Toughest Cowboy in Texas Read online

“So if they let you out of the contract, you’ll move again? Want me to take a long weekend and fly down to help?” Daisy asked when they’d sat down across the table from her.

  “I’d love it,” Lila answered. “I’ll let you know tomorrow or the next day. I’m going to call Clancy. I don’t think he’ll have a problem with it after his visit here.”

  “I’ll be glad to take a few days off and help you,” Brody said quickly. She might have put Clancy going but the man could swoop in with a lot of promises and smooth talk and convince her to stay in Florida. Then he’d have a whole year to win her back. As badly as Brody hated to be away from her, anywhere was better than Florida.

  “I’ll take all the help I can get but first I have to find another job.” Lila ran a hand from his knee to his thigh under the table.

  He shoveled ice cream in his mouth to cool him down and to keep from moaning. He’d miss her touch, the way her hair smelled and everything about her when she was gone. Skype was a good thing but it would never take the place of having her right there beside him sending desire through his body with nothing but her touch on his leg.

  Chapter Seventeen

  A flash of lightning shot out of the dark clouds as Brody drove the motorcycle out of town that Sunday evening after their ice cream date. To the north, Lila could see stars and a sliver of a moon. But to the southwest where the storms usually originated, the sky was black with only an occasional burst of light. She counted when the next streak zigzagged as if trying to reach for the treetops. Ten seconds. That meant the storm was ten miles out. Depending on whether it was traveling slowly or with the speed of a bullet, it could hit in a few minutes or take half an hour.

  The first drops of cold rain hit when they were halfway between the café and the ranch. Then the hail started pinging off her helmet and stinging her back when it hit with the force of the high wind pushing it. Brody turned into Henry’s old ranch and drove straight to the barn.

  She hopped off the back of the bike as soon as he stopped and slung the barn door open wide enough that he could drive inside. By the time he’d parked, she had her helmet off and was wringing water from her dress tail.

  “That’s some cold rain and biting hail.” She shivered.

  He quickly hung his helmet on the handlebars and gathered her into his arms. “I know where we can wait out the storm.”

  “Tack room?” she said.

  “Oh, yeah.”

  With his arm still around her, he headed that way. Not watching where she was going, she stumbled over the white mama cat and had to do some fancy footwork to keep from falling and pulling Brody down with her.

  “Poor old thing must crave company,” Lila said. “You should take her home with you. Kasey’s kids would love her and she wouldn’t be lonely.”

  “Why don’t you take her home? She could snuggle up next to you at night and keep you warm,” he said.

  “That’s your job.” Lila groped around for the string that would turn on the light. Finally her fingers found the same old wooden thread spool at the end of a length of jute twine and she gave it a tug. “Well, would you look at this,” she said.

  There was a small electric heater in the corner, a tiny air conditioner in the window, and a futon on one wall with a quilt tossed over the back.

  “Paul turned it into a poker place a few years ago. Said he needed a room for the boys on the nights when the girls gather at his house for those church meetings every month,” Brody said.

  “I don’t remember anything in here but lots of musty old saddles and a couple of horse blankets.” She wrapped her arms around herself trying to get warm.

  He hugged her close to his own chilly, wet body. “Hail produced a cold rain. You’re shiverin’, Lila. Let’s get you out of those wet clothes.”

  Brody slowly removed her dress and draped it on the back of a chair. His warm hands on her chilled skin as he unfastened her bra and removed it made her shiver even worse but it had nothing to do with the weather. He gently hooked a thumb under the edge of the elastic on her bikini underwear and strung warm kisses from her belly button to her toes as he pulled them down to her ankles.

  Then he stood up, grabbed a quilt, and whipped it around her body. “As warm as it is in here, your things will be dry by the time the storm passes.”

