The Daddy Survey by Janis Reams Hudson

Author:Janis Reams Hudson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Silhouette
Published: 2004-09-01T04:00:00+00:00

When they reached the corral, Sloan swung down from his horse. After Rose dismounted he took her reins. As much as he wanted to rush to the house to see Emily, he knew his grandmother was tired, even if she wouldn’t admit it.

“I’ll see to your horse,” he told her.

“Thank you, Grandson.” She patted his cheek. “I’m ready for a shower, and maybe even a nap, but if you repeat the latter, I’ll deny it.”

He blinked. “Repeat what?”

“You always were a good boy.”

Since Rose was going to be in the house with Emily, Sloan decided it would be wise if he kept his distance. He wasn’t ready for another lecture on the virtues of their temporary housekeeper. He feared he knew them all too well.

He wanted her.

There. He had actually let the words form in his brain. The big question was, what was he going to do about it?

While cooling down and grooming his mount and his grandmother’s, he considered the possibilities.

The first was that Emily was not interested in anything beyond that one kiss they’d already shared. In which case, his wants were moot.

But she had said she was attracted to him, too. That meant something, didn’t it? Of course it did. He could act on that, go after her. That’s what he wanted to do. He remembered the day he met her, that slow, graceful dance she’d performed while gliding from table to table. Remembered wondering if she moved that slowly, that gracefully in bed. He still wondered it, and the wondering heated his blood.

Would it be worth it to have her, then stand back and watch her drive away?

And she would drive away. She would have to, because she wasn’t cut out for life on a ranch. She had no business even being a housekeeper. Earline was as hefty as a linebacker, and the job wore her to a frazzle.

Memories of his mother surfaced, warm, loving, sad. She’d been delicate and dainty, too, like Emily. And in the end, life on this ranch had killed her. He’d been nine, and devastated.

His mother, he knew, was why he always fell for damsels in distress. Women who needed him to help them. His mother had needed a man to help her through her daily life, but his father had been consumed by the ranch, and the bottle.

Sloan had stepped in to fill the void, but he’d been a kid. He hadn’t been able to take care of his mother the way she needed, the way she deserved.

These days, it seemed, he made up for his youthful inabilities by helping any woman he thought needed him.

It was a hell of a thing, to realize all of that, and still fall in the same old trap. Because he could never, in good conscience, tie himself to a woman like his mother. He couldn’t stand to watch a woman he loved work herself to the bone and wither away before his eyes. Would never forgive himself if he did that to a woman.

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