When the men climbed into the fire-engine red pickup and roared off in a cloud of dust, Laura squared her shoulders, stiffened her resolve and headed for the house to unpack her belongings. She was going to be helpful and cheerful and prove to Wade that she wasn’t an unwanted inconvenience in his home. He’d find no fault with her, she vowed. She’d take her job seriously and put in a hard day’s work for a hard day’s pay.
This would be no different than the first week of a new school year, she mused as she strode toward the sprawling ranch-style brick home on the hill. It always took her and her students several days to get acquainted and for them to adjust to her way of conducting class. It took a week for her to evaluate the various personalities of her students and determine the best way to deal with them. The same held true for Wade Ryder. In a week she’d know how to handle him and her duties. Things at the ranch would run like a well-oiled machine, she convinced herself.
Mentally prepared, Laura pasted on a smile and ventured inside the house. Wade was still ensconced in the massive leather recliner in his very masculine, no-frills living room. The ranch décor, with landscape paintings of rolling hills, rustic barns and grazing livestock, fit this rugged rancher, Laura decided. The room lacked a woman’s touch and the heavy drapes were drawn—save the one window near the front door. She’d take Vance and Quint’s suggestion to give this dark room an open, visitor-friendly appearance.
“What the hell do you have in those three coffins my cousins dragged in here? Dead bodies?” Wade asked abruptly.
The snide questions and the harsh tone in which they were delivered caused Laura’s smile to wither on her lips. She halted in midstep. “Coffins?” she repeated, bemused.
“Yeah, those coffin-size suitcases,” he said, grimacing as he leaned sideways to retrieve the glass of ice water on the end table. “In case you haven’t noticed, this is a ranch, not a resort hotel that requires scads of fancy clothes to attend scheduled activities. A couple of pairs of faded jeans and T-shirts are all you need.”
Laura reflexively flinched at his catty insinuation that her country-club attire, packed in those coffin-size suitcases—as he referred to them—was inappropriate for her new job. If Wade was trying to aggravate her, he’d succeeded. While it was true that she came from a privileged background she never flaunted wealth and she certainly didn’t consider herself better than anyone else. But one look in Wade’s direction indicated that he thought that she thought she was just a step below royalty and hadn’t put in a day’s work in her life. That was nowhere near accurate. She and her brothers prided themselves in being hard workers. Wade had no right whatsoever to presume anything about her when they’d only just met.
Man, this guy was a real piece of work! He might be as handsome as sin but he acted like the very devil!
“I’ll go unpack,” she said between her teeth as she made a beeline across the spacious room.
“That’ll probably take you the rest of the day,” he said, then smirked. “I guess I can forget about your squeezing in time to scrounge up something for my supper.”
The smart-ass comment brought her up short. She glanced back at those glittering green eyes that shouted disapproval and animosity. “My job description is to cook, clean and ensure you take care of yourself during your recuperation, Mr. Ryder,” she said in a tone she usually reserved for ill-mannered students. “Supper will definitely be served. What time do you usually eat?”
He scoffed, as if she’d asked a stupid question. “This is a ranch, Seymour. You’ve obviously never been within shouting distance of one before, or else you’d know that supper is scheduled around chores that always come first.”
She smiled in mock sweetness. “And obviously you won’t be attending your usual chores for a while.” Her rejoinder caused his brows to bunch up on his scratched forehead, which gave her a small degree of satisfaction. “Therefore, we can establish a schedule for eating and you can depend on my having food on the table at dinnertime. Now, I’ll ask again, Mr. Ryder, what time would you like to eat this evening?”
“Six forty-five,” he grunted, then wet his whistle with ice water.
Laura was pretty sure the same said liquid flowed through the man’s veins. What a foul-tempered bear he was! He might have rugged sex appeal oozing from his pores and a body like nobody’s business, but he had the disposition of a wounded grizzly and he was making no effort to make her feel wanted or welcome.
“Fine, six forty-five it is,” she said.
“Good. I’ll eat in here…in my recliner…by myself.”
He made it crystal clear that he didn’t want or need her company. Not that she cared, of course. She’d rather eat in a cafeteria with a bunch of teenage students during a food fight than dine with him anyway.
When she walked off he jacked up the volume of the TV where an old Western, starring John Wayne, was playing. If he was trying to annoy her, he was doomed to disappointment this time. She was a John Wayne fan from way back and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance was one of her favorites.
Liberty Valance had nothing on Wade Ryder, she decided on her way down the hall. Both men leaned toward mean and nasty and deserved a good shooting.
2
LAURA NEATLY STACKED HER underwear and socks in the empty dresser and hung her clothes in the walk-in closet. Pensively she contemplated ways to give the living area a more welcoming appearance. For sure, she’d let plenty of light into that dark room, place scented candles and potpourri on the end tables and fill the area with vases of wildflowers. Then she’d rearrange the furniture to give the room better balance.
Laura stashed her suitcases in the corner of the closet then hiked off to appraise the kitchen and check to see what kind of food was on hand for supper. She was pleased to find an ultramodern kitchen at her disposal, but the reckless arrangement of food in the cabinets offended her sense of order. She set about organizing the boxes, cans and jars in alphabetical order so she wouldn’t waste valuable time rummaging to locate items while cooking.
She was halfway through the process when Wade hobbled into the kitchen on his crutch and braced his battered body against the doorjamb. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he all but roared at her.
Refusing to let him rile her, Laura pivoted and tossed him a high-voltage smile. “I’m reorganizing the kitchen.”
“It was the fine the way it was,” he grouched. “I’ll never find a damn thing now.”
“You won’t have to because I’m in charge of KP duty for the next six to eight weeks,” she reminded him, striving for a noncombative tone—which wasn’t easy since he was glaring thunderclouds on her sunny smile.
“You’re working here, not taking over the place,” he growled. “Put that stuff back where it was…now.”
Even bruised and mauled, the man could still come off looking ominous and intimidating. Laura forced herself not to shrink away from him the way she’d done when they first met. Learning to hold her own was good practice, she realized. Her fairy godbrothers were no longer waving their magic wands, paving the way for her and running interference. She’d landed her new teaching position by herself and she was taking absolute control of her life for the first time in twenty-five years. Wade was a test of her character and gumption and she had no intention
