Here Comes Trouble (11 page)

Her heart twisted in her chest that they were
back here again. He seemed to always think the worst of her. Would
she be in his arms kissing him like she was if she had a rendezvous
planned with someone else? She slugged him in the shoulder then
repeated, "Put me down, I need to go back inside."

"To get your boyfriend?" he asked gruffly.
"Want him to finish off what I started?"

"Yeah, that's exactly what I want," she said
sarcastically, then loosened her legs from around him and he
dropped her to her feet.

Instead of letting her go though, he grabbed
her hand in a firm grip and started walking toward the hotel. "Well
that's too damned bad sugar, I always finish what I start," he
grated. "Unlike you."

Anger poured off of him in waves, and Terri
tried to put on the brakes to stop his forward momentum toward the
hotel, but he just dragged her along beside him.

CHAPTER SIX

"Joel, stop!" Terri yelled and yanked her hand
from his. He took a deep breath then turned to face her. "This
isn't happening unless we talk first," she told him
firmly.

"Talk?" he asked incredulously.

"Yeah," she said softly then added, "We need
to get some stuff straight." Terri wasn't kidding when she told him
she wasn't
that
kind of girl. She didn't sleep around, as
much as he'd like to think that of her, because she'd slept with
him when she'd barely known him. He'd been hurting then, and she'd
been a fool to try and comfort him.

That was a one time thing, doing it again with
him, would mean she was allowing herself to be used. If he wasn't
ready for a relationship, he wasn't ready for her. She was five
years past her divorce, thirty-one years old, and that was what she
was looking for, nothing less.

"You want to have a drink in the bar at the
hotel?" she suggested.

"No, that's not what I want, but evidently
that's what I'm going to have," he said then huffed out a
frustrated breath.

"Good, let's go then," she said and grabbed
his hand leading him toward the front entrance of the
hotel.

They walked through the lobby, and she found
the darkened, almost empty bar and led him to a booth in the back.
The tired bartender looked up at them and waved then headed their
way. Joel ordered a beer, and Terri ordered a double martini. She
needed the reinforcement right now, and she hadn't even drank a
full beer at Smack Daddy's, she'd been dancing too much.

After the man walked off to get their drinks,
Joel just sat there staring at her, twirling the edge of the paper
placemat in front of him. His shoulders were tense, his jaw was
tense, his whole body was tense.

"What happened between us a year ago..." she
started and looked down at the placemat in front of her. "Isn't
something I normally do, and it can't happen again. I really don't
do casual. Since my divorce five years ago, I've had two
relationships that lasted nearly a year, until they fizzled out.
I'm a relationship kind of girl...and you're not that guy," she
told him without looking up at him.

There was dead silence between them, until the
bartender sat their drinks down and then walked off again. "I was
that kind of guy, and it didn't get me anywhere," he said
darkly.

"You can't give up, Joel. She wins if you do
that. That's what I told myself after I divorced Craig. Limiting
yourself to superficial shallow relationships isn't going to make
the hurt go away, and it's not going to guarantee that you never
get hurt again," Terri told him then put her hand over his across
the table. "The kind of good-time girl you're looking for right
now, will eventually hurt you too."

The pain in his eyes when he finally looked up
at her took her breath away. She knew where he was, he was still
grieving his lost relationship, unsure of himself and where his
life was going. Terri had been there. The best she could do for him
right now was to be his friend. "Joel, I think we need to keep it
at friends until you figure out what you want...I think you're a
great man, and you certainly light my fire, but I don't want to get
hurt."

His jaw worked a few times then he said, "I
understand...I just don't know if we're together twenty-four seven
if I'll be able to keep my hands off of you. I've tried," he
admitted and his lips kicked up.

"Try harder," she told him. "I'll have to do
the same, and I promise not to antagonize you anymore. I'm sorry
for doing that."

"I'm sorry for saying you're easy, you're
definitely not, and you had a right to be mad. You left me pretty
worked up though, that's why I came to find you tonight. Thinking
of you and Dylan together pissed me off," he told her heatedly,
then took a swig of his beer.

"How
did
you find out where we
were?"

"I grilled Rocky until she told me..." he
admitted with a twist of his lips. "They invited her to come along,
but she stayed home."

"I haven't met her yet, she's one of your
ranch hands right?" Terri asked him conversationally, but a little
twinge of something very close to jealousy grabbed her
heart.

"Yeah, she used to be a barrel racer in the
rodeo, and now she tends to the horses and gives riding
lessons."

"I really need to meet her then," Terri
laughed. "Maybe she can show me which end I'm supposed to face when
I get up on one."

Joel chuckled softly and she met his eyes and
held them as she lifted her hand and extended it to him.
"Friends?"

"With benefits?" he suggested with a sexy grin
and took her hand. Tingles shot up her arm to her breasts and her
nipples hardened. All the man had to do was look at her and he
turned her on, it amazed her...and scared her.

"Friends...with benefits maybe later, once you
get over that bitch you were married to," she told him
softly.

Terri knew she was going to lose this battle
eventually. He would get over his ex-wife, but that still didn't
mean he would want another relationship, or one with her. Getting
too close to him most likely meant she was setting herself up for
heartache. Sometimes though, those things were out of your control.
Every time she got near Joel Rhodes she felt out of
control.

"I'm damned close to being there, sugar," he
assured her.

"You say that, but your actions don't.
Screwing your way through all the women in Amarillo won't help you.
Take the time to heal, you can't rush it, trust me."

