The Cowboy Takes a Bride Page 11

  “The tournament’s starting. Who all’s up for a game of pool?” Cordy asked, rubbing his palms as he came over to stand between Ila and Joe. He had to reach up in order to lay a hand on Ila’s shoulders.

  Ila shrugged off Cordy’s hand, downed half the beer Clover set in front of her in one long chug. “Me and Joe against you and Mariah.”

  “Who?” Cordy asked, his gaze fixed on Ila.

  “Dutch’s daughter.” Ila waved in Mariah’s direction.

  “You’re Dutch’s daughter?” Cordy stopped drooling over Ila long enough to pump Mariah’s hand like a water tap. “Welcome to Jubilee.”

  “Thank you.” Mariah smiled at him.

  Joe felt a draft of jealousy pass through him. Nah, it wasn’t jealousy. He had nothing to feel jealous about. He had no relationship with her. More importantly, he didn’t want one. He knew what was bothering him. Not jealousy for sure, just that one minute Cordy was drooling over Ila and the next he was spreading his grin over Mariah. He was trying to hog all the pretty women.

  “Can you shoot pool?” Cordy asked Mariah.

  “I’ve played a time or two.”

  “Don’t worry,” Cordy said. “I’m ace enough for the both of us.”

  “No way,” Joe said, not knowing why he was letting himself get sucked into this. “Ila and I are beating the pants off you.”

  “Ha!” Cordy said, leading the way to the back room.

  Mariah got off the bar stool to follow Cordy, and as she passed by Joe, he could have sworn he heard her murmur, “What the heck is it with you and the lack of pants?”

  That made him grin.

  On the jukebox, John Denver was singing “Rocky Mountain High,” and Joe was trying hard not to stare at Mariah’s cute little butt. But she was bent over the pool table. What was he supposed to stare at? There it was, looking all perfect and nicely rounded cupped in the sling of her blue jeans.

  It didn’t look like Becca’s butt. Becca’s butt had been sort of flat. But not in a bad way. He’d loved Becca’s butt. It’s just that Mariah’s butt . . . well, there was nothing flat about it.

  He hitched in a lungful of air and tried to force himself to glance away. But nothing doing, her butt was a magnet and his eyes were steel. She sank her shot, straightened, and grinned at the room, her blond hair floating around her face.

  Little Bit of dynamite, he thought. Comes in small packages. Simple but deadly.

  “Uh-oh, someone’s been sandbagging,” Ila said.

  “I think we’ve been scammed,” Joe agreed.

  “Who me?” Mariah said innocently, and lined up to take her shot. She sank two balls on that one.

  “Will you look at that?” Cordy beamed.

  Joe looked. Mariah’s butt was over the pool table again as she reached for a difficult shot. His libido cleaved a cleft of longing straight through the middle of him. No one had turned him on like this since Becca. His sex drive had come roaring back to life, and in a major way.

  While he was happy to be feeling something below the belt again, he was very disturbed to discover Mariah was the one doing the arousing. Why couldn’t it have been Julianne Fletcher? Hell, why couldn’t it have been just about anyone else? He did not want this.

  “Your turn.” Cordy nudged Joe with his elbow.

  “Huh? What? Oh yeah.” He hadn’t realized Mariah had missed her shot. He took his time chalking his cue.

  When he looked up and found her smiling at him, a wild sensation beat through his chest. He was a grizzly bear staggering from a dark cave after a long hibernation—fuzzy-headed, a little confused, and a lot ravenous.

  No. Just no. This was not a good thing.

  Joe moved down the table, looking for the best shot, and ended up near where Mariah stood with her back against the paneled wall, pool cue gripped in her hand. A narrow wooden pole the only thing between them besides air.

  “Let’s take this up a notch,” Ila said. “Joe, show Ms. Callahan how it’s done.”

  “My pleasure.” Joe sank three balls and then scratched.

  Cordy took his turn. Then Ila was up. For the most part, they were all evenly matched.

  Or so it appeared.

  Joe was enjoying himself. He’d played pool since grade school. Mostly with Ila on the billiards table in her family’s rec room. He’d won more tournaments than he lost. As a teen, he’d been good enough at the game to hustle horse money from other cowboys. He had a mathematical mind. Angles and pattern of trajectory easily popped into his head. He could see the shots sinking before he ever put hand to cue. He was patient. He was controlled. He was good at taking advantage of other people’s weaknesses. The same qualities he brought to cutting horses, he brought to pool. It made him difficult to beat.

