Masked Cowboy (Men of the White Sandy) (9 page)

“Goddammit, No Nose, what the fuck is wrong with you?” he howled from the other side of the hall.

Immediately, strong hands were under her arms, gently lifting her to her feet. “Are you okay?” Jacob asked, his eye darting between her and Buck.

“That shit-for-nothing horse of yours nearly killed me!” Buck yelled, his voice echoing throughout the tall barn. The echoes that bounced back took on a distorted sound, making him sound like something from a horror movie.

Be okay
, Jacob’s eye said.
Be okay
.

“I’m, uh, I’m fine,” Mary Beth stuttered, her head still spinning. She looked up to see Tommy Yellow Robe appear out of nowhere, grab the bucking horse’s lead and calmly circle him into an easy stop.

“
Hé únt
h
unyan hwo?
” Tommy called out, sounding surprisingly aggressive.

“
Únt
h
unye šni s’elél
,” Jacob yelled back.

“Goddammit, you know how much I hate it when you assholes don’t speak English! This is America. Learn the fucking language,” Buck snarled. “And No Nose, if you can’t control my animals, I’ll just have to get myself a new manager, won’t I?”

Jacob dropped his hands away from Mary Beth’s arms and took two steps in front of her. “I’m sorry, McGillis. It won’t happen again.”

“It better fucking not,” he screamed as he stalked out of the barn.

“
Ínš tanyán he?
” Tommy demanded.

“
Ečháš thimá yín kte kin él étunwan yo,
” Jacob ordered. Tommy dropped the horse’s lead and lit out of the barn.

“Okay, I hate to be forced to agree with the likes of that man…” Mary Beth said as she sat back down in the straw.

“Tommy wanted to know if you were okay, and I told him to make sure Buck went into the house,” Jacob quickly explained as he sat down next to her. He reached out as if he was going to stroke her hair like she’d seen him stroke the stallion but quickly drew his hand back. “I don’t want him to lurk around.”

Old memories collided with new ones. Part of her wanted to wail in pity. Why were assholes always trying to force her? And poor Robin. No horses had galloped to her rescue. No one had saved her. Mary Beth’s stomach turned. She’d worked so hard to get away from Skeevy Greevy—away from anyone that could hurt her. And where had that gotten her? Working with—she refused to say
for
—a man who considered her body an
investment
?

“Breathe,” Jacob calmly ordered as she ducked her head between her knees. “In through the nose, out through the mouth.”

She focused on the sound of his voice and was surprised when a sense of calmness filled her. The horror of the moment faded away, replaced with more of a sense of amazement at the whole stupid situation. How did he
do
that? Damn, but he was some sort of hypnotist. He had to be.

Finally, the nausea passed. She looked at him. “Jesus, Jacob, what just happened? I mean, what the hell just happened?”

“It was my fault,” he said softly. “I shouldn’t have left you alone. Not when he’s around. It won’t happen again.”

“How can you be sure of that?”

“I won’t let him hurt you,” he simply said, and she knew he wouldn’t. How weird was that? She wasn’t one to trust a man, with the lone exception of her Uncle Hank—but Jacob was different. Understatement of the century, what with the mask and—did Buck call him No Nose? Did he have a nose under there or not?

But her thoughts turned back to Robin, of the way she shut down whenever anyone mentioned Buck. Of the way Jacob tried to look after her. “How many women are you protecting from Buck McGillis?” she asked as she rubbed her bruising arm.

It was an odd thing to see such sorrow wash over his normally blank face. “I won’t be late again.”

More than just Robin. Was he counting that little girl who probably wasn’t his daughter too? “It wasn’t an accusation,” she said as he turned away from her.

He paused, not looking at her. “I know. Just a fact.”

The horse snuffed as it lifted a piece of hay from the ground. “Jacob,” she asked carefully as her mind ran back over the flurry of motion that had saved her from McGillis, “did you let the horse go?”

“No.”

