrieved the small first-aid kit Marvin kept in his bathroom, she heard her son and Dusty murmuring to each other.
In the living room, she found Josh leaning against Dusty and staring up at him with adoring eyes.
Don’t, she thought. Don’t become attached, son. He’s only here for a short while, then he’ll be off to chase women and rodeo buckles.
Squatting in front of Josh, she cleaned the tiny cut with an alcoholic swab. He flinched, glanced up at Dusty and straightened his little shoulders.
While a young man’s influence on her son might be good, Josh’s hero worship of Dusty worried her.
Josh needed a steady influence.
After applying ointment and a bandage, Max returned the kit to the bathroom and stopped back in the front room.
“You coming, Josh?”
“I’ll stay here with Dusty.”
With a look, she asked a question of Dusty.
“He’s good here,” he responded to her nonverbal concern. “He can stay until I get tired.”
“I’ll let Marvin know where you are,” Max told Josh and left the house unsettled and wary.
Chapter 8
Dusty watched her go, his emotions an odd jumble of compassion and irritation, but not with the boy.
He liked Josh.
Max’s obvious reluctance to leave Josh here alone with Dusty bothered him.
Did she think he would hurt the kid?
Shame on her.
Anyone who knew Dusty for more than a few seconds knew he could no more hurt a child than cut off his own arm.
Not intentionally, at any rate.
How about unintentionally, Dusty?
He didn’t know what he meant by that. How would he hurt the boy without meaning to?
He looked down at Josh, who watched him almost adoringly.
The answer came quickly. He could hurt Josh by getting to know him and then by disappearing at the end of August, once the fair and rodeo were over.
Nothing would stop Dusty. Not a stubborn ranch owner, or her endearing son, who even at this moment wiggled his way under Dusty’s defenses with his lively, innocent chatter.
Dusty would head out to the next job and the next rodeo.
For how long, Dusty?
For as long as I want.
When his psyche pointed to his knee and laughed at his hubris, Dusty chose to ignore it.
“You want to help me make phone calls?” He explained to Josh the importance of the calls. Getting people to participate in the Western events wasn’t hard—they were more than happy to do bronc busting and barrel racing. Getting them to enter the polo match while they were here proved more difficult.
He phoned more rodeo riders. Josh listened and occasionally piped in with a great comment or two.
His little voice, audible despite not actually speaking into the phone, softened the hard line of the listeners.
A couple of times, Dusty said, “You’re listening to the voice of the future.”
And lo and behold, some of the people were swayed and agreed to come.
* * *
Max went about her business until late afternoon, when she remembered she should be taking care of her injured employee.
She’d told Charlie she would, and she respected the other woman enough to keep her word.
Damn and blast. She didn’t have time for this.
Max headed toward Marvin’s house and entered quietly. If Dusty napped she didn’t want to awaken him.
In the doorway of the living room, she halted, both pleased and chagrined by the sight in front of her.
Dusty lay on the sofa in his T-shirt and a pair of underwear, his long muscular legs bare. His sweatpants lay on the floor beside the sofa.
Eyes closed and unaware that she watched, he massaged his thigh, long fingers trying to reach around the back to his hamstring. Pain etched commas at the sides of his mouth. His teeth bit into his bottom lips.
A wave of sympathy burst through her. She blurted, “I can do that for you.”
His eyes snapped open, pinning her with a pain-hazed glare.
She frowned. “Haven’t you been taking your pain medication?”
“Don’t like to take it. Fogs my mind.”
“You mean Marvin went to the trouble of getting the doctor out here and picking up your prescription and you won’t take it?”
“I take it at night. During the day, I need a clear head for work.”
Oh. He had a point. Working was good.
The organization of the rodeo hung over Max’s head like a burden she really didn’t need. It mattered to her. It had to be done.
As a child the annual fair had been her home away from home every summer for the two weeks it stayed open.
Her motivation for getting out of the house had been huge. Mighty. She shivered to think about it now.
Thank God she’d been a kid with backbone and ingenuity.
“How are the phone calls going?” she asked.
“I’ve got another of my buddies coming out.” He told her how Josh’s innocent comments really helped.
“Are these guys giving a firm commitment?”
“Yeah. I also got three maybes.”
“Those don’t do us a bit of good.”
“I know. I told them so, but they weren’t willing to commit.”
She bit her thumbnail. “Are we going to have enough cowboys come out to participate?”
Dusty attempted a reassuring glance, but his face registered too much pain to make it believable.
“Know what, Max?”
“No. What?”
“We have enough for one team. No extras, but we just might be okay.”
Max’s hopes scooted up out of the bottom of her nervous stomach. “Really?”
“Yep. Steadily, each day, I get at least another guy willing to commit.”
