Naked Hunger: Naked Cowboys, Book 8

by Desiree Holt

  “Jesus, Ryan.” Sonny stared at hm. “She’s an animal doctor, for chrissake. She’d know better than that.”

  “Would she? Doc told me one of the reasons she bought this practice is because she didn’t get to work the large animals much in West Texas. Maybe there was a good reason. Maybe she just isn’t as careful as she should be.”

  He couldn’t believe he was saying these things about Sable. Sable. Of all people. He raked his fingers through his hair.

  “She told me she did her internship on large animals,” Sonny said. “Doc wouldn’t have sold to her if she didn’t have the goods to do the job.”

  “But she was the only one down here.” Ryan ground the words out. “I should have asked her why the hell she wanted to stay when I went back up to the house.”

  “Women shouldn’t be around these bulls,” Manny said. “They don’t know what to do. You shoulda told me and I’d ’ave watched her.”

  “Well, everyone’s tucked up safe now,” Sonny pointed out. “Go get yourself another cup of coffee. You can use it.”

  “Actually, I think I’ll take a run into town.” He pushed himself up from the bench. “I’ll be back.”

  Sonny grabbed his arm. “You should cool down first, Ryan.”

  Ryan glared at him. Sonny never called him anything but boss unless he was being very serious.

  “I mean it. Don’t go barging in there where she’s got patients and all and start yelling.”

  “I’ll be a model of courtesy.” He glared at Sonny. “You go double-check everything around both Red Danger and Brutus. Triple-check. I’ll be back.”

  He did his best to calm his nerves on the drive into town, but he was seething. He just could not believe that Sable, the woman of his dreams, the vet on her way to being the darling of the county, would do something so stupid. He was sick to his stomach at the thought of the financial loss he could have suffered. He’d put himself out there moneywise to get the bull. Indiscriminate breeding wouldn’t produce bulls that people would pay high dollar for. He needed that high dollar. His whole operation could have gone down the drain. Well, he’d see what she had to say for herself.

  Maybe this whole sex thing with her was just a way for her to distract him so he wouldn’t realize how unprepared she was for this job. And Doc Lynch, what was wrong with him selling to a so-called doctor like her? By the time he reached the clinic, rather than having himself under control, he had worked up a full head of steam. He slammed the truck door and barged into the clinic.

  “Where the hell is she?” he demanded of Deedee.

  The receptionist stared at him, eyes wide. “Is something wrong, Ryan?”

  “Just tell me where she is. Sable.” He raised his voice. “Where you hiding?” He looked around the waiting room and saw everyone there staring at him in shock.

  “I’m here.”

  Sable’s voice broke into his rage. He looked up and saw her at the entrance to the examining rooms. “I gather something’s wrong. Why don’t we go into my office and you can tell me what this is all about.” She looked at Deedee. “Eric is finishing up with the poodle. I’ll be in my office.” She looked at Ryan again. “This way.”

  They were barely in her office when she closed the door, turned to him and, hands on her hips, demanded, “You want to tell me why you come busting into my clinic screaming at me like your house is on fire?”

  “You damn near cost me that house.” The words were like huge blocks of ice falling on metal. “You and your stupid carelessness.”

  “I still have no idea what you mean. Why don’t you sit down and tell me.”

  “Sitting down’s not on the list. What in hell were you doing with Red Danger when I went back up to the house?”

  Sable frowned. “Doing with him? Nothing. Nothing at all. I just wanted to watch him a little, get a better idea of how he moves and stuff. He fascinates me, and I know he’s the foundation of the future of the ranch.”

  “A foundation that could have been blasted to hell today, thanks to you.”

  She sighed. “Either tell me what’s wrong or get out. I don’t have time for this.”

  “Were you a little careless with the lock on his stall? Did you decide you wanted to see what happened when he was out with the cows?”

  Sable shook her head. “Speak English. I’m still in the dark.”

  “Okay, is this plain enough for you? You left the lock open on his stall and the gate open to the little pasture where those few cows are. Danger got out and was getting ready to mess with them. I’m just damn lucky he didn’t, or all that great pedigreed semen might have gone to the wrong cow, and I’d end up with calves worth about a hundred dollars.”

