To Court A Cowgirl

“Well,” Kate said, “I see some waves ahead where Pat’s concerned, so my offer stands. If you need to talk, I’m here.”

“Dad wants me to move in around the corner. Want to talk about that?”

Kate laughed. “He tried to get me to do that, too.”

“That makes me feel better about saying no. But I did go talk to Ray Largent. He told me about a place that’d been for sale a while ago, but taken off the market. I took a trip out there this evening.”

“Rather than staying home and taking a few hits for me?”

He shot his sister an amused look. “It was your turn and I didn’t think it would take long. It didn’t. I practically got frog-marched out the door.”

Kate gave him an amused look. “Where?”

“The Lightning Creek Ranch.”

Kate’s eyebrows went up. “I didn’t know that was ever for sale. Allie Brody just moved back so she could go to work for the elementary school. She’s taking over for Tricia Kettle while she’s on maternity leave.” Kate wrinkled her forehead. “She frog-marched you off the place?”

“Pretty much and I don’t know why.”

“You didn’t mention Ray’s name, did you?”

Jason shrugged. “He’s the guy that put me on to the place.”

Kate rolled her eyes. “He’s also her ex-father-in-law. And it was not an easy divorce from what I hear. Kyle tried to get a chunk of the ranch in the settlement and didn’t.”

“Well, shit.” Jason rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, which was still a little stiff from his discussion with Max. “Maybe he could have told me that.”

“Maybe he thought you knew.”

“I don’t know how.” It’d been a while since he’d been home for more than a couple of days, and certainly not long enough to catch up on all the local goings-on. And, honestly, Allie Brody probably wouldn’t have been a subject of conversation, even if Ray and his father had been business associates for years and Ray had been her father-in-law. In fact, when he thought about Allie all he could remember was a hot body, a lot of blond hair and an attitude that had smacked of smoldering resentment toward him after he’d bested her for valedictorian.

And it appeared that not much had changed there.

CHAPTER TWO

ALLIE WENT TO bed early after her confrontation with Jason Hudson, but she did not sleep. A wind blew in close to midnight, beating on the house and making the trees creak until the early hours of the morning. Allie finally fell asleep, only to have her alarm ring minutes after she’d dozed off. First day of work. No hitting the snooze.

Yawning, she left the house in her pajamas and coat to do her early morning chores, only to find a few random shingles scattered across the front porch. There were more shingles in the yard. And in the driveway.

Allie had a very bad feeling as she followed the shingles toward the small barn, hidden by the arena—the only building on the property that still had a shingled roof, as opposed to metal. She rounded the corner of the arena then stopped dead. The entire structure lay in a heap of boards, beams and trusses. So much for refurbishing the small barn when they could afford it.

Allie approached the destruction slowly, circling it as if it were a carcass, which in essence it was. It appeared that the roof had been totally lifted off and tossed to the side, twisting the building enough to bring it down. Then she saw the damage to Dani’s arena, the canvas covering impaled by debris.

Allie pressed a hand to her forehead. Her first day of work and...this.

The ranch hated her.

The feeling was mutual.

As soon as she got into the house, she called the insurance agent and left a message, then showered and dressed for work, debating about whether she should move to the Staley house, with its stainless steel appliances and vaulted ceilings. No bad memories. No curses. Dani wouldn’t care.

The ranch would win, but she’d probably be a lot happier.

* * *

OKAY, SO HIS dad didn’t want a sitter and he had made that abundantly clear again this morning when Jason had asked him again about meds. Cool. Jason didn’t want to be a sitter and that hadn’t been his intention when he’d come home. But he also didn’t want to fight with his dad about how he needed to take care of himself.

He glanced at his watch and continued jogging up the mountain, ignoring the sweat rolling down his back and the dull ache in his knee as he tried to shake off the early morning pissing match he’d just had with his father. Sweat helped. It always did. He might be done with football, but he couldn’t imagine life without training. Or a schedule, which he currently lacked.

