Stranger in Cold Creek (21 page)

She nodded to verify that it was indeed guy trouble.

No, he didn't want to hear this, so he blurted out the first thing that popped into his head. He probably should have waited for the second or third thing, though.

“I had a girl break up with me once because I kept calling her your name,” he said.

“
My
name?” She didn't seem to know how to react to that.

“Uh, no. I kept saying
your name
because I couldn't remember her name.” And he added a wink that usually charmed women.

But, of course, it'd been Anna's name. The way stuff about her often popped into his head, her name had a way of just popping out of his mouth.

“Any other confessions you want to get off your chest and/or six-pack?” she asked. And she winked at him.

Man, that's what he'd always liked about Anna. She gave as good as she got. “Let me see. I don't wear boxers or briefs. I like mayo and pepper on my French fries. And my mother's in jail again.”

All right, so that last one just sort of fell from his brain into his mouth.

Anna didn't question the
again
part. Maybe because she remembered the reason he'd ended up at the McCord Ranch all those years ago was that his mother had been in jail then, as well.

In jail only after she'd stolen and spent every penny of the money that Heath had scrimped and saved for college. She'd also burned down their rental house with all his clothes and stuff still in it.

Heath had snapped up Riley's offer of a job and a place to stay—since at the time Heath had had neither. His father hadn't been in his life since he was in kindergarten, and what with him being broke and homeless, he'd had few places to turn.

If it hadn't been for his jailbird mom, he would have never met Anna. So, in a way he owed her.

In a very roundabout way.

“Want to talk about why your mom's in jail?” Anna asked.

Well, since he'd opened this box, Heath emptied the contents for her. “Shoplifting Victoria's Secret panties. She'd stuffed about fifty pairs in her purse—guess they don't take up much room—and when the security guard tried to stop her, she kicked him where it hurts. Then she did the same to the manager of the store next door. Then to the off-duty cop who tried to stop her. My mom can be a real butt-kicker when it comes to high-end underwear.”

Anna smiled, a quiet kind of smile. “I do that, too, sometimes.”

“What?” And Heath hoped this wasn't about butt-kicking or stealing panties.

“Diffuse the pain with humor. I'm not very good at it, either. Pain sucks.”

Yeah, it did, and he thought he knew exactly what she was talking about. “You lost your parents when you were a teenager.”

“Yes, they were killed in a car accident before you and I met. I was fourteen, and I thought my world was over. That was still the worst of the
world's over
moments, but I've had others since.”

“Is that why you need cheering up?” he asked.

She didn't answer. Anna stood. “I should deliver these cookies before the ice gets to them.”

Heath put his hands in his pockets so he wouldn't touch her as she walked away. Not that he would have had a chance to do any touching. Because someone pulled up in a truck. Not a work truck, either. This was a silver one that Della would have labeled as fancy schmancy. It went well with the cowboy who stepped from it.

Logan McCord.

The top dog at the McCord Ranch and the CEO of McCord Cattle Brokers. He made a beeline for the porch, passing Anna along the way. She said something to him, something Heath couldn't hear, but it put a deep scowl on Logan's face.

“Smart-ass,” he grumbled. “She threatened to hit me with Riley's shovel if I didn't make you feel welcome. So—welcome.”

Warm and fuzzy it wasn't, but at least it wasn't a threat. Not yet anyway.

“Riley called,” Logan continued. “He said I was to come over here and convince you to stay.”

“Because of Anna, Della and Stella.”

Logan certainly didn't deny that, and his gaze drifted to Anna as she drove away before his attention turned back to Heath. “You're only going to be here two weeks at most, and then you'll leave, right?”

Since that pretty much summed it up, Heath nodded.

“Well, the last time you did that, it took Anna a long time to get over you.
Months
,” Logan emphasized. “We all had to watch her cry her eyes out.”

Hell. Crying? Months? This was the first Heath was hearing about this, but then he hadn't been around to see those tears. He'd been off at basic training at Lackland Air Force Base. He'd written her, of course. In the beginning at least. She'd written back to him, too, but she damn sure hadn't mentioned tears.

Logan took a step closer, got in his face. So close that Heath was able to determine that he used mint mouthwash and flossed regularly. “You won't hurt my kid sister like that again.”

