Her Unbridled Cowboy (Harland County Series) (9 page)

Jordan reeled back. “That bitch! You
want to borrow my dog?”

Kerri laughed. Great minds. “No,
that won’t be necessary.”

“Ooh…I smell a cat fight.” Kevin
smiled, rubbing his hands together.

Smiling, Kerri shook her head.
“Sorry to disappoint you, but that won’t be necessary either.”

Jordan’s gaze narrowed. “Why not?
What did you do?”

She shrugged. “I told her she could
have him.”

Kevin’s bark of laughter was
drowned out by Cole’s, and together, the two men chuckled in unison.

A dark emotion skittered through
Connor’s eyes, but before she could name it, a neutral expression fell into
place.

“You’re not my type either, darlin’,”
he said, settling down by the window, arms folded across his chest. “I don’t
care for city girls. Besides…” His gaze was lazy and lingering. “You’re like my
kid sister.”

Kid sister. Right.
Except her
body didn’t have sisterly responses to his. No. The handsome cowboy made her
toes curl with his deep, sexy drawl, and her heart race should his brown eyes
stare for too long. Yeah.
Not
sisterly.

“Then this should be interesting,”
Cole said, smile still hovering around his mouth.

Kerri watched Jordan turn to her fiancé and frown. “What?”

“The mistletoe, of course.” Her
future brother-in-law pointed to the branch hanging directly above Connor’s
head.

Kerri’s gaze bounced from the sprig
down to Connor, then to the others.

They were all staring right at her.
Oh, heck no.
They’d all lost their friggin’ minds. “No way.” She couldn’t.
She just couldn’t. “You can’t be serious?”

“Of course we are,” Cole replied,
looking from her to his brother. “You’re the only single girl standing here.”

“Then I’ll go get another.” She
laughed and would have left if Connor had kept his pain-in-the-butt mouth shut.

“She’s too chicken, little brother.
Must be a city girl thing. No backbone.”

C
hicken?

City girl?

No backbone?

Okay, so Connor was right about the
city girl and the chicken part, but Kerri sure as heck had a backbone. A strong
one. She’d been through a lot the past two years and learned plenty about
herself. Resilient. Tough. Strong and resourceful. She didn’t need this smirking
cowboy saying any different.

Her mind reeled. This was a good
opportunity to show him, and her, just what she was made of. She’d survived a
cheating spouse, a divorce, the death of her brother-in-law, an earthquake,
explosion, and the loss of her home and business. It was about time she tackled
her sexual inadequacy.

And what better subject than the
man whose lips had barely touched hers last April, hardly giving her a chance
to respond before
he
ran away? She needed redemption.
Deserved
redemption. Would have her redemption, darn it!

Besides, it’s only a kiss. Nothing
more. And there were others there. They weren’t alone. She could do this. She
would
do this.

Mind made up, Kerri set her
shoulders and walked to him.
Baby steps
. She could do this, she told
herself again.

Connor just sat there, lazy
amusement lighting his expression as he looked up at her, daring her to run. 

She didn’t. This needed to be done,
as much for him as for her. She’d probably be sorry later—would definitely be
sorry later when her mind was clearer. But with her anger still lingering, she
drew on the strong emotion and forced herself to use Connor as a guinea pig to
her ‘recovery.’

Talking her knees out of buckling,
barely, she looked down at the smug cowboy and sighed. “I take it you’re not
going to stand?”

“No.” His dimples appeared.

Bugger.

From the corner of her eye, Kerri
could see her sister shake her head and heard her say, “Big mistake, cowboy,” under
her breath. Jordan knew the strength of Kerri’s backbone.

At least someone did.

Ignoring everyone, Kerri sat right
down on Connor’s lap causing him to unfold his arms and stare at her through
startled eyes.

Good.

Unexpected move number one.

Aware that his arms were at his
sides, and he appeared to deliberately refrain from touching her, Kerri decided
her goal would be to make him touch her. Once he did, she could break the kiss.

Now, if only she knew
how
to
make him touch her. She had no friggin’ clue. With the exception of Kevin, the
last person she’d kissed didn’t even like women. How in the world to get a
virile man like Connor to break his control was way out of her repertoire of
experience, and exactly the challenge she needed.

