Cowboy Rebel--Includes a bonus short story Read online

  “Well, looks like you was the one who got the whuppin’.” Dr. Richards chuckled and turned to Nikki. “Good job there, Nikki. Now it’s my turn. We could try glue and strips, but as deep as this is, stitches will do a better job.”

  “You’re the doctor,” Tag answered.

  “It’s up to you whether you shave your face clean when you get home, but if you don’t, you’re going to look a little like a mangy dog.”

  “Looked worse before,” Tag drawled. “And probably will again.”

  A lady in pink scrubs poked her head between the curtains.

  “What do you need, Rosemary?” Dr. Richards asked the nurse.

  “Sue Ann just arrived. Nikki handles her better than any of us. Would you mind if I help out here and she takes that job?”

  “Go on,” Dr. Richards said. “I’ve got this.”

  “Where is she?” Nikki asked as she pushed back the curtain. Rosemary had fast become her friend since they both worked the weekend shift. The woman was average in every way—brown hair, brown eyes, but her sense of humor and smile were infectious.

  “I’ll show you and then get right back in there with Doc.” Rosemary led the way. “Lord have mercy.” She laid one hand over her heart and fanned her face with the other one. “That cowboy could melt my panties with those blue eyes.”

  “Sue Ann strung out or drunk?” Nikki liked Rosemary, loved working with her, but she was always teasing Nikki about settling down and getting married.

  “Maybe both. Did I hear you turn that man down when he asked you for a date? Are you bat crap crazy?” Rosemary asked.

  “You’re married and have four kids,” Nikki said.

  “And I’m on a diet, too, but that don’t mean I can’t stare in the window at the candy store.” Rosemary laughed. “Oh, there’s another good-lookin’ cowboy out in the waiting room who says he’s here for Tag. Want me to let him come on back?”

  “I’ll get him if you’ll keep Sue Ann pacified for another minute.” Nikki made a quick right turn.

  Tag’s twin brother, Hudson, stood up when he saw her. “How bad is it this time?”

  She motioned for him to follow her. “Stitches on his jaw. The cut was deep. Doc’s takin’ care of him right now.”

  Nikki had had no trouble seeing that the Baker brothers shared DNA from the first time she met them. The cleft in Tag’s chin was more pronounced, and he wore his hair longer than Hud did, but those crystal clear blue eyes were the same. Even with those similarities, there were enough differences between them that she could hardly believe they were twins. However, they were pretty true to what she’d heard about it taking two personalities to make one when it came to twins. Tag was the wild and crazy one. Hud, the more grounded brother with a funny streak and a big heart.

  “Right here.” Nikki eased aside the curtain to Tag’s cubicle.

  “What’d you do now?” Hud asked.

  “Had a little run-in with a beer bottle,” Tag answered.

  Nikki hurried away to take care of Sue Ann, their regular weekend patient in the Bowie emergency room. Some folks were happy drunks, but not Sue Ann. When she had too much liquor or snorted too much white stuff up her nose, she became the poster child for hypochondria.

  “Oh, Nikki, darlin’.” Sue Ann slurred her words. “Just take me on into surgery and take out my stomach. It’s got an alien in it that’s trying to eat its way out through my belly button.”

  “I need a list of all the medicine you’ve taken since you were here last week, and whatever you’ve ingested in the way of alcohol or drugs in the past twelve hours—no, make that twenty-four hours—before we can do that, honey.” Nikki pulled a stylus from the pocket of her scrubs and was ready to write before she realized she didn’t have her tablet. “You think about what you’ve had, Sue Ann. Things are hectic here tonight. I’ll be right back.”

  “All done,” Dr. Richards said as Nikki slipped inside to get her tablet. “You see to it that you call my office tomorrow and make an appointment for next Friday so I can check this. If you start running a fever, call me. I think Nikki did a good job of cleaning it up, but one never knows when it comes to bar floors and beer bottles.”

  “I’m riding a bull at a rodeo on Friday night,” Tag said.

  “We’ll see about that.” Doc turned to Hud. “Make your brother behave this week.”

  “That’s an impossible job.” Hud grinned.

