The Bull Rider's Twin Trouble

Mrs. McNeal’s offer of a helpful son had been a gift from heaven, and she knew she could never turn down the assistance, even if the man on the doorstep made her think nothing but the most sinful of thoughts.

Cassie pictured the way he had been standing there looking her over, and she felt short of breath again. She had tried to behave as professionally as she could, despite the inclination to kiss this complete stranger. She was no longer a whimsical young woman who could give in to an impulse of that sort, no matter how strong.

It was more difficult than she’d like to admit, though. She did not look forward to seeing the man again, and she needed to keep her distance when those urges pushed her to do some very inappropriate things. If she had any choice, she would tell the neighbors she didn’t require any help, after all. But she did, so there was nothing for it.

Cassie turned her thoughts back to her two sons, who were playing amid the boxes piled around the living room. “Time for bed,” she told them, and they hopped up, racing for the bathroom.

Zach won, shutting the door in Carter’s face. While he waited his turn, he went over to his mother and pulled on her arm. “Can you tell us the story about the time Dad saved the baby birds?” he asked, looking up to her with his large green eyes.

Cassie’s heart squeezed tight. The boys idolized their father and always wanted to hear stories about him. He had only been gone for six months, and she couldn’t face tarnishing their perfect image of him, so she had kept telling them the good stories over and over, keeping the not-so-good ones to herself. To them, he was a kind-hearted police officer who had died in an unfortunate car crash. She wanted it to stay that way.

Zach and Carter were by far the biggest reason why she couldn’t bring a man into her life. They weren’t ready. Especially not for someone like this Mr. McNeal, who carried an air of recklessness about him.

If only that recklessness wasn’t so damn enticing.

* * *

“YOUR NEW NEIGHBOR seems nice,” Brock told his ma as he piled mashed potatoes onto his plate, trying to keep any hint of emotion out of his voice.

The old woman was terrible at hiding her exasperation. She had been so interested to hear what had happened that he was surprised she hadn’t been hanging out a window with binoculars and some kind of long-distance microphone like in an old spy movie.

Well, it served her right to be on tenterhooks for a while, after that bit of meddling. Not that she shouldn’t already know exactly how it went. She was well aware of his rule.

A bite of delicious fried chicken later, he felt he had tortured her enough.

“No kids, ma. You know that.”

She gave an exaggerated sigh. “Brock, I can’t understand what you have against children, particularly those two. They’re sweet things. And being around them might do you, and them, some good. Howie, tell him,” she said, swatting her husband on the arm.

The elderly man looked up from his food slowly, clearly unwilling to join the conversation. His gray mustache shifted from side to side as he chewed. After it was clear he was expected to make some sort of contribution, though, he nodded slightly. “Fine boys,” he said.

Sarah looked triumphant, as if that settled everything.

Brock shrugged. “You know how I feel about raising kids. Between the rodeo circuit and the kind of life I live—”

His ma snorted, making her thoughts clear on that score. He plowed on, regardless.

“—I don’t want the responsibility of children hanging over me every time I go rock climbing or hop on my motorcycle.”

He didn’t need to say any more. His adopted parents knew that he would never want to leave children without a father. When his parents had died...well, it wasn’t something he would wish on anyone.

He turned his attention to his food, the air thick with unspoken words.

Still, if there was ever a woman who could make him consider breaking his “no kids” rule, it was this Cassie. Even then, the only type of relationship he was prepared to have with her would need to be something temporary, casual, especially when he’d be on the road again in another couple of weeks, and he doubted she would be okay with something like that. Not a widow with two young children.

It was best not to even start something, no matter how tempting the lady.

His ma shook her head at him. “Why you and your sister can’t be happy with a nice calm life, I’ll never know. With her always thousands of miles away and you doing reckless heaven-knows-what...at least your brothers don’t try me like the two of you.”

Brock bit his tongue, but he was sure Ma knew what he was thinking: what she called “reckless,” he called fun, interesting, exciting.

“Where’s Amy going after her visit?” he asked, hoping to change the subject.

