Harlequin American Romance November 2014 Box Set: The SEAL's Holiday Babies\The Texan's Christmas\Cowboy for Hire\The Cowboy's Christmas Gift (55 page)

It was going to be a problem, though he would never admit that to Carrie. He'd have to either forget about her or get her out of his system. Considering she would be at the ranch day in and day out, forgetting didn't seem like the most likely option.

* * *

C
ARRIE
'
S
HEAD
SEEMED
to pulse at the same tempo as her heartbeat. She swiped her hand across her eyes, scraping away the grittiness in the corners and wincing at the pain that throbbed just behind her forehead.

Stupid rum and cola.

Sun glinted through the blinds she'd forgotten to shut last night, and she squinted. What time was it? A quick check of her ancient clock radio said eight forty-five. She couldn't remember the last time she'd slept this late. As she sat up in bed, the room took an uncertain shift. She waited it out, then cautiously stood, shut her blinds, and went in search of acetaminophen and a large glass of water in an attempt to rehydrate.

It was half-gone when there was a knock on her door.

Probably Kailey, Carrie mused, shuffling her way to the foyer. She'd want a play-by-play of last night for sure. Instead she opened the door to find Duke on the step holding a cardboard tray with two coffees and a smile.

She then realized that she was in her panties and the same red shirt—still minus her bra—that she'd been wearing when she fell into bed after he left. His smile was replaced by a slightly shocked expression that mellowed to amusement. “I'd offer you hair of the dog,” he said warmly, “except I thought you'd appreciate coffee more.”

She would not freak out that he was seeing her in her underwear. She would not. “Gimme,” she muttered instead, and reached for the tray. As she disappeared into the kitchen, she called back, “You coming in or what?”

She heard his boots hit the tile and the door shut behind him. “How could I refuse such a warm invitation?” he responded, coming through to her small kitchen. He looked her up and down. “Do you always answer your door in your underwear?”

“I thought you were Kailey.”

“Right.” He grinned at her. She really wished he'd stay grouchy and broody. He was easier to dislike then.

“You didn't need to bring coffee over.”

“I thought you might be a little worse for wear this morning, that's all.”

Which she was. Not that she'd had trouble sleeping. But she distinctly remembered dreams last night. Dreams about Duke and what might have happened in his truck. Or inside. She wondered if the reality was even half as good as her dreams, and if it was, she discovered she quite regretted putting a halt to their activities.

Sort of. Because her body was sorry but her brain was a bit blown away by the sheer force of their chemistry. It was too much. Overwhelming. The kind of thing that could swallow a girl up and then spit her out.

“Give me a minute to pull on some pants, okay?” Avoiding his assessing gaze, she resisted the urge to scoot to her bedroom for proper clothing, instead taking calm, measured steps. It wasn't as if she was naked....

Which she very well might have been if they'd finished what they started and were dealing with a true morning after.

She returned to the kitchen feeling seminormal, dressed in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt and her hair scraped back into a ponytail. The coffee smelled delicious, so she reached for her cup and took a cautious sip while Duke watched her over the rim of his own, his hips resting against the kitchen counter and his left foot crossed over his right. He looked ultrarelaxed when she was anything but.

Maybe walking away hadn't messed with his sleep the way it had hers.

“Thanks for this,” she said, cupping her hands around the heat sleeve. “But you really didn't need to come by. I'm fine.”

“Actually, I wanted to apologize.”

“You did?” She raised an eyebrow at him. “What on earth for?”

He looked oddly embarrassed as his gaze dropped to the floor for a moment and his cheeks grew ruddy. He looked up and gave a small, slightly crooked smile. “Look, Freckles, it's pretty clear that we've got chemistry. But I shouldn't have let it get in the way of my common sense. You were right last night about it being an awkward situation.”

Chemistry, hah. Carrie remembered the old trick from high school where a bunch of them had dropped a Mentos into a bottle of cola. That was chemistry, too, and that was just about how she'd felt last night. Fizzy. Explosive.

