“No.”Bitterness poured into him.“I am not my bio dad.Nothing like him, even if he is my bio dad.If I had a kid, I’d stick like glue.”
She searched his eyes.“Yes.I can see you mean it.”
“Kids are not part of our agreement.”He heard thenow, but kept it silent.He’d contemplate that mischievous devil later.“But I’d be lying if I didn’t admit I’m very attracted to you physically,” he admitted.“Very.”
She smiled and touched his cheek with her fingertips, then stroked along his jaw with the back of her knuckles.“I know.”
Imp.
“I’m on birth control,” she said.“And I feel like our open-ended business negotiation terms in Denver ofif we have sexhave firmly slid intowhen.”
The fraught moment faded, and he felt his own tension uncoil.He hadn’t spoiled everything between them by pushing when he’d had no intention of pushing.
She reached behind her and pulled out her work tote and the gift bag of chocolate and sweet and salty varieties of popcorn.
“Let the next adventure—spying on your birth family while assessing some… what did she call them… bulls and buckin’ bronc skills—begin.”
“That hardly seems conducive to a romantic conclusion of the evening.”His tension was back.
Again, he was the outsider.All the Telfords would know what to do.Have a routine.
She laughed, the sound lighting him up as much as soothing the tension creeping up his spine to his shoulders, neck, and jaw.
“You’re kidding right?Bulls thrashing around.Broncs bucking—all those feral muscles and then the cowboys in dusty wranglers and leather chaps dropping down and straddling all that surging primal masculine energy—trying to hang on?Staring beast and fate in the face and sayingyeah, I’ll take that dare.I’m hot already.”She fanned her face.
“When you put it like that…” He stared at the hint of color back in her cheeks.“So am I.”
She laughed and placed her hand on his thigh, splayed her fingers.“I know it’s probably weird and a whole lot of other things coming here this evening for you—but props for grabbing the bull by the horns to use a Montana-appropriate analogy—and walking into the arena to face your past and your blood.I’ll follow your lead, but if you feel uncomfortable just try to take yourself out of it—pretend to be an actor, observing, participating, playing a role.”
He’d felt like that most of his adult life, playing a role.The realization tasted sour.
“Might help to keep some of the emotional baggage out of the barn, so to speak.”
“Improv again laced with western-themed speak.”
“That’s the spirit.”Ayana leaned over and kissed his cheek.“The power of yes and sweaty cowboys showing off.Who knows where it will lead?”she teased.
Telford wasn’t sure, but he no longer dreaded driving under the Telford family ranch sign and onto a legacy family ranch he had no part of, but his bio dad had hinted he could and should earlier.
Reconnaissance, Cam would have called it.
Curiosity he could have dismissed as of a week ago.
But no lie, when he drove onto the birth land of his blood ancestors, something inside him—he didn’t know what, good or bad—shifted.
*
“Girl, you aregoing to be missing one heck of a show if you’re going to be knitting.”A beautiful strawberry blonde swept back her thick mane of hair so that it fell over one shoulder and sat down next to Ayana on the metal risers.
“Oh, I’ll be watching,” Ayana said, wondering if she should have left her work tote in the truck.Some people found it off-putting, but it could be a conversational starter, and she was here for information.“Hard not to.”
“Impossible.”The woman laughed; her green eyes sparkled.“Cowboy watching never gets old.I’m Piper.That one’s mine.”She pointed to a sandy-haired man, who was explaining something to Telford.
Telford listened in that still-impassive way of his.She blew out a breath.This was probably overwhelming to him and seeing him at one end of the arena by a gated area standing with several other cowboys, he stood out for his height, but that was it at first glance.The men all had a look.
That was good, wasn’t it?
“I’m Ayana.I haven’t had many cowboy sightings in my life,” she told Piper, keeping the triangle scarf she was crocheting on her lap.She found keeping busy with her hands soothed her, and she loved creating something pretty and colorful she could sell or gift or donate.