“She said she needs to write an article about Morocco or something,” Ma said, still glowering. “It’s as if you two have a bet going to see who can make the last of my hairs gray the fastest.”

Brock had to laugh at that. He’d never told Ma about the time the previous winter that he’d nearly snowboarded off a cliff face when a storm blew up around him, or a dozen other adventures he’d had in the last few years, but he could imagine her hair going pure white if she ever found out about it. He wondered if Amy had been keeping similar secrets from their ma.

The older woman harrumphed, but didn’t say anything more on the subject, and for that he was grateful. They’d had the “When are you going to settle down?” conversation so many times that another run-through just sounded exhausting.

After eating, Brock climbed the stairs to his childhood room, too tired from the competition earlier in the day and the long ride home to think about much of anything. Before he went to sleep, however, the image of Cassie floated before his eyes, and he drifted off with a smile on his lips.

* * *

THE NEXT MORNING dawned hot and still, the sky quickly turning from soft lavender to a bright, cloudless blue. Cassie was awake but kept her eyes shut, not wanting to let go of the luxurious feeling that had come with whatever dream she had been having. Most of it had slipped away the moment she awoke, but she remembered one part of it with a vivid clarity: strong arms encircling her, holding her close to a warm muscular body.

She sighed and opened her bleary eyes, pulling herself off her bed, which was currently nothing more than a mattress and box spring on the floor. The time for dreaming was over, and that dream in particular had no place in her very busy day. She looked around the bedroom full of cartons, her eyes passing from the unfinished Ikea dresser to the headboard leaning against one wall, waiting to be attached to a bed frame she hadn’t gotten around to putting together. She sighed again and started rummaging in one of the boxes for something to wear.

They had moved into the house two weeks before, but with the delays from the moving company and two raucous boys with no friends in town yet, she had hardly made a dent in the mounds of containers everywhere. Most of her time had simply been spent assessing what needed to be fixed and trying to organize the mass of paperwork the Wilsons left her about the property, none of which helped much.

What had she been thinking, buying this place and moving them all out here to chase some childish dream of hers? The thought had flitted through her mind over and over again since they’d arrived.

Without noticing, she had gotten to the bottom of the box of clothes, and her hand touched something silky. Curious, she pulled out whatever it was she’d found, promptly dropping it in surprise. The lingerie fell to the floor, a small pool of black silk and lace.

She didn’t remember packing it, had even forgotten she’d ever purchased the thing. It was years ago now, when she was trying to keep her marriage afloat. It was a reminder that she had once hoped to have an exciting love life, the sort of thing she was now avoiding.

Cassie shook her head slightly and shoved the thing into the bottom of the box marked “Pajamas,” then went back to picking something practical to wear. She pulled on jeans and a blouse, trying to forget the sexy black teddy, only to have the concerns about her new ranch rush back in on her.

She tried to make those thoughts go away, too. It was too late to second-guess her decision to put an offer on the ranch and sign the mortgage paperwork, so she might as well stop it and just look ahead to what needed to get done so their new home would run smoothly. Now that she’d have someone helping who might know a thing or two about how to do that, she felt hopeful about the progress that would be made.

If she could manage to keep her hands off him, of course.

She walked out of her depressingly cluttered room without looking at it again. That would need to wait until she dealt with more pressing matters, like when she could start seeing patients and figuring out how she could get the ranch to make money.

She let the worry drift to the back of her mind as she entered the living room, where Zach and Carter were using the piles of boxes and some blankets to make a fort. She smiled and crawled through the little doorway they had created using two kitchen chairs and a rug. Before she spent the day trying to be a doctor and a rancher, she could spend an hour being a mom to her two boys. That, at least, wasn’t overwhelming.

They weren’t very far along on their fort, however, when there was a knock on the door that made her heart sink. There was only one person who could be on the other side of that door, and despite how much she needed his help, she wasn’t looking forward to seeing the handsome Mr. McNeal again, especially not after her dream from the night before. Zach jumped up, his head grazing the blanket that made the fort roof. “I’ll get it!” he shouted, diving between the two chairs.

