Cowboy Lessons. Pamela Britton

out fast that the only hay he was thinking about was the hay he wanted to roll her in.

      “I’m not off to a very good start, am I?”

      He felt her stiffen, felt her kind of jerk a bit before saying, “Actually, you’re not doing too bad.”

      They were the first kind words he’d had from her, and they made Scott’s heart pitter-patter.

      “Yeah, well,” he croaked before coughing to dispel the odd crick in his throat. “I’ve decided to hire someone to do the feeding.”

      She was silent a long moment. The horse swayed beneath them. The smell of leather rose up to mingle with her scent. Lemons. She smelled like a giant lemon, and he liked it.

      “It must be nice,” she said.

      “What?”

      “To be able to buy whatever you want.”

      “It is.”

      She turned quiet after that. That was fine, Scott was too busy wondering if she’d mind taking a turn around the pasture. It was a beautiful morning. Very Sound of Music. Off in the distance a chicken clucked. Behind them steers mooed. All he needed was a pair of chaps, some pistols and a rope. And Amanda. John Wayne always got the girl.

      “When I was in high school I had it in my head that I wanted to be the National High School Rodeo Association champion barrel racer,” she broke the silence by saying. “We had a horse that my dad picked up at auction. He was short, but man was he fast.”

      She paused before the gate, but she didn’t move to open it. The horse shifted beneath them, but she seemed lost in another world. “At the beginning of my senior year nobody could touch us, and this girl, Andrea Thomas was her name, must have gotten sick of it because her dad showed up at our house one day. I didn’t know what he wanted, didn’t ask, just watched him go into the house to talk to my dad.” She paused, shaking her head a bit, a strand of her hair tickling his face. “You want to know what he wanted?”

      He nodded, even though he had a feeling where she was going with this.

      “He wanted to buy my horse, only, see, it wasn’t my horse. It was my dad’s. He’d bought it and I guess he felt he had a right to sell it.” He felt her whole body tense just before she said, “He did.”

      If Scott had thought her father a total loser before, he was even more of a loser now. “He didn’t.”

      She nodded. “For a bunch of money. Oh, he gave me some of it…to buy myself a new horse he said, as if the hours I’d spent on Thumper’s back could be bought back.” She shook her head again. “I’ve spent as many hours—more, actually—running this ranch, tending to the cattle, breeding them, selling them, and once again my father went and sold it from under me. Well, not sold, just lost it, which in some ways is even worse.” She tilted her head, and for the first time there was no animosity in her eyes as she said, “If you go back on your word to sell this place back to me if ranching isn’t your thing, Mr. Beringer, I promise I’ll buy the best hit man I can afford. You have my word on that.”

      At that moment, he almost offered to sell the place back to her. Right then and there. But he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Not when it’d always been a dream of his to own a ranch—a real ranch—like this. But if he decided to keep the place, maybe he could work something out with her. He might not be able to give her Thumper back, but he could give her the next best thing.

      “Don’t move,” she said.

      Scott was about to ask why, but she threw a leg over the front of her saddle and slipped from his arms before he could say a word.

      She didn’t get back on, either, just led him through the gate like a child on a pony ride. And she never looked up at him, either. He suspected it was because she didn’t want him to see what was in her eyes. But he knew. Yes, he knew. Right after his parents had died, he’d watched as the State had sold all their personal belongings before placing him in foster care. He’d only been allowed to pack up one box. Granted, he’d never had a lot of toys, but he still remembered the hurt at having to leave some of them behind.

      “Let me down.”

      She must not have heard him at first because she kept leading the horse.

      “Amanda, I need to get down. Now.”

      She stopped then, the horse doing the same. When she looked up at him, Scott saw himself in her eyes.

      “What’s wrong?” she asked.

      He didn’t answer, just mimicked what she’d done a few minutes before. He almost fell flat on his face but clutched at the foot-strap thingies when he landed, which saved him—stirrups, they were called.

      “What is it?” she repeated as he closed the distance between them.

      Scott lifted her chin. “I’d buy you ten Thumpers if I could.”

      He saw her eyes widen, that gaze a splendid mix of blues and greens and grays. Then she blinked and swallowed at the same time. It took him a moment to realize that it was because she’d teared up. Ah, hell.

      He kissed her.

      He’d wanted to do it all morning, and he wasn’t sorry that he did so now. He expected peaches and cream. He got a Fourth of July firecracker, right down to the sparks.

      She gasped in surprise. So did he. But then he was slipping his tongue inside her mouth, tasting her. Wanting her. Lapping her up.

      And she kissed him back. She didn’t protest. Didn’t jerk away from him. She seemed to feel the instant kapow that he did.

      Her hands came up to his head, her fingers entwining the hair at his nape. His hands explored her sides, a part of him calculating the risk it would be to move his hand up and cup a breast…or two. Man, how he wanted that. But he couldn’t.

      Instead he forced himself to draw back. One of his hands lifted to cup her chin again. Her eyes were closed. Freckles dusted her nose, her lashes long against her tanned cheeks.

      Then her eyes suddenly sprang open and she looked a tad bit freaked, so he said, “I hope you don’t mind my doing that, but you seemed like you needed something to turn your mind from Thumper.”

      She stiffened in his arms. “Scott—”

      “No,” he said. “Don’t say a word. You needed a kiss. Don’t make more of it than it is.”

      She didn’t look like she believed him. He didn’t blame her. He didn’t believe himself.

      “Thank you,” she said.

      A second later she turned toward the house. And Scott just stood there, arms hanging limply at his sides, wondering why it was he felt so weird.

      It was only when he realized she’d left her horse behind that Scott realized he wasn’t the only one thrown.