Rocky Mountain Cowboy (42 page)

“Think so, you young fool,” Eli laughed. “But the real question is what are you gonna do ‘bout it?”

The bewilderment resurfaced. “I don’t know.”

“Oh, for the love of Pete! You’re one dumb cowboy!” Eli chastised. “You tell her you love her, for heaven’s sake, then you get her a ring and make her your permanent partner! Then we all go back to a normal, happy life, and Tom gets what he wanted all along.”

“Our partnership?”

Eli rolled his rummy nearly colorless eyes again. “That and you marrying his
daughter!”

“He wanted me to marry Jenny? He never said a word to me about that.”

“Well, it was just a dream of his. I guess he was hopin’ the two of you would eventually see something in each other ‘sides business. I think he knew you both pretty well and figured you had a lot in common. So man— marry the girl, have a few kids, and pass this ranch of Tom’s onto a whole new generation of Fletchers and Larsons. You won’t even have to change the brand.”

Hawk smiled crookedly at Eli. “You got this all figured out pretty damn well, don’t
you?”

“Yeah, well at least I got somethin’ beside cotton up here,” he said, pointing to his head. “But first you got to make this partnership legal, you stubborn jackass. How come you were so all-fired pig-headed ‘bout takin’ Jenny’s money and signing those papers?”

“Pride and worry.”

“Pride I can see, but worry?”

“Caldwell’s backed in a corner over that land deal,” Hawk told him. “He’s got some pretty dangerous looking goons partnering up with him, and probably no way now to give them what they want. So, who do you think he’s going to blame for that? Jenny, damn it! He knows by now she was the one responsible for removing his threat of foreclosure. I know better than anyone that he’s going to make her pay for thwarting his plans. When Brad doesn’t get what he wants, he retaliates. Look how he badgered Tom. I wonder all the time if it didn’t put more stress on Tom’s heart than it could take.”

“Yeah, me, too,” Eli agreed sadly.

“I couldn’t protect Tom. I hope to God I can protect his daughter. I didn’t want her money invested in the ranch right now because I didn’t want her in danger.”

“Yeah, but she couldn’t let her home be put at risk, either.”

“I understand that.”

“You need to tell her that. And you still need to sign those papers. She can’t run this place without you, any
more than she can handle Brad without you.”

“I figured that out. I signed the papers this afternoon, as soon as I got back from Cheyenne. But now what? Jenny’s gone.”

“I reckon she’ll be back ‘fore too long,” Eli advised him. “I’ve seen how much she loves this place— and you. She won’t stay away forever.”

Hawk thought she’d return, too, eventually, but that didn’t mean she’d come back feeling the same way about him. The incredible sex they’d shared last night wouldn’t be enough to assuage her anger with him over not signing those partnership papers. He still had charter flights all week, and he had to keep them, so he couldn’t fly out to L.A. He’d just have to wait until she returned to repair the damage he’d caused. The fact that she’d told him again last night that she loved him, even if he’d had to drag it out of her, gave him hope. Hell, when she did get back, he’d get down on his knees and beg her forgiveness with a hundred dozen flowers if that’s what it would take to win her back and put a smile on her face for him again.

CHAPTER 25

It was the first of November. After spending a week in warm and sunny Los Angeles, the cold wind blowing the clouds in from the north was an abrupt change. The heater in the Corvette had been blowing all the way from the Denver airport. The local radio station was predicting the season’s first snowstorm this weekend, and warning it could be heavy in the mountains.

Jenny wished she had dressed more warmly. Her waist-hugging dark red leather jacket looked great with her jeans and the fitted white high-collared Victorian blouse Hawk had liked so well, but it wasn’t made for icy cold winds. She didn’t have time to go to the ranch, unpack her things and change, either. She’d promised Becky a week and a half ago that she would go to this local rodeo with her. They’d even gone shopping for it.

