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

      “Sheila, read my lips. I’m not selling…ever.”

      “You have a buyer lined up?” Zack asked.

      Sheila’s plump shoulders moved up and down with a shrug. “Nobody in particular. I just know it would sell quickly and make Kate a wealthy woman. She could make enough money to live anywhere she wanted to.”

      “I want to live where I’m living right now,” Kate replied evenly.

      “Well, dear, if you change your mind you know where I am.” She wiggled two fingers, then turned and marched back up the sidewalk from where she’d come.

      “That woman is quickly becoming the bane of my existence,” Kate said.

      “Forget her. She’s always been a pushy opportunist. We’ve got more important things to take care of.” Zack paused on the sidewalk just outside the office and turned to look at her once again. “Let’s not complicate the issue by mentioning your suspicions about the stampede.”

      Her first impulse was to buck and kick. Dammit, somebody had spooked her herd on purpose yesterday and she’d nearly been killed.

      But reluctantly she recognized the wisdom of Zack’s words. She also suspected Zack didn’t believe her about the intentional stampede, but she knew better than to push that particular issue with him at the moment.

      There was no concrete evidence of what had happened in the pasture the day before. Right now the important thing was to get Jim Ramsey investigating her father’s death. As much as she hated to admit it, Zack was right. There was no point in confusing things.

      She nodded and together they entered the office. A woman seated at a desk manned the reception area. “Morning, Kate, Zack.” Sarah Lutten smiled, the gesture pulling all her wrinkles upward.

      “Good morning, Sarah. Sheriff in?” Zack asked.

      “He’s in. Let me just check to make sure he’s available.” She got up from the desk and disappeared through a door that Kate knew led back to the sheriff’s personal office and the jail cells.

      As they waited for Sarah to return, Kate thought of those moments when Zack had held her while she’d cried. His arms had been so strong around her and for a brief moment she wished she were back in those arms once again.

      She straightened her spine. She had to get hold of herself. She needed Zack for his investigative skills, for the resources he and his family business could bring to the table. But the last thing she needed was to become emotionally dependent on him in any way.

      “You can go on back,” Sarah said as she reentered the room.

      They entered the small inner office and Sheriff Jim Ramsey rose to greet them.

      “Katie, Zack, what brings you two to see me on such a fine morning?” He gestured them to the two chairs in front of his desk then sank into his big leather chair.

      “Murder.” The word escaped from Kate before she could stop herself.

      Zack shot her a look of warning and she sat back in the chair and bit her bottom lip to keep anything else from escaping her mouth.

      It was probably just as well she sit back and let Zack handle things. Sheriff Ramsey had always been one of those men who listened to men better than he listened to “the little ladies” in town.

      Jim frowned and absently plucked a piece of lint off his protruding belly. “Murder?” His gaze went from Kate to Zack. “You want to tell me what’s going on?”

      “That’s what we’d like for you to find out,” Zack said. “I rode out to the place where Gray had his accident. How much investigating did you do into his death?”

      Jim’s frown deepened. “It was an open and shut case. His head was on a rock, Kate and some of her men told me his mount had come back without him to the stables. It seemed pretty obvious what had happened. You should know these kinds of accidents happen occasionally out here in ranching territory.”

      There was an edge of defensiveness in his tone. “Dr. McCain pronounced Gray dead due to head trauma. It was ruled an accidental death and that was that.”

      And that was that. Those words resonated in Kate’s heart with a hollow ache. That was that. Her father was dead and nothing in this world would bring him back. She would never again have the opportunity to make him proud. She would never be able to tell him just how much she’d loved him.

      “Did you check out the rock where Gray fell?” Zack asked.

      Jim shrugged. “No reason to. When it looks like a duck, it’s a duck.”

      Zack leaned forward, his eyes narrowed slightly. “It didn’t quack and it wasn’t an accident.”

      “What are you talking about?”

      As Zack explained what he’d found on the rock, Kate watched him. In the five years since she’d seen him, the lines radiating from his eyes were a little bit deeper, his mouth appeared more sensual than she remembered and his face held a strong maturity that hadn’t been evident years ago. His shoulders appeared wider, but his stomach and hips were as lean as when he’d been a teenager.

      He’d always affected her on some base, visceral level. His nearness to her had always charged the atmosphere with dangerous electricity. It still did.

      She frowned and tore her gaze from him, realizing she was studying him in an effort to distance herself from the details of her father’s murder. She became conscious of her ankle throbbing and told herself that when she got back to the ranch she needed to prop it up for a while.

      “We’d like a full investigation into Gray’s death,” Zack said to Jim. “And of course we’ll do whatever we can to assist you.”

      Jim leaned back in his chair and raked a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair. “If what you think is true and that rock was used to bludgeon Gray to death, it was kind of stupid for the murderer to leave it right there at the scene.”

      “On the contrary, it was very smart. If the rock hadn’t been there then you would have instantly ruled Gray’s death suspicious. As it was, the murderer counted on you chalking it up to a tragic accident,” Zack replied.

      “And that’s just what I did,” Jim said mournfully.

      Kate wasn’t sure whether the sheriff felt badly about not fully investigating the situation in the first place or the fact that he now had to do something about it.

      Sheriff Jim Ramsey wasn’t known for his energy and enthusiasm for his work. Most people in the town were hoping that retirement was just around the corner for him so they could vote in a new sheriff, somebody younger and more committed to the position.

      “I’ll get right on it,” Jim said, and stood, as if to indicate to them that the meeting was over.

      “We appreciate it, Sheriff.” Zack stood, as well, and shook Jim’s hand.

      Kate got up, vaguely irritated that Jim had listened to Zack when he hadn’t listened to her two weeks before. The good-old-boy network was apparently alive and well in Cotter Creek.

      As she and Zack left the office and got into his truck, she tried to tamp down her irritation. “It’s good that bad things don’t happen too often in Cotter Creek because that man is barely competent.”

      “He’s just lazy,” Zack replied.

      “He was certainly lazy in the way he handled Dad’s death.”

      “He was the one who found my mother’s body when she was murdered. Of course, he was just a deputy then.”

      His words shocked her. “I’d forgotten about your mother’s murder.”

      He shrugged. “It was a long time ago. I was only six when she was murdered.”

      There was nothing in his voice to evoke her