Cowboy Underneath It All (3 page)

Chapter Three

Kane was a bona fide liar now. One with a serious hangover that was likely punishment for the lying.

He located the biggest mug he could find in his kitchen and filled it to the brim with coffee. The coffee was stale, a package he'd bought over a year ago when he'd come home on leave, but stale would have to do. He needed the caffeine hit to try to ease the throbbing in his head. Or maybe that would only make him more alert and aware of the throbbing. If so, he'd have to risk it.

Cursing the headache and his decision to attend Dax's bachelor party, Kane took his coffee to the front door so he could go outside and start surveying the land. Something he'd intended to do the day before, but he'd gotten distracted.

And blindsided.

Damn Eliza and her lies. And now she'd made him a part of those lies as well, since Kane hadn't set Dax or the other partygoers straight. Worse, he wasn't sure he wanted to set Dax straight. The guy was happier than Kane had ever seen him, and it would have taken a special kind of cow dung to stomp on that happiness. No, if there was stomping to be done, it needed to come from Eliza.

Kane stepped onto the front porch. And damn near killed himself when he tripped over something.

Or rather someone.

Speak of the devil. It was Eliza.

Amid all his cursing and his spilled coffee, she shrieked like a banshee and scrambled to get to her feet. She was still wearing that smoking-hot red dress and heels from last night, and judging from her position and appearance, she'd slept on his porch.

“What the heck are you doing out here?” Kane was so sorry he'd spoken in such a loud voice because it roared through his already aching head.

It must have roared through Eliza's, too, because she winced, took his coffee and gulped some down. “I had the limo driver drop me off...” She checked her watch but had to move her arm several times while she tried to focus. “About two hours ago.”

He checked her watch as well, and by his calculations, that meant she'd gotten here at four in the morning. Not exactly a normal visiting hour.

“I knocked on the door,” she added, “but when you didn't answer, I decided to sit out here and wait. I must have fallen asleep.” Eliza handed him back his coffee. “I need to wash up, and then we'll talk. Or rather I'll grovel while you talk. I want to hear all about Dax's reaction when you told him the truth about us.”

Kane was actually glad that she stumbled off toward the bathroom so he'd have a moment to figure out what he was going to say. A moment to get more coffee, too, and since it appeared that Eliza needed it as badly as he did, he poured her a cup and put on another pot.

Eliza didn't take long with the washing up, though he did hear the shower going for a couple of minutes. When she came out, he was ready to get that conversation started and do some groveling of his own.

But someone sucked all the air from the room, maybe from the entire planet.

Yes, Eliza was definitely a twenty-eight-year-old woman. A hot one. Of course, he had noticed that in the pub, but he was noticing it again

The ends of her hair were damp and clung to the tops of that dress she'd put back on. Her face was practically glowing despite the fact she'd washed off her makeup. How could someone look that amazing with a hangover?

“Thanks.” She took the coffee from him and gulped down more. “The limo driver will be here soon. No way did I want to walk home in these heels so I told him to come back for me.” The gulping lasted a few seconds, and then she seemed to do a double take after seeing the look on his face. “What?”

It would have been a good time for him to say something. Anything. A good time, too, for him to have a different expression, one that didn't cause Eliza to smile. Because right now he was clearly gawking at her, and she was clearly pleased about that. Probably because it confirmed that he knew she was a woman and not his ex-girlfriend's kid sister.

“Yes,” she said, her smile still in place. Heck, her mouth was hot, as well.

Kane quickly tried to fix his expression, but he doubted there was a way to take the heat from his eyes. Eliza went to him, and in those heels she was only a couple of inches shorter than he was. Just the right height for her to lean in and brush a kiss on his cheek.

“Thanks for that, too.” Her breath was warm, smelled like coffee and felt like something he wanted more of on his face. “It soothes my ego a little after everything that went on in Calhoun's Pub.” She paused. “I hope this didn't screw over your deal with Charlene.”

