Healing a Cowboy's Heart (Cowboy Dreamin' 2) Read online

  The clink of a horses bridle brought him out of the mist with a startled step back. “I’m sorry. I…”

  “You what?”

  “I shouldn’t have lost control. You’re a guest.”

  “So?”

  “We don’t mess with guests.”

  “Well apparently some of you do if your brother married a woman who was a guest here at one time.”

  “That’s different.”

  “Different how? You’re the one who kissed me.”

  “Just go back to your cottage and leave me the hell alone, would you please?”

  She fisted her hands on her hips. “No. I need your expertise to answer some questions.”

  “I’m not telling you anythin’.”

  “We can go round and round about this for days, Jeff. If you help me, I’ll be gone sooner.”

  “Sooner?”

  She nodded as she swept her hair back and fixed her ponytail where he’d almost pulled it out of its confinement. “Yes. I won’t stay the entire two weeks if I get the information I need.”

  Maybe helping her would help him. Surely she didn’t need personal information about the ranch, just general stuff. “What kind of information do you need?”

  “How many cattle do you run?” she asked, pulling out a pen and small pad of paper from her pocket.

  “I can’t tell you that.”

  Air rush from between her lips in a heavy sigh as she tipped her head back on her shoulders. “What are the native trees to the area?”

  “Texas Junipers and several other types of brush. I can’t name them all, but you could get samples I guess.”

  “Rock types?”

  He told her what he knew.

  “Do you have to supplement your cattle with feed often?” she asked, biting her lip.

  Damn, she was turning him inside out with her innocent gesture. “During dry summers, yes.”

  “How did the rainfall go this year in comparison to years previously?”

  Their conversation went on this way for over an hour while he sat with her in the tack room. The guests who’d been out with one of his brothers on a run had come and gone, but still she asked more questions than he could give her answers for and some he wasn’t willing to. If it meant she’d go away, then so be it. He could get on with his life if she wasn’t nearby.

  Damn. Why did I kiss her?

  He shook his head as he remembered his dream from the night before. After she’d given him a blowjob, he’d fucked her senseless in his bed. Now she stood in front of him with her lips still red and swollen from his kiss. A kiss he shouldn’t have given her on a good day, much less how they’d started off.

  “Hello?”

  “Sorry. My mind wandered. What did you ask?”

  “How many guests do you all have in a good year?”

  “I’m not tellin’ you that either.” He stood up from his spot on the edge of the metal desk. “Look. You should have all the information you need. You can go now.”

  “No, I need to ride out to the property line between your ranch and the development so I can see what types of rocks and plant life are there. Will you take me?” she asked, chewing her lips again.

  “You can’t be serious.”

  “Of course I am. George got the measurements he needed for the survey, but I need a more up close look at the landscape.”

  “No, I meant you can’t be serious about me taking you out there.” He folded his arms over his chest. “Darlin’, I already helped you more than I should with what you are tryin’ to do to this countryside.”

  “Darlin’?”

  “Never mind. We’re done here.”

  “Please, Jeff?” She placed her hand on his arm. He didn’t like the warmth spreading up the appendage. Usually that kind of reaction meant trouble, especially when she stepped close enough he could smell her shampoo. Vanilla. Damn, he loved the smell of vanilla. “It won’t take long.”

  “Fine. When Joey gets back from…”

  A honk sounded outside as Joey pulled up the ranch truck in front of the tack barn.

  “I take it that’s Joey?”

  “Sorry. I hadn’t realized you didn’t already know all of my brothers.”

  Joey stepped out of the truck and slammed the door. “Howdy, ma’am.”

  “Hi.”

  “Joey, this is Terri. Terri Kennedy, this is the youngest of the group, Joey.”

  “Nice to meet you, ma’am.” He tipped his hat.

  “You, too.” She nodded to the trailer. “What do you have in there?”

  “A new mare for the brood. Want to take a look?”

  “Sure. I love horses.”

  “She’s a filly so I need to train her, but she’s a beauty. Black as the midnight sky with a pretty blaze on her nose.” Joey popped open the trailer’s back door and slid inside to unhook the horse’s lead rope. “Such a pretty girl.” The filly’s ears flicked back and forth to the sound of his voice. There was a good reason Joey took care of the animals. He had a way with the ladies especially.

  “Oh my! She’s beautiful.”

  “She’ll make some pretty colts, I bet,” Joey said, stroking her as he backed her out of the trailer. “Easy now.” The horse’s withers shook as she stepped out onto the solid ground.

  “You did good, Joe.” His compliment earned him a scowl. Surely he hadn’t been so hard on his brothers lately they all hated him.

  “Thanks, Jeff.” Joey glanced between him and Terri with a raised eyebrow. “I’m gonna take her into the barn. Since I’m back, you can go about doin’ whatever you needed to do earlier, Jeff.”

  “Actually, I’m goin’ to take Terri out to one of the pastures. She needs to check some things out over there.”

  “Really?” she asked, surprise written all over her face.

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, the group is back, aren’t they?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You can take any of the horses then.”

