Opposing the Cowboy

by Margo Bond Collins

  Moving into the space between the Prius and the Chevrolet truck—1956 with a chrome bumper, she remembered with a smile—LeeAnn turned to say good-bye to Jonah, and was startled to find him standing right behind her.

  Once she realized he was there, she couldn’t imagine how she had missed his presence before. Electricity practically jumped between them as she tilted her head back to look up at him.

  Jonah tilted his Stetson back on his head and leaned closer, then reached up and brushed one work-callused thumb across her bottom lip. Her breath caught in her chest, and she froze, uncertain what to do next.

  “This could work,” he whispered, so quietly that she couldn’t tell if it was meant for her or not.

  She stared up, mesmerized first by his full lips and then by his navy blue eyes, gazing intently at her, as if he meant to read her every thought with his eyes alone.

  He’s going to kiss me again.

  She was sure of it.

  Without an audience—for no reason other than…he wants to?

  For a long moment, she stood perfectly still, waiting, not certain what she wanted him to do even as every cell of her body urged her toward him.

  Then he blinked, and the spell was broken.

  Taking a deep breath and blowing it back out as he stood up straight, Jonah dropped his hands gently onto her shoulders. “I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?” he said, then reached around her to open the Prius’s door.

  LeeAnn’s hands were still shaking as she started the car and pulled out of the parking lot.

  What did he mean when he said this could work?

  Us?

  Chapter Nineteen

  Closing out her morning practice the next day with a brief meditation, LeeAnn worked to ignore the excitement that fluttered through her stomach at the thought of Jonah showing up for another day of sorting through Gran’s things.

  She couldn’t, however, ignore the fact that the excitement had nothing to do with searching the seemingly endless boxes of papers—and everything to do with Jonah.

  No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t convince herself that she hadn’t fallen for the man.

  But I can at least keep him from figuring it out.

  I can protect myself that way—because falling in love with someone like him is bound to end in heartache.

  Anyway, he’s only here because he wants to destroy my property.

  My land.

  My peace of mind.

  She huffed a sigh. So much for meditation.

  The second part of her morning was bound to cheer her up, though—saddling Blackie always made her smile. In fact, merely pulling on her jeans and boots brought a smile to her face.

  But when she got to the barn, the saddle, saddle pad, and bridle were all missing.

  Jonah must have decided to ride today.

  That shouldn’t have made her smile, but it did. It also made her want to see her favorite boy and his new friend—Blackie, she clarified. Blackie was her favorite boy.

  Oh, God. I’ve got it bad. I wish I couldn’t wait for us to be done with this search. Truth be told, though, I want it to drag out.

  And she had to tell the truth—to herself, anyway, even if not to him.

  The morning air still carried a slight chill, though the sun was beginning to burn away some of the dew that coated the short native grass lining the sides of the path down to the pastures. LeeAnn whistled a little as she made her way toward the paddock, half expecting to see Jonah and Blackie riding through the pastures.

  They weren’t there.

  She frowned a little, her jaunty step slowing as she turned a complete circle, scanning for them.

  It’s not like I specified that he should stay in the pasture. Or on my property, for that matter.

  Surely he hadn’t taken Blackie off the ranch.

  She drew in a deep breath, counting to herself, and blew it back out.

  This is no big deal. I simply need to get to higher ground.

  Without thinking, she turned toward the highest hill on the property. She knew the land like she knew her own heart—and she could see everything from that point. At the top of the incline, she once again did a slow turn, gazing out across the ranch as she searched for her horse and the man riding him.

  There—on the far eastern edge of the property, she could barely see him. She shaded her eyes against the glare of the rising sun. What was he doing? It looked like he had some sort of equipment. Like he was setting it up…

  “Oh, no,” she breathed aloud, then cursed. “He’s already started surveying for the oil company.” Heading down the hill, she continued muttering to herself. “That lousy, lying, cheating, thieving…”

  At the bottom of the slope, she broke into a run, her boots slipping in the wet grass.

  When she reached the house, she threw open the door. “Keys. Where are my keys?” Scrabbling through the bowl on the entryway table, she finally located them. Slamming the door behind her, she stomped down the porch steps toward her car, still grumbling under her breath.

  The Prius wasn’t really made for driving across the ranch—in fact, until recently, she’d still had her gran’s beat-up old pickup. But it had finally died for good, so she had traded it in. She missed it now as she bumped across the east field. Before her grandfather had died, they’d had cattle in this field, so at least it had been cleared at some point.

  The thought caused her to slow down. She couldn’t afford to break an axle—or whatever it was that cars had these days—just because some jerk had stolen her horse in an attempt to rape her land.

  Oh, yes. Rape. Pillage. Defile. Destroy.

  It doesn’t matter what he calls it. That’s what it really is. I bet his company plans to…to frack it.

  Never mind that she didn’t really know what fracking was. She knew it was something terrible that oil companies did to the land in order to get oil. And that it had caused earthquakes all along the Permian Basin.

  Earthquakes.

  In Texas.

