Taming a Texas Devil (Bad Boy Ranch Book 5)

by Katie Lane

  “I bet I know who it’s for,” Raynelle said with a knowing smile. “Maybe a sexy badass Texas Ranger?”

  Raynelle was right. The coffee was for the sexy badass Texas Ranger Dixie had left sleeping in her bed. A Texas Ranger who had loved her so well during the night they’d both overslept. Which was why she knew nothing about the sheriff being back. She needed to get to the office and figure out what was going on.

  “I better go, ladies,” she said as she backed toward her SUV. “Thanks so much for inviting me to join the Simple Book Club. I’ll look forward to my first meeting.”

  “It’s at the Gardener Ranch,” Raynelle called after her. “And Sadie is the best cook ever.”

  “Now why would you say that, Ray?” Luanne scolded. “I’m just as good a cook as Sadie. You loved my pigs in a sleeping bag when I made them.”

  Before she could hear Raynelle’s answer, Dixie got in her SUV and backed out. Sure enough, when she got to the office, she saw Sheriff Willaby’s truck parked out front and his sheriff’s SUV was now parked in a different space than it had been.

  Depression didn’t come close to describing how Dixie felt. Not only because she would have to go back to being bossed around by the arrogant jerk, but also because she now knew what a good lawman was. And Sheriff Willaby didn’t come close. He cared nothing about the town and the people who lived there. She could only hope folks had come to realize that and wouldn’t re-elect him in the fall. Of course, from what she’d heard, the only reason they had elected Willaby in the first place was because no one else had wanted the job. She would have to find someone to run against him. Someone who loved the town as their own.

  She hesitated as she got out of the SUV.

  What if she ran for sheriff?

  She shook the crazy thought out of her head. She wasn’t prepared to be sheriff. She had just gotten the hang of being a deputy. She could handle the little things like getting after folks for speeding or teenagers for ditching school, but she couldn’t handle the bigger problems. Like confronting a murderer. When she walked into the office and saw Sheriff Willaby sitting behind the desk shoving store-bought donuts in his mouth and playing solitaire on the computer, she figured anyone would be a better sheriff.

  She pinned on a smile. “Good mornin’.”

  The sheriff swiveled around in the chair. “You’re late.”

  “Sorry.” She held up the cup she’d brought in with her. “There was a long line at the pharmacy soda fountain. I thought I’d bring you coffee to welcome you back.”

  His eyes narrowed. “How’d you know I was back?”

  “Nothing in a small town stays a secret.” She set the cup on the desk and noticed the notes she’d been compiling on Sam Sweeney. She’d been in such a hurry to get home to meet Lincoln she’d forgotten to file them the night before. She hoped Willaby hadn’t read them. She felt more than a little possessive about Sam Sweeney’s case. While she would leave Lincoln to make the arrest, she really wanted to solve the mystery.

  As casually as possible, she picked up the notes. Willaby didn’t seem to notice. His mind was on something else.

  “So where’s your boyfriend?”

  “Boyfriend?” She played dumb. “I don’t have a boyfriend.” It was the truth. Lincoln really wasn’t her boyfriend. He was her secret lover who refused to acknowledge he had some major feelings for her. But Dixie knew he did. Just like she knew she had major feelings for him. Having never been in love before, she wasn’t ready to label it. All she knew was that when she was with him, she felt like she could be herself. Not her mama’s beauty queen. Not her daddy’s pea in a pod. For the first time in her life, she could just be Dixie Leigh. And it felt nice.

  “Don’t play dumb, deputy,” Sheriff Willaby said. “I’ve seen Lincoln Hayes’ truck at your apartment at all hours of the night.”

  The fact the sheriff had driven past her apartment gave her the willies. And ticked her off. “Have you been stalking me, Sheriff? Because that’s criminal behavior.”

  He stood and his face turned red with anger. She had seen him angry before, but never like this. And never directed at her. “Don’t you dare take that uppity attitude with me! I’ve seen the way you look at me. I know you think you’re better than I am. And I know you were glad to get rid of me. You went to your big shot senator daddy, didn’t you? He’s the one who got the governor after me.”