And why on earth did she feel all girlie when he called her Freckles?

“What, you've shortened Freckle Face to just Freckles?” She ignored the other stuff he'd said—she didn't feel like going into a postmortem of “let's define our relationship parameters” while her head was still throbbing.

“Too many syllables.” Duke's lips twitched and he took another long drink of his coffee.

“Don't worry about last night. It's already forgotten.” Yeah, and her nose was about to grow
à la
Pinocchio. As if she'd ever forget straddling him in his truck or the way he'd carried her inside as if it was his single purpose in life.

“Deal,” he agreed.

Now that it was settled, Duke seemed to relax and look around him. “So. This was the house you grew up in, huh.”

She nodded, knowing how it must appear to Duke. The house was nothing special. Things had fallen into a bit of disrepair, though Carrie did her best as a handyman. Maintenance usually took up what little budget she had for household items, so she hadn't really had a chance to put her own personal stamp on the place in the form of homey, decorative touches. Not that decorating was really on her list of strengths...

“I love it here. When Mom got sick again and my dad took off, I talked the bank into letting me assume the mortgage.”

“As a ranch hand? You weren't foreman then, were you? Wow. I'm impressed they lent you the money.”

She shook her head. “I know you and your grandfather weren't close, but he was really good to me. He cosigned the loan. It was the only way they'd approve me.”

“That was good of him.”

He sounded sincere, and she was glad. “So much had changed in my life. I think it was a relief to have this house, some sort of consistency. Plus it let Mom stay here during most of her illness.”

“That must have been hard.” He watched her over the rim of his cup, his gaze steady on her face. One thing she'd say about Duke, when you spoke to him, he paid attention.

She met his gaze. “Yeah, it was,” she said quietly. Harder still had been the last days, when she'd had to give in to harsh reality and her mom had gone to a hospice in Great Falls. It had meant that Carrie couldn't be with her as much as she wanted. It had meant that she'd missed her opportunity to say a last goodbye, too. That was something she'd always regret.

“It must have been tough, being the main breadwinner.”

She shrugged. “You do what you have to do. All I can say is I'm glad the ranch is still running. Without this job, I'd lose the house, and I'm still paying off the medical bills.”

She met Duke's gaze and saw the expected sympathy. “Hey, don't feel sorry for me,” she said. “I'm still healthy as a horse. It's all good. What about you? How're you settling in at Crooked Valley?”

It was Duke's turn to make a face. “Honestly? That house is too big and quiet for me. Quinn's got his office in the downstairs, and I felt like a fool wandering through it all alone. I moved my things into the bunkhouse.”

Carrie put her coffee cup in the trash. “The bunkhouse is all right. Quinn never used it because he has the house nearby and he's got Amber, too. But it had to be in rough shape. No one's lived in it for quite a while.”

Duke nodded. “It needed some work. I spent a few days last week cleaning it from top to bottom and dropping some money at the hardware store. I've been doing odd jobs in between shadowing Quinn around and getting an overall feeling for the operation. There's more here than I remember.”

“Your grandfather added the bucking stock in the past ten years. It didn't take off the way he hoped. He needs a Kailey.”

“A Kailey?”

“She runs the program at Brandt. Our stock has potential, but needs dedicated attention. And that's not my specialty. Nor Quinn's. He does the best he can, but he's not a rodeo guy.”

Duke started to laugh. “You know who'd be good at that? My brother, Rylan.”

“I heard a rumor he was still competing.” Rylan, three years younger than Duke, who'd moved to the city and then surprised everyone by becoming a bareback rider. “Joe wanted him to come back, too, you know. He always refused.”

Duke nodded, then finished his coffee and threw his cup in her garbage can. “I know. Ry was determined to make it his own way. He's more stubborn than I am.”

“God forbid,” she said drily, and Duke's eyes twinkled at her.

“Ry doesn't want handouts. I get that. He got one of these letters, too—that is, if he stayed in one place long enough for the lawyers to find him.”

