Almost a Cowboy Read Online Free Page A

stopped in front of Utah, steeling her thigh muscles to keep from leaping over the smudged wooden bar top into his arms. He shifted his jaw, making the crease bulge. What she wouldn’t give for a peek at that cleft in his chin.
    “What’ll you have?” she asked.
    He knuckled the brim of his hat up, giving her a clear view of his eyes. Heavy-lidded eyes ticked down from her messy hair to linger on her face, and then licked over her throat and her breasts practically spilling from her tank top. Every syrupy-sweet second of his blatant perusal ratcheted up her desire.
    “Take a beer. For now .” His words oozed innuendo.
    God, could she do this? Spinning away from him, she pulled out a frosty mug and poured him a draft. Sure, she’d gone home with more than one cowboy from this establishment, but this wasn’t just any cowboy.
    It was Utah. First love, first kiss, first man to share her body, first orgasm.
    First heartbreak.
    Drawing her lips into a line, she placed the beer before him. “Two dollars.”
    He fished in his back pocket and came out with a silver money clip—the very one he’d carried in his youth. She bit off the ragged sigh that threatened to erupt from her lips.
    He’d always been a gentleman—buying her sweet teas and ice cream.
    Had anything changed? He’d grown up, grown harder, but each minute she stared at him, the more he seemed unchanged. Or maybe her view of him was molding to fit his new form.
    The idea of conforming herself to his body sent a spike of need straight to her pussy. Since that sleepless night following Hollis Davies’s funeral, she’d used fantasies of Utah to reach her peak over and over again.
    From memories of them rolling, kissing, and clutching each other down by the creek to new experiences ad-libbed in her imagination. Usually it involved him spreading her open and diving between her legs and then ended with her pinned against a wall taking it roughly from behind.
    Utah peeled off three dollars and held them over her palm. Their gazes locked, and she no longer even heard the twangy two-step blaring from the jukebox or the never-ending clank of dishes as the busboy cleared them away.
    “I said two dollars.” She started to pull her hand away, but with lightning speed he snared her wrist with his maddeningly-long fingers. A deep ache blossomed from his touch and traveled through her entire body.
    “It’s only right to tip a bartender.”
    “I’m not a bartender. I’m a journalist.”
    He lifted a brow, still unsmiling. No chin cleft appeared.
    “I mean, I’m filling in for a friend whose little boy has the flu.”
    “Looks like you’re workin’ now, Caroline.” He plastered the cash to her palm and held it in place with his heavy hand. The warm weight did things to her body she didn’t know possible. Before now her needs seemed to have been lying dormant.
    Utah awakened every damn nerve ending in her body.
    She yanked her hand back and tossed the money at him. “On the house.” With that, she spun from the cowboy bearing the stern expression and sending the confusing signals.
    By the time she’d waited on half a dozen more customers, she realized the spot where he’d been standing was empty. A hole had opened up where his broad shoulders had been.
    Her soul cracked and wept for what coulda, shoulda, woulda been.
    So many mistakes. All of it before and more now.
    She finished her shift, closing down the bar with Sandy, the busboy, and the owner who came out of the back to pay Caroline from the till. When he handed her a wad of cash, she pulled two dollars from her tips.
    “I bought a friend a beer.”
    “Appreciate your honesty,” the owner said, giving her the once-over that meant if she wanted to stay a bit longer, they could finish the night together.
    Caroline left the bar, carefully checking the dimly-lit parking lot for any drunken lingerers—namely Jeremy. But her car stood in a ring of light under the pole, and no one was around.
    Within