Page 6 of My Cowboy Trouble (The Cowboy Romantic Comedies #1)

"I have a good teacher." Her voice has dropped to something softer, breathier.

"Just good?"

"Don't fish for compliments. It's unbecoming."

"Everything I do is becoming. Ask anyone."

"Your fancy shirts are becoming. You are not. I asked Clara Mae. She said you're trouble with a capital T."

"Clara Mae's a smart woman." I adjust our position slightly, which means pressing closer. "It's all about rhythm, you know."

"Everything's about rhythm with you, isn't it?" There's something in her tone that makes my blood heat.

"Most things." I guide her hand through another swing, letting my breath skim across her neck. "The best things, anyway."

She shivers despite the ninety-degree weather. "You're doing this on purpose."

"Doing what?" Another swing. Another perfect nail. We're getting into a rhythm now, moving together.

"This." She gestures vaguely at our position with her free hand. "The whole pressed-against-me-teaching-moment thing. The voice thing. The breathing on my neck thing."

Damn, the woman does not mince words. My kryptonite.

"Would you prefer I let you keep shooting nails at innocent bystanders? Because I saw one land near that squirrel, and he looked personally offended."

"You should buy better nails. These ones suck. I wasn't shooting them. They were just... misdirected."

"Is that what we're calling it?" I laugh, and she must feel it rumble through my chest because she shivers again. "Like that time in college when I 'misdirected' my roommate's car into a lake?"

"You drove a car into a lake?"

"Misdirected. Completely different thing. Also, he deserved it. He kept eating my leftover Chinese food."

"That seems like an overreaction. A psycho overreaction."

"You haven't had Chen's General Tso's chicken. Wars have been started over less."

She's laughing now, relaxed against me, and we work like that for the next hour—me guiding her hands, her pretending she doesn't lean back into me every time I get close.

The fence is getting fixed, but more importantly, her walls are starting to crack.

Every joke, every bit of banter, every perfectly driven nail is another tiny fissure in her defenses.

I can work with cracks. Cracks are just opportunities waiting to happen .

"Okay," she finally says, stepping away after we've replaced an entire section. "I think I've got it now. You can stop... helping."

"You sure?" I watch her line up the next nail, noting that her form is actually pretty good now. "Because I'm happy to keep my hands on—I mean, helping. Happy to keep helping."

She snorts. "Subtle."

"I've never been accused of being subtle. Charming, devastatingly handsome, occasionally heroic, but never subtle."

"Occasionally heroic?"

"Well, there was that time I saved Billy from the bull."

"What bull?"

"The one in the south pasture. Meanest son of a bitch you've ever seen. Billy thought he could pet it."

"He tried to pet a bull?"

"Billy tries to pet everything. We had to put a sign on the electric fence."

She misses the nail entirely, hammering her thumb instead. "Fuck!" She drops the hammer, shaking her hand. "Fucking fuckity fuck!"

I grab her hand, examining the damage. Her thumb is already turning red, but the fingernail's intact. "Not broken. You'll have a hell of a bruise though."

"Great. Another war wound to add to my collection." She doesn't pull her hand away, and I find myself rubbing my thumb over her wrist. Her pulse jumps under my touch.

"Want me to kiss it better?" The words are out before I can stop them.

She looks up at me, eyes wide, lips parted slightly. For a second, neither of us moves. Then she pulls her hand back, color rising in her cheeks.

"I think I'll survive without your magic lips, thanks."

"Your loss. My magic lips have healing properties. Ask anyone."

"Anyone being the two girls waiting for you to call?"

"Jealous?"

"Of what? Your imaginary healing powers or your real inflated ego?"

"Both are pretty impressive."

She picks up the hammer again, but she's smiling. "Just shut up and show me how to do the next part."

We eat lunch in the shade of the truck, sitting in the bed with our legs dangling over the edge.

The metal's hot enough to burn, but neither of us seems willing to move.

She's packed sandwiches that are definitely not ranch standard—some kind of fancy bread with actual vegetables and what looks like real cheese, not the processed stuff Gavin lives on.

"Where'd you even find arugula out here?" I ask, examining my sandwich like it's some kind of archaeological discovery. "Did you have it shipped?"

"I have my ways." She takes a bite of hers, and a drop of mustard catches on her bottom lip. It sits there, golden and tempting, and it takes everything in me not to lean over and lick it off. "Clara Mae's actually got a decent selection if you know what to ask for."

