Not Your Average Cowboy

Bending back down, she picked up her purse and began to toss items in it. “My purse has a hoof print on it. They chewed on my cell phone. And they ate my makeup.” She stopped to looked at him. “There are stores around here, aren’t there?”

Buck didn’t think she needed any makeup. In spite of how she irritated him, he had to admit that she was one of the prettiest women he’d ever seen. And he didn’t know much about fashion, but that pink suit she had on looked expensive. So did her gold jewelry.

Everything about the woman looked expensive.

He sure hoped she didn’t expect to be waited on. Karen wasn’t feeling well, and he had a ranch to run. In his experience, women who were on Meredith Bingham Turner’s level were too high-maintenance.

“Yeah, we have stores around here. We have a feed store over in Lizard Rock. Oh, and there’s a John Deere store in Cactus Flats, too.”

She stared up at him with big green eyes, probably trying to figure out if she could get makeup shipped from Boston via overnight mail. Then she glanced down the road at the burros, which had stopped to graze. “You will stand guard, won’t you? In case they come back.”

He choked back a laugh. “Yeah, I’ll stand guard.”

“Thank you.” She sniffed. “But don’t shoot them.”

“No, ma’am.”

She bent over to pick up more items from the road, and he couldn’t help noticing how the fabric of her skirt molded against her perfect butt.

“Mr. Porter, where is your horse?” She stood straight and focused her eyes on his rifle. “You didn’t have to shoot it, did you?”

“Lady, I don’t shoot everything that moves out here. If I did I’d have to carry all my ammo on a packhorse,” he snapped, then realized she was dead serious. She’d probably seen too many westerns on TV where animals were put down. Remembering she was from Boston, he softened his voice. “Bandit’s fine. He’s probably back in his stall and eating dinner by now.”

“Bandit?”

“My horse.”

“How are you going to get home?”

“I thought I’d ride with you.”

“You cowboys ride in cars?”

She really was a slicker, unless she was pulling his leg, as he’d pulled hers. He couldn’t tell.

“I’ll give it a try.”

Speaking of legs, hers were blue-ribbon winners. Her hair was the color of corn silk and probably just as smooth to touch.

What the hell was wrong with him? He was waxing as romantic as a cowboy poet. If he didn’t stop himself, he might break into song and start yodeling.

She had to go. She was going to be nothing but trouble. He could feel it right down to his bones.

But one thing he knew for sure, he wasn’t going to spend half his born days bailing a tenderfoot like Meredith Turner out of trouble. He had a ranch to run.

Or what was left of it.

“Would you like to drive, Mr. Porter? You do know how to drive a car, do you not?” She held out a key with a yellow paper tag hanging from it. Her voice held a bit of sarcasm. She was pulling his leg.

He slapped his thigh and added a dumb grin. “Gee, shucks, ma’am. Ya mean I can drive a real car like this?” He went over the top with a Texas accent. “How about if I drive you back to the airport? This place isn’t for you.”

She was silent for a dozen heartbeats, and Buck immediately regretted his words. He was being a knothead. If Meredith was as big of a celebrity as Karen said she was, the new Rattlesnake Dude Ranch would be a success.

He supposed he should be happy about the plans for the ranch. It would be the answer to his financial problems, but he just needed more time to come up with the money himself. He had a plan, but the clock was ticking and the bank foreclosure was looming.

His plan was to sell the furniture he’d been making. An old Army buddy owned a fancy gallery in Scottsdale and had scheduled a show and sale for him. Whether or not his sale would be a success was a crap-shoot, but he was keeping his fingers crossed.

Meredith met his gaze. “Your sister said she needed me. Therefore, I intend on helping her in any way I can. So if you don’t want to drive, point me in the right direction and I’ll find my own way.”

Loyalty. Buck admired that, but he still didn’t want a bunch of dudes on the ranch he loved, wandering around, playing cowboy and sleeping and eating inside his parents’ house. He had Caitlin to think of, too. His daughter had retreated so deep into her own world since her mother left that he just couldn’t reach her. A bunch of strangers might make her withdraw even more.

His siblings disagreed, particularly Karen. She felt that Cait needed people around her, especially kids her own age to encourage her to open up more. He reluctantly agreed to give it a try. He’d cut off his arms if it’d help his daughter.

He tried to point out that even if the ranch did turn a profit, it wouldn’t be that significant. The ranch was in the red almost two hundred thousand bucks, give or take, and the bank said he had to pay that off before he could borrow another penny to diversify into stock contracting for rodeos.

He wished he had the money to buy them all out, but that was spitting in the wind.

He let his eyes skim over the generous curves of his sister’s friend. Maybe it wouldn’t be all that bad having her at the ranch. If nothing else, she was fun to tease and easy on the eyes. He could use some fun in his life.

Cait seemed to be looking forward to Meredith’s visit, or at least that’s what Karen assumed. Every Tuesday when Meredith’s cooking show was on, Karen would microwave some popcorn and the two of them would watch it together.

He should be used to Cait’s silence toward him by now, but he wasn’t. He kept hoping that someday she’d say something—anything. He wanted to hear his little girl’s voice again, to hear her call him Daddy.

Meredith Something Turner tossed him the keys and mumbled a question about whether or not Lizard Rock or Hanging Tree Junction, Arizona had a dry cleaner.

He was willing to bet she wouldn’t last a week here before he’d be driving her back to the airport and his home would be safe from change.

Then he hoped like hell that people would like his furniture and buy it. If they did, he could get out of the red a lot faster and his home would still be safe.

But by then it might not be his.

Chapter Two

Buck skillfully guided the rental car down the narrow mountain road, but Meredith still found herself holding her breath on every twist and turn. The craggy rocks were so close to the car, she could reach out and touch them. Every fallen tree branch looked like a snake or a lizard, and every other stone or twig was either a tarantula or a scorpion.

Swallowing hard, she adjusted the air-conditioning vents until the cold air blew right on her face. As she took a couple of gulps of the air, she decided that she was being ridiculous by scaring herself like a teenager at a summer camp bonfire.

But still, there was no sign of civilization as far as she could see. No hotels. No stores. No banks. No fast food places. Arizona was as foreign to her as Jupiter.

She stole a glance at Buck. He was so tall that he had to take his hat off to sit in the car. His hair was jet-black and tied back in a ponytail with a piece of leather. It made him look more masculine than some of the men back home with their neat Boston haircuts.

Merry remembered the day that Karen had called her, sobbing about Caitlin, and how devastated her brother was when his wife had walked out. Apparently, Buck’s wife, Debbie, had left for Nashville to pursue a singing career more than two years ago, and Cait had stopped talking from that moment on. Buck was having a hard time dealing with his daughter’s silence.

Buck had found a psychiatrist for the child to see, but based on Karen’s last call, the little girl was still withdrawn and still not talking to anyone.

Merry stole another glance at Buck. How awful for him to have gone through so much pain. In a way, he’d lost his wife and his little girl on that same day two years ago. Karen had said that he’d barely left the barn for a year or so, and was there all hours of the day and night, barely sleeping.

His siblings, Karen, Louise and Ty, had told Buck he needed to snap out of his funk, for his daughter’s sake. He finally had, and tried to make things up to Cait, but she still wouldn’t talk.