Hard Ride: A Cowboy Romance Read online

  “Glamorous.”

  “Yes, and I’ve left it all behind to help you. Even though you don’t seem to want my help.”

  I want to slap a hand to my forehead, but I’m too busy holding the pillow in place. “Isabel, this wasn’t my idea.”

  “Clearly. If you knew what was good for you, you’d have called me a long time ago.”

  Who is this woman? She’s not the shy little girl I used to see at Cy’s house years ago when our only worries were the dates we’d make for Friday night. She’s not even the self-conscious young woman in a holiday dress that gave the most tantalizing glimpse of that line where her ass met her legs I’ve ever seen. She’s all grown up.

  “I know what’s good for me.” Can she tell that my cock is still at full mast behind the damn pillow?

  “Well, I can see that you haven’t neglected your exercise.” She delivers this assessment with a flick of her eyes trailing down to my abs, but then she looks away, as if she can’t quite pull it off. Ah, yes—that’s the Isabel I used to know.

  “Christ almighty, you’ve gotten bold.”

  “You’ve got to be a little bold to survive.”

  “Wise words from my best friend’s kid sister.” I laugh out loud.

  She raises her eyebrows. “Do I look like a kid to you?”

  “No, you look like a full-grown adult woman who’s still standing in the middle of my living room, despite no invitation.”

  “Here, let’s try this.” Isabel takes a deep breath and I hear the hitch in it. “Luke, let me come in and talk to you about the ranch. I have some ideas to save it.”

  She’s caught me naked in every possible way, and shame curdles at the pit of my gut. I can’t ask her for help. I can’t be the pathetic man who couldn’t save Rider Ranch, Texas’s number one riding destination.

  “I’m sorry you came all this way.”

  Her eyes widen and she takes one step closer. “Really, Luke, it’s not a problem. Our families have been friends for years, and—”

  “It’d be best if you go.”

  For multiple reasons. Not least because she’s wearing a little black dress, casual and elegant all at once, something that she’d never have worn before, and the way it falls over her curves is driving me even crazier than the attitude she’s got going on. Plus, she smells like shampoo and sunscreen.

  I’ve been alone in the house too long.

  “Luke—”

  “It’s not—it’s not a good time, Isabel. Head on out.” I nod toward the door.

  She opens her mouth like she’s going to argue one more time, then snaps it shut.

  “All right.”

  Isabel puts her sunglasses on with a flick of her wrist, turns on her heel, and with a look as steely as I’ve ever seen, heads out the front door.

  I can’t help it.

  I love watching her go.

  4

  Isabel

  “—and then he told me to head on out like I was a stray cat.”

  “Sometimes you act like one.” Cy gives me a meaningful look as I delicately place another bite of my second piece of pie onto my tongue.

  “Oh, fuck off. I spent all day on a plane and then trying to deal with your stubborn friend.” And then after that, I came home to an old-fashioned family dinner sans Mom and Dad and managed not to blurt out that I burst in on Luke Rider naked.

  Never mind the part where I liked what I saw.

  He laughs. “I can’t believe he kicked you out.”

  “He sure as hell did.”

  “And you just went along with it?” Cy clicks his tongue. “I just don’t see it happening, you running away with your tail between your legs.”

  “I didn’t run. I walked. And my tail is in no such place.”

  My brother leans back in his seat, folding his hands behind his head. It’s just the two of us at the kitchen table, and Cy was gracious enough to reheat leftovers from yesterday. I’ve now demolished a quarter of the apple pie my mother made before they left for Montana.

  “When do you fly out, then?”

  My brother can be exceedingly dense. “I’m not leaving. We’ve been over this.”

  “That was before he kicked you to the curb.”

  “He asked me to leave and I left. That doesn’t mean I’m going to stay on the curb.”

  “Some people can’t be helped, you know.”

  “If you think Luke and his ranch are beyond help, why’d you call me and beg me to come home?”

  “Beg is a pretty strong word.”

