Her Unbridled Cowboy (Harland County Series) (2 page)

She also understood her mother’s
worry and immediately returned the embrace. It couldn’t have been easy residing
several states away and hearing about the earthquake that had destroyed her
youngest daughter’s home and restaurant.
My home
.
My restaurant
.

The sweet fragrance of jasmine
filled her nose and instantly calmed the aggravation from her soul. The smell
of her mother’s perfume always brought with it an invisible hug and strong
sense of reassurance. Something Kerri hadn’t realized she needed until that
moment.

“I’m fine,” she said, holding back
a sigh.

“Thank goodness.” Her mother
tightened her hold and shook while they embraced. “Things would’ve been a lot
different if you were home when the quake hit.”

Everyone in the gathering room knew
Kerri’s stilted house had crumbled in the disaster. Kind of similar to what was
left of her life.

She would laugh if it wasn’t so
flippin’
tragic.

“And we thank God both you and your
sister got out of your restaurant before it blew up,” her father, Nate Masters
added from behind, his hand warm and reassuring as it closed around her
shoulder in a soft squeeze.

God, if they only knew…

Kerri closed her eyes and recalled
the image forever burned into her mind.  The image of Jordan rushing across the pavement intent on turning off the gas to their restaurant despite the
danger. Terror, unlike anything she’d ever felt before, had resembled a sharp
skewer piercing the air from her lungs. All she had been able to manage was a
panicked cry for her sister to stop.

It was the worst moment of her
life.

“We certainly had a guardian angel
watching over us that day. Didn’t we, Kerri?” Jordan’s voice from only a few
steps away cut through her thoughts.

Kerri opened her eyes and smiled at
her sister, now safe and sound, happily cocooned in Cole’s arms. Matching
expressions of love and wonderment adorned their faces as they stood in front
of a stone fireplace, warm fire crackling in the background. The white bandage
on her sister’s temple was a stark reminder of last Sunday, but did nothing to
dim the mood.

Jordan’s long, wavy brown hair fell
to her waist and dark eyes held the same happy gleam as her dark haired, dark
eyed fiancé.

Okay, forget
love
and
wonderment
.
Heck, given her sister’s soft smile and relaxed posture—
extremely satisfied
was a better description.
Jeez Louise
, Cole had only taken off after Jordan an hour ago. Ride time alone was close to forty minutes. How the heck did they fit
in sex, let alone satisfying sex?

It usually took Kerri that long
just to concentrate when Lance used to…

“What do you mean?” their father
asked, removing his hand from her shoulder.

Her mind stumbled a bit to get back
in the conversation.

“What guardian angel?”

Jordan burrowed in a little closer
to Cole, and he gathered her sister tighter. “Well, I just think we were both
lucky that day.”

“I don’t know about me.” Kerri
stepped out of her mother’s embrace to answer her sister. “But you definitely
have a guardian angel. I remember calling out to you as you ran toward the
restaurant. But you didn’t stop. That’s when the most amazing thing happened.”
She paused to glance around the room, a little uncomfortable with being the
center of attention. That was more a Jordan thing. A trait the former cop
embraced.

“Go on. Tell us what happened
next,” her father prodded.

Kerri swallowed, then forced
herself to continue. “Something…or someone, I can’t be sure, mysteriously
yanked Jordan to the ground right before Comets exploded. No one was there.
Just the two of us, but it was as if an invisible pair of hands had reached up
from nowhere and pulled her down, out of harms’ way.”

“Oh my…do you think it was Eric?”
her mom asked, eyes wide and unblinking.

Jordan’s late husband, Eric, had
died in a convenience store robbery almost three years ago. Kerri had to admit,
the thought had crossed her mind more than once in the last few days. But she
honestly didn’t know. 

“Could’ve been my Cole,” Leeann
McCall said, a look of pride lighting her brown eyes. “I bet he kept her safe
through sheer willpower that day.”

“True,” her husband, Alex McCall
chimed in, draping an arm around his petite wife. “No one’s more stubborn than
our boys.”

