“Aaron Weber is watching you try to get that hay out of your bra, sis. In fact, he’s been watching you all night long.”

Natalie Camden leveled a cool glare on her sister, Holly. “Well, if you hadn’t dragged me off of my horse and made me come out with you all, I wouldn’t still have hay poking my boob…and he is not.” Natalie was lying, and all of the Camden women seated around her knew it.

The hottest bartender at Saddleback’s Honkytonk, who just so happened to be her sweet friend, had been staring at her, silently inviting her to come over and tell him what it was she wanted.

She’d called him the night before in a moment of weakness and told him she wanted to ask for a favor. But the impulse that had made her pick up the phone had been undone by his kindness.

He’d immediately sworn to do anything in the world for her, because he was Aaron and when he said things like that he meant them. But they were just friends. She’d blown all chances of him being more than that straight to hell a year ago. The favor she longed to ask was nothing more than an exercise in taking advantage of what a great guy he was. He’d pressed her to ask him. She’d called herself several less than kind names and changed the subject.

Wriggling again, she debated just sticking her hand down her own shirt and removing the offending hay. Why weren’t there easy solutions for cowgirl problems? Currently she was surrounded by four dozen cattle ranchers, more than half of them skating on drunkenness. Flashing her cleavage probably wasn’t the best idea.

The thought sent an all too familiar wave of panic throughout her. She dug her fingernails into the palms of her hands and tried to forget. God, why was it always right there just under her skin? Just out of reach so she couldn’t take it in her hands and crush it violently. Why couldn’t she just damn it all to hell the way she did most everything else she hated?

“Bet Aaron would be more than happy to help you with your hay issue, Nat,” Summer, Natalie’s sister-in-law, suggested with a sly grin. Her voice floated up above the low hisses of the beer taps and the drawl of the jukebox.

“Why aren’t you even talking to him?” Holly asked. “I thought you were friends.”

“Holl, I am not going to go ask him to get the hay out of my bra. We aren’t that good of friends. How much have you had to drink anyway?”

“You don’t have to do that.” Holly rolled her eyes. “Just go say hi. It’s weird you aren’t up there. Besides, we all know he likes you.”

“He likes me as a friend. We just established this.”

“He likes you as way more than a friend, babe,” Her brother Luke’s wife, Indie, goaded. “Trust me, guys who are just friends don’t stare at you like their hands are the only things they don’t want to take off of you tonight.”

“He’s working. I’ll talk to him later.”

“Well, when you do talk to him, tell him you want to earn a few buckles in his bedroom rodeo.” Indie laughed.

“No, no, no, Aaron’s not a cowboy. She has to tell him she wants to become his peen queen,” Holly announced rather loudly.

It was a testament to the amount of alcohol they’d consumed that everyone except Natalie erupted in hysterical giggles.

If she stayed at that table any longer, they were only going to get louder and more obnoxious. Rolling her eyes, Natalie stood with enough force to send her chair careening into the ancient jukebox. The inevitable collision switched the song from Hank Williams to Alan Jackson.

Aaron’s chuckle shook through his upper body. His black T-shirt pulled across his pecs concealing a few of his tattoos while struggling to contain his tight Army-earned muscles. The jostle of his impressive body shook through her, the way it always did. What would it feel like to lay her head on that chest, to be enveloped in the sanctuary of him, and not run away this time?

“I hate that song anyway,” he hollered across the sea of cattle ranchers.

When he winked at her, her feet carried her toward him of their own free will.

Stop. Stop walking. What the hell? What are you even going to say to him? You cannot ask him to pop your cherry and teach you all the finer points of lovemaking. If you go up there you’re going to ask him. He’s way too easy to talk to.

Half a dozen steps and two cowboys away from him, her better judgement finally shattered whatever spell his gaze had set on her. Heart double-timing to the tune of “Where I Come From” she skidded to a stop, changed course, and ducked into the restroom.

Slamming herself inside a stall, she jerked the hay out of her bra and tossed it in the toilet. The cool metal of the stall door against her back tempered the flare of shame. God, why did everything have to be so fucking difficult? Why had those few weeks all those years ago impacted all of the other perfectly normal moments? Why couldn’t she just prance up to the bar, order one of those stupid pink drinks like other country girls did, flirt, and go home with Aaron or with anyone she chose? Maybe she could. Maybe it was high time she cowgirled up.

* * *

Disappointment crashed through Aaron as he watched Natalie disappear into the women’s restroom. Dammit. What was going on with her? He’d been sure she’d make her way up to see him eventually. Slammed with a local rodeo crowd, he’d been pouring beer and mixing shooters for the last three hours straight.

Last night on the phone he thought they were finally getting somewhere in the general vicinity of where they’d been a year ago when she’d run away in a fear he didn’t understand. Addicted to the sweet sound of her laughter, he’d pulled out all of his best material just to hear her giggle. She’d said something about a favor. Now, she was avoiding him like an Amway salesman with a quota to meet.

