Jesse
I’d woken up swinging.
Not literally, but close enough that my heart was already pounding before my eyes were fully open. Confusion hit first. Then, the sharp jolt of Lucas being in my space when he had no business being there.
Fuck.
I dragged a hand down my face, grit catching under my fingers.
There was still dirt there. I hadn’t bothered scrubbing it all off when I’d finally crashed, and it showed.
I felt it immediately, the embarrassment flaring hot and ugly in my gut.
This wasn’t how I wanted to be seen. Half naked, half asleep, and laid out like I’d given up.
I’d barely slept for two hours.
Miguel had called me out just after three, voice tight and apologetic even as he told me the good news. Two cows dropping. Not one. Two. Healthy calves, both of them. It was good for the ranch, damn good for the bottom line, especially after the winter we were having.
It was also hell on sleep, and by the time I got back to the house, my bones felt packed with sand.
Lucas had no right to ask me why I’d made my bedroom in the family room.
I’d been sleeping on the sofa since the place became mine, hadn’t wanted Walter’s room that still smelled of old soap and cold air, untouched and waiting like some kind of shrine.
I didn’t want to sleep in his space. I didn’t want the weight of it pressing down on me in the dark, and I didn’t want either of the spare rooms, which were empty of everything but iron bed frames or boxes.
I still didn’t feel as if any of this was mine, and the family room was easier and neutral.
Last night, I’d dropped onto the old, comfortable sofa, dragged my quilt over myself, and let exhaustion win.
And then, I’d woken to a stranger pulling back the curtains as if he owned the place.
My space. The only part of the house that I felt as if I could breathe in.
And there he was, coffee dripping down his chest, pink sweatshirt, wide eyes.
Lucas Barrett.
I grabbed my clean clothes and headed up to the bathroom before I could think too hard about any of it.
The door swung open, and I stopped short.
Citrus.
The whole room smelled like it, sharp and clean and very much not mine.
The mirror was still fogged at the edges, the air damp with recent heat.
A towel hung neatly on the rail, not one of mine, folded with care instead of flung there and forgotten.
The shelf above the sink was lined with bottles and jars, more than I’d ever owned in my life.
Fancy lotions. Potions. Labels promising control and balance and things I’d never once considered needing.
Lucas had been in here. Had made himself at home. Hence his damp curls.
Pretty curls.
I swallowed irritation and stepped inside anyway, stripped fast, and grabbed my own soap from the bottom of my bag.
Plain. Unscented. Familiar. I turned the water as hot as it would go and stood under it, scrubbing hard, attempting to wash off the night, the lack of sleep, and the sight of the cute intruder standing in my space with coffee in his hand as if he belonged there.
I stared at myself in the mirror and considered shaving.
Nah. The bags under my eyes were dark enough to have their own shadows, and no blade in the world was going to fix that.
I poked at my face, tired and rough and unmistakably worn down, and my gaze drifted to the neat row of bottles on the shelf.
I wondered, briefly and against my better judgment, if any of them held the secret to functioning on two hours of sleep.
“Probably expensive enough,” I muttered, then dressed and headed downstairs.
Lucas was already at the table, nursing a mug of coffee. My cereal was out. My bowl half-full, soggy spoonfuls abandoned as if he’d lost interest halfway through. Irritation flared.
“That’s my fucking stuff, get your own shit,” I snapped, moving past him to make more coffee, the words rough with sleep and resentment.
“Isn’t it three-quarters mine?” he said mildly.
I whirled to face him, ready to bite his head off, muscles already coiling for a fight.
But he wasn’t posturing. He wasn’t even looking at me properly.
He scrubbed at his mouth with his thumb, half smiling as if he hadn’t meant to correct me out loud, gaze dropping to the table, then flicking back up again.
It threw me.
What was he doing? Was that flirting? Was that some new shit he was trying to pull?
I tried to stay angry, but it stalled, replaced by a jolt of confusion and an unwelcome awareness sending all my blood south. Was he—fuck—was he doing something on purpose, or was that just how he was? Casual. Self-assured. Pretty in a way that had no business landing right now.
I scowled harder because that was safer than thinking about it.
“Anyway,” he added, “it’s out-of-date. Stale.”
“I don’t eat here,” I said and pointed out of the window. “I eat at the staff building. Kitchen, employees’ dining hall, offices.” Stop talking, idiot.
He looked thoughtful. “Can I get an omelet there? Y’know, egg whites? Whisked.”
“I know what a fucking omelet is, and we have eggs,” I blurted. Jesus Christ. We have fucking eggs.
He stood as if he’d already made a decision. “Okay then. I’ll get my coat, and you can show me,” he said and wandered out to the hall as if this was settled.
What the hell?
I stared after him, coffee mug clenched in my hand, irritation flaring hot and sharp. I wasn’t taking him to breakfast like some guest on a fucking ranch holiday. He wasn’t a guest. He was a problem. He was here to carve this place up with paperwork and good intentions and call it progress.
