The Bridal Path: Sara (2 page)

Since there was no way to appeal to her father once his mind was made up, that left Jake. Fortunately, during the years Jake had been at Three-Stars, Sara had been observing him closely, more closely than was proper no doubt. She knew his strengths and weaknesses almost as well as she knew her own.

Jake was proud and smart and determined. He also had a tendency to enjoy a hand of poker every now and again, an occasional bet on football. That knowledge brought her the first smile she’d been able to muster since she’d overheard her father making that traitorous deal.

As any rodeo star had to be, Jake Dawson was a gambling man. And, as her father repeatedly said with despair, she was quite a risk taker herself.

If there was no way to convince her father to put her in charge of Three-Stars, then she’d just have to concentrate on making Jake change his mind about buying the spread. By the time her father and Jake were toasting their deal, she was pretty sure she had exactly the right scheme in mind, one that would appeal to the ex=nrodeo champ’s sense of danger and daring.

She ignored the possibility that trying to best a man as unpredictable as Jake might also get her into more trouble than she’d ever bargained for.

With the lawyer coming tomorrow, there was absolutely no time to waste weighing other options. She figured she had another half hour, while Jake and her father dawdled over that outrageously expensive brandy, to get ready. When Jake got back to his quarters, she would be waiting for him…with an offer he couldn’t refuse.

* * *

Years of yearning for something of his own, something real and permanent were almost over, Jake thought as he paused to stare out over the rugged terrain after his meeting with Trent.

Spring hadn’t yet made its way into Wyoming. The night air was crisp and clear. If he stared up at the sky, he could see a million stars, but he was more interested in what lay beneath, the land that was almost his. The stars might fuel a man’s dreams, but it was land that gave him independence.

Ignoring his recent pledge to quit smoking, he shook a cigarette loose from the pack in his pocket, cupped his hand against the breeze and lit up. Something that felt an awful lot like contentment shimmered through him.

He had to stop himself from looking on this deal with Trent as some sort of a gift, something he didn’t deserve. He’d worked damned hard to make it happen. He’d almost lost his chance because of a woman. Until that ill-fated romance, he’d saved darned near every penny he’d made on the rodeo circuit and most of his salary since he’d been at Three-Stars so he’d be ready when this day came. With the money he had to put down, no bank would be able to declare him a credit risk. Not that the Riverton Bank would dare to stand in the way of any deal Trent Wilde cared to make. Trent’s deposits probably doubled those of everybody else in the area combined.

As far back as he could remember, Jake had had a single goal for his life: to own something, something no man could take away. He wasn’t going to be satisfied with some little bungalow in town, either. Or starting from scratch with a few acres and a handful of cows. He wanted the biggest and best spread in the state, a place that would prove once and for all that Jake Dawson was somebody.

What happened tomorrow would be just the beginning, he promised himself as he stubbed out his cigarette and headed for home.

As he approached the three-room house that had been his since he came to work on the ranch, he noticed smoke curling from the chimney and a faint glow from inside that suggested someone had lit a fire. The sight stopped him in his tracks. What the hell was going on?

He slowed his approach and detoured to the north, which would give him a clearer view inside without making him readily visible to anyone watching the front walkway for him. Not that whoever was inside was exactly hiding the fact. Only a fool would light a fire while waiting to ambush someone.

Slipping up against the side of the house, he peeked in a window and instantly drew in a sharp breath. To his astonishment, Sara Wilde was curled up in his easy chair in front of the fire.

Her hair, which she normally wore twisted into some sort of knot on top of her head or tucked into a Stetson, waved down past her shoulders. The red shimmered with golden lights.

She was wearing a silky, soft green blouse the shade of moss that dipped and clung in all the right places. Her long, slender legs were encased in formfitting denim. Her feet were bare, the toenails an unexpected and very feminine sizzling pink.

The sight was enough to make stronger men than Jake weak with desire. Out-of-the-blue lust slammed through him like a runaway freight train.

Every instinct he possessed told him he’d better proceed with caution. Sara wasn’t in the habit of dropping by unannounced, much less taking up residence while he wasn’t home. She looked like a woman with something on her mind, the same alarming, dangerous something Jake suddenly had on his.