  She had only disliked the man before. Now she out and out hated him. “You’re wrong. I didn’t run to my daddy and tattle on you. And just for your information, Officer Hayes was at my apartment because we’re working on the Sam Sweeney case together.” It wasn’t a lie. Between hot, mind-blowing sex, they did talk about the case.

  The anger drained out of the sheriff as quickly as it had come, and he laughed. “He isn’t working on the Sam Sweeney case with you. That’s just to cover up what he’s really doing. Which is babysitting you for your daddy. Although I bet your daddy would be pretty upset if he found out his little girl was getting fucked by her Texas Ranger bodyguard.”

  Dixie was so stunned all she could do was stare at him. “My bodyguard? You don’t know what you’re talking about. My daddy didn’t hire a bodyguard for me.”

  The sheriff smirked. “Not hired. He just asked Lincoln’s boss to do him a little favor. And when a big-shot senator asks you to do him a favor, you do it.”

  Dixie would have argued if what he said didn’t make sense. Calling in favors was something her father did all the time. After she mentioned working on a murder case, Daddy would’ve been worried enough to want someone watching out for her. And the Texas Ranger she claimed she was working with would’ve been a perfect choice for a bodyguard.

  There was just one thing that didn’t fit.

  Lincoln.

  He was too much of an honorable man to lie. If her father had hired him, he would’ve told her. Especially after they made love.

  She smiled. “Sorry, Sheriff. Whatever game you’re playing, isn’t going to work. I wasn’t trying to get your badge taken away, but I am now. You don’t deserve the star you’re wearing and I’m going to do everything in my power to make sure you don’t get to keep it for long. You are a petty man and I didn’t realize how petty until Officer Lincoln Hayes showed me how a true officer of the law should act. Now if you will excuse me, I need to go on patrol.”

  But she didn’t go out on patrol. She headed straight to her apartment. She didn’t believe for a second that Lincoln would lie to her, but she needed to tell him the sheriff was back and spreading rumors. She couldn’t stand the thought of Lincoln losing the job he loved because of her. Which meant they would have to be a lot more careful.

  She expected to find him still in bed when she got to her apartment and was disappointed he was fully dressed and standing in the kitchen. She never tired of seeing him naked. But he was pretty hot fully clothed too. As soon as she walked in the door, he gave her a stern look of warning. But if she had paid attention to his warnings, they never would’ve ended up in bed together. So she ignored the look and walked straight over and slid her arms around his waist. He stiffened, but he always took a while to warm up.

  “I thought you were supposed to be waiting naked for me.” She lowered her hands and squeezed his fine butt. “When I give an order, Officer Hayes, I expect it to be carried out.”

  He cringed. She didn’t understand why he was acting so weird until she heard her father’s voice.

  “Just what the hell has been going on here?”

  Dixie turned to see her daddy standing there, looking like he was about to bust a blood vessel. Behind him, her mama looked as unruffled as ever. In fact, a slight smile tipped up the corners of Winona’s perfectly painted lips.

  Dixie dropped her hands from Lincoln’s butt and tried to act like she hadn’t just molested a man in front of her parents. “Daddy! Mama! What a surprise.” She hurried over and gave them each a big hug. Her mama squeezed back. Her daddy only growled.

  “Don’t
you try to act like everything is just fine and dandy, Sugar Squirt. I want to know what’s going on and I want to know now.”

  A few months ago, she would’ve lied through her teeth. But a few months ago, she was still an immature woman trying to get her way with her daddy. She wasn’t that immature woman anymore. She had finally grown up and knew what she wanted. It wasn’t to follow in her father’s footsteps. Nor was it to follow in her mother’s. She was forging her own life path and it felt damned good.

  “I don’t know what you mean, Daddy. Nothing is going on here that’s out of the ordinary. I’m a twenty-eight-year-old woman living on my own and paying my own way. If I should decide to have a man stay over, then that’s my business. Not my daddy’s. Or my mama’s. Now if you’d called to let me know you were coming, this little scene you just witnessed wouldn’t have happened.” She turned to Lincoln. “I’m sorry if my parents surprised you, Lincoln. This is my Daddy, Senator Grant Meriwether and my mama, Winona Meriwether. Daddy and Mama, this is Lincoln Hayes, the Texas Ranger I’ve been working with.”