He was here to destroy everything.
“Out the front. Turn left,” I snapped.
“Huh?” He sounded confused. “You’re not coming with me?”
“No.”
He glanced at me, doubtful, then at the snow piling up outside. I waited for him to argue. But instead, I saw something shift.
His chin lifted. His mouth set. Stubborn focus slid into place like a switch being flipped. He tugged on boots that were too clean, too city, all leather and no give, then pulled on his coat and hat, winding a scarf around his neck.
“Fuck you, asshole,” he muttered. “I can do this shit on my own.”
I told myself I was watching him walk outside to underscore his leaving the house. I wasn’t checking to see if he was okay. Nope.
I topped up my coffee, stared into the mug, then drifted to the window anyway.
Outside, the snow was thick and bright. Lucas stepped into it and immediately sank deeper than he’d expected, swore silently, windmilled once, and kept going.
A few steps later, the snow gave way under him completely, and he disappeared into a bank of white. A heartbeat passed. Then another.
He surfaced, scrambling—snow caking his coat and down his collar—and hauled himself back onto his feet.
Halfway across the yard, he stopped, turned, and looked straight back at the house. At the window. At me.
He flipped me off.
Then, he turned and trudged left, limping a little, shoulders squared, heading for the dining hall as best he could manage.
I stood there longer than I should have, coffee cooling in my hand.
Then, it hit me.
What the fuck was I doing standing here when breakfast was over there?
I made it to the bunkhouse a minute or two after him, stamping snow off my boots and shoving the door open with my shoulder. Heat hit first, then noise. The place smelled like coffee, grease, and bacon.
“Morning,” Ruth called out without looking up.
She ran the bunkhouse kitchen and about a dozen other things besides.
Cooking, supplies, laundry when someone screwed it up bad enough, and was half the emotional glue that kept this place from flying apart.
She’d been here thirty years now. Long enough to have raised her kids in a small house on the edge of the ranch, long enough to have watched them grow up and leave.
She didn’t take shit from anyone, including me.
Especially not me. She mattered to this place, and she mattered to me.
She had a spatula in one hand and a clipboard on the counter, hair scraped back, sleeves rolled, already irritated with the world.
Miguel was the only other hand in here, sitting at the far end of the room, not at all looking as if he’d been awake all night—I wish I had half his youthful energy. He gave me a nod and went back to his plate.
Lucas sat at a table on the far left, nursing another coffee.
A plate in front of him with scrambled eggs that were the closest thing to an omelet Ruth was ever going to produce for the man who threatened her home, because yeah, when the first letter arrived and it was obvious our new majority owner wanted to sell, I told her and Jake; then, Ruth’s grief at losing Walter had turned to anger that his grandson wanted to destroy his legacy.
She glanced at me, then fixed Lucas with a long, unimpressed look that could curdle milk, before flicking her eyes back to me in a way that made it very clear exactly whose side she was on. He looked out-of-place and stubborn at the same time; curls still damp at the edges.
I took it all in and felt my jaw tighten.
Of course, he’d made himself comfortable. Sitting there as if he belonged. I bet he didn’t care that no one wanted him here. Probably never even crossed his mind.
“What did you do to his eggs?” I asked quietly.
She raised an eyebrow. “Everyone likes salt, right?”
I took my plate—bacon, eggs cooked perfectly as per usual with Ruth’s skills—and headed for the table where Miguel was parked. “You okay?” I asked.
He nodded. “Yeah. All good. Tired,” he added, mouth quirking as he shoveled food in, “but the second calf’s a fighter.
Loud already. Big lungs,” he added, a note of pride slipping in.
“Both calves up and nursing inside an hour. Jake’s doing me a solid and keeping an eye on the second cow just in case she throws a fever or won’t settle.
” Jake was our horse guy, but he pinch-hit for us when it was calf season. “I’m back out there in ten.”
“Good.” I ate a mouthful, then nodded toward the door. “Jake been pushing it?”
Miguel snorted. “Always. Says he’ll rest when the horses are done and not before.”
“Tell him to sit his ass down anyway,” I said. “I’ll cover if he won’t.”
“He won’t,” Miguel said, but there was a flicker of appreciation there. “I’ll make him drink some water at least.”
“Do that,” I said. “And if that second cow so much as looks sideways, you call me.”
Miguel tied back his loose hair and smiled. “Yes, boss.”
Then he left with a lazy wave, and I was alone again, the sound of Lucas retching somewhere behind me catching my attention.
I had a dozen things queued up in my head, and an ugly, smug flicker of satisfaction that he was uncomfortable.
That didn’t last. Guilt crept in just as fast. Ruth shot me a look and a smirk, and for a second, I almost smiled back, like making him sick might be enough to drive him off.
But I knew better. This wasn’t a short-term standoff where we pushed until he packed up and left. He was supposed to be here six months, and deep down I knew for sure that he was stubborn enough to see every one of them through.
Fuck.