Cowboy Crazy

chapter 14



Lane looked down at his hands as Sarah stalked out of the office. He could swear his fingers were tingling from where he’d touched her. For half a second, the two of them had replayed their brief dance at the bar, his hands steadying and supporting her, her flesh yielding under his palm.

He looked up to see Eric watching him, eyes narrowed. “Did something happen between you two?”

“No.” Lane’s voice came out thick and hoarse. “Nothing. I just—I need to talk to her.”

He almost overturned the chair in his hurry to follow Sarah, but she was already halfway down the hall. He called her name and she hastened her steps, turning into an office and swinging the door shut behind her.

Lane caught it just before the latch clicked.

“Hey.” He edged through and let the door close behind him. “We need to talk.”

“There’s nothing to talk about.” She stood with her back against a desk, her hands gripping the edge on either side of her hips. He had no doubt she was trying to look tough, but the pose was more alluring than fierce.

“There’s a lot to talk about,” he said.

“I noticed you had a lot to talk about with Eric.”

“Not really.”

“You were talking about where I was from.” She tossed her head in a move worthy of a soap opera star, but he saw more fear than anger in her eyes.

“I wasn’t going to tell Eric a damned thing. I was trying to help.” He took a step toward her, but her knuckles whitened on the edge of the desk and he took the step back and spoke in the soothing cadences he used on frightened horses. “Eric’s a detail guy. I was trying to see if he’d checked you out. If he had, I could have saved you from worrying about keeping secrets. As a matter-of-fact, he knows you’re keeping something from him, and he says it doesn’t matter.”

She scanned his face and he stared back, willing her to believe him. Her jaw was tense, but he sensed that sudden shift of energy he’d felt the night before, and he thought he saw that straitlaced professional mask slip for a moment.

She wanted to believe him. He just needed to keep pushing. Like he did with the horses—if he asked for a little more each time, eventually they’d form a true partnership.

“We can keep what happened this weekend a secret,” he said. “For a while.”

“Forever,” she said. “I’ve worked in places where…” She swallowed hard. “Where women had sex with the boss. I’d lose everyone’s respect.”

“I’m not your boss. And that wasn’t just having sex,” he said. “It was a whole lot more than that.”

That wasn’t what he’d intended to say, but it was true. Because—what was it? Why was he so smitten with her? Why was he even here?

“Because I’ve been running away from who I am all my life, just like you.” He was sensing the truth as he formed it into words. “You’re a class act, Sarah. No one would ever know you weren’t born to wine and fine china. But underneath all that, you and I are a whole lot alike—it’s just that we’re moving in different directions.” He smiled. “Maybe we could meet in the middle.”

His words surprised him as much as they’d surprised her. He hadn’t realized his feelings until he put them into words, but what else could have made him come to the office on a Friday morning, like a regular nine-to-five wage slave?

He peeled one of her hands off the desk, then the other. She didn’t help him any, but she let him. As he looked down at her, the office seemed to fade away. He could smell flowers. Hear music. What the hell?

He looked her straight in the eye. “Look, if you want to keep this a secret, we can do that. Whatever you want—for a while. But eventually, your coworkers are going to have to get over the idea of us being together.”

The scent of flowers hit him again, along with the hum of voices. You may kiss the bride. He heard the words as clearly as if they’d been spoken and stepped back, dropping Sarah’s hands.

A wedding? What was he, a woman?

Now he knew how a horse felt the first time it saw the halter. He’d never had thoughts like that before. Maybe he had one of those biological clocks or something. Next he’d be picturing kids. A little boy, maybe, or a girl like Sarah. He could see the little tomboy she used to be in her face right now, as she looked up at him and struggled for composure.

Aw, hell. He ought to stay away from this woman. He’d always figured on finding some starry-eyed buckle bunny to marry someday, one of those girls who looked at him like he was some sort of hero. He wanted a passel of kids, a little home on the range. Sarah was hardly what he had in mind.

But taking the easy road with women had never gotten him anywhere. Maybe it was time for something different. More of a challenge.

Bending his head, he cupped the back of her head in one hand and kissed her, gently at first, then harder. She stiffened against him but he persisted and finally she relented, letting him wrap his arms around her and pour his soul into figuring out just what it was about her that had him so damn confused.

