At Long Last; Book 4 of the Long Ranch Series

by Michel Prince

  Taking off toward the house, she turned momentarily and called back to him, “And what kinda cowboy wears tennis shoes?”

  “The murdering kind,” he stated plainly. “Ankle monitors aren’t really made for boots.”

  * * * *

  The screen door snapped shut and Ashleigh jumped in surprise. Storming into the largest family home of the Long’s wasn’t her intention. She’d wanted to walk in, sit down and pretend she hadn’t been kissed so well, her toes were still curled.

  Harper looked up from the dining room table where she had a legal pad out and pen at the ready. A smiled curved Harper’s dark lips before she returned to the slightly out of date law books they’d been using.

  Walt, the owner of the home and oldest of his generation had gone to school to be a lawyer. Having shown up at eight in the morning, Ashleigh had learned a lot about the Long’s and found out there was more to them than a handful of ranchers eking by an existence. They also weren’t the spoiled rotten ranchers who’d struck oil and were now living high on the hog, bossing around their workers.

  Nope, the Long’s were a highly educated family of men and women who, despite the degrees they earned, stayed with the family business and worked the land. Ashleigh hadn’t learned the breakdown, but she had started to figure out the family dynamics. More importantly, the fact that despite the current case of love whipping through the family like a case of pink eye at a day care center, Miles had been unaffected.

  “You burn easily huh?” Harper teased as Ashleigh sat down at the table.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re face is pretty red.” Harper turned and tapped her pen on her lips a few times. “No, wait it’s fading. Now, how fast do white girls lose sunburns again? Aren’t you supposed to shed like a lizard first?”

  “She got kissed,” Sierra blurted out then covered her giggles with her hand. “Miles did after my ride.”

  “Did she now?” Harper held back her laugh. “Oh wait, that sunburn is back.”

  “Nope, she’s remembering the smooching,” Sierra said as she sat across from Harper. “It was a good one. Or two. Maybe three.”

  “Really.” Harper leaned across the table. “What else happened? You think there was tongue?”

  “Eww gross, what would she do with a tongue?”

  “And you wonder why I never introduced my impressionable sister to you?” Ashleigh interjected.

  Harper leaned back in her chair. “Sierra, you got to ride a horse huh?”

  “Gideon.”

  The way Sierra beamed when she said his name made Ashleigh’s heart lighten. Her own fears of losing her sister had kept her away from the day camps and other opportunities that could have exposed her to animals, trails and the outdoors. Growing up, Ashleigh remembered having fun at local camps before Sierra came along. Even a few times after, but between medical bills and her parents not wanting the responsibilities a disabled daughter brought, Ashleigh’s adventures halted. Part of her wanted to get up on Gideon and ride him herself, but how could she when she’d made an ass of herself around Miles?

  “You rode Giddy?” Vanessa the middle child of Walter asked as she bound into the room. “Isn’t he pretty? He’s my favorite, don’t tell Trixie.”

  “Who’s Trixie?” Sierra asked.

  “She’s my new horse. She’s all mine. Giddy, I have to share. Wanna see Trixie? She’s gots blue eyes.” Vanessa was spinning around in circles like the over sugared almost five year old she was, minus the sugar. “Can Sierra come out and see him?”

  “The ranch is pretty safe,” Harper said. “And now all the animals are contained to this part of it. Except for Lester.”

  “Who’s Lester?” Ashleigh asked a bit scared to find out.

  “A mutt that does nothing but get on my cotton pickin’ nerves,” Clevon said as the front screen door snapped shut. “Did Mel actually check on that dog last night or did she just drop food in his bowl? I swear that damn shit eatin’ sooner is more trouble than he’s worth.”

  “Papa!” Vanessa exclaimed and pointed to a jar resting on a bookshelf. “You said a naughty word.”

  “How long you been in here?” he asked as he dug in his pocket to drop a quarter in the swear jar.

  “Why?” she replied with her hands on her hips and her chest out. “Do you not pay when I’m not here?”

  “You bustin’ me?” he teased his only granddaughter as he scooped her up in his arms. “Because if you’re busting me, I’m taking back all my kisses.”

