Page 8 of Owned By The Cowboy

He talked to Mama about us? The thought makes my stomach fill with butterflies, but more than that, watching him with Annalise does something dangerous to my chest. This massive, intimidating man, who looks like he could bench press a truck, is being so sweet to my baby. The contrast is heartbreakingly beautiful: his big, calloused hands staying perfectly still while she bounces around with her armload of cereal boxes, his deep voice all quiet and gentle.

“Mama, can we get ice cream too?” Annalise asks.

“We’ll see.”

“That means yes,” she tells Blayne with a conspiratorial whisper, and we all laugh.

When he stands back up to his full height, I have to tilt my head back to meet his eyes. The corners of his mouth, still twitching.

“I figured.”

And there it is, the briefest glimpse of something warm in his eyes as he looks at my girl. My six-year-old princess has managed to crack the armor of this giant, gruff man in about thirty seconds.

My heart can’t take much more. I have to resist the urge to fan myself with my shopping list.

“We should really get going,” I say before I do something stupid like invite him for dinner or ask him to flex so I can see if his biceps are really as impressive as they look under his shirt. Or just climb him like a tree…

“Yeah. See you around, ladies.”

“See you around, Blayne.”

I watch him walk away. All broad shoulders and confident stride, his jeans fitting him in a way that should be illegal, and try to ignore how my eyes want to linger on his ass.

Then I realize Annalise is staring at me with a knowing look that’s way too mature for a six-year-old.

“What?”

“Nothing,” she says, but she’s grinning.

Great. Now, my six-year-old is reading me like an open book.

I gather up my kids and finish our shopping, but I can’t stop thinking about the way Blayne looked at me, like he was seeing something he liked. Like maybe, just maybe, years of distance is about to become something else entirely.

And that thought scares me almost as much as it excites me.

Four

Blayne

On Sunday afternoon, my house sounds like a damn zoo. Tommy’s yelling at the TV like the quarterback can actually hear him, Martinez is arguing with Carlos about whether that last play was a fumble or not, and Jake’s already on his third pizza even though the game just started.

This is exactly what I needed. Something loud, normal and completely unrelated to Reggie Mason.

“Boss, you got any more of those jalapeño poppers?” Tommy yells from the living room.

“In the oven,” I call back, flipping burgers on the grill out on the deck. “And don’t eat them all, you pig.”

“No promises!”

I’ve been hosting these Sunday games for years now, ever since I moved into this house. Started with just Tommy and Martinez, but word got around and now half my crew shows up. They’re good guys. The kind of men who have my back no matter what.

“Blayne!” Carlos appears next to me, holding an empty bottle. “You got any more of those fancy drinks? The ones with the weird name?”

“Yeah, there’s more in the garage fridge.”

“Thanks, man. Hey, you okay? You seem off today.”

Shit. If Carlos noticed, I’m not hiding it as well as I thought.