Читать книгу Rancher's Deadly Reunion - Beth Cornelison - Страница 11

Piper was leaving town. Ken Grainger watched the evidence play out on his computer screen. Thanks to the tracking program he’d installed on her computer on a weekend when the accounting office was abandoned, he could see everything she did on her work computer. Getting access to her personal laptop had been a bit harder, but he’d rather enjoyed the challenge. He was even able to access her laptop camera and watch her in her apartment. Well, as far as the camera angle allowed. But he’d caught a few glimpses of her walking through her living room in her towel last week, and he was still enjoying the fantasies that peek created for him.

He shoveled another spoonful of cereal in his mouth, then wiped dribbles of milk from his chin with his sleeve. He chewed and followed the movement of her cursor as she booked her flight for Denver.

Ken frowned. He knew she was from Colorado, but she typically didn’t go back to her family’s ranch except at Christmas and for a brief visit around Mother’s Day. An October visit was unusual, and this break from her normal pattern didn’t sit well with him. Why was she going now? What was he missing?

He grumbled a curse under his breath. He had to find a way to hack her new cell phone. He was missing so much valuable information by not being party to her texts and phone calls. Putting that kind of hacking in place would take a little more planning. Cunning.

He grinned as she typed in her credit card number to purchase the airline ticket. Challenge accepted. Piper was worth the effort and the expense involved. He would convince her, some way, that they were soul mates, destined to be together, and anyone who interfered with that destiny would pay the price.

Like Ron Sandburg had.

The dirtwad had tried to move in on his turf and had regretted it. He’d overheard Piper tell Elaine in the break room that the way Ron stared at her from his cubicle gave Piper the creeps. So after he’d seen Ron hitting on Piper at the coffee shop in the lobby of the office building, he’d made sure Ron Sandburg left Piper alone. Permanently.

The look of confusion in Ron’s eyes, the instant of fear when Ron had known he was about to die, had been sweet payoff. A well-centered push on Ron’s chest as he’d topped the long flight of stairs in his apartment building...and any threat Ron had posed to his plans with Piper went tumbling down.

Ken grinned to himself, relishing that victory.

Yes, he would come up with a way to add her new phone to his surveillance, he vowed as he hit Print Screen to make a hard copy of her flight schedule. He’d remedy this gap in his surveillance as soon as feasible.

But how? She kept her damn cell on her person all the time while she was at the office. He’d tried before to steal a peek at it, but she carried it in the pocket of the cardigan she wore year-round because the management kept the temperature of the office set to arctic.

Turning to his second screen, he navigated to the airline’s reservation page and booked himself a ticket to Denver on the flight arriving just before Piper’s. He wanted to be in place at the Denver airport to observe her arrival. Who would pick her up? Where would she go after arriving? The family ranch or a hotel?

He sloshed another bite of cereal into his mouth, irritated that he didn’t know the nature of her trip. Had someone died? Was this a business meeting? He dismissed the idea of this trip being work-related with a brisk shake of his head. Surely if this was company travel, he’d have heard about it in staff meetings or seen something come through her work email. If he could—

He cut the thought off, seeing new activity on her laptop. Speaking of email...she was apparently writing one to—he leaned closer to the screen to see what she’d typed—Josh and Zane. Her brothers.

He set his now-soggy dinner aside and rolled his desk chair closer to the monitor where he followed her activity.

Hi guys, I just booked my flight out for Mom and Dad’s anniversary party. Can one of you dolts find it in your hearts to pick me up and save me the cab fare in from Denver? I arrive on the Wednesday before the party at 3:10 p.m. Love you both (despite your many flaws!) Ha ha! P.

An anniversary party, huh? He rubbed his jaw and considered that for a moment. On the surface, a family event seemed innocent enough, but...

