The Rancher's Family Thanksgiving Read online

  Hal returned the salute.

  Will turned back to Susie, smug masculine amusement shimmering in his eyes. To her discomfit, the ex-navy pilot looked as though he knew something Susie didn’t. “It sure looked that way to me,” Will drawled.

  “Well, you’re wrong.” Disbelief racing through her, Susie planted her boots on the edge of the tarmac. The Texas wind made the brisk November afternoon even colder. “Tyler can’t be envious of Hal.” It didn’t make any sense.

  Will shrugged and lifted a dissenting brow. He turned the collar of his leather flight jacket up against the cold. “If you say so.”

  “I mean, why would he be?”

  Tyler had never said one word about wishing he knew how to fly. Nor had he ever mentioned any desire to go skydiving. To her, anyway.

  “They’re both professional men. Successful,” Susie continued theorizing out loud.

  “I don’t think my cousin’s unhappiness had anything to do with careers,” Will interrupted drily.

  “Then what was—is—at the heart of it?” Susie demanded.

  Will merely smiled at Susie as if she ought to know the answer to that.

  He started walking with her toward the hangar, where the private jets were kept. Susie shivered, wishing she’d thought to bring her sheepskin lined suede cowgirl jacket with her, instead of just a sweater. She slanted another curious, assessing look at the charter air service owner. “You sure there was no emergency?” she pressed anxiously. “Family or vet or whatever?”

  A roar sounded behind them as Hal’s plane raced down the runway and took off.

  Will’s mood shifted from amused to perplexed. “He didn’t say anything to that effect.”

  “Well, something must be wrong,” Susie declared, her pulse beginning to race. “Otherwise, Tyler would not have come all the way out here looking for me in the middle of a workday.”

  Will looked Susie over from head to toe, before returning his eyes to her face once again. “Are you two dating?”

  “No.”

  Will pursed his lips together thoughtfully. “Does he want to date you?”

  What was it with everybody she knew suddenly matchmaking for her? And worse yet, fixing her up with Tyler McCabe? A man who had never shown the slightest interest in having that kind of relationship with her!

  Susie shook her head and shoved her hands through her hair. She grumbled bad-temperedly, “Don’t be ridiculous.” Don’t get me wishing for the impossible, too!

  Will mulled that over. “Huh.”

  The heat of embarrassment climbed from Susie’s neck to her cheeks. “What does ‘huh’ mean?” She hated it when men refused to just come out and say what was on their minds.

  Will clamped a brotherly arm on Susie’s shoulder. “I think you’re putting your questions to the wrong guy. Go find Tyler. Ask him.”

  If only to satisfy her own mounting curiosity, Susie decided to do just that.

  Luckily, he wasn’t hard to find. By the time she reached the vet clinic, office hours were over and everyone else had left for the day. Only Tyler’s pickup truck was in the lot.

  The front door hadn’t been locked yet so Susie strode in.

  Tyler came around the corner, Dictaphone in hand. Clad in his usual snug jeans, custom-fitted boots and solid-colored cotton shirt, he looked so ruggedly handsome and sexy she felt herself go weak in the knees.

  “Is everything okay with Catastrophe?” Susie’s words came out in a rush. She dropped her shoulder bag and keys on one of the wooden benches in the reception area. “Will said you stopped by the airstrip this afternoon, looking for me.” Breathlessly, she closed the distance between them. “What’s going on here, Tyler?”

  He gave her a look of choirboy innocence that was as unexpected as it was suspect. “I heard you were on a date and thought you might need some discreet help getting rid of Bachelor Number Three.”

  His casual confession left her feeling more disappointed than relieved.

  Aware Tyler was waiting for an update, Susie recited dutifully, “Hal Albert turned out to be pretty nice. He’s ex-military and he has his own skydiving instructing business, which he started from the ground up.”

  Tyler headed past her and locked the door. He turned the Closed sign around, and switched off the lobby lights. Hand beneath her elbow, he steered her toward the back of the building, where lights still blazed.