  “I know who he is,” her daddy snapped. He pointed a finger at Lincoln. “And if I have anything to do with it, you won’t be a Texas Ranger for much longer. When you agreed to keep an eye out for my daughter, I meant for you to keep her safe. I did not mean for you to . . . to be doing what you’re doing.”

  Her father’s words took a moment to sink in. When they did, she still couldn’t quite believe she’d heard him right. The sheriff she could ignore, but she couldn’t ignore her daddy. “Lincoln agreed to keep an eye on me?”

  His father continued to glare at Lincoln. “He sure did. I think he was hoping to get a promotion out of it. But if you think you’re getting that promotion now, you can think again.”

  Dixie turned to Lincoln. She wanted him to look shocked by her father’s complete misunderstanding of what had happened. But he didn’t look shocked. Nor did he look repentant. His face was devoid of all emotion.

  She turned to her parents. “I need a few minutes alone with Lincoln.”

  “What you need is to get your butt back home, baby girl,” her daddy said. “This little game of deputy you’ve been playing is—”

  “That’s enough, Grant,” her mama said. Her mother rarely interrupted her father so he looked more than a little stunned. Before he could argue, she hooked an arm through his and gave him a kiss. “Let’s go get a Coke float at that cute little soda fountain we passed on our way into town.” She kept talking as she led him to the door. “It reminds me of that soda fountain you took me to on our first date. Do you remember? I was so star struck by your good looks I poked myself in the eye with the straw and we both laughed until we . . .” Her voice faded as they walked out the door.

  When they were gone, Dixie closed the door and turned to Lincoln. “Is it true?”

  He hesitated only a second before he nodded.

  She felt like she’d felt the first time she’d been thrown onto her back at the police academy. Stunned and unable to catch her breath. She flopped down on the couch. Queenie must’ve sensed that something was wrong because she got up from where she’d been sleeping on the back of the couch and jumped into Dixie’s lap. Dixie stroked her fur as she put all the pieces together.

  “I should’ve known something wasn’t right when you stayed to look for Sam Sweeney when there was no evidence of a crime. Texas Rangers don’t hang around when there’s no case to solve. Nor do they take home drunk women and spend the night with them. Or buy new deadbolts for their apartments. Or waste their time training a stupid deputy who doesn’t know her butt from a hole in the ground.”

  “You’re not stupid.”

  She fought to keep the tears from her eyes. It was a losing battle. “Yeah, I am. I was stupid enough to think you hung around me because you liked me.”

  “I do like you.”

  She looked away. “Yeah, you liked me enough to lie to me.” He didn’t say anything. She didn’t expect him to. Lincoln wasn’t good with words. He was a man of action. His actions had said it all. She hadn’t meant anything to him but the means to get a promotion. And maybe a good piece of ass—or an average piece of ass. She no longer believed she’d been all that phenomenal in bed. It was just something he’d said so he wouldn’t hurt the senator’s daughter’s feelings. So she wouldn’t run to her daddy and tattle on the big bad Texas Ranger who had done her wrong. A few months ago, she would have run to Daddy.

  But not now.

  She lifted Queenie off her lap and got up. She opened the door and held it. “You should leave, Lincoln. You don’t have to be my bodyguard anymore. And you don’t need to worry about the promotion. I’ll make sure Daddy doesn’t ruin it for you.”

  “I don’t give a fuck about the promotion.”

  She finally looked at him. “Yes, you do. You love your job. I know you wouldn’t have lied to me for anything less. And you did the job of watching out for me well. So well that I thought there was more to what we had than there was.”

  “Dixie, I—”

  She held up a hand. “No. I don’t need your apologies. I wanted what happened to happen. I have no regrets.” She forced a smile. “We both knew it wasn’t forever. You made it clear you’re not interested in a relationship.” She paused. “And neither am I. So it’s for the best that it ends now.”

  He stared at her for a long moment as if he wanted to argue with her. But there was no good argument and they both knew it. He grabbed his cowboy hat from the table and pulled it on. Before he walked out the door, he hesitated. When he looked at her, she finally saw emotion in his eyes. Frustration and pain and something she couldn’t name.

