To Love A Cowboy Read online

  When Rafe closed the bedroom door behind him, Carly stared at the ceiling, wondering what she would have done if he’d kissed her.

  Letter to Reader

  Title Page

  About the Author

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Copyright

  When Rafe closed the bedroom door behind him, Carly stared at the ceiling, wondering what she would have done if he’d kissed her.

  For a moment, she’d thought he was about to. And, God help her, she’d wanted him to, with the same deep longing she’d harbored for the past nine years.

  Despite everything, the spark between them had never died.

  Guilt churned inside her. She owed him so much. Besides what he’d done for her since her accident, he’d given her the most precious gift she’d ever received. And he didn’t even know it.

  She owed him the truth. But if she told him, would he hate her? It didn’t matter. She had no choice.

  She squeezed her eyes shut, a tear tracing a damp path down her cheek. How could she ever tell Rafe that the little boy sleeping in the room down the hall was his son?

  Dear Reader,

  A new year has begun, and in its honor we bring you six new—and wonderful!—Intimate Moments novels. First up is A Marriage-Minded Man? Linda Turner returns to THE LONE STAR SOCIAL CLUB for this scintillating tale of a cop faced with a gorgeous witness who’s offering him lots of evidence—about a crime that has yet to be committed! What’s her game? Is she involved? Is she completely crazy? Or is she totally on the level—and also the perfect woman for him?

  Then there’s Beverly Barton’s Gabriel Hawk’s Lady. the newest of THE PROTECTORS. Rorie Dean needs help rescuing her young nephew from the jungles of San Miguel, and Gabriel is the only man with the know-how to help. But what neither of them has counted on is the attraction that simmers between them, making their already dangerous mission a threat on not just one level but two!

  Welcome Suzanne Brockmann back with Love with the Proper Stranger. a steamy tale of deceptions, false identities and overwhelming passion. In Ryan’s Rescue, Karen Leabo matches a socialite on the run with a reporter hot on the trail of a story that starts looking very much like a romance. Wife on Demand is an intensely emotional marriage-of-convenience story from the pen of Alexandra Sellers. And finally, welcome historical author Barbara Ankrum, who debuts in the line with To Love a Cowboy.

  Enjoy them all, then come back next month for more excitement and passion—right here in Silhouette Intimate Moments.

  Yours,

  Leslie J. Wainger

  Senior Editor and Editorial Coordinator

  * * *

  Please address questions and book requests to:

  Silhouette Reader Service

  U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

  Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

  * * *

  TO LOVE A COWBOY

  BARBARA ANKRUM

  BARBARA ANKRUM

  says she’s always been an incurable romantic, with a passion for books and stories about the healing power of love. It never occurred to her to write seriously until her husband, David, discovered a box full of her unfinished stories and insisted that she pursue her dream. Need she say more about why she believes in love?

  With a successful career as a commercial actress behind her, Barbara decided she had plenty of eccentric characters to people the stories that inhabited her imagination. She wrote her first novel in between auditions and she’s never looked back. Her historicals have won the prestigious Reviewer’s Choice and K.I.S.S. Awards from Romantic Times, and she’s been nominated for a RITA Award from RWA. Barbara lives in Southern California with her actor/writer/hero-husband, and their two perfect children.

  To Barbara Joel, my soul sister and best friend, who

  always knows when I need a kick in the pants and when

  I just need to whine. This one’s for you.

  With special thanks to my agent, Irene Goodman, for

  keeping the faith. You’re the best.

  Chapter 1

  The phone shrieked on the bedside table, wrenching him from the shadowy nightmare of plunging hooves and the white-eyed fury of an angry bull. Disoriented, he jerked upright in bed, blinking at the yellow pool of moonlight spilling through his naked bedroom window and onto his glistening arms. In the utter stillness of night, his heart battered the wall of his chest and echoed in his ears. A familiar pain shot through his right side and knee at his sudden movement. He sucked in a breath between clenched teeth and cursed.

