Page 15 of A Baby for the Texas Cowboy
“You wouldn’t give me a private moment so you got a public declaration.” She brushed her hands together. “Now you know, so nothing more to say. We’re done.”
“Done?” he echoed incredulously. “We’re not even started.”
“I felt you deserved to know, but I’m not expecting anything.”
“You’re not expecting anything?” he repeated, feeling like his brain wasn’t working. He’d never seen Whiskey angry. It would be hot if her ire were directed at some other hapless cowboy.
“Stop repeating everything I say.” She crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes, but the action pushed her breasts together and up so that more creamy cleavage was revealed in the deep V of her thin, bohemian-style floral top.
He’d never seen her wear anything like it before except that afternoon she’d been working his brothers’ weddings. It was pretty. And distracting as hell.
“Is the baby mine?” he demanded, suspicion rearing up out of nowhere, startling even him.
Her breath whooshed out, and she stared at him, beautiful eyes huge and round and her plump pillows of lips forming a circle.
“It’s not an unreasonable question, considering.” He knew he should back down, but now that he was on this road, he needed to walk it. Pretty crucial fact.
“Considering what?” She flung her arms wide. “You wouldn’t even talk to me and now when you finally climb down from your mountain of superiority, you have the audacity to suggest that I was sleeping around and had a whole stable of men to entertain me? That I don’t know which one knocked me up?”
The mental image that painted—Whiskey with other men, men he knew and competed against weekly—burned his brain.
Tension snarled between them just like the words. The air felt hot. It was hard to breathe. He even saw red, and the top of his head felt like it was going to blow off.
“You think I’m a slut,” she taunted and laughed a little. Anger and disbelief and then a determined glint of steel sliced through her glare. “You think the mother of your child is a slut.”
He winced at the word. “I didn’t say that.”
Her accusing tone didn’t sit well with him. He’d had more women than he remembered. Whiskey had the same right to find pleasure and fun.
She rolled her eyes. “I had to watch you every weekend yacking it up with—” She broke off quickly and Anders felt his interest kick up. She’d watched him. She’d noticed.
“Yes,” he said softly taking a step toward her.
“So, if I don’t know who my baby daddy is, why did I pick you? Oh wait, you probably think you’re all that.”
“I think you might think I’m all that.” He felt something in his chest warm up and kick free, unfurl.
“Not even close.” She closed the distance. The heels of her motorcycle boots were hard on the wood floor and the jangle of the chains on the boots were musical in contrast. “I don’t want anything from you. I don’t want your money and I don’t want your pity and I sure as hell don’t want you to make some dumbass sacrifice like thinking you have to spend time with me when your mind is somewhere else with someone else. You’re the type of man who always has one boot out the door.”
The sensation of heat and warmth fizzled out.
Jesus. This was a disaster.
His fault for trying to avoid being alone with her because he’d been worried he’d say something stupid like “I missed you.” Or “I can’t stop thinking about you.”
“Whiskey,” he began. He needed to defuse the situation but had no idea how. Dammit. He should have listened to August and Kane. But no. He’d rushed off hotheaded and unprepared.
“That’s not even my name.” She huffed.
Anders waited.
“That’s not on me.” He’d asked her before, but she’d laughed that husky laugh of hers and when combined with her enigmatic expression that always cranked him higher, he’d been distracted enough to let it slip.
He’d liked the name Whiskey. Suited. Sexy as hell.
“Tinsley,” she said finally, as if she were in an interrogation room and confessing to a crime. She hesitated, and an expression he couldn’t quite define flitted over her beautiful features. “Tinsley Underhill.”
He felt as if she’d just kneed him in the balls and thrown a hard uppercut to his jaw. They’d made a baby and he hadn’t even known her real name. Not even close.
