12
I find Reese on the front lawn, staring up at the sunset. She’s so fucking breathtaking my chest hurts. I shove the thought away before it can take root.
“Way to kill it,” I say, coming up beside her. Smirking, I lower my mouth to her ear. “Minus the whole hating-horses bit.”
Reese clutches her necklace. “I didn’t know dinner would come with a side of interrogation.” A sigh furrows her mouth. “I should have lied, but I really hate that fucking movie.”
No shit. It wouldn’t take a detective to see that Reese was jumpy as hell after Stede brought it up.
“We love hard, but we’re also nosy as hell. They’ll get over it.”
Relief floats into her emerald eyes and she nods.
I’ve been in her shoes more times than I can count. I know the feeling of putting my foot in my mouth all too well. Meeting my family isn’t for the faint-hearted. I don’t want her to beat herself up over it.
The wind blows softly through the woods, rustling the trees. A truck door slams and together we watch Fallon, duffel bag in her hands, take it inside the house.
Reese looks up at me. “What happened to her?”
The question catches me off guard. “Fallon?”
Reese nods.
“Let’s see…she dated a fucking sociopath who happened to be her sister’s ex. She was kidnapped and stabbed.” Reese flinches. “Instead of dealing with it, Fallon doubled down on, well…Fallon.”
“Are you sure that’s all it is?” Her voice is wary.
“What else is there?”
Reese shudders, wrapping her arms around her waist. “She makes me feel like I’m standing next to a bomb.”
I look back toward the house, worry simmering in my gut.
Before I can say anything, Reese takes a step forward, our shoulders brushing. “See you, Country Boy,” she husks.
With a little wave, a jingle of her bangles, she heads out, taking her honeyed perfume and her scowls with her.
The soft sway of her ass as she crosses the field has my cock flexing in my jeans. It’s clear Reese is intent on torturing me with those shorts. That shape, that hair, that smile? God was generous with that girl.
Because I’m a glutton for punishment, I take a second to admire the view of Reese disappearing down the bend. The clothes she bought are still her style, sexy as hell, but they’re different somehow.
Softer. Happier.
I head back inside the house, and everyone has gathered in the kitchen. Fallon sits on the counter, and Dakota is at the kitchen table, a glass of wine in her hand, while my brothers clean up. An upbeat country song plays on the Bose speaker. Beside it, a baby monitor shows Duke sleeping.
“You hired her?” Davis asks, scraping leftovers into the trash. Keena hovers, hoping for a stray crumb.
Annoyance rises in my throat. “Look, y’all told me to keep her close. Keep her out of trouble. That’s what I’m doing.”
He passes the plate to Charlie. “That include shopping?”
I glare at my mouthy little brother, who’s suddenly interested in the bubbles in the kitchen sink.
“You spent the day with her,” Davis presses.
To be a contrary fuck, I drawl, “I did, Dad .”
“Okay, no dad-speak,” Dakota interjects, holding up her wine glass like she’s ready to splash the next instigator. “We all know where that gets you two.”
Fallon cackles in delight. “Shopping, Ford? That’s like third base already.”
I tear a hand through my hair, squeeze the back of my neck. Reese was right about the family interrogation. Since when has everything become a family affair?
“There is no first, second, or third base,” I snap, my temper waking up. I’m already annoyed Reese barely touched her dinner. “She’s too young for me, anyway.”
Fallon and Dakota exchange smirks.
Not my type , I remind myself. Too high maintenance. We come from different worlds.
“Ain’t she some big-shot country singer?” Wyatt says, dunking a wad of napkins in the garbage. “Where’s her money?”
“For some reason, she’s broke,” Charlie says. “From what Ruby told me, she was in The Corner Store picking out change just to buy an energy drink.”
Fallon shoots me a withering glare and mutters, “Bet it was a man. It’s always a man.”
All three of my brothers stare at me. I clench my fist, grit my teeth.
Only your siblings can make you mad in seconds. And it’s a specific kind of mad, too. No one else can make you rage so suddenly.
I swing a finger around the kitchen. “I seem to remember y’all laying this trouble on me. She’s my problem, so I’m going to make her my fucking problem.”
“I don’t want her to give you problems.” Brotherly concern and annoyance war in Davis’s voice.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
He crosses his arms. “You know what it means.”
They think I’m combustible since last year, but they don’t know I’ve been working on it.
“I don’t know what it means,” Fallon says slyly.
