Do Him Right (6 page)

“So, Sam,” Chet tapped his hat on his knee,
matter-of-factly, “this means there’s only one thing left to do.”

Sam set his jaw. “Yeah? Tell me.”

Chet grinned. “Let Kylee come. Just stay away from her.”

“Easy to say.”

Chet stared at him. “What’s it worth to you to forbid her to
come? Thousands of dollars you won’t earn or Kylee’s reaction to your
rejection—a rejection that you will never see?”

Sam grumbled over that for long minutes while he slugged
back his margarita and considered the land outside his big window. “Fine. Fine.
You two caught me between my damn money and a hard place.” He gazed at Shana. “Where’s
your contract?”

* * * * *

“Oh, thank you for that, Chet!” Shana beamed at him as he
climbed into his seat, put up his hat and slammed closed the truck door. “He
never would have come along unless you’d found a way.”

“You’re welcome, honey, but what I suggested wasn’t brain
surgery. I know Sam’s hardheaded, but when you’re talking money, Sam always
wants a way to win. Plus this thing with Kylee, well, it’s complicated.”

She squeezed his arm, ecstatic she was hired, officially. “You’re
the magician who got him to sign.”

“Not hard to do.” He traced a finger down her cheek as he
spun to back the truck out of the driveway. “But whatever happened between him
and Kylee was explosive. As much as I know is that it happened more than a
decade ago, but Sam has never let it go.”

Shana didn’t want to probe. She had enough of her own
history she didn’t talk about, let alone prying into someone else’s. Still, the
fact that Sam could hang on to anger for ten years upset her and reminded her
that Chet, if he knew who she really was, might carry a grudge bigger than Sam’s.
“Sam loved her badly.”

“Yeah, plain as the nose on his face, isn’t it?”

“How tough will it be to keep them apart?” She had to know.

“A tall order, I’d say,” Chet said as he drove them down the
road. “From what I can piece together, his wife had been dead quite a few years
when he met Kylee. Fast love affair, so say a few folks in town. Anyway, Sam
loved her more than a lot. And she walked out on him. Don’t know why or how.
But she left, no explanations. Few people have ever stepped on Sam’s toes and
lived to tell the tale.”

“Willa doesn’t seem to know anything about it.” Shana
scolded herself at the mention of the young woman, whose immature
possessiveness of Chet had riled her so that she’d wished she hadn’t had to
bring her up.

“Willa thinks she knows more than she does—and she’s always
surprised when the world doesn’t turn precisely the way she expected.”

Shana stared straight ahead, refusing to ask anything about
his involvement with Willa.
Just because I’ve made love with this man three
times today does not mean I have the right to ask anything about a woman who
obviously cares for him.

Chet took Shana’s hand. “Shall I tell you about Willa and
me?”

What a sweet man, you are.
“No, thank you. You don’t
have to.”

“How about if I want to?”

Praise for him clogged her throat with emotion. “You don’t
owe me, Chet. But yes, I’d like to hear.”

They were approaching the turnoff to his house, headed back
toward Main Street and the B&B, but he pulled over into a grove of live
oaks and pampas grass. In the leafy seclusion, he parked and put his arms
around her shoulders. “Look at me, Shana. There. God, I love your blue eyes,
honey. Don’t be sad or mad or jealous. Truth is, Willa has dreams that aren’t
gonna come true. Ever since I got here, she’s set her sights on me and I am not
a man to be led. Besides, she is just not my type. She’s too bossy. Too
spoiled. And the owner’s daughter.”

Shana rolled a shoulder, sensitive but trying to be a big,
brave woman. “She’s lovely.”

Chet moved closer, thumbing her lower lip. “Not as lovely as
you, darlin’.”

Shana took that compliment with a tiny smile. “She’s
determined.”

“She’s not sweet. Not honest.”

Shana froze.
I’m not honest.

“What’s more, she’s never moved me like you do.”

Shana tilted her head to one side, awed by his simple
statement. “Why is that, I wonder?”

“Our electricity, honey. It just is what it is,” he
explained against her ear. Then he pulled away and looked down at her. “What
other kinds of reasons do I need to list for you, Shana?”

Do you bed women the day, the hour you meet them? Am I
unique or just another roll in the hay?
“You must have dated other women.”

