His Enemy's Daughter

When Pete’s father Davey had started the All-Stars back in the eighties with a group of his friends, he’d had big plans. More than just a bunch of individual rodeos—with individual winners—Davey Wellington had seen a way to crown the world’s best All-Around Cowboy. It’d been a crazy idea but then, Davey had been just crazy enough to make it work.

Every rodeo that wanted to count toward the world rankings had to be approved by the All-Around All-Stars. The summers of Pete’s childhood had been spent with his dad, driving from rodeo to rodeo to see if that local rodeo was worthy of being counted as an All-Star rodeo.

God, those had been good days, just the two of them in Dad’s truck, sending postcards back to Mom. As far as he could recall, those summers had been the only time Pete had ever had his father’s undivided attention. Pete might not have been there when Davey decided to settle the matter of who the best cowboy was forever, but by his father’s side, Pete had literally worked to build the All-Stars from the ground up.

Rodeo was family. The All-Stars was his family, his father’s legacy. It was his legacy, by God. Except for that damned poker game. Milt Lawrence had all but stolen the All-Stars from Davey when the man was deep into his whiskey and nothing Pete did could change that. And God knew he’d tried.

When Armstrong Oil—Lawrence Oil’s main competitor—had tapped oil on his ranch and Pete had suddenly become quite rich, he’d tried to buy the All-Stars back from Milt Lawrence. Hadn’t worked. Neither had any of the lawsuits that had followed.

The Lawrences were like leeches. Once they’d latched on, they weren’t letting go until they’d drained the All-Stars of all its history, meaning and money. It was time to try a new line of attack.

One that relied on grumpy old farts. “You can’t be serious,” Yardley snarled. “We had a deal.”

Pete glared at the man. He should’ve known better than to trust Dustin Yardley with something like this.

“What deal?” Chloe snapped. Any trace of confusion was gone from her face. She jammed her hands on the sweet curve of her hips and glared at Pete. Because of course she suspected the truth.

It was no accident that Pete was in Missouri today and it was no accident that he’d come upon the scene with Chloe being browbeaten by a bunch of old cowboys.

“What deal?” Pete echoed, trying to sound innocent and hoping that Dustin would get the damned hint to shut his trap.

Chloe had been running the rodeo by herself for a few months now and the buck stopped with her. She couldn’t hide behind her daddy’s boots anymore, and her brother Oliver? He’d been useless from the get-go, relying on Chloe as his liaison. In theory, the decisions had come from Oliver but Chloe had been the show manager.

When Oliver had officially stepped away from managing the rodeo earlier this year, Chloe hadn’t hired anyone else to help run the show. She should have, though. She had to be drowning in work. They were a long way from Dallas and Chloe had no backup.

Managing the All-Stars was a full-time job and she’d also started that Princess clothing line. His sister, Marie, had bought a couple of shirts, ostensibly so she and Pete could make fun of the latest tacky venture from the tacky Lawrences. But Marie—the traitor—had actually liked the clothing so much she’d bought a few more pieces.

Chloe could have her little fashion show—Pete didn’t care about that at all. But she was going to ruin his rodeo and he wasn’t going to stand for that.

The contractors and local rodeo boards—they wanted to work with him, not her. Not Oliver Lawrence. And they’d never trusted New Yorker Milt Lawrence, with his fake Texas accent.

Pete could rally everyone who made the All-Stars work and get them to go on strike unless the Lawrence family either divested themselves of the circuit or paid Pete his fair share of the profits—going back thirteen long years. The rodeo was worth a lot of money—money that by rights belonged to the Wellington family.

But money wasn’t why he was in Missouri this weekend. Between oil rights and cattle, his ranch was worth millions. No, this was about his father’s legacy—about Pete’s legacy. He wanted the All-Stars back.

So he’d proposed a solution to the stock contractors. The locals threatened to mutiny and, when things looked bleak, Pete would ride to the rescue, Chloe’s knight in a shining Stetson. Chloe would be so grateful for his support that she would agree to Pete working for the All-Stars in one capacity or another. And once he was in, he’d slowly begin to crowd Chloe out.