She shot him her cut-the-crap look—never as good as her mom’s, but it got the job done.

“I didn’t let him go,” he protested.

“I’ve never seen you lose control of an animal.”

He sheepishly shrugged.

Realization dawned on her. “You drove him down the aisle?”

He leveled his eye at her, unreadable as always. “Worked, didn’t it?”

For the first time since she’d run into Buck, Mary Beth smiled. “I didn’t cost you your job, did I?”

“First,
you
didn’t do anything. Second, I make him too much money for him to fire me. Third, he’s all talk.”

“I don’t know about that,” she replied, scrambling to her feet. “Not a lot of that seemed all talk to me.”

“I’ll give you that. He’s all talk with men,” Jacob corrected. Mary Beth giggled, and he looked at her like maybe she’d hit the ground too hard. “What?”

“‘This is America—learn the language,’” she snickered. “He’s not too smart, is he? Lakota is more American than English is. You guys were here first.”

“Yeah, you’re okay. The mouth still works.”

Tommy cleared his throat. She hadn’t heard him come back into the barn, but suddenly there he was standing next to Jacob. “He’s in the house.”

“Hey, Tommy.” She smiled, trying to act like the whole thing had been just another day on the ranch. “Thanks for your help.”

“No problem, Doc.” He blushed, looking more like the slightly shy guy he normally was. “Next time, threaten to castrate him.”

She laughed out loud, and even Jacob chuckled. “I’ll do that, thanks.”

After that, Jacob never left her alone while she was on the ranch. From the moment the cab door opened, he was within line of sight, never taking his eye off of her until she climbed back in the Ram at the end of the day. Even then, he stood there and watched her until she drove around a curve in the road.

But instead of a claustrophobic closeness, Mary Beth felt unusually safe around him. Aside from when he’d grabbed her by the armpits and hoisted her onto her feet, he hadn’t touched her. He was close enough to defend her, but not close enough to give anyone, including her, the wrong idea. Sure, some days he still didn’t do more than grunt in response to her questions, but he was always there.

Mary Beth guessed it worked, because aside from the roaring of the Jeep past the café just before the show every night, she didn’t see Buck McGillis again.

But just seeing his Jeep cut a swath down Main Street was enough to make her sweat.

Chapter Six

One cloudy morning in late July, Bill sent her up to the ranch alone. “Got a bit of a head cold,” he explained as he reached for the tissues on his desk.

“No problem, Bill.”

“We were going to preg-check those cows,” he said before he blew his nose.

Nothing new there. “Jacob will have the chute, right?” The chute was a rickety steel contraption that was probably older than she was, but it kept the cows contained. Mary Beth always felt badly for the poor cows, but preg-checking was an important job. And besides, she was usually covered in manure from head to toe by the time she was done. The cows got their revenge all right.

“Right. And Fran has packed extra shoulder gloves,” he sniffed, unsuccessfully trying to breathe through his nose.

“I’ll be sure to thank her,” she replied, quickly escaping before Bill shared any of those germs with her.

As usual, Jacob was leaned against the barn with Mick drop-tethered next to him and Jezebel tied to the fence. “Mary Beth,” he said with a touch of the fingers to the brim of his hat. “No Bill today?”

“Head cold,” she replied with a shrug as she hefted the saddlebags out of the truck bed. “He said we’d be preg-checking. Is the chute here or out on the range?”

“Can you do it on the range?”

Mary Beth couldn’t help but roll her eyes. “Yes, I could see where you might think I wouldn’t be able to handle preg-checking cows after all these months. Seriously, Jacob.”

His eyebrow edged up just a bit as he almost smiled. God, Mary Beth thought, what a piece of work—uncharted territory just waiting to be discovered. And then her brain decided this was the exact moment to revisit the question of his underwear.

But she didn’t want to fold first, so she jammed her hands onto her hips and glared back at him, ignoring the fact that she was blushing.

