Just a Cowboy and His Baby (Spikes & Spurs) (24 page)

“I’m glad you’re here,” Trace said.

“You are welcome. Are you going to let me win this week?” she teased.

He shook his head. “I am not! You know the rules. When it comes to the competition, we aren’t even friends.”

Gemma smiled. “You got it! Oh, we’ve got to have that thing.”

“What is it?” Trace asked.

“A fold-up stroller for when we take her to the rodeo. We can put it under your bed when we aren’t using it, but we need it,” she said. “And now for the pretty stuff. Five outfits should be enough right here at first, wouldn’t you think?”

“For what?”

“Trace Coleman, this baby is not going out in public dressed in a nightgown or a knit undershirt. She’s going to have some pretty things, and when I can get to a Western-wear store she’ll have cute little cowgirl things. Look!”

He turned to see her flipping through a round rack of baby things. She quickly picked out half a dozen pink dresses with matching diaper covers and tossed them into the cart.

“And that should do it for this week,” she said.

“You mean this is a once every week thing?”

“Oh, honey, at least that much, maybe more.” She smiled.

“You are enjoying this way, way too much.”

She nodded. “Yes, I am. Now let’s go home and play with her. I swear she’s such a good baby. She hasn’t fussed a single bit.”

***

The day went past in a blur. Holly ate. Holly slept. Holly had her diaper changed and her gown at least three times that day. Then it was time for bed and Trace stopped dead in his tracks.

“What now? I can’t sleep with her, Gemma. I’m a big man. What if I rolled on her or my pillow got all tangled up in her face?”

Gemma exhaled in exasperation. “We forgot to buy a bassinet.”

“A what?”

“It’s a small baby bed. They can use them until they’re about three months old.”

“What does it look like?”

Gemma held her arms out. “About this long and this wide with legs on it and rollers so it can be moved around, and sometimes they have a little canopy thing with lace and frills for little girls.”

Trace’s brown eyes narrowed. “I got an idea. I’ll be right back.”

He was gone ten minutes and returned with a big wooden box about the size of a bassinet but without a hood, legs, or a fancy little mattress.

“Will this do?”

“I expect it would, but isn’t that a feed box?”

“Yep, it is, but it’s brand spanking new. Never had a single bit of feed or hay in it. Man I bought it from swears he was going to start using it tomorrow, but he’ll go get another one.”

Gemma cocked her head to one side. “We could fold a blanket several times for a mattress and put the box beside the bed.”

“Then it will work?”

“Yes, and she can say she was a true cowgirl from the time she was two weeks old,” Gemma said.

Trace grinned. “Maybe that will keep my mother from trying to turn her into a lawyer or a judge.”

Baby Holly was bathed, fed, dressed in a clean pink nightgown, and her dark hair brushed, but Gemma continued to hold her. Sitting in the middle of Trace’s big bed, she rocked the baby back and forth and hummed to her.

The sight put a catch in Trace’s chest. He wished Gemma had been the one that had gotten pregnant with his child. He finished dumping the baby’s bathwater down the sink, rinsed the big plastic bowl, and in a few easy strides was beside the bed. He leaned down and kissed Gemma on the forehead and then Holly on the cheek.

“Thank you, one more time. I wouldn’t know what or how to do anything, but I’m learning fast,” he said.

“You’ll get the hang of it. Look at her sleeping. Isn’t she beautiful?”

“Yes, she is,” Trace said, but he was staring at Gemma, not at his new daughter. He cleared his throat and sat down beside her. “Hey, I need to call my dad to see about all this legal stuff. You okay while I step outside? How long do you think it’s going to take us to get to Oregon after this rodeo?”

“We’ve got a week to get there. If we have a horrible night with her, then we’ll only go a couple of hundred miles. If she sleeps good, we’ll go more. Go call your folks. I think you are procrastinating,” Gemma answered.

“Yes, I am, but before I make the call—” He paused.

Gemma looked up at him. “What?”