It was a hell of a risky plan but he’d tried everything else. This would work. It had to. By this time next year, Chloe would be completely out of the picture and the All-Stars would be his.

Provided, of course, that Dustin Yardley didn’t blow the plan to bits before it got off the ground.

Chloe swung back to him, her eyes narrowed. Suspicion rolled off her in waves. “Is there something you’d like to tell me, Pete?” She bit off each word as if it had personally offended her.

He had to make this look good. The plan would work fine even if she was a little suspicious of him, but he needed her to hire him on. Pete was walking a fine line and he knew it.

“Steve Mortimer gave me a call. He’s under the weather and wasn’t able to get his horses here, so he asked me if I could help out. I guess he must’ve asked Dustin first, but you know Dustin.” That wasn’t exactly how it’d happened. It’d cost Pete a pretty penny to get Steve to stay home this weekend. The man did love his rodeo. But then, so did they all.

Chloe gave him a hard look before her entire face changed. It was like watching a cloud scuttle past the sun because suddenly, everything was brighter. Yet, at the same time, that look irritated him. Like she’d flipped a damned switch, Chloe Lawrence looked instantly dumber. If Pete hadn’t watched it happen, he might not have noticed the difference.

He’d say this for Chloe Lawrence—she was a hell of an actress.

She swung around to face Dustin. An inane giggle issued forth from her mouth. She was smart, Pete had to give her that. Dustin Yardley would never admit to being outmaneuvered by a girl.

“I’m so glad Mortimer trusted you enough to call you first,” she said, her voice rising on the end as if she were asking a question.

Pete frowned at her. He understood what she was doing, but that didn’t mean he had to like it.

Then again, when had she ever done anything he’d liked? He didn’t like the way she ran the rodeo. He didn’t like the changes she wanted to institute. He didn’t like the way she used the rodeo to promote her own princess-ness.

The All-Stars wasn’t about Chloe Lawrence. It didn’t exist to sell clothing or stuffed animals or—God help him—Lawrence Oil, a subsidiary of Lawrence Energies, owned solely by the Lawrence family. The All-Around All-Stars existed for one reason and one reason only—to celebrate the best of the best of ranchers and cowboys. To take pride in ranching. To connect them to the tough men and women who had tamed the Wild West.

None of those things applied to Chloe Lawrence. She’d been born in New York, for God’s sake.

Dustin looked confused. The man was mucking this up. Then, at the last possible second, Dustin got a grip on the situation. “Yeah, good old Steve. I, uh, didn’t have any room, uh, in my trailer. For his horses. I was glad Pete was able to pick up the slack.”

Yeah, that was believable.

“But that doesn’t change anything else,” Dustin went on, talking over Chloe’s head to Pete. “It’s not right to have women riding in our rodeo. They’re distracting and they could get hurt. She’s the goddamned Princess of the Rodeo. She shouldn’t be making decisions like this, and God save us all from that arrogant ass of a brother of hers.”

“Which one?” someone from the crowd asked.

“They’re both asses,” Dustin announced with grim satisfaction.

Pete watched the tension ripple down Chloe’s shoulders and he knew without even looking at her face that she had lost her innocent mask and was about to tear Dustin a well-deserved new one. But before she could launch into her tirade, Pete stepped forward. “How about a compromise?”

“How about you go screw yourself?” Chloe said under her voice.

Pete damn near bit his tongue, trying not to laugh at that quiet jab. Never let it be said the woman didn’t give as good as she got.

“Ms. Lawrence isn’t wrong,” he went on as if she hadn’t just insulted him. “A rising tide does lift all boats. Making the All-Stars bigger will mean more money for you, for the riders and, yes, for management. And she’s not wrong that having a woman ranked in the top ten in the Total Bull Challenge has brought in a lot more money to that outfit. Are you guys trying to tell me you would rather remain a second-tier rodeo organization rather than open up the All-Stars to new blood?”

Dustin glared at him, but that was to be expected. Pete was more concerned about what Mort and Dale and the riders would think. If other people bought into Dustin’s way of thinking, Chloe would dig in her heels and the rift could tear the All-Stars apart. A flash of terror spiked through him. That was definitely not part of the plan. He wanted his rodeo back intact, thank you very much.

