Cowgirl Heart (The Dalton Boys Book 12) Page 4

  Golf ball-sized hail hit the windshield so hard, she expected it to crack, but it held.

  “Sky’s looking a bit green,” she noted.

  “Yeah, ain’t good.”

  Ain’t? Oh my.

  Improper grammar shouldn’t be a turn-on, but coming from KC, it raised the hair on her arms.

  “I might have to move the car. If the trees start pulling up by the roots, I’ll put it in gear and drive like hell.”

  She shook her head as the storm increased in power. The noise of wind and hail drumming the vehicle halted any further conversation. When she could be heard, she said, “I hope the horses are tucked away.”

  He nodded. “They will be. The hands keep an eye on the weather. This ranch has been hit by two tornadoes in the past.”

  Her brows shot up. “Two?” Through the windshield, blurred with water and smaller hail now, the outbuildings looked pristine.

  “Yeah, rebuilt the barn once. The roof of the house got pulled off when I was about eight. Damn. This might be the only break we get for a while. Should we make a run for it?”

  His hazel eyes burned into hers, serious and serene, though she wondered how much of his emotion he was hiding.

  She bit into her lip, and he stared at her mouth a moment before returning his glance to the world outside.

  “I’m not afraid of a little rain.” She placed a hand on the door handle and poised to run. Thank God when she’d packed, she’d seen the benefit of changing into trousers and sensible boots.

  KC grabbed the door handle and pointed to the closest building, painted white with a turret on the roof, like a small church. “That’s one of the sheds.”

  A shed in her language had four walls and a roof, but this was far more elaborate. What did she expect from something that belonged to KC, though?

  She nodded.

  “On three, go.”

  Now it felt like a child’s game. She felt an inappropriate giggle rise up and swallowed it before it escaped.

  “One, two, three.” KC flung his door open, and so did she. When her boots hit the turf, water splashed up over her ankles. The runoff from the sudden storm was deep, and she splashed her way as quickly as possible to the shed.

  When she reached it, KC grabbed her arm and yanked her inside just as another deluge of hail hit.

  “Thank God that didn’t happen when we were running. We would have been knocked out.” She was standing so close to him, she felt his body heat. Not the first time, but now she noticed it far more. Outside of the office, alone with the man she was finding more attractive by the second, and coupled with the slips he’d made, only added to his allure.

  “You okay?” He looked into her eyes. Water was dripping from his hair and down his face. Hers too—she was soaked from just that quick sprint, and her feet were miserably wet.

  “I’m fine.”

  He stepped up to a small window, but there was no way he could see out. The rain was too thick.

  She looked around. For the first time, she realized she was surrounded by the scents of home, of leather and good polishing oil and hay. Feed was stacked along one wall of the shed, and there were rakes, shovels and other tools for working the land hanging in a perfect row.

  Near the door stood a few bowls with cat food.

  “KC, where are the cats?”

  He turned to eye her, a strange expression on his face. He’d rumpled his hair in an attempt to remove some of the water, and it was spikey, a change from his usual slick coif.

  “The cats?”

  She gestured to the bowls.

  “Barn cats. They have bowls here and there throughout the ranch. Might even be one in here now.” He looked around. “Here kitty-kitty.”

  She blinked in shock. Never in her life would she have guessed a man like KC Cohen would ever call cats in that tone of voice.

  None of the animals showed themselves, and he shrugged. “They’ll be all right. Cats are smart and will be hunkered down.”

  The wind let out a howl, and Kizzy wrapped her arms around herself.

  KC looked at her more closely. “You’re wet and probably chilled. Let’s see if there’s a horse blanket around.”

  He went to the other side of the shed, which was three times the size of a prefabricated shed you could buy from a home improvement store. As kids, she and her sisters had begged for a shed of their own to make into a playhouse, but their no-nonsense father had gifted them with more pets instead. Puppies and goats were the norm. One year, Kizzy had received a piglet, and she’d raised it for the fair.

  Her whole life seemed to flood her brain as she stood in this dim shed with her boss as he searched for a blanket.

  “Ah-ha.” He turned with a thick blanket in hand and shook it out as he approached her. “Here, wrap up. This storm doesn’t seem to be lettin’ up, does it? Why don’t you have a seat there on the sacks of feed?”

  She took the blanket and wrapped it around her shoulders, noticing how wet his shirt was too. In patches it was soaked through, plastered to his skin so she could see the carved muscles underneath. She shivered again, and he helped her by draping the blanket securely around her.

  “Thank you.” Why did her words come out in that whispery way?

  He stared at her a moment before returning to the window. She was tired of sitting, but there was little else to do but wait out the storm. She’d left her phone in the car so it didn’t get wet on her run to the shed.

  The wind died down suddenly, giving her an eerie feeling.

  “Do we need to find a storm shelter? I don’t like the sound of that.”

  “Me either. Closest shelter is a good two hundred yards away. But it looks as if the sky’s clearing to the east. The storm’s breaking up.” He made a fist and pressed it against his sealed lips in a thoughtful pose, and she wondered if he was remembering all he had facing him as soon as they got out of this shed.

  The rain slowed to a drizzle.

