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Brad shifted uncomfortably in the chair. “That’s not exactly the case.”
Margot frowned. “If you’re not watching it for him, what are you doing here?”
“Well, you see, your father put up the deed to the ranch in a poker game.” A sheepish grin crossed his handsome face. “He lost. I won. The Leap of Faith is now mine.”
* * *
Brad left the pretty redhead fuming in the downstairs parlor as he headed upstairs for his shirt and shoes. He was concerned about her father, too—if he wasn’t he wouldn’t have used some of his own money to hire a PI to search for the old man. But right now he had Boyd’s daughter on the brain.
Sitting across from Margot Sullivan with that white shirt gaping open and those green eyes flashing fire had been a huge turn-on. Especially when he’d told her she could stay the night. It had been like tossing kerosene onto a burning fire.
The hellcat had been so angry she’d sputtered and stammered, her breasts heaving in a most delectable way as she informed him that this was her house and if anyone was leaving, it was him.
Damn. There was nothing that excited Brad more than a woman with spunk.
That fact was firmly evident in the sudden tightness of his jeans. He grinned, more than a little relieved.
Though he’d dated his share of women since his divorce four years earlier, in the past six months there hadn’t been a single female who’d caused his mast to rise.
Not that his seeming lack of libido worried him. Not in the least.
Brad had been more puzzled than anything by the occurrence...or rather the non-occurrence.
Tonight had illustrated he’d been foolish to give the matter a second thought. Obviously it had just been that none of the women he’d taken out recently tripped his trigger.
Odd, as the saucy redhead had only to step through the front door to capture his interest.
Brad jerked on a flannel shirt, buttoned it but deliberately left the tail hanging out. Even being on a different floor in a far-removed room hadn’t, ah, cooled his interest. Still, there was no need to advertise the fact.
Of course, he reminded himself as he pulled on his boots, that interest between a man and a woman needed to be a two-way street. The fact that, in her eyes, he’d—oh, what was the phrase she’d used—“stolen a grieving old man’s ranch” almost certainly ensured she wasn’t likely to get naked with him.
At least not tonight.
He clambered back down the rickety steps and felt one bend beneath his weight. After making a mental note to fix it before it collapsed, Brad traversed the last few steps, then crossed to the parlor.
Margot stood at the darkened fireplace, her gaze riveted to one of the photographs on the mantel: a family picture of her parents and a skinny girl with rusty hair and freckles. But that gawky little girl had grown into a real beauty. Worn Levis hugged her slender legs like a glove and a mass of red-gold hair tumbled down her back like a colorful waterfall.
His body stirred in appreciation of such a fine female figure. Brad tried to recall how old she’d be by now.
Twenty-two? Twenty-three? Definitely old enough.
All he knew for certain was that the spitfire who at age six had once tossed a bucketful of rancid water on him when he’d mentioned her freckles had grown into a lovely young woman.
A flash of teeth from the dog standing beside her brought a smile to his lips. It wasn’t only the white-and-black coat tinged with silver or those large ears that alerted Brad to the breed. The protective stance was pure heeler.
Rather than resenting the animal, Brad found himself grateful Margot had such a companion. A woman traveling alone could be a target for the unscrupulous. But first they’d have to get through—what had she called the animal... Viper?
The name didn’t sound exactly right, but it certainly fit.
Viper emitted a low growl as Brad entered the room.
Margot didn’t growl like her dog, but when she turned her face was composed and icy.
“I’m calling Gage Christensen first thing in the morning,” she said, referring to the sheriff of Rust Creek Falls. “You and I and the sheriff will hash out this matter tomorrow.”
“Anyone ever tell you you’re pretty cute when you’re angry?” Ignoring the dog’s warning growl, Brad stepped closer. “You growed up real fine, Margot Sullivan.”
Though Brad was a recipient of a solid education from the University of Montana, most of his days before and since graduation were spent with ranch hands who delighted in slaughtering the English language. When necessary, he could play the good-ole-boy card with the best of ’em.
He shoved his hands into his pockets, rocked back on his heels and let his admiring gaze linger.
Instead of blushing or simply accepting the compliment as her due, she glared at him.
“You think you’re pretty hot stuff.”
Brad waited, inclined his head, not sure of the point she was trying to make.
