The Rancher's Dance (5 page)

But once she was sitting upright once more, his gaze had
moved circumspectly back to her face—or at least around her face, because his eyes didn't meet hers. But her breath still felt strangely short, and the brush of her robe against her nude skin felt strangely erotic.

She sipped the water, not entirely sure whether she welcomed the attraction or not.

Until she knew whether her knee would fully heal or not, she was stuck in a holding pattern. Unable to move ahead and make a life that might be wholly different from everything she'd ever worked for. Unable to move back and regain control of the life that she'd had. Either dancing again if she was very, very lucky, or at worst, accepting that being NEBT's ballet master was simply the next stage in her life as a dancer.

Whether she appreciated her attraction to Beck or not, her blood was humming in her veins in a way it had not for a very long time—even before Lars's defection—and her nipples were so tight they were nearly painful. The kind of painful that was only assuaged by a man's touch.

Beck's touch.

Her gaze had dropped to his long-fingered hands, and realizing it, she felt a flush bloom hotly across her face.

She quickly lifted the water glass and drained it. “So, uh, how long have you lived in Weaver?”

“Year and a half.”

“Caleb said you're an architect? From Denver?”

He nodded once.

Didn't offer any elaboration. Didn't make any attempt at all at conversation, for that matter.

She wasn't used to feeling tongue-tied or out of her element. She was usually comfortable around most people; could usually find something to talk about with anyone, whether they were reporters or ballet patrons or strangers on the street.

She looked at Beck Ventura, who still wore a wedding ring despite the fact that he was widowed, who had chilly shadows deep inside his eyes, and all she had were questions that she didn't feel comfortable asking and an attraction that she was fairly certain was returned. And even more unwanted on his part than it was on hers, judging by the expression on his face.

She wished she hadn't finished off the water so quickly and moistened her lips. “So, what brought you from Denver to our little old town of Weaver?”

A fresh shadow came and went in his eyes. He looked toward the doorway as if he wanted to get to it just as badly as she'd wanted to get to the pain pills that she hated being weak enough to need, before her knee had simply given out while she'd been climbing the stairs.

“My wife was born here.” His answer was as abrupt as the way he suddenly pushed himself out of the chair. “I need to get home.” He didn't look at her as he headed toward the door, only to stop halfway there. “Do you need anything?” The question was almost dripping with reluctance, but something about the way he waited told her that he wouldn't go until he had an answer. An honest one.

She thought about the bottle of pain pills that she'd been pretty darn intent on getting to earlier, when her regular dose of over-the-counter hadn't done the job.

“I'm fine,” she said quietly. Sincerely. Because she'd finally figured out what was behind that cold solemnness in his eyes.

And what was a bum knee in comparison to a broken heart?

L
ucy knew that it wouldn't be long after her arrival before the rest of the family began descending on her.

For one thing, she might as well have announced she was back by megaphone while standing in the center of town considering that she'd stopped in to Colbys Bar & Grill the night that she'd arrived in town.

There was one sure way to get gossip started in the town of Weaver, Wyoming, and that was to show your face in the most popular watering hole on Main Street.

And even though she'd touched base with most of them on the telephone the morning before to assure them that she was fending for herself quite well at the Lazy-B, they soon started arriving.

First came her grandparents bearing coffee and oversize sticky cinnamon rolls that they'd picked up at Ruby's Café on their way through town from their home on the Double-C ranch.

Gloria and Squire Clay technically weren't Lucy's grandparents. Gloria and Squire had been married for as long as Lucy could remember, but Squire had already raised five adult sons by that time, and Gloria had raised Belle and her twin sister, Nikki. And Belle was Lucy's stepmother. But those kinds of distinctions had never mattered when it came to the family that her father had married into.

To the Clays and everyone who came under their umbrella, family was family. Love was love.

It was that simple.

So Lucy swallowed her protests that she was fine and didn't need them worrying about her and let Gloria, who was a retired nurse, fuss over her knee and let Squire, who'd become an unrepentant and somewhat wily nosy body in his later years, guilt her into eating not only half of one of the decadent rolls, but the whole darned thing.

Spaghetti the night before.

Fat, fluffy cinnamon rolls now.

She'd be working out for hours just to calm her conscience.

Then, before Gloria and Squire departed, one of Lucy's cousins, Sarah Scalise, showed up with her three kids in tow.

The house just got more crowded as the morning wore on.

And even though Lucy was truly delighted to see each and every one of them, she couldn't help but be aware of the silence from the back of the house where the day before had come the sound of Beck's power tools and hammer.

He hadn't shown up that morning at all.

Because of that strange, stilted dance they'd conducted over his mercy package of spaghetti? Or because of something that had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with her?

A part of her chided herself for thinking that
she
might have had any disturbing effect on the man strong enough to make him keep his distance. But another part of her knew that…disturbing…had definitely been one of the things floating in the air between them.

