Rancher at Risk Read online

  “Good. Always nice to know something about the men you’re working with.” No reason he shouldn’t get along with those here. He’d always done just fine back home…until lately.

  “I mentioned the renovations.” Caleb gestured toward the bunkhouse. “The contractor’s not done yet with the addition. Things will be a mess over there for a while, but since we don’t have a full crew, that shouldn’t be a problem. I want you to bunk down here at the house, anyway.”

  Puzzled, Ryan said, “You and the family haven’t moved in yet?”

  “No. We’re keeping our rooms at the Whistlestop for now. My mother-in-law has plenty available.” His grimace told Ryan business hadn’t picked up for the family-owned inn. “Anyhow, the bunkhouse is low on the priority list. I’ve had the contractor’s men working on the cabins.”

  “Cabins?”

  “Yeah. Phase two.” Caleb eyed him for a long moment.

  From inside the barn, metal clanged against metal. A horse nickered. Tony’s soothing response reached them as a murmur, reminding him of the woman on Signal Street.

  Caleb gave him a wry smile. “We’re not up to speed yet, mostly because it took me a while to decide what I wanted to do with the property. I’ve finally figured it out. We’ll eventually get this place running as a working ranch. But along with that, I’m setting up a school for disadvantaged boys.”

  Ryan shoved his hands into his back pockets and forced himself not to break eye contact. Hell, not to break into a sweat. He knew enough about his boss’s history to understand his interest in folks who didn’t have much to call their own. But Caleb knew his history, too. “You never mentioned kids.”

  “I am now.”

  He sucked in a breath. This wasn’t part of their deal.

  As if they’d actually agreed on his reassignment.

  “We’ve got student applications coming in, and we’re in the process of hiring. Officially, we won’t open till August.”

  Four months from now. He would be long gone.

  The contractors had left a sawhorse just outside the barn door. He settled on it and crossed his arms over his chest.

  “I’ve brought in a project manager to handle the school setup,” Caleb added. “Meanwhile, I’ll be keeping a close eye on things.”

  Ryan frowned. Did he plan to keep an eagle eye on him, too? Or a squint-eyed gaze like the one the judge had given him earlier? And how many other surprises did the boss plan to throw at him? “I met a friend of yours on my way through town this morning.”

  He gave himself a mental kick for blurting the statement.

  Before he could get himself in deeper, a vehicle screeched to a halt in the front of the house.

  Caleb looked at his watch again and pushed himself upright. “Speaking of friends, here’s another one of mine you’ll get to meet. The new project manager.”

  Thankful for the reprieve, he walked across the yard, trying to get a handle on the same issues that had dogged him all year. Frustration over circumstances he had no ability to control. Overwhelming anger at unanswered questions.

  He shook his head. In the few hours since he’d set foot in Flagman’s Folly, he hadn’t done much of what he’d come here to prove—that he was back to his calm, rational, clearheaded self. Back to the self he was before the accident. Back to being a man his boss could trust.

  He wondered what kind of man Caleb would trust to manage a project as big as building a school. He turned the corner of the house and got his answer. Not a man after all.

  The third bad thing of his day had just arrived.

  He stared past Caleb at the woman he’d had the run-in with that morning.

  Chapter Three

  Would she never get away from the man?

  She just couldn’t shake him off. On Signal Street. In her thoughts. And now on the ranch. Just behind Caleb, the cowboy crossed the driveway toward her, striding with his thumbs hooked in his belt loops like some Old West villain wanting quick access to his guns. Well, if he wanted a shoot-out, she’d give him one. And if he thought that unblinking stare of his would send her packing, he’d have to think again.

  Caleb made introductions. She regained her focus barely in time to read the cowboy’s name from Caleb’s lips.

  “…Ryan Molloy.”

  She plastered her smile in place and nodded silently. No sense wasting the effort to speak to the man. She’d been there, done that earlier and had felt the consequences of it ever since.

  Unlike this morning, he seemed done with her, too.