Davis turns to her. “Ford doesn’t attract what’s good for him.”
“Again,” I say through clenched teeth. “I’m right fucking here.”
“She’s a train wreck,” Davis argues. “I heard about her dancing on the bar at Nowhere, seen those videos. She went to rehab when she was sixteen.”
I suck in a breath. Rehab or not, Reese doesn’t deserve to have her past thrown in her face. “Hell, who hasn’t fucked up when they were sixteen?”
Davis leans in, lowering his voice. “What I’m saying is, you don’t need that shit in your life, Ford. You have it together. After Savannah—”
“Savannah almost killed him,” Wyatt snarls in a rare show of sibling loyalty. When it comes to my ex, all my brothers have my back.
“She’s Savannah.” Anger clouds Davis’s features. “Times two.”
A primal, protective urge to defend Reese surges through me. I understand Davis is worried, but that doesn’t mean he can rag on the girl relentlessly.
Before I can knock Davis into next week, Charlie dries his hands on a towel and says, “We don’t need tabloids and press sniffing around the ranch. She doesn’t know a lick about ranch work. What if she gets hurt? Hell, what if she decides to sue us?”
“She won’t.” Ruby’s soft voice floats into the kitchen. Finished resting, she straightens out her dress and crosses the room.
The minute he sees her, Charlie’s face pulls into a rare smile.
“She needs someplace to go,” Ruby says, leaning back against the counter. Charlie keeps a hand on the small of her back. “Whatever she did in the past, we shouldn’t judge.”
“That’s the sweetheart inside of you, Fairy Tale.” I give her a soft smile. “You always look for that second chance.”
Ruby narrows her eyes. “And you all should, too.”
Quiet falls on the room.
I take a breath. The conversation is now at a simmer and I’d like to fucking keep it that way.
“Reese is a little wild, I get it,” I say to the room. Everyone wants a fucking speech, so here we go. “She eats like shit, and I doubt she can work a fucking day on the ranch without killing herself. She’s a pain in my ass, but I don’t think we can turn her out. I think she’s in trouble. Or scared or both.”
“Ford’s right,” Dakota says, standing. She lays a hand on her husband’s arm, and he instantly softens.
My hard-ass military brother doesn’t trust easily. Especially after the events of last year. He’s guard-dog protective of Dakota, Fallon, and the rest of his family.And he should be.
But instinct has my own red flags up—an unsettling feeling that if Reese leaves, something bad will happen to her.
Later, when Davis walks me to the front door, I say, “So, listen…” I glance toward the kitchen, making sure my family’s out of eavesdropping distance. “I didn’t want to do this in front of everyone, but I need a favor.”
Davis scrapes a hand over his close-cropped hair. “I don’t like the sound of this.”
“You still talk to anyone on your team who’s a PI?” If anyone has contacts, it’s my brother with his military ties. The idea came to me earlier, during my trek down Main Street. The sooner I help Reese Austin, the sooner she can leave—and I can get my life back. Back to the mountain. Back to the ranch.
“I have a few names.” He frowns. “Is this for Reese?”
“I think she’s in something she doesn’t know how to get out of.”
“She tell you that?”
“Not exactly.”
“Woo-woo shit?”
I grin. “Woo-woo shit.”
Baseball players are the most superstitious players in all sports. I once knew a guy who wore a diaper when he needed to right his game. Cinnamon candies were my go-to for getting out of a slump. But when it comes to family, I tend to get a gut feeling when things go wrong. It’s unexplainable, but after all these years, and especially after last year when I found Dakota and Davis in the middle of the woods, I trust it.
“You know what you’re doing?” Davis asks. “Getting involved?”
“I’m not involved,” I grunt, wondering how long I can lie to myself. “Just do this for me.”
“I’ll put in a call,” Davis says in his scary Marine voice. “They call him the Poacher.”
“Jesus, man.” I laugh. “I don’t want to know who you hang out with in your spare time.”
This time, Davis cracks a shit-eating grin. “Tell me, is this the kindness of your heart talking, or are you still a cowboy?”
“Fuck you,” I say, but there’s no real malice there. We fight fast, but we also end it fast. I clap him on the shoulder. “Thanks, brother.”
The night air’s cool against my skin as I set out for the garage. But I don’t get far. I stop on the path that would normally take me to the ranch proper, edginess skittering beneath my skin. Reese’s expression at dinner lingers in my mind. Her parting words.
