Trusting the Cowboy Read online

  “I see,” said Lauren, the vague tone of her voice conveying her lack of interest.

  “I know Walden is glad you’ll be there,” Jodie said. “He told me you guys work well together.”

  “Who’s Walden?” Lauren asked.

  “The other pickup man,” Vic said. “We always work in pairs.”

  “You’ll have to come to the rodeo, Lauren. See Vic in action,” Jodie said. “And that horse that Finn trained. Adelaide, one of his clients, will be riding it in the barrel riding competition.”

  “We’ll see how that works out.” Lauren’s polite smile seemed to dismiss that line of conversation. She slipped her glasses on her face and it was back to business. “We’ve been looking through our father’s papers and so far haven’t found anything referring to your deal.”

  Vic glanced down at the folders lying on the table between them, resisting the impulse to riffle through them himself. “Your father and I agreed on a lease-to-buy agreement,” Vic said, struggling to keep his tone even. Pragmatic. “Are you sure he didn’t say anything about that to you or make a note of it anywhere?”

  Lauren shook her head, picking up another file and opening it. “We haven’t seen everything yet, mind you, but it doesn’t look good.”

  “Are there any files left? Did he have anything on the computer?”

  Lauren frowned as she held his gaze. “Dad didn’t do much on the computer,” she said, dismissing that possibility. “Besides, we couldn’t figure out the password on it. I don’t suppose you would know?”

  “Not a clue. Did you try the horses’ names?”

  “Yeah. And his birth date, our birth dates—though I doubt he remembered them anyway—and in a pinch his and Mom’s anniversary. The name of the ranch. Nothing.”

  “I can’t help you there.” He didn’t know Keith that well.

  “Even if we could log on, I doubt there’s anything there, and even there was documentation, if it wasn’t signed...” Her voice trailed off.

  Annoyance snaked through him. It was so easy for her to dismiss his claim. She didn’t know what was at stake.

  “Would you mind if I looked through the papers myself?”

  Her lips tightened and he wondered if she was afraid he might find something that would help his case. He held her eyes, as if challenging her, then she looked at Jodie.

  “What do you think?” she asked her sister.

  “I don’t care,” Jodie said with a shrug. “If Vic has a claim, maybe we need to see if we can find evidence for it. He might know better what he’s looking for.”

  Lauren nodded and turned back to Vic, taking her glasses off again, ignoring Jodie’s chuckle at her action. “I doubt you’d find what you want. But if we don’t discover anything, I’m willing to sell the ranch to you, provided you can match the buyer’s price.”

  “What price is that?”

  When she named it, Vic’s mouth fell open as blood surged to his throat and chest, threatening to choke off his breathing.

  There was no way he could meet that amount, but there was also no way he was telling her that. He swallowed hard and tried to claim some remnants of composure.

  “I’ll have to talk my banker,” he said, attempting to inject some confidence into his voice. “But before I do that, I’d like to make sure that there is absolutely no evidence of the agreement. And I’d like to look for myself.”

  Lauren gave him a tight nod. “I guess that’s fair, though, like I said, we didn’t find anything. You’d have to come here, though. To look at the papers. And one of us will have to be here.”

  “You don’t trust me?” The words burst out of him before he could stop them.

  Way to create a good impression.

  Jodie patted him on the shoulder. “We trust you, Vic.” She turned to Lauren. “I trust him. He’s Finn’s friend and a good guy.”

  “Don’t take it personally,” Lauren said, her mouth twisting in a cool smile. “I don’t trust any man.” Then she turned to Jodie. “But as far as his agreement with our father is concerned, there are other factors at play. If he finds something that corroborates his claim, it’s best that it happens here with us watching. That way no one can challenge it.”

  He. His. She spoke of him as if he suddenly wasn’t there.

  Vic took another sip of his coffee, reminding himself that he just had to get through this.

  And, more than ever, he had to find some evidence of the deal he and Keith had drawn up.

  There was no other choice.

  * * *

  “Confess. You think he’s cute.” Jodie plinked out a few more bars of her new composition on the piano in the corner of the living room and turned to her sister, grinning that smirk of hers that Lauren knew was trouble.

  Lauren sent her sister a warning look over her laptop. “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think he was attractive, but it’s irrelevant.” She turned her attention back to the purchase agreement the lawyers had drafted, sent to her by her future partner, Amy.

  Part of her mind balked at the price tag, but it was an investment in building clients and staff. All of which would cost more to gather if they started from scratch.

  “How is it irrelevant?” Jodie got up from the piano and fell onto the couch across from her. She dropped her feet on the coffee table, looking as if she was settling in for one of the heart-to-heart chats she loved.

  “Don’t put your feet on the table,” Lauren chided.

  “Don’t be Dad,” Jodie shot back, but her smile showed Lauren she hadn’t taken her seriously.

  Lauren sighed and closed her laptop. Clearly she wasn’t getting anything done tonight.

  “I think you should sell the ranch to Vic,” Jodie said. “He’s put a bunch of work into it and I’m sure he wants to buy it for Dean.”

