She glanced at the massive truck, and back to the trailer. “You’re kidding.”
“Nah, you can’t hurt it, and we’re on a back road. Thirty minutes from the inn.”
She smiled, “I don’t know…”
“Come on, I’ll be right next to you the whole way.”
“Okay, if you insist.” I didn’t insist, but a break would be nice. I got in the truck and she climbed in next to me. Behind the wheel her feet barely reached the pedals and she squealed half the way.
But Briar handled it like a pro. She wasn’t ready for the highway, though she would get there.
“You got it.” I said, putting my hand on the wheel as she turned a short time later down the long dirt drive of the inn. “Give it a little gas.”
She clapped. “This is fun.”
“Hands on the wheel, darlin’,” I grinned. “If you think this is fun, wait till I get you in a tractor.”
She took her eyes off the road for a second to stare at me. “You have a tractor?”
I stared at her. “I have a ranch. A tractor is common for that kind of atmosphere.”
“Is it big?”
“Depends on the one you pick.” I motioned back to the road and helped her steer it up the drive in front of a large two-story house. She parked it, with only a little jerk, next to another truck with a trailer hitched to the back.
We went up to the front door and rang the bell. A tall, older man with a white handlebar mustache answered. He was my kinda people. Just a good ol’ country boy. He showed us up to the second floor to the room we could stay in, and then took us out to the stables. I had Ash settled for the night, with Briar keen on helping whenever she could.
We finally crashed in the upstairs room. I didn’t even bother changing. I kicked off my boots and fell right into the squeaky twin bed, only to be awoken shortly after by a phone ringing.
“Hello?” I glanced at the clock, bleary eyed. It was seven in the morning. Shit. Time flew by.
“Just lettin’ ya’ll know we got breakfast downstairs if you want to eat.”
I thanked the woman on the phone and hung up. “Briar?”
“Hmm?”
“Time to get going,” I pushed up on my elbows and looked her over. She’d fallen asleep on top of the covers, and like me, hadn’t bothered to change out of her clothes from yesterday. I smiled. “Breakfast is ready if you’re hungry.”
She pushed her curls out of her eyes and squinted at me. “I’m not human enough to be hungry until I shower.”
I laughed, sliding out of the bed and heading for the bathroom. “Better hurry up then.”
I threw on a clean shirt and pulled on my boots. Briar took a little longer, but she emerged from the bathroom her usual cheery self, ready to get on the road. The couple who owned the inn fed us, and even gave us sandwiches for the road.
I hooked up the GPS and Briar’s eyes nearly bugged out of her head. “We have twenty five hours left of the drive to your ranch?”
I laughed, “Yeah, we’ll do fifteen today.”
She nodded, taking a deep breath. “We’ll be in the truck until eleven.”
“I warned you.”
“Hey, I’m not complaining.” She smiled. “In fact, after you fell asleep, I stayed up most of the night playing games on my phone.”
“Why?”
“So I can do this…” she pulled the hood of her jacket up to cover her face. “Goodnight.”
I shrugged, “Whatever works.”
Chapter 12
Briar
I only slept for a few hours. Turns out I wasn’t the kind of person capable of snoozing in bright daylight with other cars zooming past us on the highway. By lunchtime I was wide awake, and climbing into the backseat of the truck to grab a couple sodas and the sandwiches. Chase was content behind the wheel most of the time, but he got a little fidgety as the day wore on. We talked, I’d pretend to sleep, and he would make fun of me for trying. A few times we stopped at rest stops to use the bathrooms and to stretch. Ash was an old pro at riding in a trailer, and didn’t seem to care what we did. He just grazed on the little bit of hay Chase had provided.
I checked in with Grandma via text throughout the day. My parents were clueless, thinking I’d gone to Boston with her for the summer. Maybe it should have irritated me that my parents were self-absorbed snobs, but I’d been around them my whole life, and could only roll my eyes and hope one day they came to their senses. If not, at least I had them as an example of what not to be like as I got older.
