“You stole my father’s ranch and tonight you bullied me into dancing with you.”

“I only did all that because I knew you wouldn’t dance with me otherwise,” Scott told Amanda. “And I couldn’t let that happen.”

“Why not?”

“Because, Amanda, I’ve wanted to hold you from the moment I saw you. Because you are, without a doubt, the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on and I’m dying to kiss you again.”

He felt her body tense, saw the way her eyes swept back and forth between his own as if wanting to avoid his gaze, but unable to do so.

He kissed her, not as Scott the nice guy. Not as Scott the geek.

But as Scott the man.

And she was lost.

Cowboy Lessons

Pamela Britton

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Dedicated to Laura Blake Peterson The best agent a writer could ever ask for.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Bestselling author PAMELA BRITTON blames her zany sense of humor and wacky story ideas on the amount of Fruity Pebbles she consumes. Empowered by that Fruity Pebble milk, Pamela has garnered numerous awards for her writing, including a nomination for Best First Historical Romance by Romantic Times, a nomination for Romance Writers of America’s Golden Heart, and the title of Best Paranormal Romance of 2000 by Affaire de Coeur magazine.

When not writing, Pamela enjoys showing her quarter horse, Strawflyin’ Missile aka Peasy, and cheering on her professional rodeo cowboy husband, Michael. The two live on their West Coast ranch (aka Noah’s Ark) along with their daughter, Codi, and a very loud, very obnoxious African Gray Parrot prone to telling her to “Shut up!”

Dear Reader,

Hey there, hidey-ho! My first book for Harlequin American Romance! Wow. Can you feel my excitement? For years I’ve written single-title historicals, always wondering what it’d be like to write modern-day stories. You have no idea how wonderful it was to use twenty-first-century slang like “You’re joking” and “I swear,” instead of “Surely you jest” and “’Pon my honor!”

I hope you enjoy Cowboy Lessons, the first of many—I hope—contemporary romances for Harlequin. The story was a blast to write, most especially since it takes place in a small town, something I happen to have a lot of experience with. Mixing that small town with a billionaire hunk who sweeps a local cowgirl off her feet was loads of fun. I hope you think so, too.

Incidentally, look for the sequel to Cowboy Lessons to arrive in bookstores sometime next year. Until then, feel free to drop me a line at www.pamelabritton.com. I give away cool prizes. Why? Because next to writing, shopping for my readers is my favorite thing to do (plus I get to write it off)!

Smiles and giggles,

Pamela

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Epilogue

Chapter One

There were three truths in life, Scott Beringer decided. One, it didn’t matter how wealthy or how famous you became: once a geek, always a geek.

Two, most geeks weren’t very athletic.

Three, said computer geeks without said athletic ability had no business trying to ride a horse.

The last he knew from personal experience, because as sure as he could debug a software program, he was about to fall off the horse he was riding. That horse, a beast whose red hair should have given Scott his first inkling as to what kind of ride to expect, gave him a look of half disgust, half delight at finding a human being hanging half on, half off his left side. Scott tried to cling, he truly did. But no amount of butt clenching or leg flexing could save him. He had a brief thought as the ground approached from way up on high.

This is going to hurt.

It did.

Every bone in his body reverberated when he hit. Like a Saturday-morning cartoon character, he lay there, smooshed into the ground. Puffs of dirt drifted up on a warm breeze. A fly buzzed his face as if shocked to see him there. Through the whitewashed boards of the arena, he could see the face of the grizzled old cowboy who’d put him up on the horse.

He was doubled over. “Criminy,” the old coot said, slapping his knee with laughter. “Did you see that? He looked like one of them rodeo trick riders.”

Someone next to him nodded. Scott wasn’t sure who.

“I reckon he’s okay, though. Seems he’s moving.”

Scott—the human catapult—only groaned. He felt like a gnat who’d hit a front bumper at a hundred miles per hour. Sure, he was able to reach up and straighten his thick-framed black glasses, which had miraculously stuck to his head throughout the whole ordeal, but he’d be surprised if the eyes beneath those glasses weren’t bulging.

A face loomed over him.

He opened his mouth, realized the wind was still knocked out of him, and gave up the idea of trying to greet the person, but, man, was she something.

Reddish-blond hair nearly the same color as the mane of the horse he’d fallen off of hung around her face in spunky little ringlets. As she frowned down at him, he noticed her wide, generous lips. And her eyes…They were the color of his computer monitor, a shade of blue he’d only ever seen created artificially. Those eyes stared down at him with concern and something else he couldn’t quite identify.

“Mr. Beringer,” she said. “If it’s your intention to kill yourself here on the Lazy Y Ranch, you should let us know. It’s easier to fit you with a body bag when you’re alive.”

Ah, a comedian.

He opened his mouth again, realized he still didn’t have his breath back, and closed it.

“Are you hurt?” she asked, the look in her eyes turning to one of concern.

“No,” he managed to say at last. “I’m fine,” he added, because, hey, she was easily the prettiest woman he’d set eyes on in a long, long time, and he’d be damned if he’d act less than a man in front of her. What was it jocks said? Shake it off.

C’mon, Beringer, shake it off.

“Can you move?”

“Not if I don’t have to.”

“Here. Let me help you up.” She held out a hand, and it was either a trick of the light or the pale blue denim shirt she wore that made those eyes of hers look almost green now. Wow. Long legs encased in jeans completed the picture, as well as cowboy boots that had definitely seen better days. He should know because he had a bird’s eye view of those boots. They were right by his left eye.

“You sure I should move?” he asked, because, hey, he watched ER and knew you shouldn’t move an accident victim.

She frowned. “Are you hurt that bad?”

“Only my pride.”

“Can you move your legs and arms?”

“Do you have puppet strings ’cause I think that’s the only way they’ll work.”

She immediately looked concerned again.

“Kidding. Kidding,” he gasped, gasped because he tried to sit up to show her that he was a real man who could shake off a fall from a horse, and that he had faith in her if she thought he looked okay enough to move.

“Here.” She offered her hand again.

He took it this time, everything within him stilling as his own large hand encased her slender fingers. He’d never thought of himself as having particularly large hands before, but he felt downright cavemanish as he clasped hers.

“You okay?” she asked, spoiling the fantasy he’d had of dragging her off by the hair and out behind the barn, which only proved that he must have crowned himself harder than he thought, because he never had caveman thoughts about women he’d only just met.

He managed to sit up, put on his best game face, and say “I’m fine.”

She tugged on his hand again, urging him to stand, which he did, reluctantly, the brand-new jeans and red-and-white-checkered shirt he wore coated in dirt.

“Are you sure you’re all right?” she asked.

He kind of liked her concern for his well-being. Frankly, it made him understand why cowboys did such stupid things like strap themselves to bulls and jump off horses mid-gallop. The sympathy factor obviously really worked. “Yeah. I’m fine.”

She studied him a second longer, her wide mouth pressing into a thin line, her blue eyes narrowing just a tad before she said, “Good, then leave.”

He thought he’d misheard her, even shook his head a bit to dispel the arena dust that must have plugged his ear canal. “I beg your pardon?”

“I said leave the ranch, Mr. Beringer.”

The horse had stopped near the opposite end of the arena, Scott noticed, the man who’d mounted him on the beast—the former owner of the ranch—having caught the bronc. Obviously, the person who’d been standing next to him earlier had been her. Terrific. She’d seen his cannonball.

