Judy Duarte: Romancing the Cowboy

And once Jared got to Granny’s ranch, he was going to take control of a sorry situation, evict a few freeloaders and see to it the thief ended up in jail.

It was after midnight, but Sabrina Gonzalez had never been able to sleep very well in an unfamiliar house. So it was no wonder she was wide-awake on one of the twin-size beds in the small guestroom Mrs. Clayton had given her to share with Joey. Her new job, which had been a blessing in and of itself, came with room and board, too. That was a bit out of the ordinary for a bookkeeper, but Sabrina wasn’t about to complain.

Besides, the room inside the Clayton ranch house was only temporary, since Mrs. Clayton planned to remodel an old cabin on the grounds. Sabrina and Joey, her six-year-old nephew, would move in as soon as it was ready for them. But God only knew how long that would be. The rustic structure hadn’t been used in ages, so it would need a lot of work to be livable.

Sabrina stopped by Joey’s bedside and gently caressed the top of his head.

Carlos, her twin brother and Joey’s dad, had been convicted of a crime he hadn’t committed and was currently serving time in prison, so Sabrina had stepped in as a guardian.

At first, when Mrs. Clayton’s job offer came through, Sabrina had declined to take it, since the ranch was quite a drive from Houston and she hadn’t found a competent and trustworthy sitter for her nephew yet. But the elderly woman had invited both Sabrina and Joey to live at the ranch, insisting that it was best for the motherless boy to be near a loved one at a time like this and not in day care.

How could Sabrina argue with that?

Joey stirred, and she shushed him until he grew still. Before leaving the room, she stopped by the closet for a robe, then hesitated. The door squeaked terribly when it slid open, and she hated to make any unnecessary noise.

Besides, what would it hurt to walk out into the kitchen wearing just her nightgown? There were only women in the house.

A night-light lit her way downstairs, the steps creaking under her weight. She walked into the living room, where she flipped on a lamp, illuminating the room. Then she went to the kitchen.

Connie, the new cook, was a sweetheart, but she hadn’t been hired for her culinary skills. The oatmeal cookies she’d made, however, were the best Sabrina had ever tasted.

Rather than turn on every light in the house, Sabrina decided not to flip on the switch. She could make her way through the dimly lit kitchen easy enough.

She opened the fridge and poured herself a glass of milk, just as a car engine sounded outside. She glanced at the clock. 12:17 a.m. Surely, Edna wasn’t expecting company. Maybe someone on the highway had made a wrong turn and was lost. The driver would figure it out soon enough, she supposed, and head back to the road.

She plucked two of the chewy cookies from the plastic container in which Connie had stored them and wrapped them in a paper towel to take into the living room, where she would eat them as she thumbed through a magazine.

But the vehicle didn’t turn around or back out. Instead, the engine continued to idle, and the headlights remained on.

A door opened and shut.

When Sabrina heard a baritone whisper through a window that had been left partially open, she froze. Another voice responded, this one a bit louder.

One of the hired hands?

Maybe so.

She pinched off a bite of one cookie and popped it into her mouth, relishing the taste of raisins and spice, then took a sip of milk.

More voices—all male—sounded. Another door opened, then shut.

“Be quiet,” a man said, as he neared the window. “I don’t want to wake up anyone in the house.”

“I hate this,” another added.

“We don’t like it, either. Just sit back and enjoy the ride, kid.”

Footsteps sounded at the back porch. It might be the end of spring, but a winter frost crept up Sabrina’s spine. Her heart pounded out an ominous dirge in her brain and perspiration beaded on her forehead.

As quiet as a cornered mouse, she tiptoed toward the kitchen counter, where the butcher block rested. She set down her milk and cookies, then grabbed the biggest weapon she could find—a meat cleaver—and held it with both hands, ready to defend herself.

Maybe it was Lester, the ranch foreman, and some of the hired hands. Maybe they had reason to be awake and milling about at this time of night.

That had to be it, yet her pulse escalated until she could hear it throbbing in her ears. An avid mystery reader with a wild imagination, Sabrina often thought in terms of worst-possible scenarios. And she tried to keep that in mind, tried to remain calm.

She could scream, waking everyone in the house. And what if there was a perfectly good explanation for all of this?

Then the new ranch bookkeeper would look like a fool.

The lock clicked, as though someone had a key. Or perhaps someone was picking it.

Should she scream now?

The door to the mudroom swung open, revealing a group of men outside, their forms barely illuminated by the headlights of a vehicle. The one in front, a tall, thirtysomething hulk of a man with wheat-colored hair, held a key in his hand and gaped at her. “Who the hell are you?”

If she’d witnessed a crime and stood behind a mirrored window, looking at a lineup and listening to each voice, she’d recognize that one.

Jared Clayton.

She didn’t know whether to cry in relief or anger. “Didn’t anyone teach you to knock on doors?”

“Not at this house.”

“Hey,” a voice behind him said, “get a move on. This is heavy.”

Jared stepped aside, and several of the ranch hands carried a dark-haired man and the wheelchair in which he was still seated through the service porch and into the kitchen, where they lowered him to the floor.

“I’m sorry,” she said, more in response to the injured man’s plight than anything.

From what she’d heard, the one-time rodeo cowboy had been involved in a tragic car accident a while back, and he’d been recuperating at Jared’s ranch. Yet her gaze and her focus turned to Jared. “You scared me.”

“Oh, yeah?” Jared’s features—quite handsome in the light—softened a tad. “And you don’t think seeing a shedevil, wielding a meat cleaver in her hand and dressed like a ghost in flowing white didn’t give me a start, too?”

Sabrina glanced down at her gown, realizing how threadbare the fabric had become, how sheer the material.

Her hair hung down her back, but she freed the side tresses, allowing them to cover the front of her gown the best they could.

As Matthew wheeled himself out of the kitchen and into the living room, the ranch hands backed out the door, closing it and leaving her with Mrs. Clayton’s oldest son. He still hadn’t formally introduced himself, although he really hadn’t needed to.

He crossed his arms across a broad chest and shifted the bulk of his weight to one, denim-clad hip. “Who are you? ”

She crossed her own arms, hoping that would help hide what her hair couldn’t. “I’m Sabrina Gonzalez.”

“The bookkeeper who’s taken up residence in my mother’s house.”

It wasn’t a question, yet his tone, his condescension, set her off, provoking a retort that was completely out of character. “And you’re the rude, arrogant man who called earlier.”

Jared had been accused of worse, but he didn’t take any guff off anyone. Never had, never would.

Granny had done her best to teach him and his brothers to be cordial and polite, but it didn’t come easy to Jared. Not when he had reason to believe someone was a liar or a cheat. And he didn’t trust Sabrina Gonzalez any farther than he could throw her—something that wouldn’t be too tough. She was just a slip of a thing, with a slinky veil of black hair that nearly reached her waist.