  “Not everything was a lie, Dixie.”

  He walked out the door.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Lincoln learned a long time ago that the best way to deal with pain was to focus on something else. But this time, it didn’t seem to be working. He’d spent all morning mucking out stalls, stacking hay, and raking the paddock. But no matter how hard he worked, he couldn’t stop seeing Dixie’s stunned face when her father had told her the truth. She’d turned those pretty green eyes on him and it had felt like a sharp kick in the gut. He’d read every one of her emotions: Confusion. Disbelief. Hurt. It was the hurt that almost brought him to his knees—that almost had him confessing something he had no business confessing.

  He had fallen head over heels in love with Dixie Leigh Meriwether. He loved how she could talk to anyone about anything. He loved her mama’s quotes and the cute way she wrinkled her nose when she was giving something hard thought. He loved her girlie outside and her tough as nails inside. But mostly he loved the way she looked at him as if he hung the moon.

  Or the way she used to look at him.

  She wouldn’t look at him like that anymore. And that was a good thing. It was the reason he hadn’t confessed his feelings to her. Dixie deserved a better man than he was. She deserved someone who wasn’t emotionally handicapped by his past. Someone who not only knew how to feel love, but also knew how to show it. It was the showing love that Lincoln struggled with. That was the reason his wife had wanted the divorce. Although now he had to wonder if he’d ever really loved Mary Lou. When their marriage had ended, he’d been able to lose himself in his work. He hadn’t felt this raw. This gutted. This feeling of losing something he could never replace.

  “What’s goin’ on, boy?”

  He stopped raking and turned to see Chester and Lucas standing at the fence. He’d been avoiding them since he’d gotten back yesterday—and wanted to continue to avoid them. “I’m almost finished here,” he said. “And then I thought I’d patch that hole in the roof of the old shed.”

  Lucas rested his arms on the gate. “Chester wasn’t talkin’ about your plans for the day. He was talkin’ about what’s goin’ on in your head. Ever since you got home yesterday, you’ve been working like a man possessed. And we want to know what’s wrong.”

  Chester hooked his arms on the fence nex
t to Lucas. They had never looked more like brothers with their cowboy hats tipped back from their sun-wrinkled faces and their aged blue eyes pinned on him. “If it’s Sam Sweeney’s case that has you so wired up, boy,” Chester said, “you need to let it go. The truth always comes out in the end. I figure it will this time too.”

  Lincoln wasn’t so sure. He had hit a dead end on the case. He had spoken to almost everyone in town about Sam. While a few remembered the night Sam got in the bar fight, no one remembered the exact date or who Sam had been fighting with. For all Lincoln knew, the fight could’ve happened before Sam got fired. But he had a gut feeling that wasn’t the case. It made sense Sam would be pissed about Chester shooting at him. His ego would be bruised and he’d want to prove himself. Bullying someone at Cotton-Eyed Joe’s would be a way to do it. Lincoln knew from experience when Sam was ticked, he wanted to use his fists on someone smaller. It also made sense that whoever he got into the fight with might have met up with him later and taken his own revenge.

  But after sixteen years, there was no way to prove it. People’s memories faded. And maybe Lincoln was just grasping at straws. Maybe the bone Boomer found wasn’t even Sam’s. The forensic report had come back inclusive. With no witnesses or conclusive evidence that Sam had been murdered, there was no reason for Lincoln to stay in Simple. He ignored the pang in his chest and did what needed to be done.

  “There’s nothing wrong,” he said. “I’m heading out in the morning and wanted to get as much done as I could before I leave.”

  Chester and Lucas exchanged a look before Chester spoke. “That’s a shame. We’ve sure enjoying having you here and I know the other boys have too. But we understand that you have your job to do.” He spit out some tobacco and shook his head. “It’s just a shame that Simple will be losing two good law officers.”

  Lincoln stared at him. “Two? I hope you’re not lumping me with Sheriff Willaby.”

  Chester snorted. “That man’s not a good lawman, he’s a horse’s ass. I was referring to Deputy Meriwether.”