The woman shifted the baby to her other side so that she could shake hands with him.
“Chloe,” she told him. “My name is Chloe. Chloe Elliott. And I guess we’ll be interviewing for the same job once Graham gets back.”
Chance could only stare at her. What was she, five-one, five-two? Did she say they were going to be competing for the same job? She didn’t look like a rancher, and she certainly didn’t look like any former military person he’d ever met. The ad he was answering was for a rancher, and it had said that preference would be given to any veterans who applied.
But then, what did he know? The world had been doing a lot of changing in these last few years. Black was white and white was black, and he’d heard that with proper drilling, tiny little ladies like her could mop the floor with guys like him.
That might even turn out to be an interesting experience, Chance caught himself thinking. The one thing he was certain of was that he was glad that the petite blonde wasn’t married to the man who he hoped would be hiring him.
He glanced down at her hand, which she had tucked around the baby. It was still clearly visible for his purposes.
There was no wedding ring.
Maybe things were looking up, Chance mused. He could use a little good luck right about now.
“What branch of the service were you in?” he asked her, curious.
Chloe looked at him quizzically. “Service?” she repeated.
“Yeah, you know, navy, army, marines, air force. Service,” he repeated. Had she been in some sort of secret branch? he wondered. Was that why she looked so reluctant to say anything?
“I wasn’t in any branch,” Chloe told him, looking bewildered. “What makes you think I was in the service?”
Aware he might have made a mistake, Chance backtracked. He didn’t want to get off on the wrong foot by insulting the woman.
“Well, the ad said that preference would be given to veterans,” he began, feeling as if he was on really shaky ground here.
“I didn’t see the ad,” she told Chance. “Graham just called to tell me about the position and he asked me to come out to the ranch to interview for it. And then he got called away because of that emergency.”
He nodded. “Right. The emergency,” he repeated. “So you said. Um, do you have any idea when he might be coming back?” He wasn’t much for small talk, but this had to be a new low, even for him.
Chloe shrugged. “Not a clue. He just said he’d be back as soon as he could.” She paused for a moment, as if searching for something to say in order to fill the stillness. “So, you served?” she asked.
Chance nodded. “Special Forces in Afghanistan—until that IED sent me straight to the hospital, and eventually, stateside.”
“Recently?” she asked, trying but failing to covertly scan his appearance.
The cowboy looked perfect, but she knew that there were some injuries and scars that weren’t visible.
But in her opinion, the worst ones were the ones that didn’t allow you to come home at all, other than in a coffin.
“No, I’ve been home for a few years now,” Chance told her.
“Where’s home?”
“Here and there,” he answered vaguely. “I go wherever the work is.” He didn’t want it to sound as if the reason for his nomadic existence was because he didn’t do a good job and was let go. “I don’t stick around long in any one place,” he confessed.
“Why? Are you looking for something?” Chloe asked.
“Not particularly.”
It wasn’t that Chance felt he was actually searching for something specific, he just stayed in one place until he began feeling restless. It was as if something inside him would suddenly tell him that it was time to go.
“I already know that the only place I ever feel like I’m at peace is on the back of a horse. I guess you could say that’s my haven, my church,” he explained.
She smiled at him, and it seemed to make its way to her eyes. “Lucky for you, you can keep your church close by so it’s there whenever you need it.”
He smiled back at her. “Something like that.”
It wasn’t really like that, but he wasn’t about to correct the blonde right off the bat. They hadn’t even known each other for a total of five minutes yet. Correcting her wasn’t exactly the way to get to know her any better.
He did, however, appreciate the fact that she wasn’t grilling him, trying to make him explain his thinking. Some of the women he’d encountered would try to do just that—especially the ones who made it clear that they wanted him to stay with them.
Just as Chance was searching his mind for something to say, an older man burst into the living room.
Chloe looked at the older man in surprise. She’d completely forgotten he was in the house, making a call. “Did you finish making your call?”
He looked at her a little sheepishly. “It took longer than I thought,” he apologized.
Obviously realizing that Chance had no idea who this man was, Chloe made the necessary introductions.
“Chance, this is Sasha’s uncle Roger. Roger, this is Chance Howell. He’s the other person Graham was going to interview today.”
“The one he couldn’t reach,” Roger acknowledged, nodding his head as he shook hands with Chance. “Matter of fact, that’s why I came back. Graham just called me to say that he and Sasha will be home soon. Looks like Maddie just broke her wrist, not her whole arm, but she’s still got a big cast and from what I could tell, that is one unhappy eight-year-old,” he added sympathetically.
“Anyway,” Roger continued, addressing Chance, “Graham told me to tell you that you can reschedule your interview if you don’t want to wait around until he gets in.” He turned to Chloe. “Same goes for you if you’re getting a mite antsy, waiting for him. Course, since you’re so good with the baby and all, I’m hoping you’ll stay.”
“Sure, that’s okay,” Chloe told Sasha’s uncle. “I’ll stay until he gets here. No point in my going back and forth.”
“Same here,” Chance chimed in. His eyes met Chloe’s and just for a moment, the job he had come out to apply for slipped into the background for him. “I’ll be happy to stay.”
What he really meant was that he was happy spending a little more time talking to the petite blonde with the sunbeam smile—even if talking didn’t exactly come easy for him.
Chloe felt a quickening in the pit of her stomach. It was identical to the one she’d experienced when she’d first opened the door and caught sight of the tall, rangy-looking cowboy.
Careful, Chloe. Remember, been there, done that. You really don’t want to go down that road again, do you? You know exactly where that road leads.
Donnie had been her first love. She’d fallen really hard for Donnie and had felt like jumping out of an airplane without strapping a parachute to her back. The feeling was nothing short of exhilarating, but in the end, leaping out of an airplane without a parachute was just asking for trouble, and that was the very last thing she wanted in her life: the kind of trouble that led directly to heartache.
But on the other hand, Chloe reasoned, she didn’t want to come across as rude, either, and being nice—cautiously nice—to Chance didn’t hurt anything, she silently insisted.
The trick was that she had to remember not to get carried away.
Before