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“Lunch?” Kate glared at him. “Does it look as if we have time to make lunch?”
He frowned at her. “Hey, I’m not asking anyone to wait on me. I just figured this might be my last chance before the boys from the Double R get here with—”
“Oh, my God.” Kate covered her mouth with her hand and briefly closed her eyes.
“What?”
Kate squinted bleakly at her brother. “You’re going to kill me.”
“You did remember to order the lumber, right?” He rubbed his right temple, looking as if he already knew he wouldn’t like her answer.
She glanced at the round wall clock over the stove. “You still have time to pick it up. Take the trailer.”
Clint groaned. “That’s over a two-hour round trip, and that’s not counting loading.”
“I’m sorry. Dory will go with you.” Kate met her eyes, and Dory nodded. “She can help.”
“That’s a lot of lumber. I’m not taking a girl—” Clint pressed his lips together, his gaze fixed on his sister.
Dory grinned. “Yes?”
He slid her a guilty glance, and then grabbed an apple from a fruit bowl on the counter. “I’ll rustle up one of the boys from the back pasture to go with me.”
Kate sighed. “They’re all busy and we really don’t have time.”
Dory plucked a ripened pear from the bowl. “Come on, cowboy, I’ll try not to show you up.”
CLINT TOOK HIS OWN TRUCK, knowing he’d have to use the extended bed. After checking the trailer in the rearview mirror, he pulled out of the private dirt road that led to the family ranch and onto the highway. Beside him on the bench seat, Dory stretched out her long, jean-clad legs and munched her pear. Above her knee the faded denim was torn, matching another tear he’d noticed below her rear pocket. Nothing to do with making a fashion statement, that was for sure. Even her right hem was frayed where it skimmed a battered tennis shoe.
No, she wasn’t afraid of getting her hands dirty, he’d have to admit. She’d jumped right in to help hook up the trailer, and loaded the ramps and straps by herself. She hadn’t even waited for him to toss her a pair of gloves. Still, he felt weird letting a woman do physical work beside him. His sister was no flower herself, but even Kate stuck to her duties in the house.
“What’s the lumber we’re picking up for?” Dory asked, using the back of her wrist to wipe pear juice from the corner of her mouth. Her ponytail had loosened and her hair was all over the place.
Clint smiled at her lack of self-consciousness. “Tomorrow’s game booths.”
“Game booths? Like what?”
“The usual…tic-tac-toe, ring toss, that sort of thing.”
“Kind of like a carnival.”
“Yeah, I suppose.”
“We have a traveling carnival in Hawaii, but I haven’t been in years.”
Surprised, he looked over at her. “That’s where you’re from?”
“Yep, born and raised. My parents moved there during the free-love sixties era from Kansas. We lived in a commune until I was about thirteen.”
“You’re serious?”
She shrugged. “It’s not much different than you and Kate and your brother living here on the ranch all your life.”
He saw a major difference but no point in arguing. “How did you end up at a college on the East Coast?”
“A friend from high school talked me into it. I almost transferred out because I hated the snow. How about you?”
“I didn’t go far. University of Houston for four years. I liked coming home on weekends and working on the ranch with my brother, Joe.”
She shifted, bending one leg so that she faced him. “What did you study?”
“Business, believe it or not.”
“That is a surprise.”
Clint shrugged. “It’s not like I wanted to work in an office. I figured I might learn something that would make the ranch more efficient.”
“Did you?”
He gritted his teeth, annoyed that she was probing areas better left alone. “Yep.”
“So what kind of changes did you make?”
“Why all the questions? You writing a book?”
At his terse tone, she stiffened. “Jeez Louise, I thought we were making small talk, passing the time, being friendly.” She sniffed and twisted around to face the road again. “We don’t have to talk. We could listen to the radio if you want. Or I could sing to you. But I warn you, I can’t carry a tune worth a damn.”
He exhaled loudly. “Sorry, it’s kind of a touchy subject.” He felt the weight of her stare but she didn’t comment, which oddly encouraged him to add, “My brother, Joe, he wasn’t interested in making any changes.”
“Ah. He’s the oldest, right?”
Keeping his eyes on the road, Clint nodded. “He pretty much took over the ranch after our parents died. Kate was only fourteen and I was going into my senior year in high school.”
