Chapter 2
“Sell the bitch.” Blaine, a junior trainer here at Lodestar Ranch, smacked the dust from his ass, which he had been tossed on by Belle of the Ball. Not unceremoniously. There had been, in fact, a hell of a ceremony. Bucking and spins galore.
Blaine joined me at the fence. “I’m serious, Adam. She’s got the attitude of a stallion.” His eyes narrowed on the palomino, minding her own business on the other side of the pen. “If she were a stallion, at least we could lop her balls off.” He sounded downright bloodthirsty. “She’s unrideable.”
I grunted noncommittally. “By you, maybe.”
“I don’t recall seeing anyone else stay on.”
“I have,” I said, earning a dubious side-eye from Blaine. “I’ve seen someone stay on,” I amended, because I sure as shit hadn’t even tried. I had an eleven-year-old son, not a death wish.
My mom, though. She stayed on. I thought back to that day two years ago, her body frail from cancer, Mom bound and determined to have one ride on the filly she had hand raised herself. Belle had barely started her training at that point, but she didn’t kick up a fuss at all when my dad gently placed Mom on her back. Mom died a week later, and precious few people had managed to ride Belle since. Sometimes I thought she was heartbroken, like the rest of us.
Then I remembered she was a fucking horse.
“Couldn’t sell her even if I wanted to,” I said. “Not without a loss.”
Belle’s bloodlines were impeccable. Winners on both her sire’s side and her dam. That quality of sperm didn’t come cheap. Not to mention the thousands of dollars we had already spent on Belle’s care, feeding, and training. Dollars we no longer had to invest elsewhere. Dad had let a lot of things slide when Mom got sick, including the business. Belle was our best hope for putting Lodestar Ranch back in the game.
Hell, she was our only hope.
“So take the loss,” Blaine said. “Someone will buy her. I mean, look at her.”
I didn’t disagree. Belle had come by her name honestly. Golden coat the color of a summer hayfield, cream-colored mane and tail, four white stockings and even a white star on her forehead. But there was no denying the truth—the beauty was a bitch.
Blaine shook his head. “You’re never gonna sell.”
“You got a problem with that?” I twitched an eyebrow. A dare.
One that Blaine wasn’t stupid enough to take me up on. He was young, barely out of high school, but he had been here long enough to know better. “Nope.”
“Good.”
I pushed away from the fence and squinted at the sky. It was one of those gorgeous, late-spring Colorado mornings, all blue skies and sharp sunlight. But I wasn’t fooled by the beauty of it all. We had maybe an hour before the storms rolled in over the Rockies that rose, jagged and lethal, in the distance beyond our green fields. Rain and thunder were imminent. Possibly hail, too.
“I’m going to check on Ben,” I said. It was a Saturday, so he wasn’t at school. My son was old enough that he didn’t need constant supervision, but young enough that he still got into dumb shit if I looked away too long. Anyway, he’d want lunch right about now. “You know how to find me if you need me.”
I made my way past the stables, pausing to check in on the grooms and horses and make sure all was well, and up the driveway to the main house. Ben and I had shared a small two-bedroom cottage on the property for most of his life, but we had moved into the main house with Dad when Mom passed away two years ago. Dad had claimed it was so he could be available to help out with Ben, but in truth, I thought he was lonely in that big house all by himself.
“Ben?” I called as I stepped into the foyer. “Where are you?”
“He’s on the deck out back,” Dad answered. He poked his head out from the kitchen off the living room. “Come in here a minute. I’m making sandwiches.”
Of course he was. None of us were adept at cooking, so we ate a lot of spaghetti, burgers, and mac and cheese. None of that was great, but at least it was edible. My dad, though, was a genius at creating sandwiches. No PB and J for us.
Unless Ben requested it specifically, that is. Dad didn’t have the heart to say no to that kid. There was a kinship between them because they had the worst possible thing in common: cancer had claimed the most important woman from each of them. The difference being that Dad had lost the love of his life, his wife of thirty-six years, and Ben had lost his mom when he was only a year old.
I entered the kitchen to find the counter completely covered with Italian loafs of bread, cheese, meat, and condiments. Dad had a whole assembly line thing happening.
“What do we have here?” I asked.
“My best invention yet. Turkey, ham, provolone, pickles, shredded lettuce, onion, garlic mayo, and potato chips for crunch.” He pointed at each ingredient in turn with his knife. “I’m calling it the Good News Sub, because we got some today.” Dad always named his sandwich creations.
“Oh, yeah?” The last time Dad had good news it was that the new barista at the coffee shop was cute. Frankly, I was more interested in the sandwiches. My stomach rumbled.
“Yeah. I found us a new head trainer. Can’t say it was easy, either.” Dad gave me a pointed look, which I ignored. “Seems word has spread that you’re not the easiest man to work for. Got a reputation for firing trainers before they fully unpack their bags.”
