Rodeo Father

“Let me.”

Udall shot him a surprised look. “You sure? You only just got here.”

“I’m sure. Just spent too many days on the road. I’m itchy to get out on the land.”

Udall smiled approvingly. They mounted and rode on.

So darned glad to be back in the country, Travis breathed deeply of fresh air purer than anything he’d ever found in any city.

His worries fell away, leaving only the wind in his ears, the sun on the prairie and the warmth of the animal beneath him.

Chapter Two

Rachel McGuire rested her head against the inanimate pony’s unforgiving neck, unsure whether to laugh or have a good, hard cry.

What on earth had just happened to her poor battered heart?

The second she’d laid eyes on the new arrival, Travis Read, she’d been attracted to him.

What kind of man could melt her hardened heart with just a look from blazing blue eyes, the rustiest of smiles and so few words? And not just her heart, but also her pregnant body, waking it from a long slumber.

Could the timing possibly be worse?

What kind of poor, dumb fool was she for finding a man so attractive when she was more than seven months pregnant, and as big as that horse she’d heard shuffling in his trailer?

She’d wanted to flirt. But why would he ever be interested in her?

That smile? When he’d ridden the carousel? Oh, sweet heavenly pumpkins, pure and utter joy.

She’d given him a simple ride on a carousel, and he’d smiled at her as though she’d hung the moon.

And all of that lovely warmth and admiration she’d basked in had come to a crashing halt when he’d seen her belly.

Of course she understood why. Totally got it.

But wouldn’t it be nice to be carefree and available to flirt with a man who’d found her attractive?

Suck it up, Rachel. This is the life you chose. Live it.

Rachel laughed at her lapse in common sense. “You so need to get over yourself, Rach.”

She put the finishing touches on the carousel, preparing it for the coming winter. An hour later, she tucked away her tools, along with her unreasonable attraction to the new man.

She drove into town and stopped at the used-clothing shop.

Her wardrobe was pretty slim pickings at the moment.

She found a glittery maternity top she could wear to work. If she took off the sequins and rearranged the beading, she could remake the top into her own style. Embroidery, sewing and knitting calmed her. That she could take a five-dollar top and make it personal filled her with pride.

At the market, she shopped for next week’s groceries. In the produce section, she found marked-down overripe bananas that would make an excellent bread.

She picked up fruits and vegetables on special and root vegetables in season.

A huge bag of lentils was on sale. Good source of protein. She bypassed the expensive sugary cereals and instant oatmeal to pick up a bag of rolled oats. By the time she finished, she had an economical, nourishing menu planned for the weekend and coming week for herself and her daughter.

Maybe I should get a small steak to share with Tori. Her mother was always on her case about eating meat for the baby, and Tori was a growing girl who needed protein.

She perused the packages, but the prices worried her. She picked up one minuscule steak, shuffling along the counter to see if there was a better deal, until she ran smack dab into a hard body.

She looked up.

Travis Read. Here. In the grocery store.

Good grief. Was her heart going to do somersaults every time she met him? Or bumped into him? Literally.

He grasped one of her upper arms to steady her, his big palm warm even through Davey’s thick old jacket.

“I’m sorry!” Her heart thumped at just the sight of him let alone the touch of those long fingers. “I wasn’t watching where I was going.”

Rachel’s skin seemed to constrict until it was a size too small for her body.

“No problem,” he said. “No harm done.”

The thick honey of his deep voice flowed along her nerves. Her pulse skittered a foolish teenage girl’s dance in her mature woman’s body.

Travis had a great mouth, finely shaped with a firm outline. How would his lips feel on hers? Would his kiss be more refined than Davey’s had been? Her husband’s kisses had been long on enthusiasm and short on finesse. She had a feeling Travis loved on a whole different level.

Get a grip, Rach.

“You okay?” Travis asked. He glanced down.

Too late, she remembered she’d opened her jacket when she’d entered the store. Her shirt wasn’t maternity and didn’t fit properly. Only the top three buttons were done up, and the bottom of the shirt splayed over her big belly.

Her nicer maternity jeans were hung up at home, waiting for her to put them on for work.

