by Lexie Ray
“I don’t need help, Paisley,” I said.
“You haven’t even heard what kind of help I’m offering,” she said, raising her eyebrows at me. “This is help you’re going to want. I just know it.”
What would it even be? Did she think I was a drunk? In need of psychological support? A makeover for my trailer? What in the world did Paisley Summers think she had to offer me? A manicure?
“I have no idea what you think I need from you,” I said. “And it’s not a girlfriend, so don’t even go there.”
Sure, I was jealous from time to time of the closeness Hunter and Hadley shared, but I didn’t think I had enough energy to put into an actual relationship. It was better to love them and leave them — or leave the relationship end of commitments up to my hand. We were pretty committed.
Paisley narrowed her eyes at me. “I know why you were drinking so hard last night.”
I frowned at her. “Why do you think I was?”
“I didn’t say think. I said know.”
“Okay, give it a guess.”
“The bank’s trying to take the Corbin Ranch.”
I tried to swallow, but my mouth was too dry. “How … how do you know that? I didn’t say anything about it to anyone, did I?”
“Avery, every single person at that bar knew why you were drinking so hard. You didn’t have to say anything. It’s a small town. Even people who weren’t in the bar last night know.”
She had one thing right. Gossip in this place was a real bitch.
“That’s nobody’s business but us Corbins,” I informed her. “Stay out of it, and if you overhear anyone in town dishing about it, you can tell them I said to stay the fuck out of it.”
“Pretty defensive,” Paisley said. “That tells me your family’s in pretty deep.”
“Just stop.”
“Why? Why would you want me to stop talking about it if I have a solution?”
“Solution?” I scoffed. “What the hell do you think you’re going to do to solve this?”
“Only money will solve this,” Paisley said. “And that’s what I’m offering.”
I forgot to breathe for a moment, my mind whirling. Was she really serious? It didn’t help that she was still naked — albeit holding a sheet in front of her — as she proposed this.
“It’s a lot of money, Paisley. I don’t think you can offer me something like that.”
“Bullshit I can’t,” she said, jutting her chin out at me, making me blink away yet another image of her as a defiant little girl. “I know it’s a lot of money — I don’t know how much, exactly — but guess what? I have a lot of money.”
“Your father has a lot of money,” I corrected her.
“It’s the same thing.”
“I don’t think any of my brothers will go for you loaning the ranch the money,” I said. “If you say you know what’s going on, then you’ll know the bank is trying to take the ranch because we can’t repay the loan right now. What makes you think we’ll be good for it?”
Paisley smiled. “I didn’t say anything about loaning you the money.”
“Then what are you even talking about?” I didn’t know if it was my poor, hungover head that was this fuzzy, or if Paisley was playing coy on purpose. It was probably a little of both. I had no idea what was going on.
“I’m telling you I’d give you the money …”
“No. No way. The loan idea was bad enough. Not one of us — not even me — would accept the money with no intention of paying your father back. That’s just not happening, Paisley. It’s unrealistic. What would even be in it for your father?”
“You mean, what would be in it for me,” she corrected.
“What would be in it for anyone giving away tens of thousands of dollars for no good reason?” I asked, throwing my hands up in the air.
“I’d tell you if you just let me finish.”
“By all means.” At this point, I was genuinely curious as to what insane thing was going to pop out of Paisley’s mouth next. It was almost as good as television.
“What I’m proposing is a merger, of sorts, on a couple different levels,” she said. “I recognize that your family’s ranch has fallen on hard times, but I’ve always respected that you Corbins have kept doing things the traditional way. That’s how the Summers Ranch is being run, too, and there are too many big players in the game now. Little ranches — and even medium-sized ones like ours — are getting edged out by all the wrong people. Merging our ranches will give your family’s ranch a shot at surviving.”
“But what will it give the Summers Ranch?”
She still had that strange little smile on her face. “More land. More cattle. More resources. And a husband for me.”
