Chapter 1 #3
Dammit, I’m reacting exactly as what she’s accused me of being, a rough-and-ready cowhand in a homestead where I don’t belong.
Hell, she probably thinks I’m the ranch owner’s lover, looking like I do, just hopped fresh out of his shower.
The thought brings a smile to my lips. It takes me too long to answer her, and by the time I’ve pulled myself together, we’ve both forgotten the question.
“Cord! Lanie!” Sally’s voice rings throughout the homestead as she thunders along the hallway toward us. “I got the door open on my own!”
“That’s a relief.” I smile but keep my eyes on the woman—Lanie—the entire time. Hell, it’s not like I can look anywhere else right now. I haven’t reacted to a woman in a long time, and never like this.
Get your shit together, cowboy.
Sally launches herself into the air and Lanie holds her arms out as Sally leaps at her and clings on around her neck. “Sweetie, you’re far too big to do that.”
“I know, but I love you.”
“I love you, too, lupa.”
I watch them cuddle, and something in my chest pulls tight at the nickname. Wolf. “Lupa? Like the wolf who mothered Romulus and Remus?”
Good to know that classical education finally came in handy.
A slow smile spreads across Lanie’s face as she clutches Sally, her eyes sparkling, a brilliant sapphire. “The same. Someone knows their history.”
“Or myths and legends, at least.” I grin back. “Cordell Rand. Cord.” I offer her a hand, more than a little stunned at the instantaneous way this woman breaks down my barriers when I usually go by my surname alone.
“Oh.” She hesitates, a sunset pink staining her cheeks.
I try not to take too much perverse pleasure in that simple sound and the apology that doesn’t follow.
“Lanie Parker.” Her grip is firm as she takes my hand, juggling Sally on her hip, but a softness in her touch leaves me aching to check if she feels that way all over.
Rein your shit in, Rand.
Sally bats at her. “Lanie knows all about wolfs.”
“Wolves,” we both correct her together.
I snort, releasing Lanie’s hand, and shove mine into my pockets before my teenage-level hormones rage past the realm of inappropriate and get me into more trouble. “She does, huh?”
“Lanie’s a wolf biologist. She lives with us.” Sally beams while Lanie shushes her. A deeper flush creeps up her neck.
“Is that a real job?” The words escape before I can stop them. Both girls glare at me, their outraged expressions identical. “Uh—”
I survived eight seconds on the meanest bulls in the circuit.
I built a finance and logistics empire from dirt and sweat.
I constructed this entire homestead with my own scarred hands.
But this red-haired wolf girl in tight jeans and a cocoon phase T-shirt has just knocked me flat in my own hallway, and I have absolutely no idea how to haul my ass back up.
“Yes, it’s a real job,” Lanie snaps, her eyes blazing. She turns her attention to Sally and forces a smile across tight lips. “Are you ready to go? Why don’t you grab your things?”
Sally leaps out of Lanie’s hold and tears back through the house.
I open my mouth to yell about not running, but I’ve already gotten off on the wrong foot with Winnie’s friend. I cast about for something to rectify my mistake.
“I’m sorry. Do you want to come in while Sally packs? I wasn’t expecting my sister until after dinner.” I hold the screen door wider, gesturing for Lanie to head inside.
Her lips roll inward as she takes a tentative step across the threshold.
An azure-bright glance brushes over me like a physical touch, lingering on my bare chest and the scars visible there.
It isn’t as invasive as I would’ve expected, and I return the favor, my gaze heating as it sweeps over her perfectly proportioned curves.
I let the door shut behind her and fist my hands in my pockets, giving myself that pep talk I needed a solid ten minutes ago.
“Thanks,” she murmurs, pausing a hand’s breadth away.
Her sweet breath grazes my chest, Big Sky eyes glancing up and lancing straight through me.
Every insecurity, every judgment I’ve hidden away from, all the reasons I built Coyote Falls in the first place—it’s all laid bare with her right in front of me.
This woman strips everything away in an instant.
While I’m struggling to take my next breath, Lanie steps past me, apparently unaffected. My lungs play ball finally and I inhale her cinnamon-and-sugar scent. Like Christmas fucking morning. Hell, I’m in trouble.
If I can’t pull myself together in my own home, I have no chance of being able to deal with the public in a few weeks. The hermit I’ve become rebels at the thought of leaving my home. My shoulders tighten, and the twinge I forgot flares again.
“Sally’ll be out in a minute. I’ll get a shirt. Kitchen’s that way.” I point past her shoulder in the right direction.
Her eyes are indecipherable as she shoots me a look over her shoulder before she heads along the hall. I watch her walk away and then turn toward my bedroom. Dragging my sorry ass away from her is the hardest thing I’ve done in a decade.
One clean shirt later, I return to locate Lanie before she gets lost in the empty wing. She’s wandered as far as the guest end of the house, studying the paintings that line the walls.
“Are all these yours?” she asks, flicking her gaze my way before I lose her attention to a vista of the unforgiving watercolor of razorbacks that frame the house, albeit depicted in a grayer mood than they are today. A faint smile graces her lips. “Nice shirt.”
