men. Four of them. The only Barron missing was Clay.
Yikes! She had to get out of here. She could avoid driving by the office, though it involved a circuitous route. Kade’s truck was still parked in front of the house and she figured the brothers would be headed here next. She located her purse and keys, glanced around to make sure no other evidence of her presence remained and boogied outside. She twisted the lock on the door handle, hoping it would secure the door, and pulled it shut behind her.
Skulking to her car, she scrunched down behind the wheel, started the engine and eased away from Kade’s house. Taking the back road toward the houses where other ranch hands lived, she eventually circled around toward the big house, gained the driveway and rocketed down it. Pippa didn’t take a deep breath until she’d hit the section line road headed toward I-35. Then she started laughing. She was so ridiculous sometimes.
* * *
Kade sat on his horse. The small hill gave him a good view of the ranch buildings on the left and the grass range where a herd of Black Angus cattle grazed. He’d ridden out before dawn looking for some peace. He hadn’t found it. He took off his Stetson and turned his face toward the sun. Wind teased his hair, loosening a few strands from the cord he used to tie it back.
He loved this land. Every scrap of it—the river to the south, the scrubby trees and rocky hills, the sweeping grasslands. He could admit to himself that he’d once wanted his own spread but after all the years here at the Crown B, this was home and he was satisfied. Until now.
Cyrus Barron. The man had been a master manipulator and he’d led Kade like a lamb to slaughter. Land management? You’re the expert, Kade. Cattle breeding program for high-yield, Grade A beef on the hoof? I trust you, Kade. Want a “super horse” stud? Do whatever you need, Kade. And he’d fallen right into the old man’s nasty web. Everything Kade worked for had been done to further the Barrons’ brand. And he’d been proud of what he’d achieved.
Then the truth came out.
Shoving the hat back on his head, he judged the time by the height of the sun on the eastern horizon. Was Pippa awake yet? And man, wasn’t that another can of worms he needed to sort out. He shoved that problem to the back of his mind. At the moment, he didn’t have the time or energy to sort out his feelings for Pippa. But he worried last night had been a mistake. A big mistake.
Kade shifted in the saddle to ease the pressure in his jeans. Physically, last night had been amazing. Emotionally? He wasn’t ready to go there. He liked Pippa. She was funny and cute and smart and sexy and sweet. Very sweet. She came from money—lots of it—and was the type of woman a Barron would date. Which brought him right back into that mental box he’d been trying to escape. He was a Barron. According to Cyrus’s will. But he wasn’t. He was Kaden Waite, half Chickasaw son of Rose Waite, grandson of William and Ramona Waite. He was a cattleman. He worked with his hands. He did not wear an expensive suit and tie.
But he’d put down roots in this place and it could all be his. His horse nickered and pawed the ground with a front foot. Kade loosened his grip on the reins. He’d freaked and stormed out of Barron Tower—and wasn’t that one of his finest moments. Not. He shook his head, feeling rueful. His half brothers had risen to their feet, all of them talking to him at once as he’d lost his cool. Chance had blocked the door, tried to manage the situation. Kade scrubbed at his face as he remembered the scene. He’d threatened to coldcock Chance if he didn’t get out of the way.
Chance held him in that conference room just long enough to say a few things—things he didn’t want to hear. Take some time, Chance had said. Think things over. Kade heard the murmurs of agreement coming from the rest of the Barron brothers. Yeah, easy for them to say. They’d grown up as Barrons, knew who and what they were.
Since coming to work at the ranch, he’d walked a fine line between employee and friend with the five brothers. Looking back, he recalled the sideways glances and the hints. They’d suspected all along and he’d been... What? An idiot? Stupid? Clueless? Pretty much. He’d definitely been blind. He was still too angry to call his mother and too unsure to call his grandparents.
How could she not tell him? And why hadn’t she gone after the sonavagun for child support? She’d worked hard all his life, sometimes two and three jobs until her paintings started to sell. His grandparents had all but raised him. All that time his father—Kade spit on the ground. Cyrus Barron had money. Lots of it. And he’d known of the bastard son living in Davis, Oklahoma.
The cell phone in his shirt pocket pinged. Jerking it out, he read the text from Selena Diaz, the ranch secretary. The Barron brothers had descended like locusts on the office. When was he coming back? He hated texting and she knew it. Stewing over whether to text back or call, and what to say, he chose to just ignore it.
He urged his horse off the hill and pointed him toward the far northwest side of the ranch. Selena’s husband Pedro and several other hands were moving cattle today. They needed supervision, he decided. There was something soothing about pushing cattle, even with the dirt and grit. Kade was good at this job. It settled him. He was desperate for that right now.
Six hours later, Selena caught him in the barn as he unsaddled his horse. She was full of sass as she stomped toward him, face twisted into her version of a snarl—mostly crinkled nose, pursed lips and narrowed eyes. She stopped several feet from him, planted her fists on her hips.
“Did you lose your phone?”
Kade didn’t look up. “No.” He carried the saddle and pad he’d just stripped off into the tack room and returned with a curry brush.
She opened her mouth to start again, but Kade beat her to the punch. “Don’t want to hear it, Leenie.”
“Seriously? Then don’t listen. Just stand there and don’t pay any attention to me while I talk.” When he continued brushing the horse, she launched into a speech. “Dude, you do not want to be jacking the brothers around. I know things have been really weird since Mr. Barron died. I mean the Crown B has always been sort of a...a sideline. Oh, sure, Cord was nominally in charge as president of Barron Land and Cattle but that was just a thing on a line of a corporate tax return because we all know he’s into all that oil and gas stuff. You have no idea how excited Pop was when old Mr. B hired you.”
Her father, Manuel Sanchez, was his ranch foreman now. Leenie and her sister, Rosalie, grew up on the Crown B. He tuned out her voice while he curried the horse. Then he turned his mount out in a big stall and set about watering and feeding the animal. Selena dogged him every step. He finally paid attention again when she grabbed his arm and jerked him around to face her.
“You could have at least replied to my text so I could tell them what was what so they’d get the heck out of my office. There was so dang much testosterone in the air even Dusty was hiding under my desk. What the heck is going on between you and them?”
Head lowered, he studied the tips of his boots. “Long story, Leenie.”
She ducked and twisted so she could look into his face. “They didn’t threaten to fire you or something, did they?”
How was he supposed to answer that? “Not your business.”
Leenie straightened and glowered. “Seriously? I work for you, dude. If you get fired, it is most definitely my business. And FYI, they’d be stupid if they did. I grew up on this ranch. I know what it was before. And what you’ve done with it? Absolutely no comparison, boss man.”
Kade removed his hat and scrubbed his fingers across the top of his head, loosening long