  That slimy prick is going to cause an earthquake on my ranch.

  She could feel a hot rage welling up in her throat, choking her, and as she came over a slight rise in the land, almost the only thing that kept her from stepping on the gas and running right over the lying ass-hat was the fact that her beloved horse stood next to him.

  Never, in a million years, would she do anything to hurt Blackie.

  She stepped on the brake, and the Prius swung in a wide arc before coming to a stop.

  Wait. I wouldn’t do anything to hurt anyone.

  I won’t even eat meat.

  What is wrong with me?

  In that final skid, her car had ended up turned sideways rather than facing Jonah, so through the windshield, all she saw in front of her was the wide expanse of land that she had inherited from her gran, and in the distance, the house, the barn, and all the outbuildings, slowly falling in on themselves.

  What had she been thinking?

  She’d been thinking of the days that she had “helped” her grandfather fix that recalcitrant old tractor, handing him tools and solemnly promising not to tell Gran when he cursed in front of her.

  Hours spent cooking in the kitchen with Gran—making those buttermilk pies so often that she didn’t even need the recipe she and Jonah had found.

  The long nights after her parents’ deaths, when Gran would come into her bedroom and rock her, the two of them clinging to one another in their shared grief.

  The first time she’d been able to ride Blackie, when he was finally filled out enough so his ribs didn’t show and his coat had turned a sleek, glossy black.

  She’d been thinking of everything she’d had.

  Everything she’d lost.

  For years, she had been hanging on to the ranch with everything she had inside, clawing at the world to keep from having to sell off acres or mortgage the land—to keep the promise she had made to her gran, whose own parents’ experiences during the Great Depression had left a
generations-long horror of allowing banks too much access to the land they held.

  She was the only person she could trust to take care of the land Gran had left her. No one else cared enough.

  For the first time ever, that made her feel lonely instead of strong.

  Tears welled up in her eyes, and she dropped her head onto her hands on the steering wheel. She hadn’t cried since Darrell had called to break up with her over a month ago, but now deep, heaving sobs racked her body.

  The sharp rap at the window startled her. She’d been so lost in her own misery that for a moment, she’d completely forgotten Jonah and his treachery.

  His face loomed close, separated from her by only the thin glass.

  Moments ago, she had been prepared to run him down for betraying her trust. Now, she couldn’t even bring herself to care enough to even look up at him.

  “LeeAnn?” His voice echoed through the window, worry coloring his tone. “Are you okay? What happened?”

  When she didn’t answer, he pulled at the handle. “Open the door. Please. I need to know you’re okay.”

  Finally, she dragged her head up from its resting spot on the steering wheel.

  What did it matter if he had already started surveying?

  If they didn’t find anything proving that she had the right to tell Natural Shale to take a hike, then the company would bring in its lawyers. She couldn’t compete with that. She didn’t have the money. And right now, she didn’t have the heart.

  Turning her tearstained face toward the window, she dragged her eyes up to his as she unlocked the door.

  “What is it?” Jonah asked, pulling open the car door and leaning in. “Are you okay?” He reached past her and unbuckled the seat belt, then took her hands in his and turned her to face him as he knelt down next to the car.

  She looked down into his eyes for a moment, then turned her head to stare blankly out the window.

  It was like he was two people. How could he be so kind in one moment, then turn around and callously undermine everything he knew she cared about?

  “Talk to me, LeeAnn. Please tell me what’s going on.” He squeezed her hands, trying to pull her attention back to him.

  Blackie stood next to the fence, tethered to a post, placidly grazing as far as the line would reach. The car slewing sideways hadn’t even fazed him.

  As she stared at the fence outside the windshield, the tools Jonah had been using came into focus.

  She hadn’t realized that surveyors used wire to do their jobs.

  Wait. Is that a post-hole digger?

  And that fence post Blackie was tethered to looked…odd. One side was darker than the other. As if it had been lying on the ground for some time and had only recently been brought upright again.

  The realization hit her hard.

  Jonah hadn’t been surveying her land at all. He had been riding her fence, fixing it as he went.

  Hot embarrassment threaded its way through her entire body, starting in her stomach and twisting into her arms and legs, up to her face, where it burned bright red.

  Finally, she looked at Jonah, whose worried gaze still centered on her eyes.

  “Well, this is embarrassing,” she said, and exploded in hysterical laughter.

  …

  For a moment, Jonah thought that LeeAnn was sobbing. But then she raised her eyes to his, and he realized that although she was crying, they were tears of laughter.

  She gasped, trying to speak. “I thought that you”—more insane giggles—“I thought that you were surveying.” The last word came out in a howl, followed by more wild laughter.

  “No.” A broad sweep of his arm served to take in the fence, the horse, the tools he’d brought along. “I saw some spots that needed work,” he said, shrugging. “I thought I’d ride the fences and see what I could fix.”

  A sudden, uncomfortable twist in his stomach suggested that perhaps he hadn’t fully considered the possible implications of his actions. Riding the fences certainly implied a level of…if not ownership, at least possessiveness…that LeeAnn might not appreciate—at least not as much as he had hoped, on some subliminal level, that she would appreciate having the fences fixed.

