Last Chance Llama Ranch (19 page)

Sam sat back in the chair. His fingertips drummed against the axe haft. “You thought I was looking at your pants because I'm some sort of Tim Gunn fashion police?”

Merry's eyebrow rose.
He knows who Tim Gunn is?
“Weren't you?”

“Merry,” Sam said slowly, like a teacher explaining basic arithmetic to a particularly dense student, “I was looking at you because you were a six-foot Amazon in painted-on jeans. What man wouldn't look?”

“Six three,” Merry mumbled, her cheeks going scarlet. Well, that put this afternoon in a different light, didn't it? “And I'm well aware I was a freak of nature even
before
I got run through a wood chipper, so you don't have to feed me a bunch of crap just to make me feel better. I know guys get all wiggy when a woman's taller than them. Believe me, I've been dealing with that shit since I was seven years old.”

“I don't care if you're seven feet tall. That doesn't make you a freak.”

“Says the guy who calls me Wookiee!”

Sam looked abashed. “I didn't realize you'd be so sensitive about it. I was actually referring to your hair—which at the time was doing a fair Chewbacca impression.”

“Says the guy who ran headfirst into a haystack!”

Sam's shook his head, letting his rough-and-tumble mane fly where it would. “It's true, I haven't been down to the mayor's office for a haircut in a while,” he acknowledged, baffling Merry. “Anyhow, my point is, any man worth his salt isn't going to be put off by a woman just because she's taller than he is. If he is, he's not worth your time anyway. He's probably an asshole with a tiny schlong.”

Merry's blush went nuclear.
Well
, she thought,
Sam has the asshole part down pat
…Still, from what she'd seen at the spring this evening, his schlong was something to schling home about. She looked away. “Whatever, Llama Boy. I'd really prefer not to get in a measuring contest with a dude in footie pajamas.”

“I take offense at that categorization,” he said, crossing his legs at the ankle and gazing fondly at his broad, callused—and very bare—feet. “I'm a big believer in letting the tootsies breathe. And while we're on the subject of gnarly things, why are you so hung up about a couple of scars anyway? A scar is just a record of where you've been in this life, not a source of shame.”

Shows how much he knows
, thought Merry. Her career-ending injury had been the ultimate humiliation. Winning had been Merry's whole reason—and frankly, her whole
justification
—for being.

Suddenly, Sam looked stricken. His eyes widened and he sucked in a breath. “Wait…is
that
why you've been such a klutz? Why you had so much trouble keeping up on the llama trek? Your injury?”

Merry looked away and didn't answer.

“Well, hell.”

He stood up abruptly, strode over to the cot, and helped himself to a seat on it. The bed dipped under his solid bulk, and Merry's body lurched close to his. Suddenly her senses were swamped with that warm, slightly musky Sam scent, and she scrambled to the other end of the cot to get some distance. She pressed her back to the wall and gazed at him with something close to alarm.

“I really am an ass, aren't I?” he said, seeing her reaction. “But Jesus, Merry, why didn't you tell me you were hurt?”

“I'm not hurt. I'm
crippled
,” she snapped, then clamped her mouth shut, embarrassed by the admission. Her eyes were suddenly blurry, but that only made her madder at Sam.
Damn it, I. Will. Not. Cry!

“What are you talking about?” he asked, genuine puzzlement in his voice. “You shoveled shit, you baled hay, and you helped get the Muellers all the way to the top of Wheeler Peak and back. You were slow, sure, and you stumbled a bit, but you made it. Nobody could ask more from you.”

My mother could ask more
, Merry thought.

“Merry, I'm sorry I've given you such a hard time. I guess since you got here, I've just been afraid you were trying to take advantage of my aunt. But you aren't, are you?”

With so little space between them, Merry could see the gold flecks in his blue irises.
Pretty
, she thought, before his words sunk in. “Of course I'm not! I'm trying to help! I've been doing everything I can to portray the ranch in the best light possible—and honestly, aside from
you
, I haven't had to fudge a whole lot to make it look good. The Last Chance really is a pretty magical place. And so is what I've seen of the rest of Aguas Milagros. I want to do the place justice for my readers—and I was hoping maybe that might do you guys some good, tourism-wise. I don't know if I'm physically capable of doing all the heavy lifting I signed on to do, but I'd like to be of use while I'm here, if you'd only stop trying to run me off at every turn.”

Sam sucked thoughtfully on his teeth, giving her a sideways assessing glance. “I guess I can see that now. I just thought…hell, I dunno. I thought all that over-the-top ‘Cowboy Sam' crap was you making fun of us country bumpkins—that, or you were wearing some serious rose-colored beer goggles.” His lips twisted ruefully.

“No beer goggles,” Merry said. “But maybe I have a career as a romance novelist in my future if I've managed to sell
you
as a leading man.” Relenting a bit, she allowed a small smile to cross her lips.

Sam matched it with his own, then allowed the smile to grow into a full-fledged grin. It transformed his homely features into something that made Merry's heart grow warm.

At least she told herself it was her heart.

“You're gonna tone that down now though, right?”

“Am I?” Merry arched her brow. “No, I don't think I am. I could stand to stretch my fiction-writing wings.”

“I'm not going to start having groupies, am I?” He sounded alarmed.

“You might, if the comments on my columns so far are any indication.”

“Oh, sweet Jesus,” he muttered. A look of consternation crossed his face. “Maybe
that's
why…”

“Why what?”

“Well, Aunt Dolly told me she's started getting a surprising number of bookings for the tours the last couple days. All of them from women.”

Merry had to laugh at the chagrin on Sam's face. “Maybe you'll get to play swashbuckling hero after all, Mr. Dundee.”

Sam changed the subject, clearly uncomfortable. “If you don't mind me asking, how did that happen?” He waved at her leg.

