The Texan's Little Secret

“Come on, Carly, you can’t be immune to the guy. He’s twice as hot as he was when you went with him.”

“And any interest I had in Luke Nobel cooled to sub-zero temperatures back then. It’s not like he meant a lot to me, anyhow,” she fibbed. “You know I only went out with him in the first place to try to get my dad off my back.” That had been her intention anyhow.

Too bad she had sabotaged herself.

No matter how strongly she’d objected, with graduation on the horizon, Brock had grown more adamant than ever about her taking her place at Baron Energies. At a desk job.

She had acted out, doing the worst thing she could think of—the only thing she could think of at the time—to make Brock Baron change his mind. She had dated Luke Nobel. Being an “older man” and living in a poor part of town earned an automatic two strikes against him—at least on her daddy’s list of high standards.

Yes, the perfect plan...

“But then you never told your dad anything about Luke,” Kim said. “You never told your family or anybody but me. Why not?”

Carly shrugged. For some strange reason, after her first date with Luke, her feelings about flaunting him in front of Brock and her family had done a one-eighty. “I didn’t need him for leverage anymore. I decided to get a backbone and stand up for myself, instead. I told Daddy point-blank I just had no interest in a job at Baron Energies. Then I flashed my acceptance letter from Houston at him and informed him I would be leaving town.”

Kim gasped. “You never told me that, either. How did he react?”

“As if I’d tossed a cow pie down in front of him.”

“You probably broke his heart. You should’ve listened to me about drinking and drugs. Those would’ve had your dad changing his mind altogether about wanting you on the payroll.”

And just look who he had on his payroll now.

Carly choked on a laugh. “As if you really meant the suggestions seriously.”

“You know I didn’t.” Kim sighed. “Well, I’m sorry it didn’t turn into the romance of the century. But even if you never told anyone, after all, I guess going out with Luke was better than my alternatives.”

If she only knew.

But how could she tell Kim the truth? She couldn’t explain, even to her own satisfaction, why she had suddenly felt the need to keep Luke all to herself. Instead, she had sworn Kim to silence.

Still, typical teen that she was back then, she couldn’t keep from sharing developments with her best friend.

Day by day, she had filled in every little detail of her first big romance...until the part where she and Luke slept together.

* * *

THREE LONG, LONG DAYS after the barbecue, Luke sat at the bar of the Longhorn, the local saloon. He took a deep, satisfying swallow of beer from the mug in front of him.

His mom had gone to her usual Monday-night get-together with her cronies, bringing Rosie along. The ladies all claimed to take their card games seriously, but he suspected the women paid more attention to dessert and his daughter than they did to their poker hands.

He thought about the endless weekend, starting with Friday and the barbecue he never should have gone to. Not when he knew Carly Baron was back on the Roughneck and would be there, too.

On Saturday, he’d kept busy with his men, handling the backbreaking job of clearing brush. The hard labor kept his body moving, and working with a couple of cowhands who always had their mouths in gear kept him from thinking thoughts he shouldn’t. He’d chosen to work side-by-side with those men for that very reason.

On Sunday...well, that was a mite tougher. If the Longhorn had been open, he might’ve stopped in for a brew and some company to distract him. Instead, he’d spent the slow summer afternoon with his mom and Rosie, his two-year-old daughter, who were his first choice of company, anyhow.

At least, Rosie was, always. His mom, not so much. Not when he had something on his mind. When he had worries, he also had all he could do to keep them from her sharp eyes. Somehow, yesterday, he had managed to get by without getting the third degree about anything.

And today, he’d cleared his mind of Carly again.

He intended to keep it cleared.

He breathed a sigh of relief at his own determination, took a last slug of his beer and set the empty mug back on the bar.

“Fill you up again?” the bartender asked.

Luke nodded, then watched the man walk away with the mug.

“Good service,” commented the guy a couple of stools to his right. He wore dress pants and too-shiny shoes. “Hope it stays that quick.”

“It won’t once the crowd gets here,” Luke told him. Between the locals, whose Monday-morning quarterbacking usually lasted through the evening, and the city slickers like the one next to him, who liked to live life rough in the ’burbs, the bar wouldn’t be quiet for long.