I snorted. “Pretty sure if those trainers had done their damn job, they would have found me much more pleasant of a boss.”
“You gave them an impossible task, Adam. And we’ve been short-staffed for three months now. I need you to promise me you’re going to give this one a fair shot. Six months, not a day less.”
“Hm.” I made no promises. “Who’s the new hire?”
“James Campos. We got damn lucky.”
“James Campos, huh?” I rubbed my chin, noting the way the scruff scratched against my fingers. I had forgotten to shave…again. “I’ve seen his name around. Good reputation. I’m surprised he’d be willing to come on board such a small operation.” A flailing operation, I add silently.
“As I said, we got lucky.” Dad tilted his head, studying me. “Adam, you do know James is—”
“Hey.” I held up my hands to stop him. “You’re the HR department, not me. Not one person I’ve interviewed accepted the job. Whatever James is or isn’t, I trust you.” I reconsidered. “Mostly, anyway. Hell, we can’t do worse. We have done worse. He’s hired.”
“Right. But James is—”
“Dad, I know who James is.” I was exasperated now. I’d already agreed to the hire. Why were we still talking about this? “I might not live and breathe quarter horse statistics and trainer biographies like you do, but I pay attention. I know he’s trained some good winners, and he’s on his way up.”
Dad smirked at the sandwich he was currently layering with mayo. “Well. I guess you know everything, then,” he murmured.
“I know enough.”
“Okay, then.” Dad made a sound like he was swallowing a laugh. “But mind what I said. I have a good feeling about this one. Don’t ruin it. Six months. That’s all I’m asking.”
I wasn’t in the habit of making promises I couldn’t keep, so I shrugged and changed the subject. “Let’s eat outside.”
We loaded up three plates with subs and a side of baby carrots—the only vegetable Ben would eat. He wouldn’t even eat regular carrots, no matter how much we promised him that they were literally the same thing, just bigger.
“We’ve got lunch, kiddo,” Dad said, leading the way onto the deck that looks out over the pastures. Horses grazed contentedly, swatting flies with their long tails. Beyond the pastures, the Rockies rose up, majestic and brutal.
I had to admit, Dad couldn’t have chosen a more idyllic spot to build a ranch.
Ben was in one of the chairs, staring out at the horizon. No screen, no book, no distraction. He did this a lot. I had no idea if this was something to worry about, but of course I worried anyway.
“I think I want to grow something,” Ben said as we gathered round the table.
“Oh, yeah? What’s that?” I asked after I swallowed a bite of sandwich, which, to my dad’s credit, was damn good with just the right amount of salt and crunch.
“Watermelon,” Ben said. “That would be nice. I could plant it right there, in Grandma’s garden.” He pointed to the side of the house, where weeds had overrun the flowers, peppers, and cucumbers she used to grow there.
I personally enjoyed watermelon, but it wasn’t my call. I looked at Dad, eyebrows raised in question.
He shrugged. “I like watermelon.”
Ben beamed. “Great.” He took a huge bite of sandwich, chewed, and swallowed it down. “This is your best one yet, Gramps. What did you name it?”
“Good News. Because we got some today.” Dad’s eyes glinted with amusement. “And I can’t wait to see how it turns out.”
One week later, clouds gathered overhead as I hustled through my list of errands, pushing out the morning sunlight. Bank, groceries, feed store for watermelon seeds, gas. I ended the afternoon at Jo’s, the local coffee shop. Probably a bad idea. It was late enough and I was old enough that a shot of caffeine would keep me up past midnight. But we were expecting the new hire, James Campos, this evening. I needed to be sharp for that, and like always, I was drained from the day’s work.
The new barista was there. Chloe. She was cute, like my dad said. She was also frowning at me as I approached the counter.
“Coffee. Black,” I said, pulling out my wallet.
She nodded, grabbed a to-go cup, and stepped to the coffee pot, leaving me face-to-face with my reflection in the long mirror behind the counter. And shit, I was frowning, too. In fact, it was entirely possible I was frowning first, and her frown was only a response to my own. I wiggled my jaw, trying to relax, but my face felt stiff and frozen.
I was stressed. All I did was worry, it seemed. I worried about Ben. That whole thing with the watermelons was weird, right? Or maybe not. How the hell would I know? It wasn’t like I had a posse of eleven-year-old boys running around that I could ask.
And I worried about Lodestar Ranch. This place had always been important to me, but for most of my life, I had been a secondary player while my dad ran things. He stepped aside when Mom got sick, and while I didn’t blame him for his grief, all that responsibility was a heavier weight than I was prepared for. I felt like I was constantly failing. There was too much to do and not enough hours to do it in. And, fuck, I was tired.
And now I had James Campos to worry about, too. Whether he’d get along with the other staff at Lodestar. Whether he’d be man enough to train Belle the Bitch. Whether he had what it took to turn this business around.
