had been around for ten years, at least, because he’d had them in college. Looked like he’d be wearing them for the next two days. Finally, for good measure, he slicked back his dark hair.
The invasion could come at any minute, so he went in search of Tuck. He found the weathered foreman down by the round pen putting Gabriel through his paces. Tuck was a hell of a trainer, and if anyone could get Gabriel ready, this was the guy. Clint had known him all his life.
Tuck had been a good cowman in his day, too, but the Circle W had stopped running cattle several years ago. Clint’s dad had been mired in debt by the time he’d sold to George Forester, and the cash from the sale had all gone to pay off those debts. Now the ranch’s income came from boarding and training horses for all the folks who’d moved to the area recently. The Circle W also offered trail rides and cookouts for the tourists, and every year there were more tourists showing up in Sonoita.
In the beginning of his association with George, Clint had tried to interest him in quarterhorse racing, but George only cared about land values, so Clint had decided to pursue the racing angle on his own. He was lucky land values hadn’t skyrocketed, or the Circle W would already be subdivided and Clint would be out on his ass.
Or, put another way, if George got upset with Clint for some reason, any reason at all, he could be canned. Then no telling what would happen to Tuck, and José, the cook, and Jed and Denny, the ranch hands who helped take care of the place. George might sell all the horses and let the ranch go to seed. So Clint had to pretend that this TV thing was a good idea. For the first time, George had seemed pleased that the land had an actual ranch sitting on it.
“Hey, Tuck, I have some business to discuss with you.” Clint leaned against the top rail of the round pen and watched Tuck work Gabriel at the end of a lunge line.
“What’s that?” Tuck made a little chirping noise to keep the horse cantering in a circle. Then he took a look at Clint. “You sure are gussied up. You planning on getting hitched today?”
“No. The outfit’s part of my new plan. When this TV lady arrives, I’m going to tell her I’m not a cowboy, never have been a cowboy. I’m going to say I handle the business end of the ranch but you’re in charge of the physical running of the operation.”
“Good luck on putting over that whopper.” Tuck slowed Gabriel to a trot. “Even in those clothes, you look like a cowboy to me.”
“That’s because you know me. She doesn’t. She doesn’t know much of anything about anything, and I want to keep it that way. So how about it? Will you go along with whatever I tell her? And will you clue in the other guys?”
Tuck nodded as he watched Gabriel circling the pen. “It won’t work, but I’ll go along, and I’ll spread the word. So you’re definitely not entering her contest?”
Clint snorted, which startled Gabriel into breaking stride. “Nope.”
“Some people around here are real excited about this contest.” Tuck turned slowly with the motion of the horse. “They see it as the road to riches.”
“They couldn’t pay me enough to prance around on TV. I mean, would you do it?”
“Depends on the stakes, I guess. Anyhow, some vehicle’s kicking up a cloud of dust on the road, so I imagine that’s your TV people.”
Clint glanced over his shoulder. Oh, joy. He sighed and tried to cheer himself up with the thought that the whole episode would be over by the day after tomorrow. Then life at the Circle W could return to normal.
He walked toward the front of the ranch house, determined to be as gracious as possible without letting this TV woman take over. He got there as a white van pulled around the circular drive and parked in front of the house.
The woman who hopped down from the passenger side was shorter and skinnier than he’d imagined from watching her on TV. Mostly skinnier, anyway. Her breasts were quite impressive, not that it mattered to him one way or the other. Her outfit, though, was exactly what he might have expected.
She wore a rhinestone-studded denim shirt over a scoop-neck top that showed plenty of cleavage, a pair of tight cropped jeans also studded with rhinestones, and backless red shoes with pointed toes. The tooling on the red leather was probably supposed to make them look sort of like boots.
“Hi, there.” She walked toward him, her hand outstretched. “I’m Meg Delancy, from ‘Meg and Mel in the Morning’.”
He’d intended to be suave. He’d intended to be slightly nonchalant, as if he met TV celebrities every day and he couldn’t get very excited about this one. But her smile blinded him. He hadn’t been prepared for that smile to go right through him and make him weak in the knees.
Despite her ridiculous outfit, despite her plan to turn the noble Circle W into a media circus, despite his resentment of her intrusion into his peaceful way of life, he was dazzled. “I’m…uh…Clint…uh…Walker.”
“Now there’s a name right out of television Westerns. Wasn’t Clint Walker the star of Cheyenne?”
“My dad loved the show.” He shook her incredibly soft hand and cursed himself for acting like a teenager with a crush.
“Glad to meet you, Mr. Walker. I must say I expected jeans and a Stetson. You’d be right at home on Madison Avenue.”
“Well, I don’t…my foreman, Tucker Benson, he’s the cowboy around here. I’m a business-school major.” That last part was true. Unfortunately his shiny new degree had been no good when it had come to pulling the ranch out of the red.
“Not everyone’s cut out to be a cowboy, Mr. Walker.”
“You can call me Clint.” The words were out before he knew it. Sheesh. And he’d promised himself not to be overly friendly, just polite. Mr. Walker would have suited that plan perfectly.
“I’ll do that.” She hit him with The Smile again before gesturing to the small, wiry guy who climbed from the driver’s side of the van. “This is my cameraman, Jamie Cranston. Jamie, this is Clint Walker, our host.”
“Good to meet you.” Jamie’s handshake was firm. Then he glanced up at the sky. “We still have some daylight left, so if you don’t mind, I’d like to get footage of the ranch. Do you have a bunkhouse?”
“Yes. Behind the main house, over by the corrals.” Clint thought about the usual condition of the bunkhouse. “But the place isn’t very—”
“I’m not interested in a Hollywood bunkhouse,” Jamie said. “I want a real one. If you have a spare bed down there, I’d like to hang out with your ranch hands.”
Clint hadn’t figured on this at all. He’d made up both spare rooms in the main house, planning that she’d take one and her cameraman the other. If the cameraman slept in the bunkhouse, then he and Meg Delancy would be in the big house…alone.
“It’s the best way to get local color,” Jamie said.
Clint could hardly object on the grounds that he wanted Jamie around to chaperone. “Sure, I guess that would be okay.” Jed and Denny would be only too happy to have the cameraman there. They both planned on entering the competition, so hanging out with Jamie would seem like a good way to gain an advantage.
“Great,”