He glanced into the wall-length mirror lined with liquor bottles. It reflected most of the room as well as the Longhorn’s double glass doors, which had just opened to admit a couple of females. Familiar females. The one he took note of was hot and blonde and loaded for bear, judging by her expression when she caught his reflection in the glass.

So much for clearing his mind of Carly Baron.

“You sound like a regular,” the guy next to him said.

“I stop in once in a while.” For two or three beers, his limit. He’d come tonight more to get away from his empty house and his own thoughts than to have a brew. And now look where that idea had gotten him.

Carly wore jeans that hugged her hips and a shirt of some shimmery fabric. With every little move she made, the shirt caught the glow from the neon advertisements hung around the barroom. He tried not to follow the flashes of light in the mirror as she and her friend Kim sauntered across the sawdust-covered floor to seats at the far end of the bar.

The guy to his right gave a low whistle. “Now, there’s a real babe.”

Luke clamped his jaw shut.

Once, Carly had meant everything to him. But that was years ago, before she’d accused him of using her to get ahead. Before she’d joined the ranks of folks who didn’t believe he could succeed on his own.

Yeah, at the barbecue, Carly had hit the mark with her crack about making nice with the boss’s daughter. He had gone out of his way to talk with her, the way he stayed friendly with all Brock Baron’s kids.

But, more to the point, the truth was, he’d chatted her up to show himself he could do it and walk away again. To prove she didn’t mean anything to him anymore. And he’d done exactly that, hadn’t he? She was just another woman to him now, right?

A few people occupied stools between him and the women, but he could still see her in the mirror, her blond hair spilling over her shoulders and down her back, almost reaching the waistband of those snug jeans of hers. All too aware of his own jeans suddenly hugging tight, he shifted on his stool.

The bartender dropped off his second beer. Luke clamped his fingers around the mug. As he nursed the drink along, a steady trickle of folks filled up the rest of the space between him and the two women and overflowed onto the dance floor. Somebody fed the jukebox in one corner. In another corner, a crowd began to gather around the mechanical bull.

Over the buzz of conversation, Carly’s laugh rang out. He’d have recognized it anywhere.

“Sounds as good as she looks,” said the guy near him. “You know her?”

“Yeah.”

“I wouldn’t mind an introduction—”

Luke narrowed his eyes.

“But, uh, I’m not asking,” the other man said in a rush. “I can see that would be a waste of my time.”

Luke took a long, hard swallow from his mug. Irritation, like the guy to his right, had begun to grate on him. He wanted nothing to do with Carly.

But he needed his job to provide for Rosie and Mom.

Beer mug in hand, he rose from his bar stool.

Time to go make nice with the boss’s daughter.

* * *

IN THE LONGHORN’S ladies’ room, Carly sidled past the crowd of chattering women primping at the long counter. She found a spot halfway down the room. But as she stared into the cloudy mirror, she wasn’t seeing her reflection.

Instead, she saw Luke the day he had come to the Roughneck years ago.

He’d looked so good in his worn jeans and white shirt, so tanned and fit and strong. For a moment, that overrode her concern at seeing him on the ranch. For another moment, she couldn’t fight the tremor of excitement and disbelief running through her. Couldn’t tamp down the rush of joy at knowing he was hers.

Only a few days earlier, they had made love for the first time.

Blinking, she looked away from the mirror. As she pulled her hairbrush from her bag, someone touched her back. She moved aside, thinking it was another woman trying get by in the tight space. Instead, the touch came again.

She turned to find Kim close behind her.

“Hey.” The women around them made enough noise to cover the sound of a gunshot. Still, Kim stepped closer and muttered, “Let’s go for a walk outside.”

Carly laughed. “Kim Healy, gangster’s moll. What do you want to do, get me out in the parking lot so your boys can fit me up for cement shoes?”

Kim leaned forward and said in a low voice, “Luke’s here.”

“Is he?” She projected indifference. Heck, she pretended ignorance. The minute they had stepped into the Longhorn, she had seen those unmistakable wide shoulders and that sandy hair. “So?”

“So, I need some air.”

Kim led the way out of the room. Instead of going back to the main room, they went down the hall to the emergency exit at the end.

