The Texas Way
The Texas Way
Jan Freed
HOME ON THE RANCH"Jan Freed writes with spice and flair! An exciting new voice in contemporary romance." – bestselling author Susan WiggsThe H&H Cattle Company, near Gonzales, TexasScott Hayes–He's the owner. Scott's a hardworking cattleman who's got a reputation with the ladies. Not that he has any time for womanizing these days. Fact is, Scott's putting in twenty-hour stretches, now that H&H is down to one hired hand. And the word around these parts is that H&H is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy.Margaret Winston–When Scott calls her a princess, he doesn't mean it as a compliment! Still, Maggie has a few choice names for Scott, none of them pretty. That's because Maggie knows Scott from the old days and there's bad blood–and a good horse–between them.HOME ON THE RANCH
Table of Contents
Cover Page (#u70c083bd-c4f0-5bd0-a618-193385a0c2e5)
Excerpt (#ubffe4c71-be3d-5369-8407-7a16d7e8aaf2)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR (#ud3ffd19c-e474-5f3c-adbc-13603110de7a)
Title Page (#u30bbd3a2-4e62-5c0b-83d7-ada1414951b5)
Dedication (#u4d2f66b6-b4df-542b-96b6-e5c3bc7317e4)
CHAPTER ONE (#u6100e6a3-f395-51a5-9a7c-969b7790e7f2)
CHAPTER TWO (#ubdcc3af6-2bd2-57ba-9a22-2a3405bc13fa)
CHAPTER THREE (#ufd6fb1f7-3983-5c8d-bc2d-d255183c4ed1)
CHAPTER FOUR (#u58ef600b-4cfb-5aaf-8b05-ac7835fd8584)
CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
“Easy, handsome. Don’t be afraid. How’d you like to go for a ride?”
Tightening her fist in the stallion’s mane, Margaret gathered her muscles into vault position, then gasped.
Cold metal—round, hollow and unmistakably lethal—pressed into her neck. “Don’t listen to her, Twister,” a deep voice drawled from behind. “Takin’ a ride with Maggie here can kill a guy.”
Blood rushed to her face in a sickening wave of guilt. “You,” she whispered.
“Yeah, me. The owner of the land you’re tresspassin’ on.” The pressure on her neck eased, replaced by the sliding caress of a gun barrel. “All grown up now, are you? Let’s take a look. Turn around, Maggie.”
Schooling her features into a cool mask, she turned. “Don’t call me Maggie.”
“Seems to me I can call you any name I want. And right this minute, ‘Maggie’ is the nicest one that comes to mind.”
Nothing had changed, she realized. He would never forget…or forgive.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR (#ulink_2f0c6cf5-e438-5dc6-89c7-265e8aa2c2c6)
After years of writing advertising copy, Jan Freed decided that if she could make washing machines sound glamorous, creating likable characters should be a breeze. Jan’s second book combines her pride in the indomitable spirit of Texans with her lifelong love of horses. “Cowboys and the Arabian breed share a mythical appeal that makes for great romance—pairing the two was a natural choice.”
Jan lives in Texas (of course!) with her husband and two children. She’d love to hear from readers and invites you to write to her at: P.O. Box 5009-272, Sugarland, Texas, 77487.
The Texas Way
Jan Freed
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Mica Kelch and Marian May, sisters in madness and valued friends. And to Jenny Hiller, blood sister and my truest fan. Thanks for the advice and support, buds!
Special thanks to Sharon and Xavier Moreau, owners of Bloodstock International, Inc., for sharing their knowledge of the Arabian horse industry. Any errors are accidental and entirely my fault.
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_ade703be-c370-5950-910b-c6af72c46825)
MARGARET CHELSEA WINSTON crouched behind a clump of cacti, peeked over one spiny rim and forgot to breathe.
Moonlight leeched all color from the red clay and yellowed grass. Only light and dark contrasts remained. At the center of this ghostly vista stood a commanding figure, the embodiment of proud male arrogance—a shimmering gray stallion.
Twist of Fate, she’d named him six years ago, hoping she wasn’t overestimating his potential, praying he’d really beaten the genetic odds. He had. His magnificence surpassed her girlish dreams. He was one of the finest Arabians in the world.
Gripped with excitement, she rose and stood tall, giving him time to study her as thoroughly as she had him. Earthy smells nettled her nose. Coyotes yipped in the distance, two, maybe three miles away. Sound carried far in this part of Texas.
He stared back across the stark landscape, his dark gaze asking, Who watches me in the night?
A friend, she answered, not questioning their silent communication. She’d long ago accepted her uncanny rapport with animals as compensation for the skills she lacked.
After learning the stallion still lived in this area, she’d planned on sneaking a glimpse, then slipping away unseen. But nothing had prepared her for the ambition and resentment he awakened—the burning need to reclaim him.
She walked to the fence and slipped between the strands of barbed wire. “Hey, handsome. What’s a fella like you doing in a place like this?”
She kept her voice soothing, knowing he understood her tone if not the words. Ears pricked forward, he blew short and hard through flared nostrils. A fluttering snort would have indicated fear. She smiled.
“Curious, huh? I came to get reacquainted, that’s all.”
Her initial impression had been correct. Strong topline, wide airway, compact proportions. Perfect. Her mind whirled with possibilities. She forced her thoughts to focus, her movements to remain fluid.
Holding his alert gaze, she walked the last few feet and stood nose to muzzle. “Don’t run out on me, okay, handsome? I could use a little company right now. Things’ve been…” Lousy. Miserable.
Normal.
The insidious emotions struck out of nowhere, stinging her eyes and swelling her throat. Damn, damn, damn! So what if she’d never felt more alone in all her twenty-six years? She’d made the right decision, and by God she would prove it. Her new life wouldn’t tolerate weakness. She wouldn’t tolerate weakness in herself, not ever again.
Warm breath blasted her face, jolting her back to the present.
Here is my special smell, his action said. If you trust it, we might be friends.
She stared at the chiseled muzzle only inches away. How many years had passed since she’d been offered simple, innocent friendship? Too many, judging by her fierce desire to hug the stallion’s neck. Suppressing the urge, she responded to his overture in horse language and blew gently into his nostrils.
When he lowered his head, she laughed in delight. “I like you, too.”
She squeezed a portion of silver mane between her thumb and forefinger, then rubbed the strands together. The simulated grooming action of equine teeth demonstrated her friendliness. More so than if she’d stroked him in the usual way.
Working her fingers up and down the mane, she frowned. His thick gray coat, shaggy fetlocks and furry ears hadn’t felt the buzz of clipping shears in months. Trust a cowboy to let an animal of this caliber winter in the open like a second-string range pony. No warm stable for this beauty, oh, no. After all, that wouldn’t be the Texas way of doing things. Lord knew this stallion’s owner hated “pampered creatures.” She ought to know. Memory of the tall rancher’s contempt narrowed her eyes. “He ought to be horsewhipped, pardon the expression.”
Finger-nibbling her way across the stallion’s shoulder and ribs, she noted plenty of lean muscle but no bony protrusions. In all fairness, he appeared to be well fed and in excellent health.
Some experts considered rough terrain ideal training conditions. If true, she’d be that much ahead of the game. What she wouldn’t give to put him through his paces!
Gauging the height of his withers, she glanced up at the full moon, then down at the illuminated ground. Temptation won over caution. She reached up and grasped a handful of mane.
The stallion suddenly tensed, lifted his head and shifted to the right. Margaret sidestepped his clattering hooves.
“Easy, handsome. Don’t be afraid. How’d you like to go for a little ride?” Tightening her fist, she gathered her muscles into vault position and gasped.
Cold metal—round, hollow and unmistakably lethal—pressed into her neck.
“Don’t listen to her, Twister,” a deep voice drawled from behind. “Takin’ a ride with Maggie here can kill a guy.”
Blood rushed to her face in a sickening wave of guilt. She dropped her forehead against the stallion’s hide, inhaling the pungent scent of warm animal and dried sweat. The gun followed her movement.
“You,” she whispered.
“Yeah, me. The owner of the land you’re trespas-sin’ on. Next time you try stealin’ a horse, Maggie, don’t park so close to the main gate. That Porsche is a little conspicuous.”
“I wasn’t stealing…Twister, is that what you called him? I only wanted to see what he could do.”
His mocking laugh set her teeth on edge.
“Maggie, darlin’, the minute your fanny hit his back you’d be on your way to Mars. Beats the hell outta me how you ever got this close.” Honest puzzlement tinged his voice.
Her head jerked up. “Don’t call me Maggie.”
The pressure against her neck increased. “Well now, seems to me I can call you any name I want. And right this minute, Maggie is the nicest one that comes to mind.”
Nothing had changed. He would never forget—-or forgive. She released the stallion’s mane and straightened her shoulders.
“Put the gun down, please. I’m not going to do anything foolish.”
The pressure eased, replaced by the sliding caress of a gun barrel. “All grown up now, are you? Let’s take a look. Turn around.”
Margaret’s heart slammed against her ribs. Her entire future depended on the mercy of this man, as it had once before. She was damned if she’d wimp out this time.
Schooling her features into a cool mask, she slowly turned.
Scott Hayes lifted pistol point to Stetson brim and nudged upward. His eyes gleamed colorless and flat in the moon’s glow, but she knew they were lion gold and insolent as a cat’s. His gaze roved over her body now with the calculated intention of rattling her composure.
But contrary to his sarcasm, she had grown up. So she ignored her erratic pulse and conducted her own slow inspection. He was taller than she remembered, around six foot two perhaps. Or maybe it was just that damned hat he wore. At midnight, for Pete’s sake. In the few times she’d seen him, she’d never laid eyes on his hair—other than the brownish waves breaking over his shirt collar. Maybe he was hiding a bald spot.
She smiled at the malicious thought.
He crossed his arms and cocked one knee, the action drawing attention to his rangy legs, lean hips and impossibly wide shoulders.
“Mind tellin’ me what’s so funny?”
Her smile faded. She looked him in the eye. “Yes. I do mind.”
Surprise flickered across his bold features. She sensed a new awareness in him, a reassessing of her will, and drew strength from having knocked the cocksure look off his face.
He’d filled out in six years, but then, Texas ranching bred muscular men. To add to Scott’s physical workload, H & H Cattle Company was down to one hired hand. Or so she’d heard. Word was the business teetered on the edge of bankruptcy. She hoped to God that was true.
Scott jammed the gunpoint down behind his belt, against the tight denim molding everything it touched. His gun wasn’t loaded, she realized. He wouldn’t risk damaging his precious…jeans.
Cheeks burning, she jerked her gaze up.
His cocky smirk was back, along with a disturbing new gleam in his eyes. “You keep lookin’ at me like that, and I’m gonna think that husband of yours doesn’t know how to keep you hap—” His eyes widened.
She started to turn. Twister’s bared teeth caught her ponytail just as Scott’s strong hands gripped her shoulders and pulled. Margaret rebounded in the circle of his arms like a bungee cord.
“Dammit, Maggie! What the hell are you doin’ messin’ with this stud? He’s mean as a javelina hog around everyone but me.”
When his arms pulled her close, a strange sense of safety clouded her brain. Nose, chest, stomach and thigh pressed against Scott Hayes, she groped for concentration.
“Twister eats little girls like you for breakfast. If I hadn’t grabbed you when I did, he woulda torn this pretty blond scalp of yours clean off.”
His touch was so light, at first she didn’t notice. Once she did, every hair follicle stood at attention.
“What were you thinkin’ of, tryin’ to ride that son of a bitch? At night. Bareback, no less.”
Some of Scott’s contempt filtered through Margaret’s fog.
“Damned stupid, Maggie. Don’t you have the sense God gave a goose?”
His barbed insult hit bull’s-eye this time. For a moment she quivered under the impact. A lifetime of similar taunts echoed in her mind.
Melissa can read, Margaret, and she’s two years younger than you…I’m afraid Margaret just doesn’t apply herself, Mrs. Winston…That was a very important call, Margaret. Can’t you even write down a simple phone number?…For heaven’s sake Margaret, how could you be so stupid-stupid-stupid-stupid….
“Margaret? Margaret?” Scott gave her a shake.
She blinked twice, looked up and bumped her head against his jaw.
“Ow!” they both yelled. Breaking apart like boxers from a clench, they faced off and took each other’s measure.
Feeling puny by comparison, Margaret glared. Behind her, Twister cropped grass. She jerked a thumb at the horse.
“Does that look like a violent animal to you? For your information, Twister was trying to groom me, not bite me. He was showing his trust. If you hadn’t interfered, everything would have been fine.” She arched an eyebrow. “Of course, breaking up relationships is what you do best, isn’t it?”
Lit by moonlight, his dusky complexion darkened in embarrassment. Or anger. She didn’t care which. That she’d struck a nerve at all filled her with triumph.
He tugged down his hat brim and shrugged. “I protect what needs protecting. Call it what you want.”
“I call it betrayal,” she said, abandoning all pretense of talking about the present. “I’ve spent every day since the car accident paying for my mistake, Scott. But you betrayed me. Worse, you betrayed your best friend. And my father rewarded you for it. He had no right—” She stopped, hating the quaver in her voice.
Donald Winston’s action didn’t bear thinking about. She’d concentrate on one betrayal at a time. “It’s taken six years, Scott, but you’re finally going to pay me what’s due.”
His mouth thinned. “And what’s that?”
She took a deep breath. “Twister.”
He ripped off his hat and slapped it against his thigh. “Like hell!”
Twister’s head swept up. His tail lifted high. He exploded from a complete standstill to a full-stretch gallop in the time it took her to blink. Mesmerized, she watched him float over the uneven ground toward the far end of the field. She could no more control her elated smile than stop her heart from soaring. Man, could that horse run!
“I want him back, Scott.” Turning, she caught him staring not at Twister, but at her.
“Forget it. Twister belongs to me. I’ve got the papers to prove it.” End of discussion, his expression said.
She lifted her nose. “Papers Daddy transferred to your name without my knowledge. I never would’ve let Riverbend Arabian Farm give up that foal. You knew that when you accepted him. That’s why you accepted him.” Suppressed hurt welled to the surface. Why did she still care?
“Don’t flatter yourself. Only a fool would’ve turned him down. He’s a valuable animal. Special.”
“Oh, right. He’s so valuable you don’t care if he breaks his leg in a gopher hole or cuts himself on barbed wire or throws a shoe and pulls up lame. It could happen out here and you wouldn’t even know it.” Her disdainful gaze swept the rock-strewn pasture. “If this is how you treat ‘special’ animals, I shudder to think about your poor cattle.”
Scott laughed unexpectedly, the moonlight glinting off his straight, white teeth. “Lower your nose, princess. I’ll have you know every one of my Santa Ger-trudis has a pedigree longer than yours. I treat ‘em same’s I do Twister. Feed ‘em. Doctor ‘em when they’re sick. And pretty much let ‘em do what God intended.”
Settling the Stetson low on his forehead, he sobered abruptly. “Pamperin’ my stock would be downright cruel. They’d die come the first summer drought or winter storm.” He squinted at a nearby cactus, at the moon and, finally, at her. “It takes a special breed to survive this land. But it’s got nothin’ to do with bloodlines. You have any idea what I’m sayin’, Maggie?”
His eyes glittered with sudden intensity, as if her answer were somehow important.
She knew what he meant all right. He thought her weak and spoiled and worthless. Trouble was, so had she for too many long, miserable years.
Averting her eyes, she hugged her stomach and focused on Twister, now grazing in the distance. “I understand your hay may not last much longer. And your credit’s maxed out at Luling Feed and Hardware. And you could really use some cash right now.”
She risked a glance at Scott and wished she hadn’t.
“Spit it out,” he said as if he’d like to spit on her.
“I want to make a deal with you for Twister.”
In answer, he turned and headed for the fence line, his boots crunching hard and determined on the ground. “Go home, Maggie,” he called over his shoulder.
Home? She watched his bobbing hat grow smaller and felt alone. So alone. “Hey, wait!”
Even running, it took her several moments to reach his side. “Why won’t you listen?” she managed breathlessly, hop-skipping every other step to keep up. “I’ll treat him like he deserves. He’s being totally wasted out here. H & H Cattle Company doesn’t need him, but I do.”
They’d reached the barbed-wire fence. Resting a forearm on the top strand, Scott tilted up his hat brim. Silvery light flooded his face.
Margaret took a half step back, as if she’d caught a snarling predator in her flashlight beam.
“You need him?” His sardonic stare traveled over her Italian half boots, designer jeans and lambskin jacket. Their gazes clashed and held. “Run out of toys to play with? That lawyer husband of yours spending too much time in court maybe?” His upper lip curled. “Too bad, Maggie. There are lots of other horses. You’ve got lots of money. Find another stallion to need.”
Having tried, judged and convicted her, he resettled his hat, pressed down on the wire and prepared to cross.
Margaret had spent a lifetime following everyone’s wishes but her own. Just this once, for something this important, someone would listen to her. Fury fueled her reflexes. She rushed forward and slapped down his arcing leg.
“Just a minute, buster! Think you’ve got me pegged? Think you know everything? You know nothing. Nothing, do you hear? I spent two years researching bloodlines before selecting Twister’s Polish sire. I agonized waiting for Aladdin’s Girl to be shipped home. I dreamed of her producing the perfect equine athlete, a foundation stud for the most elite line of Arabians in the world. And she did it! I did it. But you—” she grabbed two fistfuls of shirt “—have the supreme gall to deprive breeders of that line. And why?”
She leaned forward until her forehead grazed his hat brim. “Because you think I’m rich. Because you think I’m a bored housewife looking for thrills. Because you hate my guts.”
“Mag—”
“Well, I’ve got news for you, Scott Hayes. I have no money. I have no husband. And I hate your guts right back. You’re a selfish, judgmental jerk, and you’ve ruined my life for the last time!” Her chest rose and fell in labored breaths.
“You have no husband?”
She stood close enough to count his eyelashes. Obscenely thick, they couldn’t hide the stunned expression in his eyes. Her anger drained, leaving her feeling oddly at peace. She’d finally stood up for herself.
Realizing her hands still gripped his shirtfront, she relaxed her hold and smoothed the wrinkled cotton with self-conscious, outward swipes. Her fingers landed on rounded biceps, fluttered, then settled in the crook of his arm. The man was made of rock.
In the bright moonlight his throat looked strong, his chin square and stubborn. Fascinated, she stared at the dark stubble shadowing his jaw. Her ex-husband, Jim, had shaved faithfully every morning, but more from routine than necessity. Did a heavy beard feel different?
As if sensing her sudden impulse, Scott stepped back out of reach. “Okay, Maggie. We’ll hash this thing out. But we’ll damn well do it on my terms, not when I’m tired and mad and…hungry.” There was a distinctly sensual growl in his voice.
Her gaze flew to his. What had gotten into her responding to his nearness like that? He was Gonzales County’s reigning Lothario, and her enemy to boot.
His expression hardened. “Be at my back door by eight tomorrow. You’re one minute late, we don’t talk. Understand?”
“I understand.”
He nodded, pressed down on the top fence strand and crossed over with practiced ease. She waited for him to turn and offer assistance. He walked on without a backward glance, his broad shoulders disappearing behind a stand of mesquite trees.
She understood all right. Perfectly.
BY SEVEN the next morning, Scott had finished his barn chores and moved on to kitchen duty. Closing the refrigerator door with one hip, he ignored the rattle of jars and bottles inside. He knew exactly how much pressure the old appliance could take before its guts spilled. The Cokes were safe.
He poured Eggbeaters into a bowl, whipped them to a froth and set them aside. Turkey bacon popped and sizzled in the skillet almost like the real thing. Inhaling its dubious scent, he hoped the stuff would tempt his father’s appetite. Grant Hayes’s recent heart surgery had taken off another five pounds. Pounds he couldn’t afford to lose, together with the weight he’d already burned off from pure worry.
Dragging a hand down his jaw, Scott glanced at the clock above the stove. No time to shave. Margaret—Maggie, he corrected with a fleeting grin—would be here soon. He wanted Dad fed and out of the house by then.
His performing the cooking tasks by rote allowed his mind to dwell on the astounding events of last night. He still couldn’t believe it. Margaret Chelsea Winston—model of propriety and good breeding—sneaking into his field like a common horse thief! Last he’d heard, she was married to some hotshot Dallas lawyer and was living the Junior League life. No surprise there. Her sass, though, had clipped him on the chin when he wasn’t looking.
The Margaret he’d known would never have ranted till he actually doubted his own judgment. She would’ve lifted her oh-so-proper nose and given him her patented look. The one that said, “I don’t talk to pond scum.” The one that made him feel uncouth and awkward. The one that made him call her Maggie, knowing she hated the unsophisticated nickname.
Yet last night, for the first time, she’d seemed like a Maggie. Human. Approachable. Her passion for Twister was the genuine article, Scott admitted. Nothing else could explain her foolish attempt to ride the devil. He’d damn near had a heart attack when the stallion had gone for her head!