“Others who, like Willa, have tried to tie me down? Is that
what you’re asking?” he persisted, chuckling under his breath. “Well hell, yes.
What of it?” He spoke against her lips and ran one of his hands up into her
hair, wrecking her ponytail. “Tell me you don’t like my kisses.” He took her
mouth and claimed it all with a spearing tongue. “Tell me you don’t want my
hands all over you.” He cupped one breast and rubbed her nipple with one
demanding thumb. “Tell me you don’t want me inside you, here, riding you long
and hard.” He thrust his hand between her legs, and she felt her pussy become
drenched in fresh desire for him.

“Oh, I do! I just need to know what to do about Willa.”

“Ignore her. She’s such a baby.”

“I’m not much older,” she pointed out.

“But more mature. And sad too. I want to learn how that
happened. Long talks and long nights loving you.” Chet reared back and took a
gander at her through narrowed eyes. “Okay, I see I need to ask. So how old are
you?”

“Twenty-six.”

“A mere child,” he feigned distress.

Ten years younger than you.
She cuffed him. “And
Willa?”

“Twenty-one, maybe. Hell, I don’t know. Whatever she is, she’s
not for me. She’s got no soul.”

“How do you know I do?” Shana shot back, partly amused but
damn frightened to hear how she differed from the rich belle of the county.

Crimson shades of afternoon turned his golden features to
copper as he moved ever so nearer, lowered his voice to a sinful seduction and
said, “Because I knew who you were from the minute you walked in my door this
morning.”

She sucked in her breath. The game was up. Her cause lost.
Her hopes dashed.

Cursing under his breath, he hauled her over the gearshift
then flicked open her waistband button and pushed up her skirt. Eager to claim
him as her own, she wiggled, spreading her bare thighs over his, then worked at
his belt and zipper. Her pussy was open, sending off the musky aroma of her
need, exposed to him, cool and begging for his touch.

He didn’t let her go hungry long. His fingers thrust up
inside her wet channel with stunning urgency. “You are the one woman I do
believe I cannot live without.” He caressed her and the sounds of her liquid
desire for him urged her on. “Listen to how you want me. God, I am so blessed.”
He pulled out and raised his fingers to his mouth to suck one dry. “You do
taste better than honey. Want some of this?”

She bit her lip. She was so needy. Her action her answer,
she put her mouth around his fingertips and licked them with delicate whisks of
her tongue.

He groaned. “You are killing me, here, darlin’.” He lifted
up to let her slide down his jeans, and his cock sprang free. Bright red and
dripping cum, his shaft was such a lush enticement, she snuggled closer.

“Got to have you inside me,” she pleaded, one hand aiming
his rod toward her oh-so-empty pussy.

“Wait, baby.” He reached down to extract a condom packet
from his pocket.

She almost choked on laughter. “You brought one?”

“You bet!” He tore it open and rolled it on with a snap. “I
am not going anywhere with you without a supply. Damn if one is gonna do the
job here either!”

They both chuckled until he wound her hair around his fist
and pulled her mouth to his. “In bed. Out. Day or night. I want you. In all the
ways I can get you.” He kissed her in a ravishing assault until her mind melted
and her body flooded with need for him. “Come on, sink that hot, pink pussy
over me, and let’s get us both feeling better, eh?”

She sank. He rose up. Her head fell back, and he kissed her
throat, rocked his hips and seized her with long strokes far up inside her. His
power shoved her higher, one palm to the ceiling of the cab, one to his
shoulder as he filled her with a keening fury and she rode him hard until he
too, was groaning in happiness.

She fell down to rest her head on his shoulder, caress his
jaw and nuzzle his throat in contentment.

He cupped her ass with two large hands and jerked her tight.
“You gonna argue with me on this, or are we going to go on from here, seeing if
what we have is really real?”

Relieved he hadn’t recognized her as his old nemesis.
Relieved he wanted her often and wild, and overwhelmed he could sweet-talk her
to gushing delight, she brushed her lips on his. “Take me back to the B&B,”
she instructed. “I think we’re about to send the town of Hayward up in flames.”

“Hell, baby.” He snorted. “They need to get used to that,
cuz we’re making love every hour of the day.”

Until I tell you who I really am—and all this ends as if
it never occurred.

