thick coat Ty’s mother had insisted she wear when they’d headed out the door and she’d only had her overcoat. His mother had also found her a pair of boots to put on so she didn’t have to worry about soiling her shoes.
“I like your family, Ty.” Not that she’d met his father yet. The great man had yet to return from the arena where the rodeo was being held. Her breath made a puff of smoke in the crisp air.
“Good.” He clasped her gloved hand. “They like you, too.”
Her gaze cut toward him as they continued their trek toward the barn. “Am I really the first girl you’ve brought home?”
Staring at her from beneath the cowboy hat he’d donned before they’d left his bedroom, he feigned a sigh. “Caught that, did you?”
“What can I say?” She smiled, despite the frigid air stinging her face. “Smart chick, remember?”
He turned to look at her, his eyes like molten chocolate. “I remember everything about you, Ellie.”
At the warmth in his voice, her insides lit.
“But to answer your question, there were a few local girls during high school who came to the ranch. But during college and afterward …” he shrugged beneath the heavy work coat he’d donned “… I just didn’t meet anyone I wanted to bring to Swallow Creek.”
“You brought me.” Her heart slammed against her rib cage. She knew it didn’t mean anything, that she’d only been a convenient, uncomplicated buffer between his family and the circumstances under which he’d left Swallow Creek.
Only more and more her relationship with Ty wasn’t feeling convenient or uncomplicated.
Sex complicated everything.
“A wise decision on my part.”
Uncertainty hit her. “Because of what happened in your room?”
He pushed an aluminum door open, pulled her inside the building. Warmth swamped her as she stepped onto the concrete floor. Her idea of a “barn” was nothing like the extensive heated metal building in which they stood. This was more like a minibusiness complex. She supposed it was. At the far end she could see areas that appeared to be stables, but at this end there were office spaces and everything was quite meticulous.
Ty shed his gloves, unzipped his jacket and pulled it off. “What just happened was fantastic, but that wasn’t what I meant. I meant because I enjoy being with you—your company, your smile, just holding your hand.”
“Oh.”
Grinning, he rubbed his finger across her cold nose. “Yeah … oh.”
After taking her coat, gloves and scarf and hanging them, along with his, in one of the small offices, he took her hand and showed her around the main barn, one of several barns on the Triple D, apparently. He introduced her to some of the hands, let her feed an apple to a mare, then proudly showed her his stallion, Black Magic.
“Why have a horse when you’ve not been home for years, Ty?”
He stared at the horse, his expression contemplative. “He’s a Thoroughbred and a champion, so he brings a high stud fee.” He’d shown her a room earlier where those stud fee samples were kept frozen. “That more than pays for his upkeep, but maybe you’re right. Maybe I should sell him as I’m not around.”
Eleanor glanced back at the magnificent animal that snorted and grunted as if giving his own feedback to his long-gone owner. Something in Ty’s tone said he didn’t want to let the horse go, that really he was ready to heal past wounds, but perhaps Ty himself wasn’t even aware of what she heard.
“Or maybe,” she suggested softly, hoping she wasn’t overstepping the boundaries of their tentative, confusing relationship, “you should come home and ride him more often.”
Ty held Ellie’s hand tightly in his as they walked into the Swallow Creek Arena where the rodeo was being held. Tonight’s agenda was more about family fun and kicking off the rodeo than actual competitions. There were kids’ events, exhibits, a barbecue cook-off and a barn dance.
From the time they made their entrance, familiar faces greeted Ty, introduced themselves to Eleanor and told him how good it was to see him.
No one mentioned his father.
But no doubt about it, he’d be seeing his father soon.
Acid gurgled in his stomach.
He glanced at Ellie in her jeans and Western-style snap-up that his sister-in-law had insisted she wear. It seemed his whole family was planning to dress her before the weekend ended, but Ellie took it all in her stride, smiling and going along with their wardrobe suggestions.
The jeans were a little snug and looked good clinging to her body. The shirt did nothing to hide her generous curves and looked even better. Ty’s mouth watered just recalling what those curves felt like in his hands, his mouth, pressed to his body.
And the boots. There wasn’t a single practical thing about Ellie’s red boots but hell if they weren’t his favorite part about her outfit. Somehow the bright boots suited her, the real her, the passionate woman beneath the surface.
“You okay?” she asked, her big eyes looking up at him.
“Fine,” he answered, squeezing her hand gently. “I’m fine, darlin’. Just so long as I have you at my side.”
Which crazily enough was true. Having her next to him both excited and calmed him.
“Just thinkin’ how much I liked your boots.” He grinned, liking how her gaze dropped to her boots and a blush that almost matched their bright color spread across her cheeks. “And what’s in ‘em,” he added, just to watch the color in her cheeks deepen.
“Ty Donaldson?” a familiar feminine voice called out from behind them with a distinctive Southern drawl. “Is that really you?”
“Layla?” Ty spun, surprise filling him at the sight of the pretty little blonde barreling toward him. He held his arms out and she stepped into them. “Layla! What are you doing here? Last I heard you were practicing in Florida.”
She hugged him then smiled up at him as if he was a sight for sore eyes. “I’m still in Miami. How about you? You still a big-city doc up North?”
“Absolutely. Angel’s is where I was meant to be. There’s no place in the world I’d rather practice than at that hospital.”
Ellie shifted at his side and he put his arm at her waist, proudly pulling her close to him. “Excuse my been-away-from-the-South-too-long rudeness, Layla.
This is Dr. Eleanor Aston. She’s a pediatrician at Angel’s. One of the best. Y’all have a lot in common.”
Eleanor told herself that it didn’t mean a thing that Ty introduced her as a coworker and not as his weekend date. Or that he’d introduced her as “Eleanor” rather than the “Ellie” he’d taken to calling her by. Or that when he’d said they had a lot in common she’d instantly wondered if he meant they’d both slept with him.
She
