Home Is Where Hank Is (Cowboys To The Rescue 1) (13 page)

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Authors: Martha Shields

Tags: #Contemporary, #Romance, #Fiction, #Forever Love, #Adult, #Bachelor, #Single Woman, #Sensual, #Hearts Desire, #Harlequin Treasury, #Series, #Cowboys, #Rescue, #Family Life, #Western, #Rancher, #Rodeo, #Teenage Sister, #Caretaker, #Household, #Manage, #Persuade, #Reconcile, #Relationships, #Marriage Minded, #General Romance, #Silhouette, #1990's

BOOK: Home Is Where Hank Is (Cowboys To The Rescue 1)
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“Have fun,” Claire told her as another up-tempo song began. “Hank’s a better teacher than Travis.”
Travis swept her away. “That’s loyalty for you.”
“Well, he is.” Claire looked up into his handsome face adoringly. “But you’re a better dancer.”
Travis grinned down at his sister, and Alex pulled her eyes away from their happy faces.
“You ready?” Hank asked quietly. “Remember to start with your right foot.”
Hank stepped forward a second before Alex stepped back. His boot toe barely missed her shin as he lurched forward, catching her against him.
Alex tried to pull away. “I can’t dance.”
Hank wouldn’t let her escape. “That was my fault, Alex. I’m sorry. Let’s try it again, okay? Look at me.” He held her until she met his gaze. “Okay?”
She dropped her eyes to the third snap on his shirt and nodded miserably. She felt like a cow in a roomful of ballerinas.
He loosened his hold. “Ready? Now.”
They stepped in unison this time and Hank guided her around the room. Novice that she was, she still had to count and look at. her feet. The third time she looked down Hank tightened his hold. She gasped softly as he fit their bodies so close together that she was stepping between his feet and he was stepping between hers.
“Don’t,” she breathed.
“You were looking at your feet.”
“So?”
“You’ll never learn to dance that way,” he whispered next to her ear. “Close your eyes. Listen to the music. Feel me move. Don’t worry. I won’t let you bump into anything. Just move with me.”
Alex had no choice but to comply. Her eyes wouldn’t stay open as his warm breath tickled her ear, burning every thought from her brain. With her vision gone, other senses became acute. With every breath she inhaled Hank’s light musky odor mixed with the even fainter smells of coffee and soap. His deep voice whispered soft words of encouragement. The music poured into her ears and went directly to her muscles, making them move with the rhythm. She could feel Hank from the beard scraping her forehead to the sculptured planes of his chest to the steely strength of his thighs moving against hers.
At that moment in time, Hank became her universe. Nothing else existed.
The song ended, but Hank kept on dancing. Alex was vaguely aware of Travis and Claire moving away, but she didn’t want to open her eyes and break the enchantment. Hank wove a spell so drugging that it lasted the few seconds until the next song began. He adjusted their steps to the slower beat and began humming the tune. The deep sound reverberated through her, hypnotizing her, dragging her deeper into the depths of desire.
Another song began and ended, then another. Still they danced. Alex still heedless of time or company. Heedless of everything but the warmth that surrounded her, the comfort of the strong arms that guided her as she floated around the floor.
Finally the tape ended with a solid click. By slow degrees, Alex became aware of the silence that surrounded them. They were alone. Travis and Claire had left. But Alex didn’t care. The music still echoed in her mind, and warm strength still surrounded her.
She vaguely remembered that there was some reason why she shouldn’t be where she was, but she pushed that away, too. The only thought that mattered at that moment was the overwhelming sense that she was precisely where she belonged.
“You’re a quick learner,” Hank whispered.
Alex moaned softly, sad to realize the moment was about to end, that reality was about to intrude. In an effort to keep reality at bay, she rubbed her cheek against the soft chambray of his shirt and whispered, “You make it easy.”
Hank moaned, too, and pulled her tighter against him. As he did, she realized that at some point he’d slipped both arms around her.
“Alex, look at me.”
She shook her head, ignoring his quiet command. “Can’t we stay like this for a while?”
With another moan, he brushed her hair from her neck and placed his lips in the hollow just below her ear. “Do you like being close to me?”
“Mmm.”
He released a deep, ragged breath. “I like being close to you, too.”
“You do?”
“Yes.”
Alex knew something was wrong with that statement, but couldn’t waken enough brain cells to analyze it.
“Alex?”
“Hmm?”
“I want to kiss you.”
“You do?”
“Yes.”
“Will it be nice, too?”
He groaned. “It will be even nicer.”
