Catching Calhoun. Tina Leonard
glanced in the direction Minnie was pointing.
“He’s very tall,” Kenny said. “I don’t think he’ll be able to stay in the saddle.”
“But he looks like Antonio Banderas,” Minnie observed. “In that movie we weren’t supposed to be watching when you fell asleep, Momma? Antonio could do anything.”
“Let’s all stick to G-rated movies from now on,” Olivia murmured, her heart beginning to beat faster as she watched the cowboy walk. He did have a saunter to him, a loose swagger of confidence that caught the attention of every woman in the arena.
Then he turned around to wave to her children, and Olivia’s heart sank deep inside her chest.
He’s gorgeous.
Chapter Two
Too gorgeous to be anything but trouble in spades, she decided quickly. “Come on,” Olivia told Minnie and Kenny. “Come watch Gypsy and Grandpa.”
“No, thank you, Momma,” Minnie said. “We want to see this man. I think he can stay on if he’s been doing his cowboy calisthenics.”
Olivia frowned. “What are those?”
“The ones you do in front of the TV every morning,” Kenny said. “With the lady in the tight swimsuit who always smiles real big and says ‘You can do it!’”
Olivia shook her head. “Those are not calisthenics. And that’s not going to be a cowboy after he gets tossed and stomped.”
“I think he’s gonna win the big prize,” Minnie said. “Calhoun, you can do it!” she called loudly.
The cowboy grinned at Olivia, touching the brim of his hat with two fingers in a roguish salute. She gasped and drew back. “You two come with me.”
“Mom,” Minnie said, “you wanted us to watch this. You wanted us out of your hair while you did the act. We’re not going to try to get you to talk to him. We just want to see what he can do.”
“It’s Bloodthirsty Black,” Kenny reminded her. “Mean as a three-headed rattler. We can’t miss him!”
Olivia sighed, caught by her own sales pitch. “I wasn’t trying to get you out of my hair. I thought you would enjoy seeing bull riding more than you’d enjoy an act you’ve watched a thousand times.”
“Well, we are.” Minnie gave her a squeeze around the waist. “We’re fine. Don’t be so worried about us.”
Worry was her first and middle names where her children were concerned. But she’d been outmaneuvered here, though the cowboy didn’t appear to have much on his mind other than his impending trip to the E.R. Olivia gave both her children a hug, then happened to glance toward the chute again. The cowboy was sitting on the rail, watching them with a grin on his face.
She had never seen a sexier cowboy in her life.
Her skin crawled, itched and tingled.
“Have fun,” she said. “No talking to cowboys!”
“We won’t,” Kenny said. “Maybe just an autograph or two.”
But Olivia had walked away, not hearing his last words. She couldn’t stop thinking about shaggy long black hair, full smiling lips, and predatory black eyes that said Hey, pretty lady, even from a distance.
Wolf.
And she’d seen it all before. Maybe not in such a sinful package, but still, that cowboy wasn’t going to sing her a trailside good-night tune.
SO THE TWO LITTLE rodeo urchins had a cute-as-a-bug mother, Calhoun mused. And no father watching over the family, apparently. The little girl hadn’t said anything about a father in the rodeo when she’d mentioned her mother. He knew all the cowboys hanging around the stalls, and he’d never seen this particular family before. He wondered where they hailed from.
Shaking his head, he tried to focus on what the cowboys were saying about Bloodthirsty tonight.
Two little faces watched him intently.
Sighing, he thought about his art exhibition. The urchins’ little mother would make a nice painting. He wondered what color her nipples were. Were they the shade of her lips, which had been a nice blush, or the deeper brown of her hair underneath the blond highlights? He loved nipples—they added an element of surprise. You never knew what color they would be. A lot of other things on a woman made sense; you could figure them out in advance. But nipples were dependent on the shading of the body, individual and unique to every—
“Cowboy, have you sent your brain to space?” someone called. “Earth to Calhoun, earth to Calhoun.”
“Very funny.” Calhoun slid off the rail. “I was thinking up my strategy.”
“Really,” another cowboy said, pinning Calhoun’s number on the back of his vest. “From the stupid look on your face, we thought maybe you were daydreaming.”
“About women,” someone else said, and everyone laughed. “Sex-dreaming. About all the women who are going to want you after you tame this bounty bull.”
“Nah, sex was the furthest thing from my mind,” Calhoun said, lying through his teeth. “All my attention’s on Bloodthirsty Black.”
Except that small piece that had leaked out for a moment of fantasizing, Calhoun thought, glancing toward the children who watched his every move. It was so unlike him to find a woman in the flesh who stayed in his thoughts longer than his paintings did. Dang, he was going to have to be careful around those children. They had a smokin’ hot mama—and that was the last thing he needed to be fantasizing about. There were too many surprise kids who had recently turned up in the Jefferson family tree.
He wasn’t planning to add a branch. Or even a couple of twigs.
“You can do it!” he heard a little voice call.
“Cheering section?” someone asked.
“No.” Calhoun turned to look at the children briefly. “Who are they?”
Everyone stopped what they were doing to stare at him.
“Barley’s daughter Olivia’s kids. Barley the rodeo clown. Tough character, Barley Spinlove. No one except a brainless wuss would ever think about dating his daughter, or marrying into Barley’s family.”
“Barley used to date Marvella,” someone else explained. “Think he married her, but it didn’t last long.”
“And that’s a bad reference right there,” Calhoun said.
Marvella had a tough enough rep of her own. The owner of another bounty bull, Bad Ass Blue, and the Never Lonely Cut-n-gurls Salon in Lonely Hearts Station. Everyone had had a run-in with her at one time or another.
“Barley makes it known that he wants no part of a smooth-talking cowboy hanging around his daughter—she’s got two kids from just that same incident. Cowboys can’t be trusted—and Barley doesn’t differentiate between us. We’re all bad as far as he’s concerned. None good enough for Olivia and his grandkids.”
“Uses himself as an example of why women ought not date cowboys,” someone else offered, and everyone went back to whatever they’d been doing.
“Great,” Calhoun said. “Guess that means I won’t be painting her.” Or getting her clothes off. Or going out with her. And marriage was definitely out.
Marriage? Why had that thought floated through his brain?
“Of course anyone with a half cup of sense knew Olivia’s marriage wasn’t going to last. She married a first-class jerk, but that doesn’t mean anybody else is going to get a chance,” a cowboy muttered.
Calhoun looked up at the four faces staring at him. “Oh, don’t tell me,” he said. “I’m standing