  KC let out a low chuckle. “Not the best way to introduce you to the Amazing Grace.” He opened the door, and she stepped up beside him so they could look out together. “Welcome to my family’s legacy.”

  She was able to see the barn, a massive white structure with miles and miles of fence. Behind that was the roof of another big building, and she guessed it to be the house. There were also bunkhouses, which he pointed out, and a second barn in the distance.

  Even through the gray mist of rain, it was lovely. Breathtaking, even, considering the grand stock that came from this place. And to think, KC had never said a word about this part of his life. Actually, he rarely spoke of owning one of the largest companies in the country either.

  She turned her head to look at him. He offered her a trace of a crooked smile. Just then, a gray barn cat came in with a meow of a greeting, to curl itself around his wet ankles.

  To her surprise, he bent and scratched its ears. “Hello, Murphy.”

  Kizzy gave a light shake of her head. Every minute that passed, this man was more and more of a surprise.

  Chapter Three

  Kizzy’s phone was ringing off the hook. Apparently, without KC around, Cohen Mortgages wasn’t able to function. She’d put out more fires by lunchtime with good old-fashioned common sense than with her college degree.

  In the house, she’d been given a bedroom suite with its own separate sitting area. It also happened to contain a desk, and she’d set up there. The surface was littered with notes and messages. Her laptop was going full force. Meanwhile, somewhere in another part of the massive ranch house KC was handling his family business.

  Following the storm, they’d made it into the big house, and she stood in a grand foyer that already held floral arrangement after floral arrangement, dripping on the expensive tiles.

  A servant had shown her face, given KC a huge hug with tears seeping from the corners of her eyes, and then turned to Kizzy for introduction. After she had made the acquaintance of Caroline, who had been in the Cohens’ employ since K
C was four years old, the woman had given her a sort of level stare that made her aware that the family would believe they were sleeping together.

  She had made it a point to ask for a separate room, and KC had said, “Of course, we aren’t together.”

  She hadn’t considered how her coming along with him to handle his business would be interpreted. And she still hadn’t met his uncle yet.

  A knock came at her door, and she pivoted in her chair. Before she could stand, KC’s voice projected to her.

  “Kizzy?”

  “Yes, come in.”

  The door opened farther, and KC stepped inside.

  Her stomach sank. He looked terrible. Grief had ravaged him in a short time, and dark smudges under each eye accentuated the hollowness of his stare. He wore a white shirt, still crisp as always, and dark-wash jeans that looked to have just come from the store rack. But something about him looked sloppy and unkempt. His hair was spiky, and she knew he had been running his fingers through it.

  She stood and padded in her bare feet across the thick carpet. The black linen dress she wore floated around her thighs as she moved. “Come in and sit down?” she asked him.

  He looked undecided and then finally nodded. When he drifted to the sitting area and sank to one of the two white leather armchairs, she perched on the other, unsure how to speak to her boss right now.

  There were many things with the company that needed addressed, but now was the worst possible time. Right now… it looked like KC just needed a friend.

  Was she able to be a friend to the man who signed her paychecks? If she was honest, she was always a bit awed by him. He was professional to a fault but never stuffy, charming and yet unapproachable. He had more money than her family would ever see in a lifetime of hustling cattle.

  But right now, he was a man who’d lost his father.

  She was silent a moment longer, trying to find some words to say. He spoke first.

  “Getting lots of phone calls?” He gestured to the desk.

  “Yes. Quite a few.”

  “I’m sure the company is faring fine without me for a day. It’s not as though I’ve never left the office before.”

  She bit down on her lip. That wasn’t exactly true about the employees faring fine. For some reason, many of them had gone into a state of panic, unable to make the simplest of decisions. And unfortunately, and surprisingly, Charles Davis was one of them.

  “KC, I can handle all this.” She swept a hand toward the mess on the desk. “That’s what I’m here for. You just focus on what you need to do.”

  He was staring into space.

  She had heard things about people being hit hard by shock after the death of loved ones, and he seemed to be following those rules. Her heart ached for him. To think of her own father… Well, she just couldn’t.

  Reaching out, she touched the back of his hand. He slowly turned his head to look at her. His grave expression still so handsome that it was hard not to take note of it.

  “Why don’t I see about getting you some tea?” she asked.

  “I don’t drink tea.”

  She’d only suggested tea for its calming properties. “Coffee then. Come on. Show me to the kitchen and I’ll make it for you myself.”

  He didn’t immediately stand. His gaze traced over her features.

  Just then, her phone rang on the desk. She got up to answer. She spoke to the caller briefly and then wrote a note about marketing budgets. There had been a meeting about that scheduled for this morning, and obviously KC had been absent, but that didn’t mean the department didn’t require the figures so they could do their jobs.

  When she turned, KC was on his feet and moving to the door. She hurried to slip her feet into a pair of flats, and he watched her.

  “Let’s get that coffee. I could use a cup myself.” She’d had a brief breakfast this morning, of a grapefruit and coffee, but it was past lunchtime and she was getting hungry as well.