By slow degrees, Alex levered her head so she could see him. His dark face hovered so close above her own she could barely focus on his features.
Before she could say anything else, his lips touched hers. The word
nice
flew from her head and other, more sensual terms replaced it—all having to do with heat—
searing
,
burning, scorching.
The warm lassitude accompanying their dance fell away, replaced by a fervent desire to burn him as fiercely as he was burning her. She dug her hands into the short spikes of his hair, pulling his lips close enough for them to meld.
“Damn, Alex,” he breathed against her mouth. “I never thought—”
His tongue traced her lips, then slipped inside. Alex felt the impact in her toes as wave after sensual wave cascaded down her body. With a moan coming from deep in her throat, she touched her tongue to his. His hands dropped down to her bottom and pushed her against a hard, pulsing ridge.
Alex froze as reality finally flooded back.
“Stop!” she cried, ripping her mouth from his. Hot tears stung her eyes as she tried to pull from his embrace. “We can’t.”
Lost in his own sensual fog that had thickened considerably since they stopped dancing, Hank reflexively held on to Alex, despite her struggles. She’d changed so quickly from a warm, wonderful armful that it took a moment for his dazed mind to realize what had happened.
“What’s wrong?”
“Let me go!” she cried. “I can’t do this.”
Struck dumb by her tears, he let her go. She ran down the hall, and a moment later the screen door at the back slammed shut.
Raking fingers through his hair, he fell back. Instead of hitting the chair usually there, he sat hard on the coffee table, but he was beyond caring.
What the hell just happened? What started out as a celebration of Claire’s womanhood had ended up as a seduction of Alex.
No, that wasn’t true. Alex had been a willing partner in everything, up until the last moment when he...when he what?
When he showed her exactly how much he wanted her.
Damn.
And damn Travis, too. During the third song, his brother pulled Claire out of the parlor with a broad wink. At that particular moment. Hank had been so enmeshed in Alex’s spell that Travis’s scheme barely registered. Now he could cheerfully put his fist through his brother’s smiling face.
Hank shook his head. It wasn’t Travis’s fault, it was his. If he hadn’t told Travis he was attracted to Alex, this wouldn’t have happened.
But it had happened, and somehow Hank couldn’t bring himself to be sorry. Hell, all he’d done was kiss her. What was so wrong with that? Eyes narrowed, he looked at the door Alex had escaped through. She’d certainly found something wrong with it, and he intended to find out what.
Chapter Seven
H
ank found Alex easily, sitting on top of the corral fence, staring at the full moon and shivering in the cool night air. He knew the moment she realized he was coming because she stiffened, then pulled her heels from the third rail as if about to jump down.
“You might as well stay right there,” he called. “Because I’m coming after you. You can run all the way back to Alabama, but you’ll feel me breathing down your neck.”
She didn’t say anything until he stood at the fence.
“Just leave me alone.”
“Hell, no.” He climbed up and straddled the top rail, facing her. The moonlight bathed her face with an ivory light that traced the path of a tear. His voice softened. “What did I do wrong? Kiss you?”
“Yes!”
“I asked, remember?”
“I didn’t say yes.”
“Not with your lips, but every other part of you was screaming yes.”
Her wince admitted she knew he was right.
“Are you saying you didn’t want me to kiss you?” he asked.
For a moment she looked like she would deny she’d wanted his kiss, but she didn’t say anything.
“You can’t say it, because it isn’t true.”
“I didn’t!”
“Don’t lie to me,” he said softly. “I was on the receiving end, remember? You pulled me closer, wanting more.”
With a choked sound, she leaned over until her head rested on her knees. “No, it isn’t true! It can’t be.”
Wanting to comfort her, Hank stretched a hand over her back. But he stopped short of touching her. “Why not? What’s wrong? Tell me.”
“I’m leaving, that’s what wrong. I have to go to San Francisco. That job is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. If I don’t go now, I’ll never get another chance. Then I’d never be able to open my own restaurant. Then I’d never have...”
“Never have what?” he prodded gently.
She looked at him with tortured eyes, making him ache to draw her into his arms. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me.”
She shook her head vehemently. “How could you? The Garden has been here for you and your family for a hundred years. Even when you left it to rodeo, you always knew you could come home, that there was someone here who cared about you, who gave a damn whether you rode your bronc or if it trampled you in the dirt.”
Suddenly everything became crystal clear. Her mother dying, the orphanage, drifting from place to place—she needed a home, a family.
She needed exactly what he couldn’t give her.