Heart hammering in her chest, palms
sweating, she told herself this kiss wasn’t about what Connor wanted her to do
to him…it was about what
she
wanted to do to Connor.

Finding herself face to face with the
potent man for the first time in her life, she felt less intimidated. He no
longer towered over her. They were…equal.

She liked
equal
.

Clearly waiting for her next move,
he sat still, spicy aftershave tickling her nose, and she was so close she
could see every gold fleck dancing in his brown eyes as amusement sparked with
heat. When the warmth of his exhale hit her face, a swarm of butterflies
settled low in her belly. Massive ones. Huge. The size of mutants.

But she refused to lose her nerve. Raising
her chin and ignoring the incessant beating of her heart, she removed his
Stetson and handed it to Kevin.

“Here, hold this for Connor,” she
said without looking at the dreamboat cowboy. “He doesn’t need it right now.”

Right now. Right. Because she was
going to…what?

Lordy, what am I doing?
She
had no idea, but refused to panic.
Go with your instincts
.

Okay. Right. Instincts
.

Her hands itched to touch him, so
she palmed his chest and slowly ran her fingers upward to his shoulders, loving
the feel of sinew and muscles rippling beneath. Darn man was walking
testosterone wrapped in hard strength.

Even though he still hadn’t touched
her, Connor’s eyes had darkened, so she took that as a sign she was doing
something right.
Please God, let me be doing this right
. Using her need
as a guide, Kerri ran a finger up the bare flesh of his neck, over his jaw then
down to his chin.

Holy smokes, the man was hot. Heat
emanated off the cowboy like an L.A. sidewalk in mid July. And she could feel
him,
all
of him. She was very aware of the bulge poking her cradled butt.

The strangest urge to squirm and
rock into him shook through Kerri. So she did.

He stiffened. “Kerri.” His sexy
tone was too low for the others to hear, but she heard the warning.

Holy sugar
, he made her want
things…things she couldn’t name.

Completely unable to breathe, she
ignored that minor annoyance and brushed her finger over his lower lip,
watching, enthralled as his pupils grew large as she very slowly moved her face
closer.

But he still made no move to touch
her.

Didn’t matter. It was no longer
about him. It was about her. She needed to taste him. Now.

Holding his chin in her hand, she lightly
ran her tongue across the seal of his lips, and
Alleluia
, he growled.

Growled.

In an instant, she was crushed to
him as one large hand spanned her shoulder blade and the other held the back of
her head, breaking her clip like she’d broken his control.

If Kerri had been firing on all
cylinders, she would’ve jumped to her feet and celebrated her victory. But her
cylinders and brain cells, and even stark reality, shifted out of focus as he
deepened the kiss.

Her whole body tingled and felt
alive. She’d never been kissed like this before—like she was the most important
thing in the universe. Worshipped. Needed.
Desired
. Connor’s mouth was
hungry and firm, his tongue touching hers, and judging by the increase in the bulge
she was now sitting on, the cowboy wasn’t as allergic to city girls as he claimed.

City girls…

Reason returned to her muddled
brain with a thud. She abruptly ended the kiss and scrambled to her feet,
thankful her boneless legs somehow supported her. One look at his desire-laden
eyes, however, and she nearly sat back down for some more.

Thankfully, Kevin cleared his
throat.

 “Do you want this back now?” he
asked, handing her Connor’s hat.

Sanity returned and brought with it
the reason she’d agreed to kiss Connor in the first place. To prove to him, and
herself, she was desirable and…and…for now that was enough.

Baby steps.

Kerri placed the Stetson back on
the unbridled cowboy’s head, then with shaky fingers, took his chin in her hand,
forcing herself to complete her redemption. “Never underestimate the back bone
of a young city girl again, Connor McCall.”

With a wink, she spun around, and
ignored the snickering happy couple to her right.

Cripes, she’d forgotten they were
even there. Oh well, it would certainly be an engagement party they’d remember.

She wasn’t likely to forget. Ever.
Her mouth still tingled, and she had no idea how her legs were working. Must be
the new heels.

