What a Texas Girl Dreams (Crimson Romance) (7 page)

Last night, she’d needed to remind herself that she was better on her own than tied down. She couldn’t save her father from the bottle. She had no clue how a strong relationship worked. Staying in Lockhardt, imagining a life with Trick was foolhardy. She would hurt him. He would tire of waiting for her to come back from a rodeo. So she built the fort as a reminder not to get too attached. This morning, she felt ridiculous. She rolled her shoulders a few more times, until the muscles began to loosen.

Her brown- and teal-flowered boots lay on their sides near her door. She still wore the jeans and shirt she’d grabbed before going to look for Trick the night before. Monica stripped off the clothes, tossing them through the laundry chute to the basement, and stepped into her
en suite
bath to shower the remnants of last night away.

She scrubbed her hair twice and ran the water as hot as she could bear. Finally, pink from the heat, she emerged ready for the day. More or less. Monica grabbed a fresh pair of jeans, pulled Lucchese boots over her feet, and slipped a coral-striped camisole over her head.

The grandfather clock in the entryway chimed eight. Not late enough to miss the breakfast crowd. She sighed and started down the stairs. Kathleen, straw cowboy hat beside her on the table, told their grandfather, Mitchum, about the latest addition to the rescue horses — a quarter-racer, who’d torn a muscle in his foreleg and couldn’t run competitively. Monica stood at the dining-room door watching them. Mitchum, in pressed Wranglers and a pearl-buttoned western shirt, focused on his eldest granddaughter in a way he’d never focused on anyone else. Nothing existed except Kathleen’s re-telling of the first session of rehab for the injured horse.

Pain stabbed in Monica’s chest. She’d retrained Jinx, alone. Won four buckles at the National Finals, and was on her way to number five before last weekend. She didn’t think Mitchum had ever looked at her with the pride he showed Kathleen.

And wasn’t she Jan Brady for allowing it to matter?

“You going to join us or just stare at the food and hope it reaches your stomach by osmosis?” Nathaniel rubbed his tee shirt-clad shoulder against hers, his smile inviting her into the room with the rest of the family. Monica dutifully followed her father inside, ordering herself to snap out of the funk she’d felt since last night. There was no need to take her mood out on them.

She served herself scrambled eggs and toast from the plates on the buffet, then grabbed a bowl of raspberries and melon before sitting down at the table.

“Hey, kiddo. I hoped we could catch up over dinner last night.” Mitchum finished his eggs and pushed the plate to the side. “What say we take a ride around the pastures after lunch?”

Monica didn’t think her bruised hip could take a long ride, not after the night on the floor. But she’d never been good at turning Mitchum down. He didn’t mean to favor Kathleen; Monica knew enough pop psychology to understand Kathleen had simply needed him the most as a child. Vanessa was raised away from the ranch by her domineering mother. Monica’s own mother lived until her teenage years. It wasn’t fair to Mitch to blame him because she wanted more than he had been able to offer. She nodded, accepting the invitation, and forked a bite of eggs into her mouth. The table was quiet for a long moment, as if the room held its breath for something.

“We missed you last night at Vanessa’s.” Kathleen bit into a slice of melon, but didn’t give Monica a chance to respond. Maybe she felt the weirdness, too. “I’ve got the new rescue set for nine in the pool, and Jinx is second on the list at ten-thirty, if you want to come and watch. And I still don’t think it’s a good idea, but if you promise nothing strenuous, I can fit you both back in at three this afternoon. The water won’t hurt him, as long as you follow my instructions to the letter. I don’t have any trainers available, so it will be you, me, and the horse.”

Monica bit into a tart raspberry and nodded. “It’s perfect. I thought I’d … ” Her words were cut off by a loud rumbling in the driveway. All eyes in the dining room turned to the bay window overlooking the drive. Trick’s big four-wheel-drive truck nosed in under a large oak. He got out and headed straight to the house — with a bouquet of wildflowers in his arms.

What the — ?

“Well, I’ll be.” Mitchum grinned from his place at the head of the table, wiped his hands on his napkin, and sat back like a king at a banquet.

