Guardian Cowboy

But she didn’t tell him that evening, or the next when he once again showed up and ordered a soda with lime. Instead, when she was between waiting on people, she stood next to his booth and they continued to get to know each other better.

Wednesday evening when he came in, she knew she couldn’t put it off another minute. So far their conversations had been pleasant. They’d talked about the nicer weather and his work around the ranch.

He’d told her that Trisha Cahill, who’d married fellow ranch hand Dusty Crawford, was pregnant and that Dusty was over the moon. In turn, she’d told him that she’d heard rancher Abe Breckinridge and his wife, Donna, were down with the flu and that Janine Willis, who worked at the grocery store, had taken a fall and broken her hip.

They’d talked about nothing in depth and she still had no idea how he’d react when he learned what she had done to him.

Even though she got to know him better the more time she spent with him, she’d like to know him even more. She wanted to know what he dreamed about, what life events had made him into who he was, and what he looked for in the future.

But she feared she’d never get to learn those things once she told him how she’d fooled him. And he had every right to be quite angry with her. What had seemed like a funny idea at the moment didn’t feel quite so funny now.

She glanced across the bar to where he was in a booth visiting with Chad Bene who worked on the Swanson ranch. The two men were laughing at something and she wished she was seated next to Sawyer in the booth and having fun.

He glanced in her direction and the look he gave her felt sinfully intimate and warmed her from head to toe. Oh, she didn’t want to come clean with him. She didn’t want the budding romantic relationship with him to end.

She couldn’t completely lose her head. She had to remember that the romance she believed might be building between them was based on her lie.

If tonight went as the other two nights had, Sawyer would stay until about ten or so and then leave to go home. Usually by ten on a weekday the bar became fairly deserted.

Tonight, no matter what was going on in the bar, she was going to have that conversation with him. She absolutely, positively, couldn’t put it off any longer.

As the clock quickly wound down to the designated hour, a ribbon of tension twisted around her stomach and pressed tight against her chest.

There were only three people left in the bar. They were all seated in Annie’s section when Sawyer reached next to him on the booth seat for his hat, a sure sign that he was preparing to head out. She couldn’t let him leave tonight without knowing the truth.

She approached the booth. “You getting ready to leave?”

“It’s about that time,” he replied. “I know tomorrow is your night off and I was wondering if you’d be interested in eating dinner at the café with me again.”

“I’d love to. But, before you leave, there’s something I really need to tell you and it might make you renege on your offer.” Dread and tension once again pressed tightly in her chest.

He frowned and set his hat back down on the seat. “And what would that be?”

She sucked in a deep breath and then released it.

“We didn’t sleep together the other night. I mean, we slept together, but we didn’t have sex.”

His frown deepened and a dark wariness jumped into his eyes. “What are you talking about? I was there.”

“Well, you mostly weren’t there,” she replied. She stared down at the booth table, unable to meet his gaze as she continued. “You were passed out, like you usually are at the end of a Saturday night. It was kind of a joke, but I also wanted to show you how vulnerable you are when you get in that state. It frightens me for you.”

When her words were met with a weighty silence, she finally looked up. Anger. It was written in the darkness of his eyes, in the grim slash of his lips. Every line in his face appeared sharper and his shoulders were stiff.

“Did everyone have a good laugh at my expense?” he asked, the words clipped and curt.

“It wasn’t like that,” she quickly protested. “I didn’t do it for my own humor, although I will admit it was kind of funny seeing your reaction when you woke up in my bed the next morning.”

Her words did nothing to soften any of the hardness in his gaze. He leaned over, grabbed his hat once again and worked the brim between his fingers.

“Sawyer, I’ll admit something else,” she continued hurriedly. “I told you I had a crush on you and I meant it. It’s the truth. I didn’t like the idea of you being passed out to the point that you could become a victim. You could get beaten up or robbed when you’re in that state. You could be taken advantage of by an unscrupulous woman.” The words tumbled out of her in a desperate rush to take his anger away.

“So, you decided to be the unscrupulous woman?”

The press of tears burned at her eyes. This was going so much worse than she’d ever thought it would. “I’m sorry. I should have never done it.”

“Yeah, you got that right.” He got up from the booth, slapped his hat on his head and walked away from her toward the door.

She watched him go until he disappeared from her sight. So much for a romance with Sawyer Quincy. She’d be lucky if he ever spoke to her again.

* * *

Sawyer stepped out into the cool night, the air a welcome relief to the hot anger that coursed through him. He wasn’t just ticked off at Janis. He was also irritated with his friends, who had obviously been in on the whole thing all along.

Geez, he’d been so worried and had felt so guilty when he’d believed he’d had sex with Janis and had no memory of it. The whole reason he’d invited her out to dinner the next night was that he’d thought they’d been intimate.

But you enjoyed having dinner with her, a small voice whispered in his head. And he’d enjoyed her company since then. Still, he couldn’t believe what she had done to him.

He leaned against the front bumper of his truck, let out a deep sigh and stared up the street. Bitterroot shut down early on weeknights and there wasn’t a soul on the street except him.

And why was he still there? Why wasn’t he already in his truck and driving home?

He had to admit, the whole thing had given him a wake-up call he’d needed for a long time about his drinking. On that same Saturday morning he’d gone to speak to Cassie about the possibility of him becoming foreman once Brody Booth stopped working on the Holiday Ranch.

Brody had found love with Mandy and they now lived on a big spread. Everyone knew he was just biding his time before quitting the Holiday place.

For the first time in his life, Sawyer had wanted to step up and take on additional responsibility, but Cassie had turned him down. She’d said something to the effect that she didn’t believe the other men respected him enough to follow his lead.

That night he’d carried a bitter disappointment with him to the bar and he’d tried to drink it away. He’d guzzled his beer down with purpose and, like usual, he hadn’t remembered anything after the first couple of beers.

Cassie refusing to consider him for the foreman’s job coupled with believing he had made love to a woman while drunk and having no knowledge of it had made him rethink his drinking.

Hell, he didn’t even enjoy it that much. Before he could get a nice little buzz going, he always passed out. Was it really possible Janis had a genuine concern about him?

She didn’t appear to be the type of woman who would do something like that just for grins and giggles. Maybe she really had done it because she cared about him.

At the moment he was too confused to do anything but head home and get a good night’s sleep. He’d figure out how he felt about Janis tomorrow.

He climbed into his truck and instantly spied a piece of paper tucked beneath his windshield wiper.

“What now?” he muttered. He rolled down his window, reached out to grab the paper and then turned on the dome light.

Stay away from her.

Printed in bold, black letters, the words stared up at him. His heart had been racing with anger but it instantly quieted. He looked up and down the street once again, but there was still nobody to see.

As he looked at the note once again, his heart began to beat more quickly. What in the hell? There was no question in his mind that the “her” was Janis.

What was going on? Was this the same work as the person who had spray-painted the back of the bar? If that was the case, he had serious doubts the culprit was Zeke Osmond.