My Kind of Trouble Read online

  Being stubborn wasn't going to get her to Bowie any quicker, she decided. It was hot as cornbread in a cast iron skillet out here, and she was exhausted. Her skin was coated in a fine layer of dust that was turning to mud with every bead of sweat that trickled down her face. Her fair skin would be burnt to a crisp by the time she got to Bowie.

  She could ride with him, and remain unaffected, she told herself. Luke Matthews meant less than nothing to her now. He was simply a public servant to her, and for right now, she was one of the public he served.

  Lifting her chin, Cassie looked over toward the car where he sat smiling, waiting for her to either accept his ride or start walking again. Cassie huffed out a breath then crossed the road and walked around the car to jerk open the passenger door. When she slid inside, cold air brushed across her skin and evaporated the sweat beads there. Breathing a sign of relief, she laid her head back against the seat.

  "Feel better?" He asked then leaned forward to kick the air up a notch and point another vent toward her.

  "Yes, thank you. Could you please take me to Bowie?"

  "Sure thing, cup--" he started, then stopped when she opened one eye and gave him a warning look. "Cassie," he corrected then looked at the road and pressed the accelerator.

  After a minute, Cassie sat up and looked out the window at the all-too-familiar landscape of her former home, dotted with patches of grass, cactus and scrub brush, broken up by copses of trees here and there. When she felt his eyes on her, Cassie looked at him to find him staring at her chest.

  Looking down, she saw that the cold air had made her nipples tighten under the wet tank top. She gave him a nasty look and folded her arms across her chest, crossed her legs and shifted her body toward the door. There, how was that for body language? Off limits buddy--that ship sailed about ten years ago, she thought.

  Silence filled the inside of the car, except for the sound of the air blowing from the vents they didn't speak. Finally, curiosity got the better of her. "So, how long have you been a deputy?"

  He looked away from the road and said, "I was a deputy for three years, and I've been Sheriff for nearly four."

  A grin she couldn't control eased up her lips and she chuckled. "Sheriff?"

  "Surprising, huh?" his firm lips ticked up wryly.

  "I'd say...I kind of expected you to be on the other side of the bars."

  She would, he thought. But she didn't know Luke Matthews wasn't the same boy she'd ran out on ten years ago. Luke was a man now, and respectable. His drunken father wasn't how people knew him these days, neither were his youthful indiscretions...most of which were caused by her.

  Her smile faded and she asked, "How's your dad?"

  "Dead. His liver finally gave out three years ago." He still couldn't force any feeling into saying that, even after three years, all he could feel was relief that his old man was dead.

  She gasped. "Oh, Luke...I'm sorry."

  He glanced over at her and saw her eyes filled with sympathy. It grated on his nerves. "Don't be. I'm not." He pinched his lips together and gripped the steering wheel tighter.

  Luke didn't care if he came off sounding like an unfeeling bastard, that was just how he felt about it. His father got what he deserved, after years of physically abusing and mentally torturing him when he was into the bottle.

  "You here to see about Carl?"

  "Yeah...Imelda called me. I'll be around a few weeks to help him get back on his feet, unless I can talk him into coming to Phoenix with me."

  Luke snorted. "That ain't happening, honey. You know it." Carl Bellamy's roots were planted on that ranch and the only way she'd get him to leave was boots up. She unfolded her arms and put her hand on her thigh. He glanced down and saw a diamond ring on her finger big enough to choke a horse. The sun shining through the windshield hit it and it about blinded him.

  A sharp pain pierced his chest and he reached up to rub it. Her eyes met his and he saw something that looked almost like guilt there. "Your Daddy never mentioned you got married."

  "Engaged." She corrected him flatly and covered her left hand with her right in her lap, as if hiding the huge stone would make it go away. Like she was embarrassed over it.

  He nodded. What did he expect? She had a life in Phoenix now, she was a beautiful woman, how could expect her not to be married by now? But the hard proof on her finger that another man had the right to touch her...to love her...that she loved someone else, made his heart wrench a little over what could have been if she'd stuck around.

  He gritted his teeth then swallowed hard and said, "Congratulations."

  Her blue eyes slid to his and she studied him a moment, then said, "Thank you."

  She glanced down and picked up her purse from beside her leg and unzipped it. Removing a pack of wet wipes, she flipped down the visor and wiped her face, neck and then her chest.

  Watching that cloth slide over her throat and chest had him hot and bothered again, so he forced his eyes back to the road to keep from torturing himself. As they rode in silence, Luke reminded himself that her flippant attitude toward him proved she was still the selfish bitch who'd left him ten years ago without explanation. No way was he going to let the pretty packaging blind him to that fact.