The woman with angry eyes crossed her arms. Scott was aware for the first time that she was tall. She had to be if she was shoulder level to his six-foot-three frame. “Leave,” she repeated. “You low-down, dirty thief.”

Thief? Uh-oh. Obviously she’d heard about the change of ownership of the ranch. “I didn’t steal it.”

“Not technically, but close enough.”

“Buying property by paying the delinquent back taxes is perfectly legal.”

“Legal, yes. Ethical, no. In my mind it’s like fore-closing on a mortgage.”

Well, put that way he could kind of see her point. Kind of.

“You stole my father’s land,” she said, lifting her hand and pushing her index finger into his chest. She looked momentarily startled to find that it wasn’t soft flesh. Hah. Gym. Four days a week.

“And I aim to get it back,” she finished, flexing the finger she’d poked him with as if she’d hurt it.

Her father? “Look, it’s not like I’m going to force him from his house. As I told him earlier, I want him to stay on.”

She snorted, crossing her arms in front of her, that pretty hair of hers flicked over one shoulder angrily. “You couldn’t force him out if you wanted to.”

He almost pointed out to her that he really could, if he wanted to. But the fact of the matter was, he didn’t. He’d acquired their ranch because of the investment value, but as he stared around him, he realized he truly liked the place. The two-story farmhouse looked charming with its wraparound porch. An ancient-looking barn, turned a dusky gray, stood not far from the arena, and multiple cross-fenced pastures stretched out behind it. It was hard to believe they were less than an hour from the heart of California’s Silicon Valley, and San Francisco’s East Bay was right over the hill.

“Another thing,” she added, as if the laundry list she’d pronounced wasn’t enough. “You have no business riding a horse that isn’t yours.”

“But it is mine.”

“You lying—” She struggled not to cuss. He could see that. “That horse belongs to my father.”

“And I bought it from him.”

“You what?”

For just a second Scott found himself studying her face. Anger set her whole cheeks aglow. Her ears were tipped in red. A spot on her brow, right above her nose wrinkled, delightfully. Even her small nose looked adorably red.

“Your dad sold it to me.”

“My dad—” She looked momentarily speechless. “My dad sold you Rocket?”

Now it was Scott’s turn to be surprised. “Is that his name?”

She nodded.

A new respect for the grizzled old cowboy who’d suckered him for two thousand dollars filled Scott. “He told me it was Buttercup.”

She snorted again.

And then a new thought penetrated Scott’s mind. “I could have been killed.”

She gave him a look of mock sympathy. “I doubt you’d have been mourned for too long.”

“Thanks,” he said. Well, he supposed he couldn’t blame her for being snippy. But still…He really had saved her father from being evicted, because he knew for a fact someone else had been right behind him ready to pay the tax bill. Literally. The guy had been at the window with him. But he decided not to argue the point.

“I really don’t intend to turn your father out.”

She didn’t look in the least bit grateful for his intervention. As a matter of fact, she looked like that model he’d dated, right after he’d told her he thought she looked cute now that she’d gained some weight.

“You don’t intend to turn him out,” she said, shifting her weight onto one foot in a hip-jutting motion that Scott couldn’t help but notice was really sexy. “Well, gee, Mr. Beringer, thanks ever so much. Considering this ranch has been in my family for three generations, that’s very kind of you.”

“Kindness is my middle name.”

He’d been trying to make a joke. She didn’t take it that way.

“Get out,” she grated through teeth clenched like Thurston Howell’s from Gilligan’s Island. “Forget about the horse. I’ll have my father mail you your money back.”

“I can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s kind of hard to be a cowboy without a horse.”

AMANDA THOUGHT SHE’D misheard him. Frankly, she must have had the same expression on her face as he’d had when she’d told him to get off her father’s land.

No, his land.

She fought back a hiss of anger. Why the heck her father had waited until today to tell her about the tax lien, she had no idea, but it was hard to say who she was more angry with: her father for not sharing the trouble the ranch was in, or Mr. Scott Beringer, Silicon Valley billionaire.

Oh, yeah, she knew who he was. She’d recognized him the moment she’d seen him at her feet. Her father’s robber baron was none other than the reclusive boy wonder of the software industry.

“What do you mean, ‘be a cowboy’?”

He smiled in a friendly sort of way, not that she had any intention of being that. “I want to learn to be a cowboy. Well, a rancher, really.”

She digested the words for a second while she tried to come to grips with the fact that he really must be the nutcase the press made him out to be. A formidable nutcase, she reminded herself. Someone who did whatever it took to get what he wanted, at least if the newspapers were to be believed. But it was obviously true, because look how he’d acquired their land.

“Mr. Beringer, I think you’ve been inhaling too many silicon fumes.”

He shrugged. Puffs of dust rose from his dirty red-and-white-checkered shirt. He looked ridiculous. Like a cross between Gene Autry and Buddy Holly with those thick-framed black glasses and wide green eyes. And yet…cute.

Ack. Where the heck had that thought come from?

“Why not? Maybe I need to take life a little less seriously. Stop and smell the roses, if you will. Or the manure as the case may be.”

“So you looked around for a ranch to steal?”

“I didn’t steal it. And, no, that’s not why I did it. Frankly, it wasn’t until this very moment that I realized I have a hankering to learn to ride the range.”

“Ride the range?”

“Sure. Herd cattle. Cook over a campfire. That sort of thing.”

“That sort of thing,” she repeated because she really couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “You think it’s that easy?” She snapped her fingers to illustrate. “Have you any idea how much work a ranch is?”

“So, then, if it doesn’t work out, I’ll sell the land back to you.”

For the second time, Amanda felt speechless. “You’ll do what?”

“Sell it back to you.”

“Mr. Beringer—”

“Scott,” he insisted.

Scott seemed like the wrong name for him. Attila. Genghis. Those seemed more appropriate.

“Scott,” she said mildly, even though inside she felt as if she’d woken up in the middle of a Saturday Night Live skit. “My father is old. And he’s been ill lately. Certainly not well enough to teach you the ropes.”

“Then you teach me.”

“Oh, no. No. No. No.” She waved her hands and shook her head, that mane of hair of hers bouncing around her shoulders.

“Sure, why not? I leave for Singapore tomorrow. We can start my horse lessons when I get back in a week.”

“Horse lessons?”

“Yeah. I’ll need to learn to ride my new horse.”

He really must be insane.

And yet, what if he were serious? What if he really would give her the opportunity to buy the ranch back? Could she pass that up?

“No. I can’t do it.” And she wouldn’t, no matter how tempting Beelzebub’s offer. “I have a busy life, Mr. Beringer, and I don’t have time to baby-sit.” Although with the ranch gone, maybe she would.

“But I promise to be a good baby. No crying. No whining. And most important, no dirty diapers.” He smiled a jack-o’-lantern grin.

But Amanda was impervious to his charms. “No.”

He looked disappointed. He really did. “Well,” he said, pulling a business card from his shirt pocket as if he’d expected to run into a fellow tycoon out here. Unbelievable. “If you change your mind, let me know.”

She almost didn’t take the card. Almost, but he waved it in front of her in a way that’d make it rude if she didn’t. Besides, her father had always taught her to be polite. He was the new owner. She should be nice to him.

New owner.

Her hand clenched the card, twisting the paper.

