Cowboy Take Me Away (25 page)

Shannon was walking across the square, stopping to talk to people here and there. Instead of the jeans she usually wore, she’d put on a casual dress with a lightweight sweater over it. The dress swirled around her legs in the soft evening breeze. She reached up to brush a strand of hair out of her face, turning as she did, and their eyes met.

A warm smile inched across her face, and even at this distance, the look she gave him made his heart beat just a little bit faster. She started toward him, looking more beautiful than he’d ever seen her before.

Finally she reached the table and sat down next to him. He leaned over and spoke to her softly.

“Barbecues are like rodeos,” he said.

“Oh? How so?”

“A guy’s got to be with the prettiest girl.”

“Is that a rule?”

“No. It’s the
law
. And I’m not breaking any laws tonight.”

She smiled, and his heart turned over. This was going to be a good night. A wonderful night. A night to remember.

“Eat fast,” Eve told Luke. “The band’s already started, and you’re going to be doing a lot of dancing tonight.”

Shannon and Luke got plates of barbecue and dug in. But Eve was true to her word. Luke had barely laid his fork down after eating before she grabbed him by the hand, dragged him from the picnic table, and headed for the dance floor. He looked back at Shannon apologetically, but she just smiled. For the next forty-five minutes, he danced with several women whose men refused to, all the while wishing he was dancing with Shannon instead.

When the band took a break, he walked back to their table to rest for a moment and finish off his beer. He leaned in and spoke softly. “Sure you don’t mind me dancing with other women?”

“You might be dancing with them now,” she said, “but you’re coming home with me.”

Beneath the picnic table, Luke edged his hand over, eased up the hem of her skirt, and placed it on her thigh, rubbing it gently. When her eyes fell closed and her chest rose and fell with a breath of pure pleasure, he knew she was thinking of what it was going to be like tonight when she was naked and his hands were on more than just her thigh.

Across the dance floor, Luke saw Russell sitting with Shannon’s mother and father, and he wondered what was going on there. Every once in a while, one of them would look their way and frown.

“When’s the last time you talked to your mother?” he asked Shannon.

“It’s been a while.”

He nodded toward the table where they sat. “If looks could kill…”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. It’s not your fault.”

She nodded, but he could tell she felt bad about it, anyway. “Looks as if your knee is all healed.”

“Yeah. It feels good.”

“You’re getting plenty of exercise tonight.”

“I don’t know what it is with some of these guys. If they’d learn how to dance, their women would be eternally grateful.”

“Apparently they don’t know the advantages of having their women’s eternal gratitude.”

“Hey, Luke!” Tasha called out from the other end of the table, a big, loopy grin on her face. “How about another dance? I
love
to dance!”

That was weird for Tasha, who never showed any assertiveness around men. Then Shannon saw the beer in her hand and understood her sudden overconfidence.

“Go dance,” Shannon said. “I like watching you.”

“It’s more fun if you’re dancing yourself. Sure you don’t want to?”

“Nah. I’m pretending I’m watching
Dancing with the Stars
. Hey—when you win the bull riding championship, maybe you can be on the show. You could wear some of those sparkly gold pants you love so much.”

“Chaps,” he said over his shoulder as Tasha dragged him to the dance floor.
“Chaps.”

Shannon put her chin in her hand and watched Luke spin Tasha around the dance floor, the music thumping pleasantly through her body. After a while, she checked her watch and realized it was getting late. She decided to grab a few desserts for her and Luke before they called it a night.

She rose and wove through the crowd, moving to the end of the dessert line. A moment later, somebody came to stand behind her, and when she turned around and saw who it was, a familiar feeling of defensiveness overcame her.

“Mom,” she said offhandedly, looking back at the desserts. “Missed you during the festival.”

Loucinda examined the virtues of brownies over apple pie. “Yes. Well, I stayed very busy in the Preservation Society booth.”

“I thought you would at least drop by. What stopped you?”

Loucinda reached for the apple pie and moved down the line to pay for it. “You know what stopped me, dear.”

Her mother’s tone of disapproval fell on Shannon like a cold rain, and as always, her heart automatically beat faster.

“No, Mom. I’m afraid I don’t.”

