Cowgirl Rescue (Selkirk Family Ranch Book 3) Read online

  After such an organizational triumph, what had Tess done? Returned to Hollywood to be just another pretty young body in the endless exploitation of youth and beauty they called acting. She took up with Blake Whosis again, too.

  After that one night with Rolf.

  ***

  Tess arrived sober for her day in court, and she wore the penitent look and the restrained clothing and makeup Marty had advised. The judge let her off with a warning.

  She had to run the gantlet of the tabloid reporters outside, but that was part of the deal about gaining fame in Hollywood. Marty did the talking for her, having previously warned her not to smile. The judge or the public might take her smile to mean that she’d gotten off lightly due to some privilege. “It’s best to look sober,” he said.

  “Great word, sober,” she said.

  “May I make a suggestion?” Marty said, once they were in his limo and driving away. “How about you lay low for a while? The paparazzi will be dogging your footsteps for at least the next few weeks, and they like to provoke incidents. I heard about your fall in the restaurant yesterday. You’re on limited probation, which means that the court will pay attention to your behavior.”

  “And I’ll be punished if I step out of line?”

  He nodded.

  She tossed her hair. “It’s just like being a kid again, or in Cheyenne, where everybody told me what to do all the time. I hate that.”

  Noting the pout she didn’t try to hide, Marty pulled something from his pocket. “Then I guess you’ll be needing this.” He handed her his business card. “Call anytime.”

  He made quick work of their final parting, getting out of the limo at his office and sending Tess home alone. This limo driver wasn’t talkative, unlike her regular driver. He took her to her townhouse and left as soon as she’d emerged from the vehicle.

  “Why’d he take off so fast?” The voice came from behind her.

  Tess turned. Rolf Pedersen stood on her front steps.

  Chapter 4

  He looked so good, so familiar and appetizing. Like home. She threw herself at Rolf and kissed him wholeheartedly. His instant response made her tighten her arms around him and kiss him more thoroughly, teasing his lips with hers and nestling her soft body against his hardness.

  Heaven.

  At some point Rolf took the lead. He shifted his stance to bring her closer while he tilted her head to receive his kisses. She wanted to drag him inside and to bed. Right now.

  ***

  He’d like to strip her right here and take her. Right now. Wait. They were outside. He lifted his head, breaking their intimate connection.

  “Are the tabloid reporters watching?” He scanned the area, looking for men in cars with cameras pointed at them. “Should we go inside?”

  Tess shook off the kiss more slowly. “I…uh…no, it’s a gated community and strangers can’t—wait a minute. How did you get in?”

  Suddenly staring around them nervously, she stepped back and pulled her keys from her purse. “Let’s get inside. They might have telephoto lenses—or even a satellite overhead or one of those drones with a camera.”

  As she put the key in the lock, she stopped. She cocked her head at him. “Why should I let you in? What are you doing here?”

  He reached up to push back his Stetson before remembering he wasn’t wearing it. Trying to blend in. “Why don’t you open up, and then we’ll talk?”

  Tess surveyed him suspiciously. Looking for signs of his intentions? He kept his expression bland. She knew damn well what he wanted from her. What he’d had from her only for one night.

  “Tess. You can rank me out all you want once we’re away from public view.”

  As soon as she’d opened the door and walked in, she turned and kissed him again. “This is what I want, cowboy,” she said, with a determined glint in her eye.

  Rolf’s head spun. She was kissing his neck and biting his ear and trying to unbutton his shirt all at once. Her soft hands were warm where they touched him. He shivered.

  “No, Tess. Stop,” he ground out, fighting his desire to let her have her way.

  “I don’t want to stop,” she said, between kisses that promised and enticed. “We want each other.” Her arms wrapped around him tightly. “Ohhh, Rolf.”

  She was so eager. It would be so easy to take what she was offering. The way she said his name heated up his male parts. Her hands were inside his shirt, touching his sensitized nipples, making him yearn for her to stroke all over his body.