I was certain I’d misheard that last part. “Pardon?”
“The merger, Avery. It all makes perfect sense, doesn’t it? What better way to consolidate our strengths and eliminate our weaknesses than by getting married and merging the ranches?”
Whatever was making so much sense to Paisley was creating a dull roar in my ears.
“So what do you think?”
I shook my head slowly, trying to rid myself of the roaring noise.
“Oh, don’t be a baby, Avery. People get married for all the wrong reasons all the time. This reason is right. You and I have a good thing here. And this would make us one of the biggest ranches in the state — even with the huge operations.”
“We’re not going to get married.” This had to be some kind of a bad dream that I had yet to wake up from. Please, God. “This is a ridiculous idea.”
Paisley’s smile only faded a little bit. “I’ll give you some time to think about it,” she said. “I know this is all kind of sudden. But the thing is, you’re going to have to move fast. The bank isn’t going to dally around about taking your family’s ranch. If you wait too long, even marrying me isn’t going to save this place.”
She let the sheet drop once more, and my eyes were treated to the sight that was the woman Paisley had become.
“It’s not as if marrying me would be pulling teeth, Avery,” she said, running her hands over her breasts, not taking her eyes from mine, enjoying the effect her little show was having on me. She rose gracefully from her sitting position and crossed the distance between us in two lithe strides. “I think you’d like being married to me.” She pressed her front to mine, my cock jumping helplessly at the contact, and kissed me long and hard. She’d just woken up, but her mouth tasted fresh, as if she’d chewed mint or somehow managed to brush her teeth while I’d been passed out.
Then, as suddenly as she’d kissed me, she backed away again and pulled her clothes on as if we were a married couple already, not taking care to cover herself up whatsoever. I remembered that she’d neglected to wear panties underneath that denim skirt last night, wondered if it was comfortable.
“Let me know, Avery, but make it sooner than later,” she said, giving me a last searing stare before leaving me dumbfounded and alone in my trailer.
Her truck roared to life just outside, gravel skittering beneath the tires as she drove away.
How in the world was I going to wake up from this dream — and was it actually a nightmare?
Chapter 3
There was one good thing I had to say about the ranch. When I was really invested in the work, it numbed my mind to all other things.
I grabbed the clipboard of cattle log papers — Chance must’ve put everything back in order when he returned to the ranch yesterday evening — saddled my horse, and took off. He was concerned that there were cattle missing, and I was concerned that Paisley Summers had finally ensnared me in a trap she’d been constructing for years.
I’d address the missing cattle situation before turning my attention back to Paisley. I just couldn’t think about her right now.
The sun was already well above the horizon by the time I reached the herd. I could see Hunter in the distance riding the fence line, checking for breaks. That was his favori
te job because he liked to ride the hell out of his horse. I couldn’t blame him. He’d lost his leg in Afghanistan. The man deserved to go fast.
To drive images of Paisley naked and spreadeagled on my bed, I poured myself into the cattle logs, squinting at the tags on the ears of the herd, parsing them out, weaving the horse between them to make sure I counted all of them. We were missing five, but that couldn’t be right. Five was ludicrous. The cattle stuck together with few exceptions. There was a reason why “the safety of the herd” was a saying. Cattle just stuck together. Even though predators were rare here — coyotes sometimes worried us — the mentality remained. Where would the other five be?
I issued a recount, carefully recording each and every animal in the log, but came up short again. Who said I needed a cattle log to tell these things? I was usually dead on — when I was mentally invested. That was the key to my ranching success, apparently. Chance was always on me about not caring.
After updating the logs, I urged my horse into a gallop to catch up with Hunter, still circling the pasture.
“Hey!” I shouted, trying to get his attention. How was he even able to check the fence for weaknesses if he was riding so fast? “Hey! Hunter!”
He turned in the saddle and eased up on his mount. “What’s going on?” he asked shielding his eyes against the sun rising ever higher. “Were you out late last night?”
