скачать книгу бесплатно
* * *
Scarlett went inside to speak to her mother, who was bathing little Carl. For an instant worries fled as she smiled at her precious, adopted baby boy. Her heart squeezed when Carl smiled at her and held out his little arms. “I can’t take him, Mom. Luke Weston is here. He’s in town and said his dad let the ranch go and the animals are sick, maybe dying now. He came to ask for help. Mom, I have to help those animals.”
Her mother frowned and shook her head. “I know you’re not going to ignore the livestock, so do what you have to and then come home. You don’t need to get involved with Luke Weston again. He broke your heart, Scarlett. Don’t let him come back and hurt you again.”
“I won’t. He lives in a different world now and he’ll go right back to it,” she said, thinking about the big, strapping man standing in her yard, instead of the young boy she remembered from their high school days. He was wickedly handsome, and her heart had pounded to such an extent that there was no way to ignore what she felt.
As Scarlett talked to her mother, she cut up apples from a bowl her mom kept on the counter. She bagged the apples and smiled at Carl.
Kissing her little boy’s chubby cheek, she dodged when he grabbed for her hair. She and her mother both laughed, but she saw the worry in her mother’s eyes as she left.
Scarlett fought the urge to tell Luke she couldn’t go, but when she thought about the horses that might be hurt or hungry, she knew she had to help. She didn’t want Luke putting any animal down unless it was hopelessly suffering and she couldn’t save it.
She felt a tangle of emotions—shock because her pulse had raced at the sight of Luke when she had convinced herself that she was completely over him. And then there was the anger. It was always churning beneath the surface when she thought of him. Of how he’d left her behind. She didn’t want to react to him or remind herself that he was more handsome than ever. He was a man now, not a boy, and so incredibly hot.
Scarlett closed her eyes and shook her head. “No, no, no,” she whispered. She didn’t want to find him better looking than ever, more appealing. Breathtakingly sexy. She didn’t want her heartbeat to race. All of that manifested itself, leaving her gasping as if she were sixteen again, lusting like a starry-eyed schoolgirl over the most irresistible boy in Texas.
Little reminders of Luke still popped up in her life, but for all these years since he’d left Royal, she had ignored them. So she had thought she was totally over him, but how wrong that was. All he had to do was step out of his pickup and stride up to the porch, and she was ready to either melt into a quivering mess, or run and throw herself into his arms.
She didn’t want him to come back to town and cause that kind of reaction simply by laying eyes on him. When he looked at her, he felt something, too. She knew him well enough to know he’d had a reaction to seeing her, which just compounded her desire for him.
Could she work a few hours with him on his ranch and keep a wall around her feelings? She never wanted to suffer through another heartbreak over Luke like she had when he’d left Texas all those years ago. She had cried herself to sleep every night for more than a month.
Scarlett hurried to the closet to grab her new jeans and a shirt she liked, and then she looked down at the clothes in her hands. Whoa...what had gotten into her? Dressing better because of Luke was just asking for trouble.
“Nope, not happening,” she said aloud and shoved the jeans and blouse back in the closet. She couldn’t resist looking at herself in the mirror, though, and running a comb through her short hair. She guessed there weren’t any women he took out in California who had freckles and pixie haircuts. She sighed because it wouldn’t matter how she looked, she wasn’t the woman for Luke. She wasn’t risking her heart a second time because he would never make her a permanent part of his life. She had little Carl to think of now and how what she did would affect him.
Hurrying to her office, she tried to focus on what she might need at his ranch as she grabbed her bag.
Before she left she paused, pressing her forehead against the wall. “Don’t let him break your heart again. Take care of the animals and then come home. Treat him as if you’re with a stranger,” she whispered and then shook her head as she hurried out of her room. Who was she kidding? She knew she couldn’t heed her own advice, but if she could just remember he was totally off-limits and keep her guard up, she might avoid more heartache. He hadn’t loved her before—now he definitely never would since he was completely out of her league. She knew he was the newest addition to Forbes’s billionaire list. Luke could have any woman he wanted, she was sure. In fact, she had seen his occasional picture in magazines or the news and knew he dated gorgeous celebrities and some very beautiful socialites.