He also hoped that, but you never knew with Charlene. She wanted him in her bed, and the deal might have hinged on her thinking that could happen. It wouldn't. Ever. Charlene wasn't his type.

Apparently at the moment, though, Eliza was. Because his body was still reacting to her.

“I hope this didn't screw up a lot of things for you,” Eliza added.

Kane considered getting into that, but since he was still trying to wrap his mind around his thoughts, he needed more coffee. Needed to put some distance between Eliza and this heat that she was generating in his body. He took his coffee and the frenzy she was creating behind his jeans' zipper to the back porch. She followed him, but she kept a safe distance while he looked over the ranch.

There was plenty to see.

He owned about three hundred acres, not big by Texas standards, but most of it was fenced and ready for him to bring in the livestock he wanted to raise. There was a pond just in the distance, two barns and a corral. Not perfect, not by a long shot, but everything looked a lot better than he'd thought it would.

“I had someone come over and check the fences and such,” Eliza told him.

Ah, that explained why things weren't falling apart. “Thanks.”

“Well, I didn't do it totally out of the goodness of my heart. One of the hands, Simon Jenkins, has a sick daughter who's been in and out of the hospital, and he needed the extra money. I'll bill you.”

Good. He thanked her again, and part of that thanks was because she'd obviously kept an eye on the place for him even when he hadn't specifically asked her to do it.

Kane drank more coffee, and once he could feel the cobwebs starting to clear out, he figured it was time to confess to what had gone on when he'd talked to Dax.

“If you're looking for horses,” Eliza went on before he could say anything, “my father's selling a lot of his. He's cutting back on work, and that means there'll be a shortage for the McCord Ranch. Logan McCord would rather buy local when it comes to horses.”

That was good to hear. Logan was Lucky's twin brother, and Kane preferred to do business with someone he knew. Too bad he couldn't get the cows from Logan as well, but the McCords ran a brokerage business, which meant they dealt in bulk. To start out, Kane only wanted the fifty head of cows that Charlene was to sell him. Horses were a different matter. Even for a place the size of the McCord Ranch, Logan would only need a dozen or so horses at most in any given year. Kane could easily supply that once he had the ranch up and running.

“So, why is your father cutting back?” Kane asked. “He's, what...only in his midfifties, since your folks had Violet and you when they were young?”

Eliza suddenly got very interested in staring down into her coffee cup. “I think he's just ready for a change.”

Kane thought there might be more to it than that. Or not. He was certainly in the “ready for a change” mode, and that's why he'd gotten out of the Air Force and returned home to his cowboy roots.

“How'd Dax take the news of me lying about us?” she asked.

She was still staring at her coffee so Kane put his fingers beneath her chin, lifting it so that they could make eye contact. Kane was ready to admit that he'd chickened out, that Dax still believed they were a couple. But he felt that punch of heat again.

Maybe it was the hangover or that red dress. Maybe it was the fact that Eliza suddenly looked good enough to taste.

And that's what he did.

Kane leaned in and kissed her. Not a peck on the cheek like the one she'd given him earlier or the hesitant kiss in the ladies' room at the pub. No. This was a real kiss, and even though he felt some hesitancy—or maybe that was shock—in Eliza's stiff muscles, it didn't take long for her to give in. She relaxed, made a silky sound of pleasure and kissed him right back.

All in all, that was not a good thing.

He was still battling the cloudy head and the fire she was creating, and kissing her was a confirmation of a couple of things he already knew. One, Eliza was indeed a woman. And two, he was damn attracted to her.

Kane went with blaming it on the dress again, but that was just a reminder that she would probably look even better out of that dress. Especially since the kiss had moved past the mere hot stage.

And speaking of hot, they were both still juggling their coffees as they tried to get closer to each other. Kane remembered that when he sloshed more of it on himself, and it was a good cue for him to either toss the coffee or take a moment to consider what the hell he was doing.

