Unbridled (Unlikely Lovers) (8 page)

As the evening progressed, h
e couldn’t deny he’d enjoyed himself, although it would have been better if he could’ve spent more time with Miranda. Unfortunately, trying to catch another moment alone with her was like trying to catch a moonbeam. His conversation with Christina had yielded a date, and he was sure Miranda would be pleased. Still, those few moments alone with Miranda before the party remained stuck in his head, and he wanted to repeat them, even though he knew he shouldn’t. Alan would be proud that he’d managed to get through the evening without dragging Miranda off to her bedroom and…

D
on’t even think about it.

But he
did
think about it. He liked her. Hell, he even liked her house. Granted, most places looked their best at Christmastime, but hers was homey, warm, and comfortable. Staying until everyone else left was easy; he’d been the first to arrive, and everyone else had parked behind his truck. He tried to tell himself he hadn’t planned it that way, but he knew he had.

Miranda
had introduced him as “my friend, Travis York” to everyone and then left him to fend for himself. She obviously didn’t intend to hover, though he did catch her watching him from time to time. She gave him the occasional encouraging smile, but when he sat next to Christina, she’d averted her eyes before he could meet her gaze—obviously not wishing to interrupt him when he was doing exactly what she’d asked him to do.

No, she hadn’t. Not really.
She’d said she wanted him to be happy—and he knew exactly what it would take to make that happen. Christina had nothing to do with it.

When the last
stragglers left, Tracy and Travis stayed behind to help with the cleanup. He’d made up his mind he would leave when Tracy did. That way he wouldn’t be alone with Miranda again. Barring a call to Alan for support, that was the best strategy.

What he hadn’t counted on was that Tracy would sneak out ahead of him. Travis had finished wiping off the kitchen table when he heard the front door close.

“That’s it for another year,” Miranda announced as she returned to the kitchen. “I’m beat. I’m sure you are too.” She handed him his coat—obviously ready for the party to be over.

“I wanted to tell you, I asked Christina out.”

“And…?”

“She said yes.”

“That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

“It’s never hard to ask someone out the first time. It’s the follow
-up dates that are tough.”

She nodded, stifling a yawn. “Yeah. The whole ‘Do I invest more time in this relationship or not?’
thing.”

“That’s right. I guess I’d better get going. Thanks for the invitation.”

“Thanks for coming.”

Travis knew he shouldn’t do it, but when she walked him to the door, it was the most natural thing in the world to turn and give her a hug. He probably squeezed her too hard and
held her too long, but she felt so good in his arms, he couldn’t help it. At least he hadn’t done anything
really
stupid. Like kissing her until her knees buckled. 

Miranda watched him go, waving as he backed his truck out of the driveway. Travis had done exactly what she’d hoped he would do, which meant it was only a matter of time before he and Christina fell in love and set a wedding date. They’d live happily ever after, and Miranda wouldn’t have to wonder when he was ever going to realize how much he meant to her. Everything was falling neatly into place. She should be happy.

So why was she crying?

Ch
apter 8

Christmas came and went, and Miranda saw the New Year in with Lola and Peggy in the ICU, sharing a cup of sparkling grape juice with her only alert patient. After that, she found herself looking bleakly forward to another year without Kris and now, without Travis. He’d taken Christina out a few times and reported that things were going pretty well. At least, that was
his
side of the story. A bit later, she heard Christina’s version, which was quite different. Travis had promised to keep his mouth shut and quit complaining. Christina had no such qualms. 

“He’s boring,” she announced when Miranda met her for lunch. “He doesn’t like anything I like, and I told him I didn’t want to see him anymore.”

“Boring?” Miranda didn’t get bored when all she could do was look at him. Christina was either completely nuts, or all the time she’d spent with the criminal element had skewed her perspective. “He’s never seemed boring to me.”

Christina gave her shoulders a haughty shrug. “You’ve never dated him. He doesn’t know anything about the law and doesn’t even watch any legal shows on TV. I couldn’t talk to him about anything.”

“Not even the weather or politics or having babies?”
Where did
that
one come from?
Christina had never said anything about wanting children—at least not that Miranda could recall.

“Oh, sure, I could talk about
those
kinds of
things.” She paused, frowning. “Except the having babies part. He simply doesn’t understand what it’s like to be a lawyer.”

“Who
could possibly know that except another lawyer? I don’t expect anyone to understand what it’s like to be a nurse. No one would believe half of it, anyway. It’s one of those things you have to experience firsthand.”

“You at least like horses, so you’d have that much in common.” She flipped open her menu and began reading, avoiding Miranda’s gaze entirely. “I didn’t like him, so let’s leave it at that, shall we?”

