Against Her Odds: when dedication meets desire (2 page)

“Phone call, Val!”

Val snatched the phone up and snapped,
“Valerie here.”

“Hey there.”

The long slow drawl penetrated her annoyance
as effectively as an hour of yoga. Not that she ever took the time for yoga
anymore.

“Cason?” she blurted out.

“Yep,” he confirmed, pleased that she
remembered him so easily. He’d had a whole introduction planned, but he was
happy that he hadn’t had to use it. It meant that maybe she’d paid him a little
more attention than he’d thought, and that was a very good sign. “I’m glad you
remembered me, but you don’t sound like you’re having a real good day,
darlin’.”

“You could say that,” she admitted, thinking
back to how her less than stellar mood had stretched out over the whole
morning. “But I’m sure you didn’t call to ask about that. What can I do for
you?”

“You can have dinner with me,” he said,
still in that lazy drawl.

“Could I really?” she asked, slightly
surprised by the sudden invitation, but feeling herself grinning at his
confidence.

“If you were feeling like being nice to a
hardworking cowboy, that is,” Cason answered back, pleased at hearing the smile
in her voice.

“Do you still count as a cowboy if you have
sheep?” Val teased.

“I like to think so. Otherwise, my feelings
get real hurt and I start having a lot of self doubt.”

“I’m sure you have a great deal of trouble
with self actualization.”

“You just wouldn’t believe it. So what do
you say? Want to have dinner tonight?” He chewed his lower lip, waiting for her
to answer. The conversation seemed like it was headed in a good direction, but
you just never knew. She might be seeing someone already. He hadn’t thought of
that before.

“Sure,” she said with a shrug. “You can
pick me up at six.”

After she’d given him her address, she
turned back to her laptop to find that Becky had been eavesdropping
shamelessly.

“Was that the hot cowboy you interviewed
yesterday?”

“Yes,” Val answered.

“And he asked you out?” Becky went on,
narrowing her light blue eyes.

“Yes,” Val confirmed again.

Becky collapsed into her desk chair and
shook her head. “If you weren’t my best friend, I’d have to go ahead and hate
you.”

“You would not. I’m insanely charming.”

“Okay, I guess that’s true. But I fell in
love with Cason McDaniel on the news last night. I’ve decided we’d have a short
engagement and a destination wedding and I’d spend the rest of my life having
his babies and baking apple pies. Not at the same time, obviously.”

Valerie laughed. “That settles it. I’m
insanely charming and you’re just insane.”

“What? Do you want something other than hot
sex and homemade pie?”

Val glanced around to make sure that none
of the anchors could hear her. “I’m not discounting the wonders of sex or pie.
But you know how I feel about relationships.”

“You’re going to give Cason McDaniel the
talk? Don’t you ever learn?”

“Hey,” Valerie said indignantly. “If they
run at the talk, then they aren’t worth my time anyway.”

“So, what are you going to wear?” Becky
asked, leaning forward eagerly. “You gonna let me fix up your hair for you?”

Val raised a hand to her fine blonde hair.
“When are you going to realize that nothing works? You curled it for my date
with Jim a few months ago and my hair was straight as a stick before dessert. I
felt like an idiot.”

“Yeah, but I got this new ceramic curling
iron. It’s got some kind of ionic technology.” Becky gestured at her long
locks. “The proof is right here.”

“Your hair is wavy anyway.” Val frowned at
Becky’s thick, shiny curls.

“Okay, okay,” her friend said. “Don’t get
upset about it.”

“I’m not.” Realizing what her face must
have looked like, she sighed. “I’m sorry. I’m still thinking about last night.”

“The anchor desk?” Becky asked
sympathetically.

Val sighed again and rested her chin on her
hand. “People get delayed at the airport all the time. Why couldn’t it happen
to Steven?”

“Keep your chin up, okay? It’s going to
happen.”