  “Then I’ll admit him for a week. We’ve got restraints that we can use to keep him in the bed, and the nurses will love taking care of his catheter.” Doc winked at Hud.

  “I’ll be good,” Tag growled. “But I don’t have to like it.”

  “Give me your truck keys. Paxton is out in the waiting room. He’s going to drive it home, and I'm taking you,” Hud said.

  “I’ll call if I need you,” Nikki said as she picked up her tablet. When she reached Sue Ann’s cubicle, the woman was sitting up in the bed. She was as pale as the sheet she tucked around her thin body. One hand was over her mouth and the other was pointing toward the bathroom. Nikki dropped her tablet on the table and barely got a disposable bag to Sue Ann in time.

  When she finished emptying her stomach, Sue Ann handed the bag to Nikki and said, “I had a little drop of tequila at the Rusty Spur tonight.”

  “How big of a drop?” Nikki picked up her tablet and stylus. “Tell me the truth. If we have to do surgery, it’ll make a difference in how much anesthetic we give you. You wouldn’t want to wake up before we got done, would you?”

  “Five shots. No, six, and then maybe four”—she lowered her voice to a whisper—“of those pills.”

  “What pills?” Nikki asked.

  “The ones I bought from that cowboy who was dancin’ with the pretty girl. That damned alien got in my stomach. They told me it was just the worm in the bottle of tequila when I ate it with a little lime and salt, but I know better. It looked like a baby alien, and I just swallowed it whole. Then my stomach started to burn and hurt. I saw that cowboy passing some pills to a lady, so I bought some from him.”

  Nikki thought she’d seen and heard everything when she worked at the nursing home in town, but this would be a story she’d have to share with her best friend, Emily. “Okay, then several shots of tequila and pills of some kind. I think we can kill the alien and fix you right up without surgery.”

  Sue Ann fell back on the bed with a sigh. “I don’t know about that. Don’t you need to do one of them TSA things?”

  Nikki bit back a giggle. “You mean an MRI?”

  “That too. Do all the tests you need to. I want this thing out of me.” Sue Ann put a hand on her stomach.

  “I’ll talk to the doctor and be right back. Are you still taking…” Nikki read off a whole page of prescription drugs. “You do realize that you’re not supposed to drink with about half of these or take street drugs with them?”

  “I know my body better than you do,” Sue Ann declared. “My grandma drank every day of her life and she lived to be ninety-eight.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Nikki said. “I’ll go talk to the doctor and be right back.”

  She stepped out of the cubicle, tablet in hand this time, and stopped so fast that her rubber-soled shoes squeaked on the tile floor. One more step and she would have collided with Tag.

  “It’s just not my night.” He smiled down at her. “I get in trouble for taking up for a woman, and now one almost falls into my arms but doesn’t.”

  “It might be a sign that you need to peel those stickers off your truck and begin to reform a little,” Nikki told him.

  “Never.” Tag grinned.

  Chapter Two

  If the next door neighbor’s dogs hadn’t set up a barking chorus with the landlady’s mutts, Nikki might have slept until dark on Monday. That would have been disastrous since her mother expected her to answer the phone at exactly seven o’clock. If she didn’t answer, then her mother would call the police station and the hospitals. Any other day of the week,
it didn’t matter if Nikki was lying in a ditch half dead, but no one had better mess with Wilma Grady’s schedule.

  “Thank God for barking dogs,” Nikki said as she crawled out of bed. She had an hour until her mother called, so she took a quick shower and got dressed. She sat down on the sofa in her tiny three-room garage apartment and called her mother’s number.

  “It’s not seven. My show isn’t over, but there’s a commercial, so what’s wrong?” Wilma said curtly.

  “Nothing’s wrong. I thought maybe we’d go out, or I’d bring a pizza or some fried chicken over for supper and we could visit in person,” Nikki said.

  “I eat at four thirty so I can take my medicine. I don’t eat fried foods or spicy pizza. You know that, Nikki. The commercial is over. I’ll call you at seven and we’ll visit.” And just like that she was gone.

