Mistletoe Cowboy (8 page)

“Good Lord, I am besotted with mistletoe and holiday pictures.”

Besotted! Shit! I've never used that word in my whole life. I don't even like that word. It sounds so formal. Erase that, Lord!

She made a motion in the air like she was erasing a big blackboard. “What the hell is the matter with my paint gods that all they are giving me are Christmas pictures with mistletoe in them? Will it be my best year ever next winter? Will they refer to this as the Sage Presley mistletoe season? Or will it put a screeching halt to my career?”

Maybe it wasn't paint gods. Maybe it was hormone devils making her see mistletoe since that was the first thing she noticed after the initial shock of Creed Riley bursting through the back door that first morning.

“Maybe they'll refer to this year as the year Sage Presley lost her edge and got all sappy.” She opened the door and Noel bounced inside ahead of her. Angel met them, bumped noses with Noel, and then proceeded to wind herself around Sage's legs. The dog shook snow and dog-smelling water all over the floor.

Sage unzipped her snow-covered coveralls to the waist, removed her boots and set them on the rug to drip, and then finished removing her coveralls. She hung them on the rack and grabbed the mop from the pantry. Wintertime had its problems just like all seasons in the canyon. But at least there was Christmas to make it bright and cheerful.

“Is it your breakfast time, sweetie?” Sage crooned at the cat. “Well, that old slow cowboy will be here soon with warm milk…”

“Who's slow?” Creed pushed through the door, closed it behind him, and set the milk on the table. “Can I please have some of that bread now? I'm starving.”

“Soon as I feed the house livestock and you get out of all those wet things.” She broke four eggs into a bowl, whisked them into an orange froth, and poured fresh milk over it.

Angel hurried over to the pan and joined the dog when Sage set it on the floor.

“They're still sharing,” Creed said.

“Looks like it. Let's get that milk taken care of and
we'll
share that loaf of bread,” she said.

“Well, damn!”

She spun around. “What?”

“I thought it was just for me.”

She smiled. “Too bad.”

***

Creed settled in a chair at the table with a spiral notebook before him.

“What's that?”

“I usually keep the workings of the ranch on the computer, but since there's no electricity and the battery is down on my laptop, I'm making notes. When things are back up to normal, I'll get it all transferred into the computer. How'd your grandmother do things?”

“By hand. I offered to put it on the computer, but she'd have none of it. She doesn't even like banks,” Sage said. “Didn't she give you the books?”

“Not yet, but she said she would when she came back.”

Sage's giggle was soft but he heard it.

“What's so funny?”

“There's at least ten big boxes out in one of the bunkhouse bedrooms. You'll pull your hair out when you start to go through all that,” she answered.

The canvas she fastened into the easel was smaller than the one she'd just finished. Creed figured it to be an eleven-by-fourteen, about the same size as his momma's velvet picture of the King. In no time she'd sketched in the lower branches of a cedar tree with a couple bunnies hiding underneath. It didn't look like much right then, but he'd seen her work magic with nothing but a kitchen window as a model.

From the corner of his eyes he watched Sage mix the colors and begin to work.

“I told you in the beginning I don't like people to watch me,” she said.

“But you fascinate me. Bunnies, right?”

“I saw them when I was on my way back inside. They'd taken shelter up under that big cedar between here and the barn.”

“You going to take a whole month to paint that one?”

“I don't think so. Must be the Christmas season that's gotten into my blood. Probably won't sell but I'm having fun.”

“Then you are a success,” Creed drawled.

“How do you figure that?”

“Granny Riley said that if you love what you do whether it's diggin' ditches or servin' as president of the U.S. of A., then you are a success. Your love comes through the paintings, so you are a big success. Take a snapshot of that window painting and send it up to your gallery owner. See what they think, but I'm telling you, they're going to love it,” he said.

“You think I should?”

“Can't hurt. But if they say it is trash, don't burn it. I'll buy it to hang right where it is.”

***

Ada tried to call the house phone at the ranch in Texas, but evidently the lines were still down. She tried to call Sage's cell phone and Creed's as well, but service wasn't available and with no electricity, they had no way to recharge their phone batteries anyway. The weatherman on the six o'clock news said that the storm was finally moving east but it was going slow. The last time the Panhandle had seen a storm that severe had been back in the thirties and thousands of people would be without power for several days.

She carried a bucket of milk in each hand from the barn to the house. Essie did need her help, that was for sure. Until she got there, Essie had been doing all the work on the place, and at eighty-six she didn't have a bit of business milking two cows and picking apples. But convincing her to leave the five-acre farm was like getting St. Peter to open up the pearly gates and welcome Lucifer in for a double shot of Jack Daniel's.