  Her face turned white. “Wait a minute. Are you telling me you think I was careless enough to let that bull loose? Is that what you’re saying?”

  “Nothing wrong with your hearing.”

  For a long moment, she didn’t say a word. Then she opened the office door and pointed. “Get out. Get the hell out.”

  “I want answers from you,” he demanded.

  “I only have one answer for you. I didn’t do it. If you could even think I did, then we have nothing between us. Not even sex. So leave.”

  “Oh, yeah. The sex,” he sneered. “Was that to muddy my brain so I wouldn’t know how incompetent you are?”

  “In—” Her jaw dropped. “Incompetent? Who the hell saved your cow and calf?”

  “Maybe that was just luck. Do you know if that bull had gotten injured or mated improperly, I could have lost everything? I literally bet the ranch on him.”

  “Well, it wasn’t me, you asshole. Now get out, or I’ll call the sheriff and have him throw you out.”

  “Oh, I’m going. But you will be too. Once I get finished.”

  He stormed out, satisfied at the sick look on her face.

  * * * * *

  “So how are you doing really?” Georgie Hannigan asked. “If you don’t mind my saying so, you look like shit.”

  They were sitting in Sable’s office. She looked across her desk at her friend.

  “Gee, thanks. Be careful, I might get a swelled head.” She was desperately trying not to cry. “I’m going to lose it all.”

  Georgie handed her one of the double lattes she’d brought in, took the cover off her own and blew on the hot liquid.

  “That won’t happen, Sable. I promise you. I saw plenty of people in the waiting room when I came in.”

  “The small animals.” She waved a hand. “It’s too expensive and inconvenient for them to drive over to the next county to see a vet. But the ranchers have all pulled out. I guess they’re paying the price for someone from Kerr or Bandera County when they need a vet.”

  “I still can’t believe Ryan’s being such an asshole.” Georgie took a sip of her coffee. “He should know you’re not that stupid. I mean, personal situations aside, you have excellent credentials, and until this happened, you were doing a damn fine job. He could have just asked you if you saw anything.”

  She shook her head. “I thought we were friends. That he knew me better than that. I thought we were—” She stopped.

  “Were what?” Georgie prodded. “What did you think?”

  That we actually had something special. That he was right and we had feelings for each other. Fat lot of good it does me now.

  Still, it made her heartsick to think about it. She knew without Ryan telling her that he’d had deep feelings for her. That he’d been waiting patiently for her to realize how she felt about him. Right when she was just about to admit it to herself and to him, this happened.

  “It doesn’t matter.” Sable took a sip of her own coffee.

  “What have you been doing about Clover? Obviously, you haven’t been out to ride her.”

  “That’s a big damn mess.” Sable scowled. “I called Sonny. At least he’s still talking to me. Anyway, I told him I was looking for a place to move the mare and he said he refused to hear of it.”

  “
Sonny said that?” Georgie’s brows rose to her hairline. “Does he know it’s not his ranch?”

  Sable gave a short little laugh. “I’m not sure. He told me he’s been making sure she get exercised and I shouldn’t jump into anything. He’s convinced Ryan will come around.” She rubbed her forehead. “I think he’s been drinking funny juice.”

  “This will settle,” Georgie assured her. “I believe it.”

  “If things don’t pick up, I’ll have to sell and probably at a loss. Take a job working for someone else again.”

  “The girls and I have been discussing this. We won’t let that happen. I promise.”

  Sable shook her head. “And exactly how do you intend to go about it?”

  At that exact moment, her phone rang. The readout said the number belonged to Stark Ranch.

  “Reenie?” She frowned. “Why are you calling me on the ranch’s landline?”

  “This isn’t Reenie,” a male voice said. “It’s Matt Stark.”

  “Matt?” What the hell? “Is Reenie okay?”

  “Reenie is fine. I’m calling on business. It’s time for the horses to be inoculated. Can you make it out here tomorrow?”