  “I’m not averse to selling the ranch to him,” Lauren said, slipping her reading glasses into their case. “If he can even match Alex Rossiter’s offer, he can have it. But I doubt he can. When I told him what Alex was paying, I thought he would keel over.”

  Jodie twisted a strand of hair around her finger. Though her frown was partially hidden by her long bangs, it wasn’t hard to read her dissatisfaction.

  “I can tell you don’t like the idea,” Lauren continued. “I’m not alone in this, you know. The ranch is one-third yours.”

  “I know. Trouble is, I think you’re right in saying that Vic can’t match what Alex would pay you.” Jodie took her feet off the table and set them on the couch, lounging sideways. “What does that Alex guy want with the ranch?”

  “He owns property in the Caribbean and now he wants a ranch.”

  “A hobby ranch. To add to his collection.” Jodie’s voice held a faint sneer that Lauren chose to ignore. She wasn’t wild about the idea, either. She would prefer to see it sold as a working ranch to someone personally invested in the property.

  Someone like Vic.

  “I think he sees the ranch as more of an investment,” Lauren said. “But the stark reality is I need every penny of my third to buy into this new business. It’s a huge opportunity I can’t afford to let go. And if Vic needs the land base, he could lease it from Alex and run his cows.”

  “It’s not the same. Alex would have all the control.”

  Lauren understood Jodie’s concern. Wasn’t that the very reason she was buying this business—so she could have control over her own life instead of depending on the whims of employers?

  And worthless fiancés?

  “I can’t believe you would want to buy an accounting firm.” Jodie shifted her position, curling her legs under her. She could never sit still long. “Why don’t you just start your own accounting business? Just you. Why buy in to this one?”

  “Because I need clients and I can’t take any of the a
ccounts I brought into Jernowicz Brothers or the last firm I worked at with me to a new business without being sued, and it would take too long to build up a new customer base. Even one-third of the amount Alex is willing to pay, after taxes, is barely enough for my buy-in. But I can’t pass this up. It would mean a substantial income down the road, which means independence in many ways.”

  “And that’s important to you.” Jodie’s words were more comment than condemnation.

  It was important, Lauren thought, but not in the way that Jodie was implying. Not because money was the end-all and be-all for her.

  After being dumped at the altar only to discover that she’d been lied to and milked dry by her ex-fiancé, then, in the past couple of months, fired by her most recent boss, Lauren needed some control in her life. Though Jodie knew about the canceled wedding, she knew little about the amounts of money Lauren had set aside to get the business she and Harvey had hoped to start on their own. She’d worked at Jernowicz Brothers, disliking every minute of the high-pressure job, while Harvey got things together for their eventual departure from the firm.

  When he’d left her at the altar, he’d not only broken her heart, he had broken their bank account. The money they had set aside for the start of their new business had disappeared with him.

  But she was too ashamed to tell Jodie that. She had always been the good example of what hard work could do. She wasn’t about to share how badly Harvey had duped her.

  With anyone.

  “It’s important to me to establish my independence,” Lauren said instead. “I’ve lived enough of my life for other people—” She stopped there, not wanting Jodie to think that she resented the time she’d spent taking care of her. Taking care of their grandmother.

  “You’ve done enough of that,” Jodie agreed. “And I can understand that you’d want that, but I know enough of Vic that he wouldn’t make this claim lightly. And if we find something to prove Vic’s claim—” Jodie pressed, clearly unwilling to let this go.

  “We haven’t yet, and I doubt Dad would have hidden a paper like that away.”

  “He didn’t exactly make the letters he wrote to us easy to find.”

  “They weren’t hard to find, either,” Lauren said, stifling a yawn. It had been a long, tiring day. Her head ached from thinking and phoning and planning and from reading her father’s letters.

  After his cancer diagnosis, their father had written each of the girls a letter apologizing for his behavior to them. It had been emotionally draining reading his words.

  Though regret dogged her with every sentence her father had penned, she couldn’t forget the tension that had held them all in a complicated grip each time they came to visit. He alternated between domineering and absent, angry and complacent. Though Lauren was sad he was gone, his loss didn’t create the aching grief losing her mother and grandmother had.

  But knowing that he did care, that he had felt bad about their relationship, had eased some of the residual bitterness from their time together.

  “So what did you think about what Dad wrote?” Jodie asked. “Do you feel better about him now?”

  Lauren reached over to the coffee table and picked up the handwritten letter Jodie had given her shortly after she’d arrived.

  “I never had the issues with Dad that you did,” Lauren said. “We never fought like you guys did, so I don’t think I had as much to forgive him for. Knowing that he had sent money to Mom after their divorce helps. Mom always made it sound like he didn’t support her and us at all. I don’t want to get all psychoanalytical, but I think his absence in our lives, and how he treated us when we were here, had repercussions for all of us.”

  “Probably. Even Erin, who has always toed every line in her life, followed every rule without questioning, has had her relationship issues.” Jodie shifted herself on the couch again. “I thought for sure she and that doctor guy she was dating would get married, but they broke up over half a year ago.”

  “She say anything to you about why they broke up?”

  “Not a word. I know she’s secretive, but she’s been freaking me out with the radio silence she’s been maintaining.” Jodie sighed.