  Luke was relieved when they finally pulled into a parking spot in front of Toby's garage. She picked up her purse from the floor. "Thanks for the ride," she said then started to reach for the door handle.

  "I can wait and bring you back to your truck if you want?" Luke offered without knowing why. Must be latent masochistic tendencies. All needed was to be trapped inside the car with her any longer, her familiar smell and half-naked body taunting him to the brink of insanity.

  "Nah, I'm sure I can get a ride," she said distractedly. "Hey--is that Cody Lawson over there?" She waved at the large blond man in the grease-stained overalls who stood at the bay door wiping his big beefy hands on a red rag.

  Luke knew she'd dated the big bozo, who had been full-back for the Bowie Beavers, in tenth grade, before he and Cassie had started dating the next year. Jealousy punched him in the gut and he tamped it down. So what if she still had the hots for the big grease monkey, he thought.

  "Yeah, he's worked here since right after high school. He owns it now. Toby retired a few years ago."

  "Really? I thought Cody got a full-ride to A&M for football?"

  "He did--they took it back when he got hurt that last game." The knee injury wasn't the only thing that would have prevented Cody from finishing college. The guy was dumb as a box of rocks. The only reason he finished high-school was because the teachers wouldn't dare fail their star athlete. The coaches made sure of it. This was Texas, and A&M football was much more important than education to them.

  "That's too bad...he was really good," she said with sympathy filling her blue eyes.

  "Yeah, he was," Luke agreed tightening his grip on the steering wheel. "He probably wouldn't have made the grades to stay on the team anyway," he told Cassie then realized what a jealous fool he sounded like. But, it was true. Cody didn't have the drive or the brains to have gone the distance.

  Unlike Luke, who had worked two jobs so he could go to school and make sure he could do better than his drunken father.

  Luke watched as recognition hit Cody and a big smile split his face, before he walked to the car and jerked open the door. He pulled Cassie out of the car and into a big bear hug that lifted her off her feet. "Oh, my god...honey, are you a sight for sore eyes!"

  She giggled...fucking giggled...and then put her arms around his neck and put a big smacker of a kiss on his grease-smeared cheek. Luke wanted to punch something. That certainly wasn't the reception he'd gotten. And that guy hadn't almost been her fiancé before she'd up and left him high and dry with no explanation. Luke held that honor.

  Luke had actually been on the verge of asking Cassie to marry him the night she'd left, had the ring he'd saved up for six months in his pocket. If Becca Harvey hadn't fallen into the damned lake and almost
drowned, making him late meeting her at their spot, he would have. Maybe Becca saved him the embarrassment of Cassie laughing in his face, and telling him she was leaving.

  He'd never been good enough for her anyway, everyone said so, and she'd probably figured it out, or had always known it too. Which probably explained why she'd had no problem at all leaving him. What Luke had thought to be sincere words of love from her had actually been a little rich girl getting her jollies by stringing him along with hot kisses, before she cut out for greener grass.

  Her daddy owned a big cattle ranch...she was part of the 'haves' and he was definitely a 'have not'. Just the size of the rock on her finger told him she was still out of his league, regardless of the fact that he had made something of himself in the ten years she'd been gone. Luke was not, and would never be a rich man, someone who could keep Cassie in the style to which she was accustomed.

  But he was happy with his life now without her. Things had turned out like they were supposed to. He wasn't letting a case of 'what ifs' make him forget how far he'd come. He dated plenty, got laid when he had the urge, without complications. He didn't need the tall leggy former rodeo queen complicating his life. Nope, Luke learned from his mistakes...and Cassie Bellamy was one of the biggest he'd ever made.

  He wasn't sticking around for the rest of her reunion with Cody Lawson either. Leaning across the passenger seat, he grabbed the door handle. "Looks like you have things covered. See you around," he told her gruffly and slammed the door then jammed the car into reverse and pulled away. A glance in the rearview found her standing beside the big beefcake staring after him with her hands on her hips.

  Luke dragged his eyes away from her in the mirror and hit the accelerator. If he hurried, he could make the trip to the ranch to see Carl and be gone before she got her truck fixed and made it there. He'd make sure of it.

  CHAPTER TWO

  It was dusk by the time Cassie dragged her suitcase from the bed of the truck and lugged it up to the front of the big farm house that had been her home for the first eighteen years of her life. She stopped for a moment at the steps and just took it all in.

  The big old house looked the same, even down to the brightly colored potted flowers hanging on the hooks her mother had put along the porch eaves twenty years ago. Imelda must still be making sure flowers were hung there and they were tended. Cassie inhaled deeply and took in the familiar smell of cattle, hay, dust, rich earth...home.