Forget all that crap about grooming. This was the same horse who’d taken a big enough chunk out of Pete’s butt to make the wrangler sit crooked the rest of his days. And she was such a little thing. Fragile as those porcelain doodads his mother had loved. Nestled against his body, Margaret had barely reached his chin.
Memory seared a path straight to his groin. She might be small, but there was nothing childish about her body. Lord, but she’d felt good in his arms. Really good.
She got under Matt’s skin too, buzzard brain, and look what happened.
Scott shook off his thoughts and stared. Two plates loaded with scrambled eggs, bacon and dry toast steamed on the counter. The chipped Formica table was set for two, the juice glasses already filled. This evidence of his total absorption with Maggie scared him more than any mental talking-to could.
She’d dredged up a muck of feelings better left buried. He would listen to what she had to say, then boot her out of his kitchen—and his life.
“Breakfast!” he called, setting the plates on the table and scraping back his chair.
A door squeaked open. Boots clumped down the planked hall. Grant filled the doorway, his graying auburn hair mere inches from the frame. Faded jeans sagged at his waist; a once-tight shirt puckered at his shoulders and stomach. He seemed thinner and older than the last time Scott had paused long enough to look.
Testing the air like a coon hound, Grant cast a cautious look at the table. “Thanks, son. Looks good.”
Liar. Scott forced a quick smile. “Eat up then. I’m tired of looking fat compared to you. Bad for my ego.”
Grinning, Grant strode to the table and sat down. “The day your ego suffers, I’ll eat a carton of ice cream to celebrate. Seems to me your sister made a similar promise not long ago, something about…flowers, was it?”
Regretting he’d ever told his dad that story, Scott grunted and dug into his eggs. Laura’s exact phrase had vibrated with frustration. Someday a woman is going to bring you to your knees, Scott Hayes. And when she does, I’ll send her a dozen roses.
His mouth twitched at the thought of poor Alec. Laura had cut him off at the kneecaps, but Scott knew his brother-in-law had dropped willingly.
Too soon, Grant put his fork down and made a show of patting his stomach. “What are your plans today?”
Scott eyed his father’s half-filled plate and scowled. “The windmill up on the red hill is jammed. Pete said it looks like a tree branch. Shouldn’t take more than an hour to fix, so I thought I’d ride the north fence line while I’m at it.”
“Good idea. I could start at the county road and meet—”
“Dad.”
Grant tightened his mouth and glared out the small window above the sink. His strong, callused fingers clenched once, then relaxed. When he turned to Scott, his leaf green eyes were calm and resigned.
“If you’re not using the truck, maybe I’ll take a look at the carburetor. The ol’ girl could probably use an oil change, too.”
Scott swallowed hard. Physical weakness demoralized a man of Grant’s former vigor. “Yeah, Dad, that’d be great. If I’m not back by lunch, there’s still some of Ellen’s casserole in the fridge.”
His father’s pained groan made him grin. The vacuous widow’s visits strained even Grant Hayes’s good manners.
The sound of an engine’s purr turned both their heads. Scott’s stomach flip-flopped, a sensation he hadn’t felt since his teens. He pushed back his chair, carried plates to the sink and began rinsing. Through the window, he watched a sleek red Porsche crawl up the graveled drive.
His father’s mildly questioning glance suddenly deepened. “Expecting someone?”
“Margaret Winston. Remember her?” Scott forced a nonchalance he didn’t feel.
“B’lieve the name rings a bell.” Grant’s wry tone said he remembered enough.
A thousand questions hung in the air. That they remained unasked was a measure of their mutual respect.
“She wants to buy Twister,” Scott confessed. Not for a minute had he believed that crock about her having no money. Drying his hands on a dish towel, he turned and met his father’s eyes. “I’m just listening out of courtesy.”
Grant’s expression eased. “Don’t do anything rash.” He rose and clasped Scott’s shoulder. “I’d sell Bandolero before I’d let you give up Twister.”
The prize bull was one of the few ranch assets left with a hefty market value. Scott reached up and squeezed his father’s forearm. “It won’t come to that.”
A car door slammed. Gravel crunched.
“I’ll get out of your way,” Grant said, giving Scott an odd look.
The screen door twanged open. Knuckles rapped on the door.
“Why don’t I get that?” Grant suggested, his green eyes twinkling now.
Scott heard his father introduce himself and exchange pleasantries, then excuse himself to work on the truck. He heard the screen door whack. But he saw only Margaret.
If he’d entertained any doubts about where she belonged, he now knew with certainty it wasn’t in his kitchen.
She stood like a calla lily on the dingy white linoleum. Graceful. Delicate. Lovely in the way of women blessed with classic bone structure, rather than voluptuous curves. Her soft gray sweater and matching slacks complemented eyes the color of smoke, skin fine as bone china, hair glinting gold in the sunbeam streaming through the door.
Last night, he’d thought she must look her best in moonlight. He wished to hell he’d been right.
She squinted at the clock a long moment, then smiled hesitantly. “Right on time…aren’t I?”
He checked the clock. Eight o’clock on the money. Apparently her vanity wouldn’t permit wearing glasses.
He nodded toward the table. “Sit down.”
She glanced at the rickety dinette, and Scott imagined her inner shudder. He hadn’t even swiped it down after the meal. But she pulled out a cracked vinyl chair and sat with nary a blink.
“Thank you.” She waved a graceful hand at the opposite chair. “Please, you sit down, too.”
As usual, the more graciously she behaved, the ruder he felt. He might as well act the part.
Plucking his Stetson off the refrigerator, Scott jammed it low. He flipped around the chair nearest her and dropped into a straddle. “So talk.”
“I’m prepared to offer you five thousand dollars for Twist of Fate…for Twister. Cash on delivery.”
So much for preliminaries. He stacked his fists on the chair back and planted his chin. “That’s a lot of money for someone who has no money,” he drawled, waiting for her blush to peak before continuing. “But it’s not a fraction of what he’s worth.”
“Not if he was a show-ring champion. But Twister’s never been campaigned. Never sired any proven get.”
“Campaigned? Proven? We’re talking about a stallion, here, not a damn politician. Twister’s got nothin’ to prove as far as I’m concerned.”
“Wasting his potential is criminal! And stupendously selfish. And…and just plain ignorant! You don’t deserve to own him.”
There was that passion again. So unlike the girl he’d known. So intense he couldn’t take his eyes off her. He dropped his voice a husky note. “So make me an offer I can’t refuse, Maggie.”
Color splashed her cheeks. “I don’t have any more money, damn you. I don’t have a home. I don’t even own that Porsche out there. The lease expires next week.”
He frowned, feeling a niggle of unease. “Your husband?”
“We’ve been divorced a month.”
He raised his eyebrows. “No settlement money?”
“The prenuptial agreement was airtight. He was a lawyer, after all.”
She said it matter-of-factly, as if signing such agreements before pledging to honor and love your life mate was normal. He supposed in her privileged world, that was true.
“There’s always Daddy,” he said, his voice cynical. Donald Winston spared no expense when it came to his precious daughter. And his pockets were very deep.
Her mouth clamped shut. Her color heightened. She drew a cloak of dignity around her narrow shoulders.
“I’ll be damned. The old man cut you off.”
With sudden clarity, Scott remembered just how far her father would go to teach Margaret a lesson. Questions whirled like dust devils in his mind. He snatched at the nearest one.
“What’ll you do now?”
She gave a humorless laugh and stared at her clasped fingers. Scott doubted if those creamy, manicured hands had done more than dial a phone in the past six years. With grudging admiration, he watched her trembling lips firm, her spine stiffen and her chin lift. She met his eyes squarely.
“Give me a job.”
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_134885fb-7b8c-5c90-a6fb-b977a682e037)
MARGARET FELT her courage falter, smothered beneath Scott’s heavy silence. The electric hum of the ancient refrigerator mingled with the dull roar of blood in her ears. She took a deep breath. Big mistake. Musty house and strange breakfast odors wreaked havoc on her nervous stomach.
“Come again?” Scott finally asked, his amusement insulting.
“If you won’t sell Twister, hire me to train him. I guarantee within six months he’ll pump cash back into H & H Cattle Company. He’ll bring in a bundle standing at stud.”
“It takes years of training to bring a horse up to national competition level. Even I know that. H & H Cattle Company doesn’t have years,” he admitted grimly.
“You’re thinking in terms of show-ring competition. That’s not what I have in mind.” The excitement she’d nurtured for weeks bubbled in her voice.
“Wanna let me in on your secret?”
“Twister has the makings of a champion racehorse.”
“Racehorse?” Scott’s incredulous stare grew pitying. “He’s six years old—over the hill by at least two years. Besides, Thoroughbreds race, not Arabians.”
“Oh, but you’re wrong. Arabian racing is well established in Europe and the Middle East. It’s a hot trend in the States now. Not only that, an Arabian’s prime racing years begin at age five.” She paused, savoring his dazed expression. “But that’s not the best part.”
“No?”
She shook her head. “The best part is, breeders are clamoring for a particular type of Arabian. One with a conformation suited to running, rather than class performance. One that is relatively rare right now and therefore brings top stud fees. There’s a huge demand now for an Arabian like Twister.”
Unable to contain herself any longer, she broke into a huge smile. “And we have a lock on the supply!”
“We have a lock on the supply?” Scott lifted one tawny brow to meet his hat band. Rising, he hooked a chair leg with his boot and slung the seat around. “I don’t recall selling you any portion of my racehorse, Maggie.”
She looked up into eyes the color of scotch whiskey—and lost both her smile and her capacity to speak. His lazy, masculine confidence had always twisted her up inside. But she couldn’t let him intimidate her now. She had too much to lose.
As if he read her mind, his mouth quirked upward. He shoved his chair under the table and sauntered toward an aluminum percolator plugged into an outlet near the sink. Helpless to stop herself, she watched the rolling action of his lean hips and tight butt.
Jim hadn’t walked like that. Neither had Matt. The truth was, no other man in her civilized experience had ever moved with quite the same feline grace and male swagger as this tall cowboy.
Opening a painted cabinet door of indeterminate color, he pulled down two mismatched ceramic mugs and looked back over one shoulder.
Caught admiring the broad stretch of his faded blue shirt, Margaret froze. He held her gaze, his own smoldering beneath sooty lashes.
“How do you like your coffee?”
He might have been asking how she liked her sex, so intimate was his tone. Margaret had never hated her fair complexion more.
“I don’t drink coffee, thank you.” Even to her own ears, she sounded priggish.
Shrugging, he filled his mug, turned and propped a negligent hip against the counter. “I think this farce has gone on long enough, don’t you?”
“Farce?”
“This fairy tale about Twister racing. I’ll give you credit for trying. But you of all people should know I can’t give you a job.” He took a leisurely sip of coffee, his eyes watchful behind tendrils of steam.
She stiffened. “Can’t? Or won’t?”
He lowered the mug. Those eyes were glittering dangerously now. His dark stubbled jaw clenched and unclenched. “Need a refresher course, Maggie? Okay. My hay won’t last, my credit’s maxed out, and I could really use some cash right now—you seemed to grasp the situation clearly enough last night. So what makes you think I can afford to pay you a salary today?”
Her stomach roiling, Margaret picked a nonexistent piece of lint from her cashmere sleeve.
“Run on home to Daddy while you still can, Maggie. You’d be plain stupid not to.”
Margaret’s chin came up. She skipped angry and went straight to livid. “Don’t call me Maggie. And don’t call me stupid.”
She jumped up and stalked to within an arm’s length of his slouching form. “Who said anything about a salary, Einstein? I’m interested in a joint venture. My expertise and seed money in exchange for fifty percent ownership of Twister, plus room and board.”
Scott set his mug down with a snort. “Dream on, princess. Twister is mine and that’s that. Besides, he’s half-wild. What makes you think he’ll even respond to you?”
It was Margaret’s turn to snort. “He’ll respond.”
On sure ground at last, she dismissed his skepticism and prowled the room. “I’ll take care of insurance, feed, farrier, veterinary and transportation costs for the first five months. With creative management, five thousand dollars ought to just about cover it. After Twister wins the Armand Hammer Classic in August, we’ll split the bills fifty-fifty.” She slanted him a challenging look. “And, of course, the profits, too.”
Scott straightened, forcing her to tilt her head back. His thick brows drew together into a daunting V. “What profits are we talking about here? A couple of grand a month in stud fees? That’d be nice, but hardly enough to pay the note due on H & H Cattle Company.” His features hardened. “Frankly, putting up with you isn’t worth it.”
My life in a nutshell, cowboy. Her throat constricting, she examined one smooth coral fingernail with forced indifference. When she could safely speak again, Margaret met his gaze.
“The Armand Hammer Classic offers a fifty-thousand-dollar purse. Top racing sires command stud fees of up to five thousand dollars a mare. By conservative estimates, Twister could earn over a half-million dollars a year for the next ten years. Would that be worth putting up with me?”
His slack-jawed surprise did wonders for her bruised ego. Thankful she’d done her research, she played her ace. “If you won’t do it for yourself, think of your father. With that kind of working capital, you could hire all the hands you need, make a big dent in his medical bills.”
Muttering a foul word, he spun around to brace both palms on the lip of the rusted sink and stare out the window. She followed his gaze. For once, fate was on her side.
Blurred by the dirty glass panes, Grant Hayes stood outside the barn wiping his fingers on a faded red cloth. Pausing, he lifted the rag with trembling fingers to his forehead and blotted twice before continuing his listless cleaning. If she hadn’t heard about his triple-bypass surgery, she would have suspected worse. He looked pale and exhausted.
Watching Scott’s chin drop and his knuckles whiten, Margaret felt her satisfaction slink away in shame. If anyone understood the sickening helplessness of emotional blackmail, she did. She’d had no right to bring his ailing father into their battle.
Scott slowly raised his head and spoke without turning. “All right, Maggie, you win. But I swear to God, before we’re through you’ll wish you hadn’t.”
TWENTY-FOUR HOURS LATER, Margaret parked just outside H & H Cattle Company’s gate and listened to the powerful engine idle. This was it. Her chance for independence and the fulfillment of a dream she’d cherished since first becoming enchanted with Arabians as a teenager. Scott’s agreement to a joint-venture partnership yesterday could establish her as a top breeder and trainer, a woman to be respected, instead of ridiculed. A woman who didn’t need a man to survive.
True, she was dependent on Scott now. But then, he was equally dependent on her. With luck, they’d separate in less than six months in a position to pursue their individual goals and change their lives. Money had that power, she’d learned early in life. Her father made sure she never forgot it.
Morning sunlight winked off the eighteen-karat-gold initial key ring her parents had presented—along with a flashy silver Corvette—for her sixteenth birthday. A reward, she recalled wryly, for winning four blue ribbons in a class “A” horse show.
After years of disappointing them with poor grades, botched recitals and social faux pas, she’d been pathetically happy at the proud smiles on their faces. Her riding instructor had mentioned that with a finer horse, Margaret had the potential to become a national champion. Donald Winston’s eyes had gleamed at the prospect.
Margaret dropped her forehead against the steering wheel and succumbed to bittersweet memories of the Arabian horse farm her father had established adjacent to Scott’s ranch. Riverbend. In many ways, her life had begun—and ended—at the prosperous breeding and training facility.
She’d spent five summers and many holidays there under the tutelage of Liz Howarth, Riverbend’s manager and a former member of the U.S. Olympic equestrian team. Yet Liz’s lessons had been a joy. Her instructions had been easily understood. Wonder of wonders, her teaching hadn’t been hindered by her student’s dyslexia.
Margaret squeezed her eyes shut, remembering the incalculable frustration and humiliation her impairment had caused throughout her childhood. The exclusive girls’ boarding schools she’d attended had been staffed to train future matrons of society, not detect learning disabilities. She’d often wondered why she advanced to the next grade each year. Later, she’d learned her father was a most generous benefactor of each school she attended.
Heaven bless Miss Jenkins. The seventh-grade English teacher had possessed the perception and integrity to insist Margaret be tested by a specialist. Donald and Gloria had first denied, then been embarrassed by, their daughter’s problem. But Margaret had received the news with profound gratitude.
She wasn’t stupid. She wasn’t! There was a medical reason for the jumbled mess her mind made of letters and numbers. With specialized tutoring, she could learn to decipher the world in ways she could understand. Her relief had been shattering. Liberating.
Lifting her forehead from the leather-wrapped wheel, Margaret blinked at the rutted road winding beyond the open gate. She’d almost conquered her debilitating insecurity six years ago, only to be knocked down again with brutal force.
Matt. Oh, Matt, I’d turn back the clock and start over, if I could.
But she couldn’t. She could only go forward and live with her guilt as best she could. Funny how life had brought her full circle to the man least likely to help her forget Matt’s death.
Straightening her shoulders, she shifted gears and drove over the rattling cattle guard, past the sagging aluminum gate propped against a fence post. Scott Hayes was every bit as domineering as her father and ex-husband. Maybe more so. Living with his contempt on a daily basis, striving to earn his respect, would be the toughest challenge she’d ever faced.
As the Porsche climbed an ungraded road and topped the steep rise, Margaret set her jaw. Scott might call her Maggie, but it wasn’t the first nickname she’d been given. Teachers and schoolmates alike had awarded her another epithet after experiencing her tenacious, dogged…persistence, she preferred to call it.
Scott would have his own challenge to deal with, Margaret vowed, looking down the hill at a dilapidated barn and house. Her new partner was about to face The Mule.
IN THE FARMHOUSE BELOW, Grant stared at his bedroom ceiling and watched the fan blades whirl. Pitiful, he thought. There was a time he would’ve already put in four hours of hard labor by ten o’clock, and here he lay weak as a kitten from washing the breakfast dishes. Damn his traitorous heart! Fifty-three wasn’t that old. Yet his ticker had given out when Scott needed him most. And now the medical bills, on top of the bank note…
He closed his eyes and willed himself to rest. To heal. The fan motor whirred. The pull chain ticked against the swaying brass casing like a metronome. He fingered the nubby chenille bedspread Patricia had bought their first year of marriage and sighed wistfully.
After eighteen years, he still missed her. She’d been too fine and cultured for a simple rancher like him, but he’d accepted the gift of her love and tried to be worthy. They’d had ambitious plans for H & H Cattle Company once. Then cancer had struck, and his dreams had died with her. His body had gone through the motions of ranch chores. He’d loved his children and kept a roof over their heads. Occasionally he’d slaked his physical needs with an equally lonely widow in Gonzales.
But his heart had remained insulated. He simply hadn’t cared about improving the place or making it profitable. And now Scott was paying the price.
Pain that had nothing to do with his operation made Grant wince. For eighteen years, he’d been sleepwalking through life, his memories of Patricia more real to him than the deteriorating ranch. Damned if he’d asked to wake up, but he didn’t seem to have much choice in the matter these days.
A loud ruckus broke out in the barn. Masculine shouts. Twister’s whinny. Grant listened for a tense moment, then relaxed back against his pillow. No point in getting up really. If there was a problem, Scott would handle it.
He always did.
THE DOUBLE CRACK of iron-shod hooves against wood reverberated throughout the barn.
“Dammit, Pete, I told you to stay back! You know he hates the sight of you.” Scott threw an irritated glance over his shoulder.
“Well, he don’t exactly make the sun shine for me, neither,” the peppery old cowhand grumbled, shuffling to a safer distance.
Scott ignored Pete’s injured feelings and concentrated on the greater problem at hand. What the hell was wrong with Twister?
The stallion danced restlessly on the far side of the twelve-by-twenty-foot stall, his bunched muscles rippling beneath a pearl gray coat. Charcoal velvet nostrils fluttered in distress. His silver tail swished up and down, side to side.
“Come on, boy. Don’t you want to get out and stretch your legs?” Scott moved slowly into the stall and clasped a lead rope to the nylon halter. Thank goodness he’d forgotten to remove the halter last night before returning to the house.
Noting the full feed bin, he frowned. “What’s the matter, Twister? You’re usually a pig. Are you getting sick maybe?”
A coil of dread tightened Scott’s belly. Ranch life had hastened his mother’s death, crushed his younger sister Laura’s spirit, weakened the heart of his once-invincible father. He sent up a silent prayer. Please God, not Twister, too.
Backing out the open door, Scott pulled the rope taut.
Twister planted his forelegs and refused to budge. Eyes rolling, sides heaving, sweat lathering his neck and flanks, he nickered low and deep.
Scott turned toward Pete. “Go up to the house and ask Dad to call Doc Chalmers. Something’s wrong with Twister, but hell if I can figure out what.”
“Car’s comin’ down the road,” Pete observed from the barn doorway. “Fancy thing, just like the girlie drivin’ it.”
Scott drew in a hissing breath. Maggie. Damn. He’d thought it would take her at least a day to pack whatever a princess needed to live among the common folk. He didn’t have time for her royal crap now.
“Just do what I ask and get the Doc out here. Tell him it’s an emergency.”
“I’m goin’, I’m goin’.” Pete pushed off the doorframe and ambled toward the house, his voice drifting back in mumbled snatches. “Too dang mean to be sick…into some loco weed…do this, Pete, do that, Pete…”
Doc Chalmers wouldn’t go into a stall with the fractious stallion for a truckload of money. The veterinarian had made that clear the last time Twister had landed a well-aimed hoof.