Loucinda’s mouth settled into a grim line of disapproval. She leaned in and spoke quietly. “With that Dawson boy at your booth, do you really have to wonder?”

“You need to stop calling him that.”

“You were with him all over the festival grounds. Do you have any idea what people were saying?”

“Depends on what people you’re talking about. My friends weren’t saying anything.”

“I don’t know where I went wrong with you and your sister. You just don’t seem to understand what’s proper and what isn’t.”

“Just for the record, I don’t care about propriety. I do, however, care about Luke.”

“Shannon!” Loucinda hissed, looking left and right. “Will you keep your voice down?”

“I’ll talk as loud as I want to.”

Loucinda gave her an angry look, put the pie back, and walked away. But this time, instead of the apprehension Shannon usually felt when she crossed her mother, all she felt was a cool self-assurance she should have acquired somewhere along the line but never had. She left the dessert line and caught up with her.

“You know what, Mom? You might change your mind about Luke if you actually got to know him.”

“Glenn Dawson’s son? I don’t think so.”

“Luke isn’t like his father.”

“Evidently you’re not like your mother, either.”

“Given the awful things you’ve said about Luke, I’m pretty proud of that.”

Loucinda shot her a dirty look and kept on walking. “Speaking of awful things, Dr. Morgensen seems to think you’re no longer interested in seeing him. Are you seriously that short-sighted?”

“Russell and I aren’t right for each other.”

“How can you say that? You’re perfect for each other! If you’re fortunate, he’ll consider asking you out again.”

“And the day I feel about him the way I feel about Luke, I’ll take him up on it.”

Loucinda stopped and spun around, her mouth falling open. “The way you feel about”—she shook her head with disbelief—“Just the fact that you’re
sitting
with that man is an embarrassment!”

“Eve has been dancing with him. How does that make you feel?”

“Eve has been flaunting her poor choices all her life. I’ve always expected more of you.”

“Yeah, and sometimes those expectations get just a little hard to handle.”

“All I’ve ever tried to do is to set you on the right path and protect you from bad influences. Have you ever appreciated that? Ever?”

Suddenly things were coming back to Shannon. So many things. The really nice boy who’d asked her to a dance in the tenth grade, but his father was a welder and his mother worked at the dry cleaners, so going with him was out of the question. In junior high, she’d wanted to be on the yearbook staff, but one of the boys was rumored to be gay, so that was inappropriate. When she was in grade school, she couldn’t go to another girl’s house to play because she had a single mother who was struggling and they lived in an apartment on the wrong side of town. Shannon had been listening to this crap all her life, and she wasn’t taking it anymore.

“Grandma North,” Shannon said. “That’s where all this comes from, doesn’t it?”

Loucinda looked horrified.

“She always made you believe you had to tie yourself in a knot to live up to the family name. Stop trying, Mom. You’ll never be perfect. Just stop trying, and you’ll be a hell of a lot happier. I know I will be.”

Loucinda’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “I don’t want you to
ever
speak another word about that!”

“I’m so tired of you telling me what’s right for me. What to say. How to act. Who to associate with. I’m just so tired of it. Stop judging me. And while you’re at it, stop judging Luke!”

With an ugly glare, Loucinda wheeled around and stormed off again. Shannon waited for anxiety to overtake her, but it never came. She knew there would be fallout, but for maybe the first time ever, she wasn’t afraid of it. Instead, she felt as if a dark cloud had lifted and she could see clearly for the first time.

Suddenly she realized what a fool she’d been. She knew Luke was avoiding any affection in public because he was afraid of the fallout it might cause for her. So she’d spent the last several days acting as if they were just acquaintances, as if there was nothing more between them.

Never again. Never again was she going to be swayed by what anybody else thought. She knew there was no future for her and Luke, but they still had the present.

And she intended to live every moment of it.

Luke finished dancing with Tasha and sat down at the picnic table, feeling exhausted after the long day at the festival and the dance marathon that followed. Eve told him Shannon had gone to get dessert for them, but he didn’t care about eating another bite. He just wanted her back there with him. He’d been a good sport and danced with other women, but enough was enough.