Holding her bag of instruments, medications and ointments, she rushed out. Luke leaned against his pickup and was looking down at his phone. She couldn’t keep from stealing a glance down the length of him, admiring his broad shoulders, his narrow waist and his long legs. When he saw her, he jammed his phone into a back pocket. He straightened and his gaze drifted slowly over her as she approached him, and all her advice to herself to pay little attention to him evaporated.
Everywhere his gaze drifted over her, she tingled. Part of her wanted to turn around and go right back to the house and lock the door. Part of her wanted to yell at him to get off their property and go straight to hell because he had hurt her badly. Yet another, more urgent, part of her just wanted to rush into Luke’s arms, pull his head down and kiss him senselessly. She sucked in a breath, and her hand tightened on the handle of her bag while she struggled to think about something besides Luke, his hands and mouth and her pounding heart.
He opened the door to the truck for her, and when she came close, he reached to take the black bag from her. When his big, warm hand closed on hers, she thought her knees would buckle. It was the first time in years—since he’d left for college—that he touched her, and the slight contact sent a sizzling current racing to settle low inside her. Longing rocked her, and she had to take a deep breath and clench her fists.
“I’ll put your things in back,” he said, his voice raspy, which happened when he was aroused. She couldn’t answer him and merely nodded. They knew each other so well. He knew she was having a reaction to being with him, and she knew he was having his own reaction to her. That made the moment hotter and more intense, and kept dredging up memories of their lovemaking when he had lived in Texas.
Again, he took her arm to help her into the pickup—help she didn’t want or need. Help that made her quiver and have to fight more memories of his hands on her. When he closed the door and walked around to the driver’s side, she inhaled deeply and watched him. A breeze tousled his dark blond hair over his forehead. He looked sexy, more handsome than ever—something she didn’t want to acknowledge. Luke was tall, with scruffy stubble on his jaw, and he had gorgeous blue-green eyes, broad, powerful shoulders and well-shaped hands. Hands that could carry her to paradise. In short, Luke was a fantasy come to life.
He slid behind the wheel, closed the door and started the pickup, glancing at her. He sat too close, looked too enticing. “Thanks, Scarlett,” he said in a husky voice that still wasn’t his normal speaking voice and she knew it.
She nodded. “Let’s get this over with,” she said curtly, staring out the front window, fighting to ignore him as much as possible. What was happening to her? She was over him, over the hurt he caused when he left for California and said goodbye without a second thought. The old familiar anger and pain made her sit up straight and look out the window as he drove away from the house.
“Stop at the barn, and we can get some bales of hay,” she said.
“I did. They’re in the back of the truck. I loaded up hay and feed, and then drove back to your house to wait for you.” He spared her a quick glance. “I’ll reimburse you for everything. I appreciate not having to go back to town to get supplies. I’m guessing there’s nothing at the ranch—just on the drive in, the place looked abandoned. There were signs of vandals, and the animals have been left to die,” he said gruffly. “I was just there a few minutes, but it’s clear I have a catastrophe on my hands. I want to save what animals we can.”
Scarlett knew Luke so well that she could tell he was angry with his father. When they drove past the barn on her family ranch, she stared ahead, sitting stiffly, fighting yet another wave of memories.
“You still have the big barn,” he rasped.
“We’re not going down memory lane,” she snapped without looking at him. But she was already down it. Her fingers knotted and she fought the urge to glance again at the barn she saw every day of her life, yet it held special memories of an unforgettable night.
Her whole family had been away for a barn dance. Early in the evening, Luke had coaxed her to leave with him. They had gone back to her place because everyone had gone to the party. Instead of driving to the house, Luke had stopped at the barn. The minute they stepped inside, he pulled her into his arms to kiss her. Later, he spread a blanket on the hayloft and drew her to him again to make love to her, her first time.