  “We were just talking about you,” Caleb said.

  She stood straighter. “Were you?” Had he already learned what had happened on Signal Street? With Becky involved, of course, she’d had to tell Kayla. But had the darned cowboy already spread the news to her new boss?

  If Caleb did know, he chose not to mention it right then. “Ryan’s come down from the ranch in Montana. I was starting to fill him in on our plans.”

  And why did the cowboy need to know?

  Taking a deep breath, she forced another smile.

  “We’ve decided to call it a night,” Caleb said. “And before I forget to tell you—” he glanced at them both but kept his face turned toward her “—Tess and Roselynn already plan to set places for you at the Whistlestop for Sunday dinner. And Nate’s got a whole list of questions she’s saved for Lianne.” He looked at her. “Okay with you?”

  “That sounds perfect.” Half the truth, since the cowboy had been invited along, too. But she had loved Caleb’s new extended family the minute she’d met them at Kayla and Sam’s wedding more than a year ago. “I’m looking forward to seeing them again.”

  “Good. I’ll be back in the morning, then. Ryan, help Lianne with her gear when you bring yours in. Then you’ll both be set for the night.”

  The sudden blankness in the cowboy’s face alerted her. She could read lips with the best of them, but no one caught one-hundred percent of a conversation, even after years of practice. She had missed something. Something he didn’t like. What?

  She watched Caleb carefully as she said, “We’ll both be…”

  “Set for the night.” He laughed. “Maybe better said, for the duration. Ryan’s moving in, too.”

  Instantly, she made her face as blank as the cowboy’s. She’d had plenty of practice in that, too, and she couldn’t let Caleb see her dismay. But right now the last thing she wanted was to share space with anyone. Especially Ryan Molloy.

  “You okay with that?” Caleb asked. “If not, we can get you a room at the Whistlestop.”

  “No, I’m fine,” she blurted. As much as she liked his family, she needed time alone. She would have even less chance of that in a bed-and-breakfast inn than she would have had at Kayla’s. At least here she had only the cowboy around. She would stay far out of his way.

  “And you?” Caleb asked Ryan.

  “I don’t have a problem with it.”

  As far as she could tell, he’d spoken quietly—no exaggerated mouth movements, no strained muscles in his neck. Yet standing so close to him, she could swear she felt a tiny vibration rumble through her.

  Caleb nodded at her, and he and Ryan walked toward Caleb’s pickup truck.

  Eyes narrowed, she looked the cowboy over from his broad shoulders to tight-fitting jeans. When she realized she was staring, she hurried around the end of her Camry. The man was irritating and confrontational—and not worth her time.

  Everything inside the trunk had shifted during her trip, and it took a few moments to work some tangled straps free. Ryan reached forward to grab another bag. She nearly jumped out of her shoes. Even wearing her hearing aids, she couldn’t pick up footsteps. But people coming up from behind her never startled her. Her nerves must need time to regroup as much as she did.

  He gestured at the car. “Riding a little low to the ground, isn’t it?”

  “It’s packed.”

  He nodded. “Yeah, I can see that. You’ve got more in there than most folks ma
nage to cram into the back of a pickup. Looks like you brought everything you own.”

  “I did,” she snapped. Regret flooded her. Why hadn’t she kept quiet? He didn’t need to know anything about her personal life.

  Ryan reached for another bag.

  “I can do that,” she said quickly.

  He nodded. “I’ll start on the boxes in the car.”

  “That’s okay.” When he turned to open a rear door, ignoring her, she managed to hold her temper in check. Barely. Surely he knew he needed to face her when he spoke. “Caleb said you have your own things to unload.”

  He looked at her and shrugged. “Two duffel bags and an extra pair of boots.” One side of his mouth curved up. “From the looks of it, your stuff will take a lot longer to unload than mine. And I’m beat. I’d rather get this done before I run out of energy.”

  “I can handle this,” she said.

  “Hey, I recognize an order from the boss, even if you don’t. And I don’t slack off anytime, which means I’m sure not going to do it when he’s still here.”