  In his job—and in his private life, for that matter—he was used to considering actions, not motivations. Or at least, not his own motivations. He studied clients’ needs, considered their motivations, desires—all in an attempt to make a drilling lease offer that would satisfy both Natural Shale and the landowners.

  So what had happened here?

  What was I thinking?

  Her giggles finally died out, and he feared she might be considering some of the same implications. “You were fixing the fence?” she finally asked.

  Still working to sift through his own motivations, he simply nodded.

  “Why?” Her mouth tightened into a small bow, and the sudden urge to kiss it until it softened again hit him so hard he felt a little dizzy. Why, indeed?

  Why would a man with absolutely no connection to the ranch decide to ride the fences?

  Unless he wanted to prove something.

  Or show something.

  Oh, shit.

  He’d done it. He’d gone and fallen for the hippie yoga chick. Not some kind of opposites-attract lust. That he knew how to handle: get the girl in bed, have fun, go home.

  But this? This is something different.

  The long silence led LeeAnn to prompt him again. “So?”

  He shrugged. “I needed to get outside for a while.” With a jerk of his chin, he indicated the rest of the ranch, with its dilapidated outbuildings full of dusty boxes.

  Flicking her narrowed gaze from Jonah, to the fence, to the horse, to the rest of the ranch, and back again, LeeAnn sat back in the seat, still clutching the top of the steering wheel. “Huh.” Closing her eyes and shaking her head, she banged her forehead against the backs of her hands several times, finally coming to rest with her face pressed against them.

  A flash of alarm shot through him as he realized that her shoulders were shaking. Was she crying again?

  “LeeAnn?” he asked, working to keep the worry he felt from leaking into his tone.

  But when she lifted her face from her hands, he realized that the tears streaming down her face were from laughter. She wiped her palms across her eyes, then her fingertips, clearing away the tears as she shook her head. “I’m sorry. I think I might be a little bit insane.”

  He wanted to reassure her that she wasn’t—but to be honest, he wasn’t entirely certain of her sanity, himself. It didn’t make sense that she wouldn’t take the company’s offer—an offer that would leave her with enough money to pay her taxes and hire real help to fix the fences, repair the outbuildings, and paint the house.

  If she’s insane, what does it say about me that I’m attracted to her?

  Because that’s all it could be. A crazy attraction.

  Fine—so the pull he felt toward her seemed to tug at some deep part of himself, some newly discovered sense of…what? Protectiveness?

  Yeah. That was it.

  He hadn’t fallen for her—that would mean he was the crazy one.

  LeeAnn Walker was a neo-hippie part-time yoga instructor with a ranch that was falling apart and not enough sense to take the one offer that would solve all her problems.

  She was a vegetarian. Her Prius sported a meat is murder bumper sticker.

  She cuts fake nuts off pickup trucks, for Chrissakes.

  Clearly, she needed protection—from herself, if nothing else.

  That was why he was out here first thing in the morning, working a fence that wasn’t his job.

  Having worked out an explanation for his own actions—and more importantly, for the way her every motion pulled at him—Jonah nodded firmly. “I’m almost finished here,” he said. “Let’s go back down to the house and see if we can go through the last of the boxes today.” Rapping once on the hood for emphasis, he stepped back, ignoring the urge to brush away the one gl
ittering tear that remained suspended on LeeAnn’s flushed cheek.

  With a nod, LeeAnn put the Prius into reverse. “I’ll see you down there,” she said.

  Jonah lifted one hand and waved, forcing himself to turn toward the fence rather than watch her drive away.

  The silence left in the wake of the retreating car was broken only by Blackie, snuffling through the grass at the limits of his tether. When Jonah stepped up beside him, the gelding nuzzled his pockets, searching for treats. Jonah pulled out the last of the sugar cubes he’d secreted there and held them out on his palm, where Blackie delicately lipped them up as Jonah stroked his mane.

  Staring blindly at the fence in front of him as he thumped his palm against the horse’s neck, Jonah said companionably, “Oh, yeah, boy. That’s it. I’m screwed.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Even after a full day of searching through reams of paper, then lugging out boxes of trash and heaving them into the back of Jonah’s pickup to haul away, LeeAnn hadn’t slept well—despite being utterly exhausted when she fell into bed that night. Instead, she tossed and turned, unable to quit thinking about Jonah.

  She spent the entire next morning thinking about him, too—about everything that had happened in the weeks since she had met him.

  Jonah, kissing her in the Wagon Wheel—twice—to help her deal with Darrell.

  Cutting mesquite wood for a party and never complaining, even when he got hurt.

  Standing up to Darrell at the party.

  Fitting in perfectly with Kylie and Cole.

  Almost kissing her in the TexZen Yoga Studio parking lot.

  Fixing her fence.

  Spending hour upon hour sorting through piles of old junk, stopping to hand her anything she might find valuable, stepping in to help her lift the heavy boxes, laughing with her at the funny images in old magazines.