The Rancher and His Unexpected Daughter

“Thought you’d be outside by now, ready to get to work,” he announced. “I won’t tolerate slackers working for me.”

Her gaze shot to his. “What does this crummy job pay anyway? Minimum wage, I’ll bet.”

“It pays for a smashed up pickup, period. Think of it as a lump sum payment.”

“I’ll want to see the repair bill,” she informed him. “If the figures for my pay, based on the minimum hourly wage, are higher, I’ll expect the rest in cash.”

Harlan wanted very badly to chuckle, but he choked back his laughter. This pint-size Donald Trump wannabe had audacity to spare. “Fair enough,” he conceded.

“And I’m not getting on a horse,” she reminded him belligerently.

“That’s something we can discuss,” he agreed. “Meantime, let’s get out to the barn and groom them. They’ve been fed this morning, but tomorrow I’ll expect you to do that, too.”

She stood slowly, reluctance written all over her face. Harlan deliberately turned his back on her and headed out through the kitchen, winking at Maritza as he passed. He didn’t pause to introduce them. He had a feeling Jenny would seize on any delay and drag it out as long as she possibly could. She might even inquire about those Tex-Mex recipes she claimed not to like, if it would keep her out of the barn a little longer.

With her soft heart, Maritza would insist on keeping Jenny in the kitchen so she could teach her a few of her favorite dishes and coddle her while she was at it. That would be the end of any disciplining he planned. Until he’d laid some ground rules and Jenny was following them, he figured he couldn’t afford to ease up on her a bit. Her very first day on the job was hardly the time to be cutting her any slack.

“Was that your housekeeper?” Jenny asked, scuffing her sneakers in the dust as she poked along behind him.

“Yes.”

“How come you didn’t introduce us?”

“No time for that now,” he said briskly. “You have a job to do. You’ll meet Maritza at lunch. She’ll be bringing it out to us.”

“We’re going to eat in the barn?”

Harlan hid a grin at her horrified tone. “No, I expect we’ll be out checking fences by then.”

She scowled at him. “I thought you were rich. Don’t you have anybody else working this place? I can’t do everything, you know. I’m just a kid.”

“Trust me, you won’t even be scratching the surface. And yes, there are other people working the ranch. Quite a few people, in fact. They report to my son. They’re off with the cattle or working the fields where we have grain growing.” He shot her a sly look. “You had any experience driving a tractor?”

“The sum total of my entire driving experience was in your truck yesterday,” she admitted, then shrugged. “You want to trust me with a tractor after that, it’s your problem.”

He grinned. “You have a point. We’ll stick to horses for the time being.”

He led her into the barn, which stabled half a dozen horses he kept purely for pleasure riding. Jenny eyed them all warily from the doorway.

“Come on, gal, get in here,” he ordered. “Let me introduce you.”

“Isn’t it kind of sick to be introducing me to a bunch of horses, when you didn’t even let me say hello to the housekeeper?”

“You’ll get to know Maritza soon enough. As for these horses, from now on they’re going to be your responsibility. I want you getting off on the right foot with them.” He pulled cubes of sugar from his pocket. “You can start off by offering them these. That’ll get you in their good graces quick enough. Let’s start over here with Misty. She’s a sweetie.”

Jenny accepted the sugar cubes but she stopped well shy of Misty’s stall. “Why is she bobbing her head up and down like that?”

“She wants some of that sugar.”

Jenny held out all of it. “Here. She can have it.”

“Not like that,” he corrected, “unless you want her to nip off a few fingers at the same time.”

He showed her how to hold out her hand, palm flat, the sugar cube in the middle. Misty took the sugar eagerly. He grinned as Jenny’s wary expression eased. “Was that so bad?”

“I guess not,” she said, though she still didn’t sound entirely convinced.

For the next two hours he taught her to groom the horses, watching with satisfaction as she began first to mutter at them when they didn’t stand still for her, then started coaxing and finally praising them as she worked. He’d never known a kid yet who could spend much time around horses and not learn to love them. Jenny’s resistance was weakening even faster than he’d hoped.

