“Mr. Davis is here. He said he had an appointment,” Abby said, gesturing in his direction.
Beth stepped forward, her gaze landing on him in the shadows. An inexplicable look of relief crossed her face and she walked towards him, her hand extended.
He’d been ready to leave for the past half hour, but the sisters had kept him talking, their polite manners making his exit impossible. Now he was tempted to stride out of the room without excusing his poor behavior.
“Hello,” Beth said. “I apologize. I didn’t see you after the glare of the sun from outside. I’m sorry I kept you waiting.”
She stopped as he shook her hand, her face flushed and her eyes widened in surprise.
He wished his reaction had been that simple. At least he hoped he hid the surge of desire that hit him, the approval he felt as he realized her hands were callused, hard, the sign of a worker.
“I wanted to talk to you about training me to be a barrel racer,” she said. She hooked her thumbs in the back pockets of her jeans. One light brown eyebrow slid up. “I understand you’re the best.”
He recognized a challenge when he heard one. He tightened his features, hoping for impassiveness. “Yeah. The best.”
“Well, you certainly don’t lack in self-confidence,” she chided, her chin rising slightly even as she smiled.
He kept his answer succinct. After all, he wasn’t being hired for conversation. “Nope.”
“I assume you have references. I’ve read some interviews, but I haven’t heard who you’ve worked with lately.”
“I trained two of the last three world champions. You can call Sherry Duncan and Lisa McDonald,” he said, naming his two latest pupils. He wasn’t used to having his credentials questioned, but he didn’t blame the young woman for asking. No, that wasn’t the problem.
But there was a problem. Or maybe several.
“Look, Miss Kennedy, I think there’s been a mistake,” he said, avoiding her gaze. “I’ll be on my way.”
“Wait!” He heard Beth call as he turned his back on her, not bothering to shake hands with her. He didn’t want to touch her again. The last time had unsettled him for some strange reason.
“Where are you going?” she asked.
“On down the road. I have others interested in my services.”
“I haven’t said I’m not interested,” she reminded him.
“You’re not the only one to make the decision, lady. I don’t work where I’m not wanted.” He opened the door and walked out to his beat-up pickup, ignoring the whispering going on between the sisters.
Hearing footsteps behind him, he hoped it was Abby, the sensible older sister. But the tingling on the nape of his neck told him it was Beth.
Soft name. Feminine. Trouble.
“Mr. Davis, could we talk a minute?”
“Nothing to talk about,” he muttered. All his instincts were yelling for him to get the hell out of there before she persuaded him to stay.
He slid behind the wheel and closed the door, but the window was down, since it was October, and she put her hand on the opening.
“What’s your hurry?”
“I’ve been waiting over an hour for you to get your rear in gear, lady. I don’t like to waste time.” He kept staring straight ahead. He’d already noted her hazel eyes, the dash of freckles across her nose, the full lips that started a hunger in him that was dangerous.
Hell, she was too young for him to be thinking those thoughts. He was only thirty-two but he felt years older in comparison to her fresh beauty.
“I didn’t have a flat tire on purpose.”
“Doesn’t take that long to fix a flat tire. Unless you’re sitting helpless-like alongside the road waiting for Prince Charming.” He figured even then someone would happen along pretty quick for a woman like Beth Kennedy.
She flushed and looked away. “I didn’t have a spare,” she muttered.
“What did you do?”
“I had to walk to a neighbor’s house and call the garage in town and have them bring one out to me.” Now she looked him in the eye. “I should’ve called here to warn you I’d be late. I apologize.”
“No problem,” he said, and cranked the engine in his truck.
“So I apologized. Why are you leaving?”
“I don’t work with anyone who won’t give one hundred percent.”
Both of those pretty brows rose, almost disappearing in her soft bangs. “Who said I wouldn’t?”
“You have to be hungry to make it in rodeo. You’re not hungry.”
“Oh, yes I am.”
“How could you be? Your next meal doesn’t depend on how well you race.”
She studied him, which made him all the more uneasy. He knew some women were attracted to him. He’d had too many offers to deny the truth of it. But he was untrained in social skills.
“Does your next meal depend on your job?” she asked casually. But he saw the intelligence in her eyes. More trouble.
He shrugged. “Not my next one, but eventually I’d run out. It did once.”
“Mine did once, too. Not now, as you’ve obviously heard. But it’s not food that drives me. And I think it’s not food that drives you. That doesn’t make me any less hungry. Does it you?”
Damn, why didn’t she back off? He couldn’t be anything but honest. “Nope.”
“So, we have something in common.”
“I charge a hefty fee.” He was searching for reasons to leave. He should have known money wouldn’t be one of them. But he’d try. He doubled his fee, watching her face as he named it.
“My, my, you are proud of your work, aren’t you?”
The urge to justify that amount, to tell her just how good he was, surged through him, but he held it in check. “Yeah.”
“Okay.”
He stared at her, not sure what her single word meant. And irritated that she could be even more succinct than he was.
“Okay, what?”
“I’m agreeing to your price. I’m assuming that’s in addition to room and board. Anything else?”
“Yeah. If I take on any other training jobs, I’ll need stable space for the animals. I’ll pay for the extra feed, of course.”
“I’ll have to check with Abby on that. She runs the ranch. But I think it’ll be okay. When can you start?”
What the hell was he doing? He’d had every intention of driving down that long, dusty driveway and never looking back. Now he was practically moved in.
“Wait a minute. I haven’t seen you ride.”
“So we’ll try it for a week or two and then reevaluate. If you don’t think I’m worth your time, you move on. Or if I don’t like the way you work, you move on. If we’re both satisfied, we keep going.” She was watching him closely. When he didn’t respond, she repeated her earlier question. “When can you start?”
“Uh, in the morning?”
“Right. It’ll take about an hour to fix up a room in the bunkhouse. You’ll take your meals at the house with us. The stable has a couple of empty stalls,” she said, gesturing to the two-horse trailer he had