Convincing the Rancher (19 page)

They walked back through the ghost town, looking in a few more windows. Tess realized she’d never done anything like this with a man before—gone sightseeing, walked around holding hands and talking history. And despite the emptiness around them, despite the creepy ghost-town feeling, she felt safe next to Slaid. Safe and happy to be out here in the middle of nowhere, with him.

He looked down at her, a mischievous glint in his eye. “We haven’t seen a single other person. I don’t think we have to hide behind a rock down here, do we?”

“No,” she answered, laughing softly. “I think we’re safe from prying eyes. Maybe not ghostly eyes, though.”

“So is it rude to eat a picnic with ghostly eyes watching? Because there
are
tables.” He pointed to a picnic area near the parking lot. “I mean, if you’re really worried, I do see a few boulders out there...” He pointed away from the town, where the desert just kept going.

She had to laugh at his teasing. “The table will be fine,” Tess answered.

“Are you ever going to tell me what your reaction at the restaurant was really all about?” Slaid asked, wrapping her hand more closely in his.

“Probably not,” Tess answered. Might as well be truthful when she could.

His smile was thoughtful, but Slaid didn’t pressure her for more, just led her to a rough, wooden table and offered her the bench with a flourish of his hand, like some maître d’ at a posh restaurant. Then he walked to the truck to get the picnic.

Tess sat where she could see the town, so still under the bright midday sun. The dry heat felt good beating all around her, baking her muscles just enough to relax them. The hissing wind, the dull thumping of Slaid opening and closing the truck door all lulled her, making her a little sleepy.

She studied the abandoned buildings, still littered with the remnants of long-ago lives. People had been born and lived and loved and died here, and now there was nothing but the wind whispering through the buildings. This place was a reminder that time passed quickly; lives were lived in the blink of an eye. Tess suddenly felt a sense of urgency—that she needed to be braver, more alive, than she had ever been.

She heard Slaid’s footsteps on the rocky soil and looked up as he placed a basket, a real picnic basket, on the bench beside her. He set a cooler next to it, and as she stared in astonishment he opened the basket and pulled out a blue-checked tablecloth. He shook it out, and she helped him spread it over the splintered surface. Next came two wineglasses, real plates, silverware and cloth napkins. Finally she found her voice. “You are pretty serious about your picnics, aren’t you?”

“I’m pretty serious about our date. You made it clear I only have one more chance, so I wanted to make it good.” He winked and pulled out a bottle of white wine from the cooler.

Tess looked in the basket, finding a corkscrew there. She walked over to Slaid and handed it to him. “Well, I’m flattered that you’d go to so much trouble. You didn’t have to.”

“I wanted to.” His eyes were dark under the brim of his hat. Maybe it was the sun behind him, leaving his face in shadow, but Tess thought it was something else. She couldn’t look away, and Slaid didn’t, either. He set the unopened wine and the corkscrew down on the table with a thud.

And then his hands were in her hair and his mouth came down, warm and firm, on hers. So much sensation blasted through her that Tess gasped. How could one kiss be so much...bring so much?

There were a million reasons not to do this, but she wasn’t planning on listening to them today. She’d let so much time pass in her life by playing it safe. At least the ghostly people of Bodie had the courage to try for more, to take huge risks for a better life. She’d been such a coward, maybe it was time for her to risk a little.

Slaid pulled her still closer until she could feel the strength of his massive thighs and his broad chest along her body. His arms wrapped around her, holding her up as she kissed him back with a fierce hunger that was all mixed up in the quiet of this place, all the passion and life here that had been lost and stilled by time. She breathed in the scent of him, a combination of minty aftershave, sage and fresh air.

Every part of him, every touch, left her feeling more awake and alive—just the way she wanted to feel after exploring the dusty remnants of other people’s lives.

Tess unzipped his jacket, then hers. She didn’t want to break from his mouth, from his warm, dark kisses, so she kept one hand behind his head and brought her free hand under his flannel shirt to where his white T-shirt was tucked into his jeans. Slaid made a sound, low and rough, that she felt in her own throat when her hand found the soft skin and the taut muscle at his waist. If there was a way to feel more of him, right here next to the Bodie parking lot, she wanted to figure it out.

