To Tempt a Cowgirl

by Jeannie Watt

  “With a water park and a possible drive-in theater?’

  Stewart’s mouth tightened. “You know as well as I do that I’m only doing those things if I have no other choice.”

  “You don’t. The Brodys aren’t going to sell.” Gabe gestured at the chair across from Stewart’s desk and the older man nodded. Gabe sat, leaning his forearms on his thighs. “They won’t sell and you’re going to end up with a revenge water park.”

  “It’ll serve them right and should make some decent money.”

  Gabe looked down at the parquet squares beneath his feet, considered his words for a moment before he looked up and said, “So you punish the Brody women for not selling to you and Jeffries sits across the valley, laughing because he has a world-class resort and you have a water park.”

  Instead of going red as Gabe had expected, Stewart went a little white around the mouth.

  “I’ll have my resort.”

  “Not if you build the water park.”

  “I’ll get the additional land.”

  “You won’t. I know these women.” Gabe tapped his fingers together between his knees. “We can start fresh somewhere else. Somewhere where you’re building because you believe in the project, because it’s something you want to build, and not because it’s part of a vendetta.” Gabe stopped talking, waited for a response—any kind of response. But Stewart remained stubbornly silent. “Vendettas are unhealthy,” he said softly.

  “So is betrayal,” Stewart said grimly. “It eats at you—especially when you’ve trusted someone as deeply as I trusted Jeffries.”

  Oh, yeah, Gabe thought. There was karma taking a nip at him. Dani had trusted him.

  “Believe it or not, I’m aware.”

  “Who betrayed you?” Stewart asked in a curious tone.

  “It’s more like who did I betray,” Gabe said.

  “Who?” Stewart frowned deeply, as if surprised there was something about Gabe’s life he didn’t know.

  “Dani Brody.”

  “How?”

  “I lied to her. For our gain.”

  “A betrayal involves a personal relationship,” Stewart said.

  “Exactly,” Gabe said.

  “You and—” Stewart waved a finger back and forth in front of him “—her?”

  “I love her,” he said simply. “And because of what I did, she hates me.”

  Stewart made a disparaging noise. “So you want me to back off. Because you love her.”

  “No,” Gabe said slowly. “I want more than that.”

  “What exactly do you want?”

  “I want you to sell me the Staley place.”

  * * *

  MOLLY WAS BACK. For a moment Dani simply stared at the mare when the excited fifteen-year-old girl with the swinging ponytail unloaded her from the horse trailer and led her proudly forward.

  “I know you’ve already worked with her, but that the previous owner stopped short of sixty days,” the girl’s father said.

  “He did,” Dani said vaguely.

  “I’m kind of new at riding,” the girl said, “and I thought that you could work with both of us, if I could come after school.”

  Dani smiled, bringing her attention back to her livelihood. “That’s the deal I worked out with your mom,” she said. She glanced at the dad, who walked around the new truck after closing the door on the new horse trailer. These guys were new to horse life in every respect. “I just didn’t realize that I’d already worked with the horse.”

  “Does that make a difference?” the father asked.

  “No,” Dani replied brightly. “It makes things easier. I know Molly and Molly knows me.” She smiled again at the girl, who was now petting Molly’s neck as if still trying to believe she owned a real live horse. “She’s a nice mare.”

  “I just love her.” The girl beamed. “Mom thought I might want to barrel-race, but I just want to trail-ride with my friends.”

  “Good plan,” Dani said. “Molly’s not built for barrels, but if you’re interested in trying it out, my sister has just moved in and she’ll start running barrel-racing clinics in the spring.” Despite water parks and drive-in theaters and whatever else Widmeyer might throw their way.

  “We’ll keep that in mind,” the father said, settling a hand on his daughter’s shoulder.

  “Follow me.” Dani gestured toward the pens with her head. “We’ll let her settle in, then start the first lesson tomorrow.”

  “I can’t wait.”

  Well, at least Gabe had found Molly a good home. She’d give him credit for that. Found the horse a home and left town shortly thereafter. All in all about as perfect of an ending to this chapter in her life as she was going to get.

  And it still sucked.

  * * *

  THAT NIGHT THERE were lights on in the Staley house. Dani stood at her bedroom window, toweling her damp hair as she peered out across the dark fields that separated the two houses. What now?

  A new tenant? Another aggravation to deal with? Or was Gabe back?

  Dani wadded up the towel and headed back to the bathroom. There was nothing she could do about what happened on the Staley place. For the moment, she and Jolie had some peace. The construction had stopped, but everyone in town who knew anything—and that was almost everyone—told her that this was because they were transitioning between phase one and phase two.

  Meanwhile Dani was transitioning between aggravation and extreme aggravation. She and her sisters hadn’t done one thing except refuse to sell their property and now they were being made miserable by a rich guy who didn’t like to hear no.

  Dani dropped the curtain and sank down on her bed. The rich guy may be over at the house right now. Or it could be that Serena character, or a project manager, or any number of people, but she was pretty damned certain that the current resident was not Gabe Matthews. Because he had no reason to be there...and because she really, really didn’t want him to be.

  Jolie gave a knock on her door and came in to sit beside her.

