Rancher's Rules

by Lucy Monroe

  He did not interrupt her tirade. He was not about to explain that the image of her tongue on the spoon had all but robbed him of his senses. Hell. He had almost kissed her again. He tossed asparagus spears into a pan with butter and sautéed them.

  They chatted about Zoe’s class at school over dinner. The kids were involved in the Christmas program at the Sunshine Springs Community Center the following week. “You’ll go with me, won’t you?”

  He wanted to refuse, figuring that any time spent around her right now would just lead to further tortured urges, but he’d hurt her feelings enough for one day. “Sure.”

  “Thanks.” She took a bite of her pasta and then licked the fork. The temperature in the kitchen shot up. “You know how nervous I get when my kids are performing, and I’m not even on the program committee this year.”

  “Yeah.” He smiled, trying to hide his reaction to her innocent actions. “One year you’d unraveled an entire knit scarf by the end of the program.”

  She laughed, her head going back to expose the creamy column of her neck. He wanted to reach out and touch the smooth skin. This was nuts. He stood up.

  “Where are you going?”

  He stared. Where was he going? “The bathroom.” What could she say about that?

  When he got to the bathroom he turned on the cold water and bathed his face. Looking in the mirror, he glared at his reflection. “Knock it off. Zoe’s off-limits.”

  The man staring back at him looked unconvinced. He splashed cold water on his face a second time and dried it. He felt marginally better. Now, if Zoe would just refrain from licking her fork, all would be well.

  He went back into the kitchen and sat down across from her again. She smiled. He smiled back and nearly choked. She’d picked up a piece of asparagus and was systematically licking all the butter off the vegetable.

  “This is really good. You sautéed these perfectly.”

  Her guileless comment mocked his randy response. He mentally chastised himself for his unruly thoughts, but it didn’t make his jeans any more comfortable. By the time Zoe had finished the fifth prong of asparagus he was sweating and hard as a rock. At this rate he wouldn’t be able to get up from the table when dinner was done.

  She looked at him, her eyes darkened with concern. “Are you okay? You’re perspiring. I hope you aren’t coming down with something.”

  “It’s too warm in here. I must have the thermostat set high.” He knew it was a lie. He hadn’t changed his thermostat in days. But what else could he say? Watching his best friend eat her dinner had him so hot he was melting?

  He breathed a sigh of unfettered relief when Zoe did not take a second helping of vegetables.

  Later, he got the longest T-shirt he could find for her to wear to bed and then headed for his office. Why bother going to bed? He wasn’t going to get a wink of sleep, knowing Zoe’s too tempting body was down the hall nestled in his old bed. She was going back to the Pattersons’ tomorrow, even if he had to drive her in a blizzard.

  Zoe snuggled down under the quilts on Grant’s childhood bed. Dinner had been very entertaining. Grant might have a rule against kissing her, but he sure wanted to. His gaze had strayed to her lips twelve and a half times. She’d counted. One time he had only looked at her neck before looking away, thus the half. She was certain that he’d wanted to look at her lips.

  She’d made it interesting for him, trying her best to eat her food as provocatively as she could. At one point, she’d almost felt sorry for him.

  Almost.

  He deserved it, making that crack about kissing anyone but her.

  The following morning, Zoe woke up to chattering teeth and the smell of bacon cooking. It took her a moment to realize the person doing the chattering was herself.

  Had they lost power last night in the storm? She could not believe that Grant or the foreman hadn’t started the generator yet. She gritted her teeth and tossed back the covers. She yanked on the sweats Grant had lent her, which she had refused to wear to bed with the oversized T-shirt. She also donned a pair of thick socks, and went searching for a flannel shirt in Grant’s closet.

  After pulling on one of his shirts, that hung down to her knees, she went to the kitchen to find him. He stood at the stove, turning bacon. She wrinkled her nose at the smell of pork cooking and made a beeline for the coffee.

  “It’s freezing in here. Did something happen to the furnace?”