Ken ground his back teeth together and stared at the monitor, as if he could read any hidden agenda into her return to her family’s ranch. She had a good job, a good life here in Boston. She had him here in Boston, even if she hadn’t yet realized what they could mean to each other. Maybe he was paranoid, but every time she went back to Colorado, he worried that she might decide she was missing something by not being close to her family. She talked fairly often about her brothers. He knew she and her brothers were triplets. Did she have some triplet bond with her brothers that might trump everything she had here in Boston?

Mentally, he bumped up the urgency to hack her cell phone before she left town in a couple weeks. He couldn’t be sure how closely he’d be able to observe her once she got to Colorado, and he needed that additional link to her ASAP.

He went back to reserving a flight to Denver, then pulled up a list of motels near Boyd Valley, Colorado. Piper had said the town was small and rather remote, and the lack of lodging options in the town confirmed that. Two motels were listed within a twenty-five mile radius. One called The Mountaineer in Boyd Valley itself and a place called Catch-a-Wink in a community ten miles to the south. Next closest result was 56 miles away. He clicked the link for The Mountaineer’s website and arrived at a rudimentary website that looked like it had been created as a junior high kid’s school project. Jotting down the phone number for the office, he’d started tapping in the number on his cell phone. Activity on his monitor caught his attention. A quick reply from one of the brothers to her email.

Of course we’ll pick you up, dummy. No prob. Can’t wait to see your ugly mug! LOL! BTW, do you want to go in thirds on the cruise Josh and I are giving them as their gift? Have a good trip, Zane

“Mountaineer Inn. Can I help you?” asked the woman who answered his call.

“Yeah, you got any rooms left for later this month?”

“Absolutely. How many rooms do you need, and when will you be checking in?”

“Just one room.” He only gave the lady from the motel half of his attention as he rattled off an alias. If Boyd Valley was as small as Piper said, it wouldn’t do for her to catch wind of his presence there thanks to some town gossip.

“Can I pay cash for the room when I get there?”

“Yes, if you pay for the full stay on arrival.” The lady from The Mountaineer went on to rattle off a spiel about their hot breakfast and something about local attractions, but he tuned her out.

Piper was replying to Zane’s email.

Yes on the cruise. I already told Josh that. Not surprised Doofus forgot to tell you! :-) I’ll give you a check when I get there. Excited! See you soon, P.

“Yeah,” he muttered, hanging up on the lady at the motel. “We’ll see you soon, bro.”

Piper McCall entered the baggage claim area at Denver International Airport and scanned the crowd for a familiar face. Her brothers had assured her they would pick her up, but since then some question had come up about which of them it would be. Despite the long flight, she actually looked forward to the ride to the Double M Ranch. The hour-long drive would give her the chance to catch up on ranch and family news. She hadn’t seen her identical twin brothers, the other two-thirds of the McCall triplets, since Christmas.

She missed the bond she’d had with her brothers. She might have felt a bit odd-woman-out growing up, but you didn’t share a womb for nine months and not have a connection to your siblings.

“Piper!” a strong male voice called over the crowd noise, and she turned in the direction she’d heard her name. And froze.

The face she spotted by the luggage carts was definitely someone from the ranch. But not one of her brothers.

Brady Summers.

Son of their foreman. Her first love. And her first lover.

Her mouth dried. Why did it have to be Brady?

He raised a hand to make sure she’d seen him, and she bobbed a stiff nod of acknowledgment. Her gut somersaulting, she wove through the milling passengers and airport personnel toward Brady.

She silently cursed her mother, who had, no doubt, set this up. She’d have to explain to her mother, again, that she and Brady were over. Kaput. History. Time to stop throwing them together, believing that the old spark would reignite, and the McCalls and Summerses would live happily ever after.

She exhaled a cleansing breath. Okay, so her mother didn’t know the whole truth about what had happened between Piper and Brady. Probably for the best. Piper shuddered internally at the notion of what her mother might do if she knew the whole story, the whole, checkered past between her and the foreman’s son.

Brady doffed his cowboy hat as Piper approached and gave her his charming, lopsided grin. “Hey there. Good flight?”