Looking away from the barn, she tried to think of something else and forget that night so long ago, forget memories of his slow, sweet kisses that made her want him with her whole being, memories of his strong arms around her, his mouth on her, his seductive hands all over her body.
“How are your mom, and Toby and his wife?”
“They’re fine,” she answered, glancing at him. “Toby and Naomi have a little girl, Ava.” While Luke watched the road, her gaze swept over him, once again taking in the short stubble that covered his jaw, his tousled, dark blond hair that she could remember running her fingers through too many times to count. His shoulders were broader now, thicker. Desire rocked her and she took a deep breath. Realizing once again where her thoughts were going, she turned swiftly to stare out the window, not really seeing the landmarks they passed, but remembering being held in his arms, her head back against his shoulder.
She gave a tiny shake and struggled to get her attention off of her ex. He would leave as suddenly as he had come, and she didn’t want one tiny bit more hurt in her life because of Luke Weston, especially now that she had a son to care for.
She looked at familiar land, places she had grown up, and in seconds Luke dominated her thoughts yet again.
She had to resist his appeal. In no time he would be back in his private plane, headed to California, back to his ritzy life, back to glamorous models, celebs and rich socialites, eventually marrying one who could give him the children he’d want.
“You’ve done well in California. You did the right thing to move out there. It suits you as much as all this suits me,” she said, knowing the Silicon Valley world was his world.
“I guess you’re right, Scarlett. It’s my real home,” he said without looking at her. He sounded casual, but his hand was tight on the steering wheel, so obviously he felt something, too. “Common sense says to sell the ranch and forget it. I won’t live in Texas again. But...I can’t sell it. I just can’t let the family place go. It’s been in our family since the 1800s.” He blew out a frustrated breath. “I paid the house off three years ago, and damned if he didn’t go out and mortgage it to the hilt again. He hasn’t kept up his payments—no surprise there. He’s let the help go. I just found that out before I came.”
“Sorry, Luke,” she said, again without looking at him. How polite and cool they were being with each other. “So you’re going to keep the ranch, even though you’ll go back to California? You think you’ll come back to the ranch someday?” she asked, watching him and curious about his answer even though she knew she shouldn’t care at all. They would never again mean anything to each other. Unfortunately, the jump in her pulse today showed she still had to work at getting him out of her system.
“No, I never will, but at this point in my life, I just don’t want to let it go. I know that doesn’t make sense, because California is absolutely my forever home.”
“You don’t need to be in a hurry. Your dad is still around. It may mean something to him.”
“Booze is the only thing that means anything to him,” Luke said, and she heard the anger and bitterness in his reply. “He’ll never be able to live alone again.”
After they left the McKittrick ranch, they rode quietly. Her thoughts were in turmoil because she couldn’t lose that intense awareness she had of Luke. She never had been able to ignore him, and she definitely couldn’t now. Why couldn’t she ever see him as just another guy? She had to get over him or get hurt again. She could never be the woman for him because of her fertility problems. One man who loved her enough to ask her to marry him had already walked out on her. Luke hadn’t been interested when he had never been out of Texas and was getting ready to leave the family ranch. Now, he wouldn’t have any permanent interest in a small-town female vet who couldn’t bear his children. If she got involved with him, he would love her and leave her and in doing that he would get to know her baby. If she let Luke in her life again, when he said goodbye, he would not only break her heart again, he would break little Carl’s heart. That could be a lifetime hurt for her and her baby.
Scarlett tried to avoid remembering Luke’s kisses, but whenever she glanced at his handsome profile or his sexy mouth, the memory was vivid, tantalizing, still painful after all this time. She looked at his big, masculine hands on the steering wheel, but shifted her attention swiftly because she could remember those hands on her body, working their magic. An undercurrent of longing taunted her.