  “Long shift,” she said, rubbing her neck. She pointed to the window, where lights were now shining where they hadn’t shone in well over a month. “New resident?”

  “Apparently.”

  “I wonder what this means.”

  “I was just wondering the same.”

  “Can’t be good,” Jolie said.

  “I think not.”

  “We’ll get through this.”

  “Pig farm,” Dani said with a smile.

  “Pig farm,” Jolie agreed, standing up again. “And a shower for me. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  “Yeah,” Dani said, once again focused on the lights. She couldn’t help but recall how comforting she used to find those lights not that long ago. And now... Now they mocked her and her penchant for trusting the wrong people.

  Later that night, when she woke after a whopping three hours of sleep, she got out of bed and crossed the hall to the bathroom, where Gus was taking up most of the floor. On her way back to bed she stopped as the light across the field caught her eye.

  Someone was still up at 3:00 a.m....just like Gabe.

  She let out a shaky breath, blinking rapidly at tears that shouldn’t be forming, and got back into bed, giving her pillow a couple of healthy punches to knock it back into shape before falling back against it.

  What in the hell was wrong with her? Why could she not accept that she’d fallen in love with a lie? Why did she keep wanting something that didn’t exist—had never existed?

  But it had felt so very real...

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  THE STALEY HOUSE was dark the next night. Dani pulled the curtains over her bedroom window anyway, as she had the night before, but she couldn’t help peeking out in the wee hours of the morning when she couldn’t sleep. No light. The next afternoon the heavy equipment disappeared. After that all was quiet, but Dani knew something was coming, construction would continue. After all, they’d gotten the go-ahead from the county and th
ere was no way that the Widmeyers would cause such a stink, then simply back off.

  Not knowing was almost worse than listening to the equipment work.

  Molly’s new owners showed up two weeks after they’d dropped her off so that Dani could demonstrate Molly’s capabilities and evaluate their daughter’s, Amber’s, riding ability. The demonstration and the lesson went well; Amber was eager to learn and Molly was on her best behavior. By the time Dani put the mare away, Amber’s mother, Ginny, was discussing the possibility of buying a horse for herself and the father was laughingly saying that he’d prefer a motorcycle.

  “It’s quieter than it was the last time we were here,” Ginny said as they walked to the car. “I imagine you’re relieved that the place sold.”

  Dani stopped abruptly. “Sold? Are you sure?”

  “I just got my real estate license,” Ginny said. “The people in my office are sick about it being a private sale, but apparently it changed hands between friends.”

  “I see.” An awful possibility began taking shape in Dani’s mind.

  “The new owner used to live there.”

  Dani forced a smile after a few seconds of stunned silence when she realized that the family was giving her odd looks. “A new neighbor. That’ll be nice.”

  “As long as he doesn’t build a water park, eh?” Amber’s father chuckled.

  “Right.” Somehow she continued walking with the family to their car, making inane small talk, barely aware of what she was saying. She smiled and said goodbye, waved as they left. Once they were gone, she put a hand to her stomach and sank down to sit on the mounting block next to the hitching rail.

  Gabe had bought the property.

  This was worse than living next to a water park. Now she had to live next to the guy who’d screwed with her head, made her think she loved him.

  Instead of the annoying trucks and heavy equipment rumbling nearby, Gabe would once again be driving across her property to reach his house...except that he wasn’t. Yet.

  That didn’t mean he wouldn’t be in short order.

  As soon as Jolie pulled into the yard, Dani met her at her car. “Gabe Matthews bought the Staley place.”

  Jolie’s chin jerked up. “What does that mean for us?” she asked slowly.

  “Nothing, I hope.”

  “I don’t believe that for a minute,” Jolie said. Neither did Dani.

  Two edgy weeks passed and there was still no sign of Gabe.

  Where was he and why had he bought the property? Those were the two questions that Dani managed to keep at bay during the day, but they cycled viciously through her mind during mostly sleepless nights.

  Why did she feel so unsettled not knowing where he was?

  For the same reason she wanted to know where a snake was, even though she had no intention of making contact. Self-preservation.

  Every now and again, Dani caught herself staring out across the emptiness between the Lightning Creek Ranch and the Staley house, wondering when she would ever feel as if she’d truly healed, truly moved on, while Gabe owned the place.

  Not while she was waiting for that inevitable encounter...

  Not until she had some closure of some kind.

  “You can stop being so jumpy. He isn’t coming back,” Jolie said one Saturday morning.

  Dani turned on her. “I’m not jumpy.”

  “Are you kidding? You practically have whiplash from swinging your head around every time a car drives up the road.”

  “Fine. Well, you know what? I’m going to contact him, find out what his plans are, because until I know, I’m going to be on edge.”

  “What happens once you do know?”

  “I’ll be unhappy, but not on edge.” She’d know where the snake was.

  Jolie snorted. “We’ll see.”

  Dani waited another two days before she brought up an old voice message on her cell phone, and pushed the call-back button before she had time to talk herself out of it. Gabe answered so quickly that for a moment she couldn’t find her voice.

  “It’s Dani,” she finally said.

