Her Stubborn Cowboy

“I mean, he was my first real love, and that’s special, but I wasn’t going to walk away from a chance like this because I happened to date a boy the next ranch over.” She shrugged. “That would be stupid, wouldn’t it?”

* * *

AFTER THEY CHECKED on the animals in the field, Chet provided the promised walk-through for the big barn. Chet was helpful and informative. That in itself was suspicious. Why would Chet, the man who’d never thought her good enough for a Granger, put his valuable time into her ranch unless he had an ulterior motive? He’d offered to buy this property repeatedly over the years, and she had to wonder if his interest in keeping up her land was more selfish than he was letting on.

Chet opened the front door and gestured her outside first. Her arm brushed against his taut stomach as she passed by him and back into the sunlight, the warmth of his body just a little too comforting for her liking. But then, she’d always been attracted to Chet. He’d been the silent, brooding sort, but as it turned out, connecting with a man like that was difficult, especially when his more outgoing younger brother was pursuing her like crazy. If Chet had felt anything for her at all, he’d hidden it well, and she’d let her feelings for him go when she’d started dating Andy. As it turned out, she’d done the right thing—he’d never thought she was good enough, anyway. She’d only have made a fool of herself, and no woman in her right mind courted rejection.

Granny had made this all seem a whole lot easier, and she’d hired and fired her workers without apology. She’d had some simple rules on this ranch—no booze, no sleeping around and no cursing within her hearing. She knew that ranch hands had a rare talent when it came to profanity. Far be it from her to tell them what to do on their own time, but if she was even around a corner, she expected them to clean up their language pronto. There was something about the sight of that slender woman with gray hair and gum boots that made the men stand up straighter and doff their hats. Every single ranch hand Mackenzie had ever seen around this place called her Granny “ma’am,” and while she wasn’t sure how exactly, she had the distinct impression the old lady had earned it.

Granny, I wish you were here to give me some advice...

Granny wasn’t, but Chet was. He’d have to do.

“Come on,” Chet said as he led the way to her truck.

“Where to now?” Mackenzie asked.

“The house. We’ll take care of those blisters.”

He got into the driver’s seat, and she felt a pang of annoyance. He was already acting as though he owned the place, but her hands were quite sore. A couple of blisters had popped. She’d let this one go. For now. But she wouldn’t back down, and she wouldn’t let Chet push her into any corners. This was her land now, and if she was forced to sell, she’d sell to anyone but him. On principle.

If there was one thing that her father’s infidelity had taught her, it was that men could lie. Before her father’s affairs came out, she’d trusted in a man’s good intentions, but not anymore. If her father could look her and her mother in the eye and tell them that he was so sorry, but he had to work late... It had been a painful lesson, but a valuable one. Men lied. Men looked out for their own interests, and a woman should never rely on a man to care about hers. Chet had wanted this land for a long time, and she doubted that would have changed just because she showed up.

As they bumped along the gravel road that led back up toward the house, Mackenzie watched the familiar landscape roll by. Out the left, low hills rolled out toward the horizon, cut off by a strip of trees. If memory served, those trees lined a creek that meandered through the pasture, complete with a swimming hole and a rope swing. To the right was the Grangers’ land, a wooden fence slicing between the properties. The place looked different now that it was hers, though. She felt as if she had to memorize it, figure it out, protect it from a Granger takeover.

When Andy told her about Chet’s dislike of her, that he thought that she wasn’t the kind of woman who would fit in with them, she’d been doubly hurt. Not only had her father lied to her face for years, but now Chet had been hiding his own bias. She’d never suspected that he felt that way in the few conversations they’d had, and she certainly didn’t deserve it. So now that she was the sole owner of this ranch, she couldn’t help but feel wary of other people’s devious intentions, Chet’s included. She’d be responsible for all of this, and that weighed rather heavily on her shoulders.

But this was better than her life in the city had been. What with all of her friends having left for other more exciting opportunities and working a job she truly loathed, even if it did pay moderately well, being responsible for something of this magnitude woke her up in a way she’d never experienced before, not even when visiting here. This was going to be hard—really hard—and somehow she knew it could also be worth it.

“So what happened between Andy and his fiancée?” Mackenzie asked. She’d been wondering what the details were ever since Chet had mentioned it when he arrived.

Chet shrugged. “I don’t know too much, but if I had to guess, I’d say it was Andy’s fault.”

Mackenzie chuckled at his bluntness. “What makes you so sure?”

“Ida’s great.” Chet glanced in her direction, one arm out the open window, drumming an absent rhythm on the side of the truck. “She’s good for him. She settles him down and makes him think. Ida isn’t the difficult type. And I know my brother. If there’s friction, it’s not because of Ida.”

