He watched her, noticing the way she studied his face briefly. For half a second, he thought she might play along.
She didn’t.
“Well, it’s a fully functioning ranch, Mr. Walker.” Her eyes cooled significantly. “We’ve got plenty of activities the whole family can enjoy. Horseback riding, archery, swimming—although that’s probably out in October. If they’re interested, we can even put ’em to work while they’re here.”
The fact that she called him Mr. Walker made him smile. “I imagine you do,” he countered, still maintaining eye contact. “And I’ve got a few cousins I’d like to put to work.” Namely Travis and Kaleb.
Her soft laugh hit him square in the chest. There was something about this woman … something that made him want to yank her into his arms, slam his mouth over hers and… Yeah.
And.
All the stuff Jared wasn’t looking for in a woman. He didn’t give a damn how pretty she was or how sweet her voice was or how fucking awesome her ass looked in those damn jeans.
He forced his gaze away to check out the arena. When he looked back, he managed to rein in his thoughts, nodding his head, signaling her that he was ready to see what else there was to see.
And he wasn’t referring to her … naked.
No, definitely not that.
HOPE DID HER damnedest to keep from glancing over at the sexy cowboy walking alongside her. She found he was easy to talk to, far more laid-back than many of their guests. He seemed to know his way around a ranch, which was a good thing. Oftentimes she had to explain to the guests what they did here at DHR, what their guests were allowed to do, and what they weren’t, but with Jared, he seemed to get it.
After showing him the bunkhouses—one of which was available to guests and could hold almost twenty comfortably—and one of the thirty cabins—ranging from single room to three bedrooms—they now had available, she led him back to the main house. She’d gone over her allotted fifteen minutes, and she was trying her best not to show her irritation. When there wasn’t enough time in the day as it was, Hope hated dealing with interruptions. It frustrated her to no end.
“What do you think?” she asked when they stepped up onto the porch. Budweiser, one of the Labrador retrievers, joined them, sniffing Jared’s legs and boots before he earned a head scratch from the big man.
“I think it’ll work.” Jared squatted to pet Budweiser, then looked up at her. “I don’t know anything about the length of time, how many people…”
He left the sentence hanging and she couldn’t help but grin. “No worries. We can get it all nailed down. I’ll have my dad get you the information you need. You can take it with you and call back when you have an idea.”
Jared stood, causing her to look up at him once again, and she couldn’t help but admire the straight line of his nose, his thick, dark eyebrows.
The corded muscles in his neck.
And the seductive curve of his lips.
Good gravy.
Unfortunately, she couldn’t see his eyes since he’d put those mirrored sunglasses on.
Pulling herself back from the brink of insanity, Hope took a deep breath. Before she could invite Jared into the main office to get him the information he needed, Grant Kingsley and Lane Miller joined them on the porch.
“Hey,” Grant greeted. “When you get a minute…”
“Sure,” she said, nodding to Jared. “Jared Walker, I’d like you to meet our ranch foreman, Grant Kingsley. And this is our head wrangler, Lane Miller.”
“Nice to meet you,” Jared greeted, shaking both men’s hands.
“Same,” Lane said.
“Give me just a sec?” Hope asked Grant. “I need to pass him off to my dad.”
Grant nodded in the direction of the barn. “I just saw him go that way.”
Shit.
Turning back to Jared, she nodded toward the office, tried to keep her tone polite. “Come on. I’ll get you set up with information. You can take it with you, then call back when you have an idea of what you need.”
As they were stepping inside the office, Jared’s cell phone rang. He looked to her, as though asking permission to take the call, and that warmed her for some strange reason. It was a gentlemanly thing to do, something she didn’t see often these days. Not from the city boys who came to the ranch anyway. Then again, Jared Walker certainly wasn’t a city boy.
Hope nodded her head, then went around to the file cabinet where they kept the brochures.
“Walker,” he said into the phone. “Yeah. He okay?”
