Read the book: «In A Cowboy's Embrace»

Chapter One

“Daddy! Daddy!” Five-year-old Stevie came running into the kitchen from the back of the house. “Goldilocks is sleeping in your bed! And she brought her mother with her!”

Clifford Swain cupped the back of his son’s head. He’d had a long day rounding up cattle on the Double S and branding this year’s crop of calves on the ranch he and his twin brother jointly owned. He wasn’t at all sure he had the energy to deal with another of his son’s flights of fancy.

Still, a stranger in the house would explain the silver-gray BMW parked out front. No one in the small Montana town of Reilly’s Gulch drove a car like that, certainly not one that was five years old and looked brand-new. Pickup trucks and sport utility vehicles were the favored mode of transportation in this rugged, northwestern part of Montana.

Except for Chester O’Reilly. He’d gotten it into his ninety-year-old head to buy a Mazda Miata from Cliff’s sister-in-law, Ella, and then started a taxi service with it.

“Come on, bucko,” Cliff said to his son. The crime rate in Reilly’s Gulch was so low, he didn’t imagine whomever Stevie had spotted—real or pretend—would pose much of a danger. He should know. When he wasn’t punching cattle, he was a Reed County deputy sheriff and had filed the papers to run for election as county sheriff. “Let’s find out what’s going on.”

“Do you think they ate up all our porridge?”

Cliff grinned at the boy, whose blue eyes sparkled with excitement. “Don’t think you’re going to get out of eating your oatmeal for breakfast if they have. I’ll just buy some more.”

“Aw, gee…” He did a little skip-hop to catch up with Cliff. “Sweet rolls are better.”

“That gooey stuff’ll kill you, kid.” As well as give the boy a sugar high that he didn’t need. Where Stevie was concerned, energy was rarely in short supply.

The sprawling ranch-style house had large rooms and wide hallways. He and his wife had wanted a big family and plenty of space to spread out. But Yvonne had died nearly three years ago. They’d never built the second story, which had been in the original plans.

They’d never had any more kids, either, and that still hurt almost as much as having lost his high school sweetheart.

Cliff peered into the guest room. Actually he’d been sleeping there since Yvonne died. At first there were too many ghosts, too many memories in the master bedroom. Then it simply became a habit to sleep across the hall.

“See, what’d I tell you,” Stevie whispered.

Yep, definitely Goldilocks and her mom, both of them sound asleep on top of the covers, a paperback novel open on the night table. The girl’s hair was tousled with blond ringlets, her face like an angel, but it was the woman who drew Cliff’s attention. Her hair spilled over the pillow like a waterfall made of white gold. At rest, she looked vulnerable. Approachable. Tempting as hell.

Thick coils of heat whipped through Cliff, and he had to fight an instinctive urge to flee…or to join the woman lying on his bed.

A grown-up Goldilocks far more alluring than a younger version. He must have made a sound because the woman stretched, arching as lazily as a sleek cat. Her eyes blinked open. Blue as a Montana sky. A slow smile curved lips specifically made with kissing in mind. She gave him an assessing look, then her gaze slid to his son.

“Hi. You must be Stevie.” A low, seductive voice, husky with sleep.

The boy nodded. “You’re sleeping in my dad’s bed.”

“I am?” She eyed Cliff again with a warm, blue-velvet gaze.

“Did you break any of our chairs?” Stevie asked.

A fascinating little inverted V appeared between her nicely shaped eyebrows. “Chairs?” Effortlessly, she rose to a sitting position, swinging her legs over the side of the bed. Her skirt swirled into position, settling like silk across her lap, draping the quick flash of leg that he’d glimpsed. With easy grace, she picked up a silver hair clip from the nightstand, twisted her long hair a couple of times and piled it on top of her head, snaring it in place in a sexy, casual do.

“He thinks you’re Goldilocks’s mother,” Cliff explained, his throat strangely tight and his voice as husky as hers had been.

She glanced at her sleeping daughter, and her smile blossomed into something radiant. Madonna and child with a measure of laughter mixed in. “More like an overtired minx, I’m afraid. We’ve been driving for days and then I got lost.”

From the looks of her long fingernails painted a raspberry red, to her perfectly oval face and her flawless complexion, not only was this woman lost, she’d wound up about two thousand miles off target. Hollywood should have been her destination.