Essie had always kept two milk cows. According to her, it was as easy to milk and feed two as one and she sold enough milk to the neighbors to buy her groceries. The small apple orchard produced abundantly and on good years she put quite a wad of money into her bank account, but last year she'd fallen off a ladder while picking apples.

Ada kicked the back door with the toe of her cowboy boot. “Eighty-six and still climbing ladders!”

Essie opened it wide. “Age don't mean I can't fix a roof or pick apples, so stop your bellyachin'. Idabelle called and said that blasted Texas storm is headed toward us now. Weatherman says it's going to build up force until it hits the East Coast and that by the middle of next week, we'll have snow.”

“Long as my flight can get off the ground on Christmas Eve morning, I'm not too worried. I've fed cattle and milked cows in everything from a hundred and fifteen degrees down to ten below zero.”

“You promise you'll come back the day after Christmas? I really like having you here, Ada.”

“Got the ticket already bought and paid for. But you got to promise me that you won't climb any more ladders to pick apples. If I'm going to live here, you are going to have to trust me to do the work.”

The wrinkles around Essie's mouth disappeared when she smiled. “I didn't tell you that just before I fell, I climbed on the roof and fixed a few loose shingles.”

Ada set the milk on the counter. “Great God Almighty, Esther! I'll have to live with you. Your mind has done left your body.”

“No it didn't,” Essie argued. “It's just that my stupid old body ran off and left it. Body is eighty-six. Mind is still twenty-six.”

“Those boys of yours ought to be over here helping you,” Ada fussed.

“Calvin is sixty-eight and he's had two heart attacks. Can't say how it's any big surprise with that woman he's been married to for more than forty years. She'd nag a normal man to death and Calvin ain't never been real healthy. He ain't got no business crawlin' up on a two-story roof and hammerin' shingles back on.”

“Neither do you,” Ada said.

Essie shot her a dirty look. “Omar is sixty-six and he just retired from over at Letterkenny Army Depot. His wife is a whiner and a hypochondriac. You just try namin' a disease and by golly she's either had it or has it ordered for next year. She's got him runnin' back and forth to that drugstore so often it's a wonder to me that his car don't have the place on automatic pilot.”

Ada laughed.

The daughters-in-law had always been a sore spot and age hadn't improved any of them. Essie hadn't really liked any of them from the beginning, but then they hadn't liked her either.

“Well, Lester is only sixty and his wife is busy with her church stuff. He could help while she's off doing her charity work,” Ada said.

Essie shook her head. “Lester got his grandpa's tongue. Not my sweet daddy's but his paternal grandpa's. He'd help but I'd have to endure a lecture about how this house is too big for me and how I should be lookin' at a nursing home. No thank you!”

Ada strained the milk and put it in the extra refrigerator in the pantry. Ten gallons were ready for sale. It would be gone by noon the next day. If they had ten milk cows they couldn't keep up with the demands for it.

She wiped her hands on the butt of her jeans and unsnapped a shirt pocket to take out her cell phone. Sage's cell phone's battery would have long since died, but there was a possibility that the landline would work.

Three rings later, Sage's voice came through.

“Grand! We've got service, at least on this old rotary phone you keep in the kitchen for emergencies. The storm has passed. It's still cloudy and cold. How are you? Are you ready to come home?”

“I am home, Sage. How's the cowboy working out?”

“He didn't lose a single cow and he's been doing the milking. You know how I hate to milk. And I painted a new picture. I took a snapshot and sent it to Marquee but then when I tried to call you the battery had gone dead and the service had gone out again. It's very different than what I'd done before…”

Ada butted in. “Is the cowboy naked in it?”

“Grand!”

“Well, shit! I guess that means you aren't bein' nice to him. Is he bein' nice to you?”

“He's standing right here, Grand.”

“Is he smiling?”

“Yes.”

“Then he knows we're talkin' about him. What do you want me to bring you for Christmas?”

“Just you. Come home and call this whole thing off.”

“Essie needs me. You're a big girl. You don't need me, and you are beginning to cut out. Well, shit! I forgot to charge my phone. I'll call you tomorrow and we'll talk longer.”

“Grand, I'll always need you.”

That was the last thing Ada heard before the line went dead.

“Well?” Essie asked.

Ada sat down at the table. “Service is still spotty even on the old phone and the battery is down on her cell phone. Damned technology! Get used to it all and then it plays out.”

Essie poured two cups of strong black coffee and carried them to the table. “Is he a serial killer or were your instincts right?”