She released a quavering breath. Why did her heart race when he had merely brushed her fingers with his? She remembered how much she’d hurt when he left when she was sixteen. She didn’t want a bigger hurt now.
She couldn’t understand her own reactions to him. She wasn’t in love with him—she barely liked him because of the bitter fight before he left for California. How could he set her pulse pounding just by reappearing? She had to get over him. She didn’t want to spend years longing for a guy she knew as a boy in high school. A guy who didn’t want her.
They rode in silence until he turned and headed up the road toward the house where he had spent his boyhood.
The first sign of neglect was a rusty pickup smashed against a tree. She saw bullet holes where kids had probably placed bottles on it or just shot out the windows and used the truck for a target. The wheels were gone. Weeds grew up in the road that was barely visible in spots.
“Evidently, after Dad let the hands go, he sold some of the horses to subsidize his alcohol addiction.” Luke scowled. “I used to send money home, but he just bought liquor with it, so I stopped. I’ll get a crew out here as fast as I can, but right now I wanted you to see if we can’t save some of these horses. But honestly? I don’t know how the horses I saw can last through the night. No one works here. The damn ranch is deserted—the animals left to starve and die.”
She could hear the anger and pain in his voice and couldn’t blame him for his reaction. She was equally shocked by the terrible conditions.
In minutes, Luke approached a pasture with half a dozen horses standing near a stock tank that needed water. The windmill had broken boards and wasn’t working. She gasped. “Oh, no,” she whispered without knowing she had spoken when she saw the horses with ribs painfully revealed and two with their heads hanging. All the horses looked severely malnourished. The stock tank had holes in the side.
“Sorry to pull you into this because I know it’ll tear you up, but I need your help here,” Luke said.
“Oh, my heavens. Look at the horses,” she lamented. “It breaks my heart. You know I’ll help these animals,” she said, horrified to look at the condition of the horses. She felt sympathy for Luke, even though she didn’t want to get caught up in his problems. But what he had come home to was ghastly, and he had tried to help his dad to keep the ranch in good shape.
She could certainly understand his anger and disappointment, and gave a silent prayer of thanks for her own family. They helped each other and did the best they could and always could be counted on. “Oh, Luke, this is unbelievable. I had no idea this ranch had just been abandoned. We’re neighbors. Our ranch adjoins yours, and nobody in the area has said a word about it. Why didn’t someone speak up? The last hands that left here—why didn’t one of them contact you? How could your dad neglect everything so badly?”
“Because he’s a sick old drunk who doesn’t care about anybody or anything except his next drink,” Luke bit out, and she was sorry for saying anything because Luke was obviously suffering over finding his home in shambles.
“I’ll get the pasture gate,” Luke said, getting out to drag open a sagging, battered gate made with barbed wire. He returned to drive the pickup in and close the gate.
“Sorry, Luke,” she said stiffly when he was behind the wheel again. She spoke without looking at him, trying to avoid thinking about what he was going through. “We’ll start. Let’s get to work.”
“I’ll patch those holes enough to get water in that tank so they can drink. I sent Dad money to get fiberglass tanks and look what we’ve got—the old corrugated metal the cows have pushed against and bent years ago. Damn, I wasn’t sure what I’d find here, but I didn’t expect it to be this bad. Every dime I sent home must have gone for booze.”
She looked around and saw three horse carcasses. The live horses had moved away from them and they were decomposing, probably torn by predators and birds.
“You have dead animals.”
He sighed. “Damn. I can get a temporary crew out here to help.” He parked near the horses and a few watched them while two slowly moved toward them. Luke was already on his phone, calling someone who worked for him to start trying to hire a crew of cowboys to do temp work.
When she approached the horses, her sympathy shifted to the animals, and she could hardly blame Luke for being so upset at his father for letting this happen. When Luke was a kid, the Double U had been a fine ranch. His dad was a good rancher, and he knew what he was doing to his livestock when he neglected them. At least he had to have known when he was sober. She spoke softly and got her bag of apples, but the horses couldn’t raise their heads. She knelt to open her bag and get a needle to give shots that would help more than anything else.
