Just a Cowboy and His Baby Read online

  He had hoped he wouldn’t see her again after the South Dakota ride, but there she was in San Antonio the next night. He’d come out the winner that time and was more than a little disappointed that she didn’t stick around for the dance following the rodeo. Then in the middle of March she’d showed up in Austin, Texas, to ride like the devil and snatch the purse in a gold match, making them even.

  Poor old Dugger broke his arm in a practice session and that put him out of the running. In May she came to Redding, California, and whipped him by six points, but that was a silver competition, and in Prescott, Arizona, they both wrecked and a newcomer by the name of Coby Taylor grabbed a silver purse right out from under them. Again he’d thought she’d give up, but she showed up in Wyoming pulling a travel trailer behind her truck.

  That meant she was in it for the long haul.

  Trace would have his hands full for sure.

  He was ten thousand dollars ahead of her and he needed this ride for a nice comfortable lead. He measured the rein one more time and shoved his boots down into the stirrups. He hadn’t even met her formally, so why the hell did she make his brain go to mush over one little touch? He’d had less reaction to Ava, the only groupie who had ever wound up in his bed.

  He shook his head and tried to free himself of the image of Gemma with her red hair, green eyes, and lips that would run Angelina Jolie some stiff competition. He was riding Hell Cat, a big black horse with a solid reputation in the rodeo rounds. That was fine by Trace. He needed a real bucking horse that night to beat Gemma’s points.

  He didn’t like losing at all, but to a woman? That was a tough pill to swallow. Hell, he’d never even competed against a woman until this circuit. And now he’d been whipped twice by that red-haired piece of Texas baggage that was trying to get into his head by blowing him a kiss. Well, she could damn well take her sassy little butt back to her part of Texas because he was about to show her exactly how to make more than eighty points.

  He tightened his hold on the rein and nodded. The gate flew open and Hell Cat went into action, twisting, turning, bucking as if he were trying to throw Trace all the way to the St. Paul rodeo—airborne, with no stops. Trace kept one hand up, held on to the rein, and did what came natural in his movements. Legs forward, legs back, spur, go with the movement of the horse.

  The buzzer sounded and a pickup rider was beside him with an arm outstretched. Trace grabbed it, slid off the horse, and hit the ground running. When he was away from the bucking horse, he stopped and waved to the crowd. Everyone was on their feet screaming and yelling. Folks did tend to like a winner.

  While the buzz left his ears he headed for gate eight and listened to the announcer say, “And that, cowgirls and cowboys, was Trace Coleman from Goodnight, Texas, who just did his bit in taming Hell Cat. He’s our final bronc rider of the night, and to beat Gemma O’Donnell he has to have at least eighty points. And the judges are totaling their points now. Remember, that’s fifty for the horse and fifty for Trace’s ability. And the winning number is, oh my goodness, Trace, sorry, old man, she’s whooped you right here in Cody, Wyoming, but just barely. You’ve got seventy-eight points, so Gemma O’Donnell takes the saddle bronc riding purse home tonight and you come in second. Next up is the bull riding.”

  Trace nodded toward the judges’ stand and then tipped his hat to the roaring crowd still on their feet and making enough noise to raise the dead before he slipped back behind the bucking chutes.

  Eight seconds could damn sure change the whole world and knock a rider off his pretty pedestal. He’d have to work harder, keep his mind on the ride better, because if he didn’t final and didn’t win the big event in Las Vegas, he could kiss his Uncle Teamer’s ranch outside of Goodnight good-bye.

  He’d planned on sticking around Cody for a few hours after the rodeo to toss back a few beers and bask in the glory of the win before he began the thousand-mile journey to St. Paul, Oregon. But suddenly a party didn’t look so inviting and he was eager to get on the road. He made up his mind that as soon as the rodeo personnel removed his saddle from Hell Cat, he intended to load up and point his truck and trailer toward the west. By the time the sun came up tomorrow morning he’d be more than a third of the way there.

  “Hey,” Gemma said so close to him that he jumped.

  “Good ride,” he said stiffly.