***

Sarah held onto her anger as long as she could, stiffening in Lane’s arms and resisting his kiss. This man was going to ruin her life, she was sure of it. He was a cowboy, after all. His life was one long road trip, and he liked it that way. He’d never settle down with one woman. If she was stupid enough to risk her job for him he’d be gone in a month, off to the next town and the next woman, leaving her life in ruins with that sexy sideways grin and a wave of his hand.

And her job—how could she trust him? She’d caught him asking Eric if he knew where she was from. He’d proven he couldn’t be trusted.

She told herself all these things, blocking her emotions with logic like a fighter pilot throwing out chaff, but the kiss shot right through her defenses and made a direct hit on her heart.

Yes, he was a rodeo cowboy and a ladies’ man. But he was a study in contradictions: a gentle, kind man who rode wild animals to a standstill, a rich man who loved the grit and grime of the rodeo, a cowboy with class. And job or no job, this kiss was sincere.

As the kiss deepened, she struggled to remember why she cared so much about her career. She didn’t need to be rich. She didn’t care about wearing fancy clothes or living in splendor. She wanted safety and security, but what was safer or more secure than the arms of this man? She gave half her money to her sister anyway.

She froze and stiffened in his arms. Her sister. How could she forget the one thing that mattered most? She could take risks with her own life, but she couldn’t take risks with Kelsey’s—or Katie’s.

“Lane, stop.” She pulled away, but his arms were like iron, holding her like he’d never let her go. She looked up into his face and saw tenderness in his eyes, but there was determination there too—the kind of determination that could glue him to the back of a bucking bull for eight seconds.

She put her hands on his chest and shoved—hard. He let her go, but he didn’t step back. He still stood close, looking down at her with equal parts tenderness and amusement.

“Sorry,” he said. “I guess this isn’t appropriate office behavior.” He gave her a charming, hangdog look from under his brows, then swabbed at her smudged lipstick with the pad of his thumb. “I’ll try to be good.”

She closed her eyes for a second, marshaling her defenses against the feel of his rough fingertip against her lips. She leaned back against the desk again, but there was no gripping the edge this time. She’d studied the body language of successful women and how to radiate authority, and clinging to the furniture was not the way to do it.

Folding her arms over her chest, she crossed her feet at the ankles and tilted her head, arrowing her brows down over her eyes in an expression she hoped was confident and commanding. Her heart was hammering double-time in her chest, but he didn’t have to know that.

“Lane.” She put a frigid bite into her tone. “I’m sorry, but I think you misinterpreted what happened between us.”

He stilled. “Really? What part of ‘You rip off my clothes and I’ll rip off yours’ did I get wrong?”

“I did not rip your clothes off.”

“You came damn close.”

He was right. Lane one, Sarah zero for this conversation. But she continued as if he hadn’t spoken.

“I know you’re used to getting what you want, but I think the other girls have spoiled you.” She tossed her hair and shifted slightly, propping one hip up on the desk and allowing herself a small, sardonic smile. “I think you overestimated my…”

“Enthusiasm?”

She cleared her throat. “I was going to say you overestimated my feelings.”

“Which are what?”

She lifted one shoulder in what she hoped was an eloquent shrug that precluded the need for words.

“Sarah, don’t bullshit me. You felt it too.”

“If you’re trying to woo me with your eloquence, you should leave out the references to animal excrement.”

“Like you never heard the word bullshit before. Like you never dished it out. Hell, you’re shoveling it on now, and you know it.”

He was right. She hated this side of herself, prim and proper and phony as hell. But it was her best defense.

She couldn’t look at him, so she pretended to study her nails—but her hand was shaking. She quickly folded her arms again. “It was fun, but it’s done. Come on. People don’t fall in love in one night.”

“Yeah, they do. I’ve seen it happen. A guy meets the right woman, and boom. It’s over.”

“Well, it’s not over for me.” She walked to the door, shoulders back, and held it open.

He stayed right where he was.

“Lane, please. My career is important to me, and I’m not going to ditch it for a man.”

“I’m not asking you to ditch it.”

