To Kiss A Cowgirl

Her sister Dani was practically climbing the walls by the time she got home.

“I’m losing training time with all this rain,” she said as she emerged from the kitchen wearing a cherry-print apron. When her fiancé traveled, she ate all her meals with Jolie. “I need my arena. Damned surveyor.”

She and her fiancé and Jolie had each put up one third of the money for the training facility, but the company that was supposed to set up the canvas-covered training arena had yet to have the area surveyed and leveled. Until they did, there was no covered arena and thus no training during inclement weather.

“But we’re growing hay as we speak,” Jolie reminded her. She felt like doing a little happy dance. If this continued, there’d be meadow hay in the barn for the first time in years. One item checked off the very long list she’d made in a loose-leaf notebook. When the last item was checked off, Lightning Creek would once again be a bona fide working ranch. Her working ranch...well, hers and her sister’s, but she’d be the one living there, managing it once Dani got married next summer.

“I’ll give you that,” Dani agreed as she returned to the kitchen while Jolie hung her damp coat on a hook near the front door. “But my arena should have been up by now and it’s ticking me off. And it’s not doing your practice schedule any good.”

Jolie’s barrel racing season started in a matter of weeks at the Glennan Memorial Day Rodeo and she and her mare still had some serious work to do to get up to speed. Unfortunately, the soggy conditions made practicing in the outdoor arena impossible, which in turn made it difficult to reestablish herself as a barrel racing contender—which she needed to do if she hoped to eventually establish a business.

She’d moved back to Lightning Creek Ranch with the idea of conducting barrel racing clinics while her sister continued to develop her successful horse training business. Between the two of them, they’d figured they could keep the ranch afloat and make enough to live comfortably—as long as one of them, aka Jolie, worked a steady job to help pay the land taxes and other incidental expenses.

But once she’d moved home, Jolie had found that she hated seeing the ranch lie fallow. All five cows had been bred the previous spring and all had successfully calved. But the fields were a wreck, the buildings needed re-roofing and the irrigation system needed revamping.

The ranch was in even worse shape than it had been during her teen years when it had slowly been slipping away from them as hay and cattle prices tanked. They’d hung on until the prices rebounded, but only by cutting back to bare bones while their mother worked at a full-time job.

So one late night, over a bottle of wine—or had it been two?—Jolie and Dani had come to an agreement. They would put the Lightning Creek right again. It wouldn’t be a big operation, but they would increase the herd, lease out the fields, mow and bale the meadow hay instead of letting it go to waste. With careful management, they should be able to glean enough profit for Jolie to quit her job in a couple of years and until then they’d build the training business.

That had been the plan, anyway. Then Dani had become engaged to Gabe Matthews, the landscape architect who lived in the mansion next door. Even though Dani still used the ranch as her base of operations, revitalizing the Lightning Creek had become more Jolie’s project.

Jolie had no problem with that. Finally she could put a bit of her animal science degree to work in a meaningful way instead of preg-checking cattle on a mega ranch. She also didn’t mind being the decision-maker. As the youngest of four, she’d been bossed around more than the average kid, and enough was enough.

And speaking of being bossed around...

“Guess who my new supervisor is?” Jolie said, following her sister into the kitchen. At the stove, she sipped a little sauce off a teaspoon and reached for the salt.

“Mike?”

“Still laid up from his hip surgery. No. It’s Dylan.”

Dani turned back from where she was taking plates out of the cupboard. “Dylan?” Her mouth twitched.

“It’s not funny, Dan.”

“Is he as hot as ever?”

“I never found him hot.”

“Liar.”

“I could appreciate his attractiveness but it’s difficult to classify someone who is ordering you around and generally pissing you off as hot.”

Dani shrugged. “Hot is hot.”

Jolie rolled her eyes and went for the wineglasses. Pasta cried out for wine. So did her rather trying day.

Dani waited until they were seated with the bowl of pasta between them before she said, “I assume you’ll be able to work together?”

“I have little choice. I like my job and once Finn gets back it’ll be back to normal. All I have to do is hang on until then.”

“You’ll play nice with Dylan?”

