Winning the Rancher's Heart Read online

  “That’s good,” Jeri told the boy, “for her and her babies. When I was little, my mother spent months in bed. I thought she was just napping all the time, but she was growing a baby brother for me.”

  “Aunt Tina growing two babies. She gotta sleep a bunch,” Frankie reasoned, sounding much more confident about the situation.

  Ryder chuckled. Jake and Kathryn frequently corrected Frankie’s speech, but Ryder loved the way the boy expressed himself.

  “Do you have a lot of siblings?” Jake asked Jeri.

  Ryder noticed that she stiffened, her gaze downcast. “No. I think Mom would’ve liked more, but it wasn’t possible.”

  “Ah.”

  Jeri got up from the table then and turned to Kathryn. “How can I help?”

  Kathryn looked at Wyatt as he walked toward the table. “Would Tina like anything in particular?”

  “She said something about soup.”

  “Beef and barley or chicken noodle?”

  “Beef and barley,” all three brothers said at once.

  One of the best things about a true winter, Ryder had decided, was Kathryn’s beef and barley soup.

  Kathryn shrugged at Jeri. “Can you chop vegetables?”

  “Sure.”

  “I’ll do the onion and celery if you’ll take care of the carrots and green beans.”

  “I’ll get the beef, zucchini and wheat rolls out of the freezer,” Ryder said, moving in that direction as Tyler carried the graham cracker box to Jake, who began doling out the crackers one quarter at a time.

  When the boys had eaten as much as Jake would allow, he took them into the den to watch television. Wyatt looked in on Tina then walked out with Ryder to spread rock salt and check the horses. Thankfully, the sleet had stopped.

  “I hope no one’s wounded before dinner gets on the table,” Wyatt drawled. “That Jeri is a walking catastrophe.”

  “Aw, she’s not that bad,” Ryder replied casually.

  “What I can’t figure,” Wyatt went on, “is how such a clumsy girl could make it to the national finals.”

  Ryder chuckled. “If you didn’t notice, she’s a natural on horseback.”

  “That’s true,” Wyatt conceded. “Let’s hope she’s as skilled with a paring knife.”

  Nodding, Ryder silently noted that as it was his foot that was throbbing, he ought to be the one irritated with her rather than Wyatt, but for some reason he couldn’t quite manage it. Despite her hot and cold nature, something about her felt...right. He had to think she meant well, and she’d been sweet and helpful with the boys and Kathryn.

  “Suppose I better use Jake’s truck to take Jeri over to Stark’s later.” He slid a glance at Wyatt from the corner of his eye. “She helped us earlier. Turnabout’s only fair. Besides, I’d like to get a look at those animals of hers.”

  “No doubt you would. You’ve had horses on the brain for a while now.”

  Deciding this was not the time to press for a horse-raising operation at the ranch, Ryder said nothing.

  After a particularly satisfying dinner—during the preparation of which no one, thankfully, suffered any injury—Jake and Wyatt got the boys ready for bed while Ryder and Jeri helped Kathryn clean up the kitchen. Tina had eaten a hearty meal, and Kathryn announced her intention to sit with her for a while, so Ryder proposed taking Jeri over to Stark’s in Jake’s truck to care for her horses. Surprisingly, she hesitated before agreeing.

  “Yes, I guess that would be best.”

  Ryder fetched Jake’s keys, and he and Jeri outfitted themselves for the cold. One thing Ryder disliked about a true winter was having to constantly dress and undress to deal with the weather, but he couldn’t manage the cold without a coat or sit around a toasty house in one. A stiff breeze had blown up, and he couldn’t keep from commenting on it once he and Jeri were inside Jake’s truck.

  “Man, that wind cuts right through you, don’t it?”

  “It does,” she agreed, shivering. “But it’s a good thing. Not only will it blow away the clouds, it will help dry up and blow away the ice.”

  She was right about that. The sky had already cleared, and stars were beginning to twinkle as the pickup trundled toward the Burns compound. Ryder had no experience with snow chains, but they didn’t have far to travel, and the truck moved along the icy roadway with ungainly ease. Even traveling slowly, they turned off the highway onto the Burns compound in less than ten minutes.