A voice came over the loudspeaker. “It’s been the best festival ever, and one heckuva party tonight! But all good things must come to an end. So grab your honey and hit the dance floor one last time before we call it a night.”

Just then, Luke heard his phone. He pulled it out of his pocket to find a text from Shannon. He looked up, searching the crowd for her. Finally he saw her standing near the edge of the dance floor, her skirt whisking around her legs. She reached up to brush her hair away from her face, and her mouth turned up in an inviting smile.

He smiled back, wondering what she had in store for him now. He touched the button. It was a song title.

Save the Last Dance For Me.

A
s the band started playing a slow, sweet song, Luke stuck his phone into his pocket and rose from his chair, taking the most direct route across the dance floor, dodging people left and right. When he reached Shannon, she was still wearing that smile.

He closed his hand around hers and led her to the dance floor, then pulled her gently around to face him. As he slid his hand around to her back, she skimmed her fingertips to his shoulder, then flattened her palm against it. Twining the fingers of his other hand with hers, he pulled it against his chest.

They didn’t dance as much as they simply swayed to the music. With each second that passed, they moved a fraction of an inch closer to each other until her breasts grazed his chest. He stroked his hand up and down her back.

Ah,
God
, it felt like heaven.

“Told you I couldn’t dance,” she said against his ear.

“You dance just fine,” he murmured. “Just fine.”

He inhaled her scent at the same time he moved his hand gently over her back, imprinting his mind with both of those sensations. Her hand felt so soft inside his, and he hoped his calloused fingers weren’t scraping her tender skin.

“People are watching us,” Luke said.

“I don’t care.”

“Will you regret it tomorrow?”

“No. Never.”

“Even with your mother watching?”

“That doesn’t bother me, Luke. And it won’t ever again.”

A cool evening breeze swirled around them, drawing them even closer together. Luke felt as if they were the only couple on the dance floor. He’d never heard the song before, but it was pleasant and soothing and it felt as if it was playing just for them.

He slid his hand up and tucked it beneath the hair at the back of her neck, stroking his thumb back and forth. She sighed softly and lay her head against his shoulder. He closed his eyes for a moment, savoring the sensations. But when he opened them again, he glanced across the dance floor and saw Loucinda looking back at him. She caught his gaze and held it. In the span of a single second, her hard, unyielding eyes told him no matter what he thought, he wasn’t one of them. That he never could be, no matter how Shannon felt about him.

Just seeing that expression on her face stirred up Luke’s old feelings of inferiority all over again. In the end he knew what would happen. Long after he was gone, her family would still be there, and sooner or later Loucinda would make Shannon pay for whatever she did tonight.

Finally the music wound down. Shannon pulled away and looked up at him, her blue eyes shimmering in the dim light. He had the sense of people looking on, but they seemed to fade away to the edges of his vision until all he saw was her. Then, in the middle of the dance floor with the whole town looking on, she did something he never imagined she would.

She took his face in her hands and kissed him.

It was a long, soft, sensual kiss that no one watching could have mistaken as a quick kiss between friends. He knew he should pull away. Hold her at arm’s length. Ask her if she knew what she was doing. But he just couldn’t bring himself to make her stop. Then she eased her lips away, trailed them along his cheek, and whispered in his ear.

“Come to my apartment.”

Yes.

As the crowd dispersed, Luke told her he’d parked just a little bit illegally and needed to move his truck. Shannon told him she’d say good-bye to her friends and meet him at her apartment. Their hands were still clasped together as they walked away from each other. Shannon waited until the last second before letting go, and even longer before she turned away. Her eyes were tempting, her smile full of promise.

Luke walked across the square and down Rainbow Way to the intersecting street where he’d parked, hoping the sheriff and his deputies had been far too busy that night to even think about issuing citations. But as he came closer to his truck, he saw something far worse than a parking ticket. Russell was leaning against the fender, his arms folded, watching as Luke approached.

Luke stopped in front of him. “What do you want?”

“I saw you with Shannon.”

“So?”

“I want you to stay away from her.”

His words were slurred just enough that Luke could tell he’d had one too many drinks, which meant he needed to avoid getting angry and keep on moving. He shook his head and brushed past Russell, heading for the driver’s door of his truck.