She clenched her jaw to keep her chin from trembling. What was wrong with her? It had just been a fling. If she hadn’t deprived herself for so long, it wouldn’t have felt like such a cataclysmic event. She was being such a girl.

“How could I stay on here and date the boss’s brother?”

“Grit and determination. Seems to me you’ve got plenty of both.”

“Yes I do, and I’m using it now. A relationship with you is out of the question.”

The tenderness had completely faded from his face. The power that had seemed strong and comforting the night before now seemed almost threatening.

“The question is when you’ll let yourself relax and have a life.”

“That’s my decision,” she said. “The only question I have is whether you’ll break my confidence.”

Everything rested on that question. She’d just about finished the initial three-month tryout Eric had asked for, and though she felt like she hadn’t accomplished much, she was pretty sure the company would renew her contract—unless he found out she wasn’t the woman she seemed to be.

If this job didn’t work out, her next one might be in San Francisco, or Boston, or New York. That would mean leaving Kelsey and Katie, and she couldn’t do that. Kelsey was doing a great job raising Katie without Mike, but lately the stress was getting to her and she was having migraines. She needed Sarah close.

“I won’t tell your secrets,” he said. “But you need to stop lying to yourself.” He reached up as if to tip the brim of his hat, but the hat wasn’t there; he’d left it in Eric’s office.

He made the tipping gesture anyway, gave her a wry smile, and walked out of the room.

***

Lane scooped his hat off his brother’s desk.

“You coming tonight?” Eric asked.

“Don’t think so. I ride this afternoon.”

“So you’re giving up on her?”

Lane gritted his teeth. He didn’t believe in giving up, and Eric knew it.

“Dinner’s at seven if you change your mind. I’m having a limo pick up the girls.”

“Girls? Plural?”

“Sarah and her friend Gloria. She’s a barista at Starbucks. Peppy little thing. Think I might get lucky.” Eric ran a hand through his dark hair. “But hey, let’s pretend I didn’t tell you Sarah’d be at the club though, okay? She’ll be furious if she finds out I set her up.” He laughed. “Never thought I’d have to get a woman for you, that’s for sure.”

Lane had a sudden urge to lunge over the desk and sucker punch his brother—not to hurt him, just to take him by surprise and remind him who was the stronger brother. They’d tussled all the time as kids—Eric with his brains, Lane with his brawn. Which brother won didn’t mean anything; it was the sparring that mattered. It was a tradition, a ritual that defined all their differences and confirmed their strengths.

“So did you get what you came for?”

Lane scowled. Sarah had him spinning in circles, but nobody else needed to know that.

“I came to talk to you.”

“Right. Why? Did Sarah change your mind about the drilling?”

Lane looked down at the toes of his boots. She hadn’t changed his mind, but she’d hijacked it. He’d practically forgotten how this whole thing started. It was about the ranch, the landscape, the traditions of the West. It was about Two Shot, even though Sarah didn’t want it to be.

In fact, she’d only increased his determination to save the town from the curse of an oil boom. Sarah might be ashamed of her hometown, but it had made her the woman she was—resourceful, hardworking, and ready for anything. The world needed more people like her, and more places like Two Shot.

“Don’t you care about Two Shot?” he asked his brother.

He knew the answer to the question. Lane had always longed for a hometown, a place to belong, but the small town near their grandfather’s ranch had barely been a blip on Eric’s radar.

“Not really,” Eric said. “I know you don’t want it to change, but it’s inevitable. It’ll either die and be absorbed back into the prairie, or it’ll grow and thrive. Which would you prefer?”

“I’d like it to thrive, but not the way you mean. The guys that work the platforms don’t care about the towns or the people. They’re there for what, six months, maybe a year? They move into trailers and cheap rentals, work all day, and screw around on weekends. Then they leave.”

“They leave a lot of money there.”

“They do more harm than good, and you know it.” Lane set his fists on the edge of the desk and leaned forward, looming over his brother. For the second time in under an hour, he wanted to punch his little brother.

But dominating Eric physically wouldn’t change anything. It didn’t matter that he was the bigger brother anymore. They were grown-ups now, and for once, he was going to have to act like one.

He was going to have to learn a whole new way to fight.