Chloe turned so she could look at Pete sideways. “Have you been replaced by aliens or something?” she asked in that same quiet voice, and oddly, he was reassured that she didn’t sound inane or ditzy.

He wanted to deal with the real Chloe Lawrence. No tricks, no deceptions.

Which was ridiculous because he was actively engaging in deception as they spoke.

“Doesn’t sound much like a compromise,” Dustin grumbled.

“I’m getting to that.” Pete put on a good grin, the kind he used in bars on Friday nights when a pretty girl caught his eye. “We all want to make more money and Chloe has a few interesting ideas that are taking a lot of her time and attention.”

She kicked at the dirt. “A few?” But again, she was talking only to him.

He ignored her, knowing it would do nothing but piss her off. “Maybe it’d be best if we let her focus on high-level marketing and expansion stuff, the kind that will bring in new viewers and new fans, and leave the nitty-gritty details to someone who doesn’t mind getting his hands dirty, someone people know and trust.”

“We?” she challenged. Damn. Pete had been hoping that would slip right past her.

“Someone like you?” Dale said on cue. Thank God someone was hitting their marks today.

“I am going to kill you,” she whispered even as her eyes lit up and she smiled as if this were a great idea. “Slowly.”

He ducked his head as he stepped around her. “You can try,” he whispered back, and then he turned his attention to the gentlemen gathered around him. “What do you all say? Does that sound like a workable solution? Chloe can keep doing her part to move the rodeo forward and I can handle everything else.” He winked at the crowd where Chloe couldn’t see it.

Dustin looked like he wanted to challenge someone to a gunfight, but Pete had most everyone else and that was the important part.

“Might not be a bad idea,” Dale mused. “After all, we know and respect Pete.”

Pete couldn’t see Chloe’s face, but he heard the sharp intake of breath at what wasn’t said. Sure, they all knew and respected Pete—but they didn’t respect her. It didn’t matter how long she’d been riding at the All-Stars rodeos.

She would never really belong here. It was high time she realized that.

“Well,” she managed to say in a voice that sounded relieved, if a little airheaded. “I’m so glad we were able to find a solution that works for everyone! And Mr. Wellington, I’m extra glad you are able to bring your horses all the way to the Bootheel.” Her grin was so bright it about blinded him. “I’d like to remind everyone that showtime is in three hours and we do have a sold-out crowd tonight and an almost sold-out crowd tomorrow night. Let’s give these people a reason to come back that doesn’t involve funnel cakes.”

She got a little bit of a laugh for this and she kept that big smile going, but Pete could see the light dying in her eyes a little bit.

Good. That’s just what he wanted. He didn’t feel the least bit sorry that she’d been overthrown in a mutiny. It was past time she found out what it was like to have a usurper sitting on the throne of one’s inheritance.

Still... Watching her grit her teeth as she shook hands with cowboys bothered Pete a little bit. These men had been nothing but rude to her today. Some of them had dressed it up with prettier language than others, but still. She had to pretend like this was all hunky-dory because if she punched someone like her brother would’ve, they’d start in on how it was more proof that women shouldn’t be in charge of these things.

That’s just the way it went. What was done was done and the end justified the means. He had successfully accomplished the first step in taking back his rodeo and he couldn’t afford to let things get personal. Nothing he felt for Chloe was personal and that was final.

She turned to him. “When you get time,” she said, sweetness dripping off every word, “I’d like to go over your new duties with you.”

Which meant she was going to try to destroy him. Pete grinned. He’d like to see her try. “Absolutely,” he told her, fighting the odd urge to bow. “You’re the boss.”

Fire danced in her eyes, promising terrible, wonderful things. She tilted her head in acknowledgment of this false platitude and then sashayed off, her head held high and her hips swaying in a seductive rhythm. Pete knew he wasn’t the only one watching the Princess of the Rodeo leave him in the dust. The woman was an eyeful.

Just as she got to the gate, she turned and looked back over her shoulder. Sunshine lit her from behind, framing her in a golden glow. Damn, she was picture-perfect, every fantasy he’d ever had come to life. If he didn’t know who she was, he’d be beating these other idiots off with a stick to get to her first.

