Cowboy at Midnight

She twisted a strand of her long, blond hair around a fingertip. Being busy and keeping herself surrounded with people were her drugs of choice. Constant work and constant people kept the real demons at bay—at least, most of the time. Her number-one client called her night and day. That was a good thing.

On nights when she hadn’t pushed herself to the point of exhaustion, her demons attacked her full force. Sometimes she saw Lexie’s face in a deep pool of water with her red hair flowing all around her. Sometimes she heard Lexie’s laughter. Sometimes she dreamed she was riding endlessly over dark water, calling Lexie’s name.

As she had so many times in the past, Amy tried to pray. She squeezed her eyes shut, but her heart felt too numb. Instead of forming coherent thoughts, her mind went blank.

“God, please hear my silent cry,” she finally whispered in despair as her hopelessness consumed her.

Opening her eyes, Amy caught the funereal scent of roses. She sighed again and let go of her hair. Eight lush, velvety red blossoms wrapped in pink tissue lay on the leather seat beside her cell phone. The flowers had been expensive. She’d meant to give them to Lexie. This time she’d really meant to get out and walk up to her grave.

She still meant to, only when she leaned across the seat and lifted the bouquet, a thorn pricked her through the tissue paper. Then just as she touched the door handle, her cell phone rang. She picked it up.

She tensed when she read Carole Burke in vivid blue.

Mother.

Amy frowned and set the phone back down. When it finally stopped ringing, she touched the door handle. Again her hand froze, just as it always did, and her throat went tight and scratchy.

Folding her hands in her lap, she just sat there for several more minutes and endured the silence and the heat that intensified the sickly fragrance of the roses, until finally she tossed them onto the backseat. They would wilt and turn black before she noticed them again.

As she started the Camry, she was almost glad about the long, stressful day ahead of her, almost glad she was going out to dinner tonight with Betsy. At least she wouldn’t be home alone on this night of all nights, her thirtieth birthday.

Thirty. She was thirty.

Eight years ago Lexie had given her a wild birthday party on Lake Mondo. Amy hadn’t had another birthday party since. She never even let her parents bake her a cake.

Even so, she had to go out tonight, not to celebrate, but to avoid her mother’s calls, to avoid the empty walls of her apartment and the awful silence, as well. And the dreams. She couldn’t face her dreams.

Thirty. She was thirty.

She was alive…and yet in some ways, she felt less alive than Lexie.

Damn! Steve Fortune knew he wasn’t much of a cook. Hell, he was supposed to be the owner of this establishment, not the cook. Try telling that to Amos, who hadn’t shown up on the busiest night of the week.

Steve’s left forefinger throbbed where he’d just burned it frying hamburger patties. He needed a beer—fast—to soothe his frayed nerves.

It was ladies’ night at the Shiny Pony Bar and Grill on Sixth Street in Austin, Texas, and so, as usual, his trendy bar was jammed with beautiful women seeking cheap booze and the admiration of urban cowboys who showed up to amuse them.

Men like me, he thought cynically. Steve was thirty-six, too old for this sort of mating game. Too smart, too. After all, he was the smart triplet. At least, that’s the story he tried to sell his brothers.

The girls with their long, satiny hair and their slim hips encased in skintight jeans looked young as they stood at the sturdy wooden bar beside all the liquor and fancy glasses that were stacked sky high. Hell, these girls looked way too young and naive for what he had in mind.

Madison.

Why the hell had Madison chosen to show up this morning on Cabot’s arm when they met to sign the formal papers? She’d had that wounded look in her eyes that carved out his heart and made Steve wonder if Cabot was taking care of her.

She’s not your responsibility anymore.

Sucking on his blistered finger, Steve sank into an out-of-the-way booth where he could watch the action in the shadow-filled room charged with an overload of testosterone and estrogen. The dark lighting, high ceilings, huge beams and scuffed, wood floors made for a cozy, casual atmosphere.

He should have fired Amos for being late again. It was the third time in thirty days. But Steve had been desperate to have a night off, so he’d merely nodded when Amos had finally shown up. He’d ripped off his grease-spattered apron and tossed it at the redheaded kid with too many piercings. Then Amos had mouthed the usual apologies for oversleeping again. Hell, Steve was a softie when it came to firing people.