Jolie smiled with mock sweetness. “Of course, Dani. He’s my employer.”

CHAPTER TWO

DYLAN CLOSED HIS laptop and pushed it aside. Finn wasn’t answering his emails. It was probable that he wasn’t available to answer, given his circumstances, or he might not be opening the mail from his cousin, knowing full well that said cousin had a few choice things to say about the help Finn had hired.

Dylan reached for the bottle on the sideboard next to Mike’s kitchen table—his makeshift desk—and poured a shot of bourbon. The deed was done and now he had to live with it.

He lifted his glass in a salute to his absent cousin. “Up yours, Finn.”

He sipped and leaned back in his chair. Hell, this might all be for the best. Having Jolie around could distract him from the other issues in his life. The box of lingerie had definitely distracted him. Steamy images of Jolie in a garter belt didn’t mesh well with him trying to keep her on task in the store.

Was she still as easily sidetracked as she’d been a decade ago? Did she still head off on those wild tangents when she was supposed to be focused on the matter at hand? Her flippant attitude indicated a possible yes to those questions.

All he needed was to have to do two jobs instead of one. But again, maybe being that busy would keep him from fixating on getting the doctor’s release he needed to go back on patrol and stop riding the desk. Law enforcement might not have been the career he and his father had plotted for him, but he loved it.

He didn’t know if he could handle a desk job for the rest of his career—not unless he was wearing a detective’s badge while doing so. He was scheduled to sit for the exam in a matter of weeks, but it was a crap shoot. He knew better guys than him that had failed it the first go, so he needed a contingency plan to ensure he didn’t end up in Logistics until he did pass the exam. And that plan involved getting a doctor’s release and going out on patrol.

“Hey, Dylan?” His grandfather’s gravelly voice came from the back bedroom where he was sorting through belongings in preparation for his move to a smaller, more manageable house on the edge of town, closer to the store.

“Yeah?” Dylan pushed his chair back and got to his feet, putting the bottle on the sideboard before heading down the hall.

Mike was standing between two cardboard boxes with neatly folded tops. “Can you haul these out to the living room so I have room to maneuver?”

“You bet.” Dylan knew it killed Mike to have to ask for help, but at least he was asking. His recovery from the hip replacement had taken longer than expected because he’d tried to do too much too soon. Apparently he’d learned a lesson.

“Marjorie can’t take the goats.”

Dylan stopped in the doorway. “That’s too bad.”

“Yeah.” Mike shook his head. “I don’t want Maisy and Daisy to become cabrito dinner, but I have to be realistic here.”

“I’ll find them homes,” Dylan promised before heading out to the living room with the first box. By the time he got back, Mike had the second box on the bed.

“This one goes to donation.”

“Got it.”

Mike nodded and turned back to the closet. He pulled out a garment bag; the one that Dylan knew held his father’s wool WWII uniform. “Can’t let that go,” Dylan said.

“Don’t have a lot of room in the smaller place.” Mike had been all for moving. Taking care of his menagerie had become too much for him when his hips had started to go, and a house with two stories had been difficult to navigate. Unfortunately, moving to a one-story house meant parting with some of the stuff he’d hung on to for most of his life.

“We’ll find room.” Mike had been close to his own dad, just as Dylan had been close to his. He couldn’t imagine letting go of the few keepsakes he had and didn’t want Mike to have to do that, either.

“You know,” Mike said, “I’ve had about enough of packing. Damned depressing business.”

Dylan wasn’t going to argue. He’d packed everything he’d owned almost exactly a year ago and moved out of his house. His marriage was over, but he still owned half a house he didn’t live in—or he would until it sold. Every month he sent his payment to the bank and every month he contacted the real-estate agent to make certain she was doing her best to move the place. Not that he didn’t trust Lindsey...but he didn’t trust Lindsey. Not since she’d cheated on him, anyway.

“I just poured a shot,” he said to his grandfather. “You want one?”

“In the worst way.” Mike jerked his head toward the door. “Come on. I’ll beat you in a game of cribbage.”

