IN BED WITH THE BOSS

He’s successful, powerful and extremely

sexy. He also happens to be her boss!

Used to getting his own way, he’ll demand

what he wants from her—in the boardroom

and the bedroom….

Watch the sparks fly as these couples

work together—and play together!

MILLS & BOON

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LUCY MONROE started reading at age four. After going through the children’s books at home, she was caught by her mother reading adult novels pilfered from the higher shelves on the bookcase. Alas, it was nine years before she got her hands on a Harlequin® romance book her older sister had brought home. She loves to create the strong alpha males and independent women who people Harlequin® books. When she’s not immersed in a romance novel (whether reading or writing it), she enjoys travel with her family, having tea with the neighbors, gardening and visits from her numerous nieces and nephews. Lucy loves to hear from readers. E-mail her at LucyMonroe@LucyMonroe.com, or visit her Web site at www.LucyMonroe.com.

What The Rancher Wants…

Lucy Monroe

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For my children…your support means the world,

and no mom could be prouder of what amazing

women and young man you have become.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER ONE

CARLENE DANIELS parked her car in the circular drive in front of the most imposing ranch house she’d ever seen.

Being from oil-rich Texas, she’d seen a few too…not to mention the beautiful homes built locally by millionaire celebs looking for anonymous vacation homes.

Anonymous. Right.

Built in the California Mission style, this home’s three-story stucco walls gleamed pristinely in the bright sunshine, the red-tiled roof and wrought-iron accents looking elegant rather than historic. She wondered who lived here. Typical for the area, the ad had given no particulars about the family she would be working for. If she would be working for them.

Sunshine Springs was not a hotbed for career opportunities, especially for an ex-schoolteacher turned cocktail waitress. But it was time to stop hiding behind spandex miniskirts and her job at the bar. Her experiences with Grant Strickland had made her realize that.

She’d left Texas in pain and determined to leave her old life behind completely. When the only opening available when she arrived in town had been working in a bar, she’d taken it because in no way would it remind her of the job and the kids she’d loved so much back home. But memories didn’t go away with a change in setting and she wanted her life back.

Carlene opened her car windows a crack and put a sunshade on the dash to protect the car from turning into a portable oven before sliding out of the driver’s seat and slamming the door. Swinging the wrought-iron gate open to the entryway, she slipped inside and rang the doorbell. After a couple of minutes and no answer, she rang it again.

They were advertising for a housekeeper after all. If the bell hadn’t been answered by now, it probably hadn’t been heard.

The door swept open. “What’s the rush?”

The husky, masculine demand caught her completely off guard. Oh, wow…this man was…totally yummy. Black hair, cobalt-blue eyes and a tall, droolworthy muscular body.

“I…uh…”

The piercing blue gaze traveled from her hair to her toes and back up again. Then it made a return journey, leaving chills in its wake. Wow…again.

She knew what she wanted him to see: a woman from another time in her life, before she’d taken the job as bartender at the Dry Gulch. A time when her clothes and manners matched the woman she was on the inside.

Instead of the revealing outfits she wore to work nowadays, she had donned a long straight denim skirt, a loose white scooped-neck top, and white sandals. Flats. After months of wearing nothing but spiked heels that added inches to her diminutive height, these shoes almost felt as if she were wearing bedroom slippers.

The only concession she’d made to the glitz she’d grown accustomed to was the silver and turquoise belt around her hips. Even her normally riotous brown curls had been tamed in a loose French braid and she’d left off everything but the barest of makeup. She looked exactly like what she wanted to convey: a nice girl. Non-threatening in the feminine stakes and perfect for the role of housekeeper.

She stifled a cynical snort at the thought. Even her oversized top could not disguise her generous curves. Curves that had been causing her trouble since the sixth grade. And she was pretty sure it was those curves that had caused the second once over and small tilt at the corner of the man’s otherwise rather grim lips.

However, she was darned if she was going to have breast reduction surgery, as her mother had suggested in order to make herself appear more respectable. She liked her figure. She just didn’t like the things it made people assume about her character. An old familiar ache tried to work its way to the surface and she forced it back down.

That part of her life was over. She wasn’t going to let it dictate her present any longer and she sure as shootin’ wasn’t going to let it dictate her future.

“You Carlene Daniels?”

She nodded, experiencing an odd inability to speak.

“I’m Win Garrison. Expected someone older.”

“So did I.” The words were out before she even realized she was going to say them.

She’d set this interview up with the former housekeeper. The woman had spoken little English, adding no further details about the family she was leaving behind than the ad had given. All Carlene knew was that Rosa’s last day had been yesterday and that she, Carlene, had an interview for the position of housekeeper with Rosa’s former employers today.