When he was satisfied that her fear had waned, he walked over to her with bit and saddle. “How about that ride now? Seems to me like Misty’s getting mighty restless and you two seem to have struck up a rapport.”

Jenny regarded the black horse with the white blaze warily. The gentle mare wasn’t huge, but Harlan supposed she was big enough to intimidate anyone saddling up for the first time.

“I don’t know,” Jenny said.

“Let’s saddle her up in the paddock and you can climb aboard for a test run. How about that?”

“You’re not going to be happy until I fall off one of these creatures and break my neck, are you?” she accused.

“I’m not going to be happy until you try riding one,” he countered. “I’d just as soon you didn’t fall off and break anything, though I can pretty much guarantee that you’ll get thrown sooner or later.”

“Oh, jeez,” she moaned. “My mom really will sue you if that happens. We’ll ask millions and millions for pain and suffering. We’ll take this whole big ranch away from you and you’ll end up homeless and destitute.” The prospect seemed to cheer her.

“I’ll take my chances,” Harlan said with a grin. “Come on, kid. Watch what I’m doing here. If you don’t cinch this saddle just right, you’ll be on your butt on the ground faster than either of us would like.”

Jenny grudgingly joined him in the paddock. With trepidation clear in every halting move she made, she finally allowed him to boost her into the saddle on Misty’s back.

“I don’t know about this,” she muttered, shooting him an accusing look. “What happens now?”

“I’ll lead you around the paddock until you get used to it. Don’t worry about Misty. She’s placid as can be. She’s not going to throw you, unless you rile her.”

“Is there anything in particular that riles her?” Jenny inquired, looking down at him anxiously. “I’d hate to do something like that by mistake.”

“You won’t,” he promised.

It only took two turns around the paddock before Jenny’s complexion began to lose its pallor. Satisfied by the color in her cheeks that she was growing more confident by the second, Harlan handed her the reins.

Panic flared in her eyes for an instant. “But how do I drive her?”

“You don’t drive a horse,” he corrected. He offered a few simple instructions, then stood by while Jenny tested them. Misty responded to the most subtle movement of the reins or the gentlest touch of Jenny’s heels against her sides.

“Everything okay?” he called out as she rode slowly around the paddock.

Jenny turned a beaming smile on him. “I’m riding, aren’t I? I’m really riding!”

“I wouldn’t let you enter the Kentucky Derby just yet, but yes, indeed, you are really riding.”

“Oh, wow!” she said.

Harlan chuckled as she seemed to catch herself and fall silent the instant the words were out of her mouth. Clearly she feared that too much enthusiasm would indicate a softening in her attitude toward this so-called prison sentence she felt had been imposed on her.

“I’m ready to get down now,” she said, her tone bland again.

Harlan patiently showed her how to dismount. “I think you’re going to be a natural,” he said.

She shrugged with studied indifference. “It’s no big deal. I’d like to go inside now. Too much sun will give me skin cancer.”

He hid another grin. “Run on over to the kitchen. Maritza will give you some suntan lotion. She might even have some of those cookies she was getting ready to bake out of the oven by now.”

“Jeez, milk and cookies, how quaint,” she grumbled, but she took off toward the house just the same.

“Be back here in fifteen minutes,” he shouted after her.

“Slave driver,” she muttered.

Harlan shook his head. If she thought that now, he wondered what she’d have to say when she saw the fence he intended for her to learn how to mend.

* * *

Janet wasn’t sure what to expect when she drove back out to White Pines late that afternoon. She supposed it wouldn’t have surprised her all that much to find the ranch in ashes and Jenny standing triumphantly in the circular driveway.

Instead she found her daughter sound asleep in a rocker on the front porch. Harlan was placidly rocking right beside her, sipping on a tall glass of iced tea. He stood when Janet got out of the car and sauntered down to meet her. Her stomach did a little flip-flop as he neared.

To cover the tingly way he managed to make her feel without half trying, Janet nodded toward her daughter. “Looks like you wore her out, after all.”

“It took some doing. She’s a tough little cookie.”

“At least she thinks she is,” Janet agreed. She allowed herself a leisurely survey of the man standing in front of her. “You don’t appear to be any the worse for wear. You must be a tough cookie, too.”

