Drawn to a Cowboy (Brother Duet #1) (11 page)

Jade

I
expected to be alone when woke I up. I expected to be denied his company once again. I expected that our night was just a “heat of passion, in the moment” thing. I knew that weddings tended to put false hope into attendees’ minds. Those who didn’t usually cry, cried. Those who didn’t believe in true love, fell under the make-believe, happily ever after spell. Why should a certain cowboy be any different? Pleasantly, he remained at my side not only that morning, but for days after.

Besides delighting in the pleasures of his company since the big event, Sage made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. I just hoped that it would involve more than lodging. “You’re welcome to stay in this cottage for the rest of the week, if you’d like.”

I stilled my legs from stepping into a pair of white denim shorts and stared at the hot man before me, half dressed. I didn’t need breakfast. I could’ve been happy licking the panty dropping muscular cuts on his hips that extended down to a lovely package trapped inside a pair of slightly tight jeans.
Hell yes, with you!
“Depends on whether it comes equipped with a cowboy.” I was feeling very frisky, very playful. What did I have to lose by asking that question? He had my body tingling everywhere. Being near him, it was always on full alert.

I smiled at him as he moved closer, pulling a tight blue t-shirt over his head. “I’m sure one could be arranged.” He returned my smile with his own, gorgeous.

“Oh good,” I quipped as I finished putting the rest of my clothing on. With my feet slipped into my ever faithful red boots, I was ready. “Now, let me see… which one do I want to diddle my fancy?” I pointed my index finger into my cheek, pursed my lips, and rolled my eyes to the ceiling.

Before I could say more, he pulled me into him for a quick kiss before slapping me on the ass. “Only one cowboy for you.” He placed his hat on his head and guided me to the door. “Let’s get going.”

Inside the lodge, sitting and waiting for our breakfast order, Spencer joined us and they chatted about restaurant stuff. Norma saw us and pushed our server to the side politely to take over tending to us like a mother hen. It was her excuse to gawk at Spencer.
Ha!
She was so cute around him, like a schoolgirl. Her husband, Clay, just shook his head while Spencer played it up. So funny!

Serious Sage reprimanded her spunkiness and channeled her mind to more productive means. “So I have an idea. We have a lot of kids here this week because of the wedding. I noticed some of them watching you painting early yesterday morning, they seemed very interested. What do you think about giving some painting lessons?” Before I could answer, he continued with his plan. “We can drive into town to get the supplies you need for them. I’m sure more parents will sign up to go on the daily cattle drives if they knew their kids were busy.”

“That sounds great,” Norma clapped her hands together.

“I’m willing,” I said, not with quite as much excitement, but it was a great idea.

“Hey, I’ll volunteer too. I can have them baking and decorating cookies. We could even put together a simple cooking class. Maybe have them help make dinner for their parents when you all get back. I know I would’ve rather done something like that when we came here.”

“Okay, that sounds good. Then all I need is for one of the guys to stay back and do cowpoke stuff for the kids that are interested.”

“I’m in,” said Rance sitting at the next table enjoying a cup of coffee. “Kids always like the roping. We can even saddle up a few horses for them to ride around the ring. I can handle that with a little help.”

“Let me know when you do the rope tying, I could use a brush up course,” Spencer spoke up. Sexual connotations were evident in his tone of voice as he eagerly volunteered.

“They’re going to learn how to rope a baby calf, not a woman.” Sage reminded him, or reprimanded him.

“Same principle,” Spencer said to Sage, before turning to address me and a red faced Norma. “Sorry, ladies.” We all laughed when Norma said she’d volunteer to be his calf any day of the week. Sage shook his head and we laughed even harder. He was like the strict camp counselor.

Finished with breakfast, Sage took me on a trip to the art supply store in town. We loaded up on: heavy paper for the washable paints and washable markers we bought, a few variety packs of inexpensive brushes, and crayon boxes that had to include Jade Red. I tried to explain to him that green and red together made brown, you couldn’t name a shade of red with a color that was a variation of green. He just laughed at me saying “whatever you say” and corrected the red crayon labels that matched my hair color with a black, fine point, permanent marker.