“Never mind that,” I said, because minding that would mean turning my mind to Paisley, and I just couldn’t do that right now. “Have you noticed any stragglers?”
“Stragglers?” Hunter frowned. Stragglers weren’t good. Stragglers caused trouble for themselves and all of us. If the herd didn’t stick together, it was a nightmare. “I’ve been riding the fence all morning, but I haven’t noticed any stragglers. The entire herd overnighted here. They should all be here. The fence is secure.”
It was important to know that the fence was secure because that was about our only assurance the cattle would stay on our property. It was a nightmare when a section of fence opened up. Depending on the kind of damage our cattle did and where they ended up, the ranch could face fines for “free ranging” cattle. Notably, one time a couple of Corbin rogue cattle had crashed the cornfield that the agricultural department at the school was growing and ate their fill. We had to reimburse the school and apologize to the students whose work was destroyed.
“Would they have gone missing last night?” Hunter asked. “Wasn’t the count right?”
I heaved a sigh. “No. The count wasn’t right. I’m not sure when the count went off.”
“Ah.” It was easier to admit that to Hunter than it was to anyone else because if the baby of the family ever passed judgment on anyone, he did it silently.
“Has, uh, Chance talked to you about anything?” I asked hesitantly.
“I haven’t seen him this morning,” Hunter said, shrugging. “Why?”
“No reason,” I said, not sure why I was so relieved that only two Corbins — and the rest of the town, apparently — knew what fate was about to befall the ranch. It just meant Chance would probably tell everyone later, and I’d have to be there for it.
“What’ve you done to piss him off this time?” Hunter grinned at me. Our oldest brother had been a curmudgeon since birth, probably. One of us was always pissing him off in one arena or another.
“Me?” I bluffed. “Who’s to say you’re not the one who’s done it this time?”
“Well, if you’re looking for stragglers, Chance is sure to be pissed,” Hunter reasoned. “Come on. Let’s ride to the rest of the pastures and see if we can’t turn them up.”
It was probably just an excuse for him to gallop his ass off a cross the ranch, and Emmett would be angry if we returned the horses to the barn lathered, but I was glad for Hunter’s exuberance and company. It just delayed the inevitable.
I wasn’t crazy about the horses. Mine, in particular, was pretty persnickety, shying at rocks and blowing breezes and about everything else. But when we gave them the reins and let them run together, Hunter and I were the wind flowing around the ranch, invincible and untouchable. When you were riding that fast, you never wanted to stop. I was convinced that I could outrun everything, and it was an even better distraction than booze from all of my various problems. With just the wind in my ears and the rippling muscles of the creature carrying me, I could almost pretend that everything was all right even if nothing was.
Hours passed, and I remembered just how big this place was. It sprawled from all directions up from the river that curled around the property, even if the bed was nearly dry. Our next step, if the skies continued to deny us rain, was to start bringing in water for the cattle — or start pricing other options, like digging wells and other solutions. It wasn’t going to be pretty if we couldn’t keep the herd watered, but it also wasn’t going to be pretty to go into even more debt than we already were in. I had honestly no idea how we’d pay for the thing if we couldn’t even repay the bank.
Only there was a way to repay the bank, but the solution was marrying Paisley Summers.
“I don’t see any stragglers, do you?” Hunter asked me as our horses slowed to a trot. He was just as troubled as I was. “When was the last time the count was right?”
“I honestly don’t know,” I said. “Those cattle could’ve gone missing weeks ago and we didn’t notice. Chance only brought it up to me yesterday, and he’s not out here all the time.”
“We’ll keep looking,” Hunter said, nodding to himself. He was the man with the plan. “I’ll ride the entire perimeter and see if there are any sections down. We’ll get the entire Corbin calvary saddled and on the lookout for the missing guys. Little rascals. Probably eluding us in the gorge.”
