The Cowboy In Me (Wild At Heart Cowboys Book 2)

by Charlene Bright

  Copyright © 2019 by Charlene Bright

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronical, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Editing: Flying Elephant Editing

  Cover Design: Killion Group

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  All he had was his resolve...

  Ryder Sieverson loves his family's ranch in Five Forks, and when a corporate entity threatens the entire community with a buyout, he uses every bit of pull as fire chief to make sure no one is pressured into selling. But when a mysterious fire breaks out that threatens the livelihoods of nearby ranchers, things get complicated.

  All she had was her integrity...

  Amanda Halston came to Five Forks to ensure her corporate client got what they wanted - the entire town of Five Forks for a land development project. As a city girl, she didn't expect to find resistance in the loyalty of a bunch of country folk. And she certainly didn't imagine she'd be tempted by a handsome but rugged cowboy.

  All they had was a fire...

  When a blizzard finds Ryder and Amanda snowed in together during an arson investigation in which they are on separate sides, the circumstances seem impossible. What will they do when a mutual attraction and a resolve to stand their ground, the flames they build aren't in the forest or the fireplace but in their hearts. Whether they deny their passion for each other or give in to their desires, they're likely to get burned. Can two people so different find a way to stand together, or will the situation that brought them together be the one that drives them apart? Whether they deny their passion for each other or give in to their desires, they’re likely to get burned. Can two people so different find a way to stand together, or will the situation that brought them together be the one that drives them apart?

  1

  The smile on Parker Brandt’s face reminded Ryder Sieverson of the villains in the old cartoons who twirled their handlebar mustaches and laughed with sinister intent. The tailored suit, the expensive leather briefcase, and the slicked-back hair did nothing to impress Ryder, and after what he’d heard from the other ranchers in town, he had no reason to treat this skinny little man with the least bit of respect.

  “You underestimate what we’re offering,” Brandt said in a sleazy, whimpering tone better used on desperate women than furious fire chiefs. “This is the deal of a lifetime, Mr. Sieverson. We’re offering double the actual value of your property, relocation costs, and a buyout of all cattle and crops currently in existence on your land at top-market prices.”

  Standing and leaning over the desk in his looming, intimidating manner, Ryder snarled at the disgusting man. In a deceptively calm tone, he replied, “I think it’s you who underestimates me, Brandt, and the rest of Five Forks, for that matter. We didn’t build our ranches for big wads of cash. We built them with love and dedication and a desire to be here for the rest of our lives. We built with the intention of passing the land down to our children and their children, the way my Papa passed my land to my daddy, and he passed it to me. I believe everyone else in Five Forks has already turned down your offer, and I’m going to repeat it with much more emphasis. I’m going to pass, Mr. Brandt, so you can take your papers back to wherever you came from and get out of my town.”

  The sniveling idiot stood and scowled, but he didn’t leave. “I’m sorry you feel that way, Mr. Sieverson. In fact, I’m sorry you all feel that way. Know that Fillmore Investments has a long arm with great reach, and while you may not wish to consider how generous we’re being now, I’m sure you’ll change your mind in the future.”

  The threat wasn’t even particularly veiled, and Ryder had to force himself not to hurdle the desk and chase the jackass out the door and into the street, where a good whooping wouldn’t get blood on the hardwood floors of his new office. He fisted his hands at his side and turned to look out the window behind him, watching the cars pass, driving slowly with lots of space in between.

  Fillmore Investments. There was no telling what they wanted with the rich ranch lands in Five Forks. Chances were, they either thought there was a source of oil to tap or they planned to commercialize an area that had long been kept rural and thriving with families dedicating their lives to their properties and the livestock or crops. No corporation was going to come into this community and bulldog Ryder or any of his neighbors into leaving the homes they loved.

  He gave the corporate twit enough time to leave before he walked out of his office and then out of the building for a breath of fresh air. His town might not be far in distance from a bigger city, but in terms of connections to the urban lifestyle, it was far removed. Everything moved at its own pace here, and expectations of deadlines and appointments were flexible. No one was ever in a hurry, unless it was getting close to the holidays. Then, everyone wanted Christmas to come so they could celebrate together.

  City slickers didn’t understand that, and Ryder didn’t use the term lightly. He knew plenty of people who preferred the convenience of living in the city and who didn’t have the mentality of these investors who had been bugging everyone in Five Forks left and right. It was only the greedy jerks who didn’t understand loyalty, the value of hard work, and the joy of undeveloped land that really got his goat up.

  If he ever thought about selling his land to some guy in a three-piece suit who wanted to pour a foundation and build condos, his daddy would roll over in his grave. And his Papa would probably get up out of his to come give Ryder a good belt lashing, not even caring that he was almost thirty years old. And Ryder would deserve it for disgracing the family name. Sieverson Ranch had stood for four generations, as had most of the properties around here, and tearing it down for some big city planner to come from somewhere out east and make a fortune was tantamount to going through a museum and destroying all the artifacts that had been so carefully preserved.

  “Don’t you look hotheaded!” He turned to find Noah Thomas walking his direction, teasing with a smile.