He took a deep breath and spit it all out without stopping. “From Hermiston it’s only three hundred miles to Bremerton, Washington. That’s just a day’s trip, and then it is two weeks until the rodeo there. Would you fly to Goodnight with me and spend that two weeks at my house? We wouldn’t be so cramped and I could help Uncle Teamer. We could fly back to Bremerton, ride that night, and then drive down to Ellensburg.”

Gemma nodded. “Yes, I will.”

Trace let out a lungful of air in a whoosh.

“You didn’t think I’d say yes, did you?”

He kissed her on the cheek. “I was almost afraid to even ask.”

“Go make your call now. I’m going to talk to Momma and then Ace while you visit with your folks.”

Trace carried the folder with all the information in it outside with him. He held his breath again after he dialed his father’s phone number. It rang four times before his dad picked up.

“Yes?”

“Dad, Trace here.”

“I have caller ID, Son. I know who is calling. Your mother and I just finished dinner and we’re in a taxi on our way home.”

“I have a daughter,” Trace blurted out.

“Is this a joke?”

“No, sir. Put it on speaker so Mother can hear. I need some legal advice, and I only want to tell this story once,” he said.

He started at the beginning and told them exactly what documents were in the folder.

“Now what do I do?” he asked.

“Are you positive the child is yours, and that if it is, the mother has given up all rights?”

“Looks that way on paper, but I can fax them to you tomorrow morning for you to look at,” Trace said.

There was a pause before his mother spoke. “First thing you do is drop down on your knees and promise Gemma O’Donnell half your kingdom for being so generous with her time. I’m still mad at you for bringing her to dinner with us and not even telling her or us. I was so stunned that she probably thinks I’m horrid, and nothing your father or I said came out right.”

“What?” Trace said.

“I’m a grandmother now, Son. I can say whatever I want.”

“You always have anyway,” Trace said.

“Yes, I have, but it’ll get worse now. I’ve got court and your father has cases in the next few days, but we will be in Bremerton for that rodeo. I want to see my granddaughter. And Gemma deserves better than meeting us without giving her a chance to refuse or even pretty up. Good Lord, Trace, I would have shot your father if he’d taken me to see your grandparents without a notice.”

“And,” his father chimed in, “now she’s taking on a child you fathered with another woman from a weekend bender?”

“Okay, okay, I goofed. I wanted her to meet you all. And I thought it would be a nice surprise for both of you. All I hear from you, Mother, is how you wish I’d find a nice girl and settle down. Now about this legal stuff?” Trace asked.

“Sounds like it’s pretty well taken care of, Son. I want another DNA just for absolute proof in case this woman ever comes back. And send all those documents to me first thing in the morning,” his father said. “I’ll file them all in the state of Texas. You want to change her names?”

Trace hesitated.

“Talk it over with Gemma,” his mother said.

“She’s agreed to go to Goodnight to spend the two weeks between Hermiston and Bremerton to help me with Holly.”

“Good, then we will plan on seeing you at Teamer’s rather than flying all the way to Washington. We’ll be in touch, and you tell Gemma that we’re coming,” his mother said.

***

Gemma laid Holly in her bed and dug her cell phone out of her purse.

She hit the speed dial for her mother and waited.

“Hi, kiddo. Where are you? How’s the ankle? You really should forfeit your entry fee and not ride in this rodeo. You can win the next one with a good foot rather than hurting this one again and not winning either,” Maddie said.

“I’d forgotten about my ankle. Trace still makes me use crutches, but it’s healing pretty fast, and I hate to give up my entry fee. Are you sitting down, Momma?”

“You didn’t marry that man, did you?”

Gemma sputtered. “What made you say that?”

“Your tone. There’s something different about it.”

“No, I did not marry him. But I’m sitting here looking at his baby.” Gemma went on to tell her the whole story before Maddie could butt in again.

“Oh my!” Maddie said when she finished.

“Is that all you’ve got to say?”

“For right now it is because I’m shocked speechless. Don’t you dare fall in love with that baby and mistake it for real love for the man. That wouldn’t be fair to either of you, and you better think twice about getting too attached to the baby because it’ll just make it harder to leave her when the time comes.”