He must have seen it because she thought she saw his face lose some of its spark. Well, too bad. She’d find another way to get the place back, that she vowed. She crossed her arms in front of her, telling him with her eyes that he should just leave.

They stared at each other for a full ten seconds before he finally said. “Okay. Well, then. I guess I’ll be going.”

“Well then, see you later.”

“Bye.”

But he still didn’t leave right away. Instead he looked at her kind of strangely. As if he was memorizing her or something.

“Have a nice day,” he said.

Have a nice day? Was he playing a scene from Leave It to Beaver?

She watched him turn and walk away.

Scott Beringer wanted to be a cowboy.

She should teach him how to be one. And make sure he hated every moment of it.

He climbed into a brand-new Mercedes, which, by the looks of it, probably cost more than all the back taxes he must have paid. The thought depressed her. How could they possibly hope to pay the man back?

“What’d he say?”

Amanda turned to her father, a man nearly as tall as she was, but who seemed to be shrinking daily. His blue eyes had gone rheumy in recent years, but they were still bright. Beneath a cap of gray hair his face looked red, though whether caused by drink or disappointment, she couldn’t say. “He said you have a week to get out.”

“He what?” Roy Johnson asked, straightening his stooped frame, the belly he’d had since before she could remember hanging over a tarnished belt buckle he’d won back in his rodeo days.

“Kidding, Dad. But it’d serve you right if he did.”

Her father squinted his eyes at the departing car, his hands hooking into his leather belt. “He’s younger than I thought he’d be.”

“He wants cowboy lessons.”

“Cowboy lessons?”

She eyed the man she loved more than any person on Earth. Her only family, and yet a man who’d managed to disappoint her more times in life than she cared to admit. She added today’s fiasco to the list. “Yeah. Ranching lessons. Horse lessons. The whole bit.”

“Are you going to teach him?”

“I told him to find someone else.”

He blinked gray lashes, still staring at the car. “Humph. I wondered why he wanted to buy that horse.”

“That horse could have killed him.”

“Nah. He was safer than a tick on a deer.”

She shook her head in disgust. She almost left it at that; experience told her that trying to make her dad accept responsibility for anything was a task best left alone. But she couldn’t keep quiet.

“You should have told me what was going on, Dad.”

“I never wanted this life for you, Amanda,” he said, still not meeting her gaze. “You know that. It’s why I sent you to that fancy college.”

Fancy, in her dad’s opinion, was anything away from the small town they lived in. Los Molina was fifty minutes from the Bay Area, but you’d never know it. Nestled in a small valley, the town enjoyed mild winters and cool summers. Perfect ranching country with rolling green hills and shady oaks.

“Dad, I happen to like this life.”

“I think you could do better. Heck, I didn’t let you go off to Cal Poly and get a degree in business agriculture so you could come home and use it.”

“But I want to use that knowledge.” Even though that hadn’t always been the case. When she’d first realized she’d need to come home because of her father’s failing health, she’d been bitterly disappointed. She’d wanted to use her degree to find her dream job: working for a thoroughbred breeding farm. Instead she’d been forced to come back home. But that was ancient history. She’d learned to love this place in the past few years.

“It’s a hundred thousand dollars.”

“What?”

“You asked me earlier how much I owed. One hundred thousand dollars.”

She just about fell over. Lord, how the heck was she going to get the place back?

I want to learn to be a cowboy. The words bounced off the inside of her head as if she were in a drum. But she couldn’t do it. She just couldn’t.

Could she?

Chapter Two

She could. And a week later—a week during which she regretted agreeing to the ridiculous scheme the day after he’d proposed it—Amanda woke up to the buwap-wap-wap-wap of helicopter blades, which rattled her bedroom window and shook dust off her ceiling.

She knew immediately who it was.

“Give me a break,” she muttered, tossing back the antique-ivory lace cover her grandmother had made almost seventy years ago. Leave it to Scott “Mr. Billionaire” Beringer to arrive in a helicopter.

She’d been dreading this day for a week, and so she took her time crawling out of bed. The hardwood floor felt cold beneath her bare feet as she crossed to the window and looked up. Sure enough, a white-and-black helicopter glided into view, the Global Dynamics logo visible against the gray-and-red sky of an early morning dawn. Pique made her jerk the lace curtains back as she moved to turn away, but just as quickly, she moved back to the window.

It looked like—

“No.” She shook her head in disbelief. “No. Don’t land in the bull pasture,” she murmured. “Not the bulls.”

But the spring grass in the pasture had already compressed from the pressure of the helicopter blades.

She turned around—the chilly morning air smacking her hard—then quickly pulled on rubber boots. Her blue-and-white-checkered flannel nightgown barely hung past her knees, but she paid it no attention as she squeaked along the hallway’s hardwood floors…no, ran along the hallway.

“Not the bulls,” she murmured again.

The outside morning air was cold enough to make her eyes water, the door swinging wide just in time for her to see the helicopter drop a passenger, then begin to lift off again.

“Not the bulls,” she said, watching as Scott Beringer, wonder boy of the techno industry, did something incredibly stupid. He’d hopped out of the chopper into the middle of a field of bulls. Granted, they were cowering bulls right now. But not for long. Once that helicopter lifted off—

“Scott,” she screamed. But she might as well have been yelling at her shadow. The chopper drowned out any sound: Scott calmly walked toward the wide gate as if he had all the time in the world, toting a black piece of luggage in one hand and a cowboy hat in the other. In the corner of the pen, one of her brown-and-white Herefords lowered its head. And as the helicopter began to lift, it became apparent that that particular bull would take it upon himself to be the sole representative of his species in stomping down the lone human intruder.

“Scott,” she called again, panicked now.

The bull waited half a heartbeat before wringing its tail, a sure sign he was about to charge. He didn’t have horns, but it wouldn’t matter. When fifteen-hundred pounds of beef hit you broadside, you’d be lucky to walk away alive.

Oh, damn. She would succeed in killing him where her father had failed.

She waved her arms. Scott finally looked her way.

She pointed. Scott turned.

She yelled, “Run!”

And Scott Beringer, one of the wealthiest men in the United States, ran. Fast.

The suitcase got left behind, but not the hat. That he waved behind him as if shooing away a fly. Dumb, dumb, dumb. It only gained a bull’s attention. But then the big Hereford spied the suitcase. It changed its path like Wile E. Coyote. Amanda never, not in a million years, would have thought a bull could turn that fast, but it did, heading toward the suitcase with its head down, tail flicking. The suitcase never stood a chance. It sailed through the air like a carnival ride. Scott, still running, looked back. The bull—its Samsonite enemy now vanquished—turned to Scott and put his head down again.

“Run,” Amanda repeated. Not that he wasn’t running already. Her blood thrust through her veins so fast it hurt her head. She began to wave her arms again, hoping to distract the bull. Didn’t help. Scott’s eyes looked panicked behind his thick glasses. “Stay.” She thought she heard him yell. “Stay.”

The bull charged. Scott wouldn’t make it.

She arrived at the fence; Scott was about three feet away on the other side, three feet that he seemed to jump, launching himself like a Harlem Globetrotter.

The bull hurled himself at Scott, and maybe it reached him in time to help propel him, or maybe it was pure adrenaline that allowed Scott to cover so much ground, but he landed across the top rail and a second later, the bull hit the rail right below where he dangled. Scott was thrust off the top rail like a bird from a perch. He landed on his back and, as coincidence would have it, right at her feet. The hollow thud he made caused Amanda to wince, but she was so winded, and so relieved that he’d survived, all she could do was lean over and clasp her knees. “You lucky bastard.”

