How to Lasso a Cowboy (33 page)

He could almost hear her teeth grind.

“All right, rat bastard. You win. I can put up with almost anything for a few days.” She grabbed the quilt folded at the foot of the bed and jerked it from beneath his legs. Then she headed for the door.

“Where are you going?”

“It won't be the first time I've slept in front of the fireplace.”

“That might look passing strange if one of the hands happens in.”

“I care how it looks?”

“Isn't that what your whole scheme is all about? Looking married? Aren't you the one willing to go to any lengths, cheating or otherwise, to get the family ranch?”

She stopped in her tracks and turned slowly and deliberately back toward him. “I do not cheat. McCabes are straight as an arrow and twice as honest.”

Those green eyes of hers could turn remarkably hard, Josh noted happily. He gave her his most infuriating smile. He knew it was infuriating because his sister had told him so at least a dozen times.

“And I am not letting some two-bit sot turn me out of my own place.”

That stung a bit, but Josh figured he might have had it coming.

Still glaring at him, she settled huffily in the room's one chair and wrapped herself in the quilt. “Enjoy the bed,” she invited sourly. “Just don't infest it with fleas.”

 
TESS UNCURLED FROM
her chair in the predawn, the smell of rain tickling her nostrils. Before she left the bedroom, she took a moment to observe her roommate, who snored quietly on the bed—her bed. She made a face. Beneath the covers—her covers—her “husband” looked warm and comfy, while Tess had spent an uncomfortable, almost sleepless night clutching the quilt around her, trying unsuccessfully to ward off the cold. Obviously the fellow was a slugabed, for the cock had already crowed. A lazy smile touched his mouth as he dreamed. The mouth, Tess couldn't help but notice, was the sort of mouth a sculptor might carve on a statue, and its smile gentled the rugged face. His cheek with its morning shadow of coarse, dark beard, bore a crease from the pillow. Her pillow.

With broad shoulders, tousled hair, and that seductive mouth, the sot wasn't all that hard on the eyes, Tess decided. Not that it mattered. The fellow could look like a billy goat for all she cared. Sean had better hightail it back
to California soon, so she could boot her “husband” down the road. She couldn't put up with this nonsense much longer.

Cautiously, Tess took her boots from the floor where she had dropped them the night before and tiptoed toward the door. She hoped the fool slept through breakfast. Going hungry would serve him right.

He didn't sleep through breakfast. Ten minutes after Tess had grabbed a biscuit and a cup of strong coffee, her thorn-in-the-side husband strolled out of the house and over to where she talked with Miguel, Luis, and Henry at the corrals. He looked annoyingly fresh and chipper from a good night's sleep.

“Good morning,” he said, cradling a steaming mug in his hands. “Nice morning.”

Tess nodded curtly. The men mumbled a greeting. Rojo quit giving the eye to the horses in the corral and bounded over to the newcomer with a friendly greeting. He scratched the cattle dog's ears, and the dog melted in ecstasy.

Tess watched in disgust. Rojo didn't show much taste when it came to people.

“Be careful of Rojo,” Tess warned curtly. “He's a good cattle dog, but he doesn't take to strangers.”

The bed-stealer gave her a lazy smile. “Most dogs know who deserves a show of teeth and who doesn't.”

Tess almost showed her own teeth. This fellow had a way of eating at the edges of her temper. What had happened to the woozy, boozy cowboy she had practically poured into Glory's crib the day before? Or the self-conscious, confused fellow who had looked so ridiculous sitting bare and hairy in her washtub?

Now the man looked almost clean-cut. He had taken time to trim the steel and silver mustache, and his silver-shot-with-black hair shone in the bright sunlight. Her father's old shirt stretched tight across axe-handle shoulders which whittled down to slim hips and long legs. The man stood at least a head taller than Tess, who looked eye to eye with Miguel.

“Nice-looking bunch of horses.” He pointed his freshly
shaven chin toward the green broncs in the corral—two bays, a chestnut, a gray, and two blacks.

Miguel nodded. “We throw a saddle on these for the first time this morning. They are mustangs brought up from Mexico.”

“Sell them once they're saddle broke?”

“
Sí
. Señora Bermudez at the Circle T has already said she will take the chestnut, and she likes the gray as well. She likes mustangs, because they are smart, strong horses that can work all day. And the army always buys from us. Some of the other ranches too.”

Tess scowled at Miguel. The stranger didn't need to know their business. But Miguel didn't notice. Once he got to talking about horses, there was no shutting him up. Her husband seemed to have a similar interest.

“You buck them out?”

Miguel shrugged. “If they have spirit, they will buck.”

The bum grinned. “Kinda like women, eh?”

Miguel looked cautiously from the newcomer to Tess, whose fists had clenched, and back again to her husband. When Tess had first walked out of the house, the foreman had given her a swift perusal, then nodded when he found her in one piece after spending the night in a room with her new husband. Now a small smile twisted the mouth beneath his mustache. “A man must know his horses, señor. Some will buck until they drop dead. Some will roll to crush the rider beneath them. There are some who should never be mounted, because they will never be gentled.”

“Have you known many to be that ornery?”

Miguel's smile grew broader. “Not many.”

The stranger nodded. “On my place, we don't break a horse, we gentle it. The process takes more time, but it results in a more dependable mount.”

