The Rancher's Dance (7 page)

But which one
was?

She toyed with the stem of her wineglass and her eyes drifted over the bar. It was more crowded than before, though the families who'd brought kids to eat in the restaurant were being replaced by young adults—most on the obvious prowl.

“Refill?” She glanced away from the dance floor to the Strauss boy and shook her head. “I'm good, thanks.” He quickly moved on and when he did so, Lucy found herself looking straight at Beck who'd come up behind the server.

Her nerves went as tight as piano wire.

There was no use pretending that he'd just happened to notice her. Their tables weren't on the way to anywhere. Not the exit. Not the restroom. Not the long bar itself.

His gaze focused on her leg stretched over the chair between them, the folds of her dress hiding her knee. “Overdoing it seems to be a habit for you.”

The fact that he was right didn't mean she had to acknowledge it. Instead, she lifted her wineglass and the
pale chardonnay that still filled the bottom of it glistened. “Good evening to you, too, Beck.”

His lips twisted and he looked away as his hand closed over the wooden back of the chair. “Looks like they've all abandoned you.”

“No more than you've been,” she pointed out. His son, Nick—a thinner, younger version of him—was dancing with Courtney. His father—a shorter, slightly stockier version—was dancing with Susan Reeves who'd arrived along with her nephew Jake, who was J.D.'s husband.

Beck gave a silent faint nod, acknowledging the point.

She sipped her wine, studying him. Up until now, she'd only seen him wearing T-shirts and worn jeans and tool belts. Tonight, though, he wore a beige button-down shirt that her experienced eye recognized as silk with black jeans and polished boots. He looked casual, sexy and as comfortable now as he did when he was hefting around power tools and lumber that weighed nearly as much as she did.

And just as disturbing.

She drew her leg off the chair. Thanks to the icing she'd given her knee before she'd come into town and the dose of aspirin, it wasn't as painful as it had been earlier that day. For which she was grateful. It was bad enough knowing she'd pushed too hard the day before—again—without letting that fact show to Beck. Again.

“Would you like to sit down?” It seemed only polite to invite him, which didn't explain at all the way she held her breath, waiting for him to shake his head and move on.

He shook his head. Only he didn't move on.

He lifted his chin toward the dance floor. “I thought maybe you'd rather be out there.”

She hesitated, surprised. “Are you asking me to dance?”

His lips thinned again. “I thought about it.” His gaze
skimmed over her. “Not that I figure you ought to be, considering your bad knee and all.”

Something inside her stomach skittered around.

He looked like he wished he'd kept his mouth shut.

So naturally she set down her wineglass and pushed to her feet. “Well, then,” she said sweetly. “How could I possibly turn down such an irresistible invitation?”

As if it were the most natural thing in the world, she wrapped her hand around his wrist, pulling his clamped hand away from the chair and headed toward the dance floor.

H
e should have cut out his tongue.

But now it was too late.

The dancer was turning against him, putting one hand on his chest and drawing his other—the one she was holding—around to the small of her back. She tilted back her head to look up at him and her river of blond hair tickled his arm. “Where's Shelby tonight?”

He didn't know what he'd have done with his hand if she weren't still holding it in place behind her, but he was pretty certain it wouldn't have involved lingering there, absorbing how delicate—how feminine—that faint hollow felt. He stared at the mirror that hung on the wall behind the bar. “Spending the night with her friend, Annie Pope.”

“Ah. She mentioned Annie. Evidently she wants to be a horse?” She smiled slightly.

He knew because he saw it in the mirror.

Hell. Might as well be looking at her face if he was going to watch her anyway.

“She also told me her brother was home for his birthday?”

“For the weekend, yeah. He flies out again tomorrow night. He's taking classes over the summer.”

“Good for him. Must be a hard worker.”

He glanced at his son. “He's a good kid.”

“How old is he?”

“Twenty-one as of today.” He still found it hard to believe.

“Ah.” Her dimple flashed mischievously. “Out for his first drink?”

Beck made a face. “His first legal one anyway. He
is
in college.”

Her smile widened. “What's he studying?”

“Architecture.”

“Following in your footsteps,” she observed. “Makes a father proud.”

He didn't take credit for Nick's successes. That was owed as much to Harmony as it was to him.

“I have to say you don't really look old enough to have a grown son,” she continued.

“Feel old enough,” he murmured.

She moistened her lips, looking strangely discomfited. “Do you, uh, like country music?”

“Only thing I've ever heard playing here.”

Her eyebrows rose. She finally let go of his hand behind her back, which was good.

But all she did was loop her two hands loosely around his neck instead.

Which was bad.

He stared over her head again and wondered what the hell he was doing.

“That wasn't exactly an answer,” she pointed out after a moment.

