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She opened it and then she was in his arms, her face raised for a kiss. He didn’t deny her. He wrapped his arms around her and lowered his mouth to hers. Her lips were invitingly soft and hot. Instantly, a fire of hunger leaped into his veins.
He couldn’t believe that he had no memories of kissing her last night. Before he followed through on his desire to deepen the kiss, he dropped his arms and stepped back. “I’ll see you at six tonight,” he said.
“I’ll be waiting,” she replied.
Sawyer practically ran for Clay’s truck. He got in on the passenger side and turned to the blond-haired driver. “Clay, you’ve got to help me out, man. I guess I did something crazy last night and I don’t remember it and now I’m in way over my head.”
Clay released a dry chuckle. “Welcome to the world of drunk adulting.”
Chapter 2 (#u482ac5fa-deb4-5c38-a359-10163dbfd347)
Janis couldn’t help the bouts of laughter that overtook her throughout the course of the day. Each time she thought of the stunned look on Sawyer’s face when he’d first awakened, she got the giggles.
His copper-colored eyes had radiated a quiet panic as he’d maneuvered the morning conversation in a way for her not to know he had no memory of them having sex.
Of course he had no memory. Absolutely nothing had happened between them. He had slept soundly through the night while sleep had remained elusive for her because she’d been so acutely aware of him next to her in the bed.
His scent had surrounded her and she’d tried to match her breathing to his. She’d wondered what it would really be like to make love with him.
What she’d done to him was wrong on so many levels, but, if given the same opportunity, she would do it again. What if another woman had gotten him to go home with her while he’d been blindly drunk?
It would be easy to lift his wallet or to make him believe he was a baby daddy or to kill him when he was in that kind of condition.
No hint of laughter left her lips as she thought of all the bad things that could happen to him. He was lucky his fellow cowboys babysat him when he passed out. But he was a grown man and shouldn’t have to rely on the kindness of others to see him home safe and sound.
She’d tell him the truth tonight over dinner. She had no idea how he would react. It was possible her little ploy would make him so angry he’d never speak to her again. Hopefully, he’d take it all in good humor and see that the intent behind it was good and she’d meant him no harm.
Still, her heart raced as she dressed for the evening out. Was it beating more frantically because she didn’t know what to expect from him when she told him the truth? Or was the quickened rhythm because she was finally going to spend some quality time with the man she’d had an interest in for so long?
Dinner at the café wasn’t exactly a formal affair, so she pulled on a pair of jeans and topped them with a coral-colored sweater she knew complemented her chin-length brown hair and brown eyes.
At five to six that evening she stood at the window next to the door with her coat in hand. March had definitely roared in like a lion, hanging on to the cold and blustery winds of winter.
She was ready for spring, with warm breezes and the scent of new grass and flowers in the air. A smile touched her lips as a memory of her father jumped into her mind.
Her father had loved spring, too. One day, when she was about ten years old, he’d pulled her out of the house and onto the front lawn. Together they had stretched out on the ground. “Listen,” he’d said.
“What am I listening to?” she’d asked.
“The earth’s heartbeat,” he’d replied. “Sometimes it’s just nice to be quiet and listen.”
A sharp pain of grief pierced through her heart. Her dad had died of a heart attack when Janis was sixteen. That was the day every ounce of love had been taken from Janis’s world.
The pain was vanquished by the sight of Sawyer’s truck pulling into the small parking lot.
Her heart began to beat with the anticipation and excitement of the evening to come in his company.
Before he could get out of the truck, she pulled on her coat and stepped outside the door. She ran to the passenger door and got in.
“Hi,” she greeted cheerfully.
“Hi, yourself,” he replied. “You know, I would have walked up to your door to get you like a proper gentleman if you hadn’t run out so quickly.” He pulled out of the parking area behind the bar and onto Main Street.
“There was no reason for you to get out in the cold,” she replied. The interior of the truck smelled pleasant and masculine, with hints of rich leather and his woodsy cologne.
“Are you hungry?” he asked.
“I’m starving. What about you?”
“I can always eat, but tonight was a good night to head to the café instead of eating at the ranch. Cookie made meatloaf and I’m not particularly partial to it.”