  “I know, but at least she’s staying in touch.”

  “If you want to call the occasional two-word text with emoticons staying in touch.”

  “It’s better than nothing.” Lauren had her own concerns about Erin, but she also knew her twin sister. Erin was a quiet and private person, something their ebullient younger sister didn’t always understand. When she wanted to talk, she would. “You have Finn now, and it looks to me like you’ve found a place to settle after all the wandering you’ve been doing.”

  “I have. I’ve learned many things about myself over the years, and Finn has helped me through a lot. He makes me feel...complete. Loved. Treasured.”

  “I’m happy for you,” Lauren said, trying hard to keep the note of envy out of her voice. She knew how unworthy Jodie had felt for much of her life. Lauren could identify all too well and was thankful her sister had found someone. Was thankful Jodie dared trust someone again.

  She wasn’t sure the same could happen to her.

  “Oh, Lauren. I’m sorry,” Jodie said, sitting up, instantly contrite. “I shouldn’t be...all...happy and stuff.”

  “Of course you should,” Lauren hastened to assure her. “I am happy for you. So happy. You had so many disappointments in your life. You deserve this.”

  “Don’t know if deserve is the right word, but I am grateful,” Jodie murmured. She gave Lauren a reassuring smile. “There’s someone for you. I just know it.”

  “There might well be,” Lauren said, crossing her arms over her chest. “But I don’t want or need another relationship.”

  Jodie nodded, but Lauren saw her glance at the diamond ring on her finger. Her satisfied and peaceful smile created a nasty twist of jealousy.

  At one time Lauren had worn a ring, too. At one time she had been making wedding plans.

  She wasn’t ready to go there again. Between her father’s neglect and anger, and Harvey’s lies, and her past bosses’ treatment, she’d had enough.

  But your father apologized.

  She held that voice a moment, realizing that the apology had gone a long way to helping her settle the past.

  However, he still had placed conditions on them. And as she fought a touch of resentment over that, a picture of Vic sitting across from her, holding her gaze, slipped into her mind. She knew Vic wasn’t letting go of his claim on the ranch until he knew, without a doubt, that her father hadn’t written anything up.

  Which meant he would be around more than she liked. Not that she was attracted to him. She was never going down that road again.

  * * *

  Vic drove the tractor into the yard and pulled in front of Keith McCauley’s shop, frustrated that he hadn’t checked the amount of twine he had left in the baler before he started out this morning. He should have taken more with him, but he had been rushing all morning ever since he overslept.

  Too much thinking last night, he told himself as he climbed out of the tractor. Too much on his mind. Dean. His widowed mother.

  The missing deal with Keith. If he didn’t find the papers, Lauren was ready to sell the ranch. At a price he couldn’t afford.

  He’d prayed about it and struggled to release it all into God’s hands, but he kept pulling back.

  Stay focused. You’ll find the agreement.

  He just wasn’t sure when that was supposed to happen.

  He stepped into the shop, the light from the open door slanting into the dark of the cool building. He blinked, letting his eyes adjust to the indoors from the bright sunlight outside.

  But as he walked across the uneven concrete floor, he heard rustling and clanging coming from inside. He walked closer, liste
ning. He reached for the door just as it opened under his hand.

  Lauren stepped out carrying a shovel.

  She wore blue jeans today and a dark T-shirt. Her hair hung in a loose braid over one shoulder, and as she looked up at him, the shovel fell to the floor with a clatter, her hand on her chest as she stumbled backward.

  She would have fallen, but Vic caught her by one arm, pulling her upright. They stood that way a moment and he caught a whiff of her perfume.

  She stared up at him, her eyes wide, a soft gray in the low light. There was a smudge of dirt on her cheek, some grass stuck in her hair.

  “Oh. It’s you,” she said, breathless as she pulled away from him.

  The speed with which she did it almost unbalanced her again, but this time she grabbed the door handle, looking hastily away.

  “Yeah. I just needed some more twine for the baler.” He poked his thumb over his shoulder. “Sorry I bothered you.”

  “No. No. That’s fine. I just was startled. That’s all.” She pushed her hair back with the palm of her hand, creating another smudge of dirt. “I thought you were Jodie. She went to town and said she would be back soon.”

  With her blue jeans and casual shirt, dirty face and messy hair, she looked even more appealing than she normally did.

  And he was, suddenly, not in any rush to find another roll of baler twine.

  “You’ve got some dirt on your face,” he said, pointing.

  Lauren hastily scrubbed at her cheeks but only managed to make it worse.

  Vic pulled out a hankie from his pocket and handed it to her. “Here. Use this.”

  She frowned as she looked down at the red polka-dotted square.

  “I haven’t used it yet,” he assured her.

  “Thanks, but that’s not what I was worried about. I don’t meet many men who actually use the hankies they carry.” She hurriedly wiped her face, as if embarrassed he had caught her looking less than her best. “Though they’re not called hankies, technically they’re pocket squares and they’re usually white, artfully folded and peeking out of a suit pocket.” Then she released a short laugh. “Sorry. Babbling.” She looked up at him, her expression questioning. “Did I get it all?”