She settled the two of us in the parlor with tea and cookies. Then she bustled off into the back to tell her husband about our arrival. Kia’s face was looking a little paler than before as she sipped her tea, but it didn’t stop her from raising an eyebrow at me.
“Hunter Golden? That’s quite a name you’ve got there.”
“Thanks,” I said sarcastically, raising my own cup before I took a sip of the sweet black tea Mrs. Miller had brewed.
As usual, the comment stung whenever someone brought up my family name. My father had loved money far more than his children, and it had been a bitter disappointment to him when I didn’t live up to his legacy.
Kia bit her lip. “I’m sorry,” she said after a moment. “I’m being an ass, aren’t I?”
I laughed, the tension suddenly draining out of me. There was something about the way she bit down on her plump lower lip, those gorgeous eyes of hers downcast, that made it hard for me to be angry with her.
“You are, but considering that you’ve had such a rough time of it so far, I’m willing to forgive you.”
She smiled, just a slight curve of her lips, but it was the first smile I had seen her give, and it softened her angular features. A surge of protectiveness swept through me, and I frowned.
What the hell am I doing, developing feelings for this woman?
She was definitely not my type, and I still hadn’t figured out what her agenda here was.
Is she planning on settling down at the ranch? Or selling it?
Questions burned my lips, but I held them back. Now was not the time to ask, not when she was in pain and possibly suffering brain damage.
“Miss Nash?” Dr. Miller came out of the back room. He was an older man, dressed in a red-and-brown plaid shirt tucked into a pair of jeans, his light-brown hair liberally streaked with gray, and a pair of glasses perched on his nose. His eyes widened as he caught sight of me. “Why, hello there, my boy! It’s been so long since I last laid eyes on you. Is this your lady friend here?” he asked, gesturing to Kia.
I stood up and shook Dr. Miller’s hand. “Great to see you, Doc, and, no, this is not my lady friend. Her name is Kia Nash, and she’s the new owner of Bridle Hill Ranch.”
“Ah.” The doctor’s friendly gaze grew calculating. “So, you must be that mysterious relative we’ve been hearing about. But enough small talk,” he said, helping Kia to her feet. “I can see that you’re in pain. Let me take you back to the examination room.”
He led her to the back, leaving me alone in the parlor with tea, cookies, and a heap of questions.
CHAPTER 4
Kia
“WELL, YOUNG LADY, I must say, you’re mighty lucky to escape your first encounter with a horse’s hooves with only some mild bruising,” Dr. Miller said as he handed me an ice pack, his examination finished. “He must have only grazed you.”
Mild bruising? You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.
The area was dark purple and blue now, but I held my tongue about it. The doctor was right. I was lucky I hadn’t broken anything.
“I guess I managed to get out of the way just enough,” I said tiredly.
“Now, remember, make sure to put this on for fifteen minutes every hour. Try lying on the couch and placing a pillow underneath your back, so you can elevate your ribs above your heart,” the doctor said as he busied himself putting instruments away. He finished cleaning up and then opened the door for me. “Let’s go ahead and tell your man the news.”
“He’s not my . . .” I started to say. Then I sighed.
Who am I kidding? The doctor wasn’t going to listen to me.
Grumpy, I followed him out, barely refraining from stomping my boots on the floor like a child. What has gotten into me?
Hunter was waiting in the living room, the platter of cookies mostly demolished. He stood as we entered. I had to admit, he looked damn good in his Wrangler jeans and worn leather cowboy boots. His black Stetson was in his hands, revealing his headful of thick, wavy blond hair grown to just below his jawline. His green-and-white plaid button-up shirt was open at the collar, showcasing just a hint of the broad, tanned chest I knew must be underneath it. My fingers suddenly itched with the desire to undo a few more buttons and see if he had any chest hair to run them through.
His eyebrows rose as he caught my stare, and I felt my cheeks flush. I didn’t look away though, and something like amusement glimmered in his emerald-green eyes before he turned his attention to the doctor.
