Cowboy Crazy (8 page)

But Sarah knew now that there was a price to pay for fun. Her sister had paid that price and Sarah had been careful ever since—the responsible sister. She tipped out one foot, frowning down at her worn-out boot. When things went wrong, you had to have a plan. That’s where Roy had gone wrong. He hadn’t planned on the accident. He hadn’t planned on Flash selling for next to nothing. He’d bet everything and lost, so they’d had nothing to fall back on.

That was never going to happen to her again. She’d worked hard to become a new person. A successful person, a
rich
person who could take care of herself and have enough left over to help her family.

She needed to get back to work, where she only had the younger brother to contend with. The safe one.

Because being with Lane was not safe. She could feel her old self clawing at the cage she’d created, trying to break through the layers of sophistication she’d built up over the years. And if her old self got loose, she was liable to do a lot more than kiss Lane Carrigan the next time they ended up in a dark alley.

Lane watched Sarah sit primly in a folding chair, watching the band crank out country’s greatest hits on the platform at the front of the tent. Her lips were pressed tightly together, her hands knotted in her lap. She was probably afraid the locals would eat her alive.

He smiled at the thought. As far as he was concerned, her world—the business world—was full of piranhas and barracudas. Worse yet, the predators there dressed like regular folks. In his world, people might look a little rough but at least you knew what to expect. Bikers wore leather, and cowboys wore hats. Easy girls wore low-cut tops, and good girls—good girls dressed like Sarah.

The top of the tent was a tangle of electrical wires, each one leading to a paper lantern. The individual circles of light made each table a mini-stage, highlighting the various dramas taking place. At one, a woman sat slouched over a beer, watching with wounded eyes as the cowboy beside her chatted up a woman at the next table. At another, three women watched the band, their eyes fixed in identical predatory squints on the lead singer. At the one closest to the door, a man and woman conversed in furious whispers. Lane couldn’t hear what they were saying, only the faint hiss of anger in their tone.

He let his eyes roam down the bar, where cowboys and cowgirls perched on tall stools, boy-girl, boy-girl. Some of the women leaned close to the men beside them; others seemed determined to shrink into the smallest space possible as eager cowboys waved imaginary lassos in the air, recounting their glory days.

Everyone was trying a little too hard, including the band up on the makeshift stage. A singer with serious dental issues was rasping out the lyrics to “Sweet Home Alabama” with his stance spread wide and his skinny hips thrust forward. Behind him, a fiddler sawed determinedly at a battered violin. Everything was a little too loud, a little too desperate.

Sarah’s eyes flicked from one face to another, then slid back to a thirty-something cowboy who was standing a few feet from the bar, talking with a bunch of other guys. Lane had seen the guy ride a few times, and his mental tape loop pictured him getting bucked off a lot. He remembered a fatal tendency to misread the horse’s cues, a habit of letting his shoulders tilt into the spin and pull him off center.

The guy sure wasn’t making much of an impression on Sarah. Lane hoped she never looked at him like that, with her brows lowered and her lips tightened in disapproval. He scanned the luckless cowboy from head to foot, wondering what annoyed her so much. He wasn’t bad looking—reasonably fit, dressed in the typical cowboy uniform of striped shirt, Wranglers, and boots. The shirt was faded as if it had been washed about a hundred times, but Lane didn’t think Sarah cared about the condition of a man’s clothes. If she did, his own would never pass muster. And however cold she was now, she’d kissed him like she wanted him. He brushed a finger over his lips and she flashed him a glare almost as cold as she’d given the other guy.

Maybe coming to the beer tent was a mistake. He should have kept her in the shadow of the potato skins stand.

As Sarah swung her gaze back to the cowboy, the guy turned like he could feel the chill. When his eyes lit on her face he froze as if he’d been turned to a pillar of ice.

“Sarah Landon,” he said. “Shit.”

So he knew her? That was odd. Though she’d seemed remarkably comfortable at the rodeo, she sure didn’t seem like the type to spend time in the kinds of places where this guy probably hung out. Unless he was from Texas or Colorado, where she’d stomped out a couple small towns at the bidding of the corporations she’d worked for. Maybe that’s what this was about.

“Mike Sullivan.” Sarah spat out the name like it was a cuss word. She turned to Lane. “Could you get me a beer, please?” She said it curtly, still staring down the mystery cowboy. Suddenly, she seemed less like a delicate flower and more like a cactus blossom, beautiful but ringed by thorns. He felt like saying no, but maybe it was better to get away before she started scratching the other guy’s eyes out.