“For someone who is stunned into silence you are doing a really good job of talking. Ace is here. I hadn’t even called him and wasn’t expecting to see him until the rodeo, but he just stuck his head in the trailer door so I’ll call you later.” She ended the call with a touch of a finger.

Blake and Dalton followed Ace into the small trailer with Trace behind them. The brothers stood around the feed box and stared down at the sleeping child.

“Well, I bet that was a big surprise!” Ace said.

Gemma slid off the bed. “Yes, it was. I thought y’all were coming for the rodeo.”

“Bull was ready early,” Creed said.

Ace bent down on one knee to get a better look at the baby. “We won’t be staying for the rodeo. But we’ve worked out a plan with Trace. Blake is going to hitch up to your trailer and take it home with him. He had planned to go on west of here and check out a ranch, but it sold today. That’s why he brought his own truck and can take your trailer home.”

“I might look at a couple of places between here and home. You tell your momma about this?” Blake asked Gemma.

“Just did.”

“Liz and Jasmine?” Ace asked.

“Not yet.”

Ace stood up. “Then I call dibs on telling Jasmine, and you can tell Liz.”

“I wish that was mine,” Dalton said.

Gemma gulped. “You do?”

“I’m so ready for a wife and kids now that I have bought my own place,” he said.

Blake touched the edge of the baby’s bed. “I can’t believe you’ve got her in a feed box. Throw a little hay in there and she’d look like the nativity scene down at the Ringgold church when we have the Christmas pageant. Remember when Rachel was the baby for it and she cooed and gooed at her momma the whole time the kings were there?”

“Those were her uncles and she knew them. She damn sure didn’t coo at you three, did she? And besides, this is nearly August, not December,” Gemma said.

“No, she set up a howl,” Ace answered.

Trace looked at Gemma.

“Her uncles and father were the three kings, and these three were the shepherds. Maybe y’all should have brought her shiny presents instead of leading a baaing sheep up on the platform,” Gemma explained to Trace.

“Gemma was the angel that night. She had a crooked wire hanger covered in silver tinsel on her head,” Ace said.

Trace shook his head. “Angel? Y’all let her be an angel?”

Blake’s booming laugh woke the baby. “I’m sorry, but that’s exactly what I said when I saw her all draped in a bedsheet with that halo on her head.”

Gemma picked Holly up. “Well, this is a real angel.”

She suddenly realized that Holly would be in Goodnight, Texas, celebrating her first Christmas with her father and his family at the end of December. Gemma would be in Ringgold with her family.

Oh, no, I will not! I’m not leaving. Trace can get used to the idea one day at a time and even think it’s his idea when he asks me to stay on forever.

“And come Christmas, she might even be teething and even Jesus won’t be able to get along with her then,” Blake said. “Remember those times with our nephews and our niece?” He looked at his brothers.

Ace’s face went serious. “Come Christmas, I’ll be a daddy! It just hit me. I’m going to have one of those.”

“Maybe two if you want to stay up with Wil and Pearl,” Blake said.

“Oh, no!” Ace said. “They did an ultrasound and I saw my daughter and there’s just one of her.”

“Okay, while my big brother is digesting the idea of fatherhood, let’s go get these trailers changed over. We’ve got a bull in a trailer out there and a lot of miles to go,” Blake said.

“Tell me again how you manage to take care of this,” Gemma asked.

“Blake brought his truck, so he’s going to take your trailer all the way home. Dalton is going to follow me in Trace’s truck and we’ll leave it at Goodnight, then he’ll get in with me and we’ll go on home,” Ace said.

Gemma handed the baby to Trace. “I’ll go get my things out of the trailer.”

“Would you mind if I used your trailer on the way? It would save some hotel expenses while I’m looking around. There’s a couple of pieces of property I want to look at around Vernon,” Blake asked.