  Nikki was hungry, and she’d figured out that she didn’t have to be in her apartment to talk to her mother on Monday nights at seven o’clock on the dot. She could talk to her anywhere, especially when Nikki’s part of the conversation was nothing more than muttering, “Well, that’s too bad,” or “Bless her heart,” now and then. She could do that in a booth at the Mexican place or sitting in the park while she ate a hamburger. With her purse and keys in hand, she locked the apartment door behind her. She made up her mind as she started the car engine that chicken enchiladas sounded really good that evening.

  The hair on the back of her neck prickled when she walked into the restaurant. At first she attributed it to leaving the sweltering night air and coming into a cool building. Then she heard her name and turned to see Tag and Hud sitting in a booth, waving at her to join them.

  It would be rude not to sit with them. They were, after all, her best friend’s brothers. Besides, the place was full and there were no more seats available. She threw up a hand in a wave and started that way. When she got close enough, Tag slid over to the far side of the booth to allow room for her to sit beside him.

  “How’s the jaw? I see you opted to look like a mangy dog, rather than go clean shaven for a few days,” she said.

  “Sore as the devil, but it’ll get well. Maybe you’ll take pity on a poor old hungry dog and go out with him?” Tag cocked his head to one side and whimpered like a puppy.

  Nikki grabbed a menu and propped it up in front of her. “You don’t look like you’re starving to me.”

  “You’ve met your match, Tag. You might as well admit defeat.” Hud grinned.

  “Why’s it so important for me to go out with you anyway?” Nikki asked.

  “Because he’s never been rejected, not one time in his whole life,” Hud answered.

  Nikki reached up and gently patted him on the cheek. “Poor baby.”

  He grabbed her hand, brought her knuckles to his lips, and kissed each one. Sparks flitted around her like Fourth of July fireworks. It had been that way since the first time she met him, and then again a month ago at Emily’s wedding to Justin Maguire. She’d served as maid of honor. Tag and Hud had both been groomsmen, and Tag had glued himself to her side all evening. As much as Nikki would have liked to be the maid of honor who went to bed with one of the groomsmen like in the movies, she wasn’t interested in a one-night stand—not even with the supersexy Taggart Baker. And any kind of fleeting relationship she might have with Tag could complicate her friendship with Emily. No way on the great green earth would she ever do that—Emily meant too much to her.

  “Why do you just keep breaking my little cowboy heart?” Tag’s blue eyes begged for an answer.

  “Darlin’, you are way too wild for me.” She told him the same thing every time he asked.

  The waitress finally made it to their table and took their orders, then promptly returned with their drinks, individual bowls of salsa, queso, and a basket of warm chips. “Orders will be along in a few minutes,” she said, and then hurried off to clean a table so another group could be seated.

  Nikki’s phone rang before Tag could come back with one of his famous pickup lines. She dug her cell out of her purse and checked the clock on the wall. It was five minutes until seven, so she was surprised to see her mother’s number pop up. Evidently her mother’s clock wasn’t in sync with the one in the restaurant.

  “Hello, Mama.” Nikki would have to talk to Wilma or the world would come to an end for sure. She was about to tell the Baker brothers that she had to take the call and motion to the waitress to make her order to go. Then she would sit on the park bench outside until it was ready. But a long sigh preceded a whisper. “Mrs. Thomas from next door came over with a plate of chocolate chip cookies and asked me to make coffee so we can have a visit. I don’t know what she’s thinkin’. We visit on Tuesday evening at six, never at seven on Monday. She’s getting senile and can’t remember anything.”

  “Where is she now?” Nikki asked.

  “In the bathroom washing her hands. I’ll have to clean the room when she leaves because she always makes a mess, and all she does is gripe about how her kids never come to see her. I wouldn’t go in that house either. She’s a hoarder. I bet there’s roaches in them boxes she’s got stacked everywhere.”

  “Then you want me to call later?” Nikki asked.

  “Lord, no, you can’t call later. She’ll stay until nine and you know that’s when I have to get my medicine and then get ready for bed. We’ll just have to talk next week,” Wilma said. “She’s coming out of the bathroom right now.” A long sigh and then the screen went dark.

  “You need to take your order to go?” Hud asked.