“So, what’s the news?” he asked.
“The news is that your lady friend suffered a good bump on the head and has some bruised ribs, but other than that, she’s all right. You’re going to need to check on her every few hours in the night to make sure she doesn’t slip into unconsciousness. Just tap or gently shake her to wake her. If she doesn’t respond, call 9–1-1 right away.”
“What? I don’t—” I started to protest.
Hunter cut me off. “Understood. I’ll make sure she’s taken care of.”
“Good.”
The door opened, and an elderly man hobbled in with a cane.
Dr. Miller smiled at him. “You’ll have to excuse me. My next patient is here. Please see my wife about payment.”
He bustled off to the older man with a jovial greeting, taking him into the back room, leaving me standing in the living room, flabbergasted.
“Shit,” I muttered, patting myself down. “I don’t have my purse or anything.” I’d been so out of it that I didn’t think to grab any of that stuff from the house.
“Don’t worry about it.” Hunter took me by the arm, bid Mrs. Miller adieu, and led me outside. “I took care of payment while I was waiting for you.”
“You did?” I stopped dead.
Hunter tugged me by the elbow, impatient to get to the car. “Yes, I did. Can we go now? I’d like to get back to the ranch and check on those horses of yours.”
“I can’t allow you to pay for my medical bills,” I said, digging my heels into the ground. “I did this to myself, not you or anyone else.” There was no way a doctor’s bill was chump change for a small-town cowboy. I didn’t want to take money from someone who needed it.
“I said, don’t worry about it.” He tugged more firmly at my arm, and this time, I followed. “I don’t want your money.”
“But . . .”
I started to protest again, but he yanked open the passenger side door, giving me a look that told me he was reaching the end of his patience. Biting back a scathing retort, I got into the car. I might not like his attitude, but he was helping me out. The least I could do was not give him shit about it.
We drove back to the ranch in silence. Hunter parked around the front of the house, and then he came around to help me out of the car. As I got to my feet, a sharp pain lanced through my side, and I gasped, stumbling.
Hunter instantly stepped forward to catch me, his strong hands grabbing me by the underarms. He pulled me against him, and I instinctively wrapped my arms around his torso to steady myself. Then I froze at the intimate contact. My breasts were pressed up against the bottom of his rib cage, and the heat from his hard body enveloped me, inciting an answering heat from my own.
“Are you all right?”
He tilted my chin up so that I was looking directly into his eyes, and my heart fluttered at the concern I saw in their green depths.
“Yes,” I said.
My eyes latched on to the sensuous curve of his mouth, and I hastily backed away as a sudden urge to kiss him took hold. It had been a while since I’d had sex with a man, but I wasn’t exactly a stranger to one-night stands. But I also knew that getting involved with this man would be a damn bad idea, especially since I didn’t really know why he was here. Not to mention, I was injured and hurting like a motherfucker.
That knock on the head must have really fucked up my common sense.
“Come on. Let’s get you inside.” Hunter turned away, taking the porch steps two at a time.
&
nbsp; I followed him a little more slowly and allowed him to settle me onto the cracked, faded brown leather couch.
“Just hang out here for a few and put some ice on that, okay? I’m going to go and check on the horses.”
CHAPTER 5
Hunter
IT WAS NEARLY AN hour later before I stomped up the porch steps and back into the main house, and I was furious.
What the fuck has been going on at this ranch?
It had only been two weeks since Daniel died, so the sheer amount of neglect couldn’t simply be attributed to my old friend’s absence.
Grinding my teeth in frustration, I slammed the door behind me and then felt guilty as Kia shot up from where she’d been resting on the couch.
“What’s going on?” she asked groggily, looking at me with half-lidded eyes, still clouded with sleep. Her hair was a tousled mess, and the couch had left an imprint on her right cheek from where she’d rested on it.
I was oddly touched by how damn cute she looked.
You have my permission to mate with this one, my wolf rumbled in my head.
