by Mindy Neff
With that, she whirled and headed for the Suburban, muttering the whole time. Darn it, even her dog wasn’t here to support her. He was still upstairs asleep with Tori and the cat.
She was twenty feet from her truck when a masculine arm wrapped around her middle and her feet left the ground.
Instincts had her struggling as Jack wound both arms around her waist and held her snug against his chest, her feet still dangling. She could have kicked him in the shins, but when he pressed his cheek close to her ear, she only wanted to weep.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
Oh, he would have to use that tone, the one that was raw with sincerity and genuine remorse. The fight drained out of her. “I’m on your side, you know.”
“I know. I’m an idiot.” He kissed her hair, settled his cheek on hers.
“Well, no, you’re not exactly an idiot. But you really, really made me mad.” She felt the muscles of his face shift. “Are you smiling, Slade?”
“Yeah. Thanks for telling me where you were going.”
She wasn’t about to admit that it was the mature thing to do, that she’d done it for him, that the minute she’d left the barn a blinding flash from the past had spun her around like a hotel revolving door. She took a breath, aware of his forearm beneath her breasts.
“I only did it for the animals—in case they needed me.”
“Um-hmm. Am I forgiven?”
She tried not to smile. “I suppose. Now would you put me down? I’m a respectable veterinarian and you’re tarnishing my reputation.”
“Oh, no, sugar bear. When I get around to tarnishing your reputation, you’ll know it.”
Her feet touched the ground. That they even held her was a wonder. Before she could fully assess the condition of her emotions, she saw Beau standing by the corner of the barn, hands on his hips, an apron tied around his waist. He was making a good effort at appearing annoyed, and failing dismally.
“See there,” she whispered to Jack.
The fool man just looked down at her and grinned.
“I walk all the way out here,” Beau said, “to fetch the two of you to breakfast, and there you are, sparkin’ in the middle of the yard, and the sun hasn’t hardly peeped up. Ya’ll better come inside before my perfectly fine breakfast goes stone-cold.”
“Sorry, Beau,” Jack called, “not this morning. We’ve got work to do.” He slung an arm around Sunny’s shoulders. Beau threw up his hands and stalked back toward the house—though his bowlegged gait looked more like a jig.
“I think you’re wrong about him and Cora not having sex,” Jack said, urging her toward the barn. “He reads foreplay into a mere settling of differences. Definitely a man with romance on his mind. And it’s been a long time since I’ve seen him high-step it across the yard. That looked like the walk of a happy man to me.”
“Romance and sex aren’t the same thing—and no,” Sunny said before he could interrupt, “I’m not going to spell that out for you, so don’t ask. And I stand by my original opinion. They haven’t done it because he’s still talking about it. That says frustration, loud and clear.”
“Sounds a lot like us.”
“I guess it does.”
The stumble was barely noticeable, his tone utterly casual. “Want to do something about it?”
“Not right now, thanks.”
“Just checking.”
She ducked her head and smiled. “That’s allowed. Where are we going, by the way?”
“To saddle the horses. I figured we’d have a look around, see what kind of trouble we run into.”
“I’d just as soon stay out of trouble, if it’s all the same to you.”
He chuckled, dropped a kiss on her temple and headed toward the tack room, presumably to get saddles.
Her heart thudded, and for a minute she felt disoriented. Something had shifted between them. She didn’t know how to define it, exactly. It just felt…more at ease, natural.
She’d already brushed and haltered a bay gelding and was leading it out of the stall when she heard the echo of Jack’s boot against concrete.
The sight of him walking down the center aisle of the barn, carrying two saddles as though they were mere blankets, had her halting in her tracks. Somebody ought to capture that masculine sensuality on film, she thought. Transplant the man to California and he’d be in a movie pronto.
The gelding nudged her in the back, snapping her out of her trance. She took a breath and waited for Jack to set down the saddles.
“You get to do the honors,” she said, holding out the reins.