The bull snorted its frustration from the other side of the fence.

“It attacked me,” he protested.

She sucked in breaths of air.

“What is it with the animals on this ranch, anyway?”

Amanda ignored him, still huffing. “Go away, Harry.” She waved a hand at the bull, too winded to straighten just yet.

“Harry?” Scott said. “The thing’s name is Harry?”

The bull turned, his muscles and veins enlarged, tail still ringing. When it caught sight of the suitcase again, it turned around, put its head down and charged.

A glance up revealed the helicopter still hovering above.

“Are you okay?” she finally decided to ask. Fact is, she felt a little angry. What kind of a fool tells his pilot to land in a field full of bulls?

Scott looked up at her, his arms straight out as if he were about to make a snow angel in the thick green grass he lay on. She noted he’d dressed differently, less like a character from a B movie and more like a real rancher. Denim shirt. Wranglers. His glasses—knocked from his head—lay near his right elbow, and his hair was spiked out around his head as if he’d been electrocuted. The hat had disappeared. She had a feeling it was beneath him. Smooshed.

“It chased me,” he repeated.

Amanda waved at the pilot, telling him without words that Scott was fine. If he could complain, he was fine. The pilot waved back—she thought she saw him grinning beneath his insectlike goggles—then he angled the helicopter away and flew off.

Gradually, silence descended. Well, silence punctuated by her bull’s goring of Scott’s luggage. She had a feeling there wouldn’t be many of his clothes left when all was said and done.

“I had no idea that thing would come after me with the helicopter hovering so near.”

Man, her legs ached. And she had a side ache. And her damn feet ached.

“Lesson one, Mr. Beringer,” she said as she slowly straightened. “A bull doesn’t care if you’re holding an Uzi or a flame thrower. When it’s mad, it’ll do whatever it wants.”

Scott sat up on his elbows. “Uh-oh,” he said.

Amanda’s heart resumed it’s double-time beat. “What? Is something broken?”

“I landed on something.”

“Your hat,” she theorized.

He winced. Concern turned into amusement when he leaned forward and she spied the crushed straw hat.

“Hope that wasn’t new.”

“It was,” he grumbled, slowly coming to his feet as he smoothed his hair back. The hat lay on the ground like a discarded corn husk. Amanda was about to tell him that he didn’t need it, but as she met his gaze, the words just sort of lodged in her throat.

Clark Kent looked good without his glasses. Very cute. And entirely too boyish to own a billion-dollar empire.

Lord, she couldn’t imagine having a billion dollars.

One billion dollars, she repeated to herself like Dr. Evil.

“Are you hurt?” she asked again.

“Nothing but my pride.” He repeated the same words as last week, and that had her remembering why he was here, and all of a sudden the depression returned with a vengeance. Even if she could convince him ranching wasn’t his thing, how was she going to afford to pay him back? And if she couldn’t pay him back, then what? Where would she go? Where would her father go? How many cattle ranchers would hire a woman, even if she did have a degree?

He tested a leg, then the other one, then moved his arms. The sound of her bull head-butting his suitcase faded. She looked up only to realize Harry had gotten the case open.

“Hey,” Scott yelled, taking a step toward the rail, obviously not completely blind without his glasses.

“Forget it,” Amanda advised, clutching his arm, only to immediately drop her hand. He had surprisingly large muscles. “If there’s anything left, we’ll pick it up later.”

“What’ll I use for clothes?”

“Why do you need clothes? You’re not staying, are you?”

He looked up at her sharply, his glasses like a crooked hanger. “I told your father when I called last night that I’d be staying.”

He’d called? And her father hadn’t mentioned it?

Suddenly, the reason why her father had departed for parts unknown made sense. Typical Dad. Coward.

“He didn’t tell me.”

Scott’s eyes slid over her. Amanda suddenly felt ridiculous, and self-conscious, even though the blue-and-white-checkered flannel gown couldn’t be called revealing. Most of her lower legs were covered by her rubber boots, the kind with a wide red ring around the top, and they were mud-spattered and stained. She’d hardly noticed how beat-up they were. At least not before he took to staring at them.

“I’m going to kill him,” she grumbled.

“Who?”

“My father.”

“As long as it’s not me.”

“Tempting, but no.”

SCOTT TOLD HIMSELF to be encouraged by that. She didn’t want him dead, unlike her father. He looked past her to the house, wondering where the old coot had gotten to, but the moment his gaze rested on Amanda, his thoughts jammed like the keys of an old-fashioned typewriter. She looked even more adorable than he remembered.

You’re losin’ it, buddy, if you find a woman in black rubber boots sexy.

Odd thing, though: he did. “Hey, thanks for agreeing to do this. I’m really excited.”

“Yeah, well, wait until your first day is over before getting too worked up.”

Hmm. She was still sore over the loss of the ranch. Well, he supposed he couldn’t blame her. “Well, I’d still like to thank you, anyway.”

“Let’s get you cleaned up,” she said by way of acceptance.

Well, the apology thing didn’t work.

She turned away without a backward glance, saying, “Follow me.”

He did, stepping in behind her. The back of her was even more charming than the front. He wasn’t usually a body-parts man. That he left to beer-swilling football fanatics. But he found himself liking Amanda Johnson’s parts. Rounded bottom, shapely legs, at least what he could see above the boots. Nice smell, too, even this early in the morning. It wafted back to him on the early morning breeze. Natural. Earthy and yet wholly feminine in a way that most of the women he’d dated had never been.

The house she led him toward was a one-story rectangle with a wide wraparound porch, old-fashioned windows with real wood frames and five creaking steps that led to the front door. To the left of the house was a large brown barn with big brown double doors. To the right was another barn—brown, too—this one a single-story affair that had doors off the back that opened into individual pens. Horse pens. And he would bet there were four more matching doors and pens on the other side. A horse barn—though it looked ancient and not at all like the fancy affairs one could see off of I-280 when he drove around Silicon Valley.

“I feel like I’m on the set of Bonanza.”

“Yeah, well, welcome to my home, Little Scott.”

“Hey, you watched Bonanza, too?”

“Yeah.”

Her answer sounded more like “What of it?” and Scott tried not to feel wounded. “Where’s your dad?”

“Away, apparently.” And the way she said that didn’t invite more small talk.

She held a heavy oak door open and stepped aside. She smelled even nicer close up. Better than him, probably, after his trek through cow poop.

The inside of the home was cozy. Surprisingly high ceilings. What looked to be bedrooms to his right, kitchen and family room to his left. She paused just inside the door and—holy moley—bent over to tug off her boots. Slowly, like a stripper. Not that he’d seen many strippers wearing rubber boots…or any strippers, period. But he imagined one would take off rubber boots slowly like she did, exposing one inch of flesh at a time.

Unbelievable. Who would have thought the sight of her slipping off latex boots would be sexy? But darned if it wasn’t.

She glanced up just then—saw that he was staring at her legs—and straightened abruptly.

A voice inside his head said, uh-oh.

“I’ll go find you a clean shirt.”

Scott was not a stupid man. He realized ogling a woman who would be responsible for his safekeeping in the coming week was likely not a wise thing to do. She looked as if she was fighting to hold on to her temper.