I bit back a growl. Fuck that. I was not letting my wolf pick and choose whom I could mate with, for fuck’s sake!
“Sorry,” I muttered, scraping my shoes clean on the welcome mat inside. I joined her in the living room, sinking into the matching recliner by the fireplace. “I didn’t mean to wake you . . . though, on the other hand, I guess I should be glad that you woke up instead of falling into an unconscious stupor. Must mean your head injury isn’t so bad after all,” I teased.
Kia rolled her eyes, but I caught a hint of a smile curling the corners of her lips.
She shifted into a sitting position, and her expression grew more serious as she looked at me. “Really, though, what pissed you off so much to make you slam the door?”
I sighed, taking off my hat so I could drag a hand through my hair. “It’s just . . . I don’t understand what the hell happened to this place,” I said after a long moment. “I went out to check on the horses—and, by the way, I let them all out to pasture, which is what you should have done. And while I was in the stables, I decided to check on the feed stores. They’re extremely low, as is the cattle feed, and with winter only a few months away, that’s a really bad thing. And we need to figure out a solution for the feed since no grain crops were planted this year. I decided to go and do an overall inspection of the ranch, and there are all kinds of things that need to be fixed. Machines need to be oiled, and fences need to be repaired.” I pressed the heels of my hands against my temples, a headache forming behind my eyes from just thinking about it.
“I wouldn’t worry too much about any of that,” Kia said, surprising me with her nonchalant tone. “I’ve been here for a few days, trying to figure out what to do with this place, and I’m just going to sell off the livestock and machinery, fix up what I can around the house, and then sell this place.”
“Like hell you are!” I snapped.
Her plan is to dismantle the ranch and sell it off? Over my dead body!
“Excuse me?” Kia lifted her chin, her brown eyes turning hard.
I slowly got to my feet, stretching myself to my full height so that I towered over her. “You are not going to tear down everything Old Daniel worked so hard to keep,” I told her. “That man built this whole ranch with his bare hands and passed it down to you so that it could stay in the family. Not so that you could sell it off piecemeal just to make a quick buck!”
“Well, maybe I don’t want to be a rancher!” Kia jumped to her feet and then swayed slightly.
I instinctively reached out my hands to catch her, but she steadied herself on a nearby table and batted my hands away.
“Maybe it hasn’t occurred to you, but I actually came from somewhere. I’m a fashion photographer, and I have my own life and plans back in New York. I’m not throwing away everything I’ve worked for just so I can become a rancher, which is not something I ever envisioned as a career choice, by the way.” She jabbed a finger into my chest and glared up at me. “I don’t know who the hell you think you are, but you don’t have the right to tell me what I can and can’t do with my life!”
“A fashion photographer, huh?” I wrapped my hand around her finger, pulling it away from my chest, but I didn’t let go of her hand. “Well, Little Miss High and Mighty, what if you just hired a few ranch hands to fix up and maintain the place for you, so you can go back to your glamorous lifestyle?” Something twanged in my chest at the idea of her up and leaving, and I scowled.
What the hell do I care if she goes back home? I’ve known her for less than twenty-four hours.
I pressed on. “Not only would you be able to get out of doing some actual hard work, but you could also even turn a profit here at the ranch and pad your wallet a bit more.”
“I don’t have the money to pay a bunch of cowboys to run this place.” But I saw the wheels turning in her head. “You really think this place can turn a profit?”
Ah, so money is the way to this girl’s heart. Good thing I have plenty of that to go around.
“Hell yeah, it can turn a profit,” I said, crossing my arms. “When I was growing up, Daniel sure was able to live nicely off what he made on the ranch while paying his hired help a decent wage.”
“If that’s the case, then why is this place such a wreck?” Kia demanded, sitting back down.
I followed suit.
“Where are these hired hands he was paying so well? This place doesn’t look like a successful business to me. It looks like it’s on its way out.”