  Heat flooded her face. She turned around to look down the length of the driveway. Sure enough, Caleb had just begun to back his truck onto the road in front of the house. His truck with the engine that was loud enough to make her aids vibrate.

  Wonderful. Earlier, she’d messed up reading Caleb’s words, and now she’d completely missed the clue that would have told her he hadn’t yet left.

  From tiredness, that was all. Tiredness after the long drive from Chicago. Excitement over the new job. Frustration over dealing with this darned cowboy again. And…

  …and fear.

  Normally, she could handle anything that came her way. But every once in a while when she thought of the scope of this project, a small part of her worried she’d gotten in over her head.

  She owed that to Mark, too.

  Forcing a smile, she waved goodbye to Caleb. Then she turned back to Ryan, moments too late. He had pulled a box from the backseat of the Camry, taken the bag from the trunk, and was already going up the front porch steps.

  The box he carried, filled with books and file folders, weighed a ton. Ryan cradled the cardboard box in one arm as though it weighed no more than the pillow she’d tossed on top of the bags in the passenger seat.

  She stared at his arms and shoulders, at bulging muscles probably honed through hard labor. Nothing at all like most of the men she knew in Chicago, who sculpted their bodies at the gym. None of those men would have ventured out in public dressed the way he was, either, in boots so old and cracked that the leather had worn to suede in spots and jeans so threadbare they’d turned white in places. The perfect specimen of a true-blue, red-blooded, thank-you-ma’am-polite cowboy.

  Until he’d started in on her this morning and the image had shattered like a mirror dropped on concrete.

  * * *

  TWO HUNDRED YARDS shy of the railroad crossing at the south end of town, the car swerved, painting black rainbows on the asphalt, straightened again, slid forward and ended up grill-first against an unyielding concrete fence. Fiberglass popped. Distressed metal collapsed, twisting and bending, folding in on itself like a beer can in the hands of a drunken man.

  He could smell the rubber, hear the metal scream, feel the pounding in his temples.

  But he wasn’t there….

  He hadn’t been there the day of the accident. He didn’t know where he was now, other than sitting bolt upright in an inky darkness that stretched on into forever. His heart limped for a few beats as he sat waiting for his eyes to adjust.

  Dead ahead a thin gold thread appeared, outlining a dark rectangle—light seeping around the edges of a window shade. Off to one side of him, bright red LED numbers hovered in the dark like a candle flame. A bedside clock, reading 5:43 a.m.

  The red images gave him his bearings: Caleb’s ranch house, the guest room on the second floor, the faint light from the porch fixture outside. A deep sleep after two days of no shut-eye. A nightmare he had hoped he’d left behind.

  The screeching metal and shattering glass had only added sound effects to a bad dream.

  Then why did they still echo inside his head?

  Lianne?

  He crawled out of bed, grabbed his jeans and slid them on, all the while trying to identify the source and location of the racket that wasn’t in his head at all. And that had just ended as abruptly as if someone had pulled a plug.

  The noise had come from below.

  He took the stairs in two leaps. Not a sound down here, and dark as pitch except for the band of light streaming from an open door halfway down the hall to the kitchen. The continuing silence made the previous noises all the more ominous.

  He hurried toward the light from the office Caleb had shown him that afternoon and then skidded to a halt in the doorway, expecting splinters from the polished wooden floor to pierce his bare soles. One glance told him serious damage had been done.

  Every door in the wall of custom-built cabinets hung wide open. A drawer of each file cabinet gaped. The rest of the room looked like a field back home after a winter storm, except instead of snow, every horizontal surface had been covered with clipboards, plastic filing trays and folders spilling their guts.

  Over everything drifted the scent of freshly brewed coffee from a table in one corner, the only uncluttered space in the room.

  In a far corner, his new housemate stood with her back to him near one of the file cabinets. She flung another folder the few feet over to the desk behind her without looking. It slid from the edge to join the rest of them on the floor.

  What the—?