She smiled. A laugh burst out of her. “Thank you.”
Dusty stared for a moment before looking away. “Did you mean it?”
He looked so hopeful she faltered. Just when she had a firm grip on her hardheadedness toward him, he said things that made her soften. The earnestness in his blue eyes eased her resentment.
She’d lost track of the conversation. “Mean what?”
“Did you mean that you would massage my leg? It hurts like hell.”
“Doesn’t it hurt when you touch it?”
“Yeah, but massage will stretch out the hamstring and help it to heal faster.”
She swallowed. Touching his thigh? Oh, so tempting and so hard, her offer impetuous and the thought of touching him too real.
She had offered. She had no choice but to follow through.
She pretended a nonchalance she didn’t feel.
“Sure. I can do that.”
Her voice might sound confident, but her slow steps betrayed her fear. Only to herself, she hoped.
He lay back with his eyes closed and an arm across his forehead, his features distorted by discomfort.
Funnily enough, she wanted to ease his suffering.
She touched his leg, the hair-dusted skin warm.
Bending forward and curling her fingers around to the back of his thigh, she rubbed.
“This isn’t going to work,” she said.
He opened his eyes, slow to comprehend. “What?”
“A ten-or fifteen-minute massage like this will kill my back. There’s no room for me to sit beside you. I need you lying down on your stomach.”
“Okay.” Wi
th an effort, he sat up. “Let’s go to the bedroom.”
The phrase jarred. She’d heard it only once before in her life and it had gotten her into a whole lot of trouble.
This was different. There was nothing even remotely sexual about this. It was purely about helping Dusty to heal.
A funny, pathetic little part of her grieved that it was not sexual, that she was not a woman who knew her way around men and relationships and could just take a man to bed purely for finding him attractive.
Forcing herself to be objective and professional, just an employer helping out an injured employee, she hardened her defenses. She gave her traitorous libido, normally so full of common sense, a good talking-to.
Max knew how disappointing sex was.
Somehow, she knew that wouldn’t be the case with Dusty.
So what?
He needed a therapeutic massage. Nothing else.
Pull yourself together, Max, she scolded for the entire length of the hallway, with Dusty halting and slow behind her on his crutches.
Longest walk of her life.
She had to get this done quickly, finish all of this tempting touching, and get out of here.
In the bedroom, Max smoothed out the covers. The bed had been made, but clumsily, Dusty doubtless hampered by his injury.
She reached for his crutches, trying hard not to devour his legs with avid hunger. Beautiful like the rest of him, long and proportioned perfectly, they made a visual feast.
Of course they were perfect.
This was Dustin Lincoln, after all. God of male perfection.
He was beautiful. In his pain, he was also oblivious to anything she might be thinking, thank goodness.
He lay face down on the bed. A sigh gusted out of him.
She put her fingers to his skin and another, longer sigh whispered onto his pillow.
At first, she kept her touch soft, but Dusty said, “Use more pressure. Stretch that hamstring. Please.” His voice came out thin.
Her compassion kicked in.
She pressed harder and he moaned. She backed off.
“It’s okay,” he said. “It hurts, but you aren’t doing damage. It’s exactly what that hamstring needs.”
She dug in, not too hard and not too soft, the experience of her hands on a man’s skin strange and unfamiliar.
Her knowledge of men limited, she felt her lack of worldliness while touching a man easy with the opposite sex.
Never had she had a chance to explore a man’s body.
Her time spent with men had given her a disgust of many of them and of their bodily demands.
Her stepfather had been—
She shuddered away from those thoughts.
Nope, nope, nope, don’t go there. It doesn’t belong here in this room.
Then there’d been Josh’s father.
Joel had been selfishness personified. He’d wanted to sleep with her. He’d waged a campaign. She’d given in to the temptation to know, just to know, a man.
Curious about what all the fuss had been about, she’d wanted to experiment with the physical, to hold a man’s body and to have him inside of her.
Her disappointment after a wet, sweaty, noisy, awkward and uncomfortable encounter had been profound.
Maybe she should have chosen a man instead of a boy for her one and only night with a male. At twenty-one, Joel had been only two years older than her.
The second he’d found out about the pregnancy, he’d offered to do the right thing, but had been killed by a bull soon afterward.
Pregnant and rattled by morning sickness that lasted all day every day, Max watched when the bull stomped on Joel, ending her hope for a normal family.
He’d never even met his son.
Thank goodness his father had been a good man.
Max’s stepfather sure hadn’t been good.
How many other men have you been giving it away to?
The ugliness of his reaction and his accusation had never left her.
She rubbed Dusty’s hamstring, his muscled leg real and solid. The hair on his legs abraded her fingers. It felt good. He felt good.
