A Cowboy For Christmas (17 page)

“
Come here.” He grabbed her
by the arms as he spoke and pulled her against him. They embraced
with her chin tucked into his neck. “I don’t care what you do
anymore, but you better not ever run away from me
again.”

“
What if I hurt you,
Brent?” She liked how he felt against her and how his arms held her
close.

“
You didn’t drag me into
this.”

“
But what if I’m using you
so I won’t be alone for the holidays?” In truth, that had been one
small consideration. But she couldn’t tell him the rest.

“
Is that so bad?” He ran
his hand down her hair and rested it against her cheek. She
wondered if he was letting her off the hook about telling him the
truth. He added, “Sounds like you don’t want to hurt
me.”

“
I’m scared I will. And
that you’ll want more than I have to give you.”

“
Right now, it’s more than
enough just to hold you.” He pulled her closer so that she could
feel his warmth through their layers of clothing. “I can go slow,
follow your lead.”

“
You make it sound easy,”
she mumbled, closing her eyes.

“
I’m trying, I don’t want
to make your life harder than it is.”

“
I’m the one doing that. My
life’s about as simple as you can get. I make my own hours, run
things the way I want to. It’s the stuff inside me that’s messing
up everything.”

“
I don’t think it is.” He
pulled her head back to look into her eyes. “The only suggestion I
can offer is to share your burden. When you’re ready, I want to
help you.”

His expression sent shivers
through her. He touched his forehead to hers with his eyes closed.
His lips touched hers, moved, and took on an urgency until she
couldn’t resist.

She answered him and
wrapped her arms around him, pulled him as close as possible, and
didn’t fight the feelings stirring up inside.

“
I love you, Missy, and I
can’t fight it.” Speaking against her cheek, he shut the door
behind her and looked into her eyes. Love? That couldn’t be what
she was feeling. What about trust?

Her heart pumped with a
painful velocity, and she knew if she didn’t share, it’d end up
hurting her. “It’s about time I told you a few things.” She took
his hand. “About me.”

* * * *

Brent knew he couldn’t walk
away from her, no matter how big this turned out to be. He pulled
her into the living room and onto the couch with him. “Whatever you
want to tell me, I’ll still love you.”

“
I don’t doubt that.” She
sighed. “I don’t feel good about myself while holding this back.”
Tears flooded her eyes. “This is about the job I left
behind.”

Things clicked together in
his head, and he couldn’t believe he hadn’t seen it before. “This
is about the man you dated there.”

“
Russ, my boss.” She met
his gaze. “He flirted with me from the day I started working for
the firm. But I didn’t want to date someone from the office.” Her
voice shook so she paused. “He was persistent.”

He nudged the tears off her
cheeks with his knuckles. “So you never dated?”

A stalker? Harassment in
the office? No matter how the jerk scared her, he’d have to
pay.

“
Yes, we did. I’ve been
ashamed of it ever since.” She stared straight down at the floor,
but looked up when he touched her. “I finally went out with him
just because he’d been asking for so long. He seemed to care about
me, and I hoped I might feel something for him if we went on a
date.” She stopped, looking down again, and he noticed she was
barely breathing.

“
Missy?” He scooted closer,
wrapping his arms around her. “What happened? I remember you said
he fired you.”

“
My feelings didn’t change,
and he grew more and more pushy. Then, one night when we were alone
at the office, I told him I didn’t feel anything for him, that I
couldn’t sleep with him, and that I couldn’t date him
anymore.”

And he sent her packing.
Brent tried to imagine how that made her feel, and could understand
why she’d been so reserved when she came to the ranch.

“
He wouldn’t accept that.”
She spoke so quietly that he almost missed what she
wasn’t
saying. Gently, he
touched her chin and nudged her face his way again. She turned her
head but didn’t look at him.

“
There’s more, isn’t
there?”

“
He thought the security
guard was done with his rounds, but the guard was running late. If
he hadn’t been on the floor, and heard my yells, Russ would have
raped me.”

Pulling her close to him,
he saw their time together in retrospect. Certain things, strange
before, now made sense. After pulling in a deep breath to calm his
rage, he asked, “Did you report him?”

“
I ran. I went home and
tried to figure out what to do, but I couldn’t think. By the time I
called the police two hours later, they already had a report.
Against me.”

“
You?” He
stiffened.

“
For stalking Russ. They
told me I was lucky they didn’t have enough to press charges, but
they were going to watch me. By morning, the entire office had
heard that I offered him sex when he fired me.”

“
The bastard. He’s enjoying
his high paying job, and you left town.”

“
No one’s going to hire me
now.”

He felt her tears through
his shirt and pulled her even closer. “We’ll make it right,
Missy.”

Instead of answering, she
rubbed her face into him, still crying. He didn’t know what he’d do
to the man who tried to hurt her, but he sure as hell wasn’t going
to let him get away with it.

“
So that’s what this was
about. You had good reason not to trust me, or any man.” He rubbed
her back, wanting her to release the tears and held-back emotions.
“I’d sell this ranch before I hurt you. I’d give away the horses,
move into a city.”

That’d be hell for him, but
still not as bad as losing her. When her breathing sounded normal,
he kissed her temple.

His lips trailed down to
her neck, making her fingers dig into him. She couldn’t hold still.
“It’s been so long.” She almost cried the words.

“
Too long,” he agreed and
felt her body tremble, come alive. She reached out to him and he
knew that by sharing, she’d freed herself of the guilt that held
her back before.