“He couldn’t have been much older himself.”
“He’d just finished his sophomore year at UCLA.”
“Wow!”
That was all Clint had to say on the subject. He knew he owed Joe a lot. It hadn’t been easy for him to drop out of school, take on the ranch and two resentful teenagers. Neither Kate nor Clint would’ve made it to college if it weren’t for Joe. But sometimes it was hard for Clint to keep his mouth shut when it came to the old-school way the ranch was still run. “So what do you do?”
“I’m a forensic anthropologist.”
He waited until he’d safely passed a horse trailer parked on the shoulder of the highway and then glanced her way. She was tightening her ponytail and with her arms raised, her T-shirt clung to her breasts. Odd he hadn’t noticed before how full and round they were. “I’m not sure what that means.”
“I study remains mostly.”
“Like bones?”
She chuckled. “Yeah, like bones.”
“Man, that would creep me out.”
“Wimp.”
He grunted but ignored her teasing. Figured she had a job like that. “So what? You work with law enforcement?”
“Actually, I’ve spent the last six months in Vietnam and Cambodia, identifying remains of missing soldiers.” The teasing tone was gone. Her voice had softened. “It’s so sad that families have had to wait this long to find out what happened to their missing loved ones from the war.”
“That’s true, all right,” he agreed quietly. “They’re lucky they have people like you to finally give them some closure.”
“Yeah, well, the findings are always kind of bittersweet, you know?”
“I can imagine.” His gaze went to her hands. Her nails were uneven but clean, the skin badly scraped on two of her knuckles. He understood now why she wasn’t like Kate’s other two friends. They seemed like nice enough women, pretty, well put together, his type actually. Stupid when he stopped to think about it, but the high maintenance ones were the kind that attracted him. Maybe that’s why he’d never entertained the thought of marriage. Too damn much work.
“Hey, look.” She straightened and pointed to an eagle soaring low against the cloudless blue sky. “Beautiful, isn’t he?”
Clint slowed down so he could appreciate the grace of the bird, and grinned. “How do you know it’s a he?”
“Guys have to try harder to attract a mate. That’s why males in most species have all the stunning feathers and bright colors,” she said matter-of-factly. “When it’s time to mate, girls just have to show up.”
He chuckled. She did have a point.
2
DORY WAS SURPRISED when they turned down a dirt road under an arching sign that announced the Double R Ranch. It had seemed more like twenty minutes instead of an hour since they’d left the Manning’s place, which was quite a spread as it turned out…about two thousand acres. Mostly flat pastureland, much of it fenced off for grazing cattle. For the entire ride, that pretty much had been all there was to see, more grazing land. Although she hadn’t focused on the scenery half as much as she had the man sitting beside her.
She liked watching his hands as they confidently gripped the wheel. They were large and tanned, the back of his fingers sprinkled sparingly with crisp dark hair. Rolled-back sleeves exposed broad, big-boned wrists and muscled forearms, and his blue cotton shirt did nothing to hide his well-formed biceps.
He obviously hadn’t shaved in a couple of days, and she wondered if that omission had been deliberate. Had he tried for that perfect, rugged, cowboy look? No, he seemed like a man who enjoyed the outdoors and wasn’t afraid to sweat. Sure, she worked with a lot of big, muscular guys like that on digs, but unlike them, Clint had a lithe grace that had caught her attention earlier when he hooked up the trailer.
Weird, because she wasn’t normally attracted to a man based on physical attributes, even one as good-looking as Clint. In fact, she tended to ignore the head-turners. She figured they got enough female attention.
The road to the Double R had obviously once been graveled and graded but not well maintained, and the truck dipped and bounced for nearly a mile before a large white house and outbuildings came into view. Good thing. Her fanny had had enough, and that was saying something since she seemed to spend half her life in a Jeep lately.
“I hope some of the hands are close by to help load the lumber.” Clint pulled the truck up to the front of the barn. “Kate was supposed to have called ahead.”
“I don’t see anybody.”
“The Reynoldses own this place, but times have been kind of tough for them lately,” he said grimly. “They lost a good deal of their herd to cattle rustlers last year and had to lay off half their men.”
“Rustlers? You’re kidding.”
“Wish I was.”
“That sounds like something out of the old west.”
