Once A Rancher. Linda Lael Miller

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      Now he hauled open the door on his side and got in.

      “I’m sorry,” Ryder said. He didn’t really sound sorry, and he didn’t look at her, but sat staring out the windshield instead. His tone was stubborn, and the set of his mouth underscored his attitude.

      Grace sighed inwardly.

      Ryder was a good kid, and Slater Carson had been right earlier, when he’d said everybody made bad decisions now and then. “You know better.”

      “It just—”

      She raised a hand to indicate she wanted him to stop. Now. “There’s no excuse I care to hear. You stole something and we returned it.”

      Grace started the car, flipped on the headlights and turned around to head back down the driveway.

      Ryder was quiet for a few minutes. They reached the county highway, which was practically deserted at that time of night, and, since both the ranch and the resort were well outside town, they didn’t pass many cars.

      Eventually, Ryder said, “He liked you.”

      Fourteen and he’d picked up on that, Grace reflected with rueful amusement, but he still couldn’t pick up his underwear.

      He liked you.

      There was liking a woman, and there was wanting to go to bed with her. Grace was not inclined to explain the difference to a fourteen-year-old.

      So she said briskly, “He doesn’t know me.”

      “He thought you were pretty.”

      There were times when she wished Ryder would talk to her more, and times, like now, when she wished he wouldn’t. “I think it’s just possible that he’s prettier than I am.”

      That made Ryder crack up. “At least he tried to be subtle. He didn’t, like, stare at your—”

      He stopped abruptly, and Grace figured he’d be blushing right about now over what he’d almost said, so she cut the kid a break and kept her gaze on the road. “Mr. Carson was very polite,” she conceded. “How’s the science project coming along?”

      Ryder jumped on the sudden change of subject, even if school wasn’t one of his favorites. “Okay, actually. Turns out my partner isn’t as geeky as he looks.” He was quiet for a moment, then he went on. “I was wondering if he might come over to our place and hang out sometime. That okay?”

      Grace felt a rush of relief. She’d been waiting for Ryder to stop rebelling against the move to Mustang Creek and make some friends, hoping and praying he would.

      She was in over her head with this parenting thing.

      And she didn’t seem to be getting any better at it.

      A few months back Grace’s former father-in-law had called her one day, out of the blue. Haltingly, he’d explained that with his wife so ill, they couldn’t handle their grandson on their own. They hated to ask, but since Hank was overseas and all, they didn’t have anyone else to turn to.

      Hank, Grace’s ex and Ryder’s father, made a career of being unavailable, in her opinion, but of course she didn’t say that.

      She’d had no idea what to say, under the circumstances. Ryder’s mother was remarried, with a whole new family, and for reasons Grace still didn’t understand, the woman had never shown much interest in her firstborn, anyway. When she and Hank were divorced, she’d handed Ryder over without a quibble, not even asking for visitation rights.

      The woman couldn’t be bothered to send her son a birthday card, never mind calling to see how he was doing or firing off the occasional text to keep in touch.

      The whole scenario made Grace furious on Ryder’s behalf, and it didn’t help that Hank was so emotionally distant, absolutely caught up in his military career.

      In that respect, she and Ryder had been set adrift in the same boat, but Grace had had options, at least. She could divorce Hank—which she had—and move on. His son didn’t have that choice.

      So she’d said yes, Ryder could stay with her until Hank’s current deployment ended, and here they were in Mustang Creek, Wyoming, stuck with each other, both of them struggling to adjust to major changes.

      Grace brought herself back to the present. “I think it would be great if your friend came over sometime. I could order you guys a pizza, how’s that?”

      Ryder nodded. “As long as it isn’t like the ones they have at the spa, with goat cheese and whatever those green things are. I tried to like the stuff, Grace, but no way.”

      “Artichoke hearts,” she supplied helpfully. “How about plain old pepperoni?”

      Ryder grinned. “That would be great,” he said.

      “Okay, you’re on. I just need your word that you’ll stay out of trouble for five minutes.” She feigned a narrow glare. “I didn’t like facing Mr. Carson with what you’d done any more than you did, buddy.”

      Ryder’s grin broadened. “Maybe not,” he agreed, “but I think he sorta enjoyed it.”

       CHAPTER TWO

      BEYOND THE TALL windows of the breakfast room off the ranch-house kitchen, the Tetons soared against a morning sky of heartbreaking blue. Slater sat in his usual place at the table, coffee mug in hand, silently marveling. He’d looked out on that same vista almost every morning of his life and never once taken it for granted.

      He was a lucky man, and he knew it.

      The sound of boot heels on the wide plank floor alerted him to company.

      “Hey, Showbiz.” Slater’s youngest brother, Mace, meandered in from the next room, pulled out a chair on the opposite side of the table and dropped into it, an easy grin surfacing. Of the three of them, Mace most resembled their dad, who’d been killed in a fall from a horse when Slater was twelve. Sometimes just the sight of his brother brought him a pang of grief.

      “Hey, yourself,” Slater responded lazily. As nicknames went, he figured Showbiz was something he could live with; both Mace and Drake, his middle brother, used it often.

      Mace reached for the carafe in the middle of the table and filled a waiting mug, adding a hefty splash of cream before closing his eyes, savoring that first sip and giving a blissful sigh. Next, he raised the lids on the metal serving dishes and helped himself to a heaping portion of scrambled eggs, bacon and sausage and three slices of buttered toast. He’d consume all of that, and most likely repeat the whole process.

      Slater, a devout aficionado of home cooking, was continually astonished by the sheer quantity of food Mace could put away.

      Finished with his own meal but in no particular hurry to head elsewhere, or to pad the silent spaces with talk, Slater replenished his coffee. He sat there, gazing quietly out the window, soaking in the special ambience of a country morning, content to be who he was, where he was.

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