The pants she had on now, a pair she’d bought secondhand, were already worn out from her first pregnancy. The belly panel was stretched to the max, showing white flecks where the elastic had broken.

Good grief.

The silence went on too long. “You made it to the Double U?”

“Yeah. Made it there just fine.”

A dark shadow painted his strong jawline. He smelled of citrus. His body generated heat.

She stepped away.

Come down to earth, she scolded herself.

She dropped the one barely there steak she’d picked up onto her discounted vegetables and lentils. His basket held seven steaks. Seven!

Her economic situation had never embarrassed her in the past. Frustrated her? Oh, yeah. But caused her shame? No. It had merely been a fact of her life. It disconcerted her now, though.

Neither of them had said anything for a while. Their silence fell into truly awkward, uncomfortable territory.

“Don’t forget to add some vegetables,” she blurted.

Cripes, small talk had never stressed her out before. She could usually talk the paint off a barn door, yet here she stood with her mouth gone as dry as a popcorn fart.

Travis sidled away from her, hefting the basket with a rueful kick up of one side of his mouth. “Yeah, guess I’ll grab a few potatoes.”

“And greens.” Brilliant conversation, Rach.

He grimaced. “Maybe.”

She managed a reasonable facsimile of a grin. “Which means you won’t.”

His sweet fraction of a shy smile made a brief appearance.

He doffed his hat and left. “See you ’round town, Rachel.”

She watched him stride away.

The phrase salt of the earth came to mind. Travis Read would fit in well in Rodeo, maybe better than she did. After all, she wasn’t much of a cowgirl. She didn’t ride horses, and she didn’t live on a ranch.

She loved Montana, though, and loved her town with all of her heart. Rachel adored its basic, varied, salt-of-the-earth residents. She was working her fingers to the bone on next summer’s fair to keep the town alive and make it prosperous again.

Tamping down her wayward daydreams, she paid for her purchases.

At home, she poured a glass of OJ, taking it and an oatmeal muffin outside to soak up the rays of what might be one of the last good days of autumn.

She sat on the porch step—porch being a generous term for the slice of tilting wood and two steps hammered together under the front door of her mom’s trailer.

Sunlight flooding the valley reflected off the tarnished white wood siding of the Victorian across the road.

Rachel sighed. She missed Abigail Montgomery, her elderly friend. Her death, days after Davey’s, had been devastating. Worst time of her life.

She’d lost too much six months ago. Thoughts of her big, irrepressible Davey... Whew! Those could still bring her to her knees.

She wrapped her arms around herself and rocked. She missed him every night.

She’d already cried a river for him, and for Abigail, but she had a life to live and children to raise. She needed her good spirits to help shoulder her burdens.

Veering away from her grief before it brought on tears, she concentrated on the Victorian.

Her every-second-of-the-day dream about owning that house perked her up, rerouting her thoughts away from devastating memories.

To everyone else in Rodeo, the aging home looked like a run-down romantic anomaly in the Western landscape, but to Rachel it was perfect.

But then, romantic notions and daydreams had always been her downfall, hadn’t they?

Davey had never known about this particular dream. She’d wanted to surprise him with a fait accompli. Look, honey, I bought us a house.

Any day now it would be hers. She hadn’t heard even a whisper about whether Abigail’s British relatives were going to put it up for sale, but why wouldn’t they?

It was useless to them.

She’d scrimped and saved until she had just shy of five thousand dollars in change and small bills hidden in her closet.

Dumb spot to keep her money, but she and Davey had had a joint bank account. Had he known about this money, he would have siphoned off every spare cent for his motorcycle passion...or for treating his friends to beer every Friday night...or for chewing through money like it was cereal.

Davey had had those great big hands that could love her with enthusiasm, but they were a pair of sieves where money was concerned.

She should roll the change and count the money soon and get it into the bank. Later. Right now she needed these moments of rest.

The pretty trills of a horned lark on Abigail’s land floated across to her on the late-October breeze.

No one else in town would want that house.

There was no way there would be a speck of competition. It needed work.

It would be hers. It could have been hers a lot sooner had she married someone more practical.

The heart has a mind of its own, Rach, and you just have to follow it.

I sure did, didn’t I?