A few months from now, the home she thought so permanent would belong to someone else—probably would be bulldozed to make way for a new subdivision. Even if he didn’t want to return to the rodeo, he’d have to sell the ranch sooner or later. The ledger didn’t lie.
Pain swept through him, so sharp and deep it nearly knocked him from the fence. He wanted to be the one to give her what she needed. He wanted to be the man she kissed goodbye every morning and hello every evening. He wanted to sit on the swing with her in the crook of his arm and watch the sun go down. He wanted to sleep with her at night, to help her deliver their children, to grow old with her. But he couldn’t.
The realization he’d had earlier hit him again. He was damned if he got close to Alex, and damned if he didn’t.
So—if he was damned, anyway, why not take Claire’s advice and make the most of the time he and Alex had? The reality of her going couldn’t hurt any worse than the thought of it did right now.
Very slowly, as if he were approaching a skittish mare, Hank reached over and pushed an errant strand of hair behind her ear. “I know you’re leaving. I understand. Believe me, I do. But damn it, Alex, I don’t want you to be afraid of me.”
Her arms crossed over her midriff. “I’m not afraid of you. I’m afraid of the way you make me feel. I can’t start any kind of romance with you. If I do, I might never go to San Francisco. And that’s something I’ll regret the rest of my life.”
Hank searched her eyes in the moonlight. “And if I let you go without finding out what this is between us, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.”
He didn’t realize he’d said it out loud until her eyes widened. The words scared him almost as much as they scared her, but he’d be damned if he’d take them back. He scooted closer. “Look at me. Please... Alex darlin’, I can’t promise you anything—certainly not forever. All I know is that I’ve never felt this way about any other woman.”
She stared at him until he thought he’d start howling at the moon. Finally she asked, “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying I want to spend time getting to know you, letting you get to know me.” He reached out and placed his hand over hers. He was gratified when she didn’t pull away. “Be my date at the rodeo this weekend.”
She stared at him a long minute, then shook her head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Why not?”
“I’m leaving in two and a half weeks, Hank. I have to do this.”
“I know. I’m not asking for a lifetime commitment. Just a date. We’ll have a few laughs. I’ll hold your hand, buy you a barbecue supper and claim all your dances at the hoedown after the rodeo.”
She pursed her lips and shook her head again. “No. We shouldn’t.”
Hank’s hand tightened in frustration, but he kept his voice low and calm. “Can you honestly say you could leave now with no regrets? Without ever wondering what it would be like to kiss me?”
“I know what it’s like to kiss you,” she said in husky tones. “That’s what started all this, remember?”
“Can you tell me you don’t want to do it again?”
“Yes.”
“Liar.”
She quickly looked way. “Damn your cowboy hide.”
Heat surged through him, making him want to drag her back into his arms. But knowing he had to tread carefully, he ignored it.
“When I was ten, just starting out in rodeo, I’d drawn a bucking horse that nobody but the best professional cowboys had ridden. That mare bucked off every kid that I knew, and hurt a lot of them, one real bad. Anyway, I was going to draw out. I didn’t want to get hurt bad enough that I couldn’t rodeo anymore. One old hand, Tex McQuire, came up beside me as I was standing by the pens, staring at that rank old mare. He asked why I wasn’t going to ride. I told him I didn’t want to be sorry the next day. To make a long story short, he made me realize that I’d be sorry if I didn’t ride her. I ended up climbing on the back of that old mare, and I made the whistle.
“That’s how I’ve lived my life ever since. If I know I’m going to be sorry anyway, I want it to be for something I’ve done, not for something I didn’t do. Do you understand what I’m saying? Since we’re going to be sorry whether or not we spend time together, why not make some memories to soften the blow?” He laced his fingers through hers. “Go with me this weekend.”
“I’m already going.”
“Go as my date. There’ll be lots of people there. You’ll be as safe as a chick in the nest. And we’ll have Claire and Travis to chaperone. But I want the right to hold your hand...like this. I want to put my arm around your waist...like this.” He drew her against him. “I want the right to kiss you good-night.”
Alex slowly relaxed against him. “Damn you, Hank Eden. How can I resist you when you say things like that?” She released a long, miserable sigh. “But I have a feeling we’re going to regret it.”
Damned or damned? With Alex in his arms, the choice seemed a lifetime away.
 
Claire and Alex arrived in Lander, hauling an empty horse trailer behind Hank’s red pickup. The brothers had left several hours before them so they could pay their entry fees and settle down their horses after the two-hour ride. They went separately because Travis wouldn’t be going back to the Garden. He planned to spend the night in Lander and head for Texas the next morning.