Starting toward the bar, he wove his way through the crowd of cowboy-hatted men and tight-jeaned women. Halfway there, he turned and saw the guy striding over to her, fists clenched at his side and a pugnacious scowl on his face. Lane paused midstride to listen in.

“What are you doing here?” the guy asked Sarah.

“Working,” she said. “And I suppose you’re having a
good
time
.”

She said it like it was the worst thing a guy could do. Lane definitely needed to rethink hanging out with this woman. She was even more straitlaced than he’d thought.

“I suppose I am.”

The guy’s chin jutted in defiance, his hands still clenched into fists. Something was wrong with this picture. Maybe it was the familiar way the guy spoke to Sarah. Maybe it was the way he stood, stiff and hostile. He looked like a man about to start a fistfight. Surely he wouldn’t hit a woman. Lane walked back to Sarah and stood just behind her. The guy’s eyes flicked toward him and he did a quick double take.

“Hey, you’re Lane Carrigan.”

Sarah turned and scowled at Lane. “I thought you were getting a beer.”

“Thought you might need me.”

“I don’t.” Her tone was frosty as a chilled mug.

“You sure?”

“Hey, run while you can, buddy.” The guy spat out a bitter laugh. “Sarah’s liable to spit in your eye before she even knows your name.”

“Spit?” Sarah snorted. “That would be too mild.”

“Yeah, well,” the guy said. “Having second thoughts isn’t a capital offense, you know.”

“No?” Sarah lifted her chin imperiously. “Well, it should be.” She waved the guy away. “Have a
good
time
, Mike.”

What the hell was she so upset about? And how did she know this guy? The mystery was intriguing, but if she had a problem with a guy having a good time Lane was done with her. Sarah might have softened when he’d kissed her, but now she was all sharp edges.

He’d get her the beer she’d asked for, but then he needed to get her home and get away from her. No matter how much he’d enjoyed that kiss.

***

“Who was that?” Lane had returned from the bar with two beers, making his way through the crowd in record time despite the shout-outs of half-a-dozen cowboys and an equal number of eager buckle bunnies.

“He’s nobody.” Sarah downed half the beer in one gulp, determined to finish it and go. She’d thought she could get away with coming here. Because of the lack of jobs, there was hardly anyone under the age of sixty left in the Two Shot area.

But Mike didn’t care about jobs. The guy had all the ambition of a cat in the sun. He’d seemed smitten with her sister, and he’d done the right thing for a while, sticking around after the baby was born. He’d found a steady job at the feed store and come home to Kelsey’s cooking every day. He didn’t spend much time with Katie, but Kelsey thought parenting was the woman’s job.

Then the feed store had shut down and instead of finding another job, Mike had left his family for the rodeo road. Said family life was too “confining.” He’d married too young, he said. He needed to “have a good time.”

Sarah wanted to kill him. He’d left Kelsey with a two-year-old daughter and Kelsey started the single mom struggle for yet another generation of the Landon family.

She threw back another slug of beer as Lane hailed a waitress who was edging through the crowd with a tray full of oversized shot glasses. Grabbing one, he shoved it at Sarah.

“Drink up,” he said. “I’m driving.”

She sniffed the amber liquid and the scent of tequila almost knocked her head back. A shot was the last thing she needed. She’d already loosened up way too much, kissing Lane in the alley, letting Mike get her steamed. Or was she already drunk—on Lane, on all the testosterone he put out? Could pheromones make you dizzy?

Maybe. He gave her a smile and a wink that made the rage ebb a little, raising his beer in a toast.

“Come on, it’ll do you good,” he said. “You’re a little tense. I’m afraid to get back in the truck with you.”

She didn’t blame him, but there was nothing to worry about. She’d spent all her anger and adrenaline on Mike, and now she felt like she was made of glass and might shatter any second.

Bringing the glass to her lips, she tilted her head back and drank. The liquor traced a fiery path down her throat and coiled in her belly, spiraling up to warm her from the inside out. She set it on the table and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. Dang. What a redneck move that was. But Mike had already blown her cover, and Lane didn’t seem to care. He grinned and draped an arm over the back of her chair.

“See? Having a good time isn’t such a bad thing.”

He had a point. She let herself lean into him a little. It felt good to have a big, muscular man beside her. And Lane really was trying to show her a good time.

That kiss. Now
that
was a good time.

