Page 26 of Last Chance for Her Rancher Boss

There were animal nests here and there, but nothing had chewed its way through the timber or left irreversible damage, so that was good. There was dust and spiderwebs, piles of leaves and general debris. A typical abandoned building.

Nash was looking around the place, his face sad.

“You don’t really want to sell this place, do you?” she asked. Nash said nothing; he just sighed, but that was answer enough.

“No, I don’t.” He said it so quietly that Meg wasn’t even sure he’d meant to say it out loud. She tried not to focus on how sad he sounded. She also tried not to focus on how she was playing a major part in taking this place away from him. She might have held a pretty solid grudge against him for a decade, but there was still a loyalty there underneath it all. The stoop of his shoulders and the resigned expression on his face had her old allegiance to him roaring back to life.

If there was a last-ditch way to help him out, to help him keep the ranch instead of helping to take it away from him forever, then she would jump on it.

The idea struck her, hard and fast. Meg had never really understood why cartoons had lightbulbs above characters’ heads to show that they’d had an idea — such a bizarre connection to make. But right now, that’s exactly what it felt like; a light switching on out of nowhere, illuminating a whole bunch of things.

Itcouldwork. And even if the idea was a little bit out in left field, it was a last-ditch effort, after all…

“Oh, don’t make that face…”

She looked over at Nash, who was watching her like she might start biting or something.

“What? What face? What aboutyourface? Why are you looking at me like that?”

“You’ve got that ‘I’ve got an idea’ look on your face.”

Meg folded her arms across her chest. “How do you know what my ‘idea’ face looks like?”

“Because it looks like that right there,” he said, pointing a finger straight at her nose.

“You haven’t seen me in ten years. You can’tpossiblyremember what my idea face looks like,” she continued to protest.

“Oh, but I do, because that face traumatized me one too many times, so it’s been seared into my memory.”

Meg pouted, but there wasn’t much use in arguing because hewasright, after all. She had a pretty big idea brewing.

“I just had a thought…” she began.

“Oh God…”

“Do you want to hear it or not?”

“I never said I didn’t want to hear it. I was just bracing myself for whatever chaos crossed your mind.”

“Actually, it’s all about getting organized. So no chaos at all.”

“Ah-huh.”

“We clean these buildings up…”

“And?”

“And lease them out for holiday rentals. Overnight stays, that sort of thing.”

It was like she’d spoken in Swedish or something because he didn’t seem to comprehend the words that had come out of her mouth.

“You know,” she prompted, trying to get Nash to see her vision. “Like a countryside getaway for city people. They’d love to stay in a place like this.”

Nash raised his eyebrows and looked pointedly around the room. “Are you sure about that? Because I’m pretty certain there’s a skunk sleeping in the corner over there.”

Meg resisted the urge to go and look for the skunk and focused on the mission at hand.

“I mean, we clean it up, obviously.”

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