“Average.” She heard the slight falter in her voice, the flutter that matched her staggering heartbeat.

Damn it, why did he have to look so good to her even after all these years? Better even. His youthful face had matured with a stronger jawline, sharper angles to his cheekbones and more rugged overall appeal. Brady’s eyes were the same piercing green, though, and the smile that tugged at his lips had the same power to tie her insides in giddy knots. His gaze held hers as he greeted her, and she felt his stare to her marrow. Could he see how he still affected her? How the mere sight of him turned her insides to goo?

Steeling herself, Piper surreptitiously wiped her sweaty palms on the seat of her jeans.

“Welcome home.” He reached for the backpack she had draped on one shoulder, and she shrugged away.

“I can get this. I have two suitcases coming, though. Carousel 3.”

He lifted a shoulder. “All right.”

She jerked a nod and turned to search the lit signs for the carousel.

“Piper?”

She glanced back at him. Please don’t make this harder than it already is.

His gaze dropped to a boy standing slightly behind him. The boy was playing with a small windup fire truck, rolling the toy up the side of a trash can. “Connor, c’mere. I want you to meet someone.”

Connor glanced up, staring at Piper for a moment, his eyes the same clear green as a Rocky Mountain lake. The same green as Brady’s eyes. Air backed up in her lungs. If her life had gone differently...

Connor scuttled to Brady’s side, jerking her from the dangerous path of what-ifs.

“Piper, this is Connor. My nephew.”

The breath she’d been holding left her in a gush. His nephew. Of course. Relief made her knees tremble, but on the heels of that release came the stark reminder of why his nephew was with him.

Brady’s brother and sister-in-law were killed in a bad traffic accident on Interstate 70, her mother had said in a phone call a few months back. When had that been? January? February? The couple had left custody of their son to Brady, a move that still puzzled her. Pam had family, sisters with children who’d surely have been better equipped to care for the little boy.

She worked to hide her dismay over the couple’s deaths from the boy.

“Connor, this is Josh and Zane’s sister, Piper. Can you tell her hello?”

The boy stepped forward with a shy smile and stuck his hand out. “Hello. I’m Connor. Nice to meet you.”

A smile bloomed on her face, and she took the small proffered hand. Crouching to the boy’s level and letting her backpack slip to the floor, she said, “Pleased to meet you, Connor. You have wonderful manners.”

He twitched a crooked grin and shrugged. “Yeah. I know.”

She snorted a laugh before she could muffle it. Glancing up at Brady, she added, “And so humble.”

He grinned and flipped up his palm. “He’s a work in progress.”

Piper sandwiched Connor’s hand between hers in a warm clasp. “How old are you, Connor?”

“Six.” His face brightened. “I had a cowboy birthday party.”

Piper chuckled. “Cowboys, huh? Like your uncle?”

“And Grampa. He’s foreman at the Double M!”

Piper matched the boy’s enthusiastic expression. “I know! Guess what? I’ve known your Grampa since before I was your age.”

Connor tipped his head and gave her a skeptical frown. “Really?”

“The Double M is my family’s ranch. I grew up there.”

He nodded sagely. “Like Josh and Zane.”

She tapped his nose. “Bingo. They’re my brothers. We’re triplets. We were all born the same day.”

“And Brady?” Connor’s green eyes widened. “He grew up at the Double M, too. Like my daddy. ’Cept... Mama and Daddy died. So now Brady’s my daddy.”

Piper’s smile drooped, and her throat clogged painfully as if she’d swallowed a jagged stone. She angled her gaze to Brady and nodded. “Right. And Brady. I knew Brady and your dad growing up.” Drawing deep breath to regain her composure, she pushed to her feet. “Wanna help me get my suitcases?”

She tousled Connor’s sandy-brown hair, the same color as Brady’s—

She determinedly cut the thought off as she hiked her backpack onto her shoulder again. Not Brady’s. Like Scott’s. But even that wasn’t right, she thought as she set off toward the luggage carousel.

