LITMIR.BIZ

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desk job, but his father had wanted to retire and there had been no one else to carry on the family business. As always, being the responsible one, Connor had set aside his own dreams to accept the duty.

      The sad truth was, it had been so long since he’d followed his own heart, the path he’d once dreamed of walking had become so overgrown with other people’s expectations, he would need a machete to chop his way through. Joining the Cattleman’s Club was the first thing Connor had done for himself in a very long time. Maybe ever.

      Despite that, Jake somehow always managed to out-shine him. If he didn’t love his brother so much, Connor may have resented him. But Jake was so charming, so full of playful mischief, it was hard not to get caught up in his energy. And he appeared to have outgrown his reckless tendencies. For the most part, anyway. Connor supposed marriage could do that to a man. Not that he would ever find out. Marriage and family weren’t in the cards for him.

      “What do you know about Nita Windcroft?” Logan asked.

      “Not much.” Connor had never actually met Nita, but he’d heard plenty of talk from the people in Royal. He knew she was raised by a single father and worked the farm by his side—an honest to goodness tomboy. Connor also had heard gossip that, if she didn’t pretty herself up and find a man soon, she was fast on her way to becoming an old maid.

      He had met his share of tough women in the military, the kind you wouldn’t want to meet in a dark alley, and it sounded as if Nita Windcroft fit the bill.

      “I know that if you have a horse that needs breaking, even the wildest, meanest of stallions, Nita Windcroft is the woman to call,” Connor said.

      The other men exchanged a look, and Connor got the idea there was something more to this than they were telling him.

      “She’s a pistol,” Gavin agreed. “With pride by the bushel load.”

      “Why do I sense there’s a problem?” Connor asked.

      “She asked for a man to watch the farm,” Jake clarified. “We think that with her father out of commission, she may be the next target.”

      “We believe she’s in danger,” Logan added. “We don’t want you to watch the farm. We want you to watch her.”

      Now it was starting to make sense. “In other words, Ms. Windcroft isn’t going to be too keen on having a bodyguard?”

      Jake nodded, a screwy grin on his face. “I’d say that’s a fair assessment.”

      “So, you’re okay with that?” Gavin asked. “Living in such close quarters with a woman like Nita.”

      Connor shrugged. “Sure, why wouldn’t I be?”

      They exchanged another look. This Nita person must be even worse than he’d imagined, in looks or personality—or both—if they thought he would be so put off by her that he wouldn’t take the assignment.

      “Who knows,” Jake said, leaning over and slugging Connor in the shoulder, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively. “You might even like her.”

      Granted, Connor didn’t date much, but he was far from desperate. And he preferred his women to look like…well, women. Round and soft in all the right places and reasonably attractive.

      “I don’t think we have to worry about that,” he told his brother. “I’m definitely the man for the job.”

      “Then pack your bags,” Gavin said. “She’s expecting you first thing tomorrow morning.”

      Nine o’clock the following morning, gravel and dirt crunching under the tires, Connor drove his Mercedes up the long drive leading to the Windcroft horse farm. The sprawling, stone house looked fairly new considering how long the farm had been in the Windcroft family. The facade was punctuated with a lot of tall, easily accessible windows—a prowler’s dream. He hoped they had a good alarm system, and if they didn’t, they needed one.

      Wood rocking chairs flanked the long, covered porch, and off to one side of the front yard a cedar swing sat amidst a pristine, green lawn in the shade of a towering oak whose leaves had just begun to turn yellow. In the distance, on acres of flat land, he could see barns and outbuildings, corrals dotted with mesquite trees. There was also another smaller, older house several hundred yards back from the main structure. He didn’t know much about horse farms, and even less about horses, but this one seemed pretty damn big. Which explained why Nita Windcroft was so charged to get to the bottom of the threats and mischief. The sheer size alone meant he would have his work cut out for him.

      The one thing he didn’t see, however, was horses, which struck him as odd.

      He parked, grabbed his things from the back seat and stepped out into the cool, dusty air. Duffel bag in hand, he climbed the stairs to the porch and knocked on the front door. Several minutes passed with no answer so he knocked again.

      “Can I help you?” a feminine voice inquired and Connor turned to find a woman climbing the steps behind him. She was tall and slim, dressed from head to toe in work-faded denim and a pair of battered cowboy boots. A farm hand, he assumed. A fine-looking one at that.

      And young. She didn’t look a day past eighteen.

      “Ma’am,” he said, removing his hat. “Name’s Connor Thorne.”

      Hands on her hips, she eyed him up and down from under the brim of a black Stetson, as if she wasn’t quite sure what to make of him. Finally she said, “You’re older than I thought.”

      “Beg your pardon?”

      “You look older than your brother. But being twins, I guess you’re not.”

      “You know my brother?”

      “Of course I do.”

      He should have figured. Before Jake had settled down, he’d been a shark with the ladies, though this one looked a bit young even for him.

      She removed her hat and a mane of shiny black hair spilled down around her shoulders. She gazed up at him with a pair of wide, startlingly brilliant violet eyes.

      Holy cow, he didn’t even know eyes came in that color. Whoever this girl was, she was a looker. At thirty-eight, he didn’t typically date women young enough to be his daughter, but this girl had a fresh, wholesome quality that intrigued him.

      He also had a job to do, one that would leave no time for a roll in the hay with a stable girl.

      “I’m looking for Nita Windcroft,” he said. “She’s expecting me.”

      “Well—” she looked him up one side and down the other “—this is your lucky day, cowboy, because you just found her.”

      Chapter Two

      Salvation manifested itself in many forms.

      This particular brand had showed up in tight jeans, a flannel shirt and cowboy boots.

      And he was looking at her as though her hair had caught fire.

      “You’re Nita Windcroft?”

      “That’s what it says on my birth certificate.”

      He shook his head, as if he couldn’t believe it. Connor may have been Jake’s identical twin, but they were complete opposites. Sure, they looked alike—the same height, the same dark brown hair, though Connor’s was cut military short. They both had eyes the color of the Texas sky at dusk on a cloudless day—deep, relentless blue. But Connor seemed darker somehow, more intense.

      The lines bracketing his eyes were carved deeper in his skin, the worry lines in his forehead more pronounced. This man had obviously done his fair share of frowning. In their depths his eyes held the life experience of a man twice his age.

      The things that man must have seen to have eyes like that.

      “You’re really Nita?” he asked, looking down one

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