The Rancher's Mistress

‘Janet is bringing me some toast and coffee,’ she said, and felt herself moved to add, ‘I’d have got it myself, but I understand your cook doesn’t like strangers wandering about the kitchen.’

‘Buck doesn’t like anybody wandering about the kitchen,’ Cal agreed. ‘Including me.’

Alex lifted a brow in faithful imitation. ‘You allow him to dictate?’

‘Considering the difficulty I’d have in replacing him, I don’t have much alternative.’

‘Oh, well, I don’t imagine you’re all that eager to spend time in the kitchen anyway,’ she said blandly.

‘You could be right about that.’ He came away from the doorjamb to allow Janet through, following her out to indicate the nearest group of chairs with a nod of his head. ‘I’ll join you.’

There were two cups already on the tray, Alex noted. Obviously Janet had anticipated some such move. She was none too keen on the idea herself, but she didn’t have much alternative either.

Cal waited until she was seated before taking a seat himself, lifting both boot-clad feet to rest a heel on the rail with the ease of long custom.

‘I wouldn’t mind a piece of toast to go with it, if there’s any going spare,’ he said when Alex handed him a cup of the hot black coffee. ‘Figuring always did work me up an appetite.’

‘I’m surprised you don’t employ an accountant,’ she commented.

‘I did at one time, until I found he was cheating me blind.’

Blue eyes lifted to regard the strongly carved features, taking in the firm line of his mouth, the hardness of jaw. ‘What happened to him?’

‘He spent some time behind bars.’ The tone was matter-of-fact. ‘He was lucky.’

‘Meaning he might have got worse if he hadn’t been locked up?’

‘Meaning he was out inside a few months. We don’t do any stringin’ up these days.’

It was hardly what she had meant, but she let it pass. Chair tipped back, Cal looked in imminent danger of having it slide from under him, but she doubted if it would. Stretched out the way they were, and encased in close-fitting denim, his legs were long and straight, his thigh muscles clearly defined, his hips lean and hard. There was no bulging of surplus flesh above the belt at his waist, just a broadening of frame to meet the wider line of his shoulders.

‘Margot was going to show me round the place this morning,’ she said on a somewhat edgy note. ‘Have you seen her?’

‘She’s helping out over at the cabins,’ he advised. ‘One of the girls called in sick. I said I’d look after you till she’s through.’

‘You must have better things to do with your time.’

‘Not especially. I’d hardly leave a guest to her own devices anyway.’

‘I’m not a guest,’ she pointed out. ‘Not a paying one, at any rate. You don’t have to entertain me.’

He flicked her a deceptively lazy glance, dwelling on the soft fullness of her mouth. ‘Is that what I’m doing?’

Alex felt a sudden and unwelcome spiralling of heat from the pit of her stomach, the warmth running up under her skin as for a crazy moment she imagined what those lips of his would feel like on hers. She might not like the man but it had little bearing on her responses when he looked at her that way.

‘Superbly,’ she responded, emphasising the sarcasm in an effort to cover her confusion. ‘The perfect host!’

‘I’m gratified.’ The expression in his eyes suggested an inner amusement. ‘How much longer do you reckon on staying in the same line?’

The abrupt change of subject left her floundering again for a moment. She recovered with an effort, summoning a dismissive shrug. ‘As long as the jobs keep coming in, I suppose.’

‘And when they don’t?’

‘Something will turn up.’

‘Or someone?’

It was all she could do to keep an even tone. ‘Maybe even that. Providing it was the right someone.’

There was irony in his smile. ‘True love or nothing, you mean? I didn’t have you down for a romantic.’

‘Just goes to show how wrong impressions can be. Maybe you’re not quite the cynic you come across as either,’ she added with deliberation. ‘Could be I’ve totally misread your attitude where my brother’s concerned.’

‘An attitude based on two months’ observation,’ came the dry return. ‘He’s given me little reason to believe he cares for Margot the way she cares for him.’

The same doubt she had herself, Alex acknowledged wryly, but wasn’t prepared to admit it.

‘Few men wear their hearts on their sleeves,’ she defended. ‘That doesn’t mean they don’t feel anything. Greg wouldn’t have married her if he didn’t love her.’

‘It’s been eight years since the two of you were together,’ Cal observed. ‘Do you consider you still know him all that well?’

Alex bit her lip. ‘People don’t alter all that much.’

‘Depends where they’ve been and who with. Eight years bumming round the world is hardly likely to strengthen character.’

‘He had jobs,’ she protested. ‘He worked on an Australian sheep station, for one.’

‘So he says.’

‘It’s true! He wrote to me from there.’ Alex had no intention of admitting that it had been only the one letter. ‘He was in a job when Margot met him, wasn’t he?’

‘Nightclub barman!’ Cal made it sound like the lowest of the low. ‘She didn’t belong in any nightclub to start with.’

‘So blame the people who took her there in the first place.’

‘I do,’ he said grimly. ‘They won’t be coming here again, that’s for sure!’

Alex could hardly blame him for that—any more than she could blame him too much for failing to be overjoyed when his baby sister turned up with a husband in tow. In all fairness, she didn’t see the present-day Greg as ideal husband material herself, but if he was what Margot wanted then it was surely best for her that every effort was made to keep the two of them together?

‘Has it occurred to you,’ she ventured, ‘that if you did succeed in getting rid of Greg you might just finish up losing Margot too?’

‘She wouldn’t go with him.’ It was a flat statement of fact.

‘You mean you wouldn’t allow it?’

‘I mean I doubt very much that he’d want her to go with him.’ He brought his feet down to the ground again, the chair back onto its four legs. ‘If you’ve finished, we’ll go fix you up with a horse.’

Alex replaced her empty cup in its saucer, aware of the futility in attempting to pursue the subject further. Not that there was a great deal more she could say on Greg’s behalf, in any case. It was up to him to prove his own worth.