She cast a side-glance at Brady as they made their way through the crowd, allowing herself to conjure a painful memory from the first summer she’d been home from college. The trip that summer had been the first time she’d returned to Colorado since breaking up with Brady and setting out for Boston, for independence, for her fresh start. That first year had been the toughest year of her life, and seeing Brady after eleven months away from home and family had been gut-wrenching.

In a stiff conversation with Brady in the stables, an accidental meeting she’d barely made it through without crying, she’d asked all the polite questions.

“How’s your dad?”

“Dad is Dad. Same as always.”

“And Scott?”

“Good. He and Pam adopted a baby.”

Piper remembered the stabbing pain in her heart and how she’d forced a quivering smile. “Wow. That’s great. Tell them congratulations from me.”

Connor wasn’t Scott’s biological son, so the similarities she saw between Connor and Brady were just coincidence. Or some misplaced wishful thinking. Or her head playing the heart-wrenching what-if game again.

Brady placed a callus-roughened hand on Connor’s head, lightly ruffling the boy’s silky hair, as they waited beside carousel 3 for the belt to start moving. “What do your suitcases look like?”

“Plain black like a thousand others.” She set her backpack at her feet and rubbed her aching shoulder. “One has a red luggage tag, and I tied a little blue ribbon on the other.”

He nodded. “Got it.”

“So...you drew the short straw, huh?” she asked without looking at him. She pretended to be intently watching the crowd and the shadowed maw where her flight’s cargo would soon appear.

“Pardon?”

“To come get me. You pulled the short straw?”

“Actually, I volunteered.”

She cut a side-glance at him and met his piercing gaze. “You did?”

“Yeah. I thought Connor would get a kick outta seeing the airplanes, the terminal. Oh, before we leave, I’ve promised him we can get a cinnamon pretzel at Auntie Anne’s.”

A loud warning beep blared from a speaker just above their heads, interrupting any reply. He wasn’t here for her. He was here for Connor...and a cinnamon pretzel. She wasn’t sure how that made her feel. Relief? Disappointment? And why did it matter to her?

The conveyor belt started rolling, and someone with an oversize duffel bag on his arm pushed past Piper, knocking her into Brady. She tripped over her backpack, lost her balance and landed against him with an oof, her hands splayed on his chest and her nose in the V of his open collar.

Brady wrapped his arm around her waist to steady her as she regained her footing, and heat flashed through her. From his taut body, from embarrassment...and from a kick of lust she couldn’t quell. As she righted herself, she drew a deep, calming breath and immediately regretted it.

Brady smelled so good. And familiar. A sexy combination of soap, hay and male warmth that took her back to hours spent in his arms. Naked. Inquisitive. Bursting with young love and rampant teenage desire.

Piper shifted her grip from his chest to his arms, trying to wiggle free of his hold. “I’m good. You can let go.”

But he didn’t.

After a couple of strained seconds, she glanced up to repeat herself. Maybe he hadn’t heard her in the din and bustle of the airport. When she met his eyes, her voice stuck in her throat. The intensity of his gaze left no question that his thoughts had followed a similar track to hers. Motes of longing swirled through the green depths and tangled with shadows of regret. His mouth looked soft, but his jaw muscles flexed and tightened with restraint. He wanted to kiss her. She recognized that look well, and so did the muscles in her belly that quickened and the nerves in her lips that tingled with the memory of his kisses. How easy it would be to push up on her toes and steal the kiss his eyes promised.

Instead, she forced her throat to loosen enough to wheeze. “I’m okay. L-let go.”

Slowly, his arm slipped away, even though his stare held hers for several more painful heartbeats. Despite her assurances to Brady that she could stand alone, her knees trembled as she stepped back, threatening to give out.

Pull it together, McCall! This moony, love-sick calf act will not help you get through the week and back to Boston with your heart intact. With the steely determination that had helped her survive her freshman year, keeping her grades up while she battled morning sickness and a broken heart, she shoved aside the jittery sparks dancing through her and put some starch in her spine.