He could cope with this without giving in to temptation, he swore to himself. He had to. He wasn’t about to risk tomorrow’s deal on a one-night fling with the boss’s daughter, no matter how inviting the idea seemed right at this moment.

Besides, this was Sara, for God’s sake. He’d watched her grow up. He’d never thought of her as anything more than a pesky kid sister. Okay, an
attractive
pesky kid sister, who was so far off-limits to a man like him, she might as well have been in Alaska.

After sucking in a final lungful of the crisp, night air, he strolled inside and tossed his hat in the direction of a rack on the wall. It caught and held. Sara’s delicate eyebrows rose an approving fraction, but her gaze remained steady and unblinking. Jake’s pulse bucked under that thoroughly feminine look. How had he missed the fact that little Sara had grown up? The daring she’d shown as a girl took on far more dangerous implications in the woman she’d become.

He shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his booted heels. He cleared his throat and aimed for sounding casual. “So, what brings you by?”

“We need to talk.”

“About?”

“The deal you’re about to make with my father.”

Jake grimaced. He’d guessed right. She was going to make trouble. It was written all over that pretty face of hers.

“I wasn’t sure if you knew about it,” he said cautiously.

A frown passed over her face. “I sure as heck didn’t,” she admitted heatedly. “Not until I overheard you and daddy talking tonight. Quite a secret, wouldn’t you say?”

“Since you’re here, I gather you don’t approve.”

“No,” she said succinctly. “I don’t.”

“Then shouldn’t you be talking to your father?”

“We both know that would be a waste of time.”

Jake steeled himself against the hurt and fury he could read in her eyes. He couldn’t afford to feel any sympathy under the circumstances.

“So is talking to me,” he said tersely. “This is a business deal, pure and simple.”

“Not to me, it isn’t,” she said. “We’re talking about my home.”

“Mine now,” he retorted.

“Not quite,” she contradicted. She stood up and moved slowly toward him. “Jake, you and I have always been friends, haven’t we?”

Warning bells echoed in his head at the plaintive question. “Yes,” he agreed warily.

Her gaze lifted and clashed with his. Why had he never noticed that her eyes were precisely the shade of emeralds shot through with fire? He had to drag his gaze away, force himself to focus on something innocuous like the dishes still sitting in his sink.

“See,” she said blithely. “We’ve already agreed on something. We’re friends.”

“Sweetheart, I’m not sure where you’re going with this, but I surely do wish you’d get there.”

“Okay, the bottom line is, I have a counteroffer I don’t think you’re going to be able to resist.”

He swallowed hard at the soft, provocative tone. Sweet heaven, she was going to try to seduce the ranch away from him. Temptation curled through him, tangling his thoughts. Or maybe just seduce him, then scream bloody murder afterward so that Trent would chase him off with a shotgun. Either way, she represented danger.

“No way,” he managed to mutter, backing up a step.

Her lush lips curved seductively. “You don’t even know what I have in mind.”

He couldn’t lose sight of his goal, when it was so close. Not for this woman. Not for anyone. “Doesn’t matter,” he said vehemently. “I want Three-Stars.”

“You want it badly, don’t you?”

“More than you can imagine.”

“I doubt that,” she said wryly. “Remember, I want it, too.”

“Which brings us to an impasse.”

“Not necessarily.”

She stepped so close he could smell the soft, spicy perfume she wore, something intoxicating and wicked. She slid her fingers up his chest until they were less than a hairsbreadth from the burning skin of his neck. Jake wondered if hell could possibly be any worse than this. To keep from reaching for her, he jammed his hands in his pockets so roughly that his knuckles scraped on denim.

“I think you and I could come…” she hesitated, then added “…to an arrangement.”

“An arrangement,” Jake repeated, his voice choked. Trouble was rapidly escalating into calamity.

She nodded and smiled. It was a look of such innocence that Jake’s thoughts went spinning. What the devil was she up to?

“I want you to make a bet with me, Jake,” she said sweetly.

“A bet,” he echoed.

“An all-or-nothing bet,” she elaborated.