She turned and scanned his face, wishing she could just give in to the urge to nestle into the crook of his arm, tuck her head under his chin, and enjoy the music. But what must he think of her? He didn’t know Mike had walked out on her sister. He probably thought the guy was an old boyfriend. He must think she was a total bitch.

As a matter-of-fact, a lot of people thought that. And maybe they were right. When had she changed so much? She just wanted security, financial and otherwise, for herself and for Kelsey, but most of all for Katie. She didn’t want her niece growing up with the same doubts and uncertainties she’d had.

But sometimes it seemed like her ambition had taken on a life of its own. It was eating up her life and her personality until she’d become a woman she barely recognized—and one she didn’t like very much.

She wouldn’t blame Lane if he let her go, but he pulled her a little closer and she went limp, tucking her head under his chin and resting her cheek on his chest. She felt safe for the first time in years.

“That guy,” she said. “It’s not what you think.”

He shrugged. “Whatever. You don’t have to tell me anything.”

“No, I do,” she said. “
I’m
not what you think.” She hailed the bartender. “Bring us another shot.”

Lane sat back as the waitress in the tight Cuervo T-shirt and denim short-shorts slid two more shots across the table. “On the house,” she said with a flirty little curtsy. “Just let me know if you need anything, Mr. Carrigan.” She winked and walked away, twitching her tight little behind.

The glasses skidded on the moisture glossing the table. One almost landed in Sarah’s lap, but she caught it deftly and downed it in one easy motion.

“So,” she said. “Let me tell you everything.”

“Everything?” He grinned. “You’re giving me whiplash.”

She arched an eyebrow. “The kiss was good, buddy, but I’m not buying you a monkey.”

He laughed. “Not that Whiplash. Emotional whiplash.”

“You’re right.” She sighed, staring down into the empty shot glass. “I’m running hot and cold tonight. Part of it’s Mike.”

“Bad memories?”

“Like I said, it’s not what you think,” she said. “He’s my sister’s ex. Knocked her up, made a big deal out of ‘doing the right thing’ and marrying her, and then last year he walked out. Said he’d married too young and needed to have a good time.”

“Oh.” Maybe he’d misjudged her. She had every reason to hate that guy. But what was her sister’s ex-husband doing here in Wyoming?

“How…”

He didn’t even have to finish the question. It was like she couldn’t wait to tell him. “I’m from here. Well, near here.” The words tangled on her tongue. The tequila was talking, but she didn’t seem to care. Stiff, stuck-up Sarah was gone. He could almost believe she was from Humboldt.

“I thought you were from New York or something.”

“That’s what you’re supposed to think.” She sighed. “For God’s sake, don’t tell Eric. He thinks I’m just like him. Like you. To the manor born. But I’m—I’m actually from Two Shot.”

She said it like she was admitting to mass murder. Now it was his turn to look away as he tried to figure out how to respond. He kind of wanted to laugh, but that would obviously hurt her. She was confiding in him, letting him into her life as surely as she had when she’d kissed him. And it was becoming more and more obvious that letting people in wasn’t easy for her.

She was watching his face, her eyes flicking up to his to gauge his expression.

“You sure don’t seem like a small-town girl,” he finally said.

“Thank you.”

“That’s not necessarily a compliment.”

“I know.”

The waitress set down a pitcher of beer and two plastic cups, shooting Lane a sexy little smile. Sarah grabbed the pitcher and started pouring. She’d filled the cup halfway with foam before Lane took the pitcher from her and finished the job, holding the cup at an angle so the beer poured smooth and clear.

“I hated it, Lane.” Sarah took the cup from him and sipped. “You think Two Shot’s so great, but I couldn’t have spent my whole life there.”

“I wish I had.”

“I know. You call it your hometown. But you never—I mean, I’m from there, and I never saw you there. We would have known each other.”

She stopped short of accusing him of lying, but he could see the doubt in her eyes.

“I wasn’t there much,” he explained. “It was as close to being home as anything I had, but I spent most of my time in boarding schools back East.”

“Boarding schools?”

“Exeter.”

She drew back and scanned his face like she was looking for the stuck-up preppie hidden under his cowboy facade. “You’re kidding.”

Apparently she couldn’t even imagine him at a swanky school. He should probably be insulted, but as far as he was concerned that was a good thing.

“I hated it,” he said. “I might not have spent much time at the ranch, but it was home. My real home. The two weeks a year we spent on the ranch were the best times of my life.” He took her hand and laced her fingers in his own. “The prep schools were my dad’s idea. He wanted nothing more than to leave the ranch behind.” He flashed her a questioning look. “Kind of like you.”

