Heartbreak Ranch (6 page)

Colt kneeled down carefully in the stable. He checked the foal’s dressing, unwrapped its leg carefully, and wrapped the wound in some clean bandages all with Graysen on his mind. He was trying to be patient and bide his time, but he knew with her family only staying for two weeks at the most, he needed to make things happen and make his move now. He left the stable and found himself wandering back to her cabin instead of on the way to his own. He could see one light on in the guest cabin and knew she was still awake.

***

“Graysen? Graysen, are you alright sweetie? You look like you are still half asleep,” her mom asked, observing her disengagement.

Under the pretense of gathering up the last bit of maple syrup from her plate, Graysen pushed the last bit of pancake around and stared out the lodge window in the direction of the barn. “Sorry, Mom, I guess I’m just not fully awake yet,” she said, yawning through her response.

The truth was she was distracted. She kept focusing on the note that sat snugly in the front right pocket of her denim shorts. She’d woken up late that morning. She pulled the curtain back on the window near her bed to see if she could spot Colt. Instead she had found a note scrawled on yellow paper taped to her bedroom window. She was trying to make out what it said when Harper came back from her shower. Graysen pulled the curtain shut and pretended to be calm.

When Harper finally left, Graysen pulled back the curtain to read the note’s contents.
“Iowa – Be at the barn by 3.”
It wasn’t signed, but she knew who it was from. Colt was the only one who called her that. What was he thinking? What if her sister had opened the window? And how did he know which room was hers?

Graysen bolted out of bed and threw on her robe. She made some excuse to her family about wanting to enjoy the crisp morning air and walked outside to free the note from the window. Checking to make sure no one was around, she slipped the small piece of paper into her robe’s pocket before going back inside to get ready for breakfast. Back in her room, she gently unfolded the note as though it were a priceless treasure, to scan it again, making sure the message hadn’t changed in the last two minutes. The note sent an involuntary shiver shimmying up her spine as warmth filled her cheeks.

“Graysen, wake up and finish your pancakes already,” Carson commanded in his usual domineering manner. “We’re all going on the group mountain hike in a while. All of the ranch guests make the trek. It should be fun.”

Her heart sank into her stomach. She knew she was becoming the killjoy of this family vacation, she had to be quick on her feet and invent some reason she could give her family about why she wouldn’t be joining them on their adventure today. “A hike up the mountain?” she asked, her face turning pale with fear that her story wouldn’t be believable. Her entire family was staring at her, as though daring her to wriggle her way out of the family activity.

“We need to meet up at the trail head this afternoon,” her father chimed in after polishing off his bacon.

“I didn’t sleep a wink last night. My head has been killing me for a couple of days. I think it’s the pillows on my bed. I knew I should have packed my own. I don’t think I am going to go on the hike today.” Graysen thought her excuse sounded believable. After all, it was exactly how she behaved, like a spoiled brat, and more importantly, it was how her family expected her to behave.

“Okay, pillow snob. You’re always complaining. It seems like you aren’t ever in the mood to spend time with us. Mom wanted this trip so we could all spend time together, as a family. Where have you been the last couple of nights? You never seem to be at the lodge with everyone else.” Carson’s tone was biting as he interrogated her.

Graysen was growing annoyed with Carson’s overprotective routine. He seemed to forget that she wasn’t ten anymore. “I went back to the cabin early last night. I had a splitting headache, and I didn’t really feel like being around a bunch of people. Besides that fiddle music grates on my nerves. I have half a mind to write a letter to Tim McGraw and tell him to shove his fiddle music where the green grass grows. Oh and his buddy, Kenny Chesney, too. I might find his tractor sexy but not with that God-awful fiddle music playing in the background.” Graysen hoped her little tirade would throw Carson off the scent of her whereabouts for the past few nights.

No such luck. Carson looked at her for a moment before he focused on a second helping of pancakes and nonchalantly added, “I saw you talking to that Marlboro Man, the ranch hand ... what’s his ...?”

“Colt.” She regretted responding so quickly, knowing she was probably giving herself away. Carson glared at her.

“Yeah ... that guy ...” he said slowly after pausing a moment.

Harper decided to join in on the conversation and made matters worse. “Is he that hot cowboy we saw on the trail yesterday?” She snickered.

