The Ranch Solution

Mariah turned and saw a tall, well-built man standing next to a sullen teenager. The girl’s hair looked as if it had been trimmed by a weed whacker and it was a peculiar shade of streaky black, ending in purple tips. Apparently she was going through a Goth phase because she also wore black from head to toe, including her lipstick. Her T-shirt was ablaze with silver studs in the shape of a skull and raggedly cut to display her midriff...which seemed to have a spiderweb tattooed over it.

A tattoo?

Distaste filled Mariah, but it wasn’t for the teenager—it was for the father who’d allowed his daughter to do something so permanent to her body when she was still a child. Echoes of her grandmother’s urging to be patient rang in her ears and Mariah squared her shoulders. Fine, she shouldn’t make snap judgments. She wasn’t doing a stellar job of parenting Reid, either.

Mariah approached the mismatched pair. The man was in his mid-to-late thirties and attractive in an uptight sort of way, with brown hair and eyes. He was intense, focused and had a rock-square jaw. As for the girl, she might be pretty beneath her clothes and I-don’t-give-a-damn-what-you-think air. It was hard to be sure. Together they were the most unlikely twosome she’d ever seen going on a ranch vacation.

“Hi, you must be Jacob and Kittie, but Burt Parsons tells me you want to be called Caitlin,” she said to the teenager, trying to ignore her bizarre appearance. “I’m Mariah Weston. Welcome to the U-2 Ranch. I hear you’ve met my brother, Reid.”

“Yeah. He says I’ll scare the horses,” Caitlin said resentfully.

Reid could be right, only it wasn’t diplomatic to agree. Mariah sat on the edge of the table. “He helped birth a lot of those horses, so he’s very protective. A horse doesn’t understand why someone looks or smells different than they’re used to, and he worries how new people will affect them.”

“Oh.” Something flickered in Caitlin’s eyes, a blend of powerful emotions that seemed to go beyond normal teen angst. “Birth them...you mean, like, clean the babies up?”

“We do whatever they need. If we’re lucky, we mostly get to just watch. It’s incredible seeing a horse being born.”

Caitlin shifted her feet.

“I can loan you some outfits if you don’t have any ranch clothes,” Mariah offered. “Things that might be better for working with animals. We keep extras on hand in case they’re needed by our guests.”

“I don’t... Whatever.” Caitlin spun and marched from the tent as if the short conversation had exhausted her supply of civility.

Mariah stood, unsure of what to expect from Jacob O’Donnell, though his corporate attire and unbending stance weren’t the best signs. Up close she saw lines around his mouth from stress or frequent smiling or both. Right now he wasn’t smiling.

“As I was saying, welcome to the ranch,” she repeated. “You may want to borrow suitable clothes yourself to use while you’re—”

“I know Kittie can be trying, but your brother could have been friendlier to her,” he interrupted. “We’re paying good money to be here.”

Mariah’s temper, frayed by dealing with a distraught guest and a randy ranch hand, threatened to flare again. “My brother feels responsible for the horses—both for their well-being and for our guests’ safety. He gave his honest opinion. I’m sorry it upset Caitlin.” Reid took on too much responsibility for a boy of sixteen, but it was one of the realities of growing up on a ranch. She wouldn’t add to it by asking him to pamper their guests as if they were staying at a fancy resort.

“Your parents should speak to him.”

“I’m Reid’s legal guardian.”

Jacob O’Donnell regarded her narrowly, but she couldn’t read anything in his remote gaze. “You’re what, twenty at the most? You can’t be old enough to take charge of a teenager.”

Mariah shrugged. “I’m twenty-seven and I’ve been his guardian for four years.”

“I see. I suppose you have a degree in child psychology to run this kind of place?”

“What kind of place?”

“A place for teenagers with...issues. Like my daughter.” The words seemed forced from Jacob O’Donnell’s chest. His pride was clearly on the line.

Through the entrance Mariah could see Kittie sitting on a small knob of ground, curled in a defensive posture. “We should talk privately, Mr. O’Donnell.”

He followed her with a frown. Mariah headed away from the mess tent and out of sight of Kittie before stopping.