  She adjusted the quilt like a sari and undid the snaps on his shirt one at a time as she started undressing him. Running her fingers through the soft black hair on his chest, she tiptoed and kissed him on the chin. Then she quickly undid his belt buckle and pulled his jeans off, admiring all the hard muscles from his broad shoulders down his ripped abdomen and the V that led down below his flat belly. Then she took his hand and led him to the futon. In a blur the quilt left her body and she sat down, pulling him down with her. She moved into his lap and covered them both.

  His fingertips grazed her jawline, tilting her chin for the perfect angle so that his mouth could cover hers, and she leaned into the kiss. The tip of his tongue touched her lower lip, asking permission. She opened slightly and he eased inside as the hail and rain made beautiful music on the barn’s old tin roof.

  His work-roughened hands lightly skimmed from her shoulders, ever so slowly down her bare arms. When they reached her fingers, he made slow circles on the tender part of her palms as he deepened the kiss. Her body on fire, she pressed closer to him, her breasts against his chest.

  Then his hands were on her back, massaging and working kinks out from her shoulders all the way to her butt and then down the backs of her legs. The kisses got hotter and hotter until she couldn’t bear it anymore. She wiggled a few times and guided him into her but he controlled the movement with a long, slow gliding motion.

  “My God, Brody,” she panted.

  “Good?” he asked as he maneuvered her onto her back and laced his fingers in hers, holding her hands above her head. “There is no one else on the earth right now but me and you.”

  “Good isn’t even close,” she said.

  Talking stopped and they moved together until she was frantic with need. He slowed down and let her cool down just enough to catch her breath, then started building the speed again until she squealed his name and dug her fingernails into his back.

  The heat as she tumbled into steaming hot desire into complete and utter satisfaction was more than she’d ever experienced, even with Brody. He rolled to one side but the futon was so narrow that they were still plastered together. She kicked the quilt off to one side and slung a leg over his body to keep him from falling off on the rough wooden floor.

  “That was amazing,” he whispered.

  “I know.” She stifled a yawn. “Don’t you love the sound of rain on a tin roof?”

  “Mmmm,” he said as his blue eyes fluttered shut.

  Brody awoke to her soft breathing. The rain had stopped and he could see stars shining in the window above the air conditioner. As hot as it was and as much as he would have loved to have had cool air, he didn’t want to wake Lila. That would mean they’d have to go home and he didn’t want to ever let go of her.

  “Hey.” She opened her eyes slowly. “What time is it?”

  “Have no idea. Phones are on the table over there,” he said. “Let’s lock the door and live here forever.”

  She snuggled down deeper into his arms. “Sounds like a plan to me, but I bet Molly would send out the National Guard if I wasn’t in the kitchen by opening time. It’ll be strange not havin’ Mama there.”

  “So that means our date is over?” Brody asked. “I think it better be. I’ll get dressed and walk home. You can take the bike.” He sat up and rolled the kinks out of his neck. “I love sleeping with you. I love the way you fit in my arms.”

  “Me too.” She left the futon and went straight for her clothing.

  “Seems a shame to cover something that beautiful.” He grinned.

  “Right back at you,” she told him. “I’ll take you home, Brody. You don’t have to walk.” She checked the time on her phone
and gasped. “Holy smoke! It’s four o’clock.”

  “Be best if that loud bike don’t go roarin’ down the lane at this time of morning, don’t you think,” he said.

  She made it home by four-thirty and went straight to the shower. When she came out with a towel around her head and one around her body, two kittens were sitting on the floor staring at her.

  Duke meowed.

  Cora laid back her ears.

  “Young lady, you don’t get to give me those kind of looks either,” Lila said. “It was worth losing a little sleep over. Besides I liked sleeping with him. Not as much as I like the sex but having someone to snuggle with is nice.”

  Duke meowed again.

  “See, there, Duke agrees with me. He likes having you to sleep with.” She bent forward and dried her hair.

  At five o’clock she heard pots and pans rattling in the kitchen. She dried her hair and dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, laced her shoes, and fed the kittens. Duke put his paw on Cora’s head and tried to push her back but she wasn’t having any part of that.

