Chapter Nine
When Clancy heard someone enter the barn, she thought it would be Dub coming back. He’d left her alone earlier to finish up with the stalls. She could hear boots on the wood floor as he approached, but she didn’t turn, determined to keep working.
Their earlier discussion had left her unsettled.
When he walked away, she’d regretted not opening up to him.
She would be gone soon, Dub Crawford just a memory—if even that, she told herself.
A lie. Whatever it was about this cowboy, she’d remember him.
Just as she would have regrets that she hadn’t gone out with him.
Hadn’t even given him a chance to show her that he wasn’t just another cowboy who’d break her heart.
She realized her mistake almost at once.
Those were definitely not Dub’s boots behind her.
The man who’d come into the barn wasn’t Dub and now he was standing so close behind her that she felt she couldn’t breathe because she knew who it was.
She could hear him breathing hard, smell something sour on his breath, feel his dislike radiating off his body.
Clancy picked up the handiest tool and turned around in the tight space between the stall wall and Tanner Crawford.
“What is it with you and my brother?” Tanner demanded, having cornered her. He towered over her, scaring her a little even as she told herself that he was only trying to intimidate her.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
His eyes narrowed, his gaze shifting from her face to the hammer in her hand. Dub had been working on the stall door earlier and had left it lying there. “What are you planning to do with that?”
She didn’t answer since they both knew that he hadn’t given her enough room to swing a hammer. Still, she held it between them and met his dark gaze. While Dub’s eyes were a high lake-green pool, Tanner’s were dark like a bottomless sea, expressionless and cold.
“You’ve put some kind of spell on my brother.
I saw it when you were working down at the convenience store.
He got all goggle-eyed when he saw you behind the counter.
I could tell he was taken with you, but I never expected you to take it this far by showing up here.
” She started to object that her being here was a fluke.
There was no way she could have planned it, but he cut her off.
“You might have fooled my old man, but you aren’t fooling me. You’re not reeling my brother in like some big fish you’ve set your sights on. You’re not the first woman who wanted to marry our ranch and you won’t be the last. I won’t let you trap him.”
Clancy wanted to laugh. He was so wrong about so much. “I don’t want to marry your ranch.”
“Right. Going to tell me you don’t want my brother either?”
She started to answer that when she realized Dub had come into the barn and had stopped only a few yards behind Tanner as if anxious to hear her answer.
Neither of them had heard him come in. She wanted to blurt out that she was leaving as soon as the bridge was fixed and she wouldn’t be looking back.
But when her gaze met Dub’s even for a second, the words stuck in her throat.
She wasn’t after a ranch, nor did she plan to end up here.
But here she was thrown together with this cowboy who had made her want to throw caution to the wind.
Dub promised a wild ride, and it was damned tempting to saddle up.
“There a problem, Tanner?” Dub said.
His brother started, surprised to find his brother standing just feet behind him. Tanner turned slowly, pushing away from the stall where he’d had her cornered, and walked away from her. She took a breath, no longer feeling suffocated by his presence and equally relieved that Dub was here.
“You know the problem,” his brother said as he pushed past Dub and stormed toward the open barn door.
Her chest hurt as she felt her heart thunder against her ribs. She looked at Dub and saw fury in his expression. At her? Or his brother? Or both of them?
Now that Tanner was gone, she knew she should have been more frightened while he was threatening her. The man was intense, but what she’d seen in his eyes was hatred. Tanner had a problem with his brother, and he wanted to take it out on her.
“Are you all right?” Dub asked, his expression softening as he stepped to her and gently removed the hammer from her hand. She’d forgotten that she was holding it. He put it back on the edge of the stall.
“I don’t want your ranch,” she said.
He turned to look at her and tilted his head. “Why not?”
She gave him a please-be-serious look. “He thinks I’m trying to trap you.” She watched Dub take off his cowboy hat and scratch his neck with his free hand before putting it back on.
When his gaze met hers again, she felt that familiar stirring inside her. “You know what bothers me? You’re more afraid of me than my brother, who you probably should fear.”
“I’m not afraid of you,” she blurted out, making him grin.
“I beg to differ.” He leaned toward her, stepping into the space Tanner had deserted, but the sensations she felt now were nothing like the ones she’d felt when his brother had stood near her.
She froze, her eyes widening as he leaned even closer. Her gaze shifted from his eyes to his mouth and quickly back. He must have seen what she was thinking, because his grin widened, dimples deep. And she felt again that now-familiar ache for this man.
His green eyes widened a little as if he took her retreat as a sign that he was right about the nature of her fear and he was about to prove it.
She’d never been so terrified of a kiss and what it was about to prove.
She feared she wouldn’t be able to keep lying to herself about her reaction to this cowboy, and from his look he knew it.
He shifted ever so slightly on his boots.
She felt the temperature change in the stall and fought the urge to fan herself or, worse, strip out of the heavy barn jacket he’d given her to wear.
He leaned closer, somehow giving her space and yet closing the distance between them until his lips were a breath away from hers.
