The Rancher's Housekeeper

The Rancher's Housekeeper
Rebecca Winters

“I wish this hadn’t happened. Now you feel a new obligation to help me. It’s all you do, and I don’t want to be any more of a burden than I already am.”

“If you’re a burden, then it’s news to me,” Colt replied. “Right now I’m going to kiss you, Geena. If you don’t want me to, that’s tough. ‘No quarter asked or given,’ you said. Remember? Your mouth is all I’ve been able to think about since you kissed me on the dance floor in Hulett.”

His hand spanned her tender throat, positioning her face so he could kiss her. He’d been starving for her. It was ecstasy to feel her crushed in his arms like this.

Dear Reader,

Have you ever been accused of something you didn’t do?

Every so often the media tells us about people who have spent time in prison for a crime they didn’t commit. The possibility of that happening is a terrifying thought. No one can know their anguish before they’re freed, or their joy when the mistake is caught and the injustice rectified.

I explored this idea in my latest novel, The Rancher’s Housekeeper. Walk in Geena’s shoes. You’ll feel chills and then thrills when she meets the owner of the Floral Valley Ranch.

Enjoy!

Rebecca Winters

About the Author

REBECCA WINTERS, whose family of four children has now swelled to include five beautiful grandchildren, lives in Salt Lake City, Utah, in the land of the Rocky Mountains. With canyons and high alpine meadows full of wildflowers, she never runs out of places to explore. They, plus her favourite vacation spots in Europe, often end up as backgrounds for her romance novels, because writing is her passion, along with her family and church.

Rebecca loves to hear from readers. If you wish to e-mail her, please visit her website: www.cleanromances.com

The Rancher’s Housekeeper

Rebecca Winters

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

CHAPTER ONE

COLT Brannigan kissed his mother on the cheek. “I’ll see you tonight.” He turned to her caregiver. “I’m working with the nursing service in Sundance. They’ll be sending someone out in the next few days to start helping you with Mom’s care.”

“I’ll be fine. Hank’s been able to give me some free time.”

“That’s good. See you tonight, Ina.”

Colt’s sixty-year-old mother didn’t know anyone. She’d been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s before his father’s death sixteen months ago. It had grown much worse over the past year. She needed round-the-clock care.

“Hey, Colt?”

At the sound of his brother Hank’s voice, Colt shut the bedroom door and strode down the hallway of the ranch house’s main floor toward him.

“What’s up?”

“Phone call for you from Warden James’s office.”

Warden James? “Must be a wrong number,” he said, knowing full well it wasn’t. He walked past his brother and headed for the back door, not needing another delay when he should be in the upper pasture.

Hank followed him at a slower pace due to his walking cast. “You did advertise for a housekeeper in the Black Hills Sentinel. They want to know if you’ve already filled the position.”

Colt realized he should have indicated in the ad that they were looking for a female housekeeper. His mother would insist on it if she could express herself, but that time would never come again. “Tell them it’s too late.”

“But—”

“No buts!” He cut his brother off with a grimace. Before their father had passed away from blood clots in the lungs, he’d obliged the warden by granting him a favor, one he’d lived to regret.

The freed inmate had been taken on as a ranch hand on a provisional basis. He’d stayed only long enough for a few meals and a paycheck before he took off with the blanket from his bunk and some of the other hands’ cash. To add injury to insult, he’d stolen one of the ranch’s quarter horses.

Colt had tracked him down and recovered the stolen property. The ex-felon was once again behind bars. Unfortunately the percentage of freed inmates who ended up back in prison was high. Now that Colt ran the Floral Valley Ranch, he’d be damned if he would make the mistake his father had and invest any more time or money on an ex-con.

“I’ll be checking fences all day. Won’t be home until late. Call if there’s an emergency.” He jumped off the back porch and headed for the barn. After swinging into the saddle, he galloped away on Digger.

It took the right kind of female to run a household like theirs and manage the domestic help. In fact it took a saint, but those were in short supply since their previous housekeeper, Mary White Bird, had died. Colt realized their family could never replace her. The full-blooded Lakota had been their mother’s right hand and an institution on the ranch.

He’d advertised in various newspapers throughout Wyoming and South Dakota, but so far none of the applicants had the qualifications he was looking for. Forget a released felon. Colt was getting desperate, but not that desperate.

Floral Valley Ranch 4 miles.

Geena Williams rode past the small highway sign and had to turn around. Eight miles back an old rancher at the Cattlemen’s Stock and Feed Store in Sundance, Wyoming, had told her she might miss the turnoff if she weren’t looking for it. He’d been right. From here on out it would be dirt road.

She stopped long enough to catch her breath and take a drink from her water bottle. During the day the temperature had been sixty-nine degrees, with some wind in the afternoon, typical for early June in northeastern Wyoming. But now it had dropped into the fifties and would go lower. Her second-hand parka provided little insulation.

Though the weather had cooperated, it was sheer will and adrenaline that had gotten her this far. Now desperation would have to get her the rest of the way. Her legs would probably turn to rubber before she reached her destination, but Geena couldn’t quit now. She needed to make it to the ranch before it was too dark to see.

A half hour later she caught sight of a cluster of outbuildings, including the ranch house, but it was ten to ten and she didn’t dare approach anyone this late. She pedaled her road bike over to a stand of pines and propped it against one of the trunks.

Her backpack contained everything in the world she owned. No. That wasn’t exactly true. There were some other items precious to her, but she had no idea where they were. Not yet anyway.

She undid the straps to eat some snacks. They tasted good. After she’d pulled out her space blanket, she more or less collapsed from exhaustion onto a soft nest of needles beneath the boughs of the biggest tree.

Using her pack for a pillow, she curled on her right side and covered up, still in shock that tonight the only roof she had over her head was a canopy of stars. She picked out the Big Dipper. Venus was the bright star to the west.

Heaven.

“Come on, Titus. Time to go home.”

Colt shut the barn door. The border collie raced ahead of him with more energy than he knew what to do with. Titus led a dog’s perfect life. He was loved. He ran and worked all day, ate the food he wanted and had no worries. That’s why he went to sleep deliriously happy and woke up happy.

As for Colt, he wouldn’t describe himself happy in the delirious sense. He’d been in that state only one time. Falling in love at twenty-one had been easy when you’d been on the steer-wrestling circuit, winning prize money and dazzling your girl.

It was the happily-ever-after part he didn’t have time to work on before she wanted out because a married man had ranching duties and she wasn’t having fun anymore. Their eleven-month marriage had to have been some kind of record for the shortest one in Crook County, Wyoming.

At thirty-four years of age now, he recognized his mistake. They’d been too young and immature. It simply didn’t work. Since then he’d dated women from time to time, but unless he met one who enriched the busy life he already led, he didn’t see himself in a rush to get married again.

Suddenly the dog switched directions away from the ranch house, barking his head off. He hadn’t gone far when he made that low growling sound that let Colt know they had an intruder on the property. Whether animal or human he couldn’t tell yet.