"Clara Mae stocks arugula?"

"She called it 'fancy lettuce' and charged me twelve dollars for it."

"You paid twelve dollars for lettuce?"

"It's arugula. And yes. Some of us have standards."

"My standard is 'will this kill me?' If no, I eat it."

"That explains a lot." She wipes her mouth with the back of her hand, destroying my mustard fantasy. "So, what's your story?"

"My story?" I ask.

"Yeah. Everyone's got one. Gavin's the washed-up rodeo star nursing a bruised ego and possibly a death wish?—"

"Don't let him hear you say that. He still thinks he's making a comeback."

"—and Trent's the responsible one with the weight of the world on his shoulders and a desperate need for a vacation he'll never take. But you... you're harder to figure out."

I lean back on my elbows, the hot metal of the truck bed burning through my shirt. The sun's beating down, and I can feel sweat gathering at the base of my neck. " Not much to figure out. I'm just a guy who's good with numbers and better with people."

"That's not a story. That's a resume. And a boring one."

"You want the real story?"

"I want something real. Everything here feels like you're all playing characters. The cocky one, the grumpy one, the smooth one. But who are you when you're not performing?"

The question hits harder than expected. I sit up, taking a long drink from my water bottle to buy time. "What makes you think this is a performance?"

"Because I do it too. PR is ninety percent performance. Smile at the right people, say the right things, pretend you give a shit about their product launch or their brand message or their revolutionary new way to sell basically the same thing everyone else is selling."

"Sounds exhausting."

"It is. Was." She corrects herself, then looks confused about which tense to use. "I don't know what it is anymore."

"You miss it?"

"I miss the simplicity of it. Lying to strangers is easy. This..." she gestures between us, at the ranch spreading out around us. "This is complicated."

"Why?"

"Because in twenty-six days, I leave. Either with the ranch or without it. But I leave. And you all stay. And pretending that doesn't matter is getting harder. "

I want to tell her she doesn't have to leave. Want to tell her that maybe staying wouldn't be the worst thing. But that's not the game we're playing here.

"You ever been somewhere that just... fits?" I ask instead. "Even when it shouldn't? Even when everything logical says it's wrong?"

"No," she says honestly. "I've never fit anywhere."

"Not even in the city?"

"Especially not in the city." She picks at the crust of her sandwich, tearing it into small pieces. "I'm good at pretending, though. Right clothes, right coffee order, right apartment in the right neighborhood. But it's all... hollow. Like I'm playing a part in someone else's life."

"So maybe you're not as different from us as you think."

She looks at me, really looks at me, and for a second, I forget we're playing a game here. Forget about everything except the way the sun's catching her highlights and the way her lips move when she's thinking.

"My parents died when I was fifteen," I say, the words tumbling out before I can stop them. "Car accident. Black ice on Highway 89. Very Montana way to go. One minute, they were driving home from their anniversary dinner, the next..." I snap my fingers. "Gone."

Her hand moves toward mine, hovers, then settles on the truck bed between us. Close but not touching. "Oh, Asher, I'm sorry. "

"It was a long time ago."

"Doesn't make it easier," she says.

"No," I agree. "It doesn't."

We sit in silence for a moment, and I can feel her wanting to ask more. To my surprise, I want to tell her.

"Trent's dad took me in," I continue. "Gave me a job, a place to stay. Didn't ask questions when I showed up drunk at sixteen or when I got in fights at school. Just put me to work and waited for me to sort my shit out."

"Did you? Sort your shit out?"

"Mostly. The ranch became home because it was the first place that didn't feel temporary.

Foster care was all about waiting—waiting for the next placement, the next social worker, the next disappointment.

But here? Here was just work and routine and people who showed up every day whether you deserved it or not. "

"That's why you stay."

"That's why I stay." I look at her. "Even though I could probably make more money managing some corporate ranch or working for one of those agricultural corporations that are buying up all the land. This place... it's family. Even when Gavin's being an ass or Trent's acting like a drill sergeant."

"Or when you're conning innocent city girls into fixing the wrong fence?"

"Hey now, we haven't gotten to that part yet."

She laughs, but there's something soft in her eyes. Understanding, maybe. Or recognition.

Right on cue, because the universe has a sick sense of humor, a truck rumbles up the dirt road, kicking up a dust cloud visible from half a mile away. It’s Clara Mae herself, because apparently she has supernatural timing when it comes to gossip opportunities.