The Rancher Next Door. Cathy Gillen Thacker

nose to nose, “because what was said was strictly between me and your father.”

      Rebecca rocked forward on her toes, too. “But it was about me. Wasn’t it?”

      To her mounting aggravation, Trevor said nothing.

      A discreet cough made them both turn their heads.

      Rebecca caught sight of a well-dressed thirty-something cowboy she didn’t recognize, lingering in the doorway of the warehouse, listening and watching all that was going on. Everyone else was looking at him, too, in the same way, which meant he was not known to people in these parts. The handsome blond-haired hunk lifted a hand in greeting to one and all and headed in their direction.

      The stranger smiled pleasantly. “If it were me, I’d tell you everything you needed and wanted to know, and then some.” He swept off his hat and waved it at the crowd. “Vince Owen,” he introduced himself to one and all. “Trevor and I went to college together.” Vince clapped a hand on Trevor’s shoulder, grabbed his hand and shook it heartily. “Good to see you, buddy.”

      Trevor nodded, the expression in his eyes unreadable. “Vince.”

      Vince Owen turned to Rebecca. Charm radiated from him like light from the sun, as his gaze fastened on her face. “And you’re…?”

      Rebecca smiled, switched her keys to her left hand, and stuck out her right palm. “Rebecca Carrigan.”

      Vince clasped it warmly. “Good to meet you, darlin’. If you need anything, I’m at your service. I just closed on a ranch in the area—The Circle Y. You heard of it?”

      Aware that Trevor had gone stone-still with something akin to shock, Rebecca paused. Ignoring the man who had given her so much grief in so little time—what did she care what Trevor McCabe’s reaction to the news was anyway— she asked Vince, “It’s right next to The Primrose, isn’t it?”

      He nodded. “And one ranch away from Trevor’s Wind Creek Ranch, although I could be his next-door neighbor if I can snap up The Primrose, too.”

      “I doubt that will happen,” Rebecca said politely, not sure she should say more until the papers were actually signed by her and Miss Mim.

      “I agree with Rebecca.” Trevor gave Vince Owen a long, steady look. “Last I heard, The Primrose wasn’t for sale.”

      Which showed just how much Trevor knew, Rebecca thought, a tad guiltily. Miss Mim had told her Trevor’d had his eyes on her place, too, for quite some time now. But that was neither here nor there.

      Deciding she had wasted enough time, she tightened her hand on the thick strap of her shoulder bag and took one last look at Trevor. “I meant what I said. I don’t care what bill of goods my father tried to sell you about me needing a man in my life, Trevor McCabe.” She ignored the chuckles of all the men gathered around them. “I’m fine as is,” she continued stubbornly, holding Trevor’s testy gaze with effort. “There won’t be any connection—any private talks—between the two of us. And I’m sorry if my father misled you otherwise.”

      Trevor flashed her a grin that was more of a come-on than an expression of mirth.

      “You don’t look sorry,” he remarked.

      Knowing this wasn’t a conversation that she would ever have the last word in, Rebecca merely rolled her eyes, turned and walked away.

      AS TREVOR EXPECTED, Rebecca Carrigan had only to leave the warehouse before Vince Owen whistled. “That is one gal who needs a man to tame her.”

      Trevor had an idea what that would entail in Vince’s opinion. Seething, he swung around on the man who had dogged his every step since the first day they’d met on the Texas A&M campus.

      Trevor had vowed never to get tangled up in any of Vince Owen’s cutthroat antics, no matter how much or how often he was baited. It had been a promise that had been easy to keep—until now. “Don’t talk about her that way.”

      Vince offered the perverse smile Trevor had come to loathe. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were sweet on her.” Vince unclipped his BlackBerry from his belt and checked the screen, before hooking it back on his waist. “Not that it matters.” Vince regarded Trevor steadily, his sick need to compete with Trevor as obvious and as powerful as ever. “Rebecca Carrigan is going to be mine before the month is out.”

      Trevor doubted Rebecca would fall for Vince’s practiced lines, no matter how avidly Vince courted her. Although Vince would never show the sleazy side of himself to Rebecca. To Rebecca, Vince would be all Texas charm and helpfulness. Like a chameleon, Vince had a talent for blending in—when he wanted to be inconspicuous. Right now, however, Vince’s compulsive competitiveness had exposed his arrogance. Instead of making the friends he ought to be, Vince was making a statement about his own superiority to all the other ranchers in the feed store. A mistake in a place like Laramie, where folks didn’t let anyone’s head get too big for his or her hat.

      “I think Rebecca just might have something to say about that,” Trevor said casually, walking over to sign for the special bags of organically grown grain he had ordered for his calves.

      Vince followed. He leaned against the sales counter. “Oh, I’ll make her happy,” Vince stated, loud enough for everyone to hear. He paused to let his words sink in. “And before I’m done, I’ll bet you I get a ring on her finger, too.” Vince turned to the other ranchers gathered around. He removed his wallet from his back pocket, withdrew two crisp one-hundred-dollar bills. “Any takers?”

      It was all Trevor could do to hang on to his temper. “We don’t make bets on the women around here,” Trevor said.

      Vince looked around, obviously disappointed no one else was reaching for their money.

      With a slimy smile, Vince slid his wallet back in his pocket. “That’s too bad for me—although it’s probably smart on you all’s part, because I’m going to win this wager.” Vince tipped his hat, looked every man there in the eye and sauntered out.

      “We don’t need that element around here,” Nevada Fontaine, the feed store owner, grumbled in Vince’s wake.

      No kidding, Trevor thought.

      “How’d you get to be associated with him anyway?” The farm equipment salesman, Parker Arnett, asked.

      “We were both in the Aggie cattle management program at the same time.” As much as Trevor had tried, there had been no avoiding Vince Owen.

      Vince had set his sights on Trevor early on, and competed viciously with him ever since.

      “You don’t seem to be friends,” fellow rancher, and esteemed head of the local rancher’s association, Dave Sabado, remarked.

      Nor would they ever be, Trevor thought, as everyone looked at him. Trevor knew this was his opportunity to tell everyone the whole sorry story. How ugly things had gotten before he landed the top honors of his program at A&M, how he’d lost the affection and respect of the only woman he had ever been serious about in his life, how he had figured once he graduated he could say good riddance to the fellow-ranching student who had made him a target of the unhealthiest competition Trevor had ever seen, only to find out the hard way that Vince Owen’s obsession with besting Trevor was never going to end.

      Unfortunately, that meant he’d be trashing another man’s reputation in public and Trevor made it a policy never to do that. So he figured it best he keep his own considerable resentment to himself. The men here were smart enough not to fall prey to men of Vince Owen’s ilk, anyway. “Vince has a history of buying and selling increasingly bigger ranches. No doubt his purchase of the Circle Y Ranch is just a temporary thing. He’ll make some improvements, stay just long enough to sell it for a profit, and move on.”

      “And meantime?” Nevada Fontaine asked, signaling some of his help over to begin loading the feed Trevor had just purchased into his pickup truck.

      “I plan