by Susan Crosby
Garrett tossed used straw into a wheelbarrow. “On the other hand, she is just passing through. That’s a good thing, right?”
Pete cocked his head and whined a little.
“I get it. She’s the marrying kind. I need to remember that.”
Pete looked away then took off running at the same moment Garrett heard a car coming down his driveway. The rest of the dogs followed. It was probably the straw he’d ordered earlier being delivered. At least he hoped so.
No such luck. He spotted Victoria’s car. She tapped the horn twice and the dogs scattered except Pete and Abel. Pete stopped when Garrett did. Abel hurried over to greet her. Garrett didn’t call him off.
“Well, don’t you look all spiffy,” she said, grinning. “Those rubber boots are the height of fashion.” She was wearing the same thing she’d worn yesterday, except her shirt was deep purple, low cut and a little frilly. Garrett had a soft spot for feminine frills, even more if they were red, lacy and barely covering a fine female body. He wondered what she was wearing underneath…
“I’ve been muckin’ manure, princess. Wanna help?”
She wrinkled her nose. “Maybe another time.”
“Uh-huh.”
She made the mistake of stopping downwind of him. After a second, she waved her hand in front of her face. “You weren’t kidding.”
“You take your chances when you come uninvited.” He cupped her arms and reversed their positions.
“I thought you’d like to know that I didn’t have the nightmare last night,” she said.
He’d had one. It’d been a hell of a night, in fact. “Good. So, now you’ve come to say goodbye?”
Her eyes sparkled. “Did you think I’d let you off that easily, cowboy?”
“Meaning?”
“I still want to get to know you.”
The last thing he wanted was more alone time with her. He turned on his heel and headed back to the barn. “You’re welcome to watch me work.”
He heard her following him and shook his head. She was like a mosquito. A stubborn, tenacious…and damned sexy pest.
He’d reached the barn door when the sound of a truck stopped him. His order of straw. Great. Lenny, the delivery driver, would spot Victoria and the town would soon be alive with rumor. Hell.
“You look like you want me to hide,” Victoria said. “You don’t want anyone to know I’m here, I suppose?”
Her insight surprised him. “Would you hide?”
“Heck no.” She laughed.
He eyed her steadily, resettled his hat on his head and went to greet Lenny, a sixty-year-old man who only seemed slow. He backed his truck to the barn door, hopped down and lumbered to where Garrett stood, waiting, Victoria next to him.
“Howdy, Garrett.” Lenny grabbed a bale hook, as did Garrett.
They worked in silence until the bales were unloaded and stacked. Garrett didn’t order too much at a time, preferring fresh straw and feed. His barn wasn’t huge, just ten stalls, one where he stored straw and another a tack room. Plus his workshop, hidden from casual glances.
When Garrett didn’t introduce Victoria, Lenny made it a point to do the honors. He lifted his gimme cap for a second. “Lenny Paulson, miss.”
“I’m Victoria Fortune.” She extended her hand as if he’d just washed up for supper, when in fact he was a mess from head to toe.
He hesitated, looked at his hand, then grasped hers for less than a second. “You Fortunes seem to have populated the whole earth.”
She laughed. “We have many branches all over the country, that’s for sure, and most have been fruitful. I have four brothers myself in Atlanta.”
“Whacha doin’ with this reprobate?”
“Learning how to muck stalls.”
Garrett almost laughed. She’d said it with a straight face.
“That so?” Lenny asked. “Got much call to do that in Hotlanta, do you?”
“You might be surprised.”
Lenny guffawed. He pulled a folded piece of paper from his back pocket and passed it, along with a pencil stub, to Garrett, who signed the bill.
“He ain’t much of a bargain,” Lenny said to Victoria as he headed to his truck.
“‘Free’ is always a bargain,” she countered.
After the truck rumbled off, Garrett went to work finishing cleaning the stalls. She sat on a stool and watched, not saying a word, but not seeming bored, either. He wondered what Lenny would say to people, because he certainly wasn’t about to keep this bit of news to himself. No way.
Garrett was aware of her, of every time she crossed her legs or stretched or sneezed. Once when she was hunched over a little, her shirt gaped and he could see she was wearing a black bra. He liked red best, but black took a close second. It gave him something to fantasize about, anyway. Did she wear some tiny black thing as underwear?
“You only have the three horses?” she asked after a while, having seen them in the corral.
“At the moment. One’s been with me a long while. Apple Annie. These others ended up here over the past week. Haven’t located any owners as yet.”
“And how many dogs?”
“Six. At the moment.”
“Do those numbers change a lot?”
“They come and go. Except for Pete. He stays.”
“Abel seems pretty entrenched, as well.”
Garrett glanced over at the mutt, who’d made himself at home at Victoria’s feet. “He’s been hard to place. Not that he isn’t a good dog. He’s just…attached.”
“I haven’t seen any cats.”
“They keep to themselves. Last I counted, there were three. They do a good job of keeping the rodent population controlled.” He spread new straw in the last stall and wondered what would happen next. She didn’t seem inclined to leave.
“I brought lunch,” she said then, sliding her hands down her thighs nervously.