“What I’m leaving behind isn’t twenty thousand acres and a family empire. We didn’t even have a home—just a series of trailers and apartments. We had a ranch for a while, but…”

He could almost see the shield going up. The light in her eyes dimmed and she swallowed, turning her attention to their interlaced fingers, staring at them as if they were so absorbing she couldn’t possibly continue the conversation.

“The ranch?” he prodded gently.

“We lost it. So there’s nothing in Two Shot for me but a bunch of bad memories.”

She dropped his hand and straightened in her chair. Obviously, talking about Two Shot was not the way to win her over.

“I suppose I shouldn’t claim it as my hometown,” he said. “I didn’t actually grow up there.”

“That’s okay.” She sipped her beer and rolled her eyes. “You can have it. I don’t mind. And I’m sure they’d be happy to put up a sign for you at the city limits. You know,
Home
of
Rodeo
Champion
Lane
Carrigan.
Something like that.”

“That’s not what I want,” he said. “I just want to belong there.”

The minute the words were out, he wanted to take them back. How pathetic was that? He’d just given away far more than he’d intended. She was probably picturing him as a kid, slouching around the campus at his prep school, friendless and homesick for a place he’d never really lived.

“I guess boarding schools wouldn’t be a great place to grow up,” she said.

“Not really. But I could see where a small town might be tough too.”

She sighed. “There’s nothing there. No jobs. No money.” She sipped at her beer, then licked the foam mustache off her upper lip. “And poverty sucks.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“No, you wouldn’t.” There was no bitterness in her voice; they were both just stating facts. “When you don’t have money, you don’t have options. You get trapped.”

“So how’d you get out?”

“Scholarschlip. I mean scholarship.” She slumped back in her chair and traced her finger down the side of her cup, revealing the golden liquid through the condensation. “I went to Vassar.”

“Well, they sure put a sheen on you.”

“Yeah, they did.”

“
That
was a compliment.”

She smiled, which was definitely an improvement over scowling into her beer.

“Thanks. But I’m still the same person underneath, you know? And places like this remind me of that.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be,” she said. “Telling Mike what I think of him felt really good.”

“You miss cutting loose.”

“I miss my old self. I watch every move these days. I have to test every word before I say it, make sure I’m still in character. I miss saying what I think, being myself. I miss being
fun.
”

***

Sarah felt like her thoughts were a runaway horse, breaking through fences and running for freedom. She’d never told anybody these things before, but somehow telling them to Lane felt right.

“It must have been hard—getting out,” he said.

“It was.”

“Bet you broke a lot of hearts.”

“No. I didn’t get attached to anyone. No boyfriends or anything. I didn’t want anybody to tempt me to stay.” She didn’t know why it suddenly felt so important to explain things to this man. Maybe it was because he straddled both worlds: her old world of cowboys and country and her new world, which consisted mostly of Carrigan Corp. these days. “I didn’t want to hurt anybody.”

“But you did.” His voice was surprisingly gentle. “You hurt yourself, hon. The person you used to be.”

“It’s no big deal. People change every day. It’s how you survive. I built a new image for myself, just like I’m building a new image for Carrigan.”

“So your life is like a publicity campaign. Everything planned out and calculated.”

She’d never thought of it that way before. He was right. She controlled every aspect of her life like she was producing a movie, and that meant she was faking it 24/7. There was a tension inside her that simmered just below the surface, a panicked, desperate feeling that needed an outlet. She’d been able to tamp it down until tonight, but somehow he’d opened a door to her true self. Maybe it was being here in the beer tent. Dressed like everyone else, she felt like one of the crowd, anonymous and strangely free.

Or maybe it was that kiss. Lane was watching her with those ice-blue Carrigan eyes, focusing on her face as if reading the thoughts behind her expression.

“Do you watch the bulls like that before you ride them?” she asked.

“Like what?”

“You look like you’re trying to figure out how hard I’ll buck. I’ll save you the trouble. I buck hard. So you can stop watching me like you’re going to break me or something.”

“I don’t want to break you.” He put his hand on hers. “I was trying to figure out how I could gentle you a little bit.”

She felt the hard shell around her heart crack like the candy coating on an M&M. Lane moved his thumb over the soft spot on her wrist and she felt suddenly vulnerable.
Melts
in
his
hand, not in his mouth
, she thought.
No, melts in his mouth, too. His mouth…

“What are you thinking, Sarah?”