  “I’ll get her set up.”

  “See you two later.” Joey led the new filly toward the barn.

  “How much ridin’ have you done?”

  “Some, but not recently. I mean I can stay on one and make them go where I want them to. I don’t consider myself an expert by any means.”

  “Most of our horses are very tame. We have a lot of beginner riders but I don’t want to give you one who won’t do anything either.”

  “Mediocre then?”

  He chuckled, startling himself and Terri. It had been a long damn time since anyone made him smile, much less laugh.

  “You have a nice laugh.”

  A sobering thought ripped across his mind. He didn’t have anything to be happy about. His life sucked right now. Unfortunately, he didn’t see it getting better anytime soon.

  “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  “You didn’t. I have a lot on my mind is all.” He headed back into the tack room to grab his saddle while she followed on his heels. Why in the hell had he agreed to take her out to the property line anyway? The last thing he needed was to encourage her into thinking he might be okay with this damned crap with the developers when he wasn’t. “Let’s get this over with.”

  “I’m sure I could get one of your brothers to take me, if you would rather not.”

  “I’ll do it. Besides, I want to keep an eye on you.”

  “I’m not trying to do anything illegal, Jeff. I need to see a few things.”

  “We’ve had this discussion, Terri. I don’t want you on our property. The sooner you leave the better for everyone, especially me.”

  “Why especially you?”

  “I don’t like you.”

  She stepped forward and ran her fingernail down his chest. “Your problem is I think you like me a little too much.”

  With her fingers in his fist, he snapped, “No, I don’t.”

  “Then why’d you kiss me?” she asked, glancing up through her lashes with those incredibly green eyes.
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  “Hell if I know, but it won’t happen again.” He started to push past her, but she stopped him dead in his tracks with her words.

  “What if I want it to?”

  A lump formed in his throat and he swallowed hard to push his words past it. “Well, it won’t. I don’t need a woman in my life. I don’t need you.”

  “Not even for a little bit of quick fun?”

  His cock hardened behind the fly of his pants at the sultry sound of her whispered words. His dream came back to haunt him in the flesh as she stood there promising him sweet release if he’d only give into the desires blazing between them. “What’d you have in mind?”

  “You seem like you could use a good romp in the hay. I’m just thinking we could help each other out a little. It’s been a bit for me and from the conversations around the ranch, it sounds like it has for you too.”

  “Let’s get this ride over with.”

  “And then we’ll talk more?”

  “Maybe.”

  She smiled with a sexy little tip of her lips that drove desire straight to his balls. I’m so fuckin’ screwed.

  Chapter Four

  They rode along with the sun beating down on their shoulders. Sweat trickled down her back between her shoulder blades. She wiped at the moisture on her forehead wishing she would have thought to bring water.

  Jeff reached into his saddle bag and brought out a water bottle. He handed it over as she sighed in relief.

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome, city girl.”

  “I’m not a city girl.”

  “Could have fooled me. Who rides out here without bringin’ water?”

  “I didn’t think…”

  “Yeah, I know. Good thing I did, huh?”

  “Ass-wipe,” she grumbled under her breath.

  “What did you say?” he asked with a grin.

  “Nothing.” She really did like his smile even though right at the moment she’d like to wipe it off his lips with her fist or a kiss. She wasn’t sure which one and it bothered her.

  How far it would be until they reached the property line, she wasn’t sure.

  Several types of plant life made it into jotted notes of her book while the rode along. Rocks and animal life got noted too. The more information she had, the better her report to the developers would be. This job meant a lot of money to her fledgling company so she had to do her best.

  “What are they plannin’ on doin’?”

  “Dividing up the property into five acres parcels, building a few houses on them to get started and then selling off the plots so people can build their own.”

  “Wonderful. Just fuckin’ wonderful,” he snapped.

  She reached over to lay her hand on his arm. For some reason his misery at the prospects bothered her. “I’m sorry, Jeff. I know you don’t want to be a part of this, but its progress. You have to look at it in the sense where it’s going to be good for the community to have the additional population here. It will help the local stores, restaurants, bars, and your family’s ranch.”

  “How in the hell will it help us?”

  “Think of it this way. People will come to visit family and friends who live in the new development. If they don’t have a place to stay, they’ll stay at Thunder Ridge. You have a great set up! You can teach them about cowboying and how to live life with the cattle as part of your life verses the citified people coming out here to mess up the land.”

  “Maybe.”

  “It’s true.”

  “I have to have somethin’ to leave my son when he’s grown.” He shook his head, glancing at her even though she couldn’t see those arresting gray eyes beneath his sunglasses. “We won’t sell off any of our property to them. They have to know that.”

  “You’ll have the land to give Ben. The developers aren’t looking for more at the moment.” The horse shifted under her as she grabbed the pommel in a death grip. It really had been a long time since she’d been on a horse, but it came back like riding a bike.

  “Right now, they ain’t, but what if they do in five years or even ten?”

  “If you aren’t selling, what difference does it make which way they expand?”

