Free Just a Cowboy and His Baby (Spikes & Spurs) by Carolyn Brown

July. We’ll have steaks on the grill at the campground, corn on the cob, and maybe summer goulash if I can find a fruit stand along the way.”
    “Summer goulash?” he asked.
    “That would be potatoes, squash, onions, and tomatoes or whatever fresh vegetables I can find at a stand all put together in some foil and grilled with the steaks. And watermelon for dessert.”
    He polished off the rest of his omelet and smeared grape jelly on the last piece of his toast. “Sounds like a meal fit for a king who just rescued the princess.”
    “Darlin’, I’m not the princess. I’m the queen and I intend to have the crown in Vegas,” she told him.
    He leaned across the table until their noses were only inches apart. “Miss O’Donnell, to get that crown you are going to have to get past me.”
    “I can do it.” Her green eyes locked with his brown ones.
    He slowly straightened his back and picked up his coffee cup.
    She was disappointed. She was so sure that he would kiss her that she could already taste the coffee on his lips. She felt cheated and then she was angry at herself for wanting him to kiss her at all.
    “I believe that you think you can beat me,” he said.
    “I believe that you think I can’t.” She slid out of the booth. The room didn’t sway and her feet were on solid ground once again.
    “I guess we’ll see what happens in the next five months.”
    “And like I told you before, one of us is going to be very happy. Thank you for breakfast. I’ll be ready to leave in thirty minutes,” she said.
    The room seemed smaller when he slid out of the booth. Six feet two inches of a bronc rider took up a lot of real estate, especially in a small trailer. “I’ll follow you. If you start feeling light-headed or sick just pull over and we’ll stop earlier than the campground. We’ve got five days to get to Colorado Springs. We don’t have to hurry.”
    He opened the door for her and followed her out into the bright sunlight. “Going to be another hot one. Thank goodness for air-conditioning.”
    She turned around and smiled up at him. “Amen.”
    His arms gathered her close to him and she barely had time to close her eyes before his lips had found hers in a searing kiss that came close to frying her underpants.
    Tongue met tongue in a fiery mating dance, and their bodies pressed tightly together as if closeness would ease the aching pain brought on by steaming hot kisses. One kiss grew to two with the last one lingering on and on. Yet it ended too soon, and when he stepped back she had to get her bearings quickly or she would have fallen forward into his arms again.
    “See you when we stop for lunch.” He picked up her hand and wrote his phone number on her palm. “That’s in case you need to call me.”
    He quickly disappeared back into his trailer.
    Words would not come out of her swollen and hot mouth. And her hand was every bit as warm as her lips. So that first impromptu kiss hadn’t created an oozy feeling down deep in her gut because of an adrenaline rush; she really was attracted to the cowboy.
    “Dammit to hell on a rusty poker,” she exclaimed.
    With shaking hands, she fished her key from the pocket of her tight jeans and unlocked the door into her own trailer. Once inside, she threw herself backwards on the bed and stared at the ceiling.
    She could not be involved with Trace. She couldn’t let him kiss her again. It would be like sleeping with the enemy, and she’d never know if he was playing her or if he was seducing her with those blistering kisses just to mess up her head so she’d wreck at every rodeo. Or was he as attracted to her as she was to him? Either way, she’d never know the absolute truth.
    She’d leased her beauty shop and given up a year of her life for this circuit round. No matter how much her heart whined for more kisses and a taste of what Trace would be like in bed, the answer was no. Her heart could get over it. It could not have both, and there’d be lots