Chapter One
I hate being away from my kids.
I hate being away from my ranch and my house and my damn horses.
It’s times like these when I regret my career choice, but then I get stuck in the job and it all falls back into place. Before there was anything else, there was me and horses.A magic touch,my eldest brother, Roman, used to say, but it was more listening to what they needed that gave me the skills I have. It didn’t happen overnight; I worked tirelessly to become one of the state’s most sought-after trainers.
Running my hand down the body of a beautiful red roan quarter horse, her muscles quiver under my touch, but she’s still and she’s calm, quietly grazing from the trough of feed attached to her stall wall. I’d come up late last night after I’d tucked my kids in bed and left them with Beth, my nanny. It had taken somebriberyto get my kids to settle, since they knew I would be gone in the morning for at least two weeks.
I hardly slept at all last night; the cabin I was given for my stay isn’t what I’m used to. I like routine, I like knowing how my day and my nights are going to go, and if the last few weeks have proven anything, it’s how easy it is to get thrown off course.
It certainly doesn’t help that the guy who’s employed me is a raging prick.
Okay, that may be an overstatement since the guy has done nothing to me, but I like to believe I’m a pretty good judge of character and I’d be stupid to ignore the red flags. Calvin Scott is too stern with his horses, doesn’t allow them to show him who they are and just wants blind obedience with no reward. It’s no shocker he’s now fucked himself up and paid a stupid amount of money on an Appaloosa, barely over two years old, who he’s struggling to train while also keeping his workers safe. It was an accident with one of the guys who works here that had prompted Cal’s call to me, begging me to work with him.
It only took an hour watching them to know what the problem was, and it’s going to take me days, if not weeks, to undo the damage he’s already done.
“I’m just taking Ginger for a ride,” a raspy female voice says from outside the stables. Someone mumbles something back which I don’t catch. “I wasn’t going to be long.” The woman responds, so I piece together what I can’t hear, keeping my back to the door.
There’s more mumbled talking, like whoever she is speaking with is attempting to keep their voice down, but I can hear the agitation within the sound. It’s definitely a man, that much I am sure of, but I haven’t been around long enough to recognize people’s voices. I certainly don’t recognize the woman’s, in the few visits I’d paid the ranch before it was decided I needed to come stay, I never saw a woman on the property although I’d guessed there was based on the wedding band on Calvin’s finger.
“I won’t talk to anyone,” she replies, which immediately has a tingle of awareness prickling the hair on the nape of my neck.
Not my circus.
Footsteps sound behind me, the clip of a heel, and I glance over my shoulder to see the woman walking toward me. Beneath a white cowboy hat, her long, flowing blonde hair, the shade of honey, tumbles down her back, and she’s wearing a white shirt adorned with delicate embroidered orange flowers on the shoulders. It’s tucked into fitted, painted-ondenim jeans, and scuffed-up cowboy boots, the leather cracked and worn, clip against the dusty ground.
The sight of her, with her heart-shaped face, deep brown eyes fringed with thick lashes, and gracefully arched brows, turns my mouth dry. She has a gently sloped nose, dusted with freckles, and angled cheekbones, and there’s a scar that splits her top lip on the right.
She’s mumbling to herself, eyes on the ground as she heads right for the stall I’m currently standing in.
This horse must be Ginger.
I clear my throat to make her aware of my presence, and she freezes, dark eyes landing on me and widening. Pretty pink lips part on a shocked gasp; her face paling. She stares at me, not moving, a deer caught in headlights.
“Y-you shouldn’t be in here,” she eventually speaks, that rasp of hers deeper. “Why are you here?”
“Silas Knight,” I introduce myself, stepping away from the horse. “I’m the trainer.”
Her dark eyes flick to the red roan and then back to me, “She doesn’t need training.”
I chuckle, “No, I’m here for the Appaloosa.”
“Oh,” she nods, a little manically, “Right. That makes sense.”
She still doesn’t move toward me, her body statue-still. I can recognize fear when I see it.
I take a step back, hoping to ease some of that anxiety. “Have you seen Cal?” I ask.
Her lashes flutter, and her throat works on a hard swallow before she throws her thumb over her shoulder and points to the stable exit, “That way.”
“Got it,” I reply, giving her a wide berth as I step around her. “She’s real sweet.” I jerk my head toward the horse; the mare’s dark eyes trained on her owner.
“Ginger?” That seems to ease her a little. “She is; I’ve had her since she was small.”
“You train her yourself?” I ask.
She rolls her lips and dips her chin, a long curl of blonde hair slipping over her shoulder, “I did.”
