Boots and Twisters (3 page)

“Greta Sue,” the bar owner said. “She’s not well. Let’s get her out of this crush.”

“I’ll get her out. All the way out of the building. Plenty of air to breathe outside. She didn’t pay the cover charge.”

The strawberry blonde smiled. “It’s okay. I’ll cover for her this time.”

“But, Ms. Anderson, she snuck in somehow. That’s trespassin’.”

“It’s okay. I’m sure she has a good reason.” Ms. Anderson led her to the edge of the jostling crowd and already Lucky could breathe better.

Lucky held her breath as Greta Sue pointed at her, her gaze narrowing, warning her not to make any sudden moves.

The strawberry blonde smiled and held out a hand to Lucky. “I’m Audrey Anderson, owner of the Ugly Stick Saloon. How may I help you?”

Her voice was warm, friendly and so likable it made Lucky want the floor to swallow her whole. Why couldn’t Audrey Anderson have been old, ugly and mean-spirited? Breaking the bad news to this sweet woman made her feel even more of a heel.

Lucky took her hand and shook it, cringing inwardly, at a loss as to how to explain how she’d managed to wreck both her own truck and that of the pretty woman standing in front of her with the friendly smile and the firm handshake.

She cleared her throat and blurted, “I have some bad news.”

Audrey’s brows knit and she stepped closer. “Jackson. Is he all right?”

Lucky frowned. “Who’s Jackson?”

“My boyfriend. I assumed the bad news was about him. Are you telling me it’s not?”

With a shake of her head, Lucky waved her hand toward the doorway. “It’s best I show you.”

Greta Sue gave Lucky the stink-eye. “You hurt one hair on Ms. Anderson’s head…” Audrey Anderson had her share of folks looking out for her. A stab of longing tugged at Lucky’s heart. It would be nice to be loved that much by so many people.

Lucky raised her hands in surrender. “I’m not going to hurt her.”

“Damn right you’re not.” Greta Sue followed them out the door. “I’m coming with you.”

Great. More witnesses to Lucky’s destruction and mortification.

“Tell me what happened.” Audrey walked beside Lucky, her feet moving briskly in the night air, her bright red cowboy boots crunching gravel.

“I stalled out in the parking lot and didn’t have any help moving my truck, so I pushed it. And well…” Lucky stopped where Audrey’s red truck used to be parked.

The strawberry blonde’s brows dipped together. Her gaze moved from the empty spot to glance around the parking lot. “Didn’t I park my truck here? For that matter, I don’t see it anywhere.”

Lucky bit down on her lower lip, touched the Ugly Stick owner’s arm and pointed to the ditch. “It’s in there.”

Audrey stepped up to the edge of the embankment and stared down at the shapes of the two trucks wedged into the ditch at angles. As recognition dawned, she gasped. “That’s my new truck!”

Trent couldn’t believe a girl had bested him. Isaac, Nick and Jackson would all have laughed had they witnessed his humiliation. Strange that the embarrassment and fact that he’d been tricked only made him that much more determined to get that kiss.

No sooner had he been shoved out the door, he turned, caught the door before it closed and stormed back inside, only to see the tall, slender, cool drink of cowgirl water slip into the darkness of the bar. Well, hell. It was Ladies Night and Audrey had given them strict instructions to limit their movements to the employee-only area of the bar or risk being pinched, kissed, squeezed and fondled by a couple hundred horny women.

Trent debated following her, but he’d heard of how Jackson had been stripped to his skivvies once on Ladies Night and he had no desire to be exposed in such a way.

So he didn’t get his kiss. What harm could one more woman add to a room full of raging estrogen?

He returned to the poker game and settled in, his mind on the cowgirl, not his hand. No sooner had Jackson dealt the cards, Nick got a call to tow two trucks.

“Audrey, is that you?” Nick asked.

Jackson frowned. “Trouble?”

“Two trucks in the ditch out front.” Nick tossed his cards on the table and rose. “I’ll be right there.”

