Taming The Cowboy (She's in Charge Book 4)

by Layla Valentine

  “I…we still have things to work out, and everything’s progressing with the business side of things. Now, I need to talk to you personally.”

  “Can we meet then? I wanted to show you something anyway.” He sounded too eager. Like he had been dreaming of this. Did he really have that big of a crush on me?

  “Don’t get too excited. The kind of garbage you pulled could put a woman off dating forever.” The blunt statement might have been a little bit cruel, but it was also completely honest.

  I heard him draw a sharp breath, and he was quiet for a bit. Then he said, “Well, that would be a tragedy. But look, I know I deserve that. Probably more.”

  “I didn’t call up to yell at you, believe it or not.” I sat back, feeling myself sink into my new leather couch, which still had that almost new-car smell clinging to it. Sometimes this place reminded me of a hotel room; everything aside from my belongings set around on shelves and the table, none of it was familiar.

  Neither was this situation.

  “If you want to talk in person, I’m game. Just know, as far as I’m concerned, the gloves are off. If you try anything—”

  “You don’t have to tell me,” he said. “I get it. You’re mad as hell, and you have a right to be. I just want to clear the air about everything this time. I also really do want to show you something.”

  “Okay, then. Where is this surprise?”

  He gave me directions. It was a longish drive out into the countryside, but in the mood I was in, it would be a relief. Three hours to myself, with nothing but music and the road, sounded a lot better than knocking around in this place for another weekend.

  Summer was finally starting to loosen its grip. That meant hurricane season was on the horizon, but I would rather deal with a lot of rain and wind than the steady, oppressive baking that had settled over Texas for months. Just as long as nothing turned into a disaster.

  But I could say the same about the meeting at the end of this long road.

  When I finally got there, I was shocked. It was a ranch. Small, obviously unworked for a few years, now in the process of being renovated. New fence replaced the old in several places, and the weeds were being cleared, leaving behind stubbly fields under a fresh layer of fertilizer. A paddock near the barn held a pair of coltish bay horses, still on the small side and knobby at the knees. Chickens wandered the paddock, patrolling for bugs and worms.

  In the center of the property, a dusty road that was slowly being regraveled led up to a small farmhouse in need of a coat of paint. A battered pickup truck, vaguely red, sat in the carport next to it.

  It wasn’t picture-pretty like Dream Acres or the dolled-up ranch “Dallas” had supposedly owned. It was real, and it needed a lot of work, but showed promise.

  Calvin was sitting on the weathered porch with a cooler next to him when I rolled up and parked just outside his carport. He was wearing work jeans and a T-shirt, his boots a little muddy and his tan reddened and darkened from working in the sun. Even his smile was different: less dazzling, more genuine. And relieved.

  “You came,” he said as if I had worked some kind of miracle.

  “For better or for worse, I need this resolved. Nothing else about this is going to give me any kind of closure.” Maybe I sounded silly saying that, but I didn’t really care.

  He got up, his brow furrowing. “Did something happen?”

  “All kinds of things have happened,” I said as I walked up the porch steps. One of them creaked alarmingly under my sneakered foot. I had deliberately dressed down for this encounter, resisting any urge to impress him. “What is this place?”

  His smile regained its strength. “This is my ranch,” he said warmly. “My family ranch. The real one. I figured you’d like to see it, while I showed you the real me.”

  “The real you, huh?” I couldn’t help but smile. “How different is it from the you that I met on vacation?”

  “Nearly exactly the same, but I’m not working for an asshole,” he promised.

  My smile quirked up on one side. “Oh really. Let’s see how this goes, then.”

  I didn’t know how much to hope for…but this place, flawed but honest, was far more to my tastes than some well-groomed sham. And I could say the same thing about him.

  Chapter 20

  Calvin

  I tried to contain my excitement as Ruth and I took a slow walk around the fence line. Realizing that I had screwed up that badly with someone who turned out to be the woman of my dreams had left me struggling, a lot more than I wanted to admit. But I would, if that would help get her back. As it was…I hadn’t even expected to be able to talk to her again about anything personal.

  “It’s a work in progress,” I told her about the ranch. “Good thing I never took a loan against it. I would have lost it by now, chasing dreams.”

  It was cooler and blustery, the cloud cover thickening slowly as we walked on, and now and again I had to grab my hat to keep it from going flying. “I grew up here, like I said. I was honest about pretty much everything. My place just isn’t anywhere near as nice as the fake one.”

  “That’s fine. I’ll take genuine but not perfect over impressive fakes any day.” Ruth went quiet, face thoughtful. “Look, I know you brought me out here to settle things between us personally. Any luck with milking your…client…for more information?”

  “Working on it. I wanted to ask you what you wanted me to tell them.” I stole a long, thirsty look at Ruth as she stared out over the field. Even in jeans and a simple, she looked amazing. But she also looked troubled. The mess at work probably never entirely left her mind right now. “I have another check-in meeting next week, and I have to bring something to the table if we’re going to string them along.”

  She nodded once. “I’ll…send you a script?” Her eyes twinkled slightly, giving me hope. It was the first even half-joke I had heard from her in a while. “Or at least, some thorough notes.”