She slipped her bare feet into a pair of leather sandals on the floor beside the bed, her toenails the same bright shade of raspberry as her fingernails. When she stood, she extended her hand to Cliff. “I’m Tasha Reynolds, your new housekeeper. Temporarily, of course.”

Cliff’s jaw dropped to somewhere near his knees. His housekeeper? No way was this the sort of woman he’d expected to fill in for Sylvia Torres while his regular housekeeper was helping her daughter following the birth of Sylvia’s third grandchild. But he’d asked his sister-in-law if she knew anyone….

“Are you Ella’s sister?” he asked, belatedly noting a vague family resemblance to his brother’s new wife. But while Ella Papadakis-Swain was attractive, Tasha was…striking. Tall and willowy, she moved with a dramatic grace that only a man who could meet and beat her height could fully appreciate. A man like Cliff.

“Guilty as charged.” She slipped past him as smoothly as warm butter on toast, taking Stevie’s hand in the process. “Why don’t we let Melissa sleep a little while longer? Four days of travel were hard on her.”

He watched her walk down the hallway—no, she floated down the hallway, Cliff mentally corrected himself, noting the sway of her skirt. She left the scent of the tropics behind her, hot and sultry. No way could he let Tasha Reynolds stay around as his housekeeper. No way, unless she’d allow him to spend twenty-four hours a day in bed with her.

Given he had an impressionable five-year-old son—and she had a young daughter—that wasn’t a viable plan. The only other choice was to ask her to leave. Because no way could he be under the same roof with her for any extended length of time without bedding her.

He wasn’t going to do that.

Especially not when his reputation was likely to be under scrutiny because of his election campaign for county sheriff.

TASHA RELEASED Stevie’s hand when they reached the spacious living room, decorated in Western style with bright colors accenting the earth tones of wood and the native stone fireplace. “Your Aunt Ella tells me you’re five years old.”

“I’m almost six.” The youngster looked like a small replica of his father—close-cropped, sandy-blond hair that on the boy had gone slightly shaggy and was in need of a haircut; baby-blue eyes that on his father held a glint of mischief; a particularly strong jaw and lips that naturally curved upward in an invitation to return his smile.

“My Melissa’s almost seven. She’s looking forward to playing with you.”

“She really isn’t Goldilocks?”

“’Fraid not. But that’s always been one of her favorite stories, too.”

The little boy scrunched his forehead into a frown. “I thought the bears were gonna eat Goldilocks up and I got scared, but they didn’t. The bears around here will eat’cha up if you’re not careful.”

“Yes, well, I’m certainly glad Goldilocks found some friendly bears to play with, aren’t you?”

“I guess. Ricky Monroe kept wanting the bears to rip her head off.”

Tasha shuddered at the thought, and at the same time felt Clifford’s gaze on her. She was used to people looking at her. After all, she was a fashion model on the runways of New York and Paris and posed in front of the camera for cover shots. People admiring her—or at least the clothes she wore—wasn’t unusual.

The way Cliff looked at her was different. Not predatory. Certainly interested. But with a wary gleam suggesting she didn’t belong here.

Well, she didn’t. But every woman deserved a safe place to lick her wounds when she got dumped. Naturally, she’d called her sister, who’d suggested she fill in for Cliff’s missing housekeeper and play nanny to his little boy.

Even though she’d met Ella’s husband—Cliff’s twin—at her sister’s hasty marriage last year, Tasha hadn’t expected this version of the Swain brothers to have such an impact on her. With his narrow hips, broad shoulders and Stetson tipped back at a rakish angle on his head, he was so potently masculine, he made every man in New York City pale in comparison. The guys in Paris couldn’t hold a candle to him either.

If Tasha hadn’t been getting over her latest romantic involvement, she would have considered making a play for Clifford Swain. But she’d turned over a new leaf.

Lust was no longer enough to base a relationship on. And being a single mother was better than settling for something less, like playing second fiddle to an eighteen-year-old modeling phenom who was landing cover jobs by the handfuls.

“You said you got lost?” Cliff sauntered into the room, all long, loose limbs, cowboy boots and sexy hips.

Lost in lust, she thought before she could stop herself. “Ella gave me the directions to her place, but I must have made a wrong turn. More than once,” she admitted with a wry smile. “I swear I went by the same cow six times.”

His lips hitched up. “They tend to look alike.”

“About the seventh time around the loop, I recognized your name on the mailbox. Melissa was whiny and I was exhausted, so I thought I’d crash here and worry about Ella tomorrow. Your door was unlocked.”