He didn’t know what to make of her—of the adoration in her eyes, her sassiness and straightforwardness. It was an odd and fascinating combination, and he needed to be careful. While he felt an almost blinding physical attraction to her, he would never be good enough for a Fortune, not with his past, not even for a night.
“I pictured you slapping a peanut-butter sandwich together for yourself,” she went on when he didn’t speak. “Thought maybe you’d like something a little heartier.”
He ambled over to where she sat. She straightened as he got closer. Her eyes took on a little wariness. “Victoria—”
“Vicki,” she interrupted breathlessly. “Most people call me Vicki.”
He let a few seconds pass. “Victoria, I don’t need mothering.”
“I’m not mothering you. I’m trying to be your friend. Friends do nice things for each other.”
“I’ve got all the friends I need.”
“Well, then, you’re a rare man. I figure I’ll meet lots more people in my life who will become friends. Some just for a little while and some forever. You saved my life, Garrett. That’s an unbreakable bond between us.”
“Yeah? Well, I’m beginning to regret doing that.” He stalked toward the door, not knowing where he was going, just that he needed to get outdoors.
She laughed and followed. “Roast beef sandwich, potato salad and apple pie,” she said, a coaxing lilt in her voice.
How’d she know his favorite meal?
“Estelle told me,” Victoria said smugly, apparently reading his expression. “Emily and I ate breakfast at her diner this morning. She even packed our lunch in a cooler I’m supposed to bring back when we’re done.”
He reached the stairs to his front porch, stopped and turned around. “So now Lenny and Estelle both know you’re out here visitin’ me. You
might as well have taken out an ad in the weekly.”
“Are you hungry?”
Her cheerful, I-am-never-denied-anything tone made him want to shake his fists at the sky. Instead he shook his head. “I need a shower.”
“I’ll wait. Thank you,” she said seriously.
He bit his lip. She’d gotten her way, and she knew it. “We’ll eat here on the porch,” he said.
“Afraid if I come inside your house, I’ll slip behind the shower curtain with you?” Her eyes took on some shine, not so much in humor this time but provocation, as if daring him.
She had it backward. He was afraid he’d invite her in. Not only would lunch not get eaten, but maybe dinner and perhaps breakfast, too. He wouldn’t mind a good, long time in the sack with her.
“I won’t be long,” he said, then escaped into his house.
“I’ll be right here,” Victoria called after him then drew a calming breath. Keeping her hands off him had been torture.
She pulled the cooler from her trunk and set out lunch on a small, rough-hewn table between two unpadded rocking chairs. She couldn’t picture him in a rocker at the end of the day, except maybe if he had an ice-cold beer while watching the sunset for a few minutes. Maybe. She would’ve said he wasn’t a sentimental man, except that the way he treated animals said differently.
She wondered if he really deserved his reputation. He’d been gentlemanly with her—unfortunately. She smiled at that, then she loosened a button on her blouse, sat on a rocker with her knees up and waited patiently for him to join her.
Beyond the way her body felt around him, she liked him. He wasn’t like anyone else she knew, sure of himself but not in an arrogant way. The way he touched his animals said a lot, too. He knew how to be tender. She figured he was also very strong. Men who worked ranches and farms generally were. She didn’t know anyone else who worked physically for a living.
And he seemed comfortable in his own skin, a very good trait.
The screen door creaked open. Pete stood right away then tracked Garrett to the second rocker, sitting next to his master.
“Is Pete one of your rescued dogs?” she asked.
“We sort of rescued each other. The food looks good.” His easy change of subject was marked with a tone indicating it wasn’t going to be reopened. He grabbed a wrapped sandwich and dug in.
They didn’t talk, and that was amazingly okay with her. She was a curious person, one who asked lots of questions, wanted to know the how and why of things, but this time she just ate and listened to the land, the wind swirling dirt across the property, horses neighing in the corral, dogs yipping now and then. How different were the night sounds?
After they finished eating, she put the empty containers in the cooler, which he carried to her car.
“Have a safe trip home to Atlanta,” he said, blocking her from moving beyond the car.
She forced herself to smile. “I’m not leaving Red Rock yet.”
“Your choice, Victoria Scarlett, but don’t come out here again.” His eyes seemed filled with both desire and regret.
Something roared through her—loss, a sense of abandonment and even more, a feeling her future had just zagged onto another path. “How’d you know my middle name?”
“You’re splashed all over the internet, the adored daughter of Atlanta.”
“I want you,” she said impulsively, probably foolishly but honestly.
“Which is exactly why you need to go now and not come back.” Tension coated his words. He fastened the button she’d undone, his fingers grazing her hot skin, making her draw a shaky breath. “You can’t be with a man like me, Victoria.”
“Why? What’s wrong with you?”
“I’m too old for you. I like my quiet life. I don’t want bright lights and big cities.”
“What makes you think I want more than to sleep with you?” She saw that her words surprised him. Maybe he even saw she was lying. She did want to sleep with him, but perhaps he could see more deeply into her and know that she felt something more than that. She shouldn’t. It was ridiculous, given their short history. But she wanted more. Her dreams had been full of him. She’d been wanting him for months.
