crowd about. Natalie was a shoo-in for this year’s equestrian games in show jumping. As long as they could keep her primary mount, Nero, sound, she’d be representing the United States of America.
“Was he as good-looking as Mariah claims?”
“He’s not bad.”
More like drop-dead gorgeous with his blond hair and green eyes. He had the looks of a movie star. She frowned because that was something she knew firsthand.
Negative energy. Focus on the positive.
“Not bad?” Natalie repeated, blond brow arched over an almond-shaped eye.
“Okay, fine. He’s pretty hot.”
No sense in denying it. Natalie would see for herself one day soon.
“Wow, that’s pretty high praise coming from a woman who dated Jason Brown.”
“Shh,” she hissed, glancing around. She had no idea why. It wasn’t as if there were members of the paparazzi nearby. Those days were long behind her.
“What? I think it’s kind of cool that you dated People magazine’s sexiest man alive.”
“Yeah, well, they didn’t know him like I did.”
He’d called her because he’d been having problems with his Arabian stallion. She should have known right then that he was an idiot because only egotistical jerks owned stallions if they weren’t in the breeding business. But no, she’d accepted the job, figured out the problem and ended up getting asked out on a date, and he was just so dang handsome and sweet that she’d said yes. And then yes again. Only he’d turned out to be nothing like the men he portrayed on-screen. He wasn’t a sweetly sexy hometown boy. He was an ass who’d broken her heart.
“...don’t you think?”
Jillian shook her head. That was all in the past. A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away...
“What?” she had to ask.
“I said you should probably answer your cell phone, don’t you think?”
Jillian jumped, then fished into her back pocket for her phone and as she glanced down at the unfamiliar number, she knew—she just knew.
“It’s him.”
Sometimes her abilities extended beyond the animal kingdom.
“Him who?”
“Wes Landon.”
Natalie smirked. “That was quick.”
“Yeah.”
She ignored the voice of reason, the one that told her to ignore him because he was just a little too good-looking. It would be easy to forget the rules around him.
Her finger had a mind of its own. “Hello?”
“You ran away before you could give me your phone number.”
She wanted to grin like a silly teenage girl. What a doofus. She had sworn off men after Jason had left her shattered.
She glanced left. Natalie stared, her expression one of clear interest.
“You never indicated you wanted it,” she admitted. “Not that I was surprised. You know, me being a crazy woman and all.”
Next to her, Natalie broke into a wide smile.
“Come to think of it, how did you get my number?”
“Mariah.”
“I should have known.”
She shot Natalie a look of apology and then stood, heading toward the middle of the building and the exit. She didn’t need grief from her friend.
“What did you want?” she asked.
The noise of the crowd in the arena made it hard to hear and so she headed for the atrium at the front of the building. The smell of hot dogs and hamburgers filled the air and reminded her she hadn’t eaten lunch.
“You were right.” There was a pause, and she could perfectly imagine him shaking his head. Or maybe that was a visual she picked up from his dog. Hard to tell.
“I followed that horse back to the barn so I could watch the kid untack.”
“Oh?” She’d reached the exit and it was immediately quieter. “What’d you find out?”
A large man with a dog at his side blocked her path. The dog was a black-and-white border collie. She glanced up sharply, her heart flipping over in her chest. Beautiful green eyes smiled down at her from beneath a black cowboy hat, one nearly as dark as the man’s lashes.
“He about kicked the kid in the head.”
Her hand dropped, cell phone forgotten. His hand did the same, although he took the time to disconnect. She absently did the same.
“And then he yelled, ‘You crazy son of a bitch,’ before he spotted me standing there.”
Hey, Cowboy, she silently telegraphed the dog. A long black tail started to wag. She smiled and returned her attention to Wes.
So handsome. So ridiculously gorgeous. Mariah had been trying to set him up with one of the girls from the barn for ages, and he was so cute she might have been tempted to throw caution to the wind if they’d been introduced before now...before she’d pegged him as a doubting Thomas.
“Did he get nailed?” she asked to cover that particularly troubling thought.
Green eyes sparked. “Nah. He’s fine.” She saw his lips turn up in a brief smile as he remembered the incident. “But when he realized I’d heard, I could tell he was about to offer up some excuse. I told him don’t bother.”
“So you believe me now?”
And why did the thought make her so giddy? She knew what his answer would be even though she hoped for something different.
“I believe you intuitively knew something was off with that gelding.”
Intuition. A sixth sense. Men had excused her abilities a million times over. Women had, too, but it always felt different when it was a man.
“I’m usually pretty good at reading horses, but I’ll admit I missed the mark on this one.”
“That’s big of you.”
His smile was pure charm. “Mariah says you’re the real deal, a bona fide horse whisperer, and so I was thinking...”
No. Don’t say it. She didn’t want to spend any more time with him. To be honest, she had been glad when he let her walk away.
“...maybe between the two of us...”
He
