A Sparkle In The Cowboy's Eyes

She’d found her, the old Merideth, and she’d be her...at least for the moment.

“Does she know?”

Mandy shook her head, but kept dusting, nerves making her movements jerky. “I don’t think so. If she did, surely she would have said something.”

“Should we tell her?”

Mandy stopped her dusting and turned to Sam, who had, as each of them did when one of the three was in need, responded to Mandy’s call for help. She caught her lower lip between her teeth and worried it. “If we do, I’m afraid she won’t go and I really think this might be good for her. She thinks she’s fooling us with this front she’s putting up, but I know she’s hurting inside. She needs to get out more and be around other people. Moping around here all day certainly isn’t helping.”

“Yeah, but is going to John Lee’s the answer?”

Mandy wrapped the dust cloth around her fingers and nervously twisted. “I don’t know. I just don’t know.”

“What don’t you know?” Merideth asked as she strolled into the room. Dressed in a gauzy calf-length dress, she trailed a light, seductive scent in her wake.

Mandy shared a quick worried look with Sam. Frantically, she searched for a response, anything but the truth. “I don’t know where all this dust comes from,” she said with a sudden inspiration, quickly turning to push the cloth along the mantel once again.

Merideth raised her arms above her head and stretched catlike. “I don’t know why you even bother,” she said, stifling a bored yawn. “The furniture will just be covered again tomorrow.”

“Yes,” Mandy agreed, “but there’ll be one less layer of dust.”

Merideth shifted her gaze to Sam. “What are you doing here this late?”

“Making a vet call.” The lie came easily to Sam, because it could have so easily been the truth. She was often called to tend to a sick animal on the Double-Cross. She gave Merideth the once-over, pretending she didn’t already know her younger sister’s plans. “What are you all gussied up for?”

With a resigned sigh, Merideth sank onto the sofa next to her. “I’m going to John Lee’s for dinner. I saw him while I was out sunbathing at Cypress Pond. He caught me—well, off guard,” she said with a flutter of her hand that sent the gold bangles at her wrist clinking together musically. “When he offered the invitation, I didn’t have my wits enough about me to refuse before he rode off.”

“You don’t want to go?” Sam asked.

“Heavens, no!”

“Sure you do,” Mandy insisted as she ran the dust cloth over the mantel one last time. “It’ll be good for you to get out and have a little fun for a change.”

Merideth angled her chin to peer at Mandy from beneath a neatly arched brow. “With a playboy like John Lee?” She snorted. “I seriously doubt an evening with him will be fun.” She fanned her fingers in front of her face, checking her nail polish for any nicks. “Exhausting, maybe,” she added thoughtfully, “but definitely not fun.”

“Exhausting?”

“Yes, from dodging all his passes.”

Mandy laughed and dropped down on the sofa, squeezing in between her two sisters. “You make John Lee sound like some sex-crazed maniac.”

“He is.”

“He is not!”

Merideth turned to her. “How many girls in high school claimed that they’d slept with him?”

Mandy lifted a shoulder. “A few.”

“A few hundred, you mean. And how many women’s names did you hear linked with his during his stint with the NFL?”

“A lot, but then your name’s been linked with quite a few men, as well. I certainly hope that doesn’t mean you slept with them all.”

Merideth lifted her chin. “Certainly not.” She adjusted the band of emerald-cut diamonds on her finger, a gift from one of those men, a millimeter to the left. She smiled smugly. “But then, I have much higher standards than John Lee Carter.”

John Lee shifted uncomfortably in his Porsche’s leather bucket seat, trying his best to find some more room for his cramped legs. He bit back a curse, the pain in his knee threatening his usual good mood. Six hours spent at his desk updating the ranch’s ledgers, and another four spent on horseback scaring up strays from the brush had left him stiff-legged and crankier than a two-year-old in desperate need of a nap. By the time he’d made it back to the house to get cleaned up for his date with Merideth, his knee was swollen and throbbing like a bitch in heat.

