A Ranger For Christmas. Stella Bagwell

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      “Nine years,” he answered. “I became a ranger right after I turned twenty.”

      She’d guessed him to be in his late twenties and she’d guessed right. And though his age really had nothing to do with anything, it made her feel ridiculously old.

      “There’s a tiny crease marring your forehead,” he said. “What’s the matter? Is there anything wrong with me being twenty-nine?”

      “No. It’s just that you’re very young.” Compared to me, she almost added.

      He studied her for a long moment before he finally asked, “How long have you been a ranger?”

      “Nine years for me, too. Only I didn’t start as young as you. I’m thirty-five.”

      He shrugged as though her age was insignificant and she supposed, to him, it was.

      “You didn’t have to tell me your age,” he said, then flashed her a grin that was far too provocative. “But if it makes you feel any better you look a lot younger.”

      She stared at him in disbelief while the urge to curse and laugh fought a duel inside her. “Is that supposed to be a compliment?”

      “Just the facts, ma’am.”

      There was a teasing lilt to his voice and it warned her that if she didn’t try to put a brake on his behavior right now, he would soon be outright flirting. And she couldn’t deal with that. Not from this man.

      She squared around in the seat until the seat belt was straining tightly against her shoulder. “Look, Sawyer, I have no idea if your former work partners were male or female. Or what sort of relationship you had with them. But I think you need to know right up front, right now, that there isn’t going to be any flirting, any hanky-panky or anything else between us. The only thing the two of us are going to do together is...work. Got it?”

      “That’s what I’m here for—work,” he said cheerfully. “I know the ranger rules. Hands off. No flirting. No hanky-panky. No anything else.”

      He was making fun of her. Making her sound like some prim spinster afraid to have a man even look in her direction. Damn it.

      He said, “You know, you’re even prettier when you get stirred up.”

      Her jaw tight, she stared out the windshield. Damn, Mort. What in the hell was he thinking calling in a man like this to take Louis’s place? Why couldn’t he have called some man out of retirement, some old ranger that didn’t set her on fire each time she looked at him?

      “What makes you think I’m stirred up?”

      Leaning slightly toward her, he studied her face. “Because the little gold flecks in your green eyes are flashing fire and there’s a raspberry-red color staining your cheeks.”

      What was it about this guy? She wanted to be outraged and insulted, yet deep down she felt flattered that he was implying she was attractive.

      Oh, brother, she’d been without a man for much too long. At least, that’s what her younger brother Holt would say.

      “Really?” she asked.

      “Sure. We’re going to be the best of partners,” he said, then gestured toward the gearshift. “Don’t you think you should put that in Reverse and get us out of here? We’re burning daylight.”

      Straightening away from him, she yanked the gearshift into R and tromped on the gas pedal to send the vehicle flying backward. If Mort happened to look out the window and see gravel spewing from the tires, then so be it, she thought crossly. He was the one who’d gotten her into this mess.

       Chapter Two

      Sawyer would be lying if he said he was anything but shocked when he’d walked into Mort Woolsey’s office and found Vivian Hollister waiting for him.

      When he’d been contacted about taking the temporary position here at Lake Pleasant, he’d been excited at the opportunity to work in different surroundings. He’d not bothered to ask who he’d be working with. And even when Mort had told him his new partner would be a woman, he’d not been fazed one way or the other. Sawyer liked to think of himself as easygoing and flexible. He could work with most anyone. And he’d expected Vivian Hollister to be no different. Still, he’d imagined his new partner was going to be a coarse, homely woman in her early fifties with a henpecked husband waiting for her at home.

      Vivian Hollister had blown that image to smithereens. Tall and shapely with chestnut-red hair that brushed her shoulders, she had the face of an angel and the sass of an unbroken filly. Just looking at her sent his thoughts in all sorts of naughty directions. And to make matters worse, she knew it.

      As for the husband waiting on her at home, he wasn’t sure about that yet. Back in Mort’s office, he’d checked out her ring finger and there definitely hadn’t been any sort of band or diamonds to brand her as some man’s wife. But that hardly meant she was unattached. For all he knew, she could have a special boyfriend, or even a live-in lover. No doubt, a woman who looked like her had men circling around her like a pack of hungry coyotes.

      “Where did you work before?”

      Her question brought him out of his daydreaming and he looked over to see her focus was on the narrow blacktopped road. So far they’d been traveling through open desert hills dotted with spiny bayonet, sage, cacti and agave. To his right, in the far distance, he caught glimpses of blue water.

      “At Dead Horse Ranch State Park. It’s near Cottonwood. Are you familiar with the area?”

      “A little. Enough to know the landscape is far different up there than it is here. You have trees and forests and creeks. We mostly have thorns, horned lizards and rattlesnakes. Are you sure you can handle it until spring ends?”

      He chuckled. “I can handle most anything—for a while.”

      “If you live in Cottonwood, you have a long commute,” she commented.

      “I live on the Yavapai-Apache reservation west of Camp Verde. Once I get on 17 the drive isn’t all that bad.”

      She darted him a glance. “You have family there? On the reservation?”

      “Only my grandmother. I live with her.”

      “Oh.”

      His gaze slipped over her profile to eventually land on the soft, sweet curve of her lips. Did she have a special man that kissed her until she was wrapping her arms around his neck and begging for more?

      Trying to shake off that image, he repeated her one-word reply. “Oh. What does that mean? You can’t figure why I’d live on the reservation?”

      “No. It means I’m a bit surprised that you live with your grandmother. I figured you’d have a bachelor pad in town.”

      Chuckling again, he shook his head. “Me live in a town? Never. And I’d never leave my grandmother. She raised me from a little boy. It’s time for me to take care of her now.”

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