Chapter 2
Chapter Two
CORD
"Jace, get them out of the damn way!" I cup my hands around my mouth to yell to the ranch-hand currently herding half a dozen yearlings in aimless circles right through the middle of the crowd pen instead of moving them into the race for sorting and loading.
He's a demon on the back of a horse, but the boy doesn't have a lick of sense.
Unless I tell him exactly what to do, he's as lost as a day-old kitten.
"Yes, sir," he shouts back.
I watch for a moment to make sure he's obeying orders and then glance out into the primary pasture, scanning for Hamburger. The fucking bull keeps escaping. If he wasn't so ornery, I'd have given up on bringing him back long ago and let him have his freedom. But he's an asshole.
The last thing I need is for the old bastard to trample some tourist. He'd do it out of pure spite.
As far as he's concerned, this mountain is his and we just live on it.
I keep threatening to send him to the butcher, but I think he knows it's an idle threat.
He's too fucking valuable a stud to turn into beef.
It's tempting though. Especially since I spend half my time looking for his cranky ass.
Luckily, my younger brother, Cam, is chasing after him again today, freeing me up to deal with things here. Lord knows, on a ranch this size, there's enough work to go around, especially with the winter calving season beginning. I haven't gotten nearly enough done lately.
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why.
A certain curvy romance author has me by the balls and won't let go.
Cassia Murphy is the prettiest little thing I've ever seen.
The second I saw her photo staring up at me from the back of the book Cleary left on my coffee table, I was hooked.
Those brown doe eyes and that sweet, cheeky smile are Kryptonite for a man like me.
I haven't had soft in decades. Sweet either, for that matter. That smile promised both.
I started reading that damn book right then and there.
Spent all fucking night reading every word, curious to know what a sweet little thing like her looks for in a man.
Imagine my surprise when every word pissed me off.
She's talented beyond measure. The way she paints a picture with her words is a thing of beauty.
But the more I read, the more I realized I didn't want her writing about some other man.
I wanted her writing about me. I wanted her thinking about me.
I want her, period.
I shouldn't have fired off that first email, but I knew it'd get her attention.
She's a fucking goddess. Men probably line up to compete for a moment of her time.
I doubt many complain her heroes aren't alpha enough.
I cut to the front of the line, gave her a reason to remember me.
Of course insulting her cowboys riled her up.
She's feisty and gives as good as she gets.
I've been stalking her social media like a goddamn creep ever since.
Cleary refuses to loan me another book. She's suspicious.
I won't tell her why I'm reading them. She thinks I've lost my mind.
Hell, I may have. I email Cassia every fucking day, just because I can't resist. I want her thinking about me.
When she sits down to write, I want it to be my name on her mind, my emails running through her head.
I'm ready to fly to Seattle to spank her pretty little ass for ignoring me.
But even I know that's taking it a step too far.
Cam and Cleary will kill me if I end up in a jail cell for stalking and they have to run this place.
The ranch has been in our family for generations, but neither of them has much interest in it.
Cleary is happiest with her books and crime statistics, and since Cam came home from overseas, all he wants is his cabin up the mountain and a sturdy piece of wood beneath his hands.
That's all right with me. I find peace here, a little bit of quiet in the chaos.
This place is home to me, but that doesn't mean it has to be home for them.
All I want for my siblings is happiness.
Life is too fucking short to spend it miserable.
Losing our parents in a car accident fifteen years ago taught me that.
With Cam already in the service, taking care of Cleary fell to me.
I went from being a twenty-six-year-old kid to raising a ten-year-old little girl overnight.
When Cam got hurt a few years later, we almost lost him too.
It made me realize what's important in life and what isn't. So long as my brother and sister are safe and happy, I'm happy.
My phone rings, vibrating against my leg.
"Jace, keep 'em moving," I shout to Jace, and then fish my cell from my pocket.
"Found your goddamn bull again," Cam growls into the phone.
"Hello to you too," I mutter to my younger brother, smirking.
Cam never changes. He's a grumpy motherfucker morning, noon, and night.
All that time alone on the mountain killed his people skills.
Not that he had many to begin with. He was a sniper with the Rangers.
He had to distance himself from people for self-preservation.
"The fence isn't broken. He's breaking it," he says, ignoring my greeting. "The bastard figured out how to use his horns to pull loose wire down around the posts. I watched him do it. We're going to have to ride the whole fucking fence-line to reinforce it."
"Motherfucker," I growl, tipping my head back to stare up at the sky. The weather is calling for another storm sometime tomorrow. We don't have time to ride miles of fence right now. It'll take days for us to check it all. "How the fuck did he learn to do that?"
"Don't know," Cam says and then snorts. "You would have the one bull on the planet trying to prison break his way out of a lifetime supply of pussy."
He's not wrong. I don't think that's the problem though. Hamburger has no problem breeding every heifer he comes across. He just thinks fences don't apply to him.
"You need to chip him," Cam says. "It'd save me a lot of time."
"Are you saying you have shit to do?" We both know he doesn't. Aside from chasing after Hamburger, building his custom furniture, and showing up to weekly family dinners here, Cam doesn't leave his cabin.
He hasn't been the same since he came home.
I keep hoping he'll rejoin the land of the living one of these days, but I've been waiting for years for something to drag him out of his hole, and it hasn't happened yet.
I wish like hell it would. I miss the hell out of him. Cleary does too. We've got time though. We'll wait as long as we have to wait for him to work through what happened over there…and the bullshit that happened when he came home. Time heals all wounds. Some just take a little longer than others.