Yes. She sure had, right back into the financial insecurity she’d grown up with.

She let out a sigh full of hot air and yearning.

The distant hum of an engine—a motorcycle—cut through her daydreaming. Her unreasonable heart lurched with thoughts of her late husband.

A big Harley shot down the old road toward her.

It wasn’t Davey, of course. Never again would her husband ride home with a shit-eating grin that would light up any cloudy day.

She scrubbed her hands over her arms and shivered despite the sunshine. Oh, Davey.

The bike came close, closer, and slowed down enough to initiate the turn into Abigail’s driveway. Who was it?

The noise disturbed the lark. Routed, he surged from his hiding spot, his distinctive yellow-and-black face catching the eye of a white cat crouching in the grasses along the side of the road. Ghost. Abigail’s cat shot out toward the songbird, right into the bike’s path. No!

Rachel stumbled to her feet. “Get back,” she yelled.

The biker swerved to avoid the cat, Ghost ran back into the tall grasses and the bike tipped over. The machine flew across the road, screeching and shooting sparks, leaving the rider bouncing and rolling along the shoulder in a plume of dust.

In the ensuing silence, dirt and stones fell on his still body.

Rachel froze. Unwelcome memories of that awful day and the police officer at her door surged through her. He’s gone, ma’am, in a head-on collision with a tree. I’m sorry.

Resurrected shock held her immobile.

The man lay unmoving.

Rachel stared. Please, not another death. Abigail. Davey. No.

A groan from across the small highway galvanized her.

Rachel ran over, the only sound her pounding pulse.

He still hadn’t moved. Oh, dear Lord, please don’t die.

Kneeling beside him, she checked his body for signs of injury. Hard to tell through the leather. She touched his shoulders, arms and legs, feeling for broken bones. Under layers of solid muscle everything seemed fine, but what about internal injuries? She didn’t know how to check. With a wail of frustration, she tore into herself for never having taken first-aid classes.

One arm moved, raising the visor of his helmet.

Her frantic glance took in his face. He was conscious. Deep-set blue eyes watched her steadily, silently.

He reached up to remove his helmet. She stopped him with a hand on his wrist, feeling a strong pulse, thank God. “Should you do that? Is your head injured?”

Her voice shook. So did her hands.

“I’m good.” He took off his helmet, and she gasped.

Travis?

Of all people—What—? How—?

“Are you okay?” Her voice emerged reed thin.

He didn’t respond, just stared into her eyes, then touched her bottom lip with a glove-clad finger.

“Only one,” he murmured.

Huh?

His eyes met hers again, mesmerizing. She could fall into that blue gaze for hours. The moment stretched out. A smile, sweet and broad, curved the corners of his mouth.

Oh my-y-y. What did Travis use for toothpaste? Moonbeams?

He sat up slowly, his body coming close enough for her to feel his heat even through his leathers. She sat back on her heels.

She should tell him to be careful, to check for injuries, but couldn’t find her voice.

His hand brushed a strand of hair from her forehead, the leather soft against her skin. Grasping the tips of his glove with his straight white teeth, he tugged it off, then did the same with the other. Still mesmerized, Rachel stared, swallowed and stared some more.

Again he reached for her hair and ran his fingers through it, massaging her scalp. Rachel almost purred like a cat.

“Soft,” he said. “Calf’s ear.” He wasn’t making sense, but Rachel was too captivated to question him while he touched her with such gentle grace. Her traitorous desire overrode her common sense.

She moaned low in her throat.

He moved his hand to the back of her neck, urging her close to his chest. As pliable as a rag doll, she allowed it. His lips touched hers with velvety moisture and a faint exhalation of coffee-scented breath.

She hadn’t touched a man since Davey. Davey. Her late husband. Her eager, playful lover.

Pull back, Rach. Don’t allow this. Davey is only six months gone. You should—

He deepened the kiss. Taking his time, he caressed her tongue with his. His skill. Oh, his earnest, deep skill. Yes, to his awesome finesse. She’d known it would be like this. Heavenly bliss.

Rapture. Joy.

Need simmered inside her. In the months since Davey’s death, what she had needed most was his touch, his soothing physical support, one last endless night of blazing lovemaking.

