Page 32 of Last Chance for Her Rancher Boss

“Hmm.”

The woman scanned the items at an aggressively fast pace. Did Meg remember her as well? Yes… Genevieve… something. Meg couldn’t remember her last name if her life depended on it. While she hadn’t had much to do with Mike in school, Genevieve had taken an active dislike to her from junior year. Apparently, Meg being smarter than her and getting better grades had allbeen a personal slight in Genevieve’s books. But tostillbe acting like this? They were nearly thirty, for crying out loud. Maybe Nash was right and they’d breathed in too many paint and varnish fumes over the years.

There was more staring at Meg, like she was some sort of sideshow act. Well, not exactly staring… Genevieve looked her up and down like she was evaluating every square inch of her, and considering the crinkle in Genevieve’s nose, Meg had definitely failed whatever criteria she was looking for.

Mike might have caught her off guard and weirded her out a little, but getting sneered at was another thing altogether. Meg had officially had enough.

“Are you staring at me for a reason, or do you have a lazy eye all of a sudden?”

Genevieve blinked as if she hadn’t expected Meg to call her out. Maybe she was still expecting Meg to be the meek, mild little nerd that she used to know. Well, nearly a decade of working as a woman in agriculture had squashed any sort of meekness out of Meg a long time ago. And knowing Nash was here gave her a borrowed confidence boost.

“Thought you were supposed to be successful or something?” Genevieve sniffed.

“What?” If they were going to be weird and catty to her, could they at least make sense while they were at it?

“Little miss hotshot, Texas scholarship winner, still ended up back here with the rest of us,” Genevieve said with a spiteful little curve to her lip.

Oh, my God. It’s like these people haven’t left high school.

Holding a grudge, Meg could understand. She’d done it herself, to the man standing right next to her. But having your heart and your promises broken was one thing; still beefing with someone you sat next to in class a couple times was something else altogether.

“I am successful. Thank you so much for asking and not assuming,” said Meg. Thankfully the words came out dry and sarcastic rather than desperate to defend herself. Genevieve didn’t look impressed. And Mike just continued looking like a slapped fish.

“Mike said you were just a vet or something…” she continued, scanning the last of the items before ringing them up.

“That’s right. A large animal vet.”

“Well,Iown a business.”

“Okay?”

Meg’s lack of admiration seemed to get under Genevieve’s skin in a truly psychotic way.

“I have a question,” Nash said, voice cool as a summer breeze. Genevieve squinted at him like she’d forgotten he was there.

“Have you got a problem with me too?” Nash asked. “Or is it just Meg you’ve taken a dislike to for some reason?”

Genevieve couldn’t seem to comprehend whyNashwas sounding offended.

“No? You’re one of our best customers.”

“Ah-huh,” he said with a grin. “I won’t be after today.”

Now, they might only just be rekindling any sort of friendship between them, but Meg knew that smile. That was Nash’s “I’m about to tear into you” smile, the one that gave people a false sense of security before he took them down a peg or two. When they were teenagers it had been an unsettling sort of smile, but on a grown man it was something closer to murderous.

“Do you know how much a livestock veterinarian for a nationwide corporation makes?” he asked, perfectly innocent.

Genevieve looked like she’d been thrown for a loop, but to be fair Meg didn’t know where he was going with this either.

“Uh… I don’t know. How much does someone get paid to stomp through mud all day?”

“About two hundred grand,” Nash said without missing a beat. “Is that right, Meg? Or am I remembering wrong?”

Meg felt just a tiny bit better when Genevieve’s face started turning pink around the edges.

“Well… yeah, that’s about right.”

Mike was looking between them all like he was watching a game of ping pong.

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