A Nanny for the Cowboy Read online

  “Oh, it always is.”

  “Who are you talking to, Marianne?” a male voice asked.

  Luke felt Hayley’s body stiffen next to him. One quick look at her face, suddenly pale, told him there was something about the man who’d spoken that bothered her. And Luke was curious. Real curious.

  “Table for Walker.”

  Before he had a chance to move, Hayley waved at the blonde. “Great to see you again, Marianne!” Then she turned to him and slipped her hand into the crook of his arm. “I thought they’d never have a table for us.”

  He chanced a look at her, and didn’t fail to catch the hard glitter in her eyes as she smiled up at him. Something was definitely up.

  They made their way to their table and were immediately joined by a waiter, who left them with menus, and soon after was followed by a waitress who took their orders.

  “That was fast,” Luke said, when he and Hayley were alone.

  “Amazing, considering the crowd here tonight.” She went on to tell him that the blonde she’d spoken to had been a classmate in college, but she didn’t mention the man, and Luke didn’t ask.

  When the waitress arrived with their drinks, he had a feeling they were in trouble. “Uh-oh, that’s one gigantic margarita,” he said, indicating Hayley’s huge glass with a nod.

  She looked up as the waitress placed it in front of her. “You’re kidding, right?”

  The waitress laughed and shook her head. “The menu does say very large.” She grinned at Luke, adding a conspiratorial wink. “But don’t worry if you can’t finish it. Lots of people don’t.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Hayley replied.

  When the waitress disappeared, Luke stared at the size of the drink. “Maybe they give a prize or something to those who can finish.”

  Chuckling, Hayley took a sip. “If that’s the case, I’ll be going home empty-handed.”

  They changed the subject and talked about Brayden and Dylan’s return. When their order arrived, their talk turned to favorite food. Luke was surprised that she, like he, enjoyed the simpler things more than the exotic. “Maybe because we were both country kids,” he suggested.

  Just as she started to answer, the man who’d caused what he could only call her earlier discomfort approached their table with a very young woman. “You’re looking good, Hayley, but I hadn’t heard you’d taken up drinking,” the man said, stopping next to her chair.

  Luke watched as her eyes narrowed and she looked up. The smile on her face didn’t match her eyes, and he hoped he never had the bad luck to have her look at him that way.

  “They get a bit carried away,” she said, her gaze moving toward the woman, her smile more congenial. “Great for a little celebrating, though.”

  “Celebrating?” the man asked, glancing at Luke as if he was an uninvited guest. Then a practiced smile appeared and he held out his hand. “Nathan Hardy.”

  Luke took the offered hand. “Luke Walker.”

  The young woman giggled. “Is your middle name Sky?”

  Luke got the joke immediately. He’d heard the same question since he was old enough to remember, though he hadn’t been born when the first movie premiered. Even so, both he and Dylan had become fans at a young age. “No, ma’am,” he answered, and her cheeks reddened. “But you’re not the first to ask,” he added to soften the blow.

  She ducked her head, and then looped her arm through her date’s. “Maybe we should be getting back to our table,” she said, looking up with wide eyes and a childish pout at the man.

  Across the table, Luke noticed Hayley’s quick grimace, and he nearly laughed. It didn’t take a whole lot to guess what was going on, but he wasn’t going to let on that he’d figured it out, unless Hayley brought it up.

  “Yes, you’re probably right.” Nathan Hardy’s arm snaked around her as he smiled, first at Luke and then at Hayley. “Enjoy your drink,” he told her. “Just don’t get into any trouble.”

  Luke watched them walk away, before asking, “He a friend of yours?”

  She sniffed. “Not at all,” she announced, and then took a long drink.

  As far as Luke was concerned, if she wanted to drink herself silly, he wasn’t going to stop her. She obviously felt she had reason, and it was probably none of his business what that reason was. But that didn’t stop him from being curious, even though he reminded himself that asking would be rude.

  “She was kind of young,” he commented, instead, to see her reaction.

  Across the table, a very tipsy Hayley snorted. “The younger they are, the easier to control, my dear.”

  Surprised, Luke didn’t answer as she took another long drink. Reaching across the table, he wrapped his fingers around the fat stem of the big margarita glass and pulled it away from her. “Why don’t we head home?”

  Hayley closed her eyes and nodded. “You’re right. I’ve had more than enough tonight.”

  He hoped to avoid the table where her friends were sitting, but it wasn’t possible. As they passed by, Hayley raised her hand to wiggle her fingers in a wave and tell them, “Bye-bye.”

  She seemed okay from all the drinking, as they walked to his pickup, although she was very quiet. She remained quiet for some time, as he drove through the traffic that thinned as they left the city behind. When he’d had enough quiet, he finally decided to say something, even though he didn’t expect her to answer.

  “Is something bothering you, Hayley?”

  She turned in the seat to look at him. “You’re going to regret asking me that, you know.”