A woman should be allowed to say goodbye to her husband. Rachel’s anger wrestled with her guilt and desire.

Fireworks blazed. Buried dreams came to life. This man’s touch, his mouth, soothed away aching, aching grief.

Rachel sighed and lost herself in his kiss, exploring his mouth with her ardent tongue.

She’d never kissed, had never been kissed, so slowly and intently. Her mind went blank and her body limp.

Elizabeth announced her presence with a hard kick to Rachel’s belly.

She pulled back. “Ouch.” She’d been kneeling too long.

“Ouch?” Travis’s voice sounded lost in a sensual fog, echoing how she felt.

“The baby kicked me. I need to stand up.”

“Baby?” Coming out of his daze, his eyes widened.

Horror spread across his features. “Sorry! God, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that.”

“You’ve had a shock,” she managed to bite out, while she really wanted to blurt, Don’t be sorry. I’ve never been kissed like that in my life. I needed it. After all of the turmoil, and the crazy worries about the future, I needed something for me. Purely, selfishly, for just me.

But that was a daydream that required a hasty burial. Just me was not possible these days.

She eased away from him and rubbed her belly to soothe Beth.

“Are you okay?” she asked, striving to pretend she hadn’t been rocked by a stranger’s kiss, that this was nothing out of the ordinary.

“Yeah.” He nodded with a perplexed frown.

Did he understand any better than she what had just happened?

“Should I call an ambulance?”

“No ambulance. No hospital. I’m good.”

The cowboy she’d met a short while ago was gone, replaced by a motorcycle rider. “No head injury? You were out cold.”

“Naw. Not out cold, just winded.”

“But you didn’t move when I was checking you for injuries.”

“No, I didn’t.” His jaw hardened, so briefly she barely caught it. She didn’t have a clue what was going on.

He stood and winced. “This head’s pretty hard. I’ve survived worse. Gonna be bruised tomorrow, though.”

Rachel struggled to get to her feet. Travis rushed to help her. “You shouldn’t be kneeling in your condition.”

In her condition. For a brief moment, she hadn’t been a pregnant woman, but a desirable one. He’d looked past her circumstances to her.

She stared at him. “Are you serious, Travis? I thought you were unconscious. I needed to check you. You could have been badly hurt.”

“I appreciate your concern,” he said, his hands strong beneath her elbows, lifting her as though she weighed no more than a sack of potatoes. “I’ll be stiff the next few days, but that’s all.” He made sure she was steady on her feet, took her hands in his and squeezed before he released her, his rough calluses a jolting return to reality.

She needed reality, needed to get her head back onto her shoulders. So, he hadn’t been knocked out, but maybe he’d been in shock. How else to account for that kiss? He hadn’t known he was kissing her. Maybe he’d thought she was an old girlfriend. Or a current one? After all, she was nothing to him.

His leather jacket had a tear along one arm. Travis could have been killed.

On a dime, those awful memories raced through her again. Davey, Davey, Davey.

Her blood arced and swooped through her arteries. Her pulse skittered worse than on a caffeine high. “You sure you don’t have internal injuries?”

“No injuries. Everything feels fine. Good thing I slowed down to take the turn.”

Rachel reached down to swipe dirt and gravel from her knees. A fine tremor ran through her. Anger overtook the fright he’d given her.

She couldn’t fend off images, thousands of Davey carefree and laughing, and that one horrifying imaginary picture of him broken by the side of the road thanks to his damned obsession with motorcycles. Because of them, he was gone for good, and her children were fatherless. What was it with men and their stupid, dangerous toys? Unfair, Rachel. A motorcycle is just a tool. Davey’s reckless speed had been the real problem.

Common sense held no sway, only anger. “Maybe you should stop riding motorcycles. They’re dangerous.”

At her sharp tone, he shot her a hard look. “Not if you know what you’re doing. Was that your cat that ran out in front of me?”

“No, it was Abigail’s.”

“Who’s Abigail?”

Rachel pointed to the aging Victorian. “That was her house.”

“Right,” he said. “I thought the owner died months ago. Who owns the cat now?”

