The Reluctant Texas Rancher

Liz gulped, every inch of her going into white-hot alert.

Wh-what are you doing?” She stepped back, found she was suddenly holding her breath.

He danced her slowly backward, toward the wall. “Putting your willpower and integrity to the test.”

The feel of his hands moving up her arms, to her shoulders, then her neck, then her face, sent a shimmer of need sifting through her. “Travis….”

He ran his thumbs along her jaw, then her lips, the soft encouraging pressure parting them. “I’m not your client any more, Liz.” He touched his mouth to hers. Briefly. Testingly.

“I’m not even your friend.”

He bent his head and kissed her again, his lips tenderly coaxing and recklessly taking, the sensuality of his mouth moving over hers, until she wreathed her arms about his neck and kissed him back, every bit as passionately and deeply as he was kissing her.

Dear Reader,

When I created the fictional town of Laramie, Texas, I wanted it to embody all the best qualities of the Lone Star State. Hence, it had to be a place where people dreamed big and knew through hard work and determination that anything was possible. It had to be a place where love was boundless. Family mattered. Neighbors helped each other out. Generosity of spirit and honorable behavior was the norm.

Readers responded by falling in love with the setting as surely as I had, and now, the fictional town of Laramie, Texas, is home to twenty-four novels. (All now available as ebooks.) The McCabes of Texas miniseries—the stories about John and Lilah McCabe’s four bold, handsome sons—started the McCabe family dynasty. The answers to those four men were the four orphaned sisters in The Lockharts of Texas. Sam McCabe, his five rowdy sons and feisty Kate Marten were the subject of Texas Vows, a single-title novel. The McCabes: Next Generation focused on the six offspring of Sam and Kate Marten McCabe. Texas Legacies: The Carrigans featured the four offspring of Meg Lockhart and Luke Carrigan. And Texas Legacies: The McCabes recounts the love stories of the offspring of Greta and Shane McCabe.

Now, I introduce to you my new series, The Legends of Laramie County, with four memorable new Texas clans. We start with the Cartwrights—four generations of Texas lady ranchers who suddenly find themselves in need of a … man?

For more information on these and other books please visit me on the web at www.cathygillenthacker.com.

Happy reading!

Cathy Gillen Thacker

The Reluctant Texas Rancher

CATHY GILLEN THACKER

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Chapter One

“We have to face facts. We need a man and we need one bad,” eighty-three-year-old Tillie Cartwright said, the moment the four women sat down on the porch of the ranch house.

“Like heck we do.” Sixty-six-year-old Faye Elizabeth handed out the corn to be shucked. “Men are nothing but trouble. Always have been. Always will be.”

“But they have their uses.” Forty-eight-year-old Reba winked. “And with my sciatica acting up again …” She winced as she tried to get her aching hip and thigh settled comfortably in the cushioned wicker chair. “I don’t know any other way to manage. Unless …”

All eyes turned to the youngest member of the family.

Liz Cartwright shook her head at the three generations of Cartwright women in front of her. Under any other circumstance this conversation would have been ludicrous, but on the estrogen-powered Four Winds cattle ranch, where she had grown up and now resided once again, the ornery, fiercely opinionated comments were to be expected.

“I’m not giving up my law practice to run this ranch,” Liz said with the full conviction of her twenty-eight years. It didn’t matter how much pressure her mother tried to exert. “I said I would help out—and I will—but other than that, the most I’m prepared to do is help you choose a new ranch hand.”

“Then it’s a good thing I’m here,” a deep male voice interjected.

An audible gasp filled the air as Travis Anderson walked around the side of the house and climbed onto the porch. The tall, oh-so-sexy cowboy removed his hat, revealing thick dark hair in need of a cut, and charcoal-gray eyes.

His respects paid, Travis settled the Stetson squarely on his head and smiled. “Isn’t that right, ladies?”

TRAVIS HAD FIGURED Liz Cartwright would not be all that excited to see him. The two of them had dated in high school. She still resented him for the way he had ended it.