“Darlin’, out here, it still is the old west at times.” He opened his door. “That’s why I told Joe that we’ve got to start looking at—” He cut himself off, shaking his head, and then slid out from behind the wheel.
Dory scrambled out on her side. “What did you tell him?”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“Of course it matters.” At his annoyed expression, she shrugged a shoulder. “Look, I’m just curious. What was your idea?”
The way he set his jaw told her it was time to leave the subject alone. He picked up his hat, pushed a hand through his hair in obvious frustration, and then reset the Stetson on his head. “I’m gonna go check if anyone’s in the barn.”
She leaned a hip against the truck and watched him walk away, his strides long and purposeful. Was he in a hurry to get away from her probing questions? Or worried about getting the load of lumber back in time to start working on the game booths? Probably both, she thought, sighing.
It wasn’t that she was being nosy. She didn’t have brothers or sisters, and although she understood sibling dynamics on a textbook level, she lacked the human experience. She did know that Kate adored both of her brothers, and that the older one had become more a father figure over the years. But Clint was older than Kate, about thirty was Dory’s guess, so he probably didn’t appreciate the perception of being kept under Joe’s thumb.
Still, Joe obviously knew what he was doing to keep a ranch that large profitable. Dory wisely kept the observation to herself.
She shaded her eyes and gazed around the Double R. The place was spread out with a barn, what looked like a bunkhouse, stables and a corral where three horses grazed. But, unlike the Manning’s ranch, there was no buzz of activity. Then again, she knew some of the goings-on had to do with the big July Fourth get-together.
Clint emerged from the barn, solo, his expression grim, and she had a feeling they had a ton of work ahead of them. She didn’t mind. She just hoped he had a spare pair of gloves. Getting dirty was one thing, but getting pricked by splinters was something else.
“The lumber is stacked behind the barn,” he said, shaking his head as he closed the distance between them. “But we’re not gonna get much help loading. Part of their south fence came down last night in the wind and most of the men are rounding up strays.”
“No problem. We should be able to handle it. But I’ll need some gloves.”
He pulled open the driver’s door, eyeing her with amusement. “I deliver you back crippled and Kate will take a branding iron to me.”
“Oh, please.” Dory tightened her ponytail, preparing for the work ahead. She might be useless in the kitchen, but out here…this was her world. “I bet I load as many boards as you do.”
One side of his mouth hiked up. “Get in. We’ll drive around to the back.”
She did as he asked, smug in the knowledge that she was going to surprise the heck out of him. She was in better shape than she looked. Often she’d hiked uphill for miles to get to a dig site, and then spent another two hours with shovel in hand. Loading lumber would be a vacation.
“Check the glove box,” Clint said as he steered the truck around the barn. “There might be some in there. If not, I might have a pair in my toolbox in the back.”
She opened the compartment, which was jammed with the truck manual, a package of beef jerky, binoculars, a couple of maps and a small box of condoms. Quickly she slammed the door and stared straight ahead as they rounded the barn.
“Nothing, huh?” He pulled the truck to a stop. “If we don’t find a pair, you can use mine.”
“A callus or two won’t kill me.” She jerked on the door handle, anxious to jump out, annoyed with herself for being so flustered. So what if he kept condoms in his glove box? Good to know he was responsible. Although it didn’t matter to her. Why should it?
“Wait a minute,” he said, and slid an arm across the seat back behind her shoulders.
Her chest tightened as he slowly turned his face toward hers, his warm moist breath brushing the side of her jaw. She blinked, frozen, not knowing what to do, before finally giving in and meeting his eyes. He flashed her a grin and then twisted around to look out the rear window as he backed the truck and trailer toward the pile of lumber.
She let out a whoosh of air, and before he cut the engine, she jumped out of the truck, willing the heat that stung her cheeks to subside. Had she totally gone out of her mind? She seriously needed some rest. How could she actually have believed for a second that he’d been about to kiss her?
“You okay?” He’d gotten out and come around the back of the trailer to stare at her, his green gaze warm with concern.
“Fine.” She looked away and nodded toward the daunting stacks of lumber. “That’s it?”
Clint chuckled. “That’s enough.” He lowered the truck’s tailgate, hopped up on the bed and went to a large metal toolbox anchored down behind the cab. After rooting around inside he produced a pair of tan leather gloves that he tossed to her.
