Her Summer Cowboy (10 page)

“How?” Emma asked. The breeze blew around him and he didn’t want to say this out loud.

“Just did. Momma always kept the peace but she got sick while I was on the road following rodeos from town-to-town,” he said. He couldn’t remember what town he’d been in when he’d gotten the call that she didn’t have long and he needed to come home. He did know it had been a long ways away because he’d driven through the night and made it to her hospital room just before dawn. She’d looked so small and pale, her eyes runny and body frail and fading. But she’d smiled when she’d seen him and drew him into a hug that was still as fierce and filled with love as it had ever been.

“I got to her room and Pops stood in the corner,” he said out loud. Hudson remembered the tears in the old man’s eyes and felt them burn the back of his own. “I gave Momma a kiss and hugged her.” She wanted to hear how he’d done at the rodeo. He showed her the buckle he’d won and as he talked she’d closed her eyes.

He cleared his throat and looked away from Emma. Hudson had thought she’d drifted off to sleep at first, but then her hand went slack and the heart monitor had gone to that one long tone. He’d stood there until his father brushed him aside and his brothers had all filed in to say goodbye.

In his heart he felt the pain of losing his momma and a little bit of guilt that he’d taken so long to get there. Pops caught up with him outside the hospital where he’d gone to clear his head and laid into him.

“Dad and I had a fight after she passed,” Hudson said out loud. He remembered Pops saying that Hudson had made his mom’s last days longer and more painful than they’d had to be. He remembered the conversation.

“You’re no son of mine,” Pops had said.

“You’re no father to me,” Hudson replied. He was aching and angry. Not at Pops but at the world. And for irrational reasons. Later on he’d realize he shouldn’t have spoken but he was hurting too. And Pops and he had never seen eye-to-eye. “Momma wanted me to go rodeoing because you couldn’t accept that I wasn’t going to be happy to live under your rule.”

“Well don’t worry about that anymore…just get gone.”

“Gladly.”

He’d moved into the old ranch foreman’s house that very night. It had been given to him by Momma’s parents when they’d retired to Arizona. And it had been drafty and cold but he hadn’t cared. He had a bottle of Jack that had kept him company. Three days later he’d gone to the funeral. Lane and Trey had tried to talk him into apologizing to the old man but he hadn’t been ready.

He’d left and never looked back.

He sat up. “Things were said that shouldn’t have been and I was too stubborn to admit the old man was right.”

“What?”

He reached for her hand and pulled her off balance until she fell over his chest. “I’ve been running around the country searching for something or someone to make a life with and now that I’ve found you…well I’ve said I’m staying here and your life is far away.”

She didn’t know what to say to that. A part of her felt like it was right. That the man she’d come to know was the man she wanted to spend more time with. And it took just a few moments to fall in love. She wasn’t saying this was love but to be honest it felt pretty darn close.

“Nothing is set in stone. We’ve both lost loved ones and tried to cope the best we could but the path in front of us is never easy.”

“I think it’d be a lot less lonely if I had you by my side,” he said.

Marietta, Montana

H
e pulled her
into his arms, kissing her on this hot summer day. She still hadn’t gotten to the heart of what was bothering him, and she suspected she never would. He played his cards close to his chest in life.

His hands swept up and down her back and she shifted a little to straddle him. At this moment with the Copper Mountain rising up behind him the field all around them, it felt like they were the only two people in the world.

“I wish you’d talk to me,” she said softly between kisses.

“I want you, Emma. Just the thought of getting you out of these clothes and naked beneath me is enough to make everything else disappear,” he said as he slowly pushed her clothes aside.

Her blood was humming as he slowly took off his shirt and boots. She smiled, remembering the last time he’d struggled to get them off, and then he pushed his jeans off and they were both naked.

The sun shone warmly through the trees and he lay down next to her on the blanket. He propped himself up on one elbow and smoothed his hand over her chest. He kept tracing the same pattern from her neck to her belly button and then back up to her breasts.

“You have such a pretty body, Emma. Every time I’m near you, all I can think about is getting you naked and then taking my time touching you,” he said. “Making sure that I know every inch of you.”

He was talking and telling her things she was glad to hear, but when she’d asked him to talk to her, she’d wanted to know the intimate inner thoughts and fears that had made him look so…solemn earlier.

Of course, that look was gone now, replaced by the fire of passion in his eyes. She’d take the passion. But just taking wasn’t truly her style. She put her hands on his shoulders, pushing him onto his back before she came over him. She straddled him.

He put his hands on her waist and shifted her around until the tip of his erection was at the entrance of her body. Slowly she sank down on him.

Their eyes met and the words she wanted from him suddenly didn’t seem all that important. Because she saw in his eyes all the need and desire she’d been hoping to hear in his voice.

She leaned forward, draped her body over his. Their exhalations mingled as their eyes met and she felt something change inside of her soul. He had helped her awaken over the course of the last few weeks. Had forced her just by being next to her to let her guard down.

She brought her mouth to his, rubbed her lips against his. He had the softest lips and every time his mouth touched hers, her entire body started to tingle.

He was buried inside of her, his hands on her hips urging her to move but she wanted to take this slowly. To make it last forever.