“So, we'll all meet at Colbys tomorrow night,” Sarah was saying as she stood in the doorway, keeping a weather eye out on her two thirteen-year-olds—Eli and Megan—as they kept their four-year-old brother, Ben, occupied in the front yard. “Girls' night out.” She'd already made plans with the rest of the cousins to meet in town. “We'll catch up on all the gossip and drink until we're silly and my husband's deputy sheriffs will have to drive us all home.” She grinned. “Sound good?”

“Sounds great.” Lucy had a smile on her lips because she
was
looking forward to it, but she also knew her gaze kept straying past her cousin to search the road for signs of a dark blue pickup truck.

“Sure you don't want me to come out and get you?” Sarah lived in the town proper, whereas most everyone else lived in the outlying rural areas, like the Lazy-B.

“I drove here all the way from New York,” Lucy reminded her wryly. “I think I can make it into town from here.”

“And I still can't believe that you rented a car to drive it,” Sarah returned. “It would have been so much quicker to fly.”

Lucy shrugged. “I like to drive.” She was not averse to flying, but she'd needed the long hours on wide-open roads to get her head together and shake off the worst of her feelings about what she'd left behind.

In one part, she'd been fairly successful.

She could think about the cheating pig, for example,
without wanting to break something. Namely his handsome face.

In another part, however, she had accomplished nothing. Because she was no closer to knowing what to do with her life if she couldn't go back as a dancer than she had been when she'd packed up her dressing room at NEBT.

As she left, Sarah was still shaking her head as if she couldn't fathom Lucy's decision. “See you tomorrow evening,” she called as she corralled her kids into her SUV.

Lucy nodded and waved, and even after her cousin was long gone, she kept checking the road for signs of Beck.

Eventually, she told herself she was being ridiculous and made herself stop. She'd dressed in her usual workout clothes—stretchy camisole and dance pants—when she'd finally made it up the stairs that morning. After having slept on the couch all night with her knee elevated on a pillow, it had settled down so well that she'd been able to go up and down the stairs with very little difficulty at all.

She filled a water bottle, grabbed her cell phone and headed across her freshly mowed grass toward the old barn that was situated closest to the house.

It was there that her father had put together a virtual at-home rehab unit when she'd been twelve, and the very basic notion of walking again had been nearly out of reach. All of the equipment was still there, situated in a partioned area that consumed half of the barn's space along with a portable dance floor that she'd had installed herself nearly ten years ago. Neither were exactly state-of-the-art, but everything was perfectly maintained and perfectly serviceable for Lucy's purposes.

There was a boom box that was as old as she was stored on the shelves that her father had built, alongside fat, folded tumbling mats and towels that—when she plucked one off the stack—smelled freshly laundered.

Which meant, she thought with a vague smile, that Belle was probably still using the barn as a workout space. Her father had never needed to use equipment or weights to stay in shape, not when he had an entire ranch as his workout arena.

She plugged in the boom box, popped in a random CD from the stack of them on the shelf and dragged down one of the thick mats, flipping it out in the center of the floor in front of the mirror that lined one wall.

Then, with the sound of some New Agey music that Belle must have chosen filling the lofty space, Lucy got down to work.

 

It was the music that got his attention. More specifically, it got Shelby's attention, which meant that Beck couldn't just ignore it because he figured it was coming from the dancer anyway.

He somehow doubted that Caleb Buchanan was the one responsible for the lush orchestration of some classical music that his mind recognized even if he couldn't identify the composer.

It had been a hectic morning, not helped by the fact that the leader of Shelby's day camp had come down sick and cancelled the day. And Stan had an AA meeting over in Braden that he attended every week on Friday mornings, after which he was driving down to Cheyenne to pick up Nick, who was flying in that afternoon from Princeton.

The second Beck parked the truck where he usually did near the house, Shelby hopped out, clutching Gertrude the rabbit. Like a dog scenting game, his daughter jerked her head around as she listened for the source of the music. “What's that?”

“Sounds like music to me.” He grabbed the bag of books and toys he'd pulled together to keep her entertained, then
lifted his toolbox from the truck bed and went around the truck to her. “Come on.” He touched the top of her silky head. “I'm working around the back of the house.”

Once he had her situated in the shade nearby, he figured he could get in at least a good hour or two before the afternoon was spent. The trick, he knew, was to make sure Shelby stayed occupied. Because once she got bored, there was no way he'd be able to get any real work accomplished.

“It's coming from over there,” Shelby whispered. She was squinting into the sunlight as she pointed her finger toward the older of the two barns.

The only reason Beck knew what the barn contained was because half of the building supplies he'd ordered for the project were stored there until he'd need them.

He had an image of Lucy hobbling her way from the house over to the barn and felt his nerves tightening up.