However, Carlene had heard of Win’s ranch, the Bar G. Who hadn’t? Only it had never occurred to her that the owner of a ranch that bred free-range mustangs, not to mention having the most prestigious thoroughbred horse breeding and training program this side of the Rockies, would be younger than fifty. Win Garrison was maybe thirty, but certainly not much older.

Making no effort to respond to her comment, he turned around and started walking down the hall, clearly expecting her to follow him. “I’ll interview you out in the courtyard.”

She walked behind him, cataloging his attributes like an inventory control clerk and powerless to focus her attention elsewhere. Despite his obvious wealth, Win’s clothes were that of a working cowboy. His long legs were encased in a pair of jeans washed to a comfortable, faded softness that clung to his backside with almost indecent snugness. His ebony hair brushed the collar of the dark T-shirt that rippled with his muscles as he walked.

The man was too hot for Carlene’s peace of mind. Maybe this job was not such a good idea…but hand-tooled boots clicked on the tile floor ahead of her drawing her inescapably toward a future as uncertain as the past she’d left behind.

Where was his wife? Why would he conduct the interview for a housekeeper and cook?

Win led her through the entrance hall to another interior hallway that surrounded the courtyard. An intelligent concession to central Oregon’s cold winters, she thought. They went outside through one set of four sliding glass doors placed in the walls of windows that faced the courtyard from the house. She followed him to a large brick patio and couldn’t help but admire the beautifully kept foliage along the way. Small shrubs and patches of grass, broken by stone pathways leading to the house, surrounded a two-tiered cement fountain. “It’s lovely.”

“Thank you.”

He moved forward and pulled out a chair from the wrought-iron patio set. She sat down.

“Want anything to drink?”

She shook her head. “I’m fine, thanks.”

He nodded and sat across from her.

When he didn’t immediately begin asking questions, she decided to ask a few of her own. “Mr Garrison, I’m afraid I have almost no information regarding you and your family. When I called on the ad in the paper and spoke to your housekeeper, she told me little more than that she planned to be gone as of yesterday. Do you have children? Will Mrs Garrison wish to interview me as well?”

It made her nervous to have to go through a two-interview process for the job of housekeeper, but she would survive. It just meant that much longer before she knew whether or not she had the position. What she really wanted to ask was if there had been a lot of other applicants.

He leaned back in his chair, his boots scraping on the stone tile. “No.”

No? No, what? She smiled faintly. “Would you care to expand on that a little?”

“No kids. No wife. No other interview.”

She wasn’t sure if she was relieved or worried by that bit of news. “Then perhaps you would like to commence with this one?”

His eyes narrowed. “You sure you wouldn’t like to do it? You seem to be doing fine so far.”

Crud. It was the teacher’s instincts coming out again. She would have thought, after all this time out of the classroom, she’d have no problem treating adults differently than the children she used to work with. But then a lot of times patrons at the bar needed the same kind of handling.

She tried another smile. “Um…okay. We can get the rest of my questions out of the way first. Is this a live-in position?”

“No.”

She managed to bite back a sigh of relief. The job of live-in housekeeper to a man as good-looking as the one before her was rife with the potential for gossip. The last thing she wanted was any more gossip. “What are the hours, then?”

“Rosa worked from seven-thirty to four.”

Carlene nodded. “What exactly do the duties entail?”

He frowned and shrugged.

She stared at him in shock. “You don’t know?”

“Why do you think I need a housekeeper? It’s the house stuff. I don’t want to have to worry about it. A cleaning service comes in a few times a week. Rosa took care of setting that up.”

Great. His Spanish-speaking housekeeper had set up the cleaning service…which meant that the maids probably spoke Spanish as well. She could hope they were bilingual because her college French wasn’t going to do her a lot of good here.

“What else did Rosa do?”

Win’s frown deepened. “I told you…I’m not sure. I run my ranch and the stables. She ran the house.”

“And that’s what you want me to do…run the house?”

He nodded, almost smiling. “Yes.”

“Did Rosa cook all your meals?”

“Yes. Both for me and the hands.”

“Okay.” Now they were getting somewhere.

“Did she make your bed?” Oh, nuts…why had she asked that? Not that she didn’t need to know, but she really didn’t need to be thinking about bed and this man in the same sentence.

But Win looked as if he was thinking. “The service only comes in maybe three times a week…my bed is made every night when I climb into it, the towels and such are gone from the bathroom too. Yes…guess she made my bed.”

“And did the laundry.” Not to mention a pile of domestic stuff that Carlene was quickly coming to realize Win never even thought about.

Must be nice to be rich enough to leave all those details to someone else.