  Grant slid a mug for her coffee across the counter toward her. “No.”

  “Then why is it so cold?” Zoe wrapped her hands around her mug, letting the heat seep into her chilled skin.

  “Is it cold? Doesn’t feel bad to me.”

  Grant wore a sage-green turtleneck under a black flannel shirt, faded jeans and cowboy boots. Of course he wasn’t cold. The man was dressed to work outside. He did a lot more work on the ranch this time of year, so his hands had time to do the holiday thing with their families. But could he really be that dense? She walked into the hall and checked the thermostat.

  “Fifty-eight degrees? Grant, are you nuts? No wonder I’m freezing.”

  She went stomping back in the kitchen and came to an abrupt halt at the look of satisfaction on Grant’s face. Evidently he had a few little surprises of his own. “This is about your kissing rule, isn’t it?” And dinner last night.

  If grown men could look as innocent as newborn babes, then he should have had a pacifier.

  “Isn’t it?”

  He placed two plates on the table. One piled high with bacon, eggs, hash browns and apple slices. The other identical except, without the crispy strips of bacon. “Sit down and eat before the food gets cold.”

  She sat. “It can’t get any colder than I am.”

  “Stop whining. If you don’t eat and get a move on, you’ll be late for the last day of school.”

  Her gaze skittered to the window. Bright sunlight reflected almost blindingly off the snow. “You’re right.”

  She took a big bite of her hash browns and nearly spat them out. Groping for her coffee, she took a huge gulp, scalding her tongue in the process. She stood up, knocking her chair back, and weaved like a drunk toward the sink.

  Grant looked up from his own rapidly disappearing breakfast and asked, “Are you okay? Something wrong with the food?”

  Her hand gripping her throat, she choked out the word “water.”

  He jumped up and grabbed a glass from the cupboard. He filled it with water from the tap and handed it to her. She gulped it down and took several deep breaths before turning to face Grant. “What did you use to season the potatoes? Dried jabañero peppers?”

  “A little of this, a little of that. You know I cook by the seat of my pants.”

  She wasn’t buying it. Giving him a look that had sent five-year-olds scampering for cover, Zoe advanced on Grant. “What did you put in my breakfast?”

  He did not appear intimidated. “It’s a little spicy, but you don’t have time to savor your food this morning anyway.”

  “What does that have to do with…?” She let her voice trail off. Understanding came like air rushing from a balloon. “You didn’t want me savoring my food?”

  His cheeks took on a wind-burned look, although he had not yet been outside. “Like I said, you don’t have time.”

  Right. It had nothing to do with his response to her and the asparagus the night before. “Whatever you say. Are the eggs similarly spiced?”

  He shrugged.

  Great.

  Grabbing the apple slices from her plate, she carried them to the sink and rinsed them off. She was not taking any chances. She left the kitchen, munching on her apple, without another word.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  GRANT watched Zoe leave the kitchen and his appetite went with her. He’d woken that morning thinking she needed payback for dinner the night before. He’d worked out around two a.m. that there’d been nothing innocent in the way she’d eaten. He’d known her practically her whole life, and she did not e
at that sensually.

  He didn’t know what had gotten her dander up—maybe the comment about him not minding other women liking his kisses—but whatever it had been, she’d set out to prove she could make him uncomfortable. And she’d succeeded. In spades. This morning it had been his turn, but now he felt like a skunk.

  He picked up the plates and scraped the food into the garbage. Feeling guilty, he toasted her a bagel and slathered it with her favorite blackberry honey. He finished cleaning up the kitchen, washing the dishes. He had just rinsed the last plate when Zoe came storming in.

  White terry cloth barely concealed the curves he had spent the entire night trying to forget. Her hair still had soap bubbles in it. Water trickled down her neck to disappear in the cleavage at the top of her towel. Grant thought seriously about opening a few windows. He needed air—cold air—and he needed it now.