“And one more thing before I go, Chet.” Sam sounded stern as
he stood, ready to leave after their most recent conference on the rodeo’s
opening events. “I need to see both of you doing something for me.”

“Sure, Sam.” Chet got to his feet. “What did you have in
mind?”

“It’s Friday night tonight, and that means there’s a big
dance at The Long Horn. And tonight, you both will be there. Together. You hear
me? Because from all I hear, you
are
together.” Sam picked his white
Resistol hat from the wall rack and pointed it at Shana. “No problem with that.
Not by me. No, sir. But people are beginning to talk, you realize?”

Shana blushed, rose from her chair and brushed her hands
down her jeans. To make love to Chet nearly every night since she’d arrived two
weeks ago was one thing, but to think that the people of Hayward knew, despite
their efforts to be discreet, was disaster. Gossip in a small town could kill
your reputation before you could sneeze. “Sam, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. Be out and about.” He glanced at Chet who
frowned. “I’m not telling you how to live your lives, but if you two don’t get
out in public, how do you expect folks are gonna take to this expansion? This
rodeo is a business—and you two are having way too much fun.”

Shana bit her lip, her cheeks burning.

Chet’s face was a mask of concern.

Sam strolled toward the office door. “Come out. Let them see
you. And if they’ll see you together because that’s the way you two want it,
fine by me. But for god sakes, press a little flesh, will you? Let ‘em get to
know you. Talk this up. I can’t do it by myself—and as you might expect, my
Willa is not helping your cause any.” He chuckled. “Can you dance, Shana?”

“Yes, sir.” She forced a smile. “Really well.”

“Good. Do it then. And you, Chet? I know you don’t like to
go to The Long Horn, but get over it. Take her dancing and introduce her, you
hear me?”

“Yes, sir. We’ll be there.”

“Good.” Sam adjusted his hat on his head and opened the
door. “We’re putting a lot of effort and money into this opening, and I want
you two promoting it personally. You can do whatever else you want afterward.”

He grinned at them both, winked and shut the door.

“Oh my god,” Shana sank into her chair, one hand to her
chest. “Were we that obvious?”

Chet blinked then walked around his desk toward hers. When
he stood beside her, he reached down and drew her up to him. His hands framed
her face as he kissed her lightly, chuckling. “We weren’t thinking, sugar. And
my apologies, I should have been. I know this town better, but I cannot get
enough of you and damn, if I want to share you. Still, orders are orders, and
it’s time to go out in the world.”

“And if Willa is bad-mouthing you and me, we have a lot of
work to do.”

Chet hugged her. “Nah. We’ll be fine. The men’ll take one
close look at you and froth at the mouth. And the women will see you belong to
me and not feel threatened. Then we’ll be in. You wait and see.”

* * * * *

“I haven’t been two-stepping in ages,” Shana told him as she
took his hand to climb down out of his truck. The Long Horn Dance Hall was a
classic rough wood-clad Texas saloon and dance hall. On the hot night air, she
heard the strains of a honky-tonk tune from a live country band. She shut her
eyes at the sounds of the toe-tapping music and told herself she was going to
enjoy it
and
her social obligations to meet the townspeople. “Lord, I am
nervous.”

“Don’t be,” Chet crooned and swept a hand around her waist. “In
those jeans you look good enough to eat, and heaven knows, I’ve got a hankerin’
for that all the time!”

She elbowed him. “Come on, now. You promised to be good
tonight. If we have to win friends and influence people, you cannot be
complimenting me all the time.”

He stopped and turned her in his arms, his heavily muscled
thighs and rigid cock nestled warmly against her torso. “I promise to be good.
It’s just damn hard for me to look at you and not want you naked with those
pretty legs spread open so I can lick your folds.”

“Chet,” she warned, shivering with his ardor. “Stop, honey,
just for a few hours.”

He inhaled, looked up at the night sky. “I’m looking for
strength.”

She laughed and grabbed his hand. “Come on. Let’s dance!”

“Hey, Chet,” a burly cowboy in a white shirt and jeans
called from across the stone parking lot. “How you doin’, man?” He strode
closer with a friend who was as tall and dark as he. “Introduce us.”

“John Dayton, Shana Carpenter,” Chet said the words
mechanically then looked at the man’s friend. “And I’m sorry, I don’t know your
name.”