  The little girl squealed and wiggled in his arms. “No, papa, no. Not all my kisses!”

  After a few minutes, the two had gotten all their grandparent love out and Vanessa was dragging Sierra out to see Trixie.

  This time, Ashleigh was keeping herself and her lips away from the barn.

  “You gonna be taking up space here huh?” Clevon asked as he scanned the pages of legal documents and notes scattered over the large oval shaped dining room table that was set up for ten. “It’s almost four, the boys are coming in for a meeting.”

  “Right,” Harper said as she tried to scramble, organize and clean.

  “I’ve got you,” Ashleigh said as she held Harper’s hands to stop her before Ashleigh lost her ever lovin’ mind. How Harper could be an insanely good litigator and a totally incompetent filer was lost on Ashleigh. Maybe something happened when they passed the bar exam. It would be the only explanation she could see.

  “It’s the baby,” Harper said. “It’s sucking out my brain one synapse at a time.”

  “Are we playing pretend because people are watching?”

  “Hey, I don’t leave messes.” Harper looked down at the pile and her messenger bag that Ashleigh cleaned out on a weekly basis. “Okay, but I don’t expect you to clean it up for me.”

  “Walk away,” Ashleigh ordered as she organized the notes by law and year. All of it was too much, with too many moving parts. They’d gotten to the point where she needed a dry erase or cork board. Anything to connect the dots. Her mind clicked as she categorized each piece of information in a drop down file. The information overlapped with Hamilton’s case. How could they not? Harper was investigating Federated Gas and they were the company that probably ordered the hit on her.

  Flipping the pages of Harper’s legal pad, a name stood out, obviously important, as Harper had circled the name a few times. Samuel Trunket. Hadn’t she met him? Or maybe he’d been with Arthur Connelly. His name had a line connecting it to Art, but it kept hitting up against a dead end as it bounced around her brain. Ashleigh didn’t have dead ends. She blasted through or turned the curve to find what she needed to. Setting the legal pad aside, she finished cleaning up the papers and took them into the living room where Harper had moved the books.

  Suddenly, a gust of air cut through the room followed by a pile of cowboys.

  Monty came in first and gathered his new bride in his arms.

  “Not so fast,” Harper said with a giggle as he gently set her back on her feet. “Better knock that stuff off or I’ll start thinking you like me.”

  “Is Nessa around?” he asked before kissing Harper gently on the lips. “Walt has to be giving that girl a cut of the swear jar.”

  “Harp,” Ashleigh said unable to get the name Sam Trunket out of her head. With the legal pad in hand, she flipped it toward Harper. “Who’s Sam Trunket?”

  “He was in my office a few months ago, you were bummed because I wouldn’t let you seduce him.”

  “Lucky man,” Miles said.

  His remark caught Ashleigh off guard. “Why, because I wanted to seduce him?” She challenged the interloper she’d missed before.

  “Nope, because Harper protected him from your charms.” Miles gave her a knowing look. “The man might live a normal life.”

  She felt the heat erupt across her face again. “That’s it!” Ashleigh exclaimed, not about to reengage with Miles. “Sam’s the one who signed for the two men’s bodies.” Ashleigh’s eyes widene
d realizing she had said too much. “You didn’t hear that. Sierra, we gotta go.”

  “Sierra is with Nessa and Sunny meeting her horse,” Miles said.

  Ashleigh glanced at him then to Harper who’s eyes pleaded with her to stay as her eyes softened. She couldn’t, not until she decided if she was staying with the prosecution. Harper and Ashleigh had a very comfortable working relationship. One, where she never had to censor herself. “I shouldn’t have come today. It’s too hard walking a tight rope,” she said.

  “We’re on the same side,” Harper reasoned.

  “My job is to put him away for life.” Ashleigh pointed directly at Miles.

  “What am I?” Clevon asked. “Chopped liver? I killed someone.”

  “No he didn’t,” Harper said switching sides so quickly, she should have pulled a muscle. “You didn’t hear that and he didn’t say anything.”

