True-Blue Cowboy Christmas (18 page)

Thack could only stare at his father. “Paint the town?” He looked around the room, but he was the only person standing here. “Me, paint the town?”

Dad shrugged, eyes never leaving the TV. “Hear they've got some good entertainment down at Pioneer Spirit.”

“At Pioneer…oh.” Oh. His dad was trying to get him to go out. To Summer. On a Friday night. While Dad and Thack's kindergarten teacher watched his daughter.

“If something comes up with the cows, I can see to it.”

“But—”

“And I can see to Kate.” Mrs. Bart smiled reassuringly as Kate furiously scribbled whatever image was part of their little game.

Thack could only stare. A few short months ago, his life had felt too heavy, falling apart at the seams, and now suddenly people were stepping up to help. What's more, he was actually thinking about letting them—something he never would have been able to do before Summer came into his life. Lights twinkled on the Christmas tree, and paper chains Kate had made with Summer were hanging from just about every available surface.

He still had wrapping to do and stockings to find and meals to figure out, but this was the most on top of it the house had probably ever looked before Christmas. Enough so that it wasn't crazy to entertain the possibility of a night away.

Part of him was afraid to trust the idea, but part of him was starting to think he owed it to Kate
to
trust it. She wasn't begging him to stay. She was so caught up in whatever she was doing with Mrs. Bart that he might as well not even be here.

“I…suppose I could find something to do for an hour or so,” he said slowly, not at all sure.

“Daddy.” Kate finally looked up. “You should go listen to Summer sing. She's so good, and you're never here to hear her. Oh, can I go?” She hopped to her feet, ready to run for her shoes, but Thack stopped her.

“Summer plays at a place that's only for grown-ups. But I can stay home and play games with you if you want.”

Her shoulders slumped, but she kind of shrugged, like she didn't care much one way or another. Kids were such ego builders.

“Or, you could go,” Mrs. Bart said, getting to her feet and holding a hand out to Kate. “Kate and I can have a little fun in the kitchen. What if I told you I knew how to make the best Christmas cookies in the world, but I'd need a helper?”

“Really?” Kate started hopping. “I can help? Like measure stuff? Daddy always says I do it wrong.”

Mrs. Bart clucked her tongue. “Your daddy is too precise. A true baker goes by the feel, and I can tell that with the right guidance, you'll be a true baker.”

Kate was already heading into the kitchen without even a good night, and Thack could only stare.

“Go on, boy. Enjoy yourself.”

“If anything…”

“Trust me, I'm no hero. If we're in over our heads, I'll summon you home immediately.” Dad grabbed the remote and started clicking through the channels. “But, Son?”

“Yeah?”

His father gestured at him with the remote. “You might want to clean yourself up a bit. Change your clothes. Brush your hair.”

“It's Pioneer Spirit.”

The corner of Dad's mouth quirked. “It's Summer.”

Thack didn't have an argument for that.

Summer sang her first set. Usually the rowdy Friday crowd made her a little uncomfortable—something she'd learned to breathe through and ignore. Rose helped by keeping the rowdiest customers toward the back. But tonight, Summer was still angry and jumpy enough from this morning with her family to enjoy the heady mix of drunk and soon-to-be-drunk revelers.

She shifted her usual playlist around a little, started with some of the faster-tempo songs, and got into them much more than she usually did.

When Summer took her break, Rose handed her a bottle of water. “You need some whiskey to go with that? You seem a little on edge.”

“No, I'm fine.”

“Everyone's eating it up. Come to work angry more often.” Rose grinned and then sauntered back to the bar. Summer drank the water, re-situated herself, and then played into the second set.

Usually she enjoyed singing, even for people too drunk to notice, but she was feeling antsy and irritated, and the energy she'd been able to push into her first set began to wane. Her songs got slower, and people got rowdier. Exhaustion closed over her, and she just wanted this to be over.

She moved into the second-to-last song of her second set, scanning the bar for Rose. Maybe she could take off instead of doing a third set. Rose had a jukebox, and by this time in the evening, most people weren't listening to
her
. They were drunk. They were falling over each other or getting into fights, making out in a corner, or stumbling out the front looking for more trouble.

She didn't find Rose, but her eyes landed on a familiar set of green eyes, and she thought her heart stopped. Or that she was hallucinating. But even after she blinked, there he still was.

She realized she'd stopped singing and playing, and people were yelling at her. Blushing furiously, she found her place in the song and finished it. Even though what she really wanted to do was jump off the stage and ask him why he was here. Was he here to see her?

Oh God—was he here to see someone else?

She finished out the set. She was distracted and her playing was all off, but no one seemed to notice as long as the background noise kept on. She wasn't sure what to do. He was sitting at the bar. Alone. And he kept his eyes on her.