  For the briefest of moments, he wondered whether the ringing had been part of his dream—a judge’s timer buzzer signaling the end of his ride, the scream of the ambulance that had come to pick up the pieces that day.

  The phone jangled again.

  Damn. Rafe’s glare went from the phone to the clock as he raked the hair from his eyes with one hand. One-forty-five a.m. Who the hell would call him in the middle of the night? Probably a wrong number. All the same, some darker instinct made him reach for the receiver.

  “Yeah?”

  “Uh...” came a tentative female voice, “Mr. Kellard? Mr. Rafe Kellard?”

  So much for a wrong number. “Yeah? Who’s this?”

  “Uh, Mr. Kellard, my name is Nancy Kowalski. You don’t know me, but...”

  Annoyance bunched the muscles of his shoulders, and Rafe sent up a silent prayer that she wasn’t some glittery-eyed rodeo groupie who’d waited until the dead of night to track him down. The novelty of that had worn off years ago. He shot a look at the clock again. Exactly three hours before he had to roll out of bed and head for the fence line. Mentally he calculated how long it would take him to fall back asleep, if he even could.

  “...I’m a trauma volunteer at Reno General, in Reno, Nevada,” the voice on the other end went on.

  That got his attention. “Reno?” he repeated, trying to get a grip on who she was.

  “Yes...Nevada. I’m sorry, I know it’s late.”

  “It’s the middle of the night. Look, if this is some kind of prank call—”

  “No, sir. Nothing like that. Uh...if you’ll just bear with me for a moment...”

  Something prickled the back of his neck. Her voice sounded a little shaky, uncertain, as if she were trying to say something difficult. That realization cleared the cobwebs from his brain. What had she said? Reno General? Hospital? The word settled into Rafe’s consciousness like a cold, flat stone.

  Reno. Reno. That was seven hundred miles away. Hell, he didn’t even know anybody in Reno. Did he? He realized the woman was talking again.

  “...just brought a patient in to emergency, and going through her things, all we found was a newspaper clipping about you in her purse. It had a note written on it with your address in case of an emergency. I know this is a long shot, but—”

  His heartbeat slowed to a standstill and his throat went dry. “A woman?”

  “Yes. Mr. Kellard, do you know someone named Cara Lynn Jamison?”

  If the woman on the phone had reached through the wire and sucker punched him, she couldn’t have more effectively driven the breath from his lungs. The room seemed to shift as Rafe swung his bare legs over the side of the bed, switched the phone to his other ear and braced his right hand on the bedside table.

  Carly.

  “Mr. Kellard?” the woman asked.
“Are you still there?”

  He cleared the sudden tightness in his throat. “How is she?”

  The woman hesitated. “At the moment, her condition is listed as serious.”

  He squeezed his eyes shut. Carly. After all these years. “Serious. What the hell does that mean?”

  “Are you...her husband, Mr. Kellard?”

  Another time, he might have laughed at that question. But not tonight. “No.”

  “A relative?”

  “No.”

  “I see.” An uncomfortable silence stretched on the wire between them.

  “What happened to her?” he asked in a hollow voice.

  “She was involved in a motor vehicle accident on the Truckee Pass. There was an unexpected storm here, and the roads are very icy tonight. Ms. Jamison is unconscious, and has been since she was brought in. There are a few other minor injuries, but that’s all I’m at liberty to tell you. Would you happen to know where we might contact her husband?”

  Rafe’s hand tightened on the receiver. “I...” He cleared his suddenly clogged throat. “I couldn’t tell you anything about that, except...I knew she married.”

  “Well,” the woman went on, “there’s no ring on her left hand, but we assumed...because of the child...”

  He sat up straighter. “She has a kid?”

  “Yes. A little boy. He was in the car with her. He’s doing fine. Only a few minor cuts and bruises. But he’s pretty scared, and we can’t seem to get much out of him.”