She listened to his quick footsteps and the squeak of the front door. When she heard the deep rumble of Brock McNeal’s voice as he spoke to Zach, her face flushed. She steeled herself for a long day of pretending not to notice how attracted she was to him.

And how attracted he is to you, a little voice inside her added. Her mind drifted back to what hid in the bottom of her box of pajamas. She quelled all that immediately. Sure, she’d seen the way he had looked her over when she’d opened the door the previous night, but she had also seen the way his face fell when Zach and Carter joined her. She knew what that look meant, and it was enough to make her even more sure that she would keep her distance from this man.

If he wasn’t interested in a woman with kids, well, it just made things that much easier. She took a deep breath, glanced down to make sure her shirt was more modest than yesterday and began trying to extricate herself from the tiny fort.

* * *

BROCK FOLLOWED THE young boy into the home formerly owned by his old neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Wilson, where he had played dozens of times as a kid. The house had a slightly dilapidated look about it, as if nobody had taken the time to keep it in good working order, but it was still clean and homey, the wallpaper and fixtures exactly as they had been twenty years before, and likely twenty years before that.

Though it was outdated and a little the worse for wear, it was of solid construction, a good home. He imagined there wouldn’t be too much to do to get it up to snuff; hopefully the land was in a similar state and not too far gone to seed.

In the living room, the lovely woman of the evening before was crawling out of what was clearly a makeshift fort, her curly hair a messy tangle that hid half her face, her splendidly curved butt shown off in lovely detail.

How did she manage to make climbing out of a blanket fort sexy?

If he’d been out of sight, he would have smacked himself in the forehead to dislodge these wayward thoughts. It was clear to him that he’d need to help her as quickly as possible, and then keep his distance from this woman from then on out. If she got his heart pumping doing something so innocent, he needed to do everything in his power to protect himself.

She straightened up, looking even more deliciously tousled, and nodded to him with a small smile. “Thank you for coming, Mr. McNeal. I wasn’t expecting you this early. I was just going to make some pancakes for the boys. Would you like some?”

Brock knew he should take the chance to get working while she was busy elsewhere, to ensure that he could concentrate on the manual labor without her nearby, but the thought of missing out on pancakes was disheartening. His ma was happy to make eggs and bacon but had never been one for pancakes—too sweet for a good start to the day, she’d always said. He forced himself to shake his head. “No, thanks, I already ate. I’ll just get started on whatever you need me to do, if you don’t mind.”

Her mouth thinned a little and her cheeks blushed a light shade of pink. He realized that she really hadn’t expected him yet, and she wasn’t sure where he should start. She seemed to be at a loss for a moment.

Not that it was surprising she hadn’t anticipated his early arrival. He’d woken at dawn, itching to get over there—to get started on all the work that needed to be done, he’d told himself. After all, two weeks wasn’t much time, and he didn’t want to leave his new neighbor in the lurch after he’d gone. So he’d headed over right after eating, without noticing exactly how early it was.

Brock decided that just because there was so much to do didn’t mean there wasn’t time for pancakes. “Actually, pancakes sound great. After all, there’s probably enough work around here to burn off four breakfasts, I’m sure. And while you’re at it, I’ll take a look around to see what all there is to do, if that’s all right?”

She nodded, looking relieved, and he immediately felt like he’d made the right choice. Plus, he would get to eat pancakes. That was a win-win.

“I’ll go get them started. Please make yourself at home, Mr. McNeal.”

“Call me Brock,” he answered before she disappeared into the kitchen.

The moment she was gone, he looked around the room and started creating an inventory of everything that would need to be done to get the house in shape. Besides two warped window frames and the very faded wallpaper, the living room at least appeared in decent condition.

“Would you like to come in our fort?” one of the boys asked suddenly, poking his head out between two boxes.

Brock had forgotten he wasn’t alone in the room. He gave the kid a small smile. “No, thanks,” he said, not sure if there was anything else he was supposed to say.