Nathaniel and Kathleen gaped as he made his way across the gravel to the mudroom door. Kathleen’s eyes widened, focused on Monica, who wanted to sink through the floor. Lord, but he looked good. Trick wore his usual vet outfit of a clinic tee shirt, faded jeans, and boots.

What was the man up to? And why did he already have her heart going a mile a minute?

She felt her cheeks redden, with embarrassment, she told herself, but couldn’t make her legs work to leave the table. A second later, Trick entered the room as if he delivered flowers to the ranch on a daily basis. He set his cowboy hat on a chair beside the buffet table and held the flowers out as if for inspection.

Texas Bluebonnets filled the simple, blue vase alongside a few stems of baby’s breath and the biggest yellow-and-orange Gerbera daisies Monica had ever seen.

“You deliverin’ for Bloomers now, Trickett?” Mitchum’s voice was loud in the quiet room.

Trick grinned. “Nope. This is a special delivery.” He reached for the card, sticking up from the middle of the display. Monica’s heartbeat clip-clopped in her chest and she shook her head no, trying to head him off before he really got started. Trick caught her eye, winked and continued on as if she wasn’t about to die right here in the dining room. He cleared his throat and read.

“Roses are red, Violets are blue, Monica Witte’s sure sweet, but she’s certainly hard to woo.”

Mitchum chuckled. Nathaniel snorted. Kathleen looked like she wanted to jump over the table and dance a jig.

“Son, your poetry could use a little work.” Nathaniel picked up his plate and started for the door. He patted Trick on the shoulder as he passed, and Monica swore she heard him whisper, “Good luck.”

Time to nip this in the bud before her family got any more ideas circling around in their heads. She stood. Trick pressed the flowers and vase into her hands.

“I thought about roses, but decided something wild would suit you better than hothouse flowers.”

Monica automatically reached out to take the flowers. “If that’s your idea of a compliment-” The fresh scent tickled her nose, and she bit back a grin. He was right. She did prefer wildflowers. She should have made him take them back, but now that they were in her arms, the flowers were too pretty to turn down.

“Not a compliment, although we might get to that later. This is me, asking you for a date. Today. We’ll start with lunch — at a restaurant not in the Lockhardt city limits.”

“It’s barely breakfast time.”

“Hence the not-in-the-city-limits reference. It’s going to take a little while to get there. I might even throw in a movie, if things go well.” His smile widened, and Monica’s heartbeat picked up the pace again.

She told it to slow down. “Big spender, springing for a matinee.”

“You’ll have to come along to find out just how big a spender I can be.” He waited. Monica searched her mind for a reason not to go. Nothing.

“Or we might just go see a man about a horse.”

Success! A reason not to go. “I have rehab with Jinx today.” Monica set the flowers on the table and then immediately picked them back up again. She’d never been given flowers, at least not the kind she actually liked. Before the Senior Prom, Bobby Westham had snapped a perfumey corsage of lilies and lavender to her wrist. The smell had made her wish she could walk with her arm extended twenty feet in front of her all night long. She’d ignored most of the boys in college, and until five minutes ago, her relationship with Trick was about sex and fun, not flowers and … whatever he had in mind, showing up like this, unannounced.

She should be angry with him, but … oh, the flowers were perfect. Monica couldn’t resist. She pressed her face into the arrangement and drew in a long breath. Closing her eyes, she let the different scents mingle. It smelled like the meadow between the cattle and horse areas of the ranch. Under the clean smell of freshly cut flowers, she was also aware of Trick’s masculine scent.

Too late, Monica remembered not only was her family watching this interchange, but Trick was, too, standing not two feet away from her, looking like the cat who ate the canary. He knew she was on the edge of giving in. Monica swallowed.

“Rehab starts in just a few minutes. Kathleen needs me to be here and … ”

“Actually you’ll just be in the way.”

Damn. She should have known Kathleen wouldn’t play along with her little white lie. Ever since she and Jackson married, Kathleen had been hell-bent on marrying off everyone around her. Just look at what had happened with Vanessa and Matias — living together and committed, not even a year after Vanessa’s ex had dumped her. Monica beetled her eyebrows and turned her head, sending Kathleen a look that should have made her leave the room. Kathleen only grinned.