  Maybe he hadn’t woken up yet. He scrubbed his face with his bare hand, attempting to wipe away the last traces of drowsiness.

  When he took his hand from his face, he found Lianne watching him.

  “Couldn’t sleep?” she asked.

  Biting his tongue, he fought to come up with a question that didn’t include any swear words. “What are you doing up?”

  She shrugged. “I couldn’t sleep, either. I’ve got a busy schedule, so I thought I would get in here and rearrange everything the way I want it. While I’ve still got the opportunity. Before I get to work.”

  She was babbling and, for the first time, had spoken to him naturally. Nerves had made her forget her defenses. Probably best not to point that out.

  “Did you need something?” she asked.

  “Some peace and quiet.”

  “Oh.” She grimaced. “I forgot to close the door, didn’t I?”

  “You forgot more than that.” He glanced at the center of the room. The sound of plastic file trays and a half dozen other items crashing to the floor in front of the desk had played right into the crumpling metal and breaking glass of his dream.

  She followed his gaze. “I guess I got a little involved.”

  And a lot reckless.

  Her cheeks pinker than the T-shirt she was wearing, she stooped and began scooping papers together.

  He dropped to one knee and grabbed her wrist. When she looked up at him, her brows lowered, he gestured toward the floor. “Watch it. You’ll hurt yourself.”

  “You’re worried about paper cuts?”

  “No. This.” From under a flurry of paper, he lifted the jagged pieces of glass and wood.

  She took the broken frame from his hand and turned it over. A trio of smiling faces looked up at them. Caleb. His wife, Tess. Their daughter, Nate.

  “Oh, no. Caleb just had this photo taken.” Lianne stared down, her face stricken. Broken glass had left a deep scratch across the surface.

  “It’s only a picture,” he muttered. “Easy enough to replace.”

  She ignored him.

  He took the frame from her and set it on the desk, then leaned over to start picking up files from the floor.

  “Not those,” she said.

  He looked at her.

  “They’re in order. Organized chaos, I know. But that’s the way I work.”

  �
�Right. How about I pick up what belongs on the desk and you take care of the rest?”

  When he’d finished that, he rose and looked over at the coffeemaker.

  “Want some?” she asked. “Help yourself.”

  “Might as well. I don’t guess I’ll be going back to sleep tonight.” He looked at the pink-tinged sky through the office window and corrected himself. “This morning.”

  She picked up an empty mug from the desk. “Ranchers have to get up early, don’t they?”

  “Not this early,” he said.

  She flushed again but held out the mug. Once he’d filled it, she took a seat behind the desk. The power position.

  “Maybe sharing this house isn’t the best idea.” Her gesture swept the room. “Obviously, I’m not the quietest person. I’d hate to interfere with your sleep again.”

  “I’m staying.” As if he had a choice. “Once you’re done fixing things up here, there won’t be anything else to bother me. Unless you get hit in the middle of the night with an idea to rearrange heavy furniture.”

  “Very funny.”

  He sat on the small couch near the coffeemaker and stretched out his legs, crossing them at his bare ankles. Might as well make use of the time, too. Show Caleb he’d done his homework. “Tell me about the school.”

  She took a long deep breath followed by a sip of coffee. “Our overall mission is to provide a home for troubled boys. A residential school. They’ll live here, attend classes and group therapy sessions, and have one-on-one meetings, as well.”

  He raised his brows. “Then you’re talking behavioral counselors and teachers as well as camp counselors?”

  “They’ll be called aides, but they’ll act as counselors like at a camp, yes. And only a small staff of teachers, since the older boys will take some of their classes online. We’ll also have a live-in registered nurse.”

  “Sounds like a big operation.”

  “It will be. We’re starting small and plan to increase enrollment in future.” It was the most she’d said to him since their first meeting. She spoke slowly and clearly, ensuring he didn’t miss a thing, as if she wanted to emphasize the importance of what she was saying. Or as if she recalled the conclusion he’d jumped to when they’d first met—that she was drunk.