  Normally, he would have laughed, but because of the look on her face, he wondered if she might be right.

  * * *

  A LITTLE VOICE IN Hayley’s head told her she’d be better off if she kept quiet. She knew she’d had too much to drink. The last time she’d come within a foot of an alcoholic beverage, she’d made a fool of herself at the wedding of her oldest brother. Would she ever learn?

  “I don’t drink very often,” she began, thankful for the cover of darkness. “In fact, after the last time I embarrassed myself and my family, I swore I wouldn’t do it again.”

  “How long ago was that?”

  She closed her eyes as the memory shot through her. “Three years ago, at Chris’s wedding.”

  “Your oldest brother.”

  She nodded, then realized he couldn’t see her. “Yes.”

  “Okay. So what about tonight?”

  “It was silly, really.”

  “It usually is.”

  She obviously wasn’t going to get out of explaining herself. The more she thought about it, the more she wondered if telling wouldn’t be such a bad thing. It was all in the past and couldn’t hurt her again. Besides, he deserved to know, although she couldn’t for the life of her remember why.

  She took a deep breath before answering. “That man? The one who stopped by our table?”

  There was a beat of silence before Luke replied. “With the young woman—the very young woman.”

  “Yes, that man.” She wished with all her heart that they’d gone somewhere else. If they had, she’d probably be thinking clearly, instead of trying to figure out which words were the right ones to say. She was definitely having a problem with that.

  “An old boyfriend?” Luke asked.

  “Sort of,” she hedged. The sound of the tires on the pavement beneath them seemed to grow louder as she waited for him to say something. When he didn’t, she knew she’d begun
this crazy idea to tell him what happened, and she couldn’t just stop now. “We were once engaged.”

  She felt more than saw him turn his head to look at her. “Engaged? To be married?”

  Unsure of what to say, she simply replied with, “That would be it.”

  “He left you for a younger woman.”

  He sounded convinced that he’d guessed correctly, and her sigh filled the cab of the pickup. For a moment, she felt dizzy, as her thoughts swirled in her mind, but she managed to right them again. “If only that had been the problem.”

  “Do you plan to tell me what was?”

  She gritted her teeth on the giggle that threatened to escape and wondered why it seemed so funny now, so many years later. Just talking about it again made her feel vulnerable. Or maybe it was the drink. Either way, she didn’t really like the feeling.

  “I suppose I owe you that much,” she admitted. “I met Nathan during my second year of college. I guess you could say he swept me off my feet.”

  A quiet noise that resembled a grunt came from the other side of the truck. “And then?”

  “We became engaged, and after I finished classes that spring, he suggested that I might want to postpone my education for a semester or two so I could focus on planning our wedding. At the time, it sounded reasonable.”

  “And now?”

  She shrugged her shoulders, wishing she could just close her eyes and go to sleep. She didn’t care about all the things that had happened with Nathan. It had been a long time ago, and seeing him again didn’t arouse any of those old feelings she’d been afraid she might still have for him.

  “Now I know it was all a lie,” she answered. “It was probably a good thing I decided to take some time off, because my dad suffered a stroke, and I needed to be there to help my mom.”

  “I’ve suspected you’ve always been a responsible person. But your dad got better, right?”

  “After a while, yes.” She remembered how hard that time was for her mother and how frustrated her dad became when his progress didn’t move faster. But he was fine now. Even the paralysis in his right side had pretty much gone away.

  She suddenly realized that Luke was waiting for her to tell him more, so she hurried on, ready to finish the story. Maybe then she could sleep. “In the meantime,” she continued, “I started seeing things in Nathan that bothered me. In the end, I realized the truth. He never wanted me to have a career. Everything would have been fine if I’d just been the happy little homemaker. That wasn’t what I wanted—or want now—so I ended it.”

  “Better sooner than later.”

  Mixed with the little bit of regret in Luke’s voice was the hard edge she’d heard when he spoke of his ex-wife. “So here we are,” she said, as cheerfully as her muddled mind would allow.

  “Yes, we are.”

  “What?” She focused out the windshield ahead and realized they’d left the paved road behind and were now turning onto the drive of Luke’s ranch. “Oh, we’re home.”

  “Right.” He drove off to the left and parked the truck, instead of driving into the garage as he usually would have done. “I left some papers in the barn. Sit tight, and I’ll be right back.”

  She wasn’t sure how long she sat there, her head leaned back against the seat, as a mixed bag of memories did somersaults in her mind. Instead of fighting them, she hoped they’d slow down so she wouldn’t feel quite so dizzy.

  “Hayley?”

  She heard her name and felt a breeze on her face, but she thought they were just a part of the crazy acrobatics in her head. And then she felt the touch on her arm. “What?”

  “Let’s get you into the house.”

  She recognized Luke’s voice and forced her eyes open to see him standing in the open pickup door. “We’re home.”

  He chuckled. “Yeah, we are. Here, let me help you out.”