“Western hospitality.”

He came closer, and she caught a whiff of him, an elemental fragrance no aftershave designer had managed to bottle—a combination of leather and sweat and something she suspected was pure sex appeal.

“I’ll drive you out to the ranch if you want to see your sister tonight,” he offered.

“I hate to wake Melissa. Why don’t I just call Ella and let her know I got this far? After all, I’ll be staying here.” She shot a look at Stevie and grinned. “Goldilocks and her mom need someplace to hang out so the mean ol’ bears won’t get ’em. What d’ya think?”

The boy giggled. “I don’t think you want to sleep in my daddy’s bed. It’s not big enough for two people.”

To Tasha’s amazement, she felt the heat of a blush stain her cheeks. “I’m sorry. I thought that was the guest—”

“It is. I’ve been sleeping there the past couple of—” He snatched off his hat and tossed it on an end table. “Look, you can take the guest room. I’ll sleep in the master bedroom and Melissa can sleep—”

“She can sleep with me, Dad. I’ve got an extra bed in my room. She might get scared or somethin’ if she was all alone.”

The boy’s generosity touched Tasha’s heart. What a sweet child! Raising his son with no mother around, Cliff had still managed to rear a sensitive youngster who could empathize with the fears of others. That was a very special attribute few people—particularly men—could claim.

“I think she’d like that, Stevie,” she said. “Thank you for offering.”

Cliff’s scowl telegraphed his disapproval, and Tasha wondered why.

Stevie had plopped himself down on the couch, swinging his feet, and one shoe caught a handle on the carryall purse she’d left there earlier, toppling it over. The contents spilled out, including a paperback she’d finished reading last night.

“Careful, son.” Automatically, Cliff stooped to pick up the mess Stevie had made and his hand fell on a magazine that had fallen out of the purse. Tasha’s image gazed back at him from the cover with a come-hither smile. One creamy shoulder was bare, her salmon-colored dress slinky, sophisticated and sexy as the devil’s own. The headline on the women’s fashion magazine shouted Bright Colors for Summer. His mouth instantly went as dry as a hot summer day and his blood heated to match the temperature.

“Hey, look, Dad. That’s Tasha on the front of the magazine.”

She took the magazine from his fingers that had gone nerveless. “I spotted this at a convenience store where we stopped for a soda. I never know which shot they’ll use.” She studied the photo with a critical eye. “Not too shabby, is it?”

“You’re real pretty,” Stevie said.

Tasha gave the boy a warm smile. “Why, thank you, honey.”

“You’re a cover model,” Cliff said as though that weren’t entirely obvious.

“Mostly I do fashion work, designers’ shows, that sort of thing.” She tapped the magazine. “This was a nice gig, though. Gives me some national visibility, which I could use right about now.”

Visibility was right! On every magazine stand across the country, Tasha would be smiling at passersby, tempting men to pick her up and indulge in a little fantasy. He could just hear the raucous laughter and catcalls when the guys at Sal’s Bar and Grill heard she was his housekeeper.

“Nice gig” was a total understatement. He wasn’t an expert, but he’d guess a national cover like this would bring big bucks.

He plowed his fingers through his hair, stiff from the sweat and dirt of a roundup. This was never going to work. Surely if he asked around a little more, he’d find somebody more suitable to be his housekeeper until Sylvia came back—somebody who wouldn’t tie his libido in knots.

Or draw a lot of attention just when he was starting his election campaign for county sheriff. Granted, so far he was running unopposed and had the support of the incumbent sheriff, who was planning to retire. Still, his personal life would be under a microscope for the next few weeks. Having a beautiful single woman living under his roof was bound to raise eyebrows.

He knew his sister-in-law would watch out for Stevie if he needed her to. But Ella had a new baby, and the main ranch was ten miles by road from Cliff’s house, which was located in the corner of the spread closest to town. When he worked nights or had a meeting to attend, he’d have to pick up Stevie, interrupting his sleep to bring him home.

There had to be some other option.

“Look, I’m not entirely sure—”

She bent to scoop a wallet and fallen keys back into her purse, her low-cut neckline blousing out to reveal the swell of her breasts, and Cliff’s tongue got tangled with his good intentions.

“I didn’t bring our luggage in since I wasn’t sure where you’d want us to sleep. Would you mind helping me?”

