Dancing With Danger: Book 8: Dancing Moon Ranch Series (9 page)

"Then you're just g
iving it to them?" Genie asked.

"No," Josh replied. "It's a down payment on a parcel of land. They have more than they need, and I want a place to hang my hat when I'm not on the rodeo circuit."

"That's it? Just to hang your hat?"

"For now."

"What about at your folk's ranch?" Genie asked. "According to Annie, your dad set aside parcels for each of you."

"
He did," Josh replied, "but by the time you cut the place up the plots are impractical for ranching, and Adam's wanting more land, which is why Ryan sold his piece to him, so if Adam can come up with the money, I'll sell him my piece too. Besides, I'm beginning to like the wide open spaces here, and I could have a pretty nice spread by the time I'm ready to settle."

Which, Genie realized, was a long way
s off. There were still all those rodeos to follow. Returning her attention to the horseshoe sculpture, she placed her hand on its back, and said, "How long did it take you to make this?"

"I don't know
, I did it during my off time," Josh replied. "Maybe a couple of months."

Catching sight of a
drawing on the workbench, Genie lifted the paper and saw that it was a beautifully-executed drawing of a bucking bull. "Did you do this too?" she asked.

"Yeah.
I do posters for rodeos," Josh replied. "That was the illustration for the Sisters Rodeo poster, but I mainly drew it to show the city council. They commissioned me to do a horseshoe sculpture of a bronc to put at the entrance to the rodeo grounds, but I wanted to do a bucking bull instead, since this is cattle country, so I used that to convince them. They liked it."

"Then they're paying you
for the bull sculpture?"

Josh nodded.
"$6500 bucks." He started pounding on the horseshoe again.

"
That's a lot of money for two months during your off time," Genie said, wondering why Josh couldn't pursue horseshoe sculptures instead of the rodeo lunacy, but Josh was making too much racket to hear her. Glancing beyond him, she caught sight of a poster taped to the concrete block wall of the building. Walking over to it, she saw that it was the same bucking bull except it had a rider on its back, and it was in color, with lettering and information about the rodeo. When the clang of pounding horseshoes stopped momentarily, she said, "Can I have this?"

Josh shrugged. "Sure. There are
a stack of them in the bunkhouse."

Genie removed the poster from the wall and looked at it more closely, while saying, "How do you do this? It looks almost like a photograph
, but I know it isn't."

"
The originals are pastels," Josh said. "I do them in the evening to pass the time since I don't much like TV."

Genie set the
poster on the workbench, and before Josh started pounding again, she said, "I'm not going on the overnight. Maybe that will help some of your frustration, and mine."

Hammer
paused in his hand, Josh stared at the horseshoe for a few moments, like he wasn't sure what he'd heard, then looked at Genie, and said, "What do you mean by
your
frustration? Women don't go through what men go through. Having the hots for a woman who's always just out of reach does a real number on a man."

"I'm not out of reach now," Genie said.

"Are you telling me you're available?"

"No, I'm telling you I'm frustrated too, which is why I decided not to go on the overnight."

"You know what, babe? You're still sending me a crapload of mixed messages." Josh tossed the hammer onto the workbench, and walking over to where Genie stood, pulled her into his arms, and said, "And frustrated or not, I want you on that overnight." He kissed her, and even though Genie had been prepared to go into a long-winded colloquy about the futility of heading into a relationship that was a dead end, she wrapped her arms around Josh's neck and kissed him back. Caught up in the circle of his arms, and hearing her own soft moans of pleasure reverberating in her throat as Josh's mouth and tongue connected with hers in a long sensual awakening, she knew, about halfway into the kiss, that she
would
be going on the overnight.

***

Before setting out on the trail ride to the campsite, Josh announced to the group that whereas the ride took the better part of two hours, it looped around and circled back so the campsite was only about twenty minutes from the ranch if there was an emergency, which had Genie relaxing some. After the incident with the dam breaking, she liked the idea of being closer to home.

The
day was comfortably warm, and the two-hour ride leisurely, following along the stream bed of a wide canyon for a distance before making a winding zigzag path up a hillside through a series of switchbacks. Somehow Josh managed to work it so Genie was riding directly behind him and at the head of a string of a dozen-and-a-half riders, so when they stopped at vista points, she and Josh ended up side-by-side on their horses. It hadn't escaped her when Josh's horse sidestepped toward hers, and his leg brushed against hers, and when he caught her eye and winked and smiled, she knew he'd done it intentionally.

Other
times he'd send subtle signals—demonstrating to her the proper way to hold her reins by wrapping his hand around hers and toying with her fingers overlong while rearranging the leathers, and when he pressed his palm to the small of her back to remind her to sit straight, his hand remained longer than necessary, and the little pat before he removed it was like an intimate touch. There was also his hand lingering on her calf when he stood by her horse while reminding her to keep her heels down, and the little squeeze of her leg afterwards definitely sent a signal.

But she also thought Josh was being
obvious, so when they stopped by a spring that trickled up between rocks so everyone could get a drink, and Josh was waiting on his horse beside her, she said to him, "You're not being very subtle."

Josh glanced around, and when he saw that no one was within hearing distance, he said, "
I know, but I'm trying to discharge some frustration. It's not working so well, but I have my jump rope with me in case we don't get a chance to sneak off for our love fest."

"
No love fest," Genie said, "but I wouldn't object to a long kiss behind a big rock. I liked the taste of your tongue, but I couldn't figure out what it was."