“Two trucks?” Trent’s brother, Isaac, asked. “Things must be hoppin’ on Ladies Night.”

“What’s going on? The strippers try to make a run for it?” Trent joked, wondering if the woman he’d let go into the bar had anything to do with the trucks in the ditch. A jab of guilt twisted in his belly. He should have let Audrey know she’d had a trespasser.

“Sorry, guys,” Nick said. “You’re welcome to stay and play, but I’ve got work to do. Seems Audrey’s was one of the trucks that got knocked into the ditch.”

“Audrey’s?” Jackson jumped to his feet. “She wasn’t in it, was she?” Jackson checked his cell phone. “Fuck. I had my ringer off. Audrey’s been tryin’ to get a hold of me. She called three times.” He punched the screen on his phone and held it to his ear.

“No, someone else’s vehicle pushed it into the ditch. Come on. Let’s check it out. I could use a hand getting them out.”

“Maybe we should all go check it out.” Trent tossed his hand onto the table and pushed to his feet.

“I guess we’re all going, since it’s kind of hard to play one-handed poker.” Isaac stood and stretched. “Besides, with a bunch of horny women leaving the Ugly Stick, we might get lucky tonight.”

“I’ve been in the middle of that mob before. Scared the jitters out of me,” Jackson admitted. “Let’s go ‘round the back to the front and find Greta Sue. She can run interference.”

“She can’t guard us all. Frankly, I don’t want her to. I’ll take my chances with the ladies.” Isaac rubbed his hands together. “I could use a little distraction after having my butt kicked at poker.”

“Must be the Jameson luck,” Nick said.

Isaac chuckled. “Remind me not to play poker with Jackson and Nick. I’m completely out of my league here.”

“We both are.” Trent jerked his head toward the door. “Come on.”

Jackson feathered through the handful of bills he collected from the table and stuffed them in his pocket. “You two are more than welcome to come throw money at us anytime.”

Nick headed for his tow truck he’d parked at the rear of the building. Tonight was a full moon. People always got crazy at the full moon. Otherwise, the mechanic would have ridden his motorcycle.

Jackson climbed into the passenger seat of the tow truck’s cab.

Trent and Isaac slowly walked around the building.

“Did you put that ad in the paper for a ranch hand?” Isaac asked.

Trent shook his head. “I put a flyer up at the feed store and here at the Ugly Stick.”

“I took a whack at an ad for the newspaper, we’ll see what we can get. We have more work than we can shake a stick at and no relief until Dusty gets back.”

Dusty, their ranch foreman, was out recuperating from knee replacement after having been thrown one too many times by Thunder, the meanest horse they had.

“Yeah, cattle to round up, horses to train and pastures to cut. Should have hired someone a month ago.”

“Whose idea was it anyway for us to do our own ranchin’? We have the money to pay someone else,” Trent reminded Isaac.

“I can hear Dad’s voice in my head.
You’re gettin’ too big for your britches, boy
.” Isaac dug his thumbs in his belt loops and rocked back on his boot heels with a deep scowl, just like their father wore when he was delivering a lecture on the sins of laziness. Isaac’s frown turned around and he grinned.

Trent didn’t. Their taciturn father had backhanded him more than once, and he’d sworn never to return to the Triple J Ranch outside of Temptation, Texas. He hadn’t come back until he’d gotten news from his brother that Old John Jameson had died of a heart attack, leaving his two-thousand-acre spread to his boys.

If he’d had his way, Trent would have sold the ranch and given the proceeds to the Wounded Warriors organization or some other worthy cause. But Isaac hadn’t wanted to give it up. He’d felt some sort of connection to the place.

Hell, he’d been their father’s favorite and could do no wrong. The ranch probably held
good
memories for him.

Now they both lived there and worked the ranch with their own hands. Although Trent had never wanted to keep the ranch, he’d never been closer to his brother, and he was starting to work out his anger toward his father. But it was a struggle to keep the ranch going when he had full-time commitments as an oilrig architect. And the time spent ranching had given him a little more understanding and grudging respect for his late father.

