Part 6 (2/2)

”Not dressed like that! that!” It was the pure impracticality of the ensemble that infuriated him, not the effect it had on him. Worse, he feared she knew exactly what she was doing to him and she was enjoying it a lot more than he was. ”Anyway, I fired you.”

She seemed to ignore him as she dropped the skillet on the back of the woodstove and went to dig in the cooler. ”Then you rehired me. Is it always this cold up here?”

Cold? The cabin felt suffocatingly hot. ”Maybe if you were dressed appropriately-”

She s.h.i.+vered and went back to the bunk to get her socks and boots. He watched her wince as she pulled them on. They looked ridiculous with the expensive peignoir. And as ridiculous and out of place as Reggie herself had looked in the red suit yesterday on the roadside. The same way she didn't fit in here at the line camp.

Getting to her feet again, she looked like the only thing keeping her upright was pure stubbornness alone. Why didn't she have the good sense to give up now? Why didn't he?

He watched her draw one fingertip into her mouth, the same one he'd noticed she'd burned the night before. He felt himself weaken.

”I have some balm for your burns,” he heard himself say. ”You can put it on your boot blisters as well.”

She looked over at him in surprise. The grat.i.tude in her gaze grabbed hold of him in a death grip. She bit her lip as if she might feel a little guilty for putting him through this. Or maybe it was just him who was feeling guilty. Could he be wrong about her motives?

J.T. stepped to one of the smaller coolers just off the porch and came back with a chunk of cheese. He held it out to her. ”Eat this.”

Regina took the cheese and did as she was told before she even thought to question him. As she chewed, she looked up at him, realizing that people just did what J. T. McCall told them to do and he expected nothing less. He wasn't used to anyone not following his orders. No wonder he'd been so angry with her.

The cheese helped, she felt more awake, not quite so tired. She figured that was his intention. ”Thank you.”

He wasn't like anyone she'd ever known. His looks alone made him stand out. A blond, blue-eyed handsome cowboy. The real thing. Just what she needed.

And yet he was nothing like she'd originally thought she wanted. He drove an old dirty pickup, wore worn clothing, often had mud and manure on his boots and jeans and smelled of sweat and horse-flesh, leather and dust. And she'd never met a s.e.xier man in her life.

No man had ever stirred the desires in her that McCall did. When this was over, she knew she would look back on it and wonder if she'd lost her mind in Montana. She could just imagine what her mother would say if she knew that her daughter was having such thoughts about a man like J. T. McCall.

Not that she would ever let a s.e.xual desire make her stray from her purpose. Too much was at stake for a roll in the hay-literally-with such a man. But she couldn't help but wonder what it would be like.

And he was attracted to her. He'd just about died when she'd gotten out of bed in her nightgown. She smiled to herself at the memory.

If everything in her life wasn't riding on this advertising campaign....

She could just hear Anthony. ”Gina, baby, what could it hurt? You can't work all the time.”

But looking at McCall, she knew it could hurt. He wasn't the kind of man you just bedded and walked away from unscathed. Not that she'd ever just bedded a man. She hardly had time even to date. Her grandmother was always telling her she'd be an old maid if she didn't forget about work for a moment and think about a man.

Well, she was thinking about a man right now. And her thoughts would have shocked her grandmother. Maybe not. But they definitely shocked Regina.

J.T. DIDN'T LIKE that look in her eyes. ”I'll go get that balm,” he said as he retreated backward until he felt the doork.n.o.b digging into his behind. ”Get dressed. Don't touch that stove. I'll make breakfast.” He felt much too heroic.

That's why her next words floored him.

”I'd really like to see you ride today,” she said. ”Do you think that would be possible?”

Her words stunned him. She couldn't be serious. The guilt he'd felt just an instant before took off like a wild stallion on open range. It took any sympathy he'd felt for her with it as well.

”You just don't know when to quit, do you?” He stepped to her, forgetting for the moment how she was dressed. Or not dressed, as the case was. ”I'm going to tell you this one more time. I don't know what you're really up to, but I want you out of my cow camp.”

”What I'm up to? I told you what I want. All you have to do is agree to the commercial and you won't ever have to see me again.”

So she was sticking to that story. ”I thought you had to see me ride first before you could make me the offer?”

She seemed to realize her mistake. ”I do. Why else would I want to see you ride?”

”My question exactly.” She looked so innocent standing there in her negligee and cowboy boots-”Whatever it is you're really after, give it up, Reggie. I told you, no one can be more stubborn or determined than me. Not even you.”

She smiled, baby blues twinkling. ”I guess that's the one thing we have in common, McCall. We're both tenacious to a fault.”

”Wrong, Reggie,” he said as he towered over her. ”With you, it's a fault. With me, it's my best quality.” He tipped his hat and headed for the door.

But as usual, Reggie got in the last word.

”Believe me, McCall, your pigheadedness isn't your greatest a.s.set. If it were, I wouldn't be here.”

Chapter Five.

Blurry-eyed, Regina sat down slowly on the lower bunk and pulled off her boots so she could get her jeans on. She ached all over. A faint blush of light sifted down through the pines beyond a gap in her makes.h.i.+ft towel curtains at the window. She felt like the walking dead, her boot-blistered feet aching, her eyes sandpapery, her fingers burned and red.

But she'd done her best not to let McCall see it. She looked at the bunk, wanting sleep, but not even tempted to get back into that hard bunk. Even if her pride would have let her. She was going to make pancakes. Come h.e.l.l or high water.

She dressed in her new cowboy clothes, not that they looked new anymore. She wished now that she'd just bought a plain western s.h.i.+rt, a pair of her own jeans and some brown boots so she fit in more. The thought surprised her. What was happening to her? She was a Holland. Their whole goal in life was to stand out.

Dressed, she picked up all the food supplies she'd left on the floor. As she began to mix the ingredients for pancakes she felt like she was having a recurring nightmare. She'd stayed up most of the night practicing making pancakes, one batch after another. She'd been determined to show J. T. McCall that she wasn't as helpless as he thought.

Part of her wanted to shock him. The other part wanted to please him. That was the part that worried her.

Before last night she'd never made pancakes in her life, but fortunately she'd discovered a recipe on the back of the flour sack and other recipes on boxes and cans of food and she could could read. read.

After she was sure everyone had gone to bed, she'd gotten up, covered the windows with towels and, working by flashlight, had practiced making pancakes. One batch after another. She hated to think how many mistakes she'd made and had to dispose of before she finally got a pancake that looked like the one on the flour sack.

Now she put more wood on the fire and looked down at her pancake batter and smiled. Her only concern was the amount of supplies she'd used. She hoped they didn't run out of food. But there seemed to be enough for an army and Buck would be bringing back a truck so they could go get more, right?

She tried not to think about Buck's arrival-and her forced departure. She didn't have much time and she was rather at a loss as to how to proceed. J. T. McCall didn't need the money, didn't want the fame and wasn't even flattered by the offer. She would never have believed such a man existed if she hadn't met him.

What McCall was, she realized, was incredibly stubborn. It would take dynamite to dislodge him once he'd made up his mind. And according to him, his mind was as set as cement.

There was the thump of boots on the porch, a step she recognized, then a soft knock at the door. She reached up to tuck an errant lock of hair behind her ear. ”Come in, McCall.”

J.T. OPENED THE DOOR, another armload of firewood and the balm for her blisters, expecting he would need to get Reggie out of bed. Again.

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