His brows lifted. “This isn’t my mount.”
She grabbed his hand, slapped the reins in his palm and walked back to the stall. “It’s nice to see you’re on the ball this morning. By the time you get mine rigged out, I’ll have brought yours here.”
“Now, that’s a pure-and-simple female thing. What happened to the I-can-do-anything-you-can-do woman?”
She glanced at him over the stall door, noted he already had the pad and saddle in place, and gave him a cheeky grin. “Oh, she’s still around.”
He snorted and tightened the cinch. “Are you flirting with me, Sunny Leigh?”
She led his roan out and handed him the reins, relieving him of the ones he held. “You think a woman’s flirting when she asks you to saddle her horse?”
“When it’s you asking, I do.”
She smiled and walked her horse out of the barn. She was waiting at the end of the fence when he rode up next to her. Their legs practically brushed, and she had to scramble to keep the bay steady.
“You forgot something.” He plucked her hat from his saddle horn and shoved it on her head. “We need to get you a new one. That pitiful excuse for a cowboy hat has dog’s teeth marks in it.”
She adjusted the brim, made sure the crown wasn’t smashed. “Don’t pick on my hat. It happens to be my favorite one.”
“Guess there’s no accounting for taste.” His lips quirked, and he urged his horse forward.
Sunny ignored his remark. It was a cute hat.
She caught up with him, and they rode out across the pastures, eyes peeled for any livestock acting sick or abnormal. Jack stopped a couple of times to check fences, and when they finally circled back to the creek, it was close to noon, the sun baking the earth and Sunny’s arms, as well.
“You want to stop and rest?” he asked, riding up next to her.
“My tailbone would appreciate it. I don’t get to ride often at home.”
She dismounted beneath the shade of a cottonwood. She wasn’t sure how he had managed it, but he was already on the ground and right there to help her, his hands steadying her waist until her feet touched the ground.
“Thanks.” Although the aid had been unnecessary, the gallantry charmed her. She’d noticed that he’d grown quieter as they’d ridden. This ranch was beautiful and impressive. As he’d surveyed his land, she knew this sense of waiting for the other boot to fall was getting to him. Their argument this morning was a prime example.
And she was just as antsy as he was, because she didn’t yet have any answers.
But she did have a suspicion that was growing stronger by the day.
“Jack, do you have any enemies?”
He frowned and tugged off his leather gloves. “I suppose I could. But I can’t name any off-hand. Why?”
“Because something just doesn’t feel right to me. It’s like I’m looking in the wrong direction. My initial thought was that your cows must have just lain down and died peacefully. I considered cardiac arrest, but the age isn’t consistent with that possibility and I doubt you’d have two animals die that close together from the same heart disorder. I did note a couple of postmortem signs that could indicate disease, but when the lab tests ruled them out, I started to wonder if my mother’s urgency over the phone had colored my judgment. If I’d read more into this than was warranted because I was expecting to encounter disaster.”
“It’s not like you
to second-guess yourself.”
“I was speaking in the past tense.” Water burbled over smooth stones in the creek, tempting her to kick off her boots and wade. “I’m just not used to running up against a brick wall.”
“I don’t see how any of this relates to enemies.”
“It doesn’t. But poison would. And the foamy saliva would corroborate it.”
“Poison would show up in the lab test, Sunny.”
“Normally, yes. But the nonreactive results are nagging at me. I’m missing something, and I keep coming back to that. Plus Marty’s doing some more extensive, specialized testing, which tells me he’s worried. And when Marty worries, I get really edgy.”
“So what’s next?”
“I think you should station guards over your herd, assign your men around-the-clock shifts. I realize it’s a lot to ask of them on top of their other duties. If you’re short on manpower, I’ll take a shift, too.”
“Like hell. If you think somebody’s messing with my livestock, there’s no way I’ll let you put yourself in the middle of an ambush.”
“I know how to defend myself, and I know how to shoot a gun—and hit what I’m aiming at!”