“So they say.”

He tucked a hand under her elbow and steered her toward the porch and poured her a glass of tea. Jenny never even blinked at her arrival.

“Business any better today?” Harlan asked only after he was apparently satisfied that her tea was fixed up the way she wanted it.

Rather than answering, Janet took a slow, refreshing sip of the cool drink. It felt heavenly after the hot, dusty drive. Her car’s air-conditioning had quit that morning on her way back to town and she hadn’t yet figured out where to go to have it fixed. The sole mechanic in Los Piños, a man with the unlikely name of Mule Masters, was apparently on vacation. Had been for months, according to Mabel Hastings over at the drugstore.

“My, but this tastes good,” she said, sighing with pure pleasure. “It’s hotter than blazes today. I thought I’d swelter before I got back out here.”

“What’s wrong with your car? No air-conditioning?”

“It quit on me this morning.”

“I’ll have Cody take a look at it when he comes in,” he offered. “He’s a whiz with stuff like that.”

“That’s too much trouble,” she protested automatically. For a change, though, she did it without much energy. It seemed foolish to put up too much of a fuss just to declare her independence. That was a habit she’d gotten into around her ex-husband. Weighing her independence against air-conditioning in this heat, there was no real contest. Air-conditioning would win every time.

“Nonsense,” Harlan said, dismissing her objections anyway. “It’ll give Cody a chance to snoop. He’s dying to get a closer look at you, so he can tell his brothers that I’ve gone and lost my marbles.”

Startled, she simply stared at him. “Why would he think a thing like that?”

His gaze drifted over her slowly and with unmistakable intent. “Because I’m just crazy enough to think about courting a woman like you.”

Janet swallowed hard at the blunt response. She could feel his eyes burning into her as he waited patiently for a reaction.

“Harlan, I don’t want you to get the wrong idea here,” she said eventually.

It was a namby-pamby response if ever she’d heard one, but she’d never been very good at fending off the few men bold enough to ignore all the warning signals she tried to send out. She’d ended up married to Barry Randall because he’d been persistent and attentive…until the challenge wore off.

With that lesson behind her, she should be shooting down a man like Harlan Adams with both barrels. Suggesting he might be getting the wrong idea hardly constituted a whimper of protest.

He reached over and patted her hand consolingly, then winked. “Darlin’, there is absolutely nothing wrong with the ideas I have. You’ll have to trust me on that.”

That, of course, was the problem. She didn’t trust him or, for that matter, herself. She had a feeling a man with Harlan’s confidence and determination could derail her plans for her life in the blink of an eye. She couldn’t allow that to happen for a second time.

“You running scared?” he inquired, his lips twitching with amusement.

“Scared? Not me.”

His grin broadened. “You sound like Jenny now. I didn’t much believe her, either.”

“Harlan—”

“Maybe we’d better get this conversation back on safer ground for the moment,” he suggested. “Wouldn’t want you getting too jittery to drive home tonight. Now, tell me about your day. You never said how business was.”

Janet’s head was reeling from the quick change of topic and the innuendos Harlan tossed around like confetti. With some effort, she forced her mind off of his provocative teasing and onto that safer ground he’d offered.

“I had a call from somebody interested in having me draw up a will,” she told him. “They decided I was too expensive.”

“Are you?”

“If I lowered my rates much more, I’d be doing the work for free, which is apparently what they hoped for. The man seemed to assume that since I’m Native American, I handle pro bono work only and he might as well get in on the ‘gravy train,’ as he put it.”

Harlan’s gaze sharpened. “You get much of that?” he asked.

He said it with a fierce undertone that suggested he didn’t much like what he was hearing. Janet shivered at the thought of what Harlan Adams might do to protect and defend those he cared about.

“Some,” she admitted. “I haven’t been around long enough to get much.”

“Maybe it’s time I steered a little business your way.”

She suspected that was an understated way of saying he’d butt a few heads together if he had to. She understood enough about small towns to know that a sign of approval from a man like Harlan would guarantee more clients coming her way. As much as the idea appealed to her, she felt she had to turn it down. Barry had always held it over her head that her career had taken off in New York because of his contacts, not the reputation she had struggled to build all on her own.

