Home on the Ranch: Oklahoma: Defending the Rancher's Daughter / The Rancher Bodyguard. Carla Cassidy

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СКАЧАТЬ suddenly running the ranch was skewing her thinking. But such rational thoughts did nothing to dispel the darkness that had claimed her soul.

      Maybe it was time to speak her suspicions out loud to somebody. But who? Sheriff Jim Ramsey was good at arresting drunk and disorderly cowboys on a Saturday night, but she wasn’t sure she trusted his investigative skills in working a murder case.

      Besides, she’d tried to talk to him soon after her dad’s death and he’d dismissed her concerns with a pat on her head and a sympathetic sigh.

      Funny, when she thought about who she trusted most to talk to, it was also the man she detested more than anyone else in the world.

      Zack West.

      Her fingers tightened on the steering wheel as she thought of the cowboy who had been the source of her first passionate fantasies and for years the bane of her very existence.

      Zack worked for his family business, Wild West Protective Services. Zack’s father had begun the business years ago and it now was a multimillion dollar enterprise offering bodyguard services to people all around the world. Zack, along with his four brothers and sister, worked the business.

      It had been years since she’d seen him; he spent most of his time away from Cotter Creek and on location. She’d heard through the grapevine that he was back in town. As soon as she got to the hospital, she’d give him a call. As much as she hated it, she needed him.

      The throb of her ankle brought back the memory of the strange sound she’d heard just before the cattle had stampeded.

      The loud noise had had nothing to do with natural phenomena. Now that she had a moment to consider it, she thought the sound had been like that of a bull horn.

      Yes, it was time to talk to Zack.

      She needed to tell him that she suspected her father’s deadly fall from a horse hadn’t been an accident. She believed somebody had murdered Gray Sampson.

      She also needed to tell him that somebody had started a stampede that could have killed her. She gripped the steering wheel with suddenly sweaty hands as she thought of that mass of frightened cattle racing toward her.

      If she hadn’t been so quick on her feet, if she’d paused another single second before racing for the truck, she wouldn’t be driving herself to the hospital right now. She’d be dead.

      It was at that very moment that she realized somebody had just tried to kill her.

      * * *

      Zack West heard her before he saw her.

      “If it’s not broken then tell Dr. Greenspan to get in here and wrap it so I can get out of here.” Her familiar voice, filled with agitation, drifted out the open door of Exam Room Four. “I’ve got lost cattle wandering around the countryside and broken fencing. I don’t have time to waste hours in here.”

      Zack hesitated just outside the door, summoning the strength to face the spoiled, willful girl who had never hidden her dislike of him.

      Why had she called him? The only way he’d know what she wanted was to go into the exam room and to speak to her. He met a nurse hurrying out, a harried expression on her face.

      He entered the room and hoped his face didn’t radiate his shock at the sight of her. When he’d gotten the call from her stating that she was in the emergency room and needed to talk to him, it had been sheer curiosity that had prompted him to respond. He’d been curious to see her and interested to find out why she was at the hospital.

      She was staring out the window, unaware of his presence. He took that moment to reconcile the woman he saw to the wild teenager of nearly five years before.

      The last time he’d seen her she’d been a gangly seventeen-year-old with a bad haircut and mascara-smeared eyes.

      There was nothing gangly about the woman in front of him. Her feminine curves were evident despite the blue flowered hospital gown she wore. The hair he remembered as an uneven burnt-copper mess now hung below her shoulders.

      One of his hands unconsciously rose to his cheek, where the last time they’d been together she’d ripped sharp fingernails down his skin at the same time she’d kicked him in the shin so hard he’d thought he’d be crippled for the rest of his life.

      “Katie.”

      Her head whirled around and he saw that her eyes were still the same intense blue that he remembered, minus the raccoon rings of mascara.

      There was a long moment of awkward silence and he wondered if she, too, was remembering the debacle of their last meeting.

      Her gaze swept him from head to toe, reminding him that he hadn’t shaved this morning and was about a month overdue for a haircut. The fact that he even thought about his own physical appearance irritated him.

      “I’m here, so what do you want?” he asked brusquely.

      “Zack. Please close the door.” Her voice gave nothing away of her emotions.

      He shut the door, then turned back to face her, a heavy tension in the air between them.

      “Please, have a seat.” She gestured to the chair next to the examining table where she sat.

      “I’m fine.” He jammed his hands into his pockets. He didn’t want to sit. He didn’t intend to stay. “What happened?” He pointed to her ankle, which was swollen and turning ten shades of purple.

      “Somebody tried to kill me.”

      He raised a dark eyebrow. It was the kind of dramatic statement she’d often made as a girl. “How? By squeezing your ankle to death?”

      The baleful look she leveled at him would have sent lesser men running for the hills. Zack merely stood his ground, waiting for her to explain.

      She broke the gaze first, looking down at her hands clenched tightly in her lap. “I was out in the pasture checking a stock tank and somebody caused my herd to stampede. If I hadn’t managed to roll underneath my truck, I would have been killed.”

      Despite the fact that he didn’t want anything to do with her, she’d certainly grabbed his attention. He swept his cowboy hat from his head and sat in the chair. “What do you mean, somebody caused your herd to stampede?”

      As he listened to her explain what had happened, he tried to figure out why she had called him. She’d certainly made it clear years ago that she didn’t like him, had resented his relationship with her father.

      She’d been a brat, trying to undermine him, competing with him for her father’s attention and generally making his life miserable when they’d been younger. So why on earth had she called him?

      “Are you sure it wasn’t the storm that spooked the cattle?” he asked. “There was a lot of thunder and lightning, enough to spook a herd.”

      “The storm had them restless, I’ll admit to that.” She shoved a strand of her long, shiny hair behind her ear. “But I heard something like an air horn blow and that’s what spooked them into the stampede. Somebody did this on purpose and the only reason for them to have done this was in hopes that I’d be trampled СКАЧАТЬ