He swallowed hard and tried to get his mind to focus on what she was saying. Too damned much was riding on this for him to be fuzzy headed and thinking with some part of his anatomy that clearly wasn’t connected to his brain.

He deliberately backed up a step, then another. He figured he wouldn’t be safely out of harm’s way unless he fled the house completely, but he refused to do that. He just had to keep reminding himself that Sara was like a pesky little sister, not a seductive, alluring woman. Climbing Mount Everest would have been easier, he conceded, as his mouth went dry and his skin flushed.

“Exactly what is this bet you want me to make?” he asked. If the woman wanted to bet he couldn’t go another minute resisting her, he might as well forget about the ranch. His body was carrying on an argument with his brain the likes of which no man should have to endure. His brain was losing, flat out shutting down while his senses raged.

She smiled once more and his knees went weak. She moved closer again. Her fingers crept along his neck and tunneled through his hair. This time he didn’t seem to have the will to move away. It took pure grit to keep his hands in his pockets.

“It’s simple really,” she explained. “And the odds are all in your favor.”

Jake seriously doubted that.

“After all, you were a rodeo champion, weren’t you?” she added smoothly.

Jake’s gaze narrowed. What did his rodeo victories have to do with anything? At some point in the last ten seconds this conversation had taken a twist he hadn’t followed.

Sara stood on tiptoe, her lips so close he could feel her sweet breath fanning across his face. “You were good, weren’t you?”

“Very good,” Jake agreed.

“Then this shouldn’t be any problem for you at all. In fact, I’m probably crazy for even bothering…” Her voice trailed off as if at this very moment she might be reconsidering the idea that had brought her to his house.

Yeah, he thought, she was crazy all right. Crazy like a fox. Those warning bells in his head were clanging loud enough to wake the dead. Every fiber of his being heeded the call to arms.

Jake untangled her hands from his hair and retreated another step, out of touching range, if not out of danger.

“You’re going to have to spell it out, sweetheart. I’m afraid you’ve lost me.”

She smiled. “It’s not so complicated,” she assured him. “I just want to challenge you to a bull-riding contest, winner take all.”

Chapter Two

J
ake stared openmouthed at the woman standing before him, hands on hips, fiery hair dancing around her face like dangerous flames caught by the wind.

He was absolutely certain he couldn’t have heard Sara Wilde correctly. If she’d clobbered him over the head with a two-by-four, Jake couldn’t have been any more flabbergasted. Was it truly possible that she was willing to risk her life on the back of a bull to get control of the ranch he’d just agreed to buy from her father? Surely not even Sara, who’d pulled some pretty outrageous stunts in her time, would suggest something so crazy.

“You want to do what?” he asked slowly.

“I want to challenge you to a bull-riding contest,” she repeated every bit as calmly as she’d delivered the same incredible words the first time.

She had certainly dashed cold water on his libido, he thought wryly. This was a long way from the seduction he’d been convinced she had in mind. An unmistakable and worrisome sense of disappointment flitted through him. Either deliberately or inadvertently, Miss Sara Wilde had started something she clearly had no intention of finishing. He wondered if he’d ever be able to look at her in the same way again.

That, of course, begged the immediate problem: what to do about this absurd bet of hers. It was taking considerable effort to hold back the laughter threatening to bubble up from somewhere deep inside him. He hadn’t had a good belly laugh in a long time. The glint in her eyes as she waited for an answer told him he didn’t want to have one at her expense.

“Well?” she prodded, when he remained silent.

“You’ve obviously lost your mind,” Jake said succinctly. “For starters, women don’t ride bulls.”

“Sure, they do. I’ve researched it.”

“You’ve researched it,” he repeated, then shook his head in disgust. “Well, that’s just dandy.”

To prove her point, she listed a whole string of women riders. Jake wasn’t impressed.

“Maybe what I should have said was women don’t ride bulls in competition with me.”

Sara’s willful expression never wavered. “You aren’t chicken, are you?”

The deliberately taunting question had him gritting his teeth. “I was bull-riding champ on the circuit three years running,” he reminded her. “If anyone ought to be quaking in their boots here, it’s not me. Forget it, sweet Sara. You’re playing out of your league.”