Page 5 of Rainwater
Safer for her heart.
Safer for her sanity.
She let her breath trickle out. She didn’t need any more outlaws in her life. One had been enough. What she needed was a dependable, hardworking, benign foreman, who knew horses and bulls. Who knew how to ride, rope and brand. One who didn’t have hot turquoise eyes, hard muscles and a soft husky drawl.
Not that man. That man was running from something. It was in his eyes. The law? The past? Love? It fit with the image of him. Weren’t outlaws always running from something?
And weren’t there always women who wanted to help them or reform them?
Well, not her. Not this time.
She turned and walked away.
The woman had been attractedto him, but not in that giggly, irritating way most women came on to him. It was so subtle that he wouldn’t have been aware of it if she hadn’t flushed slightly, or dropped his hand as if it had been a hot potato. The woman was pure class. His palms still tingled from the contact; his ears still vibrated from the tone of her velvety voice, and his body was still hard from the awareness that had jolted through him. The force of the attraction scared the hell out of him.
He’d been so tempted to accept her dinner invitation, but it would only prolong the inevitable. He was just passing through.
But he couldn’t stop thinking about her. Her hair was like a hidden treasure. He’d thought it was dark, but when the sun had come out he realized it was a dark auburn with glinting fiery highlights.
Damn, he had always had a soft spot for redheads—sweet, classy redheads with delicate bones, wide catlike green eyes and a body that could give a saint the fever. Make him give up heaven for one night in her arms. And her mouth. Those soft, coral lips invited, beckoned.
He had never wanted to explore an attraction more. He’d never met a woman he wanted to kiss right away. No, not kiss, but savor. Linger over lips as if they were sweet nectar from the gods. His lips wanted more than the soft flesh of her hand. He didn’t want to just kiss her. He wanted to connect with her.
He wanted the right to touch her hair, her body, her heart. A lump formed in his throat. He couldn’t ever allow those pleasures because of his dark legacy.
His body had never responded so quickly to the sight of a woman. It was as if his body had a mind of its own and recognized her as the other half to make him whole.
He was so damn tired, devastatingly lonely and his guard was down. That was it, he told himself. His threshold was low.
It was a good thing he was just passing through, because Jennifer Horn was not a one-night stand. She was a woman who could worm her way into a man’s heart with one soft breath. A woman who would make a house a home. A woman who deserved better than a broken-down bull rider who had turned into a coward.
Maybe if he hadn’t been such a coward, his mother and little Marigold would still be alive.
He’d been wandering since he’d gotten out of the hospital two months ago, never staying long in one town except to do odd jobs until he made enough money to travel again. Right now he had fifteen hundred dollars to tide him over. It was as if his shame pushed him along, dragging him from city to town to small little burgs like Silver Creek. The same he’d carried with him for a lifetime.Once a coward, always a coward, he said.
He recognized the look in the boy who had been with Jay this morning. They were tied by a common bond. He wondered who the kid was and what relationship he had to that vicious cowboy. Hell, it didn’t matter, did it? He wasn’t hanging around long enough to find out anything.
He never even went near a rodeo now. Once he had been at the top. A champion bull rider, belt buckle and all—years of belt buckles. But now he was nothing, and all he had to show for his time on the circuit were scars, painful memories and fear. He must never forget about the fear. How could he? It was always with him.
The vision of the black-and-white bull charging at him made his stomach queasy, and he pushed the image out of his head. He gripped the handlebars of the bike a little harder to quell the shaking of his hands. His hip began to throb.
He didn’t want to think about the past or worry about the future. He lived for right now. Got through each day and each night in a never-ending succession.
He didn’t think about the loneliness and the emptiness or the guilt. Not much. He didn’t dare think about the talent he’d locked up inside himself since he was a small child. A talent that burned to be released, ached to be expressed. He didn’t think about allowing himself to settle down in one place too long.
It would allow the shame and fear to catch up to him.
He’d spied the motel sign before he saw the building where Jennifer had said it would be. She’d also said it was clean in that soft, husky voice that made him think of black satin sheets. After a while, the motel, a nondescript elongated building beside the highway, came into view. It was the same as every other motel he’d ever seen, only this one was well kept. Flowers lay in thick red, gold and purple riotous abundance. He had to admit it was the most appealing motel he’d ever seen.
A vacancy sigh sat in the big picture window that could use a good cleaning. The dust from the road, he supposed. Just as he pulled in, a fresh-faced blonde came out with glass cleaner and flashed him a friendly grin as she proceeded to clean the window.
Corey parked the bike and ambled toward her, stretching the kinks out of his legs and back, rubbing absently at his left hip.
“Need a room, mister?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“It’s Ellen,” she said before giving the window another swipe. “I must clean this at least three times a day. The road dust makes a mockery out of my elbow grease.”