  “This is what I’m talking about. All we’re doing is saying things we shouldn’t be.”

  “Then quit the DA,” Harper pleaded. “Help me, help us.”

  “I don’t have a hot rancher husband who can pay my bills.”

  “She thinks I’m hot,” Monty jeered as he slapped the back of his hand against Miles’ chest.

  “Yeah, but she kissed me.”

  “Oh my God, are you twelve?” Ashleigh exclaimed as she threw her hands in the air.

  Chapter Six

  “You think she’s a bit touched in the brain?” Clayton asked as the cousins watched Ashleigh pace back and forth over the old rug in the middle of the living room. Her hands were flying and she seemed to be in a debate with herself. The winner of said debate was hard to determine, since she could only be fighting the evil verses good sides of her personality. Either way, all those in the room might as well be watching a tennis match the way their heads followed the blonde haired melt down mumbling about statutes and morals. “I mean she did make out with Miles, so her mental stability is already in question.”

  “True that,” Monty added.

  Ashleigh stopped her motion making them all get a crook in their necks in response.

  “Made out,” Ashleigh bit out. “You have a sorry idea what making out is if you think—”

  Miles let out a sigh, then scooped her up in his arms once again, to shut her up in the best way he could. Just like before, she protested his mouth on hers for approximately point one second. Once she softened against his body, he set her feet back on the ground and let his hands slide down her body coming to rest on her hips.

  “Quit doing that,” she whined exposing a bit of a twang, he hadn’t caught before as her hands warmed his belly while they rested on his abs.

  “You need to calm down. We aren’t used to the spastic behavior around here.”

  “At least, outside of the bedroom,” Monty replied.

  Miles leaned his head, so he could see around Ashleigh and give him the side eye.

  “What? I’m not the one playing tonsil hockey with a woman trying to put me away for life.”

  “My first mistake was not letting you fall down the stairs as a child.”

  “You know Miles,” Monty said as he plopped down in a recliner. “I understand you haven’t done much in life, but we all know you left that baby gate open. You were really covering your own ass.”

  “Can we please talk outside?” Ashleigh asked with a little less frenzy she’d been showing so far.

  “It’s alright,” Uncle Clevon said. “We still need your daddy here anyway.”

  Miles held the door open and Ashleigh’s pale green eyes crinkled at the edges before walking through the opening. Why was she mad at him? Seriously, she asked to go outside.

  Settling down on the railing that circled the front porch, Miles kept his hands on either side of him.

  Ashleigh stood with her arms crossed and one hip popped to the side.

  It made it hard to concentrate with the way her jeans were painted on her hips and hung low. The blue lace of her top accentuated the breasts that, although they fit her, seemed a bit large for her petite frame.

  “The kissing has to stop,” she stated plainly.

  The problem with this was he couldn’t help looking at her full lips and licking the corner of his own to capture the taste of her once more. Not the way he wanted to, instead he tried to figure out if he could go for it one more time. Probably not. At least not now.

  “Well? Aren’t you going to say something?”

  “Have you noticed when I kiss you, the stick in your ass starts to inch its way out.”

  Ashleigh’s jaw dropped at his description.

  He pushed off the railing and stepped so he was right next to her, hip to hip. Leaning his head next to hers, he whispered in her ear, “I bet if you and I were alone for an hour, you might loosen up enough to have it drop out completely.”

  “You’re not as irresistible as you think you are.”

  “You’re the one who used the word irresistible, not me.” This time, he made sure to let his lips brush the top of her ear. “I just suggested I have the ability to make you relax. What about me made you say irresistible?”

