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The Rancher's Rules
LUCY MONROE
The millionaire's forbidden virginGrant Cortez is rich, famous and seriously sexy. But although he arouses feelings in virginal Zoe that no other man ever has, as her best friend he's strictly a no-go zone…. Grant wants Zoe badly, but knows he can't have her.When they're forced to live together the temptation is too much, and so Grant imposes some rules—no kissing, and definitely no sex. But then there's the best rule of all: some rules are just made to be broken!
The Rancher’s Rules
Lucy Monroe
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
For Myra…a dear friend and heart sister for
more than two decades. You are and will
always be a very special part of my life.
Much love, Lucy
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER ONE
GRANT took a swig from his beer and set the long-neck bottle on the familiar oak surface of the kitchen table. He grimaced. It tasted like swill, and didn’t smell much better in his opinion, but it was all part of the ritual.
“Damn it, Bud, this is the third one in two months.” His date last night had ended the evening with a Dear Grant speech, and he hadn’t even been able to work up enough remorse to make her feel properly appreciated.
He’d been too busy trying to control the urge to follow Zoe and the guy on the Harley. He’d been looking after Zoe Jensen for as long as he could remember. Too long to take seeing some leather-clad joker with his hands all over her with any kind of equanimity.
Bud did not answer, and Grant took no offense. He stared morosely into his new friend’s beady but understanding eyes.
“Guess you understand, amigo. You got dumped too.”
Bud wiped his face and stared silently back at Grant.
Grant nodded. “Women. Who can understand them? Even Zoe is like a puzzle with a piece missing lately. You should have seen the loser she was with last night.”
Just remembering the thick-necked biker-wannabe who wore more leather than one of his bulls made Grant’s jaw ache. He knew Zoe had been going through some kind of emotional crisis since her dad had sold Grant the family ranch, but he hadn’t thought she would take it so far. She did not belong on a cattle ranch and she had to know it. He had expected her to come to terms with that truth by now.
If her recent behavior was anything to go by, she hadn’t.
He moved the hamster’s cage so that he could put his booted feet up on the already scarred oak tabletop. It was the oldest piece of furniture in a house that had been home to four generations of the Cortez family. Surprisingly, it had survived the decorating efforts of his grandmother, his mother, and then his stepmother.
Looking at Bud, he sighed.
A man who talked to hamsters probably had no room to criticize Zoe’s choice of dates. On the other hand, a hamster would make a better companion for her than the guy last night.
Grant stood up and put his now empty beer bottle on the counter. He could not stay still and he did not enjoy the feeling. Zoe had him tied in knots and she was not even his woman. But he felt as possessive of her as if she bore the name Cortez. He only wished he saw her as a sister.
His image glistened in the window behind the sink. He glared at his reflection. Disgusted blue eyes glared back. Almost black hair left a little too long brushed the collar of his denim shirt. For once, he looked like the rancher he was. He spent most of his time in suits, overseeing the Cortez conglomerate, but at heart he was every bit the rancher his Spanish great-grandfather had been.
Ramón Cortez had left his aristocratic roots and the country of his birth to make a new life for himself, and every generation after him had built on his efforts. There was no conceit in Grant’s belief that he’d increased the Cortez empire more than any man before him, only simple truth.
His father was a millionaire; Grant was a multimillionaire. Unlike the rich and famous who had winter homes in the area, his family had their roots in this small town. And, as wealthy as he was, he preferred the slow pace of life here to that in the big city, though his business interests dictated that he spend a fair amount of time there.
In fact, he had a business trip coming up he could not get out of. And maybe that was a good thing. He needed to get away from Zoe before he did something they would both regret. He wanted her, but his daddy had a saying and it made a lot of sense: “Don’t piss in your own backyard. It kills the grass and gets your boots muddy.”
Giving in to his desire for Zoe would be a very stupid thing to do, and Grant Cortez was not a stupid man.
He swung around and faced Bud’s cage again. Opening the door, he reached in and took the hamster out. The tiny furball started climbing up his arm. “Do you know what my problem is?”
The hamster did not pause in his ascent up Grant’s arm to answer.
“I need sex.”
Saying it out loud didn’t help, and neither did the idea that Zoe’s date might be getting more in that department lately than Grant was.
The hamster shifted his path to climb across Grant’s chest, unimpressed with the man’s problems. After all, the little rodent had gotten cut off too.
Grant petted the hamster curled up near his breast pocket. “Don’t worry, Bud. Zoe’ll take you in.”
She had a soft spot for animals that resembled a Double Tuffed down pillow.
He’d never forget the look on her face the day they’d met. He’d saved her life from a mountain cat, only to find out the reason the six-year-old had been wandering the range was that she had been trying to save her pet cow, Flower, from a stock sale. Her dad had been furious, but had reluctantly agreed to sell the cow to Grant instead.
At eleven, he had given up the money he’d been saving to build a soapbox car to buy that cow. He had learned the lesson well, and he’d been taking care of Zoe ever since.