Ada picked up her coffee. “She says she needs me and wants me to come home for Christmas and call it all off.”

“And?” Essie held her breath.

“And her tone says something different. I was right. She just don't know it yet.”

“What if she don't figure it out?”

“She will,” Ada said.

***

Sage grabbed Creed by the arm and danced around the kitchen floor with him. Chores could wait. She'd talked to her Grand and the world was almost right again.

“I heard her voice again, Creed, and she's fine.”

Creed pulled her to his chest and tipped her chin up with his fist. “Why wouldn't she be? She's doing exactly what she wants to do.”

All the air left Sage's lungs. She wanted her grandmother to come home and never leave again, but after only three days she didn't want Creed to leave either. She wanted him to kiss her. She wanted to snuggle into his arms and listen to him describe her paintings to her. She couldn't have it all and she only had until Christmas to decide what she wanted most.

The movement stopped and she looked up at Creed. His lips were coming closer and closer. Warmth shot through her body like she was hooked up to a Jack Daniel's IV. The first touch made her lips so hot that his tongue felt cold when it gently probed her lips and begged for entrance.

It was the first time that she had experienced a kiss that was every bit as intimate as sex, and the feeling was so heady that she wondered if it came complete with a climax. She closed every inch of space between them and savored the touch, the taste, and the moment.

His hands found their way under her knit shirt and splayed out on her back. She wished he'd move them all over her body because they were frying her skin with blistering hot heat, but the only thing that moved was his thumbs. They made lazy deliberate circles right below her bra line.

If he hadn't stopped when he did she would have pulled the shirt off, shucked out of her bra, and stretched her body out on the kitchen table and whined for sex. But it all ended with a gentle kiss to her forehead and one more hug.

“I'm glad you heard from her. I'm sure she's been worried,” Creed said hoarsely.

His kisses.

Her grandmother's voice.

She didn't want to give up either one. Was there a way under heaven she could have both?

Sage had started with a fist full of snow and patted it firmly until it was big enough to roll and then she and Creed worked together. It went fast at first, but the last couple of rolls had taken all their combined strength.

“I reckon that's big enough,” Creed said.

Sage huffed as she leaned against the round ball. “Now what? Even though the next one will be smaller, we won't be able to lift it up on this one, even if we work together.”

“You start rolling one up and I'll go get the tractor. If it can lift a bale of hay from the back of a truck, it'll easily put that next ball up on that one,” Creed said.

Sage picked up a handful of snow and patted it into a ball. She really intended to start rolling but Creed's wide back was just too tempting. She drew an imaginary bull's-eye on the back of his coveralls, drew back, and hurled it like a softball. It hit with a loud thud and if he hadn't grabbed the porch railing, he would have pitched forward into a six-foot drift.

She had another one formed and ready by the time he got his wits about him and turned around. He sidestepped to the right, caught it like an outfielder, and hurled it back at her. She giggled and hid behind the base for the snowman. He hid behind a cedar tree and sunk his glove into the snow. When he peeked around the tree, she got him right in the chest. He threw one and it whizzed past her ear. She reloaded her glove and stood up only to come face to face with him.

The grin on his face said that she'd lost the battle. The warmth spreading through her when she looked at his face said she hadn't lost a damn thing.

He grabbed her around the waist and wrestled her to the ground. From the hips down she was on bare frozen ground. From there up, the snow made a soft mattress. She wasn't aware of hard, cold, or softness because Creed was suddenly on top of her and his lips made their way to hers.

Cold lips tasted different than warm ones. She'd never realized that before or how they could send such a sensation down her entire body. His tongue slid through her parted lips. She dropped the snowball and wrapped her arms around him, pulling him tighter against her.

Damned old coveralls anyway! If they were gone she could feel all those muscles that had taken her down with hardly any effort at all. If he'd make love to her in the snow, she'd gladly die of pneumonia.

He drew back and tried to prop up on his elbows, but they sunk deep into the snow. He sat up and pulled her with him, settling her onto his lap.

“You lose, darlin'.”

She tangled her fingers in his hair and brought his lips back to hers. He wasn't calling the shots and she hadn't lost. She was the winner of the whole war. Her hands went from his hair to his neck, down inside the coverall's collar. She wiggled out of one glove so she could feel bare skin, and she felt him shiver.

“God that feels good,” he said.

“Mmm,” she purred.

“You are something else, Sage Presley.”

His warm breath in her ear traveled down her body like a lightning bolt, creating heat all the way to the deepest reaches. He nibbled on her earlobe and strung light, sweet kisses to her cheeks, her eyelids, the tip of her nose, and finally back to her mouth.