Giving up on trying to reason with him logically, I moved on or back to an earlier subject. “So Spencer likes to tie his women?” I asked as we picked up some things on his list for baking at another nearby store.

I sensed that I was asking about things Sage would rather avoid, but he answered anyway without offering much information, “He’s been known to, yes.”

I liked to see him on the edge, off balanced, so I continued my line of questioning, “Do you teach that kind of roping, Master Donovan?” I had a big grin.

“No. And he was just saying that for Norma. He doesn’t need training, anyway. I will tell you that he always enjoyed that part of the dude ranch experience. It was useful for our cowboy and Indian game. He’s been tying me up since we were little, along with a few other neighborhood kids. The first kiss he got was from a girl down the street that he attached to a tree in our tiny backyard.”

“I thought he was always the Indian? Shouldn’t he have been scalping you?”

“I’d tell him that all the time. I’m the cowboy with the rope, I insisted. He’d say that he needed to tie me to the stake in order to burn me. So I endured being bound to his pretend totem pole, as he called one of our fruit trees.”

“So you like to be tied up?” I winked at him.

He laughed and shook his head. “No, and don’t worry, I learned to be a pro at hog tying. I gave him a taste of his own medicine, he hated it.”

“Hmmm… cowboy roper.” I had naughty thoughts running through my brain. His jeans were replaced with leather pants. No shirt. A bullwhip in hand. I giggled at myself, breaking my wandering mind. “So you taught him a lesson?” My voice was suggestive, a dead giveaway of where my mind had drifted.

He seemed to be ignoring my inquiries as he moved on to a completely different subject involving his brother. I didn’t know where or why this change had occurred. “He married his childhood girlfriend a couple weeks after high school graduation.”

Maybe the tied up, first kiss triggered him, “Tree girl?”

“No, he met her a couple years later when she moved into the area. They were inseparable, never dated anyone else. They even went off to college together, but she dropped out to become a real estate agent. After he graduated, they got married and lost their virginities on their wedding night. They became very successful individuals, their marriage was just the opposite the older they got.”

“That had to be hard on them getting married so young.”

“It was, but they wanted to stick it out, figuring it was just a rough spot—they sought out unconventional therapy. It helped or hindered their relationship as they discovered a lot about each other and themselves. They couldn’t work it out in the end. After ten years of marriage, they divorced, but remained connected through business affairs. He always valued her opinion as a commercial real estate agent and used her services when he purchased restaurant properties. On top of that, she has managed some investment rentals.”

“So they’re still connected? Better off as friends?”

“Yes, that part has worked out for them, until lately, it seems. He’s met someone that he thinks is
the one
. Valerie, his ex, somehow caused problems between them. He didn’t say how. He didn’t want to go into details with me, but I believe he’s been confiding in Norma.”

“She’s wonderful.” I loved to talk to her about my own troubles.

“She’s always been like a mother or grandmother to me and lately to Spencer. An important female figure in our lives.” I could sense a bit of melancholy or something deeper, darker wash over him and suddenly he was wandering off in yet another direction, “And if we don’t get back soon and let them see what we have planned, we’re going to be in trouble. She likes to know what’s going on around the ranch, she doesn’t like surprises.” Surprises? He was full of them, I couldn’t keep up with him. I was just following his direction, as best I could.

“Things seem to run smoothly when she’s around.”

“Yep, always have. Hank got a real gem with Norma.”

His relationship with her had me wondering about his own mother, his parents. He was very vague about them. He hadn’t said anything bad about them. He loved that they had introduced him to the dude ranch. He said they were very supportive in his farming program. The thing that had me puzzled, was that he ran off to work the ranch every summer since he was sixteen, then took off for college so far from home. I knew people did that all the time, but he was interested in being a veterinarian, and one of the best schools in the country happened to be in his own backyard, so to speak. Not that the college he picked wasn’t good, but it was more of an agricultural school which turned out to his advantage in the long run. He had my mind spinning.