“Don’t make it a habit,” Steve had warned, barely holding on to his temper before he’d slammed out of the swinging doors of his kitchen.

Steve hated calls on his cell at the end of a long day at his ranch to come pinch hit at the Shiny Pony Bar and Grill. He hated being dependent on irresponsible kids like Amos. He wanted out of the restaurant/bar business. The sooner, the better! Not that the Shiny Pony didn’t coin money, but it took management. Hell, he wouldn’t have a ranch if it weren’t for this place. There was big money in a trendy bar, but if Steve wasn’t here all the time, his help got creative. Real creative. Either they didn’t show or cash, booze and food evaporated into thin air.

A vision of Madison—blond, golden with pain-filled eyes—arose before him. God, she’d looked great this morning in that white silk suit with her golden hair swept sleekly back from her thin face.

Steve signaled Jeff, his number-one bartender, for a beer. After a beer, or maybe two, he wanted a woman, preferably a brainless, buxom brunette with a bad-girl body she knew what to do with. Next he wanted to take all his phones off the hook, read his book about ancient Greek wars and get a good night’s sleep, preferably alone, so he’d be fresh for his meeting with the governor tomorrow morning. If that was ruthless, he had his reasons—reason.

Madison.

Not that Steve was in a rush to pick up a bimbo. Truth to tell, such women bored the hell out of him. After all, he was supposed to be the intellectual in his family. The smart triplet. He dreaded the preliminary flirtations and idiotic maneuvers necessary to bed such a woman.

Hey, smart triplet, idiocy and boredom equal self-preservation.

Still wearing his jeans, work boots and sweat-stained Stetson, he leaned back in the tall, dark booth while he grimly eyed the pretty women clustered around little tables and booths. When a beautiful young brunette at the bar, who was braless in a tank top, smiled at him, he frowned until he saw Jeff flying toward his table with a frosty mug of Corona.

“Here you go, boss. Three slices of lime just the way you like it.”

“Thanks.”

Steve squeezed the limes and then took a slow swig of beer. The familiar knots in his muscles meant he was exhausted from a long day at his ranch, followed by his stint of playing stand-in cook after Jeff had called him. After signing papers at his lawyer’s office, where he’d seen Madison, Steve had spent the morning arguing with construction crews about the delays in the restoration of his historical ranch house. At noon his meeting with his architect and contractor had been tense, to say the least.

In less than six months he would be hosting the big, prestigious, annual Hensley-Robinson Awards Banquet because this year the governor had chosen to honor Ryan Fortune, who just happened to be Steve’s good friend, distant cousin and mentor.

His damn house had to be ready. What could he do to make James, his laid-back, good-ol’-boy contractor, who liked to hunt and fish at least once a week and every sunny weekend, understand that?

Then there was Dixon. Dixon was turning into a helluva pest. Steve had wasted the afternoon in the hot sun watching men survey the pastures of his legendary ranch, the Loma Vista, because Dixon, his neighbor to the east, was disputing the one-hundred-year-old fence line between the properties.

Dixon had wanted to buy the ranch himself. He’d given Steve trouble about the title ever since Steve had bought the place from old Mel Foster.

Not that Steve wanted to rehash his day. Hell, he wanted to forget it. He’d intended to celebrate an anniversary of sorts and a victory and then to party with the lady of his choice.

The Shiny Pony Bar and Grill was now his, all his. As of this morning, no more meetings with Larry Cabot, his former partner and former best friend. Betraying best friend, he reminded himself. No more Madison Beck, either. He was done once and for all with her, even if she was his ex-fiancée, whom he’d loved. Hell, she’d broken his heart exactly one year ago to the day.

Would he ever forget standing at the altar, waiting for her, all eyes drilling him while “Here Comes the Bride” was played for the fifth time?

Steve forced a deep breath. Finally he could close the book on the sorry chapter of his life in which Cabot and Madison had starred.

Steve had told everybody who would listen that he resented her for jilting him for Cabot, his former college buddy, who’d been born with more money than God, as had four generations of Cabots before him.

So why did he ache every time he even thought about Madison? Because she was lovely and so vulnerable, he still worried about her. Because she needed to be told and shown constantly that she was beautiful and loved. Cabot was too arrogant to tend to anyone’s needs other than his own.

