is bad. This is…not like me, Grant reminded himself.
And it wasn’t. Not like him in the least.
Yeah. All right. He knew that in town, folks considered him something of a ladies’ man.
And he did like a pretty woman. What man didn’t? But he never obsessed over any of them, never got tongue-tied as a green kid in their presence.
Not until today, anyway.
Stephanie. Of all the women in the world…
By some minor miracle, he found his voice. “Show me what?”
“You’ll see.” She beamed up at him, those shining eyes green as a matched pair of four-leaf clovers. “Come on.” She tugged on his hand.
He let her pull him along, vaguely aware of a chuckle from Rufus behind them and the hissing snap as the cowboy struck a match.
Inside, she led him to the office, which was off the entry hall, not far from the front door. She tugged him over to the desk and pushed him down into the worn leather swivel chair that used to be his dad’s.
He sent her a wary glance. “What’s this about?”
“You’ll see.” She turned on the new computer she’d asked him to buy for her when she started in as top hand.
“What?” he demanded, his senses so full of her, he thought he’d explode.
“Don’t be so impatient. Give it a chance to boot up.” She leaned over his chair, her gaze on the computer screen, that fragrant hair swinging forward. He watched, transfixed, as she tucked that golden hank of loose hair back behind her ear. He stared at her profile and longed to reach up and run the back of his hand down the smooth golden skin of her throat, to get a fistful of that shining hair and bring it to his mouth so he could feel the silkiness against his lips. “There,” she announced. By then, she had her hand on the mouse. She started clicking. “Look at that.” She beamed with pride.
He tore his hungry gaze from her face and made himself look at the monitor. “Okay. A spreadsheet.”
She laughed. The musical sound seemed to shiver all through him. “Oh, come on. Who’s got the fancy business degree from UM? Not me, that’s for sure.” She pointed. “Look. That’s a lot of calves, wouldn’t you say? And look at the totals in the yearling column. They’re high. I think it’s going to be a fine year.”
He peered closer at the spreadsheet, frowning. She was right. The yearling count was pretty high. He muttered gruffly, “Not bad…”
“I’m working on making sure they’re all nice and fat come shipping day. And as far as the calves? I think the total is high there because of that new feed mixture I gave their mamas before calving time. Healthy cows make healthy calves.” She laughed again. “Well, duh.
As if you didn’t know. And you just watch. Next year, when those calves are ready for market, they’ll be weighing in at close to seven hundred pounds each—which is really what I’m leading up to here. Yeah, my new feed mixture is looking like a real success. But bottom line? Winter feeding is expensive. Not only because of all the hay we have to put up, but also in the labor-intensive work of caring for and feeding our pregnant cows in the winter months when the feed has got be brought to them. If you really stop and think about it, we work for the cows. My idea is to start letting our cows work for us, letting them find their own feed, which they would do, if there was any available during the winter months…”
He watched her mouth move and kept thinking about what it might feel like under his. What it might taste like…
She gave him a big smile. “There are changes going on in the industry, Grant. Ranchers are learning that just because a thing has always been done a certain way doesn’t automatically mean it’s the best, most efficient and profitable way. What I’m getting to here is that lots of ranchers now are switching from spring to summer calving. And you know what?”
He cleared his throat. “Uh. What?”
“It’s working for them, Grant. Matching the nutritional needs of the herd to the forage available can cut production costs and improve profitabil…” Her sweet, husky voice trialed off. “Grant? You with me here?”
“Yeah.”
“You seem…distracted.”
“No. Really. I’m not.”
She leaned in a little closer to him, a tiny frown forming between her smooth brows, the amazing scent of her taunting him even more cruelly that a moment before. “Is it…” She spoke so softly, almost shyly, the savvy ranch foreman suddenly replaced by a nervous young girl. “…about earlier?”
He flat out could not think. His mind was one big ball of mush. “Uh. Earlier?”
A flush swept up her satiny throat and stained her cheeks a tempting pink. “Um. You know. At the creek…” Her gold-tipped lashes swept down. And she swore. A very bad word.
It shocked him enough that he let out a laugh. “Steph. Shame on you.”
With a low, frustrated sound, she straightened and stepped back. He felt equal parts relief and despair—relief that she was far enough away he wasn’t quite so tempted to grab her. Despair that the delicious smell of her no longer swam all around him.
“Damn it,” she said—a much milder oath that time. “I am so…dumb. Just…really, completely childish and dumb.”
“Uh. Steph.”
“What?” She glared at him.
“What are you talking about?”
She flung out a hand. “Oh, please. You know exactly what I’m talking about.”
“Er. I do?”
“I keep…beating this silly dead horse to death over and over again. It’s just not that huge a deal that you saw me naked, right?” She looked at him pleadingly.
For her sake—and his—he told a whopper of a lie. “No. Not at all. Not a huge deal at all.”
“Exactly. It’s no big deal and I need to act like a grown-up and let it go. But no. Every time you look at me funny, I’m just sure you’re thinking how annoyed or amused or…whatever you are at me and it gets me all…flustered and I instantly start babbling away about the whole stupid thing all over again. Oh, I just… Will somebody shoot me? Please. Will somebody just put me clean out of my misery?”
He rose. “Steph.”
She put up a hand. “Oh, wait. I know you’re going to say something nice. That’s how you are. Always so good. So understanding. So…um…” Her eyes widened as he did exactly what he shouldn’t do and closed the distance between them. “Wonderful…” she whispered. “Just a wonderful man.”
Getting close again was bad enough. But the last thing he ought to do was to put his hands on her. He knew that. He did.
So why the hell was he reaching out and clasping her shoulders?