  “You paid me to be here.”

  “Shh.” Cy holds out a hand to stop me from saying such horrible words aloud. “The walls have ears. They could report back to Mom and Dad.”

  “What do you care? You said it was extra soap money.” Cy makes most of his money by acting as the middleman between the various family businesses and the rest of the world. He makes sure everything gets packaged and shipped, and spends the rest of his time lifting heavy objects on the farm to stay in shape. It suits him.

  “It was extra soap money. Look, Iz, you don’t visit as much as you used to.”

  “Don’t guilt-trip me. I’m too full of pie. I’ll throw up.”

  “I’m not guilt-tripping you. Mom just—you know how she mopes.”

  I imitate Mom’s long face.

  “It’s frightening how accurate that was.” Cy shudders and looks away.

  “She could have called me.”

  “What’s done is done,” he says sagely. “I called you, and now I’ve killed two birds with one stone. She’s happy. Luke’s at least aware of his own failings.”

  “What a kind friend you are.”

  He inclines his head like a king receiving a compliment. “I am. That’s right.” Cy picks up his fork and stabs the last remnant of pie crust on his plate. “What do you think you’ll do, then? Relax?”

  “Fat chance.”

  “What else is there to do? Lush Acres has its business handled.”

  “I’m going to fix Rider Ranch.”

  Cy leans forward and pats my hand. “It’s hard to accept the truth, but Luke fired you. He’s not going to let you help him.”

  I lean in even farther and dart my eyes to either side. “Here’s the thing.” I keep my voice low, confidential. “Luke didn’t hire me. You did. So I’m staying until the ranch is fixed. Or until my flight.”

  Cy roars with laughter. “Can I place a bet on which one of those will come first?”

  “Only if you’re prepared to lose more money.”

  “Challenge accepted.”

  “That…wasn’t a challenge.”

  “Sure it wasn’t.”

  “Get out of here, Cy.”

  “I’m gone.”

  Sleeping in my old bedroom feels like wearing clothes that are two sizes too small. It sort of fits, but only if you’re willing to use your imagination.

  And my imagination can’t help me with anything other than Luke.

  I saw that naked body coming down the stairs—every inch of those harder-than-rock abs. I’m dying to know what he was thinking about before I showed up, because I’ve never seen anyone that hard in my entire life. Never mind the fact that I don’t have much to compare it to. A girl knows a world wonder when she sees one.

  I came up here after Cy left for his house on the far end of the property. I locked the place up tight and read an old romance novel I found stuffed in a drawer of the bedside table.

  I still can’t sleep.

  At two in the morning, I sit up in bed and flick on the lamp. My tablet is on the bedside table, too. I use it when I’m on business trips, so I have a case with a little attached keyboard, and I set myself up with the blanket tucked around my waist, as prim as you can be on the outside. Beneath the blankets, I’m squeezing my thighs together like that’s going to get him off my mind.

  The light is too much. I turn it off and gaze into the glow of my tablet.

  Spreadsheets aren’t going to cut it for Luke Ride
r.

  But spreading the sheets would…

  God.

  I flop back dramatically onto the pillow and throw my hand over my eyes. My tablet clatters to the floor.

  Sex with Luke Rider is not on the table. It’s never been on the table. Only in my wildest dreams has it ever been on the table. And I am being paid to do a legitimate job. Not to indulge a teenage crush that was definitely over by the time I went to college. O-V-E-R.

  Over.

  I bolt up again.

  Sex with Luke won’t ever enter into this, but why not bring a little heat to the marketing strategy for Rider Ranch? The name is perfect for it, and people love that stuff.

  Luke will learn to love it, too, once he sees how successful he’s going to be.

  Better to beg forgiveness than ask permission, as they say.

  Plus, I wouldn’t mind being down on my knees in front of—

  “Stop it,” I tell myself sternly. “Just stop.”

  I flick the light off and nestle back down under the covers.

  I can talk myself out of fantasizing.