Valerie forced a smile that she didn’t feel
and allowed Becky to direct the conversation elsewhere. It was better than
thinking about the chili cook off she had to go and cover later. She’d been so
excited to finally have her chance behind the desk that her heart had felt like
it had fallen through the soles of her shoes when Steven rushed in with barely
two minutes to spare, straightened his tie and slid into his desk chair,
leaving her standing to the side trying not to look the way she felt. Or grab
Steven by his fancy tie and strangle him.

“Great!” the station manager had sighed in
relief. “Okay, Val, head on home. You won’t have to stay after all.”

“Sure thing,” she’d said, trying to be
cheerful even as she swallowed back her annoyance in an attempt to remain
professional. “You know that I’m always ready to--”

“Quiet! Action!” one of the grips shouted,
and she’d left as fast as she could.

It hadn’t been a good day yesterday, and
she was still feeling the sting. She found herself replaying her conversation
with Cason once more. What
was
she going to wear tonight?

Val opened the door promptly and ushered
Cason into her apartment. “Right on time.”

“I figured you’d be the type to appreciate
things like that,” he said with a smile.

“You wouldn’t be wrong.” It was actually
one of her biggest pet peeves. If she could be on time, everyone else could to.
She’d spent countless hours of her life waiting for her dad to show up only to
have him rush in late or not at all. She made it a point to always, always,
call if she was detained by work. “Come on in.”

“You did a good job with this place. I like
the art.”

She followed his gaze around the room,
looking at the place through his eyes. She wasn’t allowed to paint the walls
since it was a rental, so she’d made do by hanging a lot of art prints that
she’d bought at various museums.

She had a Monet over the couch, a Van Gogh
in the kitchen, and several smaller paintings by Degas scattered about both
rooms. She loved his dancers. They gave a sense of movement to rooms that might
have felt cramped otherwise.

Val saw his gaze drift to the scant amount
of furniture and her small television and she prepared to defend herself as
“non-materialistic.” Instead she saw his lips tilt into a grin.

“Eclectic decorating style, huh Blondie?”

“Blondie?” she asked in surprise.

“‘Fraid so,” Cason said. “I give everybody
nicknames.”

“I guess that’s fair enough,” Valerie
admitted, slightly pleased by his choice. “But how does a cowboy know about
“eclectic” decorating? I wouldn’t imagine that it’s a big deal in your line of
work.”

“This cowboy listened to his mama,” Cason
said seriously, even though she saw a sparkle in his eyes. “She was a
frustrated would-be interior designer, always changing something. Half the time
me and the old man weren’t sure we were in the right house when we came in from
the field, but it always looked nice. Then we got to hear about it at the
dinner table.”

Val listened to the way his voice softened
when he talked about his mother and felt her heart go all mushy. It had been a
while since she’d liked a guy so much right away. If her lecture didn’t scare
him off, she had a feeling that they would have a lot of fun together.

“Does she still decorate?” Val asked.

“Sort of. My parents were older when they
had me. They actually thought that they wouldn’t be able to have kids at all.
Mama was in her forties when I came along, so they’re in their seventies now.
They both live in Glistening Springs Retirement Home now. Their choice,” he
hurried to say so that she didn’t think he was a heartless jerk. He had fought
the decision tooth and nail, but his parents had overridden him in the end.
They knew he didn't have the time to manage their care and the ranch and they
were both adamant about entering the nursing home. “Not mine.”

“I did a Christmas story there a few months
ago,” Val said, to put his mind at ease. She could tell that he wasn’t the type
of man to just ship his folks off when they got to be a burden. “It’s the
nicest home in the state.”

Cason nodded and shoved his hands down into
his pockets. The conversation was drifting from his normal first date
repertoire. He glanced around for inspiration.

“Is that yarn?” he asked suddenly,
surprised to see what looked like a half-finished blanket amid a colorful pile
of yarn. “You
knit
?” It didn’t fit his picture of polished, elegant
Valarie and that made her even sexier in his eyes.

Val felt a sudden flush of heat rise from
the collar of her shirt. “I crochet,” she admitted.

“Crochet?”

That was clearly something his mother
didn’t do, by the confusion that spread over his face and the way he’d
pronounced the word as if it were totally foreign.