Outside, they walked a few feet along the side of the building. Carly settled on the low stone wall and reached behind it to pick up a couple of pebbles. “The Southwestern landscaping will come in handy for you. Don’t you have to fill my pockets with stones?”

“Carly.” She didn’t need to look to see Kim’s worried expression. “What’s going on?”

A few yards away, the Longhorn’s door swung open. Music and laughter swelled into the night.

As Kim settled on the wall beside her, Carly sighed. This conversation wasn’t going to be to her liking, she could tell.

“Inside,” Kim said, “I turned to say something to Sandra, turned back again and you were gone. So I went looking for you. Because you need to talk to me. And I’m done with sitting back and waiting for you to get to that conclusion. That’s what’s going on. Come on, girl, it’s me. Your BFF.” She gave Carly a nudge. “You do remember we’re best friends forever, right?”

“Yes, I do.” Tears made her eyes sting. “I don’t know where to start, Kim.”

“How about with the week before you and Luke had the fight?”

Now she did turn her head.

In the light of the streetlamp, Kim’s set jaw and grim expression matched her flat tone. But the glow in her friend’s eyes didn’t come from the lamplight.

“You knew something was up?”

Raising her brows, Kim looked at her without speaking.

“Sorry.” Carly stared into the distance, where the lights couldn’t breach the darkness. “There was a lot going on that week. And then, when Luke and I broke up, I wasn’t in the mood to talk about it.”

“You fell to pieces,” her friend said gently. “You were good for nothing the rest of that summer, till you went away to school. And I’m worried it might happen again.”

She snapped her head in Kim’s direction. “Don’t worry. There’s not a chance of that.”

“Well, at least at this point, you’ve only started to crumble around the edges. Just enough for a BFF to notice.”

Carly gave a strangled laugh.

“You slept with Luke, didn’t you?”

Her breath caught at Kim’s outright question. At her spot-on guess. But then, Kim was no dummy and never had been. And Lord only knew, she had probably picked up dozens of clues in that one short week to tell her something momentous had happened in her best friend’s life.

Momentous, all right.

Who knew so much could have come from her one and only time with Luke?

Who knew she could have been so naive? So stupid?

“Sorry, Kim. I... It wasn’t that I didn’t want to tell you back then. I just needed some time.” Time to hold her secret excitement close to her heart, the way Luke had held her close to his. “I almost couldn’t believe it had happened.” She gave a derisive laugh worthy of Brock Baron. “I know that sounds ridiculous, but it’s the way I felt.”

Special. She’d felt special when she was with Luke. As if she finally stood out from the crowd. Finally meant something to someone who wasn’t connected to her by birth or a promise between best friends. “But before I could convince myself it was real...it was over.”

“You wouldn’t have slept with the guy if you didn’t care about him, Carly. And I know how much you did. When you broke up, I let you slide with the excuse you were going off to college and didn’t want to get tied down. But I didn’t fall for it, even then. What really happened?”

The door to the Longhorn opened. A lone customer turned to go to a motorcycle parked at the opposite end of the building.

Just like that, Luke had turned and walked away from her, too. And, like the customer who revved his engine and tore out of the parking lot, he never looked back.

She swallowed. “I slept with him,” she said evenly, flushing with embarrassment over her stupidity but determined to tell Kim the truth. This part of it. “I slept with him, and three days later he showed up on the ranch. My dad was looking for wranglers, and Luke planned to use me to try and get a job at the Roughneck.”

“He wouldn’t.” Kim sounded as stunned as she had felt at the time.

“He would. I confronted him, and he didn’t deny it.” Despite her struggle to keep her words even, she could hear the strain in her voice. “He didn’t even answer me. He just turned and left the ranch.”

The door to the Longhorn opened again. A small group of women spilled out of the bar and headed toward them, laughing and lurching and passing them by with farewell waves.

She and Kim waved back.

Another woman trailed behind them, walking steadily and flashing a key ring. “Don’t worry. I’m the designated driver.”

“Good deal,” Kim said.

They sat watching the women make their unsteady way down the length of the building, trailing bursts of screechy laughter behind them. Carly felt grateful for the din. She had more to share with Kim. But not here. Not now. “Time to get back inside.” She stood. “We wouldn’t want Luke thinking the sight of him scared me away.”