“It's music,” he said evenly. “It's as good as any other.” Right now the song was going on in a slow, swaying lament which only meant that they were moving in a slow, swaying torment.

“In other words you don't give a rat's patootie.”

He looked down at her, catching the amused glint in her eyes. He felt his lips tilt. “Not really.”

She blinked and suddenly looked away. “So you do remember how.”

Just that abruptly, amusement slid into awareness.

Heat streaked down his spine. Coiled low in his gut.

He wanted to swear.

Holding her in his arms had been a serious lapse in judgment.

Because he remembered how to do a lot of things, and every one of them was banging around inside his head reminding him just how long it had been since he'd been with a woman.

“Remember how to smile, I mean,” Lucy continued, making him wonder if he was that easy to read.

“Yeah.” He cleared his throat. “I remember.” The song ended, moving seamlessly into another, and he stepped back as the beat picked up. “That's it for me,” he said. “Thanks.”

She said nothing as he backed away. Just watched him with those pale eyes that seemed to see too much.

Like the fact that he was escaping, pure and simple.

Nick had moved on from the statuesque blonde to a petite brunette, and his father was still sticking close to the Reeves woman. Neither one noticed when Beck aimed straight for the exit.

Outside, he sucked in a deep breath of fresh night air.

The music from inside the bar was muted only slightly.
He shoved his hands through his hair and sat down on the bench that faced the empty street.

He sighed and stared down at the wedding ring on his hand.

He'd hawked his beater of a car when he was eighteen to buy their plain gold wedding rings, and twenty-one years later, he was still wearing it.

Aside from a wristwatch, it was the only jewelry he'd ever worn. He curled his hand into a fist. For so long the ring had been as much a part of him as the finger it circled.

“You all right?”

He jerked and looked up.

Lucy was standing beside him, holding two longnecks in her hand.

“You make a habit of sneaking up on men?”

Instead of being put off by his terseness, her lips curved faintly, though not really with amusement. “Apparently so.” Her voice was mild and she held out one of the beer bottles. “Want it?”

He wanted lots of things, most of which began and ended with a grave in Colorado. If he hadn't had Nick and Shelby to consider, he'd have come close to climbing in one, too.

But he hadn't. And he was here. And an annoyingly appealing woman was standing nearby, filling his senses with more life than he wanted to acknowledge.

But he unfisted his hand and closed it around the cold bottle anyway. “Drinking on a public street's probably frowned on around these parts.”

“Probably.” She twisted open her beer and sat down beside him. “But I've got family connections to the sheriff.” She softly clinked the bottom of her bottle against his. “No worries.”

Even if she didn't have connections, what was the worst that would happen? He'd get a ticket?

Small potatoes in the scheme of things.

He opened his own beer.

And they sat there in silence for several minutes while the muted music from inside throbbed through the wooden bench beneath them.

He stared at the park across the street. There were some kids chasing each other around and their carefree laughter floated on the air.

“There's a pavilion over there in the park where the teenagers go to neck,” she said. “At least they used to when I grew up here.”

He didn't look at her. It had been so long since he'd carried on a conversation having nothing to do with his family or work that he could practically taste the rust. “Did you?”

“Neck? Sure. A few times.” She held the bottle loosely between her fingers and swirled it around a little.

He noticed, though, that she didn't drink much of it.

The beer had just been an excuse.

To come out here.

With him.

Knowing it was one thing. Knowing what to do about it was another. And he wasn't even going to touch how he felt about it with a ten-foot pole.

“I'm sorry about your wife, Beck.”

He went still.

Dozens…maybe even hundreds…of people had offered the same sentiment over the past three years. His employees at the architectural firm that he'd walked away from. His friends. His family. Even near strangers. He should be used to hearing it by now.

God knows he'd gotten used to saying the usual “thank you” and moving on as quickly as possible.

Instead, the words that he heard coming out of his lips weren't usual at all. “I loved her.”

His jaw tightened and he stared even harder at the park across the street. He couldn't see the kids over there anymore. Maybe they'd gone to the pavilion. Maybe they'd just gone home.

“That's the way it should be.” Lucy's voice was soft.

Wistful.

He looked over at her. She was watching the park, too, her long hair streaming over one slender shoulder.

“What do you want from me?”

He knew what his body wanted from
her
—something he had no intention of indulging which was why it was better all around if he stayed away from her. He hadn't cheated on his wife when she was alive. He wasn't sure he was ready to do it now either.

But he was still a man. With the predictable reactions around an incredibly sexy woman.

But women? They had different things that drove them. He'd figured out one woman in his lifetime. Wasn't that enough for one man?

The last thing he wanted to do was start wondering what exactly drove
her.

He didn't want to be interested, but no matter how hard he tried to pretend he wasn't, he was.

