Tempted by the Texan

Author:Kathie DeNosky
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2015-01-08T16:00:00+00:00

Seven

The following Sunday, as Jaron drove his truck along the road leading to the Lucky Ace Ranch, he glanced over at Mariah in the passenger seat beside him. Since asking about his scars after they made love, she hadn’t mentioned them again. He knew she was still curious about what had made the marks, but if he told her how he got the lines crisscrossing his back, then he’d have to tell her about his sadistic father. That was sure to cause her to ask more questions that he wasn’t about to answer.

The more he revealed about his past, the bigger the chance that she would either remember hearing about his father and the murders he’d committed or more likely, she would do an internet search and find out the whole sordid story. He felt safe that she hadn’t done that already because of the judge ruling that he could take his mother’s maiden name after his father’s conviction. But just the thought of Mariah looking at him with fear and suspicion the way some of the foster families he’d been sent to live with had done made a knot the size of his fist form in his stomach.

“Have you told your brothers about hiring me to work at the ranch?” she asked, breaking into his disturbing thoughts.

They hadn’t discussed when or what they were going to tell the rest of the family about her working at the Wild Maverick, but he suspected her reasons for keeping things on the down low were similar to his own. She looked a little uneasy and he felt just as apprehensive. He’d already gone through one interrogation with his brothers Ryder and T.J. He wasn’t looking forward to another inquisition by the other three. And there wasn’t a doubt in his mind that was exactly what was going to happen.

The entire family had known about Mariah’s crush on him. And they weren’t blind. They could tell he was just as attracted to her as she was to him. They’d also known that his insistence he was too old for her had evolved over the years from a valid reason into an excuse to keep her at arm’s length. In the past few years, he’d endured their good-natured ribbing about asking Mariah out on a date, but if Ryder and T.J.’s reaction was any indication, they were also concerned that it might not work out between them. Or worse yet, that one or both of them would end up with a broken heart.

“I didn’t have a choice about telling Ryder and T.J.,” he admitted as he steered the truck onto the ranch road leading up to Lane and Taylor’s house. “I ran into them the night I went to pick up our supper at the Broken Spoke. But I asked them to keep a lid on the news until we were all together.”

“I had the chance to tell Bria when she called about the change in plans for Sam’s party, but she wasn’t feeling well and I didn’t want to go into it,” Mariah said, nodding.

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