He’d felt a jolt the moment he had walked into the office and seen her sitting at her desk. He was a man of strong sexual appetites, and he’d been single for the past eight years. He noticed women, and Ellie Bowman definitely was one.
“I can bunk in with the hands,” she said. “This time of year, you’re probably still looking for strays and moving them down to the lower pastures.”
Kade inwardly groaned. The bunkhouse? Not likely. A good-looking woman would be nothing but a distraction to the hands.
“I don’t suppose you can cook,” he said. “Mrs. Stenson is leaving for a month-long visit with her son and his family in Phoenix. Be a place you could easily fit in.”
One of those smooth reddish eyebrows slid up. “Why am I not surprised the only job you think I can handle is in the kitchen?”
Irritation trickled through him. He wasn’t being disrespectful. His mother had taught him better than that. With an opening in the kitchen, hiring her would be believable. Simple as that.
“Cooking won’t be a problem,” she answered before he had time to respond. “My mother cooked for our ranch hands. I pitched in whenever she needed me.”
He managed to nod. “Mabel has a helper, so you won’t be left to do all the work yourself. In fact, Maria usually does most of the heavy lifting now that Mabel is in her seventies.”
“If that’s what you think works best, that’s what I’ll do. It’s your money. I’m sure you’d like to get the best results for the dollars you spend.”
“True enough.” She was pragmatic. Heather had been exactly the opposite, spending ridiculous sums of money on herself. “Taking over the kitchen will give you an excuse to be in town. You’ll be feeding a six-man crew plus my foreman and me, a few part-time hands, a stable boy, and anyone else who happens to be around. Mabel went in for supplies a couple of times a week. That should give you a chance to get to know some of the locals.”
Ellie’s full lips curved in the first real smile he had seen. He wondered what she’d taste like. Damn.
“Actually, standing in for your cook is a good idea,” Ellie said, surprising him with the admission. Kade reassessed some of the assumptions he’d made.
“I haven’t cooked for a while,” she said. “But it’s kind of like riding a horse. Once you’re back in the saddle, you remember how to do it.”
He clamped down on the heat those words generated and the stirring in his loins beneath the table. He’d like to give Ms. Ellie Bowman a ride—the kind neither of them would soon forget.
Kade scrubbed a hand over his face. This was a bad idea on every level. Except that if the lady was as good as Conn said, it might actually work.
Kade straightened in his chair. “Anything else you need to know?”
“Where will I be staying?”
“Mabel moved into a cabin behind the ranch house a couple years back. Her old room is down the hall from the kitchen, off the mudroom.”
“That’ll do.”
He nodded and rose from his seat. “If you think of anything else, you can call me on my cell phone.”
“All right.” Ellie put his number in her contacts, and he put hers in his. There was something intimate about it Kade didn’t like.
“I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“I’ll be there no later than three.”
He frowned. “We get up early on the ranch. Cook’s the first one up.”
She smiled, and he caught a glint of humor in her eyes. “Maybe I should charge you a little extra for ruining my beauty sleep.”
Kade actually laughed. Looked like Ms. Bowman had a sense of humor. Good thing to have on a ranch. “You find my wife’s killer, and I’ll give you a ten percent bonus. That pay for your beauty sleep?”
Ellie stuck out a hand. “You’re on.”
Kade accepted the handshake, his big palm wrapping around her smaller one. Surprised at the strength he felt there, he settled his hat on his head and tugged the brim down low. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Ms. Bowman.”
“Ellie,” she said in a voice that made him think of clean sheets and his big, four-poster bed.
That was the moment Kade knew he was in trouble.