  Lila left them tumbling around on the floor and went straight to the kitchen where she wrapped Molly in a fierce hug. “I’m so glad to see you.”

  Molly stepped back and narrowed her eyes. “I leave and everything goes down the toilet.”

  “Mama left this place clean as a pin. What’s your problem?”

  “Nothing to do with my kitchen. I told you to stay away from Brody Dawson.”

  “Ah.” Lila grinned. “I missed you, too, Molly.”

  “Who said I missed you or anything about this place. I just hated the sand more than I do…” She fussed. “I’m lyin’. I didn’t like the sand or the beach or anything about that place and I found out real quick that I love Happy, Texas, and do not want to leave it. And Georgia agrees with me.”

  “So where are you going when you go on another vacation?” Lila opened a drawer and took out a clean apron.

  “Maybe to the mountains or maybe I’ve been broke from suckin’ eggs and I’ll stay where I’m happy from now on and that’s right here where I know everyone and they all like my cookin’,” she said. “I hear that Hope is coming around to being civil to you but that Valerie isn’t. That right?”

  Lila tied an apron around her waist and tucked an order pad into her pocket. “That’s about it.”

  “Valerie means well. I can remember when Hope was a lot like her. She sure didn’t like Mitch Dawson there at first and Mitch’s mama wasn’t very happy with the marriage either. It’s the way of mothers—always interfering, but they do it out of love.” Molly flopped a bowl full of biscuit dough on the counter and started rolling it out.

  Lila laughed. “How do you know all that when you’ve only been home a few hours?”

  “I keep my ears open. Speakin’ of that, I heard your motorcycle comin’ past my place about the time I was havin’ my first cup of coffee and gettin’ ready for work this mornin’. I expect you were out at Hope Springs all night,” Molly said. “He’s goin’ to break your heart, girl. You know the old sayin’ that goes ‘Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, it’s my own blamed fault’?”

  Lila glanced at the clock. “Time to open the doors and I don’t think that’s the way that sayin’ goes.”

  “Close enough,” Molly said. “It’s goin’ to be your own fault.”

  “Note taken,” Lila said.

  “Smarty pants,” Molly huffed. “Turn on the lights and let’s get this week started.”

  “So is Georgia comin’ home too?” Lila poured herself a cup of coffee and carried it with her.

  “Soon as she can get here. She had all her belongin’s moved down there. Thank goodness her house hasn’t sold and she hadn’t signed on the dotted line to buy one down there. Do you know what it costs to buy a place in that state?”

  “Not much more than here unless you want beachfront,” Lila said.

  “Do you own a house?” Molly asked.

  She’d thought about buying a little cottage on the beach and had decided she might give it more serious thought if she stuck around for five years.

  “Oh, no, I rent a garage apartment and it’s furnished. I could put all my belongings in the back of my truck. I can’t afford the taxes on a place in that area—not on a teacher’s salary.”

  “Well, thank God for that. When are you comin’ home to Happy, then?” Molly asked. “If me and Georgia buy this café, we’ll hire you as a waitress. You probably make as much in tips as you do teachin’ and Lord knows, you don’t have nearly the hassle. Teachin’ a teenager anything is like nailin’ Jell-O to the smokehouse door.”

  “You got that right, Molly, but what on earth gave you the impression I would ever come back here permanently?”

  Molly grinned and pointed. “That right there.”

  Lila whipped around to see the first customer of the day getting out of his truck in the parking lot. In the dim morning light he was nothing but a silhouette settling an old Stetson on his head but that swagger left no doubt that it was Brody, and the feeling deep inside Lila left no doubt that Molly was right.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Good mornin’!” Lila said cheerfully when Paul and Fred entered the café that Tuesday morning. “Y’all boys ready for a cup of coffee?”

  “Oh, yeah, and we’ll have two of Molly’s big country breakfasts with all the trimmin’s,” Paul said. “I’m buyin’ this world traveler breakfast this mornin’. Our wives are at the church with the Ladies’ Circle so there ain’t no food at home.”

