Page 22 of A Baby for the Texas Cowboy
“Please don’t,” she whispered, and her voice shook.
He pulled away. “Sorry. My intentions are really just to give you a ride to the ranch and help you set up your apartment.”
“That’s managing me again.”
“You’re getting off lucky. Taking control is in my DNA. My father stole my mother away from her own bachelorette party.”
She turned to stare at him in astonishment, and he laughed. He loved his family’s stories, especially the crazy ones.
“He saw her in the bar with her friends. Fell head over heels instantly, asked her to dance, and married her less than two months later.”
“Not really,” she breathed.
“True story. That’s how it is with the Wolf men. They see. They want. They take.”
“This is something you brag about?”
“Same with my granddad. He saw my grandmother at a country dance at a grange. She was promised to another rancher. My grandfather cut in for the dance and he never let her go. Took her home to his ranch that night, and her daddy was happy that the preacher came the next day.”
He started his truck and breathed a little easier. He felt like he’d been walking on broken glass trying to get close to her.
“I am never dancing with you again.”
He laughed. “Wolfs are irresistible.”
“You are vastly overestimating your appeal.”
He smiled, finally feeling like he had a bit of balance back after being completely freaked out over the past twenty-four hours. What would she do if he drove to the county courthouse instead of the ranch? Part of him really wanted to find out, but the wait time for a marriage license was seventy-two hours. He’d already Googled.
He pulled out of his parking spot and headed out of town. He’d come here today to assure her that he’d marry her and that there was no point for her to move into the apartment because she could stay in his suite of rooms at the main ranch house. His two brothers and their wives lived there now so she wouldn’t be alone when he was gone.
But now he realized that wasn’t the best course of action. Yet. He had to bide his time. Woo her. Tinsley was going to lead him on a dance. Good thing he’d spent so much time two-stepping in country-western bars.
Chapter Seven
“Lie on it,give it a bounce. See what your body says.” The mattress store salesman Jeff Lyons made the suggestion sound dirty, but Tinsley was so tired and overwhelmed her temper didn’t even notch up.
Anders’ did. He puffed up and his eyes narrowed on the mattress salesman.
Why was he acting all proprietary?
The baby.
Not her.
Of course.
Marriage because of an oops pregnancy. Just what every woman dreamed of. Not any better than a business-deal marriage—especially where the would-be groom had pretended to care about her. Anders was at least honest about why he wanted to get married.
“We’llbe needing a king,” Anders said, his voice mock pleasant, but his blue eyes homed in on Jeff like lasers.
Men.
Tinsley mentally rolled her eyes.
There was not going to be awe. After she’d run out on John days before her over-the-top, every-moment-choreographed wedding that her mother had likely started planning immediately following her birth, she’d made a promise to herself—she would follow her own path, never again subject herself to fitting into someone else’s fantasy mold. She was not ever going to be a wife.
“I’m not sleeping on a queen,” Anders added, as if he’d heard her mentally arguing with him.