“No,” she insisted with what she considered to be sufficient force to make her point even to a man as stubborn as Harlan appeared to be. “I need to make it on my own. That’s the only way people will have any respect for me. It’s the only way I’ll have any respect for myself.”

“Noble sentiments, but it won’t put food on the table.”

“Jenny and I won’t starve. I did quite well in New York. My savings will carry us for a long time.”

“If your practice was thriving there, why’d you come here?” Harlan asked.

“Good question,” Jenny chimed in in a sleepy, disgruntled tone.

“You know the answer to that,” she told her daughter quietly.

“But I don’t,” Harlan said. “If it’s none of my business, just tell me so.”

“Would that stop you from poking and prodding until you get an answer?”

“Probably not,” he conceded. “But I can be a patient man, when I have to be.”

Janet doubted that. It was easier just to come clean with the truth, or part of it at least. “My divorce wasn’t pleasant. New York’s getting more and more difficult to live in every day. I wanted a simpler way of life.”

She shot a look at Jenny, daring her to contradict the reply she’d given. Her daughter just rolled her eyes. Harlan appeared willing to accept the response at face value.

“Makes sense,” he said, studying her with that penetrating look that made it appear he could see straight through her. “As far as it goes.” He grinned. “But, like I said, I can wait for the rest.”

Before she could think of a thing to say to that, a tall, lanky cowboy strolled up. He looked exactly like Harlan must have twenty or so years before, including that flash of humor that sparkled in his eyes as he surveyed the gathering on the porch.

“Looks right cozy,” he commented, his amused gaze fixed on his father. “Anything going on here I should know about?”

“Watch your mouth,” Harlan ordered. “Janet and Jenny, this tactless scoundrel is my youngest, Cody. Son, this is Janet Runningbear and her daughter Jenny.”

Cody winked at Jenny, who was regarding him with blatant fascination. “Don’t tell Daddy, but just so you know, I’m the brains behind White Pines.”

“If that were true, you’d have better control over your manners,” Harlan retorted.

Janet chuckled listening to the two of them. Talk about a chip off the old block. There wasn’t a doubt in her mind that any trait Cody possessed, he had learned it at his father’s knee. That included everything from charm to arrogance. Still, she couldn’t help responding to that infectious grin and the teasing glint in his eyes as he squared off against Harlan. The squabbles around here must have been doozies.

“Why don’t you make yourself useful?” Harlan suggested. “Janet says the air conditioner in her car has gone on the blink. Do you have time to take a look at it?”

“Sure thing,” Cody said readily. “Let me get a beer and I’ll get right on it.”

“I could get the beer,” Jenny piped up eagerly.

Cody tipped his hat. “Thanks.”

Janet speared her daughter with a warning look, then said to Cody, “If one single ounce of that beer is missing when it gets to you, I’d like to know about it.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Cody said, winking at Jenny, who blushed furiously.

When they were gone, Janet turned to Harlan. “If he were giving the orders, I suspect Jenny would be docile as a lamb the rest of the summer.”

“But he’s not,” Harlan said tersely. “I am.”

“Jealous of the impact your son has on the Runningbear women?” she inquired lightly, just to see if the remark would inspire the kind of reaction she suspected it would.

Harlan’s expression did, indeed, turn very grim. “He’s married.”

She grinned. “I know. Heck, everyone in town heard about his courting of Melissa Horton. It was still fresh on their minds when I moved here. But last I heard, looking’s never been against the law. I ought to know. I read those big, thick volumes of statutes cover-to-cover in school.”

He scowled. “You deliberately trying to rile me?”

“I didn’t know I could,” she declared innocently.

“Well, now you know,” he asserted.

Janet couldn’t help feeling a certain sense of feminine satisfaction over the revelation. But hard on the heels of that reaction came the alarm bells. It was entirely possibly that she was enjoying taunting Harlan Adams just a little too much. She had a hunch it was a very dangerous game to play. He struck her as the kind of man who played his games for keeps.

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