  “More and more people tearing up the roads, using up the land, dammin’ up the water for their own use. All of those things take away from what we’ve built here.”

  “You can’t keep living in the past, Jeff.”

  “I don’t want things to change.”

  “Change is good.”

  “Not always.”

  She continued to mull over what he said. True, change wasn’t always for the best, but in this case it had to be. Her life and her job depended on it being the right thing to do.

  They came around a large boulder to see a barbed wire fence stretching far into the distance in both directions.

  “This is the property line.” He leaned over the pommel of his saddle, resting his forearms across the padded leather in a relaxed, totally cowboy state. “Do what you need to do.”

  She swung her leg over the back of the horse and dropped her booted feet into the loose gravel. She grabbed the binoculars from around her neck and scanned the area. Several birds flew out of a nearby bush into the afternoon sky. With a note in her book, she described the birds in as much details as she could. Their species might be important in the long run.

  “I’ll hold her while you look around,” Jeff said, swinging down from his own horse. “There’s a small spring over here to the right. I’ll water them.”

  “Okay.” She sighed as she took her pen and paper in her hand to make some notes. After several minutes, she glanced off to the right where she heard the spring tinkling down over the rocks. Instead of making the notes she needed to make and the drawings of the area, she found herself wandering to where Jeff said he was going. Surely they had the same rocks and bushes over there, right?

  “Jeff?”

  “Over here.” She followed his voice until she saw him crouched down near a pool.

  “How pretty.”

  “It’s one of the natural springs we have running through our property. This one has a great little swimmin’ area right here.” He pointed to the two boulders on the other side with a sweep of his hand. “It’s not terribly deep but you can swim in it. I bet it would feel good right now.”

  “Can we put our feet in?”

  “Sure.”

  She giggled as she quickly stripped off her boots and socks before she rolled up her pant legs. The water felt cold on her feet when she dipped them in, but after the heat of the day during their ride, it felt like heaven. “Lordy, that’s great!”

  Jeff took the rock next to her and dipped his feet in too. “We used to come up here swimmin’ when we were kids much to my mother’s disappointment. Came home wet all the time.”

  “I can totally see you and your brothers getting into trouble with your mom. She’s a strong lady.”

  “Yes, she is. She’s the glue holdin’ this whole ranch together. God forbid somethin’ happen to her, none of us would know what to do.”

  They sat in silence for several minutes while she contemplated the man near her. He really didn’t seem so grouchy while he sat with her dipping their feet in the cool water. She wondered more about him. How had he grown up? He seemed like such a strong man, but around Ben he buckled under to be the dad the boy needed in his life. He ran the ranch with an iron fist, but seeing how he handled his younger brothers, she thought he needed to let up on them some.

  “What are you thinkin’ about?”

  “You.”

  “Me? Why me?”

  “I’m wondering about you is all. You’ve had it pretty rough from what I’ve heard.”

  “Not really. I’ve had a great life livin’ out here on the place I grew up. I love runnin’ the ranch, doin’ the chores, workin’ with the animals. You know, ranch stuff.”

  “I can see that.”

  “What do you do when you aren’t out in a place like this? Y
ou seem like a city girl to me.”

  “I live in Houston. I have my own architecture firm.”

  “Definitely a city girl.” He laughed when she frowned.

  “I’m not either.”

  “What do you call those clothes you were wearin’ yesterday with your fancy boots and designer jeans?”

  “All right. I don’t have worn boots like yours or ripped jeans, but I’m not a city girl like New York or Los Angeles. Houston isn’t the city.”

  “Sure it is.”

  “No, it’s not.” She cupped her hand in the water before she tossed the small trickle onto him.

  “Hey!” He threw some back at her.

  Within minutes, she stood halfway in the middle of the pond to her waist, soaking wet while they laughed like children as they splashed each other. Jeff stood at the edge with the water to his calves, but his jeans and T-shirt were soaked too. She bit her lip while she stared at the material clinging to his chest. The muscles rippled beneath the material when he moved. Damn, he’s got a magnificent chest and abs.

  He quickly flung off his hat and rushed into the water as she squealed and tried to get away. “No! Wait,” she shouted right before he pushed her under. She came up sputtering with her hair partially in her face. “You’ve done it now, cowboy.”

  “Come after me, babe! You don’t have what it takes.”

  “Oh no?” She rushed him, jumping full into his chest and taking them both down into the water. They broke the surface together laughing while she clung to his shoulders. A moment later, she realized how close their mouths were as she looked up into his gray eyes that turned to molten silver with lust.

  His cock hard between their straining bodies kicked up her desire to raging. She could feel every inch of him against her stomach. Water clung to his lashes, making them looked like diamonds in the sunlight. The man was beautiful.

  Silence stretched between them. She wasn’t sure what to do. She wanted to feel his mouth against her again, feel the heat raging between them. “Kiss me.”

  “I shouldn’t.”

  “But you want to.”

  “Yeah, I do.”

  “Then do it.” She sucked in a ragged breath, blowing it out on a sigh. “Afraid?”

  He dragged her closer still. “I’m not afraid of you.”