The Rancher Who Took Her In. Teresa Southwick

like a sin.

      When she’d looked her fill, she went the other way, past her cabin and the ones that campers and seasoned counselors would occupy in a couple of days. She was looking forward to that, to being busy. With too much time on her hands it was difficult not to obsess about how stupid she’d been to accept Ted’s marriage proposal.

      What a huge mistake she’d nearly made. And how anxious her parents had sounded when she’d called to let them know she was okay but refused to say where she was now. She needed time by herself, and God bless them, they understood. They had handled canceling the wedding and reception and were returning gifts. She had planned to take the summer off for a honeymoon and settling into married life. Now she had time off to figure out where her life went from here.

      The sound of a deep voice followed by childish laughter carried to her. Then she heard a muffled slap. As she made it to the top of the hill, she saw that in front of the big log-cabin house Cabot was playing catch with Tyler, who had his back to her. When the boy missed his father’s underhanded toss, the baseball rolled downhill toward her. He turned to chase it and stopped short when he spotted her.

      “Hi, Kate.” His smile was friendly and he seemed happy to see her.

      “Hey, kid.” She stopped the rolling baseball with her foot, then bent to pick it up.

      She couldn’t remember the last time she’d played any sport involving a ball. Once she’d started going to the shooting range with her father and showed an aptitude for skeet, her life had changed. Practice and competitions dominated her life. Before that she’d gone to traditional school, where organized peer activities were possible, but she’d never participated. All the family moves because of her father’s military career had made her reluctant to join anything. Then she found her best event. The sport, and being good at something, had made her happy. Until finding skeet shooting, she’d never fit in anywhere.

      “Are you going to stare at that ball all day or throw it back?” It wasn’t clear whether Cabot was irritated or amused.

      “Sorry.” She drew her arm back and tossed the ball at Ty. At least that had been her intention. It went way to the right of the mark and rolled away from him. “Sorry,” she said again.

      “It’s okay.” Ty ran after it.

      “Athletic? Really?” One of Cabot’s dark eyebrows rose questioningly. “You throw like a girl.”

      “At the risk of stating the obvious, I am a girl.”

      “Yeah. I noticed.”

      Nothing in his tone or expression gave away what he was thinking, but Kate remembered that Cabot had said she was pretty. It had been indirect, an answer to a question from someone else, but he’d agreed. That was something and she would take it. Her ego had recently taken a hit, even though it was stupid to care what Ted thought. If she’d been enough, he wouldn’t have been hitting on someone else on the day of their wedding.

      Ty ran back with the ball clutched in his hand. “Wanna play catch with us, Kate?”

      “I don’t have a glove.”

      “You can use mine,” Cabot offered. “It’s probably a little big but should work okay.”

      She could have said no, but that eager, friendly, freckled eight-year-old face wouldn’t let her. Ty was a sweet kid and his father had taken a chance on a stranger and given her a job. The world wouldn’t end if he fired her now for misrepresenting her skills, but she didn’t want to go back to Los Angeles and the glare of the spotlight waiting for her there. At some point she’d have to, but not yet.

      “Okay, Ty. But you might be sorry. I’m not very good.”

      “My dad and I can give you pointers.”

      “I’d like that.”

      When she moved close to Cabot and smelled the spicy scent of the aftershave still clinging to his skin, the sport of baseball slipped right out of her mind. Everything about him was sexy, from the broad shoulders to his muscled legs covered in worn denim. She liked his white, cotton, long-sleeved snap-front shirt and decided he wore the cowboy uniform really well.

      She took the seen-better-days leather glove he held out and put her fingers inside, finding it still warm from his hand. It seemed intimate somehow and tingles tiptoed up her arm, put a hitch in her breathing.

      “Ready, Kate?” Tyler called.

      “Yes.” She dragged her gaze from the man and turned it on his son. “Go easy on me.”

      “I will. Don’t worry. Just keep your eye on the ball.” Obviously Ty had heard that advice before.

      She did as he suggested, but as it came at her, she didn’t know whether to hold the glove out like a bucket or lift it and close her hand around the ball. In the end she jumped out of the way and let it fall.

      “That’s okay,” Ty called. “Good try.”

      Probably he’d heard that from his father, too. Children were a reflection of their environment, and she had to conclude that Cabot Dixon was providing a very positive one. The revelation made her like him a lot.

      She picked up the ball, then straightened to meet Cabot’s gaze. Amusement glittered there and his silence said what her mother had always told her three children—if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.

      She put the ball in the glove, testing the feel of it. After several moments, she prepared to throw it back. “Get ready, Ty. I can’t guarantee where this is going.”

      The boy set his sneaker-clad feet shoulder-width apart and held up his glove as a target. “Right here.”

      The body movement to make it go there was so different from sighting a moving clay pigeon. She was also pretty good with a bow and arrow. During Olympic training, she’d made friends with one of the female archers who had given her pointers in their downtime. Right now she had to command her arm to throw this ball at just the right velocity and close to the vicinity of the kid’s glove.

      She threw and it went way to the side, out of his reach, forcing Ty to chase after it again. “I’m sorry.”

      “I like to run,” he called out cheerfully.

      “Hmm” was all Cabot said.

      She wasn’t sure whether she was just a little embarrassed or totally humiliated for being proved a fraud. When Ty returned, he moved closer and tossed the ball underhand, like his father had. She turned her hand up but misjudged and it fell at her feet.

      “Hey, kiddo, I’m really sorry. This isn’t my best sport. Playing this with me isn’t much fun for you, is it?”

      “It’s okay.” He shrugged. “You’ll get better with practice.”

      They kept at it for a while, and Kate figured Tyler had also learned patience from his father in addition to encouragement and liberal praise. She actually caught a few and was getting the hang of throwing more accurately. Finally shadows started creeping in and Tyler announced he was getting hungry.

      “It’s about that time,” Cabot said. “Ty, you go on in and wash up for supper.”

      “Okay, Dad. See you later, Kate.”

      “’Bye.” She watched the boy run up the steps and into the house, then handed the glove back to Cabot. When he started to turn away, she said, “Can I talk to you for a minute?”

      “Sure.” He folded his arms over his chest. “What’s on your mind?”

      “I want to do something to earn my keep until the kids arrive for camp.” Because that sounded a little like a come-on, she felt it necessary to put a finer point on the statement. “Chores. Like housekeeping maybe. Cleaning. Doing dishes. Cooking.”

      “You know your way around a stove?”

      “I’m not the best,