As Kerri walked past Kevin, the
blue-eyed cowboy grumbled about her not kissing him like that. A smile tugged at
her mouth because she knew she now wore the same smug expression she’d just
succeeded in wiping from Connor’s face.

I
t hadn’t gotten any
easier. Not one damn bit.

A whole week had passed since Kerri
had settled onto his lap and proceeded to kiss the tar out of him.
What had
been with that
? Connor wondered as he sat behind his desk at the ranch.

He was supposed to be entering this
week’s expenses into the computer, but he’d only gotten as far as booting up
the laptop when thoughts of a brown-eyed, brown-haired cook with her sinfully
delicious kiss entered his mind.

Again.

It was his fault. He shouldn’t have
let it happen. Sure, he knew instinctively she’d knock him for a loop. But had
he known she’d taste so damn hot and willing and…and so hot, or feel so soft
and curvy and…and hot, hell he never would’ve goaded her into that kiss.

Never.

But he had. And she had, and damn,
he couldn’t get the incredible feel of her supple curves, or the sweet, sensual
taste of her out of his head. All week, she’d haunted him, fueling fantasy after
fantasy he had no business having of his former childhood neighbor.

But he had.

And dammit, now he was hard. Again.
He swiped the hat off his head and tossed it far across the room onto a leather
couch before shoving a hand through his hair. Cripes. It was going to be a
long
two months.

As if agreeing, his computer dinged,
breaking the silence of the room. He glanced at the screen and expelled a
breath, easing some of his tension in the exhale.

It was Kade.

Connor immediately accepted the
invitation to Skype. Thank God he’d been sidetracked by thoughts of Kerri or he
might not have been online to get the unexpected call.

Kade’s image filled the screen. His
buddy was in his Army fatigues, hat and wrap-around-sunglasses in his hand,
giving Connor an unobstructed view of his friend. He looked good. Tired and a
little dusty, but otherwise, good. 

 “Hey, buddy,” he said.

“Hi, Connor.” His friend cracked a
smile. “Got a new look, I see. Suits you.”

Connor frowned at the smirking face
on screen. “What new look?”

Kade pointed to his own hatless
head. “If you’re going for an
I want to pull my hair out look
, I’d say
you’ve nailed it.”

Glancing at his image in the small
box at the top right corner of his monitor, Connor saw what had his friend
grinning. Thanks to his raking fingers, the hair on top of his head stood at
odd angles. He laughed and smoothed it down with a swipe of his palm.

“You’re just jealous ‘cause I
have
hair,” he teased, motioning to his buddy’s high-n-tight military cut. “This is
about as short as I’ll go. Couldn’t handle that peach fuzz you’ve got growing
on your head.”

Kade hadn’t had long hair since his
teens. Once his best friend had joined the National Guard, the long-haired
rebel had disappeared, and the short-haired, upstanding, responsible citizen
had emerged.

“Believe me, you wouldn’t want it
longer than this during the summers here.”

“It’s not summer there now, though,”
he said dryly.

Kade nodded. “True. But it
is
regulation. Maybe you’ve heard of it? A guideline, parameter, rule. Oh wait,
never mind. Connor McCall doesn’t follow rules, he breaks them or makes his
own.”

“Damn straight,” he agreed, and
they both laughed.

God, it was good to hear
. Tough
enough to go on one deployment, but four? Connor appreciated Kade’s sacrifice
and that of all the troops, but how much more did his buddy have to give? Hell,
how much more did his buddy have
left
to give?

Not much. Kade hadn’t been the same
since his first deployment and each time he came back there was a noticeable piece
missing. Kade had always been good at hiding his feelings and emotions. Except
from him. Connor could always tell by the slight stiffening of his friend’s
shoulders—like he was bracing himself, shoring up to weather a storm.

Ever since they were kids, when
Kade’s father had died, then his mom ran off with some rodeo clown and later
also passed away, Kade had mastered the art of concealing. His buddy had been
eleven when his Aunt Sarah had taken him in. It’d been the best thing that
could’ve happened to him, and Kade would readily agree. Living on Shadow Rock,
then eventually running the ranch had given his buddy a sense of purpose. A
mission. And Kade Dalton was all about missions.