Damn that three-hundred-pound ape of a defensive guard who clipped me just below the knees, he cursed silently. Five minutes, he told himself. Five minutes alone with him and John Lee would make that son of a bitch pay for prematurely ending his football career and for the pain he’d live with for the rest of his life.

The pain was so intense, he’d considered calling Merideth to cancel his invitation for dinner and soaking in his whirlpool instead. But then he remembered how much she needed his help...and how much he needed hers.

He stole a look at the passenger seat where Merideth sat, her elbow propped on the edge of the open window, her eyes shaded by dark sunglasses while the wind played havoc with her hair. Maybe he should have canceled, he thought belatedly. Dealing with Merideth was always tough and tonight he really didn’t feel up to the challenge.

Too late now, though, he told himself as his ranch house came into view. With a sigh, he pulled the Porsche up in front of his home and climbed out, then had to wait a second before he was sure his knee was going to support him. “Damn car,” he muttered under his breath as he slammed the door behind him. “No bigger than a matchbox. I ought to sell the damn thing and buy me something with some size to it.”

Merideth tipped down the visor and studied her face in the lighted vanity mirror placed there. She touched the tips of her middle finger and thumb to the corners of her mouth and drew them together, blotting her lipstick. “Why don’t you?” she asked, turning to him.

“Because I like it,” John Lee snapped disagreeably, then headed for the front door of his home.

Merideth frowned at his back. And wasn’t this just her luck? It looked as if she was condemned to spending an evening with Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. The man who’d teased and laughed and taunted her that very afternoon, was gone and she was left with this scowling, grumpy-faced bear. With a sigh she sank back against the seat.

When he realized she wasn’t following him, he stopped and half turned. “Well?” he asked impatiently. “Are you coming or not?”

Without sparing him a glance, she flipped the visor back into place and lifted her chin. “I’m waiting for you to open my door.”

John Lee turned to face her. He propped his hands on his hips, cocking one hip higher than the other, and scowled. “You aren’t gonna try that prima-donna crap with me, are you? You’re a big girl now. You can open your own damn door.”

She turned her head slowly, one brow arched pointedly. “I thought the code of the West dictated that cowboys must treat women like ladies. I guess I was wrong.”

“Oh, for God’s sake,” John Lee grumbled, and rounded the car to jerk open her door. “Get out,” he ordered impatiently.

“My, aren’t we friendly tonight,” she replied dryly. She lifted a hand, waiting for him to take it.

With a low growl, he grabbed her hand and all but yanked her from the seat. “Are you satisfied now?”

With a look of disdain, she turned her back on him. “What you lack in finesse, you certainly make up for with your macho-jock-turned-cowboy charm.”

Her sarcastic remark had the same effect on John Lee as a shot of cortisone had on his knee. Forgetting all about the pain and discomfort in his leg, he tossed back his head and laughed. Macho-jock-turned-cowboy. What a description! And one only Merideth could come up with. Yep, he told himself. There was hope for her after all. He slung an arm around her neck, crushing her hairdo, and headed her toward his house. “Darlin’, you’d be surprised what kind of finesse us macho-jock-turned-cowboys possess.”

“Mmm-hmm,” she replied doubtfully as she slipped a hand beneath his arm and freed her hair.

Once inside, John Lee tossed his hat onto the entry table. “Mrs. Baker, I’m home!” he yelled.

An older woman bustled from the kitchen, stripping an apron from around her thick waist. “Thank goodness,” she puffed, mopping the apron against her damp brow. “I’m ’bout ready to drop.” She wadded the apron into a ball and stuffed it into a purse she retrieved from the coat closet, pausing long enough to stare at Merideth for a moment. When Merideth lifted a brow in reply, the woman turned away with a disapproving huff.

“The salad’s in the refrigerator,” she informed John Lee, “the potatoes in the oven and the steaks on the grill. I set the timer, but you’ll need to turn ’em in about five minutes. I’ve fed the—”

John Lee grabbed her elbow, cutting her off, and hustled her toward the door. “I sure appreciate you taking care of everything, Mrs. Baker. And don’t you worry that pretty little head of yours about a thing. I can handle it from here. See you in the morning.”