Page 19 of Unforgettable Cowboy (Montana’s Rodeo Cowboys #1)

“S he can’t sleep out there.” Wade pointed in the general direction of the barn, where they’d parked Bailey’s trailer so that she could plug in to electricity. “Tell her to come in. The spare bedrooms are empty.”

“I think she’s going to stay where she is,” Hayes said.

She was jumpy, as one would be after an encounter like she’d had, but she’d also been determined to maintain her independence in an I-won’t-let-the-bastard-win kind of way.

It was costing her, and it was costing him, but he hadn’t fought her.

For one thing, Chance Meyers had no reason to suspect that Bailey was on the Tree Fork Ranch, and for another, his ego was huge, but even he had to recognize that a confrontation on the Matthews family ranch might not end in his favor.

Chance was ballsy, but Hayes didn’t think he was that ballsy.

“Ask her.”

Instead of telling Wade—yet again—that he’d already done so, Hayes simply said, “Will do.” He wanted to check in anyway.

Wade settled back in his chair as Hayes left the room, but he felt his uncle’s gaze drilling a hole in his back.

“After I talk to Bailey, you need to accept that no means no,” he called before disappearing out the kitchen door.

The door to the trailer was open when Hayes approached, and he was glad of that because it meant less of a chance of startling Bailey.

She painted herself as tough as hell, but she’d been assaulted and had her livelihood stolen.

He heard her speaking to someone and stopped a few feet from the trailer door, clearly hearing Bailey say, “He was threatening, Jenn.”

She looked up when Hayes’s shadow filled the doorway and her expression blanked out and her voice took on a brisker tone as she said, “I’ve got to go, but call me.

We need to talk.” She lowered the phone, and he could see that she was fighting to keep her business-as-usual attitude in place.

The woman had just been assaulted for Pete’s sake. Couldn’t she give herself a break?

“Wade has invited you inside.”

“I’d rather stay here.”

“I told him.” He leaned his shoulder against the trailer as she came down the step.

Hayes said nothing, nor did Bailey. Instead, she let out a breath that made her shoulders drop a good inch.

“I can’t believe this played out this way.

Never in a million years did I think that Chance would do something like this. And now you’re involved.”

“Bailey,” he said matter-of-factly, “how does he know that we’re involved?” After all, she’d gone to great lengths at Big Z’s to make it appear as if they’d just bumped into one another, and Hayes thought it had played well.

“He’s no fool,” Bailey muttered. “If he doesn’t know that I worked here all summer, he’ll find out.”

“So, we play this out.”

Bailey glanced down at the ground, toeing the gravel before she looked up. “I wish this wasn’t a ‘we’ situation. I hate dragging you guys into this.”

Which, as far as Hayes could tell, was how she lived her life. Taking care of herself, and her friends, but not letting anyone take care of her.

“Tough. We’re in it.”

She blinked at him. “I don’t need a hero, Hayes.”

“Never signed up for that.” He took a step closer, then stilled as he caught a movement near the windmill, a hundred yards away. A large shadow cruised smoothly along, followed by another and then another. He cursed under his breath.

“What?”

“Cows are out.”

“Shit.” Bailey instantly took off, running to turn the herd, while Hayes ran the opposite direction toward the corrals.

“Ready,” he called from where he’d opened a gate.

“Got it!” Bailey waved the broom she’d picked up on her way past the barn and whistled, attempting to turn the lead cow, who lowered her head and shook it.

Bailey lunged at her, waving the broom and making the yi-yi-yi noise that cows seemed to find either intimidating or annoying enough to make them move away from it.

Hayes abandoned the gate, dodging confused calves as he worked one side of the herd and Bailey the other, guiding them to the open gate.

Once she saw it, the lead cow, thinking she’d found a means of escaping the pesky bipeds, galloped toward it and the others followed.

After the last cow had cantered into the corral, Hayes swung shut the wide gate with a satisfying metal clang, only to have a calf appear out of the darkness, shooting past him while bellowing for his mama.

“Son of a bitch,” Hayes muttered, while Bailey let out a frustrated groan.

It was going to take some keen maneuvering to get the baby back in the corral without having other calves escape, but that problem was soon a moot point; mama bellowed back to her calf, then hit the gate hard, bending the top rail under her weight and popping the latch.