Graysen tried to kick her beneath the table. She missed. “Yes, he is,” Graysen grudgingly admitted.

“So you think he’s hot?” Carson asked accusingly.

“No!” Graysen raised her voice defensively. She grimaced because she’d let Carson bait her. “Harper obviously thinks he’s hot.” She tried to shift the focus of the conversation back to her younger sister.

“Is he the one we met our first night? The one Mrs. Edmiston introduced to us?” her mom asked. “Well he seemed like a nice enough young man ...”

Harper giggled and poked her sister in the side teasingly. “Sis, do you have a thing with him?”

“A thing? As in a boyfriend/girlfriend sort of thing? Is this something I should know about?” her father interrupted.

Graysen peeked at her father and almost groaned. He didn’t sound one bit happy with the direction the conversation was taking.

She snapped, “I don’t have a thing with him!” She stormed out of the lodge and walked back to the cabin. “I think she definitely has a thing,” she heard Harper whisper before she was out of earshot.

A few hours after their tense breakfast thanks to Detective Carson Beaufort, Graysen’s mom came into the bedroom to check on her before they left for the hike. Graysen convinced her mother that she felt a migraine coming on and wanted to nap in a dark bedroom that afternoon.

Graysen questioned herself for backing out of spending time with her family for a man she hardly knew. She felt a twinge of guilt for making a story up so she could meet up with the handsome ranch hand, but she dismissed the idea almost as quickly as it entered her mind. Graysen was inexplicably drawn to Colt and she didn’t want to fight her feelings any longer.

Glancing at the clock, she darted from the bed to get ready. She took a quick shower, washed her hair and quickly dried it with a blow dryer, and ran the straightening iron over it a few times. Unsure of what to wear to learn how to ride, she decided on a pair of cutoff white denim shorts and a bright red shirt. She tied the shirt a bit above the jeans’ waist so it showed off a sliver of skin. She slid her feet into her lipstick-red boots to complete the outfit. She secured her hair in a loose ponytail and stared at her reflection in the mirror.

As she walked across the ranch, she noticed it was almost deserted. It seemed as though every guest must have gone on the hiking trip today. She wondered why Colt had asked to meet her at that time. The barn doors were open and she peeked inside. Colt was in the same place he’d been last night, kneeling in the foal’s stall. When Graysen saw what Colt was doing, a tiny gasp, a mixture of shock and horror, escaped her lips. He was changing the bandages on the horse’s leg, and for a moment, she saw the extent of the gruesome injury.

“Please don’t look,” he said softly, acknowledging her obvious distress. She turned her back to the sight, trying to regain her composure.

“It’s horrible,” she whispered, choking back tears.

“It is. But she is a strong girl. She still has a chance.”

Graysen listened to the soft voice behind her. “What’s her name?” she asked curiously.

“I haven’t given her one yet.”

Graysen grew more curious. “Is she yours?”

“Yes. Most of these horses are mine. Heck and June manage the business side of things at the ranch and leave the fun stuff like raising the horses to me.”

“Raising horses seems second nature to you,” Graysen commented.

“Been around them for as long as I can remember. Before I became part of the Edmiston family, I was living on a small spread in Texas with my parents. I was a bit of a wildcat. Mamma used to say I could have torn up an army tank with a chicken feather. Riding horses was a great way for me to burn up all that energy ...”

“Miss June told us about your parents the other night. I’m sorry.” She didn’t know what had prompted her to say it. Her heart went out to him.

“Don’t be, Iowa,” he said softly. “It was a long time ago. The Edmistons had been like family for a long time, it was just natural that I came to live with them. They love me like a son, raised me as their own, and gave me a great home. I couldn’t think of a better blessing.”

Graysen heard Colt begin to stand and presumed it was safe to turn around. As she slowly spun around, she crashed into Colt’s broad chest. He quickly moved and stood close behind her. Her face grew hot as her pulse leapt at her throat. She hoped he didn’t notice. She knew that moment of impact when their bodies collided would keep her up tonight, fueling her fantasy of him.