Steve had wanted to take care of her for the rest of their lives. Her parents had died when she was eight, leaving her to grow up poor and abandoned. Underneath her glamorous facade, she’d been a scared little girl in need of love. He’d been determined to make her feel safe. As it had turned out, money represented real security to her.

Cabot and he had owned a couple of restaurants with bars downtown. Steve had bought out Cabot’s interest in this place while selling him his own interest in the Lonesome Saloon, which, unfortunately, was just across the street. From time to time, he would probably run into Cabot. Only, now they wouldn’t have to speak or work together. He probably wouldn’t see much of Madison anymore.

Even as his heart ached, Steve’s mouth twisted. “Cheers,” he growled in a low voice as his callused hand tightened on the handle of his mug.

“Goodbye, Madison.” With a supreme effort he lifted his mug and willed her to stop haunting him.

One day at a time. One night at a time. That had been his mantra ever since his screwed-up wedding day. His triplet brothers, Miles and Clyde, who ribbed him about everything, still hadn’t dared to even breathe Madison’s name in his presence or mention the wedding. Jack, his older brother, whom Steve had idolized as a child, had suffered too much heartbreak himself to ever embarrass Steve about his.

Steve glanced toward the long-haired brunette at the bar in the tight red tank top. The skinny blond kid who was standing beside her kept edging his drink closer to hers. If Steve wanted her, he’d better get a move on.

To hell with her.

“No woman will ever turn me into a chump like that again,” he vowed aloud, addressing the brunette, who smiled at him and batted her lashes even as she leaned against the kid, nudging his bulging bicep with her breast.

To hell with her. The last thing Steve would ever do was pick a fight with a paying customer over a woman.

Steve glanced away—straight into the haunted eyes of a smoldering golden-haired, golden-skinned babe, who at first glance seemed an exact replica of Madison.

Run!

She stared straight into his eyes and held them and him perfectly still for an endless moment.

His pulse quickened.

No blondes, you fool.

He told himself that smart guys learned from their mistakes.

Smart or not, his blood coursed through him like a molten rush. Blondes, not to mention Madison clones, were no-no’s, and the little voices in his head began shouting all the familiar warnings.

The blonde crossed her long legs and then uncrossed them, very very slowly. Her black spandex skirt was so short, he got a glimpse of matching black lace panties.

Mesmerized, Steve let his gaze crawl up her legs. When she oozed forward on her bar stool, her glossy red smile widened. He could not stop staring at her—at her lips, at her body. He kept hoping against hope she’d shift her position on that damn stool and uncross and cross those gorgeous legs again. He wanted more of those thighs and black lace.

Her companion was a stunning black girl with big hair and skin the color of caramel. A tight red sheath hugged her slim body. Gold bangles gleamed at her throat and ears. When she caught him watching the blonde, she winked sassily and shot him a toothy grin. Then a cowboy came up to her and asked her to dance. She melted into the tall man’s arms, leaving the coast clear for Steve. When she began to undulate on the dance floor, everybody in the bar except Steve watched her.

Through narrowed dark eyes, Steve refocused on the blonde. She was slender, rather than voluptuous, classy looking in spite of her skimpy outfit.

In the right clothes, say a white silk suit like the one Madison had worn this morning, she would fit on his arm anywhere. He could even take her home to meet Mom in Manhattan and the brothers.

Squash that thought.

Her creamy, honey-colored skin—thanks to low-cut black spandex, he could see a lot of that, too—and her rippling yellow hair looked so soft he wanted to wrap her body around his and carry her out to the back alley and take her against a wall caveman style. He wanted to smother his face in her hair and then rip that little nothing of a skirt off and yank down her panties. He wanted to touch her, to kiss her, to taste her—now. He wanted her mouth on his body, kissing him everywhere. He wanted her so badly, he knew he should run.

Why her? Her narrow face wasn’t conventionally pretty. Her mouth was too large, her slender nose too long, her cheekbones too high and pronounced. She was too tall probably and too slim for him, as well. But her big sad eyes that tilted upward at the corners lured him in some unfathomable way.

The voices in his head had given up. As he shoved his Stetson back, Steve’s gaze drifted from the blonde’s mouth to her small, firm breasts, down her waist, down her hips and then lower, skimming the length of her long, tanned legs again. She wore black cowboy boots embroidered with red roses. He knew boots. Hers were custom-made.