“That one?” a young voice asked, and she felt a tug on her shirt. She glanced down at Brady’s nephew and found him pointing behind her. “That one has blue string.”

Blue string...suitcase...airport. Piper blinked several times, bringing her surroundings back into focus. For just a moment, she’d lost track of the rest of the world. Being with Brady had a way of narrowing her scope to just the two of them.

“Grab it, buddy.” Brady stepped past her, a guiding hand on Connor’s shoulder.

The little boy scuttled forward through the crowd with his uncle at his heels. When Connor grabbed the huge suitcase’s handle and struggled to drag it off the conveyor belt, Brady added a helping hand. After the bag thunked to the floor, Brady stepped back, letting his nephew raise the handle and roll the suitcase through the crowd.

Piper shook the tension from her hands and arms and blew out a puff of air, gathering some semblance of composure. Pasting on a smile for Connor, she reached for the oversized suitcase as he dragged it to her feet. “Need some help?”

“I got it,” Connor said and grunted. “Sheesh! How many clothes did you bring? That’s heavy!”

“Oh, that’s not clothes. That’s my bag of rocks.”

Connor frowned for a second before twisting his mouth in a crooked grin. “You’re teasing!”

She flashed a playful grin and shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe not.”

Brady approached with her other suitcase in tow and asked, “Is this it?”

She nodded. “Thanks. I think that’s everything.”

“All right then.” Brady dug his keys from his pocket and bounced them once in his hand. “Let’s go home.”

Piper’s stomach swooped. Home. Once upon a time, she’d called the Double M Ranch home. But she had a new life now in Boston. She’d found the independence she’d been looking for when she went to college, but that independence had come at a cost. She’d lost the close family connections she’d taken for granted growing up. She’d stayed away from the ranch for most of the last seven years. Her freshman year, she’d hidden herself at college to protect the secret she carried, afraid of her family’s reaction, running from Brady and from a future that couldn’t be. She’d flogged herself with regret and guilt. Each year that followed, she allowed herself brief visits, but kept mostly to the main house, avoiding the stable and cattle pens at times she knew Brady would be there.

“Wait!” Connor cried as they started for the parking garage. “Don’t forget my pretzel!”

“Oh, right,” Brady said, giving his head a shake and patting Connor on the back. “Sorry, buddy. Now let’s see. Where is Auntie Anne’s?”

A review of the airport map in the lobby showed the only Auntie Anne’s was past the security gates.

“Sorry, buddy. They won’t let us go to the part of the airport where the pretzel store is without a ticket,” Brady told his nephew and ruffled the boy’s hair.

“Where do we get a ticket?” Connor asked.

“We don’t. Not today.”

Connor wrinkled his nose in protest. “How come? You said I could have a pretzel!”

“I know. I’m sorry.” The look on Brady’s face said everything he didn’t. How much he hated letting his nephew down. How hard he was thinking about a way to make it up to Connor. Piper sent Brady a sympathetic smile and tapped Connor on the shoulder.

“You know what? I’ve been craving a big chocolate ice cream cone for hours. What do you say we stop for ice cream on the way home instead?”

Connor looked unconvinced at first, but when Piper batted her eyelashes and clasped her hands under her chin with a “Please?” the boy nodded. “Is that okay, Uncle Brady? Can we get Piper some ice cream?”

“That we can, Con.” He gave her a wink of thanks, and the moment of conspiratorial connection wrapped around her like a hug, warmth burrowing to her core. As they made their way out of the airport, Piper tried to rein in the soft emotions that tugged at her. She didn’t want to let her guard down around Brady or share private smiles that would chip away at her protective walls. Even after seven years, she was clearly still vulnerable to Brady’s lopsided grin and soft-spoken charm, and she was thankful for the buffer and distraction Connor would provide on the drive back to the ranch.

