Hollywood had come to the ranch, and he didn’t like it.
His mouth compressing into a flat line, he jerked his eyes back to the road and reminded himself that he’d do well not to look a gift horse in the mouth. With cattle prices at an all-time low, the cost of feed up because of a drought that looked like it was going to last into the next century, and money tighter than it had been in decades, the ranch had been in serious financial trouble when Gold Coast Studios literally came knocking at the front door. The studio suits had wanted to use the ranch as the location for the filming of its next big blockbuster, and they’d been willing to pay an obscene amount of money to do it.
Even then, his first instinct had been to tell them no and shut the door in their faces. He wanted nothing to do with the artificial world of movies and the people who made them. He didn’t want strangers poking their noses into every nook and cranny of the ranch like they owned the place, scaring the cattle and making general nuisances of themselves. He didn’t want to be bothered, dammit!
But business was business, and the ranch was a family operation. He couldn’t make a unilateral decision based on his personal feelings. So in a family meeting with his mother, brother and sisters, the matter was presented and discussed. And to no one’s surprise, it was decided that, considering the ranch’s current financial troubles, they really had no choice but to accept the studio’s offer.
The next day, he’d signed a contract giving Gold Coast Studios unlimited access to the ranch for the making of Beloved Stranger. Because of the shortage of available housing in town, he’d also given in to the pressure applied by his mother and sisters and agreed to rent out rooms to several cast members at the homestead and at his house. So for the next two months, the cast and crew could go just about anywhere they liked on the property.
Common sense told him he’d done the right thing, but that didn’t make him like the situation any better. He’d been running the ranch for the last seventeen years, ever since his father died the summer after he’d graduated from high school, and the land was as much a part of him as the color of his eyes. His brother and sisters had all gone on to college and important careers, but he’d given that up without a single regret. Because it was the ranch that he loved—the vastness of its high mountain meadows, the solitude of its canyons, the beauty of a lone hawk soaring on thermals high over land that belonged to his family as far as the eye could see.
And when he drove over ranch roads that he knew like the lines on the back of his hand, it was deer and elk he expected to see when he caught sight of something moving through the trees, not cameramen and set designers getting ready for the first day of shooting on Monday.
He supposed he would, with time, grow used to the sight of strangers on the ranch, but he didn’t think he would ever come to accept the idea of one in his home. Especially one like Garrett Elliot. The man was a jerk, a self-inflated, pompous fool who’d moved in yesterday while he was out, and taken over the house with an arrogance that still infuriated Joe. Elliot had actually had the audacity to claim the master bedroom for himself for the duration of his stay!
Who the hell did the man think he was? Joe fumed. Just because he was a big shot in Hollywood didn’t mean he could waltz into his house and start taking over like he owned the place. As far as Joe was concerned, he was nothing but a boarder. And he’d had no trouble telling him that. He’d then given him two options. He could either take the two smaller rooms, one of which he could use as an office, or find himself a hotel. And the closest hotel with rooms still available was seventy-five miles away. Not a stupid man, Elliot had sulked off to the two smaller rooms and been thankful to have them.
But they’d taken an instant dislike to each other on sight, and Joe didn’t fool himself into thinking that was going to change. He had no use for a man who thought he was entitled to special privileges because of his position in life. The next two months were, he thought grimly, going to be long ones.
He didn’t, at least, have to treat the jerk like a guest. That wasn’t part of the deal. He wasn’t running a motel. Elliot had to pick up after himself and cook his own meals. Joe doubted that he even knew how to turn on the stove, but he wasn’t sticking around to find out. Just as soon as he took a shower and washed off the ranch’s red dirt, he was heading into town to have dinner at Ed’s Diner. Chili sounded good. And chocolate cream pie. Nobody made chocolate cream pie better than Ed.
Already savoring the taste of it, he spied his house in the distance as the last streaks of red left from the setting sun turned to magenta, then darkening shades of violet. Every light in the house was on, not to mention the floodlights that illuminated the front and backyards. It was barely dark, and the place was lit up like a Christmas tree.
Swearing softly, Joe increased his speed. He could see right now that he and Elliot were going to have to have another talk. The studio might have paid a decent sum for him to stay there for the next two months, but that didn’t mean Joe was going to stand by and let him drive up his utility bill just because he missed the bright lights of L.A.
He had a scathing lecture all worked out in his head. Then he braked to a stop behind a red Ford Taurus sedan in his driveway and his mind went blank at the sight of the woman pulling something from the trunk of the car. Angel Wiley. He’d barely spared her a glance at Myrtle’s that afternoon, but he’d still have known her on the dark side of the moon. Just like every other man in America.
Not that he was a fan. He didn’t give a rat’s ass that she was Hollywood’s latest sweetheart. But like it or not, she wasn’t the kind of woman any man with blood in his veins could easily ignore. And for the life of him, Joe didn’t know why. She wasn’t drop-dead gorgeous. She was too cute, too wholesome with her wavy, sun-streaked blond hair, freckles and sparkling blue eyes. To add insult to injury, her smile was crooked, and she had dimples, for God’s sake. Granted, she was tall and willowy and had legs that went on forever, but she couldn’t, under any circumstances, ever hope to be called voluptuous. Still, there was something about her, an air of innocent sexuality, that was incredibly appealing.
Furious with himself for even noticing, he wondered what the hell she was doing there. Then his gaze shifted from her to the suitcase in her hand, then to his open front door. And it hit him. She was moving in!
Muttering a curse, he slammed out of his pickup and strode toward her, his long legs quickly eating up the distance between them. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
Her heart thumping crazily, Angel didn’t so much as flinch. Myrtle had warned her he wouldn’t be happy about the change in plans, but that wasn’t something she could be concerned with at the moment. She needed a safe haven, and like it or not, his house was it. Nothing else mattered.
Still, she wasn’t nearly as cool as she pretended when she looked down her slender nose at him and met his hostile gaze with a delicately arched brow. “I would have thought it was obvious. I’m moving in, of course.”
“The hell you are!” he growled. “Put that damn suitcase back in your car and get out of here. You’re trespassing on private property.”
There’d been a time when that would have been enough to send her packing. Unlike Joe McBride, she didn’t have an ounce of anger in her. She didn’t like confrontations, didn’t like fights. Given the chance, she avoided them at every turn. But this was one she couldn’t back down from. Not when not only her safety, but her daughter’s, was at stake.
Standing her ground, she faced him squarely. “I hate to be the one to disillusion you, Mr. McBride, but I have every right to be here. You signed a contract with the studio—”
“My contract is with an actor,” he cut in coldly. “An actor,” he stressed. “Sharing my house with a woman was never part of the agreement. Especially a spoiled prima donna who thinks she’s God’s gift to the rest of the world.”
Angel felt her cheeks burn and knew she looked guilty as sin. Damn Garrett! Was there anyone who hadn’t heard and believed the lies he’d told about her? “Your contract is for a cast member,”