  Nikki dropped the phone back into her purse. “No, Mama has company, so I’ll talk to her later. We usually have a catchin’ up visit on Monday nights.”

  “Only once a week?” Tag said.

  “The first week we were on our ranch, Mama called twice, sometimes three times a day,” Hud said.

  Tag winced when he grinned. “Mama missed her pretty babies.”

  Hud chuckled. “Yeah, right. She’s just afraid that you’ll kill your fool self. From the look of your jawbone, she came close to being right. I told her this morning that you wouldn’t be riding bulls on Friday night.”

  “Well, if a bull comes through named Fumanchu, you can bet your country ass I’ll ride him, even if I’ve got stitches, a broken arm, and a busted up leg.”

  “You’re crazy,” Nikki said.

  That was another reason she wasn’t starting something with this cowboy—not even a first date. When Nikki fell in love, she fell hard, and the way Tag lived, well, he’d never see his first gray hair. She’d never knowingly put herself in that kind of situation.

  “Maybe so, but when I check out of this life, I’ll be able to say that I lived every single minute,” Tag said.

  The waitress brought their food, reminded them that the plates were very hot, and then asked, “Need more chips or dip?”

  “I’m good,” Nikki said.

  “Prove it.” Tag nudged her shoulder.

  Heat popped out in her cheeks in the form of two bright red circles. “You have got to be the biggest flirt I’ve ever known.”

  “Thank you. I do my best,” Tag said.

  Tag and Hud settled their sweat-stained straw hats on their heads as they stepped out of the cool restaurant into the hot night air. Hud’s truck was parked down the block with the windows rolled up. When Tag opened the passenger door, it felt like a blast from an oven hit him in the face.

  “Hurry up and get this thing started so it will cool down,” he said as he got inside.

  Hud nodded, started the engine, and turned the A/C as high as it would go. He pulled away from the curb and headed back toward the ranch that he and his brother had bought. It adjoined the huge Longhorn Canyon Ranch, owned by the Maguire family. Their sister, Emily, had married the younger Maguire brother, Justin, and they were about to get their new house ready to move into.

  Hud drove west out of town. “We really should name our ranch and get a brand registered.”

  “I was t
hinkin’ the same thing.” Tag smiled and then frowned. “Dammit! This thing hurts like hell when I grin.”

  “Serves you right for stepping into another couple’s fight,” Hud told him. “And you weren’t really thinkin’ about a name for our place. Your mind was still on Nikki Grady. What is it about her that makes you keep going back for more rejections?”

  “It’s just a game we play. A man would have to be blind or dead not to be attracted to those big brown eyes. But the truth is that in the long haul, we both know she deserves someone who’s grounded and stable, not an old rebel like me,” Tag answered.

  “Do you feel more for her than, say, you did for all the other women you’ve sweet-talked into takin’ their clothes off?” Hud took the road heading south toward Sunset.

  Tag shrugged. “Maybe. Why are you askin’? Interested in her yourself?”

  Hud shook his head slowly. “Not me. She’s sweet and has a firecracker sense of humor, but there’s no sparks between us. Got to admit, though, I see some serious electricity when y’all are flirtin’.”

  “She’s fun, and I like her sass. That’s as far as it goes or will go. Like I said, Nikki is one of them good girls who someone with my background don’t have a right to.” Tag adjusted the vents so the cool air blew right on his face. “This thing burns when I sweat.”

  Hud made a hard right onto a section line road off Highway 101. “Should teach you a lesson to stay out of other people’s fights.” Another right hand turn down the ranch lane and Hud pointed ahead. “Looks like we got company.”

  “Halle-damn-lujah! Maverick and Paxton have arrived. We’ve got help.” Tag was out of the truck the minute Hud parked. He met the two Callahan brothers, distant cousins of his and Tag’s, on the porch in a three-way bear hug instead of handshakes. When Hud arrived, it turned into a back-thumping event that looked like football players congratulating the quarterback on an eighty-yard run for a touchdown.

  “We’re here a day early,” Maverick said. “Mam talked about having a going-away party for us. The plans fell through when our sister had to go on a business trip, and our parents had to go to a funeral.”