At least he had a goal. In fact, his entire life had been goal-oriented, as Kate had pointed out the night before. Becoming a professional football player had consumed him since he’d been six and a half, when his dad had first started taking him to games. He’d known then that he wanted to be one of those titans out on the field and even though he’d kept the goal to himself, he’d strived for it. Made smaller goals to achieve; goals that built on one another. Moving to Montana, where his dad had bought a construction company, hadn’t helped, but he’d taken the small school to the state championship two years in a row. That had gotten him a scholarship to a powerhouse football school, and the rest had pretty much been history.

Truly history now.

Enter phase two of his life plan.

Jason slowed his steps as he reached the boundary fence to the Forest Service land, then turned to look out over the Eagle Valley. It was a beautiful little valley, stretching between two mountain ranges with a lake dead-center—a lake with a house on it that his father still wanted him to buy. There was a new resort on the far side of the valley—Timberline—where he’d promised his sister dinner. On the opposite side was the Lightning Creek Ranch, cozied up against the mountains with its broad pastures and fields insulating it from encroaching housing developments.

It would have been the perfect sanctuary, but as Ray had told him the day before, there were other places with acreage for sale. Just none as nicely situated as the Lightning Creek or as close.

Jason stretched for a minute, working through the kinks that were part of the territory after eight years of getting slammed to the ground, then slowly started jogging back down the mountain. What was he going to do with his future other than steer clear of Uncle Jimmy’s dealership and keep an eye on his dad? Even while jogging the thought of a nebulous future made his stomach start to knot. Pretty soon he was going to have to either come up with some kind of plan or invest in antacid stock.

* * *

“I HOPE WE see you tomorrow,” Mrs. Lynn, the school secretary, said with a speculative raise of her eyebrows when Allie turned in her key before going home after the first day of her long-term substitute-teaching contract. “I know things get a little wild in the library on kindergarten day.”

“Couldn’t keep me away,” Allie assured her with a quick smile. It was, after all, a job, with a paycheck, and in truth, the lively kindergarten classes had barely fazed her—possibly because she’d been mulling over the call she’d received from the insurance agent just before lunch. The collapsed barn had been underinsured, and while they would issue a check, it wouldn’t come close to replacing the barn. The only good news was that the damage to the indoor arena was covered and they’d start to work on that claim immediately.

But despite the rough start and the insurance issues, Allie had a surprisingly stress-free day manning the school library. Classes came and went. Teachers, many of whom she already knew, stopped by to say hello and welcome her. She’d eaten lunch with her friend Liz Belfort, who taught second grade at the school, and caught up on the local news. It wasn’t until it was time to head home that she started to feel the familiar stirrings of anxiety, and she knew it was because she fully expected to find a new disaster waiting for her on the Lightning Creek.

She gave a small snort as she drove out of the parking lot. She’d been conditioned to expect the worst there, just as her sister Mel had told her when she’d grudgingly volunteered to hold down the fort while Dani and Jolie were away. It was true. She drove into the driveway and instantly started scouting for fallen trees, escaped livestock, lightning strikes and floods.

Nothing, but she wasn’t totally convinced that the ranch was done with her.

That evening, after finishing her evening chores and checking the pregnant cows, all of whom stubbornly refused to show any sign of calving, Allie poked around the remains of the small barn. It had been built in the 1960s and the wood wasn’t weathered enough to be salvaged for reuse in offices and houses, which was a disappointment. At school she’d managed to convince herself that there might be some salvage potential to help pay the demolition costs, but no. Now, if the big barn blew down, that wood would be worth something—

Allie abruptly stopped the thought. The way her luck was going, the big barn would blow down. Best to focus on getting what was left of the small barn out of there and not wish for trouble in the form of salvageable boards.

* * *

EVEN THOUGH JASON had come home to be near his father, and even though he was immensely grateful that his dad was still alive, they’d already begun to slip into their old roles. Jason managed to keep his mouth shut in situations that would have triggered him in his teens, but he felt his patience beginning to wear thin. He and Max made a daily walk around the neighborhood, with his dad’s two monster Dobermans leading the way. On every walk Max directed the conversation to Jason’s future and the possibility of him working for Jim, no matter how many times he tried to steer it away. Finally, on a blustery Wednesday morning jaunt, Jason stopped walking, turned to his dad and bluntly asked him what the deal was. Why was he so hell-bent on Jason going to work for family?