Isaac had insisted they do the work themselves, telling him it would keep them humble when their bank accounts were overflowing and they could have anything they wanted.

Trent wasn’t afraid of hard work, but they needed help to keep the ranch up. The fences alone took all their time, mending and restringing wire to keep the cattle from straying. And the horses needed exercise and training, and the hay needed cutting.

Sure, they had a foreman who ran the place when they were away on business, but even he needed help while they were gone. Now that Dusty was out for several months, they realized just how much he’d had on his plate.

Yeah, they could use an extra pair of hands and the sooner the better.

In the meantime, his younger brother still had great expectations of finding a woman to love.

Not Trent. As a twenty-year-old, he’d thought he was in love with an older woman in her late twenties, only to find out she’d been lying to him, cheating on him with a man who could afford to buy her jewelry and fancy dates.

Since then, he hadn’t trusted a woman and never went past two dates with one, determined to keep them at a distance.

“You gonna help get the trucks out of the ditch?”

“I suppose.” Trent glanced at Isaac. “Go on, see if you can rescue a damsel in distress from the perils of a rowdy Ladies Night at the Ugly Stick. I’m sure one would happily take you home to tuck her into bed.” His thoughts returned to the sandy-blond-haired cowgirl who’d almost busted his nose. Some of his parts, besides his nose, still throbbed at her image seared in his mind.

She hadn’t been the prettiest woman he’d ever seen, but she was definitely intriguing. He wondered if she’d ever found Audrey.

He also wondered if he’d see her again. Used to being chased by women, Trent found the trespasser more than intriguing, considering she was the first woman who hadn’t been too interested in kissing him.

The competitive spirit in him had flagged her as a challenge, one he’d surely overcome and grow bored with once he had caught, kissed and bedded her.

Chapter Two

Trent stared at the front parking lot of the Ugly Stick Saloon. The danged thing was chock-full. A crowd of horny, drunk women gathered around the tow truck as Nick and Jackson rigged the equipment to drag the first truck out of the ditch and back onto the parking lot.

Trent stood back, dreading the moment when the women noticed Isaac. He was the charmer. But the way they were eyeing Nick and Jackson like sides of beef on a spit had Trent shaking in his boots, ready to make a run for it.

“Look at them. Every shape, size, color and age. Women.” Isaac heaved a happy sigh. “We could have our pick.”

Trent shook his head. “Have you ever been to the Ugly Stick on Ladies Night?”

Isaac frowned. “Can’t say that I have.”

“Jackson said it’s a goddamn meat fest. They get all hot and horny with the strippers and then go looking for anything with something danglin’ between their legs to ride.”

Isaac’s brows twisted. “And that’s a problem because?”

“If it’s all the same to you, I’ll stay right here.”

“Coward.” Isaac chuckled and waded into the herd and was immediately surrounded. Like carrion picking at the carcass, the women touched, pinched, fondled and threw themselves at his handsome brother.

Trent shivered.

The ladies of the Temptation Garden Club had been after him to date one of their daughters. Every time he came to town for groceries or supplies, they managed to have one on hand to shove in his direction. It was like they had radar where he was concerned.

Holy hell, and the one they’d shoved most was headed his way.

Kylie Sandell, the daughter of Mayor Sandell and Mrs. Sandell, the president of the TGC, vamped her way across the gravel parking lot, wearing stilettos, a hot pink miniskirt and a stretchy tube top that barely covered her breasts.

Trent saw her coming and dove into the pack of frothing vultures. Better to have his bones picked clean by a hundred women than to face the marriage-hungry former cheerleader with a keen focus on getting that ring she wanted on her left hand. He’d rescue his brother and get the hell out of there before Kylie got her painted claws in him. With her big blond hair and painted-on smile, she gave him the heebie-jeebies.

Once surrounded by the women in the crowd, he regretted his move immediately. He was caressed, squeezed, pawed and grabbed in places no decent woman would have done alone. In a pack, there was no telling what these lust-crazed women would sink to.