With Connor struggling valiantly to roll one of her heavy suitcases, they strolled down the long aisle of the parking deck until they reached Brady’s mud-speckled pickup truck. After Connor scrambled up onto the back seat of the extended cab F-150, he seized Piper’s hand and tugged. “Sit with me, Piper!”

“Well, I—”

“Pleeeeeease?”

The light green, puppy-dog eyes that beseeched her were impossible to turn down. She glanced at Brady, who only chuckled as he slid behind the steering wheel.

“Sure. Why not?” she said.

Closing the front door and glad for the excuse to move to the back seat, she climbed in next to Brady’s nephew, waved her hand blithely and in a nasal voice, said, “Home, James.”

Connor wrinkled his nose. “James? His name’s Brady!”

“Not when he’s our chauffeur,” she said, wagging a finger, her voice still pinched and snooty.

Connor caught on to her joke and gave a belly laugh. Mimicking her hoity-toity tone, he said, “Drive us home, James!”

Brady loosed an indelicate snort, then returned, “Righty-o, Sir Snoodlepants.”

Connor’s peals of laughter filled Piper with an odd warmth, and she couldn’t stop the giggles that bubbled up.

“Hey, Piper,” Connor asked as they backed out of the parking space, “how do you stop an elephant from charging?”

She cut a glance to Brady, whose cheek dimpled as he grinned. “I don’t know. How?”

“Take away her credit card!” Connor’s eyes lit as he delivered the punch line, and Piper found herself chuckling at the boy’s delight. She didn’t have much experience around children. Most of her friends were either unmarried or putting off starting a family while they launched their careers. Yet Brady had had fatherhood handed to him under difficult circumstances. The notion made her chest tighten. If she hadn’t gotten the scholarship that took her to Boston College, how would her life have been different? Could she and Brady have made their relationship work? Could they have been parents to—

She nipped off the thought before it fully formed. Don’t go there.

Focusing her attention on Brady’s nephew, she asked, “Do you know what an elephant’s favorite vegetable is?”

He shook his head.

“Squash!”

“Squash!” Connor repeated with another hardy laugh. “Did you hear that, Brady? Squash!”

“Afraid so, little man.”

Connor continued to entertain her with riddles as they drove out of the airport and merged onto the highway.

She mentally thanked Connor for providing an excuse not to make awkward conversation with Brady. The boy’s invitation to ride in the back seat with him also gave her the opportunity to study Brady’s profile covertly, to drink in the subtle changes in his face without him knowing.

“Do you know any more jokes?” Connor asked, his cheeks flushed and eyes bright with his amusement.

Piper scoured her memory for one of the lame riddles she and her brothers had told each other years ago. “What is black and white and red all over?”

“A zebra with a sun burn!” Connor shouted, clearly pleased with himself.

The boy’s mirth elicited an answering chuckle from her. The music of Connor’s giggles fed her soul. Laughing loosened the knots of tension that had kinked inside her the moment she spotted Brady across the airport lobby. More than that, goofing around with the little boy was a release she’d needed from the pressures and worries of her sixty-hour-a-week job and a few high-maintenance friends in Boston.

When was the last time she’d allowed herself to be silly? To laugh with the kind of carefree abandon that Connor enjoyed? Not that she didn’t share light moments with her friends and coworkers in Boston. She did. But with Connor there was no agenda, no drama. Just a little boy enjoying bad puns and simple irony.

Connor delivered the punch line of a joke she realized she’d missed as she was musing, but she groaned and grinned as if she’d been paying attention. As he started another riddle, Piper had the odd sensation of being watched. She’d experienced the prickling sensation at the back of her neck frequently over the past few months, so she knew the unsettling feeling well. Her gaze flew to the driver’s seat, and she found Brady staring at her via the rearview mirror. His gaze locked with hers, a strange, unreadable expression sculpting his face. The odd look held a note of intimacy, but also an edgy curiosity. Was it wariness? Fear? What did Brady have to fear from her? She didn’t have long to analyze his expression before his attention darted back to the road.