It had been a long while since he’d spoken to anyone under the legal drinking age.

The other boy, identical to his brother, crawled out of the fort and moved to stand right next to Brock. Brock waited, wondering what the little boy was thinking. Finally, he spoke. “I’m Carter.”

Brock nodded, wishing the child wasn’t quite so close. He wasn’t used to children and their lack of understanding about personal space. “Hi. I’m Brock,” he answered.

Carter kept staring, as if waiting for Brock to say more, but he couldn’t think of what else he should say.

“What are you doing?” the boy asked.

“I’m trying to figure out what we need to do to get this place fixed up,” Brock answered.

Carter looked around the room. “Like what?”

Brock felt slightly relieved that the large hazel eyes were no longer staring at him in that intense way. He pointed out the windows, explaining about the frames.

“Momma tried to open those when we got here and couldn’t,” Carter commented. “What else is wrong?”

Brock shrugged. “I don’t know. I just got here.”

With that, Carter was off, pointing out every problem he had noticed since they’d moved there. Some, like the faint scratches on the wood floor from furniture being moved around, didn’t concern Brock, but there were others that he added to the mental list he was making.

Soon, Brock and Carter had moved into the room the boys were sharing and Brock was examining the large wooden bunk bed the boys would use once, as Carter explained, it didn’t wobble anymore. “Momma says the Wilson boys must have been pretty rowdy to break such a big piece of furniture,” Carter said as Brock pulled on the top bunk and watched it sway precariously. Brock smiled, remembering exactly how “rowdy” the Wilson boys were. They had gotten Brock into quite a bit of trouble more than once when he was a kid.

Carter continued talking, as if he had no plans to stop anytime soon. “But it was free, so she said she would fix it and then we won’t have to sleep on the floor no more.”

“Anymore,” said a voice from the doorway. The other brother, Zach, had joined them.

Brock nodded to him, then turned back to Carter. “It’ll be easy to fix. A couple planks of wood and some nails will do it.”

“There’s some in the barn. Momma showed me.”

Brock stood, ready to go find them, but Zach interrupted his thoughts. “Mom says food’s ready, Mr. McNeal.”

Before Brock could say anything, Carter jumped up and grabbed his hand. “We have to wash up before we eat. I’ll show you.” And with that, Brock was being pulled into a small bathroom and shown how to clean his hands properly.

Brock washed at the sink and followed Carter and Zach into the kitchen, where the boys jumped into chairs, both sitting on their feet so they could see over the table. The moment he was back in the same room as Cassie, the air felt warm and heavy, neither of which had anything to do with the cooking.

Brock tried not to let his eyes wander along the length of her legs as she stood by the stove, flipping the last pancakes on the griddle. The jeans she was wearing hugged her in all the right places, and a long study of them would just make things worse.

He was here to do a job, help a lady and her kids out, and then he would get back to doing the things he did best. After all, his next big bull ride was coming up soon. It wouldn’t do to start getting sidetracked by a mess of russet-colored hair and a pair of shapely legs. Or any of her other attributes he had noticed.

With difficulty, Brock pulled his eyes to the plate in the middle of the table piled high with flapjacks. The smell wafting from them was light and sweet, and they made his mouth water despite the large breakfast he’d already had. The boys had quickly grabbed a couple and begun dousing them in syrup, so he speared a few of his own with his fork.

Cassie came to the table, taking the only open seat, the one directly across from him. Now that she was close and in the bright light of the kitchen, he could see a dusting of freckles across her nose and the clear green-brown of her eyes. When she leaned forward to grab her own pile of pancakes, he quickly glanced away. There was too much to catch all of his male attention when she did that.

Thankfully, she soon sat back in her seat and he could actually savor the flavor of the pancakes he had shoved into his mouth in a desperate bid for a distraction.

She didn’t seem to notice any of this and her attention remained focused on her children. “Did you both wash up before coming in and getting covered in syrup?” she asked.

Carter nodded as he licked some of the sticky sweetness off his forearm. “I showed Brock how to wash up, too,” he said.

