Accidental Cowgirl (17 page)

Shit. He was not supposed to feel this way. There was no room in his life for a woman like this. She’d have expectations. Standards. And a past that had knocked her silly somehow, given the panic attack he’d seen the other day. He longed for those things to steer him away, longed to fear those expectations. But dammit, more than anything else, he wanted to make her better.

And that was the scariest part of all.

He brought his hand up farther and stroked her hair softly, settling his chin gently on top of her head. In response, he felt her hands loosening, one of them trailing around his neck and down his collarbone.

She looked up slowly, eyes locked on his, then on his lips. Her lips were soft, raspberry-red, moist. So completely damn kissable-looking. But he was in a bar, for God’s sake. It wasn’t like him to engage in random PDA with practical strangers. He couldn’t kiss her. Not here. Not now. Not ever.

Her other hand left his neck and trickled upward to stroke his hair. Her cheeks looked like she’d overdone her makeup, so beautifully rosy. Was she feeling it, too? It sure seemed like it, but it’d been so long since he’d even tried to figure a woman out, he was afraid his signal-reading skills had gone completely to hell.

But her eyes were locked on his, and though she probably didn’t even realize it, he could see the pulse in her throat doing a double-time dance. Dammit, he did have to kiss her. He could think of nothing
but
kissing her. He brought the hand in her hair around to her jaw, running his thumb over her bottom lip. In response, he felt her entire body quiver.

God, yes. He definitely had to kiss her.

* * *

Kyla barely dared to breathe as Decker brought his hand from her hair around to caress her jaw. A shiver ran through her body at his touch, but she prayed he hadn’t noticed. For God’s sake, he was barely touching her, and she was ready to melt. How pathetic would that be? It was just a dance. Hottest dance ever, but still. Just a dance.

Then he moved his thumb ever so gently along her lower lip, and she was pretty sure her knees were going to give out and send her to the floor in an embarrassing blob of lusty flesh. What was he
do
ing?

She looked at his eyes, and couldn’t look away. His pupils were dilated, and he was looking at her with an intensity she’d never quite seen before. They’d stopped shuffling their feet and were standing still in the middle of the dance floor. He slid his thumb to her chin and lifted it almost imperceptibly. His eyes moved to her lips, which parted before she had to think. Pulling her body closer, he leaned down until he was a hair’s breadth from her lips and she thought she might actually die of lust.

“
Decker!
What are you
doing
?!” Kyla sprang out of her delirium one second before she registered the manicured hand coming at her face.

Kyla closed her eyes and braced for the smack, but it didn’t come. She opened one eye to see Decker, hand gripping Barbie’s wrist. Of course. Who else would it be?

Suddenly Cole was beside Decker, and Jess was gently pulling Kyla backward. The dance floor cleared around them, people gawking at the spectacle. Decker hadn’t let go of Barbie’s wrist, and she spouted fresh tears, aiming for the sympathy of the crowd. “Decker, honey. What’s going
on
?!”

Kyla growled low in her throat.
Decker, honey?
What the hell was
that
about? She almost smacked her own forehead when she realized what had happened. No freakin’ way. Not again. Decker’d thought Barbie Doll here was gone for the night, so he’d decided to make a play for the guest-of-the-week.

But uh-oh. Barbie wasn’t, in fact, gone. And now she was pissed. Really, really pissed.

Jess stroked her arm as she pulled Kyla off the dance floor. Decker’s eyes were blazing as he led Barbie toward the other side of the room. “Shh. He’ll handle this. Don’t worry.”

“I want to scratch her eyes out.” Kyla fisted her hands at her sides. “Or his.” She wasn’t sure who to go after first at this point. So close. She’d been
so
close to ecstasy. And it was just a kiss. A kiss with a man who was clearly involved with someone else. Of course. Why had she dared to believe it would be any other way?

“So do I, sweetie. So do I.” Jess pulled her gently back toward their table, but Kyla couldn’t rip her eyes from Decker and Barbie. Decker had dropped her wrist and was shaking his head. She couldn’t see Barbie’s face, but she imagined the tears were still flowing. For a moment, Kyla actually felt sorry for her. Here Barbie’d been thinking Decker was wrapped around her little finger, and instead, he was on the verge of kissing a stranger in a bar.