She couldn’t have moved even if she wanted to. That alone scared her. She wanted this, had wanted this maybe from the first time he’d flashed her that dimpled grin, maybe even before he’d pushed through the convenience store doors and those eyes had fallen on her, taking away her breath.
Clancy knew he moved because she felt his lips on hers, but she didn’t see him move.
She felt it, though, just like she did the moment his mouth brushed hers.
She felt the sigh rise in her, escaping on a ragged breath as he slowly kissed her.
Her body reacted against her will, drew closer as she leaned into him and the kiss.
Her arms ached to encircle his neck to pull him even closer, but before she could, he was drawing back, breaking the feel of his lips on hers.
She blinked, caught off guard since she was just starting to lose herself in the kiss, in this cowboy. She wanted to grab him by his jacket collar and drag him back—until she saw his grin.
When he spoke, his voice was a low whisper that sent a tingle of a thrill through her. “Still afraid?”
Terrified. But she straightened, ready to deny everything, especially that the kiss had shaken her to her core just as she’d feared it would.
“My brother has it wrong,” Dub said. “I’m the one trying to lasso you—not the other way around.” He met her gaze. “How am I doing so far?”
She opened her mouth. She might have lied. She might have blurted out the truth. But she didn’t get a chance for either as Dub turned at the sound of a truck roaring in their direction.
“Hold that thought,” he said. “I better see what this is about.” But as he started to turn away, he stopped to glance back. “Just for the record, I’m not finished.”
His words made her grab the stall wall for support, as did the look he gave her. What both promised had her weak with desire. Dub had asked if she was in trouble. Well, she was now, she thought as she touched the tip of her tongue to her upper lip.
* * *
AS DUB CAME out of the corral past the barn, he saw that Tanner was on his phone. Where had he gone to come roaring back so quickly? Had something happened to their father down at the washed-out bridge?
He walked over to the truck as Tanner finished his call. The look his brother gave him was all fury. Nothing new there. Dub took a step back as the truck door was flung open. Tanner stepped out, looking ready for a fight.
“What’s going on?” Dub asked, worried. “Where’s Dad? Is he all right?”
“Dad’s fine. Still down working on a temporary bridge.
” The words came out hard as stones. His brother shook his head as if trying to get control of his temper.
“The old man’s really done it this time.
He’s working so hard on that damned bridge because of her.
” He moved his head to indicate the barn.
“The two of you are so easily charmed by a pretty face.” He snorted in distaste.
“Wait until the old man hears the truth about what he brought home, the woman you are so infatuated with that you’re blind to what she’s doing to this family. ”
“What are you talking about?” Dub demanded.
“Your…girlfriend…the one you were making out with over in the barn?” His brother didn’t give him time to deny it or anything else. “She’s wanted for murder.”
“What?” Dub hoped he’d heard wrong or that Tanner was mistaken.
“I just spoke to my friend Mike, the highway patrolman. There’s a BOLO out on Clancy Roberts, your little friend who worked at the convenience store.
That’s right, she had an argument with some old lady at the rest home and threatened her over some money she owed her, and the woman ended up dead and Clancy on the run. ”
“That doesn’t mean she killed her.”
His brother made a disgusted sound. “Her car was found beside the road not ten miles out of Grass Range. All her belongings were in it. She apparently left work at the convenience store as soon as she heard the sheriff was on his way. Cleared out all her stuff from the trailer she rented behind the place and lit out. I couldn’t understand why she’d hitchhike south rather than going back to Grass Range when that made the most sense. I guess we know now, don’t we?”
We know she was afraid, Dub thought, but he was smart enough not to say it. “You’re just angry that Dad being Dad stopped and gave her a ride.”
“He didn’t just give her a ride, he brought her here to my ranch,” Tanner snapped. “He brought a killer home.”
“You don’t believe she’s a killer any more than I do.”
His brother lifted an eyebrow. “You want to bet our lives on that?”
Dub hadn’t miss the “my” ranch. Tanner had always thought, being the eldest son, that he would get the ranch. When Dub had gone away to college after high school, he’d been delighted. He’d been upset when Dub came back after graduating, telling him that he and Dad didn’t need him.
“I’m telling Dad. Mike already knows she’s here. Won’t be long and they’ll be coming to take her away.”
Dub wanted to wipe Tanner’s smug look off with his fist, but he knew his brother was looking for a knock-down, drag-out fight right now. He wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. He had hoped their days of wrestling in the dirt were over.
“You’re overreacting,” he said with a shake of his head. “I want to at least hear her side of the story.” Hadn’t Dub known she was running from something? He’d just never imagined it was this serious.
“Like I would trust anything she has to say,” Tanner snapped. “Dad needs to hear about this.” Tanner started to walk back toward the truck, but Dub grabbed his brother’s arm.
“Hold on a minute. Let me talk to her first.”
His brother shook him off. “Talk to her? You stay clear of her. Dad needs to know and so does the sheriff before it’s too late. You have no idea how dangerous that woman could be.”