“Thanks.”

She pressed her lips together before she turned on her now bare—and might he add, adorable—feet to head back toward the bedrooms. She had nice ankles, he realized. Petite yet sturdy.

Sturdy?

What was she, a cow? And yet like a herd animal himself, he suddenly found himself following her. A bull. He was Ferdinand the Bull.

She turned. Their bodies connected. She jerked back, her hand splaying on his chest. “What are you doing?”

“Following you.”

“Don’t do that. I’ll bring you the shirt.”

“Where will I change? After all, I wouldn’t want you going all mushy on me when you catch sight of my hard body.”

Did she blush? Did she actually blush? Incredible.

“You want to get the shirt, fine. My father’s room is at the end of the hall. I’m going to get dressed.”

She would get dressed…

Her arms lifting her nightgown, her breasts revealed. Skin so smooth it looked like wedding satin exposed to his flesh….

“Mr. Beringer?”

He started.

“Did you hear me?”

He felt his own cheeks fill with color. Amazing. Now he was blushing.

“Yeah. That’s fine.”

She stared up at him with narrowed eyes. “If you want to wash up, you can use the bathroom attached to my father’s bedroom.”

For a second his imagination twisted the words into an invitation to share the shower with her.

In your dreams, Scott.

“Be careful because the tap water gets hot fast.” She kept her gaze on him for a second longer, as if she was worried he might still follow her.

“Thanks.”

She gave him one last look before turning away. Wow. What was it about her that had him thinking such testosterone-charged thoughts? That had him wondering what kind of man she was attracted to? That had him wishing it was his kind of man.

You’re not her type, Scott old man.

No, but he could dream, couldn’t he?

Just one night in bed with her. That’s all he wanted. He wasn’t fool enough to believe anything more than that could last. It never did.

It took him only a second to find the room in question, and the shirt, and then he began to wash up and change. By the time he’d finished, he heard her running a shower. That shot a new burst of energy through him. Amanda Johnson naked. That must be a sight. She’d be tanned. He wondered if it was an all-over tan.

Scott, you’re losing it.

He was, but he’d known that before arriving. During the week he’d been away he’d found himself thinking of her constantly. During the long, long flight back from Singapore he’d wondered if he’d feel the same way when he saw her again. Despite having embarrassed himself in front of her again, he did.

Distraction. He needed a distraction. The kitchen. Only a handful of people knew that he loved to cook. Hell, he was a better-than-average cook. He was a great cook. Scott had long since figured out that his love of food probably had something to do with his lack of it as a child. But whatever the reason, he prided himself on his hidden talent.

She was in the shower alone.

Stop it, Scott.

Five minutes later he’d found pans, spices and various other items he might need. The appliances were ancient, but the place had a homey feeling to it. Chickens ran around the wallpaper, the curtains and the small rug in front of the sink. He’d even found an apron in the shape of a giant chicken in the drawer, the wings spreading back to tie around his waist. He put it on without a moment’s hesitation, then opened the refrigerator door in preparation for a raid.

“What are you doing?”

Scott turned, startled to see a wet-haired Amanda standing in the doorway. What’d she do, jump in and out?

You’ll need a cold shower if you keep reacting to her in this way.

Darn, but if he’d thought her pretty with that cascade of hair falling loose around her shoulders, she was even prettier with it slicked back.

“I’m going to cook you breakfast.”

“I don’t eat breakfast.”

Something inside Scott fizzled like a spent fire-cracker. “You don’t?”

She shook her head.

He told himself not to be disappointed. Regroup, Scott. No big deal. She likely wouldn’t have been impressed by his cooking skills, anyway. “Ah, but you’ve never had one of my breakfasts.”

Her pretty blue eyes looked large and luminous without her hair framing her face. “Mr. Beringer.”

“Scott,” he instantly corrected.

“Scott,” she said. “A rancher usually feeds the livestock before he feeds himself.”

“Really?”

She nodded.

“But I thought we were the dominant predators.”

“The what?”

“We eat when we want to eat. They eat when we want them to eat.”

She shook her head. “They get mad when they’re made to wait. And you saw what happens when a bull gets angry.”

His suitcase. He’d forgotten about it.

“But I was going to make you my special huevos rancheros in honor of my first day on the homestead.”

Her eyes narrowed—it must have been the word homestead. It didn’t take a man with a doctorate in computer science to figure out that she was thinking it was no longer her homestead.

“Do you want to learn about ranching or not?”

“Of course I do.”

“Then let’s go.”

“Not until we eat. You know, breakfast is the most important meal of the day.”

“Fine. I’ll go feed the livestock.”

He closed the refrigerator door. “No, wait. I’ll go with you.”

She didn’t look relieved. In fact, she looked kind of irritated. “Hey, slow down,” he called.

“The steers are hungry, Mr. Beringer. I don’t like to make them wait.”

“And here I thought ranchers ate hearty breakfasts.”

“You’re not a rancher, Mr. Beringer.” And her unspoken words were that he’d never be.

Scott stiffened, and if she’d known him better she would have realized her mistake. One never, ever challenged Scott Beringer…not if they hoped to win.

Chapter Three

Amanda felt Scott staring at her all the way out to the barn doors.

Had she been too hard on him? Should she care if she had been?

No, she firmly told herself. The whole week she’d waited for his return, she’d thought of ways to scare him off. The first of those plans started right now.

And yet she felt a surprising stab of guilt, and the urge to banter around with him. Ridiculous. The man had stolen her family’s heritage. He was like one of those cattle tycoons of the old days, the ones that squatted on small rancher’s land. His picture should be inserted into dictionaries under the words robber baron.

I’m going to cook you breakfast.

She’d wanted to eat breakfast with him.

Careful, Amanda. You might find yourself actually liking him.

She pulled open the giant wood doors that exposed the interior of the barn to early morning sunlight. Dust motes flew through the air on streamers of sunlight that illuminated a wall of hay.

“Wow,” Scott said. “That’s a lot of bricks.”

Bricks? She almost laughed.

“They’re called bales,” she corrected. “And there’re twenty tons of them.”

“Twenty tons?”

She nodded. “And we’ll go through most of it by the end of next month.”

“But I thought cattle grazed on grass.”

She turned to him. Her hair had dried a bit, despite the chilly morning air. She wore a gray sweater that she realized now was the wrong thing to wear. Slivers of the hay would stick to it and prick her all day. Darn. She hadn’t been thinking clearly.

“Cattle need at least ten acres of pasture grass per head. That means we’d need approximately ten thousand acres for all the cattle we have. Since the ranch is less than two hundred acres, and we’re able to lease only a few hundred more, we have to supplement with rice hay.”

“Rice hay?”

“It’s cheaper than grass, and cattle do well on it.”

“So what the hay?” he joked.

She caught the smile that almost slipped out at the last moment, going to the right and pulling down two sharp metal hooks before turning back to him.

“Planning on dressing as Captain Hook for Halloween?”

“No,” she said. “You are.”

“I are what?”

“Going to be Captain Hook.” She handed him the hay hooks. “Here you go,” she said with a bright smile. “You need to load a ton of it into the back of our one-ton.”

“I what?”

She really shouldn’t feel bad about the look on his face. She shouldn’t. But it was hard not to feel just a little bit guilty at the expression of horror he shot her.