Stunned, she took a couple steps back and craned her neck to look up at him. He looked down at her with an amused, devilish smile across his face. His full lips had to be his most compelling feature, apart from his eyes. And his firm chin. And his magnificent body. She had trouble keeping her eyes from travelling up and down the length of him over and over. He was that sexy. Colt was standing so close she could smell his aftershave lotion. It was starting to affect her ability to think coherently. She doubted her synapses would be able to fire on all cylinders when he smelled that good.

Before Graysen knew what was happening, he grabbed her hand and started leading her toward the other barn doors. “Come with me.”

Do I have a choice?
she thought as he firmly dragged her along.

“You’re gonna learn to ride today, Iowa.”

Great, just what I wanted to do
. Proving further to Colt how inept she was at riding a horse was not on her bucket list, that’s for sure.

They walked past stall after stall. They were almost at the back door of the barn when Graysen stopped. The last stall in the barn held the black mustang that Colt rode a couple of nights ago. Now that she had a closer view, the stallion seemed enormous. He wasn’t as restless as he had been the last time she had seen him. He certainly looked wild and untamed as he flared his nostrils and seemed to almost glare at them.

Colt smiled when he saw what she was looking at. “That’s Pumpkin,” he said with a smirk.

“Pumpkin?” she choked out, trying to stifle her laughter. He was majestic and downright terrifying. Graysen thought it was the behemoth of all horses and Colt had christened it with such a ridiculous name.

“He’s a wild one. I’ve been training him for a couple of weeks now. He’s still out of control, but I’m starting to make progress. I wanted a challenge and I certainly found it with him.”

“But Pumpkin? Seriously? Don’t you think he’s more of a ‘Panther’ or something that describes him better?”

Colt laughed. “The first night I saddled him, he gave me hell. I had to hold on for dear life. I told him he better behave or I was going to give him some God-awful name just to spite him. He didn’t, so I named him Pumpkin. The name grew on me, but I think he is still taking it out on me.”

The horse was staring at Colt, and Graysen swore it almost looked as if it could understand him, as if it knew Colt was teasing it. “Must be a lot of hard work.”

“Nope.” He shook his head. “Taming wild horses is what I live for.” He paused and turned to look at Graysen. His eyes blazed. “Training you, on the other hand, might be difficult to take. You seem pretty hard to handle. I’ll bet my last dollar though that I will enjoy it much more than what I do with the wild horses.”

Graysen knew Colt wasn’t talking about teaching her how to ride a horse. Her face felt hot and she blushed, which seemed to only make him smile even more. He towered over her as his fingers entwined with hers, and his thumb stroked the back of her hand. She wondered if he even realized he was doing it. The combination of his voice and the feel of his warm, strong hand in hers worried her. She thought she might combust on the spot and end up a heap of ash. Embarrassed, she looked down and withdrew her hand from his.

He chuckled softly. “C’mon, Iowa.” Colt placed a cowboy hat on his head and went outside into the corral. In the corral there was a saddled golden buckskin mare with a dark brown tail. The horse nickered, her expression alert and her ears pricked in Colt’s direction. The horse started moving slowly toward them. It studied Graysen intently.

Graysen grew nervous about the impending ride. She knew she would be safe because Colt would be there with her, but the idea of putting her lack of riding inability on display a second time made her uncomfortable. Colt already had a pretty good idea of how inept she was at staying on a horse.

“Hi, Clementine,” Colt spoke gently as he walked closer to the horse. Clementine answered with a happy, excited nicker. She nudged the brim of Colt’s Stetson with her nose, almost knocking it off. Chuckling, Colt rescued his hat and then patted the horse on the neck. The horse snorted, tipping its head as he scratched behind her ear. The mare snuffled around Colt’s shirt pocket until she lifted the flap and slurped out a sugar cube.

Colt’s interaction with the beautiful mare set Graysen at ease. Colt took the reins and led Clementine out of the corral. “Iowa, stand here next to me,” he instructed. Graysen walked over to the left side of the saddle next to Colt. “Always take the reins when you mount. Don’t grab the saddle, it will slide.” He handed the reins to her and placed her hand on the place where Clementine’s shoulders came together. Graysen lifted her foot into the stirrup. It took her a couple tries to swing her leg around to the other side, but Colt watched her patiently, amused at her inexperience.