  His whole body taut with tension, he dropped the Dictaphone next to the stack of files on his desk. “So you two have a lot in common.”

  “Actually,” Susie made no effort to hide her surprise about that, “we do. We talked a lot about the pros and cons of being sole proprietors. He gave me some tips on how to expand into San Angelo if I ever have a mind to, and I told him how to go about getting a toehold in Laramie. He also offered to give me free skydiving lessons.”

  Tyler did not appear as if he wanted to imagine Susie leaping out of a plane and tumbling through the sky. He lounged back against the opposite wall, one booted foot across the other, his body at an angle. His eyes glittered with a mixture of doubt and cynicism that stung. “What are you going to give him in return?”

  Not about to let Tyler think he had the right to rein her in, any more than her family did, Susie said, just as casually, “The pleasure of my company.” End of story. End of his third degree!

  He gave her a faintly baiting look. “No landscaping or plants?”

  Susie stared at Tyler in confusion. “No. Although if he needed my help in that regard I’d be happy to work something out with him.” Susie paused, her exasperation with him building. “And as long as we’re playing twenty questions, why do you have that cynical look on your face?”

  Their gazes locked, held. “No reason.”

  “Bull.” Ignoring the butterflies in her stomach, she edged closer. “You’re thinking something. You’re just afraid to tell me what it is.”

  He flashed her a sexy half smile, even as worry darkened his hazel eyes. He pushed away from the wall, and edged closer, too. “I wouldn’t say ‘afraid.’”

  “If you’re not chicken,” Susie baited, planting both her hands on her hips, “then tell me what’s on your mind.”

  For a long moment, she thought he was not going to reply.

  Tyler’s glance narrowed. “The odds are companionship is not all he’s wanting.”

  Susie’s mouth opened in a round of surprise. “Hey!” Susie cautioned, incensed.

  He adapted a no-nonsense stance. “I call ’em like I see ’em.”

  “Obviously.” Susie treated Tyler to a withering glare before continuing sarcastically, “Although since you and he have never met each other, I hardly think you’re an expert on what may or may not be motivating Hal Albert.”

  Tyler dropped his arms, came closer yet. Abruptly, his expression was conciliatory. “Look, Susie, I know how guys around here operate when it comes to you. They all handle you with kid gloves because they know what you’ve been through.”

  Susie frowned. “For your information, Hal not only knows what happened to me but he had his own bout with serious illness. Like me, he’s now living one day at a time.”

  “Mmm-hmm.”

  Her resentment simmered. “Obviously, you’ve concluded there is something nefarious about that, too.”

  “All I’m saying is that one look at you—particularly for someone who is only living in the here and now—and there is only going to be one thing on his mind.”

  Susie marched away from him, not stopping until the desk stood between them. “I hate to tell you this, but you’re not helping your case.”

  He circled his desk, too, his expression impatient. “I’m not trying to help me, Suze. I’m trying to help you. I’m trying to point out that your parents’ well-intentioned meddling might have left you feeling a little vulnerable, especially now, around the holidays.”

  Susie could not deny that, much as she wanted. “And you think that makes me susceptible to seduction,” she guessed.
>
  Ty’s mouth twisted. He braced his hands on his waist, his elbows jutting out in angry wings. “It’s a mistake both of us have made before.”

  With each other.

  Susie felt a stab of unexpected jealousy that left her feeling more uncertain and off-kilter than before. She told herself it was none of her business, but in the end she couldn’t let it go. “You’re saying you’ve turned to other women the same way you’ve turned to me, in the past?”

  “Hell, no,” Tyler said. He took her by the shoulders, forcing her to look at him. “When I’m miserable, Suze, the only person I want with me is you.”

  Talk about a backhanded compliment!

  She extricated herself from his light, staying grasp and shoved her hands through her hair. “Now if only you could want me around when things are good, too,” she found herself saying wryly, before she could stop herself.

