his eyes were solemn, even sad. “I meant what I said before,” he finally replied. “If you’re agreeable, we’ll put Madison on the gentlest horse I own and she’ll have her ride. Or she can ride with me, whatever you think best.”
Kendra’s throat tightened and she had to look away once more before reconnecting. Those eyes of his seemed to see into the deepest part of her, seeking and finding every secret she’d hidden away over the years, even from herself.
“When?” she asked, still mortified by her own behavior but trying to put a good face on things. “Madison will expect specifics.”
He smiled again, this time with his whole face. “Whenever you say,” he answered.
Kendra sighed. The ball was in her court and he wasn’t going to let her forget that. “Tomorrow?” she threw out tentatively. “After she gets out of preschool?”
“That’ll work,” Hutch said, watching her. “About what time should I expect you and the munchkin to show up on Whisper Creek?”
“Three-thirty? Is that too early? I know you probably have a lot of work to do and I wouldn’t want to impose or anything.”
Lame. Of course she was imposing—but she was in too deep and there was no other way out.
“Three-thirty,” Hutch agreed. Then, unexpectedly, he reached across the table and closed his fingers gently around her hand. “One question, Kendra. Why was it so hard for you to get all this said? We have a history, you and I, and not all of it was bad—not by a long shot.”
“I’m—not sure,” Kendra admitted softly.
“That’s an honest if inadequate answer,” he said, but his grin, if slight, was genuine. He got up, walked over to retrieve his hat, held it in one hand as he looked back at Kendra. “Tomorrow, three-thirty, Whisper Creek Ranch?”
“If it’s inconvenient for you, another time would be fine, honestly—”
Hutch narrowed his eyes, not in anger, but bewilderment, as though by squinting he might make out some aspect of her nature he hadn’t spotted before. “Women,” he said with a note of consternation in his voice.
Kendra got to her feet, led the way back through the house toward the front door. “Men,” she retorted with a roll of her eyes.
She’d never planned for it to happen, and maybe Hutch hadn’t either, but once they’d stepped beyond the cone of light thrown by the porch fixture, into the soft, summery shadows, they found themselves standing close to each other—too close.
Hutch curved a hand under Kendra’s chin, lifted her face and kissed her, as naturally as they would have done in the old days.
And Kendra kissed him back, her body coming awake as both new and very familiar sensations took hold, expanding and contracting, soaring and then plummeting.
Kendra gave a silent gasp. It was still there, then, all of it, the passion, the need, the wildness, the things she’d tried so hard to forget over the years since their breakup.
She knew she ought to change directions, put on the brakes before they collided in the train wreck of the century—but she just couldn’t.
She was lost in that kiss, lost in the way it felt to have Hutch’s arms around her again, strong and sure, holding her close.
Her knees went weak, and she knotted her fists in the fabric of his shirt and held on, and still the kiss continued, seemingly taking on a life of its own, now playful, now deep and commanding.
“Mommy?”
The word, coming from just beyond the screened door, sliced down between them like a knife.
Both of them stepped back.
“You didn’t tell me the cowboy man was here,” Madison said innocently, rubbing away sleep with one hand even as she pressed her little nose against the worn screen, looking curious but nothing more. Her sidekick, Daisy, did the same.
“I didn’t want to wake you up,” Hutch said chivalrously. “Your mom and I were deciding on when you ought to take that horseback ride we talked about.”
Madison’s eyes instantly widened, and she stepped back far enough to open the screen door so she and Daisy could bolt through the gap.
“Really?” the child cried. “When? Where?”
Hutch lifted her easily, naturally into his arms, grinned. “Really,” he said. “Tomorrow afternoon, at my ranch.”
“I told you she’d ask for specifics,” Kendra managed to say. Her face was still flaming, her heart was pounding, and she was frantic to know how much Madison had seen, and understood, before interrupting that foolish, wonderful kiss.
Madison literally squealed with delight. “Yes!” she cried, punching the air with one small, triumphant fist.
Hutch chuckled