Page 6 of Ride Me Cowboy (Coyote Creek Ranch #1)

Chapter Four

Beth

I DO A PRETTY GOOD job of avoiding Cole Donovan for the first four days on the job. With his forewarning that he works most nights, I decide to hit the desk early, going through wages first, then bills, before spreadsheeting it all.

It’s easy work, but at the same time, it’s a challenge, because despite how Reagan might have seemed on the phone, a heap of the records I thought I’d find are missing, so to some extent, I’m operating on guess work alone.

I cut the checks though, keeping track of everything I’m doing in the ledger Reagan left for me.

If it’s a bit of an old-fashioned way to work, I don’t question it. Out here, this is apparently just how things are done.

I make sandwiches—quick and easy—when no one’s in the kitchen, and eat either at my desk or in my bedroom.

But on the fourth day, the sun breaks over the mountains in the distance and the sky splits apart in a glorious display of purples and oranges, so I wake early and feel an almost animalistic yearning to throw off the covers and lose myself out into the wild.

To bask in the morning light and feel it wash over me.

I haven’t consciously decided not to explore the ranch, but I suppose when I arrived here I did plan on squirrelling away as much as possible, licking my wounds and all that.

Maybe there’s something in the air out here though, because it doesn’t take long before my whole body is energized by a heady need to go out.

I dress quickly, in jeans and a tee, and pull on a pair of brightly colored Docs.

Yet another act of rebellion. Christopher would have never let me wear them out of the house.

He hated it when I wore anything other than designer heels, at least an inch high, preferably teamed with a short skirt.

I drag my hair into a low, loose bun and make for the French doors that lead to my courtyard.

I’ve subconsciously registered, at some point, that they’re a great way to get out of the house without having to talk to anyone.

Obviously, developing escape plans is a part and parcel of who I’ve become. So too, avoiding chit chat.

Escaping wasn’t possible, in my old life.

Christopher made sure of it. While he worked long days, he locked the apartment from the outside.

I couldn’t escape, not even if there was a fire.

I think he liked holding that power over me, knowing the fear it put in my gut.

And for good measure, the entrance foyer had three cameras, catching every angle.

I was trapped in my luxurious penthouse, able to leave only if he knew of the plans, and his driver took me.

That probably explains why a jubilant laugh bubbles out of me as I push the doors open and step into the early morning light, lifting my arms over my head as if I can run my fingertips across the sun’s rays. Warmth envelops me and my smile stretches.

It is quiet, except for the faraway songs of morning birds.

The light breeze carries their voices to me, and I step further out, across the pavers of the courtyard, toward the ancient tree at first, with its huge trunk.

I’ve been looking at the thing for days; now I run my fingers over the gnarled trunk, feeling the bark and wishing it didn’t remind me, at first, of the rough callouses on Cole Donovan’s hands, that day we met.

I turn my back on the tree, fidgeting with my hand to get rid of the feeling and the memory, and stride out of the courtyard.

It’s open at the back of the ranch house—two wings form an open ‘u’.

Behind it, there’s a graveled area, and then a drop off, down a steep escarpment, toward the creek.

Over the sound of distant birds, I hear burbling, and when I reach the edge of the gravel, I see it.

Water, dark and glistening, flows quickly, over shallow rocks, carving a path through the land that reminds me of a snake’s belly.

The metaphor surprises me. It’s not the kind of thing I’ve had a lot of experience with—snakes—yet I can practically see it in the shape and writhing of the water.

I put my hands on my hips and just stand there, taking it in. There’s just one word that keeps running through my mind, as the water courses over these rocks: rugged.

Rugged like the mesas. Rugged like the fields and plains, the undulations, the trees. Rugged like the men out here. Rugged like Cole Donovan.

My heart beats a little too hard so I shift one hand from my hip to my chest, pressing it between my breasts as if I can forcibly still the frantic tattoo. It doesn’t work, but I ignore it. Or rather, I decide to make it beat for another reason.

I’m wearing jeans, hardly your usual running gear, but I start to move my feet anyway, back over the gravel at first, and skirting round the edge of the house, until I reach the front where my rental car’s neatly parked.

I give it a passing glance but keep on running, down the long drive that brought me up here, taking note of things I was too anxious to properly appreciate first time around.