  Mariah was even harder to best.

  When he finally figured out that she was better at the game than he, Joe ached ruefully . . . shamefacedly. It was like finding out she was a better cutter. Indignation welled up in him, painful as a stubbed toe, and he struggled to tamp it down. He’d underestimated her, and she used it to trounce his pride.

  Cordy stood to one side grinning his fool head off, while Mariah sank another shot and then another and another with cool, deliberate movements. Each time a ball went in, Ila snorted, until soon she sounded like a pawing bull rushing a matador.

  Mariah was controlling them all.

  You better watch this one, Daniels, or you’re going to lose everything to her.

  The other tables in the back room filled up as other tournament players drifted it. The games weren’t anything official. Just cutters who wandered into the bar after a hard day’s work for camaraderie, a meal, a game, and a beer or two. Although the grand prize was two hundred dollars. Definitely worth playing for.

  Clover came over. “You all want a pitcher?”

  They ordered a pitcher of beer and kept playing. Cordy and Mariah won the first game.

  “Rematch?” Ila asked eagerly.

  “Yes,” Joe said.

  “How about you?” Ila nodded at Mariah.

  Mariah glanced at her watch, “Actually there was something I wanted to talk to Clover about.”

  “She’s here until closing time,” Ila said. “It’s not even late yet.”

  Mariah shrugged. “Okay, but just one more round.”

  “I say we switch partners,” Cordy said, eyeing Ila like she was a big slab of filet mignon.

  “Okay,” Ila said. “Guys against girls. We’ll stomp you.”

  “I was thinking more like you and me take Joe and Mariah.” Cordy looked hopeful.

  “They’ll stomp us!” Ila exclaimed.

  Mariah reached for her wineglass resting on the small table next to the pool table, unwittingly exposing her cleavage.

  Joe wasn’t paying much attention to Cordy and Ila. His gaze was fixed on Mariah’s chest.

  She set her glass down, turned back, and caught him staring. Frowning, she straightened, pulled her shoulders back.

  He grinned. It felt good, having his sexual desire back. Not that good, considering who’s causing it. “Mariah and me against you and Cordy,” he said to Ila. “Or I’m out.”

  “Fine,” Ila said, but she sounded testy. “Have it your way.”

  Ila broke, smacking the balls hard and sending them scattering. They played for a while. Then Ila said, “So Mariah, how long you planning on staying in Jubilee?”

  “Until Christmas, after Joe wins the futurity and can afford to buy Dutch’s place from me.”

  “Good thing,” Ila said. “I don’t see you as a cutter.”

  “You don’t think I can be a cutter?” Mariah sounded annoyed.

  “Hell no. It’s either in your blood or it’s not.”

  “I’ve got Dutch’s blood running through my veins.”

  “Wouldn’t know it by looking at you.” Ila leveled her an unfriendly stare.

  Mariah’s chin hardened. “I just might fool you.”

  “Being a good cutter takes patience,” Il
a said.

  “I’m patient,” Cordy said.

  “You have to know when to make a move and when to hold back.” Ila smacked the ball so hard it bounced off the table, but Cordy caught it in his palm. Ila looked over at Joe.

  “I know how to do that.” Cordy sidled close to her.

  “We know, Cordy,” Ila said. “You’re a born cutter. It’s Mariah that’s in question.”

  “Why does everyone in your universe have to be a cutter?”

  “Have you ever been on the back of a cutting horse?” Ila asked.

  “Not that I know of, but seeing how Dutch was my father, I’m sure he put me on the back of one at some point in my childhood.”

  “But you don’t remember it?”

  “No.”

  “Then you haven’t been on the back of a cutting horse. Not when it counts.”

  “So it’s that memorable?”

  Ila leaned in close, lowered her voice, slid Joe a look. “Like the best sex you’ve ever had.”

  “That’s a big promise.” Mariah wasn’t letting Ila intimidate her even though she was almost a foot taller. That impressed Joe. Ila intimidated ninety percent of the people who met her.

  “You try it, you’ll find out why everyone around here is hung up on cutting horses.”

