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Chapter One
Bo Kennedy glanced down at his phone, checking the GPS screen one more time. The Brit had instructed him to turn left, but the road he was supposed to turn left on was barely a road. Covered in a canopy of trees, County Road 650 was a gravel track that seemed to lead off the winding foothills highway and down into a valley, but Bo couldn’t see any house or barn or fences from his vantage point. The voice came on again, “Turn left.”
Bo narrowed his eyes at the phone. That damn deep, mellow voice with the British accent sounded like someone’s butler. “I’m turning, Charles.” He hadn’t figured out how to change the GPS voice on his new smartphone, so he’d finally given it a name. He and Charles had driven all the way from Texas together without a single argument, so things were working out fine between them.
He cringed as tree branches brushed the wide fenders of his new-to-him pickup and horse trailer. It was only pines with soft boughs, but Delano Foster needed to trim his lane. Or maybe it was the county’s job? Someone should take care of it. When he swerved to avoid a particularly large pothole, he felt Whiskey and Cash adjust their footing. “Sorry, boys,” he muttered, although his geldings were in the trailer and couldn’t hear him. At least they were well-behaved travelers, so he wasn’t worried about them.
At the next turn, an obviously new sign arced high across the drive. JUNIPER FALLS RANCH. Hanging below it was DELANO & BETH FOSTER, OWNERS on a swinging wooden plaque. He was grateful for good brakes as he slowly made his way down the lane that curved before opening to a spectacular view of a well-laid-out ranch, clearly in the process of being renovated. The drive smoothed out as he drove into the property, and he pulled his rig into a graveled lot between the ranch house and the barn. The sounds of hammers, nail guns, and power saws filled the air. As Bo turned off the truck and gazed out the windshield, he saw roofers atop the ranch house and other carpenters putting in new windows across the wide front porch.
A long aluminum horse trailer with living quarters, a bigger version of his own rig, sat to one side of the house. The screen door was propped ajar, and the windows cranked open to the late-May breeze. A couple of large clay pots filled with purple and yellow pansies sat on either side of the steps to the horse trailer—definitely a woman’s touch. Delano Foster hadn’t mentioned a girlfriend or a wife when Bo had responded to the online ad for wranglers, but the sign had included a wife—Beth.
On their Zoom call, Foster had been gracious and understanding about the injury to his ankle and the cane and the fact that he was willing to work as best he could. His reputation with horses had preceded him according to the older rancher. Bo also needed a place to continue recuperating from the fall he’d taken in Texas at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo early last month. Broke his damn ankle and now had screws and a plate holding it together. Worst part was that it wasn’t even a horse- or rodeo-related injury. He’d hopped down from the hay rack on a friend’s trailer, landed on a big old rock, and snapped his ankle.
While he was off the ankle, he watched Monty Roberts train horses on YouTube, absorbing his unique approach that so matched his own philosophies. He was also pretty sure he’d watched every damn video there was about rodeo, cutting horses, and roping cows to prepare for working at Juniper Falls Ranch. He was confident he knew his stuff, but it never hurt to refresh. He’d even come across some old footage of events from the 1960s when his grandfather, Clyde Bowman, was a rodeo star along with Jim Tescher and Marty Wood. Memories had washed over him as he recalled how he’d sat in the stands at national, state, and local rodeos watching his granddad, wanting nothing more than to be just like him.
Who knew he’d grow too tall for bronc riding? But he loved cutting and roping and even more, he loved helping riders whose horse were difficult or having a problem. Bo got that gift—the ability to see into a horse’s mind and heart—from Grandpa Clyde, too, and now, here he was, just like Grandpa Clyde—ready to show Del Foster what he could do.
Nervous, but more than ready to get to work, Bo opened the door and eased out of the truck, grabbing his cane, which was actually a hand-carved hiking stick—a gift from his mom when he’d started PT. The stick, a length of hand-cut hickory that had a bucking horse burned into the top surface before being sealed with some kind of shiny epoxy, was perfect for his tall frame. Because he was six foot four inches tall, most regular canes proved to be too short to be comfortable. The hiking stick was perfect, and although he didn’t need it so much anymore, it had become almost a talisman of healing for him.