But he did know. She was an illusion, a mirage. She dressed the part, but she was nothing but a city slicker and interloper. A gorgeous, intelligent, driven interloper.

Their gazes collided and his pulse began to pound with something that felt an awful lot like lust. Even at this distance, he could feel the weight of her anger slicing through the air, hitting him midchest.

Oowee, if looks could kill, he’d be bleeding out in the dirt.

With a flip of her hair, she was gone.

“Well, how about that,” Dale said, laughter in his voice. “You got your work cut out for you, Pete.”

Oh, yeah, he was going to have his hands full, all right.

It was time to show Chloe Lawrence that the All-Stars was his. But she wasn’t going to make this easy.

The thought made him smile. He was already starting to like this job.

Three

Chloe’s hands were shaking as she sat at her makeshift makeup table in her makeshift dressing room. Which made applying her false eyelashes somewhat of a challenge. She forced herself to take a few deep breaths.

She was going to kill Pete Wellington. It wasn’t a question of if. It was a question of how.

She’d love to run him down with her glossy palomino—but Wonder was at home, enjoying her hay and oats at Sunshine Ridge, Chloe’s small ranch retreat northeast of Dallas. With all the things she had to juggle, she couldn’t handle taking care of her horse, too. It wasn’t fair to Wonder and it wasn’t fair to Chloe. So she was borrowing a horse for her big entrance tonight.

Frankly, it didn’t feel right running Pete down with a borrowed horse. Too many complications.

That man was up to something. If Steve Mortimer had had a problem getting his horses to the Bootheel, he would’ve called Chloe. It was obvious Mortimer had no such problems.

What kind of deal had Pete made with the stock contractors?

And how did backing her up when she was under siege figure into it? Because he wasn’t doing it solely out of the kindness of his heart. This was Pete Wellington she was talking about—there was no kindness in his heart. Not for her or anyone in her family. She didn’t want to offer him a job. She didn’t want him anywhere near her. But...

If she didn’t hand off some of the responsibilities to Pete, would people break their contractual obligations in protest? She could hire someone else but then she’d have the exact same problem—the people who made the rodeos work would balk at dealing with an outsider. By the time she found a workable solution, the All-Stars might very well die on the vine. And who would take the blame for that?

She would.

Maybe she could arrange a stampede. Watching Pete get pulverized would be immensely satisfying.

There. Her hands were steady. Who knew thinking of ways to off her nemesis would be so calming?

Now she applied the false lashes easily. She wore them for the shows because she was moving around the arena at a controlled canter. If she didn’t have over-the-top makeup and hair—not to mention the sequins—people wouldn’t be able to see any part of her. She’d be nothing but an indistinct blur.

And if there was one thing the Princess of the Rodeo wasn’t, it was indistinct.

She was halfway through the second lashes when someone knocked on her dressing room door. If one could call this broom closet a dressing room, that was. Hopefully, that was Ginger, who sat on the local board of this rodeo. If anyone could talk some sense into those stubborn old mules, it’d be Ginger. She took no crap from anyone.

Chloe still had an hour and a half before showtime, but the gates were already open and she needed to be out in the crowd, posing for pictures and hand selling the Princess clothing line. She was behind schedule thanks to Pete Wellington, the jerk. She finished the lashes and said, “Come in.”

Of course it wasn’t Ginger. Of course it was Pete Wellington, poking his head around the door and then recoiling in shock.

“What do you want?” she asked, fighting the urge to drop her head in her hands. She didn’t want to mess up her extravagant eye shadow, after all. Then she’d be even further behind schedule.

He was here for a reason. Was it the usual reason—he wanted his rodeo back? Or was there something else?

“I want you to put on some damned clothes,” Pete said through the open door. At least he wasn’t staring.

Chloe frowned at her reflection. “It’s a sports bra, Pete. It’s the same one I wear when I go jogging. The same basic style women across the country wear when they’re working out.”

It was a really good bra, too. Chloe had perfectly average breasts. And she’d come to a place in her life where she was happy with perfectly average breasts. She liked them. They were just right. Anything bigger would make cantering around arenas every weekend downright painful.