She broke the gaze, releasing him. Then she puckered her wet, shiny mouth and slowly bent forward so that her breasts, small as they were, bulged enticingly as she blew out the birthday candle on the tiny chocolate cupcake he hadn’t noticed before in the middle of the little round table.

Hell, was that a tiny tattoo above her left breast?

It sure as hell was. He hated tattoos. So would Mom. So would his triplet brothers.

Forget Mom and Clyde and Miles.

Her black-lashed eyes lifted to his again, and her mouth curved when she realized he was still watching her.

She was something all right. And she knew it. She was good at this. She probably trolled somewhere different every night.

The cowboy to his right was giving her the eye, too. Jealousy washed Steve in a hot green wave. In that black spandex miniskirt and the low-cut black blouse with hunky coral jewelry at her throat and wrists, she was the hottest woman in the bar. If he didn’t go after her, some other guy sure as hell would.

Steve’s hand on his mug froze. Her enormous light-colored eyes were too sweet and sad for words.

She looked lost—just like Madison had this morning. Just like his brother Jack used to after Ann’s death. Suddenly Steve wanted very badly to know why she was hurting. Even though he didn’t want to be involved, he felt connected, which meant he should run. He removed his Stetson, placed it on the table and ran his hands through his short dark-brown hair. Then he took a long pull from his mug.

He wanted her. Only her. Maybe because he couldn’t have Madison. The situation scared the hell out of him. Still, he said the predictable sort of prayer all horny bastards say in bars after a beer or two when they see a pretty woman they want.

Please, make her a nymphomaniac. At least for tonight.

He hoped the Man Upstairs was listening. Tightening his grip on his beer, he shoved back from his table and arose awkwardly.

Time to make his move.

As he swaggered toward her, his boots thudding heavily on the rough wooden boards, he felt like an actor in a bad play. Ever since his fatal wedding day, crowds gave him claustrophobia. The closer he got to her, the more the other people in the bar seemed to stare.

He wasn’t even halfway across the room when the walls started pressing closer and his breathing grew labored. He was gulping for air when another cowboy on the way to the bar shoved him, jarring him back to reality.

The voices in his head began to scream. No blondes, dummy. No blondes.

“Sorry,” the cowboy said with a sheepish grin.

“Sure,” Steve grunted as his throat squeezed shut.

Jeff signaled him.

No way could he talk to the blonde now.

Beyond Jeff, he saw an exit sign. Blindly he veered toward it, stumbled over a chair leg and sent two chairs flying. When he righted them, his legs felt heavier. Every step was impossibly difficult. He felt as if he was slogging through knee-deep mud.

Hell.

“Wait! Your hat!” a velvet voice cried behind him.

He turned and saw the black girl in the red sheath waving his Stetson at him.

To hell with his hat! He’d buy another one.

Then the blonde snatched it out of her friend’s hand and slowly put it on. It was way too big for her, but she looked cuter than hell when she peeped at him from underneath the brim with her huge, lost eyes.

Her mouth curved in a sweet, sad smile that made him want to save her from whatever the hell was bothering her.

Run!

Two

A my felt flushed. Was it the Flirtita, a fruity variation of a Margarita, that she was drinking that was making her feel light-headed and bolder than usual? Or was it the wild drumbeat of the music pulsing inside her like a second heartbeat?

“Wait!” Rasa yelled.

Amy couldn’t believe Rasa. She was too much. When the tall, dark cowboy didn’t answer the impossible girl or turn around, Rasa strolled back to Amy’s table with his hat, her pretty mouth petulant.

“He’s leaving! I can’t believe your hot-to-trot cowboy is galloping for the hills! You’d better get up and take him his hat, baby.”

Amy jumped up and then forced herself to sit back down.

She wanted to run after him.

The evening was definitely out of control, and that scared Amy, who was into control—normally.

“I don’t know what got into me. Coming here…with you…tonight of all nights. And flirting with him. What am I doing here?”

Amy slapped her own cheek so hard it stung. She had to get a grip, if not on Rasa, on herself.

“It’s your birthday. You’re thirty. You’re having a Margarita.”

“A Flirtita,” Amy corrected. “Specialty of the house. And it’s strong. Too strong.”