As he saw a couple of men hurrying out of the barn toward him, he thought better of the walking stick and thrust it back into the cab of the truck. Although Foster knew he was healing, there was no need for the cowhands’ first impression to be that he was a crippled old man. He shut the door and, walking slowly but with purpose, met them halfway across the drive. “Hey.”
The younger of the two men stuck out his hand. “Bo?”
“Yup.”
The man gave his hand a firm shake. “Del Foster. Welcome to Juniper Falls Ranch.”
“Thank you, sir.” Holy shit. The rancher was the guy from the western wear ads. Bo blinked and tried not stare.
The older man, gray-haired and a little grizzled, offered his hand. “Gus Prevott. How’s the leg, son?”
Bo considered telling the whole truth. The ankle was sore from all the hours of driving from Texas to Montana, and that he wouldn’t mind an ice pack and an easy chair with a footstool. Instead, he smiled. “Doing well, thanks. Healed up and released from PT. Ready to go.”
Del’s mouth pursed up as he looked him up and down—up mostly because Bo was pretty sure he had a good five inches on Del Foster and probably an easy eight on old Gus. “We’ve both been there. It’s a long recovery, so don’t be setting yourself back by trying to impress us.”
Bo lifted his chin. “I can work, sir.”
“Don’t doubt it a bit.” Del grinned. “And don’t sir me. I’m Del.”
Just then, Whiskey whinnied and stomped in the trailer and Cash shoved his nose against the rails.
Del started toward the rig. “Let’s get your horses. Stalls are all ready for ’em, but the east pasture is empty right now, so we can let them open up if you want.”
Bo followed, anxious to let the boys out into a pasture where they could roam. The nearly eighteen-hundred-mile ride had been just as hard on them, even though he’d kept his road time to about six to eight hours a day for their comfort as well as his own. He’d researched state parks with horse camps, keeping to places where he could get them out and walk them around a bit and then sleep outside the trailer. He’d hop on one and pony the other, switching off each evening after he’d set up camp.
He opened the rear gate, snapped leads on Whiskey and Cash and led them out, handing Whiskey off to Del as he brought Cash out himself. Still wary of the ankle and determined not to reinjure it, he was careful how he stepped off the back of the trailer. Fortunately, the dividers in the trailer folded back so he could turn the horses instead of backing them out. Just made it easier for him and them.
“Glad to see you have living quarters in your rig,” Del observed as he patted Whiskey’s neck and ran his hand over the gelding’s flank. “Good boy,” he murmured. “The bunkhouse isn’t finished yet, but it should be in few weeks. Waiting on plumbing to get in.”
Bo couldn’t help notice that Del’s accent wasn’t the western drawl he was used to hearing on the circuit. Not that every cowboy he met was from Texas or Arizona or points west, but Del Foster sounded like he was from back East … Massachusetts, maybe? Interesting.
The barn was vast, high-ceilinged, and newly painted dark red. Inside the scents of fresh hay, horseflesh, and new-sawn oak hit Bo’s senses, reminding him of Grandpa Clyde’s farm. “Nice barn.”
Del led Whiskey down the wide center aisle. “Over a hundred years old.” The pride in his voice was clear. He stopped at the last two stalls on the left. “Here and here for these boys—names?”
“You got Whiskey, and this here is Cash.” Bo scratched Cash’s neck under his mane. His dappled buckskin coat and thick black mane and tail were a source of pride, as was his bay, Whiskey’s rich reddish-brown fur and dark points.
Gus, who’d followed them in, pulled a marker out of his shirt pocket and wrote the horses’ names on the fresh white information plaques that were attached to the doors of the stalls. This place was organized. Nice.