That didn’t mean she hadn’t gone out of her way to buy a high-end sports bra that provided plenty of padding. Everything about the Princess of the Rodeo was bigger, after all. She did a little shimmy, but nothing below her neck moved. She was locked and loaded in this thing and her boobs looked good. And completely covered. “It’s not like you can see my nipples or anything.”

“Dammit, Chloe, it’s a bra,” he growled back through the door. “I can’t... You’re... Look, just put on some clothes. Please.”

Oh, she liked that note of desperation in his voice. Was it possible she’d misread the situation? For almost ten years now, she and Pete had been snarling at each other across arenas and in parking lots. She’d always thought her physical attributes had no impact on him because he’d never reacted to her before in that way.

But he was reacting now. She could hear the strain in his voice when he added, “Are you decent yet, woman?”

She stood, her reflection grinning back at her. “I don’t know what you’re complaining about,” she said, plucking the heavily sequined white shirt off the hanger and sliding her arms through the sleeves. “I’d be willing to bet large sums of money you’ve seen your sister in a sports bra and never thought twice about it. And yes, I’m decent.”

“Let’s get one thing straight, Lawrence—you are not my...” Pete pushed his way into the dressing room, which was not designed to hold a man his size. The space between them—no more than a foot and half—sparked with heat as his gaze fell to her chest. “Sister,” he finished, his voice coming out almost strangled as he stared at the open front of her shirt.

“Thank God for that,” Chloe said lightly as she brushed her hands over the sequins—which conveniently lay over the sides of her breasts. “I pity Marie for having to put up with you, I really do.”

She’d never had a problem with Marie Wellington, who worked her wife’s ranch in western Texas. But then again, Marie had made it clear some years ago that she didn’t care if the Wellingtons got control of the All-Stars or not. “It’s just a rodeo,” Marie had confided over a beer with Chloe one night. “I don’t know why Pete can’t let it go.”

In the years since then, Chloe hadn’t gotten any closer to finding out why, either. But if the man was going to torture her, she was going to return the favor—in spades.

Her hands reached the bottom of the shirt and she took her time making sure the hem was lined up.

Pete’s mouth flopped open as Chloe closed the shirt, one button at a time. She probably could’ve asked him for the keys to his truck and he would’ve handed them over without even blinking. She had him completely stunned and that made him...vulnerable.

To her.

She let her fingers linger over that button right between her breasts as Pete began breathing harder, his eyes darkening. The cords of his neck began to bulge out and she had the wildest urge to lick her way up and down them. The space between them seemed to shrink, even though neither of them moved. Her skin heated as he stared, tension coiling low in her belly.

Crap, she’d miscalculated again. Did she have Pete Wellington at her mercy? Pretty much. But she hadn’t accounted for the fact that desire could be a two-way street. He’d always been an intensely handsome man. She wasn’t too proud to admit she’d had a crush on him for a couple years when she’d first started riding at the rodeos, until it became clear that he would never view her as anything more than an obstacle to regaining his rodeo.

But the way he was looking at her right now, naked lust in his eyes instead of sneering contempt?

He wanted her. And that?

That took everything handsome about him and made him almost unbearably gorgeous. Her pulse began to pound and, as she skimmed her fingers up her chest to ostensibly reach for the next button, she had to fight back a moan.

“There,” she said as she fastened the last button, and dammit, her voice came out breathy. “Is that decent enough for you?”

Pete’s gaze lingered on her body for another two seconds before he wrenched his whole head up. His eyes were glazed. She probably couldn’t have stunned him any better than if she’d hit him on the head with a two-by-four. Chloe had to bite her lower lip to keep from saying something wildly inappropriate, like I’ll undo all of those buttons while you watch or maybe just a simple, effective your turn.

Talk about wildly inappropriate. Instead, she said, “What do you want?” because that was the question she needed the answer to.

His presence wasn’t an accident and he was plotting something. But her words didn’t come out as an accusation. At least, it didn’t sound like one to her. It almost sounded like...an invitation.

He swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing with the motion. The look in his eyes said one word and one word only—you. “We, uh, have to talk. About the job.”

Right, right. The job. The rodeo. The feud between their families, going back over thirteen years. The way she knew he was here to undermine her but she wasn’t sure how supporting her was going to help with that.