  I laughed a little. “Damn. You bounce back hard.”

  “You bet. I still haven’t decided how I’m going to get these guys entirely, but until then, I want to make sure they have no idea of the truth. When I hit them, I want them to be completely unprepared.” Her voice didn’t shake despite the anger in her eyes.

  “I’m kinda glad I’m not on your bad side anymore.” I smiled at her, only half-joking.

  “You should be. If you had turned out to be a total Judas, we would be having a very different conversation.” She shot me a dark look, and I nodded at once.

  Still, better that she be here, angry and wanting answers, than simply walking away.

  “I believe you. But no, that’s not my style. Don’t think I could have kept lying to you anyway, once I realized.” My chest tightened slightly. It was a bad time for a confession, but I was having trouble keeping it in.

  “Realized what?” She looked me over warily.

  “How I feel about you.”

  I saw the tremor go through her, and held my breath, waiting. Finally she spoke, slowly. “If you care about me so much, why didn’t you tell me the truth?”

  “Because I was a coward.” I hated that, even more than I hated admitting it. “I didn’t want to lose you. I didn’t want you finding out what I had been pushed into doing. I just wanted to find a way out of it before all hell broke loose. But then it did anyway.” Now my laugh was sad. “Guess I should have figured you were too smart not to find out.”

  “You slept with me while you were lying to me,” she said. “I know that’s a standard Hollywood-crowd move, but I thought you were trying to get away from that.”

  I winced. “I was. I am. I’m done. I just should have done it sooner.”

  “No shit,” she said. “You think that feeling bad about it and telling me that you care about me now makes what you did go away?”

  “No,” I said quickly. “Not at all. This is only the start of me trying to fix things.”

  She stopped dead, folding her arms and leaning on the fence.
“Take your best shot, then. Because so far, most of what I’ve gotten from you is remorse for getting caught.”

  “Not just getting caught—” Except, I realized as I paused, it sure could look that way. Especially in the eyes of the one I had hurt.

  “Okay, yeah. You’re right. But aside from how it hurt you, I don’t give a damn about getting caught. Getting caught and hurting you just happened at the same time.”

  “No. You slipped the knife into my back on their orders well before I found out it was there.” She stared at me steadily, jaw set. “You just figured you could slip it out the same way. I don’t like liars, Calvin.”

  I took it, not caring much about my pride right then. “Look, I’ve learned my lesson. I’ll never lie to you again.”

  She lifted an eyebrow. “Guess we’ll see.”

  Well, it wasn’t an “I never want to see you again,” and that was progress. But I needed to change the subject for a minute.

  “What happened with finding your spy?” I asked.

  Her face fell, and she tightened her arms around herself until it was more of a self-hug. “We caught her. She was the same person who recommended I come to the ranch for my vacation. She was…my friend. My closest friend in the organization except for Gregory, and…I thought… my closest female friend, period.”

  My jaw dropped. “Jesus. Was she blackmailed or something?”

  “No.” She let her arms drop, then put them on her hips, as if warding off her own sadness—or trying to hide it. “No, she got jealous of my success, thought I owed her better than twenty-five percent above the New York corporate average for her position, and just wanted to make some cash on betraying me. That and…punish me, I guess.”

  “That’s…sick.” I couldn’t hide my disgust. “How the hell could she do that to you? I mean, at least you were someone I had never even met, and at least I had a reason. And what I did was still wrong. But that?”

  “Turns out she instigated the whole thing. Came to them offering information, and a plan to get me to give up what they figured had to be a bunch of juicy corporate secrets. A plan that included you.” She licked her lips and looked down.

  “How? I mean, I’m not exactly famous.”

  “No, I mean…Bella knew I had a type. They were looking for that when they hired you.” She blushed lightly—and I almost grinned.

  “Jesus, what a fucked-up way to meet someone. I don’t know whether I should hate that awful woman and our mutual client, or thank them for my getting to meet you.”

  To my surprise, she smiled. “They pretty much made sure we would start off on the wrong foot, didn’t they?”

  “Sure did. And I didn’t fight back against that hard enough. I’m never going to feel good about any of that. Meeting you was the only part of it that was worth a damn, and…well. You know.” I scratched the back of my neck awkwardly, tipping my hat forward. “But you’re still talking to me, and I feel lucky just for that.”

  “I am still talking to you,” she said, turning to me more. “And…I don’t know, Calvin. Things are a mess right now. But give it time, and I think I could give you another chance.”

  “Now that’s the best news I’ve heard in a while,” I said with a big smile. “I’ll make sure you don’t regret it.”

  “If I do regret it, I’ll make sure you regret it more,” she warned. “You’re still on really shaky ground right now.”

  “I know. I’m sorry.” I shoved my hands in my pockets, the rough denim scratching my knuckles. “But it’s not going to come to that, Ruth. I’ve been an idiot, but I know my feelings. I love you.”

  She swallowed hard, eyes shimmering suddenly. “If I didn’t have feelings for you, I wouldn’t have come. But trusting you again, that’s going to take time.”

