One Night with a Red-Hot Rancher: Tough to Tame / Carrying the Rancher's Heir / One Dance with the Cowboy

“It’s not charity,” Cy muttered, glowering at him. “This is a legitimate need. The guy wants to work overseas, but he’ll never get the job unless he can perfect his accent.”

Kell relaxed. “All right, then. I’ll take him on. And thanks.”

Cy smiled. “Thank you,” he replied. “He’s a nice guy. You’ll like him.” He glanced at Cappie, who was wondering what sort of company Cy’s friend worked for. “You won’t,” he assured her. “I used to be a woman hater, but this guy makes me look civilized. He’ll need to come over when you’re at work.”

Cappie was curious. “Why does he hate women?”

“I think he was married to one,” Cy mused.

“Well, that certainly explains that,” Kell chuckled.

“Thank you very much for fixing up my car,” Cappie told Cy. “I won’t forget it.”

“No problem. We were glad to help. Oh, mustn’t forget the keys, Harley!”

Harley handed the keys to her as Cy headed back and got into the other vehicle. “She purrs like a kitten now,” Harley told her. “She drives good.”

“The car is a girl?” she asked.

“Only when a guy is driving it,” Kell told her with a wicked grin.

“Amen,” Harley told him.

“Come on, Harley,” Cy called from the SUV.

“Yes, sir.” He grinned at the brother and sister and jumped into the passenger seat in Cy’s SUV.

“What a nice man,” Cappie said. “Just look, Kell!” She walked out to the car, opened the door and gasped. “They oiled the hinges! It doesn’t squeak anymore. And look, they fixed the broken dash and replaced the radio that didn’t work…” She started crying again.

“Don’t do that,” Kell said gently. “You’ll have me wailing, too.”

She made a face at him. “You have nice friends.”

“I do, don’t I?” He smiled. “Now you won’t have to beg rides.”

“It will be a relief, although Keely’s been wonderful about it.” She glanced at her brother. “I don’t think the insurance paid for all this.”

“Yes, it did,” he said firmly. “Period.”

She smiled at him. “Okay. You really do have nice friends.”

“You don’t know how nice,” he told her. “But I may tell you one day. Now let’s get back inside. It’s cold out here today.”

“It is a bit nippy.” She turned and followed him inside.

The week went by fast. She got her paycheck on Friday and went shopping early Saturday morning in Jacobsville. Kell had said he’d love a new bathrobe for Christmas, so she went to the department store looking.

It was a surprise when she bumped into Dr. Rydel in the men’s department. He gave her a curious look. She didn’t realize why until she recalled that she’d left her hair long around her shoulders instead of putting it up. He seemed to find it fascinating.

“Shopping for anything particular?” he asked.

“Yes. Kell wants a bathrobe.”

“Christmas shopping,” he guessed, and smiled.

“Yes.”

“I’m replacing a jacket,” he sighed. “I made the mistake of going straight from church on a large animal call. A longhorn bull objected to being used as a pincushion and ripped out the sleeve.”

She laughed softly. “Occupational hazard,” she said.

He nodded. “Your car looks nice.”

“Thanks,” she said. She could imagine how her old wreck, even repainted, looked to a man who drove a new Land Rover, but she didn’t say so. “Mr. Parks had his foreman supervise the work. The insurance company paid for it.”

“Nice of him. He knows your brother?”

“They’re friends.” She frowned. “Mr. Parks doesn’t look like a rancher,” she blurted out.

“Excuse me?”

“There’s something, I don’t know, dangerous about him,” she said, searching for the right word. “He’s very nice, but I wouldn’t want him mad at me.”

He grinned. “A few drug dealers in prison could attest to the truth of that statement,” he said.

“What?”

“You don’t know?”

“Know what?”

“Cy Parks is a retired mercenary,” he told her. “He was in some bloody firefights in Africa some years back. More recently, he and two other friends and Harley Fowler shut down a drug distribution center here. There was a gunfight.”

“In Jacobsville, Texas?” she exclaimed.

“Yep. Parks is one of the most dangerous men I’ve ever met. Kind to people he likes. But there aren’t many of those.”

She felt odd. She wondered how it was that her brother had come to know such a man, because he and Cy seemed to be old friends.

“Where do you go from here?” Dr. Rydel asked suddenly.

She blinked. “I don’t know,” she blurted out, flushing. “I mean, I thought I might, well, stop by the game store in the strip mall.”

He stared at her blankly. “Game store?”

She cleared her throat. “There’s this new video game. ‘Halo…’”

“‘…ODST,’” he said, with evident surprise. “You’re a gamer?”