“What’s your favorite meal?”
She noted how his stiff shoulders began to relax as the conversation remained light and easy. The poor man was probably afraid she was going to bring up last night. She didn’t intend to even mention it until the end of this night when she’d tell him the truth.
“As far as I’m concerned, there’s nothing better than a big, juicy cheeseburger. What about you?”
“French fries. I like them plain or smothered with cheese or covered with chili.”
He laughed and flashed her a quick glance. “That’s not a real meal.”
“Bet me,” she replied, making him laugh once again.
By that time they’d arrived at the Bitterroot Café. Sundays, the place was usually packed at lunchtime, after church services let out. But on Sunday evenings there were not too many diners.
Janis was glad. It would make conversation easier. She knew she was intensely physically attracted to Sawyer, but she also recognized that she didn’t know that much about him. By the end of this meal, her attraction to him just might be dead.
Amanda Wright greeted them as they walked in. A month ago, she’d bought the café from Daisy Martin, a fiery redhead who had owned it for as long as anyone could remember.
Janis knew that wasn’t the only change that had occurred in Mandy’s life. A month and a half ago, after a whirlwind romance, she and Brody Booth had run off to Las Vegas and gotten married.
“Lately it seems like weddings are in the air in Bitterroot,” Janis said once they were seated in a booth and had shrugged out of their coats.
Sawyer’s gaze turned wary and she couldn’t help but laugh. “Don’t worry, Sawyer, shotgun weddings went out of style a long time ago. Besides, I don’t have a big brother or a daddy to come after you.”
He visibly relaxed. “But isn’t June Little, who works at the mercantile, your mother?”
It was Janis’s turn to stiffen slightly. “She is, but I don’t have any kind of a relationship with her right now.”
“That’s a shame,” he replied.
Before the conversation could go any further, Carlie Martin appeared to take their orders.
“How’s it going, Carlie?” Janis asked the pretty blond waitress.
“It’s going,” she replied. “We had a hellacious crowd in for lunch but, thankfully, it’s been a fairly slow night, so we’ve all managed to catch our breaths.”
After a little more small talk, Sawyer ordered a burger and fries. Janis opted for a chicken and bacon wrap, a new item on the menu, and a side of fries.
“Tell me why you don’t have a relationship with your mother?” he asked once Carlie had left the booth.
“Oh, it’s a long, boring story. I’d much rather hear about you,” she replied. “Through the years I’ve heard so many rumors about all you men on the Holiday Ranch.”
He grinned. “Probably at least half of them aren’t true.”
She could listen to the sound of his deep laughter forever. “So, you weren’t all found under lily pads in Big Cass’s pond.” She’d wanted him to laugh again and she was successful.
“No,” he replied, a sparkle of humor in his eyes. “And we weren’t all brought in from a reform school when we were kids. But we were all runaways or throwaways who took to the streets when we were young.”
“And which one were you? A runaway or a throwaway?”
“A runaway,” he replied.
“Why?” These were the kinds of things she wanted to know. Who he was as a man, where he’d come from, and what forces might be at play in his life that made him drink himself into a stupor on most Saturday nights when he came into the bar.
He looked so sexy tonight in his jeans and a rust-colored shirt that matched his slightly unruly hair and stretched across his broad shoulders.
“Unlike a lot of the other men who suffered from mental and physical abuse, I ran away when my mom died because I didn’t want to go into foster care.” He gave a dry chuckle. “At fifteen years old, I thought I was old enough and strong enough to survive on my own. But if it hadn’t been for Cass Holiday and Francine Rogers, I probably would have died on the streets or wound up in jail.”
“Who is Francine Rogers?” Everyone in town had known Big Cass Holiday, who had died a year ago in a tornado.
“She was a social worker and a good friend of Cass’s. She worked the streets at night in Oklahoma City. She tried to reunite kids with their parents, if possible. She’s the one responsible for getting us all off the streets and working for Cass. Unfortunately we heard Francine passed away a couple of months ago.”
The conversation was interrupted by the arrival of their orders. “Anything else I can get you?” Carlie asked once she had placed their plates in front of them.