Once night had fallen, we decided against stopping for dinner, ate fast food, and plowed through, driving longer than we probably should have. But it was beautiful to watch out the window. The cities gave way to fields of green hills, and corn, and other fields of plants…maybe wheat, I don’t know. They flew by the truck. I was in heaven, we turned off the air and rolled the windows down as the sun was setting. There was a sweet smell in the air when we passed a field of wild flowers. I’d never seen anything like it.
It was nearly midnight by the time we got to an overnight rest stop. Chase let Ash out of the trailer and took him for a walk. Then he put him back in and we decided to sleep for about five hours. We could have stopped at another inn for travelers with horses, but we wanted to end the ride as soon as possible.
It wasn’t too bad. I took the backseat, Chase stayed in the front. I laughed when he loaded the crossbow and put it next to him. When he didn’t laugh with me, I figured out here in the middle of nowhere some sort of protection was needed.
I rubbed my eyes the next morning, tired, and leaned into Ash’s warm side as Chase checked over the truck and trailer. It was a little cool out. Rain drizzled from clouds overhead.
“You alright?” Chase stopped what he was doing. He took my chin in his hand and tipped my head back to get a good look at my face.
“Groggy, slight headache…I could feel worse.”
“You should get out of the rain,” he opened the truck door and urged me back inside. He loaded Ash in the trailer and closed the door. Once he was inside the truck, I leaned into his side and closed my eyes. We had enough gas to get to the next gas station, and I didn’t think about getting out. It would have taken an act of god to remove me from the toasty cab. I didn’t desire getting wet or making my headache worse.
I slept off and on most of the day, slumped against Chase. I didn’t take to sleeping in a truck like he did. I felt miserable. We stopped at a roadside diner for lunch. I didn’t want to eat, but Chase insisted. I settled for half a grilled cheese and felt myself perk up a little. We crossed the state line and were in Montana shortly after. I was taking another catnap when I felt Chase shaking me awake. We were driving down a dirt road in the middle of nowhere.
And I mean, nowhere.
To the left of the car mountains with white caps seemed to float in the distance against the sun. To the right, it was a big green pasture full of cows.
“How are you feeling?”
“Good, just tired.” I stretched in my seat, ready for this trip to be done. “Where are we?”
“We’re about thirty minutes away from my house. We’ll be just in time for dinner.” He smiled and glanced at his watch. “I thought you’d want to be up before we got too close.”
I nodded, “Thanks.”
“Crap,” his brows drew together and he shook his head.
“Something wrong?”
“Watch stopped.” He took it off his wrist and tossed it in the cup holder.
“So only thirty minutes?” I was past the point of being shy and blurted, “I really have to pee.”
He laughed. “Good thing I woke you up now. There’s a place we can stop right up the road.”
So it was a sports bar. I could handle that. The people inside looked a little rough. More than one person was outfitted in camo or leather.
It was the only place that had a bathroom, so I had to brave the air thick with smoke and smell of booze.
After I w
ent to the bathroom, I went back out to find Chase. He said he’d wait for me near the bar. But I didn’t make it that far. Barbie’s tattoo covered, sailor swearing, evil twin was eyeing me.
“That’s expensive.” She nodded at my purse, which just happened to be a cross body Louis Vuitton.
I shrugged. “It’s fake.”
She didn’t look convinced and braced her hands on her hips. “What is a little ball of fluff like you doing here? Get lost on the way to the mall?”
Holy shit. “Uh, I had to go to the bathroom.”
“Sure.” She snapped her fingers and nodded at my purse. “Hand it over.”
“No, this is mine.” Grandma gave it to me for my sweet sixteen. I wasn’t going to part with it for anything. If it meant leaving with a black eye, so be it.
“And this is my neck of the woods. So I say, hand it over.”
With a heavy sigh, I nodded. “Can I at least take my stuff out of it?”
“Hurry up.”