“We’re looking for a ranch hand, Travis,” Liz told him drily as she ripped a chunk of green husk and silk from a cob. “Not a Houston attorney.”

Travis knew the Laramie County rumor mill had been working overtime since he had arrived home a few days ago, suitcase in hand.

Liz was apparently curious, too. Though he doubted his savvy fellow attorney would come right out and admit it.

After taking in the way the spring sunlight brought out the fire in her shoulder-length, auburn hair, he studied the skeptical twist to her pink lips.

It didn’t matter that Liz was more beautiful than ever, or that her fair skin looked just as soft to the touch. And the fact she was sexy in an unconscious, girl-he’d-grown-up-with way was of no consequence, either.

What he needed was the opportunity to make a deal. And this temporary job on the Four Winds Ranch would give him that. As well as a place to stay …

Never one to be taken advantage of, Liz waved a dismissive hand before going on to strip the ear of corn bare and drop it into the bowl. She paused to shoot him a disdainful look. “So maybe you should run along back to the city….”

Travis shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans and leaned against the porch rail. As always when they were together, the world seemed to narrow to just the two of them. “Didn’t you hear?” he taunted, looking into her emerald eyes. “My days as a bona fide city slicker are over.”

Standing abruptly, Liz placed her hands on her slender, jean-clad hips. “Hearing it and believing it to be true are two different things.” She let her gaze drift over him before returning ever so deliberately to his eyes. “And why anyone as accomplished as you would give up a downtown loft and a six-figure salary …”

Put that way, Travis knew, his actions didn’t make sense. He concentrated on what would. “The loft measured less than six hundred square feet.” Casting a glance at Tillie, Faye Elizabeth and Reba, he flashed the kind of disarming smile he used on witnesses he was about to depose, before explaining wryly, “It wasn’t a whole lot of space to give up. As for the job …” He turned back to Liz and lifted a hand. “I decided I’m better suited at the moment for a wide-open range and a herd of cattle. Two things you ladies have in spades.”

A place, he added silently, where I’ll have plenty of space and privacy to reflect. Plenty of time to plan my next big move …

Liz folded her arms beneath her breasts. “Neither the land nor the cattle are for sale, so if that’s your angle, Travis Anderson …”

“I do want my own land. My own herd.” As well as something even more important to him: an intact reputation. “But while I’m figuring out how I’m going to get those things, I won’t mind taking care of yours.”

“I VOTE WE HIRE HIM,” Liz’s mother said, as soon as Travis Anderson walked off to give them a moment to confer.

Tillie shrugged. “He knows cattle.”

Faye Elizabeth frowned. “I don’t see that we have much choice, given the fix we’re in.”

“I’m not so sure we have to act this fast,” Liz cautioned, with lawyerly calm. “For starters, I don’t trust why he’s here.” Travis had been achievement-oriented his entire life. “I think he has an ulterior motive.”

She just wasn’t sure what it was.

Liz’s mother sized her up with a mischievous grin. “No matter. I’m sure you’ll be able to contain yourself around that handsome man. If that’s what you want,” she teased.

Liz flushed and pushed the distant memory of Travis’s kisses away. Kisses she had been too uptight to really enjoy, because she’d been so afraid of having her heart stomped on by the cutest boy in school.

Ignoring the knot of anxiety in her solar plexus, she shook her head. “I didn’t mean me. There have been rumors in the legal community that Travis Anderson lost his boy wonder status.”

Reba frowned. “That doesn’t sound like the Travis I recall. Or anyone with Lockhart and Anderson blood running through his veins. Most members of both families are incredibly successful.”

“I didn’t believe it, either,” Liz admitted with a shake of her head. “Until he showed up here today, looking for work. Now I’m beginning to think there might be something to it. Just as there’s more to his asking for work here, of all places.”

“Such as?” Tillie prodded.

Liz turned her glance to Travis. Currently, he was inspecting the broken-down, thirty-year-old tractor parked next to the barn.

She remembered him being tall and broad-shouldered. Athletic enough to make all the school teams he wanted. Smart enough to graduate with a whole passel of scholarships. But she didn’t remember him being that muscular, or so good at filling out a pair of jeans.