“No one’s questioning your marksmanship. But my answer’s still no.”
“I don’t recall asking a question.” She had defense skills that went beyond marksmanship, but the way he was scowling at her, she decided to keep that to herself.
“I’ll assign guards because I trust your opinion. But you won’t be one of them.”
She shrugged, letting him have the last word. She’d gotten her way, and—although his tone could have used a little sugar—a compliment to boot.
Chapter Thirteen
Sunny stood on the porch and wrapped her arm around the post, enjoying the country night. She’d showered and changed into a short summer dress that skimmed her body and made her feel feminine.
Fireflies blinked in the dark as a choir of insects sang their hearts out. A warm breeze stirred the air, carrying with it the sultry perfume of jasmine from the garden a few feet away. When the front door opened, she glanced back and smiled as Jack stepped outside.
“I can’t get over Tori going home with your mom like she did,” he said, joining her at the rail.
Anna Carmichael had stopped by earlier with an apple pie, and Beau had flattered her into staying for supper. Somewhere between the pot roast and the pie à la mode, Anna had decided Tori should come help her make angel cookies for the seniors at the retirement center. Jack had nearly fallen out of his chair when Tori asked if she could go.
“Mama’s dying to brush up on her grandmother skills, hoping that me or Storm will take the hint and provide her some.”
“Do you plan to?”
“Someday. When the time’s right.” A coyote yipped in the distance, and she wondered if the animal would catch a rabbit and be satisfied rather than stalk someone’s livestock.
“It’s so beautiful here,” she said quietly. “Leaving must have been difficult for you.”
“I didn’t have much choice. My dad had nearly run the ranch into the ground—I never understood how he managed to keep the taxes and mortgage paid up on a place this size. But that’s about all he did, besides drink. He knew I wanted to do something with the land, and out of spite, or pure meanness, he refused to turn the ranch over to me. He pointed a shotgun at me when I tried to slap a coat of paint on the barn. That pretty much cinched it.”
“I’m sure it was the alcohol that made him treat you that way.”
He shrugged. “Lanette wanted out of this town, so we went to Dallas and I got a job working at an insurance agency.”
Sunny nearly choked. “Holy crud! Insurance? As in, desk job? Didn’t it smother you?”
Jack grinned. Sunny would know that about him—that he wouldn’t be happy cooped up in an office. Lanette hadn’t cared.
“Nearly. I quit after a few months and signed on to work for a big cattle outfit outside of Dallas. Learned as much as I could, things my dad didn’t know or hadn’t bothered to teach me. I saved every spare dollar and made some good investments—which paid off when it came time to fix up this place.”
“Were you surprised when your dad left you the ranch?”
“Very. It was all I’d ever wanted. Linc has a share in it, too, but he’s never claimed it, wouldn’t even come home for the funeral. I couldn’t blame him. Linc always got the brunt of Dad’s drunken rages.”
Jack gazed up at the inky sky, which formed a canopy over his land. Pride filled his chest, as it always did where this ranch was concerned. The animals were settled for the night, and the lights were off in the bunkhouse. The men who weren’t out watching over the herd would grab every minute of sleep before their shift came.
His soul was in this land, in this house.
He didn’t like the worry and suspicion that threatened his peace and everything he’d worked so hard for.
“I didn’t think twice about coming home,” he continued. “Dad was gone, and that gave me the freedom to do things my way. What I’d inherited was pretty much a few broken-down structures and a vast expanse of brown and dying grass, with a few underfed steers tossed in for decoration. But I had a picture in my mind of exactly how this place could be, and I worked eighteen hours a day to get it there. Lanette wasn’t happy about being back in Hope Valley, though, especially when she got a look at the ranch.”