Rose sauntered over, offering Summer her usual post-set water bottle. “Hey, kid, why don't you take off?”

“But…I have another set.” She didn't know why she was arguing when she'd been thinking about leaving early anyway, but there was something about the way Thack was looking at her so steadily. There was an intensity to it. Kind of like that night when he'd been angry, only nothing about his relaxed posture seemed angry or threatening now.

It was intimidating and exhilarating. She wasn't sure what to do with it yet. She knew she
liked
it, but how did she
respond
to it?

“Honey, the way that man is looking at you, take off and don't look back.”

Summer blinked, trying to look at Rose instead of Thack and failing. “Is he…looking at me a special way?”

“You're a trip, Summer. He wants you naked. If you don't want him naked back, I'll be happy to go over there and offer my own services.”

Summer frowned, but Rose gave her a push. “I'm joking. I could go over there in pasties, and he wouldn't give me a second look. That man's eyes are all for you, and you aren't much better. So, get out of here, huh?”

The word
naked
made Summer feel giddy again. She tried to smooth down her hair, but it was always a mess after she played. She felt sweaty and wished she had a second to put herself together, but…there he was. So she had to cross the room to get to him, and she found once she took the first step, the rest were easy. “Hi.”

“Hi.”

“I didn't know you were coming.” It was amazing that even though she'd kissed him and he'd kissed her, even though she knew the tragedies that made up his life, he could still make her schoolgirl nervous.

“I wasn't. But Dad and Mrs. Bart thought I could use a night on the town, and Kate didn't seem too broken up about it. Except the part where she couldn't come listen to you sing too.”

“I'm sorry she couldn't come.” Summer looked around the bar. “I don't think there's much hope of this being an appropriate venue for her for a while.”

“Uh, no. Possibly never if I have a say in it.” He smiled and her heart did that stopping thing again, and her stomach rolled, and she barely noticed the noise or the jostling bodies or the smell of spilled beer. Nothing really mattered except the space between them.

“Do you have to sing more?”

“Um, no. Rose said I could go.”

“There's not much to do in Blue Valley after nine, but maybe we could…uh…take a walk down Main Street.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “That's so very lame.”

“It sounds
wonderful
.” She grabbed his hand and led him toward the corner where her gear was stashed. She snapped her guitar case shut, pulled on her coat and gathered her bag, and then beamed up at him. “Just let me put this stuff in my car. I'm parked in the back.”

“Lead the way.”

She started walking, but he took the guitar case from her. “Here, let me help.”

It wasn't necessary, but it was awfully nice. Especially when his free hand took hers, their fingers intertwining. It was like the culmination of so much desperate belief—that not all men were like the men Summer had met through her mother. That something sweet and easy and normal could exist, and that it could be something she might earn. She swallowed at the lump in her throat. How silly she was to be emotional over something so…little.

The frigid, dark air helped her get her bearings. She led him to where her car was parked, and he helped her load the guitar in the back. When she shut the door, she turned to look at him and managed her best flirtatious-if-nervous smile. “So. Walk?” Though she didn't know how long they'd last in the freezing temperatures, she thought she might tempt frostbite if it meant spending time with him.

“Yeah. Just…one thing first.”

Before she could even ask what, his mouth was on hers and she sighed into the kiss, leaning into him. She loved the way his hands tangled in her hair, that even though they weren't exactly at ease around each other one hundred percent of the time, this was easy.

No,
easy
wasn't the right word. It just
worked
. Their bodies fit and somehow his mouth always knew exactly how to move against hers, like they had been built to match in all of the right places—two puzzle pieces that on the surface hadn't looked like they would fit together.

But the surface was never the whole story, and while for the past two years she'd desperately tried to make the layers fit, she couldn't erase those first twenty years of her life.

Somehow, kissing Thack in the middle of a dark Montana town, she found she no longer wanted to erase the experience of those years. It was a part of her, a part of how she'd gotten here, to this place where his kiss, his hands,
he
felt like magic.

She wanted more. He wanted more. They wanted each other. She didn't want to freeze her butt off on a walk down Main Street. Not when, for the first time, their time together was truly just the two of them. No matter where this took them, that was something to grab with both hands and not waste.

“We could skip the walk,” she said, holding on to his coat, ignoring the press of the car door handle in her back.

His eyes narrowed as if he wasn't quite certain she was suggesting what he thought she was suggesting. “Um. What exactly would we do instead?”

“You could take me home.” She sounded breathless and probably ridiculous, but she didn't care. This was something she'd dreamed about. Over the years, she had put a great deal of thought into the details—when and how, and what type of person would be the one she would want to give those last pieces of herself to.

Thack wasn't exactly what she'd pictured, but at the same time, he was more. Strong, steady, dedicated. Everything about him awed her. He had her pressed against a car door, and she was deliriously excited with it. How could she not want to jump in feet first?