  The sense of homecoming that squeezed her heart, was unfathomable. Ten years faded away, as she placed her boot on the first step and then the second, then on the wide boards of the front porch which led to the tall red front door with high windows. She lifted her hand to knock, but dropped it to the knob instead, and walked inside.

  Stepping inside the entryway was like walking through at time warp. The antler chandelier in the high-ceilinged entry welcomed her, and the rich brown hardwood floors gleamed in the fading sunlight. She took a few steps and looked left into her mother's sitting room. Dainty lace doilies her mother had crocheted still covered every piece of sturdy oak furniture, and the same overstuffed floral sofa sat against the wall between two sage green high-backed Queen Anne chairs.

  She peeked into the small telephone alcove that was right by the front door and was surprised to see the red rotary dial phone had been replaced by a modern black push button model. Then she took a few steps and looked into the formal dining room. Her mother's fine china was still proudly displayed in the big oak hutch her daddy had bought for her. There was a white lace table cloth covering the huge table that would seat twenty people, and often had for holidays.

  When she got to the end of the entry hall, instead of turning right to go into the kitchen, she took a deep breath of the rarified air smelling of lavender, lemon oil and leather then yelled "Daddy! I'm home!"

  "Cassie Bee? Is that you?" she heard Carl Bellamy's deep familiar voice call weakly from the family room.

  Cassie dropped her suitcase in the foyer and ran through the big doorway into the family room, and found her daddy sitting in a wheelchair near a window beside the huge brick fireplace with a crocheted afghan over his lap. Skidding to a stop on the braided rug in front of the fireplace, she stared at the frail old man in the wheelchair who looked a hundred years old. She swallowed a lump of emotion that clogged her throat. He bore no resemblance to the man she'd seen at Christmas.

  Her hand flew to her mouth and she whispered, "Oh, daddy..." then ran to him and hugged him tightly.

  "Dammit, I told Imelda not to call you," he said against her shoulder.

  "And I'd have kicked your ass if she didn't. I'm really pissed she didn't call when it happened!"

  "I'm fine girl...just leave me be," he told her then looked away to look back out the window.

  "You're not fine, and you know it. You're just a being a crotchety old fart who won't admit he needs help."

  "Watch your mouth, young lady."

  "I'm not a young lady anymore, daddy...and you're not a young man," Cassie told him and huffed out a frustrated breath.

  He grunted and jerked the afghan off of his legs and tossed it aside. When he put his hands on the arms of the wheelchair, and moved his leg off the leg rest as if to stand, she pushed his shoulders back down. "You stay right there--what do you need?"

  "I need for you to quit treating me like an invalid. I have a ranch to run."

  "I'm running the ranch until you're better. You are going to get some physical therapy to get back on your feet," Cassie told him firmly.

  "I'm not going to one of those old folks homes...you can put that right out of your head."

  "I'd never do that to you! You know that!" She couldn't believe he thought she'd do that to him. "We'll get someone to come out here."

  "They won't do it...it's too far out in the sticks." His big hand squeezed the handle of the chair and he swallowed thickly. Her dad had been so strong for so many years, it hurt her heart to see him so weak and fragile. And to see how much he was trying to hide his frailness from the world. He was only sixty-two, but right now he looked ancient.

  Cassie clenched her jaw, looked him in the eyes and said, "They'll do what I damned well tell them to do."

  A grin kicked up the side of his mouth and wrinkled his weathered cheek. He reached over and squeezed her hand. "That's my girl."

  He was right, the Double B was pretty rural, but somehow, she'd pull off getting someone to agree to come out. She had to...because she knew he'd never agree to leave the ranch. Cassie had come by her stubbornness honestly. Getting him to retire and move to Phoenix with her was a pie in the sky dream, she knew. But she wasn't giving up on trying. Tenacity was another thing she'd inherited from Carl Bellamy.

  Forcing a bright smile Cassie asked, "So what do you want for supper?" She grabbed the handles on the back of his wheelchair. "You know my cooking skills are limited, so take it easy on me."

  "You still haven't learned to cook? How're you gonna catch a man if you can't cook girl?"

  She'd heard that one before. Her mother hadn't been around to teach her, and Imelda had tried with no success. She could make simple stuff, but she wasn't going to win a blue ribbon at the county fair for her pie that was for sure.

  Without her mother's guidance in the girly department, Cassie had turned into something of a tomboy after her death, preferring to ride and rope and fish than priss and primp. It had won her the title of rodeo queen, and 4-H barrel racing champ, but hadn't done much to improve her domestic skills.

  "I'm going to hire a cook like Imelda." It was good that James was nearly a gourmet chef. He'd was the one who cooked in their household. "Or marry a man who can cook."

  He looked over his shoulder at her. "Not that prissy pants, James fella I met at Christmas, huh?"