“The shovel threat?” Heath asked, aiming to make this sound as light as a confrontation with Logan could be. Heath wasn't sure friendly bones in a person's body actually existed, but if they did, Logan didn't have any.

“Worse. I'll tell Della and Stella what you've done and let them have a go at you. If you piss them off, the shovel will be the least of your worries.”

Heath didn't doubt that. In fact, the whole McCord clan would come after him if he left Anna crying again. And that meant Anna was way off-limits.

He'd survived months in hostile territory. But Heath thought that might be a picnic compared to the next two weeks with Anna and the McCord brothers.

Chapter Three

H
EATH HAD BEEN
avoiding her for the past three days. Anna was certain of it. And she was fed up with it, partly because if Heath avoided her, it was like letting her knot-headed brothers win.

The other
partly
was that she couldn't get him off her mind, and she didn't know what riled her more—her brothers' winning or her own body whining and begging for something it shouldn't get.

Shouldn't
.

Because another fling with Heath would only complicate her life and possibly get her heart stomped on again. That was the logical, big-girl panties argument, but the illogical, no-underwear girl wanted Heath in the hayloft again.

And the hayloft was exactly where she spotted him.

He was standing in the loft, tossing down bales of hay onto a flatbed truck that was parked just beneath. He was all cowboy today: jeans, a blue work shirt, Stetson, boots. Oh, and he was sweaty despite the chillier temps.

She wasn't sure why the sweat appealed to her, but then she didn't see a single thing about him that didn't fall into the appeal category.

Anna stood there ogling him, as she'd done in the bedroom, and she kept on doing it until his attention landed on her. Since she should at least make an attempt at not throwing herself at him, she went to the nearby corral and looked at the horses that'd been delivered earlier. It wasn't exactly the right day for horse ogling, though, because the wind had a bite to it.

An eternity later, which was possibly only a couple of minutes, the ranch hands drove off with the hay, and Heath made his way down the loft ladder. Then he made his way toward her.

“You've been avoiding me,” she said. All right, she should have rehearsed this or something. For a soon-to-be lawyer, she was seriously lacking in verbal finesse when it came to Heath.

“Yeah,” he admitted in that hot drawl of his. And he admitted the reason, too. “Your brothers are right. I'm not here for long, and they said you cried a lot the last time I left.”

Her mouth dropped open, and the outrage didn't allow her to snap out a comeback. But her brothers were dead meat. Dead. Meat.

“They told you that?” She didn't wait for an answer. “I didn't cry. That much,” Anna added.

Heath lifted his eyebrow, went to her side and put his forearms on the corral fence. “The fact that you cried at all tells me that I should keep avoiding you.”

“Should?” she challenged.

He cursed, looked away from her. “You know I'm attracted to you. You saw proof of that in the bedroom.”

She had, indeed. “And you know I'm attracted to you.”

There, she'd thrown down the sexual gauntlet. But it caused him to curse again.

“I don't want to hurt you,” he said.

“And I don't want to get hurt—”

A commotion in the corral nipped off the rest of what she was about to say. And it wasn't a very timely commotion.

Sex.

Specifically horse sex.

It went on a lot at the ranch. So often in fact that Anna rarely noticed, but because Heath was right next to her, she noticed it now. And he noticed that she noticed.

With all that noticing going on, it was amazing that she remembered how to turn around, but she finally managed it. She took hold of Heath's arm and got him moving away from the corral and toward the pasture.

Where she immediately saw cow-and-bull sex.

Dang it. Was everything going at it today?

Heath chuckled. “The Angus bull was getting restless, trying to break fence, so the hands brought in some company for him.”

The ranch's version of Match.com. And the icy wind definitely didn't put a damper on things. Not for the bull anyway, but it did for Anna. She shivered and wished she'd opted for a warmer coat instead of the one that she thought looked better on her. It was hard to look your best with chattering teeth and a red nose.

“In here,” Heath said. He put his hand on her back and maneuvered her into the barn.

“The scene of the crime,” Anna mumbled. She'd fantasized about getting Heath back in here, but not like this. Not when she needed a tissue.