The thick ancient forest to my left, the wildflowers that cover the ground in spots of pink, purple, yellow, red, some spiky, some soft, some round.

There’s a soft humming too, and it takes me a moment to realize it’s a whole swarm of bees, feasting on the flowers and collecting their pollen, in the same way I was eating them up with my eyes.

“Morning, ladies,” I grin, remembering learning, somewhere along the way, that all worker bees are female.

They don’t reply, but it’s far too glorious a morning to be offended.

I crest over the ridge of the drive and my body starts to realize I haven’t gone running in a really long time—Christopher had our treadmill removed about eighteen months ago, just because he knew how much I loved it.

Running is something I always did. As a kid, for fun.

In high school, I was on the track team. He loved taking that away from me.

Now, I’m running just because I can, because I’m free, but every step hurts. I’m wearing the wrong clothes, the wrong shoes, and I feel it, but I don’t stop, because it’s a luxury. A privilege and delight I’ve been denied, and I’m intent on making the most of being able to do this again.

I run all the way to the wide, white gates of the ranch, with the metal sign hanging overhead that proudly proclaims the name of the property: The Donovan’s Coyote Creek Ranch.

I touch one of the fence posts then turn around, breath bursting from my lungs, so I start to walk, hands on hips, back toward the house.

It's further than I realized when I was driving, and when I was running with my back to it. The sun’s crept a little higher in the sky now, grown a little brighter, so I squint as I make my way up the gentle slope of the drive.

I hear him before I see him. The steady clip clopping of hooves—though I don’t immediately recognize the sound—and then the swoosh swoosh of a tail.

I glance around to see Cole Donovan astride a huge black beast of a horse.

He’s wearing those same faded jeans, cowboy boots, a button down shirt with a bandana around his throat, and a wide brimmed hat.

At his hip, he’s got a knife, buried in a leather scabbard.

The sight of it makes my throat thicken with something like fear, but I quash it.

Cole isn’t Christopher. I’m safe here. I’m safe.

“Mornin’,” he greets, tipping his hat. I realize we haven’t seen each other since the night I made mac and cheese. By design, on my part.

I half expect him to keep riding, but he swings one powerful leg over the horse and hops down with an easy athleticism that takes my breath away, grabbing the horse by the reins and walking the rest of the distance toward me.

His eyes roam my face with the same interest I’d been showing the flower covered fields a little while earlier.

“How you doing, Beth?”

Damn it. I really, really wish I didn’t like the way he says my name so much. It’s just a name. My name, that I must have heard said a million times in my twenty-five years, but from Cole, there’s like a deep swoop on the vowel, so it seems full of something…Promise. Concern. Interest.

“Fine,” I say, my own tone clipped. We begin to walk toward the house, him leading the horse, whose tail continues to swish.

“You getting on okay with the accounts?”

“So far, so good,” I say. “It’s all pretty straight forward.”

He nods, but a sixth sense (which I’ve had to hone to needle fine over the last few years) tells me he’s about to say something important. Or he’s holding it back. I wait, curious.

“You don’t have any questions for me?”

Is that all?

I shake my head. “I’ll let you know if I do.”

“Sure.”

My eyes move from his profile to the horse, studying the short hair on the animal’s nose to the deep, dark eyes and long lashes.

“He reminds me of this George Stubbs painting I’ve always loved,” I say. I reach out before I realize what I’m doing, then quickly withdraw my hand.

Not quickly enough, though.

Cole stops walking, pulls the reins in tighter. “You want to pet him?”

I glance at Cole, apprehensive suddenly. “Can I?”

A corner of his lip shifts in a half-smile. “Sure you can.” I lift my hand tentatively toward the horse, but he backs away from me, and I jump too, my heart racing.

“Don’t be scared,” Cole says, voice low, like he’s talking to both the horse and to me. “This here’s Rowdy.”

“Rowdy?” I glance at Cole, wondering if the name is any indication of the horse’s personality.

“He was my dad’s,” Cole says, his voice deepening, raw. Like the loss of his father still cuts. “Rowdy misses him.” I don’t expect the admission, or the hint of vulnerability Cole shows.

I glance up at Cole. “When did he die?” It’s hard for me to ask that. Hard for me to ask anything about death and loss because it reminds me of what I’ve run away from. What I’ll probably always be running from.