Chloe passed me my coffee and I paid up, slipping a dollar in the tip jar, aware that I was still frowning while I did it. Fucking hell.
And then the bell jangled as the door opened, boots tapping lightly against the old wood floor beams, and I could swear my back felt warm, like I had walked into a sunbeam. Chloe smiled past me. An honest smile, not the fake kind.
I stepped aside, letting the woman take my place at the counter. She beamed at me like I had done her a favor when all I did was get out of the way. She smelled like hay and vanilla, and suddenly I was hit with a memory. Sitting between my mom and dad when I wasn’t more than six years old, watching the horses in the fields, the warm summer sun on my back. All of us licking vanilla ice cream cones. It was a good memory. Happy.
I frowned harder, lowering my gaze so she wouldn’t think it was directed at her. My eyes fell on her pink cowboy boots. Like something a little girl would wear. Or a rodeo queen. But she was definitely not a little girl, although there was something youthful about her face. The freckles maybe, or her big cow eyes. I wouldn’t peg her as a rodeo queen, either. If she was wearing makeup, it was minimal, and her clothes were distinctly lacking in rhinestones.
She raised an eyebrow at me. “Sorry, were you done?”
It dawned on me that I’d just been standing here, staring at her like a creep. “Yeah. Go ahead.”
“Great.” She lit up like I’d just told her she won a fifty-dollar scratch off ticket. “Thank you.”
I moved to the bar cart across the room, where I could add cream or sugar to my coffee, if that appealed. It did not. There was literally no reason for me to linger there when I already had everything I needed.
But I lingered anyway.
I didn’t recognize her. I knew everyone in Aspen Springs, and most of their cows, too. Which was harder, actually, because there were more cows than people here. But she was definitely a stranger.
The woman said something, and Chloe laughed. I’d never seen Chloe look anything but aggravated, and now here she was, laughing. Then the woman laughed too. Loudly. Head tossed back, her thick brown hair reaching almost down to her exceptionally nice ass. She laughed like she enjoyed it. Not just the joke, but the actual feel of laughing. She laughed like she wasn’t holding anything back.
I haven’t had sex in three years.
The thought popped into my head unbidden. Probably having something to do with the way her ass looked in those jeans. Though if I was honest, it had more to do with her laugh. I didn’t know what that said about me, that I was more turned on by her laugh than her ass. That I was pathetic, probably. Because watching her smile at Chloe, hearing that booming laugh, I couldn’t think of anything more attractive than someone who actually enjoyed my company. Not a single thing.
And that probably had something to do with Ben’s mom, my ex-wife, Emily. But I wasn’t going to give that thought another second of my time.
I’d lingered enough for one day.
Chloe grabbed a card, wrote something on it, and passed it to Ms. Pink Boots along with the iced coffee she ordered. I knew in my gut it was her phone number. Damn. I felt more disappointed than I should, considering I had zero interest in a relationship with either woman. Relationships were for people with time and good mental health, and I was seriously lacking in both.
Ms. Pink Boots flashed one last grin and then practically skipped over to the bar cart, where I was still standing for no apparent reason other than I’d decided to take up stalking as a hobby.
She waved the card at me. “I made a friend!” she said, like that was a totally normal conversation to have with a complete stranger. But friend. Not a potential date. I took note of that for no good reason at all. “That’s a good omen, don’t you think?”
I grunted. Dad would be so disappointed. Use your words, son.
She clamped the card in her teeth while she added a hefty amount of cream to her coffee.
“You new around here?” My voice came out rough. I wasn’t used to making small talk with women. Mostly I scowled at them, would be my guess.
“Oh!”
She must have been surprised that I could speak actual words after grunting at her like a caveman. Fair enough. Her mouth popped open, and the card fell out, fluttering to the floor in a pinwheel. Without even thinking about it, I crouched and swiped the card off the floor. Because Mom raised a gentleman.
She did the same, except I got there first.
We looked at each other, surprised, both squatting low, balanced on our toes, and our knees knocked together.
And then we both fell forward and smashed into each other.
Nose to nose.
Lips to lips.
Arms flailing, reaching for support, finding it in each other’s bodies and catching our balance. We froze like that, holding each other’s shoulders in a death grip, as though tumbling three inches to the ground was the same thing as plunging into the Grand Canyon.
Fucking hell.
She made a strangled noise. Against my fucking mouth.
She pushed away from me, jerking her head back. Her cheeks were beet red. My face felt…entirely normal. Which probably meant I was frowning again. Shit.
She stood. I remained squatting at her feet, stunned into my best deer in headlights impression.
“Well,” she said. “Bye!”
She shot out of there like the building was on fire, leaving me still holding the card with Chloe’s phone number. My gaze cut to the barista, who bugged her eyes out at me, her jaw flapping open.
“Dude,” she said. “What the heck just happened?”
My sentiments exactly.