MisplacedCowboy by Mari Carr and Lexxie Couper Read Free Book Online

give Dylan an ear-bashing about the ridiculous nature
of his trip.
    The thought of his twin brother hit Dylan with something he
hadn’t expected. Homesickness. Perhaps it was the alien environment. He stopped
at the massive windows that comprised the east-facing wall of Monet’s
apartment, his gaze moving over the bright lights of New York. His watch told
him it was ten p.m. That meant it was two p.m. tomorrow back home. If he called
now, would he get Hunter?
    And if you do? What are you going to say?
    Pulling his stare from the alien nightscape, he looked for a
phone. The sounds of sirens, car horns and constant traffic wafting up from the
streets below was nothing like the silence of Farpoint at night, a silence
broken only by the occasional song of crickets and frogs in the nearby
billabong. It only furthered Dylan’s sense of being out of whack.
    In the wrong place, wanting the wrong woman, in the wrong
time. You shoulda stayed home.
    Spying what he was after, he crossed to the paisley sofa and
picked up a paint- and clay-splattered cordless phone. It only took him two
goes to correctly recall the prefix needed for dialing Australia from the U.S.
and then, as he stood staring out the window, the dial tone clicked and a
familiar woman’s voice said, “Hello. Farpoint Creek.”
     
    Monet didn’t mean to eavesdrop. She’d sequestered herself
away in her bedroom, as far from her bathroom as possible, and called Annie’s
cell over and over again so she didn’t have to hear the shower running. If she
heard the shower running she knew exactly what would happen. Her thoroughly
visual mind would present her with thoroughly detailed images of Dylan,
thoroughly naked and wet, separated from her by only a few feet of floor space
and one bathroom door.
    It hadn’t helped. For one, Annie hadn’t answered a single
time, damn it. For another, Monet’s mind had done exactly what she hadn’t
wanted it to and by the fourth unsuccessful attempt to call her best friend,
images of Dylan—stripped of his clothes but not his rugged cowboy sexiness—filled
her head.
    She’d sat on her bed, wishing to God Annie would answer her
phone as she stared fixedly at the wall, trying desperately to not think
about the naked man in her shower.
    Now, standing at her bedroom door, watching Dylan Sullivan
talk quietly on the landline phone in the middle of her studio, she realized
she was in trouble. Big trouble.
    She was sexually attracted to Annie’s cowboy. A lot.
    His deep voice stroked her senses, the words too low for her
to understand but not low enough she couldn’t discern his Australian accent.
She loved the way he sounded. She loved the way her name sounded on his lips.
She could happily sit and listen to him recite the alphabet and by the time he
reached Z, which he would no doubt pronounce as zed , she would be so
turned on, all it would take was one single flick of her clit and she’d come.
    God, she was pathetic. And a coward. If nothing else, she
still hadn’t addressed the kiss back in the gallery. She had to assure Dylan it
wouldn’t happen again. She remembered how hesitant he’d been to step out of the
elevator. As if he were worried she was going to jump his bones the second he
was in her apartment.
    “Okay,” Dylan’s voice grew a tad louder and Monet swallowed,
noticing his back was straighter, his shoulders squarer. “Okay, yeah. I’ll do
that.”
    Whoever he was talking to on the other end said something
that made Dylan shake his head. “No. I know. I promise.”
    There was another pause, during which Monet realized her
heart was thumping so hard in her chest she could hear it, and then Dylan said,
“Love you too.”
    Monet’s mouth went dry.
    Who was he talking to? Annie? Had he just told Annie he
loved her?
    Guilt lanced through Monet. Sharp and cold and absolute.
Dylan and Annie had spent so long chatting, at least three months getting to
know each other. The last thing Monet wanted was to be attracted