The Cowboy's Christmas Gift. Donna Alward

The kind of thing that could swallow a girl up and then spit her out.

      “Give me a minute to pull on some pants, okay?” Avoiding his assessing gaze, she resisted the urge to scoot to her bedroom for proper clothing, instead taking calm, measured steps. It wasn’t as if she was naked....

      Which she very well might have been if they’d finished what they started and were dealing with a true morning after.

      She returned to the kitchen feeling seminormal, dressed in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt and her hair scraped back into a ponytail. The coffee smelled delicious, so she reached for her cup and took a cautious sip while Duke watched her over the rim of his own, his hips resting against the kitchen counter and his left foot crossed over his right. He looked ultrarelaxed when she was anything but.

      Maybe walking away hadn’t messed with his sleep the way it had hers.

      “Thanks for this,” she said, cupping her hands around the heat sleeve. “But you really didn’t need to come by. I’m fine.”

      “Actually, I wanted to apologize.”

      “You did?” She raised an eyebrow at him. “What on earth for?”

      He looked oddly embarrassed as his gaze dropped to the floor for a moment and his cheeks grew ruddy. He looked up and gave a small, slightly crooked smile. “Look, Freckles, it’s pretty clear that we’ve got chemistry. But I shouldn’t have let it get in the way of my common sense. You were right last night about it being an awkward situation.”

      Chemistry, hah. Carrie remembered the old trick from high school where a bunch of them had dropped a Mentos into a bottle of cola. That was chemistry, too, and that was just about how she’d felt last night. Fizzy. Explosive.

      And why on earth did she feel all girlie when he called her Freckles?

      “What, you’ve shortened Freckle Face to just Freckles?” She ignored the other stuff he’d said—she didn’t feel like going into a postmortem of “let’s define our relationship parameters” while her head was still throbbing.

      “Too many syllables.” Duke’s lips twitched and he took another long drink of his coffee.

      “Don’t worry about last night. It’s already forgotten.” Yeah, and her nose was about to grow à la Pinocchio. As if she’d ever forget straddling him in his truck or the way he’d carried her inside as if it was his single purpose in life.

      “Deal,” he agreed.

      Now that it was settled, Duke seemed to relax and look around him. “So. This was the house you grew up in, huh.”

      She nodded, knowing how it must appear to Duke. The house was nothing special. Things had fallen into a bit of disrepair, though Carrie did her best as a handyman. Maintenance usually took up what little budget she had for household items, so she hadn’t really had a chance to put her own personal stamp on the place in the form of homey, decorative touches. Not that decorating was really on her list of strengths...

      “I love it here. When Mom got sick again and my dad took off, I talked the bank into letting me assume the mortgage.”

      “As a ranch hand? You weren’t foreman then, were you? Wow. I’m impressed they lent you the money.”

      She shook her head. “I know you and your grandfather weren’t close, but he was really good to me. He cosigned the loan. It was the only way they’d approve me.”

      “That was good of him.”

      He sounded sincere, and she was glad. “So much had changed in my life. I think it was a relief to have this house, some sort of consistency. Plus it let Mom stay here during most of her illness.”

      “That must have been hard.” He watched her over the rim of his cup, his gaze steady on her face. One thing she’d say about Duke, when you spoke to him, he paid attention.

      She met his gaze. “Yeah, it was,” she said quietly. Harder still had been the last days, when she’d had to give in to harsh reality and her mom had gone to a hospice in Great Falls. It had meant that Carrie couldn’t be with her as much as she wanted. It had meant that she’d missed her opportunity to say a last goodbye, too. That was something she’d always regret.

      “It must have been tough, being the main breadwinner.”

      She shrugged. “You do what you have to do. All I can say is I’m glad the ranch is still running. Without this job, I’d lose the house, and I’m still paying off the medical bills.”

      She met Duke’s gaze and saw the expected sympathy. “Hey, don’t feel sorry for me,” she said. “I’m still healthy as a horse. It’s all good. What about you? How’re you settling in at Crooked Valley?”

      It was Duke’s turn to make a face. “Honestly? That house is too big and quiet for me. Quinn’s got his office in the downstairs, and I felt like a fool wandering through it all alone. I moved my things into the bunkhouse.”

      Carrie put her coffee cup in the trash. “The bunkhouse is all right. Quinn never used it because he has the house nearby and he’s got Amber, too. But it had to be in rough shape. No one’s lived in it for quite a while.”

      Duke nodded. “It needed some work. I spent a few days last week cleaning it from top to bottom and dropping some money at the hardware store. I’ve been doing odd jobs in between shadowing Quinn around and getting an overall feeling for the operation. There’s more here than I remember.”

      “Your grandfather added the bucking stock in the past ten years. It didn’t take off the way he hoped. He needs a Kailey.”

      “A Kailey?”

      “She runs the program at Brandt. Our stock has potential, but needs dedicated attention. And that’s not my specialty. Nor Quinn’s. He does the best he can, but he’s not a rodeo guy.”

      Duke started to laugh. “You know who’d be good at that? My brother, Rylan.”

      “I heard a rumor he was still competing.” Rylan, three years younger than Duke, who’d moved to the city and then surprised everyone by becoming a bareback rider. “Joe wanted him to come back, too, you know. He always refused.”

      Duke nodded, then finished his coffee and threw his cup in her garbage can. “I know. Ry was determined to make it his own way. He’s more stubborn than I am.”

      “God forbid,” she said drily, and Duke’s eyes twinkled at her.

      “Ry doesn’t want handouts. I get that. He got one of these letters, too—that is, if he stayed in one place long enough for the lawyers to find him.”

      “He did?”

      Duke nodded. “You didn’t read the whole thing, did you? The ranch is left to all three of us. I only own a third.”

      Of course. She’d been silly to think that Joe would have left everything to Duke. “So he’s coming back?”

      Duke’s face clouded over. “I don’t know. We haven’t spoken.”

      “But he’s your brother.” Growing up, Carrie would have given her left arm for a sibling. Someone to talk to and hang out with and share clothes with—who wasn’t a friend from school. Someone to share memories of her parents with or turn to with secrets and support. “Surely you guys speak to each other.”

      “Not so much.”

      “And you and Lacey?”

      Duke frowned. “I saw her when I was first back. She’s been through a divorce, and she’s working for Natural Resources and Conservation.”

      Carrie looked up at him. “You’ve got a family and you don’t even seem to care. Trust me when I say they might not always be there.”

      “I know that. I lost my father, remember?”

      “So what’s keeping you