  Rafe put his hand over the mouthpiece and cursed softly. He took three deep breaths, then spoke again. “Listen, I don’t know anything about her husband, Miss—?”

  “Kowalski.”

  “Yeah, Kowalski. I...uh, haven’t seen Carly for some time. Years, in fact. We used to be... That is, we’re old friends. That’s all.”

  “Oh.” The single syllable betrayed her disappointment.

  “Her home phone number in Los Angeles was disconnected, and her car is full of her things, as if she were moving. We’re kind of at a loss. Does she have other family we can contact?”

  Rafe thought of her parents, who’d died when Carly was seven, and her maiden great-aunt Katherine, who’d practically raised her. He’d heard she’d passed away in L.A. only last spring. “No,” he answered at last. “There’s no one I know of.”

  “I see.”

  Rafe listened to Kowalski breathing on the other end of the line. She was waiting. For what? For him to say he’d come for Carly, for her son? For him to throw away years of trying to forget what had happened between them? To forget her? Hell, he couldn’t do it. He wasn’t responsible for Carly or her kid. Just because she carried around some dog-eared newspaper clipping about him from better days. Just because once he would have done anything...anything to keep her from walking away from him.

  Winter seeped against his bare feet through the cold planked floorboards of his bedroom. Outside the window, what he hoped would be the last snowflakes of the year struck against the pane and melted.

  Through the dark shimmer of glass, he could almost see Carly, with a mane of silver-blond hair that framed her face, the single dimple that dented her left cheek when she smiled, the special light that had shone in her golden-brown eyes—until those last days they were together. It had gone out then, like a wind-sucked flame.

  He’d spent the past nine years trying to blot the picture of her from his memory. Now a slippery road and an out-of-the-blue phone call had resurrected it. He ground his teeth together. She wasn’t his problem, dammit, even if she—

  “Listen, I—I’m sorry to have bothered you,” Kowalski mumbled on the other end. “We’ll do our best to work something out for the boy. Social services has provisions for this sort of thing.”

  The iciness of the cold floor crept up through his legs. “Provisions?”

  “Well, yes. You see, his mother’s in no shape to care for him, and because of his age...”

  A thought crept into his consciousness as the woman mumbled on. One that startled him with its swiftness. A child. Carly’s child. She’d talked of having children. With him. What if—?

  “...temporary foster care. With no relative or close family friend willing to claim him...take responsibitity—”

  “How old is he?” Rafe asked sharply.

  “What?” Kowalski stammered.

  “How old?”

  “Uh...seven...maybe eight. We’re not sure. He won’t really talk.”

  Seven or eight. Rafe’s mind tripped backward over the years, counting summers come and gone. He’d last seen Carly nine years ago. His hand, which had gone suddenly cold, tightened involuntarily around the phone. She would have told him if—Wouldn’t she?

  “Of course,” Kowalski went on, “the courts will have to appoint some sort of a guardian—”

  “No.” The word was out before he could stop it.

  “I—I beg your pardon?” Kowalski stammered.

  He rubbed his temple. “I said no. Listen, how do I get there?”

  “You mean—?”

  “Yeah. How do I get to you from the Reno airport?” He flipped on the bedside lamp and scribbled the directions on a scrap of paper by the phone. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  “Mr. Kellard,” Kowalski began when he’d finished, “I’m really...very sorry about all this. He’s a cute kid. Scared, but sweet. I’m glad he won’t have to be shuffled off into...you know...”

  “Yeah,” Rafe agreed. Foster care was something he did know about, and something he wouldn’t wish on any kid.

  “I just wanted to say,” Kowalski continued, “that, well, I’m a big fan of yours, Mr. Kellard. Have been for years. I sure hope everything works out all right.”

  Rafe hung up and stared out into the inky, snowswept night. “So do I, lady,” he muttered to the empty room. “But I wouldn’t lay good money on it.”