“What could he be up to?” Faye Elizabeth asked, inspecting the shucked corn for any stray strands of silk.

Travis turned. The bemused expression on his face said he knew they were watching him.

Thank heaven he didn’t know what Liz was thinking!

Eyebrows raised, he stared at her a long moment, then glanced away.

Aware that everyone was waiting for her to weigh in, Liz turned back to them, her pulse racing.

She pushed aside the desire welling up inside her. This was no time to be thinking about kissing Travis again.

“I don’t know.” She sighed. “Despite what he says, I can’t see him ever giving up the law to ranch.” Liz knew how hard Travis Anderson had worked for everything he’d earned, how deeply wedded he was to all his plans. “It wouldn’t matter what kind of professional disappointment he has weathered. He would still pick himself up, dust himself off and keep right on going toward his goal.” Whatever the latest one was.

Reba shrugged. “Sounds to me like Travis has finally come to his senses, in wanting to return to the ranching life he was born into.” She looked at her daughter. “You’d be lucky if you had an epiphany like that, too.”

Liz dropped her head in her hands and groaned. Would they never stop wishing she would give up everything to take over the ranch?

Getting back to business, Reba pushed on. “All those in favor of hiring Travis Anderson to ride, rope and wrangle for us, say aye.”

“Aye,” the three elder Cartwright women said in unison.

Trying not to think about how uncomfortable it would be for her to have Travis around all the time, Liz threw up her hands. “Fine.” She was so busy with her law practice, she wasn’t going to be here much, anyway.

Faye Elizabeth gathered up the shucked corn and took it into the kitchen to start dinner. Tillie headed back to the ranch books. Only Reba remained on the porch with Liz.

Her mother pointed to the fence, where Travis stood gazing out at the vast, rolling terrain of the ten-thousand-acre Four Winds. “Go get him, and show him to his quarters.”

Liz tore her gaze from his handsome profile. She hadn’t expected him to sleep on the property, too! Irritably, she demanded, “Which are going to be where?”

“The homestead, of course.”

Her mouth fell open. “Wait a minute.” Indignant, she angled a thumb at her chest. “I’m sleeping in the homestead.”

“You were. Now he will be. Unless …” Reba tossed her a speculative look “… you want Travis bunking in the main house with us?”

Her frustration mounting, Liz leaped to her feet. “Why does he have to be on the ranch at all before eight o’clock or after five?” The last thing she needed was a sexy guy she’d once had a crush on underfoot….

Reba winced and put a hand against her lower back. “Because it’s calving season, we barely have the funds to pay one ranch hand and we need someone around to do the heavy lifting at all hours of the day and night.”

Liz couldn’t argue the necessity of having someone to relieve her mother of the physical rigors of ranch work. However, she could disagree with his working conditions. “I know that, Mom, but he has to have time off,” she said reasonably.

Reba stretched to relieve the pain. “He can have time off after all the calves are born.”

As always, the Cartwright tunnel vision when it came to ranch matters superseded all else, including the needs of others. “Travis may not agree to this,” Liz warned.

Reba sent her a confident glance. “Then it’s up to you to convince him.”

TRAVIS HEARD BOOT STEPS crossing the rough ground, and turned as Liz approached.

The reluctant look on her pretty face told him all he needed to know. He had a temporary job. Likely over her objections.

“I’m ready to start anytime,” he drawled, eyeing her in a way it would have been unwise to do earlier, before he got the job.

Her rich auburn hair was just as thick and silky as he recalled. It was a little shorter now, falling only to her shoulders. But the classic cut and side-swept bangs suited her as much as the slight flush to her cheeks, the hint of temper in her pine-green eyes, and the determined set of her soft, bow-shaped lips.

His presence obviously flustered her, as it always had, in a way he found irresistible.

What was different was that he felt a little off his game around her, too.

As if his ordinary way of tackling people and problems wouldn’t work.

To get to know her, to understand the way she ticked, he would have to dig deeper, get past her resistance—as he hadn’t been able to do when they were teens.