“I’ll get these horses to the pasture by the barn. There’s water there. I’ll get halters on them and lead them back, and you drive the pickup. You can follow the road here to the house,” he said. “If there are any horses we can’t move, we’ll try to take care of them here.”
It was almost an hour later when they climbed back into his pickup and drove toward the house.
“I came home every year for the first three years while I was in college, and it was never like this. Things were messy at the house, but otherwise, he kept things in relatively good shape.” He scrubbed a hand over his jaw. “We had some good hands and a good foreman. I never stayed more than a night or two, so he must have pulled himself together.
“Several years ago at Christmas, I sent a plane for him and brought him to California. He said everything here was fine. He couldn’t wait to get back here and cut short his stay. Gradually, we’ve grown more apart than ever, and I haven’t been home. If I did make contact with him, he always said everything was going okay.” Luke worked his jaw back and forth. “I should have kept up with him better and maybe I could have prevented some of this. I could have hired someone to come out here and run the ranch.”
“You didn’t know.”
“I should’ve known. He always could carry on a decent conversation when he was dead drunk. I should have guessed what was going on.”
“Luke, I’m sorry. This is a disaster.”
“We’ll just have to hunt for the animals. I doubt if there are any cattle left. I’m sure they’ve all been stolen. The horses probably were passed over at first for cattle. By the time anyone turned attention to the horses, they may have been in such bad shape no one wanted them. I just barely glanced at the house, but I’ll walk through in case there are any animals in it.”
Scarlett cringed when the house came into view. One wall was shattered, as if someone had tried to drive through it. Windows were smashed. Steps to the porch had collapsed. The front door was missing. Bullet holes dotted the walls, and boards had been ripped from the porch floor. Someone had thrown black paint at the house, and a big splash of paint had spilled down a wall. A living room chair was upside down in the yard, one leg broken, another leg missing.
“Oh, my heavens, Luke...” she commiserated softly. Certainly it gutted him to look at his childhood home so badly damaged.
“While neglect did a lot to the house and barn and outbuildings, vandals and thieves caused the rest,” he said grimly. “My dad, because of his damned drinking, has just let our home—a damn fine ranch—go to hell.”
Knowing how she would feel if it had been her home, she ached for him. “I’m sorry, Luke. How awful for you to come home to this.” Impulsively, she squeezed his wrist and Luke turned, his blue-greeneyes intent on her, causing a chemical reaction. The minute she touched him, the moment changed. Sympathy vanished, replaced by sizzling desire. But she didn’t want to be swept off her feet by him again. She’d been through too much heartache because of Luke to go through more.
When his gaze locked with hers, she drew a deep breath, conscious of Luke and nothing else. Worse, she was absolutely certain he felt something, too.
“I’m sorry for you, and I’m sorry for your dad. Have you seen him yet?” she asked, her words tumbling out too fast as she tried to get back to anything less intimate. But that slight touch of his wrist brought a truckload of memories pouring over her, and she felt her anger with Luke lose a bit of its intensity.
She felt sympathy for him. It would be devastating if she came home to find the McKittrick ranch in ruin. She tried to pay attention to what he was saying about seeing his dad.
“No, that’s on my list of things to do while I’m here. What he’s done—or more accurately, not done—is going to make seeing him again even more difficult than I expected. He must be in terrible shape to let all this happen.”
“Well, let’s look for the horses or whatever livestock that’s still here,” she said, struggling to get back to business.
He nodded. “I stopped here briefly before coming to get you. I want the house torn down. I can’t stand to see it in ruin. The memories from there weren’t all that great anyway,” he said, and her heart lurched at the bitterness in his voice. She curbed the impulse to reach out and squeeze his wrist again. It was obvious he hurt badly.