“The trainer is already scheduled and ready. I’ll be there to oversee. There’s nothing you can do from the side of the pool.” Kathleen came around the table, her pregnant belly knocking Nathaniel’s recently vacated chair against the tabletop with a loud bang and a screech of chair legs on the floor. She took the flowers. “I’ll have Vanessa see to these. She’s working at the barn this week, building a new website for the horse therapy arm of our little operation.”

Behind her sister, Monica saw a wide smile split Mitchum’s face, too, as he crossed his arms over his chest and sat back in his chair.

“And I’m supposed to go riding with Grandfather this afternoon.”

Mitch waved his hand. “I’m sure I can come up with something to occupy my afternoon hours. Go have some fun.”

Kathleen put a hand on Monica’s shoulder and pushed her toward Trick.

“I should be here, just to make sure,” Monica said, but her sister ignored her. Short of digging her heels into the hardwood floor, there was nothing she could do to stop this runaway dating train.

A train she shouldn’t want to board. A train she didn’t want to stop, Monica admitted. She needed to be on the road, far away from Lockhardt and Trick Samuels. But she wanted to sit beside him in that big truck and drive away the day.

“You two go. We’ll take care of everything here. Don’t worry about a thing.”

Trick looked triumphantly at her. “So, lunch and … whatever comes next?” He waggled his eyebrows at her. “What do you say, Monica, to a date?”

Chapter Four

Trick turned left at the city-limit sign, sending them farther north and into the Hill Country. He’d canceled the day’s appointments before going to the Double Diamond that morning and quickly followed those calls with one to set up what he hoped would be the beginning of a new phase in his relationship with Monica. If there was a relationship.

Who needed to hire staff when there was a beautiful woman just waiting to be shown a good time?

A woman who currently sat on the passenger seat of his truck as if she were being led to the Spanish Inquisition. She looked confused at how she’d gotten there. Good. Confused was a definite improvement over the control Monica usually demanded over everything.

“Don’t you have a veterinary practice to run?”

“It’s the beauty of being an intern for a vet who is only a few months away from retirement. There was nothing major on our call sheet today. So Dr. Vaughn is going fishing and I’m taking you on a date.”

“That’s a little cavalier, isn’t it? What if something happens at one of the ranches or to a pet?”

Trying to pick a fight. Well, he’d called that one. Once Monica was away from the family and had time to think about what he’d done, Trick knew she’d come up fighting. He wasn’t disappointed. But he wasn’t biting, either.

“I called Doc Hartnett in the next county and alerted the emergency vet that the Lockhardt practice is closed for the day. I checked on the animals in the clinic before coming to see you.”

Monica scratched at her knuckles. She opened her pretty, pink mouth once and then closed it, as if she couldn’t think of another excuse.

“The animals will be fine. It was a light day at the office; I promise.” He just hoped he hadn’t called everything wrong when he’d planned this little excursion at the last minute, that there was a chance for whatever this had been to become something more.

“Thank you for the flowers,” she said, hands tightly clenched in her lap. Her next words came in a rush. “But you didn’t have to do that. I’m not the cards-and-flowers kind of girl. Big displays of emotion aren’t necessary or practical. Especially between us.”

She’d never gotten flowers. He’d seen the joy in her eyes. For a split second, before she’d remembered to summon control, there’d been pure excitement that the bouquet was for her. How could a girl as beautiful as her have reached twenty-four without receiving flowers from someone?

Maybe he should have sprung for the roses. No, better the wildflowers. Wild and beautiful and free, just like Monica.

“You’re welcome. And the point of giving flowers is to be impractical.”

She was quiet for a long moment. Slowly her hands unclenched and she looked at him across the cab. “Why make a big deal of me in front of my family?”

“Because you started something different last night at the Longneck. Maybe even before last night.” Trick turned down the radio volume. “I don’t like these rules you’ve put on … whatever this is between us.”

“So coming to the ranch unannounced, giving me flowers and inviting me to lunch was a little backlash because … ” She drew out the last word.

Trick turned onto the highway that would lead to Canyon Lake.

“Not backlash at all. I like you Monica. I like spending time with you, I like watching you ride, and I like the first night when you’re back here or in Austin after a long road trip. I don’t like sneaking around, like we’re Romeo and Juliet about to get speared by the warring factions. We’re not teenagers.”