Del opened the sliding door at the back of the barn, led them across a mostly dry mud lot, and opened the gate to a fenced pasture that looked to be about three, maybe five, acres. Four other horses grazing in an adjoining pasture looked up and nickered. Whiskey and Cash both whinnied in response. Suddenly, a shout from beside the barn turned the horses’ and the men’s attention to the huge arena where a paint horse raced toward the fence, dragging a longe line. Chasing right behind the horse was a young woman in tight jeans, a snug T-shirt, and a cowboy hat.
“Dammit, Storm, get your ass back here!” the woman cried just before slipping in a patch of horse manure. Windmilling her arms, she managed to land on her butt instead of her face as the paint horse raced along the board fencing of the roomy arena before nearly sliding to a halt and sticking its face over the fence to whinny at Whiskey and Cash.
Bo glanced at Del and Gus whose expressions of alarm had switched to amusement as the woman popped up and brushed her hands across her behind then groaned as she realized she’d just wiped them in horse poop.
“Everything okay there, Cassie?” Del asked, clearly having difficulty keeping from laughing.
Cassie? No way!
The girl’s wide-brimmed hat had dropped low on her brow, so her face was hidden from view as she stood there, hands, boots, and behind covered in manure. With a disgusted sigh, she swiped her hands on her thighs and then with a clean knuckle shoved the hat back off her face and stomped toward them. “Yeah, I’m fi—” She stopped dead in her tracks. Her jaw dropped, and she gaped. “It’s you.”
Bo’s heart leaped to his throat. It was her. The one person in his life he’d both hated and adored—sometimes at the same time. “Hey, Cassie.”
Cassie blinked and pushed her hat back farther on her head as heat rose up her neck, past her bandanna, and into her cheeks. What the actual hell? “Bo Kennedy? What are you doing in Montana?”
It was him. That tall brawny frame couldn’t be missed, towering over Gus and blocking her view of Del. And that buckskin—she’d know Cash anywhere. He was the whole reason the delicious romance she’d started with George Bowman Kennedy five years earlier had crashed and burned.
Bo turned away and removed Cash’s halter, releasing him to chase the other horse that Del had already let go. She watched as the two horses bucked and kicked and galloped across the field, clearly delighted to be turned loose. The bay lay down at the end of the pasture and rolled in a bare dusty spot, then got up and shook vigorously. Cash followed right behind, rolling in the dust and then shaking as if his life depended on it. If those horses had come up from Texas, they probably were more than ready to be out in a pasture, running and grazing.
Cassie stepped past Storm and grabbed the longe line where it clipped under the mare’s chin. “Come on, you goofball. You act like you’ve never seen a strange horse before.” She tipped her head back—the only way to see into Bo’s blue, blue eyes because even at a distance and even with her average height of five foot six inches, he was still strikingly tall. She swallowed. “How ya doin’, George?” He hated his first name. It was something they had in common.
He quirked one brow under the shock of wheat-colored hair that glinted with golden highlights in the Montana sun. “Just fine, Cassiopeia. You?”
A swift intake of breath and Cassie narrowed her eyes at him. He did not just do that! Use her hated full first name. Damn him!
She gritted her teeth. Okay, maybe he owed her—after all she’d George-d him right out of the box. She’d managed to keep her unusual full first name a secret on the circuit, allowing folks to believe she was a Cassandra or a Cassidy or even just simply Cassie. Thankfully it was only Del and Gus who’d heard, and neither of them seemed to react. The name had been the bane of her existence all through school, and she’d beat up more than one teasing bully who’d dared to use it. She was Cassie … just Cassie.
Del looked from one of them to the other, while Gus merely leaned against the pasture gate, arms back on the top rail. “Okay, so apparently you two know each other.” It was a statement that read more like question because both Del and Gus were eyeing them like they were a couple of zoo animals.
Neither of them spoke up at first, then finally Bo said, “Long time ago.”
Fine. If that’s how you want to play it.
Cassie nodded curtly. “Ancient history.”
Another long silence as Bo gazed at her, his expression unreadable. She tried to stare him down but lost the battle when Storm tossed her head, picked up her front feet, and whinnied.
