He must stop looking at her lips. He must!
‘As if he would,’ Erin said indignantly. ‘As well as expensive, he’s also intelligent.’
‘He is at that.’
And it was the truth. Matt’s pride in his bull was almost overwhelming. Cecil was the result of years and years of careful planning and selective breeding. Up until now, he’d been Matt’s pride and joy. He still was! But up until now, Cecil was the first thing he thought of when he woke in the morning, and his last thought as he slept at night.
And if he’d had to choose between Cecil and Charlotte, the choice would be obvious and absolute.
Cecil or Erin, though…
No! This was ridiculous. He liked a simple and ordered existence, he thought desperately. He wanted an existence where he farmed and Charlotte kept the house and his social life nicely ordered.
That was how he’d been raised, with his mother and father living together but in separate worlds, and that was the way he believed the world worked. As it would continue to work.
Except…there was this woman right before his nose!
But this woman came with complications, and they weren’t just minor hiccups. They were major. She came with a pair of troubled twins, and he just knew wherever Erin went it wouldn’t be just the twins that’d follow.
Get involved with Erin Douglas and he knew there’d be more kids, his and others, every lame duck in the district, every hard luck story…
And the boundaries between house and farm would cease to exist. He knew it. There’d be a riot of kids and dogs inside and out, and Erin herself wouldn’t know her place. She’d be out heaving hay or grooming cows or…or somewhere he couldn’t get away from her.
Like now. He was trapped two inches from her cute nose, and hell, all he wanted to do was kiss her.
‘Would you stop looking at me like a rabbit caught in a floodlight?’ she said suddenly, and there was no way he could escape the gentle mockery in her tone. Could she really know what he was thinking?
Apparently, yes. ‘Matt McKay, you are very, very cute, but you are an engaged person and I am not the least bit interested. I take the lust I’m looking at in your eyes right now as a compliment, I am exceedingly grateful for all you’ve done for me and the twins but I want nothing more from you than enough space to go to sleep. So you can stop looking at me like I’m going to lunge at your body any minute and you can go to sleep. Now!’
‘Hey, I’m not expecting anything!’
‘And neither am I,’ she said firmly. ‘So there’s nothing to stop either of us from sleeping.’ And without another word she rolled over and put her face to the wall.
He rolled over, too, which left his nose pressed against Cecil’s butt. The comparison to what he’d just been looking at was ridiculous.
And her butt was against his. There was simply no room for it not to be.
Sleep? Ha! All he could feel was her. All he could think of was her. She was so…
So right out of his league! In every single way he could think of.
As for Erin? She’d said she was going to sleep, but it wasn’t quite that easy. He was too darned close. Too darned male.
Too…too everything!
‘I am not interested in Matt McKay,’ she told herself fiercely. Not. Not. Not!
But he was the most gorgeous male she’d ever slept with in her life! That wasn’t saying much, she thought ruefully. Erin had always been so involved with her kids that men usually ran a mile, sensing that commitment with Erin meant commitment to a whole lot more.
But Matt was certainly gorgeous.
And he was so darned nice! He was so nice that she wanted to turn right over and…
‘That’s enough of that,’ she whispered into the dark. ‘Go to sleep!’
CHAPTER NINE
ERIN slept late. Late, that is, in cattle terms. It must have been three a.m. or later before she’d finally fallen into an uneasy slumber, she was dog tired and she was accustomed to noise. So maybe it wasn’t surprising that when she finally woke, the rest of the cattle pavilion was bustling.
As were Matt and the twins. Erin rolled sleepily over and found herself looking at ten legs. Four belonged to Cecil who was standing looking regally around as his minions worked over him. Four belonged to the twins, who, armed with a brush apiece, were intent on making Cecil look even more regal.
And two belonged to Matt.
‘Well, well. Sleepy-head’s finally decided to grace us with her consciousness. Good morning, Miss Douglas.’
‘Good…good morning.’ She brushed the sleep from her eyes and sat up, then gasped and hauled her sleeping bag up to her neck. She must have pulled the zipper down in her sleep, and her nightdress wasn’t exactly decent…
‘Have a coat,’ Matt said, and tossed a waterproof down to her, though by the glint in his eyes she knew he’d seen-and approved of what he’d seen. ‘Bathroom’s that-away, lady, but you’d better scuttle or you’ll miss breakfast.’
‘Breakfast?’ She was still befuddled by sleep and totally bewildered.
‘Pancakes at two o’clock,’ he told her, doing a sweeping circle of the pavilion until he was pointing to a barbecue at the far end. ‘Courtesy of the Country Women’s Association. But the dress code’s a bit rigid. Nightgowns with unfastened buttons don’t reach their standards.’
She gasped. Enough!
She clutched his waterproof to her while awkwardly escaping from her sleeping bag, then bolted, tinglingly aware that his eyes stayed on her until the door closed behind her.
It was a silly, happy, busy couple of hours before the Grand Parade.
Breakfast was delicious-steak and sausages for those with strong constitutions, but pancakes and honey for those with a bit more finesse. ‘Which is me,’ Erin declared, watching Matt chomp into his beef. ‘And in front of Cecil, too. Honestly, Matt, have you no sensitivity?’
‘If you think for one minute that Cecil will end up as beef steak…’
‘His cousins might.’
‘They’d have to be pretty inferior cousins.’
‘I don’t care. I’m sticking to pancakes. What about you, boys?’ And although the twins desperately wanted to be like Matt, honesty prevailed and pancakes won the day.
‘Weaklings,’ Matt declared but the boys looked up into his twinkling eyes and knew he was kidding them.
Honestly, Erin thought. For a man to get away with calling the twins weaklings-and for the twins to love it…
She could seriously fall for this man-if he wasn’t already spoken for. Or if he wasn’t rich. Or… If a million other things that weren’t going to happen!
Breakfast finished, the whole pavilion settled down to the serious business of making their animal the most magnificent. The animals left here now were all winners, but none looked as great as Cecil, Erin thought, but she knew she was biased. The four of them worked as a team, going way past the necessary preparations for a bull who’d already won champion of his class.
‘Do you think I should tie a big blue bow around his ears?’ she asked as she stood back and admired their handiwork. ‘And maybe a matching one on his tail?’
‘Over my dead body.’ Matt stood beside her and grinned. ‘I’ll have you know my bull’s a he-man and I want him to stay that way. His testosterone level would plummet at the first bow.’
‘And that would never do,’ she said mockingly. ‘A McKay male with suspect testosterone…’
‘We try to keep it above the run of the herd,’ Matt said smugly.