He set the toolbox and Shelby's bag on a stack of lumber, and took his daughter's hand. “Come on.”

She gave him a startled look, but hurried to keep up with him as he strode to the barn.

The door was pushed open to the warm afternoon, and as they stepped through, the music was so loud that it was almost deafening.

And his heart damn near stopped in his throat when he saw Lucy sprawled face down, unmoving, on one of the wide blue mats that had been spread out atop the dark gray floor that took up most of the space.

Curses floated inside his head. He should have had the presence of mind to keep Shelby at bay. He let go of her hand. “Stay here.” He didn't wait for any more of an answer than her widening eyes, before he strode across the springy floor.

He reached Lucy's side and crouched next to her. Mem
ories of the day he'd found his wife collapsed in their home crowded his mind, making his stomach churn and his hand shake as he reached out to touch the back of that blond head. “Luc—”

Her head whipped up, her hair flying out around her back. Her pale blue eyes were clearly startled. “Beck!”

Relief froze him into place. His heart climbed back out of his throat. Nausea seeped away.

And all that was left was anger.

“Goddammit, Lucy,” he cursed softly. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Working out,” she said and her voice had turned just as chilly as her eyes. “Not that it's any of your business.” She pushed up to her hands and knees and he could see the sheen of sweat on her face and her chest above the low scoop of her clinging pink shirt. A sheen that was echoed on her bare shoulders and arms.

“Working out?” He nearly choked. “Last night you couldn't even make it up a staircase.”

Her lips tightened. “That was last night.” She straightened her knees beneath her, sending her rear end—perfectly displayed in body-molding black pants that ended around her ankles—up in the air, and with her hands still planted on the mat in front of him, stretched. “And if you don't mind, I'd like to finish my stretching.” She lowered her head and the long, thick strands of her nearly white hair slid over her shoulders to coil on the mat between her hands.

He scrubbed his hand down his face and sat back on his butt. Images swirled inside his head. Harmony, racked with pain that he couldn't alleviate as her eyes begged for release. Lucy, lithe, slender and golden, as she watched him with those otherworldly, sultry eyes.

And now that body was on display in a clinging fabric
that assured him that even though she was thin, that thinness was comprised of perfectly sculpted flesh. Lean. Strong. Female…

“Daddy?”

He jerked, feeling like a damn kid caught staring at something forbidden, and Lucy's head whipped up again.

He was used to his daughter's half-whispered voice, was always attuned to it. But how Lucy heard it above the music was something else.

She straightened slowly and the blue of her eyes warmed as she spotted his pint-size daughter.

She sent Beck a questioning look before she moved across the mat and hit a button on a large, outdated boom box. The music ceased and the silence that came after it seemed almost as deafening. “Who is this?” she asked. She walked toward Shelby, her gentle question clearly meant for his daughter.

Shelby was staring wide-eyed at Lucy, her stuffed rabbit clutched protectively to her chest.

Beck shoved to his feet.

Despite the pain he'd seen on Lucy's face the previous day, the way she was moving now told him that his worry had been for nothing.

She moved as smoothly as water flowing over rocks.

And watching her was just as mesmerizing.

Dammit.

“This is my daughter. Shelby.” He headed toward her. “And we'll get out of your hair.”

Lucy gave him a thin look and deliberately stepped behind his daughter, neatly cutting off his exit. Then she bent her knees until she was on Shelby's level. “I'm Lucy.” She stuck out her hand as if she were meeting an adult. “And it's very nice to meet you, Shelby.”

Shelby blinked a little, then shyly extended her own
hand. Lucy's smile widened, revealing that dimple again, as they shook. Then she tugged on the rabbit's fabric ear. “And who is this?”

“Gertrude,” Shelby answered so promptly that Beck nearly did a double take.

“Hello, Gertrude,” Lucy greeted the rabbit and shook one of the faded paws. “I'll bet you and Shelby are the very best of friends.”

Beck's gut tightened again. “Come on, Shelby. I've still got some work to do before Grandpa gets back with Nick.” He held out his hand and his daughter obediently tucked her narrow fingers into his. He sidestepped around Lucy.

“You're here to work?” Lucy straightened again, somehow managing yet again to block his exit.

“What else would I be here for?”

Her gaze flickered, and his head filled again with the way she'd felt the night before when he'd carried her to the couch.

The way she'd felt.

The way she'd looked.

And the fact that he
had
looked, just as he did now.

His hand tightened around Shelby's. “Come on, peanut.”

“Wait.” Again Lucy stopped him. “What's Shelby going to do?”

His jaw was so tight that it felt like his molars were grinding to dust. “She has her books and toys.”

“She could stay here with me,” Lucy suggested, clearly not swayed by his abruptness. Her gaze slipped away from his to look at his daughter. “We could get to know each other.” She smiled at Shelby.