Merry hesitated. It would be so easy to let her guard down, but she wasn't actually sure she
liked
this new Sam. Or more precisely, she wasn't sure she liked how easily he might get under her skin. Bantering about his fictitious sex appeal was one thing—it was awesome to watch him squirm—but she wasn't about to swap confidences with a guy who got his jollies calling her “Wookiee.” His sudden about-face was just that—a little
too
sudden. She wasn't sure how he'd react once he learned who she had once been.

“I
do
mind,” she said shortly. “It's not something I care to discuss with ogres who come galumphing into my bedroom in the middle of the night, brandishing battle-axes.”

Sam snorted. “I don't ‘galumph,'” he informed her, letting the issue of her injury drop. “And it was a wood axe.”

“Whatever. We're not getting all buddy-buddy,
buddy
, so if you don't mind, it's time for you and your pilgrim pj's to shove off.” Suiting actions to words, Merry gave Sam a shove on his thigh with her foot.

It was like trying to dislodge a boulder from a riverbed with a spork.

A hot, muscular boulder. “Move it, Llama Boy. This Wookiee needs her shut-eye.”

“You're not worried about the so-called monster you think you saw anymore?”

“I didn't
think
I saw it, it landed splat on my face! And believe me, Mick Dundee wrestled
crocs
that were smaller than this beast.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I'm serious!”

“I'm sure you are, Wookiee,” said Sam, getting to his feet and dusting off his faded red flannels. “I'm sure wherever you're from, mosquitoes seem like ferocious wildlife to you too.”

Merry started to sputter a tart rejoinder at the unfairness of this, coming from a Garden State native, but a movement in her peripheral vision had her catching her breath. “Oh my God, there it is!” she hissed, pointing to the pile of firewood beside the woodstove. “I think I just saw it disappear between the logs!”

“Just a centipede, probably,” Sam said, not bothering to investigate.

Just
a centipede? The thing was enormous! “Aren't you going to slay it?”

“I doubt it'll bother you again,” he said. He shouldered the axe and turned, giving Merry a gander at the fireman's flap of the buttoned-up union suit. “If we're all done with the girl talk, Wookiee, I'm gonna head back to my bed. I gotta be sure I'm properly studly in the morning for your readers.”

Merry ignored the snark. “But…you can't just leave me here with that thing. It's horrible!”

Sam shrugged, heading for the door. “Lots of things are ugly at first glance. Doesn't mean they don't have a place in nature. And I certainly don't want to be the one to kill the poor bugger just because it had the poor judgment to dive into your skivvies. I didn't try to murder
you
when you tried to dive into mine, after all.”

Merry was too terrified to get huffy. “At least leave me the axe,” she pleaded.

“I don't think so, Wookiee. You're accident-prone enough as it is.”

“Some hero,” she groused, squinching herself into a tight ball at the head of her bed. “Won't even leave the distressed damsel the means to defend herself. Be careful, or I might have to tell my readers the truth about Studly Sam.”

Sam shrugged, as if unconcerned with such trivialities as public opinion. “In your case, fiction is stranger than truth.
Hasta mañana
, Merry Manning.” Then he paused at the door, looking thoughtful.

“Tell you what. We've got some very special guests coming in for an overnight experience in a couple days, and if you're serious about sticking this out, I'll want your help with them. I think you might learn a few things about perseverance. And who knows: Maybe you'll have something to teach them too. Unless…” A look of challenge lit his blue eyes. “Unless you're giving up on the Last Chance?”

“I'll be there,” Merry said tightly.
If I'm not in the gullet of a monstrous insect by then
, she thought.

“Alright then,” he said. “Sweet dreams.” And he sauntered out, swinging the door shut behind him and leaving Merry to wish it had hit him on the ass. She settled back in the cot, cranky and out of sorts. Had they just formed some sort of truce? Or was this only the beginning of a whole new phase of weirdness, Sam Cassidy–style?

And he didn't even save the day
, she thought grumpily.
Some Marlboro Man.
Her eyelids grew heavy at last—it had been one of the longest days in recent memory—and Merry started to doze off.

Crunch!

A loud, carapace-munching sound came from across the room. Merry looked up just in time to see her very pleased-looking box turtle snarf the tail end of an enormous centipede, then drop back into his terrarium to savor his victory. If she didn't know better, she'd
swear
she heard a tiny belch.

“My hero,” she said, drawing her covers up with a smile. At least
someone
on the ranch understood chivalry.

I
started to feel like Ebenezer Scrooge, for I had another spectral visitation the next night. Round about three, perhaps four, or whenever the witching hour is witchiest, I heard a creak, and a draft of air cold as the crypt washed over me. On this moonless night, there was not a speck of light, and the ranch might as well have been resting on the bottom of the ocean.

There came a noise:
Clatter-clop, clickety-tromp.

Jacob Marley's chains dragging against the floorboards? The centipede's kin seeking revenge? No, too loud for the latter. I held my breath, burrowing beneath the coverlet, and stayed as still as a quivering wreck of a woman could manage. I was too terrified to reach for my phone's flashlight app, lest it pinpoint for the phantom exactly where I lay. Yet despite my precautions, the sound came closer—and with it came an infernal reek. A reek mixed with…lavender?

I heard the sound of snorting, as if Beelzebub himself had popped in for a bedtime story, and I tried to breathe as shallowly as I could. But just as I thought I would perish from sheer fear, I heard the thing move off again, into the night. Another creak, and the draft stopped. I lay there, panting with horror, until at last my tired body gave up the ghost (or more precisely, gave up on the ghost) and I fell back into an uneasy doze.

This morning when I set feet to floorboards, I found a bouquet of fragrant wildflowers at the foot of my bed.

Apparently, this ghost wants to be friends.