  Rafe’s uneven footsteps echoed in the lonely hospital corridor. Ignoring the wintery ache in his right leg brought on by the cramped flight and the cold night air, he headed for the third-floor nurse’s station.

  The night-shift nurse sat alone behind the desk, haloed in the harsh light of a halogen lamp, her gray head bent over the charts she was working on. She looked up as he approached. She was small, and wiry, with a face he supposed simply scared the illness right out of most of her patients. Her name tag read Nursing Supervisor Rawlins.

  “Yes?” she demanded in a smoke-graveled voice.

  With one hand, Rafe brushed the snow from the shoulders of his sheepskin coat. “Cara Lynn Jamison? They told me downstairs she was on this floor.”

  He felt the professional coolness of Rawlins’s scan—from the dark shadow that stubbled his jaw to the damp tangle of hair revealed when he pulled off his battered Stetson.

  Her deep brown eyes darted back to the cluttered top of her desk. “Ah...let’s see...Jamison. The car accident?”

  Rafe’s jaw tightened. After a sleepless night on a pitching express-cargo plane out of Durango, he was sorely tempted to remind her Carly’s life counted for more than the sum of a few broken automobile parts in some snowstorm, but he bit back the retort.

  “She was brought in last night,” he answered, meeting her stare. “A Miss Kowalski called me.”

  The woman’s demeanor warmed slightly. “Oh, Nancy. Of course. You must be—” she looked at a note on her desk “—Mr. Kellard?”

  “Right.” With still-numb fingers, he fumbled with the buttons on his sheared-sheepskin jacket and shrugged it off.

  “Nancy said you were on your way.” The nurse pushed her chair back from the desk and stood. “She didn’t think you’d be here so soon.”

  Soon? It felt like days since he’d gotten the phone call, but it had only been a little over five hours. He ran a chilled hand down his face. “How is Carly...Ms. Jamison?”

  The nurse stood and came around the desk with a squeak of rubber heels. “I’m afraid you’ll have to speak with the attending physician about tha
t, but I’m sure you’ll want to see the boy—”

  He reached for her elbow as she brushed past him. “Not until I get a straight answer from you. How is she?”

  She glared back at him, lips pursed and cheeks hollowed. Then, inexplicably, her face softened. “She’s still in ICU. She’s stable, but there’s been no change in her condition. She hasn’t regained consciousness. I’m sorry.”

  The knot that had curled in Rafe’s belly since the phone call cinched inexorably tighter.

  Another, younger nurse took Rawlin’s place at the nurses’ station, staring wide-eyed at Rafe’s hand on Rawlin’s arm. “You all right, Marge?” the new one asked.

  “Fine,” Rawlins replied tartly, not taking her eyes off Rafe. “Mr. Kellard is upset, that’s all.”

  Slowly, he released the woman, then, on a deep breath, followed her to the elevator. They disembarked on a floor marked Pediatrics.

  The dimly lit hallway, the antiseptic smell, the soft hum and beep of machinery in the rooms he passed, disquieted Rafe more than he wanted to admit. God, he hated hospitals. After he left the last one, he’d sworn they’d have to kill him before getting him near another one.

  They stopped at a room marked 217.

  “He’s finally asleep,” Rawlins announced in a surprisingly gentle voice. “It took nearly the whole night, because he insisted on seeing his mother. But of course...” She pushed the door open silently.

  An arc of light fell upon the huddled form of a boy, nearly lost in the too-large bed. He looked more like seven than eight. But hell, Rafe was no expert at guessing kids’ ages. Straw-colored hair peeked out from beneath the covers, and as he drew closer, a face appeared, too. Except for the small bandage across the forehead, it was the face of a cherub.

  Swallowing hard, Rafe felt his heart thud heavily in his chest. Carly’s child. Her son. He looks just like her, he thought. Same mouth—naturally curved up at the corners; same nose—small, straight. The jawline was different—squarer.