Scott dug in his heels and pulled harder on the rope. “Come on out, dammit. You don’t even like being in there.” Sweat trickled into his eyes, stinging like hell. He lifted one arm and rubbed his forehead, knocking his hat off in the process. His T-shirt clung damply, his jeans felt hot and scratchy—and he was playing tug-of-war with a friggin’ elephant!
Twister nickered again, but something about the sound was different this time. And suddenly Scott knew. Knew even before the light, fresh scent filled his lungs with spring flowers and his mind with images of sunlit hair.
“What is he afraid of?” the cultured, feminine voice asked from several feet behind.
Scott slackened the rope and watched his proud, beautiful stallion shiver. “He’s not afraid. He’s sick. Doc Chalmers is on the way.”
“He’s terrified,” Margaret insisted, walking up to stand beside Scott in the stall doorway.
In the dim light, her shoulder-length hair glimmered palely—her translucent gray eyes more palely still. She wore a sleeveless yellow dress sprigged with blue cornflowers. A thin blue satin ribbon threaded the puckered scoop neck, drawing his gaze to delicate collarbones and the hint of creamy breasts. The cotton material hung waistless, beltless, yet skimmed her curves more alluringly than spandex.
He felt like a smelly, hairy Neanderthal next to a magical fairy princess.
“Let me see what I can do.” With ethereal grace, she slipped into the stall and moved toward the wild-eyed stallion.
Scott’s heartbeat stalled, sputtered and roared to piston-pumping life. He was afraid to yell, afraid to do anything that might startle eleven hundred pounds of horseflesh into explosive action.
“Hiya, handsome. Remember me? Of course you do.” She reached up, grabbed the halter cheek straps and pulled Twister’s head down. “You wouldn’t forget your new friend.”
Damned if she wasn’t blowing in his nose!
“Now what is it that’s got you so scared? Why don’t we check it out together, okay?” She took the rope from Scott and shooed him back from the doorway.
Dazed, he stumbled backward as she moved forward, her pink toenails flashing bright next to Twister’s tough, yellowed hooves.
God almighty! Sandals in a horse stall. Twister’s horse stall.
“Ready, handsome?” She did something to his mane with her fingers. Amazingly he seemed to calm down a little. “All right then, let’s go.”
Paralyzed, Scott watched the powerful haunches gather, the pricked ears flatten. In two tremendous leaps Twister catapulted through the door, Margaret trotting close behind. Fifteen feet away he wheeled to face the stall and backed up, snorting all the while.
Pete’s skinny form darkened the barn entrance, but Twister ignored his long-standing enemy. Nothing else could have demonstrated his fear so well.
“You okay, Maggie?” Scott choked out.
Her steady gray eyes were inspecting the stall. “Whatever has him spooked is over there. See anything new or unfamiliar?”
Scott scanned the area and rumpled his hair. Nothing looked different to him. Same frayed leather bridle drooping from a rusty nail. Same packed dirt floor covered with matted straw. Same shovel leaning against—
“The hay,” Pete said, moving toward Margaret with surprising hustle.
With the right incentive, those bowed legs of his could sure get up and go, Scott noted wryly.
At the wrangler’s approach, Twister jerked his head back. Margaret laid her small white hand against his arched neck and murmured soothingly. Once again the stallion marginally settled.
Pete’s light blue eyes widened.
“What about the hay, Mr….?” Margaret paused politely.
“Pete. Just call me Pete, miss.”
She flashed a dazzling smile. “Pete, then. And please, call me Margaret.”
Scott rolled his eyes. He was at a goddamn tea party.
“Were you talking about that hay over there, Pete?” She indicated two bales stacked next to the stall doorway.
“That’s right, mi…M-Margaret.” Pete doffed a battered straw hat and ducked his head, revealing a shiny brown bald spot surrounded by crinkled gray hair. “I put it there myself yesterday evenin’.”
“Would you mind very much moving it away from the wall for me?”
“Don’t mind a’tall, not a bit, no.” He hurried to the hay and heaved the top bale down with the strength of a much younger man.
It landed with a heavy thud, missing Scott’s toes by a dust mote. He narrowed his eyes and glared.
Supremely indifferent, Pete stooped over and lifted the second bale. A long black snake slithered between his boots.
Twister squealed and rode his haunches. Pete dropped the bale and cursed. Scott grabbed a shovel and swung it edge-side down at the snake.
The reptile’s body and head separated; the one writhing and flipping, the other yawning pink and grotesque in search of a target.
Pete shuddered. “Ain’t nothin’ on this earth I hate worse’n a damn snake, even a piddly ol’ bull snake. No wonder Twister went nuts. Want me to get rid of it, boss?” He looked none too thrilled at the prospect
Scott had the shovel, after all. Grimacing, he walked toward the motionless form. “Call Doc Chalmers and see if he’s left yet. I’ll—”
“Wait,” Margaret interrupted. “Don’t move the snake yet.”
Shovel extended, Scott frowned.
“Twister’s been scared for hours. His territory’s been threatened. He needs to protect it, to vent his fear. Let him kill the snake.”
Pete glanced down at the severed, triangular head and scratched his neck. “Uh, Margaret? It’s—”
“Go on and make that phone call, Pete. She knows what she’s doing.” Scott waited for her smug comment. When she flashed him a look of gratitude, he hid his surprise behind a scowl.
Twister’s whole manner changed as she led him forward. Head high, eyes flashing, ears pricked toward his enemy in the dirt, he screamed a high challenge and rose on hind legs. Down came his front hooves, again and again, his rage elemental and awesome to watch. When finally he stood still, blowing hard and trembling with exhaustion, the snake lay scattered in pulpy bits. Lowering his head, Twister gave the pieces one last contemptuous sniff before turning toward his stall.
Margaret scratched beneath Twister’s chin. Grunting in ecstasy, he raised his head and stretched his neck like a contented tabby.
“Good work, handsome. I’ll bet you’re hungry now. How about some nice breakfast and a nap?”
Somehow the sight of Twister calmly following her into the stall didn’t surprise Scott. Her confident assurance yesterday that Twister would respond to her training didn’t appear boastful now. The woman seemed able to read the stallion’s mind. She’d bewitched him. And much as Scott hated to admit it, he couldn’t blame the poor animal. Her fairy-princess act was pretty potent.
He reached down, hoisted the nearest bale to his shoulder and staggered blindly toward the stall.
“No! Don’t ever stack hay outside his stall again or he’ll think there’s a snake there,” Margaret explained.
Scott felt his face heat. She was right of course. If she hadn’t tied him in knots he wouldn’t be acting like a total greenhorn. Wishing she’d never slipped into his moonlit field, he turned and headed for an empty stall at the far end of the barn. The makeshift storage room housed bags of feed, salt blocks and his tooled Western stock saddle. He slid the hay from his shoulder and stepped back. Dust and fragments of summer meadow mushroomed up, tickling a violent sneeze out of him.
“Bless you.” Margaret’s gentle laughter wafted from Twister’s stall.
Every masculine instinct he possessed whispered danger.
Margaret Chelsea Winston was nothing but trouble and always had been. Look how she was already ordering him around. It’d taken her all of five minutes to hook her little finger in Pete’s nose ring. And when Scott’d told his father about her scheme to turn Twister into a money machine, Grant had been sick-eningly enthusiastic.
Scott tightened his mouth and brushed off his arms and shoulders. He’d exhausted all options for making the bank-note payment or he never would’ve grabbed at the solution she offered. Honor dictated he try his best to make the plan work. He would tolerate her because he had to.
But damned if he’d play lapdog to the woman who’d killed his best friend.
CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_8c1b9cf1-c25f-59c4-a77f-497c66978caf)
MARGARET REACHED for a stick of margarine, paused, and cautiously sniffed the air. Oh, no! Slamming the refrigerator door, she cringed at the ominous clatter of glass and raced to the stove. Acrid smoke billowed from a frying pan.
Coughing, she turned off the burner and stared down at the gooey mess in the pan that had once been a rubber spatula. A second skillet lined with uncooked strips of bacon sat on the adjacent burner. Not good, not good. Cooking meals was part of the agreement she’d made the day before, and now she’d botched Scott’s breakfast. Her ex-husband would have had a field day with this if he knew. Jim’s patronizing still stung.
You can’t even tell left from right, Margaret, and you want a career? Now don’t pout, honey. You already have a job. Just keep being the prettiest hostess any Jacobs and McMillan associate ever had, and I’ll make partner yet.
Grimacing, Margaret carried the ruined pan to the sink and twisted the cold water tap. Hot rubber hissed and foul-smelling steam rose to cloud the window. She slumped against the counter and marveled at human nature.
After three years of enduring similar put-downs from Jim, there was no reason that particular insult should have aroused The Mule in her. But it had. Oh, she’d done her job, such as it was—and filed for divorce the day Jim announced he’d made partner.
Marrying the ambitious lawyer had been a mistake of course. At the time, she’d still felt numb with guilt over Matt’s death and undeserving of happiness. Even knowing that Jim had prized her only for her ornamental value and social connections, she’d grabbed the chance to escape her father’s control. Margaret huffed and straightened from the counter.
Some escape. Her husband’s handling had been no less confining for being velvet-gloved. He’d been truly shocked when she’d called him chauvinistic. And now she was working with a man who made Jim seem practically a feminist.
She had no doubt Scott would be horrified or, worse, pitying, if he knew about her disability. It would be just the excuse he needed to renege on their agreement. Well, she wouldn’t give him the chance! She would succeed on her own, depend on herself and maybe, just maybe, win back her self-respect in the process.
Boot steps and a twanging screen door jerked her thoughts to the present. Her good intentions cowered. Please let it be Grant.
The back door opened. She spun around. Scott stepped inside, whipped off his hat and fanned the air. His brows formed a fierce line.
“What is that godawful smell?”
He glanced at the stove top, then peered over her shoulder at the hardened glob of rubber and defaced metal. His frown deepened.
She hung her head, realized what she was doing and summoned the courage to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry. It was…an accident.”
“I can’t afford careless accidents, Maggie.”
“I’ll buy you a new pan.”
“Save your money and time for Twister. We’re twenty miles from town and there’s a full day of work ahead—” he gave her white shorts and sneakers a scornful once-over “—even if you are dressed for tennis at the club. Guess we’ll have to make do with one fryin’ pan from now on.”
Sliding his hat on with a grieved expression, he nodded toward the bacon. “That was for Pete, you know.”
“P-Pete?”
“He lives in a trailer behind the barn. We take turns running into town for supplies, but he hasn’t come up to the house to pick up his stuff yet. Dad and I eat the turkey bacon.” He heaved a long-suffering sigh. “But since you’ve opened the package, go ahead and cook it. We don’t waste things on this ranch.”
She sidled by his looming form and moved to the stove, wishing he were somewhere else, wishing she were someone else. She couldn’t think with him watching her, couldn’t sort out the confusing letters beneath each knob on the electric stove. Let’s see, she’d turned this one before. Three choices left. Reaching blindly, she turned a control. Coils glowed, but not under the frying pan.
“Gawd,” Scott muttered from behind.
Her face grew scorching. Sensing he’d turned, she frantically twisted knobs until the correct burner lit. The refrigerator door clunked open.
“What the…? Dammit, Maggie, I told you about this door. Half the stuff in here is broken or spilled.” Each word wallowed in disgust. Each clink of glass hitting the trash can punctuated his censure.
Biting her lip and blinking furiously, Margaret tried to concentrate while he cleaned up her mess. Eggs. She’d planned on scrambling some. But those were probably Pete’s, too. How thoughtless to fry bacon for someone who’d just had heart surgery. How negligent to ruin a pan. How stupid to botch a simple task like cooking breakfast.
The shame she’d been holding at bay all morning attacked full force. Her nose lifted, her muscles froze, her sight glazed—the defense mechanisms developed as a child were automatic now. She was only vaguely aware of the bacon sizzling. A popping noise produced a corresponding sting on her arm, but she didn’t flinch.
“Turn down the heat, Maggie! What are you trying to do, burn breakfast and the house? Can’t you even fry a batch of—”
“That’s enough, Scott.”
Gentle hands gripped her shoulders and pulled her back from the stove. Grant adjusted the control, reached for her wrist, and slowly uncurled her fist. His work-worn fingers moved up to probe an angry red circle on her pale skin.
“Let’s get some ice on that burn before it blisters.”
She searched his eyes and found only compassion, as if he knew her pain went much deeper than a grease burn. Her senses slowly thawed.
“I’m sorry about the pan, Mr. Hayes, and the bacon. I shouldn’t have been so…careless.” Scott’s accusation was convenient, and much kinder than the truth she had no intention of revealing.
Grant released her arm with a pat. “Call me Grant, remember? That ol’ skillet should’ve been tossed out along with the Nixon administration. And don’t apologize about the bacon. I like my meat on the burned side—just ask Scott. Been eatin’ his cookin’ for years and never complained.”
The older man’s lopsided, teasing grin added lines around his eyes and subtracted years from his face. It was easy to see where Scott’s masculine good looks came from. Heaven help her if the son ever emulated the father’s conscious effort to charm.
“Scott, you get an ice cube on this girl’s arm while I make us all some pancakes.” He led Margaret to the scratched kitchen table, pulled out a chair with courtly grace and waited.
“Really, Mr. Hayes…Grant. I can make pancakes if that’s what you want.”
“Let the princess fix her own breakfast,” Scott said. “I’ll make you some Eggbeaters, Dad.” Hunkered in front of the refrigerator, Scott threw down his sponge and rose to a standing position.
“Mind your manners, son. And take off that hat. Sit down, Margaret. Please.”
To refuse would be an insult. Carefully avoiding Scott’s eyes, she sat.
Grant rubbed his neck, drawing Margaret’s attention to his frayed sleeve cuff. She frowned. The cost of a single custom-made shirt from her father’s closet could buy a dozen replacements for the one Grant wore.
He dropped his arm and sighed. “If I eat one more bite of Eggbeaters, Scott, you’ll see last night’s dinner again. Only it won’t look near as appetizing this morning.”
“The doctor said—”
“Stirring batter is not going to raise my blood pressure. And one normal breakfast every now and then is not going to clog my arteries. Dr. Hearn was clear about that. You gotta quit treating me like an invalid, son, and trust me to take care of myself.”
The moment stretched, Grant’s obvious frustration gaining Margaret’s sincere sympathy. How many times had she encountered the same lack of trust in her own abilities?
Scott relented first. Setting his hat on the refrigerator, he opened the tiny freezer compartment and cracked loose an ice cube from a dented metal tray. Cube in hand, he stepped aside.
“Make my order a double stack,” he said wryly.
Breaking into a relieved smile, Grant moved forward and began rummaging for ingredients. Scott gave him a look of affectionate exasperation, then slowly turned his head.
Margaret tensed.
Their eyes met.
She felt his contempt like a physical blow. It simmered in his tawny eyes, along with something else, a sexual charisma that was as genetically inherent as his square jaw, as unconscious for him as breathing.
Her gaze faltered and dropped. He wore a white, Western-style shirt like his father’s. But where the material swallowed Grant’s gaunt torso, it strained against Scott’s muscular frame. She focused on a pearl snap button near his tooled leather belt, refusing to look lower, unable to look higher as he walked to stand in front of her.
“Hold out your arm, Maggie.”
He was too close, and he hated her. She tilted her head back. “I can take care of myself. I’m not an invalid any more than your father is.”
One minute he was towering over her, the next he was sitting in a chair with her hand on his thigh, his fingers clamping her wrist.
“Hold still now, this might get a little uncomfortable,” he said soothingly, his glittering eyes and viselike grip hidden from Grant.
Scott raised the dripping ice cube and pressed it against her burn. She yanked her arm and gasped, more stunned at his immovable strength than the shock of cold. Jerk. He knew she couldn’t do anything with his father mixing batter not fifteen feet away. She pressed her bare knees primly together and pretended they weren’t sandwiched between denim-covered muscles.
He looked different without a hat, she realized, staring. Up close, his hair was a thick, swirling mixture of chocolate browns and caramel highlights. It begged a woman’s fingers to plunge right in. As if sensing her thoughts, he looked up through sun-tipped lashes and smiled, a lazy curl of lips that did funny things to her stomach. Returning his focus to her burn, he rubbed the ice in small circles.
Her hands flexed, the one on his thigh noting muscles gone suddenly concrete. The ice cube released a fat drip. It rolled down the curve of her skin and joined the spreading wet spot on his jeans.
He gentled his hold on her wrist. “Feel better?”
The skin on her forearm felt frozen, the skin underneath on fire where he massaged her wild pulse with his thumb. She felt flustered, aroused and very, very confused. But better?
“I’ll be fine now, thanks.” She pulled back her arm, freeing her wrist and dislodging the ice. It slithered over her thigh and fell to the floor.
“How many pancakes can you eat, Margaret?” Grant called from the stove.
She tried to answer. She tried to do anything but shiver from the combined impact of frigid ice and a predatory gold stare.
“One,” she managed breathlessly.
“What was that?”
She dragged her gaze to Grant. “One.”
“Lost your appetite, princess?” Scott asked softly, his eyes slitted with knowing amusement.
He was insufferable. He’d been insufferable from the time they’d first met. But she wasn’t a painfully shy teenager anymore. She was her own person, a woman strong enough to stand alone.
She scraped back her chair and stood.
“I changed my mind, Grant, I’ll have a short stack…with bacon.” She sent Scott a scathing look. “Suddenly I could eat a pig.”
LATE THAT AFTERNOON, Ada Butler cut the engine of her pickup and resisted the urge to check her face in the rearview mirror. Silly fool. Powder and a dab of lipstick wouldn’t disguise forty-nine years of hard living. Besides, Grant wouldn’t notice if she dyed her salt-and-pepper hair green and danced naked on his bed.
She smoothed her jeans, anyway, and wished briefly she hadn’t changed from her Sunday dress. The minister’d said the blue silk matched her eyes. Then again, it was his Christian duty to say something charitable about everyone—especially aging spinsters.
With a huff of self-disgust, she slid out of the truck and scanned the dirt yard. Her squinted eyes widened on a flashy red Porsche by the barn. Who on earth was here? She spun toward the house and shaded her eyes with one hand.
The yellow clapboards shimmered in the midday sun, every curl of paint glaringly exposed. Missing shingles pockmarked the roof. The long front porch sagged in the middle, surely more so than the last time she’d stopped by? Dropping her hand, she frowned and moved toward the house.
Scott had assured her that after the surgery his father was fine, that there was no reason for her to visit the hospital or drop off a casserole when Grant came home. Yet Ellen Gates had done both. Every congregation member sitting within five pews of the new widow heard how she’d read scripture by Grant’s bed—no doubt wishing she was in it, the hypocrite—and taken him her famous Chicken Delight the next week. Baiting the trap for a husband, that’s what she was doing.
A series of grunts from the back of Ada’s pickup gave her pause. It was true Ellen had boobs the size of Canada. But Ada had fifty times more brains. Surely that gave the widow only a moderate edge.
She was halfway up the porch steps when Grant opened the door.
“Ada, what a nice surprise.”
Hand pressed to pounding heart, she allowed herself one devouring look. He was so thin! Yet the rakish smile and lively green eyes were as irresistible as ever.
“Hello, Grant. How’re you feeling?”
His eyes lost some of their sparkle. “Oh, good as an old man with one foot in the grave can feel.”
She arched a brow. “Glad I came by in time. Dead men are so boring.”
When he chuckled, her pleasure pulsed bone deep.
“Come on in out of the sun, Ada. I think I can manage a little conversation before the funeral.”
“You’re sure I’m not intruding? Looks like you’ve already got company.” She glanced pointedly at the Porsche.
“That’ll take some explaining. Come in.”
She climbed the remaining steps while he held open the door. His fingertips branded the small of her back as she swept into the oak-planked parlor. He made her feel protected and utterly feminine when she didn’t need the first and certainly wasn’t the second.
And that, she supposed, was why she’d loved Grant Hayes most of her adult life.
He settled her on the camelback sofa and squeezed into the room’s only chair, a wooden rocker far too delicate for his large frame.
“The car belongs to Margaret Winston. You remember, Donald Winston’s daughter?”
“I’m not likely to forget.”
No single family in the county had provided as much juicy gossip as the Winstons. People still wondered what really happened the day young Matt Collins died. One thing was clear—a body never mentioned Margaret’s name around Scott unless she wanted her head snapped off. And Ada was rather fond of hers.
“I thought Margaret lived in Dallas now. What brings her here?” she asked, listening enthralled to Grant’s account of the past three days. When he finished, she slowly shook her head.
“If that doesn’t beat all. To hear Doc Chalmers tell it, Twister was spawned from the bowels of hell. Do you really think a little thing like Margaret can handle that devil?”
“She saddled him up not twenty minutes ago and took off on their first ride. Damnedest thing I ever saw. You’d have thought he was a Shetland pony at the kiddie park. Margaret’ll handle Twister just fine. But handling Scott…now, that’s a whole different ball of wax.”