  After guiding the truck past the veterinary clinic and around the neatly constructed stables, Ryder came to a halt with the headlights shining on the padlocked door. Jeri had a key and used it to let herself into the building. Ryder shut off the engine and followed her inside.

  Unlike the old-fashioned barn at Loco Man, this low, metal building had every modern convenience, including excellent lighting. Ryder moved through a set of heavy plastic drapes and past the first stall, which held a horse bearing a large incision on its neck. He could see stitches beneath a length of what looked like clear tape. Several empty stalls stood between the wounded horse and a second set of drapes. Beyond that, he found Jeri’s beauties.

  The four bays—three mares and one stud—were so similar that they looked like a matched set. They had the glossiest hides and firmest conformation Ryder had ever seen. All of a height, they would produce equally beautiful offspring. He let out a long, low whistle.

  “Where on earth did you come by these lovelies?”

  Jeri shrugged, rubbing the neck of one horse while reaching out a hand to another in the next stall. “Here and there. Glad’s Texas born and bred. That’s short for Gladiator. The girls are Star, Betty and Dovie. I picked up Star in Georgia. Her registered name is Harper’s Starlight. Betty, or Better Betty, came from Wyoming, and I found Dovie, also known as Stellar Dove, in Colorado.”

  Dovie was obviously pregnant.

  “Well, you’ve got a good eye,” Ryder praised. “If you’re as good at training as you are at choosing horseflesh, you’re going to be very successful.”

  Jeri smiled. It felt like the first unguarded, truly sincere smile she’d given him. Encouraged, Ryder searched for something else to say. He didn’t know enough about barrel racing to even ask intelligent questions, so he talked about his own ambitions, instead, hoping it would establish a point of common interest between them.

  “I’d like to raise horses. Don’t know a thing about training them except to the saddle. Uncle Dodd made sure all us boys could work an unbroken horse around to letting us ride, but that’s not the same as training for a specific purpose, like barrel racing.”

  “It’s not too far off,” she said. “You might think about learning how to train cutting horses. They’re valued on a ranch, and there’s lots of competition. You can earn some big money at that.”

  “I’ll have to look into it. You ever trained a cutting horse?”

  “No, no. I don’t know much more about it than you do, but you can go online and research it.”

  He nodded. “Good advice. Thanks.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  That seemed to exhaust that topic, at least for now, but then it occurred to him that they had something in common besides a fascination with horses. Specifically, families.

  “Does your brother work with horses, too?”

  Her smile turned into a frown, and the temperature seemed to drop ten degrees. “No.” With that, she sent him a scathing glance, turned her back and stomped toward three sealed barrels.

  Stung, Ryder stayed where he was, wondering what he’d said or done to put those angry glints in her eyes. He half expected lightning to shoot out of the top of her head or steam to pour out of her ears. After a moment, he forced himself to ask, “Anything I can do to help?”

  She didn’t so much as glance in his direction, let alone reply, as she filled a huge scoop with feed and carried it to the first of
the horses.

  Okay, then. Might as well face facts. Either the girl didn’t want him touching her horses or she just didn’t much like him. He tried not to be disappointed by either. She had a right to decide who did and didn’t care for her horses, just as she had a right not to like him personally. Besides, it wasn’t as if anything could come of their acquaintance beyond simple friendship. Why that idea depressed him, he didn’t even want to analyze.

  Deciding he could at least muck the stalls, Ryder went looking for a shovel and wheelbarrow. Whatever her personal feelings, she surely couldn’t object to that. Besides, she’d helped hay the southeast section of the ranch and tend Loco Man’s horses. He needed to do something to repay that, and he didn’t figure she’d object to him hauling away dung. He worked quietly and carefully, starting with Stark’s patient in the other section of the stable, for good measure. As he worked, Jeri went about her own business, making no comment either to commend or criticize. Apparently, she thought him well suited to his chosen chore.

