Page 12 of Wrangle Me, Cowboys

“Oh, this is beautiful,” Lidia said, walking around the car and admiring it.

Waylon grunted.

I did a double-take. It was a pumpkin-colored boxy old thing with a bar running right through the middle of the top, so it wasn’t even a real convertible. Not that I knew anything about cars. People in New York didn’t really drive. My parents both had cars, but they never took them out of the garage unless they were going out to the Hamptons or upstate for a weekend. When she did use her car, Mom hired a driver so she could ride in the backseat and nurse her gin-and-valium hangover while pretending to work on emails.

Lidia leaned over and peered through the glass top.

“Leather,” Waylon said, glowering at his mother.

“A ’78,” she said, tapping on the glass with one manicured nail. My mother got shellac manicures, short and practical, in a neutral color that would last out a season, like lilac or nude. Lidia’s nails looked like she’d smashed a piece of candy corn onto the end of each finger.

“Hurst Hatch?” she asked.

Whatever a Hurst Hatch was, it seemed to wake Waylon from his stew of resentment. He straightened up and actually smiled, though I could tell he was fighting it. “Fisher units,” he said.

“This is in excellent condition,” she said. “Are you keeping the color?”

“This isn’t the original color,” he said. “Come here.” He opened up the door and she went over and bent down, and they started talking about cars like they were fancy cocktails they couldn’t wait to try.

I turned to Sawyer. “I don’t get it.”

“It’s their thing,” he said with a shrug. While his mother and brother were busy looking at something inside the door, Sawyer took my hand and gave it a squeeze. When I glanced at him in surprise, he licked his lips and then grinned, squeezing my hand for another second before letting go. A shiver of naughty feeling crept through me. For the rest of the twenty minutes we stood there, my body was aware of his every movement even when I wasn’t sneaking glances at him.

Finally, Waylon and his mother remembered we were there, and we all headed towards the door. I followed Sawyer, my gaze riveted on his ass. How had I never noticed a guy’s ass before? The muscles in Sawyer’s ass hypnotized me as they flexed with each step. So much so that I kinda-sorta ran into one of the huge tractor tires.

I bounced off the tire and went reeling straight towards the wall, which was covered in shovels and rakes and hoes. Flailing my arms, I tried to right myself, but I only managed to grab the handle of a pitchfork, which came loose from its hanger. Off balance, I plowed forward, careening straight for Lidia like a savage warrior about to impale the enemy.

7

Waylon

By the time we got the tools hung up and Amber dusted off, my mother had calmed down.

“We’re not laughing at you,” Holden assured her before turning to Amber. “Or you.”

Amber stood there looking so damn cute with her stunned, bewildered expression. She hadn’t reached our Ma, but had fallen flat on her face in front of the lot of us.

“It’s safe to say you’re not curbing her drinking ways,” our mother said in a huff.

“She’s fine,” I said. “She’ll sleep it off and have a headache when she wakes up. No one ever died of a hangover.”

I thought it strange that a self-professed party girl could get sloppy from a few glasses of wine, but seeing Amber swaying on her feet was proof enough.

“I wasn’t trying to stab you,” she said for the hundredth time. “I swear!”

Lidia narrowed her eyes at our stepsister. “I don’t know about you living out here,” she said. “It may not be New York, but looks like you’ve found new ways to go wild. I don’t know what my ex was thinking, sending you out here. But I think it would be best if you came back to town with me.”

“Why?” Amber’s blue eyes widened. Damn, she looked innocent. Too damn innocent to be living with the likes of us.

“To live with me,” Lidia said. “It’s far more proper than you living out here, doing as you please. My sons have plenty of work on the ranch without having to keep an eye on your questionable behavior all day.”

“But…but we’re not even related,” Amber protested. “I mean, not that I’m related to your sons, but at least legally, I’m their sister. I don’t even know you.”

“I think what she’s saying, Ma, is that she’d like a chance to get to know us a little better,” Sawyer said, draping an arm around Amber’s shoulder. I could see it was to steady her on her feet more than anything, and I gave him a slight nod to thank him.

“I’m not asking what she’d like,” Lidia said. “She’s in no state to make decisions, and even if she was, her judgment obviously leaves something to be desired.”

“You’re making a big deal out of nothing,” Sawyer said.