I thumb my empty belt loops, resisting the urge to catch her fingers in mine. “Ha. No, I thought they might suit the house when I built it.”
Curiosity lights her face as she angles her body toward mine. “You built the house? The whole thing?”
“I had help. My foreman. A good friend. A few ranch hands pitched in. Some even stayed.”
“You built… all of this?” she repeats, waving her hands to encompass the homestead and the ranch around it.
I grin, imagining that this is how she must feel when someone questions her career choices like I did earlier.
Does that make us even, wolf girl?
“It took nearly two years to complete the whole thing. We had some bad weather, a few… minor setbacks. Eventually, we got it done.”
“It’s amazing,” she whispers, turning down another hall, and then glances back at me. “You’ve put so much life into it.”
I swallow at the blatant admiration in her eyes that shouldn’t be aimed my way. Not fucking ever.
“I’m ready.” Sally appears at my side.
“You’re such a little phantom.” I ruffle her hair, and my chest pangs at the thought of the house emptying out again so fast.
“It’s a talent.” Lanie grimaces.
I laugh, shoving away the emotions that don’t belong to this moment, and hoist the bags Sally has brought out with her, following her down the hallway.
She leads the way to Lanie’s car, climbing into the back seat and grabbing a multicolored crocheted blanket to snuggle into while I stow her things in the back.
“Thanks for looking after her.” Lanie stands beside the car, fidgeting with a single key I know is my sister’s spare on a keyring that has nothing else on it, the distance not enough to wane the heat that builds between us. This is not a one-way street. Who the hell are you, Lanie Parker?
“My pleasure. She’s here most weekends.”
“I know. You take the place of the father who abandoned her,” Lanie says, her gaze direct. A muscle works in my jaw. Her eyes flare wide, and she covers her mouth with her hand. Tiny scars decorate the backs of her knuckles.
I wince and pray Sally can’t hear our conversation. “That asshole doesn’t deserve much of a mention here.” Turning my back to the car, I lean on the door, folding my arms across my chest, watching her carefully.
“Sorry.” Lanie glances into the car, biting her lip. “Did she hear—”
I shake my head. “I don’t think so. You’re living with them, then?” Winnie hasn’t mentioned a roommate. Not that her life choices have anything to do with me. Until right now.
The flush in Lanie’s cheeks returns. “Just for a bit. It’s new. I’m a temporary fixture between research trips. I’m putting together all the data I got from my last trip to Alaska. I use a research outpost the university funds on occasion. Sometimes it’s manned, often not. I get a lot done.”
“I’d love to hear more about it.” I straighten as the words slip out.
I never socialize, except once a year at the upcoming Valiant Peak Invitational. The annual event is sufficient to fulfill my needs. But Lanie unearths a curiosity in me I thought so long buried it’d never see another sunrise.
Lanie smooths the front of her shirt, flicking my sister’s spare key between her fingers. Her eyes dart side to side, following the glinting motion. Is she avoiding my gaze? “I should go, get Sally back in time for dinner.”
The dinner my niece was supposed to share with me. We both know they won’t get back before dark, not even if she leaves right now. Stay. I open my mouth to offer a meal, my home, but then close it again. If she wants to stay, she’ll say so. I swallow hard. “Of course.”
Lanie gets into her car, closing the door with a gentle click.
I lean down to find Sally through the rear window. “Bye, chicken. Tell your mom not to work too hard.”
“She’ll never give up her job, Cord.” Sally peers out at me, the epitome of Winnie’s sass and stubbornness in a blink. My heart squeezes at the family resemblance.
I laugh. “Yeah, I know. But I’ll keep trying.” I tap the door with my knuckles. I love my sister for wanting to serve, but at the same time it kills me that she insists on driving herself into the ground when I could give her a life with her daughter.
Lanie rolls down her window and gives a little wave.
I wave back. “Nice to meet you, Lanie.”
“You too, Cord.” Her voice fades under the tinny rumble of the engine, but her eyes say everything when her brilliant opaline gaze lances straight through me. I back away as her car trundles along the drive, my mind whirling with ways to get her back to Coyote Falls before she’s left the property.
This won’t be her last trip here if I have anything to do with it.
Heavy footfalls approach, the sort intended to be heard, while I’m still standing in the driveway like a fool.
“You good, man?” West says, coming to stand beside me.
“Fine.”
“You know Winnie’s gonna try to set you two up.”
Dust begin to settle on the driveway. “Yeah.”
“You gonna let her?”
The smart answer is no. I built Coyote Falls to keep the world out. To hide from crowds and cameras and people who begged for pieces of me I didn’t have left to give. But Lanie Parker looks at me like I’m whole.
“She’s a wolf biologist,” I say.
West barks out a laugh. “That’s not an answer.”
It isn’t. But it’s the only one I’ve got.
Because the woman who studies wild things, who spends months alone in the Alaskan wilderness, who clearly wants nothing to do with roots or ranches or damaged ex–rodeo stars—she’s all I can think about.
And that terrifies me more than any bull ever has.