Going Cowboy Crazy (7 page)

“Are you hot?”

The softly spoken question caused him to glance over, something he’d been avoiding. It was a mistake. The lights of an oncoming semi reflected off the glitter gloss of her lips, and all he could think about was pulling over and kissing them clean. Yeah, he was hot. But Slate Calhoun had never forced himself on a woman in his life. And he certainly wouldn’t start now. She’d made her choice.

Now Slate had to live with it.

“Hot?”

Faith touched the spot right below her cute little nose. “You’re sweating.”

After wiping the sweat off on the shoulder of his shirt, he rolled the window up and turned on the air-conditioning. But the cold air that blasted out of the vents didn’t cool him down a lick. Geez Louise, he needed to get a hold on himself. There wasn’t a woman alive who’d ever made him sweat like he’d just taken a big bite of a jalapeño straight off the grill. Obviously, he needed to spend less time watching game film, and looking at Mexican resorts online, and more time with women.

Willing women.

“Is it always this warm in September?” she asked.

Thankful for the distraction, Slate nodded. “Usually. Of course, tomorrow we could get a cold front and freeze our rears off. West Texas weather is pretty unpredictable.”

When Faith didn’t comment, he looked back over. She sat all prim and proper, with her knees together and her hands folded on her lap. It was hard to believe that this was the same woman who’d ripped apart the pearl snaps on his shirt and looked at his chest like it was a cloud of sweet cotton candy she wanted to dive into. The same woman who sprawled out on the truck seat, with those sexy red high heels riding his waist, and her hot, wet center all ready and waiting.

“Watch out!”

Slate jerked the steering wheel, coming dangerously close to taking out the
WELCOME TO BRAMBLE: HOME OF THE STATE CHAMPION BULLDOGS
sign. Which wouldn’t have been such a bad thing. The sign was a constant
reminder of his failure as a coach. Four years and he hadn’t led the team to one state victory.

Pitiful.

He steered the truck back to the centerline and mumbled something about a skunk in the road. After he’d almost killed them, it was a stupid thing to say. But his mind wasn’t working on full capacity. The blood needed for coherent thinking had pooled elsewhere.

He cleared his throat and tried to clear his mind. “So, darlin’, you planning on leaving tonight?”

It took a moment for Faith to answer, probably because he’d scared her speechless. “I thought I’d drive until I got tired.”

“If I were you, I’d get on twenty-seven, and maybe stay the night in Amarillo. That will give you a good start for the morning.”

“Thank you, I might do that.” She released the dashboard but kept her eyes pinned to the road. “And I was wondering if you might keep my identity a secret until I’ve had a chance to talk with Hope. It’s just that I—”

He held up a hand. “I understand. This is between you and your sister.” The smile she flashed him made his heart do a crazy little jig, and a few minutes passed before he could think clearly enough to make another stab at conversation. “So do you have any other sisters or brothers?”

“No. Do you have a big family?”

“A younger half brother and sister, but they live in North Carolina with my dad,” Slate said.

Faith glanced over at him. “So your parents are divorced?”

“Since I was eleven.”

“Were you born in North Carolina?” she asked.

He shook his head. “Savannah, Georgia.”

“That explains the weird accent.”

Her comment made the tension in his shoulders ease, and he looked over and smiled. “Yeah, I guess it does.”

She smiled back at him. “So your mom moved here after the divorce?”

Slate thought about saying something clever to distract her from a conversation he really didn’t want to have. But smothering the sexual desire took most of his energy, so he couldn’t think up a clever retort to save his soul. It didn’t matter. She was leaving Bramble and would soon forget any conversation she’d had with some hick cowboy from Texas.

“My mom didn’t move here. I was the only one who came to live with my aunt and uncle.” Something that felt an awful lot like pain twisted his gut. But you had to care about someone to feel pain, so he attributed the feeling to the rare hamburger he’d eaten for lunch.

“Oh.” The one word held enough pity for an entire orphanage.

Slate shrugged, trying to make light of it. “I don’t blame her. After my dad left, I was a pretty hard kid to handle. Of course, any kid was too hard for my mom. Mothering wasn’t her thing.” Men were her thing. Just one of the reasons his father had left.

“At least she kept you for a while,” Faith said. “Mine gave me up at birth.”

“Maybe your mother had a good reason. Maybe she thought other people would do a better job than she could. Lord knows, my aunt and uncle were better parents than my own.” He glanced over. “Were your adoptive parents good people?”

“Very. They were close to fifty when they adopted me. But what they lacked in youthful energy, they made up for in love. You couldn’t ask for parents more proud of their only child’s accomplishments.”

“And what are your accomplishments, Miss Aldridge?” he asked, hoping to bring a lighter note to the dark road their conversation had traveled down.

Faith laughed and counted out on her fingers. “Well, I walked before I was one. Was potty trained and talked in full sentences before I was two. And by three, could read simple words.”

And by thirty, knew how to make a man burn.

“A real honest-to-goodness prodigy,” Slate said, trying not to think about how badly he burned.

“Not really, but my parents thought so. They were academics. My father taught at the University of Chicago and so did my mother before they adopted me.”

“Did you graduate from there as well?”

“Yes.”

He took his eyes off the road long enough to study her. “You don’t sound real happy about it.”

“I’m glad I got a degree, but college was stressful.”

“Because you had to live up to your parents’ expectations?”

In the lights from an oncoming car, her eyes looked thoughtful. “Yes. I guess I didn’t want to disappoint them.”

“Expectations will do that to a person.” He snorted. “I used to love football, until I started coaching it. Now it just stresses the hell out of me.”

“So you’re telling me there’s an A-type personality beneath that easygoing smile?”

Slate looked over, and their gazes locked. “Maybe.”

