The Rancher And The Redhead

by Leigh, Allison

  Letter to Reader

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Books by Allison Leigh

  About the Author

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Epilogue

  Copyright

  “One of these days you’ll take me seriously,” Jaimie warned.

  Matthew looked at her. Her soft hands were folded primly in her lap, that outrageous, citified diamond bracelet of hers twinkling in the sunlight.

  She was a walking, talking temptation for him to forget the reasons he shouldn’t get involved with her.

  For one thing, she was an employee. A temporary one at that.

  More important, she would get hurt, sure as God made little green apples. Because Matthew had no intention of getting serious about anyone, much less a city girl so obviously unsuited to life at the Double-C.

  They were fine reasons, Matthew told himself.

  But they didn’t keep his hand from lifting and skimming down Jaimie’s oh, so tempting velvety cheek.

  “Oh, sweetheart, I take you seriously,” he growled.

  “Don’t you ever doubt it.”

  Look for more compelling stories featuring the

  Men of the Double-C Ranch in 1999.

  Dear Reader,

  During this holiday season, don’t forget to treat yourself special, too. And taking the time to enjoy November’s Special Edition lineup is the perfect place to start!

  Veteran author Lisa Jackson continues her FOREVER FAMILY miniseries with A Family Kind of Gal. All THAT SPECIAL WOMAN! Tiffany Santini wants is a life of harmony away from her domineering in-laws. But there’s no avoiding her sinfully sexy brother-in-law when he lavishes her—and her kids—with attention. Look for the third installment of this engaging series in January 1999.

  And there’s more continuing drama on the way! First, revisit the Adams family with The Cowgirl & The Unexpected Wedding when Sherryl Woods delivers book four in the popular AND BABY MAKES THREE: THE NEXT GENERATION series. Next, the PRESCRIPTION: MARRIAGE medical series returns with Prince Charming, M.D. by Susan Mallery. Just about every nurse at Honeygrove Memorial Hospital has been swooning over one debonair doc—except the R.N. who recalls her old flame’s track record for breaking hearts! Then the MEN OF THE DOUBLE-C RANCH had better look out when a sassy redhead gets under a certain ornery cowboy’s skin in The Rancher and the Redhead by Allison Leigh.

  Rounding off this month, Janis Reams Hudson shares a lighthearted tale about a shy accountant who discovers a sexy stranger sleeping on her sofa in Until You. And in A Mother for Jeffrey by Trisha Alexander, a heroine realizes her lifelong dream of having a family.

  I hope you enjoy all of our books this month. Happy Thanksgiving from all of us at Silhouette Books.

  Sincerely,

  Karen Taylor Richman

  Senior Editor

  Please address questions and book requests to:

  Silhouette Reader Service

  U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

  Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

  ALLISON LEIGH

  THE RANCHER AND THE REDHEAD

  For Austin

  Always

  Books by Allison Leigh

  Silhouette Special Edition

  •Stay... #1170

  •The Rancher and the Redhead #1212

  • Men of the Double-C Ranch

  ALLISON LEIGH

  cannot remember a time when she was not reading something, whether cereal boxes or Hardy Boys mysteries. It seemed a natural progression that she put her own pencil to paper, and she started early by writing a Halloween play that her grade-school class performed for her school. Since then, though her tastes have changed, her love for reading has not. And her writing appetite simply grows more voracious by the day.

  Born in Southern California, she has lived in eight different cities in four different states. She has been, at one time or another, a cosmetologist, a computer programmer and an administrative assistant.

  Allison and her husband currently make their home in Arizona, where their time is thoroughly filled with two very active daughters, full-time jobs, pets, church, family and friends. In order to give herself the precious writing time she craves, she burns a lot of midnight oil.

  A great believer in the power of love—her parents still hold hands—she cannot imagine anything more exciting to write about than the miracle of two hearts coming together.

  Prologue

  The ranch is no place for a soft man. How many times had his dad drilled that fact into his head?

  He might only be nine years old, but Matt considered himself a man. He wasn’t as old as Sawyer, true, but he was big and strong enough to pull his weight at the ranch. To handle a man’s responsibilities.

  But standing behind his father, looking at the empty hospital bed, he felt the sick lump in his throat grow and grow until he thought he’d puke. Or start bawling like a baby. The way his little brother, Daniel, had cried all last night in bed, scared when their dad had carted her off in the truck to the hospital, bleeding and far, far too still. The fact that it was near blizzarding outside had only made things worse. He had stood in the too-quiet, too-empty front room of the big house and stared through the window at the dark, not needing to see the wall of snow that fell to know that it was still coming down, wet and heavy and blowing.

  Finally Matthew had gone into Daniel’s room and held him on his lap until the kid had stopped crying and fallen asleep. Even Jefferson, seven and stoic, had joined him in Danny’s room, climbing onto the top bunk before going to sleep. Eventually Sawyer had joined them, throwing himself on the floor, covering his eyes with a bent arm. He didn’t have anything to say and had looked like he would hit anyone who was dumb enough to speak to him. Not that anyone had felt like talking. Except Danny, who now and then had mumbled in his sleep.

