I am Not Your Melody: (steamy cowboy romance) (3 page)

“I know what you’re thinking,” she said, her throat scratchy from when she’d screamed. “But it’s still me. You…know me.”

“I suppose the contract’s already signed,” he grumbled, “and I have to trust you with my uncle’s bar. You better be as good as you say you are.”

“I am.” Allie lifted her chin, trying to look like she meant it.

It was hard to feel confident balancing so precariously on the saddle, with this man — this man she’d stupidly thought was her
friend
— who acted like he hated her at the same time as he held her tightly against him, whether she wanted him to, or not.

And she better be as good as she said she was…or what?

This was a mistake
.

Bill jumped off the horse; his long, thick leg, clad in denim, swung around with surprising agility for a man his size. Without waiting for Allie to climb down, he reached up to take her around the waist and pulled her off the horse. She slid against his body for one terrifying second before her feet hit the ground.

“What the hell day is it, anyway?” he growled.

“I know I’m early,” she said. “But that’s how it is. I need to stay in the apartment above the bar.”

“No.”

“It’s mine,” she said. “That’s part of the
already-signed
contract.”

The contract was exactly what she’d needed, broke as she was. She’d bought fifty percent ownership of the bar, and full ownership of the apartment above it, with the understanding that she would renovate, open and run the bar on her own, while Bill would put in one hundred percent of the money to get it open again. Then they would split the profits fifty-fifty on an ongoing basis.

Seeing as how she’d drained her savings to buy half of the bar, she had nothing left to do any fixes or even to buy liquor. The situation was really the only one she could’ve done. It was the only way to run her own bar, to have her own stake in it.

And now she’d just made her life-time, ongoing business partner hate her.

“Don’t just stand there,” he said roughly. “Let’s go.”

***

Allie closed the door of his farmhouse office behind her, and stood, waiting for an invitation to seat herself. It never came.

Bill leaned against the edge of his desk and looked down at her from his considerable height. His cool gray eyes studied her. Allie held her breath and stared back.

Damn, he’s good-looking
. And intimidating.

“You’re really Allie, huh?” Bill said. “Thought you’d be…older.”

“I thought the same of you,” she said, and shrugged.

“How do ya like the middle of nowhere?”

It didn’t matter whether she liked the location or not. It was the only bar she could afford — the only one with the unusual deal terms Bill offered — and the perfect excuse to get the heck out of Miami, but she wasn’t going to say that.

Allie put on a big smile. “Your uncle’s bar is in one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever visited,” she said. It was true, even if it wasn’t her main reason for wanting the bar. “I’m very excited, and based on the pictures you sent —”

“— Zach Walker took those pictures,” he interrupted. “Back when my uncle was still running the bar.”

Allie nodded. So the pictures were old. She kind of already knew that, or did she? Had she looked past that little tidbit when they were exchanging info online?

“Your assistant took great photos,” she offered.

“Zach ain’t my assistant,” he said. “Those ranchhands pretty much run the place now.”

“I’m sorry,” she said.
Stop apologizing
. A man wouldn’t apologize.

“It’s better for me that way,” he replied, mistaking her apology for calling Zach an ‘assistant’ as sympathy. “I don’t have any time to do what I used to do ‘round here on the ranch. May as well get this straight right now — all that emailin’, I don’t have time for that much involvement in real life. Runnin’ that bar is all on you. “

If he didn’t run the ranch, and he couldn’t run the bar, what exactly did he do all day?

“Of course,” she said, and smoothed her slacks, which had taken a beating from the stallion incident. “I understand completely. You don’t want to be…involved.”

Bill looked at her, concern showing in his eyes that hadn’t been there before. “Did you hurt yourself when you fell?”

“I only hurt my pride,” she admitted, “and my one chance at meeting you on a good note.”

He shook his head. “You talk jus’ like you write. It’s strange hearin’ the words come outta your mouth.”

“Right?” Allie laughed. “Maybe it would be easier for us both if we just pulled out our phones and started emailing each other instead. Just pretend we never met and immediately started screaming at each other.”