  Ryder wasn’t in the mood and scowled in response. “Don’t you have somewhere to be, Noah? You don’t come into town unless you’re meeting that girl of yours.”

  “And you don’t stand out here in the frigid cold where every man and his brother can watch the heat rise off you unless you’re thoroughly pissed off,” Noah countered without hesitation. “So, who’s got you fuming this time?”

  “Fillmore Investments and that Brandt guy.” Ryder shook his head.

  “Oh, that.” Noah nodded. “He doesn’t like taking no for an answer. Came to my place three different times with different offers.”

  “Yeah, well, the son of a bitch practically threatened this community, and I’m not going to stand for it. Don’t worry, he’s not getting anyone’s land, if I have to put in an ordinance that no one can sell right now.” He didn’t have the authority to do that, but he knew the powers that did and would be kicking down their doors to get it done.

  “See? You already found the solution,” Noah chuckled. “So stop sweating it. If you don’t mind, I’m headed over to the café to meet my fiancé for lunch. Which reminds me, we haven’t gotten your RSVP yet, and I know you’re not skipping out on our wedding.”

  Ryder rolled his eyes. “It’s the middle of January, Noah. You’re not getting hitched till
the end of April. Why are you in such a rush?”

  “Try falling in love. You’ll want everything to be perfect for your woman, too.” Noah tipped his hat and walked away.

  Fat chance of that, Ryder thought to himself. Between his temper, the amount of time he dedicated to his job, and the fact that he’d never met a woman who showed any real interest in him, he didn’t expect that to happen anytime soon. In fact, there were times he didn’t care if he ever found someone to settle down with. He had a life and a routine, and he didn’t need someone barging in trying to change things.

  The cold had made some of the indignant rage seep out of him, and he turned to go back inside. He had paperwork to finish on a citation at the high school for displays blocking exits and creating a fire hazard. He hated writing these, but in a town where the biggest fire hazards were droughts, unwatched campfires, and bored kids playing with matches, he had to be diligent about it.

  Besides, he didn’t have a lot to get home to. He’d fed the pigs this morning, and there wouldn’t be any fields to tend for a couple of months yet. When there were, Virgil White and Gordon Hammond would be back to help. He liked the ranch hands, and they’d been loyal for more than a decade. He liked getting his hands dirty, but he didn’t have time to do everything and hold the position of fire chief for the county.

  He told himself he wasn’t lonely, but the truth was, when his father had passed away four years ago, Ryder had started to think of his home as a bit of a cage. He enjoyed his time in town, where he could interact with people, more than he did on the ranch these days. If he spent too much time at home when Virgil and Gordon weren’t around, he started talking to himself—and to the pigs. It made him think he was losing his mind, and Ryder didn’t want his mind to disintegrate the way his mother’s had before she’d finally found eternal peace.

  So, he kept long hours and visited the diner fairly often during the winter. He wasn’t a great cook, either. He was great with corn, wheat, and potatoes, but if he didn’t grow it in the field, he couldn’t do a lot with it. He relied on Hattie and her gang at the diner for his meals. It kept him well fed and busy for a couple of extra hours a day.

  Unfortunately, winter was slow. With snow on the ground in patches and only two weeks into the new year, he didn’t have a lot to keep him busy here, and he’d probably be home before dark today. In fact, he didn’t have anything else waiting on his desk now, and that irked him. At least there was one good thing that came from battling these pushy east coasters. They kept him distracted from his lonely vigil at home, and now that he’d basically chased them out of town for the last time, he was going to miss the fight.

  2

  Ryder knew he should douse the embers that still glowed in his fireplace and probably shouldn’t smoke in the house. He really ought to go to bed, but he just wasn’t sleepy. Tired, yes. But that was a physical thing, not a mental thing. His mind was still alert, and he dreaded having to sit in front of the television for the fifth night in a row to let some blockbuster on a commercialized station lull him to sleep.

  So, he sat here with a cigarette burning, staring at the dying flames in his fireplace. He needed a vacation. Somewhere warm and sunny with green grass. In the middle of winter, the options were few and far between, especially since he didn’t fly. But he could drive down to Texas or Arizona and find warmer weather. Summer came early in those parts of the world, and he imaged a February day in Texas would bring temperatures closer to sixty rather than below freezing, like it was here. Five Forks would be lucky to see the forties before the end of March.

  He loved it here. Or at least, he used to. But the longer he stayed here by himself, the more he considered letting Virgil and Gordon run everything while he moved away. He wouldn’t mind a warmer climate for a year. And by then, he’d miss his home and want to come visit the family plots. He wouldn’t be gone forever.

  But his job kept him rooted here, and the community kept him tied to his job. The residents in this county greatly respected him, and on the rare occasion something bad happened to them, like a fire during a dry summer, he usually found them some financial assistance to rebuild whatever they lost and put in his own hard work to help repair what could be saved.

  He sighed, wishing he could just find contentment here. But old memories kept welling up, and if he sat here long enough, he could just make his father’s image appear in the far reaches of his peripheral vision, seated on the couch behind him, and he could almost hear the football game playing on the TV. If he closed his eyes, he could picture his mother in the bedroom, staring out the window and waiting for her “baby boy” to come home from school, and he could hear her banging around in the kitchen as she looked for the homemade cookies she thought she’d made that morning for him.