“Well, yeah.”

“It sounds like you want to hire a wife,” she quipped.

He didn’t smile at her small joke. Instead, his brows drew together in his fiercest frown yet. “The last thing I want is a wife, hired or otherwise. If you’ve got any ideas in that direction, we might as well part company right now.”

She experienced an odd combination of amusement and anger at his words. Amusement that anyone could be this blunt and anger that he would assume she was angling for such a thing.

Okay, so she had come to the conclusion that she wanted the husband, the white picket fence and the two point five children playing in the yard after the last decent guy she dated ended up married to someone else. And she wanted that yard well manicured, not full of rusty automobile parts. The guys she met at the Gulch had not been candidates for the “two point five kids and white picket fence” scenario. They were generally interested in one thing and, with her figure, they expected to get it.

But there was no way that Win Garrison could know about her secret dreams and she certainly hadn’t implied she was auditioning him for the role of husband in them.

“I’m here to apply for the position of housekeeper, not wife. Furthermore, I’m certainly not interested in marriage to a man who thinks monosyllabic replies pass for communication and rudeness is socially acceptable behavior. Don’t worry. If I were to take the job of your housekeeper, your unmarried status would remain perfectly safe.”

“Good.” He looked satisfied, her insults seeming to go right over his head. “Then we can finish the interview.”

She stood up. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Mr Garrison.” That she was using his rudeness as an excuse to get away from a man she was far too attracted to was not a thought she wanted to contemplate at the moment. “Thank you for your time, but I think it’s best if I leave.”

There had to be another job she could get that would get her out of the Dry Gulch and maybe make her application to teach in the Sunshine Springs school district a little more appealing. Just because this was the first good prospect she’d seen in the two weeks since she started looking, didn’t mean it was the only possibility.

“Sit down, Carlene, and call me Win.”

“No, really. I need to go.” She turned to leave.

But his voice stopped her. “I said sit down.” His tone made the quietly spoken command more intense than shouting could have.

She turned back to face him.

He smiled and her stomach dipped and that was so not good. “If you can’t follow one simple direction, we’re going to have a pretty rough working relationship.”

Frowning, she remained standing. “I don’t think we can have a working relationship at all, Mr Garrison.”

“Why? Because I sometimes talk in monosyllable?”

“No. Because you are rude and I don’t work well with rude people.” It was the truth. She’d gotten chewed out more than once at the Dry Gulch for taking a bad-mannered customer to task for their behavior.

“If I apologize, will you finish the interview?”

She didn’t think he was the kind of man that apologized often. “It depends.”

“On what?”

“On why you were discourteous to begin with.”

“What exactly did you consider the discourtesy, if you don’t mind me asking? My one-word replies or my warning?”

She felt herself blush because she’d been rude too. Insulting even and it hadn’t gone over his head. He’d simply opted not to make an issue of it.

She sighed. “The warning. Most women would not find your assumption that they are looking at you as a potential mate on such short acquaintance flattering.”

Even as she said the words, she felt silly. She was taking them far too personally. Really.

His cynical laugh didn’t make her feel any better. “Honey, I’m a rich man with a lifestyle a lot of people covet. A fair number of women would consider marriage a nice way to ensure they share it. I learned a long time ago to make my lack of interest in marriage clear from the beginning, no matter what relationship between me and the woman.” He certainly wasn’t talking in single syllables right now.

“You mean you warn all your dates and hands the same way?”

“Yes. I don’t have any women working the Bar G right now, but the female vet got her warning the first time she came out to check the horses.”

“It’s like a religion with you,” she said, a little awed by his vehemence.

He sat up, planting his booted feet securely under him. “You could see it that way. You sure talk fancy for a housekeeper.”

But not for a high school English teacher with a degree in French literature, she thought. “Is that a strike against me?”

“I don’t know. Why don’t you sit down and we’ll discuss it?”

She acquiesced.

He smiled again and she decided that she preferred it when he frowned. His smile was entirely too sexy and the last thing she needed was to think of her employer, particularly this one, as sexy in any way. He wasn’t interested in marriage and she wasn’t interested in an affair.

That left sexy out of their equation.

“What kind of experience do you have?” he asked.

“Not a lot,” she admitted. “Not any paid, but I can cook and I’ve been keeping house for myself since I went away to college.”

Of course, keeping up with her dorm room and then small apartments was nothing on the scale of his three-story mansion, but she would cope.

“If you can cook as well as you talk, the hands are going to love you.” He gave her another once-over, this time, instead of chills, his gaze making her go hot in places an employer should not affect. “Then again, once they get a look at you, they’ll think they’ve gone to heaven even if your food tastes like cow pies.”