  “I understand.” We started walking again, slowly, her arms around herself, me wishing I could dare put an arm around her. We passed the paddock with my two yearlings, who came over to beg for attention.

  I was petting one of them between the ears when it hit me. “Hey,” I said suddenly. “I was wondering. You know this bastard you’re after, the one who hired me? He’s probably got a serious team of lawyers.”

  “You’re right. That’s part of why I was on the fence about getting the law involved. But I’m not sure how to punish him without it.” Her eyebrows rose as she looked at me. “Do you have a better idea?”

  “I think I do,” I said, grinning triumphantly. It was time to fix what I had helped break.

  I told her my idea over barbecued ribs and beers that night. At first she looked at me skeptically. Then she smiled. Then, when I told her what the outcome I was looking for was, she started laughing.

  “You know what? That’s brilliant. Let’s do it.”

  She kissed me goodnight that night. It wasn’t entirely a make-up kiss, and it was only a kiss. But I felt it down to my toes, and it gave me more hope than I had felt since watching her helicopter take off.

  A week later, I walked into a meeting with Star of Texas’s rep wearing a big smile and carrying dozens of juicy bits of misinformation about Ruth and her business practices in my head. The Rubber Ducky and the clone of “her” phone included even more well-presented bullshit.

  The rep took many notes, looking so impressed that I realized not knowing what any of the business and technical terms I was spitting out didn’t matter one bit. All that mattered was remembering what Ruth had told me, and delivering it with charm, confidence, and plausibility. Like a good actor should.

  The fools lapped it up. They even handed me a bonus on top of my third fat check. It would be more than enough, with the other checks, to get my family ranch all the way back up and running.

  Eventually, they would realize that my “inside information,” some of which would be dutifully corroborated by this Bella person so she could avoid jail, was all carefully tailored garbage. But by then, it would be far too late—especially for their arrogant, criminal-minded CEO.

  And maybe then, once things at my former client’s ad agency crashed and burned, I could chase that second chance with Ruth.

  Chapter 21

  Ruth

  Three months after making my plans with Calvin and getting his help carrying them out, I received a frantic, furious call from Arthur Kendall.

  It was about three in the afternoon, and I was grabbing a late lunch and staring at the empty office across the hall from me, where Bella had spent her last days with the company helping to corroborate the information that Calvin had fed to that bastard. Now she was gone, her services no longer required.

  I didn’t recognize the number on the office phone, but I shrugged that off; strangers called all the time. I picked up.

  “This is Ruth Washington, go ahead.”

  “You unbelievable bitch—what did you do?” His voice cracked in my ear like a pubescent boy’s. For a moment, I didn’t recognize him.

  But then I did—and I smiled. “Mr. Kendall. Hello. What can I do for you?”

  “This is your doing, I’m sure of it. You sabotaged me!”

  “I beg your pardon?” I asked, my tone filled with mild innocence.

  “Don’t give me that crap. You know exactly what I’m talking about!” He was breathing hard, practically vibrating with anger. “You fed Calvin Dawson false information.”

  “Calvin who?” I asked again, playing at being oblivious.

  “Stop it!” he spluttered. “You know exactly who and what I’m talking about. I had two people in place getting information on your company, and you made sure they got exactly the wrong intel.”

  “I’m sorry, who did you mean? And what do you mean, you had them ‘in place’? Are you implying that you have been spying on me?” I drawled the last few words almost lazily.

  He sucked air and went very quiet. “I implied nothing of the sort,” he said.

  I laughed at him. “Then what in the world did you mean?”

  “I meant. I…I know you were in on this. Just come clean!”<
br />
  “Come clean about what exactly? How could I feed you ‘bad information’ when we haven’t corresponded in years?” I was enjoying this a little too much. I was also recording the conversation. Even if I never needed it as evidence, Gregory was going to laugh his ass off when he heard it. So would Calvin.

  “You know what I mean!”

  “No, I don’t. You seem to be implying that you’ve had people spy on me in search of company information, and you’re angry that what they stole was useless to you.”

  “That false information cost me my position. Our stock tanked. The board voted me out! No confidence. I’ve been fucking fired!” His voice rose almost to a squeak of outrage.

  “Again, it sounds like you’re angry that some spies you sent against me failed to get anything useful, and you’re now paying for committing a felony. A felony you’re admitting to, over a business phone line connected to both a recording system and my entire staff.”

  He went quiet again while I struggled not to laugh. I knew that Star of Texas’s stock had tanked, and I knew that Kendall had been ousted as CEO. I had been following the story on the news since it had broken.

  “You bitch,” he hissed. “I’ll get you for this.”

  “Are you going on the record threatening me, as well as admitting to industrial espionage against me? And whining because the crime you committed backfired on you?”

  His downfall was mostly his own doing. All I had done, with Calvin’s help, was to make sure that every detail he got about my business and how it was run was false. Not only false, but damaging. The search-engine-optimization info was wrong, the techniques were wrong, the information on myself and my employees was wrong. I had him and his cronies dancing to my tune for three whole months as he had obliviously ridden his business into the ground on that bad intelligence.