“Hey!” Russell said. “Don’t you walk away from me!”

Luke hated that tone.
Hated
it. “You’re drunk, Russell. Beat it.”

“When are you leaving town?”

“None of your business.”

“Just make sure you don’t come back.”

That really fried Luke. This guy thought he could tell him where he was allowed to go and when?

“You know what?” Luke said, turning back around. “Now that I think about it, I might come back. In fact, you’ll never know when you might turn around and I’ll be there. I’ll be your worst nightmare, Russell, because you have no way of knowing when I might show up again.”

“You’re such a bastard,” Russell said. “And I’m not the only one who thinks so.”

“I don’t give a shit what you or anyone else thinks.”

“How about Shannon? Do you care what she thinks? A man like you would never fit in with her family.”

“It’s not about what Shannon’s family wants,” Luke said hotly. “It’s about what
she
wants.”

“And you think she wants you because she kissed you out there in front of the whole town?” He made a scoffing noise. “She had a fight with her mother earlier. Loucinda told her you were scum and she should stay away from you. Shannon was just making a point because she doesn’t like to be told what to do. Are you really stupid enough to think it was anything else?”

No. That wasn’t the way it was. He knew how Shannon felt. But her mother—
God.
Was that woman going to make life hell for her until the day she died?

“I was sitting with Jerome and Loucinda while you and Shannon were dancing,” Russell said. “Do you know what Loucinda said? She said you came from trash and you’re still trash.”

Luke wanted desperately to get past that. To feel like his own man. But in this place he would always be associated with his father. Always. That hard, horrible, repulsive man was his legacy, now and forever.

Luke remembered the look Loucinda had given him when he and Shannon were dancing, that look that said that because of where he came from, her daughter would be defiled if he so much as touched her. He knew Shannon didn’t feel that way. But that look from her mother…it brought up something inside him that made him feel every bit as filthy and disgusting as his father. It wasn’t rational. He knew that. But he couldn’t shake the feeling of living eighteen years in this town with that hanging over his head.

No! Don’t pay any attention to any of this. Get out of here. Go!

Luke waved his hand dismissively and turned to get in his truck. Russell grabbed his shoulder and spun him back around. Luke shook off Russell’s hand and glared at him, his fist tightening at his side.

“If you touch me again,” Luke said, his voice slipping into the warning range, “we really are going to have words.”

Russell smiled. “Ah, now there’s the Luke who’s legend around here. The one who has a real hard time controlling his temper.”

Something old and painful welled up inside of Luke, ripping open that barely healed wound until it bled. “You don’t know a damned thing about me.”

“I know you want her,” Russell said, his voice low and intense. “I mean, what man wouldn’t? But you don’t stand a chance.”

“And you do?”

“Shannon might go slumming for a while, but in the end she knows where she came from.”

“Listen up, Russell,” Luke said, his mind growing blurry with anger, his fist itching. “The only reason you have any shot at all with Shannon is because I’m leaving.”

“Bullshit,” Russell said. “A woman like her deserves a better man than the son of the town drunk!”

White-hot fury obliterated the last of Luke’s restraint. With a roundhouse punch, he smacked Russell in the face with his doubled-up fist. Russell stumbled backward. Instead of going down, though, his face came alive with rage. He rushed at Luke, shoving him backward. Luke fell to his back, his head smacking against the ground. Russell fell on top of him. The pain only fueled Luke’s anger. He shoved Russell away, rose to his feet, and went after him again. He heard people behind him shouting. He couldn’t make out the words. They were nothing but noise. He kept punching until Russell went down again, and then he leaped on top of him. Luke had the sense of people gathering around, more shouting, but he was beyond rationality. Beyond stopping. Beyond doing anything but making this bastard pay for what he’d said. He wanted the whole fucking town to pay for what it had done to him all those years ago, for ignoring him, for treating him as if he was a lowlife just because of an accident of birth, for turning the other way when they saw a bruise on his face or a bloody lip. The anger and bitterness he thought he’d shelved came roaring out from the dark recesses of his mind, making his vision blurry with rage and his fists shift into weapons he was beyond controlling.

Then somebody grabbed his wrist and yanked him backward.