Miranda heaved a sigh. “Okay, case closed.”

So much for getting him married off.
  She couldn’t blame Travis for not wanting to seem like a whiner, but whether he hit it off with Christina or not, he was still there every week at Nigel’s for her to gaze at, dream about, and shed a few tears over. She’d been alone for a very long time. What was it about Travis that made her feel so
lonely
?

Christina peeked over the top of her menu. “
Have you heard from Mark?”

So that’s it.
No wonder she thought Travis was boring.

Miranda would’ve thought
Mark was boring if she’d tried to date him while she was still in love with Travis—which, she had to admit, she probably was. Somewhere along the line she’d gone from simply thinking he was cute and sexy to believing she couldn’t live much longer without him. She still got her “Travis fix” once a week, but she needed more.

“Not since before the Christmas party when he called to say he’d asked his new girlfriend to go to Florida with him on some sort of fishing trip.”

Christina nodded, tears welling up in her lovely eyes. “I heard that too.” Her voice was barely a whisper. “I could never go on those trips. I was always too busy.” She paused, dabbing her eyes with her napkin. “I wish I’d made more time for him. That’s why he left me, isn’t it?”

Miranda put down her menu, giving Christina her full attention. “He told me he wanted more than the little scraps of time you had for him. He wanted to do all of those things with you
. Obviously, he got tired of waiting.”

“I don’t suppose there’s any way he’d give me another chance, is there?”

Miranda knew exactly how she felt—hurt…empty…hopeless. She shook her head. “I think he’s pretty much spoken for now. I’m sorry, but I have a feeling it’s too late.”

“Well, I guess that’s that.” She took a deep breath and sat up straighter, as though attempting to appear normal. “No one ever said life was going to be perfect. I’ve got my work and...not much else.” Her face seemed to crumble and she slumped forward, sobbing.

Consoling her friend when all Miranda wanted to do was to cry was difficult. She still didn’t understand how a beautiful, successful woman could seem so wretched. But, as Travis said, looks weren’t everything, and neither was a good career.

Miranda let her cry
until the waitress came to take their order. Christina pulled herself together after that. They went on with lunch, but Miranda doubted that she even tasted it.
She
certainly hadn’t, and she could hardly recall what she’d eaten a few minutes afterward.

They parted with a hug, and Miranda drove home in the rain, the weather matching her mood. Three wet dogs came out to greet her when she arrived, as did her soggy cats. The horses stood waiting at the gate, seemingly oblivious to the rain, and she slogged up the hill through the mud only to find another lake where the barn floor used to be. The whole world was beginning to mildew, and as she swept away the flood, she couldn’t help wondering if she wasn’t getting a bit moldy herself
—which was certainly the way she felt.

* * * *

Travis had been working on the gray gelding for fifteen minutes when Miranda arrived for her lesson. He knew precisely how much time had passed because he’d been checking his watch every three minutes for the past forty-five. He doubted he would even need to tell her he and Christina—who hadn’t struck him as the type to suffer in silence—weren’t seeing each other anymore.

Miranda responded to his wave with one of her own. “I heard you and Christina didn’t hit it off very well.”

“I thought we did. Apparently,
she
didn’t.” Seeing no point in making Miranda think he didn’t like her friends, he at least tried to appear unhappy about it. “Too bad. She seemed very nice.”

She hadn’t seemed that way when she’d informed him that they’d gone on their last date together. She’d sounded like a prosecuting attorney as she ran down the list of excellent reasons why they were a complete mismatch. Since
he secretly agreed with each and every one of them, he hadn’t bothered to argue.

“I can’t say you didn’t try.” Miranda heaved her saddle onto t
he rack and left to get her horse.

“That’s all of my news,” he said when she returned. “What’s new with you?”

“New? There’s nothing new,” she said bitterly. “Mud, rain, mud, rain, flood, mud, rain, and more rain. My barn is a quagmire.”

He dropped the hoof he was working on and stood up. “Sounds like you need a ditch around your barn.”

“I
have
a ditch around my barn.” She snorted with disgust. “It’s not big enough, but it’s the best I can do with a shovel since Santa didn’t bring me a backhoe for Christmas. I also asked for a concrete floor in the barn. Didn’t get that, either.”

“
Dunno about concrete, but my brother has a backhoe.”

She shook her head. “Can’t afford it. I’d have hired someone a long time ago if I had the extra money.” Her wistful smile sliced right through his heart. “Sorry. I just needed to vent a bit. I don’t expect you to fix it.”

He thought back to the lecture she’d given Nigel about dealing with women, but he didn’t think it applied in this instance—especially since he really could fix the problem. “It wouldn’t cost that much—just enough to pay for the fuel. I wouldn’t charge you for labor.”

