Free Rodeo Daddy: Book 3 in the Stubborn Texas Siblings Trilogy by Faith Loveright Page A

on her face before she’d turned away had been so
intense; it had hit him directly in the gut like a sucker
punch.
    “Dana?” he asked, his voice breaking with the emotion that
threatened to bring him to his knees. She still couldn’t find
her voice so she shook her head adamantly, turned around,
forcefully extracted Alexis from his arms and ran down the
hall towards the bathroom that was connected to the
nursery. In that moment, she needed to get away from Jeff.
Tears poured down her face as she bathed their daughter.
The more Alexis splashed and giggled, babbling the word
“Daddy” over and over again, the heavier the flow of tears
got. She had no idea how to deal with anything that was
going on. Not her daughter’s fascination with Jeff or her
own. She was more confused than ever by his insistence on
being included in Alexis’ life. So much time had gone by
when she had been sure that he’d want nothing to do with
the little girl they’d made together.
    Now that he knew and he was going out of his way to insert
himself into both of their lives, Dana was confused. She
had no idea what to do. She desperately wanted to believe
that she had been wrong and there was actually a chance
that Jeff could turn out to be both husband and father
material after all… but she knew him too well. His
wanderlust was too big a part of who he was as a man. He
thrived on the endorphins that came from the stimulation
and titillation he got from riding a bucking bull the full
eight seconds. He got off on the roar of the crowd after a
successful ride. A man like that would never be happily
settled down in one place with a wife and child.
    Perhaps a few weeks of bliss would pass before he got
bored and went out seeking the next thrill. That was exactly
the life she’d desperately tried to keep Alexis from
suffering… knowing and loving her father as much as Dana
did, only to have to watch as he went back to his true
love… the rodeo and his buckle bunnies.
    But how could she fight Jeff when he was hurting? When
she knew that feeling like he’d done something for his
daughter would make him feel better about not having been
part of her life from the very beginning… Her heart was
swelling in her chest and it felt as if she was putting it
through the ringer by continuing to deny the man she loved
the one thing that would make him happiest.
    “What am I going to do?” she asked Alexis as she rubbed
the baby shampoo into her red curls. “Your Daddy wants to
be part of your life so desperately… and I want to give that
to him more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life…
but at the same time, I’m scared to death that in doing so,
he’s going to end up hurting both of us so badly; we may
not survive the heartache when he inevitably leaves us…
which I know he will, because that’s who he is. He is first
and foremost a free spirited rodeo cowboy. Who am I to try
to tie him down?”
    “
Daddy,” Alexis babbled happily in answer, grinning
widely at her mother as she splashed her hands in the water
in excitement at the mention of the man she’d so quickly
bonded with.
    Dana sighed as she rinsed the shampoo out of Alexis’ ha
ir.
“You’re right,” she said, nodding her head. “I’m being
selfish… I can’t keep you away from him any more than I
can keep him away from you. Clearly you love each other.
I guess my feelings shouldn’t matter,” she said, wiping the
tears from her face with the sleeve of her shirt.
    “I just can’t help it… I’m jealous of my own daughter,” she
said, laughing despite the tears that continued to fall. “The
man I’ve so desperately loved for so long has fallen ass
over teakettle in love with you and yet I’m still just a
warm body to him that he can’t seem to get enough of and I
know that it frustrates and pisses him off to no end. He
refuses to embrace anything more than lust for me.”
    “
Daddy” Alexis said again, looking towards the doorway,
knowing that the man