“Not one bit. It’s not very big, but it works for one person just fine. You might even find a woman camped right next to you in a trailer park that will change your luck,” Gemma teased.

“Ain’t happenin’. My luck is plumb run out with the women. I’m going to be the old bachelor uncle who spoils his nephews and nieces.”

An hour later she’d moved in with Trace. He’d better get used to it because she intended to be around forever.

Gemma fed Holly. Trace burped her, and then they’d stared at her for several minutes after they put her into her makeshift bed.

“We’d better get some sleep. She’ll be ready to eat again in four hours, max,” Gemma said.

Trace pulled her down on the bed. She cuddled up next to his side and shut her eyes. When she opened them a minute later, nothing had changed. There was still a baby in a big wooden box next to her. She didn’t have a trailer of her own anymore. And her saddle was in the backseat of her truck. And she’d made up her mind about her future and set it in solid stone.

“Did today really happen?” Trace asked.

Gemma kissed him on the jaw. “It didn’t happen. That would mean it was over and an end had occurred. It is happening. No end in sight. Once a father, always a father, even when she’s grown.”

“That scares me,” he said.

“It should terrify you. It’s a big job.”

He kissed her on the forehead. “I’m worn completely out both mentally and physically. How about you, Gemma?”

“Yes, on all counts. You go take a shower and then I’ll get one and we’ll get some sleep. It’ll be a short four hours.”

It seemed like she’d barely shut her eyes when Holly whimpered. She looked at the clock and only an hour had passed. The baby couldn’t be hungry yet. She rolled out of Trace’s arms and tucked the blanket back around Holly’s feet. Then Gemma could not go back to sleep.

One thing after another kept her awake. She worried about her saddle in the truck. Would the heat tomorrow cause it to get out of the fit? Then she mulled over and over the fact that she was now officially living with Trace. If they had big fight, the only place she could go was outside.

She shivered when she realized how much trust they’d put in each other. It was her truck but it was his trailer. She could drive off and leave him stranded with a baby on the side of the road. But he could throw her and all her belongings out and she wouldn’t have a home.

Home!

There was that word again.

Finally, she beat her pillow into submission and fell asleep only to be awakened by pitiful little cries two hours later. When she opened her eyes, Trace was sitting straight up in bed, his hair a mess, and his eyes wide open.

He dug his fists into his eyes. “I’ll heat the bottle if you’ll change her diaper.”

“Okay,” she said.

This time he fed her and Gemma did the burping. In thirty minutes Holly was fed and asleep again. Trace curled up to Gemma’s back with his arm around her.

“We make a good team,” he whispered.

“Yes, we do,” she said groggily.

***

Gemma looked down at a bronc who would have been cussing a blue streak if he could’ve talked. He snorted and tried to shake the saddle off. Everything about Sugar Baby said there wasn’t a sweet bone in his body and he couldn’t wait to toss her into the dirt.

The first order of business was that she had to stop thinking about the eighty-one points Trace had just racked up, about the fact that he was watching Holly all by himself, and about the fact that her foot hurt like a son of a bitch in that boot. When she could get all that out of her mind she’d be fine.

“Well, shit!” she said.

“What?” the cowboy at the top of the chute asked.

“My lucky horseshoe and my shamrocks are headed toward Texas.”

The cowboy frowned.

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Don’t reckon I would. You ready?”

She measured the rein again and touched her lucky hat pin.

Sugar Baby came out of the chute with all four feet off the ground and his back straight up in the air. She knew the crowd was putting out some noise, and the announcer’s voice was full of excitement. Her feet went back, spurs raked, feet came forward, and ankle throbbed. It was like doing a line dance on a broken foot. She should’ve taken her mother’s advice, but oh, no, she had to prove that she could ride with a sprained ankle.

The buzzer sounded and a rescue rider grabbed her around the waist. She slid off the horse and winced when both her feet hit the ground.

