Ultimate Texas Bachelor (7 page)

When he had ended his stint on
Bachelor Bliss,
Brad hadn't thought he would want anything to do with romance ever again. Lainey made him reconsider. And it wasn't just her looks, or the way she sassed and challenged him. Or even the way she had kissed him back, all the while swearing the lip-to-lip contact meant nothing. It was the way she listened to him. The way she knew what questions to ask, when to push, and when to back off.

She wanted to get to know him, the real him. Not the stud on TV or on the cover of magazines. More surprising still was the fact he wanted to really get to know her, too.

Not that it was going to be easy. She seemed a lot more comfortable asking the questions than answering them.

She tilted her head back to regard the PVC piping that ran the length of the barn's center, then spread out over each of the stalls. Four-foot fans were placed forty feet apart. Sprinkler heads were mounted eight feet over the floor above each stall. “Wow. This looks state-of-the-art,” she said as she walked across the scrubbed cement floor.

“Pretty much.” Brad continued mounting the thermostat and timer control on the wall just to the left of the door.

Lainey stood, legs braced apart, hands on her hips. “Have you ever done this before?”

He couldn't say why exactly—usually Brad didn't care what people thought of him—but he wanted Lainey to be impressed with his accomplishments. “I helped put in a system on a ranch in Colorado,” he told her matter-of-factly.

She turned around slowly to get a full 360-degree view of his handiwork, and gave him one of her in return. Brad's mouth went dry as he noted the perfection of her curves. “Is it all for fire safety?”

“There is an overheat- and fire-detection system in here.” Tearing his gaze from her breasts, Brad pointed out the components to her. “And the sprinkler system will be hooked up to that, as well. But what I'm installing right now is a cooling system that will protect animals against heat stress.”

Lainey wrinkled her nose. “Is that a problem?”

“It can be,” Brad replied soberly, “especially for newly weaned calves, or animals that have just been transported from one ranch to another.”

“I guess you've had experience with that, too.”

Brad nodded. “I worked a ranch in west Texas a couple years ago where they would have lost half their new calves
if they hadn't had a system like this.” He came down the ladder, thinking that standing there face-to-face with her would prompt him to knock off the romanticizing. It just made it worse. That close, he could see the softness of her lips, the flush of color in her cheeks, the clear interest in her forest green eyes.

As the moment drew out, with neither one of them saying anything, the awareness between the two of them increased. Finally, Brad cleared his throat, knowing it was either get back to business or kiss her. “Did you need something?”

Lainey blinked, clearly coming back to reality as slowly and reluctantly as he was. “Um, yes. Lewis is going into Laramie to pick up some pizza for us—apparently your supply of frozen dinners has dwindled precariously and I haven't had time to buy any groceries, either—and he wanted to know if you had any requests.”

Brad wasn't sure whether to thank Lewis for the interruption sent his way—or damn him. One thing for sure, he'd be thinking about Lainey, and the way she looked right now, for days and nights to come. Pizza. What did he want on his pizza? “No anchovies on mine,” Brad said finally.

Lainey grinned. And still didn't leave. “Okay, that covers what you don't want,” she teased. “What
do
you want?”

You,
Brad thought, almost as shocked by the thought as he was aroused.
Beneath me. Hair spread across my pillow. Arms and legs locked around me. And me so deep inside of you I don't know where I end and you begin.

Not that he had any right to be thinking that way.

He had no intention of getting intimately involved with any woman again anytime soon. And Lainey Carrington was the kind of woman who would demand emotional involvement.

Lainey Carrington was a forever kind of woman. And he was, as had been pointed out to him more than once today, a short-term kind of guy. At least as far as everyone else was concerned.

But that didn't mean he couldn't want to make love to her. Wanting was not out of the question.

Acting on those desires was.

“Well?” Lainey's impatient prodding brought him out of his reverie. “What do you want on your pizza?”

Brad straightened. “Whatever you and Lewis want is fine with me,” Brad said, distracted at the sight of the Lexus pulling into the driveway. Instead of stopping at the house, as most visitors did, the driver appeared headed directly toward the two of them. “Friends of yours?” he said.

“Oh, my!” The paper in Lainey's hand fluttered to the ground as the rear door of the SUV opened and a towheaded kid sprang out and dashed toward her.