He glanced up at the hayloft, his attention lingering there a moment before coming back to her. The lingering lasted more than a moment though, and he took out a handkerchief and handed it to her.

“I should probably take you back to the house so you can warm up,” he offered.

She considered it just so she could blow her nose. It was tempting, but Riley was inside. Della and Stella, too. So Anna touched the handkerchief to her nose and hoped that did the trick. In case it didn't, she went for what Riley would have called a tactical diversion.

“I'm surprised you're not off somewhere enjoying some
company
like that bull before you leave for your deployment,” she said.

Anna figured that would get Heath to smile. It didn't. And she saw it again—the look on his face to remind her that he needed to be cheered up about something. Apparently, it had something to do with his assignment.

“Unless a miracle happens, I won't be deploying,” he finally answered. The strewn hay on the floor was suddenly riveting because he stared at it. “The Air Force wants me to take an instructor job in Florida.”

With the hay-staring and the gloomy look, Anna had braced herself for something a lot worse. “You make it sound as if you're being banished to Pluto.”

“In a way, it is like that for me. I trained to be a combat rescue officer, like Riley. I didn't go through all of that to work behind a desk.”

Anna wasn't sure how far she should push this so she just waited him out. Waited out the profanity he muttered under his breath. Waited out more hay-staring.

“I feel washed up,” he added.

Ah, she got it then. “But the instructor job is temporary, right? You'll go back to being a combat rescue officer?”

“In three years.”

She got that, too. It was an eternity for someone like Heath or Riley.

Anna touched his arm, rubbed gently. “The three years will fly by. Look how fast the past nine and a half years went.”

The hay finally lost its allure for him, and he looked at her. “Yeah.” Not so much of a sexy drawl this time. The hurt was still there. Time to pull out the big guns and do a little soul-baring.

“Remember when I told you I needed a change of scenery? Well, what I really need is to get away from my ex-boyfriend,” Anna confessed. “We had a bad breakup.”

Evidently, Heath didn't like this soul-baring so much because he frowned. “Are you telling me this is rebound flirting you've been doing with me?”

“No. The breakup happened two years ago, but he's getting married to one of my classmates. And they're having a baby. Twins, actually. The classmate is a former Miss Texas beauty pageant winner.”

He nodded, made an “I got it” sound. “You're still in love with him.”

“No!” And she couldn't say that fast or loud enough. “He's a lying, cheating weasel. My need for a change of scenery isn't because I still care for him but because I'm sick and tired of everybody walking on eggshells around me.”

Her voice had gotten louder with each word, and she couldn't stop the confessions now that the floodgates were open.

“Poor pitiful Anna McCord got dumped for the beauty queen,” she blathered on. “It reminds me of the stuff my brothers pull on me, and I'm tired of it. Tired of being treated like someone who needs to be handled with kid gloves.”

She probably would have just kept on blathering, too, if Heath hadn't slid his hand around the back of her neck, hauled her to him and kissed her.

All in all, it was the perfect way to shut her up, and Anna didn't object one bit. In fact, she would have cheered, but her mouth was otherwise occupied, and besides, cheering would have put an end to this kiss.

She didn't want it to end.

Apparently, neither did Heath, because he put that clever mouth to good use and made the kiss French. And deep. And long.

All the makings of a good kiss even if Anna's lungs started to ache for air.

Heath broke the kiss just long enough for them to take in some much needed oxygen, and he went in for another assault. Anna was no longer shivering, could no longer feel her nose, but the rest of her was hyperaware of what was happening. The heat zoomed from her mouth to her toes, but it especially fired up in her orgasm-zone.

Soon, very soon, the kiss just wasn't enough, and they started to grapple for position. Trying to get closer and closer to each other. Heath was a lot better at grappling than she was because he dropped his hands to her butt and gave her a push against the front of his jeans.

Anna saw stars. Maybe the moon, too. And she darn near had an orgasm right then, right there while they were fully clothed.

Her heart was pounding now. Her breath, thin. She was melting. And there was a roaring sound in her head. That roaring sound was probably the reason she hadn't heard the other sounds until it was too late. Not horse or bull sex this time.

Footsteps.

“Interrupting anything?” someone asked.

