LITMIR.BIZ

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sixteen, I thought riding bucking broncos sounded like a great idea.”

      “You didn’t, did you?”

      He nodded slowly, touching the end of his hat. “Yes ma’am. Once upon a time, I was a rodeo cowboy.”

      * * *

      ACE HAD NO IDEA why he was telling Sierra all of this. He didn’t like to talk about his past. Didn’t like to talk about the decade he’d spent away from Copper Ridge. Because it led into dangerous, murky territory that he barely allowed himself to think about, much less have a conversation about.

      “I didn’t know that. I guess, I thought you’d been running the bar forever. Or maybe that you worked at the bar. But, I would’ve been, you know, not legal drinking age when the bar actually changed its name to Ace’s.”

      “Are you calling me old?”

      “Well, you’re older than me.”

      “Not that much,” he said, sounding slightly perturbed.

      “How long have you had the bar?”

      “About seven years.”

      “Yeah,” she said, scrunching her nose. “I was only eighteen when you took over then.”

      “Ouch.”

      He was suddenly very conscious of the decade that stood between his and Sierra’s ages. Of course, he had always known that he was older than her, he didn’t need to tally up the years to figure that out. She was shiny. Sparkly. Regardless of whatever was going on with her father, she retained the kind of innocence that was difficult to keep into your thirties.

      “Oh, come on. Men get better with age. Women just start shedding their sequins.”

      “Bullshit. Fashion magazines might want you to believe that, but trust me when I tell you I’ve had some of the best nights of my life with women over the age of forty.”

      He had said that to get a response out of her. What he hadn’t anticipated was the response it would elicit in him when her cheeks turned a deeper shade of rose. “I only wanted to know about your horse riding, Ace, not about the other kinds of riding you do.” Her tone was biting, dry. She was not as unaffected as she was trying to pretend.

      Which was good, because he wasn’t unaffected at all.

      She had to beg. Thank God for that edict. Because it was the only thing stopping him from grabbing her and pulling her flush against his body, backing her up against a wall, bending her over some furniture.

      He’d made a rule, and he would damn well stick to it. He wasn’t completely beyond the pale. He wasn’t unable to control himself. He was not that far gone.

      You are.

      Maybe he was. But in this, he wouldn’t be. He would stand strong.

      Yeah, that’s a real moral high ground, Thompson. You won’t touch her unless she begs you for it. And if she does, you know you will.

      “It’s been said I have no shame,” he said. “It’s probably true.”

      “Oh, I would say more than probably.”

      “Do you want to see the horses?” He wasn’t really sure what either of them was doing. They could act as irritated with each other as they wanted, and they probably were that irritated with each other, but they were also coming up with excuses to stay in each other’s company.

      Probably because she had the nicest rack he’d seen in a while, and he really liked looking at her ass when she walked. He was that basic.

      “Yes,” she said, a wealth of subtext beneath the agreement.

      Or maybe there wasn’t. Maybe she just wanted to see the horses. Maybe he was a pervert.

      “You said you barrel race,” he said, heading toward the front door, hoping some of the fresh air would dispel some of the tension between them. “You doing much of it now?”

      “No,” she said, walking onto the porch just ahead of him, taking the steps two at a time down to the driveway. And yeah, he watched her ass.

      “Why not?”

      “My horse is at my dad’s house.”

      “And you aren’t.”

      She looked over her shoulder, her blond curls bouncing. She was eternally bouncy, even when she was annoyed. “Right. Because, massive falling-out.”

      “So you said. So what happened? He cancel your credit card?”

      “Do you honestly think that’s the only thing I could possibly worry about? My fingernails, a credit card. Some rich bitch must’ve screwed you over good.”

      That stopped him in his tracks. “Why would you say that?”

      “Come on. You didn’t just wake up one morning deciding that girls like me are ridiculous. Someone taught you. I’m rich, but I’m not stupid. You’re right, my life has been pretty easy. And a lot of people are nice to me because of where I come from. A lot of it’s fake, and I’m aware of that. But being wealthy doesn’t automatically mean people are nice to you. A lot of people resent you for it. You think you’re the first person to hate me on sight? I already told you, you aren’t that original.”

      He wasn’t in the mood to talk about Denise. But then, he never was. Still, the path of least resistance in this case was to tell just enough of the story to satisfy her curiosity. “My ex-wife.”

      That stopped her in her tracks. “You were married?”

      “Yeah. For a couple of years.” Three years. Closer to four. He remembered every single one, because it was easy to mark them with Callie’s age.

      He gritted his teeth.

      “To a rich girl. Who had daddy and credit card issues, I take it?”

      “Pretty much.”

      “Predictable.”

      “You keep saying I am.”

      “It has nothing to do with a slashed credit card,” she said. “I don’t... My father isn’t who I thought he was.”

      “I know how that goes.”

      “Your ex-wife?”

      He stuffed his hands in his pockets and nodded, bringing himself into step with her. “The very same.”

      “You know what it’s like. And you know that sometimes you have to leave.”

      Except he wouldn’t have left. “That’s true,” he said, even though in his case it absolutely wasn’t.

      “It was pretty bad,” she said, kicking a rock.

      “Are you going to hint around about it, or are you going to tell me?”

      “Why would I tell you?”

      He treated her to his best smile, the kind that got him laid more often than not. “Because I’m the bartender. Everyone tells me their secrets.”

      “When they’re drunk. I’m not drunk. Unless you spiked my coffee.”

      “I don’t give out free alcohol. Plus, I don’t let my employees drink on the job. You are technically on the job.” Which he said more as a reminder to himself. Because he also didn’t allow himself to check out his employees’ asses.

      “I don’t think I can tell you.”

      “Why not?”

      “Because,” she said, “you hate me. Why should I trust you with my secrets?”

      “I don’t hate you.”

      He didn’t like her. Not beyond the look of her anyway. But he’d hired her, and he was taking her to see his horses. So, obviously he didn’t hate her.

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