The difficult type. Was that what Chet thought of her? And she absolutely could be, especially if he tried to manipulate her out of her ranch. Still, Mackenzie found herself feeling a tiny bit envious. Maybe Andy hadn’t been the right guy for her, but Ida had managed to earn Chet’s respect, and Chet wasn’t easily charmed. Granny had been the same way. She’d been hard to impress, but when she liked someone, that meant something. Perhaps Ida was just a better fit for the family in Chet’s eyes than Mack had been.

Difficult. She suppressed the urge to roll her eyes.

Chet looked grim as he drove, the tall, lanky bulk of him filling up that side of the truck. He smelled like hay and hard work, and she realized there were some issues between the brothers that Chet wasn’t eager to talk about.

“You and Andy always were pitted against each other,” Mackenzie said. She’d meant it as a joke, wanting to defuse the tension, but Chet didn’t even crack a smile.

“We’re just different.” He said the words low enough that she wasn’t entirely sure that they were meant for her. “Look, I should probably warn you. There’s a developer sniffing around, looking for land to buy up.”

“Oh.” Mackenzie raised an eyebrow, caught off guard by the sudden declaration. “Granny would have hated that.”

“Yeah.” The tension in his shoulders eased. “It’s not good for Hope. I just wanted you to know so that you could think it through before someone starts trying to sweet-talk you into a sale.”

How much were they offering, exactly? She had to admit she was curious. But the old guilt welled up inside her again. This was Granny’s ranch, and Granny hadn’t left it to her to sell it—of that, she was absolutely certain. Granny had loved this land. She would have known that if she’d left it to Mack’s father, he would have sold it without once setting foot on it again. Maybe that was part of why Granny had willed it to Mackenzie, in a hope that someone would love this place as she had.

Chet brought the truck to a stop in front of the house and put it into Park. “I care about this place. If that developer is successful and manages to buy up land around here, it would change Hope...take away some of the heart here. We’ve got to keep them out.”

“I can see that,” she agreed. She noticed that he hadn’t mentioned her selling to him yet. Maybe he was timing this, gauging her willingness to sell before he made his offer. “Thanks for letting me know.”

They were silent for a couple of beats, and she could tell he was still brooding about something.

“And if you could just be careful around Andy—”

“Careful?” She laughed. “Why?”

“Because he dropped himself on my doorstep last night, whining about the woman who was two months away from marrying him, and I don’t want to give him any ideas. I have every intention of sending him back home to Ida ASAP.”

Mackenzie frowned. What was Chet more worried about—the big developers or his brother’s broken engagement?

“What ideas, exactly?”

“Ideas about you.” The statement was loaded, and after he’d said it, silence and implication stretched between them. Andy was barely single again, and Chet thought she’d swoop in and scoop him up? It was insulting.

“Is that what you think of me?” she demanded.

“Excuse me?”

“You think I’m back here looking for romance?” Anger bubbled up within her. A woman inherited four hundred acres of Montana ranch land, and he thought she’d wander off after Andy Granger? “I’m here to run a ranch, and you and Andy can work out your family issues on your own. You and Ida can rest easy, Chet. I have no intention of selling out to some faceless corporation, and I have no intention of starting up with Andy again, either.”

“That’s good.”

Mackenzie wanted to reach out and smack this man, but instead she shook her head and smiled coldly.

“I think I’ll take care of my own blisters,” she said, hopping out of the truck.

“Wait—you’re mad?” Chet asked incredulously, leaning down and looking out the open truck window at her. “What just happened here?”

Just like a man, Chet had missed everything between the lines, and Mack turned back toward him in anger.

“I’m a grown woman, Chet. I’m college educated, and I’m the sole owner of four hundred acres. I’m no longer seventeen, and while this might shock you, I don’t need a man. I’m also not stupid. So you can stop standing guard and—”

Chet opened the truck door and slammed it shut harder than necessary. He leaned back into the open window and pinned her with an annoyed glare. “I’m not standing guard.”

He stalked around the vehicle and up the back stairs to her house.

“Where are you going?” she demanded.

“I’m helping you with those blisters,” he retorted, turning flashing gray eyes onto her. “This is ranching lesson number one—you need people. You can never do this on your own. You’re going to need neighbors and you’re going to need to pitch in to help them, too, because one of these days, you’re going to get the flu, or you’re going to get your tractor stuck in the mud, or you’re going to lose cows through a broken fence... The potential emergencies are pretty much countless. So get off your high horse, get into that house and let me help you sort out your blisters, or tomorrow you’re going to be bleeding through your gloves!”

Mack stared at him, stunned. Without another word, he disappeared into the house, leaving Mackenzie outside. She had two choices—go in there and let him help her, or stomp off to the barn or somewhere and make some elaborate point about her independence. She looked down at her hands—they hurt. A little bit of nursing would be nice, she had to admit, so she blew out a sigh and headed into the house.