Free Chase Wheeler's Woman by Charlene Sands Page A

I’ll be waiting out front.”
    “But Chase, you don’t have to wait for me. Petey said he’d be glad to escort me home.”
    Chase turned and headed out the door. “Like I said, Letty Sue, I’ll be waiting out front.”
    Privacy? The woman wanted privacy and all else be damned. Just like a woman. Just like Letty Sue. Nothing they’d agreed upon had sunk in. She’d deliberately taken off without telling him where she was going. She’d gone out at night, mindless of her own safety. She’d made him chase after her, nearly humiliatehimself in that kitchen, and she’d gotten angry with him!
    It was clear now she planned on obeying the rules of the truce only when it was convenient for her.
    Only more reason for Chase to keep his eye on her.
    Chase let a solid oak post of the diner’s porch hold his weight as he leaned back and puffed on a cheroot. The night air was crisp, a gentle breeze blowing away the dust of the warm dry day.
    His mind still on Letty Sue, he found a smile surfacing. She was something, if not a handful of trouble. But her happiness tonight over cooking that simple meal took most of the starch out of his fight. He simply didn’t have the heart to argue much over her leaving the ranch, not when she positively beamed with joy over bits of browned meat mingling with a batch of vegetables. Hell, even he could conjure up son-of-a-gun stew.
    And he had to admit a wave of relief had swept over him when he’d barged into that kitchen, expecting the worst only to find Letty Sue innocent of any wrongdoing. There’d been no clandestine meeting, no private affair, no planned rendezvous.
    Still, he’d eyed the boy closely. Petey was clearly smitten with Letty Sue. There was no mistaking that puppy-dog look of longing in the boy’s clear brown eyes. Letty Sue had that affect on most men, young ones included. It made Chase itchy, nervous because it was completely out of his control. He liked to be in control. He hadn’t bent to temptation often, butwhen he had, back in Abilene, he’d been burned, badly.
    Giggles, soft and feminine, had him turning his head. Letty Sue and the boy sat at one of the tables in the far corner of the diner. One candle flickered over their meal and paraded over the walls, allowing him to view them sharing the meal.
    A knot of remorse niggled at him.
    He could be dining with her.
    Enjoying her company.
    Listening to her bursts of joyous laughter.
    Chase puffed on his cheroot one last time, dropped it to the ground and stomped it out.
    It was a hell of a good thing he’d refused her offer.
    Yep, hell of a good thing.
    Ten minutes later, they were headed back to the Double J. “How the devil do you ride wearing a dress?” he asked.
    Letty Sue turned to view him sitting tall in the saddle. The slight light of the moon and stars above painted his face in shadows. Handsome, nearly savagely so, she thought, studying his profile.
    “Easy, I don’t wear any petticoats when I ride.”
    His head snapped around and his gaze flowed over her with so much apparent heat she’d have sworn she felt the warmth of it melting her bones. There was something sinful in that smoky gaze, like she was a ripe peach and he was a starving man.
    Lordy, Letty Sue.
    He cleared his throat noisily. “I didn’t know you could ride.”
    “I grew up on a ranch,” she said, her chin lifting defiantly. Did he believe she possessed no skills whatsoever? “I’ve been riding since I was a tot. That’s one thing Mama did manage to teach me.”
    “You do it well, even with wearing those clothes.”
    “Or rather, lack of them,” she said, then realized how entirely wicked that sounded. Chase didn’t appear shocked, but a deep, low groan emerged from his chest. “Thank you,” she hurried to add before he could say more. That was the first genuine compliment she’d ever received from Chase Wheeler.
    They rode in silence for a time, then Chase said quietly, “You know, you didn’t give a thought about the