  Fred chuckled. “It’s an excuse for Mary Belle to tell them all about the cruise and I’m glad I ain’t there.”

  Lila filled two mugs with coffee and took it to the guys. “So two big breakfasts? Anything else?”

  “That should do it,” Fred said. “I got tired of all that fancy food on the ship after the first week. It was pretty good there at first but all them choices kind of bewildered me. I’m ready for some of Molly’s cookin’. You ever been on a cruise, Lila?”

  She shook her head. “Not yet but it’s on my bucket list.”

  “It’s all right. Mary Belle liked it better than I did and she’d go again. I told her if we made it to our seventy-fifth I’d consider another one but only if it lasted one week and not two,” Fred said.

  “You and Brody could go on one,” Paul whispered. “All cooped up like that would tell you if you were really meant for each other.”

  The blush was instant with two red spots filling her cheeks and burning like wildfire. “I’d better get that order in. Holler if you need any more coffee before it gets ready.”

  “What’s happened since I’ve been gone?” Fred asked. “Brody and Lila? Really?”

  “Hey, I can hear you,” Lila said.

  Paul, with his salt-and-pepper hair, leaned forward until he was practically touching Fred’s snowy white mop and lowered his voice. Lila couldn’t hear a word they said but whoever made the comment about old women being the biggest gossips in the world was dead wrong. Old guys could outdo them any day of the week.

  Her phone rang and she pulled it out of her hip pocket. “Hello, Mama. Breakfast rush over?”

  “Just about but there’s still a few stragglers. I tried to call last night but it went to voice mail. Georgia is coming in early and I told her she could use the apartment. Got a problem with that?” Daisy asked.

  “They’re buyin’ the place, so I guess I shouldn’t have,” Lila answered.

  “That’s not what I asked.”

  “No, Mama, not a problem at all,” Lila said.

  “What’s wrong with you this morning? I hear something in your voice.”

  “Nothing—just dreading the move and hoping that the school board in Conway, Arkansas, offers me a contract. They gave me every hope but things could go wrong.”

  Hope—the word brought visions of Hope Springs and Brody to her mind. She dreaded telling him good-bye, even if it wasn’t final. Just thinking about it brought tears to her eye
s.

  “And if they do, it’s not too late to go somewhere else. I heard on the radio yesterday that Oklahoma, Kansas, and Texas still have jobs open everywhere. There was a number to call but I didn’t write it down,” Daisy told her. “I’d just as soon you lived far away from Happy so this thing you and Brody have started again would die in its sleep, but I’m glad you aren’t going back to Florida this fall. That Clancy sure snowed me.”

  “So you think we couldn’t survive a long-distance relationship?” Lila asked.

  “Most people can’t. I’ve got customers. Talk to you later. Hug my grandkittens for me.”

  She was gone before Lila could say another word.

  “Order up!” Molly called out as she slid two platters of food onto the serving window ledge.

  “I didn’t even put the order on the roller,” Lila said.

  “I heard them,” Molly said. “And they’ve gone to talkin’ about that cruise and cows now. Talk of you and Brody didn’t last long.”

  “You’ve got ears like a bat,” Lila laughed.

  Molly shook a wooden spoon toward her. “And Georgia’s are even better, so you’ll have to be even more careful when she gets home. You might need to meet Brody out at his bunkhouse.”

  “Molly!” Lila blushed.

  “Just callin’ it like I see it.” She shrugged.

  When things had quieted down in the café, Lila poured herself another cup of coffee and took it to the back booth. She sat down on one side and stretched out her long legs to prop her feet on the other side. Her phone had pinged half a dozen times that morning but there was no way she could check messages in their busy hours.

  The first one was from Brody and put a brand-new blush on her face. The second one was from Clancy saying that he would be glad to let her out of her contract. Third, fourth, and fifth were from Brody asking her to call him as soon as possible.

  She hit the speed dial for Brody and he answered on the first ring. “Hello, gorgeous. I sure hated to leave before daylight. I wanted to watch you wake up.”