* * *

ON HIS SECOND day of work Dylan arrived at the store just after 7:00 a.m., hoping he could figure out what the problem was with the forklift. He stopped inside the doorway and snapped on the lights.

A bulb popped and went out, leaving the place even dimmer than before.

He hated to admit it, but Jolie had a point about the store being dark and depressing.

He traced a finger over the nearest surface, very much as she had done the day before. It was dusty, too. Mike had hired a cheap fly-by-night janitorial service that came in once a week according to Finn. He’d have a talk with the owner the next time he had a few minutes, which, given the volume of customers they’d had the day before, would probably be right after he got the forklift running.

In the meantime...the light.

He set down his lunch pail and went into the supply closet. There were plenty of replacement lightbulbs but no ladder. He could go out to the warehouse and grab the big ladder there, which was covered with grain dust, or he could stand on top of the sturdy wooden shelves his grandfather had built. An elephant could dance on those shelves and they wouldn’t budge, so that option seemed reasonable—and a lot easier than dragging the ladder in through the rain.

Lightbulb in hand, he pulled a chair to the shelves and stood on it to push aside the boxes of horseshoe nails, raising a cloud of dust. Yes, he’d talk to the janitors. Today.

He stepped from the chair onto the shelving, searching for a handhold on the top shelf. He took hold of the narrow metal electrical conduit running up the wall and eased himself up, getting a knee onto the second-to-the-top shelf. He could just reach the light fixture from—

His knee slipped and he barely missed clipping his chin as his feet once again hit the chair, which toppled sideways. Wildly, he clutched for something, anything, and then hit the ground next to the chair as horseshoe nails rained down on him.

Shit.

For a moment Dylan sat staring up at the light fixture, the base of the broken bulb held in one hand. At least Jolie hadn’t been there to share the moment, although he wouldn’t have tried something that stupid if she’d been there to witness it. No, he’d have made the trip to the warehouse and hauled in the dirty ladder.

He pushed himself to his feet, grimacing at the pain that shot through his hip. Gingerly he flexed his bad leg, glad that he hadn’t injured it further. He could only imagine the humiliation of having Jolie find him lying on the floor with a compound fracture or something. As it was, he was bruised but not broken, and he had time to clean up the evidence before anyone got there.

Or in theory he should have had time. He’d just retrieved a broom and dustpan when he heard the very unwelcome sound of the key sliding into the front lock. A few seconds later the door opened, the bell jingled and Jolie stopped dead in her tracks just inside the doorway. Slowly her green eyes moved up from the sea of nails to his face.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” he said gruffly, shoving aside an empty nail box with his boot.

“Oh, but I do,” she said.

She pointed from the broken bulb he’d set on the shelving unit to the burned-out light above him. “Did we break some safety rules?”

“Enough,” Dylan said in a clipped tone as he started to sweep nails. Flat nails didn’t sweep well.

“After all the grief you gave me about following rules? Enough?” She walked forward, stopping a few feet from him. “Wear your goggles, put on your apron, no elbows on the table.”

“I didn’t want to lose points for stupid stuff,” he said, finally bending to brush the nails into the dustpan with his hand.

“You were crazed.”

“I had to do the work of two.”

“No. You never gave me a chance.”

“You were never serious enough to focus.”

Her jaw shifted sideways. “Maybe I acted like that because of the way you treated me.”

“Well, that was a crappy thing to do.”

“So was treating me like I was stupid,” she said, turning and walking around the counter to start up her computer.

“If it walks like a duck...”

“This duck was never given a chance.”

“The duck never stopped quacking. And, for the record, I never thought you were stupid.”

He glanced over in time to see Jolie’s chin come up in an expression that he knew well—in fact, it surprised him how well he remembered.

“I can barely see in here,” she said, surprising him by changing the subject instead of launching into an argument. “Do you think you can change that lightbulb without killing yourself?”

He didn’t answer as he scooped nails out from under the shelving unit. A second later feet in metallic sandals that showcased intricately painted toenails came into view. He looked up as she dropped a box to the floor.

“For your nails.” She cocked her head. “I hope you didn’t reinjure your leg.”

“No.”

“Thank goodness for small blessings, eh?” She turned and walked away.