This she was used to. This she could handle. At least that was what she tried to convince herself. Men had been making comments about her figure for years. She had learned long ago that the best way to deal with the comments was to ignore them. “Ever eaten any?”

“Any what?”

“Cow pies?”

“No,” he said, with a hint of smile in his voice.

“Then I guess you won’t know if my cooking falls under that category, now, will you?”

The smile became a full-blown chuckle. “Guess not. You start tomorrow morning, Tex.”

“My name is Carlene.”

“But you talk like a Texan.”

“I’ll have to work harder on that. I’ll never live there again.” Too much pain she never wanted to revisit.

Relaxing against the brown leather couch in his living room, Win swirled the whiskey in his glass before taking a swallow. It had been several hours since Carlene Daniels had left. His new housekeeper. He grinned.

She had a body that would make most men uncomfortable in their jeans and talked like a prissy little schoolmarm. Remembering the curves her loose top had been unable to hide, he amended his thoughts. The lady wasn’t exactly little, at least not in some places. She wasn’t too big either. She was a perfect pocket Venus, with womanly curves that led to a naturally small waist. She was the stuff of most adolescent male dreams, maybe most adult ones as well.

She’d certainly been the subject of too many of his waking thoughts today. He still couldn’t figure out what gremlin had gotten into him and prompted him to offer her the job. She had no experience. He sure as hell hoped she could cook. His hands might like looking at a sexy woman like her, but that would grow old pretty darn quick if she didn’t feed them right. He sighed.

Maybe he should assign Shorty to help her until she got used to the routine. The diminutive man made lousy biscuits, but he knew the quantities and types of food horsemen ate.

She’d probably talk Shorty’s ears off. The woman had a mouth on her and it was plain as the day was long that she was used to being in charge. So long as she limited that bossy streak to the house, they wouldn’t have any problems. He didn’t want to have to worry about anything but running the Bar G and Garrison Stables. With mares ready to foal he didn’t have time to concern himself with stuff like meals and cleaning house.

He wondered where she’d gotten such a bossy streak. If she didn’t have any experience as a housekeeper and cook, what types of jobs had she held before? He couldn’t believe he hadn’t asked her. He hadn’t even asked her to fill out an employment application. He had hired her based on sheer instinct and that wasn’t like him. He was a careful man.

He hated admitting it, but his hormones had played their part too. It was disconcerting to realize that he’d reached the age of thirty and he could still be swayed so strongly by the sight of a beautiful woman. He’d just gone too long without. He hadn’t had a date in months and hadn’t slept with a woman in even longer. He’d gotten tired of the games. Tired of empty sex. Both things seemed to come along with the territory for a man uninterested in marriage.

There were times the big house felt empty too, times he felt empty. His certainty that marriage was for idiots didn’t waver. He’d learned the lesson too well at his mother’s knee. Hadn’t she married five men and divorced four? The only reason she hadn’t divorced her last husband was because she’d died before she could get bored again with marital bliss.

There had been a time when Win had been willing to believe that there were women out there that weren’t like his mother. He’d been young and foolish. Barely out of high school and overwhelmed with the responsibility of caring for his thirteen-year-old sister, he’d met a shy, sweet little gal who wanted to get married—Rachel. He had believed that Rachel could help with his sister, could make their household, devastated by the death of his mom and stepdad, a home again.

It hadn’t worked that way. Rachel had wanted him to sell the Bar G and move to the big city. She had dreams and no one was going to stand in her way, least of all her young husband and his needy little sister. He hadn’t wanted to risk marriage since then. He’d learned his lesson the hard way, but he had learned it.

Carlene sure had been offended when he laid it out flat for her. She’d bristled with feminine pride and it had been all he could do not to laugh. She was naïve if she thought most of the women who entered his life didn’t see him as a potential meal ticket complete with caviar and silver spoons.

She didn’t know it, but it hadn’t been rude for him to set things straight from the beginning. It had been fair and he was a fair man. She had a right to know where he was coming from. He wanted her and he meant to have her, but he wasn’t interested in marriage.

He’d wanted her from the moment he opened his door, irritated by the second ringing of chimes set off by the impatient person waiting on the other side. The woman standing on the other side had been so far from what he’d expected that he’d felt sucker punched. And horny.

No doubt about it. He had been too long without the company of a woman, but he’d had the good sense to hire Carlene and soon that would be rectified.

CHAPTER TWO

CARLENE liked Shorty, the ranch hand Win had assigned to help her in the kitchen, the minute she met him. He had a grin that more than made up for his lack in stature. Soft gray eyes twinkled under a crown of silvered hair. “Well, missy, Win says you don’t got a hill of beans in experience, but I’m to help you learn the ropes. You know anything about cooking?”