So she was something else, was she? What did that mean in cowboy language, anyway? She hoped it meant that he was as besotted as she was. And there was that blasted word again.
Besotted.
The last time she heard anyone use that was when Aunt Essie was telling the story for the nine millionth time about when she met her husband, Richard.

That nagging common sense voice that she hated reminded her that it would be even harder to watch Creed leave and never look back if they had sex. So when his lips left hers and he nuzzled the inside of her neck, she wiggled free. She almost made it out of his reach, but he got her by an ankle and brought her back down beside him, her cheek in the snow.

He stretched out beside her, kissed her one more time, and then sat up, pulling her into his lap. “It's my day to win, darlin'. Now I'm going to get the tractor, and if another snowball hits me on the way, I'm going to win a helluva lot more.”

Her brown eyes twinkled. “Oh, yeah!”

“Remember what I said: I always tell the truth.”

“Ever had sex in the snow?”

His neck jerked back with a crack and a wicked grin spread across on his face, lighting up his eyes. “What did you say?”

“Ever had sex in the snow?” she repeated.

“You offerin'?”

“I'm askin'.”

He shook his head. “Don't believe I have. You?”

“No, I have not. Well, now that we got that cleared up, I'll start another snowball for the middle of our snowman. I believe we've got enough to build a snow momma and maybe a couple of kids.”

“Darlin', there's enough snow to build a whole new town. What shall we call it?”

She laughed. “Mistletoe.”

He raised one dark eyebrow, retrieved his hat from the snow where it had landed when he attacked her, and set her to one side. “Why Mistletoe?”

“You've got some stuck to your hat, Creed. Every time you go outside you bring more in the house.”

“All right, then our town of snow people shall be called Mistletoe, Texas.” He laughed, got to his feet, and offered her his hand. “I'll be back in a few minutes with the tractor.”

He pulled her up like she was a feather. Not many men could do that without a grimace or even a small grunt, but not Creed. She felt like a princess standing there in her mustard-colored overalls, no makeup, and snow in her hair.

***

Creed had planned to hop on the tractor, drive it through the snow to the front yard, and use the hay spike on the front to help lift Mr. Snowman's midsection. But then he saw the scoop shoved up against the back wall of the barn. He grabbed the toolbox, removed the spike, and put it on the short trailer that could be affixed to the back of the tractor. He attached the trailer and put the scoop on the front of the tractor.

Noel hopped up on the seat beside him and he carefully backed out of the big double doors. Using the scoop like a snowplow, he cut a five-foot swath from barn to house, leaving a pathway with a ridge of slightly dingy snow on either side.

Sage shook her head when he got close and put up a palm. When he shut off the engine, she yelled, “Don't plow all the way up to them! I want them sitting in snow when I take pictures.”

He nodded and hopped down off the tractor seat. Noel chased back and forth on the plowed pathway like a kid with a brand new toy. Angel sat in the window watching the whole affair and twitching her tail.

“We need to let her out. She's getting jealous of Noel,” Creed said.

“But she might run away or get buried in the snow and die and the kittens wouldn't have a momma,” Sage argued.

“She'll be fine, darlin'. Turn her loose to play with us.”

“Promise she won't run away.”

“Not a chance. Her babies are inside and she gets fed in there.”

Creed could hardly believe it when Sage let the cat outside. The miracle was back on track. He was changing out implements when she crossed the distance from porch to tractor in a few long strides and helped him. “Good idea to plow out pathways. It'll sure make chores easier. Look, she's going to sit on the porch. She's not even interested in coming out into the yard.”

“Got the idea from the ones we made when we made the snowman's butt. We've never had snow like this in Ringgold. Noel might entice her out to play but she won't go far.”

“I believe you are right. I wouldn't have thought of plowing pathways. Grand probably would have. She says when she first came here about fifty years ago there were some fierce winters. You about ready to give Frosty a big round belly?” She pointed to the big ball she'd rolled up while he was gone.

He looked down and nodded. “Perfect. But is that his jolly round belly or his wife's butt?”

She studied the size and shape and even the location. “It could be his wife, couldn't it? Okay, that is the wife's butt, but we'll have to move it closer to him. Let's make all the bottoms and the middles and then stack them. It will make fewer tire tracks with the tractor when we put them in place. That way there will still be snow all around them.”

He grabbed a handful of snow and patted it.

The twinkle in her eyes when she looked up had him wondering if she'd start another battle. A part of him hoped she did because the next one was going to involve
him
touching bare skin. The only problem was that when he did, he might not have the willpower to stop.