  Nothing competed with the expression in her eyes, though. He could see murder, mayhem and his own demise in her usually sweet-tempered eyes.

  She slammed her hand down on the counter next to him. “So it’s not enough that you set your thermostat to arctic temperatures and freeze me to death.” She moved so close he could see the sudsy foam drying around her temples. “And then you spice my food with enough hot stuff to permanently maim my tastebuds.”

  She reached around him, but the sight of Zoe nearly naked had Grant paralyzed. If she was going for the cast-iron skillet, he was powerless to stop her. Her hand came back around and she waved a recently washed plate in his face.

  “This is the last straw.”

  He stared down at the plate and could not fathom what had her so furious she would come storming out of the shower with soap still in her hair.

  “I cannot believe you would stoop to washing the dishes while I was in the shower.” She punctuated each word with a shove to his midsection with the offending plate.

  Sudden comprehension made him smile. Big mistake.

  “You think this is funny?” She nearly shrieked the words.

  “Calm down. I forgot about the water-shower thing.” The hacienda had had many updates over the years, but the interior plumbing had last been seen to before he was born.

  “You expect me to believe that? You have lived in this house your whole life.” She slammed the plate down on the counter with enough force that it should have broken. “First hot, then cold, then hot again. My skin is still trying to decide if you were attempting to scald me or freeze me to death.”

  Tears sprang to her eyes and she swiped at them. “Damn it, Grant. I was not the one who started the kissing last night. You broke your own rule, and taking it out on me is not going to make that fact go away. You don’t have to torture me to within an inch of my life before I promise not to attack your manly virtue. I promise already.”

  With that she pivoted and headed out of the kitchen. She stopped at the doorway. Turning her head, she pinned him to the counter with her stare. “If you run so much as a teaspoon of water while I finish my shower, I’m feeding your favorite boots to Maurice.”

  He really had forgotten about the water thing. She was never going to believe him, though. She was right. He had started the kissing last night. She had responded with enough passion to keep him sleepless with longing for the next several nights, but she had not started it. However, he had not been the one to go all sexy in his eating habits.

  She had to take responsibility for her actions. Well, actually, she had. So why did it bother him so much that she had promised to keep her hands off him? That was exactly what he wanted. Damn it. He needed to get his libido under control before he risked losing the one person in his life he would never willingly let go.

  This morning hadn’t been a good example of how to maintain friendship in the face of desire hot enough to melt rock.

  What he needed was a diversion. Something or someone to keep his mind off of Zoe’s delectable lips and even more delectable body. An image of Linda popped into his mind and he grimaced. Okay, so it hadn’t worked with her, but he was a problem solver by nature. One small setback did not justify junking an entire strategy.

  His mind skimmed through the possibilities and settled on Carlene Daniels, the bartender at the Dry Gulch. He played poker with the owner and a couple of local high rollers every few weeks, and she always served their table.

  She had a sense of humor, and dressed like a walking commercial for prophylactics, but she didn’t date much. She seemed to have a reputation, all the same, which was exactly what he wanted. A woman who knew the score and would help him get his desire for Zoe under control.

  If he hadn’t given his ranch hands so much time off he would have left on a business trip, but that wasn’t an option right now. Which left Carlene.

  Never one to wait when he’d decided to act, he grabbed the phone book to look up the woman’s number. Zoe couldn’t complain about him making a phone call while she showered.

  Afternoon sun poured through the schoolroom window as Zoe picked up a bottle of white glue. She wiped the sticky mess around it with a damp paper towel. Her students had made Christmas decorations, and she had a mess of glitter, glue and little bits of colored paper to clean up. She didn’t mind. She needed time to think.

  Her anger toward Grant had finally cooled about the time her first class of kindergartners had gone out to meet the midmorning school bus. She could not maintain fury when surrounded by five-year-olds ex-cited about Christmas.

  Breakfast had been a disaster. He had done everything possible to make her feel as welcome as a coyote at a roundup. Running the water while she’d been in the shower had been truly inspired. It was something almost as good as what she might have cooked up.

