Her Right-Hand Cowboy

She wanted to be on her way back to Dallas. “All right, so tell me what I need to sign or do to get this sale moving along,” she requested. As far as she was concerned, this was already taking too long.

“What you need to do,” he informed her, “is to stay here for the next six months.”

Ena stared at the man opposite her in disbelief. “You’re serious?” she asked, stunned.

Cash nodded. “Absolutely. Those are the terms of your father’s will.” To prove it, he read the brief section to her.

Ena made an unintelligible noise. “Even from beyond the grave, that man found a way to put the screws to me,” she cried.

“In your father’s defense, I think that he thought of it as a way to bring you back to your roots,” Cash told her.

“My roots,” she informed him stubbornly, “are in Dallas.”

“That might be,” Cash conceded. “But your father saw it differently.”

Ena rolled her eyes. “My father saw everything differently. He made it his mission in life to contradict every single thing I said or did,” she informed him.

Cash did his best to attempt to smooth over this obviously rough patch. “I realize that there was some bad blood between you years ago—”

“There was always bad blood between us,” she informed the lawyer tersely. “The only reason it wasn’t spilled was because my mother—who was a saint, by the way, for putting up with the man—acted as a buffer between us. Once she was gone, there was no one to step in and try to make my father be reasonable—so he wasn’t. Everything that ever went wrong was, in his opinion, my fault.”

Ena stopped abruptly, catching herself before she could get carried away.

“I’m sorry,” she apologized. “My father always had a way of bringing out the worst in me. How long do I have to decide whether or not I’m going to abide by the terms of this will of his?” she asked.

“I’m afraid you have to if you want to keep the ranch,” Cash told her.

“So I guess that’s the decision before me,” she said. “Whether or not I want to keep the ranch. Tough one,” she said flippantly. “How long did you say I have before I have to give you my decision?”

Cash stared at her. For the moment, she had managed to stump him.

Chapter Three (#u24835d01-3b54-5852-8dd5-bf75274c8407)

Knowing some of the circumstances behind Ena’s relationship with her father, Cash cleared his throat and tried to be as diplomatic as possible. “I realize that the situation between you and your father wasn’t exactly the best.”

Ena suppressed the involuntary harsh laugh that rose to her lips. “I take it that you have a penchant for making understatements, Mr. Taylor.”

“Call me Cash.” He didn’t comment on Ena’s observation. “Things aren’t always the way that they seem at first glance.”

Ena folded her hands before her on the desk. Her knuckles were almost white. “If you’re referring to my father,” she told the lawyer evenly, “Bruce O’Rourke was exactly the way he seemed. Cantankerous, ornery and dead set against everything I ever said or did.” She drew back her shoulders, sitting ramrod straight in the chair. “My fate was sealed the day I was born, Mr. Taylor—Cash,” she corrected herself before the lawyer could tell her his first name again.

“That’s being a little harsh, wouldn’t you say?”

“No,” she replied stiffly, “I wouldn’t. If anything, I’m being sensitive. My father was the harsh one.” A dozen memories came at her from all directions, each with its own sharp edges digging into her. Ena winced as she struggled to block them all out. “He never forgave me for being the one who lived,” she told Cash quietly.

Cash looked at her, completely in the dark as to her meaning. “I’m sorry?”

She had probably said too much already. But word had a way of getting around in this little town and if he didn’t know about her father’s tempestuous relationship with her, he would soon. He might as well hear it from her. This way, he’d at least get a semblance of the truth. It was his prerogative to believe her or not.

“I had a twin brother. It turned out that my mother was only strong enough to provide the necessary nourishment and bring one of us to term.” She took a deep breath as she regarded her folded hands. “My brother didn’t survive the birth process. I did. My father had his heart set on a boy. I was just going to be the consolation prize.” She raised her eyes to meet Cash’s. “He never got over the fact that I survived while my brother was stillborn. My father spent the rest of his life making me regret that turn of events.”

Deeply ingrained diplomacy kept Cash from arguing with Ena’s take on the matter. Instead, he said, “Still, he did leave the ranch to you.”

“No,” she contradicted, “he dangled the ranch in front of me and left me with a condition, which was something he always did.” She thought back over the course of her adolescence. “He enjoyed making me jump through hoops—until one day I just stopped jumping.”

Over the course of his career, Cash had learned how to read people. Right now, he could anticipate what his late client’s daughter was thinking. “I wouldn’t advise doing anything hasty, Ms. O’Rourke. Give the terms of your father’s will a lot of thought,” Cash advised.

“I’ve already thought it over,” Ena informed the lawyer, “and I’ve decided not to play his game.”

Cash’s eyes met hers. “Then you’re going to let him win?”

Ena looked at the attorney sitting on the other side of the desk. Her brow furrowed. “Excuse me?”

“Well,” he began to explain, “from what you’ve said, your father always made you feel that you were a loser. And if you walk away from the ranch, you’ll be forfeiting it, which in effect will be making you a loser. And that, in turn, will be telling your father that he was right about you all along.”

Ena scowled at the lawyer. “You’re twisting things.”

The expression on his smooth face said that he didn’t see things that way. “Maybe, in this case,” he responded, “I’m able to see things more clearly because I don’t have all this past baggage and animosity coloring my perception of things.” He slid to the edge of his seat, moving in closer to create an air of confidentiality between them. And then he punctuated his statement with a careless shrug. “I’m just saying...” he told her, his voice trailing off.

He was doing it, Ena thought, irritated. Her father was boxing her into a corner, even though he was no longer walking among the living. Somehow, he was still managing to have the last say.

Ena frowned. As much as she wanted to tell this lawyer what he could do with her father’s terms, as well as his will, she knew that Cash was right. If she tore up the will and walked out now, that would be tantamount to giving up—and her father would have managed to ultimately win.

She hated giving him that, even in death.

Blowing out a breath, she faced her father’s lawyer with a less-than-happy look.

“I have to stay here for six months?” She asked the question as if each word was excruciatingly painful for her to utter.

“You have to run the ranch for six months,” Cash corrected, thinking she might be looking for a loophole. There weren’t any.

“Can I delegate the work?” Ena asked, watching the man’s face carefully.

“You mean from a distance?” Cash asked. She wanted to oversee the operation from Dallas, he guessed.

“Yes,” she said with feeling. “That’s exactly what I mean.”

“No.” The lone word shimmered between them, cloaked in finality. “Your father was very clear about that. He wanted you to be on the ranch while you oversaw the work that needed to be done.”

Ena swallowed a guttural sound. It was all she could do to keep from throwing her hands up in frustration. “I don’t know anything about running a ranch. My father told me that over and over again,” she emphasized. “He deliberately kept me away from the day-to-day process—other than mucking out the stalls. That he was more than happy to let me do.”

“Obviously he’d had a change of heart about the matter when he had me write up the will. And anyway,” Cash went on, “you have some very capable men working at the Double E. I’m sure that they all would be more than willing to help you.”

He was right and that was exactly her point. “So why can’t I just tell them to use their judgment and keep the ranch running just the way that they always have?” she asked.

The look on Cash’s face was sympathetic. He could see how frustrating all this had to be. “Because your father’s will was very specific,” he told her.

Ena’s laugh was totally without any humor. “Yes, I’ll bet. It probably said, ‘Keep sticking pins in her side until she bleeds.’”