  He would remember that in the future.

  * * *

  Ryder Smith was a hard worker; Jeri had to give him that much. Then again, if he was using steroids, he’d need an outlet for the extra energy and agitation that the drugs produced. Twice already, to her shame, she’d forgotten what Ryder had done to her brother, but she remembered now—and was deliberately pushing him to show that side of himself. She expected an explosion soon now.

  She both welcomed and dreaded Ryder’s temper. On one hand, she needed this matter resolved at last. She needed Ryder held accountable for what he’d done. On the other hand, once Ryder was charged with Bryan’s death—or some other punishable activity—he and the Smith family would undoubtedly hate her, and Jeri was unexpectedly saddened by that prospect.

  She hadn’t expected to like any of these people, but she just couldn’t help it. They were a caring, supportive family, and apparently sincere Christians. If her own family had been that supportive and caring, Bryan might not have taken off for Houston at the first opportunity and gotten involved in the sport that would ultimately take his life. And she might not dread visiting or speaking with her own mother.

  For too long, since the death of her second husband, Dena Averrett had viewed herself as one of life’s greatest victims, and her son’s death had only exacerbated that feeling. Angry at the losses she’d suffered, Dena seemed to need to punish someone, and if it wasn’t Ryder Smith, it would be her surviving child. Jeri desperately hoped to give her mother some peace, her brother some justice, and herself some relief, even if it wasn’t turning out to be as easy as it should’ve been.

  Surprisingly, to this point Ryder had remained downright friendly, no matter what provocation had been thrown at him. Only now did he withdraw. Almost as if she’d hurt his feelings.

  Jeri fought the very idea that she might have wounded Ryder emotionally, but it nagged her, wouldn’t let her go. Eventually she concluded that being unfriendly would win her nothing. She didn’t want him to keep his distance, after all. How could she provoke his temper and prove him volatile enough to have caused her brother’s death if he avoided her? If she presented a friendly facade, he might let down his guard. He might even eventually confess his guilt to her or say enough, at least, to prove negligence. Anything was better than nothing, after all.

  Regardless, she’d be walking a tightrope. She didn’t see any reason to try that balancing act while bearing the additional burden of guilt for having hurt his feelings. It was bad enough that she’d injured his toes. The irony of that did not escape her, but neither did it change anything.

  After the horses were settled in for the night and they were walking back to the truck, she tried to bridge the breach by thanking him for his help. “I appreciate you cleaning the stalls. I usually handle all that myself.”

  He nodded, smiling tautly, and opened the truck door for her. “Only fair. You helped me earlier.”

  She climbed in and buckled up while he limped around to slide in behind the steering wheel. She said nothing more, and neither did he until they were back in the kitchen of the Loco Man ranch house and he had returned Jake’s keys to him. Without sitting or removing his coat, he spent a few minutes regaling his brothers with descriptions of her horses.

  “They’re gorgeous,” he summed up warmly, “all four of them. Once that first crop of foals turns out, I’ll be going around saying I once mucked out their stalls.”

  Jake chuckled. “Only you could get that excited about horses.”

  “I like horses.”

  “Lots of people like horses,” Jeri blurted, realizing only belatedly that she sounded as if she was defending Ryder.

  “Me included,” Jake said, “but I wouldn’t go out in the cold on a night like this to get a look at any horse.”

  “You know it was more than that,” Wyatt commented to Jake. “He was worried about Jeri driving around without chains. We all were. If he hadn’t wanted to see those horses, you or I would’ve had to take her over there.”

  Jeri hoped no one noticed her involuntary flinch. These Smith men were unusually thoughtful and protective, not at all the egotistical, arrogant types she’d expected.

  “True,” Jake said, adding to Jeri. “And I wouldn’t have minded a bit.”

  “You also wouldn’t have mucked out the stalls,” Wyatt teased.

  “And deprive my baby brother of an activity he so obviously enjoys?” Jake quipped.

  Ryder rolled his eyes, but his brothers just laughed. Then Wyatt turned serious.