“Princess, you’ve got a little fantasy going based on me saving your life, and maybe because there’s an attraction between us. We won’t be acting on it. That’s that.” He walked straight into his house and shut the door.
Pete had followed him, but Abel let her give him a hug, one she really needed.
Rejected. Emily had been right. Victoria wasn’t used to it, and it stung a whole lot. Mattered a whole lot.
“Take good care of him, okay?” she said to the dog. “I think he needs someone to love him.”
She had to leave him alone, as he wanted. If she pursued him, pushed him, he would only get angrier, and she’d rather he remember her fondly.
Victoria got into her car, then a half hour later she walked into Estelle’s diner, cooler in hand, having lost her good spirits. The noon rush was over, only a few customers sat at the counter, sipping coffee. The redheaded, fiftyish Estelle was leaning her elbows on the counter and gabbing with an older man.
“Everything was wonderful,” Victoria said to her. “I’ll set this by the kitchen door, Estelle.”
“That’d be fine, thanks. Oh, Lenny was here for lunch. Said he met you.”
“Yup,” Victoria answered, drawing a laugh. She would be as tight-lipped as necessary. Garrett would appreciate her discretion, she was sure. “Garrett was kind enough to show me his rescue operation. He’s doing good work.”
“Rescue operation? I thought he just took in stray animals.”
“He also trains them so that they’re ready to be good pets for people.” Victoria assumed an all-business mode. She owed it to Garrett to protect him from gossip—and maybe to improve his reputation a little. “That’s a nice little enterprise he has going. Well, thanks again, Estelle.”
“Sure thing, honey.”
Instead of getting in her car, Victoria walked to a park a couple of blocks away. She didn’t want to face Wendy and Emily yet, afraid the disappointment of being dismissed by Garrett would be visible on her face. That defeat hurt more than she’d expected and was deepening each minute. She was torn between staying away, as she’d first thought she could, and making a bigger effort to tear down his walls of resistance. Could she accomplish that? Maybe if she had more time…
Caught between the challenge of winning him over and her usual don’t-make-waves stance, Victoria sat on a park bench to think. A young mother pushed her toddler in a swing across the way, but otherwise it was a school day and therefore devoid of older, noisier children, giving her the quiet she needed.
He was right about some things—fourteen years was a big difference in age. Wendy had told her he’d moved away a couple of times. What had he done during those exiles? What kind of life experience did he have that she didn’t? She was accustomed to the men of her social circle. Similar backgrounds helped smooth the path to an easier getting-to-know-you time in a relationship.
Nothing was similar about her and Garrett, not that she could tell, anyway. She did like bright lights and big cities—it was all she knew. When he’d said he didn’t like them, it probably also was experience speaking. She’d only visited Red Rock, so she didn’t know about small-town living, especially isolated-ranch living. She didn’t think she was cut out for it.
So, what could she do?
She rubbed her face and blew out a breath. She focused on the mother and child playing, heard their laughter, smiled as the little one said, “Higher, Mommy. Higher!”
Emily had asked Victoria about having a family, and she’d answered truthfully. She hadn’t given it a lot of thought, except in the way she always had—someday, w
hen she was married and the time was right, it would be the next logical step. But she hadn’t hungered for motherhood like Emily.
And Garrett certainly wasn’t marriage material. He’d separated himself from daily life among people for a reason. If she could somehow convince him to sleep with her, that would be the extent of their relationship.
Could she live with that?
No. She knew for a fact she would want more. Much more. He appealed to her on levels she’d never experienced before. He was worth fighting for, but at what cost? Not just to her, but to him. Everyone had the ability to be hurt, even him, no matter how hard he might fight it.
She made the decision then to leave him alone, to relegate him to a bittersweet memory and unfulfilled dream. She would finish her vacation with Wendy and Emily, return to home and work in Atlanta, nightmare-free at last, and move on with her life.
And leave him to live his.
Chapter Four
Garrett was about to bang on Wendy and Marcos Mendoza’s door four days later when he spotted the “Baby Sleeping” sign hanging on the knob. It didn’t cool his ire but it did temper the force with which he knocked. Victoria Fortune had some explaining to do.
She opened the door. Her shower-wet hair had dampened her yellow blouse. No jeans this time, but slim, dark brown pants. Socks but no shoes. No lipstick.
She looked sexy as all get out.
“Well, Garrett, how nice—”
“What the hell did you do?” With his boots and hat on he towered over her. And while he didn’t usually use his height to his advantage, especially with a woman, he was furious enough with this one to make a point.
Victoria stepped outside, pulling the door shut behind her. “Be specific, please.”
“You told Estelle I run an animal-rescue operation.”
“Don’t you?”
“Hell, no. I take in strays now and then and rehabilitate them and find them homes. It’s not an operation. There’s nothing official about it.”
“Maybe my terminology wasn’t exactly right but—”
“Your inexact terminology brought me two horses, eight dogs and five cats in the past two days. And I don’t expect the ‘donations’ to stop. Included in that total are a mother dog and four puppies and a mother cat and four kittens, by the way. That’s fifteen more mouths to feed. And find homes for. Not to mention spaying and neutering and shots. Plus they need to be isolated until they get their vet check.”