  Sable stared at the phone as if it had grown horns. “You want me to do it? The incompetent vet?”

  “I heard someone had started a rumor like that, but I chalked it up to idiocy. Pete Lynch believed in you, so that’s good enough for me. Now what time can you be here?”

  She hung up after setting the appointment with Matt and gaped at Georgie. “That was Matt. He wanted—”

  But the phone rang again before she could finish her sentence. Before another fifteen minutes had passed, she also had appointments at the Montgomery Ranch, at Mac McDaniels’s to check out the two horses he had arriving in two days and at the ranch a mile down the road from the Montgomerys. The phone rang three more times before she could hang up and take a breath.

  She looked at Georgie, who was grinning like a fool.

  “Told ya,” she said, and winked.

  “B-But how—? What—?” She shook her head as if to clear it. “I can understand Matt and Buck. Their wives probably put them up to it. But these other people are still strangers to me. What’s going on here?”

  Georgie reached down into her tote and pulled out yesterday’s copy of the Hill Country Herald. Sable hadn’t been able to bring herself to read it. Now, she took the paper, unfolded it and—holy shit! She nearly swallowed her tongue. On the front page, above the centerfold, was the picture Jinx Cross had had her photographer take when Sable had been inoculating cattle at the Triple T Ranch. And with it was an article written by Jinx, the publisher herself, about Rowan county’s hot new vet and her experience and credentials.

  Sable just stared. “But—but this is unbelievable.”

  “It’s no more than you deserve,” Georgie told her. “And if we didn’t think you were the best, we wouldn’t be doing this. Believe me.”

  Sable felt tears burning her eyelids and she could hardly swallow past the lump in her throat. Friends like this were rare and precious. She just counted her blessings that something had drawn her to Pete Lynch’s ad in the paper, that she had come here and made the deal with him, and that she had fallen into such a circle of friends.

  “Jinx has been fielding calls since the paper came out,” Georgie went on, “answering questions about you and about Ryan’s rumor. Because that’s what it is. A mean rumor.”

  “I still can’t believe he did it.” Sable rubbed her forehead. “He was so angry, Georgie. And mean. And ugly about it.”

  “I think he was terrified what could have happened and he didn’t stop to think. But that’s no excuse for everything he’s done since then.”

  “I wonder if he’ll ever realize it wasn’t me that let the bull out.”

  Georgie’s lips ticked up in a wicked smile. “Oh, I think someone might point that out to him. Meanwhile, you have animals to tend to, so let’s get your stuff together. Can I watch you inoculate the horses?”

  Sable laughed, her first in two weeks. “It’s not like running a B&B, but if you want to, sure.”

  * * * * *

  Ryan slouched on a bench in the barn opposite the stalls holding Brutus and Red Danger. The headache he’d been nursing for two weeks still throbbed with a dull ache. He wasn’t eating well or sleeping well, and his hands gave him a wide berth. Sonny, his foreman, was the only one brave enough to tell him he was driving everyone crazy.

  “You worried about the woman or the bull?” he asked now, standing in front of his boss.

  “Not the damn woman,” he growled, although that was a damn lie. The look on her face when he’d confronted her at the clinic still haunted his dreams. When he got to sleep, that is. She’d looked so stunned that for a sickening moment he’d wondered if he’d made a mistake. No, he kept telling himself, she was the only one who’d been out there alone with Red Danger. Maybe she’d fiddled with the latch. Maybe she’d bumped the pasture gate so it had opened. He wasn’t exactly sure logistically how it had happened. The only thing he was sure of was she had been the only one who could have been responsible.

  “Well,” Sonny drawled, “you’re actin’ worse than either of these bulls with a burr up their ass. Get over yourself. Be done with it.”

  Ryan would have answered him, but he was distracted by the sound of boot heels clicking on the concrete of the barn floor. He looked up to see Cade Hannigan striding down the aisle, looking like a man on a mission. He wondered what this was about. He and Cade had become friends when Ryan had first come to Saddle Wells and stayed at the Butterfly until he’d moved to the ranch. He spent a fair amount of his free time with Georgie and Cade. But the man didn’t look too friendly right now.

