Linda Turner - A Ranching Man

Joe, obviously finding criticism in her silence, snapped, “I warned you this was no fancy hotel. What you see is what you get. Take it or leave it.”

There was no question that he was hoping she’d leave it, but she wasn’t that stupid. “I’ll take it,” she said softly.

A muscle clenched in his jaw. “Then I’ll tell you the same thing I told Elliot. There’s no maid service, room service, or peons to do your laundry. You cook for yourself, pick up after yourself, and do your share of the cleaning. Since there’s only one full bath and we have to share the kitchen, I’ve come up with a schedule so that neither of us inconveniences the other. It’s posted on the refrigerator. I suggest you stick to it.”

Or else. The words weren’t spoken, but Angel heard them nonetheless. If she’d wanted to irritate him, she could have told him that there was nothing about sticking to a schedule in the contract he had with the studio. She could make mincemeat of his schedule and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. But she’d riled him enough for one day. And though he didn’t know it, he was giving her and her daughter a sanctuary that was invaluable. For no other reason than that, she’d do whatever she could to make sure she intruded on his home life as little as possible.

“I’m sure that won’t be a problem,” she assured him quietly. “You won’t even know I’m here.”

He didn’t even bother to dignify that with an answer, but he didn’t have to. His snort of contempt told her exactly what he thought of that.

Joe carefully wiped down the newly sanded twin bed he’d bought for his favorite—and only—niece, Cassie, his brow furrowed with a scowl. So he wouldn’t even know she was there, would he? he fumed, hardly noticing the beauty of the antique wood beneath his hands. Yeah, right! Oh, his unwanted houseguest had kept out of his way, he had to give her that. In the week since she’d moved in, filming had started on Beloved Stranger, and he’d barely seen her except in passing. He should have been happy he wasn’t running into her every time he turned around. But a man didn’t have to trip over a woman for her to nag him to death. Angel Wiley could do it without saying a single word.

With a muttered curse, he wondered if she had a clue just how impossible she was to ignore. Her food was in the refrigerator alongside his, her damp towel hanging on the towel rack next to his in the bathroom, her clothes in the washing machine when he wanted to do laundry. Then there was her scent. Good God, he thought with a groan. Why couldn’t it have been bold and blatantly sexy, just the kind of scent he’d never liked on a woman? Then she would have given him just one more reason to resent her presence in his house.

But the lady didn’t do the expected, dammit! Her fragrance was light and delicate and softly enticing. And like a promise whispered on the wind, it lingered on the air and wrapped around him every time he stepped through the front door. But it was the nights that were the worst, when he was asleep and her perfume drifted past his defenses to invade his dreams. He never remembered what he dreamed and didn’t want to, but he woke up restless and on edge. And it was all her fault.

In self-defense, he avoided her and the house every chance he got. The summer days were long, thankfully, and the ranch overrun with a film crew that had little experience with cattle, so he found plenty to keep him busy. There were downed fences to repair, strays to round up, and the herd to be moved when it was needed for filming.

He couldn’t, however, work around the clock. Eventually, he ran out of daylight and was forced to go home to find the lights on and the infuriating Ms. Wiley already home herself. Normally, he would have cleaned up, then scrounged around in the kitchen for something hot and filling. But not with her in the house. He didn’t want to see her, to talk to her, to have any more to do with her than he had to. So every night, he grabbed a cold sandwich from the kitchen, then retreated to his workshop in the barn.

It was his last sanctuary, his woodworking shop, and the one place of his that his houseguest had yet to invade. Here, working on Cassie’s bed, the smell of sawdust and varnish thick in the air, he didn’t have to think about that damn perfume of hers, didn’t have to think of her. And he intended to keep it that way.

Finishing off the last of his sandwich, he ran his hands over the headboard and found it as smooth as a baby’s bottom. When he’d picked the bed up at Myrtle’s, it had been covered in so many coats of paint that it had been impossible to tell the kind of wood it was made of. It had taken him four days to strip away a lifetime of paint with paint remover, but he was finally down to the bare wood. And it was beautiful.

Elizabeth and Zeke were going to love it. They didn’t know that he’d bought an antique, but he’d wanted to give Cassie something special. She was the first baby born into the McBride family in over three decades and he’d wanted her to have something special that could be handed down for generations to come. It had taken Myrtle a while to find what he was looking for, but this was it. After another light sanding, staining and a coat of varnish, it would be beautiful.

“Excuse me. I don’t mean to intrude, but there’s no hot water—”

Swearing, Joe whirled to find Angel standing at the entrance to his workshop just like she had every right to be there. Too late, he wished he’d locked the door. Because the lady looked too damn good. So much for the rumor mill, he thought sarcastically. Gossip abounded about the ranch now that it had been overrun by the Hollywood crowd, and from what he’d heard, the glamour queen had had a rough day playing the part of a widow trying to break a stallion on the ranch she’d inherited from her deceased husband.

She hadn’t done the actual work, of course, but even then, a certain amount of real physical labor was required in order for her to look like she knew what she was doing. Supposedly, she’d thrown herself into the scene—and gotten more than she bargained for when the horse she was working with got out of hand and pulled her off her feet into the dirt.

He nearly rolled his eyes at that. Yeah, right. The studio’s publicity department might get her adoring fans to swallow that bunch of malarkey, but anyone who’d been jerked around by a stubborn horse knew better. If a soft city slicker like Angel Wiley had really been pulled off her feet, she’d be laid up in bed right now whining about her sore muscles, not standing there in his workshop looking as fresh as a ray of sunshine in a simple yellow cotton blouse and jeans that clung in all the right places.

Irritated that he’d noticed the enticing curve of her hips and thighs, he growled, “What do you want?”

Not surprised by his coldness—he hadn’t said two words to her after their initial confrontation when she’d moved in—Angel didn’t so much as blink. She was just too tired. Every bone in her body ached from her battle on the set earlier that afternoon with the horse from hell, and all she wanted to do was soak in a hot tub, then go to bed. But there was no hot water, and she absolutely refused to go to bed without a bath first.

If she’d known where the hot water heater was, she would have checked the pilot light herself—even if she was too stiff to sink down on her knees to do it—but she didn’t. Which left her with no choice but to beard the lion in his den in the barn. And there was no question that it was his den. He’d hidden out for hours there every night that week, not returning to the house until well after she turned out the light in her room.

More than once, she’d been tempted to follow him just to see what he did out there every night. But she’d already intruded on his privacy more than he liked, and the peacefulness of their coexistence was fragile at best. He still didn’t want her there and didn’t insult her by pretending that he did. And he had no idea how much she respected him for that. He was a rarity in her world, where people played nicey-nice just so they could get close to her. His rudeness could be off-putting at times, but he didn’t play games. She knew where she stood with him, and that was a welcome relief.