Stevie hopped down from the couch. “I’ll help you,” he volunteered.

Blessing Stevie with another smile, which perversely Cliff wished had been meant for him, she said, “I think I’m going to enjoy Western hospitality as long as I’m here.”

She took the boy’s hand, and the two of them headed toward the front door. Cliff didn’t have much choice but to follow. It wasn’t in his nature to be rude to a woman—or anyone else, for that matter, unless he was pretty darn sure they’d broken a law. Even then he tried to be courteous. Given the circumstances, he wanted to be tactful with his brother’s sister-in-law. But he wanted her gone.

Yet for the sake of family harmony, having her here for one night wouldn’t hurt him any. Tomorrow he’d discuss how Tasha would be better off to spend her vacation at the main ranch house with her sister.

Outside, the air was unseasonably warm and there was still a touch of light in the late April sky, although the red-streaked clouds of sunset had faded to gray. The distant mountains of Glacier National Park were only faint silhouettes. A couple of bats whipped past the willow tree his wife Yvonne had planted; in the flower beds that she had lovingly tended and Cliff had let go a little wild, weeds bent their heads in the gentle evening breeze. With a son to raise and a job to hold down, there was never enough time to do everything that needed doing.

Tasha popped the trunk on her BMW.

“Nice car,” Cliff commented. Though it wasn’t the kind of car most folks in this part of Montana would want, he admitted, it was more suitable than the Mazda Tasha’s sister had arrived in a year ago.

“Living in New York City, I’ve never had much of a chance to drive it. I think James enjoyed being out on the road.”

“James?”

“That’s the car’s name.” Her easy smile came his direction this time. “As in, ‘Take me home, James.”’

Right, she named her car. Once she saw his truck, she’d probably call it Brute and his police cruiser would be Hi-Ho-Silver.

She handed Stevie a child’s suitcase and lifted out a larger one for herself. “If you could bring my makeup kit, that’d be great,” she said to Cliff, indicating the remaining piece of luggage in the trunk.

“Sure, no problem.” Reaching inside, he grabbed the handle, yanked…and nearly pulled his arm out of its socket. “What the hell have you got in there? The Brooklyn Bridge?”

“You’re not ’pose to swear, Daddy.”

“You’re right, kid.” He rubbed his shoulder. “I forgot.”

Amusement made Tasha’s eyes sparkle even in the dimming light, like the first two stars to appear in the night sky. “A little of this and that. Makeup, cleansers, moisturizers, a blow dryer with a defuser attachment. Only what every woman needs to look her best.”

“What the—” frowning, he glanced at his son “—heck is a defuser?”

“I’ll show you later, if you’d like.”

Cliff wasn’t sure he wanted to know, or if Stevie was old enough to be hearing this conversation. “Let’s get this stuff inside. I don’t know about you, but I’m starving. You didn’t happen to put dinner on before your nap, did you?”

Half dragging the smallest suitcase, Stevie staggered along the walkway and up onto the porch that went across the front of the house.

“Dinner?” she questioned. The wheels on her suitcase rattled on the uneven concrete path.

The case Cliff was carrying weighed as much as an anvil and didn’t have wheels. “Uh, that’s what housekeepers usually do—take care of dinner arrangements.”

She brightened. “Oh, sure. I can do that.”

“Great. I’m due for a shower. It’ll take me only about ten minutes and then we can eat.”

Tasha looked at him askance. How on earth did he expect her to have something ready to eat in ten minutes? Maybe that was how things were done in Reilly’s Gulch.

But five minutes after putting her bags in her room, she still didn’t know the secret of getting dinner here so quickly, though she’d searched the entire kitchen and the minuscule phone book for the number of a pizza or deli delivery service. Even Chinese would have worked. The best she could find was a diner in town and Sal’s Bar and Grill. Neither of them delivered.

She went down the hall, glancing briefly into the living room where Stevie was watching TV, and knocked on Cliff’s door. There was no sound of water running, so he must have finished his shower.

“Be there in a minute,” he called.

“I can’t find the phone number.”

There was a pause. Then the door opened and Tasha realized she’d made a serious mistake in timing. He had a clean pair of jeans on, which he hadn’t yet bothered to snap, and no shirt. The broad expanse of his chest, furred by only a modest amount of sandy-blond hair, invited a woman’s caress. His nipples peaked in perfect circles of brown; muscles ribbed his washboard stomach. Overall he reminded her of the bronze sculptures on display in New York City museums but far warmer and more tempting to touch.