“Because business is flagging and you could help. And I don’t think it would kill you to do that.”

For a moment Jason stared at Max. “I thought you were concerned about my future.”

“I am. And my brother’s, too.”

Jason propped his hands on his hips and stared up at the sky. Then he looked back at his dad. “You want me to do a job I don’t want to do in order to draw in business?”

Max gave him an openhanded duh gesture. “For the family.”

Jason just shook his head and started walking. “I need to think on this.”

Max started after him and Jason slowed his steps until his dad caught up, so that he wouldn’t tax his father’s heart.

“JD.” Jason turned and stopped, hoping his dad was going to say something sane. Instead he said, “Jimmy’s already got an ad campaign planned.”

“Without asking me?”

Max shrugged a shoulder. “You do the pizza ads, so we figured he could tie into that.”

“How?”

“We have this Jaromek look-alike—” Jason rolled his eyes at his former quarterback’s name “—and he’s going to throw car keys and—”

“I’m going to catch them?” As if that wasn’t a lawsuit waiting to happen. Maybe if someone else parodied the commercials, they’d get away with it, but he’d starred in the damned things. “No, Dad.”

“Look. You might have been the big man on campus for a lot of years, but you’re home now and you need to start looking out for your own.”

Again Jason stared at his father, unable to find words. Finally he said, “Let’s talk about this later.” Because if he didn’t wait until his rising temper cooled, he’d say something he regretted. “Let’s head home.”

The Dobermans understood the word home and immediately reversed course. Max didn’t say a word on the way back, and Jason didn’t try to make conversation. It was a tense half-mile walk and once they arrived, Jason went upstairs to take a shower. When he finished, his dad was watching television, the big dogs curled up on either side of his chair.

“Hey,” Max said as he walked down the hall.

“Yeah?” Jason asked, fully expecting phase two of the battle.

“Kate forgot to buy dog food. Could you pick some up while you’re out? Wildland brand.”

“Will do,” Jason said, glad to have a chance to make an escape. He still needed some time to work through this owing-the-family stuff. Jimmy was well able to take care of himself and if the business was flagging, it was because of him. People were still buying cars, but his uncle, quite frankly, was a manipulator. He scattered pennies in the parking lot so that people shopping for cars would think it was their lucky day. He wasn’t above pretending there were bogus problems with the cars people brought to trade in. In short, his uncle was shady in his business practices and he was not going to help the guy out. It was bad enough he was related to him. And honestly? He was pissed that his father expected him to do just that, in the name of family.

With his jaw muscles aching, he got into his truck and drove to the grocery store, only to discover that they didn’t carry Wildland food. He had to go to Culver Ranch and Feed. Fine. He started back to his truck, stopping abruptly to let a car pass in front of him. He recognized the driver in an instant, even raised a hand, but Allie Brody looked through him as if he didn’t exist.

And for some reason, that pissed him off even further.

He marched to his truck and took off for the feed store, wondering if he could fit in another run that day to take off some of the stress. At the light, he caught up with Allie’s car. He saw her glance up at him in her rearview mirror before fixing her gaze forward again. She turned the corner, drove another mile, then turned into Culver Ranch and Feed.

Good. He had a word or two for Allie.

The lot was almost empty, but he purposely parked right beside her. She got out of the car and walked into the store. He followed, stopping just inside the door to get his bearings.

“Can I help you?” the lady behind the counter called as he caught sight of Allie to his left, tacking something to the bulletin board.

“No thanks,” he said. Allie’s head came up at the sound of his voice, but she didn’t move away from the board. He closed the distance between them, stopping a few feet in front of her. “Have I done something to offend you?”

Allie met his gaze dead-on, her expression cool as she said, “Why do you ask?”

“I don’t know...maybe the way you practically ran over my feet at the Food Mart parking lot and the way you’re looking at me now.”