“He did?”

Duke nodded. “You didn't read the whole thing, did you? The ranch is left to all three of us. I only own a third.”

Of course. She'd been silly to think that Joe would have left everything to Duke. “So he's coming back?”

Duke's face clouded over. “I don't know. We haven't spoken.”

“But he's your brother.” Growing up, Carrie would have given her left arm for a sibling. Someone to talk to and hang out with and share clothes with—who wasn't a friend from school. Someone to share memories of her parents with or turn to with secrets and support. “Surely you guys speak to each other.”

“Not so much.”

“And you and Lacey?”

Duke frowned. “I saw her when I was first back. She's been through a divorce, and she's working for Natural Resources and Conservation.”

Carrie looked up at him. “You've got a family and you don't even seem to care. Trust me when I say they might not always be there.”

“I know that. I lost my father, remember?”

“So what's keeping you from the rest of your family?”

He pushed away from the counter. “I just came to bring you coffee. I should probably be going.”

“I hit a nerve,” she acknowledged. “What are you hiding, Duke?”

“I'm not hiding anything. I'm back, I was at loose ends, I got the summons. I'm just here until I can figure out what I want to do next.”

A cold sensation ran down Carrie's body. “What do you mean, you're just here until...? What happens to the ranch if you leave?”

He shrugged. “We all have to take our place at some point during the year. If we don't, the ranch gets sold.”

Sold out from under them all, and if things went the way they had been lately, the buyer would sell off the herd and turn the ranch land into a housing development. She'd be out of a job. Instead of Duke being some savior, it was a real possibility that this was just prolonging the inevitable. Maybe she should start looking for new employment now, so she didn't end up scrambling. Didn't end up defaulting on loans and payments.

The problem was she loved Crooked Valley. It was her home. A home Duke didn't appreciate at all.

“I see,” she said weakly. “So why bother learning the ropes if you're just going to pick up and move on again?”

“What if I don't pick up and move? As I said, I'm figuring out what to do next. Learning about the operation is interesting.”

Carrie's hopes were short-lived. Ranchers didn't find things “interesting.” Ranching was part of who they were. It was something that was in the blood. It definitely wasn't something to dabble in for fun or because you had nothing better to do. Duke would stay a few months and be gone.

“Crooked Valley isn't really the sort of place where you just fill some of your spare time,” she replied, her voice sharp. The headache was threatening to come back, too.

“Hey, give me a break. I haven't come anywhere close to making any sort of a decision. I've only been here a week. I've hardly had two seconds to wrap my head around all of this, let alone relax.”

“Well,” she replied, “you'd better brace yourself, then, because next weekend things are going to get a lot busier and we need every pair of hands available.”

“Get ready for what?”

“You want a taste of what ranching is really like? We move the herd back here to the mountain pastures for the winter. The folks at the Triple B will give us a hand driving the cattle, and the next week we return the favor. It's exhausting but huge fun, too.”

“A cattle drive?”

She nodded. “Yup. We overnight at the old cookhouse and ride back the next day. When your grandmother was still alive, she cooked for two straight days to feed the crew when they returned. The past few years Joe brought in sandwiches and coffee for the first night's supper and we did a potluck on the return. All the wives bring dishes and someone generally fires up some music for a bit of dancing.” She knew there was a hint of nostalgia in her voice but she couldn't help it. It was one of the hardest and best weekends of the year, in her opinion—second only to the branding and vaccination day in the spring.

“I'm expected to coordinate that?” Duke's eyebrows lifted. “Why didn't anyone mention it?”

She shrugged. “I thought Quinn would have told you. Until last night, you barely said two words to me all week.”

Duke shoved his hands in his pockets. “I have no idea what I'm doing when it comes to herding cows. And I have no idea what to do about after, either. Do people expect a party?” He looked genuinely distressed. “You'll help me, right?”

Ah, so here it was. Now that he was stuck he realized she existed.
That's not fair,
a voice inside her argued.
He sure knew you existed last night.