Finally, he broke the silence. “The cows are up on the south edge of the ranch. Close to the rez,” he replied, gracefully gliding up onto the paint’s back. Then he looked at her as if he were trying to tell her something.

Close to the rez? Were they checking to see if a field had been used to slaughter cattle? She didn’t know. She only knew he wouldn’t tell her. Then he turned his face away.

“Then let’s get gone,” she said, relieved he wasn’t giving her that look—half-amused, half-pissed—anymore.

The trail wound far away from the parts of the ranch she’d been to, deeper into the hills. Like most of their rides, Jacob was silent, but he was acting a bit odd today. He kept turning around in the saddle like he was going to say something but then seemed to think better of it.

Finally, he pulled his horse to a stop and waited for her to come up next to him.

“Yes?”

“Have you seen the buffalo yet?” Jacob blurted out. Was he blushing?

“No,” she admitted, trying not to stare at the unexpected sight of the masked cowboy looking nervous. “Bill seems to think that if I sedate them enough, it’s no big deal, but I thought they were monster huge.”

He grinned, and Mary Beth melted just a bit. “You want to see one?”

“You hiding buffalo out here too?”

“Nope. There’s a small herd on the rez. We aren’t far.”

Something about the offer made Mary Beth want to giggle. Almost like he was asking her out, but instead of to a movie it was to go buffalo watching. She couldn’t help but wonder if this was Indian flirting.

“We won’t get trampled or anything?”

“I promise,” he replied in all seriousness, “I won’t let you get hurt.”

It was the second time he’d made that promise. As she watched him canter up over a small hill, his body moving in perfect harmony with his horse like he’d been born in a saddle, she wondered if it wasn’t already too late to make that kind of promise.

They rode on for another half hour, slowly climbing higher into the plains, farther from the ranch—and from everything else—than Mary Beth had ever been.

“Where are we?” she asked as he finally slowed down and slid off his paint.

“The center of the world,” he smirked as he grabbed her around the waist and easily lifted her off Jezebel. For just a second, his hands lingered, settling on her hips as he turned her to look out over the ridge they’d climbed.

Okay, this officially counts as a date, she hummed as his right hand trailed up her back while the left pointed out over the Great Plains. Every spot he touched positively tingled with a pleasure so acute it almost hurt.

“See?” he murmured, his mouth only a few inches from her ear. “Down below.”

The whole vista was nothing short of stunning. The buffalo were huge, but if they’d even noticed the humans a hundred feet away, they didn’t seem to care. She’d never been so alone with Jacob. She could kiss him now and no one would know.

Mary Beth’s heart began to hiccup as she tried to focus on the enormous dark shapes gliding through untouched grasses instead of the overwhelming desire to kiss him. As he lightly swept his fingers over her shoulder and down her arm, leaving a trail of goose bumps in his wake, she decided that she wasn’t getting back on that horse until she’d found out whether or not he had on any underwear. She was tempted to throw herself at him—that’s what she would have done at any other time, with any other man—but somehow, she knew he would have to be the one who made the first move. Otherwise? He might just shut down on her, be as unreadable as ever.

Suddenly, he tightened his arm around her as he gasped. Yes, Mary Beth thought. This was it. He’d made his move, now she could make hers. But then, unexpectedly, he pulled away from her. “We’ve got to go.”

She stumbled back. “Huh?”

As he mounted up, he pointed west. It was only then that she saw a huge wall of clouds quickly advancing. “Storm’s coming,” Jacob yelled as the wind surged up.

“Yeah, thanks for the weather bulletin,” she snipped as the cloud opened up, furious that she’d missed her chance to find out what kissing a man in a mask could have been like.
Great. Just what I need
.

The wind and the rain were coming down so fast that the horses were beginning to flounder. Then the wind shifted direction, furious and demanding as the hail began to pelt them.

“Jacob!” she yelped as the hail grew from peas to dimes.

In response, he turned Mick around and darted over a hill. “Come on!” he hollered back to her.