  He groaned and pulled away. “No.” He set her away from him, although she resisted. “What are we doing? This is crazy. Stop it.”

  “Why stop? Come to my bedroom,” she said. “You know how right we are.”

  He shook his head. “I want a commitment, not an afternoon in your bed now and then. You mean too much to me to only be my on-again-off-again lover.”

  She pouted. “I live here now. Are you planning to move in with me?”

  He shook his head again. “I want you to come back to your family’s ranch. Live with me.”

  “And do what all day?” The expression on her face clouded. She turned and walked into the front room off the hall. He followed, absently noting conventional modern furnishings.

  She went to a bar made of black and clear glass, and forked ice cubes from a crystal container into a tall glass. He shook his head to her silent enquiry, watching as she poured colorless liquid from a nearly empty bottle. Vodka? Gin? The hard stuff.

  She took a sip, then pinned him with a straight look. “I have an acting career now. Something absorbing to do with my days.”

  “There’s plenty to do at the ranch.”

  “For you, maybe. JD doesn’t let me do anything. Since he’s been in charge, I don’t even get invited to roundup.”

  “You’re family. Why should you need an invitation?”

  Her expression showed her exasperation. “The first year could have been an oversight. He was so busy starting all those veterans’ homes. Then, last year, JD held roundup later than usual, when he knew I was tied up shooting the television show.” She ticked off the years with her fingers. “This year, he scheduled roundup early, and he never told me he was going to.” She grabbed her glass again, scowled into it, and took a long drink. “Not that he ever tells me anything.”

  “If you lived on the ranch you could convince JD to deal you in.”

  “Have you ever noticed how he treats me? Like dirt,” she said, almost snarling.

  She slammed the glass down on the bar. “Forget it. I’m going to change clothes. Then we can go out and do something fun.” She turned an enticing look on him, and her voice came out throaty. “Unless you’d like to come upstairs with me?” She raised an eyebrow. “Help me off with my dress?”

  Rolf gulped and clenched his fists. She knew what she was doing to him. He had to resist, or he’d end up going home alone.

  “Uh. No thanks.”

  “You sure?” She struck an enticing pose with one hip thrust out.

  This was torture. But if he let Tess have her way with him, he’d be putty in her hands. She’d let him have one night and then send him home to the ranch like a tame puppy. He had to be strong, for both their sakes. He shook his head.

  She looked briefly disappointed. Then she shrugged, kicked off her heels, and sprinted up the stairs like a gazelle, hiking up her skirt so her long legs could take the steps easily. “Back in a minute,” she called.

  He began to stride after her, and then let out a breath, coming to himself. Whoa. Dial it back, cowboy. He was here on a mission to save Tess from herself. Get her home where she belonged. Not luxuriate in the desire between them without a commitment from her.

  Making love to Tess wasn’t what he’d come to California for. If they made love again, she might reject him again. He must resist, and lure her home where she belonged.

  He wandered back into the room off the hall. A small living room. Furnished by a decorator, he’d bet. Full of fus
sy art pieces on the walls and on the tables and even the mantelpiece. So not Tess. But California wasn’t Tess, he was sure of it.

  “You never told me, how did you get in?”

  She’d changed into a long-sleeved yellow t-shirt and blue jeans, but was barefoot, her long dark hair flowing around her shoulders. She was a beautiful woman no matter what she wore.

  “Rolf?”

  “Sorry. I was overcome by your—uh—you-ness.”

  She slanted a skeptical look at him. “Really? How’d you bypass the security? I might not be safe from the paparazzi here after all.”

  “You’re asking a soldier how he infiltrated enemy territory?” He shrugged. “Not something those losers can imitate, so you don’t need to know. I left my car outside the gates. Probably towed it by now.”

  “I’ll give you the gate password. You can go out and rescue it.”