  But I can’t control my dreams.

  5

  Luke

  I’m so fucking restless that it takes most of the night for me to fall asleep, and when I do, I find myself in dreamland meetings with loan officers at the bank. Over and over, they shake their heads. “You’re too risky. We can’t give you a loan.”

  “I need a marketing consultant.” I repeat the words as slowly and clearly as I can. “I need someone to advertise my business, otherwise I can’t pull it out of the tailspin.”

  They don’t bother with apologetic smiles. “That’s not our problem.” Door after door slams in my face.

  The asshole sun is what finally shakes me out of the dreams.

  “Shit. Shit.”

  I leap out of bed and rub my hands over my face. I’m late as hell to take care of the horses, and that means I’ll be late for everything else.

  No more sitting in the shelter and waiting for customers to come to me.

  I send a quick text to Dave, a high school kid I pay by the hour when I’m in a pinch, and he writes back saying he can be here in fifteen to take care of the horses and start work in the barn.

  Shower. Shave. Decent pants. Decent shirt. Before Dave even arrives, I’m fastening the last button and heading downstairs. Breakfast will have to wait, but having to admit failure makes my stomach churn.

  Still—better than letting Cy’s little sister take the reins at Rider Ranch.

  No—don’t think of Isabel. Do not think of Isabel.

  “Do not think of Isabel.” I say the words while I stab the key into the front door. If she’s thinking of barging in again, she’ll have a harder time.

  I jog down the front steps and cross the driveway. I keep my car in a little carport off to the side. It was installed in the eighties by my uncle, and the car might as well be from the eighties, too. It’s a piece of junk that stalls as much as it starts, but there’s no way in hell I’m spending money on it now.

  I stop dead at the car, hand on the handle.

  Because I’m not alone out here.

  I squint toward the shelter out by the road. There’s no need to squint—it’s not that far—but my mind can’t process what I’m seeing. What I’m one hundred percent seeing, without a doubt.

  I rub at both my eyes. Maybe I’m hallucinating. Maybe this is all part of a terrible dream. It’s part of that same dream, only I’m dreaming the part where everything goes wrong before I get to the bank.

  What the hell is Isabel thinking?

  She stands in front of the shelter, morning sunlight playing in her hair, which falls in soft curls over her shoulders. I’ve seen her hair like that a million times.

  Only those times, she was fully clothed.

  “What are you doing?” I shout the question across the space between us, but Isabel doesn’t turn around. My God, what is she thinking? This isn’t the reputation we uphold at Rider Ranch. She doesn’t turn around because she’s leaning into the passenger side window of a car, a clipboard in her hands. The angle she’s bent her hips at is killing me slowly.

  So is the pink bikini.

  A pink bikini. That’s all she’s wearing, other than a pair of white flip-flops with a rise in the heel so that her ass looks even more delectable.

  She straightens up and gives the people in the car a little wave, and then I’m on top of her.

  I take her by the elbow and pull her into the shelter as if the wall-free building will hide her from anyone. “What in God’s name are you doing?”

  Isabel looks at me from behind her big sunglasses, a satisfied little smile on her lips. “Getting you some business.”

  Anger expands in my chest, threatening to explode. “In a fucking bathing suit? I told you I didn’t want you here. How did you take that as an invitation to do this? You’re ruining everything.”

  Her mouth drops open. “Ruining everything?” She thrusts her clipboard at me. There are ten names on it. “How many tours have you booked lately?”

  “None, but I’m not out here naked—”

  “Naked? This isn’t naked.” Then, to my complete horror, Isabel reaches up and pulls the string on the top of her bikini. It comes off in her hands, exposing her gorgeous breasts to the entire world. “Now we’re getting there.”

  She’s so defiant and sexy, and my cock twitches against the front of my pants. I’m fucking speechless. And below us, on the road, there’s the glint and shine of another car coming up the road. What the hell did she do, post a picture of her wearing that bikini in town? Probably.