“Brak Henley,” the other man said, tipping his black gambler’s
hat at Shana. “Nice to meet you, ma’am.” He put his hand out to Chet who shook
it quickly. “Stapleton. Stapleton. Aren’t you the champ bronc buster from a few
years back?”

“I am.”

“You competing? Dayton, here, tells me you have a rodeo
doing the season opener soon.”

“No, I don’t ride any longer,” Chet told him.

John Dayton spoke up. “Chet is the town’s rodeo manager.”

“Is that so?” Henley examined him. “Got tired of the
circuit, huh?”

“Something like that,” Chet bit off.

“Chet had a bad streak of luck,” Dayton told his buddy. “Bad
press.”

Chet nodded. “That too.”

Shana stiffened.

Chet looked down at her. “Come on, Shana. Let’s go inside.
See you both later.”

He steered her toward the front door, but her feet were lead
and her heart was in her throat. Did everyone remember what she’d done to him?

“What’s the matter, honey?” He turned when she couldn’t move
beyond the front door.

She swallowed hard. Over the past weeks, how many times had
she wanted to come clean and tell him? When he kissed her in the office? When
he took her clothes off with reverent care and they made love standing up
against the file cabinets? When he put his cock inside her in her hot tub at
the B&B and just held. When he laid her down in his bed or hers and
caressed her nipples and filled her pussy with his sweet, hard cock. When he’d
probed her ass and said,
We’ll stretch you a little more again tomorrow,
baby. One day soon I’ll fuck you hard there. Promise, darlin’. Come along now
and let me kiss your lovely mouth again.

“Come along now, darlin’,” he crooned against her ear. “We’re
good here, and you need to meet these people.”

She looked up at his strong handsome face. “I want you to
kiss me.”

“Aw, Shana, you know if I do that, we’re goin’ home to make
love.” He gave her a lopsided grin. “I’ll lay you in my bed good and proper
after we shake a few hands.”

What choice did she have? Tell him and lose him? Continue to
stall, not tell him and take the chance he could ever forgive her when she did
find the gumption? And as for caring for her forever? Ah. Foolishness. No one
did that. Hadn’t she learned that first hand from her mother and father? They
had loved each other badly and still couldn’t enjoy their lives together. What
made her think she could find anything different? Especially with a man she had
deceived. A man she loved beyond reason.

“You feeling okay, honey?”

She nodded, faking a smile. She let him lead her inside.

Chet headed them straight for the long bar where the Friday
night crowd was a mix of couples and singles on the make. Some were red-faced
from alcohol or dancing, and most all were boisterous and jovial.

“Hey, Chet! Shana!” a tall, dark figure, hoisting a beer
bottle, cut through the crowd, and Shana recognized Troy Mallard, the owner of
the B&B where Shana lived.

“Oh, shit.” Chet winced. “He’s drinking.”

“That’s not good?” she asked Chet.

“Never.”

“Why?” she wanted to know but Chet had no time to answer as
Troy appeared before them. She could see what Chet meant because Troy’s brown
eyes were bloodshot, half closed and his smile, beautiful as it might have
been, wobbled. “Hello, Troy.”

“Glad to see you brought her around, Chet.” Troy ogled Shana’s
breasts in her white shirt. “We need to see pretty ladies here.”

Chet pursed his mouth. “Yeah, well, we have got to do our
public duty here, Troy.” He took Shana’s arm. “Let’s get you a drink, honey,
then we can go around and say hello to folks.” He ordered a beer for Shana and
a nonalcoholic beer for himself.

“Still drinking that panther piss?” Troy taunted Chet.

Shana, who had never seen her uncle drink and praised him
for it, glanced up at Chet who flexed his jaw, fighting anger.

“I’m good with this, Troy.” Chet stepped farther down the
bar and pulled Shana with him.

“Sure you are.” Troy followed them. “Where you goin’? You
could stay here and talk to me for a while, Chet.” He pulled himself up to his
full six-foot-plus height in challenge.

But Chet still topped him in inches and sobriety. “Another
time, Troy. We’ve got work to do.”

“Is that what you’ve been doin’?”

The words were a taunt at the least and a slur at the most.

Chet swung to face the other man. “Don’t do this, man. Do
not say another word.”

“Why? You want to make sure she doesn’t hear what a pussy
you can be?”