  “I’m here to rescue you, not a car.”

  At his bald statement, she looked troubled. “Why? I thought you understood…wait. You mean because of the DUI thing? I don’t need rescuing. I’ve got a good lawyer and it’s all settled.”

  He paced the small room, feeling stifled by its narrowness. Finally, he turned and faced her. “Your family wants you to come home. A DUI isn’t anything to joke about. You could have been killed. You could have injured someone. What were you thinking?” He couldn’t stop the exasperation from tingeing his voice.

  Tess wrapped her arms around her middle and jutted her chin out. “It’s none of your business. Turns out the cops play this game with lots of people. They wait outside popular bars, just hoping to pick someone off.”

  “So they took one look at you and knew you were drunk as a skunk. As soon as you got behind the wheel, you were done. Only it didn’t end there.”

  “That was their fault, although Marty—the lawyer, told me not to say anything about it to the judge. The police were in an unmarked car, and when I tried to move from one lane to another, they deliberately blocked me in a very aggressive move.”

  “So you decided you were a Selkirk and you wouldn’t allow anyone to cut you off?”

  She looked chagrinned. “It wasn’t like that. I wasn’t thinking well, anyway. All I knew was I could go around the guy by illegally being in the left turn only lane. He made it into a race.”

  She smiled. “I won. And then he put his light and siren on, and he had me dead to rights.”

  “Entrapment,” Rolf said. “But you were in the wrong to begin with.”

  She lifted a vase aimlessly on an end table, then set it down again. “I didn’t know the cops played games like that here. They never did in Cheyenne or back home.”

  She had the hurt look of a little child, but Rolf resisted sympathizing. “You drove drunk, raced a police car, and now you’re saying it was all their fault? Driving drunk put you in the wrong from the first moment.”

  “I know better. I just…”

  “What?”

  “I didn’t plan to go to a bar. I was upset over missing the roundup. So I went for a drive. If I’d intended to go bar hopping, I would have hired a car, or gone with a friend.”

  “What kind of friend lets you do that? Paula?”

  Tess looked pugnacious at the criticism in his tone. “Don’t blame her. She’s always helped me, got me out of trouble.”

  “That’s why I’m here. Can you legally leave the state?”

  “Sure, I can.”

  “Then come home with me now.”

  “You came to act like my parents and drag their misbehaving little girl home?” She looked hurt, then angry.

  “You can’t go on like this. You’ll get hurt, or hurt someone else.”

  “I’ll be more careful next time.”

  “You know that’s not the right answer. Why don’t you come home? The place needs you.”

  “Between you and JD, and Baron, there’s nothing for me to do on the ranch. My brothers won’t cut me in on the action. Here, I’ve got a career, something to do.”

  “Except I hear you’re between roles,” he said, gently.

  She looked up, her expression showing shame or embarrassment, the very emotions she should have shown over the DUI. “I’m in five pilots, I’ll have you know. The producers are shopping them around town. And my agent is looking for a movie role for me, too. I have work.”

  “But not right now, which is why you’re driving drunk in a congested city where you’re bound to harm someone with your recklessness.”

  She paced in the enclosed space. “Why don’t you understand? I’m not a sit-around-the-house type. I need to be busy. Doing something.”

  “How about I take you to the beach and we can talk some more? Nothing like looking at the ocean to give a person a sense of freedom. Plus, you don’t have to drive.”

  She agreed, and gave him the gate code. Within minutes, Rolf had retrieved his rental and parked in front of Tess’s townhouse. So far so good. Now for the hard part.

  When she came to the door to let him in, a strand of her long, chestnut-colored hair had fallen over her cheek. Seeing her again after only five minutes apart, he was bowled over once more. She was so lovely. She was his. How could he make her see that?

  “You’re beautiful, Tess,” he couldn’t help saying.

  Her face lit up and she threw herself into his arms.

