Texas Passion
West Texas,
June 1861
“Daggum-it,
Tom. If you don’t tell me where Trent McCall is, no one else will.” Catherine
gripped her hands at her sides and fought to control her temper. Tom, her best
friend since the age of five, would help, even if the code for men in the west
was to cover for each other.
Bare to the
waist, Tom Hayes stood in a patch of light from the barn door, rubbing down his
bay. The fresh scent of hay and horseflesh pulled her back to her childhood,
the open range, riding bareback for hours, and swimming in the watering hole.
Tom shook his
head. Golden locks, tied with a thin leather strip, hung down his
sweat-slickened back. Beautiful curls any woman would give her eyeteeth to
possess. “He’s still on the cattle drive and won’t be back from Kansas for a
few more days.”
Catherine
shoved auburn strands that escaped the tight knot at the back of her neck from
her face. “Right. What you really mean is, Mr. McCall has already planned the
end-of-the-trail party and doesn’t want me to know.” Dancing until dawn,
drinking until they fell into a mindless stupor, and bedding every available
woman, the men on the cattle drive loved celebrating their return home. “So how
many whores are they planning to hire?”
Tom lifted
the brush and pointed it at her. Thin lines streaming around his blue eyes
showed the time he spent working in the sun. “Catherine Turnberry, you best be
watching that mouth of yours. Your pa hears you talking like that, and he’ll
tan your hide.”
With muscular
biceps and broad shoulders, Tom had every girl in the county chasing him during
their younger years. Yet, he could have cared less, interested only in riding
and hunting at the time.
‘Course, she’d
missed the chase his wife had waged. The short trip Catherine had taken to
visit her aunt in Boston had turned into a four-year stretch. But unlike the
socialites of her aunt’s association, who fell for every rich man’s line of
love, Catherine knew what she wanted. And it wasn’t some sweet talking dandy. No,
even if her mother had wanted her to stay with her aunt to learn to act like a
lady, she planned to marry Trent McCall and become a rancher’s wife in the
greatest state in the union.
“Then tell me
who he’s hired to work the party. Ms. Lillian? Or Madame Foch?” She stepped
forward and caressed the bay’s neck. The smooth hair under her palm calmed
Catherine’s nerves. For most of her life, she’d planned to be Trent’s wife.
What if he didn’t find her desirable? “I don’t want him to be with another
woman only hours before seeing me for the first time in years.”
She didn’t
need the comparison.
Tom groaned. “He’s
a man, Catherine. He’s bedded lots of women while you’ve been gone.” He dropped
the brush in a nearby bucket and studied her face with a probing glare. “You’ve
had outings with other men, too, right?”
She nodded. “But
I never…”
The words
backed up in her throat. She swallowed hard, dipped her head and stroked the
bay. How could she tell him she’d known the appeal of the opposite sex, had
seen the hunger in men’s eyes while cleaning up after the girls at the
burlesque shows? Neither her mama nor her aunt knew about her job as a maid in
the theater. They both thought she had attended to the needs of a pampered socialite.
But what
other choice did she have? No other job paid as much so she’d lied. Her face
burned. No one in Texas knew about her real life back East, especially not her
parents. “For God sake, Tom, you know I grew up on my father’s ranch. I
understand the basics of sex.” But I’ve never sleep with a man. I only ever
wanted Trent.
She ignored
the anger, bubbling through her veins at the thought of Trent bedding another
woman and jumped ahead. “We’re practically engaged. He shouldn’t be fooling
around.”
“Don’t see
how you can stop him.” Tom ran his hand across his chest, and
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