She licked her lips. Being this man’s housekeeper was definitely going to be a challenge when her mind kept toying with other ideas.

“What phone number?” he asked.

It took her a couple of heartbeats before she recalled why she was standing at his bedroom door. “For a deli or pizza place that delivers. I can’t find a thing in the phone book—”

His shaking head suggested she’d made another error in judgment. “No pizza parlors here, Goldilocks. What I had in mind was for you to fix dinner.”

“Fix?” A few minutes ago Melissa had been Goldilocks. Now Tasha had acquired the nickname.

“As in cook. You do know how to cook, don’t you?”

“Well, of course I do.” She gave a disdainful huff. “Every Greek girl learns to make baklava almost before she can walk.”

He shook his head again, a truly irritating habit he’d developed. “Let’s try for soup and sandwiches. More times than not, that’s what Stevie and I have when Sylvia isn’t around.”

Tasha could handle that. Cliff didn’t have to look at her as if she were totally incompetent. In the city, you ordered takeout. No need to spend your time slaving over a hot stove. It didn’t mean she couldn’t cook—just that she didn’t have many occasions to. She was on the road a lot, and when she wasn’t her hours were grueling.

As she walked away from his bedroom door, she wondered if he’d be all that swift at picking delis out of the phone book that wouldn’t stiff him with a bad case of salmonella or inflate their charges. It took talent and experience to survive the inhumanities of the big city.

From her perspective, cow country looked easy.

TEA SANDWICHES. She’d removed the damn crusts and cut them in triangles. Cliff could hardly believe this was what Tasha considered dinner, but he was too hungry to complain.

With the same delicacy as her mother, Melissa selected one of the tuna triangles and took a dainty bite.

Cliff ate his in a single gulp and took another one from the plate Tasha had prepared.

“My mommy says you’ve got horses, Mr. Swain.”

“Why don’t you call me Uncle Cliff and I’ll call you Melissa. Unless you’d rather I call you Ms. Reynolds?” he teased.

She giggled. “I’ve got an Uncle Bryant, too. We’re going to see him tomorrow and my Aunt Ella.”

“Eat your dinner,” her mother reminded the girl, who after one bite had evidently forgotten her meal.

“I’ve got a horse all my own,” Stevie said. “She’s a cow pony and goes like the wind. Her name’s Star Song.”

“Can I ride her?” Melissa asked. “Can I?”

“Sure. I guess.” Stevie shrugged and glanced at Cliff for direction.

“Now wait a minute, young lady,” her mother said. “I don’t want you trying to ride on your own. You’ll need proper lessons—”

“I can teach her,” Cliff said impulsively before thinking through his offer. If he had his way, Melissa and her mother wouldn’t be here long enough to saddle a horse, much less learn to ride one. “Or maybe your Uncle Bryant can teach you.”

“Can you teach my mom, too? She’s never, ever even been on a horse.”

In an instinctively mothering gesture, Tasha smoothed her daughter’s flyaway curls. “Thanks, but I’m not sure I trust anything that outweighs me by eight hundred pounds.”

Though she was tall, Tasha probably weighed little more than a hundred pounds. Not any more than a decent bale of hay. She had fine bones without an extra ounce of fat on her, long, slender fingers accented by the polish she wore and graceful hands she used to advantage whenever she wanted to make a point.

Cliff swallowed hard as he considered what else her hands would be capable of doing. “I’ve got a gentle mare that wouldn’t give you any trouble.” Not nearly as much trouble as his own imagination was giving him tonight. “She’s about eighteen years old and as placid as a horse can be. Used to be able to cut a calf away from its mama slick as glass, but she’s too old to work now. She could use some exercise, though.”

“I’ll think about it.” With a noncommittal smile, she turned her attention to her cup of chicken noodle soup.

From the looks of things, Tasha didn’t eat enough to keep a sparrow going—a skimpy cup of soup and a quarter sandwich. Meanwhile, Cliff devoured everything on the plate and finished Melissa’s uneaten sandwich. Finally he rummaged in the refrigerator for some leftover roast beef slices and gravy Ella had sent home with him after last Sunday’s supper and zapped a plateful in the microwave. If Tasha stuck around for as long as a week as his housekeeper, he’d be nothing but skin and bones, too weak to chase down a jaywalker, forget an ornery steer.