And then things got blurry. Slaid must have felt her urgency, because he pushed her back toward the table until she could feel its rough wooden edge pressing at the back of her thighs. There was a
thunk
as the wine bottle rolled off the table and hit the ground, and a clanking as the silverware followed. Somehow he managed to lift her onto the edge and move the wineglasses to the relative safety of the basket while still kissing her. And then he pushed her down onto the tablecloth and leaned over her, barely fitting himself alongside her on the narrow surface, blocking out the sun and sky when he kissed her again.

His hand went under her T-shirt and had the front clasp of her bra open in such a quick twist of his fingers that Tess wondered briefly if he was a bit more experienced with women than he let on. But then his huge palm was cradling her breast, his rough fingers circling the tip in a way that had her back arching, her hips pushing up, inviting his hand to travel down so his fingers trailed under the waistband of her jeans.

“Tess.” He pulled back just a few inches, his breath unsteady, flickering across the skin by her ear. “You are so beautiful.”

Something in her glowed at his praise. It was a strange, exhilarating feeling to be with him here under the open blue sky. And then his hand was wrapped at her waist and he was tugging at her lower lip with his teeth and she pulled him down for more.

Slaid put his knee between hers, and she got what she wanted—the feel of him all down the length of her—and she pushed her hips up, feeling the hard length of his erection and the pinch of his metal belt buckle. She reached up, trying to remove his belt. He raised himself up on an elbow to accommodate her and gave a yelp of surprise when he slipped off the edge of the narrow table.

His reflexes were quick. With a curse, he somehow caught himself with a hand on the bench before he completely crushed her. She burst out laughing, despite the frustrated desire. “Are you okay?”

“Just mildly humiliated.” He gingerly lifted himself off her, one hip precariously balanced on the edge of the table as she slid out from under him, hopping to the ground so he could scoot over and bring his arm back up from the bench. He sat on the table looking at her with the most sheepish expression, and she laughed even harder. He pulled a large splinter from the palm of his hand and held it up. “This outdoor making-out thing just isn’t working.”

Tess dabbed at her eyes with her sleeve. “No. First the thistle, and now this table. We’re ridiculous.”

There was a drop of blood on his hand where the splinter had been. Tess reached into the picnic basket, pulled out a paper napkin and dabbed at his palm. “See? This is one reason I don’t date. It’s hazardous. Why not just own up to the fact that we want each other and jump into a nice safe bed?”

He burst out laughing. “I hate to admit it, but you may have a point. Normally I wouldn’t consider dating hazardous, but there’s something about you...” He paused, pivoted on the table so he was seated on the edge, his feet on the bench. He reached out for her, taking her hands and bringing her between his knees. He pushed back her mussed hair. “I’ve never wanted anyone like this. So much that I can’t stay away. Even when it’s dangerous.”

She brought her teeth to her lower lip and realized her lips felt bruised, they’d been kissing that fiercely. “I don’t know if I can stay away, either,” she confessed.

He leaned forward, put his knuckle under her chin and tipped her head up. “Look at me.”

She met his eyes, stunned by the tenderness there. He kissed her, so gently this time, just brushing his lips over hers. Offering something, asking a question with his kiss, then backing off to wait for her response.

Tess paused, knowing somehow that if she kissed him back it would be an answer. A yes to whatever it was that kept bringing them back together. Desire, but so much more. This tenderness, this connection threatened to change everything.

She could back off right now and hide from it, or she could lean in and accept it. Being here in Bodie made her want to reach out and try something new—to live. Here was her first chance to put that lesson into action. She leaned in, put her hands behind his head and kissed him with no hesitation.

The taste of him was familiar now, but with Slaid familiar wasn’t the bad thing she’d always assumed it would be. There was nothing boring about the way he pulled her roughly between his legs, or the way she knelt upon the bench so she could better reach his mouth. There was nothing boring about the way he kissed her as if he was claiming her, branding her—as if he never planned to stop. And with a sense of shock, Tess realized she didn’t want him to.

She’d reached for more, and she felt more alive than she could remember being. Awake in this moment, in this wide-open space of earth and sky and history, with this man, so warm and strong under her mouth. Exhilaration, and a sense that she was exactly where she was supposed to be, prickled cold and warm over her skin. She ended the kiss and wrapped her arms around him, burying her face in the comfort of the spot where his shoulder met his neck.