Whatever it was, Kerri would be forever
grateful for whatever caused her sister to hit the pavement at that exact
moment. And she had to admit, now she was just a tad envious, too. Envious that
her sister had found such a strong love twice in her life, while she couldn’t
find it even once. All she’d managed was a disastrous marriage that had left her
hurt, confused and divorced, doubting there were any good men left in the
world.

“That’s not entirely true.” A deep
baritone with a hint of humor cut through the room, captivating the air into a
silence of unadulterated anticipation, and sent her heart tail-spinning into
her ribs, until she looked up and realized he was talking to his father.

Still, the captivation part was typical
Connor McCall fashion.

There wasn’t an unattached female
in the tri-county area safe from his sex appeal. That’s why Kerri kept her gaze
glued to the worn-out sole of his left boot. She knew her place. He was way out
of her league. She was under no illusion as to where she stood against such a
virile man. Heck, she didn’t even qualify to kiss the sole of his worn-out left
boot. But that’s where her gaze remained. Much safer than traveling upward.

She hadn’t really said more than a
quick hello. He’d headed to the stables shortly after they’d arrived, and she’d
happily retreated to her room to regroup. To summon strength, because she was a
vulnerable mess at the moment. If she could just gather some willpower, even
just a smidge, in order to resist the gorgeous cowboy…because heck, he made her
feel
things she had no business feeling. Cripes, she was desperate. Had
to be if she was stupid enough to let herself feel something for someone like
him. He was too raw, too manly.

Yes, staring at Connor’s boot was
about all she could handle at the moment. Anything higher…

Heat shot through her body,
settling in her face and other parts further south. Parts that liked to be
called good, but she preferred to call them
closed for the season
. No
way could she allow her gaze to take in the whole man.
Jeez
, the toned
scenery of his northern terrain could make a girl want to get lost. And stay
lost. Forever. Connor McCall sported a very sexy landscape restricted for
equally sexy women…of which she was not.

The reality of those words hit her
with the force of an icy, cold blast. She blinked until his boot came back into
focus.

“There is someone more stubborn
than us,” he continued, that darn sexy drawl sending shivers to her toes, while
an unwelcomed heat pooled low in her belly.

And she’d only just cooled off.

“Who?” his father asked.

“Jordan,” came Connor’s humorous
reply.

Laughter filled the room. No one
would argue the fact. Once her sister made up her mind about anything, she
didn’t let go. Kerri laughed, too. When the cowboy was right, he was right.

Smiling, she lifted her head,
intending to snicker at her sister but…dang, it wasn’t her sister who filled
her view.

Tall, broad shoulders and chest,
muscles bulging out from under his red, rolled up sleeves, brown hair, dancing
brown eyes and those darn dimples…six-foot-four-inches of Texas testosterone.
The equivalent of saturated fat. Tasted good but wasn’t good for you.

Granted, she’d only had a little
taste when he’d briefly kissed her at her parent’s anniversary party back in
September. But it had been enough for Kerri to scratch him off her
menu—permanently. That small sampling promised to be as delicious as a fresh
from the oven cannoli dipped in chocolate. How could she stop at just one? She
couldn’t, hence the permanent scratching off part.

Besides, she preferred men with
class, who’d pick her up for a date wearing a suit and enjoyed the fine arts.
Not a brash, long-haired cowboy whose favorite pastime was teasing and never
took anything serious. One who thought dressing up was donning a new pair of
jeans. Whose idea of culture was the black velvet painting of a pack of poker
playing, cigar smoking, bulldogs hanging in his office.

A smirk hovered on her lips, while
her gaze traveled up the tall Texan. Maybe she’d gotten this all wrong. Maybe
he
was out of
her
league…

Having put things into a clearer perspective,
Kerri felt better and turned her attention to her father who’d started to
speak.

“…yes, my daughters are beautiful
and headstrong. Like their mother.”

“And smart like their father. I’m
sure it was quick thinking that kept them safe,” her mother added, slipping an
arm around her father’s waist.

All thoughts of the troubling
cowboy left Kerri’s head as the events of that horrible day came rushing back
again.

