Page 3 of Cowboy Don't Go

“Seven. I have seven now. Do I hear—” The auctioneer pointed across the room at a new bidder. “Thank you. I have eight-fifty. Eight-fifty. Any more bids? Eight-fifty.”

Crushed, Shay looked at the old cowboy who was shaking his head, no. Her gaze swept the room. Who was the other one doing the bidding?

“Eight-fifty once, twice?” He banged his gavel. “Sold! For eight-fifty to bidder number four-thirty-one. Thank you, sir.”

Disappointment rushed through her as she caught sight of the bidder dropping his paddle and standing to exit the row of seats. The stranger she’d thought she recognized from earlier got to his feet in the sunlight pouring down from the skylight above. With his face clearly visible now for the first time, she finally recognized him. Cooper Lane. Of course, it was. That voice. She should have known it. But she hadn’t seen him in years. Not since a few years after high school. He looked . . . different. Handsomer. Maybe . . . harder? But then, that was no surprise, considering what had happened to him eight years ago.

Now he glanced up briefly as he exited his row. Again, he touched the brim of his black hat to her as he settled it back on his head.

Shay scowled back at him. He knew she wanted that horse. Now he was just gloating. “I’m so sorry. Ry. I’m sorry I couldn’t go that high. We’ll find another. You’ll see.”

Disconsolate, Ryan stared at the old man who’d been baiting her with the auctioneer. “That old guy who bid against us first didn’t even want her. He just didn’t want you to have her.”

When you’re right, you’re right. “At least he didn’t end up with her. Let’s go. We’d better get back home. We’ll try again at the Flathead auction next weekend. All right?”

Ryan just shook his head and headed down the bleachers.

Ryan was right. No one had wanted that horse before her encounter in the pens. The filly would have probably ended up in the kill pen. Nor was it the first time this had happened. Sometimes, she brought her brother, Liam with her just to avoid this scenario. Ranching was a good ol’ boys’ world and often they looked at her as an intruder. She knew that. But that didn’t mean she had to like it.

Outside, she and Ryan walked toward their pickup truck with its empty two-stall trailer attached, an infuriating reminder she’d failed to keep her promise to her son.

Ryan walked a few steps ahead, already taller than her at five nine, even though he was only fourteen. He was going to be tall, like his biological father. She squeezed her eyes shut again. No, she corrected. Tall like his uncle Will, her twin brother. Height was on her side of the family as well. She tried to shove away thoughts of Ryan’s father.

Lately, Ryan had been asking deeper questions about him, but Shay had put him off with vague answers. There were things she didn’t want to talk about yet, but things he deserved to know. The time was coming soon when real, hard answers would be unavoidable.

“Mom,” Ryan said, barging into that unpleasant thought. “What’s the Hard Eight’s truck and six-pack doing here?”

Confused, she looked where he was pointing. Sure enough, Liam’s big black F-150 with their ranch’s HARD EIGHT logo on the door sat across the parking lot with its six-horse trailer attached. But there was no sign of Liam.

“What in the world—”

The trailer was already half-full of horses from the auction and none other than Cooper Lane was walking her filly—Ryan’s filly, number 1209—up the ramp and into their trailer.

Ryan cast a confused look at her as she started toward the trailer.

“Cooper? Cooper Lane?” she shouted as she approached. “What’s going on?” When no one answered, she said, “I know it’s you. I saw you there snatching up our filly.”

There he was, settling the nervous horse into her stall.

“What are you doing with the Hard Eight’s truck?” she demanded.

Cooper closed the gate behind the filly with a look at Shay. “Hey, Shay. I wondered if you’d finally remember me.”

“Well, of course, I remember you.” She remembered his short-cropped dark hair, the way his eyebrows slashed in a hard line over those green eyes and how, once upon a time, all had been right in his world. And in hers, for that matter. But that had changed and so had he. Even at thirty-one, there was a touch of gray at his temples now and crinkled tan lines around his eyes. And the well-groomed scruff that covered his jaw was new, too.

Okay, so she had to admit he was good-looking in a careless kind of way. But that didn’t temper her confusion as to why he was even here. With their trailer and her horse! “What exactly is going on here?”

“Here? You mean”—he gestured at the trailer full of horses—“all this?”

She exhaled an impatient sigh. “Yes. This.”

“I work for you now. Technically, your brother Liam hired me to work on your ranch yesterday. He didn’t tell you?” His black hat was pulled low over his eyes, but she could just make out the hint of a teasing smile around them as he hopped off the trailer and latched the back gate, banging it for good measure with his gloved fist.

The blue denim shirt he wore, worn around the cuffs and collar, looked like it had been around the block once or twenty times. So did Cooper, by the way. The brainy, nerdy kid who’d left Marietta almost a decade ago was no more. In his place, this formidable man with sharp edges and grit, who didn’t seem to care what she thought of him.

“No. He didn’t tell me.” And she would have words with her brother about it. “So . . . what? You just outbid me with the Hard Eight’s own money?”

“Looks to me like I got her for you and saved her from landing somewhere less accommodating.” He pulled off his heavy work gloves and slapped the dust off on his thigh. “And by the way, I didn’t outbid you. I outbid that other guy.”

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