“No, we wouldn’t.”

Carly led the way back to the bar.

She hooked her thumbs into her belt loops. Her stomach felt calm, her nerves steady. She was a woman ready to take on the world—and Luke Nobel.

She wasn’t at all like the naive teenager of her early college days who had spent weeks in the bathroom of her dorm, dealing with morning sickness.

Chapter Four

Well, dang. Where the heck had the man gone?

Carly clamped her jaw, taking out her frustration on another mint.

Earlier, she had managed to keep track of Luke in the long mirror across from her. Now a slim redhead had taken the stool he had occupied just a minute ago. She leaned back on her own stool and tilted her head, trying to see through the crowd standing three deep behind her.

For all she cared, Luke could be out on the dance floor with some wide-eyed city slicker or snuggled up in a booth with a wannabe buckle bunny. It didn’t matter to her what woman had caught his attention or even what the two of them had gotten up to. The important thing was to know exactly where to find him. She didn’t want him sneaking up on her. And with her luck, that’s just—

“Hey, Carly.” Luke’s voice rumbled over all the others around them.

She looked up. His reflection stared back at her from the mirror.

He stood directly behind her, the press of the crowd keeping him so close, she would need only to lean back the slightest bit to rest against his broad chest. He could wrap his arms around her and settle his chin on the top of her head, the way he had the night they had curled up on his truck’s tailgate to watch the stars come out.

Which had led to their making out.

Which had turned into making love and changed her life forever.

She swiveled on her stool to face him. “What are you doing here, cowboy? I didn’t think ranch managers got nights off.”

“And I didn’t think you’d come back again tonight.”

“Back?”

“Yeah, I saw you take off the minute I got up from my stool. You ran like a rodeo clown tearing away from the bull wanting to stomp on his butt.”

She laughed and tossed her hair over her shoulder, under cover of checking her surroundings. To her left, Kim sat in conversation with the woman on the other side of her. To the right, she saw only the broad back of the man on the next stool. No chance of interruptions from either of them. No interference, either.

She looked at Luke. “I wouldn’t run from a bull. That means I’d have no reason in the world to run from you.”

“Good to hear. Buy you a drink?”

She didn’t bother to look at her mug. “No, I’m fine, thanks.” She swiveled her seat again, deliberately putting her back to him.

He stepped between her stool and Kim’s to set his beer mug on the bar. His chest brushed her arm. The rest of him seemed to fill every inch of space between them. The mint between her teeth crunched to bits. She faced forward, which only made things worse. Who the heck was that worried-looking woman in the mirror?

Darn Luke. Maybe Kim hadn’t been far off the mark about her falling to pieces. Over the years, she had pulled herself together. But Luke had always had the power to make her feel...not so wild. She had to work twice as hard with him as with anyone else to keep up her pretense. And right now, she desperately needed that defense. She didn’t need to sit here with him for the time it would take to share a drink. She didn’t want to share that much more of her lifetime with him.

Still, she would never let him see her care.

“So, cowboy...” Her voice sounded much breathier than she’d intended.

As if to hear her better, he lowered his head. Her senses revved into high gear, automatically registering details. The gleam in his light brown eyes. His aftershave, something spicy with a kick to it that made her mouth water. She imagined running her fingertips down the plane of his cheek and along the line of his jaw, could almost feel the gentle scratch of golden five-o’clock shadow.

After what seemed like an eternity, he shifted to lean against the bar. And in a heartbeat, she put her defenses in place again. “So, cowboy.” She tried again. “Come here often to pick up women?”

The line wasn’t that funny, but he gave her a lopsided smile. “Every chance I get. You interested?”

“I’d rather spend time with that bull over in the corner. In fact, I plan to spend time over there.”

“With a hunk of metal? That’s got nothing on a live bull.”

“You’d be surprised.”

“I damn sure wouldn’t. There’s a difference.”

“You still need to stay in the saddle.”

“True enough.” This time, his mouth curved in a full smile.

As far as she could tell, he hadn’t moved, but the space between them suddenly seemed tighter, the air in the room warmer, the lights dimmer.

