Free One Brave Cowboy by Kathleen Eagle Page A

own.”
    â€œReally?”
    â€œSome don’t, even if they have their own.” She tipped her head back and gave a small, sardonic laugh. “I’m sorry. I’m making generalizations. I don’t know what I’m talking about.”
    He turned his palm to hers and closed his hand around hers slowly. “You see the people hangin’ outside the bowery?”
    She glanced over her shoulder, between a couple of droopy branches and into the dusky perimeter. Shadows strolling, shadows giggling and chasing shadows. Shadows loitering and lingering in tête-àtête pose.
    Celia smiled. “Ah, yes.”
    â€œThere’s some old-fashioned courting going on out there.”
    â€œI thought this represented courting.” She nodded toward the dancers.
    â€œIt does if you’re a bird.” He laughed. “I tried Fancy Dancing, but with two left feet, I was the one who laid an egg. Picked myself up off the ground, climbed on a horse and suddenly the chicks noticed me.”
    â€œAnd you were how old?”
    â€œAbout fifteen.” He squeezed her hand. “What else do you wanna know? I don’t have a wife, or an ex-wife or a girlfriend. I do have an ex-girlfriend.” He lifted one shoulder. “She got tired of waiting. Can’t blame her.”
    Holding hands. She was holding hands with a man, and her insides were jitterbugging. Ask an intelligent question, Celia.
    â€œHow long were you over in the Middle East?”
    â€œAltogether, thirty-two months.”
    â€œThat would be hard on a relationship.”
    â€œSome people have done three, even four tours between Iraq and Afghanistan. People who have families at home…” He glanced across the circle. Arm in arm, Mary and Logan were receiving well wishers. “…should be with their families. I could do another tour, easy. So somebody with a family could come home.”
    â€œDo you want to go back?”
    â€œI don’t know where I want to be. Except maybe…” He turned to her, looked into her through her eyes in a way that thrilled and terrified her. Shewas the connection he had on his mind, and she wasn’t sure he wanted it there. But there it was.
    He cocked his head toward the perimeter. “Care to go for a stroll?”
    She wanted to look away from the eyes that held hers, check with Mark, find something to hold her back, but she couldn’t. The look in his eyes shifted from challenging to amused.
    â€œHe’s still there.”
    She smiled. “Still dancing?”
    â€œStill dancing. Havin’ a hell of a time.”
    She stood up from the end of the bench, and he followed suit. She gave his hand a squeeze. “You’re making a statement here.”
    â€œ You’re making a statement, teacher.” He gave a return squeeze as they emerged from the bowery onto the beaten path. “Nobody knows me here. I am—what’s the expression? Off the reservation. ”
    â€œBut this is the reservation,” she accommodated him, laughing.
    â€œNot mine. But, hey.” He leaned down close to her ear. “Let ’em talk. I ain’t afraid of Indian country.”
    â€œOff the reservation,” she echoed as they strolled. “Indian country. Does any of that bother you?”
    â€œYou know what bothers me? Chief. I don’t wanna be called chief. First sergeant was good enough. Any rank with chief attached…” He shook his head.
    â€œHow about commander-in-chief?”
    â€œThey couldn’t call me chief, then, could they?”
    â€œHave they always just called you Cougar?”
    â€œNope.” He looked at her, and for a moment she thought he might tell her his secret. Or one of them. He grinned. “But they do now.”
    She glanced into the bowery as they passed the drum circle. There was Mark trying out a new step, and there was Maxine, tending to her assignment.
    â€œHey.” Cougar tugged