100% Pure Cowboy Read Free

in the distant background.
    He extended her a hand. “Are you going to step down on your own, or am I going to have to climb up there and haul you down myself?”
    Sensing that he was on the verge of bursting out laughing, Danielle felt a fierce surge of resentment well up inside her. Oh, how she would love to knock him right off that high horse of his!
    Their eyes locked in a tempestuous clash of wills. Defiantly she jutted out her chin and wrapped her fingers around the edge of her seat.
    â€œYou wouldn’t dare,” she countered in a regal, howdare-you-address-me-in-that-manner tone of voice. “And stop calling me ‘ma’am.’ It makes me feel like your mother.”
    â€œWell,” the man drawled, grabbing hold of the wagon with one hand and lifting himself out of the saddle in one, fluid motion to position himself into the seat beside her. “You sure as hell don’t look like her.”
    A ripple of heat washed over her. Feeling suddenly lightheaded, Danielle suspected that it had less to do with the sun beating down overhead than it did with the virile man whose leg had just inadvertently brushed against hers.
    Cheeks flaming, eyes flashing, she demanded to know, “Just who do you think you are, ordering me around?”
    He leaned so near that she could feel his warm breath upon her face. Assailed by the very scent of him—a tantalizing mixture of sagebrush, horse sweat, and pure bottled masculinity—she was totally unprepared for the sudden onslaught of sexual awareness that swept over her with the force of a flash flood. This man was far too sexy for his own good—and far too close for comfort.
    Sweeping the cowboy hat off his head, he formally introduced himself. “Cody Walker, ma’am, your wagon master.”
    Wagon master!
    â€œYou’ve got to be kidding,” Danielle guffawed, so startled by the announcement that she neglected to complete introductions by providing him with her own name. Suspicion swirled in the aquamarine depths of her eyes. He certainly didn’t fit the image she’d been carrying around of the sort of man who would be in charge of leading this wagon train. She had pictured someone older, more genteel, certainly less overtly virile. Someone weathered and grandfatherly. In her opinion, this man with his rugged, all-American good looks was too self-assured to be trusted with a wagonload of young girls.
    Danielle gave him an intentionally condescending once-over. “Are you aware, Mr . Walker—” her icy tone indicating she found him to be a living relic of the past “—that the term master hasn’t been politically acceptable since well before the turn of the century?”
    â€œThat may be, but remember, Re-ed...” Cody informed her, drawing the one syllable word into two. “For the next two weeks we’re living in the 1800s, and, like it or not, I am your wagon master . Now enough of this foolishness. I’ve got other business to attend to so let’s just cut to the chase. Are you getting down off of this rig peaceably or am I going to be forced to make an unpleasant and surely politically incorrect scene?”
    The softness of his voice was misleading for it was also tinged with determination. There was also something about the arrogant tilt of his firm, square jaw that suggested this wasn’t a man who would stand for having his orders disregarded.
    Danielle worried her lower lip between her teeth. Gentle by nature, she usually tried to avoid confrontation. But since her divorce she had been working on becoming more assertive. Just thinking of the way Scott had walked all over her for years brought a blush of shame to her cheeks. To meekly acquiesce to this stranger’s oh-so-virile domination was paramount to undoing all the progress she had made.
    Besides, she was dog tired, and the thought of having to walk beneath the heat of the summer sun in such outlandish garb