“Even more reason not to take this any further, especially with your brother monitoring everything that happens on the ranch. I don’t want to be the cause of more friction between you two.”
“Why don’t you let me worry about that?” Nick was wondering if he could manufacture a necessary business trip for his dear brother, who was becoming an obstacle to all things happy.
“Let’s just leave it alone. What we had today was perfect. I don’t want to spoil it by turning it into some … some complicated maneuver.”
Nick blew out a breath. “It doesn’t have to be complicated. It could be very simple. I become your date for the time you’re here and I inform my overbearing brother that it’s none of his business what goes on between us.”
“I don’t think—”
“Look, I understand that you’ll return to your life in Indianapolis in five days, and I’m cool with that.”
“I’m not so sure I’d be. I don’t trust myself not to get in over my head. I can’t take that risk.”
Nick gazed at her. “But you were willing to have outdoor sex with an anonymous cowboy.”
“Yes. But now I intend to rein myself in.”
“That’s too bad. Plus, what else are you going to do while you’re here? The skiing is lousy in June and I’m way more fun than a horseback ride or an all-day hike.”
Her lips twitched, as if she wanted to smile but wouldn’t quite let herself.
“Think about it, Miss Jeffries. In the meantime, let’s hightail it to the ranch house before all the food’s gone. I don’t know about you, but I’ve worked up an appetite.”
“Me, too, Mr. Chance.” With a little grin, she walked toward the truck.
He had to clench his hands into fists to keep from grabbing her and kissing her until she melted against him the way she had earlier. He thought he’d done a damn good job of satisfying her, but maybe he hadn’t pleased her all that much if she could turn her back on more of the same.
“The name’s Nick,” he called after her as she climbed into the cab.
“I like that,” she said over her shoulder. “I’m Dominique.”
Dominique. Great name for a very sexy lady. And he would get her into bed again or his name wasn’t Nick Chance.
4
DOMINIQUE SPENT THE short ride back to the ranch house getting her bearings. When she’d first glimpsed a rugged cowboy working in a pasture, she’d thought Fate had sent her down that dirt road specifically to discover him. Everything had played out in fantasylike detail, until she’d learned the identity of her mystery lover.
An anonymous hired hand fit her image of wild and crazy behavior. She wouldn’t say anything about the encounter and neither would he, for fear of getting canned. Very neat and tidy. Over and done with.
Had it gone that way, she could have rounded out the vacation by photographing the landscape, and flown home with a renewed sense of who she was. Her next guy wouldn’t be as boring as Herman, or as disloyal.
But Fate hadn’t been as kind as she’d thought. It had thrown a Chance man in her path, one who had the freedom to continue what they’d started, despite his brother’s obvious disapproval. She dared not risk it. If the prospect of sex with him could make her forget about condoms, then he obviously appealed to a side of her she needed to control.
Besides, why mess with a good thing? She had her perfect memory to take home with her, and there was every possibility a second go-round wouldn’t measure up. After two years with Herman, she had little confidence in her ability to improvise. What if they tried sex in a normal bed and Nick found her boring? She couldn’t bear the thought.
In the midst of her inner debate, Nick reached over and took her hand. She had to admit that felt very good. She didn’t know him at all, and yet she believed he was a nice guy. For sure he was an amazing lover, so amazing that he intimidated her more than a little.
“Look, you might have the wrong impression of me,” she said. “Until today, I’d never had sex with someone I just met.”
“Neither had I.”
“Really? You seemed so … so cool about it.”
He laughed. “Then I put on a good show. That was the wildest thing I’ve ever done in terms of sex. I kept wondering if you were part of a dream.”
“I wondered the same about you. I actually pinched myself before I started taking your picture.”
He squeezed her hand and released it so he could downshift. “Out of curiosity, what are your plans for those photos?”
“I suppose that depends on whether you’ll grant me a release.”
“Be happy to.”
“Then I could …” She was brought up short by the knowledge that this was the first picture she’d taken in ages where the subject wasn’t a relative or a paying client. Her portfolio contained family portraits, wedding photos and high school yearbook shots. All her work prior to Herman’s reign was tucked into the back of a closet, except for a few she’d framed and hung in her apartment.
“I know.” He grinned. “You’ll frame it and put it on your bedroom wall so you’ll have something to remember me by.”
His chutzpah made her laugh. “You have quite the high opinion of yourself, don’t you?”
“If I do, it’s your fault.” He recaptured her hand. “You’re the one who said you had to pinch yourself when you caught sight of me without my shirt.”
She hadn’t been teased much in two years with Herman, and she’d forgotten how fun it could be. “Maybe I was slightly mesmerized.”
“Only slightly?”
“Okay, fully mesmerized. Which means other women might have the same reaction. I could make money off that shot. Maybe a gallery would be interested.”
“Do you do that much? Display your photography in galleries?”
“Not anymore. I was going broke selling my work as fine art and borrowing money from my folks to keep afloat. My ex-boyfriend was right about one thing—weddings and portraits are a steadier income once you build up a reputation.”
“Makes sense.”
“Oh, it’s very sensible.” Herman’s lectures on the subject still echoed in her head. Her parents had been thrilled when he’d steered her in the direction of financial stability. Everybody had said Herman was so good for her, a practical guy to offset her tendency to ignore the mundane details of life.
His practical nature wasn’t quite so attractive to her friends and family now that he’d applied it to his romantic life. But still they’d expressed fear that she’d go off the deep end without someone to counter her impulsive, artistic urges.
“Well, here we are.” The truck’s tires crunched on gravel as he pulled into the circular drive in front of a massive two-story log house. The center section was a good thirty feet wide, and the wings on either side were angled forward so that the house seemed to reach out in a welcoming gesture. A porch ran the length of the house, and rustic wooden rockers beckoned a visitor to sit and contemplate a view of meadows, wildflowers and snow-capped mountains.
Dominique had liked the white clapboard quaintness of the Bunk and Grub, the B and B where she’d originally thought she’d be staying. It sat on the outskirts of the little town of Shoshone, and she’d planned to explore the small village while she was here.
But she wasn’t sorry Pam had