Connor, too, had fallen oddly quiet, eyeing them, then turning his gaze out the window and shifting restlessly in his booster seat. The boy’s brow beetled, and he said, “Uncle Brady, is this the road where Mama and Daddy died?”

Piper stilled, and a cold sorrow sliced through her.

Brady’s hand tightened around the steering wheel, and he again glanced in the rearview mirror, this time to study his nephew. “Yeah, it is.” He paused, then added, “But not this part. Their accident happened the other direction from the big city.”

“Oh,” was all Connor replied, still staring out the window.

Piper rubbed her thumb over the knuckles of her opposite hand, keeping a concerned gaze on Connor and regretting the lost conviviality. How was the boy handling the death of his parents? Knowing the challenge Brady had faced, taking custody of a newly orphaned boy while dealing with his own grief over Scott and Pam’s deaths filled her with a new respect for her longtime friend. Brady had dealt with a lot more obligations and hardships than other men his age, even when he and Piper been involved as teenagers. The loss of his mother and his father’s heavy drinking had meant he’d had to grow up fast and take on more family responsibility, especially after Scott married and moved out of town.

“Connor?” Brady said softly. “You all right, buddy?”

The boy heaved a mature-sounding sigh. “Yeah.” Then, “I miss them.”

Brady nodded. “Me, too, buddy.”

Piper tightened her fists in her lap, hurting for Connor, for Brady. Scott and Pam had only been gone nine months. Their deaths had to still be a raw and confusing subject for Connor.

After another minute or two of strained silence in the truck, Piper searched for another joke to tell, a distracting question to redirect Connor’s thoughts and lighten the mood. Or was that even the right move? Should she follow Brady’s lead and let Connor work through this moment on his own? All she knew was that her heart hurt for the little boy, and her instinct was to do something, anything, to put a smile back on his face. But what did she know about parenting?

While she was debating, Connor said, “Hey, Piper?”

“Yes, sweetie?”

“What do you call a wet bear?”

She released the breath she held and flashed a warm smile at the boy. “I don’t know.”

“A drizzily bear.” He shot her a quick grin, then turned back to his window, falling quiet again. “My dad told me that one.”

“That’s a good one,” she said and patted his knobby knee.

Connor twisted his mouth and wrinkled his nose. “My mom and dad died in a car accident.”

Her grip on his knee tightened. “I know, sweetie. I’m so sorry.”

“I live with Uncle Brady and Grampa now. At the Double M.”

Piper nodded. “Do you like the ranch?”

His face brightened a bit. “It smells bad ’cause of all the animal poop, but you get used to it.”

She couldn’t help but snort a chuckle at the boy’s bluntness. Having grown up on the ranch, she’d never really noticed or cared about the odors that accompanied all the animals. For her, the scents of oiled leather and freshly cut alfalfa were sweeter than roses.

“Riding horses and helping Uncle Brady with the cows is fun,” Connor added.

“Well, I’ve been away from the ranch for a lot of months, so my riding may be rusty.” She tipped her head and gave the boy a dubious frown. “Would you help me with my horse while I’m visiting this week?”

Connor sat taller and grinned. “Sure! I’m good at saddling and riding.” He glanced to his uncle, adding, “Aren’t I, Brady?”

“You are, little man. That you are.” Brady sent Connor a proud grin as he met his nephew’s gaze in the mirror. “When we get home, Grampa will have dinner waiting, so I want you to go straight back to the house and wash up. Okay?”

“Y’sir.”

Home. Piper turned her attention to the scenery passing outside her window. She’d been so absorbed in Connor that she’d not realized how close they were getting to the Double M. The beef-cattle ranch had been in her family for three generations. She’d grown up around muddy boots, bleating calves and horse tails swishing away flies. Her parents and brothers still lived on and worked the ranch, and someday she’d inherit one third of the Double M.