  Matthew hadn’t slept at all. Every time he’d closed his eyes, all he’d seen was the way she’d looked when he’d found her, crumpled in the white snow outside the old barn, blood pooling around her legs, soaking through her thick coat and the bright red dress she’d been wearing for Christmas Eve. Soaking into the white, white snow.

  Gritting his teeth, he swiped a hand across his nose and banished the visions from his head. From down the hallway, he could hear the nurses singing “Silent Night.” For a second he wished that he’d stayed with his brothers and not wangled that ride with a trucker here to the hospital. “What about the...you know...the baby.”

  His father, strong and proud and never given to obvious emotion, turned toward him. Grief etched hard lines in an already hard face. His jaw worked, though no tears softened the man’s stark, ice-blue eyes. “He’s fine. We’ll name him Tristan. Like she wanted.” He cleared his throat. “The doctor said he’ll be ready to leave the hospital in a day or two.”

  They would all go home to the ranch. Everyone but her.

  His mother.

  “Dad?”

  His father looked at him. He hadn’t called him Dad for more than a year now. “What is it, boy?”

  It took a minute for Matthew to get the words out, steady and strong, the way a Clay was expected to be. “What are we gonna d
o without her?”

  Squire Clay turned back to look at the neatly made bed. His shoulders seemed to sag for a moment. “I don’t know, son. I don’t know.”

  Chapter One

  Thirty years later

  She was going to fall.

  His heart lodged painfully in his throat as Matthew Clay looked up into the barn rafters and watched red-stockinged feet slowly inch along the rough beam high above his head. His fingers curled. The crazy woman was going to have splinters in her feet from now until spring. If she lived that long.

  “Here kitty, kitty.”

  Her soft voice floated down, and he closed his eyes for a moment. But he couldn’t not watch and he looked up again, fully expecting to see her tumble from the beam at any moment, plunging forty feet to the unforgiving ground.

  She was down on her knees now, nearing the cross beam. One slender hand reached out toward the gray ball of fur huddling a few feet from her fingertips, and the other hand was braced on the beam. Dark hair fell past her elbows as she inched forward, and even in the subdued light of the barn he could see glints of red fire shimmer in the luxurious auburn waves.

  She was going to fall.

  He wanted to yell at her. Call her a fool. But she didn’t know he was standing here, below her. If he made a sound, he would startle her. And she would fall for sure.

  He wondered what he’d done wrong in his life to deserve this.

  “Come on, kitty, kitty,” she sang softly, encouragingly. The cat’s only response was to meow once, then leisurely begin bathing herself.

  He saw her shoulders sag for a moment, then she was inching forward again.

  “Here kitty, kitty. Come here you ornery cat.” Her voice never lost that soothing lilt. “Come on.” She stopped abruptly, lifted her hand and looked at it.

  Splinters, he thought.

  “Come here, kitty. If you ever want me to sneak you another can of tuna, you’d better come here. Kitty, kitty.” She inched forward again.

  Matthew picked up the sound of boots crunching in the snow and he turned to the yawning entrance of the barn just as his father appeared. He lifted his hand in warning. Squire Clay frowned, then looked up in the direction of Matthew’s lifted thumb. To Matthew’s disgust his father seemed to find the sight of that redhead’s death wish utterly amusing. Even Sandy, the golden retriever, who sat next to Matthew’s leg, wagged her tail with enthusiasm.

  Suddenly the woman snatched up the cat and cradled her in one arm while she maneuvered herself around to straddle the rafter. Her legs dangled on either side of the beam and she sat for a moment, cuddling the cat. Then she looked down. “Hi, Squire,” she called. “How’re you feeling this morning?”

  Squire scratched his chin. “Fair as the weather.”

  Matthew muttered darkly. Several feet of snow covered the ground outside the barn.

  The woman’s eyes shifted his direction. “Morning, Matthew. Happy Valentine’s Day.” Her smile was bright and vivid. Just a little bit crooked. Just a lot sexy.

  She wasn’t going to fall...he was going to climb up there after her and push her off. Matthew drew in a slow breath. Exhaled it even slower. “Get. Down. Now.”

  Her smile dimmed several watts. Then she shrugged. “Sure.” Still holding the cat, she swung her legs up onto the rafter and rose. Without a wobble, she walked across it, as surely as a practiced gymnast on a balance beam.

  He could feel the gray hairs sprouting all over his head.

  “I remember you boys climbing around up there like that,” Squire commented.

  Matthew snorted as he moved across to the ladder built against the wall. “Kids.” He looked up to watch that crazy female, still cradling the cat, curl her feet over the rungs as she began her descent. He watched her to make sure she didn’t fall, he told himself. Not because of those ridiculously snug jeans she wore. “We were kids,” he reiterated. The slender curves descending toward him were anything but childlike. “Adults oughta know better.”

  She suddenly jumped lightly to the ground, skipping the last several rungs, and he didn’t move fast enough. Her pointed elbow glanced off his chest and the crown of her head bumped his jaw.