There was a brief pause that followed his concerned tone, and Hope couldn’t resist looking up at Jared.
“Sure. I’ll have someone come right over and pick him up.” Pause. “Yeah. Thanks.”
Hope met Jared’s gaze when he hung up the phone. “Everything okay?”
Jared nodded. “Yeah. My son fell and bumped his head at day care. Nothin’ major, but he’s askin’ for me.”
Fucking fantastic. Here she’d been ogling a married man. Sounded about right.
“Do you need to call your wife?” Hope asked, trying to hide the fact that her gaze instantly dropped to his left hand to see if he was wearing a ring.
“Divorced,” he replied. “But I do need to call my aunt, see if she’ll swing by there and pick him up.”
Hope offered another nod, then turned her attention to putting the packet of information together while he made the phone call. Her heart fell straight to her toes, and she didn’t even have to guess why that was. Ever since she’d allowed herself to get captivated by Ben Ruhl, a man who’d come to the ranch as a guest a while back, and his daughter, Maddie, she’d been wary of men with children. Single men with children, that was. Even considering dating Ben had gone against her own self-imposed rules. Still, she’d ignored all the warnings and jumped in with both feet.
She’d liked Ben. They’d managed to spend quite a bit of time together when he and his daughter had come to visit the ranch a couple of years back. But Ben wasn’t the only one she’d gotten caught up in, and that was her own fault.
At thirty-three, it wasn’t like her biological clock was headed for the alarm setting, but it was beginning to tick louder than usual, and at one point, Hope had found herself quite enthralled by Ben’s daughter. The thought of having a family of her own… It had appealed to her on so many levels. Unfortunately, Hope knew that having her own children wasn’t a possibility, but she hadn’t given up on becoming a mother.
So, when they’d broken up—if they could even consider the long-distant, brief interaction they’d had dating in the first place—Hope had made another promise to herself not to get involved with men who had children. This time, she swore she would hold true to that promise. No matter what. Getting through a breakup was hard enough. When she got attached to the kid … even worse.
Once Jared finished the call, she stood up straight and held out the papers for him.
“I don’t want to keep you. This is all the information on the ranch, plus some of the things we’ll need to know in order to help you get the reunion set up. Once you know what you’re lookin’ for, give me a call. If you’re lookin’ to do this soon, we’ll need to know, because fall is still a relatively busy time for us.”
Jared retrieved the packet, his gaze never leaving her face. If she wasn’t mistaken, she thought she saw the hint of awareness in those mesmerizing blue-gray eyes. Somehow, she managed to yank her gaze from his, thrusting her hands into her pockets to keep from fidgeting.
“Thanks for showin’ me around,” he said. “It might take me a few days to get the information, but I’ll be callin’ when I have the details.”
“Perfect,” she said, nearly tripping when she made a beeline for the door to show him out. “I look forward to hearin’ from you. I mean … you know … we will be looking forward to it. The ranch
.”
Okay, so she hoped like hell he hadn’t noticed the odd desperation she sensed in her own tone. She wasn’t desperate. Not by a long shot. When she glanced up into his eyes, she saw something that resembled heat flaring in his gaze, and it took more willpower than she thought she had to look away this time.
“Thanks again.” Jared nodded his head and pointed at her with the packet of papers.
“My pleasure.”
No, no, no. That was not what she should’ve said. Jeezus, she needed to learn to shut her mouth. She should’ve said, “You’re welcome.” How freaking hard would that’ve been?
Too late now. Hope took a step back, allowing Jared to walk out the door, and once he’d cleared the doorframe, she quickly closed it and leaned against the wood, shaking her head in disbelief.
She had things to do, and they certainly didn’t involve thinking about a sexy, Stetson-wearing, Wrangler-rocking cowboy who had heartbreak written all over his incredibly handsome face.