Did he know his eyes were as green as fresh mint? Did he know how masculine he looked in that dainty chair or what happened to her stomach when he smiled?
“But enough about us, Ada. What brings you away from your sows during spring farrowing? Can’t be my charming company.”
Of course he didn’t know. She was plain, practical Ada Butler, raiser of hogs and peaches, not men’s pulses. She glanced from his jutting arms and knees to the empty cushion beside her and blinked back the horrifying sting of tears.
“Ada? What is it?” He unfolded from the chair and left it rocking wildly to sit on the sofa. Reaching for her hands, he gave them a squeeze and searched her eyes. “Has something happened at the farm? Do you need help?”
Concern had accomplished what her pitiful charms could not. It would be easy enough to let the tears flow, to find a plausible problem and see where it led. Already prickles of excitement from their joined palms spread up her arms. Heavenly.
She drew a deep breath and pulled her hands away. “Nothing’s wrong, Grant. It’s my silly allergies. They always act up this time of year.”
Avoiding his gaze, she rose and walked to the door, clearing her throat and sniffing for effect. “You’re right, I really can’t stay away from the farm long. But I ran into Scott last week in town, and he mentioned wanting to raise a hog for fall slaughter.” Some day was what he’d said. She opened the door and stood half in, half out.
“Morning Glory’s last litter was a beaut,” she babbled on. “Twelve in all, but the runt barely made it. He’ll bring next to nothing at market and less than that as breeding stock. You’re welcome to take him if you want. He’s in the truck now.”
“Really? One of your prize Hampshires? I don’t know what to say, Ada.”
Neither did she, since he’d moved to peer out the door and driven every coherent thought out of her head. Her spine hugged the doorjamb. Her chest rose and fell an inch from his arm. Oh, to be Ellen Gates now.
He turned and looked down, his evident pleasure shifting to surprise, then keen awareness. She could count on one hand the number of times she’d seen that expression in a man’s eyes. Never had it thrilled her body and soul like now.
She saw his gaze fasten on her mouth, felt her lips soften in response, watched him frown in confusion and step out onto the front porch. As he stared into space, realization hit. Lord in heaven, he’d almost kissed her!
Her heart soaring, she breezed across the porch, floated down the steps and turned to call up teasingly, “C’mon, old man. Let’s get your pig unloaded.”
Spinning on one serviceable work boot, she was amazed at how naturally her walk had an extra sway when she knew Grant was watching. One thing about working a farm sunup to sundown—it kept her figure trim and supple. From this view, she might even have the edge on Ellen.
At her truck, Ada dropped the tailgate, grabbed a flimsy chicken-wire cage and pulled. Excited grunts erupted from the black-and-white shoat inside. She’d always had a soft spot for runts. She’d only postponed this one’s inevitable fate, but still, she felt noble.
“Hush, little guy. We’ll get you out of there in a minute,” Ada crooned, dragging the cage to the edge of the tailgate. The eight-week-old pig trembled miserably, his tail tucked as low as the curl would allow. Intent on getting the poor creature settled, Ada tightened her grip on the cage and heaved.
“Let me help,” Grant rumbled unexpectedly in her ear.
Her fingers slackened. The cage hit the ground. Wire crunched, popping the door open. And thirty pounds of squealing, outraged pig dug in his toes and raced wildly for the barn.
After exchanging a stunned look with Grant, Ada took off in hot pursuit.
She focused with dizzying results on the corkscrew tail twirling counterclockwise to anatomy. Ah, good. The rascal was headed straight for the first stall. Easy pickings. She plunged through the stall just behind the pig, waited tensely while he bobbled against three walls and grasped empty air as he squirted between her legs and out the door.
“Get him!” Ada shrieked at Grant, who stood watching with an infuriatingly superior male smirk.
Stumpy legs pumping, the runt streaked into the next stall. Grant leapt into manly action. Ada stumbled into the corridor just in time to see the frenzied pig rounding the stall like a fresh-shelled pea in a bowl. When Grant zigged with hands open, the black-and-white terror zagged straight out through the door.
It was a beautiful moment.
“Get him!” Grant roared, lurching out of the stall with murder in his eyes.
There were advantages to being a runt, Ada discovered during the next ten minutes. Never again would she feel sorry for nature’s pip-squeaks. Runts were faster than their heftier siblings, for one thing. And small enough to wiggle under sawhorses, between stacked well pipe and behind metal storage cabinets.
In a distant part of Ada’s awareness, she registered the sound of an approaching vehicle, then closed out all distractions save the pig eyeing her with myopic defiance four feet away. For some reason, he’d skidded to a stop in another stall. Afraid to move, she spoke in a soft, singsong voice.
“That’s a good piggy, just stay where you are and we’ll stick an apple in your mouth yet, yes we will. If you’re there, Grant, close the stall door now, because our little friend here looks very nervous.”
She watched the pig’s beady eyes follow Grant’s movement toward the door.
“Yoohoo. Oh, Gra-ant?” came a woman’s glass-shattering voice.
Hide bristling, the runt bolted for the stall door. Ada lunged, groaning as a piece of his tail slipped through her fingers. Dusty, sweaty and completely alone, she hung her head.
Outrage brought her chin up. She charged out of the stall and spotted Grant pounding down the corridor, hard on the tiny rump of Turbo Pig. A voluptuous woman in a flowing, ankle-length dress stood silhouetted in the barn entrance, holding a cake aloft.
“My, it’s dark in here. Is that you, Grant? I brought you my famous Molasses Spice Cake everybody raves abou—Eeeeek! Get away! Get away, you nasty thing!” Spinning in a circle, Ellen Gates trapped the thrashing, frantic pig in her swirling skirt.
You should have changed out of your Sunday dress, Ada thought smugly.
“Stand still, Ellen,” Grant ordered. “He won’t hurt you.”
“What won’t hurt me? What won’t hurt me, goddamn it!”
Tsk-tsk, what would the preacher say?
“It’s a pig. A small pig,” Grant explained with a superior male smirk Ada didn’t mind at all.
Just then, the animal in question caught scent of his favorite flavor in the world, the one Ada used to sweeten his sorghum and tempt his runty appetite, and snuffled as high as he could reach beneath Ellen’s skirts.
“Eeeeeyuu!”
The cake hit the ground with a succulent splat. The pig fought his way out of Ellen’s skirts with a squeal of ecstasy and began gobbling scattered molasses shrapnel from the dirt floor. The last of Ada’s hostility toward the little runt faded.
“Do something!” Ellen wailed.
Ada pushed past Grant, grabbed the warm, quivering pig, and repositioned his leathery snout dead center in the cake. “Enjoy yourself, runt. It’s famous.”
SCOTT CAUGHT a loose strand of barbed wire with his hammer claw and pressed the tool back against a worm-eaten mesquite post. He waited for the telltale twang of maximum tension before plucking a staple out of his mouth, lifting a second hammer from his belt and securing the strand with two solid whacks. Only then did he straighten and wipe the sweat from his brow.
Repairing fence alone was tricky work and required all his concentration—which was exactly why he’d declined Pete’s offer to help. If Scott had time to think, he might remember Maggie’s stricken expression earlier today when he’d lectured her about ruining a frying pan. Or her startled awareness when he’d forcibly held her wrist. Neither reaction spoke well of his behavior. But then, she’d always brought out the worst in him.
Frowning, he dropped both hammers and noted the belch of dust on impact. Damn, it was dry for April. Unless a gully-washer hit soon, the approaching summer would dry up his stock tanks. They were dangerously low as it was.
He peeled off his work gloves and walked to the pickup parked in the dubious shade of a young mesquite. This part of the ranch hadn’t been cleared in two years. The profusion of cactus, scrub brush and spindly trees depressed him. Pulling his shirttail free, he wrenched open the snaps in one movement and threw the wadded material into the open window. He’d had big plans for this place once. Now he just got up, worked until he couldn’t see straight, then fell into bed—day after day after day.
Lifting out the thermos of water he always carried, Scott gulped and then backhanded his mouth. If only watering his cattle was so easy. Inevitably, irresistibly, his gaze drifted to the thick stand of oaks and cotton-woods edging the horizon.
The trees sheltered the Guadalupe River, whose far bank sloped up to the foot of a manicured green lawn. His mind provided details of the plantation-style house, massive horse barn and various outbuildings he’d seen only twice in his life.
Riverbend. The embodiment of everything he wanted, yet couldn’t have.
As a kid, he’d listened to his dad talk about buying the riverfront acreage from old man Perkin and improving H & H Cattle Company’s holdings. Then his mom had grown ill. The medical bills stacked up, and the talk stopped.
After she died, they’d all handled it differently. Laura found comfort in excelling at school, Grant relinquished his dream, and Scott grabbed hold of it with both hands. At the ripe old age of twelve, he’d extracted a promise from Andrew Perkin to give Scott first crack at purchasing the prime riverfront land one day.
For seven years he’d worked any job his spare time would allow and saved his earnings. After high school graduation, Mr. Perkin had made noises about being too old to keep farming, and Scott had picked up a loan application from the bank. While his friends dreamed about college, he’d fantasized about his Santa Gertrudis herd drinking from the Guadalupe.
Until someone with more money, more clout and more cojones beat him to it.
Scott pushed off from the truck with a snort and headed for the fence post. He’d do well to forget the past if he hoped to show any degree of civility in the next few months. Stooping over, he jerked his gloves on and attacked his work with a vengeance.
Ten minutes and two fence posts later, he heard the jingle of a bit, the clack of a hoof connecting with rock. He straightened at the sight of Maggie riding Twister slowly up the fence line. The stallion looked foreign but magnificent, with an English saddle and slender woman in jodhpurs on his back.
She stopped about twenty feet away, one hand holding the reins loosely while the other scribbled on paper against the saddle pommel.
Scott walked forward, straining to see. Some sort of drawing, it looked like. Bracing against Twister’s nudge of greeting, Scott watched her quickly fold the paper and slip it into the pocket of her pale blue shirt.
“I thought you weren’t going to ride today,” he said, reaching up to hold the bridle.
Her gaze fluttered over his bare chest and darted away. “The farrier rescheduled for tomorrow. I decided to scope out possible training sites. Twister hasn’t given me a bit of trouble—” she leaned over and rubbed the glossy neck “—have ya, handsome?”
Her sleeveless shirt gaped at the neck. Scott’s breath snagged on a glimpse of milky flesh and scalloped cream lace.
She straightened and stared out over the fence. “I never realized Riverbend was this close to your ranch.”
“No, I don’t suppose you did. It’s beneath a princess to notice the peons.”
Her head snapped around. Twister snorted and sidestepped. She collected the reins and eyed Scott with regal scorn.
“Quit calling me a princess.”
He almost smiled, but shrugged, instead. “It’s what you are.”
“Because my father bought Riverbend out from under your nose?”
His grip tightened on the bridle. How did she know about that?
“I spent some time at the feed store last week. I found out you worked there off and on all through high school. Apparently the whole town knew about your bargain with Mr. Perkin. My father didn’t win any friends around here by offering a deal the old man couldn’t refuse. Still, that has nothing to do with me.”
Like hell. “Donald Winston bought that land for you, for his little princess, so she could win horse shows.”
“So I’m the daughter of a man obsessed with winning.”
“A rich man.”
“Okay, a rich man. I can’t help it if I have wealthy parents. They don’t define me. When have I ever treated you like I was a princess, Scott Hayes?”
She sat there with her nose in the air and her posture church perfect and her eyes frosting the air between them, and Scott felt his control snap. He moved closer and gripped the supple riding boot that epitomized her privileged world.
“Since the first day I met you,” he said, all the confusion and humiliation of that day resurfacing. He wanted to shake her ivory tower till her teeth rattled. “Do you even remember that day, Maggie?”
Her cheeks flushed to match her sunburned nose. She remembered.
“Must’ve been quite a social comedown for you to hang out with the locals, huh?”
“No, I was grateful to be invited. Being new to the area wasn’t easy.”
“Our nasty red dust get your Corvette dirty?”
“You’re not being fair!”
“That’s life in the big country, princess. It ain’t fair and it ain’t easy. You don’t belong here any more than you did ten years ago.”
He’d spotted her right off when he’d walked into Lucy’s Café. Her sophisticated haircut, her expensive clothes, her French-restaurant table manners—hell, everything about her had screamed class. He’d been fascinated—and intimidated.
“My buddies bet me ten bucks I couldn’t get your phone number. I gotta admit, Maggie, you were good.”
She shifted in the saddle and frowned. “Good?”
“I thought I’d been around, knew all the tricks. But you played me like a puppet for thirty minutes before cutting the strings. I didn’t even see it coming.” He’d bought into that shy smile, the pleasure in her dove gray eyes, one hundred percent.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, I think you do. I think you waited for the exact right minute to put me in my place. Everyone there saw me asking for your phone number. Everyone there knew I didn’t get it.”
He’d held out that pen and napkin for a hundred excruciating years while she’d given him the Snow Princess treatment. Her friends had giggled when he’d snatched his hand back. His own friends had snickered as he joined them in a corner booth. Losing the bet wasn’t the half of his shock.
Mr. Stud had finally been rejected, his friends had told him, by a Dallas blueblood—daughter of the millionaire who’d just bought old man Perkin’s place.
Twister tossed his head and stamped, jolting Scott back to the present. He focused on Maggie’s overly bright eyes, the pressed lips, which trembled nonetheless. She didn’t look cold now. She looked close to tears.
“It wasn’t you. It was me. I’m…” Her swallow was audible. She shook her head and fumbled with the reins.
Scott resented his pang of sympathy. “You’re what, Maggie?”
Her eyes hardened. Her chin came up and out. “I’m a damn good horse trainer, that’s what. That’s all you need to know about me.”
Twister launched forward into a fast trot, wrenching Scott’s hand from her boot. Stunned, he watched horse and rider kick up dust until they melted into the brush.
Absently rubbing his right glove, he stared unmoving at the horizon. The sun beat down hotter than ever, but he scarcely noticed. Something important had happened just now, no doubt about it.
He wished like hell he knew what it was.
CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_3074b31e-fed6-5071-bccd-8a3b26dcda81)
MARGARET FOUGHT the powerful undertow. Clawed her way toward wakefulness and blessed peace. But the current was invincible. It swept her past the sweetness and plunged her into panic. Into despair…
Into the car.
Cracked rubber tape on the steering wheel pricked her palms. Sweltering heat compressed her lungs. Matt’s voice implored her to slow down, to pull over. A red-white-and-blue beacon flashed in her rearview mirror. Too close. Too fast.
She couldn’t go back. Wouldn’t go back, or she might never have the courage to leave again.
Get away—get away—get away. The refrain pounded in her mind with each heartbeat. She pressed down on the accelerator and clutched the steering wheel tighter, willing her grip to hold the vibrating car together. Her muscles ached. Dizziness blurred her vision. She tried to slow her shallow breaths and only panted faster.
Get away, get away, get away—Boom!
The steering wheel was wrenched from her hands. Matt yelled. The horizon spun around and around andaround. Metal screeched. Pain exploded in her legs and chest. Glass stalactites trembled.
Silence throbbed.
She slowly turned her head. Matt’s flesh and bone fused with jagged metal in a gruesome sculpture of death.
Anguish filled her soul. She threw back her head and screamed at fate, “It should have been me. It should have been me. It should have been me-e-e-e—“
“Maggie!”
She jerked into consciousness with a gasp, her eyes popping open unfocused in the dark. Where…? Her vision cleared. The farmhouse, her second night here. Scott sat on the four-poster bed gripping her shoulders hard. She wondered how many times he’d shaken her.
“You were dreaming, Maggie. It was just a bad dream.”
Just a bad dream. She would’ve laughed if her teeth weren’t chattering like a set of windup toy dentures. Violent trembling seized her body in rhythmic waves. A terrible cold penetrated marrow deep. It would pass. Eventually. Closing her eyes, she waited…and endured.
“Damn,” Scott muttered, pulling her upright and into his arms.
She nearly whimpered with relief. His bare chest was hard beneath her cheek, his heartbeat loud and steady. She wrapped her arms around his waist and shamelessly clung. Maybe he hated her for what she’d done to Matt, maybe her present weakness disgusted him, but it didn’t matter. He felt strong and warm and alive, and she needed the human contact.
He rubbed her spine hesitantly, then more firmly, his callused fingers snagging on her cotton nightgown. “You’re shiverin’ like a spooked colt. Must’ve been a helluva nightmare.”
Swallowing hard, she nodded.
“Wanna talk about it?”
To this man? “No,” she whispered. “I’ll be fine in a minute.” Humiliating, but she couldn’t seem to unlock her fingers from the waistband of his jeans.
“You were dreaming about the accident, weren’t you?”
She tensed. His room was right next door.’ “Was I talking out loud?”
“Sounded more like screaming to me.”
She unpeeled her fingers and started to push away, thwarted by the iron band of his arms.
“Relax, princess. No need to get your nose out of joint.”
Somehow that nose was buried against his chest now. He smelled of soap and sleep-roused male, and radiated heat like a healthy animal.
“At least you don’t feel like a damn ice cube anymore,” Scott said, satisfaction deepening his voice.
Not hardly. Grateful he couldn’t see her face, she turned and pressed her cheek to his chest. “I’m sorry I woke you up.”
His body shifted toward the window. “Looks like it’s close to dawn. I’d have gotten up soon, anyway.”
“What did I…” Go on, coward, spit it out. “What did I scream?”
He hesitated a fraction too long. “Damned if I know. One thing’s for sure. My money’s on you, instead of Ada, at the next county fair.”
She struggled to make the connection.
“The pig-calling contest,” he explained. “You pack a mean set of lungs for such a little thing.”
His chuckle rumbled pleasantly against her ear. She managed a shaky smile, surprised to realize her trembling had stopped. Dangerous. She was too warm, too content, too willing to stay in his arms indefinitely. This time when she pushed away, he let her go.
She lay back and pulled the quilt to her chin, uncertain how their relationship had changed, sure only that it had.
“I guess I should thank you,” she finally said.
“No need. I didn’t want you to wake Dad.” He sprang up as if released from an unpleasant duty and headed for the door. Halfway there, he paused and looked over his shoulder. “You gonna be okay?”
“I’ll be fine.”
He didn’t linger to make sure.
Margaret stared at the closed door in bemusement. Normally it took her several hours to recover from the dream. Never in her lifetime would she have expected Scott Hayes to speed the process. She almost wished he hadn’t. His compassion increased his virility by a thousandfold. As her horror had receded, every nerve ending in her body had tingled with awareness.
Funny. She’d never been as physically conscious of Matt, although she’d planned to marry him. He’d been a handsome young veterinary student working the summer at Riverbend when they’d met. She’d craved his unconditional love, so different from her parents’ embarrassed tolerance, but never his touch.
Nor had Jim ever caused this distressing reaction. She’d found him attractive, but that was secondary to the opportunity he’d offered—the chance to start a new life unfettered by guilt or her father’s censure. If truth were told, the physical side of her marriage had been disappointing. All those disconcerting noises, all that sweaty skin…
…that tanned, sweaty skin. An image of Scott as he’d looked the day before mocked her thoughts.
Far from distasteful, Scott’s glistening torso had fascinated her. When he’d reached up and held Twister’s bridle, his biceps had bunched and the corded sinew of his forearms flexed. Leather work gloves only emphasized his hard muscles, the kind earned through strenuous physical labor, not honed and perfected in a gym.
Blinking, Margaret shook off both the vision and her sappy smile. She yawned and stretched. The first blush of dawn tinged the lace curtains. Shadows solidified into an armoire, a scarred dresser and silver-spotted mirror. Margaret fingered the Wedding Ring quilt beneath her chin and admired the workmanship.
Scott was right. Everything on this ranch had been made or purchased to last through generations of hard wear. The sense of permanency charmed her, challenged her to be just as strong, just as capable of earning her keep.
Muffled kitchen sounds told her Scott was starting the first pot of coffee. Grant would be up soon. What could she make for breakfast that would be appetizing, as well as low in fat?
Cereal. That she could handle.
Throwing back the covers, she indulged in one last joint-popping stretch. Anticipation spread like caffeine through her blood, vanquishing fatigue. There was a long, exhausting day ahead of her. She couldn’t wait to get started.
THREE HOURS LATER Margaret’s enthusiasm had faded considerably. “Hold still, darn it!”
Twister swished his tail, jerking the currycomb from her hand—but not from a nasty snarl. He swished again, avoiding her frantic grab. His third, violent swish sent the heavy metal comb rocketing into the back plank wall like a deadly missile.