“Hey,” he said, stopping her. “Shouldn’t you be wearing shoes with toes?”

“Really?” she asked flatly. “You’re going to go there?”

“I get the irony,” he said, gesturing to the mess he’d made by breaking the rules himself.

“Worried I’d file a workman’s comp claim?”

“Maybe I just don’t want you to get hurt.”

“Maybe I could wear goggles and a rubber apron, too.”

“Damn it, Jolie.” Suddenly he was seventeen again, fighting the tide that was Jolie.

“Fine,” she said before he could come up with anything better. “I’ll wear shoes with toes from now on. But...if I find you lying in a heap somewhere, all I’m doing is calling 9-1-1. No first aid. No mouth-to-mouth.”

There was no reason in the world for the term “mouth-to-mouth” to catch his attention, so Dylan pretended it didn’t. But damn if it hadn’t gotten him thinking. And once again those garter belts flitted into his mind, which kind of pissed him off. “If I croak, you may not have a job.”

“As things are now, I may not have a job. Your store is slowly dying, Dylan.”

His mouth tightened as she took her seat behind the counter and shook her mouse, bringing up a screen as she pointedly ignored him.

Given he had no response to her assertion, since he knew she was right, he put his head down and started gathering the remaining nails and dumping them into the box.

* * *

WHO DID HE think he was, lecturing her on safety when he’d attempted to kill himself that morning?

The boss.

Jolie propped her elbows on her desk and pressed her fingertips against her temples.

There was no arguing that point, even though she had. He was the boss. She was the employee. If push came to shove, and if she wanted her paycheck, then she needed to abide by the rules of the game.

Boss. Employee.

So reminiscent of their chemistry class relationship where he’d been the self-appointed boss. She hadn’t been the employee, but she definitely hadn’t called the shots and had resented being ordered around. The curse of being the youngest in the family.

Dylan had finished cleaning up the nails and disappeared out the front door to get the big ladder from the warehouse, so Jolie went to the supply closet and found another lightbulb. She set it on the counter and went to hold the door as Dylan began awkwardly dragging the long stepladder through the entryway.

She waited until he set it up and had a foot on the first rung before she said, “I was out of line earlier.”

He paused, his hands gripping the sides of the ladder, waiting, as if for a punch line.

She didn’t have one.

“Thank you,” he said gruffly before starting to climb. He shot her a quick look after he took out the dead lightbulb, as if still waiting for her to say something else.

Jolie had nothing.

She stood silently with one hand on the ladder, steadying it until he’d climbed most of the way down, then she headed for her side of the counter. She had accounts to mail out today, which meant it would be one of their busier days—that was the way it’d happened the only other time she’d mailed accounts, four weeks ago. It was as if people wanted to get in and charge things quick before they knew how much they owed. But more than 90 percent of their accounts were years old and the people all paid, eventually, according to Finn. Jolie didn’t want to alienate the paying public, so she put a happy face next to the words past due, which she wrote in pink ink instead of using the official red-ink stamp.

A couple happy faces later she put down the pen and headed for Dylan’s lair, where she knocked on the half-closed door. He looked up from the file he’d been staring at with a frown.

Dragging in a breath, Jolie took his silence as permission to enter.

“Here to take back your apology?”

“No. Just to say one more thing.”

“I’m all ears.” No. He was all long, lean muscle, but she wasn’t going to allow her mind to drift in that direction.

“Chem class ended ten years ago. Obviously it had a big effect on both of us since we’re sniping at each other like we’re still seventeen.”

“So...?”

“So.” She came forward to lean her palms on his desk. “We say whatever else we want to say on the matter here and now. Get it out and over with, then we bury it. As we should have the instant we knew we had to work together.”

“All right.”

“You go first.”

“I, uh, think I’ve said everything I need to say.” He really couldn’t think of anything that hadn’t been said.

“As have I.”

“Then I guess we move forward.”

She smiled grimly as she pushed off from the desk. “Yes. In closed-toe shoes.”

* * *

THE WOMAN PUT him on edge and then, to confuse the issue, she’d been utterly reasonable just now, suggesting that they bury the past and even apologizing to him.

