High-Stakes Colton. Karen Anders

movements quick, sharp and highly tuned as he prevented the wheeling, running steer from returning to the herd. A good cutting horse was poetry in motion as far as Jake was concerned, with the horse and rider as synchronized as man and animal could ever get. The horse’s athletic ability had to be top caliber for it to work and the animal had to have cow sense. When it really came together, it was showstopping. And his pulse sped up when he spied the gorgeous blonde putting a horse through his paces.

      But it wasn’t just the highly trained, athletic ability of the horse that he appreciated. It was the woman’s stillness, her grace, her oneness with her mount that made his pulse hit overdrive. She was something to see on a horse, especially one working like this one was. It was almost as though she were an extension of the gelding, her hands motionless, the hard, fast, twisting action of the horse barely shifting her in her seat. The lady could stick to a horse like lint; that was for damned sure. He allowed himself a small smile. And she looked mighty fine while she was doing it. He could see why Colton Valley Ranch had a top-notch reputation.

      Resting his forearms on top of the wall, he stared at her. She had on blue jeans and tan suede shotgun chaps, and a cinnamon-colored tank top showing off her tanned, toned arms. Her deerskin gloves were darkened with age and use, and she had her golden-blond hair pulled back and braided, but hair had escaped and wisped around her face. A straw maize hat with a multicolored scarf was tied around the crown on her head. She had sawdust in her hair and a big smudge of dirt on her cheek, and by rights she should have looked like a mess.

      But not this dynamo.

      She looked like she had just walked out of some fashion magazine. Boy howdy, those long legs in tight chaps were enough to make a man forget his good intentions about keeping his hands to himself.

      She worked the horse another fifteen minutes, then dismounted, handing the reins to another young woman, then took the reins of the horse the other rider had been warming up. She had just mounted when Jake stepped out of the shadows and started toward her.

      About halfway there, he got quite the jolt when he recognized the looker.

      It was the princess herself. Alanna Colton.

      * * *

      “Would you get a load of that?” Tamara LaCross said. “Holy cow.”

      Alanna Colton, perched in the saddle of one of the cutters she was training, followed the trajectory of her assistant’s gaze. In the distance, a man was striding toward them, leading a gorgeous blue roan. The horse had a black face, mane, tail and stockings, the coat a blue sheen and a leopard-patterned body.

      Feeling strangely breathless, she watched him advance. She glanced at the cowboy and a strange flutter unfurled in her midriff. The man wasn’t so bad, either.

      He was tall, six foot two at least. The cowboy literally radiated an aura of strength and masculinity. He was powerfully built with heavily muscled shoulders, but beneath his unquestionable virility, beneath his physical toughness, there was something...some indefinable quality that drew her. She wondered what kind of person really lay beneath his alpha image.

      He looked as if he had just ridden off the range. He was dressed in faded blue jeans and a dark blue Western-style shirt that fit him like a second skin. Threaded through the loops of his jeans was a wide hand-tooled belt that sported an engraved silver buckle, and on his feet he wore a pair of scuffed brown cowboy boots. His face was heavily shadowed by the broad brim of his gray Stetson, but even that couldn’t conceal the strong jawline.

      “Excuse me, ma’am,” he drawled.

      “Yes, how can I help you?” Alanna felt vaguely suspended as she met his steady gaze.

      “Good morning, ma’am,” he said, grabbing the brim of his hat and giving it a tug. “I’m looking for Buck Tressler.”

      “Buck’s on an errand in town. How can I help you?”

      “He hired me to work with your stallion Zorro. Name’s Jake McCord.”

      Oh, shoot, this was the horse whisperer Fowler had agreed to hire to work with that damn rogue stallion he had foisted on her without speaking to her first. Sure she had agreed they needed to infuse the stables with some blooded stock, but she hadn’t expected him to pay way too much for an unmanageable stallion. Fowler wasn’t the most patient person when it came to working with horses. In fact, Alanna liked it much better when her brother spent his time focused on Colton Incorporated. Since their father’s disappearance, Fowler had been on edge for the last couple of months with he and Zane fighting over his longtime girlfriend, Tiffany and her possible involvement in their father’s kidnapping. Her family seemed more fractured than usual.

      That all seemed to be resolved now with Zane blissfully happy with his administrative assistant, Mirabella, now his wife. Alanna liked and admired the willowy redhead, and was pleased to welcome her into the family.

      But with Fowler’s interference in her domain, she now had to work with this tantalizing man. She didn’t go in for that horse-whispering mumbo jumbo and was skeptical of the practice that promised near-miraculous results that were misleading at best and damaging at worst.

      Now he’d hired this phony. Jake the Fake, as far as she was concerned.

      “Alanna Colton,” she said as he extended his hand toward her. “Welcome to Colton Valley Ranch.” She pulled off her glove and placed her hand in his. She was bombarded by disturbing new impressions and the tantalizing warmth of his callused palm sliding over hers. Handsome? No, not exactly, but there was a compelling attractiveness about him, an attractiveness that was unfeigned and indestructible. Dark eyebrows arched over blue eyes, flecked with gold and amber, and the thick long lashes accentuated their hypnotic intensity, the stubble of beard along his jaw a dark, sexy shadow.

      There was something very intriguing about his face, something that touched her in the most profound way. It revealed a depth of character, an inner strength, but it also revealed an imperviousness that had been carved by disillusionment. It was the face of a man who had forged on alone, a man whose sensuous mouth had been hardened by grim determination. And, against her will, Alanna felt an immediate affinity for him that she had never felt for another human being. Her keen awareness of him as a man had an immobilizing effect on her, and she was conscious of nothing except the warmth of his touch and his unwavering gaze.

      He was a man of contradictions, and he confused her.

      “Thank you kindly,” he responded.

      Alanna didn’t want to let go of his hand, and she reluctantly withdrew it from his grasp. Impatiently, she thought this was damned inconvenient. No way did she need another alpha male in her life who told her what to do. Not to mention, she was wary of anyone who professed to “have a way with horses.” She’d already had her brother undermine her, and before his disappearance her father just couldn’t let go of control of the stables even though he often told her she was in charge. She felt like an island surrounded by sharks and if she ever tried to leave, she would drown. She was at the very worst undermined and at the very best ineffectual. Along with running every aspect of a busy and thriving stable, training cutters for market, and now dealing with a dangerous and untrainable stallion, Alanna was working with her new outreach project. Colton Valley Ranch Gives Back was a program for inner-city kids that taught them how to handle horses and provided a safe environment to learn about responsibility, leadership and community. “Tamara, continue working Samson.”

      Swinging her leg over the saddle and dropping to the ground, Alanna turned. “Yes, ma’am,” Tamara said, taking the reins from Alanna’s outstretched hand.

      “Let me show you your lodgings and where you can stable your horse,” Alanna said. The sooner she put distance between them the better. She still had a full day. But Buck wasn’t due back for at least another thirty minutes, and she didn’t want to delegate this task to anyone else. Jake was an employee and new here. She did want to make him feel comfortable, even with his questionable profession.

      “Valentine,” he said.

      She approached the roan. Jake watched her with an unsettling steadiness