  Minutes later, both of them up against the front door, he sighed and stepped back. He shook his head to clear it. “No more. You’re too tempting.”

  “Why not?” she asked. Her mouth curved in an inviting smile. “We just got started.”

  “We might quarrel again.”

  She said, “How about we have sex first? We can always quarrel later if we have to,” she said. Seduction was in every line of her body.

  “I want you to come home,” he forced out, fighting the urge to take what she was offering.

  Her inviting expression changed to pique. “Let’s go for that drive you promised me.”

  Rolf took a deep breath for the first time in five minutes. Kissing Tess was addictive. He couldn’t keep his hands off her and she wasn’t offering any resistance—when she wasn’t jumping him. His body was begging him to give in, but he had to pull back or lose his one ace with her, their need for each other.

  She frowned. “I’ll get my purse and some thong sandals, and a few other things.”

  ***

  Having Rolf drive was nice. Tess recited the directions from her phone as Rolf carefully wove their way through the always crowded roads. L.A. traffic was murder.

  She’d almost seduced Rolf, but he had more self-control than she’d expected, despite the memory of their one night together. After Addie’s wedding reception formalities were over, Tess and he had danced and danced. Then they’d slipped out and gone to his Rolf’s private little cabin in the ranch hands’ compound. But after the sex, which was outstanding, came the quarreling. He’d wanted her to stay with him on the ranch and abandon her acting career. No way.

  She didn’t want to fight with Rolf, today or any day. They were on the same page about so many things. He was a rancher, like her, an alien here in this crazy state. Or maybe the state wasn’t crazy, just the television and movie business called Hollywood. It didn’t value women. It didn’t value real men. It didn’t value hard work. Only magic counted. How a person looked to a camera counted.

  She’d been lucky at first. Now she was in the career doldrums so many other actors faced. She was waiting. She had many irons in the fire, but while she waited, she was restless. Lonely. She didn’t have a studio, or a posse, not really. It wasn’t easy to make more than casual friends when there was so much rivalry for parts. The people on Caz’s television series had known each other for years before she arrived. She’d been only a newcomer to them.

  She yawned. “Sorry. I’m a little tired. I didn’t sleep well last night.”

  “Were you fretting over your court appearance? Now you’re a Hollywood veteran—you even have a little bitty scan
dal to your name.”

  Did he have to bring that up?

  As much as she tried to play it cool about the DUI, it was shaming to have been so irresponsible.

  As the palm trees whizzed by, she straightened. “Let’s go surfing.”

  Rolf gave her a look. “I don’t surf.”

  “You can learn. I’ll call my teacher and he can give you a lesson.”

  “I don’t have a suit.”

  She wagged a finger. “Don’t be a party pooper. This is California. You can buy a suit anytime, almost anywhere.”

  ***

  How did she do that? Here he was ready to be supportive and hold her hand romantically while they walked on a deserted beach and talked about how messed up she was. Now Tess was turning his soulful outing into an athletic adventure.

  Why fight it? Maybe if she got some of her restless energy out of her system, she’d be willing to talk about returning to the ranch.

  Tess used her phone and organized it all. She also thought ahead about parking, which he was dismayed to find very scant around the beach she’d chosen.

  “Pull in there. Private lot. They’ll watch the car,” she directed.

  He turned in, glad to be out of the nonstop traffic. His time in Wyoming had made him uncomfortable with the hustle and bustle of a big city. Or maybe the truth was, his time in Iraq had done it. He liked life slow and predictable. And safe.

  Tess led the way to a surf shop. The young punk behind the counter sporting stringy blond hair and a couple of tattoos and earbobs looked too thrilled to see Tess.

  “Oh, wow. You’re back. Never thought you’d come here again after that nasty header you took. Did you need stitches?”

  She lifted her hair and pointed at one temple. “One of those plastic bandages they spray on did the trick. You can hardly see it. When I’m acting, the makeup people cover it up. Have to look perfect for the magic.”