She laughed. “I’d have to be pretty dumb to take a job as housekeeper and cook if I didn’t, now, wouldn’t I? Do I look dumb to you?”

Shorty sized her up as if he was seriously contemplating his answer to that question and Carlene’s respect for him went up a notch. The man kept his eyes focused mainly on her face.

“No, missy, you don’t look dumb at all. That must mean you can cook.” He sighed with relief. “It’s a good thing. Win and the hands ain’t real fond of my vittles.”

Then why had Win assigned the man to help her in the kitchen? Shorty answered that question for her with his next statement. “None of the hands, including our boss, can do any better. At least I know how to cook food without burning it, even if it isn’t real appetizin’.”

Carlene walked over to the sink and washed her hands. “I’ll let you in on a little secret, Shorty. I can cook without burning the food and I’ve been told that my food is better than passable by more than one person.”

“Well, glory be, that’s a relief.”

Carlene hoped that the rest of the ranch hands would share Shorty’s enthusiasm when they filed into the large kitchen for lunch. She’d made French dip sandwiches, Caesar salad and cookies for dessert.

Win took a seat at one end of the table. Shorty sat to his left and a man they called Joe, who looked about the same age as Win, sat to Win’s right. He was introduced as the ranch foreman in charge of the horse and mustang training. Four other hands, ranging in age from just out of high school to another man who looked as wizened and gray as Shorty, sat down. Apparently, most of the hands worked for Joe, while Shorty and one of the youngest men, a brunette with cold gray eyes they introduced as Lonny, worked in the thoroughbred stables with Win.

Carlene placed filled plates in front of each man, beginning with Win. She didn’t realize that she’d been waiting for his approval until he looked up and nodded. “Looks good.”

She quietly said, “Thank you,” and continued passing out plates, feeling ridiculously pleased. After serving everyone, she turned back to the counter where she had lined up the ingredients for the pies she planned to make.

“Aren’t you going to eat with us, ma’am?” Joe asked.

She turned around, waiting to see if Win would second the hand’s invitation to join them. When he didn’t, she replied, “I’ll eat later. I’ve got work to do.”

“Aw shucks, ma’am, we’d be pleased for your company,” a redhead said.

Lonny gave Carlene a knowing look and patted the bench next to him. “You can sit right here, Carlene.”

Normally, she would have just laughed off an invitation like that from such a young man, but there was an intensity about Lonny that made Carlene nervous. The cold ruthlessness in his eyes reminded her of the student that had torn her life in Texas to shreds. She suppressed a shiver, reminding herself that there was no disgruntled principal here to help Lonny hurt her. There was just Win and she could not see him stooping to the lengths her ex-boss had even if she rejected him.

She managed to swallow a rude comeback to Lonny’s comment, not wanting to offend Win’s other employees her first day on the job. “No, thank you. As I said, I’ve got work to do.”

She shifted her gaze to Win, wondering what he thought of the exchange.

The look he was giving the younger man was cold and deadly. He turned slightly so that he was looking directly at her, his gaze warming several degrees. “Do what’s comfortable for your schedule, but don’t skip your lunch.”

She smiled at the order. “Yes, boss.”

He nodded. “If you’re hungry now, the men’ll move so you can sit by Shorty.”

It didn’t escape her notice, or that of his men, if Lonny’s narrowed eyes were an indication, that Win’s dictate would place her next to him as well. Carlene didn’t mind. Compared to Lonny, Win was a much safer bet. She had no doubt that sitting between him and Shorty she wouldn’t have to fend off any roaming hands under the table.

She considered Win’s offer. It shouldn’t be such a big deal, but it would set a precedent for the future. If she ate with them now, human nature dictated that the hands would recognize that whenever she shared their table, her place would be between Win and Shorty.

Her stomach chose that moment to make a rumbling sound and the men laughed while she smiled, embarrassed. “I guess I’ll eat now.”

Several hours later after preparing a dinner that only required Shorty to heat things through before serving them, Carlene got ready to leave. Her feet didn’t hurt as much as after a night tending bar, but her back ached from a different kind of labor. She’d spent the day cooking, cleaning and trying to decipher the written instructions Rosa had left behind in a confusing mixture of Spanish and English.

She wondered what had caused the other woman to abandon her job so abruptly.

“You sure know your way around a ranch kitchen,” Shorty commented from behind as she pulled off her apron and hung it on the hook by the refrigerator.

She turned and smiled at him. “Thanks. I grew up in west Texas cow country.”

“Congratulations, Shorty. You got more information out of her in five minutes than I was able to do during her interview.”