As Jenny drove into the dirt parking lot beside the rodeo arena, she glanced at her wrist watch. Though she’d called Becky on her cell phone from Denver to let her know she was on her way, she was running late. Maybe Becky would have a nice warm stadium blanket, she hoped as she pulled into a parking spot in the nearly full lot.

A fierce gust of wind nearly blew her new black cowboy hat off
her head when she swung out of her car. With a firm tug so that it rode low on her forehead, nearly to her eyebrows, she made sure it wasn’t going anywhere and headed toward the spectator stands, where she had arranged to meet Becky.

Her long
dark auburn hair swirled and flew across her face, and she wished she had braided it. Irritated that it prevented her from seeing where she was going, she removed her hat, shoved her hair behind both ears, then jammed her hat back on.

As she wove her way through the trucks and horse trailers, she passed by Hawk’s empty rig. All around her, cowboys were unloading horses from their trailers and leading them to the stock area or the arena, but Hawk was nowhere to be seen. Reli
ef mingled with disappointment.

When she got to the bull pens, she stopped to pull her red leather gloves out of her tooled belt and put them on. While she worked each finger into the snug fit, she stared at the animals inside. For the most part, they were quiet now, but they looked huge and mean. One of them was even snorting and pawing the ground, for heaven’s sake! It was a gray Brahma with a massive, muscular stature and large horns. She recalled that when Hawk had first begun the rodeo circuit, he’d been a bull rider. She wondered if he still rode them in these little local rodeos. Surely not at his age with all the past injuries that plagued his joints!

“The cowboy who wins the bull riding today wins five thousand bucks,” a lanky teenager informed her as he led his horse by and nodded in the direction of the Brahma. “It’s the big event of the rodeo, but everybody is hoping that they don’t draw that bull.”

Jenny swung her head to look at him in horrified surprise.
Five thousand dollars was a lot of money. And then it dawned on her that for that much money, Hawk would surely be among the contenders for the prize. But he didn’t need it now, so surely some sense of self-preservation would stop him from risking his fool neck so unnecessarily.

“Hear tell, he’s the meanest, rankest bull to ride in all of Central Colorado.”

He walked on before she could comment. With one last look at the Brahma, Jenny did too.

Hawk had been on her mind every minute of every day since she’d left him nearly a week ago. Their last night together had been an astonishing experience, producing so many mixed emotions when she recalled it, she tried to avoid doing so, which she had actually failed at miserably. Whenever she did think about it, though, she was at once humiliated, aroused, moved, and furious. How easily she had succumbed to his erotic manipulation of her! And yet, he had possessed her so completely that night, she’d felt more a part of him than she ever had. He’d always been an exceptional lover, but that night he’d used every bit of skill he possessed to touch something very deep inside her, literally and physically.

She’d come to realize this past week that there would never be another man for her. She would love Hawk for the rest of her life, even if he never loved her in return; even if he decided he didn’t want her, as a partner or as a lover, or even as a friend.

By the middle of the week, she had also come to realize that she could not walk away from her home and her father’s legacy. She loved the ranch too much to abandon
it. She wanted to live here and try to operate it. If Hawk didn’t want her as a partner, then he’d have to split the ranch with her, because she was not leaving or taking a cash settlement for her interest. She wasn’t splitting her life between Los Angeles and Colorado anymore, either. She was home for good, and the man would just have to figure out a way to deal with her!

She was so lost in thought, she stepped into a pothole and grabbed the fence rails to catch herself from falling. The object of her contemplation stood on the far side of the arena, talking to several other cowboys. The fence was as tall as Jenny, so she looked through the split rails at him.

Apprehension warred with excitement. A long week apart made her privately thrilled to see him again. She’d never tire of looking at him, he was so exceptionally handsome. Since he hadn’t noticed her, she devoured every tall gorgeous inch of him.