And given what they needed to accomplish, the sooner he was able to do that the better.

“Tonight, if you want,” he continued.

Liz scowled, looking even less thrilled about that. “They figured as much.” She cocked her head sideways and sized him up with a wary glance. “You know they expect you to move out here, for as long as you choose to work for the Four Winds Ranch?”

Nodding, Travis ambled closer.

She might be struggling to handle her family, or contain him, but she was still sweet and sharp, with a way of beckoning him near that went far beyond simple chemistry.

Pushing the attraction away, he said, “The ad posted in the feed store said the position included room and board and being on call 24/7.” Which made it perfect for him … and his goals.

Liz huffed, clearly as annoyed by his accommodating attitude as she was by his presence. With only a cursory look at the cattle grazing in the pasture beyond, she wheeled around and took off in the opposite direction. “Don’t get too excited,” she said, tossing a mocking glance over her shoulder. “You haven’t seen your quarters yet.”

Travis admired the sway of her slender hips and the purposeful way her long legs ate up the ground. He caught up with her, so they were walking side by side. “Does this mean I’ll get the room next to yours?”

Liz shot him a drop-dead look and headed toward the one-room log cabin behind the barns. En route, they passed the main ranch house, an angular, U-shaped domicile made of rough-hewn timber and flat-cut stone, with wide porches on the front and back. “Actually, you’re getting my room. Or what was my room, once I clear my stuff out. You’ll be bunking in the old homestead.”

He was close enough to smell the jasmine scent of her perfume. Not a good thing, given what it did to his libido.

He eased back as they reached a field of knee-high grass, interspersed with Texas wildflowers. “Well, that’s exciting.”

“Not really.” Mirroring his ironic tone, Liz paused to open a gate in the weathered wood fence. “It’s very primitive.”

He shrugged. “There’s something to be said for whittling life down to the very basics.”

As he was doing today.

It made you reevaluate. Think about what you wanted versus what you needed. It made it easier to set a goal and develop a plan to go after what you had to have to be happy.

Travis was ready to do that, and more.

Liz latched the gate behind them, then carried on. “You say that now,” she predicted. “You may be singing a different tune later.”

She really didn’t know him. “Does it have indoor plumbing?”

She slanted him a glance from beneath those thick auburn lashes. “As well as electricity. But no real kitchen. So you’ll have to take your meals in the main house with us, unless you want to get by on whatever you can store in the minifridge and whip up on a hot plate or microwave.”

He ignored her attempt to discourage him. The way her shirt cupped her breasts was not so easy to disregard.

Folding his arms, he tried to ignore the pressure starting at the front of his jeans. “Thanks for the option, but I’m not much of a cook.”

Amusement glimmered in her eyes. “Somehow I suspected that would still be the case.”

Okay, that was definitely a dig, but he wasn’t going to apologize for the single-minded dedication he had given to his path in life. It had gotten him where he wanted to go, and then some. The fact that some of it had recently derailed was his fault, sure, but being here would fix that.

“Faye Elizabeth, on the other hand, is legendary for her culinary skills,” Travis continued, with lazy insistence. That was one bonus for being on the ranch, right there.

Liz rolled her eyes. “And there is nothing my grandmother likes more than an appreciative audience for her efforts.”

“She’ll have that in me,” he promised. These days, he would take his pleasure where he could get it.

Liz paused at the door to the homestead. “My question is why are you really doing this?” She eyed him skeptically. “And don’t give me that you-just-want-to-be-a-rancher-and-ride-the-open-range bit again, Travis Anderson. Because I’m just not buying it!”

Chapter Two

For a moment, Liz thought Travis wasn’t going to answer her. Then he reached into his pocket for his wallet, took a twenty-dollar bill and handed it to her.

She gazed into his intelligent gray eyes, wishing he wasn’t such a fine example of masculine intensity. But he was. With the kind of good looks that only got better with age. The sensuality of his lips perfectly complemented his other bold, handsome features. And the rest of him was just as fine. He was six foot three inches of solid, indomitable male, and he used it to his advantage.

Which made his arrival back in Laramie County all the more perplexing.