She’s not my responsibility.
Yet, here I am, turning and heading in the opposite direction.
My fucking fault. I put her in that damn chalet at the edge of the forest. If I was smart, I would’ve kept her close. Next to me.
Another bad idea.
But there’s something about Reese…something wild. Dangerous.
And all I want to do is rope and ride her.
“I don’t fucking believe this,” I mutter when I get to Reese’s chalet.
Her door’s wide open.
“Reese?” I poke my head inside. Makeup on the kitchen table. The clothes she wore to dinner lay in a pile in the middle of the floor. Christ. She can’t clean worth a lick.
I step back, scouring the area. In the dirt, I spot footprints.
High heels, to be exact. Long heel marks in the soil.
I move toward the forest, unease spreading through me.
She must have put down half a bottle of wine tonight. Not to mention, traipsing through the forest in those death traps she calls shoes is only asking for trouble.
Those two thoughts push me through the forest with laser-focused speed.
“Goddamn it,” I mutter, crunching twigs and brush beneath my boots. I pay more attention to this woman than anything else in my life. Fuck, but it’s embarrassing.
Just as I round the grove of trees that shield the lake, I slam into a body.
Reese.
On instinct, I reach out, grabbing her by the waist before she can fall.
“I thought you were going home,” I snap.
“Well, I didn’t,” she huffs, high heels in her hand. “Get your eyes checked.”
My gaze travels down. That’s when I realize she’s wet. Even in the dark, I can see she’s wearing nothing but a T-shirt that grazes her thighs, the thin material exposing dark, peaked nipples. Her bare feet are covered by red sand from the lake. Bangles on her wrists. High heels in her hands. Water sluices down her face, and her long hair drips over one slender shoulder like melted honey.
My hands shift on her hips. Still holding tight. I’m not sure if it’s for her benefit or for mine. “Hey, what happened? What’s wrong?”
“Always so nosy.” She juts her chin. “If you have to know, I was abducted by aliens and probed out in the big, bad woods.”
Another lie.
“Don’t wander,” I tell her roughly, staring down at her beautiful, heart-shaped face, the necklace around her slender throat.
“Don’t wander,” she says in a spooky voice, brows lifting. Her body moves in a mock shudder and her breasts sweep against my chest. My heart picks up a dangerous beat. “Are you the Grumpy Cowboy Ghost of Midnight Past?”
“It’s not safe in the forest.” I peer behind her, take in the lake and its gentle current. Did she go for a fucking swim? “We had a wolf ‘round these parts last year.” If I have to scare her to knock some sense into her, so be it.
Her laugh is sad, and she forces a small smile. “Pity the wolf who meets me. I’m a menace . Isn’t that what you said, Ford?”
Angry at myself, I shake my head. “I shouldn’t have said that. I shouldn’t have said a lot of things.”
Apologizing has never been my strong suit, but for this girl, I have the strong urge to get on my knees and do just that.
“Hold up.” I catch her arm before she can turn away. “Stop that mouth for a minute.”
Her eyes flash. Pissed off. Good. How I like her.
“You sure you’re okay?” I ask. Need has me pulling her closer. Has my thumb sweeping over that pouty bottom lip.
Her lips twist in amusement. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were worried.”
My voice is raspy as hell as I admit, “Yeah. I was.”
“Oh.” Her eyes go wide with surprise.
I quickly cup her cheek and force her gaze to mine. “Tell me you’re okay.”
“I’m okay,” she breathes. Eyes fluttering, her body curves toward me like some magnetic pull. She’s warm. Soft. Sweet.
Fuck. I want to kiss her.
I run my hands down her chilled arms. If it was up to me, I’d put her over my shoulder like I did last night and carry her back to her chalet. Spank that spoiled ass until it throbs. Put her in the bed. Fuck her.
And then I’d fuck her again in the shower.
My muscles tighten when she presses a palm against my chest. Only, instead of pulling me in, she pushes herself away from me. “Bye, Ford.” The way she says my name—real, gentle—has my cock pulsing. “See you tomorrow.”
“Bright and early. Six o’clock,” I say as she walks away.
She glances over her shoulder. Playful fire dances in her eyes. “Oh, you’re gonna love me at six in the a.m.”
There’s a bounce in her step as her presence, her soft heat, disappears into the darkness.
With that, I stand there in the dark, hating myself.
Don’t care. You absolutely cannot fucking care.