Page 14 of Blazing Hot Nights

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I chuckled to myself. A little Wisconsin humor there.

I tipped my bottle of beer up and smacked my lips. A cold beer, a warm night, and a beautiful fire to keep the bugs away. Life didn’t get much better than that. A loud, busy bar full of obnoxious drunken cowboys was not the way to relax. All I needed was nature, peace, and the hoot of an owl or the call of the crickets.

There was crunching on the gravel, and I turned carefully in my chair, reaching for my gun next to me. Usually, the fire kept wildlife away, but I wasn’t stupid enough to sit out here without a weapon.

I sighed at the vermin approaching me. If I shot this particularly nasty rattlesnake, I’d end up in jail.

So much for my night being peaceful and relaxing.

Blaze’s boots hit the gravel of my driveway, and he dropped Rapunzel’s reins. “I know what you’re thinking right now,” he said, digging in his saddlebag.

“Doubtful,” I muttered, tipping my beer back up to my lips.

Blaze laughed, and I hated that the first words that came to mind weresexy as hell. He might be as sexy as hell, but he could still be a pain in my backside. He always was and always would be. He pulled whatever he was looking for out of his saddlebag, then leaned against Rapunzel and loved her up. The massive American Quarter Horse was the sweetest, gentlest horse I’d ever had the pleasure to take care of when I worked at his ranch. Her mane and tail were gorgeous and richly earned her the name. I used to love to braid it and made sure to add a ribbon for good measure. It drove Cowboy Blaze crazy when his workhorse trotted out of the barn with pink bows in her hair. The night air filled with my laughter when I remembered the look on his face.

“What’s so funny?” he asked, leaving the horse untied and joining me by the fire. He’d pulled up one of the spare chairs I kept out for Dawn or Tex. The fact that his butt was planted in one of them now made me wish I hadn’t done that.

“I was thinking about the look on your face the first time Rapunzel wore bows in her hair. If only I’d had a camera.”

I begrudgingly held out a beer, and he accepted, popping the top off and clinking his longneck bottle to mine.

“Thanks.” He tipped it to his lips, his five o’clock shadow dark in the light of the fire. He was always clean-shaven until the clock moved closer to midnight. I swallowed my beer slowly.Mmmm,I wonder what that five o’clock shadow would feel like when it rasped across my tender breas—

“I know you used to do that just to get my goat.”

I cleared my throat before I spoke so I didn’t sound like a needy woman who’d never had sex in her life. I hadn’t, but that was beside the point. “I take offense. I did it because poor Rapunzel deserved a little pampering.”

“I hose her off every Sunday,” he announced, sipping his beer and grinning into the night.

“Every girl’s dream.” I finished my beer and set the empty bottle on the ground. “Why is your butt in my chair?”

Blaze motioned at the flames flicking up into the night air. “I saw your fire from up on the ridge, so I thought I’d put my sittin’ britches on.”

I smacked myself in the forehead. “What is it with you Texans? If it’s not the fake one I employ, it’s the real one I don’t like, walking around here spewing sentences that don’t make a damn bit of sense.”

Blaze almost choked on the swallow of beer he’d just taken. He coughed a couple of times and finally held up his hand. “Oh, right … sure … Miss How’s By You? ‘Oh, fair-to-middlin’! I’ma goin’ on down to the stop ’n go lights, yous guys wanna come? Oh ya, you betcha!’”

My giggle rolled into full-on laughing, leaving me fighting to draw in air. “We don’t sound like that!”

“You’re right. You sound worse than that,” Blaze said. “It took me two years to figure out what the hell anyone was asking me at the damn feed store.”

I waved my hand until I got myself under control. “No. It took you two years because everyone hated you. They enjoyed yanking your chain.”

“Hate is a strong word. I was an unknown. People were cautious.”

“You were waltzing into a town with less than two thousand people and bringing in prehistoric beasts that could introduce disease to every domesticated cattle and dairy operation in the county. Hate is not too strong of a word for someone engaged in that kind of nonsense.”

He tapped the beer bottle on the arm of the chair. “First, bison aren’t exactly prehistoric. Second, I wasn’t the first bison ranch in the area, Heaven.”

I pointed my new beer bottle at him. “True, but you were the first to squeeze one in so close to another ranch.”

We sat in silence then, staring into the fire while we both considered our places as ranchers and in each other’s lives. At least that’s what I was considering. I couldn’t say what he was thinking about since he was never easy to read unless he was mad. If he was angry, you knew it, even if you didn’t know why.

“I’m sorry I upset you the other day,” he said, but I had to strain to hear him over the crackle of the fire. I could tell it pained him to utter those eight words.

“Apology accepted. I’m sorry for overreacting.”

More silence. Blaze was never a man of many words, but tonight, he was either picking them carefully or unsure where to go next.