Doing her best to control the sudden hitch in her breathing, Liz looked down at the bill in her hand and remarked with humor, “I’m dying to know what this is for.”

He took off his hat as he followed her inside. “I want to hire you to represent me.”

Was he serious? The brooding look in his eyes said he was.

Liz watched him run a hand through dark, tousled hair, which was several weeks past time for a cut. “Well, then it’s going to cost you a heck of a lot more than twenty dollars,” she said, setting her lingering physical attraction to him aside. “An initial consultation is two hundred dollars.” And there were other reasons she should say no, too.

Travis nodded amiably. “Consider that a down payment for helping me clear my name and get my career back on track.”

Of all the things he could have confided in her, this was the last Liz ever would have expected. She stared at him in surprise.

“My law license has been suspended for six months. I want you to handle the appeal.”

Curiosity won out over common sense. “What did you do?” she asked in shock.

Tensing, Travis looked around the cabin, taking in the brass bed and wooden armoire, the old leather sofa, the table and two chairs. Tucked into the open shelving that served as a pantry was a minifridge, microwave and hot plate. Adjacent to that was an old-fashioned kitchen sink. A small bathroom, with pedestal sink and narrow shower, had been added on.

He turned back to her, clearly not happy about having to admit, “I disappointed a client who is now suing me for legal malpractice.”

Silence fell between them. It was impossible to imagine the Travis she had grown up with doing anything unethical or foolish. “Are you still with Haverty, Brockman & Roberts?”

He settled on the arm of the sofa and stretched his legs out. “They asked me to tender my resignation.”

Liz edged close enough to be able to see his eyes. In the dim light of the cabin, they were the color of an approaching spring storm.

“So they wouldn’t have to pay you severance, right?”

Travis shrugged, the turbulent emotion on his face fading to acceptance. “I got something out of it, too,” he admitted quietly. “It always looks better to resign than to be fired.”

True.

The uncomfortable silence between them lengthened.

Travis studied her with narrowed eyes. “What have you heard about what’s been going on?” he asked curiously.

“In legal circles? Not much … except whatever you did to vault you off the fast track was being kept very hush-hush by the senior partners.”

Travis locked gazes with her. He rested a callused hand on his thigh in a move that wasn’t quite as easy and relaxed as it seemed. “Well, that’s no longer the case.” He exhaled roughly, lips taut. “As of yesterday, the senior partners are letting it be known all over Houston that they are as disappointed in me as my former client is, and they are going to be helping her in the lawsuit being waged against me.”

Not good. Not good at all. “In return for keeping Haverty, Brockman & Roberts from being sued, as well?” Liz guessed.

Travis’s eyes hardened. “Sacrificing me is the only way they can protect the firm and keep Olympia Herndon’s business.”

Liz studied him with the same reserve she would have used with any other client. “Why ask me to represent you? Why not go to another big firm—maybe even an HB&R rival—back in Houston?” There were always competitors eager to take another law firm down a notch.

That was the more logical route to go.

But, apparently, not to him.

Travis faced her boldly, his annoyance at having to explain himself evident. “Everything I have worked for is on the line. I need an attorney I can trust, someone strong and savvy enough to handle this. And you’ve got a reputation for finding out-of-court solutions where there seem to be none.”

That was true. Although, out of courtesy, Liz felt duty-bound to point out, “Your malpractice insurance company can do that for you, Travis.”

He grimaced. “They’re interested in making the problem go away via a large cash settlement that will not only raise my rates but make it look as if I did something wrong, when I didn’t. I want to come out of this with my professional reputation intact.”

“So you’re asserting that there is no validity to any of the charges against you?”

“Everything I did was in my client’s best interest. If the huge business deal Olympia Herndon was chasing had gone through, I have no doubt I would still be representing her. But it didn’t. So—” his broad shoulders lifted in a tense shrug “—someone had to take the fall….”

And that someone had been Travis.

“What about your family?” Liz asked quietly, knowing this couldn’t be going over well with the Andersons. They would be furious at even the implication that Travis had acted less than admirably.