He pulled her close, cradled her in a security she’d never known she’d needed until now.

“Hey,” he whispered. “Just so you know, there’s a car coming down the road.”

He was so careful to remember the privacy that she’d asked for. But she didn’t want to let go of him yet. “Just another minute.” She clung to him more tightly, needing more of whatever this feeling was between them.

“I’ve got you,” he murmured.

She took a deep breath and just tried to inhale all of him. All his kindness and warmth and the way he’d made this day so perfect. Only when she heard the crunch of car wheels on the gravel of the parking lot did she pull back.

She stared at Slaid in a daze, trying to connect what had just happened with any experience she’d had before. But she’d never felt this close to anyone. So close it kind of hurt now that they weren’t connected physically. “I didn’t expect it to be like this,” she confessed.

“I did. And I want more of it. More of you.” He brought fingers to her cheek and caressed her skin with his knuckles.

Tess stared at him, stunned by his sweetness. He wore a calm smile and there was a quiet happiness about him. He was unlike anyone she’d ever met.

She kissed his fingers as they went by her mouth. Then took his hand and opened it, examining the mark where the splinter had been. “I’m sorry we didn’t get to finish what we started here.”

He kissed her softly on the mouth, but when he pulled back there was laughter in his eyes. “Who said anything about being finished?”

“And you’re thinking that will happen...when?” She glanced over to where the Subaru station wagon had just pulled in. A hassled-looking woman was unloading a little boy and a baby while a man let a dog out of the hatchback.

“On our next date.”

“You’re pushing your luck there, cowboy.” But something inside her lit up at his words.

“I know you enough, Tess Cole, to guess that you like to finish what you start.”

She watched as he pushed himself off the table and went around the side of it to rescue the wine bottle from the dirt. “Okay, another date,” she conceded. “Though I’m not sure how you’ll top this one.”

Slaid pulled a paper towel from the picnic basket and wiped the dirt off the bottle, then reached for the corkscrew. “I’m not worried. I know you don’t believe me, but there’s plenty to do out here around Benson.” He uncorked the bottle and poured a glass of wine. He handed it to her and poured his own glass and raised it, arching an eyebrow as he smiled at her over the rim. “To our next date—and all the ones after that.”

Tess had the feeling that she was stepping off the edge of something bigger than she’d meant to, bigger than she’d wanted. But looking at Slaid’s laughing gray eyes, his full mouth turned up in a smile she wanted to see so much more of, she knew he was right. She wasn’t finished. Her answering smile was hesitant. “To our next date,” she agreed, and in the clink of their glasses she heard a hopeful sound, a sound of possibilities she’d never allowed herself to consider.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

S
LAID WASN’T KIDDING
when he said they’d have privacy on his ranch. Tess was at least a mile outside Benson and Slaid’s house wasn’t in sight yet. The road was heading up slopes that would soon give way to sheer mountain. The land was mostly covered in brush, but a few pine trees began appearing, and bigger boulders dotted the rocky landscape. It was sunset and the last rays were shining around her. Then she passed into mountain shadows where dusk had already fallen.

The road zigzagged up a low ridge. Partway down the other side she saw the ranch, spread across a high valley, mountains behind it and hills rolling out below. Even to Tess’s urban eyes, it was nice. A low modern-looking house sprawled out on the uphill side of the property, surrounded by patios and a garden. Below it was a huge barn, a few smaller outbuildings and several paddocks.

Glancing at Slaid’s directions scrawled on a piece of paper on the seat next to her, she drove down the hill and turned into a gravel driveway that ran alongside the barns and paddocks. Looking past them, Tess saw vast fields where cattle grazed.

A familiar truck was parked by the barn. What was Jack doing here? Had Slaid invited him and Samantha for dinner, too? Tess pulled her Jeep up next to the truck. Stepping out she saw more pickups parked alongside the barn, with Full Power Solar emblazoned on their doors. She took a few steps back and looked up. Several men stood on the barn’s roof discussing something. Just then Slaid and Jack appeared in the doorway of the barn.