  She bit her lip and swept some glitter off the table into the trashcan she carried. For as long as she could remember Grant had been the only person in her life to accept her unconditionally. When she’d become a vegetarian and her dad had gone through the roof, Grant had bought her The Tofu Lover’s Cookbook. When her date had gotten sick the day of Senior Prom, Grant had taken her.

  He had always been her knight in shining armor.

  Remembering the hash browns that had about burned a hole in her tongue, she thought, Some knight! He’d gone from her hero to her sexual nemesis in the space of hours. Why was he so set on keeping their relationship platonic? He’d been every bit as involved in that kiss last night as she had.

  And he wasn’t exactly celibate. She didn’t think he was a complete playboy. No one could afford to be in today’s age. But he was experienced. Light-years ahead of her. If only he knew. She’d tried dating in college, and even gone so far as to go to bed with one of her dates. She’d been feeling like an anachronism, being a virgin at twenty, but it hadn’t gone anywhere. She’d made a complete fool of herself, telling her boyfriend she just wasn’t ready, getting dressed and going back to her dorm room.

  He’d broken up with her a week later and she hadn’t blamed him. She just could not imagine sharing her body so intimately with anyone but Grant, and if she didn’t do something about it soon she was going to be the oldest living virgin in the United States. The more she thought about it, the more she was convinced that he would not have made such an all-fired effort to get rid of her this morning if last night hadn’t affected him as strongly as it had her.

  Scrubbing at a stubborn stain of dried glue, Zoe glared at the offending white blob. People had been saying she and Grant should get together for years. Saying they were a natural couple. Even their parents got on that particular bandwagon once in a while. Of course her dad disagreed. Said Zoe had no business marrying a rancher with her affinity for animals.

  It appeared that Grant took her dad’s view. He acted like dating her would be tantamount to breaking the law. His law. Zoe wadded up the used paper towel and tossed it in the garbage. Well, she didn’t want to date him either. She just wanted to have sex with him. Maybe then she could start looking at other men as something besides biological creatures that took up space on he
r planet.

  She finished tidying up the classroom and headed to her car. She needed to pick the cats up from Grant’s. Maybe she should offer to cook him supper tonight. No way was she letting him cook, but they had to eat.

  She grinned, planning a meal that would make the asparagus spears look chaste.

  Walking into Grant’s kitchen half an hour later, the first thing Zoe noticed was a bouquet of roses on the counter. Her smile intensified and her heart started slamming against her ribs. Taking a deep breath, she inhaled the heady scent of the crimson blooms. He had not apologized this morning, but flowers were even better.

  She plucked the card from the arrangement. It said “Carlene” on the tiny white envelope.

  Carlene? Who in the world was she, and why was Grant buying her flowers? Hearing footsteps, Zoe hurriedly replaced the envelope among the scarlet roses. The jerk. He treated her like a pariah and bought flowers for some other woman.

  She whirled around to confront Grant when he came in. She stopped dead, staring at the apparition before her. “Grant?”

  “What?”

  It was Grant. The voice was the same. The incredible blue eyes. The nose. The masculine jaw shaved smooth. The mouth. That darned sensual mouth. That was Grant’s body encased in tight black jeans and a T-shirt. Those were Grant’s chest muscles rippling under the knit fabric stretched taut across his rib cage.

  She’d seen him dressed for the office, and wearing similar suits or smart Armani sweaters for dates with his usual glamorous women. She’d seen him dressed to work the ranch. But never before had she seen him dressed so provocatively sexy. He might be worth millions and own the ranch he worked, but right now he looked like a cowboy going out on a date. A very sexy, dangerous cowboy.

  She swallowed.

  He leaned against the wall, his arms crossed over his chest, the muscles rippling in his forearms. His dark brows rose. “What’s the matter, Zoe? You look like you’ve been eating my hash browns again.”