“A ton of it,” she reiterated. “That’s about twenty-five bales.”

“You’ve got to be kidding.”

She shook her head, having to fight back the smile again. “No, I’m not.” She refrained from telling him that she usually helped her father load the bales. It was easier with two people. Instead she said, “If you want to be a rancher, this is one of the chores you’ll have to do. Daily.”

“Daily?”

Now he looked horrified. Poor guy. Poor what? Now wasn’t the time to start feeling sorry for him. “What’s the matter? Not up to the task? ’Cause if you’re not, we can certainly stop right now. Of course, you’ll have to give up on your plan to become a cowboy.”

His eyes narrowed. And once again that odd transformation came over him, the one she noted the first day they’d met. Like the chameleon she’d seen in the local pet store he changed right before her eyes. He seemed to stand straighter, the intelligence that always shone from his eyes intensifying until it made her feel distinctly uncomfortable. This was the man who’d formed a software company from the ground up. Who was worth more money than she would ever see in an entire lifetime. Who did not, if the press was to be believed, take no for an answer.

“I’ll do it.”

“Great,” she said. But she really didn’t think he’d make it past five bales. Okay, maybe seven. “I’ll wait here while you go get the truck.”

He gazed at her a moment longer, something within Amanda stilling at that look. She was almost relieved when he turned away, set the hooks on one of the lower bales, then headed out of the barn.

“Keys are in it.”

He lifted a hand in silent acknowledgment but didn’t glance back. Less than five minutes later, he was backing the diesel into the barn in a manner that made Amanda wonder if he’d driven big vehicles before. She’d expected him to have to struggle to fit the wide truck through the double doors, but he cruised on in as if he’d done it a hundred times.

That was her first surprise.

Her second came when he turned off the loud motor, the smell of diesel making her wave her hand in front of her face and cough. The dust motes were in action again, tickling the inside of her nose. A dove nesting in the barn’s rafters coo-cooed into the sudden silence. Scott hopped out of the truck, reached up and removed his glasses only to drop them into his pocket, then went to the tailgate. It lowered with a thud. Next, he picked up the hay hooks, one in each hand, turned to the nearest golden bale and sunk the hooks with a thunk that belied an ease Amanda would have never thought possible. He lifted the one-hundred-and-twenty-pound bale, saying, “How do I stack it?” and sounding not at all out of breath as he did so.

She was so surprised, she found herself saying, “Put it all the way in the front, up against the back window, long side against the bed,” before she remembered she’d wanted him to figure that out on his own.

He nodded, hefting the bale inside without even huffing, then climbing inside to position it correctly. And now that she thought about it, he hadn’t sounded at all out of breath after his running of the bulls this morning. In fact, he’d sounded in better shape than she.

He jumped down from the back of the truck, his legs flexing expertly as he landed. Amanda stepped back and crossed her arms in front of her.

The next one went in just as easily.

So did the next.

And the next.

He was sweating a bit by the time he’d loaded seven. The next five went in a bit more slowly, but that was because he had to lift the bales atop the others. By the time he hit twenty, he’d figured out on his own the best way to stair-step them on top of one another.

Amanda didn’t say a word.

Ten minutes later he was done. A little winded and a bit sweaty, but done. He turned to her and said, “Now what?”

Amanda had to close her mouth.

Maybe it was the he-man way he’d loaded the hay. Maybe it was the way he so casually leaned against the tailgate of the truck. Or maybe it was because he suddenly didn’t look a thing like a computer genius. Whatever it was, she had to struggle to remember his question.

Hubba, hubba, what a man.

Hubba, hubba…have you lost your mind?

“Now what?” she repeated to herself. She stiffened. “Er, ah. Now you go out to the pasture and feed them.”

“The bulls?”

“No, no…they have enough to graze on. The hundred heads of steers next to the bulls.”

“All right.” He came toward her. And suddenly Amanda went on heightened alert. If she was a submarine, her red lights would be blinking. He stopped right in front of her.

Warning. Warning. Warning.

“You have some dust on your face.”

Dust?

“It probably dropped from the barn roof,” she said, her voice seeming to come from a distance.

“Do you want me to remove it?”

“Sure,” she said, before she recalled the way she’d felt when they’d bumped into each other in the house, the way she felt right now, because there could be no denying the way her whole body buzzed as he came near, the way the look in his eyes made her stare up at him unblinkingly, the way she felt as he lifted a hand, then gently, oh so gently wiped the dust away from her cheek.

“There,” he said.

And, oh, my, she couldn’t believe it, but just that touch made her grow damp between the legs.

She was attracted to Scott Beringer.

Get a grip, Amanda.

She felt dizzy, realized it was because she was holding her breath, then sucked in a blast of oxygen. That helped. Marginally. “How—” She had to work her mouth in order to make the words come out. “How do you see without your glasses?”

“I don’t need my glasses for anything but reading. In fact, I’ll just move them to the truck, if you don’t mind.”

Mind? Mind what? Oh, yeah. The glasses. “No. That’s fine.”

He smiled. Amanda just about melted. It was a crooked smile. Not suave. Not flirtatious, just a genuine crooked smile that made her heart all but melt at the boyish, yet masculine friendliness of it.

She stepped back, waved a hand at her face, saying, “Dust,” in case he thought she was doing something silly, like waving the heat out of her cheeks, which she was.

Lord, you’ve got the hots for Scott Beringer.

There were a million reasons why that shouldn’t be, not the least of which was that he’d stolen their land. And yet she couldn’t deny the truth, despite what she tried to tell herself.

“Um, if you don’t mind, I’m going to let you do the feeding part all by yourself.”

“By myself?”

She nodded and said, “It’s easy.” And it was. “You just drive about two hundred yards out and start feeding. Honk the horn when you’re done.” She turned away from him before he realized the reason why she wouldn’t meet his gaze was because she was in danger of doing something silly, like touch him. Or maybe even jerk his head down and kiss him.

“Where are you going?” he called after her.

“Into the house to make breakfast.”

“But I’ll do that.”

Oh, no, he wouldn’t, because just right now she didn’t need to admire him any more than she did, and she had a feeling Scott would cook as well as he did everything else.

“I’ll cook,” she said over her shoulder, nearly running into the door in the process.

Get a hold of yourself, Amanda.

“You just remember to close the gate when you’re done.”

She didn’t know if he nodded or not, didn’t know because she was halfway across the barnyard before she heard the truck start up.

Breakfast first, then part two of her plan. She could handle that, right?

Right?

Chapter Four

It was a sign of how discombobulated she was that it took her nearly a half hour to realize something was wrong. Very wrong.

By Amanda’s calculations, it should have taken Scott roughly twenty minutes to feed the steers, and that was taking into consideration his inexperience. But when the clock struck a quarter hour, Amanda figured she’d better check on him. Turning off the stove, Amanda removed a pot of sizzling sausages, their basil-and-garlic smell making her stomach growl.

What had he done?

She saw for herself a few seconds later.

Scott Beringer sat in the back of the truck atop a bale, only when he saw her, he shot up like a patio umbrella. Surrounding him on the ground were bales of hay, unopened, frustrated cattle milling around as they tried to get to the food. Scott tried to shoo them away so he could jump down, but he was simply out-numbered and likely too afraid to plunge into the midst of a hundred head of cattle.

She heard his faint cry of help.

“Well, I’ll be,” she murmured.