“Mommy!” The little boy threw himself into Lainey's arms.

“Petey!” She hugged him to her tightly. He hugged her back just as hard.

Seeing the resemblance—and the affection—between the two made Brad smile. Lainey's son had her intelligent eyes and warm smile. Even the stubborn way they held their chin was the same.

“Who's this?” Petey asked, looking at Brad.

“This is Brad McCabe. He and his brother Lewis live here at the Lazy M Ranch. Brad—my son, Petey.”

Brad shook Petey's hand with the same courtesy and respect he'd offer a grown man. “Nice to meet you, Petey.”

The little boy looked awestruck in the way city kids who have never been on an actual ranch usually do. He tipped his face up to Brad's. “Are you a real cowboy?”

“Yes.”

“Do you ride horses and everything?”

“I will as soon as we get some, later this week. Right now, we're still in the process of fixing up the stables and corrals to get ready for 'em.”

Petey gazed at the barn and pastures wistfully. “I always wanted to ride a horse.”

Brad recalled the joy he'd felt when he first sat a horse at his uncle's ranch. It was an experience no boy should miss. “Well, maybe if your mom says it's okay, I can teach you how.” Brad looked at Lainey for permission.

Obviously embarrassed, she tucked Petey closer to her side and said, “We didn't mean to put you on the spot.”

“It'd be my pleasure,” Brad replied, meaning it. There were some things he could still do without a bank loan or a gentleman's reputation.

Petey beamed, thrilled.

Brad cast a surreptitious look at the couple who had driven Petey out to the ranch. They were still in the car and appeared to be deep in some sort of serious discussion that his gut told him spelled trouble.

“So are you surprised to see me?” Petey demanded, going back into Lainey's arms for another exuberant hug, as the elegant-looking couple finally emerged from the front seat of the Lexus. The woman had carefully done hair and makeup. She was wearing an expensive white linen dress, and a sweater tied around her shoulders. Her companion had thinning hair and a slight paunch. He was wearing a grass-green golf shirt and plaid slacks that belonged on a country club tee-off area.

“I sure am,” Lainey said, ruffling her son's hair.

Lainey paused just long enough to introduce her sister- and brother-in-law, Bart and Bunny Carrington, then asked them, “What happened? I thought you weren't coming back until the end of the week!”

“Petey was a little homesick,” Bunny said.

“Actually,” Bart added, “the twins wanted to come home, too.”

Bunny's smile looked frozen. “Suddenly they feel they're too old for family vacations,” she said, unable to completely disguise the hurt in her tone.

Bart shrugged. “I think they just wanted to be with their
friends. They want to spend as much time as possible with each other since they're all going off to different colleges in the fall. And I can't say I blame them—they have big changes ahead.”

“For you, too,” Lainey returned perceptively. “I'm sure you're really going to miss the girls.”

“It's time for them to spread their wings,” Bunny claimed with a smile. “And besides, we'll still have Petey.”

Except, Brad thought, Petey was not their son. He was Lainey's. Hence, it really wasn't the same, no matter how much they tried to tell themselves it was.

The back door of the ranch house banged open and Lewis came bounding down the steps, car keys in hand. In his '80s slacks and tie-dyed McCabe Game Company T-shirt, he looked more like the proverbial slacker than the wealthy CEO of his own company. A fact Brad knew Lewis used to sort out the people who would treat him well no matter who he was, from the hangers-on, who were only interested in him for his newfound wealth.

Lewis smiled as he reached the group, and went straight for Lainey's son. “You must be Petey.”

Petey cocked his head. He looked at Brad, then back at Lewis. “How'd you know that?” Petey asked Lewis, perplexed.

Lewis ran his hand through his spiked hair. “'Cause your mom talks about you constantly.”

“Oh, yeah? What does she say?”

“The usual. That you're the smartest, cutest, nicest kid who ever lived.”

Petey looked at Brad for confirmation. Brad nodded. “It's true,” he said. It had been obvious from the first that Petey meant the world to Lainey. A fact that pleased her son no end.

“And guess what else?” Lewis continued affably, while Bart and Bunny watched, their expressions wary, almost jealous. “I heard you like playing computer games.” Oblivious
to the looks he was getting from Petey's aunt and uncle, Lewis bumped fists and slapped palms with Petey in the multistep greeting currently popular with kids. “And as it happens, I'm designing some for eight- to ten-year-olds that I want you to help me test.”