Hayes reeled sideways as the gate slammed into him, but Bailey grabbed hold of his arm, keeping him from going down as four or five cows shot out of the corral.

Hayes regained his balance and they both heaved at the gate, shutting it again as the cows milled, upset at having their leader on the other side.

“I’ll hold it while you get some wire,” he said.

Bailey returned with length of hay string instead of wire and Hayes tied the gate shut. He examined the bent top rail and shook his head.

“Let’s see if we can find them.”

Twenty minutes later they had the escapees safely corralled in the adjoining pen, then opened the connecting gate so that the calves could mother up.

“This will do until tomorrow.” Hayes turned to Bailey who looked almost as out of breath as she’d been the night he found her in the barn. “Saved my ass back there, didn’t you?”

Bailey gave him a let’s-drop-it look, and he lifted his eyebrows as if in surprise. “Oh, it’s okay when you’re the hero.”

Instead of answering, she studied his face, her gaze traveling slowly over his features, a faint frown drawing her eyebrows together and making him wonder what she was looking for and what she saw.

Then she gently took his face in her hands, holding it for a moment with a light pressure before easing his lips down to hers.

Hayes’s arms automatically went around her, pulling her against him, where she belonged.

Damn but he loved the feel of this woman. He could hold her like this forever.

But he wasn’t sidetracked.

“Nice diversional tactic,” he said, loosening his embrace and letting his hands slide down to link behind her back. She leaned her upper body away from him, meeting his gaze in a matter-of-fact way.

“It’s easier when I’m the hero.”

“I feel the same way, but,” he continued as he pulled their lower bodies closer together, “sometimes I suck it up and allow people to help me out.”

“I’m accepting help,” Bailey pointed out. “I’m here, aren’t I?”

“Because you have no choice.”

“What do you want? A bow on top?” she asked, an exasperated edge creeping into her voice.

“I want you.”

Her lips parted as she stared up at him. But she didn’t move away, didn’t automatically step back, and he took that as a positive.

“I mean…” He bent his head until his lips were almost touching hers and he could feel the warmth of her breath against his skin. “I really want you.”

“Hayes.” She whispered his name before dropping her forehead against his shoulder. He felt the energy of indecision rolling off her, and he wasn’t going to put her into the position of acting and then regretting, no matter how much he wanted her.

“We’ll talk tomorrow,” he said, reluctantly breaking contact instead of kissing her again as he so badly wanted to. She gave him a look as he stepped back, part grateful, part rueful.

“I should go. If you need anything—” as in if something spooks you “—do not hesitate to come to the house.” Then he turned and headed across the driveway before he did something stupid like tell her he wasn’t a danger, when honestly, he was.

He was at the gate when her voice caught up with him.

“I think I want you, too.”

He stopped dead in his tracks, then turned toward her, doing his best to appear unfazed so as not to break the fragile bond that was forming. “You let me know when you’re certain, okay?”

“I will.” She lifted her chin, and he couldn’t help but smile at her forced nonchalance. Pure Bailey.

“See you in the morning.”

Wade was waiting to pounce on him when he came back into the house. “And…?”

“Cows got out.”

“Oh.” There was a marked note of disappointment in the old man’s voice.

“Bailey wants to stay in the trailer.”

Wade rolled his eyes. “I’m going to bed.

” He began the process of getting himself up out of his chair and onto the walker and Hayes had already learned to let Wade do everything by himself that he could.

Because Jess had come earlier, for his second to last visit, he’d already bathed and was wearing sweat bottoms and a robe.

After Wade had disappeared down the hall to his room, Hayes lingered, waiting to make certain there were no crashes or sounds of distress. Fifteen minutes later, when all had quieted at Wade’s end of the house, he turned toward his, ambling down the hall to the room at the very end.

He got out of his clothes, kicking them into a pile to be dealt with in the morning before snapping off the light.

It struck him then, as he sat on the bed in his stark childhood room, lit only by the glow of the yard lamp, that he was probably home to stay.

Even if Parker came back, even if Trev returned for good, he was most likely going to stay in the Marietta area.

Bailey was leaving, but maybe when she was done roaming, she, too, would come back.

Or maybe she’d continue dodging anything that smacked of a relationship and maintain her nomadic ways.

Safety first.

His lips twisted grimly. A smart man would give it up.

He wasn’t feeling all that intelligent.