Del handed the bay’s halter and lead line to Bo and came over to the fence, putting one booted foot on the bottom board. “How’d she do today?”
“She’s getting there.” No way was Cassie going to admit that Storm hadn’t paid any better attention to her this session than she had in the last. The paint mare was young—just turned three years old and had been started well with her previous owner. Cassie had bought her after her own Appendix gelding, Pierre, had dropped dead under her in the practice ring at her grandparents’ farm near Billings a few months ago. His heart had burst—a genetic anomaly—and they’d buried him at the back of the property where Gramps had buried other animals. It had broken her heart, but not her spirit, and she’d found Storm at a ranch outside Casper after a search that had taken her all over Montana and Wyoming.
The mare was good. She rode well and seemed to have some cow sense. Cassie wasn’t sure why she hadn’t connected with Storm yet, but the last thing she needed was Bo Kennedy to distract her. She reeled in the thirty-foot canvas line, wrinkling her nose at the manure that was smeared on it from Storm’s race across the arena.
Cassie’s stomach tightened as Bo, casually holding the halters and leads in one big hand, wandered over to the arena fence. “Nice mare. She new?”
“Yeah.”
She tugged Storm’s head around to lead her back to the center when Bo said, “Use the round pen. Too much space here and too many distractions.”
Cassie gritted her teeth. “I know how to longe a horse.”
“Just a suggestion.”
She whirled around. “I don’t need any suggestions from you, okay?” Storm jerked at the on the line and stomped.
He shrugged. “Looks like you might.”
Del eyed Cassie, looked at Bo and then back at Cassie. “You two gonna have a problem here?”
“No!” They chorused in unison, and heat crept up Cassie’s neck again.
“Good.” Del stepped back from the fence. “Because I aim to have a peaceful summer. No trouble that might get somebody hurt or a horse injured. If you two have issues, I suggest you work them out.” Without another word, he walked back to the barn with Gus on his heels.
Bo leaned his arms on the fence. “You here for the summer?”
Cassie waited until Del was into the barn before she met Bo’s steady gaze over Storm’s back. “Just leave me alone and we’ll be fine.”
“Pretty sure I’m the one who should be pissy here, Cass.”
The only thing keeping her from coming over the fence and smacking that self-righteous look off his too-handsome face was the fact that she’d have to let go of Storm to do it. “You? Seriously, George?”
A muscle worked in his jaw at her sneering use of the name he hated, and he tilted his head, his blue eyes narrowing. Then he straightened. “Screw it. I’m not doing this with you.” He turned on his heel, heading for the barn.
The limp in his stride only half registered with her. She blinked. Why’s he limping? Then, who cares?
“Fine,” Cassie called to his back. “I see you’re still the same bone-headed, stubborn—”
The shiny new barn door closed smoothly and quietly on its track on her words, and she really hoped he was frustrated that he couldn’t slam it.
“Jerk,” she muttered. She’d paid damn good money to train with Del Foster this summer, to get her mare ready for the rodeo in September, and no way was she going to let Bo Kennedy ruin everything she was working toward. She and Pierre had been a great team—they’d won myriad barrel-racing competitions because of that horse’s speed, agility, and great temperament as well as her own skill and their amazing connection. The drive to barrel race diminished with Pierre’s death, and she decided that if she was going to start all over with a new horse, she wanted to try a totally different event. So, here she was, learning to cut cows.
Storm nudged her arm with her velvety nose almost as if to say, Let’s get to work or turn me out.
Cassie swallowed hard and rubbed Storm’s neck. “Okay, lady. Let’s go.” With a frustrated sigh, she led Storm out of the arena and into the spanking-new round pen that was set up several yards away. She took the horse to the center and began a circle, chirruping her into a trot as she let out the line. In no time, Storm was back on it—her attention pretty much on Cassie’s instructions and minding her better than in the massive arena.
Just a suggestion! Damn Bo Kennedy anyway.
End of Excerpt