“Hey! You two break it up!
Now!
”

When Luke looked up, he saw the sheriff standing over him. He came to his feet, breathing hard, pain slicing through his head. Russell stood a few feet away, his nose bleeding and his left eye already beginning to swell.

Luke leaned against his truck, breathing hard, his head spinning crazily, feeling as if it was about to split wide open. The sheriff took off his hat, wiped his brow with his forearm, and put it back on. “Okay,” he said wearily. “Who threw the first punch?”

Luke wiped blood off his nose. “I did.”

“You’re damned right you did,” Russell said. “I’m pressing charges!”

The sheriff sighed. “Now, Russell, I’d like you to think twice about that. If we just talk about this—”

“No! He assaulted me!”

“Looks to me like you both got your licks in pretty good,” the sheriff said. “Why don’t we just forget about this whole thing, everybody go home—”

“Hell, no,” Russell said, gritting his teeth. “I told you I’m pressing charges!”

“There’s no need to escalate this,” the sheriff said. “If you’ll just—”

“I said I want him to go to jail!”

Jail? Luke felt a shot of apprehension.
No. Not that. No!

The sheriff turned to Luke. “If you threw the first punch, it’s assault. If he wants to press charges, I gotta take you in.”

Luke just stood there, his head pounding, unable to believe this was happening. He had no idea how long this would tie him up there. He was due in Denver soon. If this dragged out very long, he might even miss the first round of competition, and the dream he’d been chasing for the past decade would disintegrate before his eyes.

No. It was worse than that. He was being arrested for assault. If Russell carried that all the way to the end, he could actually go to prison.

Slowly Luke became aware of people surrounding him, whispering, pointing. He couldn’t make out their words, but he didn’t have to. He knew what they were saying.

I knew this would happen.

Of course it was his fault.

Bad seed.

Just like old times.

Guess he’s like his old man after all.

What happened next was a blur. The sheriff turned him around and cuffed his hands behind his back. Luke had a flashback to the humiliation of his teenage years, when these cuffs around his wrists had spurred him to spit out a string of curse words a mile long. But this time he didn’t say anything, even as a hot flame of resentment burned inside him.

The sheriff walked him to the patrol car. Put him in the backseat. Luke gazed around the inside of the car. His hazy memory of being in the back of a police car before became crystal clear, and he hated what he saw.

The sheriff started the car and pulled away. Luke looked out the window. Shannon was standing ten yards away, her hand against her chest, the most horrible mix of shock and disappointment on her face.

He turned away, unable to look any longer. Now he knew that the past few months had been an illusion. A cruel illusion that he was becoming part of this town somehow, but in the end, nothing had changed. Somehow he would get out of jail. Leave this town behind, just as he had all those years ago, but this time he’d stay gone. As far as he was concerned, they could all go straight to hell.

As Shannon watched the sheriff’s taillights disappear down the street, she had the most unbearable feeling of everybody in the crowd staring at her, as if she was going to explain it to them. As if she was going to tell them why Luke had beaten the hell out of Russell and the sheriff had dragged him to jail. But she didn’t know. She’d arrived just in time to see the sheriff pull Luke off Russell and both men bruised and bleeding.

Eve grabbed Shannon’s arm. “Come on. You need to go home.”

“Eve—”

“Now.”

She led Shannon down the street toward her apartment. As they walked, Shannon saw her mother standing on the curb nearby, giving her a look so cold it made her shiver. Her eyes were dark. Accusatory.

Triumphant.

Didn’t I tell you what kind of man he was? Didn’t I tell you?

And then she turned and walked away.

Shannon’s stomach turned over with anguish. She couldn’t imagine the Luke she knew doing this. Ever. It was as if he’d shifted to another world, another dimension. Russell had to have provoked him into the fight. But what the hell could he have said or done to make Luke hit him?
What?

She wanted to go back in time. Just ten minutes. That was all. Just go back ten minutes to the time they’d spent on that dance floor in each other’s arms, when they’d made plans to be together in her apartment tonight. That was all she wanted.

Only there was no going back.

Luke was going to jail. Half the town had witnessed it. And now the connection she’d felt with him had been ripped apart, leaving a hole so ugly and jagged that no force on earth would ever be able to repair it.