Kyla tried to breathe through the catch in her throat. Sympathizing with the girlfriend wasn’t really working. She’d been
this
close to the hottest kiss of her life, and now she’d have to live with a tainted memory, as the kiss had been about to come from yet another two-timing ass. It figured.

She watched Decker as he left the dance floor, but he was hardly recognizable as the man
who had just had her at full tingle with just the promise of a kiss. Now he just looked angry and annoyed. Served him right, for goodness’ sake. Had he really thought he could get away with kissing someone else in his own girlfriend’s town? What an idiot.

Jess gave her a little nudge. “We’ll be right over here if you need us,” she whispered.

Kyla’s chest jumped as Decker strode toward her. She crossed her arms as he got closer, unsure of what to say or do. He came to a stop about two feet from her and put his hands up as he shook his head. “I have no idea what you must be thinking right now. Are you … all right?”

Kyla crossed her arms. “Completely fine, yes.”
Except for all the parts that were ready to find an abandoned coat closet with you two minutes ago, that is
.

“I’m so sorry about that.”

Kyla nodded slowly. “Me, too. Clearly you’re involved with someone else.”

He startled, surprised at her words. “No, I’m really not. Really,
really
not. Marcy and I dated a while back. It was short, not very sweet, and ended about a month after it should have.”

Kyla rocked back on her heels, studying him while the bar crowd went back to drinking and dancing. Show over. How could it be possible for him to turn out to be just like Wes? Did all men screw around? Was Decker lying, and was this Marcy person actually someone who
did
have a right to be pissed that her guy was about to kiss another girl?

If she thought about it, he was in a perfect position to play around all summer long. A new group of hungry cougars came in every other Sunday, right? Really, how hard would it be to pick one each session and have some fun, then kiss her good-bye on Saturday and get ready for the next session?

Her stomach felt sick as she realized her radar was apparently, officially broken. Thank goodness she’d realized it before it was too late this time. Small consolation, since her lips were still tingling in anticipation of Decker’s kiss, dammit.

But as hot as he was, as hot as
they
might be, did Kyla want to be anywhere near this situation? No way, no how. Definitely not. She’d been the other woman once. That time she hadn’t known it. This time she would, and
that
was never going to happen.

She took a deep breath and looked him straight in the eyes. “Look, I’m sorry this Marcy person is obviously still in love with you. And I’m doubly sorry I got in the middle of it tonight by dancing with you. You can assure her it was just a dance. Nothing else happened.”

Decker took a step closer and lifted his hand toward her face, then put it down quickly as
she stepped backward. He sighed, looking suddenly sad. “First, I won’t be telling her anything, as I don’t foresee having another conversation with her during my lifetime.” He paused, blowing out a breath, then finished quietly, leaning close to her ear. “And second, it was more than just a dance, Snow White. We both know that.”

* * *

“What’s the first item on the list this time?” Kyla steered Jess’s convertible into an angled slot on Main Street on Saturday morning. She’d gotten the driver’s seat due to the fact that she’d scored Worst Cowboy Bar Night Ever the night before.

From the passenger seat, Jess read, “Best Coffee east of the Crazies.”

Hayley yawned in the backseat. “Gotta love a scavenger hunt that starts with coffee.”

Jess giggled as she read the sheet of paper. “It says here that we’re not allowed back at the ranch until after four o’clock. Apparently we can’t experience the full flavor of Carefree unless we stay in town for the entire day.”

Hayley leaned over the front seats. “Did Ma include a map?”

Kyla snorted. “Because a map helped us so much the last time?”

Jess pulled another sheet of paper from behind the scavenger hunt list. “Why, yes, we have a map.” She looked more closely at the sheet of paper. “Though I’m not sure we’ll actually need one. It’ll be hard to get lost here, even for us.”

Kyla pushed herself up out of the tiny car, wincing when her leg protested. Apparently her Zumba moves of last night were going to cost her today. Leaning on the car, she shook her leg, trying to loosen the kinks. What she really wanted to be doing right now was lounging on a porch swing with lemonade and a cheesy novel, but staying at the ranch would have meant being way too close to Decker. Better that she was here, in town, while he broke hearts elsewhere.