Chapter Five
AFTER JARED HAD left the ranch, he’d headed straight for Curtis and Lorrie’s to pick up Derrick. Much to his dismay, his little boy had asked to stay there. Of course, it had taken Jared a little more than a few minutes to convince himself that was a good thing.
“Are you sure you’re okay, big man?” Jared asked Derrick.
“Of course, Dad.” Derrick pushed the dump truck he’d been playing with right over the toe of Jared’s boots.
“Does your head hurt?”
“Nope.”
“Are you sure?”
Derrick looked up at him funny. Probably wondering why good ol’ dad couldn’t just let it go.
Lorrie had quickly assured Jared that the bump really was nothing, but she would certainly keep an eye on it. She’d been more than willing to keep him overnight, along with Mason—Kaleb and Zoey’s oldest. That change of plans had allowed Jared a few extra hours to himself, so he decided to wander over to Moonshiners to see what was going on.
As usual, the place was relatively busy on a Friday night. Some of his cousins had shown up—including Brendon, Braydon, and Ethan—along with their significant others. Once he’d received his customary beer from Mack the bartender, Jared headed back toward the pool tables and settled in an empty chair off to the side.
“Hey,” Braydon greeted. “What’s up, man?”
“Not a helluva lot,” Jared told him, taking a long pull on his beer and watching as two guys finished up a game.
“Rumor is you headed over to Embers Ridge today. You check out that ranch?”
Jared glanced over at Cheyenne to see her smiling back at him. He lifted an eyebrow, acknowledging that he knew she’d shared the information, though he wasn’t quite sure who she’d heard it from. Last he’d talked to her, he had merely inquired, not committed to going.
“Thought you were goin’ out on tour?” he countered.
Her sweet smile told him he hadn’t been successful at changing the subject. “Not until Monday. So? You check out the ranch or not?”
“Yep,” Jared confirmed, knowing the woman wouldn’t stop until he finally gave in. “Got some information.”
“That place work for a reunion?”
“Probably,” he admitted. Truth was, he still didn’t have a fucking clue how to go about setting up a family reunion. He knew he first needed to determine a good time—for both the ranch and for his family—and then he could probably go from there. They would need to know how long they’d be there, how many guests for accommodations, etc. A dozen questions he had no idea how to answer.
Hell, he didn’t even know where to start.
“So what goes into plannin’ one of these?” Brendon asked.
Jared shrugged. “Not the slightest idea.”
“Did you get information from Hope?” Cheyenne questioned.
Jared nodded and took a swig of his beer. “Whole packet of shit.”
“Did you look at it?”
He shook his head. Truth was, Jared wasn’t much of a reader. He had glanced through the material briefly, a little overwhelmed by what he’d seen inside. There were a million things they could do on the ranch for a week. Trail riding, archery, skeet shooting, zip-lining, campfires, barn games. Those were all briefly mentioned in the first paragraph of the brochure.
It would’ve been a hell of a lot easier if Travis wanted a fucking picnic.
Suddenly, a round of greetings sounded from the rest of the patrons, and Jared looked up in time to see the man himself walking into the bar. Beside Travis was his husband, Gage, and their wife, Kylie.
“Now that he’s here, maybe we can ask him,” Cheyenne said softly.
Yeah. Great. Just what he needed, to let Travis know that he was incompetent and couldn’t put together a freaking family reunion without help.
Nope. No way. There was no way in hell he’d set himself up for a lifetime of harassment like that. The Walker clan loved to talk shit, and Jared had no intention of giving them any additional fodder to work with.
“Nah,” Jared finally said. “I’ve got it covered. I’m workin’ it out with Hope.”
That was a whopper of a lie, but one he could probably fix. The ranch was Hope’s world. If Jared needed help figuring out how to make a reunion work, surely she would have some ideas.
It wasn’t because he was looking for a reason to call her.
A big hand clapped him on the back, and Jared looked up to see Travis standing beside him.
“How’s it goin’?”
