“Why not?” Clem had asked, her voice curt.
“Retired.”
“Give me his name,” Clem had begged. If he was alive, he could help her. She wasn’t going to let an itty-bitty complication like retirement get in her way.
With a sigh, he said, “Scott. Dexter Scott. Trust me, ma’am, you’d be better off if you didn’t find him.”
Dexter Scott.
Clem had burned that name into her mind. She’d scoured old copies of Western Horseman, looking for something, anything about him, a mention in an article, a small ad. Ben Thorton and the Miller brothers, too. Tracking one of them could lead her to him. She went on the Internet to the different ranching Web sites. Posted on message boards, sought information during chats.
Finally, some kind soul sent her a brochure, an old tattered brochure. Clem had treated it like a map to buried treasure, carefully taping the folds intact. And when she discovered the phone number was out of service, she’d used a magnifying glass to read the faded address. The next evening, last night, in fact, she’d driven off in search of Dexter Scott, the legend.
He didn’t look much like a legend, not with that frown. Clem cleared her throat. “Um, have you ever considered coming out of retirement?”
“Nope.” The answer was matter-of-fact, given with a disinterested glance in her direction.
That answer was unacceptable.
Clem stared at the man who was stroking the nose of the horse. Whether he knew it or not, her fate was in his hands. And she wasn’t going to lose six hundred cattle worth at least a thousand dollars apiece. She could, however, give up forty percent of what they would bring in. It was an enormous amount of money. With her cut, she could pay off her debts and still make enough to buy the most sedate herd of Herefords she could find.
“I’m sorry, I can’t take no for an answer.” Her voice came out a little weaker than she’d planned. Where was the authority that her father talked with? She sounded like she was asking for permission.
The cowboy’s lips twisted into what she thought was a smile, but since the brim of his hat shaded his face, she couldn’t quite tell. “You’ll have to.”
He gave the horse a final pat on the nose, before saying, “Skooch.” The horse lurched underneath her as, in almost one motion, he pulled himself up behind her and then lifted her up and deposited her snugly between his lap and the horn of the well-used saddle. A warm forearm wrapped around her rib cage. As he took the reins from her hand. With just a touch of his heels, he turned the horse and urged it into a trot back in the direction of the ranch.
Clem was too astonished to protest.
Not that she could protest even if she wanted to. Her body was already cinched to his lean frame, his chest pressed flat against her spine, and while he had pulled back in the saddle to give her as much room as he could, it was a tight squeeze.
She held her breath as the horse danced underneath them, not at all certain he liked this newest burden. She felt the man behind her squeeze the ribs of the horse to establish control.
“Relax, you’ll be more comfortable.” His voice was polite. “Break fewer bones if we get tossed.”
“Okay.” But her breath just didn’t want to let go.
They rode in silence for a cautious few minutes. Clem knew he was testing the horse, seeing if it was willing to take them home. When the horse didn’t protest, she felt the cowboy settle down behind her.
“So explain again how you got in?” His voice rumbled from deep within his chest, and Clem could feel it reverberate against her back.
“I just went through the gates,” she said, trying not to sound as defensive as she felt.
“They’re locked.”
“They’re latched,” she corrected him. “Only the last one was locked.”
“And?”
“I climbed over. Left my truck there.”
“How’d you find the horse?”
“He found me on top of the gate.”
That seemed to be enough of an explanation because he was silent.
After another hundred yards, he demanded, “So what is it you want from me?”
“I want you to be as good as your brochure says you are.”
She didn’t know what she expected in response to her outburst, but a deep chuckle wasn’t it.
“Nobody’s as good as brochures says they are. They’re brochures.”
Clem’s stomach knotted up. “I need you to be.”
“I’m retired.”
There was something in his voice, some sort of odd quality that made her not want to believe him. His forearm tightened around her ribs and Clem swallowed her protest. He may think he was retired, but there was some ember in his hazel eyes not yet snuffed out. Clem didn’t know how to fan it, but she knew that she needed to. As she thought, she became very conscious of the rhythm of his body and the horse as they moved across the desert. Riding with him was hypnotic, reminiscent of when she’d ridden with her father.
On cold fall evenings, Jim Wells would zip them both up in his large sheepskin jacket, keeping her warm as they rode to the high ridge of their property to watch the sun set before dinner. She could feel the cold on her nose and ears, the comfort of her father’s heartbeat. Even when she got her own horse, they still rode to watch the sunset, but it wasn’t the same.
She could almost purr with the memory. She didn’t want to like the way this stranger’s arm felt around her waist, acknowledge how secure she felt with him. She’d done that once before. She frowned in displeasure at her own reaction. Apparently, even after the divorce, she hadn’t learned anything at all. She was still waiting for someone to keep her close.
CHAPTER TWO
CLEM JERKED AWAKE as they rode up to Dexter Scott’s ranch, then stiffened when she realized she’d relaxed against him. He obliged her new posture by loosening his arm, though she could still feel his hand on the top of her hip. A dingy, two-story Victorian came into sight, along with dead patches of grass and flower beds long overgrown with wild roses and native plants. Dexter Scott apparently cared more for the comfort of his horses than himself, because three well-placed, well-kept stables and a barn made the old Victorian look more faded.
Clem couldn’t help studying the layout of his training area. She smiled when she saw a corral of horses only a mother or Dexter Scott could love. How different than what she’d anticipated. She’d imagined a ranch rather like an elite racing stable with glossy-coated handsome horses prancing across acres of green lawn.
Glossy coats, yes. Handsome, no. Dexter Scott’s horses sported eyes set too close or ears too big or markings just plain wrong. Rather than giving these horses an endearing quality, the physical imperfections made them look as if they were genetic throw-backs of the worst possible mix. Clementine refused to be disappointed. Now that she’d found him, she was going to make sure Dexter Scott was the legend she needed him to be.
“Guess I must’ve dozed off. I was driving all night,” she apologized, mentally climbing a thicker branch of hope. First impressions were rarely the measure one should use to judge the character of a person or a situation, right? And she shouldn’t judge the horses, either.
A large hand slid under her thigh.
“Off you go,” Dexter said as he boosted her leg over the saddle horn. With his arm still around her waist, Clem was gently set down on the ground. From this perspective, Dexter Scott was enormous. He swung himself out of the saddle and led the horse to one of the stables. The horses in the corral tossed their heads in greeting.