“What do I want?” Lucy's head slowly turned. Her eyes met his. “I don't know. Maybe just to see you smile again. A real smile. The kind that stretches all the way across your face.”

He stretched his lips into a humorless smile. “Satisfied?”

She didn't look offended. “Not yet.” She took a brief sip
of her beer and looked back out at the park. She stretched out her injured leg and pointed her toes, flat thin-strapped sandal and all, then lowered it again. It seemed such an absent motion that he wondered if she even knew she was doing it.

At least it was easier to focus on that curiosity than it was on the unwanted attraction nagging persistently at him, reminding him that his heart might be dead, but the rest of him was not. “You grew up here, didn't you?”

“On the Lazy-B?” She nodded. “Yup. Loved it, too.”

“How'd you end up being a dancer?” There was no dance school in Weaver now—he knew because it was one of the few things that Shelby had actually complained about to him. But maybe there had been a studio when Lucy'd been a girl.

“I took lessons. Not in Weaver,” she allowed, as if she'd been reading his mind. “My dad had to drive me miles and miles for them.” Her lips curved. “Usually griping all the while.”

He knew Cage Buchanan. The guy was devoted to his family. “I doubt it.”

Her smile widened. “Okay, maybe he complained only some of the time.” She stretched out her other leg and pointed her toes. “But it all paid off. Dancing was always my dream. My parents helped me make it a reality.”

“And now ballet's your life.”

She lowered her leg again. “Right.” She lifted her beer bottle. Took a longer pull. Stared across the street. “Everything I ever wanted was in the ballet,” she murmured softly.

Then she let out a breath and shook her head a little.

He eyed her profile. It wasn't perfectly in balance. Her narrow nose turned up a little too much at the end. Her chin had a little too much of a stubborn tilt.

And when she was lying—and he was pretty sure that she was—the right corner of her soft lips turned down. “What's wrong with your knee?”

“Sprain.” She hesitated a moment. “A pretty serious one.”

“It'll heal?”

She nodded. Less hesitation this time, but something about the way she held her shoulders made him wonder.

“And then you'll go back to New York,” he concluded. “How'd you sprain it?”

She lifted her beer bottle again, only to look at it for a moment and lower it again to her lap. “By falling down the stairs after I found my boyfriend in our bed with another girl.” She gave him a quick look and rolled her eyes, looking embarrassed. “I don't know why I told you that.”

“Is it true?”

She let out a silent, humorless laugh. No curving down at the corner of her lips at all. “It's true all right.” She grimaced. “I just haven't told anyone else that's how I ended up like this.” She swished the fabric covering her knee.

“Who was he?”

She didn't answer for a moment. “The choreographer and artistic director for the ballet company I danced for.”

He didn't know a lot about how ballet companies operated but he could make a guess. “Probably makes it hard to work with him now.”

She tilted her head, acknowledging. “Particularly when he replaced me as the principal ballerina with
her
as well only a few weeks earlier.”

“Guy sounds like an ass. Messing around where he works?” He shook his head.

“Mmm.” She shifted. “That's not entirely fair of me, though. I don't know if you can liken the ballet world to most other things, but it's pretty much a hotbed of drama.
And whether I like it or not, Lars was doing his job. Doing the best thing for the company. I'm thirty-three.” She lifted her shoulders and grimaced. “It's not as if I expected to keep the position forever. Much as my pride would like to think otherwise.”

Thirty-three looked pretty prime to him, but admitting it aloud didn't seem like a very smart move. Not when he was doing his best to ignore that particular fact. “What does that mean for you, then?”

“No longer being the star of the show?” Her shoulder brushed his as she lifted her beer bottle. “It's just a hitch in the road,” she dismissed. Her gaze glanced off his again. “How long were you married?”

He wasn't sure if they were in some sort of verbal dance or sword play. She clearly didn't want to talk about her career any more than he wanted to talk about himself. He could end it, simply enough, by getting up and walking away.

His butt stayed planted right where it was, though.

“Eighteen years.” He knew he sounded irritated, but it was directed a lot more at himself than it was at her.

“That's even longer than I've been a professional dancer.”

“Don't sound so surprised. My son turned twenty-one today. Yeah, it was a long time.” He flexed his jaw that had gone tight again. “It should have been longer.”

She said nothing. But after a moment, her hand settled lightly on his arm.

He didn't brush it off even though warmth ripped through him.

And they continued to sit there until his beer bottle was no longer cold beneath his fingers and his father finally came looking for him.

“Been looking for you for a half hour,” Stan said and
didn't bother trying to hide his curiosity as he looked from Beck to Lucy and back again.

Beck stood. “I got tired of watching you flirt with Susan Reeves,” he returned. “Where's Nick?”

“He's still inside with that pretty little brunette. Tabby, I think her name is.”