Or maybe it just seemed strong because she hadn’t had any alcohol for eight years.

“Maybe I’ll try one.” When Rasa held up her hand to signal a waiter, Amy grabbed her wrist and lowered it.

“Oh, no, you don’t.”

“So, what’s wrong with flirting a little when a guy’s that cute?”

I could tell you what’s wrong. If you had my memories, you’d understand.

“You might as well be dead if you don’t live a little,” Rasa said, waving his hat at him again.

Dead.

The charged word echoed in Amy’s bruised heart and soul as she shakily sipped her Flirtita and tried to pretend all she felt was a haughty nonchalance. She wasn’t about to tell Rasa, whom she barely knew, about her visit to the cemetery, which was partly why she felt so crazy and out of control tonight.

When Rasa waved the cowboy hat again, Amy jumped up and grabbed it. “Would you stop?” The room whirled. She had to quit sipping this delicious drink.

The hat was still warm and damp around the headband because he’d worn it and worked in it. She caught the sharp, masculine scent of his cologne. Hardly knowing what she did, Amy flipped the battered hat over and then glanced toward him again. Without even realizing her intention, she put it on her head. When it sank to midbrow, she spun it around on her head, feeling like a kid playing dress-up.

Oh, God, what was she doing? Making a pass at a…stranger? Wearing his hat? She should have known the last place she should have come to was a cowboy bar with posters of cowgirls riding horses on the walls, not to mention Flirtitas. The posters and the sweet fruit drink mixed with vodka had made her feel crazy. All of a sudden she was remembering how it felt to be young and to ride like the wind under a blazing sun. To be happy. To trust in the beauty of life itself. To feel immortal.

Amy’s hand tightened around the stem of her cold, wet glass. She had no right to flirt with anybody ever, even if he was dark and broad-shouldered and the hunkiest guy she’d seen in years.

Flirtita or no Flirtita, hunk or no hunk, she couldn’t lose control. She was damaged and dangerous and therefore determined never to hurt anybody else, not even herself, ever again.

“Look,” she began softly, removing his hat and placing it very firmly on the table. “Rasa, I don’t come to bars. I don’t pick up strange men. Especially not cowboys. I work. That’s all I do.”

“Why not cowboys? You prejudiced or something?”

“No. It’s because—” She looked up into Rasa’s dark, imploring eyes. “Just because.”

“Okay, so you met one bad cowboy.”

“No!” You don’t understand. Again, she felt too near some dangerous edge. Defiantly Amy swirled her Flirtita glass so vigorously the liquid flashed like angry fire.

“Are you going to punish yourself forever?”

“You don’t understand.”

“Betsy has told me a little.”

“Really? Well, she doesn’t know the half of it, okay?”

“Not okay. Baby, he’s still watching you while he talks to that bartender. It’s not too late. Maybe you should go over there and—”

“No.”

“You should definitely lighten up.”

“If I do that, anything could happen.”

“So let it.”

Amy set her glass down by the beige Stetson. He’d looked so handsome in that rumpled hat. So dark and virile and absolutely adorable. Intending to push the hat away, she pulled it toward her and stroked the brim with a trembling fingertip.

“You’re way too serious,” Rasa persisted.

Why should I listen to advice from someone I’ve known all of two hours? Someone who doesn’t have a clue what kind of person I really am?

“You should try to be friendly.” Rasa’s hand squeezed hers gently. “Maybe then you’d meet some interesting people and move on.” Her voice softened. “Betsy says you bury yourself alive.”

“Maybe I don’t want to move on.”

“Or maybe you just need a helping hand.”

Amy yanked her hand free and drained the last of her Flirtita. “Betsy’s a big one to talk.”

“Hey, he just looked at you again.”

Amy didn’t smile or look his way or even look at Rasa, who was staring at her way too intently now. The words dead and bury had Amy too tense and scared to think what she should do. She had to get out of here. She had to get back to her safe, controlled life.

“Rasa, you said one drink and we’d go to dinner.”

“And I haven’t finished my drink.”

“Because you won’t drink it.”

Rasa laughed.

“If only Betsy were here,” Amy said.

“You wouldn’t be here if Betsy were here. You two would be at that boring restaurant she told me about. You’d be taking a rash of heat over the cell phone from your number-one client, and she’d be reading her book.”