Cowboy Trouble (The McCord Brothers 1.5) by Delores Fossen Page B

have a flat tire,” he commented.
    A reminder, or rather a jab, of how they’d first gotten together. In a downpour, no less. She’d had a flat tire on her vintage candy-apple-red Mustang. One look at her, and he’d stopped to help. And the rest was history. Within three days, they’d become lovers. Secretly. Within three months, they’d become engaged.
    Also secretly.
    Ditto for the elopement and marriage.
    It’d been a whirlwind romance by anyone’s standards. But when the whirling finally stopped, Natalie opted out of her promise to love him forever and went back to dear old Dad.
    “No flat tire.” And from the way she pursed her mouth, Natalie was remembering that fateful day, as well.
    She pushed aside some papers on his desk and propped her right butt cheek on the corner. She probably did that to give herself some more space as well, but the simple gesture caused her skirt to shift slightly, and he got another glimpse of her thigh.
    That cooled down the surliness and brought on the fantasies again.
    Hot fantasies of him sliding his hand right up her thigh and into her panties. Which were almost certainly silk and lace because even when Natalie had been a tomboy, she’d had great taste in underwear. Then he could sink his fingers into that moist, slippery heat and give her an orgasm they’d both remember.
    Oh, man.
    What the hell was he thinking?
    Or better yet, what was he thinking with? Of course, he already knew the answer to that. He was thinking with that brainless part of him that was causing a three-ring circus in his jeans.
    “This is your office?” she asked, her gaze landing on the framed photo on the file cabinet of him and his mother. She sounded surprised. Maybe because she hadn’t thought of him as the office-having sort.
    Rico nodded and nearly added that he was a top hand now, that he supervised the gawking butts. But that wouldn’t impress Natalie because simply put, he was still just a cowboy.
    “Why are you here?” Rico came out and asked at the same moment Natalie said, “Are you, uh, seeing anyone?”
    Rico was certain he scowled. Natalie scowled, too, huffed and stood. Or rather she tried. But she got off-balance in the small space and wobbled. It likely would have stayed just a wobble if she’d been wearing cowboy boots, but the needle-thin heels didn’t give her much support. She reached for the filing cabinet to steady herself.
    She caught on to Rico instead.
    Specifically, his thigh. She clamped her hand over it. That didn’t help him in the dirty-thoughts department.
    “Sorry,” she grumbled, snatching back her hand and hitting him in the crotch in the process. He winced, cursed. But she cursed, too. “These damn shoes.”
    Bingo. Natalie was still a cowboy-boots girl. “Please don’t tell me you wore them to impress me?” he asked.
    She blinked and stared as if he’d just suggested they fly to Pluto on a hay bale. “No.” Natalie paused. “Maybe,” she amended, swallowing hard.
    Hell’s Texas bells. Now he was the one with that “fly to Pluto” look of disbelief. “You’re not here for ex sex, are you?”
    “No,” she jumped to say. But then she hesitated, nibbled on her bottom lip. “Are you seeing anyone? Engaged? In love?”
    None of the above, but Rico didn’t answer. He went with a repeat of his question. “Ex sex?” And he was about to tell her there was no way that would happen. However, Natalie spoke before he could get his mouth working.
    “We’d have to be exes for ex sex,” she said.
    Because Rico was already confused, it took longer than normal for those words to sink in. Even when the sinking was done, they still didn’t make sense.
    “What are you talking about? We’ve been divorced for twelve years.” He was about to add all that old baggage about her buckling under to her daddy’s demands, but again Natalie got a word in first.
    One very important word.
    “No,” she said.
    “No?” he questioned, only because Rico didn’t