  Some emotion she couldn’t quite define flickered in his eyes before another silence fell, this one even more awkward.

  More telling…

  And all the while, Tyler looked as if she had pushed him into the pool, from behind.

  “Are you saying you want us to be more than time-of-trouble buddies?” he asked her eventually, in a low, cajoling voice. He paused to search her eyes. “That you want us to be the kind of friends that see each other all the time?”

  Was that what she wanted? What had been missing in her life?

  Susie knotted her hands in front of her, wishing she hadn’t started this, but unable to back off, nevertheless. “Yes,” Susie said slowly, deliberately. “That’s exactly what I want.”

  Chapter Five

  There’s no time like the present.

  “Then let’s start tonight,” Tyler said, taking both of Susie’s hands in his.

  “I wish I could but…” Susie let out a slow breath and looked at her watch.

  Tyler smiled at her as if it were no big deal, when to him it was a very big deal. “Got another engagement?” He gave her a playful look.

  Susie bit her lip, her face turning a self-conscious pink. “As a matter of fact…I do.”

  Telling himself he’d already done the unwarranted jealousy thing today, Tyler searched for some inner nobility that would give her what she needed in a friend while satisfying his need to forge a deeper connection with her.

  “Is this an engagement where three’s a crowd?” he asked her casually, reminding himself that, as friends, they would still be dating other people. As pals, it was expected they would support each other’s conquests and involvements.

  “Six, actually,” Susie answered, looking happier than he had seen her in a while as she gazed down at their enmeshed hands, “but who’s counting.”

  She released her hold on him and stepped back, all cordial Texas grace. “And of course you can come along with me if you wouldn’t mind going to the hospital to see Emmaline and her parents and Gary Hecht.”

  “The actuary?” The guy she’d barely been able to spend thirty minutes with at the driving range the other night?

  “Yes.” Susie smiled, looking relaxed, content and not the least bit starry-eyed.

  Susie waited for Tyler to turn off the lights, then walked out the side door with him into the crisp autumn evening.

  “I told him about Emmaline the night we were at the driving range, and since he consults with insurance companies all the time, he started rattling off facts and figures that showed just how futile it is to spend your life worrying about how you’re going to die. I spoke with her parents. They gave me facts about Emmaline’s illness. Gary compiled a whole host of statistics that showed just how high the odds are that she’s not only going to survive this, but go into permanent remission. He ran them by her folks this morning at their home. Mr. and Mrs. Clark realized what a boost this would be to Emmaline’s spirits and agreed to let him go to the hospital this evening and talk to her about his findings. I’m supposed to be there, too, and I’m going to be late if I don’t get a move on.”

  Tyler clasped her wrist before she could head for her own pickup truck.

  “Why waste gasoline? I’ll drive us both, and bring you back to get your vehicle later.”

  Susie leaned into his easy grasp. “Okay.”

  Tyler was glad to see the evening with Gary Hecht, Emmaline and her folks went as well as Susie had predicted.

  By the time Emmaline realized the odds were actually higher she would survive to her nineties, than succumb while still in her teens, she was in a much better frame of mind.

  “I’m getting out of here tomorrow morning,” Emmaline told Susie and Tyler after her parents had left to walk Gary down to the hospital lobby.

  “That’s great.” Susie smiled.

  Emmaline fingered the scarf around her head. “I know you’re busy, but I was sort of hoping we could get started planning the landscaping of my backyard.”

  “Sounds great,” Susie enthused. “The first order of business, now that you’ve had a chance to figure out what kind of plants and shrubs and flowers you like, is for me to see the yard at your home and figure out what we’ve got to work with.”

  “When do you think you could stop by?”

  Susie mentally ran down her schedule. “Tomorrow evening okay with you?”

  Emmaline nodded. “Tomorrow’s great.”

  “I’ll check with your parents tomorrow and set up a time,” Susie said.

  “Awesome.” Emmaline gave them the thumbs-up.

  Tyler and Susie said good-night to the teenager, and headed outside.

