Just a Cowboy and His Baby (Spikes & Spurs) Read Online Free PDF Page B

else.”
    “And what makes a woman ranch material?” Gemma asked.
    “Not snarling her nose at a new baby calf or colt goes a long way,” Trace answered.
    Gemma understood perfectly. Her last relationship had ended in a hell of a bigger mess than what a Chihuahua dog could bring about. He’d been one of those pretty, spoiled rotten rich kids who didn’t know the south end of a northbound broodmare from a hole in the ground. The only thing they had in common was a couple of friends and a few months of wild sex. The friends fell by the wayside and the sex couldn’t hold the relationship together. She slid out of the booth and carried her dirty dishes to the sink where she washed them and set them in the trailer-sized drainer.
    She picked up her bag and opened the door and Sugar bounded off the bed. “Thanks for breakfast. See you in St. Paul. Grab Sugar. I wouldn’t want to have to chase her down.”
    He picked the dog up and held the door for Gemma. “Thanks for the conversation and for saving me from public humiliation. It could have been a mess if I’d been caught in the women’s bathroom. See you later and you are so welcome to breakfast. We’ll have to do it again.”
    ***
    Gemma was barely back out on I-90 when her cell phone rang. She put it on speakerphone and laid it beside her on the console before she even answered Liz’s call.
    Liz had been born and raised in a traveling carnival. The same one that Colleen and Blaze helped take care of nowadays. Liz had been the belly dancer and fortune-teller for the carnival, but when her Uncle Haskell left her a house and twenty acres she’d changed her lifestyle drastically. Every Christmas she’d asked Santa Claus for a house with no wheels and a sexy cowboy. Her Uncle Haskell took care of the house with no wheels and Gemma’s brother, Raylen, turned out to be the sexy cowboy. They’d been married for eighteen months and Liz had told Gemma’s fortune twice now. Once before she and Raylen married and once after. Both times there was a cowboy in her future and he was going to be hers by Christmas. But Christmas had come and gone the year before and no cowboy had dropped down on one knee to propose.
    “Hey, Liz, what are you doing up so early?” Gemma asked.
    “Early? We all don’t get to sleep until ten o’clock and only work eight seconds a day,” Liz teased.
    “Ten o’clock my naturally born cowgirl ass! I rode that demon of a horse last night and didn’t even stick around for the after-party and drove until two this morning, so don’t be giving me any sass at this time of day,” Gemma said.
    Liz giggled. “Woke you up, didn’t I? Congratulations on another win. Met a blond-haired cowboy yet?”
    “Hell, no! I’m going to buy one of those signs to hang on my wall that says ‘I believe’ and write don’t in big red letters between the two words. I think you used up all your magic chasing my brother down and roping him for your own. All the rest of the cowboys worth their salt are done gone.”
    “How about Trace Coleman? I hear he’s giving you a run for your money.”
    “He’s got dark hair, dark eyes, and a damn Chihuahua dog. What cowboy rides into a rodeo with a Chihuahua dog? There’s something wrong with the picture even if he does make fantastic pancakes and—” She paused for a breath.
    “Whoa!” Liz interrupted. “Back up and talk to me. When did you have breakfast with him? Did you do more than eat pancakes with him and his dog? And FYI, I think those little critters are precious.”
    “Hell no, I didn’t do more than eat pancakes with him. And I will not. It would be a definite conflict of interest. He’s giving me the stiffest …”
    Liz giggled before Gemma could complete the sentence.
    “Okay, get your mind out of the gutter and let me finish. He’s giving me the stiffest competition I’ve ever been up against. I swear it’s going to take all my energy and concentration to beat him out enough for a place in the