  He swore inwardly and hoped he hadn’t bitten off a chunk of tongue.

  Jaimie Greene shook her head to clear the hair from her eyes. “Sorry,” she said breathlessly. D.C. purred contentedly beneath her arm, and she focused her attention for a moment on the pregnant cat. It was better than looking into the icy blue eyes of the irritated man glaring down at her.

  It was just her luck that he’d come upon her while she’d been rafter walking. “It didn’t take me long,” she started to explain. “Just a few minutes. Up and down.”

  “I don’t care if it took you all day,” he said. “Stay off the rafters. I want your word,” he added, inflexible as always.

  “Fine. But really, I was perfectly safe—” He cut her off with one look. Matthew Clay had that look perfected. The first time she’d been on the receiving end of it had been a year and a half ago. It had been her first of many visits to the Double-C, and she’d accidentally backed one of his pickup trucks into a fence post. Half a dozen of his precious calves had gotten loose. It had not been one of her finer moments. She patted D.C. again and gently placed her on the ground. Sandy padded over and leaned heavily against her leg and she scratched the dog’s head. “I had to get her down,” she began again, reasonably. “She was stuck up there.”

  “That stupid cat got up there all on her own. She’d have come down when she was ready.” Matthew glared at her. “Don’t go up there again.”

  Mentally Jaimie clicked her heels and snapped off a smart salute. Physically, however, she controlled the urge, instead pointing at the animal in question. “She’s pregnant. Her balance might be off. What if she fell?”

  “What if you fell?”

  “Don’t be silly. I taught gymnastics at a children’s activity center for a while. I was perfectly steady up there.” She looked hopefully at Squire for support.

  As usual, he didn’t fail her. “Leave the girl be, Matt,” Squire said. “Everybody’s got their feet on the ground again.”

  Matthew, fists propped on narrow hips below the sheepskin jacket he wore, looked from his father to her. He huffed, clearly annoyed, then stomped out of the barn. Sandy, faithful dog that she was, followed. Even D.C. sprang after him.

  “Traitor,” Jaimie muttered after the departing feline.

  Squire looked over at Jaimie, and she had to smile. His eyes were exactly the same translucent hue as his son’s, but Squire’s contained a decided twinkle. Something that Matthew’s definitely lacked. And that was a pity indeed.

  She gingerly brushed her palms together, wondering how on earth she would get out all the splinters. “See my shoes anywhere?”

  “Over there.” Squire pointed toward the bedraggled pair she’d left lying beside a stack of feed sacks.

  “Right. Thanks.” They once had been a pristine white. But the past seven weeks working around the Double-C ranch had taken their toll. She stuck her feet into them, grimacing at the cold, wet feel of the canvas. Joining Squire by the barn door, she shivered as the cold air penetrated the heavy, knit sweater she wore over a thermal undershirt. She would hesitate to say the barn’s interior was toasty, but it was considerably warmer than it was outside.

  “Where’s your coat, girl?”

  “I forgot it. I was trying to feed D.C. It was only going to take a minute.”

  “Hell’s bells,” Squire muttered. “There’s three feet of snow out there.” Even as he spoke, he was shrugging out of his own dark blue parka and tossing it around her shoulders. “How can a person forget their coat?”

  Jaimie just shrugged. She knew he didn’t really expect an answer. Still, she didn’t need to take the man’s coat. He’d barely been out of the hospital six months since his heart attack and surgery.

  He waved off her protest before she could voice it. “How’s Maggie feeling this morning?�
��

  Her sister-in-law had been up pacing half the night. “She was sleeping when I left their house this morning,” she told Squire. They stepped out from the shelter of the barn, and the new day’s sunshine reflecting off the white snow nearly blinded her. Their breath created rings of white clouds about their heads as they tromped across the snowplowed road toward the big house. She wasn’t sure she would ever get used to a Wyoming winter. It was about as foreign to her Southern Arizona-bred nature as it could get.

  “I remember when my Sarah was pregnant with Matthew. She couldn’t keep a thing down, either. Not for the first five months or so, as I recall. Lost weight she couldn’t afford to lose.” He dropped his arm over Jaimie’s shoulder and led her up the back steps of the main house, which he occupied with two of his sons, Matthew and Daniel. “Everything turned out okay in the end, though.” He stomped his boots on the linoleum floor, leaving a trail of dirt and melting snow. “Maggie’ll be okay, too. Mark my words.”

  Jaimie sighed and slipped out of the parka. “I hope so,” she murmured. She loved Maggie as much as she would a real sister. Was, in fact, closer to Maggie than she was to her brother, Joe. “She still has two months to go before she’s due.” She slipped off her own shoes and eyed the muddy floor. It was her job to clean up that mess.

  For the briefest of moments she thought longingly of the clerical job in nearby Weaver that she’d given up in December when she’d taken over here at the ranch for Maggie. She hadn’t had to mop a single floor in that office. Of course, she’d been busy avoiding the roving hands of Bennett Ludlow, her boss.