It was strange this connection he felt with a complete stranger. Or maybe it wasn’t so strange, given that she looked exactly like a person he’d known for most of his life.

At any rate, Bootlegger’s neon sign appeared much too quickly.

“We’re here.” Faith sounded as disappointed as he felt.

“It looks that way.” As they neared the honky-tonk, he eased his foot off the accelerator. “Look, are you hungry, darlin’? Because there’s this all-night truck stop that serves the best steak and egg—”

“Where’s my car?”

He glanced at the empty parking lot. Where
was
her car? Hell, where were
all
the cars? It couldn’t be much past ten o’clock. And nobody left Bootlegger’s before eleven on a Saturday. Not even Moses Tate, who was close to a hundred. Which meant something wasn’t right.

As he turned into the lot, Faith pointed a finger. “My car was parked right there by that wall.”

“Don’t panic,” he said, although he felt a little panicky himself. “There has to be a good explanation.” He reached over and jerked the glove box open and pulled out his phone: 10:24. Something was definitely wrong. He found Kenny Gene’s number, and after only two rings, Kenny started in.

“Hey, Slate. What’s goin’ on? What happened to Hope? Did you drop her off at her house? You know Jenna don’t ever lock the door, so she can get right in. You want me to come over and watch some game film with—”

“Where is everybody, and where is Faith’s car?”

“Whose car?”

Shit.

“Hope’s car. Where’s Hope’s car?”

“Sheriff Winslow impounded it.”

“What?!”

“Yeah. It’s all part of the town’s grand plan to get you and Hope together again.” He laughed. “Ain’t it a doozy?”

Slate groaned and dropped his head in his hand.

“What happened?” Faith leaned closer. “It’s my car, isn’t it? My car got stolen. I knew I should’ve checked the locks again.” Her eyes widened. “Or did someone hit it? That’s it, isn’t it? Someone ran into it in the parking lot and totaled it.”

“Hey.” Kenny’s voice came back over the line. “Is that Hope? Put her on; I’ve got this great story to tell her.”

Slate closed his eyes and took a deep breath, trying to pull up an image of a white sandy beach with a hammock stretched beneath two palm trees. “Look, Kenny. Hope doesn’t want to hear a story. She just wants her car back. So do you think you could tell me where it is?”

“Gee, Slate, I don’t know. But Sheriff Winslow probably does. So can you put Hope on—”

Slate hung up and dialed Winslow’s number.

In the parking lot lights, Faith’s worried blue eyes stared back at him. “So where’s my car?”

He held up a finger as he waited for Winslow to pick up. “You need to give me a minute, darlin’. I’m working on it.”

“Sheriff Winslow.”

Slate rolled his eyes. The man was too full of himself. “Hey, Sam, it’s Slate.”

“Hey, Slate. Hope with ya?”

“Yes.” He continued to take deep, even breaths. “And we were wondering if we could come get her car.”

“Her car? I don’t have her car.”

Slate gritted his teeth and at the same time tried to shoot Faith a reassuring smile. “You don’t?”

“No, I don’t.”

“Do you know who does?”

“Yes, I do.”

He gripped the phone tighter. “You think you could tell me, Sam?”

“I could, but then you’d tell Hope. You never could keep a secret from her. Remember on her fifteenth birthday when we wanted to surprise her with a party and you went and ruined the surprise by—”

Slate put his hand over the receiver. “Listen, Faith, I realize you don’t want a lot of people knowing who you are until you’ve had a chance to talk with Hope. But if you want your car back, I think we’re going to have to tell Sheriff Winslow.”

Those full glittery lips pressed together for a few seconds, before she nodded. “Fine. But only the sheriff.”

Slate didn’t have the heart to tell her that if Winslow knew, by morning the entire town would. He put the phone back to his ear and listened to the conversation that had gone on without him.

“… ’Course we were stuck with all those ceramic pigs that Sue Ellen made in ceramics class for centerpieces. Although they looked real nice at the Christmas Ball with red ribbon and holly around their little fat—”

“Sam.” Slate butted in. “I need you to listen for a minute. That car isn’t Hope’s. It’s Faith’s.”

“Faith? Who’s Faith? Is that that little waitress from that truck stop near Odessa? The big ole gal with all that red hair?”

“No.” Slate closed his eyes. “Faith is Hope’s twin sister.”

“Twin sister?” Sam’s laughter rang out. “That’s a good one, Slate. You can sure come up with ’em.”

“I’m being serious, Sam.”

The laughter died. “Now, Slate, I realize that Hope’s puttin’ all kinds of pressure on you to get her car back. But you need to be as tough with her as you are with your team. In fact, women are a lot like teenagers. They don’t know what’s good for them unless you show them. So take the bull by the horns, boy, and show that girl that the best thing for her is stayin’ right here in Bramble and marryin’ you. And tell Hope not to worry about her car because I got it in a real safe place. Although once you two get hitched, I’d be buyin’ her an American-made if I was you. Vole-Vo. What the hell is that?”

The phone clicked.

There were times when Slate considered moving to a bigger town. One where people kept their nose to the grindstone instead of up their neighbor’s ass. This was one of those times.

He closed the phone and slipped it in the breast pocket of his shirt as Faith’s eyes remained riveted on his face.

“So where’s my car?”

“Well, darlin’, there seems to be a little misunderstanding.” He tried to keep his voice as upbeat as possible.

Her brows lowered. “What kind of misunderstanding?”

How could he explain it when he couldn’t even understand it himself? Damned small-town mentality. “It’s kind of complicated, and something we really don’t want to get into until we’ve both had a little shut-eye.”

“I’m not tired. And I need to get to California.”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to wait until morning to leave.” He reached over to pop the truck into gear but she grabbed his arm.

“Oh, no, you don’t. Not until you tell me what you did with my car.”