I reached in my purse, pretending like I was digging my stuff out, when really I was finding my pepper spray. I held it up, right in her face. “Back off or go blind. Your choice.”
She put her hands up, smirking. “That was the second stupidest thing you’ve done tonight.”
I frowned. “And what was the first?”
“Coming in here alone.”
“She’s not alone, Earline.” A deep voice boomed across the room. It was the bartender. He looked mean, covered in even more tattoos, ones going up his neck and down the back of his hands. A cigar hung out of one side of his mouth. “She’s with Mr. McCree.”
The woman’s eyebrows went up and she moved aside. I meanwhile, looked at Chase, who motioned for me to come to him. He was sitting on a stool at the bar.
I don’t think I’d ever moved so fast in my life.
Earline followed. She was still eyeing my bag, but I felt like I was less at risk of being mauled by her with Chase looking pissed. He glanced at he bartender and back at the woman. “We’ll be heading out now, thanks, Don.”
The bartender smiled at me. “Ignore my wife, she can be a little rough, but she means well.”
“Sure.” I managed not to roll my eyes.
“It was good seeing you, Mr. McCree. Come back when you’re twenty-one and I’ll buy you a round.” The bartender started to move away.
Earline blocked our way out and crossed her arms. “You forgot to pay for that.”
Chase glanced down at the bottle of water in his hand and back up at her.
Don grunted. “I told him it was on the house.”
Earline still didn’t move, and that’s when Chase lowered his voice, and I got to see a side of him I hadn’t yet. “My hands are in every business matter that goes on at McCree Ranch. This includes every cent that has come and gone…which means I know about loans. One given by my father to you to save this dive comes to mind.” He looked back at the bartender. “I own you, Don. Until I get my money back, keep your woman on a tighter leash if she’s going to be in my establishment.”
Earline sputtered and looked at her husband. “What?”
Don went red. “Now, Chase, there’s something you need to understand…”
He crossed his arms and tilted his head to the side. “What, that the loan was originally for twenty grand? That after my dad died you asked my grandfather for more? Or that you were given a period of five years to repay my father in the first place?”
“Your father had an accident.” Earline argued. “Your grandfather said we could take our time after his death…”
“No one takes advantage of an old, grieving man. It’s been twelve years since my dad died. Plenty of time to pay back your loan.” Chase sneered. “You’ve got a month to get your shit together. When I turn eighteen I’ll be coming for you and the fifty grand.”
Chase led me out of the bar and we got in the truck. I took a sip of the water when he handed it to me, wondering what that was all about. I got the gist of it, and it brought on a lot of understanding where Chase was concerned. “What happened to your father?”
Chase stared out the windshield. “He died.”
“It was an accident?”
He nodded, gripping the wheel tight. “I was six. The ranch is huge, so dad got his pilots license and a small helicopter. It was windy one day, and he was searching for a coyote that had killed two calves. Dad lost control of the chopper. My grandfather found him in the south pasture shortly after he lost radio contact.”
“I’m sorry.” I reached over and slipped my hand into his.
“It’s okay.” He smiled sideways at me. “I remember his laugh. It was a good, hearty sound. I’d do anything to hear it again.”
“So what about your mom? When did she leave the ranch?”
“Oh, she was gone before my dad died. They split when I was three. My mom hated being a rancher’s wife. She wanted the city and everything a cosmopolitan life had to offer.”
“But she didn’t take you after your dad died?”
“She tried, but she was single, working long shifts and going to school. I was in daycare from sunup to sundown, and then with a sitter at night. It made more sense for me to go back to my dad’s family.” He said. “But once my mom graduated nursing school and could take care of me, I was older. I didn’t want to leave the ranch.”
“So your Grandparents raised you?”
“Yeah, and a bunch of cowboys.” He chuckled.
“Will I get to meet them?”
His chuckle stopped abruptly. “No, unfortunately. Grandma passed away two years ago. Pops shortly after her. They’d been in their mid eighties. It was time.”