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Jan Freed
HOME ON THE RANCH"Jan Freed writes with spice and flair! An exciting new voice in contemporary romance." – bestselling author Susan WiggsThe H&H Cattle Company, near Gonzales, TexasScott Hayes–He's the owner. Scott's a hardworking cattleman who's got a reputation with the ladies. Not that he has any time for womanizing these days. Fact is, Scott's putting in twenty-hour stretches, now that H&H is down to one hired hand. And the word around these parts is that H&H is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy.Margaret Winston–When Scott calls her a princess, he doesn't mean it as a compliment! Still, Maggie has a few choice names for Scott, none of them pretty. That's because Maggie knows Scott from the old days and there's bad blood–and a good horse–between them.HOME ON THE RANCH
Table of Contents
Cover Page (#u70c083bd-c4f0-5bd0-a618-193385a0c2e5)
Excerpt (#ubffe4c71-be3d-5369-8407-7a16d7e8aaf2)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR (#ud3ffd19c-e474-5f3c-adbc-13603110de7a)
Title Page (#u30bbd3a2-4e62-5c0b-83d7-ada1414951b5)
Dedication (#u4d2f66b6-b4df-542b-96b6-e5c3bc7317e4)
CHAPTER ONE (#u6100e6a3-f395-51a5-9a7c-969b7790e7f2)
CHAPTER TWO (#ubdcc3af6-2bd2-57ba-9a22-2a3405bc13fa)
CHAPTER THREE (#ufd6fb1f7-3983-5c8d-bc2d-d255183c4ed1)
CHAPTER FOUR (#u58ef600b-4cfb-5aaf-8b05-ac7835fd8584)
CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
“Easy, handsome. Don’t be afraid. How’d you like to go for a ride?”
Tightening her fist in the stallion’s mane, Margaret gathered her muscles into vault position, then gasped.
Cold metal—round, hollow and unmistakably lethal—pressed into her neck. “Don’t listen to her, Twister,” a deep voice drawled from behind. “Takin’ a ride with Maggie here can kill a guy.”
Blood rushed to her face in a sickening wave of guilt. “You,” she whispered.
“Yeah, me. The owner of the land you’re tresspassin’ on.” The pressure on her neck eased, replaced by the sliding caress of a gun barrel. “All grown up now, are you? Let’s take a look. Turn around, Maggie.”
Schooling her features into a cool mask, she turned. “Don’t call me Maggie.”
“Seems to me I can call you any name I want. And right this minute, ‘Maggie’ is the nicest one that comes to mind.”
Nothing had changed, she realized. He would never forget…or forgive.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR (#ulink_2f0c6cf5-e438-5dc6-89c7-265e8aa2c2c6)
After years of writing advertising copy, Jan Freed decided that if she could make washing machines sound glamorous, creating likable characters should be a breeze. Jan’s second book combines her pride in the indomitable spirit of Texans with her lifelong love of horses. “Cowboys and the Arabian breed share a mythical appeal that makes for great romance—pairing the two was a natural choice.”
Jan lives in Texas (of course!) with her husband and two children. She’d love to hear from readers and invites you to write to her at: P.O. Box 5009-272, Sugarland, Texas, 77487.
The Texas Way
Jan Freed
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Mica Kelch and Marian May, sisters in madness and valued friends. And to Jenny Hiller, blood sister and my truest fan. Thanks for the advice and support, buds!
Special thanks to Sharon and Xavier Moreau, owners of Bloodstock International, Inc., for sharing their knowledge of the Arabian horse industry. Any errors are accidental and entirely my fault.
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_ade703be-c370-5950-910b-c6af72c46825)
MARGARET CHELSEA WINSTON crouched behind a clump of cacti, peeked over one spiny rim and forgot to breathe.
Moonlight leeched all color from the red clay and yellowed grass. Only light and dark contrasts remained. At the center of this ghostly vista stood a commanding figure, the embodiment of proud male arrogance—a shimmering gray stallion.
Twist of Fate, she’d named him six years ago, hoping she wasn’t overestimating his potential, praying he’d really beaten the genetic odds. He had. His magnificence surpassed her girlish dreams. He was one of the finest Arabians in the world.
Gripped with excitement, she rose and stood tall, giving him time to study her as thoroughly as she had him. Earthy smells nettled her nose. Coyotes yipped in the distance, two, maybe three miles away. Sound carried far in this part of Texas.
He stared back across the stark landscape, his dark gaze asking, Who watches me in the night?
A friend, she answered, not questioning their silent communication. She’d long ago accepted her uncanny rapport with animals as compensation for the skills she lacked.
After learning the stallion still lived in this area, she’d planned on sneaking a glimpse, then slipping away unseen. But nothing had prepared her for the ambition and resentment he awakened—the burning need to reclaim him.
She walked to the fence and slipped between the strands of barbed wire. “Hey, handsome. What’s a fella like you doing in a place like this?”
She kept her voice soothing, knowing he understood her tone if not the words. Ears pricked forward, he blew short and hard through flared nostrils. A fluttering snort would have indicated fear. She smiled.
“Curious, huh? I came to get reacquainted, that’s all.”
Her initial impression had been correct. Strong topline, wide airway, compact proportions. Perfect. Her mind whirled with possibilities. She forced her thoughts to focus, her movements to remain fluid.
Holding his alert gaze, she walked the last few feet and stood nose to muzzle. “Don’t run out on me, okay, handsome? I could use a little company right now. Things’ve been…” Lousy. Miserable.
Normal.
The insidious emotions struck out of nowhere, stinging her eyes and swelling her throat. Damn, damn, damn! So what if she’d never felt more alone in all her twenty-six years? She’d made the right decision, and by God she would prove it. Her new life wouldn’t tolerate weakness. She wouldn’t tolerate weakness in herself, not ever again.
Warm breath blasted her face, jolting her back to the present.
Here is my special smell, his action said. If you trust it, we might be friends.
She stared at the chiseled muzzle only inches away. How many years had passed since she’d been offered simple, innocent friendship? Too many, judging by her fierce desire to hug the stallion’s neck. Suppressing the urge, she responded to his overture in horse language and blew gently into his nostrils.
When he lowered his head, she laughed in delight. “I like you, too.”
She squeezed a portion of silver mane between her thumb and forefinger, then rubbed the strands together. The simulated grooming action of equine teeth demonstrated her friendliness. More so than if she’d stroked him in the usual way.
Working her fingers up and down the mane, she frowned. His thick gray coat, shaggy fetlocks and furry ears hadn’t felt the buzz of clipping shears in months. Trust a cowboy to let an animal of this caliber winter in the open like a second-string range pony. No warm stable for this beauty, oh, no. After all, that wouldn’t be the Texas way of doing things. Lord knew this stallion’s owner hated “pampered creatures.” She ought to know. Memory of the tall rancher’s contempt narrowed her eyes. “He ought to be horsewhipped, pardon the expression.”
Finger-nibbling her way across the stallion’s shoulder and ribs, she noted plenty of lean muscle but no bony protrusions. In all fairness, he appeared to be well fed and in excellent health.
Some experts considered rough terrain ideal training conditions. If true, she’d be that much ahead of the game. What she wouldn’t give to put him through his paces!
Gauging the height of his withers, she glanced up at the full moon, then down at the illuminated ground. Temptation won over caution. She reached up and grasped a handful of mane.
The stallion suddenly tensed, lifted his head and shifted to the right. Margaret sidestepped his clattering hooves.
“Easy, handsome. Don’t be afraid. How’d you like to go for a little ride?” Tightening her fist, she gathered her muscles into vault position and gasped.
Cold metal—round, hollow and unmistakably lethal—pressed into her neck.
“Don’t listen to her, Twister,” a deep voice drawled from behind. “Takin’ a ride with Maggie here can kill a guy.”
Blood rushed to her face in a sickening wave of guilt. She dropped her forehead against the stallion’s hide, inhaling the pungent scent of warm animal and dried sweat. The gun followed her movement.
“You,” she whispered.
“Yeah, me. The owner of the land you’re trespas-sin’ on. Next time you try stealin’ a horse, Maggie, don’t park so close to the main gate. That Porsche is a little conspicuous.”
“I wasn’t stealing…Twister, is that what you called him? I only wanted to see what he could do.”
His mocking laugh set her teeth on edge.
“Maggie, darlin’, the minute your fanny hit his back you’d be on your way to Mars. Beats the hell outta me how you ever got this close.” Honest puzzlement tinged his voice.
Her head jerked up. “Don’t call me Maggie.”
The pressure against her neck increased. “Well now, seems to me I can call you any name I want. And right this minute, Maggie is the nicest one that comes to mind.”
Nothing had changed. He would never forget—-or forgive. She released the stallion’s mane and straightened her shoulders.
“Put the gun down, please. I’m not going to do anything foolish.”
The pressure eased, replaced by the sliding caress of a gun barrel. “All grown up now, are you? Let’s take a look. Turn around.”
Margaret’s heart slammed against her ribs. Her entire future depended on the mercy of this man, as it had once before. She was damned if she’d wimp out this time.
Schooling her features into a cool mask, she slowly turned.
Scott Hayes lifted pistol point to Stetson brim and nudged upward. His eyes gleamed colorless and flat in the moon’s glow, but she knew they were lion gold and insolent as a cat’s. His gaze roved over her body now with the calculated intention of rattling her composure.
But contrary to his sarcasm, she had grown up. So she ignored her erratic pulse and conducted her own slow inspection. He was taller than she remembered, around six foot two perhaps. Or maybe it was just that damned hat he wore. At midnight, for Pete’s sake. In the few times she’d seen him, she’d never laid eyes on his hair—other than the brownish waves breaking over his shirt collar. Maybe he was hiding a bald spot.
She smiled at the malicious thought.
He crossed his arms and cocked one knee, the action drawing attention to his rangy legs, lean hips and impossibly wide shoulders.
“Mind tellin’ me what’s so funny?”
Her smile faded. She looked him in the eye. “Yes. I do mind.”
Surprise flickered across his bold features. She sensed a new awareness in him, a reassessing of her will, and drew strength from having knocked the cocksure look off his face.
He’d filled out in six years, but then, Texas ranching bred muscular men. To add to Scott’s physical workload, H & H Cattle Company was down to one hired hand. Or so she’d heard. Word was the business teetered on the edge of bankruptcy. She hoped to God that was true.
Scott jammed the gunpoint down behind his belt, against the tight denim molding everything it touched. His gun wasn’t loaded, she realized. He wouldn’t risk damaging his precious…jeans.
Cheeks burning, she jerked her gaze up.
His cocky smirk was back, along with a disturbing new gleam in his eyes. “You keep lookin’ at me like that, and I’m gonna think that husband of yours doesn’t know how to keep you hap—” His eyes widened.
She started to turn. Twister’s bared teeth caught her ponytail just as Scott’s strong hands gripped her shoulders and pulled. Margaret rebounded in the circle of his arms like a bungee cord.
“Dammit, Maggie! What the hell are you doin’ messin’ with this stud? He’s mean as a javelina hog around everyone but me.”
When his arms pulled her close, a strange sense of safety clouded her brain. Nose, chest, stomach and thigh pressed against Scott Hayes, she groped for concentration.
“Twister eats little girls like you for breakfast. If I hadn’t grabbed you when I did, he woulda torn this pretty blond scalp of yours clean off.”
His touch was so light, at first she didn’t notice. Once she did, every hair follicle stood at attention.
“What were you thinkin’ of, tryin’ to ride that son of a bitch? At night. Bareback, no less.”
Some of Scott’s contempt filtered through Margaret’s fog.
“Damned stupid, Maggie. Don’t you have the sense God gave a goose?”
His barbed insult hit bull’s-eye this time. For a moment she quivered under the impact. A lifetime of similar taunts echoed in her mind.
Melissa can read, Margaret, and she’s two years younger than you…I’m afraid Margaret just doesn’t apply herself, Mrs. Winston…That was a very important call, Margaret. Can’t you even write down a simple phone number?…For heaven’s sake Margaret, how could you be so stupid-stupid-stupid-stupid….
“Margaret? Margaret?” Scott gave her a shake.
She blinked twice, looked up and bumped her head against his jaw.
“Ow!” they both yelled. Breaking apart like boxers from a clench, they faced off and took each other’s measure.
Feeling puny by comparison, Margaret glared. Behind her, Twister cropped grass. She jerked a thumb at the horse.
“Does that look like a violent animal to you? For your information, Twister was trying to groom me, not bite me. He was showing his trust. If you hadn’t interfered, everything would have been fine.” She arched an eyebrow. “Of course, breaking up relationships is what you do best, isn’t it?”
Lit by moonlight, his dusky complexion darkened in embarrassment. Or anger. She didn’t care which. That she’d struck a nerve at all filled her with triumph.
He tugged down his hat brim and shrugged. “I protect what needs protecting. Call it what you want.”
“I call it betrayal,” she said, abandoning all pretense of talking about the present. “I’ve spent every day since the car accident paying for my mistake, Scott. But you betrayed me. Worse, you betrayed your best friend. And my father rewarded you for it. He had no right—” She stopped, hating the quaver in her voice.
Donald Winston’s action didn’t bear thinking about. She’d concentrate on one betrayal at a time. “It’s taken six years, Scott, but you’re finally going to pay me what’s due.”
His mouth thinned. “And what’s that?”
She took a deep breath. “Twister.”
He ripped off his hat and slapped it against his thigh. “Like hell!”
Twister’s head swept up. His tail lifted high. He exploded from a complete standstill to a full-stretch gallop in the time it took her to blink. Mesmerized, she watched him float over the uneven ground toward the far end of the field. She could no more control her elated smile than stop her heart from soaring. Man, could that horse run!
“I want him back, Scott.” Turning, she caught him staring not at Twister, but at her.
“Forget it. Twister belongs to me. I’ve got the papers to prove it.” End of discussion, his expression said.
She lifted her nose. “Papers Daddy transferred to your name without my knowledge. I never would’ve let Riverbend Arabian Farm give up that foal. You knew that when you accepted him. That’s why you accepted him.” Suppressed hurt welled to the surface. Why did she still care?
“Don’t flatter yourself. Only a fool would’ve turned him down. He’s a valuable animal. Special.”
“Oh, right. He’s so valuable you don’t care if he breaks his leg in a gopher hole or cuts himself on barbed wire or throws a shoe and pulls up lame. It could happen out here and you wouldn’t even know it.” Her disdainful gaze swept the rock-strewn pasture. “If this is how you treat ‘special’ animals, I shudder to think about your poor cattle.”
Scott laughed unexpectedly, the moonlight glinting off his straight, white teeth. “Lower your nose, princess. I’ll have you know every one of my Santa Ger-trudis has a pedigree longer than yours. I treat ‘em same’s I do Twister. Feed ‘em. Doctor ‘em when they’re sick. And pretty much let ‘em do what God intended.”
Settling the Stetson low on his forehead, he sobered abruptly. “Pamperin’ my stock would be downright cruel. They’d die come the first summer drought or winter storm.” He squinted at a nearby cactus, at the moon and, finally, at her. “It takes a special breed to survive this land. But it’s got nothin’ to do with bloodlines. You have any idea what I’m sayin’, Maggie?”
His eyes glittered with sudden intensity, as if her answer were somehow important.
She knew what he meant all right. He thought her weak and spoiled and worthless. Trouble was, so had she for too many long, miserable years.
Averting her eyes, she hugged her stomach and focused on Twister, now grazing in the distance. “I understand your hay may not last much longer. And your credit’s maxed out at Luling Feed and Hardware. And you could really use some cash right now.”
She risked a glance at Scott and wished she hadn’t.
“Spit it out,” he said as if he’d like to spit on her.
“I want to make a deal with you for Twister.”
In answer, he turned and headed for the fence line, his boots crunching hard and determined on the ground. “Go home, Maggie,” he called over his shoulder.
Home? She watched his bobbing hat grow smaller and felt alone. So alone. “Hey, wait!”
Even running, it took her several moments to reach his side. “Why won’t you listen?” she managed breathlessly, hop-skipping every other step to keep up. “I’ll treat him like he deserves. He’s being totally wasted out here. H & H Cattle Company doesn’t need him, but I do.”
They’d reached the barbed-wire fence. Resting a forearm on the top strand, Scott tilted up his hat brim. Silvery light flooded his face.
Margaret took a half step back, as if she’d caught a snarling predator in her flashlight beam.
“You need him?” His sardonic stare traveled over her Italian half boots, designer jeans and lambskin jacket. Their gazes clashed and held. “Run out of toys to play with? That lawyer husband of yours spending too much time in court maybe?” His upper lip curled. “Too bad, Maggie. There are lots of other horses. You’ve got lots of money. Find another stallion to need.”
Having tried, judged and convicted her, he resettled his hat, pressed down on the wire and prepared to cross.
Margaret had spent a lifetime following everyone’s wishes but her own. Just this once, for something this important, someone would listen to her. Fury fueled her reflexes. She rushed forward and slapped down his arcing leg.
“Just a minute, buster! Think you’ve got me pegged? Think you know everything? You know nothing. Nothing, do you hear? I spent two years researching bloodlines before selecting Twister’s Polish sire. I agonized waiting for Aladdin’s Girl to be shipped home. I dreamed of her producing the perfect equine athlete, a foundation stud for the most elite line of Arabians in the world. And she did it! I did it. But you—” she grabbed two fistfuls of shirt “—have the supreme gall to deprive breeders of that line. And why?”
She leaned forward until her forehead grazed his hat brim. “Because you think I’m rich. Because you think I’m a bored housewife looking for thrills. Because you hate my guts.”
“Mag—”
“Well, I’ve got news for you, Scott Hayes. I have no money. I have no husband. And I hate your guts right back. You’re a selfish, judgmental jerk, and you’ve ruined my life for the last time!” Her chest rose and fell in labored breaths.
“You have no husband?”
She stood close enough to count his eyelashes. Obscenely thick, they couldn’t hide the stunned expression in his eyes. Her anger drained, leaving her feeling oddly at peace. She’d finally stood up for herself.
Realizing her hands still gripped his shirtfront, she relaxed her hold and smoothed the wrinkled cotton with self-conscious, outward swipes. Her fingers landed on rounded biceps, fluttered, then settled in the crook of his arm. The man was made of rock.
In the bright moonlight his throat looked strong, his chin square and stubborn. Fascinated, she stared at the dark stubble shadowing his jaw. Her ex-husband, Jim, had shaved faithfully every morning, but more from routine than necessity. Did a heavy beard feel different?
As if sensing her sudden impulse, Scott stepped back out of reach. “Okay, Maggie. We’ll hash this thing out. But we’ll damn well do it on my terms, not when I’m tired and mad and…hungry.” There was a distinctly sensual growl in his voice.
Her gaze flew to his. What had gotten into her responding to his nearness like that? He was Gonzales County’s reigning Lothario, and her enemy to boot.
His expression hardened. “Be at my back door by eight tomorrow. You’re one minute late, we don’t talk. Understand?”
“I understand.”
He nodded, pressed down on the top fence strand and crossed over with practiced ease. She waited for him to turn and offer assistance. He walked on without a backward glance, his broad shoulders disappearing behind a stand of mesquite trees.
She understood all right. Perfectly.
BY SEVEN the next morning, Scott had finished his barn chores and moved on to kitchen duty. Closing the refrigerator door with one hip, he ignored the rattle of jars and bottles inside. He knew exactly how much pressure the old appliance could take before its guts spilled. The Cokes were safe.
He poured Eggbeaters into a bowl, whipped them to a froth and set them aside. Turkey bacon popped and sizzled in the skillet almost like the real thing. Inhaling its dubious scent, he hoped the stuff would tempt his father’s appetite. Grant Hayes’s recent heart surgery had taken off another five pounds. Pounds he couldn’t afford to lose, together with the weight he’d already burned off from pure worry.
Dragging a hand down his jaw, Scott glanced at the clock above the stove. No time to shave. Margaret—Maggie, he corrected with a fleeting grin—would be here soon. He wanted Dad fed and out of the house by then.
His performing the cooking tasks by rote allowed his mind to dwell on the astounding events of last night. He still couldn’t believe it. Margaret Chelsea Winston—model of propriety and good breeding—sneaking into his field like a common horse thief! Last he’d heard, she was married to some hotshot Dallas lawyer and was living the Junior League life. No surprise there. Her sass, though, had clipped him on the chin when he wasn’t looking.
The Margaret he’d known would never have ranted till he actually doubted his own judgment. She would’ve lifted her oh-so-proper nose and given him her patented look. The one that said, “I don’t talk to pond scum.” The one that made him feel uncouth and awkward. The one that made him call her Maggie, knowing she hated the unsophisticated nickname.
Yet last night, for the first time, she’d seemed like a Maggie. Human. Approachable. Her passion for Twister was the genuine article, Scott admitted. Nothing else could explain her foolish attempt to ride the devil. He’d damn near had a heart attack when the stallion had gone for her head!
Forget all that crap about grooming. This was the same horse who’d taken a big enough chunk out of Pete’s butt to make the wrangler sit crooked the rest of his days. And she was such a little thing. Fragile as those porcelain doodads his mother had loved. Nestled against his body, Margaret had barely reached his chin.
Memory seared a path straight to his groin. She might be small, but there was nothing childish about her body. Lord, but she’d felt good in his arms. Really good.
She got under Matt’s skin too, buzzard brain, and look what happened.
