Home on the Ranch: Oklahoma: Defending the Rancher's Daughter / The Rancher Bodyguard. Carla Cassidy

might explode. “I must have been out of my mind to call you in the first place. Just get out, get out of my sight.”

      He didn’t wait for her to tell him again. He turned on his heels and left the waiting room. Kate walked back to the window and looked out with regret.

      If only she could call back the last three minutes of their conversation. Whenever she was stressed or feeling powerless, she had a tendency to respond with anger. It was a curse and a habit she’d worked hard to change, but ten minutes with Zack and she’d reverted to old form.

      She watched until he pulled out of the lot and out of her sight. It was only then that an unexpected sob rose up in her throat. She swallowed hard against it.

      Other than tears spent upon her father’s death, it had been years since she’d cried. In fact, the last time she remembered crying had also been the last time she’d seen Zack. Of course, she’d been a headstrong almost-eighteen-year-old at the time and he’d been the very bane of her existence.

      She had promised herself a long time ago that she would never again cry over Zack West. She angrily wiped at her eyes as she limped out of the hospital and toward her truck.

      The storm was passing, without a drop of rain having fallen. Early June and already they were suffering a drought. But the weather conditions were the last thing on her mind as she left the hospital behind and headed back toward the ranch.

      Instead she focused on the stampede, worrying about the damage that had been wrought by the out-of-control herd. New fencing cost money, dead cattle were a loss and, for a moment, she felt overwhelmed by the choice she’d made to take over the reins of the ranch after her father’s death.

      They were supposed to have been partners, she and her father. After college, when she’d decided to return to the ranch, she’d hoped that the two of them would work side by side on the land they both loved. She’d hoped to have the time to make her father proud of her. But time had been stolen from them.

      He’d been murdered.

      Nothing and nobody would ever be able to convince her otherwise. And nothing and nobody would be able to make her believe that the stampede that had nearly taken her life hours before had been an accident.

      Something bad was happening at her ranch and the one man she’d believed might be able to help her had walked away, leaving her alone to face whatever evil had come to stay at Bent Tree Ranch.

      * * *

      It was just after seven the next morning when Zack drove toward the Sampson place. Nightmares had driven him out of bed at a few minutes before five and for the last two hours he’d been sitting at his kitchen table, drinking coffee and thinking about Gray and his daughter.

      The nightmares had been a part of his life for the past month, but the thoughts of Gray and Katie were new and confusing. He didn’t believe that Gray had been murdered, nor did he believe that somebody had tried to kill Katie by stampeding her herd the day before.

      As a girl, Katie’d had a penchant for finding drama and creating trouble. Zack certainly knew what grief could do to somebody, how it could work in the brain and create all kinds of crazy scenarios. He’d learned that the hard way over the past month.

      But the fear he’d seen in Katie’s eyes had been very real and his love and respect for Gray weighed heavy in his heart.

      Gray had been his sanity through the insanity of adolescence. Gray had been his family when he’d felt isolated, invisible in his own. As one of six kids, Zack had gotten lost amid his siblings and if not for Gray’s love and counsel, Zack had no idea how he might have survived those years of seeming isolation.

      He’d decided to give Katie a couple of days, to sniff around the ranch to see if anything nefarious was going on. He wasn’t doing it for her. He’d do it in the memory of the man he’d loved like a father.

      Dammit. He’d do it even though he didn’t want to be anywhere around her, have anything to do with her. Besides, in the past month he’d grown tired of his own company, tired of not knowing what direction his life would take.

      He turned into the entrance of the Sampson place and saw the tree that had given the ranch its name. Bent Tree Ranch. The tree was an old oak bent at the waist like an old woman with a short cane. Many times as a teenager he’d arrive at the ranch to see Katie sitting in the limbs, a mutinous glare on her face.

      This morning there was no sign of Katie in the tree, but Zack did see the signs of trouble in the overgrown lawn and the fact that he didn’t see a single ranch hand working anywhere on the property.

      He pulled up in front of the house and before he could cut the engine, the door opened and she stepped out into the early-morning sunshine.

      Her hair caught the fire of the sun and glistened as her pretty features radiated surprise at his appearance. Clad in a pair of worn, tight jeans and a light blue T-shirt that only enhanced her attractiveness, she stood motionless.

      Zack shut off his truck, already regretting the impulse that had brought him here.

      “What do you want?” No hint of friendliness or relief in those blue eyes of hers. There was also no sign of the crutches.

      “I didn’t think this was about what I wanted, but rather what you wanted,” he replied. “You said you needed my help. I’m here.”

      She hesitated, and for a moment he wondered if she would send him away again. Fine by him. He was here under duress, haunted by the memories of her father, tormented by the trauma he’d suffered on his last assignment.

      “Come in,” she finally said, and opened the screen door to allow him entry. He nodded and walked past the two redwood rockers on the front porch, trying not to remember the hundreds of nights he and Gray had sat on the porch and solved world problems.

      Although it had been almost a year since Zack had been inside the house, he felt embraced by the familiarity as he walked through the door and into the living room.

      Gray’s wife had died when Katie had been a year old and the absence of a feminine touch had always been present in the house. The furniture was sturdy, in neutral earth colors.

      The focal point of the room was a large television. On either side of the television were shelves that held trophies and ribbons, ornate buckles and photos of Gray’s years as a professional bronc rider.

      The room smelled of furniture polish and an underlying remnant of cherry pipe tobacco. The familiar scent shot a wave of sorrow through him. He should have visited Gray when he’d arrived home from his last assignment.

      He should have taken the time to come talk to the old man. But he’d been so wrapped up in rage, in despair, he hadn’t wanted to visit anyone, and now Gray was gone.

      “Come on into the kitchen,” she said.

      He swept his hat from his head and followed behind her, trying not to notice the slight sway of her hips in her tight jeans. Maybe the sway was because she was limping slightly.

      He touched his cheek, in the place where a faint scar had remained, to remind himself of their history. Kate. Not Katie, he reminded himself.

      Papers strewed the round oak kitchen table and she quickly gathered them up as she gestured him into one of the chairs. “I was just going over some figures, trying to see what the stampede is going to cost me.”

      “Damage bad?” he asked, and eased into the chair.

      “Bad enough.” She walked over to the counter where a coffeepot was half full. “Want a cup?”

      “All right,” he agreed. This all felt far too civil and every muscle in his body tensed as if in anticipation of some kind of explosion.

      She set a cup of coffee in front of him, then carried her own to the chair next to his and sat. “I lost three cows, six calves and half a fence line.”

      “I also heard you’ve lost a number of your ranch hands in the last couple