“I didn’t practically run over your feet and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the way I’m looking at you.”

“Right,” he said flatly.

She gave an impatient snort. “Maybe you need to understand that not everyone is a fan.”

“Hey,” he said, taking a step closer and feeling a touch of satisfaction when her blue eyes widened an iota—not as if she were threatened, but instead as if she were suddenly aware that he was going to continue the conversation instead of accepting the brush-off. “I don’t deserve that. I never asked you to be a fan. I asked if I’d offended you.”

She folded her arms and seemed to consider his question for a moment. “Let me put it this way. You’re the second rich guy who’s tried to buy my ranch. I resent people traipsing to my front door, offering cash and assuming we’re going to fall all over ourselves to sell our family heritage.”

“Who was the other guy?”

Allie’s gaze shifted and then she said, “None of your business.”

“Is this because of Ray Largent? Because for the record, I had no idea that Ray was your ex-father-in-law. I came because I heard the ranch had once been for sale. End of story.”

“It wasn’t entirely your connection to Ray that put me off.”

“Then what?”

She sucked in a breath, her expression bordering on stubborn as she obviously fought to find a reason for her animosity. “Maybe it’s because things are easy for you. So easy that you can simply point to what you want and pull out your wallet.”

“What?”

She was starting to get warmed up. She pointed a finger at him. “Even in high school, whatever you wanted, you pretty much got.”

He looked at her incredulously. “This isn’t about that freaking scholarship, is it?”

“No,” she muttered. “Although I could have used that money. You had money.”

“Sounds like it’s about the scholarship.”

She rolled her eyes as if he were dense. “No. It’s about privilege and general principles. About paying dues.” She unfolded her arms and took a few steps closer so that they were now only inches apart, so close that he could smell her light floral perfume. “What hasn’t come easily to you, Jason?”

“My career. I worked my ass off for that.”

“How about off field, where most people live their lives?” She nodded at his tricked-out truck, clearly visible through the front windows of the store. “Did you have to save for a down payment?”

“You resent that I make money?”

“Playing a game. A lot of us have to scramble to get by and you got paid a huge amount of money to play a game.”

“You’re pretty damned judgmental.”

“I know, but it doesn’t change facts. Some of us have to work for what we get—at a real job—and others get things because of who they are. Or were. Well, guess what? You aren’t getting my ranch.”

“Guess what? I don’t want your ranch.”

“Good.” She smiled tightly at him and when he gave no response, she pushed by him and headed for the door.

Jason let out a breath and ran a hand over the side of his head. The lady behind the counter sent him an odd look and he turned to face the bulletin board. There in front of him was the notice Allie had tacked up.

Wanted: handyman to tear down building, remove debris.

Without a second thought Jason pulled the advertisement off the board, crumpled it up and jammed it into his pocket.

CHAPTER THREE

ALLIE COULDN’T PUSH the feed-store face-off with Jason Hudson out of her brain, even though she gave it a mighty try. She was not normally confrontational. She left that for Dani and Jolie. She was more of the peacemaker, a retreat-into-the-background kind of person. But today she’d been part of a spectacle in the ranch store. Like it or not, Jason triggered her temper. And she had to face that sad fact that she did harbor resentment against the guy. Why? Because his family was wealthy? Because he’d gotten what she wanted? Because he’d tried to buy the ranch by nonchalantly walking up to her door with more cash at his disposal than she’d ever seen?

The phone rang as she finished washing her few dishes and she practically pounced on it when she saw Mel’s number on the display. Her second sister and her husband lived on a remote New Mexico ranch and rarely called unless they were in town, where they got decent phone reception.

“Hey,” she said without waiting for a hello. “Back in civilization?”

“Hi, Allie.”

She sat up straighter at the sound of her brother-in-law KC’s voice. “What’s wrong?”

“Mel. She’s okay, but she had a bad run-in with a mama cow. Put her over the fence and she broke an ankle, bruised her ribs when she fell on the other side.”

“Oh, my gosh.” Allie pressed a hand to her chest.

