Page 43 of Wild, Wild Cowboy

She wrinkled her nose. “Good?”

“Yeah. Good.” I leaned one arm on the passenger door and waved her inside. “Don’t you want to be the wallflower? She’s smart. Funny. Kind. And in the end, she tames the rake and lives happily ever after as a duchess.” I narrowed my eyes at the back of her head. “Because all those rakes are also dukes, I’ve noticed.”

She froze halfway into the truck. Slowly she stepped back down and turned to face me. Her eyes were round with surprise. “You read my books.”

“Skimmed them,” I corrected. Then I grinned. “Except for the good parts. I took my time with those.”

Her cheeks flushed as she caught my meaning.

I caged her in, my arms braced against the truck on either side of her. “I see you, Hannah. I’ve always seen you, no matter who else is in the room. Why do you think I call you duchess?”

She gaped at me, speechless, her blue eyes wide. Her glasses slid down her nose. When she made no move to rectify that, I indulged myself and did it for her. She blinked.

I circled her waist with my hands and lifted her into the truck. “Up you go, honey.”

By the time I had buckled myself behind the wheel, she’d recovered her powers of speech and promptly used them to hurt my feelings.

“I’ve changed my mind,” she said, prim and proper as you please. “Youarea plow.”

We madeit through Idaho and a good chunk of Montana before we decided to call it quits for the night in Butte. Letting her park the truck with the horse trailer attached at the hotelwas a harrowing experience, but as she killed the engine, she rewarded me for my patience.

“One room,” she said.

Thank god. I would have kept my word and not raised a fuss if she wanted separate rooms, but I would have been pretty sulky about it. “Yes, ma’am.”

Our room was nice enough. Nothing fancy, but it was clean and the hum of the air conditioner drowned out the street noise outside. After a quick shower—taken separately—we were both refreshed and wide awake.

“Want to get a drink to unwind?” I suggested. We had grabbed fast food for dinner two hours ago, but tired as I was from our long drive, my brain wasn’t ready to shut off yet. “There’s a country-western bar next door to the hotel. That might be fun.”

“All right. I’ll go change.” Still wrapped in her towel, she grabbed the plastic bag with her new stuff and disappeared into the bathroom.

I chuckled under my breath. Her modesty was pointless. The shape of her naked body was already imprinted on my brain.

I pulled on fresh underwear, my old jeans, new socks, and the new gray henley I had bought. It took Hannah a little longer, but when she finally emerged from the bathroom, I damn near swallowed my tongue.

Good fucking god.

Her new jeans hung low enough on her waist that I could see the tiniest crest of her hip bones. Her pink tee-shirt was fitted and cropped. Between the hem of her tee-shirt and the waistband of her jeans was a solid two inches of creamy pale skin that made my mouth water. Her damp hair was down in a braid instead of her usual bun.

“I didn’t know it was a crop top.” She pulled at the hem, but it didn’t do her any good. “Maybe I should wear my sweater.”

I didn’t know how I felt about that, mostly because I couldn’t get a read on howshefelt about that. I dragged my eyes up from her tempting belly. “Wear whatever makes you comfortable.”

She frowned, looking down at herself. “I want to be comfortable inthis.”

“Well, what’s wrong with it? You look great. If you’re worried about being cold, bring your sweater.”

She pulled at her shirt again. When that didn’t work, she tugged up her jeans, which slid right back down again. She huffed in annoyance. “What if someone says something?”

My eyebrows went up. “What’s someone going to say?”

“I don’t know.” She pulled her braid over her shoulder and fiddled with the end of it, like she could hide herself behind it. “Something.”

The look on her face made my chest feel spiky. Because once upon a time, someonehadsaid something to her. Her own fucking uncle. He had made her feel like shit, like it was her fault if a boy didn’t keep his hands to himself or got a boner in church, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to let something like that happen again.

“Duchess, you can walk into that bar in nothing but your underwear and a smile, if that’s what makes you happy. Wear whatever you want.” I wrapped her braid around my fist and used it to tug her head back, forcing her to look at me. “I’m your wild cowboy, remember? I know how to brawl.”

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