The Wrangler

“Gigi, she just said she didn’t think it was a smart idea.”

“Nonsense. Sam, hop on down from there. Clint can take care of Red.”

“But, I—”

“Best do as she asks,” Clint advised. “Once she gets an idea in her head, you’re not going to get it out.”

“Are you sure?” she asked Gigi.

“I’m sure, honey. Now hop on down from there.”

“But I can untack him.” Sam slipped out of the saddle.

“Excellent idea,” Clint said with his own bright smile—though his was false. Okay, maybe not false, more like wolfish. He’d spotted the blush on Samantha’s face, the one that had flared at his “I’d love to have you” comment. “Maybe we can both do it together.”

“Clinton,” his grandmother snapped in warning. “Quit teasing her. You’re making her uncomfortable.”

Obviously, his grandmother had spotted the blush on Samantha’s face, too. He looked at Gigi in question. He hadn’t seen her so protective in…well, he couldn’t remember when she’d taken someone under her wing so thoroughly, and in such a short amount of time. She must like Samantha Davies a lot. Then again, he supposed that was to be expected. He and Gigi had been through more than their fair share of grief. First his parents, then her own husband five years ago to a heart attack. His grandmother had deeded the ranch to him, she’d been so stricken by grief. For a time there, Clint wasn’t sure she’d make it through. But she’d managed to recover. And now she had that light back in her eyes.

“I’m sure Sam’s tired from her drive. You can take care of the horse.”

“That’s okay, Mrs. Baer, I can do it myself—”

“Gigi,” his grandmother said. “Everyone calls me that.”

Everyone? The only person to call her that was him.

“Gigi, I’d really like to untack and brush him myself.”

“She could untack and brush me,” Clint said under his breath.

His grandmother shot him a look and muttered out of the side of her mouth, “What you’re after is a piece of ass, and don’t think I don’t know it.”

“Gigi!” Clint said, pretending to be horrified. He opened the gate for Sam and smiled up at her. “Seriously,” he said to Samantha, “I’ll help you out.”

Maybe he could scare her into going away.

SHE COULD UNTACK AND BRUSH ME.

Had he been flirting with her when he’d said that? Somehow she doubted it. And why didn’t he want her to know who he was? Earlier, when she’d been talking to his grandmother, it’d been clear that he’d wanted Eugenia to introduce him as a simple ranch hand…and not as his grandson.

Why?

“Clint,” she said. “I, uh…I know you’re Eugenia’s grandson.”

He stopped so suddenly Red tossed his head. “You do?”

She nodded.

“Did Gigi tell you?”

She shook her head. “I knew from the first moment I met you.”

“Oh,” he said. She could tell he was trying to hide his surprise from her.

Moisture still hung heavy in the air. A breeze played with her short hair and it blew the scent of him toward her.

He smelled like a man.

And she was attracted to that scent. It made her recall—perfectly—what he’d looked like with his shirt open. Those cords of muscle, the tan hue of his skin, the way she’d caught him looking at her earlier, as if he’d like to—

Sam!

“She’s really a special lady,” she said through a throat gone dry with—okay, she should just admit it—lust. She hadn’t been with a man since the Mesozoic era.

“Yes, she is.”

But she wasn’t the type to indulge in an affair although if there was one time in her life when it might be okay to do something impulsive, that was now. Sex with him would be something to remember for a lifetime, and since she was going blind…

Blind.

She couldn’t breathe for a moment, forced her lungs to pump air to her heart. The sad truth was that she couldn’t imagine it. She could only try her best to prepare for it. She’d been left behind for some reason. She had to believe that reason would present itself at some point in the future.

Maybe it was the Baer Mountain Mustangs.

“Tell me about them,” she said, their entrance into the barn giving Sam a second or two of panic when her vision dimmed. But it was only her eyes adjusting to the sudden darkness.

“Tell you about what?”

She led Red to the cross-ties. “The mustangs.”

He didn’t say anything. She swiveled around and grabbed Red’s halter from the hook Clint had hung it on.

“Yeah,” he said. “About the mustangs.”

She slipped the bridle from Red’s head, before turning back to him. The horse spat the bit out as if he was aiming for a spittoon.

“What about them?”

“Gigi can be too trusting sometimes. Gullible. Naive.”

“So can we all,” she said, remembering a time when she’d thought life would never change. It had only been last December. She was too young—just barely twenty-six. Her parents had still been young, too, and healthy. They’d had years ahead of them. Or so she’d thought, four months ago.

“She likes you,” he said. “But the jury’s still out as far as I’m concerned.”

She slipped the halter over Red’s head. “That’s not what it seemed like earlier,” she said as she buckled the crown piece. Though she was losing more and more of her peripheral vision, she’d been having trouble focusing up close, too. She worried about what that might mean, then shook her head. What did she have to fear? That she was going blind? She already knew that for sure.

Enjoy every day.