Despite how much she complained about him, and how much she needed to believe him a feckless guy, she knew she fooled herself.
He had a reputation on the rodeo circuit as a hard worker. She wouldn’t have hired him otherwise. She’d done her research.
Despite what she thought of as his arrogance with women, his sweetness appealed to her.
Deep inside of her where her woman’s intuition resided, she knew he would never leave a woman dissatisfied.
He would be generous in his attentions.
How on earth would that feel, to have all of his famed charm turned to her and her body?
Sweat dribbled between her breasts.
An image flashed through her of his strong hands, their backs dusted with soft blond hair, covering her breasts. Of his fingers caressing her nipples.
At the thought, they went hard.
Stop!
What’s gotten into you, Max?
Quit thinking inappropriate thoughts.
She fought her burgeoning attraction, those uncomfortable feelings that would only get her into trouble.
He made no bones about the rodeo circuit being his life.
He would never settle down here on her ranch.
She had to resist. Damned hard to do when she touched him so intimately, running her hands all the way up to, but just shy of, a solid buttock.
She’d been too long without a man. Dusty’s body was a revelation.
Joel had been a rangy, randy boy.
Dusty was a man.
As skittish as an unbroken horse when she had to deal with men outside of business, Max had never learned the art of flirtation or carefree dalliance.
She didn’t know what to do with men.
Her life was perfect without them.
But sometimes, late at night, she wanted to hold someone. She wanted to be held. Holding led to all of the other unpleasant stuff, though.
No, thanks.
She rubbed the back of Dusty’s leg, applying pressure with her thumbs to stretch his injured hamstring.
It did butterfly-type things to her insides.
Her tummy felt like it rumbled from hunger, but made no sound.
Flustered, she shifted away from Dusty so her hip wasn’t touching the side of this leg.
Max sweated with exertion, but mainly with desire for Dusty, a man she didn’t really like.
How strange was that?
She had to stop touching him.
Opening her mouth to tell him she’d bring him dinner later, she realized he was asleep.
Tenderness usually reserved for her son washed through her. Dusty trusted her enough, and felt so comfortable with her, that he would actually fall asleep. So sweet.
Without thinking, she did what she would have done with Josh. She brushed a lock of hair away from his forehead.
She placed his crutches close if he needed them.
Smoothing her fingers along his thigh, she stepped away from the temptation of the prettiest male body she’d ever seen.
Leaving the room, she grinned.
Dusty would probably croak if he heard himself described as pretty.
* * *
Dusty didn’t dare move or breathe too deeply.
He pretended to sleep.
He had sensed Max’s unease. Given that she didn’t want to take care of him, and that she wasn’t comfortable touching him, but did it anyway, his respect for her grew.
He’d known her only briefly, but had learned that she did what had to be done no matter the cost to her personally.
When he’d told his mother that he thought Max was damaged, he’d told her the truth.
He’d lied, though, about wanting to have nothing to do with Max and her vulnerabilities.
To himself, he had to admit that Max intrigued him. What would cause a woman to deny happiness to herself?
She had little experience touching a man. That was painfully obvious. Her touch had been tentative at the start. She’d gotten better.
She massaged him with serious intent.
He didn’t want to delve deeper into her psyche. At the same time, he wanted to know what had happened to her and cursed himself for his curiosity.
He lived a normal life, happy in his straightforward, simple pleasures. He neither needed nor wanted to get entangled with a troublesome, troubled woman.
No way no how did he want complications.
Complicated was Maxine Porter’s middle name.
Another problem presented itself in the erection pressing into the mattress.
How could this woman tempt him and tease him when they barely got along? When she touched him awkwardly, without the least bit of finesse, whether sexual or not?
He didn’t find her attractive. He didn’t like her. He didn’t want to have anything to do with her. He didn’t want a relationship. He didn’t want a ready-made family.
He didn’t make overtures to women who were not available by his definition.
Max had a lot of responsibilities here on her ranch, saddled with worries and too many concerns, and she had a son.
None of those things fit into Dusty’s lifestyle.
But his body desired her. Or at least, it desired that those sharp, fine fingers find their way from his injured hamstring to other parts of his body.
Tender, sensitive, longing parts.
Utter foolishness.
He may not know Max well but he trusted his instincts. Max would fall hard once she let herself go.
She didn’t dally. She didn’t take anything lightly.
Once the woman tore aside all of her restraints, she’d be a passionate lover. Dusty had no doubt about that.
Loyal to a fault, she loved her son, her ranch, Marvin, her friends and her commitment to this damned rodeo and the people of the town of Rodeo, with an intensity Dusty had never tried.
Dusty didn’t have it in him to deal with a love of that force.
Who was he kidding?
Why worry?
Home on the Ranch: Montana Rodeo Star Page 13