Tess immediately bristled. “The horses we turn out are the best in the area. They're loyal, smart, and still have plenty of spirit. Hell, they'll go places even a mule won't go.”

The uppity fellow just shrugged.

“What's the matter,” Tess taunted, “are you afraid to buck out a horse? Afraid you'll land on your tail?”

Luis and Henry leaned against the fence and grinned. Miguel tried to hide a smile.

The stranger met her eyes with an unruffled gaze. “I can stick a saddle as good as most others.” He crossed his arms on that broad chest. His eyes, almost green in the morning sunlight, twinkled with something that might be amusement, and that twinkle was the last straw for Tess.

“You can, can you?”

“Usually.”

“You want to put your bony backside where your mouth is, cowboy?”

He smiled. “You think you can stick a horse better than I can?”

“It's likely.”

“That would be a surprise.”

“Then get ready to be surprised.”

Rojo whined, gave his new friend a sympathetic look, then trotted over to join the men, who looked on, grinning hugely. Even Miguel, usually more cautious, didn't bother to hide his anticipation of a good time coming up. There was nothing a cowboy loved better than a good bronc-riding contest.

Well, they wouldn't get to see much of a contest, Tess told herself smugly. There wasn't a man on this place she couldn't outride, and she expected to laugh long and hard when this uppity jackass left his butt print in the dust.

“Okay—what was your name, cowboy?”

That got his goat just a bit. Tess could tell.

“Joshua Ransom.”

“Okay, Joshua Ransom. I'll let you prove how well you ride, and then we'll let the men decide who's got the upper hand when it come to horses. You game?”

His smile shone with confidence. “I'm game.”

“Good enough.” She grinned wickedly. “Henry, bring out Nitro.”

Miguel's brows shot up. “Nitro?”

“We want to give our friend here a challenge, don't we?”

Miguel just shook his head as a grinning Henry sprinted toward the barn. “Nitro's a stallion we haven't been able to ride,” he told Josh. “We keep him for breeding, but he's a wild one under saddle.”

Tess smirked. “Even my daddy couldn't sit Nitro for long, and there's more than one cowboy who owes this horse a broken bone or two. Nitro likes to be creative and see how far and how high he can toss anything that climbs on his back. Want to back out?”

Now he looked a little concerned. “Which one of us is going to ride him?”

“We both are. We'll take turns and see who stays on longest. I'll cut you a break and go first. Maybe he'll be tired by the time you get on him.”

Luis chuckled. “Or angry.”

Tess just chuckled. She was about to get revenge for a cold night spent in a chair, and if she got some bumps and bruises in the process, seeing this fellow flat in the dust would be worth the price.

Nitro came out of the barn snorting steam into the early morning air. He was a horse who enjoyed a good romp—a romp in his mind being a chance to break someone's bones and then stomp him into the dirt.

They snubbed the stallion to a post to get the saddle onto his back, but he stood in docile patience. Nitro knew the drill, and he looked forward to wreaking a little havoc.

“I'll go first,” Tess said cheerfully. “Miguel, ear him down while I get on.”

When Miguel let go of Nitro's ear, the horse exploded. Tess knew she couldn't stick for long, but she figured her performance would be better than anyone else attempting to ride the demon. He bucked, twisted, sunfished, and did everything but turn himself inside out to send her flying. When he connected with the earth, the stiff-legged jolt nearly snapped Tess's spine, or so it felt.

As always, Nitro won. Tess connected hard and painfully with the ground, then scrambled out of the way while Rojo ducked into the corral to keep the horse occupied.

“Ten seconds,” Miguel said, checking his pocket watch. “Not bad, Miss Tess.”

She grinned at what's-his-name. “I tired him out for you.”

Nitro did not appear to be tired, though. When Josh climbed aboard, the bronc took off like a bad-tempered tornado that had just happened to touch down in the McCabe corral.

“Fifteen seconds,” Miguel noted approvingly when the intrepid rider bit dirt. “Damned good.”

“What? Fifteen seconds?”

“Sí.”

Tess's jaw tightened. “We'll see about that!”

As Tess got ready to mount again, her grinning adversary spit out a mouthful of dirt and taunted, “I tired him out for you, sweetheart.”

Tess was too busy to retort.

And so the morning went. None of the three parties involved—the man, the woman, or the horse—came close to giving in. Foam flecked Nitro's damp hide. Tess wore dirt and sweat head to toe. Her stubborn husband looked little better. Finally, when Tess went flying for the fifth time, her adversary looked at her, looked at Nitro, and shook his head.

“The horse has had enough,” he said.

Instantly, Tess's back—what small part of it wasn't bruised, battered, and scraped—went up, but before she could reply, Miguel butted in.

“He's right. Nitro will keep going until he falls over.”

Sitting in the dirt, every inch of her aching, Tess still wanted to object. She hadn't yet won. But she looked at Nitro and knew that Miguel was right. Nitro was blowing hard, too tired even to come after her for a few good stomps.

And oh, all right, her uppity husband was right, too. She sighed.

“Okay. Luis, walk him out, would you? And make sure he's good and cool before you put him away.”

“It's a draw,” Miguel announced, looking relieved.

Tess had to admire a man who could stick a horse like this fellow could. He hadn't learned to ride like that with his head stuck in a whiskey bottle. Josh Ransom. This time she would remember his name.