Carlene’s head snapped up at the sound of Win’s amused voice from the doorway to the dining room. He leaned against the doorjamb, a lazy smile on his face and looking handsome as sin. He was dressed much as he’d been for her interview, except today his T-shirt was black instead of dark blue and a cowboy hat hung loosely from his fingers next to his thigh.

She wished he’d stop smiling at her like that. It made her forget what she was going to do next. Forcing herself to focus on his words and not his mouth, she said, “You didn’t ask.”

He came into the kitchen sniffing at the casserole in the oven with an appreciative air. “Smells good.”

“Thank you.”

He lifted the linen towel covering the two marionberry pies she’d made for dinner. She’d used the native Oregon fruit, figuring the men would appreciate the plump, tangy blackberry-style filling. “You’re wrong, you know,” he said as he put the cover back over the pies.

“Wrong about what?” she asked, feeling breathless for no apparent reason.

“I did ask.” He turned to face her. “I distinctly remember asking if you had any experience.”

“You asked about experience as a housekeeper and cook. I don’t have any formal experience, but I do know how to cook and clean house. I told you that.”

She didn’t understand his enigmatic expression. He asked, “Why’d you leave Texas? Were you looking for adventure?”

She couldn’t hold back the laughter that bubbled forth. “If I’d been looking for adventure, I wouldn’t have ended up in Sunshine Springs.” Though the small town was a lot more than what she’d thought it was when she’d first arrived.

She’d had no idea at the time that it was a winter playground for the rich and famous.

He relaxed his tense posture and returned her smile. “No. You wouldn’t have.”

“So, why did you leave?” Shorty asked, reminding Carlene of his presence.

“It was time to move on,” she replied noncommittally.

“Leave behind a disgruntled lover?” asked the irrepressible Shorty.

Carlene frowned. It was too near the truth. “I left behind a life that didn’t fit me any longer.”

Win’s expression turned distinctly chilled. “Did that life include a husband? Children?”

“No.” She was inexplicably hurt that he would have such a low opinion of her as to believe she would leave her own children behind, and her voice came out tight. “I’ve never been married.”

His expression didn’t lighten. “Do you do that often?”

“What? Move on?” Was he worried that she would move and leave him in the lurch looking for a housekeeper as Rosa had? “Don’t worry, I’ll give you plenty of notice when I’m ready to leave.”

His expression turned even more forbidding. “I see.”

She hated it when people used that catch all phrase. It made for lousy communication. For instance, what exactly did Win believe he saw and why had it put him in such a dour mood?

“There’s nothing to see. I’m a responsible employee, Win. I won’t leave you in the lurch.”

“You said when, not if. You’re already planning to leave.”

He didn’t need to make it sound as if she were betraying him. She was just an employee. A housekeeper…a job easy to fill again, as she was testament to. But perhaps she should tell him about her plans to get a teaching position in the fall. She discarded the idea as quickly as it came. This wasn’t exactly a position with a contract and long-range career plans. She would do the job she’d been hired to do as long as she worked for Win Garrison, and she’d do it well.

And she’d give him sufficient notice to find someone else. He couldn’t ask for more than that.

She did say, “I’d have to be a different person to be content with the position of cook and housekeeper for the rest of my life.”

Win nodded, his face blank. “Yes. You would.”

A couple of days later, Carlene was washing up the dishes left over from breakfast when Lonny came in. Once they learned she knew her way around the kitchen, Shorty no longer came up to the house to help. So, she was alone with the stable hand. She pushed the discomfort that thought caused aside. She could handle a young man like Lonny, even if he did have eyes colder than a meat locker.

Determined to take control of the encounter right from the start, she forced a smile to her lips. “If you’re looking for Shorty, he’s down at the stables.”

“I didn’t come to talk to Shorty. I came to talk to you.” Lonny leaned negligently against the counter about a foot from where she stood at the sink.

She put the last plate into the bottom rack of the dishwasher and then closed it. Standing straight, she dried her hands on the kitchen towel she kept by the sink. “What can I do for you?”

Lonny’s smile didn’t travel from his lips to his eyes. Carlene suppressed a shiver.

“I don’t want anything special,” he said.

She knew he was lying. There was purpose along with unmistakable confidence in the younger man’s eyes. Well, that confidence would turn to surprise if he tried anything. He would learn just as her former boss had that Carlene was not, nor would she ever be, easy prey. She was grateful that Lonny had no way of exacting the terrible price that her former principal had for her rejection. At least this time, she could say no without losing her job and her reputation in the process.

She stepped around him to pull down the platter she intended to use for lunch, using it as an excuse to move away from Lonny. She needn’t have bothered. He moved with her.