  “Morning.” Cade nodded to Sonny.

  “Howdy, Mr. Hannigan.” Sonny looked at Ryan. “I need to get the boys organized to move the rest of those cows this afternoon. The fence line needs to be checked once more.” He touched the brim of his hat and moved away.

  “Let’s go up to the house and get some coffee,” Ryan said, pushing himself to his feet. “Then you can tell me what brought you out here this morning.”

  “I’ve got a little gossip for you,” Cade said when they were seated in the kitchen with full mugs.

  “Yeah?” Ryan took a healthy swallow of the hot liquid. “Since when did you join the ladies’ sewing circle?”

  “Ha-ha. Very funny.” Cade took a sip of his own coffee. “I actually got this from someone who heard it at the Rusty Nickel over in the next county.”

  Ryan lifted his eyebrows. “I didn’t think that was part of your social calendar, Cade.”

  “Not me, you dumbass. Someone heard it and passed it along to me. And if you want to know what it is, you can stop with the smart remarks for a few minutes.”

  “Sorry. Just goes with my mood these days.”

  “Well, that mood isn’t going to improve when you hear what I have to say.” He took a fortifying swallow of coffee. “You got a hand here named Manny something?”

  A prickle of unease made its way up Ryan’s back. “Manny Valdez. Why?”

  “Apparently, he got loaded Saturday night over at that dive and bragged to anyone who’d listen how he got over on you.”

  Now Ryan’s apprehension spread to the rest of his body. “Got over on me? Exactly how the fuck does he think he did that?”

  “It seems that Manny is a little pissed off at you because you don’t think he can handle your prize bulls very well. You don’t give him, as he says, enough respect. Long story short, he’s the one that nearly cost you Red Danger. And he set it up so Sable would be the one blamed. Kill two birds with one stone.”

  Nausea roiled up in Ryan’s stomach. “That’s a lie. He’s making that up.”

  “For what purpose?” Cade asked. He drained his coffee mug and got up to refill it.

  “Everyone knows what happened.”

  “Do they?” Cade studied him. “They only know the bull
got loose and you’ve blasted Sable all over Rowan County for it.”

  “Damn straight. She was the only one out there when I had to finish a call in the house.” But the sick feeling continued to push through his body.

  “Maybe so. But then she came up here to join you. And Manny, who was pissed off you wouldn’t let him handle the bull, decided to teach you a lesson and throw some dirt on your girlfriend at the same time.” He gave Ryan a hard look. “She was your girlfriend, right?”

  Ryan wasn’t sure exactly what Sable had been. She’d been so blasted insistent that they be just friends with benefits in the beginning. He’d been damn sure about his own feelings, just waiting for her to catch up. During the last few days before the disaster, he’d sensed her real feelings for him were inching their way to the surface.

  “Whatever,” he said now.

  “Of course, she’s nothing now, right? Especially after you just about ruined her practice.”

  “God damn it.” Ryan pounded his fist on the table, making his coffee mug jump. He pulled out his cell and pressed a button on it. When Sonny answered, he said, “Get up to the house. Right now.”

  “Problem, boss?” the foreman asked.

  “If there is, it’s a damn big one. Hustle.”

  “While we’re waiting, I brought something for you to read.” Cade reached into his back pocket, pulled out the folded newspaper he’d stashed there and spread it out face up.

  Ryan looked at the picture of Sable and saw the article and got even sicker. Jinx had given the story on Sable practically the entire front page. The woman might step up for her friends, but she had been scrupulous about not printing anything that was a lie. He was still scanning the article, the pounding in his head accelerating, when Sonny clumped up the back stairs and burst into the kitchen.

  “What’s up?” He dragged in a breath, obviously having run all the way.

  “Cade’s going to tell you a little story here. I want you to find out if it’s true.”

  When Cade had finished talking, Sonny just shook his head. “I said at the time you were jumping the gun, did I not?”

  “But she was the only one there,” Ryan protested, although the words were beginning to sound hollow to him.