“I think we’re good,” Sawyer replied. When she left, Sawyer looked at Janis, his eyes lit with curiosity. “Now, tell me about you. I know you’ve worked at the bar for a long time, but I don’t know much about your personal life.”
“That’s because I don’t have much of a personal life,” she replied ruefully as she dragged one of her fries through a puddle of ketchup. “I live at the bar. I work at the bar. And that’s about the sum of it.”
“What do you do for fun?”
“I love to read and sometimes I just like to drive out into the country and sit and listen to the soft noise of nature at work.” A blush warmed her cheeks. “I know it probably sounds silly.”
“It doesn’t sound silly at all to me,” he replied. “Living with eleven other rowdy cowboys, sometimes I just need to get away and enjoy the sounds of nature. When that happens, I usually grab my fishing pole and head down to the pond.”
“That sounds like fun,” she replied.
“Maybe on a warm day I’ll take you to the pond with me.”
Her heart swelled at his words. “That would be nice,” she said. But once she told him the truth about the night before, he might be so angry he wouldn’t be speaking to her tomorrow or on the next warm day.
For the next hour they ate and talked and laughed. Sawyer seemed to be the man she’d thought he would be...easygoing, easy to talk to, and with a great sense of humor.
She loved the way his eyes shone when he talked about his work at the ranch and the other ranch hands, who were like brothers to him. She also liked that he was fiercely loyal to Cassie Bowie, who was Big Cass’s niece and had taken over the ranch after Cass had died.
It would be easy to allow her crush on him to blossom into something more, but first Janis had to tell him the truth.
She’d tell him at her doorstep, she thought. That way, if he was really angry with her, at least she’d already be home. Besides, she wasn’t ready for this pleasant time with him to end yet.
“Are you a dessert kind of girl?” he asked when they’d finished the meal.
“I wouldn’t turn up my nose at a piece of chocolate cake,” she replied.
“Then the lady shall eat cake,” he replied and gestured to get Carlie’s attention.
“I hope the lady won’t be eating cake all alone?”
He grinned at her. “I can’t walk out of here without eating a piece of Mandy’s fancy crème brûlée cake.”
“I noticed it was a new item on the menu. I’m assuming it’s good?”
His eyes warmed and a sensual curl of his lips shot heat through her. “It’s good enough to make a grown man weep,” he replied.
Oh, my, but she’d love for him to look that way, to talk that way, about her.
They had just been served their desserts and coffee when Tony Nakni, his wife, Mary, and Mary’s grandmother, Halena, came in.
Tony and Mary waved as they took a booth on the opposite side of the café, while Halena wove her way through the tables in the center to approach Janis and Sawyer.
“Hi, Halena,” Janis said.
Halena Redwing was one of the more colorful characters in Bitterroot. She had the proud, beautiful, facial features of her Choctaw blood and a mischievous twinkle in her dark eyes. Rumor had it she loved dancing naked in rainstorms. She also had a penchant for funky hats and evening dresses.
Tonight she was clad in a red gown with glittery matching shoes. A little hat of black-and-red feathers sat atop her shiny silver hair.
“Evening, ma’am,” Sawyer said.
“Sawyer, it’s nice to see you out with a good woman,” Halena said. “It’s past time for you to get married and have a bunch of babies.”
“Halena.” Janis laughed. “We’re just having dinner,” she protested.
“Dinner is a good start and you could do a lot worse.” Halena leaned into Janis. “He’s got the sexiest, most pinchable butt in all of Bitterroot,” she said in a loud, mock whisper.
“Geez, Halena.” Sawyer’s cheeks flushed red.
“Just saying,” she said and then turned on her sparkly red shoes and headed back to the booth where Tony and Mary awaited her.
“Halena is definitely a pip,” Janis said.
“I swear that woman likes to torment me whenever she sees me,” Sawyer said, but his voice held a wealth of affection. “She steals my hat whenever she can and goes out of her way to embarrass me whenever possible.”
“At least she gave me some valuable information.” Janis grinned at him teasingly.
Once again Sawyer’s cheeks dusted with color. “And now would be a great time to change the subject.”
They lingered over coffee and their conversation remained light and easy.
“Favorite music?” he asked her.