“We ran by the gorge,” I reminded him. It was a dramatic name for what was little more than an overgrown ditch dividing one of the pastures, but the terrain was problematic. Just a few weeks ago, Emmett had torn ligaments in his knee dragging a calf out of there. Cattle got hung up there all the time, but none of our missing five had been there.
Hunter and I groped for our vibrating phones at exactly the same time, which could only mean one thing.
“Family meeting,” we said in unison.
“Wonder who’s getting the intervention this time,” Hunter muttered, pocketing his device. Last time, it had been him.
“Who knows,” I lied. “It’s probably about the missing cattle.”
“Maybe. I’ll race you!”
He didn’t give me time to respond before spurring his horse into action, leaving me coughing in a huge cloud of dust. If my baby brother had a clue what this meeting was about, he wouldn’t have been in such a damn hurry to get there.
We met Emmett in the barn, who’d been grooming a horse, trimming its hooves expertly.
“You ran those horses too hard,” he said without looking up.
“Have you even done any work today?” Hunter teased. Emmett was sporting a large and bulky brace on his knee from his incident at the gorge. He hadn’t been able to ride — Hadley’s orders — and it was really wearing on him. The only person happier on a horse than Hunter was Emmett.
“More than you know,” Emmett said. “But we’d better get to the war room and figure out what’s got Chance in a twist this time.” My heart sank. I knew exactly what it was.
“We think it’s missing cattle,” Hunter said, lowering his voice conspiratorially.
“Spoiler alert,” Emmett returned sarcastically. “How do you know?”
“Because there’s missing cattle,” Hunter said, rolling his eyes. “Easy.”
“Why call a meeting over that?” Emmett wondered. “Just find the missing cattle.”
“Big ranch,” I said, walking with my brothers up to the house. “Easier said than done.”
Tucker was already up there, idling on the porch, waiting for the rest of us to get there.
“You’re not keeping Chance waiting, are you?” Hunter called.
“Kind of didn’t want to be the first one there, brother,” Tucker said. “Nothing really positive ever happens at family meetings, does it?”
“Chance should just throw in a couple of nice ones to keep us on our toes,” Hunter said. “Family meetings telling us we’re doing a good job on the ranch.”
“Yeah, right,” Emmett said, rolling his eyes as he accepted Tucker’s hand to get him up the porch stairs. I couldn’t help but notice Hunter bound up the stairs, testing the limits of his prosthetic leg. Hadley encouraged that kind of horsing around, pushing himself to reclaim his previous range of motion in spite of the carbon fiber length that kept him upright and moving.
“If some of the meetings were stupid, we’d be less likely to all show up for the important ones,” I reasoned.
“Maybe, but I just get such dread whenever my phone buzzes now,” Tucker said. “It’s a bummer.”
“Has Chance always been such a bummer?” Hunter joked.
“He can hear you all standing out here on the porch bitching about him,” Zoe said, poking her head out the door. “The windows are open.”
“Fuck,” Tucker said mildly. “Well, guess we’d better go in.”
“Damn right, you’d better come in,” Chance bellowed. “You’re wasting daylight.”
And only Chance and I knew just how precious daylight was now. How much longer would the rising and setting of the sun dictate our days? How much longer would the ranch be ours?
Inside the house in the front room, Chance looked as haggard as I felt. At least, I hoped I didn’t look as hungover as I really was. Chance appeared so much older than even the day before, and unless I was imagining things, I thought I saw more gray hairs populating his head.
“You all had better sit down for this,” he said, even though he was standing, pacing around.
“You’d better sit down, too, or you’re going to wear a hole in my floor,” Zoe tossed over her shoulder as she walked back toward the kitchen. Chance watched her go before plopping down hard on the couch. Zoe and her son, Toby, were the most recent additions to this mismatch of a ranch. She cooked and cleaned for us in exchange for a small paycheck and room and board. I had no idea where the money came from for that, but Chance was the one who kept the books, not me.