Why the heck hadn’t he opened the bales?

Because you didn’t tell him to.

She slapped her forehead. “You idiot,” she yelled, but it was hard to say who she meant, her or Scott.

She’d have to go rescue him.

SCOTT COULDN’T BELIEVE how relieved he was to see Amanda Johnson riding her horse toward him. Granted, it was usually the man that rescued the woman, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. Besides, this particular knight looked great atop a horse—better than he would. Her hair had dried into its masses of ringlets, the breeze picking up a red strand and playing with it. She looked glorious with the morning sky as a backdrop, and all he wanted to do was touch her. Unfortunately, she didn’t look half as impressed with him as he was with her.

“Nice going,” she said as she pulled her horse to a stop just outside the herd of cattle.

“I’d only fed a few bales and suddenly I was surrounded.”

“You’re supposed to open them first.”

“Open them?”

She shook her head, and he wasn’t sure, but he was pretty certain she rolled her eyes, too. But then she kicked her horse forward, and the cattle parted as if her horse were a bowling ball and the cattle the pins.

“If you wrap the hay hooks around the twine,” she said as she got close enough for him to see that her waist was tiny when tucked into jeans, “it’ll snap the cord. You throw flakes to the steers, not the whole bale.”

“You didn’t tell me that.”

“No, I didn’t,” she admitted with a total honesty that took him by surprise. “My mistake.”

This woman was apologizing? Was the sky falling?

“Here,” she said. “Climb aboard. We’ll let them eat what they can and then come back to move the truck later.”

He’d like to climb on top of her.

But, of course, that would never happen. Not at his present rate of impressing her.

She held the horse in place while he slipped a leg over, then settled behind her with an ease that took him by surprise. But the moment his front made contact with her back, he grew instantly hard. Darn, she turned him on. Maybe it was the whole country girl thing, but suddenly he wondered if she’d look good in gingham and pearls.

“Wrap your arms around my waist.”

For real? She wanted him to touch her? He didn’t hesitate.

“Now, hold on.”

He held on, pulling her up against the front of his chest. Darn. She may have a hard body, but she was all woman beneath.

“Haven’t you ever watched a western before?” she asked, tilting her head a bit to stare at him out of the corner of her eye.

It took a moment for her words to penetrate the lust-induced haze he’d sunk into. And even then, he still couldn’t follow what she meant.

She must have seen his confusion. “Didn’t you ever wonder where those little flakes of hay came from?”

He had to force himself to swallow before saying, “Sure I’ve watched westerns, but I never paid close enough attention to them to know those little bricks open up.”

“Bales,” she mumbled, and he could have sworn he heard laughter in her voice. “They’re called bales.”

Good thing the back of her saddle separated their lower extremities, otherwise she’d figure out fast that the only hay he was thinking about was the hay he wanted to roll her in.

“I’m not off to a very good start, am I?”

He felt her stiffen, felt her kind of jerk a bit before saying, “Actually, you’re not doing too bad.”

They were the first kind words he’d had from her, and they made Scott’s heart pitter-patter.

“Yeah, well,” he croaked before coughing to dispel the odd crick in his throat. “I’ve decided to hire someone to do the feeding.”

She was silent a long moment. The horse swayed beneath them. The smell of leather rose up to mingle with her scent. Lemons. She smelled like a giant lemon, and he liked it.

“It must be nice,” she said.

“What?”

“To be able to buy whatever you want.”

“It is.”

She turned quiet after that. That was fine, Scott was too busy wondering if she’d mind taking a turn around the pasture. It was a beautiful morning. Very Sound of Music. Off in the distance a chicken clucked. Behind them steers mooed. All he needed was a pair of chaps, some pistols and a rope. And Amanda. John Wayne always got the girl.

“When I was in high school I had it in my head that I wanted to be the National High School Rodeo Association champion barrel racer,” she broke the silence by saying. “We had a horse that my dad picked up at auction. He was short, but man was he fast.”

She paused before the gate, but she didn’t move to open it. The horse shifted beneath them, but she seemed lost in another world. “At the beginning of my senior year nobody could touch us, and this girl, Andrea Thomas was her name, must have gotten sick of it because her dad showed up at our house one day. I didn’t know what he wanted, didn’t ask, just watched him go into the house to talk to my dad.” She paused, shaking her head a bit, a strand of her hair tickling his face. “You want to know what he wanted?”

He nodded, even though he had a feeling where she was going with this.

“He wanted to buy my horse, only, see, it wasn’t my horse. It was my dad’s. He’d bought it and I guess he felt he had a right to sell it.” He felt her whole body tense just before she said, “He did.”

If Scott had thought her father a total loser before, he was even more of a loser now. “He didn’t.”

She nodded. “For a bunch of money. Oh, he gave me some of it…to buy myself a new horse he said, as if the hours I’d spent on Thumper’s back could be bought back.” She shook her head again. “I’ve spent as many hours—more, actually—running this ranch, tending to the cattle, breeding them, selling them, and once again my father went and sold it from under me. Well, not sold, just lost it, which in some ways is even worse.” She tilted her head, and for the first time there was no animosity in her eyes as she said, “If you go back on your word to sell this place back to me if ranching isn’t your thing, Mr. Beringer, I promise I’ll buy the best hit man I can afford. You have my word on that.”

At that moment, he almost offered to sell the place back to her. Right then and there. But he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Not when it’d always been a dream of his to own a ranch—a real ranch—like this. But if he decided to keep the place, maybe he could work something out with her. He might not be able to give her Thumper back, but he could give her the next best thing.

“Don’t move,” she said.

Scott was about to ask why, but she threw a leg over the front of her saddle and slipped from his arms before he could say a word.

She didn’t get back on, either, just led him through the gate like a child on a pony ride. And she never looked up at him, either. He suspected it was because she didn’t want him to see what was in her eyes. But he knew. Yes, he knew. Right after his parents had died, he’d watched as the State had sold all their personal belongings before placing him in foster care. He’d only been allowed to pack up one box. Granted, he’d never had a lot of toys, but he still remembered the hurt at having to leave some of them behind.

“Let me down.”

She must not have heard him at first because she kept leading the horse.

“Amanda, I need to get down. Now.”

She stopped then, the horse doing the same. When she looked up at him, Scott saw himself in her eyes.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

He didn’t answer, just mimicked what she’d done a few minutes before. He almost fell flat on his face but clutched at the foot-strap thingies when he landed, which saved him—stirrups, they were called.

“What is it?” she repeated as he closed the distance between them.

Scott lifted her chin. “I’d buy you ten Thumpers if I could.”

He saw her eyes widen, that gaze a splendid mix of blues and greens and grays. Then she blinked and swallowed at the same time. It took him a moment to realize that it was because she’d teared up. Ah, hell.

He kissed her.

He’d wanted to do it all morning, and he wasn’t sorry that he did so now. He expected peaches and cream. He got a Fourth of July firecracker, right down to the sparks.

She gasped in surprise. So did he. But then he was slipping his tongue inside her mouth, tasting her. Wanting her. Lapping her up.

And she kissed him back. She didn’t protest. Didn’t jerk away from him. She seemed to feel the instant kapow that he did.

Her hands came up to his head, her fingers entwining the hair at his nape. His hands explored her sides, a part of him calculating the risk it would be to move his hand up and cup a breast…or two. Man, how he wanted that. But he couldn’t.