  The air held a bit of a chill, and her mind cleared a little. She gave him her hand when he held out his and immediately noticed the feeling of warm honey flowing through her. Be careful, she reminded herself, and she didn’t mean getting out of the truck. Once burned, twice shy.

  After swinging her legs around, she slid down to the ground, and Luke stepped back, giving her room. A bit befuddled by what she guessed was the shortest nap in history, made worse by the alcohol she’d had earlier, she started for the house. She heard him close the pickup door, then the sound of his steps in the yard as he followed her.

  “Watch out for the—”

  She tripped in the dark, falling hard to her knees, and let out a cry of surprise and pain.

  “Tree root,” he finished.

  Before she could even discover how badly she was hurt, or even if she had been, he was leaning down to help her to her feet. “I know better,” she said, on a little hiccup.

  He held both of her hands as she stood perfectly still in front of him. He was so close she could hear his every breath. She forgot about her knees, except that they weren’t doing a very good job of holding her up, and somehow she knew it wasn’t because she’d fallen on them. Oh, she’d fallen, all right, but a tree root wasn’t to blame. And it wasn’t her knees she was worried about.

  Still holding her hands, he moved them to reach behind her back, bringing her closer to him, and she sighed, unable to fight for the sanity she desperately needed.

  “Hayley...”

  A shiver of heat went through her, and she arched her back, pressing closer to him as he gently held her. Before she could even consider protesting, she felt his mouth on hers. Instead of invading, as he easily could have, he kissed her gently, tentatively. In the back of her mind, she knew it was wrong, but it felt so good, as if every bone in her body was melting, that she ignored the whispered warning and went about silencing it.

  The touch of his tongue dragged a moan from her. Not only was her mind weak and numbed by the earlier alcohol, but also by the tantalizing things her body was now experiencing.

  At some point he released her hands from behind her back and pulled her even closer, pressing her hard against him. In response, her arms went up and around his neck. She groaned into his mouth when he delved deeper with his tongue, and all thought vanished, except for a whisper that maybe this wasn’t such a good idea. It was gone in a heartbeat, lost in a fog of passion.

  She wasn’t sure how long they’d been locked in the embrace when her stomach gave the first indication that things weren’t going well. It took every bit of strength she had to pull away from what she had guessed might be a little bit of heaven.

  “What?” he whispered, when they were inches apart.

  “I—” She shook her head and shoved at his chest with her hands.

  “Hayley? What—”

  “Sick.” After that, she didn’t remember much of anything, except stumbling through the yard and hoping he didn’t follow, then the occasional wish that the ground would open up and swallow her. She wasn’t sure it didn’t.

  It was much later when she opened her eyes to mere slits. She tried desperately to avoid anything that would make her head hurt much more than it already did. Without meaning to, she moved, and a low groan escaped her lips.

  What had she done that made her feel so bad?

  Squeezing her eyes shut against the onslaught of memories and sensations didn’t make the situation any better. She was mortified that she’d participated in the lovemaking, completely aware that it had been cut short because she’d had far too much to d
rink. Still it had exceeded her wildest dreams. It wouldn’t have taken much prompting for her to have gone to bed with her employer.

  Her employer! The father of the little boy who had been entrusted to her care.

  The clearer her mind became as to what had transpired, the more convinced she was that she could no longer continue her job. If she couldn’t trust herself to act in a professional manner at all times, she had no choice but to issue her resignation as Brayden’s nanny. And she suspected that wouldn’t go over very well with Luke. While she didn’t believe he’d formed any deep feelings for her, unlike the ones she had for him, finding someone to take her place might not be easy. But neither would leaving Brayden—and him—be easy for her.

  If only she had talked to him as her mother had suggested. But she hadn’t.

  * * *

  LUKE SLAMMED THE GEARSHIFT into Park, flipped off the key in the ignition then let out a stream of words he hoped his son would never hear when he rammed his shoulder into the door while trying to get out of his pickup. Gritting his teeth at the pain, he managed to open the door and was soon sprinting up the steps of his house, wondering how he’d managed to get himself in the mess he suspected he was now in.

  A glance at his watch as he threw open the front door told him he was in for some real trouble. If he thought Hayley had been upset before when he’d been late on a night she had her class, he had a feeling he hadn’t experienced the worst. But he probably would, as soon as he could find her.

  He spied her in the kitchen and headed her way, hoping she’d let him explain. “Before you say anything, I’m—”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  He stopped in his tracks. Of course it mattered. He was almost thirty minutes later than he should have been. Just one look at her was enough to tell him that she would probably never forgive him. He didn’t blame her. He’d acted shamefully on Friday night, taking advantage of her when she was vulnerable. As her employer, he’d been so far out of line that she had every right to be upset...and more. He wished he’d been able to think of the words he’d needed to tell her that he would do whatever it took to make things right with her. Instead, he’d given her a wide berth over the weekend. And now this.