  “Maybe we should let him ranch horses like he wants. I’m just not sure there’s enough market around here for saddle horses.”

  “Maybe I should look into getting some training myself,” Ryder suggested in a low voice.

  “Couldn’t hurt,” Jake said with a grin. “What are you thinking? Advanced stall mucking?”

  “Hey, at least I have some skill,” Ryder retorted, laughing at himself.

  “You’ve got plenty of skills,” Jake admitted, still grinning. “That’s why I’m counting on you to help me build on to our house this spring.”

  “Done.” Ryder changed the subject then. “How’s Tina?”

  “Sleeping,” Wyatt said.

  Jake sighed. “That sounds good to me.”

  “Think I’ll hit the hay myself.” Ryder turned from the table. “Good night, y’all.”

  As he limped toward the door, Wyatt said, “We should’ve had Alice look at your foot while she was here.”

  Jeri tried to control her wince. “Is it still hurting you?”

  Ryder waved a hand. “No, no. It’s fine. Just a couple of sore toes.”

  “You going to be able to help hay the cattle again tomorrow if Delgado doesn’t make it in?” Wyatt asked.

  Pausing with his hand on the doorknob, Ryder looked back over his shoulder. “Sure. No problem.”

  “I can help, too,” Jeri put in, thinking that she could make up a bit for the earlier “accidents,” but to her relief Wyatt shook his head. She was finding it more and more difficult to live with the pain and inconvenience she’d inflicted on Wyatt and Ryder, even the truly accidental portions.

  “Ryder and I can handle it. There’s just that one little section left.”

  “Let Ryder heal up,” Jake put in. “I’ll help you, but let’s get an early start.”

  “Deal,” Wyatt agreed.

  “Thanks,” Ryder told them, opening the door. “I’ll have everything ready for you. Call me if anything comes up with Tina.”

  “She’ll be fine tonight,” Wyatt assured him, “and we’ve got Jake and Kathryn here if we need them. Just get some rest. And say a prayer for her.”

  “Continually,” Ryder promised, going out and pulling the door closed behind him.

  Jeri remembered how naturally he had bowed his head when Wes Billings had prayed f
or Tina earlier. That could all be for show, but the Smiths seemed to be a sincere, praying family, more so than her own. She couldn’t remember sitting down to pray with her family since her stepdad’s death. Jeri realized that she had kind of fallen out of the habit of praying at all, and she wasn’t sure why that was.

  When she could, she caught the Cowboy Church services that were so prevalent at rodeos these days, but her heavy schedule didn’t often allow for worship attendance. Somehow, she’d let the lack of church attendance spread into a lack of prayer. Only since Bryan had died had she started talking more to God. Most recently, she’d asked God for a plan, a way to make Ryder Smith pay for her brother’s death. Soon after, she’d come up with this idea.

  That meant God was on her side. Didn’t it?

  She had to believe it did. That being the case, she figured she’d better make the most of this opportunity.

  No matter how little the idea appealed at times.

  Chapter Five

  With Ryder gone, Jeri, too, retired. It had been a long, strange, active day, and had included a heaping helping of anxiety due to Tina’s situation. As she climbed the stairs, it occurred to Jeri that she had no plans for tomorrow, and she couldn’t very well lurk around the place hoping to bump into Ryder. She needed to advance her cause, and to do that, she had to come up with a reason to spend time with him.

  Maybe she could ask him to drive her around the area to look at properties? But after today, she worried he’d just send her to a local real estate agent. The local agent, however, most likely wouldn’t have snow chains. After some consideration, Jeri came up with the idea of leaving a message with a local Realtor, asking for a callback during the breakfast hour, when she would be with the Smiths. That would at least lend credence to her cover story, and maybe Ryder’s sense of chivalry would again induce him to offer to drive her around in Jake’s truck. It wasn’t exactly the most brilliant scheme, but she couldn’t think of any other way to finagle a significant block of time with him.

  She went online with her cell phone to identify the only local Realtor. Expecting to reach an answering service or machine, she put in the call. To her shock, a man’s voice answered immediately.