  “Not my best. I could have done better, but thanks,” she said.

  “Guess that puts you where I was yesterday.” Trace’s drawl was deep and very Texan. He slumped down on a rough wooden bench beside the chute he’d ridden out of just minutes before, stuck his long legs out, and crossed them at the ankles.

  “Guess it does, but the night is still young. Anything could happen before the finals.” Gemma sat down on the other end of the bench, pulled a knee up, and wrapped her arm around it.

  “What are you ridin’ for?” he asked.

  Vibes bounced around in the space between them like a bucking bronc without a time limit. He wanted to move closer to see if the flames were hotter the closer he got, but he sat still.

  “Glory of being the second woman to win the title. And you?” she answered. Her voice had just enough grit to be sexy, and it went with that red hair, those full lips, and green eyes.

  “A ranch.”

  “One of us could be very happy when December rolls around.”

  “And the other one is going to have a few dollars in their bank account,” he finally said.

  “You going to St. Paul or Colorado Springs?” she asked.

  “Both. You?”

  She nodded.

  “Which one?” he asked grumpily.

  “Both! It’s a lot of driving, but it’s doable and I need the money to put me in the finals.”

  Gemma didn’t look forward to a thousand miles in two days to St. Paul and then thirteen hundred back to Colorado Springs. But at least there were five days between St. Paul and Colorado Springs so she wouldn’t have to drive for hours and hours on that stretch. She hadn’t been a greenhorn when she started the circuit. She’d known there would be fast drives as well as those that could be taken leisurely. It was the way of the rodeo circuit. Drive hard. Hurry up to get to the next rodeo and wait for the eight seconds to ride hard. Then get in the pickup truck and do it all over again.

  Tonight she got to put another shamrock on her construction-paper lucky horseshoe. There were still miles and miles between that four-leaf clover and the one that she was saving for when she won the Vegas competition. There would be a lot of riding, a lot of driving, a helluva lot of waiting, and a lot of missing her family and friends, but the night she got to glue the biggest, shiniest shamrock on top of her horseshoe would make it all worthwhile.

  Gemma stood up and settled her hat on her head. “Well, I’ll see you there.”

  “And I’m going to win,” Trace said.

  “Don’t bet on it, cowboy. Tonight is just the beginning of a long line of victories. You might as well go on home to Good-bye, Texas, and forget about it.”

  “Goodnight!”

  “Right back atcha.” She grinned.

  “No, not Good-bye, Goodnight.”

  “What?”

  “I’m from Goodnight, Texas, not Good-bye.”

  “Tomato, tomahto!” she quipped in a slow Southern drawl.

  She’d done her homework and she knew exactly where Trace Coleman hailed from. She knew his statistics, how tall he was, and when his birthday was. And she had not made a mistake when she said “Good-bye.” She’d made a joke. Evidently he didn’t think it was funny.

  He quickly stood up and fell into step beside her. “So you’re in it for the long haul for sure, no matter what?”

  “Yes, I am, so let’s clear the air and get something straight right now. If you ever try to ruin my ride with a comment again, I’m going to lea
ve your body so far out that the coyotes will starve huntin’ for it.”

  He chuckled.

  Instinctively she reached out to push him, but he caught her arms and used the momentum to pull her tightly to his chest. She had intended to send him ass-over-spurs into the dust like she did her brothers when they were all kids and she pushed one of them in anger, but suddenly she was listening to his heartbeat. She leaned back to look up at him and his eyes were fluttering shut. She barely had time to moisten her lips before his mouth covered hers in a sizzling kiss that left her wanting another and yet wanting to slap the shit out of him at the same time.

  “If you ever try that again, I’ll…” she stammered in a hoarse whisper.

  “Darlin’, either fight your way to the top with the big boys or go home and lick your wounds. I’m not one bit afraid of you,” Trace said.

  “That’s a big mistake, Mr. Coleman.” She turned and walked away from him briskly, fringe on her chaps flopping with each step, leaving no doubt that she was stomping instead of walking.

  Coby Taylor moved out of the shadows and said, “Sassy bit of baggage. Sexy as hell but needs a bit of taming.”