“I think we have a misunderstanding,” she said. “This is a working ranch. Guests can remain in their tents if that’s what they choose to do, but we don’t have activity directors, swimming pools, tennis courts or other entertainments to keep them occupied—basically, none of the luxuries or frills that some folks are used to having. Our visitors come to the U-2 to experience ranching. Plain and simple.”

“I know it’s a working ranch.”

“You also seem to think we’re a facility for troubled children. We’re not, so if you require that, or feel we should put everything aside to wait on you the way they do at an exclusive spa, I’m afraid you’ll be disappointed.”

A muscle twitched in Jacob’s cheek. “I have friends who said it helped bringing their son here.”

Mariah hesitated.

Granddad often told her she’d inherited more than her temper and red hair from an Irish ancestress; he claimed she’d gotten Great-Great-Grandmother Eileen’s fey instincts, as well. And her instincts were telling her to get rid of Jacob O’Donnell, except she couldn’t evict every obnoxious guest—especially guests who’d paid in advance for a six-week stay at the ranch.

“I’m glad your friends had a good visit to the U-2,” she said finally. “But if you want things to change for Caitlin, you need to do something about it yourself.”

“What is that supposed to mean? I’ve been going crazy for months trying to do something...anything that might work. That’s why I’m here. Believe me, a site with such primitive accommodations would be my last choice for a vacation.”

Primitive?

Mariah’s back went rigid.

He made it sound as if they were making guests dig their own privy holes and bathe in the creek. It had cost a fortune to have commercial restroom and shower facilities built at the ranch—she knew exactly how much, because she’d signed the checks.

“It’s too bad the accommodations don’t meet with your satisfaction, Mr. O’Donnell. However, they are thoroughly outlined on our website, so they shouldn’t have been a surprise,” she said coolly. “As for what I mean, you want Caitlin’s problems to somehow get resolved at our ‘primitive’ ranch, and yet you’re dressed as if you’ve just come from a board meeting.”

“I did come from a board meeting. We left for the airport immediately after it ended.”

“I see. That tells me a lot.”

She stepped backward as she saw Reid striding toward them, probably guessing this wasn’t a normal discussion between her and a guest. Her brother tried to protect her, but she didn’t need help. She’d learned to protect herself from pushy, overbearing guys a long time ago. She liked men who didn’t think the universe revolved around them. But it was a rare trait—one that Jacob O’Donnell obviously didn’t possess.

“I had to make arrangements to cover my business interests while I was gone, but my daughter comes first,” Jacob said in a stuffy tone.

“Then act like it. She won’t join in if you aren’t doing it yourself. This ranch isn’t a corporate boardroom. That ten-thousand-dollar watch won’t impress a herd of cows, and your custom-made suit isn’t the least bit appropriate for the physical work we do here.”

“I’m aware of that.”

Mariah belatedly reminded herself that working with the U-2’s guests was her job. It didn’t matter if she disliked them or thought they were pompous jackasses. On the other hand, she had no intention of playing babysitter for a spoiled teenager or of letting one of the U-2’s wranglers play babysitter. She had enough headaches.

“Well?” he prodded.

“In that case, the sooner you start participating, the better it will be for Caitlin. As I said, we have Levi’s and work shirts that you can both borrow. That would be a big move forward.”

“We brought our own gear, and if we need more, I’ll go into town and buy it. We certainly don’t need anyone’s loaners.” He strode off—bristling with snobbish arrogance—and Mariah had a childish wish he’d slip on a pile of fresh horse manure. That would trim him down a few notches.

Reid said something as they crossed paths, but O’Donnell didn’t pay attention.

Mariah wrinkled her nose.

City people bothered Reid; men with control issues like Jacob O’Donnell bothered her. The overt wealth, the expectation that everyone should jump at their bidding, the conviction that their money was worth more than anyone else’s...she’d met too many men like that when she was waiting tables at an upscale Los Angeles restaurant to earn money for school. She’d quickly found it wasn’t wise to accept gifts or excessively large tips from her male customers because of what they thought it would buy them later.