With his arm resting on the top fence rail and his boot heel hooked on the lowest one, he was surrounded by a group of cowboys that included Becky’s husband, Scott. Even amid the noise of cattle and horses and men, she could hear the deep timbre of his laughter. In full cowboy regalia, he was dressed in jeans and sexy long-fringed chaps
that were intricately and beautifully decorated, boots and spurs, cowhide gloves and a dark brown Stetson, which was tucked low over his eyes, shading and hiding them. His long black hair was swept back like it always was, curling over the collar of his vividly patterned blue western shirt. His lean waist was accentuated by a leather belt with a big gold and silver buckle on it that appeared to be one of his PRCA prize buckles. Jenny knew how proud he was of them. He had shown her all the ones he had won during his professional rodeo career. The dark red leather vest he wore was nearly the same color as hers. Interesting coincidence, she mused.

He was so heartstoppingly handsome, so rampantly male and lovingly familiar, she couldn’t pull her eyes from him. As if he sensed someone staring at him, he turned his head in her direction. Even across a few hundred feet of dirt arena, their eyes met and locked. Jenny lifted her hand and waved. He gave her one of his devastating slow grins and waved back. She thought he looked pleased to see her. He said something to his companions, shoved away from the fence, and turned to exit
the arena through a side gate.

Pulse racing, she watched him walk around the outside of the fence, toward her. Inside her gloves, her hands grew sweaty. She breathed in and out slowly, and hoped with all her heart that he had missed her as much as she had missed him.

Hawk stopped within arm’s length of her and smiled, slowly again, his deep blue eyes roaming over her from head to foot and back up again. He removed his gloves, then lifted a large work-roughened palm to her cheek. His index finger shot out to circle the large gold hoop dangling from her earlobe. Jenny was certain he could feel the wild thump of her pulse, the rapid rate of her breath.

“
You’re back,” he said in a low husky voice, his eyes searching hers. “Are you okay?”

Oh God, this was
exactly
the way she had hoped he’d greet her! She was amazed her legs continued to support her. Just one more step would put her in his arms, exactly where she ached to be. She wanted to reach out and touch him, too, but she was scared to death. He could break her heart again so easily.

“I just got back.” She looked up at the lowering clouds. “I guess just ahead of a big snowstorm; the first of the season, the weathermen say.” His pulse-quickening proximity chased away her chills and brought on shivers of
an entirely different kind.

His hand fell to his side, and she mourned the loss of his touch.

“You didn’t say anything about going to L.A. for a week.”

She heard accusation and hurt in his voice. “I needed some time— to work things out, to take care of a coupl
e of issues.”

“But you came back.”

“Yes.” She smiled as slowly as he did. “I came back.”

“Jenny, about the night before you left…”

How could she ever walk away from him for good? He’d have to be the first to walk away if he didn’t want her, she’d decided this past week.

Something shifted in his expression as he stared at her. With a groan, he caught her in his arms and hugged her against him. His embrace was hard and fierce, and oh so hot! Then he tugged her hat off and kissed her so deeply and passionately that he left no doubt about how very much he had missed her. Wrapped tightly in his arms, molded against his big body, she joyfully fled to a place where nothing existed but the two of them.

All the sights and sounds of the rodeo disappeared. There was only Hawk. He completely engulfed her senses; the feel of him, the scent of him, the taste of him. It was a long, hot, and hungry kiss. The unbearably sweet invasion of his tongue grew bolder and deeper. Jenny rose to her booted toes and surrendered completely as her arms tightened around his neck, locking him against her in a lover’s stranglehold.

“Hey, Larson,” someone shouted. “You’re up next.”

Hawk failed to respond, but on a second call, he lifted his mouth from hers with a groan and a dazed look in his deep blue eyes. Bracketing her face in both hands, he gave her very kissed lips one last lingering brush, one final nibble.

“Come over to the chute area with me,” he invited as he took her hand and started to pull her after him.

Regretfully, Jenny pulled free and shook her head. “Becky is waiting for me in the stands.”