How he talked about Norma and Hank, it was as if they were his true family. Even Spencer seemed to need her in his life and he was rarely at the ranch according to Sage. Were his parents still married? Did they still live in the Bay area? Were they still living? There were so many questions that I kept to myself as I watched the surrogate family that existed happily at the Bleu Moon Ranch.

With everything purchased, we headed back and got everything all sussed out with the parents and kids later that evening. Schedules were set, groups were formed for each activity, and the ranch was more like how I imagined a kid camp would be, if I’d gone to one. Feeling confident about our childcare offerings, most parents went off on the horse ride. A few moms stayed behind and took part in our activities. While others went off to town for a grown up day of shopping and lunch.

Starting out, I had the kids out in the meadow. They were having fun painting on their paper and themselves. Buying packages of extra-large t-shirts was a good addition that Sage insisted upon. Even though the art supplies were washable, it was always better to mess up cover-ups than actual clothing. The kids really seemed to love being creative, but knowing a bit about attention span, we mixed things up.

Norma stepped in organizing a variety of childhood games: tag, follow the leader, red light/green light, duck, duck, goose, heads up 7up, and a few that the kids taught us. For her grand finale, Norma brought out an acoustic guitar and had them all singing old songs. I had forgotten some of them and never heard of others. Again, our audience entertained us with some new tunes.

The kids that were more interested in corral activities ended up joining us for some of the festivities in the field, too. Of course all of them wanted in on the cookie baking adventure. Who didn’t love sweet treats? Spencer made it so much fun, he was great with the young crowd, seemed to know what appealed to them. He had us purchase every cookie cutter we could find along with several big shakers of sprinkles.
Sprinkles make the world go round!
The sugary bits looked fabulous decorating the rainbow of colorful frosting that Spencer whipped up for the kids to slather over the buttery good, sugar cookies.

The day’s events continued on into the night. After everyone consumed our communally created dinner, the ranch hands built a large contained campfire. With several bags of jumbo marshmallows and unwound coat hangers we let the kids roast the gooey puffs. We also provided milk chocolate bars and graham crackers for those that wanted s’mores. I preferred marshmallows straight up, roasted to a dark-golden-brown.
Yummy in my tummy!

I was so exhausted by the end of the night after our second day of kiddie camp. It had been so much fun, I really enjoyed working with the kids. I had given kids surfing lessons for years, but I had never taught them art. It had me thinking that maybe somewhere down the line I might have children of my own or I might consider being an art instructor. One thing I knew for certain, I wished that I could steal a bit of the energy the kids still had as they were being dragged off to bed.

The sweetest treat of my day was when a hot cowboy rounded me up and took me off to bed every night after everyone else was tucked away in their cabins. I loved spending time in his strong arms, it was pure bliss. I hated that in the back of my mind I worried that it would end. My teeter-totter thoughts had me laughing at myself for thinking that way, I needed to be happy with each moment that came along. After all, I definitely couldn’t complain about the fact that I hadn’t stayed in my room since the night of the wedding.

Our coupling was a temporary thing like my stay in the hump shack. I just kept reloading an overnight bag with clean clothes. And while I showered and got ready for the day in the cabin, he left before the sun was up, except for the first night. His sneaking around proved we were just a fling. Our days were numbered.

All of the families packed up and headed off at the end of the weekend. Usually more people arrived as soon as others departed, but we had a few days off before the new invasion arrived on the following weekend. Spencer, like the guests, headed back to his life in the city. Apparently, he had a particular lady on his radar that needed attention along with his various restaurants. Norma had given him some motherly advice that he couldn’t wait to try out.

Even though she found him overly handsome and flirted with him, she really was more of a grandmother figure. She reminded me of my Bonnie, not your stereotypical granny with grey hair, glasses and a matronly figure. Neither of them appeared that way. Like my grandmother, Norma also dyed her hair and had a fit body. I figured it had to do with the aerobic Jane Fonda era that they were part of—I imagined them together in leotards and leg warmers working out to video tapes.