Cassie gave her son a warning look. “Don’t be impolite. You can call him Mr. McNeal.”

“It’s fine,” Brock cut in, not wanting Carter to get in trouble for his actions. “I told him he could call me that. I think the only person who has ever called me Mr. McNeal was my fourth-grade teacher, and that lady was plumb crazy.”

Carter smiled at him. Brock couldn’t help but smile back.

Cassie also seemed pleased, though she wasn’t as obvious in her emotions as Carter was. “Well, now that that’s settled,” she said, “I was thinking we would start working in the library first, and then some of the fencing around the place, or maybe the barn. I want to get the ranch ready to hold horses.”

He nodded, trying to keep his eyes on his plate instead of on her. Hopefully she would show him where to start and leave him to it, and he could lose himself in hard work and avoid this woman who set his blood on fire.

After she dumped the dishes in the sink, though, she looked at her two boys and said, “While we’re moving things around, I’d like you to put your clothes into the drawers in your room. After that, you can work on your fort or play with your cars. Can you do that?”

So, she clearly wasn’t planning on freeing him from her presence. If he hadn’t been pleased that she was willing to get her hands dirty and help fix up the place, he would’ve been annoyed about spending even more time near her.

The boys nodded and raced into their room. Brock was impressed that such young children could follow directions, but before he could comment, Cassie smiled at him and shook her head. “They’ll probably throw everything in one drawer before getting sidetracked and playing with toys, but it’ll keep them busy for a few minutes, at least.”

Brock pictured himself doing just that as a kid and laughed. Her dry humor only made her prettier, which sobered him quickly. “So, you wanted to start in the Wilsons’ old library?” he prompted.

Cassie nodded and walked out of the kitchen, beckoning at Brock to follow her. He took a deep breath and tried to ignore the well-formed bottom that swayed so enticingly before him.

Chapter Three

Cassie showed Brock into the small room off the living room that she hoped to turn into a doctor’s office. Before she could start seeing patients, however, there was a lot to do.

The room had obviously been used as a library. The empty shelves lining the wall were of dark oak, making the entire space feel shady and somber. She imagined leather chairs and dusty volumes of old books giving it an air of class, but it didn’t fit with the light, friendly tone she wanted to convey.

“Mr. Wilson was quite a reader,” Brock commented, looking around the room. “I never understood why they lived on this ranch when he would have been much happier being a professor or something. What do you want to do with it?”

“I want to take out these shelves and make it into a doctor’s office,” she started, ready to turn her dream into a reality.

“You’re a doctor?” he asked, clearly surprised.

She nodded, waiting to see how he would react. Her husband, Hank, had always been negative about her choice to continue school instead of staying home with their young children, and even though he’d been gone for over six months, she still heard his disapproving words in her ears.

Brock gave her a sideways grin that turned her insides to mush. “You’re full of surprises,” he commented, and she couldn’t stop the blush of pleasure that worked its way up to her ears. “Well, the town certainly needs a doctor. People are going to line up at your door. So I guess we should get this place ready.”

Then he turned back to the room as if nothing had changed. Cassie’s defenses lowered slightly as she accustomed herself to Brock’s presence.

“Okay, so the shelves need to go,” he said. “What do you need to make the room ready?”

With that, she was off, describing the room she had imagined. A small desk, some shelves to hold supplies, bright paint, a couple of chairs and an examination table. A happy place where she could help people.

Brock listened, nodding occasionally. When she finished, he stretched, his arms raised to the ceiling. Cassie tried not to stare at him, but it wasn’t easy. “Let’s get started, then,” he said, moving farther into the room.

Soon they were grappling with the bookcases—heavy bulky things that, thankfully, took all her attention. With some difficulty, they managed to get the three large shelving units on their sides and slide each one out the door until they were lying in a row on the living room floor.

With those out, the room seemed much larger and brighter, and Cassie’s heart lifted. She knew she could make it into everything she wanted. Then she realized there was one big problem that prevented her from doing more.