  “What’s the matter?” Susie asked as they cleared the automatic doors and walked across the parking lot. Visiting hours were ending. Others were headed to their cars and trucks, too.

  Tyler shrugged and tried to summon up what little gallantry he seemed to have left. “Nothing.”

  Susie squinted at him, intuitive as always. “You look like you just lost your best friend.”

  Maybe the opportunity to make her his best friend.

  With a disgruntled frown, Tyler admitted, “I was hoping we could spend tomorrow night together.” Hoping that doing so would ease the unwarranted selfishness he’d been feeling the last few days. Let them return to normal. Make that the “new” normal, he amended silently.

  “We can,” Susie enthused, chipper as always when everything was going her way. She caught his hand and swung their clasped palms between them. “Just come with me when I go see Emmaline.”

  Tyler caught the way-too-innocent sparkle in her eyes and grinned right back. He tightened his fingers over hers, and tugged her close before she could glide away once again. “I know what you’re doing.”

  Susie paused next to the passenger door of his pickup truck. She leaned against the handle, looked up at him.

  “You do?” she murmured softly.

  Clearly, she did not believe it.

  Tyler planted a hand on the roof of the truck, just left of her head. Aware their voices were carrying a little too much in the brisk night air, he leaned in close enough to inhale the fragrance of her skin and hair. “You’re just trying to rope me into helping you dig up and replant the Clarks’ yard.”

  Undeterred, Susie stuck her hands in the pockets of her suede jacket and ran the toe of her sturdy leather boot across the ground. “I’m that transparent, hmm?”

  Tyler watched the swish of her long skirt just above her ankles, and marveled how feminine she was, at heart. “Absolutely.”

  “Next question then.” Susie waggled her eyebrows at him. “Is it working?”

  Tyler let his gaze rove from the playful curve of her lips, back to her eyes. Staying on the “just friends” side of the line was going to be more challenging than he had figured.

  Aware she was awaiting his verdict on her clever machinations, he replied, “Yes, Suze, your little ploy is working to get me further involved with your good deeds.” And every other kind, Tyler realized wistfully. It didn’t seem to matter what Susie was up to. He wanted to be a part of it.


  “Good! I think I’m going to like this change in our relationship,” she announced with a flirtatious toss of her silky blonde head.

  Tyler held the door for her and gave her a boost up into the cab.

  “Why?” he teased, unable to help but note how pretty and sassy and right she looked, sitting in the passenger seat of his truck. “Because you think you’ll have me wrapped around your little finger?”

  Susie threw back her head and laughed, the sound soft, musical, and desire provoking. “Because I know I will.”

  “YOU REALLY DIDN’T HAVE to pick me up,” Susie told Tyler the next evening. “We could have met at the Clark residence.”

  Tyler shrugged. “I figured it would be easier on them if their guests arrived together.” Plus, Susie as everyday friend, instead of crisis buddy and or crisis lover, was going to take some getting used to. He figured the sooner they practiced their new roles, the sooner he would stop contemplating the fact that, as casual friends, they would never be making love again, even if a crisis did arise.

  “You’re right.” Susie strode out the door of her house, as if them being together were the most natural thing in the world. “But I’m driving.”

  Tyler paused.

  Susie frowned at his hesitation. “You drove last night,” she reminded impatiently.

  Yes. He had.

  His fingers tightened on his truck keys.

  “I just assumed…since I’m the guy…”

  Temper flared in her amber eyes. “I can drive, too.”

  “I know that,” Tyler countered, upset she thought this was a competency issue with him when it clearly wasn’t. “But uh…” He struggled to find a way to word it without offending her, even as she strode away. “Usually…”

  Susie rounded on him. “Usually nothing, Tyler McCabe.” She propped both her hands on her waist and tossed her head in indignation. “If we’re going to start hanging out together more then we have to establish new ground rules for how it’s going to go. And the first of those is that I’m going to drive fifty percent of the time, and you’re going to drive the other half.”