He sat up, keeping his arms wrapped around her. Deepening the kiss as she continued to ride him. Her hair felt silky around her shoulders and brushed over his. He wrapped her in his big arms and hugged her close.

He whispered dark words of sexual need and longing, which inflamed her and made her start to ride him harder. She pulled her mouth from his as they both moved faster and faster, driving toward the pinnacle and then it washed over her and she kept moving on him but she couldn’t keep the pace he needed.

He held her hips to his and thrust up and into her rapidly until she felt him stiffen and then the warmth of his completion filling her. She collapsed against his chest and he held her close. The warm summer breeze stirred around them and she kept her eyes closed.

She breathed in the scent of sex, wild flowers and Hudson. She knew she’d never forget this moment. Felt the song that had been playing in her mind slip through her soul and enter her heart. It was embedded there, and she realized she figured out the rhythm of the song.

It had eluded her for a while but as she held onto Hudson she saw the song spinning in her mind. That it wasn’t about an old cowboy at his last rodeo. It was about a guy who’d been searching and finally found his home.

But a part of her—a big part—knew that the story she was writing for her song had nothing to do with real life.

Hudson fell back against the blanket and kept her pillowed on top of him. She put her hands under her chin and stared down at him. He had a small scar under his chin that she’d never noticed before.

She rubbed her finger over it and looked up into his eyes.

“How’d you get this?”

“By jumping into the lake from a tree swing. I caught a branch as I swung out,” he said.

“Have you ever not been a troublemaker?” she asked, but she realized hearing about his daring made sense. He grabbed life by both hands. She wanted—no needed to be more like him. To let this inspire her to become more daring.

She started laughing.

“What?”

“I can’t believe I’m naked in a field with a big sexy guy,” she said. “This is so not my normal life.”

“Is that a bad thing?” he asked, solemn again.

Still waters ran deep with Hudson. There was so much more to him than met the eye.

“Not at all. I think I was stagnating in my old life. Letting my fears choke me without even realizing it,” she said.

She framed his face with her hands and dropped a bunch of kisses all over it. “I guess I’m lucky you like trouble.”

“I guess you are,” he said.

They made love again and then got dressed. He took her for a short walk to see the tree near the creek where generations of Scotts had carved their names into the trunk. She traced her fingers over Hudson’s name and as they rode back to his home she wondered why he was always moving on. And if he really ever could stay in one place.

*

Emma wouldn’t let
him go back to visit his dad on his own. She said she’d stay in the truck but when they got there he knew he wanted her by his side. He was looking now at the big ranch house where he’d grown up. The big house he’d avoided setting foot in for more than ten years. And he felt eighteen again.

He felt a small hand slip into his.

“What are you thinking?” she asked.

Emma.

Emma Jean.

His sweet little country girl who made him see the future instead of a past that he kept running from.

“That I wish I’d never been eighteen,” he admitted. “I was stupid.”

“Hey, we all are stupid at eighteen,” she said.

“Even you?”

“Especially me,” she said, slipping her arm around his waist and hugging him.

“Lane said he wants to see you. You’re invited,” she said. “We both are. I’m going to knock on the door.”

She took his hand, leading him up the front porch to the big oak and glass door. “Ready?”

“As ever,” he said.

But his heart was beating so loudly it felt like a herd of cattle on stampede in his chest. He saw Emma knock on the door almost from a distance and then it opened inward.

The scent of home surrounded him. The smell of cinnamon, dad’s cigars and lavender. How had that not changed in all these years?”

Pops looked older and smaller than he’d always been in Hudson’s memory.

“Son,” Pops said. “Bout time you came home.”

“I didn’t think I was welcome, Pops,” Hudson said. He’d never been one to back down.

“You were,” Pops said stepping past Emma to give him a big hug. “But your momma wasn’t here to tell me to stop being an ass.”

Hudson hugged his father back and felt tears burning in his eyes. A man didn’t cry. He’d always believed that but today as he heard his dad’s uneven breathing, he knew they did.

“I’m sorry, Pops.”

“Me too, Hudson. I’ve missed you, kid.”

His dad let go and turned away to wipe his eyes. “Who’s this little thing?”

“Emma,” she said, holding out her hand.

Hudson swiped his thumbs over his own eyes and then put his arm around Emma. “She’s Alan Jennings’ granddaughter. I’ve been working as a bodyguard on his summer farewell tour.”

“Come in and tell me all about it,” Pops said.

They followed him inside and Hudson felt something shift and settle inside of him. He still wasn’t sure about Emma or what would happen next but he knew he’d found his way home and that was all thanks to this woman.

*

Wednesday night dinner
at the Main Street Diner was a tradition with the Scott boys since Carson’s wife had died and he’d had a baby son to take care of. It had been their way of rallying around Carson and making sure he knew they had his back. Hudson stood outside the diner with Emma and wondered why he’d never wanted his brothers to see him weak.

He’d seen Lane in a hospital bed and broken, sweating and unsure and Hudson had just felt love for his brother. Relief that he was alive and then a determination to do whatever he could to help Lane recover. He could do that for Carson and Lane but he didn’t want to be the one who appeared to need the help. In the reflection of the glass he saw himself. He was taller than his brothers, bigger and bulkier. He always had been.