He pulled back, dragging in a much-needed breath. Eliza did the same, and she stared at him, repeating the “what the heck?” expression with her bunched-up forehead. Since her face was flushed from the kiss, it somewhat diminished that question because “what the heck” was pretty darn clear. They'd kissed each other's lights out.

“It was a test,” he said. That was more or less the truth. He had wanted to know if he could pull off what he was about to suggest. But it was also shallower than that. He'd really just wanted to kiss her.

“I didn't tell Dax,” he admitted. “I let him keep on believing the two of us are together because it didn't feel right to tell him something like that when he was gushing about the woman he loves.” Then Kane picked through his cluttered thoughts and remembered there was a second component to this.

Violet.

Heck.

“How did your sister react when you told her the truth?” he blurted out.

Because obviously when Dax and Violet compared notes of the conversations they'd had with Eliza and him, then Dax was going to know Kane had joined the “liar, liar, pants on fire” club.

Eliza's attention went back to her coffee. The way she was staring at it, it held the secrets of the universe. “By the time I got Violet alone, she was already drunk. I told her, but there's no way she'll remember anything I said. When I had the limo driver take her home, she didn't even remember there'd been a bachelorette party.”

So, their secret was safe, even though
safe
wasn't exactly the right word for it. More like a festering pile of falsehoods that would soon catch up with them. After all, they were in Spring Hill, where secrets had a very short shelf life. Usually much less than the two days until the wedding. Of course, if anyone had just seen him kissing Eliza, then the lies wouldn't have looked so much like a festering pile as much as the scalding hot truth.

“Are you mad I didn't tell Violet before she got drunk?” Eliza asked. She was nibbling on her bottom lip now, her nerves showing, but it was a flashing neon sign to Kane's libido that he wanted to be nibbling on her lip, too.

“No. In fact I think it's for the best.”

Since she was giving him the same kind of stunned look he'd given her the night before, Kane figured he needed to add something to that.

“It's best
for the time being
,” he amended. “Until after the wedding. And then we don't have to spill the whole truth. We can just let everyone believe that we gave this romance thing a whirl and then broke up.”

She stayed quiet a moment. “But what about your cow deal with Charlene?” she asked.

It was a better question than the one he figured was on her mind: “But what about that kiss?” It was certainly on his mind.

Kane shrugged. “I doubt she'll sell them to anyone else before the wedding day. After that, you and I can split.” And then he could dodge Charlene's advances.

Eliza looked up at him, did a few more moments of lip nibbling. “What if we do give this romance thing a whirl?”

Since the heat was still zinging between them, it was certainly timely. And hard to answer. In some ways, she was still forbidden fruit.

Which didn't help the mental argument he was having with himself.

Because forbidden fruit suddenly seemed like the exact kind of
thing
that he wanted. Especially right now. At this very moment.

Kane didn't think he could explain away another kiss by calling it a test. After all, there were only so many tests a man needed before he got an erection. Which he was working on just by looking at Eliza.

His silence must have dragged on too long because Eliza did some dragging of her own. She caught onto the front of his shirt, gathering up the fabric in her fist, and she yanked him to her.

And she kissed him.

There it was again. That kick of pleasure. That taste. Yeah, this whole forbidden-fruit thing was making him nuts.

Blindly groping behind him, Kane located the window ledge, where he put his coffee so that it would free up his hands to get her closer to him. Unfortunately, her cup was still in the way, and since he wanted to save his groping skills for Eliza, he tossed her cup into the backyard. She took full advantage of that and used her free hands to make that whole getting-closer thing happen.

Her breasts against his chest.

Her other parts against his. And they were the right parts, too.

The kiss went on and on, just the way he liked his kisses, especially when paired with all that body-to-body contact. It went on so long that Kane was ready to drag her back into the kitchen. But he held on to the small thread of reason that was trying to fight through the lust and the haze.

The thread that told him he really needed to rethink this.