Claire guided the truck over the rough field that served as a parking lot for the small-town rodeo. Alex breathed a prayer of thanks that she went slowly because of the children chasing one another amid the cars, trucks and horse trailers filling the lot.
“Judging from the number already here, I’d say they’re going to have a good crowd,” Claire said. “I know they’ve heard Travis is riding today. He comes every year. I wonder if it’s gotten out that he and Hank are joining up for team roping.”
Alex pointed to the entrance of the arena. “I think that answers your question.”
Under a weathered sign telling spectators they could watch “Travis Eden—World Champion Bull Rider and All-Around Cowboy,” hung a new banner that read: “See Hank Eden—Riding and Roping Again after Eight Years.”
Claire gave Alex a wry look as she killed the motor. “I should’ve known Mr. Spindel wouldn’t let it slip by. These small-town rodeos make a big deal out of having one big name. Having two will probably fill the arena. Which, of course, isn’t saying all that much. You ready to go find your date?”
Claire seemed certain this “date” meant Alex would stay on as cook, ignoring Alex when she insisted she was still going to San Francisco.
Alex took a deep breath. “I guess I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.”
“Let’s go.”
As they left the truck, Alex spied a coiled rope, partly braided, in Claire’s hands. “What’s that?”
She smiled as she held it up and started for the arena. “Our ticket behind the chutes.”
They made their way through the parked cars and people. Alex returned the smiles and nods of welcome. Several people called to Claire, but she didn’t stop to talk to anyone. Instead, she guided Alex to the back of the arena.
As they got closer, Alex recognized the pungent odors of earth and animals. They passed a low, flat-topped frame building with crude letters above a white door proclaiming it the rodeo office. Late-arriving cowboys and their families milled around the outside, looking over the program or catching up on the latest news and gossip.
Alex tried to hide her relief when the gray-haired cowpoke guarding the gate announced there was no entrance to anyone but paid participants. Claire showed the guard their “ticket” and pleaded with him to let her give her brother the favorite bull rope he had left at home by mistake. The guard was unmoved, even when Claire mentioned who her brothers were.
Alex took Claire by the arm. “We can see them after the rodeo.”
“We might not live much past that,” Claire told her miserably. “At least I won’t. This really is Travis’s favorite bull rope. I took it out of his trailer after they loaded up the horses.”
“Why would you do something like that?”
“I wanted Hank to see you before the rodeo.”
Alex closed her eyes and shook her head. “Claire, Claire, Claire.”
“Well, there are a lot of buckle chasers hanging around rodeos, and I wanted to remind him he already has a date.”
“Claire...”
“I want you to stay and be my sister,” she declared, her chin set.
Alex’s eyes widened. “Sister? How many times do I have to tell you? I’m going to San Francisco. Nothing is going to stop me.”
Claire shook her head as she scanned the people milling around the rodeo office. “I’ve never seen Hank act this way. He’ll stop you.”
“Claire!”
“So sue me.”
Alex let out a huff of frustration, then suggested. “Why don’t you give the rope to someone who has paid their entry fee so they can give it to Travis? You know enough people here, surely you can find someone.”
“That’s not the point. I—” Claire’s face suddenly brightened, and she ran forward, waving. “Mr. Spindel!”
Five minutes later the rodeo sponsor escorted them through the gate himself. Claire smiled prettily at the guard, who watched them go past with narrowed eyes.
“Now just ten minutes, Miss Claire,” Mr. Spindel told her. “It’s not safe back here with all the livestock being moved around.”
“Oh, yes, Mr. Spindel. We’ll be out quick as a wink! Thanks so much. You’ve saved my life!”
Alex shook her head. Claire knew cowboys well, especially how to twist them around her little finger. She’d be at home with the best Southern belles.
Claire led them through a maze of plank fencing, past rows of narrow pens, some filled with calves, some with horses, some with bulls, some empty.
The cowboys milling about came in all sizes—short, medium, tall and kid-size. Nearly all had the same build: broad shoulders, narrow hips, strong legs. They all wore the same uniform: cowboy hat, boots and blue jeans. The only difference between them were their long-sleeved shirts, which varied in hue from soft neutrals to bright stripes to vivid solids appliquéed with various Western items like horseshoes or Indian feathers.
Most stood around in groups talking, but as they passed through, Alex saw a few sitting on their saddles, checking the length of the stirrups. One cowboy stood alone in an empty pen, going through the motions of riding. Still others threw lariats at handmade dummies of steers.

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