The Cowboy Who Broke the Mold Read Free

furiously beating its wings against the draw of a light bulb, trying its damnedest to immolate itself.
    And she somehow made the experience seem enviable.
    Most assuredly there would be time enough for Ms. Raben to realize the mistake she had made. Until then,Judson decided that there should be no reason why they couldn’t coexist amicably. Turning off the interstate and onto a less traveled road, he reached into the small cooler on the seat between them.
    “Want something to drink?” he asked, pulling out a cold one.
    Carrie cringed.
    Drinking and driving made her nervous. Though there wasn’t another soul on the road and the likelihood of an accident seemed minimal, her hand tightened on the door handle. It was one thing to be traveling alone with a stranger and quite another to be riding with a drunk.
    “No,” she stated coolly.
    “You sure?” Judson asked with a peculiar look in his eye. He held the cold can to his forehead for a sec- ond before pulling the tab and taking a long, cool swig.
    Carrie’s throat was parched. Inviting beads of mois- ture dripped down the sides of the can. She had to resist the temptation to dab away the rivulets of sweat forming between her breasts.
    “Positive.”
    A hard glint turned eyes the color of a cloudless sky to gunmetal as he asked, “Even if it’s nonalcoholic?”
    Again Carrie cringed, this time not out of fear but embarrassment. Without so much as bothering to check the label, she had simply assumed that drinking and driving was de rigueur for the Western male.
    “I didn’t mean to—”
    “Just because I’m an Indian—” Judson’s voice was cold enough to drop the temperature in the cab several degrees “—doesn’t mean I’m a drunk.” He tilted his head back and took an especially long pull.
    His words came as a total surprise. An Indian with blue eyes? Carrie was as taken aback both by Judson’s declaration of his ancestry as by the vehemence with which it was uttered.
    “I didn’t think that—”
    “I’ve yet to meet a white who hasn’t jumped to the same conclusion as you—that we’re all good-for- nothing drunks living off government handouts. You don’t need to worry, Ms. Raben.” Her name came out as a hiss. “You’ll fit in just fine around here.”
    Carrie drew back as if his words were fists. She had never meant to imply such a thing.
    Unmindful of the bewildered look on that pretty face, Judson continued. “There’s a long line of alcoholism in my family history, and I can assure you that I’ve learned something by burying the dead, so you can just let go of that door handle and relax. I have no intention of killing you today.”
    Tension wrapped the pair in a tight shroud. Gritty and on edge, Carrie attributed her raw nerves to the long, uncomfortable plane ride from Chicago. She refused to give credence to the possibility that her growing sense of uneasiness was linked to an unlikely chauffeur whose earthy scent of woods and sheer masculinity invaded her senses and left her feeling helpless.
    “Hell,” he grumbled. “If you’re afraid of me, how are you ever going to cope with the demands of a school smack-dab in the middle of the wilderness?”
    “I am not afraid!” Carrie rejoined a little too quickly, a little too loudly. “And—” Her voice rose a notch. “I certainly didn’t mean to hurt your feelings!”
    Issued with such fierce indignation, it was an odd apology indeed. Judson’s eyes snapped from the roadto lock upon her. Like an insect squirming beneath a microscope, Carrie was minutely scrutinized.
    Judson stared directly into the depths of his passenger’s eyes, the color of which, he decided, was the green of aspen leaves, of undiscovered passion and of a raw vulnerability that reached deep down inside him and squeezed his heart—hard. It just didn’t make sense. The woman was a living, breathing oxymoron. How could such a frightened, little thing exude sexuality like a tea- pot giving off