“Really?” Petey looked as if he couldn't believe his good luck. First, horses, and now this.

“Meantime,” Lewis said, as soon as he, too, had been formally introduced to Bart and Bunny Carrington, “I'm starving. So what do you all want on your pizza?”

Bunny blinked. “You're making
pizza?
” Obviously pizza wasn't a staple of her high-class life.

“Heck, no,” Lewis retorted cheerfully, before Lainey could stop him. “We don't have the makings for that in the house. We hardly have any groceries.”

Thanks, Lewis, for thoroughly alarming my sister-in-law.
Lainey smiled at Bunny and Bart reassuringly. “I'm going to remedy that first thing tomorrow,” she said.

“Meanwhile,” Lewis continued affably, “we've got to eat, so I'm driving in to Laramie to pick up a few pies at Mac Callahan's Pizza & Subs. And, of course, you're welcome to stay for dinner.”

“Pizza is hardly a proper meal,” Bunny countered, her expression stiff with disapproval.

Brad shrugged, siding with Lewis. “I don't know why you'd say that,” Brad said lazily. “It's got all the food groups.”

“Yeah, and I like it a lot!” Petey piped up, eager to be one of the guys.

Bunny looked at Lainey. “Perhaps Petey should return to Dallas with us, now that he's seen you,” she said sweetly.

“No!” Petey grabbed on to Lainey's waist and held tight. “I'm staying with my mommy!”

Bart—who looked like he didn't want any trouble—headed back to the Lexus. “I'll get his suitcase.”

Bunny turned her withering glare on Bart.

“Does this mean you're not staying for dinner?” Lewis asked, still looking eager to get on the road to town.

Bunny narrowed her eyes at him. “Obviously not,” she replied coolly.

Lainey wrapped her arms around her son's shoulders and tried desperately to end this encounter on a pleasant note. “Petey, did you thank your aunt and uncle for the lovely trip to Florida?”

“Thank you. I had fun even if I did get homesick and miss my mom,” Petey said sincerely.

Bunny's expression gentled. She leaned down so she and Petey were face-to-face. “We had fun, too,” she told Petey warmly, giving him a hug.

Bart returned with Petey's suitcase. “Here you are, sport.”

“Thanks, Uncle Bart.” Petey hugged him, too.

“Thank you, both,” Lainey said. “I appreciate everything you've done for us.”

“Yes, well, we're going to have to sit down and talk soon,” Bunny said.

Lainey felt a shiver of unease. Bunny's tone could only mean trouble.

Fortunately, not tonight.

Bart took his wife's hand and drew her away. He appeared as determined to end this conversation as his wife was to prolong it. “We'll see you all later,” he said.

 

“P
IZZA FOR BREAKFAST, TOO
!” Petey said early the next morning. “This is so great!”

“Don't get used to it,” Lainey warned. “Starting tomorrow, we're back to the usual eggs, cereal, fruit and pancakes.”

“Is that what cowboys eat?” Petey asked as Brad entered the ranch house kitchen. Lainey was already hard at work lining shelves, while her son sat on a stool at the counter, eating off a paper plate.

Brad flashed one of the smiles that was all too rare these days. “Cowboys usually eat whatever is around.” Brad peered into the fridge, sighed, and brought out the pizza box. “Which in this case is not much.”

“I know. That's how come I'm having soda with my pizza this morning instead of milk or juice. Mommy says we're all out and we have to go to the store.”

“I know.” Lewis came in, coffee cup in hand. “Sorry about that.” He helped himself to a slice of pizza and ate it cold. “Guess I should have picked up some last night when I got the pizza and wings.”

Lainey waved off his apology. “It's fine. I need to run into town and get groceries today, anyway.”

“What would you think about cooking for all of us?” Brad asked.

Surprised, Lainey turned to him.

“I know it's not in your job description,” Brad said. “But while you're here, it sure would help out.”

“No problem,” Lainey said. “I love to cook.”

“Yeah, my mommy is real good at that,” Petey said between mouthfuls. He swung his legs back and forth. “You just got to tell her what you want and she'll make it for you.”

