The Cowboys pregnant fiance

Chapter 6

As the clouds parted to reveal a splash of afternoon sun, Cody tipped back his hat and got to his haunches surveying the garden.

And the mess.

He'd started near the white picket fence which lined the little concrete patio and herb spotted patch of dirt that Sherilyn called a backyard. It had been obvious where she had been digging when she'd come across the journal, almost right up against the fence itself, near a dying butterfly bush that she'd told Cody she wanted to take out. It seemed that when the fence had been put in the workers had just missed hitting Curtis's journal with the post.

So Cody had started there.

Yup, he'd been honest with Sherilyn when he'd said he was going to do some damage, far more honest than he had been a couple hours ago, when he told her I don't know a thing about what its like to have a child.

All the time he had been working the lie stabbed at him. But why should he feel compelled to spill his guts to her just because she'd done it for him when she'd talked about her ex fiance?

Maybe it was because even now years after Cody had left his daughter behind, the guilt still weighed heavy on him. Could that be the reason part of him wished he could unburden himself to someone?

He wouldn't do it though. Couldn't. Especially to Sherilyn because he couldn't stand to think of the look she'd probably give him if she found out that he was just as immoral a man as her ex fiance had been in a lot of basic ways.

Behind him the screen door slid open. He didn't have to turn around to know Sherilyn was there because he could feel her presence tickling his back like the soft touch of fingers over skin.

"Hungry yet?" she asked

He brushed off the heaviness that had been perched on his shoulders. "You planning on rewarding me with food for tearing up your backyard?"

She laughed. "After you taste my food I am not sure you will be calling it a reward."

He finally looked over his shoulder. She was still wearing that simple white sweater and the khaki pants, but it was enough to send his libido pumping. It seemed that all she had to do to turn him on was appear.

And if that wasnt a dangerous thing, he didnt know what was.

Standing, he brushed of his jeans with his glove covered hands. "I am sure your cooking is good."

"I'm no top chef but I'm no bottom one either. Why don't you just take a break and see for yourself?"

Smiling she stood aside as he stripped off his gloves dropped them to the patio then moseyed toward and the condo. While he wiped his boots on a fake grass mat with a plastic daisy blooming in the corner he tried not to let the smell of her hair get to him. Was it lilies?

Once inside the aroma of her meal took over and he went to the washroom taking care not to make an even bigger mess than he already had outside as he soaped off the dirt and got himself halfway presentable. He even doffed his Resistol hanging the hat on the hook on the back of the bathroom door for lack of better idea.

Just before he left he caught site of himself in the mirror and he quashed the urge to run his fingers through his dark hair to wrangle it into some kind of style.

But why take those sorts of pains? It wasn't if he should be impressing Sherilyn Jane.

He went to the quaint kitchen with its cheery yellow curtains and a few knick-knacks on the counter, a farm house napkin holder a wooden block holding a set of knifes a few cookbooks piled on each other all of them with healthy titles like Mommy's organic Kitchen.