Instead he forced himself to draw back. One of his hands lifted to cup her chin again. Her eyes were closed. Freckles dusted her nose, her lashes long against her tanned cheeks.

Then her eyes suddenly sprang open and she looked a tad bit freaked, so he said, “I hope you don’t mind my doing that, but you seemed like you needed something to turn your mind from Thumper.”

She stiffened in his arms. “Scott—”

“No,” he said. “Don’t say a word. You needed a kiss. Don’t make more of it than it is.”

She didn’t look like she believed him. He didn’t blame her. He didn’t believe himself.

“Thank you,” she said.

A second later she turned toward the house. And Scott just stood there, arms hanging limply at his sides, wondering why it was he felt so weird.

It was only when he realized she’d left her horse behind that Scott realized he wasn’t the only one thrown.

Chapter Five

The thing about living in a small town, Amanda thought, as she came to a halt not three seconds after turning away from Scott, was that everybody knew your business before you did. Amanda would bet if her house caught on fire, her neighbors would be the ones to call 911.

Such was the case now, for as sure as she wore a C-cup, that was Stephanie Prichart coming up her drive.

Not now, Amanda thought. Not when she was still trying to come to grips with the fact that Scott Beringer had kissed her, and she’d liked it. Not when her heart had melted at his “I’d buy you ten Thumpers” comment. Not when all she wanted to do was escape to the house and try to figure out just what it was about the man that seemed to get under her skin.

But there was no mistaking the green Camry pulling to a halt before her house. Nor the wide smile on the face of the blond driver.

Amanda tried not to groan.

There wasn’t anything wrong with Stephanie. Amanda had known her since Fisher-Price days. It was just that Stephanie was so…so Carol Brady. Perpetually happy, always giggling—not laughing, but giggling—she was the type of person that you liked, but that you had a hard time tolerating sometimes. Like now. This morning, to be exact, because Amanda knew the moment Stephanie opened her car door that she’d somehow found out about Scott’s presence.

Well, Amanda supposed it was hard to miss a helicopter.

“Darn,” she said as the door opened.

“Amanda,” Stephanie trilled. As clichéd as it was, trilled was the only word one could use to describe the way Stephanie spoke. Like Snow White sucking some serious helium.

“Amanda, you naughty girl. Why didn’t you tell me you had a houseguest?” Stephanie looked toward Scott as if his presence was a complete surprise. Hah.

Blond, petite, entirely too Silicon Valley to suit Amanda’s taste, Stephanie approached, her over-bleached teeth smiling as her designer boots sounded as if they were munching the gravel drive. Cruncha, cruncha, cruncha.

“Stephanie, how nice to see you, too.” It wasn’t really, not now, but Amanda managed to smile. Though she wished she hadn’t because smiling pulled the skin tight around her lips, which were overly sensitive thanks to Scott’s kiss.

Stephanie had a close-up view of that skin because she came forward and gave her a hug. That was the thing about Stephanie, no matter how nosy and annoying she was, you just had to love her. She gave the best darn hugs.

“Why haven’t you been by to visit?” she asked upon drawing back, her green eyes darting from Amanda’s eyes, to Scott, then back again.

“Oh, you know. So many men, so little time.”

Stephanie lifted her brow, looking back at Scott.

“I meant bulls, Stephanie, not human men.”

Stephanie giggled. Amanda tried not to wince.

“Who’s this?”

Amanda didn’t want to do it. She really didn’t, but she had no choice but to turn back to Scott, who was holding the reins of the horse she’d abandoned, and said, “Stephanie, this is Scott Beringer.”

Of course, Stephanie had likely already known that. There’d probably been a APB put out the moment his helicopter had landed. See, that was the thing. Everyone knew everyone’s business, but the trick was to act as if you didn’t know the other person’s business.

Stephanie echoed, “Scott Beringer,” in a gushing voice. “The Scott Beringer?”

“Yes, Stephanie,” Amanda said. “The Scott Beringer.” And something about the way Stephanie stared at Scott, as if he were God’s gift to Stephanie’s pet charities—of which there were many—made Amanda say, “You know, corporate raider. Company downsizer. Robber baron.” Which made Scott and Stephanie both swing their gazes around to her, Scott going so far as to lift his brows. Amanda felt her face color like a barbecue with lighter fluid squirted on top.

“Just kidding,” she said, because it wasn’t like her to be so mean spirited. Man, he’d really rattled her with his kiss.

Stephanie, however, was oblivious to the sexual undercurrents going around. “It’s so nice to meet you, Mr. Beringer,” she said. “I’ve heard so many wonderful things about you.”

Which made Amanda’s own brows lift. She had? From whom?

“Amanda, you should have told me Mr. Beringer was a personal friend of yours.”

Personal friend? Hah. As if. But Amanda didn’t contradict her, because if there was a chance Stephanie didn’t know about Scott stealing her father’s ranch out from under them, Amanda wasn’t going to enlighten her.

Then Scott came forward, or at least he tried to. He didn’t know anything about horses, Amanda suddenly recalled, because he walked forward as if Fancy—the horse Amanda had abandoned in her kissed-senseless daze—would automatically follow, which she didn’t, and Scott got jerked back to the point he almost fell backward when the reins grew taut.

He recovered quickly, stopping, shooting Fancy a dogmeat look before smiling at Stephanie and saying, “Nice to meet you, Ms. Prichart.”

“Oh, it’s Stephanie,” she trilled. “Call me Stephanie.”

“And you can call me Scott.”

“Scott,” Stephanie corrected, the two smiling at each other as if they were members of a mutual admiration society.

“Did you want to come inside, Stephanie?” Amanda asked. “I was just about to make breakfast.”

“Are you in town to escort Amanda to the barn dance tomorrow night?” Stephanie asked as if she hadn’t heard her. But Amanda knew she had. What was more, Amanda knew the question was a ploy to lead the conversation toward said barn dance.

“Stephanie, no—”

“Barn dance?” Scott asked, his brows lifting again.

Amanda almost groaned. She almost grabbed the well-meaning Stephanie by the arm and dragged her inside. But she couldn’t. Not without being a wee bit obvious. And not without Scott realizing she didn’t want Stephanie to talk about the barn dance, which in turn meant Scott knowing about it. Which in turn would indicate that she was scared he’d come to it. Which would make her seem a coward—

“Yeah,” Stephanie said brightly. “A barn dance. It’s tomorrow, at the Los Molina Hall. Everyone’s invited. The whole town usually comes, even the kids.”

“Stephanie, I’m sure Scott doesn’t want to go to our little get-together.”

“Actually, I do.”

Which made Amanda groan. Inwardly, of course.

“Great,” Stephanie said. “There’s a silent auction. And it’s a potluck, but I’m sure Amanda was planning to bring something, weren’t you, Amanda.”

“Actually, I’m not sure I can go—”

“Of course you can, Amanda. Why you just told me last night that you were going. Don’t tell me you changed your mind because you have a houseguest; not when he can come, too.”

Scott had to admit, Amanda didn’t look like she wanted to go, but she would. He’d make sure of it. Heck, he’d never been to a barn dance before. He’d never been to any kind of dance. Well, he’d gone to charity balls, but not with any kind of date. This would be a first for him, even if his “date” didn’t look too terribly enthusiastic about the whole thing.

“What time does it start?” he asked Amanda’s friend.

“At eight.”

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