  The ranch house was a maze of rooms, each spilling into the next in an open layout. In colors of the land in the winter—sand, evergreen, sable brown, russet and chestnut with a bit of the palest blue thrown in—the spaces were both homey and like something out of a magazine. Too easy to picture KC seated on the long leather sofa, legs kicked out, reading some report or other.

  But odd how she pictured him as he was dressed the other day at the market, in the blue button-down and jeans more faded than the ones he wore now.

  He led her to the kitchen and went to a coffee bar set up along the side. Sunlight brightened the room, and it also exposed the lines of sleeplessness on KC’s face.

  “Sit down,” she said quietly, taking the mug from his hand. “I’ll fix the coffee.”

  The corner of his lip tucked in. Not quite a smile, not quite one of his looks of disapproval.

  Somewhere in another part of the house, a vacuum droned. She poured two mugs of coffee. KC watched her movements and took his from her hand.

  With a twitch of his head, he said, “Let’s step outside.”

  They rounded a freestanding wall that blocked the view of the kitchen from the dining room, which boasted tall-backed chairs, a heavy wood table and a set of double French doors that spilled onto an open patio. He led her outside.

  Texas wasn’t grieving today with the Cohen family—it was bright, with a blue sky and a few puffy white clouds scudding across it in the light breeze.

  And the land… oh, the land. Her heart swelled with a longing for home.

  She went still, looking out over the verdant fields speckled with grazing horses. Far off, there was a rider. Her heart gave a hard flex of homesickness.

  KC stood beside her, drinking it all in, his mug cradled in one palm. “They want me back in the family business.” His quiet statement had a note of heaviness to it.

  “This would all be yours?” The awe roughened her own voice.

  He looked down at her, eyes more lucid but still haunted. Or maybe the word was hunted.

  “Does it surprise you that I’m not the CEO of Cohen Mortgages you thought I was?”

  She arched a brow. “Aren’t you still that?”

  He nodded and sighed, gazing over the land again. “Guess I am. But being back here, it takes me to my childhood again. Makes me think.”

  He didn’t speak for a long time, and she felt the rising need to say what was in her heart.

  “This reminds me so much of my home that I feel it right here.” She pressed her fingertips to her chest. “So fresh and lovely. A wildness. Sort of untamed, you know? The world has a power of its own… and we’re the caretakers of this one small plot and the creatures we choose to put on it.”

  He listened without removing his stare from her face.

  “My family’s ranch is much smaller and nowhere near as upscale as all this. But it’s a huge operation, and all my cousins and even my brothers live and work the land. They’ve spread out into horse ranchin’ as well, and they make a good go of it. As a little girl, I loved going there and schooling ponies and running like a wild Indian over the fields with my siblings and cousins. But I never saw myself being part of it as an adult.”

  She fell silent, considering this. Maybe she hadn’t only left to make her own path—she had walked away from something she was sure to fail at and a world she didn’t feel she belonged in.

  Being here, though… it made her question if she’d been wrong, if she did belong.

  She shook herself back to reality.

  “You describe it so well. I can see it when you talk.” KC’s voice pitched low.

  She tipped her head up to meet his gaze. She wanted to ask if he saw that too when he looked at his own family homestead, but there was such an internal struggle on his face that she knew the answer was no.

  He was a businessman, and he’d see to the family side of his life and then return to Houston, to continue taking over the financial world.

  After taking a sip of the coffee, he lowered his mug, looking more like hi
s formidable, no-bullshit self. “Make yourself comfortable, Kizzy. But not too comfortable. I won’t be staying.”

  With that, he turned and walked back inside.

  * * * * *

  The rain didn’t come again on the morning they buried his father. For that, he was glad, because his father always hated a downpour. He worried about roads washing out and horses breaking legs in thick mud. At least Knox could send off the old man under a sunny sky.

  After the service at the cemetery finished, people crowded around him. Friends and family he hadn’t seen in many years came to give their condolences or speak a few kind words about his father.

  All of it pressed down on him, weighted him to something he didn’t want, and gave him even more guilt. He’d be surprised if he didn’t land in therapy after this, just to try to shuck off the burden.

  Now he had to figure out what to do with the ranch. His uncle wanted him to stay on and run the place—said it was his father’s wish. Knox hadn’t yet seen the will, so he didn’t know what his father wanted. They’d left things on terms that weren’t so friendly, and fact was, it was his own fault for not being mature enough to see it then.

  Now he still didn’t want the place, but for different reasons. Now he wasn’t running from something he had no part in building, but from a life he just didn’t want.

  As a woman wearing a black hat with feathers on it held his hands and spoke to him about his father, he caught sight of Kizzy from the corner of his eye.

  His pain of losing his father wasn’t so overwhelming that he didn’t notice how damn beautiful she was. Striking in a black dress that wasn’t tight but clung to all the right curves, her hair in an elegant twist. She wore dainty gold bracelets on both wrists and small gold studs in her earlobes.

  What he wouldn’t give to take her by the hand, lead her someplace they could be alone, and remove those bracelets one by one. Then take down her thick dark hair and let the mass spread through his fingers.

  His uncle stepped up next to her, and she turned to him with a kind smile. They started talking, and Knox tensed.