  Alzheimer’s was a nasty disease, and after watching Rita Sieverson suffer from it for nearly six years, it was no wonder Dwayne had followed his wife to the grave just eight months later. Ryder missed them both something fierce, but he’d shed his tears at the funerals. They’d both hurt a lot while they struggled here at the end. He was relieved that they couldn’t feel pain anymore.

  But he couldn’t get them out of his head, even though the years seemed to pass by so fast. Plenty of others had moved on after losing their parents, and in a way, so had he. He’d thrown himself into his work so he wouldn’t think about it all the time. Still, he had these images, and the images followed him to his dreams.

  It was probably why he didn’t like going to bed. But he had to sleep sometime.

  He punched out his cigarette in the ash tray and started to get up, but his phone rattled on the end table next to him. He’d silenced it but never turned off the vibration because he was always on call, and as he saw the number on the screen, he picked up it immediately. “Sieverson.”

  “Hey, Chief, we got a bad one out here.” Sully Mayfield had to holler into the phone past the background noise on the other end of the line. He sounded a little out of breath, and Ryder was already on the move.

  “Where?” he asked, throwing a sweater over his thermal shirt and a thick coat over that.

  He pulled on two pairs of socks as Sully told him, “Everywhere. It’s Forks Forest, and it’s spreading fast. We called in air support, Chief. They’re on their way.”

  Boots and a thick, knit beanie accompanied the rest. “Do we have any kind of containment on it?”

  The pause at the other end as he threw the front door open didn’t bode well. “We got it north and south, and the wind’s not carrying it west.”

  Damn it. “How close is it to the ranches?” he asked as he climbed into his truck, glad he’d had the engine on a heating block.

  “It’s already at the tree line, Chief. We’re getting trucks over there now, but they’re coming from the volunteer stations out in the counties. It’s going to take time.”

  “Move the guys on the north and south to the east, dammit! I would rather lose more of the woods than farmland.” He shook his head in disbelief and fear as he pulled out of the driveway and headed for the other end of town. He was lucky. His ranch didn’t back up to those woods, and the property next to his had a stream that helped separate the trees from his land. But there were six different ranchers in danger from that fire, and if they all lost land or crops or animals, there wouldn’t be any recovering for them this spring, and the entire town would feel the devastation.

  The drive wasn’t far, and with the hour, there weren’t any other cars on the road. The chains on his tires crunched on several patches of ice as he raced toward the glow he could see in the distance now that he faced it, and his outlook grew grim. He yanked the wheel to the right on the road that led to Noah’s place and Dylan McDaniel’s on the other side. He could see the flashing lights of the trucks in the distance as they moved to different locations, trying to stop the entire forest from becoming one big bonfire.

  Sully was waiting about a quarter mile from the action, and Ryder stopped to let him in the truck. “Air su
pport’s two minutes out, and the other trucks can be at the north and south ends in six,” he reported. For a young guy, Sully had a quick response time and a great work ethic. Ryder couldn’t say he’d been so gung ho at twenty, and he hoped it was a sign of good things to come for the kid rather than an early burnout.

  “Does anyone have a clue about the point of origin?” Ryder asked, driving forward.

  “I don’t think so,” Sully told him. Glancing over, Ryder saw the devastation on his face. Sully’s parents owned one of these ranches, and theirs was small. They couldn’t afford to lose anything, and for Sully, this had to be like the devil himself gobbling up everything he cared about.

  “And evacuations?” he asked quietly.

  “No one’s willing to leave,” Sully answered, just as quietly. “Anyone with irrigation systems is forcing them on, trying to saturate the land so it won’t burn. Others are trying to help the firemen with anything they can, whether it’s bottles of water to drink or wet rags to wipe soot off.”

  Ryder was afraid of that. In the south, people suffered through tornados and never thought about abandoning their homes. Out west, it was earthquakes, and hurricanes out east. Here, the loyal souls who carried the responsibility for their land would weather anything, including the threat of being burnt to death by a fire that was out of control.

  As he stopped the truck next to one of the other civilian cars, he heard the air support overhead. That would make a big difference, he hoped. The woods weren’t huge, and even if the fire took every last tree, it would be less than two hundred acres. But crossing the line to the ranches had to be stopped.

  He ran into the thick of it, helping with a hose that the two men handling it were about to lose, and when that was under control, he moved on to the radio, communicating with the flyers overhead.

  It took four hours from the time he arrived, but eventually they had the flames down to a small bonfire in the center of a black circle of trees that had already burned to ash. Ryder looked around, seeing some of the ranch owners nearby, several of them crying or just exhausted. He sat down on the back of one of the trucks and put his head in his hands, resting his elbows on his knees. This was a nightmare, and tomorrow, when things were cooled down a little, he’d have to investigate. He needed to find where the fire had started and if someone was to blame. Likely, it was a campfire let unattended without being put out properly, and he’d never find the inexperienced hikers who did it.