“Want to go inside and warm up before we start?” Creed asked.

She shook her head. “I was going stir-crazy in the house. I can't remember ever being cooped up like that.” She dropped her snowball on the ground and started rolling, patting the sides firmly as she did.

He did the same. When they were the perfect size he picked up the first one and carried it to the place where the two snow children would stand.

“Right here?” he asked.

“Wow! You are strong,” Sage said.

He made fists and bent his elbows in a wrestler's stance. “Muscles of steel!”

He didn't need to posture to prove that to her. She'd felt those muscles up close and personal and would like nothing better than to feel them even more.

“You wrestle in high school or college?” she asked.

“No, ma'am, not unless you count wrestlin' a bunch of hay bales into the barn. I worked on one ranch or the other during the summer from the time I was thirteen. Even went over the river and helped throw watermelons the summer I was sixteen. I'd rather throw hay from the pasture to the trucks than watermelons into the haulin' busses.”

“Why?”

“Because you can't break hay. You ever haul any?”

“Oh, yeah! This is where I grew up. I know all about hay. You about ready to put this family together?”

His eyes twinkled when he grinned. “I sure am and then we're goin' inside for something hot.”

“Oh?”

“Hot chocolate. Get your mind out of the gutter, woman. We're about to birth a couple of snow children here.”

He loved it when she laughed. It wasn't a sissy giggle but a full-fledged woman's laugh, and when he said something that brought that kind of happiness to the surface, his cowboy heart threw an extra beat into the rhythm.

She had the hiccups the whole time he stacked the snowballs together. While he was on the tractor he took it back to the barn.

When he returned she was standing back, hands on her hips, head cocked to one side.

“Please don't tell me that we have to build a lamb or make a whole nativity. I'm really getting cold,” he said.

“Poor Mrs. Frosty. She looks naked.”

Creed threw his arm around her shoulders. “Shhh, you'll offend her. She'll go shopping as soon as she can, but right now she's thinking about Christmas presents for the kids.”

Sage laughed and patted the snow wife. “Welcome to Mistletoe, Texas, Miz Frosty. Hope you enjoy your stay.”

***

Sage couldn't remember the last time she'd had so much fun.

Maybe it was because she'd been cooped up in the house for three days and cutting out paper dolls would have been a great distraction.

Maybe it was the text message she'd gotten that morning from the gallery owner. She'd said that the mistletoe pictures breathed life and joy and she should bring eight to ten to next year's showing. They were going to bill them as the Sage Presley Mistletoe Collection and start advertising two months before the showing.

Maybe it was Creed who brought out the little girl in her and made her laugh so much. Or perhaps it was a combination of all of the above after being snowed in for so long.

Her nose was numb by the time the snow family had arms of twigs, buttons for eyes, and carrots for noses. She'd found old scarves and hats, plus a purse with a sequined Christmas tree on the outside for Mrs. Frosty. But still there was something missing and Creed's nose testified to the fact that he really was cold.

She pointed at him and smiled.

“What?” Creed asked.

“Your nose is red. Is your middle name Rudolph?”

“Well, darlin', so is yours, and no, my middle name is not Rudolph. Can we go inside? I'll even make the hot chocolate and we can get warm by the fire.”

“Not just yet. Something is still missing.” She clapped her hands when she thought of what they needed for their new little icy family decorating the yard. “I know! Mistletoe. Frosty needs mistletoe hanging from his fingers. His beautiful wife will want a kiss when she comes home from the church social Christmas party.”

“Well, this place seems to grow that stuff with no problem. Let's go hunt some up. I'll back the tractor out again and we'll take a trip over the river and through the woods.” He grabbed her hand and jogged to the barn.

“And back to Grandma's house!” She kept pace with him the whole way.

“And back to my house, not Grandma's house,” he said.

“Not until Christmas,” she told him.

He didn't argue, which made her wonder if he was having second thoughts after living through a Texas-sized snowstorm.

“I thought you were cold,” she changed the subject.

“I am, but you want mistletoe and you'll have mistletoe. Besides, I saw a big chunk of it not far out into the pasture. We could walk there, but it'll be faster on the tractor.”

He motioned toward the snowy white field lying before them. “It seems like sacrilege to mess up something that pretty.”

“Virgin snow is always beautiful, but you'll probably turn the cattle back out of the feedlot before long and they'll mess it up and look, there it is. In that scrub oak tree and not too high up. There it is.”

“Yes, ma'am. That's exactly what I was talking about and I'll use the tractor seat to reach that first limb. What do I get if I bring it all down and don't lose a bit of it?”