Page 22 of Last Chance for Her Rancher Boss

Nash sighed internally. He loved Lucy; he really did. She was great. But she had never had a filter between her brain and her mouth. Luckily, Meg seemed to take it in stride.

“Uh, well, yeah… can’t deny that. I’ve worked my way up to two hundred thousand, so, you know, I’m pretty comfortable.”

Will let out a low whistle. “I should have studied harder,” he said with a shake of his head.

“But if you had done something with your life, you would have never met me,” said Lucy with a fond smile.

“True. The world needs degenerates like us.”

“You’re not a degenerate,” Meg tutted.

“Yeah, I am,” Will said, accepting his lot in life.

“He is,” agreed Lucy with a roll of her eyes. “How this man hasn’t died of salmonella yet, I have no idea.”

“Will,” said Meg, looking slightly horrified. “You’re not still eating food beyond its expiration date, are you?”

“It’s just a guide!” he exclaimed, throwing his free hand up in the air. “The supermarkets bump those numbers up because they want you coming back sooner to buy more food. I’ve read all about it.”

“Oh, my God.” Lucy sighed under her breath. Even Sammy gurgled in dismay at her father.

“You’re quiet,” Meg said suddenly, pointing a glance at Nash.

“I’ve got nothing to say.”

It was true. It was also true that he had nothing to say because he still hadn’t recovered from seeing Meg in her yellow sun dress. He’d tried to avoid looking at her altogether, because the second he laid eyes on her freckled shoulders, he was ready to go into cardiac arrest all over again.

“At least tell me you don’t eat expired food like this idiot,” Meg said good-naturedly, jabbing a thumb at Will.

“It’s aguide,” Will snipped.

“No,” said Nash, because despite joking around, Meg seemed to expect an answer, like she cared if he was part of the conversation or not. “I’ve got enough problems without getting food poisoning or whatever it is Will is going to end up with.”

“Sammy,” said Will, talking to his baby. “Your mama and your uncle are very dramatic. Did you know that?”

“Anyways,” said Lucy, steering them away from the path that probably led to Will talking about more of his crackpot conspiracy theories. “We were going to come here, andIwas going to make some tea because I stick to expiration dates…”

“It’s aguide.”

“And we were going to snoop on this whole inspection thing under the guise of being polite. But we can just drop the guise and you can tell me all about it. How’s that sound?”

“Oh,” Meg said, still getting used to Lucy’s forthright attitude. “Yeah, sure. That sounds good.”

“Great! So what does a farm vet actually do? Because I get cats and dogs, but what do you do for cows? Do cows get sick?”

Lucy rattled off questions faster than Meg could answer them, linking an arm through Meg’s and dragging her off towards the house.

Nash watched them go. Meg seemed… happy. The whole time she’d been here, she’d been like a stone wall. It was only in the last forty-eight hours that she had even talked to him in full sentences. But she’d just met Lucy and was acting like they were best friends. It made it a thousand times clearer how much she had really hated him upon arriving.

He looked back over at his brother, and Will was side-eyeing him something fierce.

“Yeah,” Will said, quiet enough that only the two of them could hear. “Distant past. Long gone. Definitely no feelings lingering or nothing.”

“Don’t you dare go there,” Nash hissed out the side of his mouth. Nash and Will continued to stand there, staring at each other.

“Boys?”

Lucy and Meg were watching them having their staring contest with raised eyebrows and faint smirks.

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