Scott shook off his thoughts and stared. Two plates loaded with scrambled eggs, bacon and dry toast steamed on the counter. The chipped Formica table was set for two, the juice glasses already filled. This evidence of his total absorption with Maggie scared him more than any mental talking-to could.
She’d dredged up a muck of feelings better left buried. He would listen to what she had to say, then boot her out of his kitchen—and his life.
“Breakfast!” he called, setting the plates on the table and scraping back his chair.
A door squeaked open. Boots clumped down the planked hall. Grant filled the doorway, his graying auburn hair mere inches from the frame. Faded jeans sagged at his waist; a once-tight shirt puckered at his shoulders and stomach. He seemed thinner and older than the last time Scott had paused long enough to look.
Testing the air like a coon hound, Grant cast a cautious look at the table. “Thanks, son. Looks good.”
Liar. Scott forced a quick smile. “Eat up then. I’m tired of looking fat compared to you. Bad for my ego.”
Grinning, Grant strode to the table and sat down. “The day your ego suffers, I’ll eat a carton of ice cream to celebrate. Seems to me your sister made a similar promise not long ago, something about…flowers, was it?”
Regretting he’d ever told his dad that story, Scott grunted and dug into his eggs. Laura’s exact phrase had vibrated with frustration. Someday a woman is going to bring you to your knees, Scott Hayes. And when she does, I’ll send her a dozen roses.
His mouth twitched at the thought of poor Alec. Laura had cut him off at the kneecaps, but Scott knew his brother-in-law had dropped willingly.
Too soon, Grant put his fork down and made a show of patting his stomach. “What are your plans today?”
Scott eyed his father’s half-filled plate and scowled. “The windmill up on the red hill is jammed. Pete said it looks like a tree branch. Shouldn’t take more than an hour to fix, so I thought I’d ride the north fence line while I’m at it.”
“Good idea. I could start at the county road and meet—”
“Dad.”
Grant tightened his mouth and glared out the small window above the sink. His strong, callused fingers clenched once, then relaxed. When he turned to Scott, his leaf green eyes were calm and resigned.
“If you’re not using the truck, maybe I’ll take a look at the carburetor. The ol’ girl could probably use an oil change, too.”
Scott swallowed hard. Physical weakness demoralized a man of Grant’s former vigor. “Yeah, Dad, that’d be great. If I’m not back by lunch, there’s still some of Ellen’s casserole in the fridge.”
His father’s pained groan made him grin. The vacuous widow’s visits strained even Grant Hayes’s good manners.
The sound of an engine’s purr turned both their heads. Scott’s stomach flip-flopped, a sensation he hadn’t felt since his teens. He pushed back his chair, carried plates to the sink and began rinsing. Through the window, he watched a sleek red Porsche crawl up the graveled drive.
His father’s mildly questioning glance suddenly deepened. “Expecting someone?”
“Margaret Winston. Remember her?” Scott forced a nonchalance he didn’t feel.
“B’lieve the name rings a bell.” Grant’s wry tone said he remembered enough.
A thousand questions hung in the air. That they remained unasked was a measure of their mutual respect.
“She wants to buy Twister,” Scott confessed. Not for a minute had he believed that crock about her having no money. Drying his hands on a dish towel, he turned and met his father’s eyes. “I’m just listening out of courtesy.”
Grant’s expression eased. “Don’t do anything rash.” He rose and clasped Scott’s shoulder. “I’d sell Bandolero before I’d let you give up Twister.”
The prize bull was one of the few ranch assets left with a hefty market value. Scott reached up and squeezed his father’s forearm. “It won’t come to that.”
A car door slammed. Gravel crunched.
“I’ll get out of your way,” Grant said, giving Scott an odd look.
The screen door twanged open. Knuckles rapped on the door.
“Why don’t I get that?” Grant suggested, his green eyes twinkling now.
Scott heard his father introduce himself and exchange pleasantries, then excuse himself to work on the truck. He heard the screen door whack. But he saw only Margaret.
If he’d entertained any doubts about where she belonged, he now knew with certainty it wasn’t in his kitchen.
She stood like a calla lily on the dingy white linoleum. Graceful. Delicate. Lovely in the way of women blessed with classic bone structure, rather than voluptuous curves. Her soft gray sweater and matching slacks complemented eyes the color of smoke, skin fine as bone china, hair glinting gold in the sunbeam streaming through the door.
Last night, he’d thought she must look her best in moonlight. He wished to hell he’d been right.
She squinted at the clock a long moment, then smiled hesitantly. “Right on time…aren’t I?”
He checked the clock. Eight o’clock on the money. Apparently her vanity wouldn’t permit wearing glasses.
He nodded toward the table. “Sit down.”
She glanced at the rickety dinette, and Scott imagined her inner shudder. He hadn’t even swiped it down after the meal. But she pulled out a cracked vinyl chair and sat with nary a blink.
“Thank you.” She waved a graceful hand at the opposite chair. “Please, you sit down, too.”
As usual, the more graciously she behaved, the ruder he felt. He might as well act the part.
Plucking his Stetson off the refrigerator, Scott jammed it low. He flipped around the chair nearest her and dropped into a straddle. “So talk.”
“I’m prepared to offer you five thousand dollars for Twist of Fate…for Twister. Cash on delivery.”
So much for preliminaries. He stacked his fists on the chair back and planted his chin. “That’s a lot of money for someone who has no money,” he drawled, waiting for her blush to peak before continuing. “But it’s not a fraction of what he’s worth.”
“Not if he was a show-ring champion. But Twister’s never been campaigned. Never sired any proven get.”
“Campaigned? Proven? We’re talking about a stallion, here, not a damn politician. Twister’s got nothin’ to prove as far as I’m concerned.”
“Wasting his potential is criminal! And stupendously selfish. And…and just plain ignorant! You don’t deserve to own him.”
There was that passion again. So unlike the girl he’d known. So intense he couldn’t take his eyes off her. He dropped his voice a husky note. “So make me an offer I can’t refuse, Maggie.”
Color splashed her cheeks. “I don’t have any more money, damn you. I don’t have a home. I don’t even own that Porsche out there. The lease expires next week.”
He frowned, feeling a niggle of unease. “Your husband?”
“We’ve been divorced a month.”
He raised his eyebrows. “No settlement money?”
“The prenuptial agreement was airtight. He was a lawyer, after all.”
She said it matter-of-factly, as if signing such agreements before pledging to honor and love your life mate was normal. He supposed in her privileged world, that was true.
“There’s always Daddy,” he said, his voice cynical. Donald Winston spared no expense when it came to his precious daughter. And his pockets were very deep.
Her mouth clamped shut. Her color heightened. She drew a cloak of dignity around her narrow shoulders.
“I’ll be damned. The old man cut you off.”
With sudden clarity, Scott remembered just how far her father would go to teach Margaret a lesson. Questions whirled like dust devils in his mind. He snatched at the nearest one.
“What’ll you do now?”
She gave a humorless laugh and stared at her clasped fingers. Scott doubted if those creamy, manicured hands had done more than dial a phone in the past six years. With grudging admiration, he watched her trembling lips firm, her spine stiffen and her chin lift. She met his eyes squarely.
“Give me a job.”
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_134885fb-7b8c-5c90-a6fb-b977a682e037)
MARGARET FELT her courage falter, smothered beneath Scott’s heavy silence. The electric hum of the ancient refrigerator mingled with the dull roar of blood in her ears. She took a deep breath. Big mistake. Musty house and strange breakfast odors wreaked havoc on her nervous stomach.
“Come again?” Scott finally asked, his amusement insulting.
“If you won’t sell Twister, hire me to train him. I guarantee within six months he’ll pump cash back into H & H Cattle Company. He’ll bring in a bundle standing at stud.”
“It takes years of training to bring a horse up to national competition level. Even I know that. H & H Cattle Company doesn’t have years,” he admitted grimly.
“You’re thinking in terms of show-ring competition. That’s not what I have in mind.” The excitement she’d nurtured for weeks bubbled in her voice.
“Wanna let me in on your secret?”
“Twister has the makings of a champion racehorse.”
“Racehorse?” Scott’s incredulous stare grew pitying. “He’s six years old—over the hill by at least two years. Besides, Thoroughbreds race, not Arabians.”
“Oh, but you’re wrong. Arabian racing is well established in Europe and the Middle East. It’s a hot trend in the States now. Not only that, an Arabian’s prime racing years begin at age five.” She paused, savoring his dazed expression. “But that’s not the best part.”
“No?”
She shook her head. “The best part is, breeders are clamoring for a particular type of Arabian. One with a conformation suited to running, rather than class performance. One that is relatively rare right now and therefore brings top stud fees. There’s a huge demand now for an Arabian like Twister.”
Unable to contain herself any longer, she broke into a huge smile. “And we have a lock on the supply!”
“We have a lock on the supply?” Scott lifted one tawny brow to meet his hat band. Rising, he hooked a chair leg with his boot and slung the seat around. “I don’t recall selling you any portion of my racehorse, Maggie.”
She looked up into eyes the color of scotch whiskey—and lost both her smile and her capacity to speak. His lazy, masculine confidence had always twisted her up inside. But she couldn’t let him intimidate her now. She had too much to lose.
As if he read her mind, his mouth quirked upward. He shoved his chair under the table and sauntered toward an aluminum percolator plugged into an outlet near the sink. Helpless to stop herself, she watched the rolling action of his lean hips and tight butt.
Jim hadn’t walked like that. Neither had Matt. The truth was, no other man in her civilized experience had ever moved with quite the same feline grace and male swagger as this tall cowboy.
Opening a painted cabinet door of indeterminate color, he pulled down two mismatched ceramic mugs and looked back over one shoulder.
Caught admiring the broad stretch of his faded blue shirt, Margaret froze. He held her gaze, his own smoldering beneath sooty lashes.
“How do you like your coffee?”
He might have been asking how she liked her sex, so intimate was his tone. Margaret had never hated her fair complexion more.
“I don’t drink coffee, thank you.” Even to her own ears, she sounded priggish.
Shrugging, he filled his mug, turned and propped a negligent hip against the counter. “I think this farce has gone on long enough, don’t you?”
“Farce?”
“This fairy tale about Twister racing. I’ll give you credit for trying. But you of all people should know I can’t give you a job.” He took a leisurely sip of coffee, his eyes watchful behind tendrils of steam.
She stiffened. “Can’t? Or won’t?”
He lowered the mug. Those eyes were glittering dangerously now. His dark stubbled jaw clenched and unclenched. “Need a refresher course, Maggie? Okay. My hay won’t last, my credit’s maxed out, and I could really use some cash right now—you seemed to grasp the situation clearly enough last night. So what makes you think I can afford to pay you a salary today?”
Her stomach roiling, Margaret picked a nonexistent piece of lint from her cashmere sleeve.
“Run on home to Daddy while you still can, Maggie. You’d be plain stupid not to.”
Margaret’s chin came up. She skipped angry and went straight to livid. “Don’t call me Maggie. And don’t call me stupid.”
She jumped up and stalked to within an arm’s length of his slouching form. “Who said anything about a salary, Einstein? I’m interested in a joint venture. My expertise and seed money in exchange for fifty percent ownership of Twister, plus room and board.”
Scott set his mug down with a snort. “Dream on, princess. Twister is mine and that’s that. Besides, he’s half-wild. What makes you think he’ll even respond to you?”
It was Margaret’s turn to snort. “He’ll respond.”
On sure ground at last, she dismissed his skepticism and prowled the room. “I’ll take care of insurance, feed, farrier, veterinary and transportation costs for the first five months. With creative management, five thousand dollars ought to just about cover it. After Twister wins the Armand Hammer Classic in August, we’ll split the bills fifty-fifty.” She slanted him a challenging look. “And, of course, the profits, too.”
Scott straightened, forcing her to tilt her head back. His thick brows drew together into a daunting V. “What profits are we talking about here? A couple of grand a month in stud fees? That’d be nice, but hardly enough to pay the note due on H & H Cattle Company.” His features hardened. “Frankly, putting up with you isn’t worth it.”
My life in a nutshell, cowboy. Her throat constricting, she examined one smooth coral fingernail with forced indifference. When she could safely speak again, Margaret met his gaze.
“The Armand Hammer Classic offers a fifty-thousand-dollar purse. Top racing sires command stud fees of up to five thousand dollars a mare. By conservative estimates, Twister could earn over a half-million dollars a year for the next ten years. Would that be worth putting up with me?”
His slack-jawed surprise did wonders for her bruised ego. Thankful she’d done her research, she played her ace. “If you won’t do it for yourself, think of your father. With that kind of working capital, you could hire all the hands you need, make a big dent in his medical bills.”
Muttering a foul word, he spun around to brace both palms on the lip of the rusted sink and stare out the window. She followed his gaze. For once, fate was on her side.
Blurred by the dirty glass panes, Grant Hayes stood outside the barn wiping his fingers on a faded red cloth. Pausing, he lifted the rag with trembling fingers to his forehead and blotted twice before continuing his listless cleaning. If she hadn’t heard about his triple-bypass surgery, she would have suspected worse. He looked pale and exhausted.
Watching Scott’s chin drop and his knuckles whiten, Margaret felt her satisfaction slink away in shame. If anyone understood the sickening helplessness of emotional blackmail, she did. She’d had no right to bring his ailing father into their battle.
Scott slowly raised his head and spoke without turning. “All right, Maggie, you win. But I swear to God, before we’re through you’ll wish you hadn’t.”
TWENTY-FOUR HOURS LATER, Margaret parked just outside H & H Cattle Company’s gate and listened to the powerful engine idle. This was it. Her chance for independence and the fulfillment of a dream she’d cherished since first becoming enchanted with Arabians as a teenager. Scott’s agreement to a joint-venture partnership yesterday could establish her as a top breeder and trainer, a woman to be respected, instead of ridiculed. A woman who didn’t need a man to survive.
True, she was dependent on Scott now. But then, he was equally dependent on her. With luck, they’d separate in less than six months in a position to pursue their individual goals and change their lives. Money had that power, she’d learned early in life. Her father made sure she never forgot it.
Morning sunlight winked off the eighteen-karat-gold initial key ring her parents had presented—along with a flashy silver Corvette—for her sixteenth birthday. A reward, she recalled wryly, for winning four blue ribbons in a class “A” horse show.
After years of disappointing them with poor grades, botched recitals and social faux pas, she’d been pathetically happy at the proud smiles on their faces. Her riding instructor had mentioned that with a finer horse, Margaret had the potential to become a national champion. Donald Winston’s eyes had gleamed at the prospect.
Margaret dropped her forehead against the steering wheel and succumbed to bittersweet memories of the Arabian horse farm her father had established adjacent to Scott’s ranch. Riverbend. In many ways, her life had begun—and ended—at the prosperous breeding and training facility.
She’d spent five summers and many holidays there under the tutelage of Liz Howarth, Riverbend’s manager and a former member of the U.S. Olympic equestrian team. Yet Liz’s lessons had been a joy. Her instructions had been easily understood. Wonder of wonders, her teaching hadn’t been hindered by her student’s dyslexia.
Margaret squeezed her eyes shut, remembering the incalculable frustration and humiliation her impairment had caused throughout her childhood. The exclusive girls’ boarding schools she’d attended had been staffed to train future matrons of society, not detect learning disabilities. She’d often wondered why she advanced to the next grade each year. Later, she’d learned her father was a most generous benefactor of each school she attended.
Heaven bless Miss Jenkins. The seventh-grade English teacher had possessed the perception and integrity to insist Margaret be tested by a specialist. Donald and Gloria had first denied, then been embarrassed by, their daughter’s problem. But Margaret had received the news with profound gratitude.
She wasn’t stupid. She wasn’t! There was a medical reason for the jumbled mess her mind made of letters and numbers. With specialized tutoring, she could learn to decipher the world in ways she could understand. Her relief had been shattering. Liberating.
Lifting her forehead from the leather-wrapped wheel, Margaret blinked at the rutted road winding beyond the open gate. She’d almost conquered her debilitating insecurity six years ago, only to be knocked down again with brutal force.
Matt. Oh, Matt, I’d turn back the clock and start over, if I could.
But she couldn’t. She could only go forward and live with her guilt as best she could. Funny how life had brought her full circle to the man least likely to help her forget Matt’s death.
Straightening her shoulders, she shifted gears and drove over the rattling cattle guard, past the sagging aluminum gate propped against a fence post. Scott Hayes was every bit as domineering as her father and ex-husband. Maybe more so. Living with his contempt on a daily basis, striving to earn his respect, would be the toughest challenge she’d ever faced.
As the Porsche climbed an ungraded road and topped the steep rise, Margaret set her jaw. Scott might call her Maggie, but it wasn’t the first nickname she’d been given. Teachers and schoolmates alike had awarded her another epithet after experiencing her tenacious, dogged…persistence, she preferred to call it.
Scott would have his own challenge to deal with, Margaret vowed, looking down the hill at a dilapidated barn and house. Her new partner was about to face The Mule.
IN THE FARMHOUSE BELOW, Grant stared at his bedroom ceiling and watched the fan blades whirl. Pitiful, he thought. There was a time he would’ve already put in four hours of hard labor by ten o’clock, and here he lay weak as a kitten from washing the breakfast dishes. Damn his traitorous heart! Fifty-three wasn’t that old. Yet his ticker had given out when Scott needed him most. And now the medical bills, on top of the bank note…
He closed his eyes and willed himself to rest. To heal. The fan motor whirred. The pull chain ticked against the swaying brass casing like a metronome. He fingered the nubby chenille bedspread Patricia had bought their first year of marriage and sighed wistfully.
After eighteen years, he still missed her. She’d been too fine and cultured for a simple rancher like him, but he’d accepted the gift of her love and tried to be worthy. They’d had ambitious plans for H & H Cattle Company once. Then cancer had struck, and his dreams had died with her. His body had gone through the motions of ranch chores. He’d loved his children and kept a roof over their heads. Occasionally he’d slaked his physical needs with an equally lonely widow in Gonzales.
But his heart had remained insulated. He simply hadn’t cared about improving the place or making it profitable. And now Scott was paying the price.
Pain that had nothing to do with his operation made Grant wince. For eighteen years, he’d been sleepwalking through life, his memories of Patricia more real to him than the deteriorating ranch. Damned if he’d asked to wake up, but he didn’t seem to have much choice in the matter these days.
A loud ruckus broke out in the barn. Masculine shouts. Twister’s whinny. Grant listened for a tense moment, then relaxed back against his pillow. No point in getting up really. If there was a problem, Scott would handle it.
He always did.
THE DOUBLE CRACK of iron-shod hooves against wood reverberated throughout the barn.
“Dammit, Pete, I told you to stay back! You know he hates the sight of you.” Scott threw an irritated glance over his shoulder.
“Well, he don’t exactly make the sun shine for me, neither,” the peppery old cowhand grumbled, shuffling to a safer distance.
Scott ignored Pete’s injured feelings and concentrated on the greater problem at hand. What the hell was wrong with Twister?
The stallion danced restlessly on the far side of the twelve-by-twenty-foot stall, his bunched muscles rippling beneath a pearl gray coat. Charcoal velvet nostrils fluttered in distress. His silver tail swished up and down, side to side.
“Come on, boy. Don’t you want to get out and stretch your legs?” Scott moved slowly into the stall and clasped a lead rope to the nylon halter. Thank goodness he’d forgotten to remove the halter last night before returning to the house.
Noting the full feed bin, he frowned. “What’s the matter, Twister? You’re usually a pig. Are you getting sick maybe?”
A coil of dread tightened Scott’s belly. Ranch life had hastened his mother’s death, crushed his younger sister Laura’s spirit, weakened the heart of his once-invincible father. He sent up a silent prayer. Please God, not Twister, too.
Backing out the open door, Scott pulled the rope taut.
Twister planted his forelegs and refused to budge. Eyes rolling, sides heaving, sweat lathering his neck and flanks, he nickered low and deep.
Scott turned toward Pete. “Go up to the house and ask Dad to call Doc Chalmers. Something’s wrong with Twister, but hell if I can figure out what.”
“Car’s comin’ down the road,” Pete observed from the barn doorway. “Fancy thing, just like the girlie drivin’ it.”
Scott drew in a hissing breath. Maggie. Damn. He’d thought it would take her at least a day to pack whatever a princess needed to live among the common folk. He didn’t have time for her royal crap now.
“Just do what I ask and get the Doc out here. Tell him it’s an emergency.”
“I’m goin’, I’m goin’.” Pete pushed off the doorframe and ambled toward the house, his voice drifting back in mumbled snatches. “Too dang mean to be sick…into some loco weed…do this, Pete, do that, Pete…”
Doc Chalmers wouldn’t go into a stall with the fractious stallion for a truckload of money. The veterinarian had made that clear the last time Twister had landed a well-aimed hoof.
Scott dug in his heels and pulled harder on the rope. “Come on out, dammit. You don’t even like being in there.” Sweat trickled into his eyes, stinging like hell. He lifted one arm and rubbed his forehead, knocking his hat off in the process. His T-shirt clung damply, his jeans felt hot and scratchy—and he was playing tug-of-war with a friggin’ elephant!