“And that, cowboys and cowgirls, was Gemma O’Donnell from Ringgold, Texas, who was tied with Trace Coleman for the top-seeded place in this year’s Million Dollar Pro Rodeo Tour right here at the Lovington Rodeo. Trace has racked up eight-one big points, and now the judges are handing me their scores for Gemma O’Donnell. And oh, my goodness, I don’t believe this—” The announcer’s booming voice held so much excitement that the crowd quieted.

Gemma held her breath. Had she beat him even with a busted ankle and very little sleep?

“They are still in a tie! They both have eighty-one points and will split tonight’s purse at this silver event! Good luck to both of you in the next rodeo. We’ll all be watching to see if you break this tie then. And now we’ve got barrel racing, starting with the queen herself of barrel racing, Katy McQueen, from Austin, Texas.”

Gemma bowed to the crowd and limped off to the chutes where Trace and Holly waited. So they were still in a tie? That beat having to listen to him brag about whipping her butt for the next fifteen hundred miles as they drove to Oregon.

***

The days flew by with such speed that Gemma wondered at night where they’d gone. She and Trace had bought a baby monitor, but they were so worn out by evening that most of the time they didn’t want to do anything but cuddle a few minutes and fall asleep.

August was almost half done when they parked in Oregon that evening, and after the rodeo the next night they’d fly to Amarillo. She wondered if they’d have time for sex at the ranch or if this was the way it was going to be. Maybe they’d had a wild, hot affair and now they’d slid back into nothing more than a deep friendship.

“Get all prettied up,” Trace said when they went from the truck to the trailer that evening.

“Why?”

“Because this is date night. I’m taking my two pretty girls out to dinner and a movie and then we’re going to put that monitor gizmo you bought to use. I’ve been thinking about you all day, and I want more than cuddling tonight, darlin’.”

“And what if I’m too damn tired?” she smarted off.

“Then you go on to sleep and I’ll wake you when it’s over,” he teased.

She giggled. “Where did you get that line? And you know damn well that a dozen of your kisses will heat me up until there won’t be any sleeping until it is over, so don’t tease me.”

“Made it up on the spot. And darlin’, your kisses do the same to me.”

He set Holly’s car seat on the table, turned on the air to cool the trailer down, and opened his arms to Gemma. She took a step and he pulled her so close that she could hear his heart beat. Not yet! They weren’t anything more than friends yet!

“Do we have to wait for dinner, a movie, and ten o’clock feeding?” she whispered. “She’s asleep right now.”

Trace grasped her butt, and with one hop, her legs were around his waist. His lips met hers in a hard kiss that sent tsunami-sized waves of desire shooting from her lips to her lower gut. Tongue met tongue in enough fiery heat to burn down the whole state of Oregon. She didn’t know when her shirt and bra left her body, but suddenly she was naked from the waist up, on the bed, and the door was shut. His mouth left her lips long enough to taste her breasts and then latched on to her lower lip again.

“God, I missed this,” he moaned between kisses.

She reached between them, undid his belt buckle, and unzipped his jeans, then ran a hand down inside to tease an already rock-hard erection.

“Me too.” She gasped.

Her jeans and underpants disappeared like magic, and he was naked and making love to her just as fast. She’d expected it to be a slam, bam, thank-you-ma’am bout, but after the first thrust, he slowed the rhythm so much that it was tender and sweet. His lips were everywhere. On her eyelids, her earlobes, her neck, and his hands wandered from her ribs to her breasts and to her face.

They’d had wild, wonderful sex.

They’d had sex on the cabinet top and in an old-fashioned claw-foot bathtub.

But Gemma felt like Trace was making love to her, not having sex. And in that moment she knew beyond the faintest shadow of a doubt that she’d chosen the right horse to ride the rest of her life.

She reached a climax long before he did and then another one, and then he collapsed on top of her with a growl that sounded faintly like, “love you.” But she wasn’t sure.

“Good idea there, sweetheart,” he murmured when he could breathe again.

“Yes, sir, it damn sure was.”

He rolled, taking her with him. “We’ve made it a whole week in a trailer with a baby. Honey, we’re ready to take on the world.”

Or
Goodnight, Texas
, she thought.