"Sen
-Sen," Josh replied. He reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a small foil packet that was, diagonally, half red and half gold, and said, "My grandmother bribed us during church with these. They lasted through the sermon and kept us quiet." He lifted up the folded corner and tapped a tiny black square into his palm. "In case you don't know what Sen-Sens are, they're tiny licorice landmines that pack a wallop."

Instead of looking at the tiny black square,
Genie found herself staring at the packet, which she'd seen Josh slip into his pocket earlier and thought, at the time, was a condom. She found herself smiling because she'd been prepared to set him straight, and all the while he'd been preparing for another long kiss.

"Okay, this is
n't good," Josh said, catching her smile and connecting it to the foil packet. "You just put an image in my head that's making my pants tight, and I don't think jumping rope will cure it."

"Then maybe we'd better skip the kiss
behind the rock because if you start sucking on those things it will end up being another long kiss, which will make your pants even tighter," Genie said. "And just for the record, you had that problem the first time I came into your hospital room to take your vitals and check your bum, so I'm not entirely to blame for it now."

"
That was the first time it happened while I was there," Josh pointed out. "The other nurses on the floor didn't cause that reaction."

"Why me then?" Genie asked.

Josh eyed her with amusement. "You want me to go into detail? It could get pretty graphic."

"No, just a short explanation. I'm curious."

"Okay then, you're put together right, you have beautiful long hair a man could get lost in, and if the skin you keep covered is as tempting as what I saw from my vantage point when you bent over to change my ice packs, I could think of a whole lot of ways to activate the nerves beneath it. You want me to keep going?"

"You got your point across," Genie said, "
but now I
know
we'd better skip the rock kiss."

"For your benefit or mine?
" Josh asked.

"Both."

"Then it's no problem," Josh said. "I brought along an extra jump rope."

"You
're not serious?"

Josh laughed.
"No, but based on our last kiss maybe I should have." He slipped the Sen-Sen packet into his pocket, then raising his hand, put his thumb and index finger to his mouth and blew a loud, shrill whistle to get everyone's attention. "Okay guys and gals. Time to move on."

The riders mounted and took their places in line
as before, and they started out again, but now, as Genie watched Josh's broad-shouldered back and firm male butt swaying in the saddle, the idea of jumping rope didn't seem so farfetched. She was definitely frustrated, and a long, heated kiss behind a big rock wasn't all that was dominating her mind. She couldn't seem to set aside the love fest, just as she couldn't earlier, when she'd thought the packet in Josh's pocket was a condom and she'd tried to justify reasons why it would be okay to act on it.

Relieved that she no longer had the choice, she turned her attention to the trail ride and the magnificent panorama of hills and
buttes and gorges, and the fact that she hadn't touched the saddle horn since they started out, just to prove she could ride without doing it.

It was another half hour before they
reached the campsite, which was on a wide flat area on top of a high hill, with a faraway view on one side and a grove of aspen trees behind. A large open shelter housed a barbecue grill, a cooking area, and several long picnic tables. A short way from the shelter was a combo restroom and dressing room, with one side for men and the other for women.

Ryan
had only just arrived driving the chuck wagon, with his horse tied behind. The light rubber-tired wagon was pulled by a mule that looked barely winded. A canvas top, supported by several bowed metal strips attached to the wagon box, made it look like a covered wagon. The hinged door of a large box-like cabinet at the back end of the wagon opened up and dropped down to form a table, revealing compartments for utensils, supplies and provisions for cooking.

W
hile Josh and Ryan unloaded the food and set up for dinner, Genie sat at a table at the opposite end of the shelter, chatting with several guests, having decided that keeping her distance from Josh would also keep her from obsessing over him. He was dominating far too much of her thoughts, and again she had to remind herself that a relationship with a rodeo bullfighter was not in her best interest. Odd that the words,
not in her best interest,
seemed to have replaced her earlier words,
was a dead end
. Yet nothing had changed. Like Cal, Josh was a man whose goal was to follow a performance circuit while tempting fate…

"I could use some help with the cooking," Josh's voice came from behind.

Genie turned around and saw a definite gleam in his eye, which she found unsettling as it stirred up a cauldron of feelings she didn't want to acknowledge. "What about Ryan?"

"He's corralling the horses."

"I thought you did that."

"Not this time."

Genie glanced around at the group of people at the table, whose eyes were darting between the two of them. She also saw slight smiles, like they knew what was going on, even though nothing had happened… yet. "I suppose I can help." She turned on the bench and followed Josh to where he'd set a large stainless steel platter stacked with frozen hamburger patties just to the side of the grill. "That wasn't very subtle," she said.

"
I know, but subtlety's never been one of my strong suits," Josh replied.

"
Incidentally, I loved the ride here. I didn't hold onto the saddle horn the whole way, even during the canter," Genie said.

"I'd kiss you if I could
," Josh replied.

"Because I didn't hold on to the
saddle horn?"

"No, because I'm going a little crazy right now wanting to, which is why I need you to help me cook. If I ke
pt looking over my shoulder to watch you, the hamburgers would burn. And maybe you could move a little closer. There's still some space between us."

Genie
eased sideways until their arms touched, and when they did, Josh bent over like he was going to kiss her, then stopped short. "Okay, I can get through this," he mumbled, then started placing patties on the grill.

"What am I supposed to
be doing here?" Genie asked.

Josh handed her a spatula.
"Looking busy."