  I can’t drag her kicking and screaming by the elbow, so I put my hand on her back—her gloriously naked back—and I hustle her toward the house.

  “Hey.” Isabel twists. “You’re going to miss out on customers. That’s why your little ranch is failing.”

  I don’t let her go. I just keep herding her toward the farmhouse, her little heels scraping against the pebbled driveway. On the porch, I yank the door open and tip her inside. On instinct, I reach behind me, pull the door shut, and flip the lock. Anything to keep her separate from the rest of my business.

  “Oh, now you’re going to invite me in?”

  I toss the clipboard onto a side table. Isabel tosses her sunglasses after it and puts her hands on her hips, seeming not to care at all that she’s displaying her luscious, creamy breasts and pert pink nipples to me.

  And God, I can’t stand it.

  My cock pulses at the sight of the curves leading down to her hips, to the little ties of the pink bikini framing those same curves, and the way it’s like a neon sign pointing straight between her legs. I’m on fire. I’m burning up. And now that the door’s closed…

  I swallow hard. “You can’t do that.” I stab a finger back toward the shelter. “You can’t show—yourself—to all those people out there. You can’t trade yourself to get me business!”

  “It’s good marketing,” she insists, but a pink that matches her bikini spreads to her cheeks.

  “It’s damn good marketing.” It hurts to keep my eyes pinned to her face. “But if you were mine, I wouldn’t let you stand out by the road like that. Not for me.”

  Isabel’s lips part, her blue eyes brimming with sincerity. “What if I wanted to?” Her eyes rake down my body then and I feel like I’m the one who’s naked. “What if—” She blushes a deeper red. “This is embarrassing.”

  “Nothing’s more embarrassing than stripping down on the side of the road.”

  “No. What’s more embarrassing is wanting so badly to be seen by your older brother’s best friend that you put on your sexiest bikini and drum up business for him. Just so he’ll notice you. Just so he’ll—”

  I can’t help it. I take a step closer.

  “Just so he’ll what, Isabel?” My entire soul throbs with forbidden desire. I can’t want her like this. I can’t look at her like this. And I can’t stop. If Cy knew I was standing in
here with his half-naked sister, he’d—

  Jesus, he’d kill me.

  And I’d rather die than look away.

  “Realize,” she says softly, and everything inside of me pulls toward her like she’s her own source of gravity. “Realize I exist.”

  6

  Isabel

  Luke runs a hand through his hair, frustration evident on his face. “Christ almighty, Isabel, I saw you when you had clothes on.”

  I’m humming with arousal and embarrassment and determination, all in a whirlwind at the center of my core. “You didn’t, though. You never did. All those years, we lived right next door, and you didn’t as much as glance my way.”

  “You were—” He looks away and swallows again. “You’re Cy’s sister, Iz. I wasn’t allowed to look in your direction. Can you imagine—?”

  “My brother’s not my keeper.”

  “Fine,” he bursts out. “Then you should know that I did notice you. And I noticed you at that holiday party.”

  I know exactly which party he’s talking about. That was the last time I spent more than a week back home, and I wore that dress especially so he’d see me—the new, college graduate. “You sure didn’t act like it.”

  “Cy would’ve laid me out.”

  I roll my eyes. Luke is standing so close I can feel the heat from his body warming the air between us, and I want to reach out and unbutton that shirt. “Since when have you ever been afraid of my brother?”

  Luke squares his jaw. “If it came to blows, I could take him.”

  I move forward one more step. There’s a foot between us, if that, and Luke lets out a heavy breath. “I think there are better things you could do with your hands.”

  “Don’t tempt me, Isabel.”

  “All right.” I dangle the bikini top in the space between us, so close to his face that it brushes his nose. “I’ll put this back on, and—”

  I bring the cloth toward my chest, and that’s what breaks him.

  With a growl, Luke wraps a fist around the top and throws it. I hear it hit something in the kitchen—a bowl?—that clatters into the sink, and then finally, finally, his hands are on me.