He put the hamster back in its cage as he heard the back door open. Zoe came into the kitchen with a blast of cold air and a flurry of snow. He hadn’t realized it was snowing.
He frowned. “You should have waited to come until tomorrow. Just because your truck has four-wheel drive is no excuse to risk the ride over in the snow.”
Zoe pulled off her stocking cap, revealing the silky length of her pretty brown hair. The ridiculous bobble on her hat bounced when she tossed it on the counter.
“I’m not driving my truck.” She yanked on one glove with her teeth and shivered. “Something went wrong with the doo-hickey and Wayne has it down at the garage. I borrowed my landlady’s compact.” She shivered again. “The heat’s broken.”
Grant grabbed her hand and pulled off the other glove. “What the hell were you thinking? You could have frozen on the way over here.” She nearly had. Her small hand felt like an icicle. He chafed it between his own much larger and warmer ones, enjoying the smell of spring she carried with her, even in the dead of winter. “Angel, you need a keeper.”
Zoe smiled up at him and her chocolate-brown eyes twinkled. “I already have one. You.”
He did not smile back. “I’m not doing a very good job if you’re out driving in the snow in some broken-down car without a heater, niña.” No way was she driving home in that death trap.
She pulled her hand from his grip and started unbuttoning her coat. Her fingers trembled. “I’m not a child, and the car isn’t broken—just the heater. What’s the emergency?”
He picked up the hamster cage. “This is the emergency.”
Zoe’s eyes narrowed and she crossed her arms over her chest, pressing the swell of her breasts against her loose knit sweater. “No.”
Ignoring his body’s blatant reaction to the subtle stimulus, he forced his gaze to her less than welcoming expression.
She stomped her foot and snow fell onto the kitchen floor. “Do you hear me? I’m not taking him.”
Grant opened the cage and pulled the hamster out. He extended his hand to her. “Look at those sad little eyes. He’s already been rejected by one woman. Don’t do this to him.”
She did not take the animal, but stood defiantly silent—all five feet two inches of her.
“He was a gift to my foreman’s daughter, along with another hamster. The pet store said they were both female.”
Zoe’s eyes widened in comprehension. “They weren’t, and your foreman did not want a zillion hamster babies running around the house?”
Grant nodded. “Little Sheila had to choose between her two hamsters. She chose the female. Bud got left out in the cold.”
Zoe unclipped her long brown hair and smoothed it back, clipping it again. Grant recognized the gesture. She was thinking. She looked at him, her expression unreadable, and then shifted her gaze to the hamster. She reached out to take Bud and cuddled the little furball close to her chest.
Her nicely rounded, high-breasted chest. He ground his teeth at the thought. He hadn’t noticed Zoe’s feminine attributes since the summer she was nineteen—he’d made sure of it—but lately his body had been going haywire around her. He definitely needed an outlet for his libido.
“What’s his name?” she asked.
“Bud.”
“Why didn’t they just take him back to the pet store?”
“They tried, but the store owner wouldn’t take the older hamster along with the babies.”
Zoe’s gaze shot to his. “They already had babies?”
“Yep. That’s how they figured out they weren’t both females.”
Zoe raised her brows at this. “They couldn’t figure it out before that?”
Grant shrugged. “I guess not.”
“Why can’t you keep him?”
“Get real. I don’t do small furry animals. That is your domain. I do not begin to have time for a pet.” Not even a hamster. “Besides, I have to fly out for a business trip tomorrow.”
“So, me coming tomorrow would not have worked?”
“No, but had I known you planned to take your life into your hands to make the trip, I would have come to you.”
“Bringing Bud, no doubt.”
He did not bother to answer. That was a given.
Her eyes skimmed the kitchen, another indicator that she was thinking heavily, and her gaze lit on his empty beer bottle. “Get dumped again?”
“Don’t sound so cheerful about the prospect.”
“The woman last night? Linda?”
“Yes.”
Zoe smiled. “She take exception to you turning your evening into a double date at the last minute?”
As a matter of fact, she had. But Grant wasn’t about to share that with Zoe. He shrugged instead.
She laughed. “You didn’t have to join me and Tyler. He’s a sweetheart under all that leather.”
“Sweethearts do not get tattoos of naked women in chains on their biceps.”
Zoe had got that I’m going to protect the underdog look on her face. “He got the tattoo when he was a lot younger. You shouldn’t judge a man by the vagaries of his youth.”
Grant couldn’t help it. He laughed. Zoe leaping to the defense of an abandoned kitten made sense. Zoe protecting the reputation of the guy she had been out with the night before did not. He had looked like someone who could take care of himself and Zoe besides. That was why Grant had insisted on joining them. He hadn’t liked the way the other man had looked at her.
“You going out with him again?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
“Come on, niña. He’s not your type.”
She looked at him, and something in her eyes made his body tense, ready to do battle. “Just what is my type, Grant?”
“It’s not that clown from last night.”
She walked over to the table and gently put Bud back in his cage. “His name is Tyler.”