Twister nickered again, but something about the sound was different this time. And suddenly Scott knew. Knew even before the light, fresh scent filled his lungs with spring flowers and his mind with images of sunlit hair.
“What is he afraid of?” the cultured, feminine voice asked from several feet behind.
Scott slackened the rope and watched his proud, beautiful stallion shiver. “He’s not afraid. He’s sick. Doc Chalmers is on the way.”
“He’s terrified,” Margaret insisted, walking up to stand beside Scott in the stall doorway.
In the dim light, her shoulder-length hair glimmered palely—her translucent gray eyes more palely still. She wore a sleeveless yellow dress sprigged with blue cornflowers. A thin blue satin ribbon threaded the puckered scoop neck, drawing his gaze to delicate collarbones and the hint of creamy breasts. The cotton material hung waistless, beltless, yet skimmed her curves more alluringly than spandex.
He felt like a smelly, hairy Neanderthal next to a magical fairy princess.
“Let me see what I can do.” With ethereal grace, she slipped into the stall and moved toward the wild-eyed stallion.
Scott’s heartbeat stalled, sputtered and roared to piston-pumping life. He was afraid to yell, afraid to do anything that might startle eleven hundred pounds of horseflesh into explosive action.
“Hiya, handsome. Remember me? Of course you do.” She reached up, grabbed the halter cheek straps and pulled Twister’s head down. “You wouldn’t forget your new friend.”
Damned if she wasn’t blowing in his nose!
“Now what is it that’s got you so scared? Why don’t we check it out together, okay?” She took the rope from Scott and shooed him back from the doorway.
Dazed, he stumbled backward as she moved forward, her pink toenails flashing bright next to Twister’s tough, yellowed hooves.
God almighty! Sandals in a horse stall. Twister’s horse stall.
“Ready, handsome?” She did something to his mane with her fingers. Amazingly he seemed to calm down a little. “All right then, let’s go.”
Paralyzed, Scott watched the powerful haunches gather, the pricked ears flatten. In two tremendous leaps Twister catapulted through the door, Margaret trotting close behind. Fifteen feet away he wheeled to face the stall and backed up, snorting all the while.
Pete’s skinny form darkened the barn entrance, but Twister ignored his long-standing enemy. Nothing else could have demonstrated his fear so well.
“You okay, Maggie?” Scott choked out.
Her steady gray eyes were inspecting the stall. “Whatever has him spooked is over there. See anything new or unfamiliar?”
Scott scanned the area and rumpled his hair. Nothing looked different to him. Same frayed leather bridle drooping from a rusty nail. Same packed dirt floor covered with matted straw. Same shovel leaning against—
“The hay,” Pete said, moving toward Margaret with surprising hustle.
With the right incentive, those bowed legs of his could sure get up and go, Scott noted wryly.
At the wrangler’s approach, Twister jerked his head back. Margaret laid her small white hand against his arched neck and murmured soothingly. Once again the stallion marginally settled.
Pete’s light blue eyes widened.
“What about the hay, Mr….?” Margaret paused politely.
“Pete. Just call me Pete, miss.”
She flashed a dazzling smile. “Pete, then. And please, call me Margaret.”
Scott rolled his eyes. He was at a goddamn tea party.
“Were you talking about that hay over there, Pete?” She indicated two bales stacked next to the stall doorway.
“That’s right, mi…M-Margaret.” Pete doffed a battered straw hat and ducked his head, revealing a shiny brown bald spot surrounded by crinkled gray hair. “I put it there myself yesterday evenin’.”
“Would you mind very much moving it away from the wall for me?”
“Don’t mind a’tall, not a bit, no.” He hurried to the hay and heaved the top bale down with the strength of a much younger man.
It landed with a heavy thud, missing Scott’s toes by a dust mote. He narrowed his eyes and glared.
Supremely indifferent, Pete stooped over and lifted the second bale. A long black snake slithered between his boots.
Twister squealed and rode his haunches. Pete dropped the bale and cursed. Scott grabbed a shovel and swung it edge-side down at the snake.
The reptile’s body and head separated; the one writhing and flipping, the other yawning pink and grotesque in search of a target.
Pete shuddered. “Ain’t nothin’ on this earth I hate worse’n a damn snake, even a piddly ol’ bull snake. No wonder Twister went nuts. Want me to get rid of it, boss?” He looked none too thrilled at the prospect
Scott had the shovel, after all. Grimacing, he walked toward the motionless form. “Call Doc Chalmers and see if he’s left yet. I’ll—”
“Wait,” Margaret interrupted. “Don’t move the snake yet.”
Shovel extended, Scott frowned.
“Twister’s been scared for hours. His territory’s been threatened. He needs to protect it, to vent his fear. Let him kill the snake.”
Pete glanced down at the severed, triangular head and scratched his neck. “Uh, Margaret? It’s—”
“Go on and make that phone call, Pete. She knows what she’s doing.” Scott waited for her smug comment. When she flashed him a look of gratitude, he hid his surprise behind a scowl.
Twister’s whole manner changed as she led him forward. Head high, eyes flashing, ears pricked toward his enemy in the dirt, he screamed a high challenge and rose on hind legs. Down came his front hooves, again and again, his rage elemental and awesome to watch. When finally he stood still, blowing hard and trembling with exhaustion, the snake lay scattered in pulpy bits. Lowering his head, Twister gave the pieces one last contemptuous sniff before turning toward his stall.
Margaret scratched beneath Twister’s chin. Grunting in ecstasy, he raised his head and stretched his neck like a contented tabby.
“Good work, handsome. I’ll bet you’re hungry now. How about some nice breakfast and a nap?”
Somehow the sight of Twister calmly following her into the stall didn’t surprise Scott. Her confident assurance yesterday that Twister would respond to her training didn’t appear boastful now. The woman seemed able to read the stallion’s mind. She’d bewitched him. And much as Scott hated to admit it, he couldn’t blame the poor animal. Her fairy-princess act was pretty potent.
He reached down, hoisted the nearest bale to his shoulder and staggered blindly toward the stall.
“No! Don’t ever stack hay outside his stall again or he’ll think there’s a snake there,” Margaret explained.
Scott felt his face heat. She was right of course. If she hadn’t tied him in knots he wouldn’t be acting like a total greenhorn. Wishing she’d never slipped into his moonlit field, he turned and headed for an empty stall at the far end of the barn. The makeshift storage room housed bags of feed, salt blocks and his tooled Western stock saddle. He slid the hay from his shoulder and stepped back. Dust and fragments of summer meadow mushroomed up, tickling a violent sneeze out of him.
“Bless you.” Margaret’s gentle laughter wafted from Twister’s stall.
Every masculine instinct he possessed whispered danger.
Margaret Chelsea Winston was nothing but trouble and always had been. Look how she was already ordering him around. It’d taken her all of five minutes to hook her little finger in Pete’s nose ring. And when Scott’d told his father about her scheme to turn Twister into a money machine, Grant had been sick-eningly enthusiastic.
Scott tightened his mouth and brushed off his arms and shoulders. He’d exhausted all options for making the bank-note payment or he never would’ve grabbed at the solution she offered. Honor dictated he try his best to make the plan work. He would tolerate her because he had to.
But damned if he’d play lapdog to the woman who’d killed his best friend.
CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_8c1b9cf1-c25f-59c4-a77f-497c66978caf)
MARGARET REACHED for a stick of margarine, paused, and cautiously sniffed the air. Oh, no! Slamming the refrigerator door, she cringed at the ominous clatter of glass and raced to the stove. Acrid smoke billowed from a frying pan.
Coughing, she turned off the burner and stared down at the gooey mess in the pan that had once been a rubber spatula. A second skillet lined with uncooked strips of bacon sat on the adjacent burner. Not good, not good. Cooking meals was part of the agreement she’d made the day before, and now she’d botched Scott’s breakfast. Her ex-husband would have had a field day with this if he knew. Jim’s patronizing still stung.
You can’t even tell left from right, Margaret, and you want a career? Now don’t pout, honey. You already have a job. Just keep being the prettiest hostess any Jacobs and McMillan associate ever had, and I’ll make partner yet.
Grimacing, Margaret carried the ruined pan to the sink and twisted the cold water tap. Hot rubber hissed and foul-smelling steam rose to cloud the window. She slumped against the counter and marveled at human nature.
After three years of enduring similar put-downs from Jim, there was no reason that particular insult should have aroused The Mule in her. But it had. Oh, she’d done her job, such as it was—and filed for divorce the day Jim announced he’d made partner.
Marrying the ambitious lawyer had been a mistake of course. At the time, she’d still felt numb with guilt over Matt’s death and undeserving of happiness. Even knowing that Jim had prized her only for her ornamental value and social connections, she’d grabbed the chance to escape her father’s control. Margaret huffed and straightened from the counter.
Some escape. Her husband’s handling had been no less confining for being velvet-gloved. He’d been truly shocked when she’d called him chauvinistic. And now she was working with a man who made Jim seem practically a feminist.
She had no doubt Scott would be horrified or, worse, pitying, if he knew about her disability. It would be just the excuse he needed to renege on their agreement. Well, she wouldn’t give him the chance! She would succeed on her own, depend on herself and maybe, just maybe, win back her self-respect in the process.
Boot steps and a twanging screen door jerked her thoughts to the present. Her good intentions cowered. Please let it be Grant.
The back door opened. She spun around. Scott stepped inside, whipped off his hat and fanned the air. His brows formed a fierce line.
“What is that godawful smell?”
He glanced at the stove top, then peered over her shoulder at the hardened glob of rubber and defaced metal. His frown deepened.
She hung her head, realized what she was doing and summoned the courage to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry. It was…an accident.”
“I can’t afford careless accidents, Maggie.”
“I’ll buy you a new pan.”
“Save your money and time for Twister. We’re twenty miles from town and there’s a full day of work ahead—” he gave her white shorts and sneakers a scornful once-over “—even if you are dressed for tennis at the club. Guess we’ll have to make do with one fryin’ pan from now on.”
Sliding his hat on with a grieved expression, he nodded toward the bacon. “That was for Pete, you know.”
“P-Pete?”
“He lives in a trailer behind the barn. We take turns running into town for supplies, but he hasn’t come up to the house to pick up his stuff yet. Dad and I eat the turkey bacon.” He heaved a long-suffering sigh. “But since you’ve opened the package, go ahead and cook it. We don’t waste things on this ranch.”
She sidled by his looming form and moved to the stove, wishing he were somewhere else, wishing she were someone else. She couldn’t think with him watching her, couldn’t sort out the confusing letters beneath each knob on the electric stove. Let’s see, she’d turned this one before. Three choices left. Reaching blindly, she turned a control. Coils glowed, but not under the frying pan.
“Gawd,” Scott muttered from behind.
Her face grew scorching. Sensing he’d turned, she frantically twisted knobs until the correct burner lit. The refrigerator door clunked open.
“What the…? Dammit, Maggie, I told you about this door. Half the stuff in here is broken or spilled.” Each word wallowed in disgust. Each clink of glass hitting the trash can punctuated his censure.
Biting her lip and blinking furiously, Margaret tried to concentrate while he cleaned up her mess. Eggs. She’d planned on scrambling some. But those were probably Pete’s, too. How thoughtless to fry bacon for someone who’d just had heart surgery. How negligent to ruin a pan. How stupid to botch a simple task like cooking breakfast.
The shame she’d been holding at bay all morning attacked full force. Her nose lifted, her muscles froze, her sight glazed—the defense mechanisms developed as a child were automatic now. She was only vaguely aware of the bacon sizzling. A popping noise produced a corresponding sting on her arm, but she didn’t flinch.
“Turn down the heat, Maggie! What are you trying to do, burn breakfast and the house? Can’t you even fry a batch of—”
“That’s enough, Scott.”
Gentle hands gripped her shoulders and pulled her back from the stove. Grant adjusted the control, reached for her wrist, and slowly uncurled her fist. His work-worn fingers moved up to probe an angry red circle on her pale skin.
“Let’s get some ice on that burn before it blisters.”
She searched his eyes and found only compassion, as if he knew her pain went much deeper than a grease burn. Her senses slowly thawed.
“I’m sorry about the pan, Mr. Hayes, and the bacon. I shouldn’t have been so…careless.” Scott’s accusation was convenient, and much kinder than the truth she had no intention of revealing.
Grant released her arm with a pat. “Call me Grant, remember? That ol’ skillet should’ve been tossed out along with the Nixon administration. And don’t apologize about the bacon. I like my meat on the burned side—just ask Scott. Been eatin’ his cookin’ for years and never complained.”
The older man’s lopsided, teasing grin added lines around his eyes and subtracted years from his face. It was easy to see where Scott’s masculine good looks came from. Heaven help her if the son ever emulated the father’s conscious effort to charm.
“Scott, you get an ice cube on this girl’s arm while I make us all some pancakes.” He led Margaret to the scratched kitchen table, pulled out a chair with courtly grace and waited.
“Really, Mr. Hayes…Grant. I can make pancakes if that’s what you want.”
“Let the princess fix her own breakfast,” Scott said. “I’ll make you some Eggbeaters, Dad.” Hunkered in front of the refrigerator, Scott threw down his sponge and rose to a standing position.
“Mind your manners, son. And take off that hat. Sit down, Margaret. Please.”
To refuse would be an insult. Carefully avoiding Scott’s eyes, she sat.
Grant rubbed his neck, drawing Margaret’s attention to his frayed sleeve cuff. She frowned. The cost of a single custom-made shirt from her father’s closet could buy a dozen replacements for the one Grant wore.
He dropped his arm and sighed. “If I eat one more bite of Eggbeaters, Scott, you’ll see last night’s dinner again. Only it won’t look near as appetizing this morning.”
“The doctor said—”
“Stirring batter is not going to raise my blood pressure. And one normal breakfast every now and then is not going to clog my arteries. Dr. Hearn was clear about that. You gotta quit treating me like an invalid, son, and trust me to take care of myself.”
The moment stretched, Grant’s obvious frustration gaining Margaret’s sincere sympathy. How many times had she encountered the same lack of trust in her own abilities?
Scott relented first. Setting his hat on the refrigerator, he opened the tiny freezer compartment and cracked loose an ice cube from a dented metal tray. Cube in hand, he stepped aside.
“Make my order a double stack,” he said wryly.
Breaking into a relieved smile, Grant moved forward and began rummaging for ingredients. Scott gave him a look of affectionate exasperation, then slowly turned his head.
Margaret tensed.
Their eyes met.
She felt his contempt like a physical blow. It simmered in his tawny eyes, along with something else, a sexual charisma that was as genetically inherent as his square jaw, as unconscious for him as breathing.
Her gaze faltered and dropped. He wore a white, Western-style shirt like his father’s. But where the material swallowed Grant’s gaunt torso, it strained against Scott’s muscular frame. She focused on a pearl snap button near his tooled leather belt, refusing to look lower, unable to look higher as he walked to stand in front of her.
“Hold out your arm, Maggie.”
He was too close, and he hated her. She tilted her head back. “I can take care of myself. I’m not an invalid any more than your father is.”
One minute he was towering over her, the next he was sitting in a chair with her hand on his thigh, his fingers clamping her wrist.
“Hold still now, this might get a little uncomfortable,” he said soothingly, his glittering eyes and viselike grip hidden from Grant.
Scott raised the dripping ice cube and pressed it against her burn. She yanked her arm and gasped, more stunned at his immovable strength than the shock of cold. Jerk. He knew she couldn’t do anything with his father mixing batter not fifteen feet away. She pressed her bare knees primly together and pretended they weren’t sandwiched between denim-covered muscles.
He looked different without a hat, she realized, staring. Up close, his hair was a thick, swirling mixture of chocolate browns and caramel highlights. It begged a woman’s fingers to plunge right in. As if sensing her thoughts, he looked up through sun-tipped lashes and smiled, a lazy curl of lips that did funny things to her stomach. Returning his focus to her burn, he rubbed the ice in small circles.
Her hands flexed, the one on his thigh noting muscles gone suddenly concrete. The ice cube released a fat drip. It rolled down the curve of her skin and joined the spreading wet spot on his jeans.
He gentled his hold on her wrist. “Feel better?”
The skin on her forearm felt frozen, the skin underneath on fire where he massaged her wild pulse with his thumb. She felt flustered, aroused and very, very confused. But better?
“I’ll be fine now, thanks.” She pulled back her arm, freeing her wrist and dislodging the ice. It slithered over her thigh and fell to the floor.
“How many pancakes can you eat, Margaret?” Grant called from the stove.
She tried to answer. She tried to do anything but shiver from the combined impact of frigid ice and a predatory gold stare.
“One,” she managed breathlessly.
“What was that?”
She dragged her gaze to Grant. “One.”
“Lost your appetite, princess?” Scott asked softly, his eyes slitted with knowing amusement.
He was insufferable. He’d been insufferable from the time they’d first met. But she wasn’t a painfully shy teenager anymore. She was her own person, a woman strong enough to stand alone.
She scraped back her chair and stood.
“I changed my mind, Grant, I’ll have a short stack…with bacon.” She sent Scott a scathing look. “Suddenly I could eat a pig.”
LATE THAT AFTERNOON, Ada Butler cut the engine of her pickup and resisted the urge to check her face in the rearview mirror. Silly fool. Powder and a dab of lipstick wouldn’t disguise forty-nine years of hard living. Besides, Grant wouldn’t notice if she dyed her salt-and-pepper hair green and danced naked on his bed.
She smoothed her jeans, anyway, and wished briefly she hadn’t changed from her Sunday dress. The minister’d said the blue silk matched her eyes. Then again, it was his Christian duty to say something charitable about everyone—especially aging spinsters.
With a huff of self-disgust, she slid out of the truck and scanned the dirt yard. Her squinted eyes widened on a flashy red Porsche by the barn. Who on earth was here? She spun toward the house and shaded her eyes with one hand.
The yellow clapboards shimmered in the midday sun, every curl of paint glaringly exposed. Missing shingles pockmarked the roof. The long front porch sagged in the middle, surely more so than the last time she’d stopped by? Dropping her hand, she frowned and moved toward the house.
Scott had assured her that after the surgery his father was fine, that there was no reason for her to visit the hospital or drop off a casserole when Grant came home. Yet Ellen Gates had done both. Every congregation member sitting within five pews of the new widow heard how she’d read scripture by Grant’s bed—no doubt wishing she was in it, the hypocrite—and taken him her famous Chicken Delight the next week. Baiting the trap for a husband, that’s what she was doing.
A series of grunts from the back of Ada’s pickup gave her pause. It was true Ellen had boobs the size of Canada. But Ada had fifty times more brains. Surely that gave the widow only a moderate edge.
She was halfway up the porch steps when Grant opened the door.
“Ada, what a nice surprise.”
Hand pressed to pounding heart, she allowed herself one devouring look. He was so thin! Yet the rakish smile and lively green eyes were as irresistible as ever.
“Hello, Grant. How’re you feeling?”
His eyes lost some of their sparkle. “Oh, good as an old man with one foot in the grave can feel.”
She arched a brow. “Glad I came by in time. Dead men are so boring.”
When he chuckled, her pleasure pulsed bone deep.
“Come on in out of the sun, Ada. I think I can manage a little conversation before the funeral.”
“You’re sure I’m not intruding? Looks like you’ve already got company.” She glanced pointedly at the Porsche.
“That’ll take some explaining. Come in.”
She climbed the remaining steps while he held open the door. His fingertips branded the small of her back as she swept into the oak-planked parlor. He made her feel protected and utterly feminine when she didn’t need the first and certainly wasn’t the second.
And that, she supposed, was why she’d loved Grant Hayes most of her adult life.
He settled her on the camelback sofa and squeezed into the room’s only chair, a wooden rocker far too delicate for his large frame.
“The car belongs to Margaret Winston. You remember, Donald Winston’s daughter?”
“I’m not likely to forget.”
No single family in the county had provided as much juicy gossip as the Winstons. People still wondered what really happened the day young Matt Collins died. One thing was clear—a body never mentioned Margaret’s name around Scott unless she wanted her head snapped off. And Ada was rather fond of hers.
“I thought Margaret lived in Dallas now. What brings her here?” she asked, listening enthralled to Grant’s account of the past three days. When he finished, she slowly shook her head.
“If that doesn’t beat all. To hear Doc Chalmers tell it, Twister was spawned from the bowels of hell. Do you really think a little thing like Margaret can handle that devil?”
“She saddled him up not twenty minutes ago and took off on their first ride. Damnedest thing I ever saw. You’d have thought he was a Shetland pony at the kiddie park. Margaret’ll handle Twister just fine. But handling Scott…now, that’s a whole different ball of wax.”
Did he know his eyes were as green as fresh mint? Did he know how masculine he looked in that dainty chair or what happened to her stomach when he smiled?
“But enough about us, Ada. What brings you away from your sows during spring farrowing? Can’t be my charming company.”