  “You’d have better luck trying to tame Smokin’ Joe or Hell Cat than that woman,” Trace said without an ounce of humor.

  ***

  Gemma retrieved her saddle and carried it to her trailer, stashed it in the special place in the closet, and took the shoebox from the shelf. Damn that Trace Coleman anyway for making her so angry.

  She touched her lips to see if they were as hot as they still felt and was surprised to find that they were cool. She’d show him that she didn’t have to fight her way to the top, that he had to fight every day to keep his place because by the middle of the circuit she intended to be so far ahead of him that he couldn’t even get a whiff of the dust she was leaving behind.

  She opened the shoebox and a smile replaced the frown drawing her dark brows together. She rifled through the small paper shamrocks until she found the one with Cody written in glitter and gently turned it over to smear glue on the back. Then she stuck it on her horseshoe and stood back to admire it.

  “There, one more step toward the big one,” she said.

  Lick her wounds, indeed!

  Chapter 2

  Truck engines rumbled outside Gemma’s trailer window, and the weatherman on her radio alarm was all excited about the heat wave. “It’s going to be sunny and hot today in Montana, so load up the cooler with water bottles and don’t forget that sunblock.”

  She cut him off midsentence when she slapped her palm on the snooze button and crammed a pillow over her eyes.

  She mumbled to herself, “I don’t give a damn if it’s sunny and hot. What the hell do you expect in July? Snow or sleet? There are still miles and miles of road between me and the next rodeo, so it doesn’t matter jack squat to me unless it decides to rain in St. Paul. God, I hate to ride a bronc in the rain. Saddle gets all slippery.”

  The alarm was set to go off every minute after she hit snooze, and the weatherman was still going on about the heat when it went off again. “I’m telling you, folks, this is the hottest summer in years. We are breaking records here in the northern states. It’s normal to be this hot in Texas in the first week of July, but not in our part of the world. No rain in sight for the next week.”

  She hit it again and threw her legs over the side of the bed. Another day of white lines on the highway and telephone poles lay ahead. She hadn’t planned on the sheer boredom of the long, long rides. She listened to the radio, played CDs, talked to herself, called her family members, but it was still mile after mile from one rodeo to the next. Add that to constant analyzing of what she’d done wrong on the last ride and how to correct it on the next and the days dragged on and on like a turtle race.

  She rolled the kinks out of her neck and stood up. The trailer looked even smaller that day than it did when she left Ringgold the week before. She wished she’d brought the bigger one. But one person didn’t need a trailer big enough to sleep four. At least that’s what she’d decided after looking at both of the trailers a dozen times.

  “I’m an idiot. I could have a bed, table, and even more storage room if I’d brought the big one,” she talked to herself.

  In her tiny new world, she was confined to living quarters less than half the size of her bedroom at home. The kitchen and closet that held her clothes and gear covered one side of the trailer. She had a two-burner cooktop, a dorm-sized refrigerator with a freezer packed full of steaks, a microwave, and a tiny sink that served as a place to wash dishes as well as brush her teeth.

  At one time a set of bunk beds had occupied part of the space on that wall, but Dewar and Rye, her two older brothers, had removed them and built the closet with a special compartment to house her saddle. A tiny bathroom with a shower and toilet, only to be used when she couldn’t find a truck stop or a campground with the option, and a booth-type table that dropped down to make a bed took up the other side. Dewar had taken the table out and had a special mattress made to fit on the platform he and Rye had built for the space, but it dang sure wasn’t as comfortable as her big king-sized bed at home where she could snuggle with six pillows if she wanted.

  She glared at the clock on the microwave. It couldn’t be six o’clock already. She’d only shut her eyes a minute ago. The damn thing was lying or maybe the batteries were old and didn’t work right.

  “Coffee! I need caffeine!” She filled a cup with water and stuck it in the microwave for instant coffee. While she waited, she popped the tab off a can of Coke and guzzled part of that down and then brushed her teeth. When the microwave timer dinged, she removed the cup, stirred in coffee granules, and took a sip.

