at the ranch to begin their afternoon chores.
“If you’re through with me, officer, I have work to do.”
“I’m definitely through with you,” she announced, stepping away from the window. “I will abide by whatever decision the chief makes about our…um…incident.”
“Ditto,” Vance said, “but I expect to get the short end of the stick since you’ve got family and professional connections.”
He watched her thrust back her shoulders and jerk up her chin. His gaze immediately dipped to her well-endowed chest. It was beyond comprehension that he found this female so damn attractive when she bugged the hell out of him. She was so distant and reserved that he had the ridiculous urge to draw a reaction from her—like tormenting a guard at Buckingham Palace until he snapped.
Vance had never had a problem relating to people or dealing with women. Normally he got along with everyone—male and female alike—because it was his objective in life to draw out a smile. He joked around, enjoyed making folks laugh and he tried not to take himself, or the world, too seriously.
He’d learned that technique after getting his heart crammed into a meat grinder by Shawna Karmody a few years back. Since that humiliating affair Vance enjoyed the company of women, enjoyed casual sexual gratification and used corny jokes and playful pranks to remain at an emotional arm’s length.
Too bad he found nothing amusing about dealing with Miranda Jackson. And yet, he couldn’t keep his eyes off her. She drew his attention and held if fast. What kind of self-defeating complex did he have going here?
“You’re doing it again,” Miranda said, jostling him back to the present.
Vance jerked his gaze off her full breasts. “Doing what?”
“Staring at me as if you can see…” Her gaze flicked away, unable to maintain visual contact. “I don’t like it when men look past the uniform. It’s insulting and degrading.”
“Then try pinning that badge someplace besides on your chest,” Vance teased, and then grinned scampishly when her face flushed beet red. “Look, Officer Jackson, I’m trying my damn…er…darnedest to stay out of your way and to see you impersonally, but you might as well know that I find you attractive.
“I don’t particularly like you and you definitely don’t like me, but there you have it. Right smack-dab out in the open. Now, if you want to arrest me for that, then fine. I’ll plead no contest. But just because I can’t seem to help liking what I see, doesn’t mean I plan to throw myself at you. I do have some restraint. Are we clear on that, ma’am?”
Miranda stared into his ruggedly handsome face, into those entrancing midnight-colored eyes, and felt the unwanted jolt of attraction jarring her entire body. “Okay, since you’re being honest I’ll return the favor. I like the looks of you, too, even if you don’t take things seriously and you drive the most pathetic excuse for a vehicle that ever cruised the highway. You’re good-looking and I’m sure you know it. Same goes for your two cousins.”
“Three, actually,” he corrected, lips twitching. “But Gage is out of the country, breaking foreign hearts as we speak, I suspect. And thank you for the compliment, ma’am. Even if you think I’m stupid, it’s nice to know you don’t find me hideously ugly while you’re handing me warnings and tickets.”
Miranda broke down and smiled when he grinned playfully. She just couldn’t help it. The man was a charmer when he wanted to be. His smile was contagious and those devilish eyes lured her into their dark, shiny depths.
“Well, I guess that’s that. Now we can attend the chief’s upcoming meeting without going for each other’s throats,” she said, taking another step away from more the unwanted lure of Vance Ryder.
“Fine with me.” He poked his head out the window and extended his hand. “Shall we shake on it and call a truce?”
Miranda placed her hand in his—and felt the sizzle of electricity humming through her body. She quickly extracted her hand from his grasp and noted her palm was sweating. For heaven’s sake, what was the matter with her? Since graduating from the academy she’d learned to handle a variety of tense and dangerous situations. So why was dealing with this particular cowboy different? Why did he affect her to such unprecedented extremes? She’d never felt such an intense reaction to the presence or the casual touch of a man before.
It was so unlike her. She lived for the job. Yet, since the moment she encountered Vance Ryder her hormones had gone completely haywire. This was absurd. She didn’t even like him very much and he admitted he didn’t care much for her, either.
She and Vance were like protons and neutrons bouncing around inside the same atom, repelling each other, colliding with each other. They were absolutely nothing alike. They had nothing in common. They approached life from opposing directions. She took life, and her job, seriously and he didn’t seem capable of taking anything seriously—except their previous shouting match in Tate’s office.
Vance flexed and clenched his fist then clamped his hands around the steering wheel. He took his gaze off her and stared through the recently washed windshield. “I need to get going.”
“If the blinkers don’t work on this bucket of bolts, please use hand signals when you veer onto the graveled road,” she instructed, falling back into police mode. “Have a good day, sir.”
Vance glanced sideways at her and her heart gave an unexpected lurch when his obsidian eyes twinkled and he flashed one of those smiles that no woman could resist.
“You, too, Officer,” he said in a low, raspy voice that drifted down her spine like a seductive caress.
When the truck rumbled off, its engine sputtering, Miranda pivoted on her heels to return to her squad car. She sincerely hoped that after the Saturday meeting at headquarters she wouldn’t see Vance Ryder—except at a safe distance. She had no intention of getting interested in that cowboy. After all, she was only going to be employed by HRPD until Uncle Tate gave her the nod to take a position in Oklahoma City.
Miranda had her life planned out. Had a promising career ahead of her. She intended to follow in her dad’s and her two brothers’ footsteps. A family of cops serving in the same jurisdiction. It was all she’d ever wanted, all she’d dreamed about.
For sure, she wasn’t going to get sidetracked by a down-on-his luck rancher who drove a beat-up truck and probably had the ambition of a slug.
On that determined thought Miranda slid beneath the steering wheel then cruised off to ensure the speed demons around Hoot’s Roost observed traffic codes.
VANCE INWARDLY GRIMACED when he put on the brakes and saw his cousins leaning leisurely against the fender of Quint’s red pickup. Those two rascals were lying in wait, ready to tease the hell out of him for getting stopped two days in a row by the same lady cop. He didn’t want them niggling him for information because, as much as he didn’t approve of Randi Jackson and her gung ho attitude, shaking hands with her and staring too long at that gorgeous bod of hers set off disturbing explosions of sexual attraction. It was insane. Plus, he’d gotten aroused just watching her walk toward him.
Jeez, if ever there was a more unlikely pair, he and Randi were it. He smiled easily and often. She didn’t. He looked for amusement in everything he did. She took everything megaseriously and stood behind her badge like a protective shield. But, man was she hot. The way she filled out her blue