“Ghost turned feral after her death.” Rachel drew a breath to steady her quavering voice. This man’s decisions were no concern of hers. Who was she to judge what he did with his life? She modulated her tone. “She won’t come near anyone. I’m worried about her.”

“She’s gonna get herself killed.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

He strode to his bike and lifted it onto its tires, the machine as light as a bicycle in his capable hands. He was strong, but then again, she already knew that.

Where Davey had been tall and lean, Travis was maybe five-eleven and heavily muscled.

He turned the bike toward the house.

Those memories of Davey still haunting her, she couldn’t help but ask again, “Are you sure you’re all right?”

His soft smile eased her anger, a bit. “Yeah, I’m good. Honest. How about you? You good?”

“I’m fine.”

He touched a couple of fingers to his forehead in a casual salute—no wedding band, not that she was looking—and then limped up the driveway toward the Victorian.

“Wait!”

He turned back.

“Why were you riding a bike? Where’s your truck?”

“Left it in the garage for a checkup. It’s been running rough, and I want it ready for winter.”

“Where’s your horse and trailer?”

“Udall’s letting me leave them on his ranch till I’m set up here.”

Here? At Abigail’s?

“Why are you going to Abigail’s house? Won’t you be bunking in the worker’s quarters on the Double U?”

“Nope. I’ll be living here.” He parked his bike at the side of the driveway. She followed him.

Living here. In Abigail’s house, which she hadn’t even heard had been rented. Travis would be living across the road from her, where she would have to see him every day and remind herself that no amount of makeup or dresses could change what she was...an ungainly woman who was a month and a half away from giving birth. No amount of dolling up would make her as attractive to him as he was to her.

But he’d kissed her.

He’d been stunned, dazed, that was all. She would probably never know who he’d really been kissing while he’d put his lips to hers so sweetly.

“No one told me the house had been rented.”

“Rented? No, ma’am. I bought the place.” He mounted the stairs to the veranda.

Bought—? Her house had been sold? When had it been listed, and why hadn’t she heard about it? This was a small town. Everybody’s business was an open book, for God’s sake, and not one person had thought to tell her the house she craved had been sold?

What do you expect, Rach? You kept that dream close to your chest, didn’t you?

True, she had. She hadn’t wanted people, not even Davey, to think poor Rachel McGuire was crazy enough to believe she could actually find a way to buy a house.

Maybe she hadn’t heard him properly.

She chased after him, stood at the bottom of the stairs and stared up at him.

“You’re joking, right?”

He frowned down at her from the top of the steps. “Why would I joke?”

“You’re not supposed to be living here. No one’s supposed to buy this house.” She sounded like a lunatic. She didn’t care.

Her house, the only thing she wanted more in life than her children’s health and happiness, had been sold.

The air became thin.

She panted. Stars danced in front of her eyes. Her vision narrowed. A moment later, she found herself sitting on the bottom step with a hand on her back urging her head between her knees. Hard to do with a nearly full-grown baby in the way. The cowboy squatted in front of her and chafed the backs of her hands.

“Are you all right?”

She straightened, still struggling for air, but not so dizzy.

“Are you hungry or something? You fainted. Good thing I caught you.”

She’d fainted and he’d caught her? The man moved fast.

“Wait a minute. Back up.”

When Travis started to pull away from her, she grasped his hands, craving his solid comfort as her daydreams slid into nightmare. He squatted on his haunches and watched her with a steady regard.

“I didn’t mean get away from me,” she said. “I meant, back up in the conversation. Please tell me I misunderstood. You did not buy this house.”

“I bought the house.”

“No.” It came out a croak, with tears clogging her throat. This house was supposed to be hers.

He watched her with pity. Great.

As if it wasn’t bad enough that she was Cindy Hardy’s daughter and a widowed, single mother with a bun in her oversize oven and a three-year-old daughter with no father, and that they lived in Cindy’s tin can, but now she had also lost the chance to own the only house in the county she could have ever hoped to afford...and the only one she’d ever dreamed of owning.

Sure, her itty-bitty down payment would buy a small trailer, but after the childhood she’d had, the thought made her sick. She wanted more for her children. She wanted a real home.