“You won’t get rich doing business like that.”

“I’m not trying to get rich. I’m trying to do a friend a favor.”

Her eyes narrowed, and Travis had the strangest feeling she could see right through him. “It’s
kind of you to offer, but I’m sure you’ve got better things to do than digging ditches—especially if you’re not getting paid.”

He shrugged. “Fix dinner for me sometime.”

“I could do that. I hate mud with a passion, and there’s so much of it, it’s driving me nuts.”

“I know what you mean.”
He was about to add further encouragement when he remembered Miranda had a husband who might not approve of other men doing “favors” for his wife—or having dinner with her. 

She gnawed at her lower lip as though weighing the pros and cons. “Okay. But it’s gonna be tough
figuring out when to do it. You’ve got to have the time and the ground has to dry out a little. Otherwise, you’d be stuck there until spring.”

Travis couldn’t help smiling. Getting stuck at Miranda’s house until spring was akin to winning the lottery—as long as her husband was stuck somewhere else. “It’s not supposed to rain again until the weekend. I could
come over on Friday afternoon.”

She nodded her agreement. “Okay, but I can’t help feeling I’m taking advantage of you.”

“Hey, you invited me to a party and introduced me to several new women. I’d say this makes us even.”

She shot him a skeptical look. “Maybe—but only if you’d hit it off with one of them.”

In Travis’s opinion, any excuse to spend a few extra moments in Miranda’s company was worth a few failed dates—plus the time required to dig a ditch. It might even be worth a confrontation with her husband. “Doesn’t matter. I’ll see you on Friday afternoon.”

Right after I call Alan.

* * * *

Stuart was okay with the loan of the backhoe, particularly since Travis hadn’t mentioned whose ditch he’d be digging. He helped Travis hitch the trailer to his truck, gave him a few pointers on ditch digging, and sent him on his way.

Travis stopped to refuel the truck and the backhoe, giving Alan a call while the tanks filled. Stuart might not have been the least bit suspicious, but Alan was worried.

“That is
not
the sort of thing you need to be doing,” he warned after Travis explained the situation. “Going to her party was bad enough. This is
much
worse.”

“True. I’ll be on a backhoe digging in the
dirt instead of hanging out in her house with a bunch of her friends.”

“You
know
what I mean. She’ll feel like she owes you something. Do
not
accept any offers to repay you—especially not with sex.”

Travis was thankful he was on the phone with his cousin rather than talking with him in person. Otherwise, he’d have been sorely tempted to take a swing at him. “She’s not that kind of woman. If she was, I probably wouldn’t be so crazy about her. She’d
never suggest anything like that.”

“Yeah, well, don’t
you
suggest it, either. I told you to steer clear of her completely, and what do you do? You offer to dig a ditch for her.” He blew out an exasperated breath. “Dammit, Travis, you’re starting to remind me of me.”

“If I was anything like you, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. I’d have done something stupid already, and I haven’t—
yet. You’re right, though. I can’t leave her alone
or
stay away from her. I’m not that noble.” The pump shut off, and he switched it over to the tank on the backhoe.

“Shit, man. You’re worse off than I thought.”

“Yeah. I know that, too.” He tightened the gas cap on the truck. “Just wish I knew what
she
was thinking. Mind telling me how you knew those married women you had affairs with were willing?”

“The
same way you know if a single woman wants you, dumb butt. They send out the usual signals—only they’re more blatant about it.”

Miranda had never given Travis the slightest hint that she was interested in him as anything other than a friend, and
she certainly hadn’t seemed willing to cheat on Levi. Or maybe it
was
encouraging. If she didn’t want him, he could hang around and drool over her all he liked. Hell, he might even get
blatant
about it.

“Travis,” Alan prompted. “You’re too damned quiet. What’s going on in that head of yours?”

“I dunno.” He chewed on a thumbnail. He’d been doing that so much lately it was a wonder he had any fingers left.

“Has she
been sending out signals?”

Travis couldn’t think of a single, solitary one. “No.”

“Not in private or not in public?”

“I mean, not at all.” He paused, frowning. “What difference does it make
where she does it?”

“
Flirting in public means she likes you but isn’t willing to take the plunge. In private…well, you get the idea.”

“Yeah, I get it.” The only time he’d truly been alone with Miranda, she’d been irked because he’d figured out she was trying to fix him up with one of her friends—or her sister. He was grateful to have dodged
that
bullet. Tracy was a nice girl, and she was very pretty, but she wasn’t Miranda.

“Look, you’ve already promised to do this job for her, right?”

He hung up the pump and replaced the cap on the backhoe’s gas tank. “Had to talk her into it, but yeah, I told her I’d be there this afternoon.”