I ground my teeth. “Look, I don’t know why the hell this place is such a disaster right now,” I said tightly. “I fully plan on tracking down Daniel’s hired help and getting to the bottom of all this. But, in the meantime, we can’t just give up on this.”
“I don’t know the first thing about running a ranch,” she said finally. “And I don’t have the money to hire someone to do it for me.”
“Yeah, well, I know a thing or two about ranch management,” I said. “And, if I have to stay here myself for a few weeks in order to get this place up and running, I will.”
Kia blinked. “Why would you do that? You’ve got to have other things to do.”
I glared at her. “Just because I have a life and problems to worry about doesn’t mean I can’t make time for things that are important. Daniel was like a father to me, and I don’t want to see his legacy flushed down the toilet by an ignoramus like you.”
“Excuse me?” Kia nearly came out of her seat, but I beat her to it, shoving up from the battered recliner. “You fucking asshole.”
“You can go ahead and act all superior if you want. But the way I see it, nothing excuses the fact that you’re trying to do away with a man’s entire life’s work just because you’re too lazy to roll up your sleeves and figure out how to make things work,” I snarled. “Blood is blood, no matter how far apart you were, and it shows a lot about how much loyalty you must feel to your kin if I’m willing to put more work into whipping this place into shape than you are.”
Seething, I spun on my heel and stalked to the front door.
“We’re not finished talking, cowboy! Where the hell are you going?” Kia called.
“Home to get a few things. Why don’t you think on what I said and let me know if anything meaningful has gone through that empty head of yours by the time I get back.”
“Asshole!” she screamed.
I bounded down the steps, almost losing the battle not to shift into my beast before I hit the ground. I struggled for control and had to sit down on the ground, clutching my head for a few moments, before I was able to calm down.
There’s no need to be so angry, my wolf chided when I finally regained control of my human side. She’s only trying to assert dominance over her territory.
This isn’t a pissing match, I snapped, struggling to my feet again.
Isn’t it, though? You’re trying to assert your dominance over her by tell
ing her to do as you wish, and she’s pushing back because she’s headstrong. There was pride and a hint of smugness in my wolf’s voice as he added, That’s part of the reason I like her so much. She’s a challenge. It will be fun to make her submit to us.
Jesus. I rolled my eyes. I’d had no idea that my beast was into BDSM.
No wonder the two of us didn’t see eye to eye. I liked easy women who fell into my lap, not ones I had to assert my dominance over. Yet, as I thought back to Kia, who was likely fuming over my insults, I had to admit a part of me had enjoyed the verbal sparring. She was feisty and intelligent, and she challenged me, making me want to display my superiority to her.
Shit. I’ve got to knock this shit off.
I walked back and forth to calm myself down, so I could go and saddle up Misty. I hadn’t come here so I could bang Old Daniel’s great-niece. I came here to protect Daniel’s legacy, and that was all I was going to do. The sooner I got this shit over and done with, the sooner I could get back to my own damn life, away from her.
CHAPTER 6
Kia
I LOOKED UP FROM my issue of Better Homes & Gardens as the front door swung open, and Hunter walked in. He had a pack slung over his shoulder, and his arms were full of a huge paper bag from which incredible smells were wafting.
“Wow. Well, something sure smells delicious.” I got up and took the bag from him, so he could shut the door. “What is this?”
“Food. My housekeeper set some aside for me, and figuring you’d be hungry, I brought a little extra.” Hunter eyed the magazine on the couch. “What have you been reading there? Better Homes & Gardens?”
“Oh.” I shrugged self-consciously. “I just thought I’d see if I could pick up some remodeling tips. This house needs a lot of work.”
“Hmm.”
Hunter looked at me thoughtfully, and I was relieved to see there was no trace of his earlier animosity. Maybe the ride back home had done him some good.
“Well, it’s a start.” He took the bag back from me and headed for the dining room table. “Why don’t you get some silverware?”
Operation Wolf: Hunter ~ Sedona Venez Page 3