“You think you can handle it?” he asked.

“I know I can.”

“Something besides a slow, sexy ride?”

He had asked the question straight out. No teasing, no taunting, no smile. What else could she expect from a true bull rider? A champion.

Too bad she wasn’t in his class.

The question had made her pulse jump to triple time. Her temperature seemed to spike a degree. And her irritation level for even having these reactions put her blood pressure through the roof. “Slow and sexy’s for city slickers, and you know it.” She leaned forward. In the narrow space, her shirtfront almost brushed his. Giving him the most languid smile she could manage, she added, “I like to make my rides worthwhile.”

His eyes lit with his grin. “All right, then.” He pointed in the same direction she had. “If you’re so confident you have what it takes, why don’t you mosey on over there. But if you plan to show me what you’ve got, you’ll really have to crank ’er up.”

“Watch me.” After all the stories she had told him of her childhood competitions with her brothers, he had to know how she would respond. Wild and crazy Carly would never pass up a challenge like this one. Besides, she’d had plenty of experience riding those “hunks of metal” he despised. She’d knock him off his bar stool.

Smiling at the thought, she turned sideways on her own stool. Her knees grazed his champion belt buckle. He sucked in his stomach as if she had zapped him with a cattle prod.

No matter what she’d told Kim, she wasn’t immune to Luke. The knowledge bothered her—but at least she had the satisfaction of seeing he wasn’t unaffected by her, either.

Still smiling, she went to the small table in one corner of the room. After scribbling her name on the required form, she stood aside to wait her turn.

Luke came up to join her just as a new rider straddled the bull. The crowd pressed forward, eager to watch the show. A man’s elbow caught her in the ribs. After a quick “sorry,” he turned away again.

From behind her, Luke put a hand on her shoulder. To protect her? To steady her? To keep her still so he could get a better view?

She didn’t know and couldn’t take the time to care. She was too busy fighting to ignore the heat licking low inside her.

Other riders, two or three or a dozen, took their turns in the saddle. Again, she didn’t know and didn’t care. Passing up the opportunity to check out their technique might be her downfall in the competition. But she couldn’t seem to focus.

When her name was called, Luke squeezed her shoulder lightly. He leaned down, putting his head close to hers again, and murmured, “Have at it, cowgirl.”

His voice, deep and intimate, made that lick of heat in her belly flame. But his final word turned the rest of her to ice.

Years ago, she had told Luke her secrets, her longings, her dreams, her fears. Her worries about her place in her family. Her irritation over her dad. She had loved Luke and shared everything with him. Had given him everything, too, the night she’d slept with him.

She had trusted him.

And only days later, he had come to the Roughneck, as eager to apply for a job there as she’d been to sign up for a ride on this fake bull tonight.

Daddy’s little cowgirl, he’d called her that day.

The insult and his desire to work for Brock were the worst forms of betrayal.

Now, she turned and stared at him. He stared back, making her heart skip a beat. She cursed herself for not having better control of her reactions. This man had once done her wrong, no denying it, yet she couldn’t keep from responding to him, his nearness, his smile.

“I’ll show you a cowgirl, all right,” she promised.

I’ll show you exactly what Daddy’s little girl can do.

And she did.

But the fun she’d once gotten from it had gone.

The ride was rough. She was tilted and jerked around. She fought to go the distance in front of the crowd—because that’s what Carly Baron did.

Yet none of it mattered.

Just the way her passion for barrel racing had vanished, so had her interest in riding Luke’s “hunk of metal.” Was it his scorn over the mechanical substitute that had taken the pleasure from her ride? Would mounting a real bull give that feeling back to her?

Or was riding, like her relationship with Luke, just going to be a part of her past?

* * *

“SO? WHAT DO you think?”

Luke shrugged. How the hell had he gotten trapped into this situation?

That brush of Carly’s knees against his midsection earlier had just about brought him to his knees. This time, he’d stayed two feet away, not wanting to get caught in the crush against her again. The distance didn’t help. She had resettled herself on a stool and leaned back to prop her elbows on the bar. The position tugged at the shimmery fabric of her shirt, making it gape just enough to show off a hint of twin curves and the barest edge of lace. Sexy as hell.