The Rancher Needs A Wife

He released her arm. “You should get yourself a good pair of boots.”

“I’ve already got some.”

“I meant some real ones.”

“I know what you meant.” She wedged her hands into her tiny jacket pockets and wished she’d thought to pull on her wool duster before heading his way. “I have a pair of ‘real boots,’ too. But they don’t exactly coordinate with raspberry bouclé.”

“Raspberry bouclé.” One side of his mouth quirked in a half smile, and his eyes flickered up to meet hers for a second before lowering again. “Sounds nearly good enough to eat.”

She suspected, for a moment, that he might be flirting with her. But since this was Wayne, she figured the teasing tone in his voice was simply that—a mild and friendly pokeforold times’ sake. “Look,” she said, “I didn’t come out here to exchange fashion tips.”

“I’m relieved to hear it.” He toed the gravel with a worn leather boot. “Wouldn’t want folks around here to get the wrong idea about why I’ve suddenly taken up such an interest in raspberry bouclé and the like.”

He shot her another one of his shy glances, and she got the distinct impression he was enjoying some mysterious private joke at her expense. “No, I don’t suppose you would,” she said.

“Why did you come out here, Maggie?”

“To tell you that I’m surprised you voted the way you did,” she said. “And to thank you for doing it.”

She heard his deep intake of breath and his quiet, resigned sigh. “I didn’t do it for you,” he said.

“I know that.”

“Then why are you thanking me?”

“Maybe I’m trying to be neighborly.”

“Is that why you made your proposal?”

His glance this time was as sharp as the frosty air. “To be neighborly?”

“Are you implying my proposal isn’t?”

“There’s nothing wrong with your proposal.”

“With my methods, then.”

“I’m not implying anything.”

“So you’re coming right out and saying it.”

He shoved his hands into his pockets and cocked one hip against the truck door in a casual pose. “If you’re looking for a fight, Maggie, you’re going to have to look somewhere else.”

She flashed him one of her sweetest smiles. “Now, why would I want to pick a fight with one of the very people I need to convince that my proposal is the right choice for Tucker High?”

“I don’t know,” he said in a maddeningly reasonable tone.

He stood there, as solid and steady as ever, waiting with the kind of long-suffering patience that always seemed to ratchet up her frustration level, and she fought back the temptation to stalk away. She reminded herself that she needed his goodwill if her plan was going to succeed, and that she’d have to learn to deal with his special brand of stubborn passivity.

He’d lowered his head until his hat brim hid most of his face, but she could still see the slow curve of his lips.

“What are you grinning at?” she asked.

“I can nearly hear the wheels spinning in that clever head of yours,” he said. “Figuring all the angles, all at the same time. Probably looking to find the weakest link on the board and work on it until it snaps.”

“Is that what you think I’m doing? Working on you?”

His grin disappeared and his chin came up, the merest fraction of an inch, enough for her to see the faint glint of his eyes beneath the Stetson’s brim. Shadow and light slid over his features, highlighting the rugged arrangement of skin and bone. He’d been a good-looking boy. And he’d grown to be an extremely attractive man.

A strong man, a man who had refused to follow his mother’s desertion, who had dug in and struggled through his alcoholic father’s abusive decline and early death. A man who had battled to hold on to his family’s ruined ranch and then slaved to rebuild it. A man who would never be a weak link by any stretch of the imagination.

“I’d like to see you try,” he said in his deep, quiet voice.

“I’ll bet you would,” she answered.

“Could be interesting.”

“Could be at that.”

Something hovered and snapped in the cold space between them, something that had nothing to do with the echoing past or the current situation. And then his hat brim lowered like a blind to shut her out, and her tension floated away on a tiny cloud puff of a sigh.

“Guthrie did a lot of working of his own on that proposal of his,” said Wayne. “Talked up his idea with a lot of folks around here. Hammered out a kind of informal agreement on how things should be.”

“He never considered any possibility other than something connected to sports.”

“I s’pose there’s a bit of truth to what you’re suggesting. Guthrie’s mighty proud of those big boys of his. And he’s got another one coming along that promises to be every bit as big and fast and tough.” He settled back more comfortably and crossed his feet at the ankles. “And maybe nothing else came to mind because sports is something most everyone in town can relate to.”

“Maybe that’s because there’s nothing else to do.”

“Maybe so. It’s hard to find a variety of things to do when there aren’t more than a few thousand people in this and the next three counties put together. And most of them are busy with making a living off the land.” His shoulders lifted in a shrug. “And maybe sports are what most folks like to watch. And if they don’t, they can talk about how their neighbors’ kids did in the game the night before.”

“There’s more to life than ball games.”

“That’s right,” he said. “There’s rodeo.”

She folded her arms and glared at him. “You obviously agree with Guthrie.”

“I do?”

“And because you do,” she said, brushing aside his question, “why did you vote the way you did?”

“Maybe I don’t like to be rushed into things.”

“All right, then.” She straightened and shoved stray bangs out of her eyes. “That’s something, anyway. Something I can work with.”

“If you say so.” The muscles of his jaw rippled along one side and then the other. “I’m not sure I like the idea of being the object of one of your campaigns, but I guess it comes with the territory.”

“It won’t hurt,” she said with a smile. “Not much, anyway.”