He shrugged, leaned his shoulder against the post. “So she left.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No need. I’d kept my part of the bargain.” He’d shouldered his responsibilities. Numbed his emotions and locked them away where they couldn’t haunt and destroy him. He hadn’t loved Lanette, but he’d been a good husband. Only with Tori had he dared to unlock his heart and soul. Remembering how he’d felt when he’d first laid eyes on that tiny baby brought a lump to his throat. “It was Lanette’s choice to leave and send divorce papers.”
“Was Tori with Lanette when she died?”
“No. Tori was with me. The last time they saw each other was the day Lanette walked out.”
“Oh. I thought…” Sunny shook her head. “Never mind.”
“No, finish what you were going to say.”
“Obviously, I don’t know the whole story. I wondered about Tori’s tendency to withdraw, thought maybe she’d been traumatized by her mother’s death.”
“She was six when Lanette split. That was traumatic enough. I shouldn’t complain. She’s a perfect kid. Just…too perfect sometimes.”
“She’s doing better lately.”
“Yeah. I caught her dancing through the house with one of the chickens.”
“A real one?”
“Feathers and all. She was singing at the top of her lungs about some purple monster.” He smiled at the memory, settled his gaze on Sunny. Her blond hair was a riot of soft curls, and tended to bush out in balmy weather. She hated it, he knew, but that tousled, sexy look inspired red-hot fantasies in any man with a set of eyes and a drop of testosterone in his blood.
She looked young and fresh, her face free of makeup except for the sheen of gloss on her lips. Her silky slip of a dress, held in place with skinny straps he could probably snap with one finger, displayed unblemished skin kissed golden by the sun. Part California tan and part Texas.
Her world…and his. Panic chilled his heart and he slammed the door on the part of his soul that wanted to howl at the injustice of fate. They were talking about Tori.
“The child running through the house with my best laying hen is a far cry from the girl who normally takes great care to scrub her hands so she won’t leave dirt smudges on the towels,” he said. “It’s because of you, you know.”
“Now, don’t go blaming me for chicken feathers in the house.” Sunny’s green eyes tilted up at the corners. “I’ll plead the Fifth Amendment on the dirty towels, though.”
He chuckled, because he was guilty of ruining a few towels himself. “She can bri
ng every single one of the hens into the living room if she wants. She’s finally being a…a girl. I’ve racked my brain for the past three years, trying to get inside her head, get her to loosen up. You did it in less than a week.”
He didn’t want to spoil the evening, but Tori wasn’t home and he needed to address the issue of his daughter’s fragile feelings. He rested his palm on Sunny’s shoulder, slid it down her arm and took her hand.
“I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, Sunny, but I don’t want to see my daughter get hurt.”
She studied him for a long moment, then squeezed his hand, her voice a melancholy murmur against the backdrop of cicadas. “When I leave, I think you’re trying to say.”
“Yes.” He expected her to be defensive. Instead, her eyes softened with genuine compassion.
“I wouldn’t do that to her, Jack. I’m aware of the attachment she’s formed, and we’ve talked about it. She knows I have to go back to California at the end of the month. She’ll be fine.”
But would he?
He should have known Sunny would be sensitive to Tori’s feelings, would take every care with her well-being. Sunny was going to be a great mother one of these days.
His gut was tangled up worse than a calf in barbed wire. Bringing up the subject had taken a lot out of him. Yet Sunny had surprised him, let him off easy.
How could she stand there so relaxed, so damn gorgeous, when he felt as though he was drowning in quicksand? He wondered how she would react if she knew his heart was still in her hands. She’d given it back to him ten years ago, but just as a pet animal could find its way home to loved ones against great odds, so had his heart.
She leaned her hips against the low porch rail, and he lost the entire thread of the conversation. That flirty little dress had been driving him crazy all night.
“I can’t take all the credit for Tori’s changes, you know. I had a little help from friends.”
“Now, that scares me. I know your friends.” He forced his gaze away from her short hemline. “While we’re on the topic, I’ve been meaning to ask what went on at your mother’s after Storm and I were called away to the traffic accident. That was when I really noticed the shift in Tori’s behavior.”