Joan Pickart - Man...Mercenary...Monarch

So, Pretty Lady wasn’t a true-blue Westerner. It was evident she hadn’t washed those stiff, spanking new jeans a dozen times or more to soften them up and fade them a bit before she wore them.

She was, oh, maybe twenty-seven or twenty-eight, but not single-scene savvy. She was definitely in foreign territory, and it showed like a brightly lit neon sign.

Pretty Lady had spunk, though. He’d give her that. She’d lifted her chin and started forward, making her way through the crowd at the bar. She’d probably faint dead out on her lovely face when she got over here and discovered there was nowhere to sit.

Man, John thought, shaking his head in self-disgust, he was really scrambling to keep his troubled thoughts at bay. He was actually wasting mental energy by concentrating on a city gal who had no business being in a Western bar where she didn’t know the rules of the game.

“Hey, sweet thing,” John heard a cowboy say as the man stepped in front of the woman. “I’m Pete. How about I buy you a drink?”

“Oh,” she said. “No. No, thank you very much. If you’ll excuse me, please, I’d like to go sit down and listen to the music.”

“Fine with me,” Pete said, placing one hand on her shoulder. “We’ll sit together, dance some, have a couple of drinks.”

“No,” she said, removing his hand from her shoulder. “Thank you, but no.”

Pete, John thought, what part of “no” don’t you understand? That worn-out cliché had been custom-made for jerks like Pete.

“Now, darlin’,” Pete said, shifting to slide his arm across the woman’s shoulders, “you don’t have to play hard to get with me. You’re alone. I’m alone. We’re a match made in heaven. Come on. Let’s find us a table.”

“No,” she said, attempting and failing to wiggle out of Pete’s hold.

Pete leaned closer. “Mmm. You smell real nice. Oh, yeah, you and I are going to get along just fine.”

“Let me go,” she said, an echo of panic evident in her voice.

Don’t you move, John told himself. He had his own troubles to contend with. Pretty Lady was getting her just deserts by walking into Jake’s, and she’d have to handle it herself. It was none of his damn business.

“Lighten up, sugar,” Pete said, kissing the woman on the temple.

“Stop it,” she said, nearly shrieking.

Ah, hell, John thought. He should have stayed at the motel. He didn’t need this hassle. But…ah, hell.

John slid out of the booth and pushed his way through the crowd in his path. He stopped in front of Pete and the woman.

“Pete,” he said, his voice very low and very menacing, “you have three seconds to take your arm off my woman. Are you hearing me, cowboy?”

“She’s not your…” Pete started, then met John’s gaze. The color drained from Pete’s face as he saw the ice in John’s blue eyes and the tight set to his jaw. “You bet.” The cowboy dropped his arm from the woman’s shoulders and took a step backward. “Hey, man, my mistake.”

“You’ve got that straight,” John said, then looked at the woman. “You’re late. Car acting up again?”

“Car,” she said, nodding. “Acting up. Again.”

“Right,” John said. “Come on, let’s go, before someone takes the booth I have for us.”

“Oh, I don’t think—”

“No joke,” John said gruffly. “That’s very obvious.”

He placed one large hand in the middle of her back and propelled her forward until they reached the booth. He shoved his jacket into the corner and glowered at her.

“Sit,” he said.

Laura sank onto the leather bench and scooted into the middle, acutely aware that her legs were trembling so badly, they had been about to give way beneath her. She drew a shuddering breath, then looked directly at the man who was now sitting opposite her.

He pushed his Stetson up with one thumb and met her gaze.

Blue ice, Laura thought. His eyes were cold, like chips of blue ice. He wasn’t handsome in a smooth, conventional manner; his features were far too rugged, with high cheekbones, a strong, square jaw and a straight blade of a nose.

His hair was dark brown, thick and shaggy, falling to his collar and badly in need of a trim. Broad shoulders strained against the material of his shirt, and his hands now wrapped around the bottle of beer were large and powerful appearing.

He was, without a doubt, the most earthy, rough-hewn—the most masculine—man she’d ever encountered. There was an aura of danger emanating from him, a sense of tension, of leashed strength that might explode at any moment.

Dear heaven, she thought, she could hardly breathe, and the wild tempo of her racing heart was echoing in her ears. Those eyes. Those incredible eyes of his were pinning her in place, making it impossible to move, to tear her gaze from his.

“I’m not going to gobble you up for dinner,” he said, frowning. “You still look scared to death. I’m not the bad guy here, you know. I rescued you from Pete the Pest, remember?”

Laura folded her hands on the top of the table and managed to shift her eyes to her entwined fingers.

“Yes, I know,” she said quietly, “and I want to thank you for what you did. I wasn’t handling the situation with that man well at all.” She sighed. “I never should have come here alone.”

“Why did you?”

“I…I just couldn’t face another long evening alone.” She shook her head. “Listen to me. I don’t go around baring my soul to perfect strangers.” She met his gaze again. “I’m acting completely out of character tonight.”

“Well, if it will make you feel any better, I’m not perfect, nor am I a stranger. I’m the knight who rode in on my white horse and saved you, the damsel in distress.

“And as far as baring your soul? I’m in this crummy place because I couldn’t handle the four walls that were closing in on me. I needed to escape from my own thoughts. And I can’t quite believe I’m telling you all this.”

Laura smiled. “I guess we’re both behaving out of character. I suppose the least we should do is introduce ourselves.”

“No, wait,” he said, raising one hand. “Since we’re behaving so far from the norm, let’s stick with first names only. That will make this whole thing not quite…well, real. I’m John.”

“Hello, John. I’m Laura.”

“Pretty name,” he said, smiling slightly, “for a pretty lady.”

Laura cocked her head to one side and studied John intently.

“You don’t smile often, do you?” she said. “Your smiles just don’t materialize naturally.”

John lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “I’ve never thought about it,” He paused. “No, I guess I don’t have a hell of a lot to smile about.”

The waitress appeared suddenly at the booth, startling both Laura and John.

“I see you took my advice, cowboy,” she said, then looked at Laura. “Drink?”

“Just a cola, please,” Laura said.

“You bet. Well, good-lookin’,” she said to John, “you’ve got yourself a pretty woman, you’re doin’ some drinkin’, so get out on the floor and do the dancin’ part. You’ll forget your troubles in no time at all. Be right back with the cola.”

John shook his head as the waitress hurried away.

“She probably actually believes that problems are that easily solved,” he said.

“Do you have problems?” Laura said.

“Doesn’t everyone?” John said, raising one eyebrow.

The waitress returned and slid a glass in front of Laura, then she disappeared again. Laura took a sip from the straw poking through the ice.

“Well,” she said slowly, “I suppose problems are subjective. One person could be upset because they couldn’t find exactly the right shoes to match a new party dress. While another person could be in turmoil due to a serious illness they’re suffering from. But each would say they had a problem.”