Texas Heroes_ Volume 1(34)

“I don’t know what you want me to say, Maddie.”

Maddie looked at him with sad eyes, and he knew he’d disappointed her. “I want you to say what’s in your heart. To let go and just feel.”

She didn’t, though. Not really. If he once let go of his control, she wouldn’t like what she saw. Boone didn’t much like it himself. He was a man who had loved one woman badly, who had never earned his father’s love. He’d lost a child who should have had a chance if he’d just done things right.

He’d been good in the dark arts of killing and war. He could track an enemy to extinction, could find a grain of sand in the desert. None of those were skills Maddie would admire.

She was a creature of light, and he was darkness. She might think she wanted to know him, but she was wrong.

Since Boone had no answers Maddie would want to hear, he didn’t even try. Instead, he pulled her close and let the music fill the silence.

She held stiff for a moment, but he didn’t relent. Soon she stopped resisting and swayed against him, and Boone knew a moment of painful longing.

Maddie had weapons of her own.

A soft, tender heart.

A ready smile.

A soul that shone brighter than the sun.

Maddie took the whole world to her bosom and cherished it. A part of Boone wanted to step into the magic circle and inhale Maddie’s cheer, her never-say-die optimism, to hold it as a talisman against the darkness inside him.

But Boone knew his own power. His darkness would snuff out her light, and the world would be poorer.

So Boone simply held Maddie close until the music faded.

And then he thanked her, turned her over to the line of men waiting for the belle of the ball—and walked away without looking back.



Maddie watched him go, so tall and handsome in the starched white shirt, knife-edged crease in his jeans. She wondered when she’d ever learn to keep her thoughts to herself. Hadn’t she warned herself that it wouldn’t work for her to come back to visit? He hadn’t answered her, which was answer enough in itself.

When she left Morning Star, she would not return.

“You ready to dance, pretty girl?” The cowboy asking the question smiled beneath his straw hat and stepped forward.

An adventure, Maddie. Remember, it’s just an adventure. You were having fun until Boone showed up.

She accepted the outstretched hand and smiled her biggest smile. Not from the heart, but it had always been Maddie’s belief that if you smiled whether you felt like it or not, you’d soon feel better. “Let’s do it, Mr.—?”

“Call me Randy, ma’am.”

“Then you call me Maddie.”

“Here we go, Maddie. I like it fast.”

“Good.” She would concentrate on her feet and forget the heart Boone had bruised.

Twenty-five days and counting. The end couldn’t come too soon.



Boone stayed outside for a long time, staring into the moonlight. He was lousy company; soon even Jim left him alone. He nursed the same beer he’d been holding since he’d walked off the dance floor, less interested in something to drink than having something to do with his hands.

He could still feel her soft curves against him, feel her warm breath on his chest where his shirt parted. He could smell Maddie’s scent, unnamable and mysterious, rich and full of sex and sunshine and thoughts of sin.

Why couldn’t he just take what she would give and enjoy it while she stayed? What was it about Maddie that made this so damn hard?

So what if she was leaving? He’d had affairs before, had left and been left, had enjoyed rolling on the bed and parting unencumbered. Why not with Maddie?

Because she’s not a roll in the hay. Just that simple.

Maddie was more. If he played with fire, he would be burned, but with Maddie it would incinerate him. He knew it in his bones.

A shiver ran down his spine. Boone grimaced in disgust. Maddie’s fanciful thinking was rubbing off on him.

Shoving off from the pillar on which he leaned, Boone drained his beer bottle on the grass and took it back inside to the bar. He planned to tell Jim he was leaving and make sure Maddie had a ride home.

Until he took one quick glance at the dance floor and didn’t like what he saw.

Hank Caswell was Maddie’s partner, and Maddie didn’t look happy at all.

Boone and Hank went way back. Hank had a vicious streak. In school, Boone had been the only one around who would go toe-to-toe with him. Hank’s crooked nose had come courtesy of Boone, and Hank had never forgotten it.

Boone cared nothing about their past. All he cared about was that Hank was holding Maddie way too close. He started through the crowd, watching carefully to be sure he wasn’t mistaken. When Maddie pushed at Hank’s chest and tried to back away, Hank jerked her back.