“While you may have a face that doesn’t send children screaming away in the night—” she paused, whether for effect or to gain control of the emotions that had brought the two bright swaths of color to her cheeks, he couldn’t tell “—you don’t impress me. You showed your true character when you stole this ranch from my fath—”
“Hey, I won it fair and square,” Brad protested. Crawfords might be many things—just ask a Traub if you wanted a laundry list of sins—but they didn’t cheat. Not at cards, or anything else, for that matter. Not even to protect an old coot from himself.
It was obvious Margot wasn’t in the mood to listen to him, so it hardly seemed the time to divulge that he planned to sign the ranch back over to her father when he returned.
Once he played that card, she’d kick him out immediately.
And Brad was much too entranced to go.
* * *
The man had showed her to her own room!
Margot held on to her temper when he insisted on carrying her battered suitcases up the stairs. They’d tussled briefly until Vivian became so distraught Margot feared the stress would push the dog into early labor. Gritting her teeth, she’d acquiesced, but not before letting go so abruptly the move had sent Brad stumbling backward.
He deposited the suitcases next to her bed then just stood there like a bellman expecting a tip.
“Thank you,” she murmured when he made no move to go. She told herself she should be grateful he hadn’t chosen her bedroom to make his own.
Instead, on the way down the hall, he’d motioned to the room across from hers—the guest room—as being his.
She was relieved—and a bit puzzled—he’d left her parents’ room undisturbed. The master bedroom was by far the largest of the four. Still, having him stay in the guest room was appropriate. He was a guest, albeit an uninvited and unwanted one. His story about winning the ranch in a poker game only managed to anger her further.
Once Gage came out tomorrow and they got this whole mess straightened out, the “guest” would be gone.
For now, Margot wanted nothing more than to shower off road grime and collapse into bed.
“If there’s anything you need—” he began.
“If there’s anything I need,” Margot said pointedly. “I think I know where to find it. I did, after all, grow up in this house.”
At the sudden intense emotion filling her voice, Vivian stiffened beside her.
“Are you always cranky when you’re tired?” Brad asked with an innocent air that neither of them bought.
“Bite me,” Margot snapped, her head now throbbing in earnest.
He murmured something under his breath, but she missed it. She sank down at the end of the bed covered by a quilt her mother had made for her sixteenth birthday and placed her head in her hands.
The blows just kept coming.
First the injury when a horse she’d been mounting had spooked and she’d been pushed back, slamming her head against a trailer. Her head had hit just right...or, as the doctor said, just wrong. The skull fracture she’d sustained had been serious enough for the neurologist to warn that another concussion before she was fully healed could leave her with permanent impairment.
All that paled in comparison to worry over her father’s whereabouts. He could be sick. He could be injured. He could be...dead.
Margot buried her face in her hands.
“Are you okay?”
The concern in his voice sounded genuine but thankfully Brad didn’t move any closer.
She knew she was in bad shape when she only exhaled a breath and nodded. “We’ll get this settled in the morning.”
That was his cue to leave. But he remained where he was. When she finally gathered the strength to lift her head, she found him staring at her with the oddest expression on his face.
“If you need anything, anything at all.” His hazel—or were they green?—eyes held a hint of worry. “I’m just across the hall.”
What should she say to that? Thank you for taking over my home? Thank you for stealing the ranch from a drunken old man?
Yet he was obviously trying to be nice so she cut him a break. “Okay.”
Then he was gone, taking his handsome face, impudent smile and the intoxicating scent of soap, shampoo and testosterone with him.
She stretched out on the bed and let her muscles relax. Eyes closed, she offered up a prayer for her father’s safety and well-being.
It was the last rational thought Margot had that evening.
Chapter Two (#ulink_083f9166-32e8-59c3-8b1f-b9c7d328760d)
Margot awoke the next morning to sunlight streaming through lace curtains and birdsong outside her window.
Vivian lay on the woven rag rug next to the bed. The dog lifted her head when Margot sat up, still dressed in the jeans and shirt she’d worn last night.
If that wasn’t bad enough, her eyes were gritty and her mouth tasted like sawdust.
Though having to walk down the hall to the bathroom had never particularly bothered her, for the first time Margot wished for an adjacent bath. The last thing she wanted was to tangle with Brad before she had her morning shower or coffee.
But she’d learned several hard lessons in the past couple of years and one of them was wishing didn’t change reality.