Bill smiled, finally, his first smile at her since she’d finally laid eyes on him. His whole face brightened, his straight white teeth contrasting handsomely with the dark scruff on his jaw.

Well, her phone was missing, but it was a good a plan.

“I’d like to get started fixing up the bar right away,” she added. “You don’t have to do anything.”

“Have at it,” he said, and tossed a set of keys to her.

They dropped to the floor by her feet, since she wasn’t expecting the cowboy to just randomly throw things at her.

“Oops…thank you,” she muttered, and picked them up. “Do you have a checkbook you can throw at me too?” Allie jingled the keys to the bar as if it would distract him from the uncomfortable discussion of money. “Seriously though.”

“You just got here,” Bill said, “and you already want access to my checking account?” He glared at the keys as if he might rip them away from her, right out of her hand.

She gripped the keys in her sweaty palm, silencing them. The man crossed his arms in front of his muscular chest and raised an eyebrow.

“As per our arrangement,” she reminded him through gritted teeth. “I need a checkbook or a debit card to an account that exists solely for business expenses, or whatever you think is best so I can get out of your hair. Either way, the sooner this bar opens, the sooner we can start sharing the profits, right?”

Fifty percent profits on his family bar was a lot more than zero, which he was currently earning from the property.

Bill grunted. “Fine.” He paused, staring out the big window to the hay field. “Suppose it’s ‘bout time my uncle’s bar was opened back up,” he said. “Been meanin’ to do it for a while now, but…” His voice dropped off.

“I understand,” Allie said. “It must’ve been hard to think about taking on such a huge project while you were still mourning your uncle… and… your wife.”

Bill’s eyes flashed as he swiveled his head to face her, his jaw hardening. “Whatever you think you know about Melody,” he said. “You don’t know. Don’t talk about her.”

Allie’s cheeks burned. She’d screwed up royally for the second time in…oh, twenty minutes? They’d just met — had she thought they were going to become best friends in only a few moments, especially after he’d thrown her over his horse with every intention of kicking her off his ranch?

Yeah, she’d thought exactly that.

“I didn’t mean to offend you,” she whispered. “Sometimes I talk too much and say the wrong thing. I apologize.”

Bill didn’t respond.

She pulled her shoulders back and shook her head to clear the tension inside her. If only she could clear the tension in the room.

“Do you have time now to take me to see the bar?” she asked. It would probably be best to get back to talking business before she stuck her foot in her mouth again. “I’d love to see it in real life. The photographs were wonderful, by the way,” she added.

Bill nodded mutely, his jaw clenching. He grabbed his black cowboy hat off the hook by the door, and set it on his head. He grabbed the keys to his truck.

“Let’s go,” he said. “I don’t have all day.”

Allie groaned inwardly and followed him.

“I have to grab my phone,” she said.

He glared at her and she just shook her head. What else could she do?

This was not how she’d imagined her first meeting with Bill Edwards. She’d wanted to impress him, to show him that she was worthy of his investment in her, and worth his faith in her.

He had to have faith in her if he intended to pay for her to renovate and open the bar, right? After all, if he felt it needed to stay in the family, that had to mean that he considered her worthy of helping him do that. Right?

Meeting Allie today must have been a big disappointment for him.

Well, screw him — she’d prove him wrong, too. Bill Edwards may be an ornery asshole, but she was going to run the most kick-ass, profitable bar in the whole county, whether he thought she could do it or not.

He’d signed a contract with her. So it didn’t matter how much she pissed him off, he’d better stand up to his end of the bargain.

She wanted him to hand her a frickin’ checkbook, and stay the hell out of her way. It would be easy enough to forget she’d ever thought she knew him. That she ever liked him, when he was still only a ping in her inbox. Allie had a bar to open and a new life to begin — and no tall, handsome cowboy with too much money and a bad attitude was going to stop her.

