“How was it?” Elissa asked as she and the others hurried toward where Logan was unhooking Skyler from her gear.
“It was okay.”
Logan snorted.
Skyler looked at him, not even trying to hide her annoyance. “What was that for?”
He met her gaze and refused to look away. “You enjoyed it.”
“How do you know that? You couldn’t even see my face.”
“I can tell when someone is enjoying herself.”
There it was again, enough innuendo to make her blush.
“Your face is all red,” Elissa said, teasing.
Skyler jerked her gaze away from Logan and focused on her friend. “Well, I didn’t put on SPF 8 billion today. I wasn’t expecting to be so danged close to the sun.”
“I saw the Ice Cream Hut is still down by the lake,” Logan said. “Not a bad choice for a first date, don’t you think?”
“Date?” Verona’s eyes widened with totally uncontained glee.
“Yeah, the deal was that I get birthday girl safely to the ground, she goes out with me.”
Skyler’s mouth dropped open as she spun toward Logan, her hands on her hips. “I did not agree to that. You made your pronouncement a breath before you shoved me out of a plane. I don’t know you from Adam.”
“Isn’t that what dates are for, getting to know each other?”
“Sounds like a good idea to me,” Elissa said.
“There will be no date. It’s my birthday, so here’s a crazy thought. How about I pick how I spend the rest of the day and who I spend it with?” She eyed the other women. “And I’m not sure any of you are on that list.”
With that, she stalked toward Elissa’s SUV. If she didn’t fear her skin being burned to a crisp by the time she got back to Blue Falls, she’d walk.
Not that she had any confidence that walking those miles was going to do anything to erase cocky, full-of-himself...sexy Logan Bradshaw from her mind. Yet another reason her friends deserved one whale of a payback.
* * *
“I’M SORRY she’s so cranky.” Verona shook her head as she glanced at Skyler’s retreating form.
“No worries.” He watched as Skyler stalked away, her jeans showing off her shapely backside. “She’ll come around.”
He didn’t think he was the world’s best catch or anything, but he liked to have a good time. And if anyone was in dire need of a good time, it was uptight Skyler Harrington. It had taken him only one look at the gorgeous redhead to know he wanted to be the man to get her to loosen up a little and enjoy herself.
“Maybe we can help a little bit with that,” said the taller, dark-haired woman, the one who seemed to be more prone to teasing Skyler. Elissa, that was her name. “We’re having a surprise party at the music hall tonight. You should come.”
“Sure, sounds like fun.” He eyed the SUV where Skyler now sat staring out the windshield instead of in his direction. Even from this distance, he could tell she was as rigid as a telephone pole.
When all the women had left, he finished gathering the gear and tossed it into the back of Jesse’s pickup truck. He slipped into the passenger seat.
“Feeling better, cuz?”
Jesse glanced over at Logan’s knowing tone. “Listen, you don’t say no to Verona Charles. Not if you don’t want her matchmaking mojo pointed in your direction.”
“So that’s what this is all about? Setting me up with Skyler? Why all the secrecy? When have you known me to not want to go out with a beautiful woman?”
“That was their crazy idea, not mine. After you left the café, Verona asked a lot of questions about you. I guess you passed her test, because that’s when she started talking about setting up a way for you two to meet without Skyler getting wind of it.”
“Because she wouldn’t have gone along with it.”
“Bingo. She’s not your normal type.”
Logan stretched his arm out along the back of the truck’s bench seat and stared at his cousin. “And what type is that?”
“Just looking for a good time.”
“Part of me thinks I ought to be offended.”
Jesse laughed.
The last thing Logan needed was to get involved with a woman who was more the settling-down type. His skin itched just thinking about it.
“So, what are you doing the rest of the day?” Jesse asked as he parked next to Logan’s old truck.
“Going to check out the arena at the fairgrounds, get the lay of the land.”
They got out of Jesse’s truck and stopped at the back of Logan’s.
“You still enjoying riding?”
“Nothing like it.” Sitting astride a bucking bull was so far from his go-nowhere, do-nothing childhood existence that he’d latched on to it the first chance he’d gotten. He dreaded the day when his body prevented him from doing it anymore. Riding bulls was kind of like skydiving—exciting, pushing the edge. They both gave him that sense of freedom he craved as much as air and water.
“Adrenaline junkie-ism must run in the family.”
Logan snorted. “Maybe yours.”
“Maybe just our generation.”
Logan let the conversation drop, even though he could have easily pointed out that his siblings seemed content to follow in their parents’ unadventurous footsteps. That Jesse’s dad had shown the first daredevil tendencies when he’d left North Dakota and joined the air force. And then instead of coming back after his stint was over, he’d gone off to Texas and started flying small planes for executives and vintage planes for air shows. Of the four Bradshaw kids in the older generation, Uncle James was the only one who “got away.” He still hadn’t heard the end of it from the rest of the family in North Dakota.
Just as Logan still heard about his own defection every time he called home. He loved his parents, but that conversation got really damned old.
He shook his head to clear the unwanted memories. “Well, I’ll catch you later.”
“I’ll see you at the rodeo if not before then.”
Logan thought about inviting Jesse to Skyler’s shindig at the music hall, but he kept quiet. As out of character as it might be, he was considering not going. Sure, he’d taken a doozy of a fall off a bull the previous weekend, but he didn’t think he’d hit his head so hard that he was suddenly avoiding beautiful women. But he got the distinct impression that Skyler Harrington wasn’t just any beautiful woman.
She was way too much trouble personified. Even if she was hot as a firecracker.
* * *
“NOW, SEE, WE’RE NOT all bad,” Elissa said as she walked out of the movie theater next to Skyler and India.
Skyler eyed Elissa as her friend shifted to walking backward in front of her. “Yes, this is more of what I had in mind in the first place.” A giant movie screen with Jeremy Renner’s fabulous arms on full display and a tub of buttery popcorn—what wasn’t to like?
“Although why you’d prefer your movie boyfriend over an actual living, breathing hottie, I have no idea.” Elissa shrugged.
“Maybe because my ‘movie boyfriend’ doesn’t think he’s God’s gift to women.”
“Aw,