With a resigned sigh, she unlatched her suitcase and scooped up all the items she needed, then slipped down the hall to the aged bathroom with cracked white tile on the floor and a mirror that made her look like a ghost. She pulled her gaze from the disturbing image and listened. The house stood eerily silent.
Brad isn’t here.
It was too much to hope that he’d packed up his stuff and left. Though Margot had no idea where he’d gone, there wasn’t a single doubt in her mind that he’d be back.
She was familiar with the type. Add a swagger and you could be talking about three-quarters of the cowboys on the rodeo circuit. Most of them only had two things on their mind; scoring enough points to make it to the rodeo finals in Las Vegas and getting into as many women’s pants as possible.
Her dad, a successful bareback rider back in the day, had warned her shortly before she’d left Rust Creek Falls to pursue her dream of one day making it to the PRCA National finals. She’d listened respectfully to everything Boyd Sullivan had said but it was a classic case of too little, too late.
Even at nineteen, Margot had been no shy virgin facing the big bad world. She’d lost her virginity—and her innocence—her junior year in high school.
Shortly after that momentous occasion in the backseat of Rex Atwood’s Mustang, she learned Rex had been bragging about “bagging” her to his fellow rodeo team members. Margot vividly remembered the day she’d confronted him and her fist had accidentally connected with his eye.
Both of them had learned a valuable lesson that day. He’d learned what happened when you crossed Margot Sullivan and she’d learned not to believe a guy who says he loves you in the heat of passion.
* * *
The bright autumn day dawned unseasonably warm, which was lucky for the calf that had been born last night. After checking on the rest of the cattle, Brad fixed a troublesome area of fence and reined his horse in the direction of the house.
Before leaving the house at dawn, he’d opened the door to Margot’s room to see if she needed anything. Viper stood guard at the side of the bed. Golden eyes glowed with a malevolent warning. Of course, the bared teeth and the growl weren’t all that welcoming, either.
A fully clothed Margot lay sprawled across the bed, facedown in the pillow. He’d known she was alive from the cute little snoring sounds. Though he’d never gotten the impression she and her dad were particularly close, he had to admit she had seemed concerned when she’d discovered him MIA.
Brad had been uneasy when he’d first learned Boyd didn’t have any family back east. But anyone who knew the old guy knew Boyd could take care of himself, drunk or not. The man reminded him of a badger, solitary and not all that pretty but damned determined.
Thankfully, his daughter took after her mother in the looks department. Though, he had to admit, last night she had shown a few badger tendencies. For a second, he’d thought she might try to rip a piece out of his hide.
Having him in her family home definitely had her all hot and bothered. Or maybe it was him without his shirt.
Brad grinned and relaxed even further in the saddle. There had been a potent sizzle of attraction between them. She’d done her best to ignore it. But he’d seen how her gaze had lingered on his bare chest and then dropped lower for an instant before returning to his face.
She might want him out of her house, but she also wanted him in her bed. A place where he wouldn’t mind spending a little time.
The sex would, of course, likely be a short-term kind of thing. It would be like one of those fireworks on the Fourth of July. Brilliant and hot, they’d light up the sky then everything would fizzle.
That was fine with him. His marriage to Janie had confirmed what he’d always known. He wasn’t a happily-ever-after kind of guy. Though Brad liked and respected women, he could never seem to make them happy. At least not out of bed.
The house was still quiet when he entered after putting his horse in the stable. Normally, he’d have stayed out most of the day, trying to get everything ready for winter. But he and Margot had a few things to square first.
Until they came to an understanding, he didn’t trust her not to toss his stuff into the yard and lock him out of the home. Thankfully, the doors didn’t have deadbolts and he’d been smart enough to drop a key into his pocket before leaving the house—just in case.
People in this part of the country barely locked their doors. If he had a mean-ass dog like Viper, there’d be no need to lock anything ever again.
Pulling the door shut, Brad glanced around. No sign of Margot. Or Viper.
Brad set the coffee to brew, then pulled out a heavy cast-iron skillet and went to work.
Several minutes later, when the eggs were frying in bacon grease and two slices of his mother’s homemade bread had just popped up in the toaster, Brad was distracted from his culinary pursuit by a voice from the doorway.
“What the heck do you think you’re doing?”