“But we have two cars and… I'm taking this too literally, aren't I?”

She couldn't stifle the laugh, both happy and nervous. “You are. I mean, if you have to get back to Kate, I understand. But you could escort me home. If you have the time. If you want.”

“Dad said he'd call if he and Mrs. Bart needed me, so I could take you home. You know, I…I'm kind of curious about what the inside of that thing you live in looks like.”

“I'll give you a tour.”

“Thank you for being ten times better at this whole flirting thing than I am.” He brushed a kiss against her mouth.

She smiled up at him. “Luckily, you make up for the bad flirting in the kissing department.”

He gave a short laugh. “Not a bad trade.”

She took a deep breath and mustered all of her courage and all of her determination. She set goals, and she reached them. Thack didn't have to be any different. “So, follow me home?”

He gave a short nod and held the driver's side door open for her as she slid in. She started the old clunker, only partially sad when it actually started. It would have been kind of nice if he'd been able to drive her home.

Oh well. “Parked around front?”

“Ah, yes. Meet me there?”

“Yup.”

He hesitated again, then smiled. “I'll see you soon.” Carefully, he closed her door. In the rearview mirror, she watched him walk away, her heart pounding wildly. She'd invited him to her place. She'd offered a
tour
, which she hoped was obviously more euphemism than reality.

Well, it didn't matter. Because tonight…tonight she was going to go after exactly what she wanted.

* * *

Thack parked his car in the little gravel square next to Summer's caravan. He'd tried to keep his mind blank during the drive, but now that they were actually here—with only a line of trees and a fence separating her odd little home and his sleeping daughter—he blew out a breath and forced himself to get out of the car. It didn't matter. Everyone was fine back home, and in a way, he was doing this for them as well as for himself. To prove to them all that he could live a full life and not be completely burdened by the people he loved.

He never wanted them to feel like burdens again.

Summer was lugging her guitar case out of her car, and he moved to help. The moonlight seemed to search out her beautiful smile, and he forgot any reservations his brain had come up with.

Virgin. Virgin. Virgin.

Okay, except that one. Why did that make him nervous? Why did that make
him
feel like a virgin again? Probably because if virginity
could
grow back, his might as well have.

“Well, come on inside. It isn't much, but it's mine.” She led him to the little stairs of her caravan, flipped on what must have been a battery-powered string of colorful Christmas lights, unlocked the door, and climbed inside. She held out her hands for the guitar, and he offered it up before following her inside.

It was tiny. Even tinier than he'd imagined. His head was very close to skimming the ceiling.

“I haven't had very many people in here,” she said, flipping on a battery-powered camping lantern and then lighting what appeared to be some old-fashioned kind of kerosene lamp. “I never realized how low my ceiling was. Or how tall you are.”

He reached up and touched the ceiling. “It's a bit close, yeah. But I fit.”

She beamed at him. “Yes, you do.” She averted her gaze. “Um, do you want something to drink? I don't keep much on hand, but I could make you some tea.”

“Uh, no, I think I'm all right. But if you want some, go ahead.”

“Sorry, I just… It helps after singing so much.”

“No need to apologize.” Or to be this stilted and awkward, but he didn't know how to fix it.

“Take a seat,” she instructed, pointing to a little bench next to what must serve as a table. A tiny Christmas tree sat in a little pot on the center of the table, covered with paper ornaments he recognized as Kate's drawings cut into little shapes.

He reached out and touched one, surprised at how much it could mean that she'd taken to Kate so wholly. It was hard to reconcile that great openheartedness and care with a woman who would isolate herself in this tiny caravan. “Do you like living like this?”

She looked around as if considering it and set to making herself some tea. She suddenly stopped, and a concerned look flitted across her face.

“Everything okay?”

“It's just…” She poked around an open cabinet. “A few things are out of place. Odd, I'm usually more organized. I must have been in a rush this morning.”

But there was a line across her forehead, as if she wasn't convinced.

“Does anyone else have a key?”

“I have an extra one up at the Shaw house.” She chewed on her bottom lip, which made it hard for him to concentrate on anything else. The slight moisture on her lip gleamed in the odd light from the lamp.

She shook her head, and her hair, already falling mostly out of the intricate little braids that she'd tied back with a beaded ribbon, fell even more. The caravan was so small he could sit where he was at the far corner and still reach out and touch the ends of her hair or run his fingers through the strands.

But he wouldn't be content with just touching her hair. He wouldn't be content with anything that wasn't
everything
—every inch of her bared to him, so that he could explore it with his hands.

She put the mug back on the little shelf she'd retrieved it from, then faced him and smiled. It was one of those forced-cheer smiles though, and he longed to make it real. But damn, he was rusty and off his game.