Had she ever apologized to him before?

What could she have said? “Sorry, Dylan, for my attempts to destroy your 4.0 grade point average and thus affect your scholarship eligibility”?

He hadn’t told anyone back then how important going to college had been to him, and he was kind of glad of that after he’d quit school following his father’s death.

Mike had insisted that he go back and finish his biochemistry degree, but long study sessions and grieving didn’t jibe so he’d quit school and by a fluke had gotten the opportunity to attend police officer training school.

Action had felt good, had helped him get his head together, and after a few weeks on the job he’d realized that he’d accidentally found a profession he could happily make a career of. He might not be a college graduate, but he was doing something that mattered.

Dylan’s lip curled as he massaged the shoulder he’d hit on the shelf on his way down to the floor that morning. He’d trusted Lindsey. And now he felt like a chump, but he wasn’t giving up a career he loved.

“Customer needs loading up.” Jolie’s voice came loud and clear through the intercom. Rather than answer, he headed for the door, limping the first few steps before the knee he’d banged loosened up. He gritted his teeth and kept his stride normal as he walked to the counter where Jolie handed him a ticket. “Red Dodge.”

No doubt, since it was the only vehicle in the lot. “Thanks,” he muttered.

The customer—a good-looking blonde in her early thirties—stood just outside the door. “Hi,” he said as he came out the door before glancing at the ticket. Eighteen bags of alfalfa pellets. “Would you mind backing your truck up to the warehouse door?”

She smiled, her warm brown eyes crinkling attractively at the corners, and held up the keys. “Would you please do it?” she asked. Over her head he saw Jolie raise her eyebrows in an amused way, then look back down at her computer screen.

“Not at all,” Dylan replied, taking the keys.

He was a little surprised when she got into the truck with him rather than wait inside as he’d thought she’d do.

“You’re new here,” she said, flashing a smile his way.

“I’m Dylan Culver,” he said, pointing to the Culver Ranch and Feed sign on front of the building before putting her truck in gear and swinging it in a reverse arc.

“Related to Finn, then?”

“Cousin.”

“Ah,” she said as if he’d said something profound. “I’m Codie James.”

“Nice to meet you,” Dylan said with a quick nod. He maneuvered the truck to the loading area, put it in Park and opened the door, leaving it running. Eighteen trips later, he patted the rear of her truck, giving Codie the signal to drive on. She waved at him in the mirror and pulled away.

Jolie didn’t look up when Dylan came back in—in fact, it was almost as if she were purposely not looking at him.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

He came over to lean on the counter. “Nothing my ass.”

Jolie’s fingers stilled on the keys and then she settled her hands in her lap before explaining. “Codie and Finn had a...thing...going on for a while, and I couldn’t help but notice that she was looking at you as if you’re next on the menu.”

“Thanks for the warning.” Dylan was not surprised to find out the two had been involved. Codie looked as if she enjoyed men and Finn enjoyed being enjoyed.

Jolie shrugged one shoulder. “It wasn’t a warning. A guy like you should be adept at reading the signs and making a decision as to whether you want to engage or not.”

“A guy like me?” The question came out before he thought and he instantly regretted it.

“A guy with a hotness factor.”

She spoke so matter-of-factly that for a second he thought he’d misunderstood her. But there really wasn’t any way to misunderstand her meaning.

“Don’t look so stunned. You’re physically fit, good-looking.” She let out a sigh. “Sorry. I thought you knew.”

“I, uh...” He slapped the counter. “I’ve got to go see what the deal is with the forklift.”

“Don’t break any safety rules,” she called as he headed for the door.

He didn’t answer.

* * *

JOLIE WAS STILL smiling when she looked back at the computer. She’d made Dylan Culver blush. Ha.

She finished the accounts, helped a couple of customers buy small items that didn’t require her to roust Dylan from the warehouse where he was either avoiding her or actually fixing the forklift. She’d never known Dylan to back down from anything, so she assumed he was fixing the forklift...but she rather liked the idea of him avoiding her—even if it meant that she was all alone in this depressing store.