Lewis and Brad grinned, seeming both amused and touched by Petey's enthusiasm. Lewis looked at Lainey. “As long as you're going into Laramie, you want to bring Petey by the McCabe Game Company testing facility for a session?”

“Can I, Mom?” Petey practically bounded off his stool he was so excited by the prospect.

Lainey looked at Lewis. “You're sure it's okay?”

“He can stay all day and come home with me tonight, if you like,” Lewis said. “We have a group of eight- and nine-year-olds coming in today to play some of the prototypes, and to talk to the focus-group leaders about what they think. Annie and Travis's sons, Kurt and Kyle, are going to be there. If Petey would like to participate, it would be great.”

“Thank you.” Lainey smiled. She looked at her son. “Sounds like you've got quite a big day ahead of you, then.”

Lewis said to Brad, “You okay with helping Lainey with the groceries?”

Brad practically spit out his coffee he was so surprised. It was all Lainey could do to keep her face expressionless. She couldn't imagine a more unlikely partner.

“We need a lot of stuff,” Lewis continued. “We can't expect Lainey to carry it all herself.”

If Lainey hadn't known better, she would have felt Lewis was matchmaking. As Brad and Lewis stared at each other, a challenge seemed to pass between them. Over what exactly, Lainey wasn't certain.

“Sure,” Brad said finally. “Why not?”

 

“Y
OU DON'T HAVE TO DO THIS
,” Lainey told Brad, outside the supermarket. Although, it would help her cause—and his attempts to put the
Bachelor Bliss
fiasco behind him—if the two of them did become friends.

Brad tossed her a look that quickly had her heart racing. He pulled out a cart for them. “You think I'm not capable of a little grocery shopping?” he teased her.

“I didn't say that.” Feeling she had no choice but to brazen her way through this sticky situation, Lainey led the way toward the fresh produce aisle once they were inside the store.

“But?” Brad tossed a bag of baby carrots into their cart.

Lainey perused the lettuce, finally deciding on Boston, red-leaf and romaine. Her breath hitched in her chest as she turned her face up to his. Just being near him like this made her blood heat and played havoc with her objectivity. Not good for a reporter on a story. “It's not really most men's idea of a good time.” And it certainly didn't fit his reputation.

“I don't know about that.” Brad stopped to inspect the tomatoes. “Personally, I like perusing the persimmons.”

Lainey grinned at his joke. How did an ordinary summer
morning suddenly end up feeling so much like a date, albeit an arranged one? “Have you ever even eaten a persimmon?” she asked, putting bags of oranges, apples, lemons and limes into the cart.

“I'm not sure.” Brad loaded a ten-pound bag of potatoes and a five-pound bag of onions onto the bottom of the cart. “What exactly
is
a persimmon?”

Lainey looked around and didn't see any in the store just then. The Dallas markets would have had them.

“It's sort of like a plum,” she said finally, aware how cozy and domestic this felt, how unlike her marriage to Chip. There, the lines had been strictly drawn. He was the one in control, she was the subordinate. Chip had never done anything remotely domestic. Chip had hired people for that. Brad just seemed to do what needed to be done, without giving too much thought to whether he was “too good” for it or not. Lainey liked that about Brad. She wanted to see it revealed in what was written about him. And if she had anything to say on the matter, it would be.

“Oh. Well.” He swaggered closer, his steps long and lazy. “Maybe I have tasted a persimmon, then.”

“And maybe not?”

He shrugged, looking amused. “I don't always know what it is I'm eating.”

Lainey hadn't, either, when she first married Chip and moved to Dallas.

Brad leaned closer. His warm breath whispered past her ear. “What's so funny?” His voice was sexy, self-assured.

She shrugged and stepped back. She had to keep some distance here. And she couldn't do that when they were close enough to feel each other's body heat. “Just thinking about my first taste of escargot.” She forced her tone to be casual, unlike her thoughts.

His gaze moved over her in disbelief. “You ate snails?”

“Only because I didn't know what they were.”

His brown eyes lit up merrily. “And when you did?”

Lainey rolled her eyes. She struggled not to notice how good he looked, with a cowboy hat pulled low over his brow, how ruggedly at ease. “Let's just say I never acquired a taste for them.”

“Or armadillo, either, apparently.”