  “Miles Long—”

  “Good, you do know my name,” he said as he backed off and noticed her face was filling with a light rose blush. “Let me tell you what I think about you Ms. High and Mighty. I think you’re the reason the whole tie ‘em down crowd is rushing to the bookstores lately.” She began to speak, but he held his hand up to silence her. “You’re the type of woman who needs to be tied down because you don’t feel worthy of a good orgasm. Any proper gentleman you’ll fight tooth and nail with until he gives up and moves on. I hate fighting. I’ll do anything to not have to raise my voice to a woman. So woman, if you’re gonna keep coming after me to make me the enemy when we both know the only reason you’re doing it is because you’re afraid I might actually bring you to a climax and treat you like a lady when I do it…well, fuck you. Next time, you try to tell me what I can and cannot do on my ranch, I won’t kiss you into submission. I’ll just leave you standing there waiting.” He stepped closer. This time, eye to eye so their lips brushed as he silently spoke his final words on the subject, “And that ache you’ll have between your legs will just have to wait until you find yourself one of those tie down freak mother fuckers because if I get my rope, you won’t see the sun for three days.”

  Abandoning her on the front porch, Miles went back inside. Giving his sister-in-law the side eye, he crossed through the living room.

  As he headed into the kitchen he gave Harper a little suggestion, “You might want to go mop up that puddle out on the porch.”

  * * * *

  The door didn’t snap shut when Miles went back inside. In fact, if the heat hadn’t left her body from his absence, she wouldn’t believe he was really gone. Leaning against the outside of the house, she tried to stay upright. Damn that man.

  “Holy hell.” The sound of Harper’s voice made Ash’s eyes flutter open. “He said he left a puddle outside and damned if he didn’t. Is he that good at kissing?”

  “We didn’t kiss,” Ashleigh replied as she let out a breath of air and found her way to a rocking chair on the porch.

  “You know Miles doesn’t say much.” Harper sat next to Ashleigh. “I barely know him. Even after living out here for months.”

  Ashleigh’s insides were all bundled up and parts of her did ache, the bastard and his hard words that were so right in the moment. “He’s…He’s wearing an ankle bracelet and is out on bail. I’m supposed to help put him away for life.”

  “Are you talking to me?” Harper asked.

  Ashleigh couldn’t focus enough to deal with Harper’s craziness.

  “Alright, I’ll just leave you to process.”

  Process? What would she be processing? The fact that every word Miles said was more accurate than Robin Hood’s arrow. She’d been using Sierra as an excuse for years. A handful of second dates and never a third. Her time was limited and the men she met weren�
��t the kind that would make room in their life for a woman who would be raising her sister for the rest of her life. Then there’s Miles, accusing her of stifling her sister. What did that dumb ass cowboy know about what she’d gone through? Staying up late as a fifth grader because her parents couldn’t deal with a fussy baby. If the stories were true, she had been a calm baby. One who consoled herself unlike her sister.

  Glancing to her side, she saw Harper rocking gently as she rubbed circles on her belly. “I thought you were abandoning me?”

  “I said I was leaving you, so you could process. Sorry, babe, you’re stuck with me.” Harper cracked one eye open. “You figure everything out?”

  “Life, the universe and everything?”

  “Isn’t that a book?” Harper continued to rock, but opened her eyes fully as the sun began setting in the west. Across from them, a clear night sky began to appear. “Look at it this way, you don’t have to worry about commitment issues with Miles. He’s pretty much stuck to this ranch until you put him away for defending me.”

  “You’re not helping the situation,” Ashleigh bemoaned. “He told me he hates to fight. How can a man who hates to fight gun down two others?”

  “Hating to and having to are two different beasts.”

  “Motherhood is softening you. I’m gonna need you to stop.”

  “Ash, you can need all you want, but I always listened to both sides of a case and if you don’t think I’m going to nail Federated’s ass to the wall, you have another think coming.”

  “What about Mr. Connelly?” Ashleigh asked in a solemn tone. “He is still technically my boss, in a way.”

  “Mine too, until I get rid of my last few cases, but what he was doing wasn’t legal. He had people prosecuted, just because they couldn’t afford the right lawyer to get them off. If Jason’s name hadn’t come up in rotations for legal aid, we might have never caught on. I was working bigger cases and Hamilton couldn’t tell a set up from a hole in his ass.”

  “Which end of him is the ass?” Ashleigh laughed. “Because sometimes, I can’t tell which end is up on that man. You should hear some of his arguments. I’m beginning to wonder if his law degree was printed at an all night Kinko’s.”