The haunting fear that lingered in those beautiful hazel eyes of hers simultaneously made him want to hunt down and end anything that had ever frightened her while holding her tightly in his arms and swearing to her that he’d never allow anyone or anything to hurt her again.

“Hey, good-lookin’, my cups lookin’ empty…a little…empty…a little.” The drunk blonde with tits the size of her head leaned forward on the bar just as Natalie made her exit from the restroom.

Her pensive stare whipped from his face to the ostentatious display of flesh on the bar. If Natalie Camden had rolled her eyes any harder, they would have lodged themselves in her skull. Shit.

Ignoring the blonde, Aaron scooted out from behind the bar and grabbed Natalie’s hand. “Hey, I’m sorry we’re so slammed. You want to hang out after last call?”

Jerking her hand out of his grasp, irritation clouded her eyes. “It looks like you already have your hands full.”

“Come on, Nat. What’s up with you tonight?” Just then the blonde decided to shove her shot glass into Aaron’s shoulder. “I said I needed another drink,” she screeched. “Make me another!”

“Yeah, you’re done. If you don’t have a ride, get one.” Much to his relief, the pack of cowgirls she’d come in with took her hands and guided her out to the parking lot. “Come talk to me. She got dumped and was looking to get smashed. At least that’s what her friends told me. You said you wanted to talk about something.”

“I changed my mind.” The impressive armor she kept firmly in place seemed to be strengthening the longer they stood there staring at each other.

“Changed your mind about what? Come over here.” Praying she’d follow him back to the bar, he scrambled for what to say to get her to relax again. “Want a whiskey sour?”

“No. What was that chick drinking?” she asked.

“Pink lemonade shooters.” Aaron rolled his eyes.

To his relief, she wrinkled her adorable nose. “Do those taste as ridiculous as they sound?” A glimmer of the Natalie he knew so well made a reappearance.

“Pretty much. Quick way to lose any inhibitions you ever hoped to have though.”

“Maybe I should try one then.” Visible regret chased the words she’d just spoken.

“I’m not making you a lemonade shooter. Where did that even come from? I’ve never made you anything but whiskey. I’ve always liked that about you.”

“Why?” She seemed genuinely intrigued.

Aaron shrugged. “The world has more than enough vapid, pink lemonade, bubblegum, sorority queens. Needs a lot more cowgirls. How’s Sundance?”

And there was the smile that summoned the golden flecks in her eyes and lit her entire face like a whiskey bonfire. He’d been to hell and back more times than he cared to recall but his one and only prayer lately had been that someday, somehow he’d get to call that smile his own.

“She’s great. After we worked cattle this morning, I rode her all afternoon.”

“Oh yeah? Bet she loved that.”

“Not as much as I did. It was a tough summer. I was in the trucks more than I was on her. I hated it. Riding today was amazing.”

How about riding me sometime, sweetheart? I’ll make it so damn good for you. Just give me a chance. The words he would never voice staged a revolt on the tip of his tongue. The all too familiar longing took another swipe at his resolve. She was wary of men in general. And he was one hundred percent, red-blooded, all American male. He had to give her time to work through whatever had happened to her. If only he could pour up glasses full of patience the way he could fix glasses of liquid encouragement.

“Okay, how about telling me what you wanted to ask me, while I start cleaning up.”

“I said I changed my mind.”

“Yeah, I know, but what did you change your mind on? Did I fuck something up?”

“No,” she sighed. “I just…I don’t know. It was stupid.”

“Last night, I told you about the time when I was a teenager and took a dare to jump out of the hay loft in the barn onto the trampoline at my foster parents’ farm. I broke, like, seven bones. Whatever you wanted to ask me can’t possibly be that dumb.”

“Yeah, but kids do dumb shit like that all the time.”

“Okay, how about this one. The first week I was living in the barracks, I locked myself out of my room wearing nothing but banana boxers and one boot. Had to wait outside all night dressed like that until my C.O showed up the next morning with the key. For years everyone in my platoon called me banana hammock.”

That earned him a genuine laugh. He watched intently as the tense set of her jaw eased. “Why exactly did you leave with only one boot on?”

“I may not have been completely sober.”

“Ah, that makes slightly more sense.”

“Come on, Nat. I know you don’t wanna go back over there and chat with your sister and all of your brothers’ wives.” He placed another whiskey sour in front of her. “Save me from everyone in here living high on booze and stupidity. Talk to me.”

“Aren’t bartenders supposed to want people to be living high on booze? Isn’t that how you make the best tips?”

“Yeah, well, there’s a reason I see this as a job not a career.”

“Do you want to go back in the Army?” That was not an option, even if he had wanted to, which he didn’t. A distinctive sadness darkened her eyes and filled him with another round of hope. Did she not want him to leave? God, that hope was going to be the death of him.

“Hell no. Just not entirely sure I always want to be a bartender.” Just then a screech sounded from the kitchen right before the clatter of pots and pans echoed through the bar.

Natalie cringed. “Sounds like Ed and Eliza are at it again.”

“Make that a bartender that moonlights as a marriage counselor. Be right back.”