“
Don’t torture me.” She
pulled him back to her mouth roughly. His hands, resting on her
shoulders, pushed her jacket off and slid down her side to rest on
her hips. All of her, he had to touch all of her. He lost his
breath when her hands slid under his worn T-shirt. Her touch did
things to him; things he hadn’t known were possible. “Missy,” he
murmured into her hair.

* * * *

Later, when his breathing
slowed, he rolled onto his side, taking her with him, so they lay
facing each other. After soothing her hair away from her face, he
kissed her once more.

“
You’re smiling,” he
whispered.

“
So are you.”

“
Guess we’re both happy.
That’s a good thing.”

A good thing. She shivered
as her body cooled. Brent pulled the covers over them and drew her
near.

He pulled her close and
held her. They didn’t speak. What they’d shared could mean so many
things, or nothing.

“
Have you noticed we
resolve arguments with sex?” she asked.

“
Not sex. We make love.” He
pulled her chin up and looked into her eyes. “In case you haven’t
gotten it yet, I love you.”

“
I know.” Her eyes were
warm with love, but he wasn’t sure she’d tell him any time soon.
Then she surprised him. “I’m not sure why it’s been hard for me to
say that. I heard you the first time, you know. I love you. I have
for a while.”

“
Stay with me
tonight.”

In response, she moved
closer.

Chapter Eleven

“
Thanks, Nick.” Brent hung
up the phone. Standing by the kitchen window, he looked out at the
horses in the pasture, but his mind was on everything Missy had
told him. Nick Hatcher thought they could do something legally
about it, and agreed with Brent that men like Russ were repeat
offenders.

And now he would have
someone checking up on him. If Russ had tried to hurt anyone else,
Nick Hatcher would find out about it.

The clouds parted outside
and bright sunshine shone in through the large windows. He spotted
Missy walking up the pasture, in her red jacket and scarf, her hair
whipping in the wind. The temperature had taken a nosedive, but
that wouldn’t keep them inside.

After yanking on his own
coat, he met her at the bottom of the steps. She smiled and took
the arm he offered. He spun her around and planted his mouth on
hers. When he finished he lifted his face.

She smiled. “Mmm . . . what
was that for?”

“
Your lips needed warming
up.” He grinned at her. When they had decided to go out today, she
had asked him for things to be normal. He decided not to tell her
about calling Nick just yet. That way she could enjoy
today.

“
Race you!”

He hadn’t expected that.
She was halfway to the stables already, and he couldn’t move as he
watched that little bottom of hers.

She turned at the stable
entrance and held her hands out in a question.

“
Why run when I can watch
you?”

“
Like my legs, huh?” she
asked, trying not to smile.

“
And everything else.” He
caught up to her and they went back to the tack room together. Once
their horses were ready, they rode out into the forest.

“
Are you looking forward to
Christmas?” Brent asked. He remembered how little excitement she’d
shown about Thanksgiving . . . until the actual day. Now out in the
forest, they dismounted and walked slowly. She ducked under a wet
Douglass fir branch, eyes scanning the smaller trees growing at the
edge of the clearing they stepped into.

“
I am, I think.” Side by
side now, they looked through the trees around them. “I haven’t
done much for the holidays in years . . . How about that one over
there?”

He ignored her first
comment, since she seemed to want to skip over it, and stuck to
business -- the business of picking out a tree. He sized up the
six-foot tree, imagining how he’d trim it into the perfect shape.
Thinking of the holidays made him think about family, think about
him and Missy that way.

“
Brent?”

Oh, no, he’d let his face
get too serious. But he had to ask, “You sure you don’t want a tree
for your house?”

“
I still think of it as
Ben’s house.”

He paused because she did,
too. “Ever consider staying with me?”

“
You? Aren’t you too old
for a sleepover?” She giggled with her face turned the other way,
cluing him in. She had understood what he meant, but he let that go
as well.

With her gloved hand up in
a branch, she paused and studied him. “I like this tree, Brent, and
I want it in your living room.”

Shaking his head and
smiling at the same time, he pulled the saw from behind his saddle.
She walked his way again and watched him work.

Feeling her behind him, he
asked, “Enjoying the show?”

“
Yes, very much, thank
you.”

The tree tilted to one side
as he sawed through it. “Timber!” Water drops sprang out of the
tree as he shook it and threw it into the long wagon they’d towed
behind his horse.

“
I love that chilly tree
smell,” she said, then took a deep breath of it before she smiled
at him. Their gazes were on each other as tiny snowflakes fluttered
between them.

When she tilted her face up
and let the flakes flutter down on her, he couldn’t breathe. He
stepped in and wrapped his arms around her. A million sensations
exploded inside him, especially when he heard her gleeful
moan.

* * * *

Stepping into Missy’s
place, Brent still didn’t know how he’d tell her what he’d done. Or
that Nick had called him back with news. Too bad he couldn’t put
this off. He wanted to spend the holiday with her without this
monster on their backs.

“
Smells like heaven in
here,” he greeted, trying to keep a light tone.

“
Heaven smells like
chocolate chip cookies?” She turned to see him staring at the
cooling batch of homemade treats. “Some are plain old chocolate . .
. And some are white chocolate with macadamia nuts.”

“
Winter Wonderland” played
from her CD player to set the Christmas mood. A happy scene and he
might have to ruin it. Might have to? There wasn’t any way around
this.

She slid a glass of milk in
front of Brent. “Remember the first day I met you?”

He nodded, thinking of the
slick woman who’d shown up in his drive. Smooth on the outside,
anyway, but her eyes had given her away. Deep brown and mournful,
like a lost puppy.