  “Now you’ve got me wanting to give it a shot.”

  Ila leveled a glance at Joe. “Why don’t you put her on Miracle?”

  “She doesn’t even know how to ride, Ila.”

  “I know how to ride,” Mariah disputed.

  Joe studied her. “Do a lot of riding in Chicago, did you?”

  “Just because I haven’t ridden in a long time doesn’t mean I don’t know how.”

  “Sounds like a dare to me,” Ila said. “Let’s put her on a cutting horse.”

  “What do we do with her if the bug bites?” Joe asked.

  “Then she’ll be like the rest of us. Out of balance, out of whack, out of our heads over cutting horses.”

  “You make it sound so righteously unpleasant,” Mariah commented.

  “Isn’t that the way of things that are beautifully difficult?” Ila asked.

  “You want to ride Miracle?” Joe set down his pool cue and assessed Mariah.

  “I’d give it a try.”

  “Miracle’s not just any horse.”

  “I know, he’s the second coming of horsedom.”

  “He is.” Cordy breathed. “In a manner of speaking. If Miracle was a quarterback, he’d be Roger Staubach.”

  “If he was a president, he’d be JFK,” Ila threw in.

  “If he was a lover, he’d be Casanova,” Clover said, wandering over to see if they wanted another pitcher.

  “You people are besotted over a horse.” Mariah shook her head.

  “We are,” Ila, Clover, and Cordy chorused.

  But Joe suddenly found himself seeing the Silver Horseshoe through Mariah’s eyes. Men dressed in Wranglers, cowboy shirts, hats and boots, shooting pool, watching the basketball game, and talking about horses. Single women sitting at tables with their girlfriends, giggling and watching the cowboys and talking about cutting horses. Couples and families in the dining area of the Silver Horseshoe, eating the blue-plate special, talking Little Britches rodeo and cutting horses.

  He supposed that to Mariah it was an alien culture, even though her early beginnings were steeped in it. Having been abandoned by her father, she spurned this life as Dutch had spurned her, and Joe couldn’t blame her. It was enlightening, seeing his home turf through her eyes, and it softened him toward her. A little.

  Besides, she was trying. She deserved some credit for that.

  Yes, yes, give her credit, but do not let down your guard. She’s not the right one for you. She’ll hurt you. Dammit all. He didn’t want to be here feeling the things he was feeling.

  “Where’d you learn to play pool?” Joe asked.

  “When the rich people are away, the hired help will play,” she said.

  He arched an eyebrow. “Meaning?”

  “Meaning the people my mother worked for had a billiards room and they were always jetting around to someplace or the other. As long as we cleaned up afterward, my mother would let me bring a friend or two over.”

  “You grew up as the hired help in rich folks’ homes?” Cordy asked.

  Mariah nodded.

  “Explains a lot.” Ila sank another ball.

  “Ooh, who’s that?” Mariah asked, and nudged Joe in the side with her elbow.

  He followed her gaze. The people near the entrance parted and a man strolled in, cock of the walk, wearing a rodeo belt buckle the size of a hubcap. Trust Mariah to hone in on the biggest tool in Jubilee. Joe’s ribs tingled where her elbow had grazed him, and he caught a whiff of her hair. She smelled like chocolate chip cookies.

  “That’s Lee Turpin. His daddy is the richest man in Jubilee,” Ila said.

  “He used to ride bulls in the PRCA during the same time as Joe,” Cordy supplied. “Turpin always came up second place. He also dated Becca in high school before she started going out with Joe.”

  “Turpin and his horse Dancer are up against Joe and Miracle in the Fort Worth Futurity,” Ila said, and sank another ball. “They’re his stiffest competition.”

  Mariah shot Joe a look. “I take that to mean he’s not a fan of yours?”

  “And vice versa.” Joe glowered at Turpin. The scuzzball.

  “Turpin was really pissed at Dutch because he wouldn’t sell Miracle to him,” Cordy told Mariah. “There’s some bad blood over that too.”

  “I have a feeling I’m sitting in the middle of a turf war,” Mariah said.

  “Uh-oh,” Ila said, setting down her pool cue. “Turpin looks drunk.”

  “Ignore him,” Cordy said. “It’s your shot, Joe.”

  Joe turned his back on Turpin, picked up his cue. “The guy’s a show-off, blowhard.”