Jared gave a brief chin nod, then took a swig of his beer.
“Heard Derrick had an accident today,” Travis mentioned.
“Yep. Nothin’ major. Little bump on the noggin. Aunt Lorrie’s got it covered.”
“Heard that, too.”
“Where’re Kate and Kade?” Jared asked, referring to Travis’s little ones.
“Kylie’s dad and stepmom agreed to watch ’em for a bit. Kylie was desperate to get out of the house for a while. Adult conversation and all that.”
“Not much adulting goin’ on at your place, huh?” Jared joked.
“Funny,” Travis grumbled, fighting a smile.
Travis took a seat next to Jared, only the two of them at the table. When Jared made eye contact, he saw what looked a lot like concern in his cousin’s eyes. Knowing he had a snowball’s chance in hell of guessing what was bothering his cousin, Jared opted not to say anything, waiting for Travis to clear his mind.
What came out of Travis’s mouth next was not at all what he expected to hear.
“Since you haven’t said anything, I’m beginnin’ to think you don’t know. Which is the only reason I’m bringin’ it up.”
Jared frowned, waiting.
“Sable’s lookin’ for you.”
That got Jared’s attention, and he sat up straight, his beer all but forgotten. “What do you mean?”
“When you were gone this afternoon, Jaxson got a call from some irate chick who was lookin’ for you. Said it was imperative that she speak to you right away. He knew who it was but wasn’t sure how to handle it.”
“Why didn’t he contact me?” That seemed like the logical thing to do.
Travis ignored his question but continued, “Jaxson called me.”
“What did she want?”
“Jaxson doesn’t know for sure. He got her number and told her you’d call her back. I told him to let me talk to you first.”
Fuck.
The last damn thing Jared needed was his fucking ex-wife hunting him down. He’d moved on long ago, and he and Derrick were doing great without her. It’d been almost two years now, and he damn sure didn’t need her poking her face back in his business.
It had been difficult enough when he’d learned that she didn’t want to be a mom and had easily handed the little boy over t
o him. Well, maybe not easily, but in exchange for twenty-five thousand dollars, the bitch had been more than willing to let Jared play daddy—her words.
In order to protect Derrick, and Jared, his lawyer had the presence of mind to insist that Sable give up her parental rights, allowing Jared to have sole custody of the little boy. Although Derrick wasn’t biologically his, based on the DNA test Sable had had done, that didn’t change the fact that Jared was Derrick’s father. According to Sable, Derrick belonged to a guy she’d been sleeping with. A guy she’d left Jared for.
Sable finally admitted she didn’t have a clue who Derrick’s biological father was. The woman wasn’t known for keeping her legs closed, married or not.
Not that any of that mattered to Jared. Derrick was his little boy. He was the reason the sun rose and set each day. And Jared damn sure wasn’t going to allow Sable to come back in and fuck shit up. If she wanted to be a mother, she should’ve thought about that a long damn time ago.
“Fuck,” Jared muttered.
“I thought you should know. I’ve got eyes and ears out. If she shows up in town, I’ll know.”
Jared didn’t know whether that would happen or not. It all depended on what Sable wanted. If he had to guess, she was in between men and feeling sorry for herself. That was usually the only time he heard from her. Or, of course, when she needed more money.
“In the meantime, I’ve got Mom and Dad payin’ close attention. They’ll make sure you know anything they know.”
“Yeah, thanks.” Jared’s head was still spinning with all the information.
“So…” Travis began, taking a sip of his beer, then setting it back on the table between them. “How’s it goin’ with the family reunion?”
At the moment, Jared wasn’t sure which of those topics he didn’t want to talk about more.
“A FAMILY REUNION? Thirty first cousins? Are these people married? Do they have kids?” Mercy’s voice had risen into the dog-whistle range.
Hope stared at her sister. “I’m sure they won’t all be here.”
Jared (Coyote Ridge) (Volume 2) Page 5