"I'm saying I'm tired of chasing down your bull," he growls. "I found him staring down two tourists on the main road yesterday. Today, he was halfway to town."
Shit.
"I'll get him chipped," I sigh, knowing it's inevitable.
The big bastard might be a pain in my ass, but I don't want him getting run over.
I actually like him, not that I'll ever admit that out loud.
And he makes me a ton of money. He's a fertile son of a gun, and he doesn't mind sharing space with the younger bulls.
Plus, his genetics are a thing of beauty.
"I'll start riding the fence," Cam grumbles. "You owe me."
"The usual?"
"Yep. Apple pie on Wednesday morning."
I chuckle, shaking my head when he disconnects. He may be a surly motherfucker, but at least he's easy to figure out. Give him pie and a good piece of wood, and he's content. Now, if I could just figure out what it'd take to get a certain curvy romance author out of Seattle and onto my ranch….
* * *
"Cassia," I groan as thick ropes of cum shoot from the end of my cock.
They land against the floor of the shower before the water washes them down the drain.
I grit my teeth, working myself through it.
My heart pounds, my mind full of visions of the sassy little author.
She's on her knees in front of me, head tipped back, tits out, teeth sunk into her plump bottom lip… .
If I get sent to hell for jerking off to fantasies of her, I'll go with a jig in my step and a smile on my face.
She's the only thing that's gotten my dick hard in years.
I'm not saying I'm a choir boy, because I'm not.
But I haven't been with a woman since my parents died.
Didn't think Ma would appreciate me bringing a string of women around my little sister.
I didn't want her growing up thinking that shit was normal, either.
Our parents were madly in love. I wanted that to be her model of a healthy relationship, not what passes for one in the bunkhouse.
I never spent much time thinking about love and marriage for myself until six weeks ago.
Between running this place, worrying about Cam, and raising Cleary, I didn't have time for a woman.
Now, I can't seem to get one particular woman off my fucking mind.
It doesn't make a damn bit of sense either.
I've never even been in the same room as Cassia Murphy, yet I'm already half convinced she's the woman for me.
Problematic since she lives in Seattle and my life is on a ranch in Lake Tahoe.
Last I heard, kidnapping was still illegal in all fifty states.
Ask me if that's stopped me from thinking about showing up on her doorstep, tossing her over my shoulder, and carrying her off to breed her like some caveman. Spoiler alert: it hasn't.
I groan and release my cock, breathing hard.
I stand beneath the spray of the shower for a long moment, trying to get my head on straight.
It's no use. My thoughts bounce around like ping pong balls, every damn one shooting off on some new tangent involving Cassia.
Eventually, I give up and scrub up before turning the shower off and climbing out.
Midway through drying off, my cell rings.
"Baby sister," I say, putting it on speaker.
"So…I may need bail money tonight," Cleary says by way of greeting.
"For what?" I growl, my brow furrowing. She works for the damn Sheriff. Brock better not arrest her, or he'll be removing my size sixteen from his ass. Cam's too.
"Remember that author you've been reading because you're being weird and having a midlife crisis or something? Her and some of my other favorite authors are in town, so I'm going to gatecrash their getaway tonight to say hi," Cleary says, talking ninety to nothing.
"I'm forty-one," I mutter, and then the rest of what she said sinks in. I toss my towel toward the hamper and snatch my phone from the counter. "Cassia Murphy is here? In Lake Tahoe?"
"Forty-one is old enough for a midlife crisis," my sister says, a smile in her voice.
"I'm not old," I growl, though let's be honest. After sorting and loading cattle all day, I feel every one of those forty-one years. "Answer my question."
"You're beginning to sound like Cam," she complains. "Maybe you both need to get out more. You're both turning into grumps."
"Cleary."
"What?" she cries.
"What author is here, baby sister?"
"Oh, a bunch of them. Zoey Hart, Mina Chance, Clover Thompson, Paige Turner, Cassia Murphy, and Emerald Lee," she says, rattling them off. "They're staying at Big Bear for the week. Isn't it exciting?"
Cassia is here. Why didn't she say anything? I want to hope she's here because of my emails, but I'm guessing the fact that she didn't clue me that she's in town isn't good news for me. She didn't want me to know.
Too bad for her. One way or another, she will be meeting me. I intend to see to it.
"Big Bear," I mutter, already making plans to make it happen. "Is that the place up near the main road?"
"Yep," Cleary says. "I'm going to see if they'll autograph my books tonight."
"How long are they staying?"
"A week, I think. Why?" My sister grows suspicious.
"Just trying to figure out how long I have to worry about you landing in jail," I lie, striding bare-assed naked into my bedroom.
"Only tonight," she says, sweet as pie. "I promise to go back to being boring again tomorrow. But I'm not passing up this chance to get their autographs. No one I like ever comes here."
"Behave," I warn her. "If Cam has to come down off the mountain to visit you in jail, he'll be pissed about it."
Cleary giggles. "Maybe I should get arrested. At least it'll get him off the mountain."
"Behave," I snort, yanking on a pair of boxers.
"Fine, but only because I planned to do that anyway," she says. "Love you, big brother."
"Love you too, baby sister."
The phone disconnects.
Huh. Looks like I won't have to kidnap my curvy little author after all.
She's already here. The fact that she didn't tell me doesn't sit well with me, but I intend to get to the bottom of it first thing in the morning.
If she's still worried that I'm a crazy man who spends all day locked in his mama's basement playing video games and knitting for kittens, she won't be for long.
I hope she's ready for me, because I'm not letting her leave until she knows exactly what it feels like to be loved hard by a real cowboy.