“Aren’t you supposed to be working right now?” she asked with no little exasperation. Really, Win could keep better track of his hands.

“You know the old saying. All work and no play makes Lonny a very dull boy and I’m anything but dull, babe.”

Carlene set the platter down with more force than necessary. “My name is Carlene, not babe.” She took a deep breath to recenter. “And the truth? I am a bit dull. I believe in working when I’m paid to work. I’ve got lunch to prepare and a house to clean, so if you’ll excuse me.”

Lonny moved forward, crowding her against the wall. He put one hand on the wall and the other on her hip, effectively caging her in. “Don’t worry. I’ll teach you how to have a little fun.” He squeezed her hip and she pushed against his chest, but he didn’t move.

Letting his gaze travel down her body, he paused at her breasts hidden behind the big white apron, before moving on. His leer sent her insides churning. She really didn’t want to have to deal with this. “Although, with the way you’re built, I bet you know plenty about fun, don’t you, babe?”

His head came down as if he planned to kiss her.

Enough was enough. Some guys just didn’t comprehend when a woman wasn’t interested. Lonny might be young, but he was old enough to learn this lesson. She’d worn a pair of her more conservative heels today, her body too used to spending hours on heels to be comfortable in her flat sandals.

She was glad she’d done so now. Using the short, but very spiked heel of her shoe, she came down with all her weight on the top of his boot. He grunted and stumbled back a step. Before he could steady himself, she’d curled her fingers into a fist and punched him right below his ribcage just as her self-defense instructor back in Texas had taught her.

Letting out a high-pitched curse that ended on a big oof, he doubled over.

She drew herself to her full five-feet-four-inch height. “I am not anyone’s babe, least of all yours. Do I make myself clear?”

He lifted his head, his arms still curved protectively around his midsection. “Yeah.”

She nodded. Good. “Though I may not be old enough to be your mother, I’m certainly too old to be your anything else. I can’t even be your friend because I don’t offer that kind of trust to idiots who don’t know any better than to make a pass at a co-worker on their boss’s time.”

He glared at her, but he didn’t argue.

“I work for the same man you do and I expect the same respect that you give any of the other hands. Is that understood?”

He finally stood up straight, but his breathing was still a little shallow. “Understood, but you don’t know what you’re missing.”

She let that slide. A man needed some pride, after all.

She had only one final thing to say to him. “As far as how I’m built having anything to do with my ability to have fun, I’m here to tell you that I’ve got all the same parts that other women do. Fun, especially the kind you appear to want, is a state of mind, not body. How I look has nothing to do with it, unless we’re talking how my brain works and then maybe you’d have a clue.”

Lonny nodded and sidled out of the kitchen without further comment.

Win came in the door as Lonny was leaving. “You forget what I told you to do this morning?”

Lonny shook his head. “Just needed to talk to Carlene about something.”

Win looked at Carlene and then back at Lonny. “Anything I need to know about?”

Lonny’s cheeks, which had taken on a slight pallor, turned red. “No, boss. Nothing important.”

Win looked at Carlene. “That true?”

Carlene nodded. “It definitely wasn’t anything important.”

It appeared as if Win wanted to ask more questions, but Lonny was already headed toward the stables. Win stepped completely into the kitchen.

“I’m going into town to pick up some things. Do you want to come along and get groceries?”

She took longer to consider his question than she was sure he expected. She did need groceries. Rosa, the previous housekeeper, had left some things well stocked and some nearly empty. The problem was going to town with Win. She avoided him and the intensity she experienced whenever he was around as much as possible. And after her little dust-up with Lonny, she did not want any more challenges from the male of the species.

He raised a mocking brow. “I didn’t realize it would be such a difficult question.”

She frowned. Why did she get the feeling that he knew exactly why she hesitated? Inexplicably, the thought stung her pride. “That would be fine, Win. Just let me get my purse.”

He shrugged. “You don’t need it. I’ll buy the groceries.”

“Don’t you know that a woman feels naked without her purse?” she asked.

His eyes took on a distinctly disturbing quality and she tensed in preparation for some ribald comment, but none came. He merely said, “My sister’s mentioned that a time or two.”

He led her out to the car and she said, “I didn’t realize that you had a sister. Does she live around here?”

Maybe Carlene had met her.

“No. She and her husband live in Portland.”

Carlene settled into the passenger seat of Win’s midnight-blue Ram pickup and buckled her seat belt. “Oh. What’s her name?”

If he thought she was nosy, he didn’t say so. He started the truck and headed toward the highway. “Leah Branson. Her husband runs Branson Consulting out of Portland. Maybe you’ve heard of it. They get their names in the paper from time to time.”