“So then what happened?”
“What, you think I was alone?”
“Well, no. You live with your aunt and uncle, right?”
“Yeah, we come from an old way of doing things. The McCree’s have lived on the same land in Montana since 1882. And when you have so many generations before you, on one property, you tend to accumulate houses and people.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I’ve got the big house. When I’m ready to have it to myself Uncle Jerry and Aunt Millie will go back to their house. Their son, Grant, and his wife, Holly, live in the one next to it with their two kids. The third is the bunkhouse, and the fourth is empty.”
“Sounds like you guys are close.”
“Yeah, we are.” He hit the brights on the truck and stopped, pointing out the windshield. A massive metal gate with a bronze M and a horseshoe embellishing the center stood in front of us. It began to swing slowly open. “Welcome to McCree Ranch.”
Chapter 13
Chase
So there was something I didn’t do…I didn’t tell anyone who I was bringing with me. They knew it was a friend from Florida. What they didn’t know was that it was a girl who had me head over boots for her.
Boy were they in for a surprise.
“Do I look okay?” Briar asked as we passed through the gates.
“You look fine.” Okay, so she looked better than fine. I was trying to play it as cool as possible though. We were friends, and I wasn’t sure if she was ready to take things to the next level yet, especially since we lived so far apart. “But we’ve got ten minutes before we reach the house…”
She gasped. “Isn’t this your driveway?”
“Yeah.”
“Wow,” she unbuckled her seatbelt and hopped in the backseat, digging through her bags. “I have almost no make up on, my hair is a wreck, and I’m wrinkled.”
I watched her in the rearview mirror, not understanding why she was so flustered. The only thing I did get was that she wanted to make a good first impression. “Don’t worry.”
“Ha, easy for you to say. Now don’t look, I’m changing my shirt.”
I averted my eyes, laughing, and focused on the road. “Your other clothes are probably just as wrinkled from being in your bag.”
“Nope, I am an expert packer. I made sure to brin
g things that don’t look to bad after being folded.” She sighed and climbed back into the front seat. “There, I feel better.”
I eyed her white t-shirt, thinking every guy in the county, and all the neighboring ones, would not only come sniffing around, they’d probably pitch tents in the yard. We didn’t get girls like her out here.
“Mind if I make a quick phone call?” I asked, pulling out my cell.
Briar shook her head. “Nope.”
I dialed my mom. He voice mail picked up. “Hey, it’s Chase. Just wanted to let you know Briar and I got to the ranch in one piece. Talk to you soon. Bye.”
“You have a beautiful home.” Briar said as I pulled up the main drive.
I pocketed my phone and cut the engine and helped her out of the truck. The big house was brown and rustic. Lots of stone and wood, it had been added onto five times over the years. I loved it.
“Holy cow,” Briar squealed as a pack of dogs rounded the side of the house and barreled towards us. Some were mutts, others purebred herding dogs. Mostly collies and shepherds. I knelt down and said hello, and Briar followed suit. They seemed to like her and licked her hands, and her face. She stood up abruptly and wiped her mouth. “That black one went right for my lip gloss.”
“Stinker,” I glared down at the old collie and told him to behave. “Sorry, he’s the odd one of the bunch.”
She laughed. “It’s okay.”
“Chase!” I turned around. A couple men rolled up next to the truck on ATV’s. One was my cousin Grant, who acted as ranch foreman. The other was John. He was Grant’s right hand man, especially when it came to calving.
“What do we have here?” Grant had red hair, a bushy red beard, and was the closest thing to a brother to me. He was in his early thirties, and had stepped up to help when I left for Florida.
“Briar, this is my cousin Grant, and our foreman, John.” I introduced them. “Briar is going to spend her summer with us.”
Grant grinned, shaking her hand. “Welcome to McCree. You’ll be a breath of fresh air around here Miss Briar. My mother, Millie, will love to have another lady around.”
Chasing McCree Page 9