“Yes,” she said, walking over to the basket
and picking up her afghan. “You can make most of the same stuff, but crochet
has creepier tools.” She extracted the hook and showed it to him. “Doesn’t this
look like something a dentist would threaten you with in your nightmares?”

“I’d have to say that it does,” Cason
admitted. “You’re a scary woman, Blondie.”

“And don’t you forget it,” she said,
dropping the hook back on top of the afghan and looking up at him with a
sparkle in her brown eyes.

“Is that your way of saying that we’d
better get on out of here and get something to eat?” he asked, casually looping
his arm over her shoulders.

“Yep,” she said, leaning against him
briefly.

Normally she wasn’t the touchy feely type,
at least not so soon, but she liked the strength in his tall body. She also
loved how good he looked in his dark jeans and the long sleeved chambray shirt
that he clearly considered dress clothes.

“Well, I don’t mind hurrying,” Cason said
as they walked down to his truck. “You look so good in that dress that I can’t
wait for people to see me with you.”

She smacked his arm lightly even though she
knew that she was blushing again. She had decided to wear a dress that Becky
had made her buy a few months ago. The wrap dress fell to nearly the knee, so
that wasn’t the problem. The problem, in Val’s opinion anyway, was the pattern.
It was so...eye catching.

She had spent her entire career in neutral
grays. It was better to err on the side of serious when you were a woman in
journalism. This dress was not serious. For one thing, it was bright red and
white, so it was about as far from neutral as a person could get. It was also
cut a little bit lower than she usually wore her clothes.

Cason helped her into the truck and she
tugged the dress down modestly as she gave him a smile of thanks. He couldn’t
help following the line of her legs with his eyes. Valerie wasn’t tall but she
had great legs, and the red pumps she was wearing showed them off perfectly.

He hadn’t been joking when he’d said that
he couldn’t wait for people to see him with her. He hadn’t had much time for
dating since taking over the ranch and helping his parents settle into their
new home. It was nice to come out swinging with a woman who was both gorgeous
and intelligent.

“Is Italian okay for you?” he asked as he
cranked the truck and backed out of the parking space.

“Sure,” she answered with pleasure. “I love
Italian food.”

“Me too,” Cason answered. “I’m a good cook
when it comes to plain old American food, but my pasta is always either too
hard or pure mush.”

“Do you do most of your own cooking?” She
couldn’t picture it, but she supposed it made sense. Who else was going to cook
for him? She wondered if he was lonely out there all by himself. She got lonely
in her apartment in the center of town.

“Yeah,” he said with a shrug. “Unless I can
get Mitch to cook for me. And, just in case you’re wondering, I never can. He
did heat up some soup for me once when I broke three fingers on my right hand,
but that’s about it. Oh, and his wife sends me bread twice a week. Bread isn’t
my thing either.”

“Does Mitch work for you?”

“Sort of, but if you put it like that he
might shoot me. He’s been the ranch hand ever since I can remember. He’s about
ready to retire, but he won’t admit it and I’m not real sure what he’d do
without Eden’s Edge to keep him busy.”

The tone in his voice when he talked about
the older ranch hand gave Val another flutter in her stomach. She’d never been
the type to go crazy over cowboys. As a matter of fact, she’d always preferred
guys who weren’t exactly the outdoors type, mainly because she was emphatically
an indoors girl.

Now she found herself studying his
suntanned face and remembering the feel of his rough, work worn hands and
really liking this particular outdoors guy. Slowly she grew more and more
nervous about her upcoming speech. He probably wouldn’t like it very much.
Weren’t these guys the type to want to settle down and have...well...babies and
apple pie? Maybe she
should
have pawned him off on Becky.

Cason noticed her rub her stomach.
“Hungry?”

She forced a smile and put her hand at her
side, glad he had mistaken her nervous gesture for a hunger pang. “A little.”

“Well, lucky for you, we’re pretty much
there.” He eased the truck to a stop at a red light and pointed to the pretty
Tuscan style restaurant on their left. “The advantage to living in a small
town. Everything’s right at hand.”