“Damned Charolais,” KC muttered. “I told my boss we needed to let a few of these meaner cows go. Maybe he’ll listen to me now.”

“When can I talk to Mel?”

“I’ll have her call you later. She’s a little loopy on the pain meds right now and worried about not doing her part during calving.”

“But she’s okay?” Allie asked, needing to hear it one more time.

“She’s fine.” But she could hear the stress in KC’s voice. “But that’s the last time she’s checking the cows alone.”

“I’ll add my voice to yours,” Allie said. Even though she was going to do exactly the same thing tonight and every other night for the next several weeks until all of the Lightning Creek calves hit the ground. Their cows were Angus, and all pretty mellow, but a cow with a calf was unpredictable.

“What about you?” he asked, keying into her thoughts. “Do you have any help?”

“I’ll call the vet if there’s any problems.” Even though it was expensive. Living alone, she couldn’t risk being hurt. “Promise,” she said when nothing but silence met her statement.

“All right then,” KC said gruffly.

She hung up the phone after a few more minutes of conversation and then rubbed her forehead. Mel was good with cattle, but things like this happened on ranches and considering her luck on the Lightning Creek...no, she wasn’t going to consider that.

Mel called a few hours later, explained to Allie how the accident had been a fluke. She’d expected the cow to charge her, had actually planned to go over the fence, but had caught her boot on the way over and fell end-over-teakettle, landing on a pile of irrigation pipe.

“I need to get less cumbersome boots,” Mel explained.

“Right.” But Allie smiled, glad that her sister sounded as if she were in good spirits.

“And KC said you promised to call the vet if any calves need to be pulled.”

“I will.”

“There’s a reason there’s a ranch fund, you know.”

And she and Kyle were the reason that the ranch fund was so low. “Speaking of which, we had a windstorm...” Allie went on about the storm, wondering why it was that when her sisters were there, the fund grew slowly but surely, and when she was there, it shrank. It was starting to give her a complex.

“Keep me posted,” Mel said, sounding as if she were glad to have something to think about other than her ankle, which was going to keep her in the house for a lot longer than she wanted. “How’s the job?”

Not what she expected. “Let’s just say teaching high school art and managing an elementary library are worlds apart,” she said dryly. She was a little surprised by the fact that she didn’t feel more satisfaction at the end of the day. She enjoyed the kids and the staff, but when she walked out the door, she felt as if she needed...more.

“Hang in there,” Mel said.

“Will do. Get some rest,” Allie said. “And let me know when you leave for the ranch.”

* * *

JASON SPENT THREE days driving around with Ray Largent, looking at properties with acreage, before finding eighty acres butted up against Forest Service land on one side and a giant ranch on the other. It was close to what he’d been looking for, only a fifteen-minute drive from his dad’s house, yet it gave him privacy. Granted, it was smaller than he wanted, and overpriced, but at least it was one option to consider. Ray encouraged him to make an offer soon, but Jason had done his homework and knew that the property had been on the market for close to a year. Odds were that he didn’t need to make a snap decision.

He headed home to what was supposed to be an empty house, since Kate had agreed to take their father to his weekly checkup, only to find an unfamiliar Lexus parked in the front yard. A moment later Jimmy got out and Jason swallowed a groan. Jimmy’s name had not come up for a couple of days and Jason was beginning to hope the matter was closed.

“Hey, JD!” His uncle clapped him on the shoulder.

“Jim.” Jason clapped him back, then put up his hands in a defensive stance when his uncle threw a couple of fake jabs at him. “It’s been a while,” he said when his uncle finally quit punching.

“Sure has. Wish we could have seen you here at home more often, but I know how it is.”

“Want to come in for a beer?” Jason asked. He’d always liked his uncle, but he also saw him exactly for what he was. An opportunist. Jimmy had made a lot of money being an opportunist, on top of what he’d inherited, but according to Kate he had invested poorly and lately had seen diminishing returns. But he hadn’t yet stopped living the high life.

“A beer sounds great.”

Jason led the way into the house through the garage door, waved Jimmy to a seat in the great room and got a couple of beers out of the fridge and opened them.