“There’s a half bath in the barn, so at least we have a little in the way of facilities for us. There may be running water and electricity in the bathrooms in the house. Right now, however, we better find what animals we can while it’s daylight. I’ll try to get them back to the pasture by the barn, where you can do what you have to do and I can feed and water them. Can you stay longer?” he asked.
“Yes, I’ll stay. I want to save as many horses as I can,” she said.
“We’ll take the pickup now. Later, I’ll probably have to search on horseback because there are places on the ranch where I can’t drive. I may have to go buy a horse because none of these can carry me on its back.” He released a breath. “But for now, I’ve got rope in the back of the truck, some feed and a saddle if I need it, all sorts of supplies.”
“All right,” he said, “let’s get started.” He turned his truck and as he drove she looked for any livestock. They hadn’t driven a half mile when she gasped. “Luke, stop. There’s an animal. It’s a dog, and it’s dead. I think it looks like it might be Mutt.” With a pang, she remembered the dog that followed Luke around when he was home.
They got out of the pickup and walked closer. Luke knelt and ran his hand over the dog’s head. “Oh, dammit to hell. That’s Mutt. He was old and weak, and I guess coyotes got him.”
She knelt to look over the carcass more closely, and she hurt even more for Luke because this was the ranch dog that he claimed as his.
“I left him here when I went to California because the ranch was up and running and in good shape,” he said, his voice raspy with regret.
“The ranch was in good shape because you were here,” she said quietly, still looking at the dog.
“The guys liked him and he was happy here. I thought he’d be better off. He looks starved. He was old and weak, but something’s really torn him up.”
“Luke, he’s been shot. Someone shot him, and they may have done it because he was old and he may have been sick. There’s one shot and it’s a killing shot, so this wasn’t random or someone being mean. I think he was torn up by buzzards and coyotes after he was shot.”
Luke leaned closer to look as she pointed to the wound. “I hope he didn’t suffer. I loved the old mutt. He was a good dog.” He released a shaky breath. “I’m going to bury him. I have a shovel, and I’ll wrap him in a tarp and bury him back at the house.”
She heard the catch in Luke’s voice, and a lump rose to her own throat. They both stood, and she looked up at him. Without thinking about it, she touched his wrist again. “I’m sorry. I know you loved him.” The minute her hand rested on his, she knew she shouldn’t have touched him, even though it was obvious he was hurting badly. His wrist was twice the size of hers, warm, his wrist bone hard. Something flickered in the depths of his eyes, and he gazed at her intently.
“I haven’t loved much in my life, but I loved him,” he said roughly, his voice grating and a muscle working in his jaw. She couldn’t get her breath, and she couldn’t understand the intensity of his gaze or his remark that he hadn’t loved much in his life. Was he just talking about a dog—or was there more to his statement?
She wanted his arms around her so badly it frightened her, and she stepped away quickly, going back to the truck. “Tell me if I can help,” she called over her shoulder.
She was breathing hard as he walked to the back of his pickup. Pulling work gloves from his pocket, he got a tarp to wrap the dog. In minutes, he slid behind the steering wheel and drove on in silence.
Why did it feel as if Luke had been away only days instead of years? Those empty years had vanished in too many ways. The worst part was the realization that she had never really gotten over him, something she had struggled desperately to do.
She had never felt this way for Tanner, and she had been engaged to him. Was it because Luke had been the first love in her life? Or did it go deeper than that?
They rode together in silence, only a couple of feet of space separating them in the pickup, but there was still a permanent, deep chasm dividing them.
He hadn’t loved her and he never would, so why couldn’t she forget him? She clearly meant nothing to him—that alone should stop the volatile reaction she had to him and the desire that still steadily simmered through her veins.
They bounced over the rough ground, and she looked around carefully, trying to see any sign of livestock. In another twenty minutes she spotted horses to the east. “Luke, over there.”
“Yeah, I see. They’re in a fenced pasture, so let’s keep looking and see if we can find some more and get them back with these. They may be in bad shape, but hopefully we can get them to the barn.” He continued to drive, and she gazed around, looking for any more signs of life.
