Riding Hard by Vicki Lewis Thompson Read Free Book Online Page B

best not to be charmed, but it was cute the way he drew out the word five.
    “Besides, it’s got to be better than the frozen dinners I’ve cooked for myself whenever I didn’t come into town for a meal.”
    She had a sudden image of Drake alone in the small cabin eating a microwaved meal by himself and felt a twinge of sympathy. She had so many friends, while he... No, she would not feel sorry for him. He could always go back to Virginia and resume his old life. For whatever reason, he’d chosen to stay here and be lonely.
    “I’ve had Lily’s lentil soup,” she said. “It’s good. Come on up to the house when you’re finished here.” She turned and walked away. All the way to the house she lectured herself about not letting down her guard.
    She knew all about the big flaw in Drake’s character. That should have been enough to keep her far, far away from him. Her mother had been seduced by a charmer like Drake, but her mother hadn’t had Tracy’s advantage of knowing she was dealing with a cheating bastard.
    Yes, he was coming to her aid at the moment, and she was thrilled about that. But she couldn’t let gratitude and her natural susceptibility override her good judgment. Somehow she had to strike a balance between being properly appreciative and throwing herself into his arms in a fit of lust. She wondered if simple friendship was an option. That might be the safe middle ground, assuming she could pull it off.
    Drake had betrayed his best friend, someone Tracy greatly admired. As she stood in the kitchen chopping veggies for the potbellied pigs, she faced a truth she’d been unwilling to admit until now. Drake was also extremely likable. Her choices would be so much easier if he could behave like an arrogant jerk. Then she’d have no trouble separating the guys in the white hats from the ones in the black hats.
    She finished filling the bowls for Wilbur and Harley and carried them out to their pens. At one time the two pigs had been free to roam the yard, but the bigger one, Harley, had bullied Wilbur into giving up his food. Now they each had a separate pen for mealtimes, although both had a gate out to a common yard and mud hole they could enjoy together when they weren’t eating.
    Tracy set a bowl in each pen and then quickly closed them in their respective homes. “That’s the answer.” She leaned against the fence and watched the pigs eat. “I should be friendly, because after all, the guy is doing me a big-ass favor. But I need to set boundaries, just like you have these fences between you.”
    Having Drake sleep in the spare room would be no problem if they established some house rules. She couldn’t appear inhospitable, because after all, she’d invited him to stay. Perhaps she’d even begged him. Her memory wasn’t clear on that point because she’d been distraught at the time.
    But now that he’d agreed, they needed to establish a routine that would minimize...temptation. No, she couldn’t phrase it like that. The word temptation shouldn’t come up. They would strive to minimize...unanticipated encounters. That sounded stuffy. She’d have to find a better description, but that’s what she meant.
    For example, he should keep his shirt on at all times. If he was in the habit of wandering into the kitchen for a midnight snack, he couldn’t do that in his pajama bottoms. He had to put on... Uh-oh. He didn’t have pajama bottoms.
    She hadn’t thought this through. She’d pleaded with him to stay, but he hadn’t come prepared with extra clothes or toiletries. He certainly hadn’t come with pajamas, either tops or bottoms. Besides, he wouldn’t want to sleep in them, anyway, if he planned to check on Dottie periodically.
    She really hadn’t thought about how this would work. But now she could see it all playing out in living color. He’d sleep in his briefs, unless he chose to sleep naked. When he got up to check on the mare, he’d put on the basics—jeans, socks, boots. It