Chapter Three

Allie followed behind Bill as he led the way to the gravel parking area outside the farmhouse office. His long strides were too fast for her to keep up, which meant her current view of him was of only his muscular back, his shoulder muscles flexing through his shirt as his arms swung with determination, the bottom of a well-shaped ass clad in the dark denim just visible beneath his untucked shirt. Her gaze dropped to a pair of scuffed black cowboy boots.

“So,” Allie said, rushing up until she stood by his side. He unlocked his truck with a click of a button on his keychain. “Thank you for taking me to see the bar. I know you’re a very… busy man.”

Bill scowled at her from under his black hat, as if he couldn’t tell if she were being facetious or not. She didn’t know either. Maybe he
was
busy? Or maybe he was just busy being alone.

“But I need to get down to business for a sec,” she continued. “I’ve given you a rather large sum of money, Bill. We signed a contract. I own half of the bar. And since I’m the one that’s meant to get this bar open and running again, I just want to make sure we’re starting on the right foot.”

Bill leaned in toward her, until her back was mere centimeters from the shiny black pickup truck door. He moved slowly, as if — now, unlike moments earlier — he had all the time in the world.

His face was close to hers. Uncomfortably close? Allie opened her mouth to ask him to say something (anything!), but he stopped her by opening the door she was leaning against with his long arm.

“Ridin’ in the truck works better when ya actually get in the vehicle,” Bill said. “Little trick I picked up.”

Allie snorted, unable to suppress her amusement at his dry tone, even if he didn’t deserve a reaction. “I’ll remember that.”

The truck was so tall she had to grab onto the handle in the doorway frame and pull herself up. She looked out to Bill, who was still holding the door open for her, waiting for her to get situated.

“All settled now? All right then.” He slammed the door, with a loud noise that made her jump.

He strode around to the other side of the truck wordlessly and climbed in with much more ease than she had. She couldn’t help but to look over at him, at the hard lines of his face, at the steel in his eyes as the engine revved.

They rode off the property, down the long driveway that connected to a dirt road. When they got out of the ranchland, the connecting road was barely wide enough to let two cars pass. Unlike in busy Miami, no painted lines marked the streets. The mountains rose up around her, covered in evergreen trees, and the fields below teamed with horses, sheep, and cattle. They passed children playing in their yards, riding old bicycles that had probably been hand-me-downs from a few generations past, by the looks of them.

Several properties had trailers on them, tiny mobile homes with cheery awnings outstretched before them, and dogs guarding chicken coops on the lawn. In Miami, it was rare for the people who lived in trailers to own their land, but these people apparently had lots of land. They put more money into the huge shops, barns, and livestock than they did to their own abodes.

“The bar’s out a ways,” Bill said.

“In town, right?”

She should have made the trip out to Idaho to see the property before purchasing it, for sure — but if she’d done that, she would have been several hundred dollars short of the purchase price. Every penny counted.

“You’ve asked about that already,” Bill said. “It’s on one of our busiest corners in town. That’s not saying much,” he admitted, “since our downtown is small even by small town standards. But when Uncle Freddy had the bar open, it was the most well-visited place other than church.”

Allie laughed, then closed her mouth when he didn’t even smile. “Can you tell me what the bar was like, in your Uncle Fred…um, Freddy’s… time?”

Bill shrugged, keeping his eyes on the road ahead.

Maybe she’d asked the wrong question. But she wasn’t just making idle conversation — knowing what the people in town would expect, what they were used to, and what they’d like in the future was important to her. Could be important to the bar’s success… to
her
success.

“He kept it low key,” Bill finally said, his voice quiet. “In the winter, it was warm and dark, and in the summer it was cool and dark. You could come in, sit down, order yourself a drink, an’ no one would bother you.”

“That sounds…”
Dull
. But she couldn’t say that. She tried again. “That sounds quiet.”

He turned his head to look at her. “Some of us like quiet.”

“Not me.”

“I noticed,” he grumbled.

They pulled up to a stoplight at the intersection of Main Street and Huckleberry Road, the so-called busiest intersection in “downtown” Bear Creek Saddle. There were about six cars that she could see, parked in front of places of business. They were the only vehicle actually driving on the road.