LITMIR.BIZ

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a grandstander,” he accused, though not with much rancor.

      “Oh, hell,” Brody groused back, “you’ve just got your tail in a twist because you wanted to show off your roping skills.”

      Conner let loose with a slow grin. “I can outrope, outshoot and outwrestle you any day of the week,” he said, “and you know it.”

      Brody laughed at that. His clothes felt icy against his skin, and his boots were full of water—again. At this rate, he’d need a new pair every payday. “Keep telling yourself that, little brother, if it’ll make you feel better.”

      “You could have roped that calf from the bank,” Conner pointed out, almost grudgingly, after tugging his hat brim down low over his eyes because they were riding straight into the sun. “Instead, you risked your life—and the life of a perfectly good horse—to pull a John Wayne.”

      “I was safe the whole time,” Brody replied, “and so was this horse. It was the calf that was in a fix, and I got him out of it. Seems like you ought to be glad about that, in place of griping like some old lady whose just found muddy footprints on her carpet.”

      Conner’s jaw tightened and he looked straight ahead, as though herding six yearling calves along a country road required any real degree of concentration. When he did speak up, Conner caught Brody off-guard, as he had a way of doing.

      “I reckon Carolyn’s out to find a husband,” he said, with a hint of a smirk lurking in his tone. “And she’s not too picky about her choice, as long as she doesn’t get you.”

      The words went right through Brody’s defenses, as they’d no doubt been meant to do. Heat surged up his neck, and he glared over at Conner. The two dogs were traveling between them now, both of them panting but otherwise unfazed by the morning’s adventure.

      “If you’re looking for a fight, little brother, you’ve found one,” Brody said. “As far as I’m concerned, we can get down off these horses right now and settle this discussion in the middle of the road.”

      Conner smiled without looking at Brody and rode blithely on. The main part of the herd was up ahead, grazing on spring grass.

      The stray calves seemed to know that, too, because they picked up speed and quit carrying on like they were being killed.

      Conner didn’t speak again until they’d reached the edge of the range, where the view seemed to go on forever, in every direction.

      Even with his hackles raised, Brody couldn’t ignore that scenery. The land, the trees, the mountains and the sky, the twisting river—all of it was as much a part of him as his own soul.

      Conner raised his hat and swung it in a wide arch, as a greeting to the mounted ranch hands on the far side of that sea of cattle.

      Then he turned to look Brody’s way. “You’d better get on home,” he said. “Get out of those wet clothes before you come down with something.”

      Brody just sat there, breathing in his surroundings, letting it all saturate him, through and through. “I’m already half-dry,” he argued, “and not the least bit delicate, for your information.”

      Conner laughed. “I got to you, didn’t I?” he said, in quiet celebration. “I do like getting a rise out of the great Brody Creed.”

      “Why don’t you go to hell?” Brody suggested mildly.

      Again, Conner laughed. It seemed there was no end to his amusement that morning. “Are you just going to stand back and watch Carolyn order up a husband online?” he asked, a few moments later.

      “She can do what she wants,” Brody bit out, more nettled than he would have cared to admit.

      “What do you want, Brody?”

      “Me?” Brody asked. “What do I want?”

      “That was my question, all right, ” Conner replied, implacable and amused.

      “Fine,” Brody answered, nudging his horse into a trot, figuring the dogs had had time to rest up a little by then. “I want you to stay the hell out of my business, that’s what I want.”

       CHAPTER SEVEN

      IT WAS TIME to take action, Carolyn thought, a wicked little thrill going through her as she reread Brody’s response to her message earlier that day.

      Want to go riding with me?

      She bit her lower lip.

      Brody had asked her to go riding with him, and she was actually considering it. A sad commentary on her level of intelligence, she figured, since she’d been burned, and badly, the last time she played with fire.

      And she’d be doing exactly that if she spent any time alone with Brody Creed, no doubt about it.

      That was that, then.

      She wasn’t getting any younger, and if she ever wanted a home and a husband and children, if she ever wanted to take real family vacations, instead of buying souvenir mugs at garage sales and pretending she’d been somewhere, she had to do something, take matters into her own hands.

      Prince Charming, if he’d ever been headed in her direction in the first place, had obviously been detained.

      “Carolyn?” Tricia appeared in the office doorway, a merciful if temporary distraction from her troubling thoughts. True to Carolyn’s prediction, they hadn’t had a customer all morning, or since lunch, and the apron orders from the website were wrapped and ready for shipping. “I’m going now. Do you want me to drop the packages off at the post office before I head for home?”

      Not wanting Tricia to see that she’d been checking Friendly Faces, Carolyn turned to face her friend with a wide smile, blocking the computer monitor from view.

      She hoped.

      “That would be great,” she said brightly. Too brightly, probably. “Thanks, Tricia.”

      Tricia eyed her curiously, maybe even a little suspiciously. “You’ll be okay working alone for the rest of the day?” she persisted.

      I’ve been working alone my whole life. Why would today be any different?

      “I’ll be fine,” Carolyn promised cheerfully. “I’m just tying up a few loose ends online, then I’ll go upstairs and start sewing. We’re going to need more aprons soon, and I’d like to finish the gypsy skirt before I die of old age.”

      Tricia hesitated a moment, then smiled and left the doorway. “See you tomorrow,” she called, in parting.

      “’Bye!” Carolyn sang out, all merry innocence.

      Then she turned back to the computer, and Brody’s brief message.

      If she agreed to go anywhere with this man, even for a horseback ride, she needed her head examined.

      In the first note, he’d asked for a second chance.

      A second chance to hurt her, to rip her heart out and stomp on it? Was that what he’d meant? Or was she being too cynical? Suppose the man simply wanted to be friends?

      That would make sense, wouldn’t it, given the way they were always running into each other at social functions, both in town and on the Creed ranch? Maybe Brody was as tired of those awkward encounters as she was.

      He’d said as much, just the other day, but then he’d gone and kissed her and confused the issue all over again.

      And then there was the fact that Carolyn never felt freer, or more alive—or lonelier—than when she was on a horse’s back, riding through wide-open spaces.

      To have someone riding alongside her out there on her favorite trails, someone who knew horses and was comfortable around them, well, that would make the experience close to perfect.

      Adrenaline

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