“Well, good,” she said, trying to keep her
voice casual, even though now she was really starting to wish that she’d turned
him down. This was too stressful. She was afraid that she liked him too much to
say what she needed to say.

He opened the door for her and they were
seated in a small burgundy upholstered booth in a quiet back corner. The waiter
lit the candles on the table and left after taking their drink orders, sweet
tea for Cason and water with lemon for Val.

Cason watched Val bite her lip as she
looked over the selections. He liked the way she absently brushed her hair away
from her face as she was thinking. He found his gaze drifting down to the V
shaped neckline of her dress.

She raised her eyes to his and a slight
smile curved her mouth when she saw where he was looking. He gave her a smile
back. He wasn’t ashamed of it. He hadn’t stared too long, and he’d be damned if
he didn’t appreciate how good she made that dress look.

“Does anything look good to you?” Val asked
innocently.

“Couple of things,” Cason admitted.

The waiter brought their drinks and Val
ordered the chicken fettuccini alfredo. Cason ordered the Tour of Italy and
placed a breadstick on Val’s plate before taking one of his own.

“Any big news lately?” he asked before
breaking the bread in half and taking a bite.

“That’s not the kind of news I handle,” Val
said dryly.

“You mean my sheep weren’t important to
you?” Cason asked, pretending to be hurt. “And here I thought that we had a
special moment that day.”

“It’s not likely to get me nominated for
anything,” she said, even though she had to smile at his phrasing and fake
wounded look. “But that’s okay. I’ve only been at the station for a year and a
half.”

“Where were you before this?” he asked,
interested.

“Nebraska,” she said, taking a sip of her
water. “I worked for their station for two years. I was in Oregon before that.”

“Did you move around a lot as a kid?” Cason
was always a little envious of people who’d traveled a lot. He didn’t really
want to travel now, but he wished he’d done more of it when he was freer of
responsibilities.

“No,” Val said. “My dad did though.” When
he looked sympathetic, she realized that she’d phrased that badly. “My parents
weren’t divorced,” she hurried to explain. “My father was a newscaster. You may
have heard of him. Aaron Turner?”

“I probably have. I hate to admit it, but I
don’t watch much of the news.”

Val put her water glass down with a thump.
“Really? Don’t you want to know what’s going on in the world?”

“I get the big details from the paper,” he
said, a little defensive in the face of her shock. “And Mitch watches like
crazy, so he tells me enough to keep me up to date.”

She held up her hands quickly, realizing
she had sounded more than a little pushy. “Sorry. I get wrapped up in it, but I
know it’s not as important to everyone as it was to my dad.”

“It’s okay,” Cason said, wondering a little
why she hadn’t said it was important to her too. After all, she was the one
doing it.  He was smart enough to know that those weren’t questions for a
first date though, so he pushed the thought aside. “So, you followed in your
father’s footsteps too, huh?”

“I wish I had!” Val leaned back to allow
the waiter to put her plate down in front of her. “He was a national
newscaster, a foreign correspondent. He…” she trailed off, comparing her career
to her father’s for the thousandth time.

“Didn’t ask people questions about sheep?”
Cason filled in with a grin.

“Not usually,” Val agreed. “His work took
him all over the world. You wouldn’t believe the stories that he covered! He
taught me everything I know about being in news today. I used to sit and watch
tapes of his stories until I could repeat them word for word.”

As she spoke enthusiastically about her
father, Cason couldn’t help but smile. She looked like a little girl talking
about her favorite superhero. He’d looked up to his dad like that too. Hell, he
still felt like the man could do anything, even from the nursing home. Suddenly
her face turned serious. She cleared her throat and pressed her napkin to her
lips, straightening her back. “Speaking of work…I feel like you should know
that my career is...well, it’s my top priority right now. I don’t really have a
lot of time for a serious relationship at this point and I don’t want you to
get your hopes up. I know that sounds really conceited.” She took a deep breath
and screwed up her courage once more. “But it’s true. We can date casually, if
that’s what you want, but I’m not looking for anything more serious than that.”