She gasped. Apparently, Roman hadn’t filled her in on everything she’d missed.
And she’d missed a lot.
“Hey, honey, want some breakfast?” Mary asked, appearing in the doorway.
I craned my neck to see around Ruby. Had Mary heard our friendly exchange? “I’m fine, Mary. Ruby Lee might like a little something to settle her stomach though. Rough night and all that.”
Mary clicked her tongue like she always did when she didn’t like what was going down and put her hand on Ruby’s shoulder. “Sweetie, can I get you something?”
Ruby glared at me, but turned to Mary with a smile. “Thank you, Mary. What you can do is tell me what the hell is going on here.”
Her voice got more shrill with every word. Maybe I’d pushed her too far. Actually, fuck it. I hadn’t done a thing to her. Her flaky parents had.
Roman had filled me in on how she’d just shown up out of the blue, like she was expecting a damn welcoming committee or something. And when she found out her parents had split town after selling everything they had, she’d been pretty much devastated.
Like Roman, I felt for her. She was in a rough spot.
Not that any of it was my problem.
“Well, honey,” Mary started. “Your parents sold. You know that.”
She pressed her lips together and took a deep breath. “I know they sold. To Roman.”
Mary nodded, her face covered in sympathy. She really was a nice woman.
“They did sell to Roman. And Jameson.”
Ruby looked up at the ceiling of her father’s former office, and rolled her shoulders like she was trying to keep her shit together.
She looked back at Mary as if I weren’t in the room. “Fine. Okay. I get it. And Mary, I would love some coffee and a bagel.”
“Oh, honey, we don’t have bagels. But I have some nice white bread I can butter for you…” As they headed for the kitchen together, their voices faded.
And as they did, Roman stuck his head in the office. Jesus. The place was busy as a train station. How was I going to get any of my fucking work done?
“What was that all about?” he asked.
I shrugged. “Guess when you briefed her about all the recent changes, you forgot to mention I was part of the deal.”
He smiled and took a seat opposite the desk. “You’re right. Didn’t want to push her over the edge with too much information. But she’s figuring it out real fast.” He rubbed his chin, and I realized he was avoiding my gaze.
“What’s up with you, man?” I asked.
Roman looked down at his hands. “From what I just overheard, I’m guessing you slept with her last night. Hers were the words of a woman who was regretting something she’d just done and looking for someone to take it out on.”
“Damn, Roman. How’d you get to be such an expert on women?”
He shook his head. “Not sure that I am. So, did you?”
I leaned across the desk, not speaking until he looked at me. “Let’s put it this way, we didn’t get a lot of sleep.”
Roman ran his hands over his face. “You know, the only thing her father and I ever agreed on was what a spitfire she was. Some things just don’t change, do they?”
“I don’t know about that, Roman. Quite a lot has changed around here. For example, did you get a look at the curves on her? She wasn’t packing those when she left Flood Creek.”
He threw me a disgusted look, got up, and left.
Since when was he so sensitive?
But I was finally alone. Maybe I could get some work done.
8
JAMESON
“Hey, you want a tour of the property? See what else has changed since your parents sold?”
Yeah, I was throwing her an olive branch. I’d been pretty ruthless with my earlier teasing and now I felt bad.
But only a little.
She looked over from her conversation with Mary.
“Go ahead, honey. I need to start dinner, anyway.”
She stared out the window for a moment, considering my offer. “I guess. Sure.”
We headed for the door. “If I were you, I’d put on some sturdier clothes. You ain’t going to the gym, you know.”
She glanced at herself. “Yeah, right. Be right back.”
I watched her awesome ass bound up the steps to the second floor, and glanced around the foyer that I’d spent so much time in as a googly-eyed teenager. At the time, I couldn’t believe anyone actually lived in a house like the Whitakers’. And now I owned the son of a bitch.
I’d grown up in a simple tract house with a bedroom for my mom, one for me, and a bathroom we shared. It was the best she could do as a single parent on her schoolteacher’s salary, but it was home and I loved it.
Mom still lived there, even though now I had a little money and could get her something nicer. But she wasn’t interested in moving.
Too much trouble, she’d said.
So, I’d have to find another way to do something special for her. Like take her on a cruise to the Caribbean or something.
But I could just imagine her saying she had no need to leave Flood Creek, and that the tropics were too damn hot, anyway.
The woman drove me crazy. And I adored her.
“So, Jameson, you bought my father’s ranch. How did you swing that?” she asked as I put my truck in gear and started driving.
“I inherited some money from my uncle, my mother’s brother, a few years back. Finally found something to do with it.”
“Your Uncle Jack? I remember him.”
I glanced at her as we bounced over the dirt road leading to the far side of the property. Christ, she’d turned into a beautiful woman.
I narrowly missed a tree before I turned my attention back to driving.
Asshole. Watch the road. Not the woman.
Uncle Jack. My stand-in father. He’d told me Ruby would leave me someday.
I wondered what he’d think of the way things stood now…
“Do you live in the house like Roman does?” she asked.
I laughed. “Hell no. That was a stipulation of the partnership. I like my privacy, so I’m in the bunkhouse.”
I looked at her again, waiting for distaste to wash over her face. It didn’t take long.
“Oh my god, the bunkhouse is a dump. Please tell me you’re not living there.”
She had a lot of catching up to do.
After driving for fifteen minutes over a bumpy unpaved road, we came into view of the property’s outbuildings—stables, barns, and the bunkhouses where ranch hands usually lived.
Every time I drove the ranch’s one road, I marveled at its beauty. There was nothing like a Montana ranch, and there’d been no bigger thrill in my life than being able to buy this one.
“Wow, the stables look nice. Guess you painted them?” she asked when I pulled over outside them.
We’d done a hell of a lot more than that.
“’Course. Your dad had let things get a little run down. I think he was just burned out.”
She nodded. “Guess that’s why they sold.”
I turned in my seat to face her. “Did you know I was working for your dad the last few years?”
Her chin dropped. “No. No, I was not aware of that.”