Of course he didn’t know. She was plain, practical Ada Butler, raiser of hogs and peaches, not men’s pulses. She glanced from his jutting arms and knees to the empty cushion beside her and blinked back the horrifying sting of tears.
“Ada? What is it?” He unfolded from the chair and left it rocking wildly to sit on the sofa. Reaching for her hands, he gave them a squeeze and searched her eyes. “Has something happened at the farm? Do you need help?”
Concern had accomplished what her pitiful charms could not. It would be easy enough to let the tears flow, to find a plausible problem and see where it led. Already prickles of excitement from their joined palms spread up her arms. Heavenly.
She drew a deep breath and pulled her hands away. “Nothing’s wrong, Grant. It’s my silly allergies. They always act up this time of year.”
Avoiding his gaze, she rose and walked to the door, clearing her throat and sniffing for effect. “You’re right, I really can’t stay away from the farm long. But I ran into Scott last week in town, and he mentioned wanting to raise a hog for fall slaughter.” Some day was what he’d said. She opened the door and stood half in, half out.
“Morning Glory’s last litter was a beaut,” she babbled on. “Twelve in all, but the runt barely made it. He’ll bring next to nothing at market and less than that as breeding stock. You’re welcome to take him if you want. He’s in the truck now.”
“Really? One of your prize Hampshires? I don’t know what to say, Ada.”
Neither did she, since he’d moved to peer out the door and driven every coherent thought out of her head. Her spine hugged the doorjamb. Her chest rose and fell an inch from his arm. Oh, to be Ellen Gates now.
He turned and looked down, his evident pleasure shifting to surprise, then keen awareness. She could count on one hand the number of times she’d seen that expression in a man’s eyes. Never had it thrilled her body and soul like now.
She saw his gaze fasten on her mouth, felt her lips soften in response, watched him frown in confusion and step out onto the front porch. As he stared into space, realization hit. Lord in heaven, he’d almost kissed her!
Her heart soaring, she breezed across the porch, floated down the steps and turned to call up teasingly, “C’mon, old man. Let’s get your pig unloaded.”
Spinning on one serviceable work boot, she was amazed at how naturally her walk had an extra sway when she knew Grant was watching. One thing about working a farm sunup to sundown—it kept her figure trim and supple. From this view, she might even have the edge on Ellen.
At her truck, Ada dropped the tailgate, grabbed a flimsy chicken-wire cage and pulled. Excited grunts erupted from the black-and-white shoat inside. She’d always had a soft spot for runts. She’d only postponed this one’s inevitable fate, but still, she felt noble.
“Hush, little guy. We’ll get you out of there in a minute,” Ada crooned, dragging the cage to the edge of the tailgate. The eight-week-old pig trembled miserably, his tail tucked as low as the curl would allow. Intent on getting the poor creature settled, Ada tightened her grip on the cage and heaved.
“Let me help,” Grant rumbled unexpectedly in her ear.
Her fingers slackened. The cage hit the ground. Wire crunched, popping the door open. And thirty pounds of squealing, outraged pig dug in his toes and raced wildly for the barn.
After exchanging a stunned look with Grant, Ada took off in hot pursuit.
She focused with dizzying results on the corkscrew tail twirling counterclockwise to anatomy. Ah, good. The rascal was headed straight for the first stall. Easy pickings. She plunged through the stall just behind the pig, waited tensely while he bobbled against three walls and grasped empty air as he squirted between her legs and out the door.
“Get him!” Ada shrieked at Grant, who stood watching with an infuriatingly superior male smirk.
Stumpy legs pumping, the runt streaked into the next stall. Grant leapt into manly action. Ada stumbled into the corridor just in time to see the frenzied pig rounding the stall like a fresh-shelled pea in a bowl. When Grant zigged with hands open, the black-and-white terror zagged straight out through the door.
It was a beautiful moment.
“Get him!” Grant roared, lurching out of the stall with murder in his eyes.
There were advantages to being a runt, Ada discovered during the next ten minutes. Never again would she feel sorry for nature’s pip-squeaks. Runts were faster than their heftier siblings, for one thing. And small enough to wiggle under sawhorses, between stacked well pipe and behind metal storage cabinets.
In a distant part of Ada’s awareness, she registered the sound of an approaching vehicle, then closed out all distractions save the pig eyeing her with myopic defiance four feet away. For some reason, he’d skidded to a stop in another stall. Afraid to move, she spoke in a soft, singsong voice.
“That’s a good piggy, just stay where you are and we’ll stick an apple in your mouth yet, yes we will. If you’re there, Grant, close the stall door now, because our little friend here looks very nervous.”
She watched the pig’s beady eyes follow Grant’s movement toward the door.
“Yoohoo. Oh, Gra-ant?” came a woman’s glass-shattering voice.
Hide bristling, the runt bolted for the stall door. Ada lunged, groaning as a piece of his tail slipped through her fingers. Dusty, sweaty and completely alone, she hung her head.
Outrage brought her chin up. She charged out of the stall and spotted Grant pounding down the corridor, hard on the tiny rump of Turbo Pig. A voluptuous woman in a flowing, ankle-length dress stood silhouetted in the barn entrance, holding a cake aloft.
“My, it’s dark in here. Is that you, Grant? I brought you my famous Molasses Spice Cake everybody raves abou—Eeeeek! Get away! Get away, you nasty thing!” Spinning in a circle, Ellen Gates trapped the thrashing, frantic pig in her swirling skirt.
You should have changed out of your Sunday dress, Ada thought smugly.
“Stand still, Ellen,” Grant ordered. “He won’t hurt you.”
“What won’t hurt me? What won’t hurt me, goddamn it!”
Tsk-tsk, what would the preacher say?
“It’s a pig. A small pig,” Grant explained with a superior male smirk Ada didn’t mind at all.
Just then, the animal in question caught scent of his favorite flavor in the world, the one Ada used to sweeten his sorghum and tempt his runty appetite, and snuffled as high as he could reach beneath Ellen’s skirts.
“Eeeeeyuu!”
The cake hit the ground with a succulent splat. The pig fought his way out of Ellen’s skirts with a squeal of ecstasy and began gobbling scattered molasses shrapnel from the dirt floor. The last of Ada’s hostility toward the little runt faded.
“Do something!” Ellen wailed.
Ada pushed past Grant, grabbed the warm, quivering pig, and repositioned his leathery snout dead center in the cake. “Enjoy yourself, runt. It’s famous.”
SCOTT CAUGHT a loose strand of barbed wire with his hammer claw and pressed the tool back against a worm-eaten mesquite post. He waited for the telltale twang of maximum tension before plucking a staple out of his mouth, lifting a second hammer from his belt and securing the strand with two solid whacks. Only then did he straighten and wipe the sweat from his brow.
Repairing fence alone was tricky work and required all his concentration—which was exactly why he’d declined Pete’s offer to help. If Scott had time to think, he might remember Maggie’s stricken expression earlier today when he’d lectured her about ruining a frying pan. Or her startled awareness when he’d forcibly held her wrist. Neither reaction spoke well of his behavior. But then, she’d always brought out the worst in him.
Frowning, he dropped both hammers and noted the belch of dust on impact. Damn, it was dry for April. Unless a gully-washer hit soon, the approaching summer would dry up his stock tanks. They were dangerously low as it was.
He peeled off his work gloves and walked to the pickup parked in the dubious shade of a young mesquite. This part of the ranch hadn’t been cleared in two years. The profusion of cactus, scrub brush and spindly trees depressed him. Pulling his shirttail free, he wrenched open the snaps in one movement and threw the wadded material into the open window. He’d had big plans for this place once. Now he just got up, worked until he couldn’t see straight, then fell into bed—day after day after day.
Lifting out the thermos of water he always carried, Scott gulped and then backhanded his mouth. If only watering his cattle was so easy. Inevitably, irresistibly, his gaze drifted to the thick stand of oaks and cotton-woods edging the horizon.
The trees sheltered the Guadalupe River, whose far bank sloped up to the foot of a manicured green lawn. His mind provided details of the plantation-style house, massive horse barn and various outbuildings he’d seen only twice in his life.
Riverbend. The embodiment of everything he wanted, yet couldn’t have.
As a kid, he’d listened to his dad talk about buying the riverfront acreage from old man Perkin and improving H & H Cattle Company’s holdings. Then his mom had grown ill. The medical bills stacked up, and the talk stopped.
After she died, they’d all handled it differently. Laura found comfort in excelling at school, Grant relinquished his dream, and Scott grabbed hold of it with both hands. At the ripe old age of twelve, he’d extracted a promise from Andrew Perkin to give Scott first crack at purchasing the prime riverfront land one day.
For seven years he’d worked any job his spare time would allow and saved his earnings. After high school graduation, Mr. Perkin had made noises about being too old to keep farming, and Scott had picked up a loan application from the bank. While his friends dreamed about college, he’d fantasized about his Santa Gertrudis herd drinking from the Guadalupe.
Until someone with more money, more clout and more cojones beat him to it.
Scott pushed off from the truck with a snort and headed for the fence post. He’d do well to forget the past if he hoped to show any degree of civility in the next few months. Stooping over, he jerked his gloves on and attacked his work with a vengeance.
Ten minutes and two fence posts later, he heard the jingle of a bit, the clack of a hoof connecting with rock. He straightened at the sight of Maggie riding Twister slowly up the fence line. The stallion looked foreign but magnificent, with an English saddle and slender woman in jodhpurs on his back.
She stopped about twenty feet away, one hand holding the reins loosely while the other scribbled on paper against the saddle pommel.
Scott walked forward, straining to see. Some sort of drawing, it looked like. Bracing against Twister’s nudge of greeting, Scott watched her quickly fold the paper and slip it into the pocket of her pale blue shirt.
“I thought you weren’t going to ride today,” he said, reaching up to hold the bridle.
Her gaze fluttered over his bare chest and darted away. “The farrier rescheduled for tomorrow. I decided to scope out possible training sites. Twister hasn’t given me a bit of trouble—” she leaned over and rubbed the glossy neck “—have ya, handsome?”
Her sleeveless shirt gaped at the neck. Scott’s breath snagged on a glimpse of milky flesh and scalloped cream lace.
She straightened and stared out over the fence. “I never realized Riverbend was this close to your ranch.”
“No, I don’t suppose you did. It’s beneath a princess to notice the peons.”
Her head snapped around. Twister snorted and sidestepped. She collected the reins and eyed Scott with regal scorn.
“Quit calling me a princess.”
He almost smiled, but shrugged, instead. “It’s what you are.”
“Because my father bought Riverbend out from under your nose?”
His grip tightened on the bridle. How did she know about that?
“I spent some time at the feed store last week. I found out you worked there off and on all through high school. Apparently the whole town knew about your bargain with Mr. Perkin. My father didn’t win any friends around here by offering a deal the old man couldn’t refuse. Still, that has nothing to do with me.”
Like hell. “Donald Winston bought that land for you, for his little princess, so she could win horse shows.”
“So I’m the daughter of a man obsessed with winning.”
“A rich man.”
“Okay, a rich man. I can’t help it if I have wealthy parents. They don’t define me. When have I ever treated you like I was a princess, Scott Hayes?”
She sat there with her nose in the air and her posture church perfect and her eyes frosting the air between them, and Scott felt his control snap. He moved closer and gripped the supple riding boot that epitomized her privileged world.
“Since the first day I met you,” he said, all the confusion and humiliation of that day resurfacing. He wanted to shake her ivory tower till her teeth rattled. “Do you even remember that day, Maggie?”
Her cheeks flushed to match her sunburned nose. She remembered.
“Must’ve been quite a social comedown for you to hang out with the locals, huh?”
“No, I was grateful to be invited. Being new to the area wasn’t easy.”
“Our nasty red dust get your Corvette dirty?”
“You’re not being fair!”
“That’s life in the big country, princess. It ain’t fair and it ain’t easy. You don’t belong here any more than you did ten years ago.”
He’d spotted her right off when he’d walked into Lucy’s Café. Her sophisticated haircut, her expensive clothes, her French-restaurant table manners—hell, everything about her had screamed class. He’d been fascinated—and intimidated.
“My buddies bet me ten bucks I couldn’t get your phone number. I gotta admit, Maggie, you were good.”
She shifted in the saddle and frowned. “Good?”
“I thought I’d been around, knew all the tricks. But you played me like a puppet for thirty minutes before cutting the strings. I didn’t even see it coming.” He’d bought into that shy smile, the pleasure in her dove gray eyes, one hundred percent.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, I think you do. I think you waited for the exact right minute to put me in my place. Everyone there saw me asking for your phone number. Everyone there knew I didn’t get it.”
He’d held out that pen and napkin for a hundred excruciating years while she’d given him the Snow Princess treatment. Her friends had giggled when he’d snatched his hand back. His own friends had snickered as he joined them in a corner booth. Losing the bet wasn’t the half of his shock.
Mr. Stud had finally been rejected, his friends had told him, by a Dallas blueblood—daughter of the millionaire who’d just bought old man Perkin’s place.
Twister tossed his head and stamped, jolting Scott back to the present. He focused on Maggie’s overly bright eyes, the pressed lips, which trembled nonetheless. She didn’t look cold now. She looked close to tears.
“It wasn’t you. It was me. I’m…” Her swallow was audible. She shook her head and fumbled with the reins.
Scott resented his pang of sympathy. “You’re what, Maggie?”
Her eyes hardened. Her chin came up and out. “I’m a damn good horse trainer, that’s what. That’s all you need to know about me.”
Twister launched forward into a fast trot, wrenching Scott’s hand from her boot. Stunned, he watched horse and rider kick up dust until they melted into the brush.
Absently rubbing his right glove, he stared unmoving at the horizon. The sun beat down hotter than ever, but he scarcely noticed. Something important had happened just now, no doubt about it.
He wished like hell he knew what it was.
CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_3074b31e-fed6-5071-bccd-8a3b26dcda81)
MARGARET FOUGHT the powerful undertow. Clawed her way toward wakefulness and blessed peace. But the current was invincible. It swept her past the sweetness and plunged her into panic. Into despair…
Into the car.
Cracked rubber tape on the steering wheel pricked her palms. Sweltering heat compressed her lungs. Matt’s voice implored her to slow down, to pull over. A red-white-and-blue beacon flashed in her rearview mirror. Too close. Too fast.
She couldn’t go back. Wouldn’t go back, or she might never have the courage to leave again.
Get away—get away—get away. The refrain pounded in her mind with each heartbeat. She pressed down on the accelerator and clutched the steering wheel tighter, willing her grip to hold the vibrating car together. Her muscles ached. Dizziness blurred her vision. She tried to slow her shallow breaths and only panted faster.
Get away, get away, get away—Boom!
The steering wheel was wrenched from her hands. Matt yelled. The horizon spun around and around andaround. Metal screeched. Pain exploded in her legs and chest. Glass stalactites trembled.
Silence throbbed.
She slowly turned her head. Matt’s flesh and bone fused with jagged metal in a gruesome sculpture of death.
Anguish filled her soul. She threw back her head and screamed at fate, “It should have been me. It should have been me. It should have been me-e-e-e—“
“Maggie!”
She jerked into consciousness with a gasp, her eyes popping open unfocused in the dark. Where…? Her vision cleared. The farmhouse, her second night here. Scott sat on the four-poster bed gripping her shoulders hard. She wondered how many times he’d shaken her.
“You were dreaming, Maggie. It was just a bad dream.”
Just a bad dream. She would’ve laughed if her teeth weren’t chattering like a set of windup toy dentures. Violent trembling seized her body in rhythmic waves. A terrible cold penetrated marrow deep. It would pass. Eventually. Closing her eyes, she waited…and endured.
“Damn,” Scott muttered, pulling her upright and into his arms.
She nearly whimpered with relief. His bare chest was hard beneath her cheek, his heartbeat loud and steady. She wrapped her arms around his waist and shamelessly clung. Maybe he hated her for what she’d done to Matt, maybe her present weakness disgusted him, but it didn’t matter. He felt strong and warm and alive, and she needed the human contact.
He rubbed her spine hesitantly, then more firmly, his callused fingers snagging on her cotton nightgown. “You’re shiverin’ like a spooked colt. Must’ve been a helluva nightmare.”
Swallowing hard, she nodded.
“Wanna talk about it?”
To this man? “No,” she whispered. “I’ll be fine in a minute.” Humiliating, but she couldn’t seem to unlock her fingers from the waistband of his jeans.
“You were dreaming about the accident, weren’t you?”
She tensed. His room was right next door.’ “Was I talking out loud?”
“Sounded more like screaming to me.”
She unpeeled her fingers and started to push away, thwarted by the iron band of his arms.
“Relax, princess. No need to get your nose out of joint.”
Somehow that nose was buried against his chest now. He smelled of soap and sleep-roused male, and radiated heat like a healthy animal.
“At least you don’t feel like a damn ice cube anymore,” Scott said, satisfaction deepening his voice.
Not hardly. Grateful he couldn’t see her face, she turned and pressed her cheek to his chest. “I’m sorry I woke you up.”
His body shifted toward the window. “Looks like it’s close to dawn. I’d have gotten up soon, anyway.”
“What did I…” Go on, coward, spit it out. “What did I scream?”
He hesitated a fraction too long. “Damned if I know. One thing’s for sure. My money’s on you, instead of Ada, at the next county fair.”
She struggled to make the connection.
“The pig-calling contest,” he explained. “You pack a mean set of lungs for such a little thing.”
His chuckle rumbled pleasantly against her ear. She managed a shaky smile, surprised to realize her trembling had stopped. Dangerous. She was too warm, too content, too willing to stay in his arms indefinitely. This time when she pushed away, he let her go.
She lay back and pulled the quilt to her chin, uncertain how their relationship had changed, sure only that it had.
“I guess I should thank you,” she finally said.
“No need. I didn’t want you to wake Dad.” He sprang up as if released from an unpleasant duty and headed for the door. Halfway there, he paused and looked over his shoulder. “You gonna be okay?”
“I’ll be fine.”
He didn’t linger to make sure.
Margaret stared at the closed door in bemusement. Normally it took her several hours to recover from the dream. Never in her lifetime would she have expected Scott Hayes to speed the process. She almost wished he hadn’t. His compassion increased his virility by a thousandfold. As her horror had receded, every nerve ending in her body had tingled with awareness.
Funny. She’d never been as physically conscious of Matt, although she’d planned to marry him. He’d been a handsome young veterinary student working the summer at Riverbend when they’d met. She’d craved his unconditional love, so different from her parents’ embarrassed tolerance, but never his touch.
Nor had Jim ever caused this distressing reaction. She’d found him attractive, but that was secondary to the opportunity he’d offered—the chance to start a new life unfettered by guilt or her father’s censure. If truth were told, the physical side of her marriage had been disappointing. All those disconcerting noises, all that sweaty skin…
…that tanned, sweaty skin. An image of Scott as he’d looked the day before mocked her thoughts.
Far from distasteful, Scott’s glistening torso had fascinated her. When he’d reached up and held Twister’s bridle, his biceps had bunched and the corded sinew of his forearms flexed. Leather work gloves only emphasized his hard muscles, the kind earned through strenuous physical labor, not honed and perfected in a gym.
Blinking, Margaret shook off both the vision and her sappy smile. She yawned and stretched. The first blush of dawn tinged the lace curtains. Shadows solidified into an armoire, a scarred dresser and silver-spotted mirror. Margaret fingered the Wedding Ring quilt beneath her chin and admired the workmanship.
Scott was right. Everything on this ranch had been made or purchased to last through generations of hard wear. The sense of permanency charmed her, challenged her to be just as strong, just as capable of earning her keep.
Muffled kitchen sounds told her Scott was starting the first pot of coffee. Grant would be up soon. What could she make for breakfast that would be appetizing, as well as low in fat?
Cereal. That she could handle.
Throwing back the covers, she indulged in one last joint-popping stretch. Anticipation spread like caffeine through her blood, vanquishing fatigue. There was a long, exhausting day ahead of her. She couldn’t wait to get started.
THREE HOURS LATER Margaret’s enthusiasm had faded considerably. “Hold still, darn it!”
Twister swished his tail, jerking the currycomb from her hand—but not from a nasty snarl. He swished again, avoiding her frantic grab. His third, violent swish sent the heavy metal comb rocketing into the back plank wall like a deadly missile.
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Jan Freed
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
Отзывы: Пока нет Добавить отзыв
О книге: HOME ON THE RANCH"Jan Freed writes with spice and flair! An exciting new voice in contemporary romance." – bestselling author Susan WiggsThe H&H Cattle Company, near Gonzales, TexasScott Hayes–He′s the owner. Scott′s a hardworking cattleman who′s got a reputation with the ladies. Not that he has any time for womanizing these days. Fact is, Scott′s putting in twenty-hour stretches, now that H&H is down to one hired hand. And the word around these parts is that H&H is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy.Margaret Winston–When Scott calls her a princess, he doesn′t mean it as a compliment! Still, Maggie has a few choice names for Scott, none of them pretty. That′s because Maggie knows Scott from the old days and there′s bad blood–and a good horse–between them.HOME ON THE RANCH