Absently rubbing her shoulder, she was
thankful the only scar she suffered was of the skin and not of the heart. Her
chest tightened, restricting her breathing. Jordan had come so close to dying.
So close. No one in the room, not even her sister had any idea it had been a
mere millimeter that had separated life from death last Sunday. Just a hair
higher and the big chunk of plate glass would’ve sheared…would’ve killed her
sister.

God
. She couldn’t get that
moment out of her head.

“Maybe it’s a sign you should leave
California and move back here to Texas like we did, Kerri,” her father said,
his grin a little too mischievous for her peace of mind. “There’s plenty of
room at our house now that renovations are almost completed.”

Her parents had repurchased the house
they’d sold when they moved to California eleven years ago. She’d been fifteen,
nearly sixteen, and Jordan had been almost seventeen when their father had
gotten a promotion and moved his family to the west coast.

The place she now called home.

“No, dad. I love it out there,
especially since Jordan and I opened Comets two years ago.” Kerri swallowed.
She still couldn’t believe it was gone. All gone. The invisible vise gripping
her heart hadn’t eased since the explosion. The loss of their restaurant ran
deep. Cooking was her life.

After graduating from the New York
School of Culinary Arts, she’d been lucky to honeymoon and train a few weeks in
Paris before landing a good job, along with her former husband, in one of California’s premiere restaurants.

Life had been good…until she’d
caught Lance cheating with a coworker. That’s when her outlook on the world had
changed. Her confidence in her feminine-side had changed. She’d changed. No
longer seeing the world as a perfect soufflé, she left her job, and husband,
and opened Comets
with her recently widowed sister.

The restaurant had been a lifeline
for them both. Her heart squeezed tighter. Jordan no longer needed that
lifeline. She had Cole. But nothing had changed for Kerri. Other than life had
gotten worse. What would she do now?

“What about Texas? Don’t you like
it here?” Alex McCall asked, coming to stand in the middle of the room.

All eyes turned to Kerri. Her face
heated. Again.

“I-I love it here, too. Texas will always be special to me.” She smiled. Texas did hold a lot of found memories…and
a few embarrassing ones.

Like teenage Connor and Cole
dripping naked at the water hole when she and Jordan had stolen their clothes. Her
first glimpse of a full-monty male had been…
holy wow
.

 “I guess it’s true what they say.
You
can take the girl out of Texas, but you can’t take Texas out of the girl.
”
Mrs. McCall grinned.

“I guess not.” Kerri laughed,
wishing they’d change the subject. They should be celebrating her sister’s
engagement, not wasting time on her. She lifted her chin. “So, are we going to
toast the happy couple, or not?”

“You heard the little lady. Gather
around.” Mr. McCall handed out glasses of Dom Perignon. Her favorite. “Here’s
to Jordan and Cole. A marriage eleven years in the making.”

A chuckle went around the room
before everyone took a sip of the chilled liquid.

“I’d say it’s more like
twenty-eight years in the making,” Connor corrected. “Cole was smitten with her
right from the beginning.”

Kerri found herself standing across
from the cowboy and allowed her gaze to take a closer look, from under her
lashes, of course.

Being five years older, Connor always
appeared tall, and although she’d grown up and was by no means small at five-foot-eight-inches,
she still felt that way next to him. He towered a good eight inches over her
now, and his trim muscular frame had gotten broader and more defined, deliciously
stretching his red flannel shirt to its limits.

The bugger.

Finally allowing her gaze to move
to his face, Kerri’s insides fluttered.
Holy cow
. He cut his hair.

The brown locks the sun loved to
kiss with highlights in the summer and that would curl out from under his
Stetson showed little evidence of either. She couldn’t recall ever seeing him
wear it this short.

Following his hairline, the cut came
in front of his ears in a slight sideburn, giving him a more respectable look.
Her fluttering increased. The style gave depth to his dancing brown eyes and
emphasized a strong jaw sporting a five-o’clock shadow, which did nothing to
disguise the sexy dimples that showed up with his ever-present lop-sided grin.

This new Connor didn’t look like a
reckless cowboy at all. In fact, she had no trouble picturing him in Armani.
Darn
it.
Her gaze dropped to his left boot again. Forget the
Marlboro Man
,
he could easily model for GQ.