They grinned, recalling her first day on the ranch. Lainey was aware they were flirting. And that Brad suddenly seemed like the old Brad she remembered. Carefree, happy-go-lucky, flirtatious. It was good to see. Their exchange was putting her in a reckless, lighter-of-heart mood, too. “What's put you in such good spirits?”

Brad's smile broadened. He shrugged. “The thought of a home-cooked meal tonight?”

It had to be more than that, Lainey thought. “You haven't tasted my…” Lainey stopped as she saw a man in a tropical-print shirt, Bermuda shorts and straw hat snapping photos of them through the plate-glass window in front of the store.

 

B
RAD SAW THE COLOR DRAIN
abruptly from Lainey's face. Instinctively, he moved closer, cupped a protective hand on her slender shoulder. “What is it?”

Lainey's face grew even paler. “That man,” she whispered. Standing stiff as a statue, she nodded toward the front of the store.

Brad turned in the direction of her gaze. “I don't see anything.”

Lainey swallowed. “I could have sworn that tourist out there was taking pictures of us inside the store.”

“Looks like he is with his family,” Brad said, as the man directed a woman and two teenage girls—also tourists—to stand in front of the windows, just beneath the sign.

“I'm sorry. For a moment there, I thought we were being stalked,” Lainey said.

Brad took their basket and guided it toward the dairy aisle at the rear of the store. “It wouldn't be the first time.”

“Since the show ended?”

He nodded grimly. “You wouldn't believe the number of people trying to make a buck off me. The first couple weeks after the last show aired were the craziest. We had tabloid reporters everywhere. Harassing my family, friends, trying to find out where I was.”

This wasn't the place or time Lainey had figured on having this conversation. But never one to look a gift horse in the mouth, she said, “It's probably not going to stop, you know.”

He looked over at her.

“As long as there are questions, there will be reporters and writers trying to find out the answers to them. The quickest way to end it is to find someone you trust, and just tell them your side of the story.”

 

I
F
B
RAD DIDN'T KNOW BETTER
, he'd think she was one of
them
. But that was ridiculous. Lainey was a homemaker, and temporary-professional-organizer-slash-household-manager. Not a bloodthirsty reporter. “They're never going to go away.”

“They will once the real story is out there,” Lainey persisted, as she added a selection of cheeses, milk and butter to the cart. “Haven't you heard the saying? The only thing worse than no news is old news.”

Brad added eggs and fresh corn and flour tortillas, too. “People will forget,” he insisted, wishing she would do what everyone else who knew him had finally done and just drop it.

“No, they won't.” Lainey continued pestering him. “Not around here. Fifty years from now, everyone who knows you will be still be wondering why you dumped Yvonne Rathbone in front of an audience of seventeen million people.”

“So it will be one of the great mysteries of all time. So what?” Brad's expression hardened as he pushed the cart toward the meat case.

“So I would think you'd want to get on with your life,” Lainey told him passionately.

“In case you haven't noticed? I am.”

Lainey fell silent. She seemed to have realized, Brad noted, that she had overstepped her bounds by a whole hell of a lot.

The rest of the shopping was done in relative silence. Eventually, Brad had to go back and get another cart. They filled that one to overflowing, too, then headed toward the checkout lines.

“I want to split the groceries with you,” Lainey said as they reached the conveyer belt.

“Not necessary. Lewis said room and board was included, so he and I will pay for them.”

Lainey got out her billfold at the same time as he did. “We'll put it on my card—you and Lewis can reimburse me for half later.”

Brad knew he had offended—or maybe just disappointed?—her with his refusal to go public with his side of the story. But she seemed to be taking it awfully personally. Too personally. Which was odd, he mused as their groceries were scanned and sacked. He had never figured her for one of those women who always had to be right….

Finally, the total appeared. Lainey removed the bank card from her wallet and slid it through the machine mounted on the counter. “Debit or credit?” the clerk asked.

“Debit,” Lainey said.

The clerk punched in a few numbers. Frowned. Punched them in again. “I'm sorry.” She looked at Lainey. “It won't take it—insufficient funds.”

Lainey did a double take. Her cheeks grew pink. “Try the credit, then,” she said finally. Turning to Brad, she murmured, “There must be some screwup at the bank. I've got plenty of balance in there to cover this transaction.”