"You sure you don't wanna go up to your room
and blow off some steam?" he asked her with a dimpled grin and blue
eyes sparkling.

"I'll dream about it for sure, I'm plenty
worked up myself, but that's as close as you're gonna get to my
room tonight, darlin'."

"Well, shit," he said then his smile left and
he looked at her seriously. "Promise me something..." he asked in
the slow sexy drawl that melted her insides. It made her want to
promise him almost anything...everything.

"What?" she asked.

"Promise me you won't go out with any of the
cowboys on the ranch, it'll just cause friction," he said and
hesitated before adding, "And I'd like us to date some, see where
things go."

"Okay...that would be fun," she agreed, more
than surprised at his request. Maybe he was trying to move on. "I
really do like you, you know."

"I really like you too, sugar...that's the
problem," he drawled in that deep sexy voice.

Terri didn't even drink her drink, she wasn't
in the mood now. Her head was clear, and she felt better about the
situation. She wanted to get back to the ranch and get some sleep.
In the morning, she'd work her ass off to finish setting up the
first aid station.

Joel would feel better too with her being
home, he wouldn't worry about her and Dylan if she was
there.

"Hey, I'm going grab my stuff from the room,
and check out. Let's go home," she suggested and his eyebrows
lifted.

"You don't want to go back to the bar?" he
asked and she saw his shoulders relax.

"Nah, I probably won't be able to walk
tomorrow from all that dancing as it is...those cowboys tore me up.
I just want to go get some sleep. Will you follow me?"

"I'd follow you just about anywhere, darlin',"
he told her with a soft smile.

"I'll be right back, I'm parked over at the
bar, so we'll just walk back over there."

"I'll be here...unless you've changed your
mind and I can follow you upstairs?" he teased with another grin
that made her want to climb over the table and kiss him again. A
'come kiss me grin' that's what that was, and damn if she wasn't
tempted.

"Alright, lay off the charm, I can't take it,"
she told him seriously.

"I said we'd be friends, I didn't say I'd stop
trying, sweetheart. My memory is pretty long, and so was that night
we spent together." That dimple in his left cheek popped out and
Terri wanted to lick it. Her eyes moved over his tightly packed
body and handsome face and she wanted to lick more than the dimple.
The tip of her tongue tingled, remembering doing just that a year
ago, and how delicious he tasted. Her memory wasn't short either,
and that was
her
problem.

"You're not gonna make this easy are you?"
Terri asked with resignation in her tone.

"Nope, never promised that either," he
replied.

Reining in the hormones pumping through her,
Terri dragged herself back a few steps, then turned to go grab her
stuff. She wasn't psychic, but she didn't have to be to know this
was a losing proposition. Lovers to friends rarely worked, and she
was still insanely attracted to the emotionally damaged
man.

How could she have thought he wasn't
interested in her anymore? How could she think that taking the job
at the ranch, putting herself in his orbit again was safe? Deep
inside, she knew that she'd taken the job not only because she had
to, but because they did have unfinished business.

Their night together had proven there was a
connection between them that went way beyond sex. He didn't see it
then, and he didn't see it now, but Terri did. She now realized
that's why he'd haunted her dreams for as long as he had. She could
only hope that he eventually realized it as well.

Joel would wear her down eventually, she just
wasn't that strong where he was concerned. All Terri could hope was
that she could hold out long enough so she didn't get
hurt.

***

"I thought about another income stream, and
had to come out here to talk to you about it. I think it's a great
idea and would get some local business out here," Gigi told Joel
and he held back a groan.

Another income stream mean a larger investment
in the money pit the R & R Ranch was quickly becoming, thanks
to the income streams he'd already agreed to. Gigi must think he
had an endless supply of money, that he was independently wealthy,
that could be the only explanation for her not taking it easy on
him.

"Shoot," he told her, hoping she'd take that
literally and put him out of his misery.

"Weddings and receptions, family reunions,
company picnics..." she told him with excitement flushing her
cheeks. "And a country bar."

The events he could see, the bar was another
story. "I don't know if I want locals out here drinking and tearing
up the place," he said firmly. "They could disturb our
guests."

Her face fell a little, but she relented.
"Yeah, you're probably right there...not such a good idea. But the
event pavilion would be a fantastic idea wouldn't it? People pay
big bucks for places big enough to host receptions. It wouldn't
cost that much to add that feature either, just a covered outdoor
pavilion and an event coordinator, you could hire caterers as
needed on contract.
Oh
--and you could have socials for your
guests at night, beer and maybe line dancing and two-step
lessons."

"How big a pavilion are you talking here? I'm
stretched pretty thin right now trying to implement your other
ideas," he told her honestly.

"200 feet by 300 feet should be big enough for
large events," she replied.

"That's the size of a football field!" he
yelled and his heart shot to his throat.

"That would hold probably three hundred
people, so at twenty-five to thirty dollars a head, that could mean
nine-thousand dollars an event, plus," Gigi calculated and smiled
smugly. "If you stay booked, which I think you will because it will
be the only outdoor facility that size in the area, multiply that
times fifty-two weekends a year and you'll make half a million
dollars a year just from that income stream.

Joel groaned because he saw the sense in her
words. And half a mil a year would definitely go a long way to
making the ranch pay for itself. It would at least pay the salaries
of his employees. He could probably even get Trish, his Guest
Coordinator to double as his Event Coordinator. She was perky and
bubbly, a fresh-out-of-college go getter his sister had
recommended. At least Shauna hadn't sent him one of her artsy
friends. No blue hair for Trish, she was a business major, with a
minor in communications.