Trusting The Cowboy. Carolyne Aarsen

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      “Don’t take it personally,” Lauren said, her mouth twisting in a cool smile. “I don’t trust any man.” Then she turned to Jodie. “But as far as his agreement with our father is concerned, there are other factors at play. If he finds something that corroborates his claim, it’s best that it happens here with us watching. That way no one can challenge it.”

      He. His. She spoke of him as if he suddenly wasn’t there.

      Vic took another sip of his coffee, reminding himself that he just had to get through this.

      And, more than ever, he had to find some evidence of the deal he and Keith had drawn up.

      There was no other choice.

      * * *

      “Confess. You think he’s cute.” Jodie plinked out a few more bars of her new composition on the piano in the corner of the living room and turned to her sister, grinning that smirk of hers that Lauren knew was trouble.

      Lauren sent her sister a warning look over her laptop. “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think he was attractive, but it’s irrelevant.” She turned her attention back to the purchase agreement the lawyers had drafted, sent to her by her future partner, Amy.

      Part of her mind balked at the price tag, but it was an investment in building clients and staff. All of which would cost more to gather if they started from scratch.

      “How is it irrelevant?” Jodie got up from the piano and fell onto the couch across from her. She dropped her feet on the coffee table, looking as if she was settling in for one of the heart-to-heart chats she loved.

      “Don’t put your feet on the table,” Lauren chided.

      “Don’t be Dad,” Jodie shot back, but her smile showed Lauren she hadn’t taken her seriously.

      Lauren sighed and closed her laptop. Clearly she wasn’t getting anything done tonight.

      “I think you should sell the ranch to Vic,” Jodie said. “He’s put a bunch of work into it and I’m sure he wants to buy it for Dean.”

      “I’m not averse to selling the ranch to him,” Lauren said, slipping her reading glasses into their case. “If he can even match Alex Rossiter’s offer, he can have it. But I doubt he can. When I told him what Alex was paying, I thought he would keel over.”

      Jodie twisted a strand of hair around her finger. Though her frown was partially hidden by her long bangs, it wasn’t hard to read her dissatisfaction.

      “I can tell you don’t like the idea,” Lauren continued. “I’m not alone in this, you know. The ranch is one-third yours.”

      “I know. Trouble is, I think you’re right in saying that Vic can’t match what Alex would pay you.” Jodie took her feet off the table and set them on the couch, lounging sideways. “What does that Alex guy want with the ranch?”

      “He owns property in the Caribbean and now he wants a ranch.”

      “A hobby ranch. To add to his collection.” Jodie’s voice held a faint sneer that Lauren chose to ignore. She wasn’t wild about the idea, either. She would prefer to see it sold as a working ranch to someone personally invested in the property.

      Someone like Vic.

      “I think he sees the ranch as more of an investment,” Lauren said. “But the stark reality is I need every penny of my third to buy into this new business. It’s a huge opportunity I can’t afford to let go. And if Vic needs the land base, he could lease it from Alex and run his cows.”

      “It’s not the same. Alex would have all the control.”

      Lauren understood Jodie’s concern. Wasn’t that the very reason she was buying this business—so she could have control over her own life instead of depending on the whims of employers?

      And worthless fiancés?

      “I can’t believe you would want to buy an accounting firm.” Jodie shifted her position, curling her legs under her. She could never sit still long. “Why don’t you just start your own accounting business? Just you. Why buy in to this one?”

      “Because I need clients and I can’t take any of the accounts I brought into Jernowicz Brothers or the last firm I worked at with me to a new business without being sued, and it would take too long to build up a new customer base. Even one-third of the amount Alex is willing to pay, after taxes, is barely enough for my buy-in. But I can’t pass this up. It would mean a substantial income down the road, which means independence in many ways.”

      “And that’s important to you.” Jodie’s words were more comment than condemnation.

      It was important, Lauren thought, but not in the way that Jodie was implying. Not because money was the end-all and be-all for her.

      After being dumped at the altar only to discover that she’d been lied to and milked dry by her ex-fiancé, then, in the past couple of months, fired by her most recent boss, Lauren needed some control in her life. Though Jodie knew about the canceled wedding, she knew little about the amounts of money Lauren had set aside to get the business she and Harvey had hoped to start on their own. She’d worked at Jernowicz Brothers, disliking every minute of the high-pressure job, while Harvey got things together for their eventual departure from the firm.

      When he’d left her at the altar, he’d not only broken her heart, he had broken their bank account. The money they had set aside for the start of their new business had disappeared with him.

      But she was too ashamed to tell Jodie that. She had always been the good example of what hard work could do. She wasn’t about to share how badly Harvey had duped her.

      With anyone.

      “It’s important to me to establish my independence,” Lauren said instead. “I’ve lived enough of my life for other people—” She stopped there, not wanting Jodie to think that she resented the time she’d spent taking care of her. Taking care of their grandmother.

      “You’ve done enough of that,” Jodie agreed. “And I can understand that you’d want that, but I know enough of Vic that he wouldn’t make this claim lightly. And if we find something to prove Vic’s claim—” Jodie pressed, clearly unwilling to let this go.

      “We haven’t yet, and I doubt Dad would have hidden a paper like that away.”

      “He didn’t exactly make the letters he wrote to us easy to find.”

      “They weren’t hard to find, either,” Lauren said, stifling a yawn. It had been a long, tiring day. Her head ached from thinking and phoning and planning and from reading her father’s letters.

      After his cancer diagnosis, their father had written each of the girls a letter apologizing for his behavior to them. It had been emotionally draining reading his words.

      Though regret dogged her with every sentence her father had penned, she couldn’t forget the tension that had held them all in a complicated grip each time they came to visit. He alternated between domineering and absent, angry and complacent. Though Lauren was sad he was gone, his loss didn’t create the aching grief losing her mother and grandmother had.

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