  “Sounds like a lot of cowboys I’ve known,” Mariah said.

  “He’s not a real cowboy,” Joe said. “He lives in a condo, for hell’s sake, and drives a Corvette.”

  “But he’s a cutter, right?” Mariah asked, angling her head at Turpin.

  He wished she would quit looking at the guy. Why did he care who she looked at? “After a fashion.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “He doesn’t know how to treat horses. Which is one reason Dutch would never sell a horse to him. He’s rough, runs ’em hard. I can’t stand a man who mistreats animals.” Joe heard the hatred in his voice, saw the startled expression on Mariah’s face.

  Back off. You’re coming on too strong.

  His mother used to tell him his strong passions would get him into trouble one day. He’d never been the kind of guy to sit on the sidelines. He threw himself into whatever venture he undertook. Rodeoing, cutting horses, grieving, making love.

  Lazily, he flicked a gaze over Mariah’s body. The woman could surely fill out a pair of jeans. His pulse jumped. Not good. Not good at all.

  But the thing of it was, whenever he was around Mariah he felt alive again. For two years, he’d had a passion for only two things—cutting horses and nursing his grief like sustenance. He wasn’t inclined to let either one of them go.

  He turned away from her, felt the heat of her gaze on him as he smacked the ball with his cue, scratched, and then put his stick aside.

  “You’re losing your edge, cowboy,” Ila crowed.

  “Well, hello there, beautiful, where have you been all my life?” The sound of Lee Turpin’s voice cut through Joe like a saw blade.

  A tingle ran up the back of his hands and he curled his fingers into his palms. Tension fisted his shoulder muscles. Slowly, Joe pivoted.

  Turpin loomed over Mariah, his stance wide. He stuck his hand out to her, cast Joe a sly glance from the corner of his eye. “Lee Turpin, sweet thing, and you are . . . ?”

  “Mariah Callahan.” She took his hand.

  Joe gritted his teeth.

  “
Dutch’s daughter. I am so very sorry for your loss.” Aggressively, Turpin hauled her to her feet, pulled her to his chest on the pretext of giving her a sympathetic hug.

  Mariah’s eyes rounded.

  In disbelief? Surprise? Or was it delight? Some women liked pushy guys.

  “You know, darlin’,” Turpin drawled. “Just let me know when you’re ready to sell your daddy’s land. I’ve got two hundred grand sitting in the bank earmarked for that property.”

  Over the top of Mariah’s head, Turpin’s gaze smashed into Joe’s, smacking him like a physical blow.

  Once upon a time, when Joe and Becca were first dating, not long after she’d broken up with Turpin, Joe had caught them together in a pasture at a rodeo, standing between two horse trailers in an identical embrace. Except Becca’s arms had been around Turpin’s neck and Turpin’s hand had been on Becca’s ass. That memory was a shard of glass in his heart. Even though, as he stood there in the shadows, and he heard Becca tell Turpin it was over for good, that she was with Joe now, he couldn’t erase the image from his mind of the woman he loved cradled in the arms of his nemesis.

  Turpin stared at Joe over a river of bitterness, rivalry, and distrust, and then he reached out and planted a meaty palm over Mariah’s shapely rump.

  She gasped, grabbed for Turpin’s hand.

  Turpin hung on, his eyes stabbing Joe’s, a dangerous smirk on his face.

  “Let go of me!” Mariah demanded.

  Turpin yanked her closer, just daring Joe to make something out of it. Instigating a brawl.

  Joe had had enough. If Turpin wanted a fight, he’d give it to him. In an instant, he was climbing over the pool table, his anger scaling up to spill from dizzying heights. He body-slammed Turpin.

  Everything happened at once.

  Spectators surrounded their corner of the room, the air filled with commentary, egging on the fight.

  Cordy grabbed for the back of Joe’s shirt, attempting to restrain him. Joe barely heard it rip, hardly felt the rush of air against his skin.

  “Stop it,” Ila hollered, and he didn’t know if she was talking to him or Turpin or both of them. All he knew was that if he had to, he’d dismantle Turpin’s arm from its socket to get it off Mariah’s behind.

  Mariah shoved at Turpin’s chest, just as Turpin thrust her aside. She went flying into the wall. The air left her lungs with an audible oomph and she landed on her butt on the floor.