Chet leaned over. “That is enough, Troy. Did you come with
anyone? Jack or Paul Dobson?” He was looking over the top of the crowd.

“No, I came alone. So what’re you gonna do about it, huh,
Chet boy? Can’t even stand here and talk to me. That’s cuz you rodeo boys think
I’m a nobody. A cripple.”

Chet considered Troy with warm compassion. “Stop this. You
know I think nothing of the sort. And you shouldn’t be drinking.”

“Oh yeah, sure, sure. How about if I take over for you, you
teetotaler, and show Miz Shana here a good time? We know she likes to fuck.”

Over the noise of the crowd and the music, those around them
heard the last word and paused, looked at Troy, glanced at Chet and moved away.
Shana stared at Troy, stunned that this kind man could be so insulting.

Chet, his face blazing red, murmured his excuses to her and
grabbed Troy’s arm. “Come with me.”

“No!” He ripped away from Chet’s hold. Straightening his
shirt, he leered at Shana. “I want to dance with her. You gonna stop me?” He
whirled and clamped an arm around Shana’s waist.

His strength caught her off guard and she put a hand to his
chest. “Troy, stop! I thought we were friends.”

“Yeah.” He got in close to whisper in her ear, pulling her
close and squeezing her ass. “So you gonna give me a little dance and a kiss
and a piece of what you’re giving to Chet?”

She gasped and shrank backward. What frightened her was not
the lust she saw on Troy’s face, but the fury she saw on Chet’s. “No, don’t hit
him.”

For a second, Chet scowled at her.

Shana had seen rage like that before. On her father’s face.
Her mother’s. And Chet’s four years ago when he’d railed at the rodeo judges.
She staggered backward. Someone righted her.

Chet stepped up behind Troy, his jaw set, his eyes blazing
green fire. With a growl, he picked up Troy from under his armpits as if he
were a sack of flour. “Enough. Let’s go.”

“Like hell!” Troy whirled, his fist aiming for Chet’s jaw
but hitting his chest with a thud that made Troy howl in pain. Chet reeled him
about and frog-marched him toward the door.

John Dayton was right behind them. “I’ll take him home,
Chet.”

Horrified, Shana stood there, mouth open, numb with fright,
as Chet handed Troy over to John and strode back to her.

“Thanks, Brak,” he told the man who still stood behind her
and held her steady. “I’m good now.”

“No problem, man.” Brak stepped around to look at Shana who
had walked into Chet’s arms. “Troy’s a good guy, just broken up from the war.
He and I were in the same unit.”

“He
was
a great guy,” Chet declared. “He could be
again if he’d learn to accept what he’s gotta do to outgun that head injury.”

“I hear you,” Brak agreed with a nod. “But he’s depressed
about the death of one of our guys, friend of ours killed with the same IED
that wounded him. Drinking doesn’t help the depression.”

“Right you are,” Chet said and stuck out his hand to Brak. “Thanks
for helping.”

“You bet.” He smiled and turned away.

The band that had stopped in the midst of the fracas stirred
to life again.

“Are you okay?” Chet pushed curls from her cheek as they
stood at the bar and drank their beers.

“Fine.”
Liar.
Her heart pounded like a freight train.

“You sure?” Chet ran a hand over her cheek. “He manhandled
you, insulted you.”

“He’s got a disability. I understand. It’s not like—” She
looked away then up at Chet. “Not like he’s an alcoholic.”

“Maybe not yet. If he keeps on, he will be. He drinks to
cope with his disability.”

“And his feelings of inferiority. All those men who served
over there have such a tough time coming back home and re-entering society.”

“And head injuries are the craziest things to understand.
Even those of us who have one don’t always know when we’re going to get a
little nuts.”

“But you do,” she said with certainty and pride that Chet
could talk about it so readily. “I’ve watched you. You try not to get angry.”
The
anger that I wrote about with such carelessness.
“How did you learn that
restraint?”

He made patterns on the bar with the condensation from his
beer bottle. “Long process. Behavior mod. Going to doctors—shrinks, really—and
learning what makes me craziest most often.”

“And what is that?”

“People who insult me. Makes me see red.”

She felt as if she’d driven a stake into her own heart.
I
insulted you. I hurt you.

“I had to learn to stay cool. Not let them get to me.”