Page 23 of Destined for the Cowboy

And then, belatedly in her sleepy state, it registered in her brain why she was up, and she jolted fully awake.

She had to go pick up Logan.

She grimaced as she finished with the hair dryer. She didn’t think she’d imagined the reluctance in Logan’s voice when her brother had put him on the phone to give her directions to his place. She just didn’t know exactly what caused it—an aversion to taking this trip in general, despite it being his idea, or an aversion to spending another day…with her.

She’d thought they’d gotten along very well that day in San Antonio, and even better when they’d gone to see the mustangs. Yet he’d sounded on the phone as if this were the last thing in the world he wanted to do, and she didn’t know why. She knew he liked Jeremy, and Nic was an old friend. Did he have some kind of antipathy toward Jackson? He’d spoken of him neutrally at first, then with more respect and even liking as he got to know him, especially after they’d started Thorpe Therapy Horses. At least, she thought he had.

She rinsed out her mug after her second cup of coffee, taking note of the clock and that she needed to leave in five minutes. That’s when it occurred to her, given how often she’d heard him referred to as a loner, that maybe even their little group of five felt like too much to him. She had a bit of that tendency herself, and had frequently had students like that, who did great one-on-one, but hated being on a team or in a group. If Logan was introverted by nature, this excursion with a car full of people might be something he’d normally avoid. She herself would have second thoughts if it wasn’t family.

Or maybe he just didn’t want to make this trip again, period. It was going to be a very long day, after all. And she gathered from what Jackson had said that he’d kind of gotten roped into it by Jeremy.

Now that would fit, that he would agree to this simply to not disappoint the boy. In which case they would all just have to see to it that he had a good time. Despite himself, if necessary. She’d have to tell Jeremy to make sure and direct all his questions—and he would have them, he always did—to Logan, since he knew the most about where they were going. Even if she herself had spent some time reading up on their destinations.

Jackson had wanted to leave by six since it was indeed going to be a long day. Logan said his place was about halfway between town and the Baylor ranch, but a fifteen-minute drive off the main road, the Hickory Creek Spur, so she calculated she’d need the regular twenty minutes it took to get to the ranch plus a half hour to get to Logan’s and then back to the spur. Add an extra ten minutes just in case, plus another ten for them to all get loaded up in Jackson’s vehicle, and she was headed out of her driveway into the pitch-dark of 4:50AM. As before, Logan hadn’t been happy about her trekking out here in the dark, but Jackson was a hard man to say no to.

He’d told her there was no road sign since his place wasn’t officially on a road. It was in essence a very, very long driveway, he’d said rather wryly. But after five minutes of negotiating the rough-textured gravel drive in the dark of predawn, without seeing a single building or light even in the distance, she was beginning to wonder if she’d found the right turnoff. He’d said there was a big oak tree right at the corner, and she’d seen one,but maybe there were others? He’d said his place was kind of isolated, but this was a bit extreme.

She was about to stop and go for her phone when the drive made a fairly sharp right turn and began to climb slightly. And she realized she’d been looking at road level when she should have been looking up. Because at the top of the rise was a rectangular building with a couple of large, lighted windows and a long covered porch that appeared to run the length of the front.

She let out a relieved breath and finished the turn. She saw the now familiar truck parked in a covered port next to what looked like a large workshop of sorts, several yards to the right of the house. She wasn’t quite sure where to stop, but the driveway, as he called it, seemed to run from where she was all the way to the workshop, so she simply stopped in front of the short flight of stairs that went up to the porch.

Almost as soon as she did the lights in the house went out, plunging everything into darkness. It took a moment before her eyes adjusted and she could see the tall figure on the porch, just in time to see him reach out to test the doorknob. Then he was down the steps before she even came to a full stop, and she had the strangest feeling he wanted to be sure there was no reason for her to come inside.

That thought almost made her smile. Did he live in bachelor messiness, was the place so untidy he didn’t want her to see it? She found it hard to believe that he lived that way, and even harder to believe that he’d care if she saw it if he did. Because she wouldn’t care. It was his home; he could live however he wanted.

Maybe he just doesn’t want you in his space.

That, she decided, was much more likely. He hadn’t wanted to be in her space, either, that day he’d come to her place.

And then he was at the passenger door, pulling it open and sliding his lean, strong frame into the seat. She hadn’t moved theseat from when he’d sat there before, even though it felt a little odd to have so much foot room over there.

“You found it. Obviously.”

“It was questionable there for a minute or two,” she admitted.

That seemed to break the ice and she relaxed a little. At least, as much as she could with this rather spectacular specimen of manhood sitting so close.

“You weren’t kidding when you said your place was a little isolated.”

“I like it that way.”

He said it as if he’d had to explain it a hundred times before. And maybe he had.

“The quiet? Or the lack of close neighbors?”

“Yes.”

“Quiet it is, then,” she said, stung a little by the short, flat answer. She wasn’t exactly a morning person anyway. She didn’t need to add forcing conversation on someone who clearly didn’t want it.

She heard him let out a breath. “Sorry,” he said. “I’m a little…”

His voice trailed away. She gave him a sideways glance but couldn’t see much in the darkness, plus she didn’t dare take her eyes off the drive ahead for more than a second, at least until they were back on an actual road. So she took a guess.

“My brother said you pretty much got roped into this by Jeremy. Thank you for not saying no to him.”

She could almost feel him looking at her now. And this time he let out a low, short chuckle. “He’s hard to say no to. Especially when I remember how he was when they first came here.”

That he’d noticed, and cared enough to let this happen today, made her throat a little tight. “And he was already markedly better than he’d been back in L.A.”

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