She tossed her hair and looked away. “Thoughts.”

“What kind of thoughts?”

Crazy
thoughts. Sexy thoughts.
Leaning into him, she caught that masculine scent cologne companies could never quite manage to cram into a bottle. The light bounced off the sun-bleached streaks in his hair and sculpted his face, highlighting a scar that ran from his temple to the top of his right cheekbone. Without thinking, she reached up and traced a finger down the length of it. The band stopped playing just then and everything in the room seemed to freeze, as if time had been temporarily suspended. Lane’s gaze was expectant, his breathing slow. The moment was hushed, like something that mattered was about to happen.

“Let’s dance,” he said.

“Okay.” She flashed him a smile. “Let’s.”

***

The woman saying yes to a dance seemed like a completely different being from the woman Lane had been talking to a moment ago. He’d watched a riot of emotions play across her face as she went through some complicated process that evidently ended with a decision to trust him. Now she was smiling and bright-eyed as she cocked a hip and held out her hand.

“Can’t think of anything I’d rather do,” he said. Actually, he could think of a lot of things he’d rather do with Sarah, but he couldn’t do any of them in public. Dancing would have to do—for now. It was an excuse to touch her, and touching would help him figure her out. Sometimes before a ride, he’d lay a hand on a bull, feel the tension in its muscles and the blood pulsing through its veins. A skipping heart and twitching muscles told him the bull was nervous, maybe even scared. A steady heart told him it was ready for the ride. A scared animal bucked to shake you off, while a relaxed animal bucked for the joy of winning—and joy bucked better than fear.

He needed to get Sarah to trust him. Then they could get back to their game, and maybe there’d even be some… bucking.

The fiddler stepped down to cheers and backslaps, and the band swung into their next song, a limping but serviceable rendition of a George Strait ballad. Lane led Sarah to a dim corner of the dance floor and took her hand, pulling her toward him while he wrapped his good arm around her waist. He’d expected her to tense, but she melted into him like a stick of sweet butter, her curves conforming to his muscles, her head resting on his chest. He could feel her tension ebbing away as he held her and swayed, and when he looked down her eyes were closed.

A wave of tenderness swamped him and he wondered what was happening. He was an old-fashioned guy, and it was a natural impulse to want to protect women. But this was more than your standard manly protective urge. There was no threat here, no ex-boyfriend, no predatory Lothario or evil ex-husband. There was just this woman, this soft tender woman, who thought she had to be tough to survive. Who thought she had to cover up her true, generous, sweet nature in order to succeed.

He wanted to protect her from herself.

And the only way to do that was to make her feel safe. What was it she’d said about poverty?
When
you
don’t have money, you don’t have options.
He wondered when she’d learned that lesson and held her a little closer, lowering his head so his lips rested gently on her glossy hair. She smelled like peaches and flowers. He rested his cheek against her head and swayed with the music, closing his eyes as she relaxed into him.

When you trained horses, there was a point where the horse stopped fearing you and started to trust you. He’d learned to feel the subtle shift in energy as the change took place and the animal opened up its heart.

He felt that now.

When the music stopped, they stood still in the moment. Somehow, in the course of one song, everything had changed.

***

Sarah let Lane lead her through the crowd on the dance floor. They followed a serpentine path through the scattered chairs and tables, most of which were empty since the band had struck up a Chris LeDoux song that flooded the dance floor with swirling girls and stomping cowboys. When they stepped out of the bar, the lights of the rides and concession stands were out, leaving the rodeo grounds in shadow. The reflection of the moon floating in a silvery pillow of cloud was duplicated over and over in the empty windshields of parked cars.

Sarah jumped as a ghostly white blob shot out from the shadows.

“Willie.” Lane bent and picked up a dog, white and woolly. Someone had tied the hair up over its eyes with a pink bow.

“That’s your dog?” She stifled a laugh.

“Yeah.” He looked as sheepish as a too-tall cowboy with a sissy dog could possibly look. “One of the wives must’ve got hold of him. I don’t do bows.”

“No, I didn’t think you did.”

“Mind if we take him back to the trailer?”

The music from the beer tent, the muffled voices rising from the flap, the hum and thump of various engines and compressors around the rodeo grounds—all the sounds of the night seemed to pound in a steady rhythm that matched the beat of her heart.
Lub-dub, lub-dub
. It sounded faintly ominous, like the music from
Jaws
. She could take it as a warning, or she could see it as a challenge.