She looked up at the cheerful green awning above the sidewalk, then at the big-paned window with a medicine cup on it. Petunias in pink, purple, and white spilled out of two huge whiskey barrels on either side of the white-painted doorway. Kyla took a long breath and let it out with a sigh. “Why can’t we have more petunias in Boston?”

Jess consulted the map, then looked up and down the street. The downtown area they were in looked like it stretched for a couple of blocks north and south, with little east-west streets
intersecting at antique stop signs, and a sweet little park right in the center. Main Street was just barely wide enough for two lanes of traffic and angled parking spaces on both sides.

Kyla looked up and down the street, marveling at how pristine the whole downtown area looked. Two-story storefronts of log and clapboard and stone dotted the neat sidewalks, and wrought-iron benches flanked each doorway. The sidewalk was clean, the paint on the buildings looked fresh, and there were flowers everywhere. Every business she could see had at least one barrel of flowers out front.

Jess sighed as she turned in a full circle. “Oh, wow. I feel like I’m on a movie set.” She squinted down the street and pointed at a forest-green sign with gold lettering. “Do I see a steaming cup on that sign down there?”

Hayley yawned again. “Yes. Coffee. Let’s go.”

Five minutes later, they were sipping huge mugs of coffee and cocoa at a little round café table outside Java Beans. Cars poked up and down the streets, but Kyla hadn’t heard a car horn since they’d arrived. Instead, her ears were filled with the tweets and twitters of the songbirds flitting through the sidewalk trees, and bumblebees were busy visiting the flower baskets hanging from the awning. As usual, the sky was a sparkly, iridescent blue. Jess sighed. “Is anyone besides me
not
missing Boston right now?”

Kyla nodded. “Despite almost getting clocked by a jealous girlfriend last night, I’d have to say I agree with you. Even the cocoa tastes better out here.” She took a deep breath of the fresh mountain air. “And this air! I forgot how good air can smell.”

Hayley blew across her mug to cool her coffee. “So, Kyla. What are you going to do about Decker?”

Kyla felt her cheeks heat up as she thought back to the night before. “
Do
about him?” Hayley nodded, eyebrows raised. “I don’t know that I need to
do
anything. Besides avoid him, I guess.” She sipped her cocoa, stalling for time. She’d been up all night rehashing their every conversation in her mind. By four in the morning, she’d convinced herself that there was no good to be had by spending any more time thinking about Decker. Yep, avoidance would probably be the best strategy. “I’m not touching that situation with a ten-foot pole.”

“How do you plan to avoid him? We’re staying on his ranch. He’s going to be our trail guide. He’ll be a little hard to ignore, don’t you think?”

Yes. He certainly would. And that thought was making her nuts. She couldn’t believe
she’d fallen for another player, but how could she have known? Apparently she had a certain magnetism for the type.

“I don’t know, Hayls. At least this time I found out before we did anything more than dance.”

Jess sighed. “But oh, what a dance.”

“Please just tell me I didn’t look like I was going to melt into a puddle, because that’s what I felt like at the time. How pathetic is that?”

Hayley squeezed her thumb and index finger together. “Maybe juuuust a little.”

Jess smiled. “But we know you. Anyone else would have thought you were completely in control.”

“Right.” Kyla picked up her mug. She’d so
not
been in control. Far from it. Had a kiss from Wes ever tingled her from hairline to heels like the almost-kiss from Decker? It had certainly been a while since she’d had one, but she would have remembered that feeling, right? Yeah, she sighed. She definitely would have remembered. “Too bad he momentarily forgot he had a girlfriend.”

Jess sighed and shook her head. “I don’t buy it, Kyla. When he was dancing with you, he forgot about
everything
other than you. It was so obvious. I don’t think anybody’s that good an actor.”

Hayley nodded. “I’m a cynic by nature, but I’d have to agree on that one. That boy had eyes for nobody but you. All night. Especially when you and Jess were getting everybody all hot and bothered. He couldn’t wait to get out on the dance floor with you.”

“He was just trying to save me from a cowboy, he said.”

“Likely excuse, darlin’. Likely excuse. He
is
a cowboy.”