But was the ranch still her home? She’d been gone seven years. Seven eventful years. She’d done a lot of growing up since she left the Double M. She’d earned her degree in finance, gotten her first nine-to-five job with a finance company, set herself up in an apartment that she’d decorated to her taste.

And she’d made the toughest decisions of her life to give birth to, then give away, Brady’s baby.

She swallowed hard and pressed her hand to her stomach. The memory always caused a guilty roil in her gut. She’d made the best decision she could as a scared eighteen-year-old, but that didn’t mean she didn’t constantly second-guess herself.

As Brady took an unexpected exit from the interstate, Piper glanced up, confused. “Where are you going?”

He angled his head toward her. “Ice cream. Remember?”

Connor sat taller, and his face brightened. “Yay! I’m gonna get chocolate, too, Piper!”

“One scoop, buddy. And you have to promise to eat your vegetables at dinner,” Brady said, one eyebrow arched.

She shook her head slightly. When had Brady turned into such a...a...parent?

The answer came to her, and her stomach curled in on itself. She really had no appetite for ice cream. No desire to extend the awkwardness between her and Brady. She only wanted to get to the ranch and decompress after her flight, unwind the tension that had coiled in her the instant she’d spotted Brady. But she’d be damned if she’d be party to disappointing Connor, a boy whose world had been so thoroughly devastated in recent months. For Connor’s sake, she’d paste on a smile, eat a chocolate ice cream cone and endure a few more taut minutes playing nice with the one man who still had the power to break her heart.

Ken didn’t recognize the cowboy who’d met Piper at the airport. Nor did he know anything about the little boy. The guy wasn’t one of her brothers. He’d seen the pictures of them she had on her desk at the office...and stored in her laptop. Irritation crawled through him. He didn’t like the idea that Piper had people in her life that he didn’t have at least a little information on.

Whoever the guy was, Piper had seemed startled to see him. She’d been cool and standoffish at first, but when that klutz with his big duffel had knocked her into the cowboy, he had been quick to catch her, slow to release her. Piper and the cowboy had shared a look that hinted at a history together. A history that might not be completely in the past. Something hot and not-yet smothered.

Hatred had burned his gut, and he’d wanted to charge across the airport and grab the randy cowboy by the throat. He’d vibrated with the urge to tear up the mystery rancher and leave no question that Piper was his.

But doing so would blow his cover, would mean leaving the concealed post he’d staked out ahead of Piper’s arrival. It was too soon to let her know he was here, that he’d come to Colorado to be with her, to prove to her that they belonged together.

Now, from the rental car he’d had waiting in the short-term parking lot since his arrival two hours ahead of Piper, he followed the cowboy’s pickup truck from a cautious distance, across the plain at the foot of the Rocky Mountains where crops, pastures and farms dotted the landscape.

Not wanting to be noticed, he hung back when the truck left the interstate, waited impatiently while they stopped for ice cream, then continued following from a distance as they headed northeast on a state road. He managed to keep Piper and the cowboy in sight until they turned in at a gravel driveway. Ken slowed as he drove past the rutted road the pickup had taken and studied a crude, stripped-log entry arch. Hanging from the top of the arch, a sun-aged wooden sign greeted people with Welcome to the Double M.

He paused long enough to search for GPS coordinates with his phone, planning to use satellite images to scope out the terrain tonight from his motel room. He had a cell signal, but it was mediocre at best. He grunted his disgust. Why would anyone in their right mind want to live out here in the middle of nowhere with a bunch of smelly cows? He could give Piper so much more than this!

He shook his head. No, not could...he would give Piper more. He would show her their destinies were locked, intertwined. He would save her from this dirt hole in the middle of Nothing, Colorado. He’d even take her away from Boston, if needed. They’d find a place where no one could find them, no one could distract her, no one could interfere with his plans for the future with Piper. His Piper. His soul mate.

He’d make it happen. And just like he’d eliminated Ron Sandburg, he’d get rid of anything or anyone who stood in his way.