Carlene searched her memory, but couldn’t remember ever reading about the consulting firm. “No. Sorry.”

“I guess you aren’t real interested in the financial section of the paper?”

She bristled at his condescending tone. “As a matter of fact, no. I like to read human interest stories, not dry articles on the state of the economy.”

She also liked to read popular fiction. She’d been teased at college because of her taste in reading material, but she refused to conform to someone else’s idea of what a French Literature major should want to read.

She realized she was taking easy offense again and sighed. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to get defensive.”

“I didn’t mean to offend you, honey.”

Now why didn’t Win calling her honey bother her a bit when Lonny calling her babe was like nails scoring a chalkboard?

“You didn’t. Not really. But just because I’m not interested in the financial section of the paper doesn’t mean I’m a bimbo.”

He took his gaze off the road for a few seconds to meet hers. “Does that happen often?”

“What?”

“People think you’re a bimbo.”

“Because I don’t read the stock reports?”

“Because of how you look.”

The man saw too much.

“People assume a lot of things about me based on the way I look.” She joked, “I guess it’s a good thing I’m not blonde. I’d have a whole slew of assumptions made about my intelligence based on the color of my hair.”

Win frowned. “Is that why you left Texas? Were too many people judging you based on your looks?”

His insight startled her and she didn’t answer immediately. How much did she want to say? “You could say that,” she hedged.

“I’d rather hear what you have to say about it.”

“I don’t like revisiting my past.”

“Okay.”

His easy agreement should have set her mind at rest, but she had the distinct impression that he was just biding his time. She was almost certain the subject wasn’t closed as far as Win Garrison was concerned.

Looking for something besides herself to discuss, she said, “Tell me more about your sister.”

His expression softened. “She’s five years younger than me. She and Mark have got a couple of real cute kids.”

“Where are your parents?”

His fingers gripped the steering wheel a little tighter. “I don’t know where our dads are. Mom moved after each divorce and we lost touch. Neither of them were big on visitation rights.”

“And your mom?” she asked.

“She died in a plane crash twelve years ago.”

“Who raised your sister?”

“I did.” He spoke with no inflection in his voice.

“That must have been really hard, taking on the responsibility to raise a teenage sister and losing your mom at the same time.”

“Raising Leah was nothing new. Mom was too busy getting married and divorced to pay much attention to either of us. Leah was my responsibility from the day Mom brought her home from the hospital.” He smiled ruefully. “I still get tied up in knots every time she cries.”

His admission touched something deep inside Carlene. It was so far from something she would have expected him to say. “Divorce is incredibly traumatic for children. I can’t imagine what it must have been like for you to go through two of them.”

“Four.”

She stared at his profile. “Your mom was married four times?”

“Five. She was divorced four times. I guess modern pop psychologists would say she had a problem with commitment.”

“What happened to her fifth husband?” Carlene knew she was being unforgivably inquisitive, but she couldn’t seem to help herself.

“Hank Garrison died in the plane crash with my mom.”

“You use your stepfather’s name. Did he adopt you?”

Win gave a harsh, bitter laugh. “Nothing so formal. Every time Mom remarried, she insisted Leah and I take her husband’s name. I had more last names growing up than pets.”

“But you stuck with Garrison.”

“Yeah.” His terse answer didn’t invite further comment.

She laid her hand on his arm. “I’m sorry.”

He spared her a brief, cold glance as he pulled into a parking spot in front of the grocery store. “Save your pity. I survived.”

She yanked her hand back, feeling chastised. She’d reserve her sympathy for someone who needed it, someone who had a little softness left in him. She just wished her heart didn’t constrict every time she thought of Win’s childhood. At least she understood the aversion to marriage he’d expressed at their first meeting. The man had a reason for distrusting the institution.

Win watched Carlene walk across the grocery store parking lot and couldn’t help admiring the sway of her hips in her snug-fitting denim jeans. She looked back when she reached the front door, and waved him on impatiently. He sighed and obeyed her imperious little wave.

Pulling onto the main road, he mulled over the conversation they’d had in the car.

He didn’t like talking about his mother, but he’d hoped that if he opened up to Carlene a little about his past, she’d be willing to do the same with hers. His was an open book anyway. Anything she wanted to know she could find out from one of Sunshine Spring’s long time residents.

He took her curiosity as a good sign. Women wanted to know about the men they were interested in. Carlene was definitely interested in him, but she’d given a lot of mixed signals. Something was holding her back.

He had a feeling that something had happened to Carlene in Texas that left her skittish as an untried filly. He figured it was his job to help her get over her past and move on. Because he wanted her warm and willing.

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