  He appeared to be just as stunned because it took him a moment to say, “Yeah, I know. It’s good to hear from you.”

  “I’m calling because, well, I wanted to know what your plans are for the property. The Staley property.” She pushed her fist against her forehead. As if there was another property he owned that she would need to know about.

  “Nothing.”

  “What do you mean, nothing?”

  “I have no plans for the place.”

  Dani frowned deeply. “You aren’t going to make it into a resort?”

  “No.”

  “Or live there?”

  “Not permanently.”

  “You’re going to sell, then?”

  “No.” His voice was clipped, impersonal.

  “That makes no sense, Gabe.”

  “Maybe not.”

  “You aren’t the kind of guy who does things that make no sense.”

  “Maybe I’ve changed.”

  “I’ll have to take your word for it,” Dani said darkly. “Because I’m not going to find out firsthand.”

  “I guess you will.”

  “Why’d you buy the Staley house?” Because she simply needed to know. No answer she came up with made sense.

  There was the briefest of hesitations before he said, “I did it for you, all right?”

  “For me?”

  “For you and your sisters. So that things would be the way they were before I made the proposal to Stewart. I’m trying to put things back.”

  It took her a moment to say, “Why?”

  “Why do you think, Dani?” He practically growled the words. “I have to go. There’s a call on my other line.”

  He hung up without a goodbye, leaving Dani staring at her phone and wondering what had just happened.

  * * *

  GABE LEANED BACK in his chair and pressed his fingers to his tired eyes. Two days, max, and he’d be done with this project and then on with the next. He needed all the work he could get, since his retirement fund was officially tied up in a property that he wasn’t going to personally use—at least not in the near future. So he’d be paying land taxes and bare-bones utilities to keep the place from freezing and being foreclosed on. He’d have to have people take care of the inside and out and hope word didn’t get out that he was never there to avoid having the place gutted by opportunistic thieves.

  Or he could rent the place. At least temporarily.

  The one thing he wasn’t going to do was sell...or contact Dani.

  Just hearing her voice had been hell. She hadn’t forgiven him, that much was obvious from her icy tone. And what did he want with a woman who wanted nothing to do with him?

  At least Neal and Serena seemed to be working things out, although Gabe had to admit to feeling a touch of jealousy. Having screwed up his own love life made witnessing their happy moments difficult. He wasn’t a sour-grapes kind of guy—or at least he hadn’t been prior to messing things up with Dani.

  He pulled his laptop closer, took a look at the CAD drawing, then hit Save. Enough for tonight. He was supposed to go out to dinner with Neal and Serena as the proverbial third wheel. They were going to a place where they parked your car, took your coat, made you smell a cork, perhaps forced fancy snails upon you. All he wanted was a nice steak in an unpretentious restaurant, alone...with Dani.

  Wasn’t going to happen.

  At least he wouldn’t have to talk about his new purchase tonight, or his motivation for buying, since they’d already gone over all that a few nights before during happy hour at the local pub.

  Upon hearing what Gabe had done, Neal had been first stunned and then appreciative. Serena had only smiled in her enigmatic way, which seemed to indicate approval, and Gabe figured she was probably glad she wasn’t going to have to make another trip to Montana to try and strong-arm Dani into selling.

  After agreeing to sell, Stewart had
shifted gears. He already looked healthier and less stressed and was now going balls to the wall with another project in the southwest corner of Montana, closer to Yellowstone and the money to be made there. He wasn’t as enthusiastic; neither Neal nor Gabe knew whether or not he would ever get over his former partner’s betrayal, but at least he’d given up on the great white whale.

  Everyone was grateful for that.

  Now all Gabe had to do was to figure out what to do with his house. He might rent it, but for the time being, he was not going to sell.

  * * *

  DANI USUALLY DISCUSSED everything under the sun with Jolie, no matter how personal, but she couldn’t quite bring herself to confess that Gabe had told her he’d bought the house for her. Well, for her and her sisters, but she knew it was mainly for her.

  And despite that, he’d made no attempt to make contact with her. Was that because of guilt? Because he thought he owed her?

  Or was it a new type of manipulation? He’d hang back, let her come to him?

  She was thinking too much, analyzing too much. It was driving her crazy, so when Mac called to tell her he was back in town and would be hanging at his brother’s bar, Dani had told him she’d meet him there at nine, even though it was a Monday and she had a superfull schedule the next day. She needed to talk to someone who wasn’t involved in this mess she’d gotten herself into. More than that, she needed an objective opinion. If anyone would give it to her, it was Mac. He’d helped her buy a horse, so maybe he could help her out with this, too. A guy’s point of view—someone to tell her, yes, what Gabe did was a standard manipulative man ploy.

  She spotted him the instant she walked into the bar, which wasn’t hard to do since he was a head taller than almost everyone there. He stood as she approached his table and enveloped her in a mighty hug. “I missed you,” he said after releasing her and waving her to a chair.

  “I missed you, too,” she said as he lifted the pitcher and poured her a glass of Budweiser. He topped off his own, then raised his glass. “Salute.”

  Dani smiled and drank. “So how’s life on the other side of the state?” she asked, wiping foam off her upper lip with the back of her hand.

  “Lonely.”