Not Riley or Logan. Her brother Lucky.

And he was standing in the barn doorway with a shovel gripped in his hand.

* * *

O
NCE
AGAIN
H
EATH
was facing a McCord brother when he was aroused. Hardly the right bargaining tool for dealing with Anna's older siblings who were hell-bent on protecting their sister.

Anna stepped in front of him as if she were his protector, but Heath remedied that. He stepped in front of her. But that only prompted her to attempt another stepping in front of him, and Heath put a stop to it. He dropped a kiss on her mouth, a chaste one this time hoping it would get her to cooperate.

“I need to talk to your brother alone,” Heath told her.

“No way. He's here to browbeat you, and he's got a shovel.”

Lucky shrugged. Propped the shovel against the wall. “Riley said I should bring it and do my part to remind Heath that he should keep his jeans zipped around you.” He shrugged again when he glanced at the front of Heath's jeans. “The zipper's still up, so my work here is done.”

Lucky turned to walk away.

“That's really all you've got to say?” Anna asked.

Her brother stopped, smiled in that lazy way that Lucky had about him. Heath knew Lucky loved his sister, but he'd never been as Attila the Hun as Riley and Logan. Heath suspected that's because Lucky got out all his restless energy by riding rodeo bulls. And having lots of sex.

“Should I ask you two to stay away from each other?” Lucky didn't wait for an answer though. “Wouldn't work. You two have the hots for each other, and there's only one way to cool that down.” His gaze drifted to the hayloft before he turned again to leave.

Was Lucky really giving them his approval?

No.

This had to be some kind of trick.

Heath went after Lucky. Anna, too, and they caught up with him by the porch steps. However, before Heath could say anything else, the door opened, and Della stuck her head out.

“Anna, you got a call on the house phone. It's Claire.”

Anna volleyed glances between Heath and her brother and then huffed. “Don't you dare say anything important before I get back.”

She hurried inside. So did Lucky and Heath, but they stopped in the sunroom.

“Zippers and haylofts aside,” Lucky said. “I don't want Anna hurt again. She sort of fell apart the last time you left.”

“Yes. I heard about the crying from Logan.” Heath paused. “Define
fell apart
.”

“It wasn't just the crying.” Lucky paused, too. “It was the pregnancy scare.”

Heath felt as if all the air had just been sucked out of his lungs. Out of the entire planet. And if there was air on Pluto, it was also gone.

“Anna doesn't know that I know,” Lucky went on. “No one does, and I'd like to keep it from my brothers. If Riley and Logan find out, they'd want to kick your ass. And mine since I didn't tell them. Then I'd have to kick theirs. If you don't mind, I'd rather not have to go through an ass-kicking free-for-all.”

“Pregnancy?” Heath managed to ask. Considering there was still no air, he was doing good to get out that one word.

Lucky nodded. “A couple of weeks after you left, I went into Anna's bathroom to get some eye drops, and I saw the box for the pregnancy test in her trash can. She'd torn up the box, but I was able to piece it together to figure out what it was.”

Heath managed another word. “Damn.”

“Yeah. Two words for you—safe sex.”

“I used a condom.”

Lucky shrugged again. “Then, it must have worked because when I found the pee stick—it was in the way bottom of the trash can, by the way—it had a negative sign on it.”

Heath heard the words. Felt the relief at that negative sign. Then managed another word.

“Hell.”

Anna had gone through a scare like that, and she hadn't even told him.

“The only reason I dragged this up now was so that you'd understand why I'm protective of her,” Lucky went on. “Now, go find her. Confront her about all of this. Then use a condom when you have makeup sex.”

There'd be no makeup sex. Because Heath wasn't touching her again. Hell. She could have had his kid.

Heath went looking for Anna, and when he didn't find her in the kitchen or any of the living areas, he went to her bedroom. Of course she was there. The one room in the house where he shouldn't be alone with her. The door was open, and she was still on the phone, but she motioned for him to come in. He did, but only because he wanted answers and didn't want to wait for them.

But he had to wait anyway.

He listened to Anna talk niceties with Claire. Several “you're welcomes” later, she finally ended the call and looked at him. The smile that was forming froze on her mouth though when she saw his expression.