spectacular party for Cricket, which had made Cricket look wide-eyed and uncomfortable, particularly in the fitted dress Emerson had chosen for her. Cricket did not enjoy being the center of attention.
Emerson did like it. But only on her terms.
Cricket looked mildly incensed in the moonlight. “I didn’t come out here to be teased.”
“I’m sorry,” Emerson responded, sincere because she didn’t want to hurt her sister. She only wanted to mildly goad her, because Cricket was incredibly goadable.
Emerson looked out across the vast expanse of fields and frowned when she saw a figure moving among the vines.
It was a man. She could tell even from the balcony that he had a lean, rangy body, and the long strides of a man who was quite tall.
“Who’s that?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” Cricket said, peering down below. “Should I get Dad?”
“No,” Emerson said. “I can go down.”
She knew exactly who was supposed to be at the party, and who wasn’t.
And if this man was one of the Coopers from Cowboy Wines, then she would have reason to feel concerned that he was down there sniffing around to get trade secrets.
Not that their top rival had ever stooped to that kind of espionage before, but she didn’t trust anyone. Not really.
Wine-making was a competitive industry, and it was only becoming more so.
Emerson’s sister Wren always became livid at the mere mention of the Cooper name, and was constantly muttering about all manner of dirty tricks they would employ to get ahead. So really, anything was possible.
“I’ll just run down and check it out.”
“You’re going to go down and investigate by yourself?”
“I’m fine.” Emerson waved a hand. “I have a cell phone, and the place is heavily populated right now. I don’t think I’m going to have any issues.”
“Emerson…”
Emerson slipped back inside, and out a side door, moving quickly down the stairs, not listening to her sister at all. She didn’t know why, but she felt compelled to see who the man was for herself.
Maybe because his arrival was the first truly interesting thing to happen all evening. She went in the direction where she’d last seen the figure, stepping out of the golden pool of light spilling from the party and into the grapevines. The moonlight illuminated her steps, though it was pale and left her hands looking waxen.
She rounded one row of grapevines into the next, then stopped, frozen.
She had known he was tall, even from a distance. But he was…very tall. And broad.
Broad shoulders, broad chest. He was wearing a cowboy hat, which seemed ridiculous at night, because it wasn’t keeping the sun off him. He had on a tight black T-shirt and a pair of jeans.
And he was not a Cooper.
She had never seen the man before in her life. He saw her and stopped walking. He lifted his head up, and the moonlight caught his features. His face was sculpted, beautiful. So much so that it immobilized her. That square jaw was visible in even this dim light.
“I… Have you lost your way?” she asked. “The party is that way. Though… I’m fairly certain you’re not on the guest list.”
“I wasn’t invited to any party,” he said, his voice rough and raspy, made for sin.
Made for sin?
She didn’t know where such a thought had come from.
Except, it was easy to imagine that voice saying all kinds of sinful things, and she couldn’t credit why.
“Then… Forgive me, but what are you doing here?”
“I work here,” he said. “I’m the new ranch hand.”
Damn if she wasn’t Little Red Riding Hood delivered right to the Big Bad Wolf.
Except, she wasn’t wearing a scarlet cloak. It was a scarlet dress that clung to her generous curves like wrapping paper around a tempting present.
Her dark hair was lined silver by the moonbeams and tumbling around naked shoulders.
He could picture her in his bed, just like that. Naked and rumpled in the sheets, that hair spread everywhere.
It was a shame he wasn’t here for pleasure.
He was here for revenge.
And if he had guessed correctly based on what he knew about the Maxfield family, this was Emerson Maxfield. Who often had her beautiful face splashed across magazine covers for food and wine features, and who had become something of an It Girl for clothing brands as well. She was gorgeous, recognizable…and engaged.
But none of that would have deterred him, if he really wanted her.
What the hell did he care if a man had put a ring on a woman’s finger? In his opinion, if an engaged or married woman was looking elsewhere, then the man who’d put the ring on her finger should’ve done a better job of keeping her satisfied.
If Holden could seduce a woman, then the bastard he seduced her away from deserved it.
Indiscretion didn’t cause him any concern.
But there were a whole lot of women and a whole lot of ways for him to get laid, and he wasn’t about to sully himself inside a Maxfield.
No matter how gorgeous.
“I didn’t realize my father had hired someone new,” she said.
It was funny, given what he knew about her family, the way that she talked like a little private school princess. But he knew she’d gone to elite schools on the East Coast, coming back home to Oregon for summer vacations, at least when her family wasn’t jet-setting off somewhere else.
They were the wealthiest family in Logan County, with a wine label that competed on the world stage.
Her father, James Maxfield, was a world-class visionary, a world-class winemaker…and a world-class bastard.
Holden had few morals, but there were some scruples he held dear. At the very top of that list was that when he was with a woman, there was no coercion involved. And he would never leave one hopeless, blackmailed and depressed. No.
But James Maxfield had no such moral code.
And, sadly for James, when it came to dealing out justice to men who had harmed someone Holden cared about very much, he didn’t have a limit on how far he was willing to go. He wondered what Emerson would think if she knew what her father had