  The KOA campground in Three Forks, Montana, had shower facilities so she grabbed her shower bag from the closet, stuffed in a pair of cutoff jeans and a bright pink tank top, took a couple more gulps of coffee, and slung open the trailer door.

  Cool morning air greeted her. It wasn’t all that hot. That crazy weatherman should step out of the house in Texas in July. Then he’d know what hot was for sure. When she left Ringgold, the lizards and scorpions were having races every time the back door opened to see who could get into the house before Dewar and Gemma slammed it shut.

  The campground was one of those areas that looked like a picture on a postcard, and she was glad she’d finally given in to exhaustion and stopped for the night. She’d been so hyped up when she left Cody that she planned to drive all the way to St. Paul on the jacked-up adrenaline surge from winning the competition. At midnight she’d begun to flag and stopped for a cup of coffee and a fried apple pie at McDonald’s. At one thirty she saw a billboard advertising a campground only a mile and a half off Interstate 90. Next exit, it said, so she took it and followed the signs. It had been dark when she checked in at two a.m. She’d been too tired to notice the gorgeous surroundings and was asleep five seconds after her head hit the pillow.

  She sat down at the picnic table right outside her door and enjoyed the view of the Bridger Mountains off in the distance. Big puffy clouds looked like fluffy icing on the top of cupcakes. The sky was that gorgeous shade of blue that only came in the springtime in Texas. In the summer, it was washed out by the heat and days would go by when there was never a cloud in sight.

  The aroma of bacon and real coffee wafted out from the kitchen window of the camper next to hers and her stomach grumbled. She promised herself a bacon, egg, and cheese McGriddle from the next McDonald’s out on Interstate 90. But for now she needed to wash the rodeo dust off her before she started driving again. She stood up and headed toward the building housing the bathrooms and showers.

  The hot water felt so good that she stood under the shower and let it beat down on her sore back muscles for a long five minutes. Eight seconds wasn’t so long when she was out exercising horses at her folks’ ranch in R
inggold, Texas. It wasn’t very long at all when she was talking to her sister, Colleen, on the telephone or playing with her niece, Rachel. But slap her butt on the back of a bucking bronc and those eight seconds were equivalent to working a whole week with no rest. Everything ached and the next day, the day before Independence Day, she would be doing it all over again. She’d be right back in her spurs and looking down from the side of a chute into the rolling eyes of a bronc. And then five days after that she’d be repeating the same process in Colorado Springs.

  “I wonder if Dewar could rig up a Jacuzzi in my trailer. I could do without the bed and sleep on an air mattress if I had a tub with jets to laze in after a rough ride,” she muttered.

  She turned the water off and ran her hands through her thick hair, squeezing out as much water as possible. She wrapped a towel around her hair, bent forward, and rubbed even more moisture from it. Then she flipped it over her back, dried her body, and dressed in the cutoff shorts and tank top. Her rubber flip-flops made slurping sounds on the concrete floor when she carried her bag and towels to the vanity. Then she leaned forward and checked her roots.

  “Still good,” she mumbled.

  She had dark hair by nature, but she was a hairdresser and she wanted something different for the rodeo tour, so the day before she left Ringgold she had dyed her hair a gorgeous light auburn. It went with her complexion and gave her even more of a kick-ass attitude than she’d had before—if that was possible.

  She was smearing sunblock on her nose and face when she felt a movement against her leg. A burst of pure adrenaline sent her into a jump that landed her in a squat on the vanity with one foot on each side of the sink. She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror, and she looked like a big-eyed owl perching on a tree limb, but she didn’t care. Public bathrooms bred spiders and an occasional mouse and she hated both of them.

  They were sneaky creatures, always appearing when they were least expected, and they weren’t afraid of the devil. She didn’t care what her daddy, Cash O’Donnell, said about them being more afraid of her than she was of them. Spiders she could abide at the distance of ten feet if they weren’t wolf spiders. Those suckers had been injected with kangaroo DNA back on the fifth day of creation. They could jump more than ten feet and they always jumped toward her, never away from her, which proved her dad was dead wrong about their fear of human beings.