Page 1 of Ash on the Range
CHAPTER ONE
WILL
The drive into Red Hart Ranch was just as I remembered it. Rolling hills were covered in golden grasses still flowering in late fall before winter finally set in. Everything was ablaze in a glory of color until we rounded the bend that brought the familiar sight into view, and although it wasn’t a carbon copy, this would aways be the same image I stored in my mind of the first time I saw the ranch of the jaw dropping variety.
The picturesque mountain that watched over the big house, like it studied everything that sat beneath its immense, white capped overhang. The giant red and white RHR sign covered instylized Imperial antlers surrounded by heavy lettering I’d never forget from my first drive into Red Hart land. That day I’d sat in the back of one of the farm trucks along with a dozen other seasonal ranch hands hired on by one of the ranch’s then heirs and now owners for twelve weeks’ worth of work and pay. Solid meals I could count on. Back then, that mattered a lot.
This time, returning to the ranch for my fourth season, it looked a whole helluva a lot different.
This time, I had a stunning girl by my side and a junker of a truck beneath me. But for the first time ever, both were mine.
Cassie’s hand flexed around my callused fingers as I pulled up at the gate, craning up at the RHR sign. “Should I be nervous?”
I grinned. “Being here? Nah. The first time I ever pulled through these gates I was on the back of a pick-up packed in like sardines with a dozen other farm hands. I had no idea what I was doin’ and less of an idea of what hard work looked like. But it was the best job I’d been given and by the end of the season, I drove back out a different person. Been coming back every season ever since.” I squeezed her hand reassuringly. “You wanna grab the gate for me?”
She stayed stock still in the passenger seat, clenching my fingers in a death grip. “So, you’re saying…I’m about to meet your unofficial family?”
I snorted. “Honey, this is my family. My real one kicked me out at fifteen. Been on the road ever since. That was the same kid you met out the back of the rodeo circuit last week where your brother beat the crap out of me, just a handful of years on, yeah?”
“That makes it so much better," she whispered, and slipped out of the passenger seat before I could utter another word.
Damnit.That hadn’t been the best thing to say, maybe.
Cassie unhooked the chain draped around the gate that, as far as I knew, was never locked. Or, at least, it never had been the entire time I’d been coming out to Red Hart. A big part of me hoped that never changed. I drove onto RHR land for the first time under my own steam. Tension slipped from my shoulders as I leaned out the window, brushing my fingers across Cassie’s shoulders as she walked around my side of the truck.
“Like it?” I asked quietly. “I know it’s not a rodeo at midnight, but…” That was where I’d met her, a dusty rodeo ground a few starts and a week away. We’d been driving ever since, when I promised her I’d take her somewhere else. Somewhere better. Now we were here, I hoped my promises would be able to live up to reality.
Like me. Will Kirk. The kid who couldn’t stay on a bull to save himself. Couldn’t stay with a girl, either. Didn’t have a home and drifted from place to place, season to season. Sensing a theme there?
I found her hand and squeezed, hoping I didn’t hold on half as hard as I strangled the steering wheel.
“It’s beautiful, Will.” Cassie gifted me one of those smiles that left me without air in my lungs as I stared into eyes the color of the clear Montana sky above us. Pale blonde hair drifted about her face, and my fingers itched to tuck it behind her ears. Her gaze shifted focus over the truck, her brow dipping. “Is it meant to be like that?”
I let her hand go to duck my head, peering through the passenger window at the small stream of smoke wafting over the ridge line at the mountain's foothills that rose along the border of the next property behind Red Hart to the north.
“Shit. Could be back burning. Might be the day for it. But…”Also, maybe not.A light breeze feathered across the rise to sway the red and gold grass heads. I doubted Jude would risk a burn today. He was as conservative as it came, and I’d workedwith Red Hart’s foreman for enough seasons to have a read on him, even half a year apart since I'd seen him last. I doubted he’d recommend it to anyone else, either. My jaw set. “Hop in, Cassie.”
She trotted around the front of the truck, and the tension that dropped off my shoulders left me as took off too fast down the long drive, heading toward the main house. The view I’d always appreciated blurred past. Cassie’s hand slipped into mine as we headed toward the big house.
I pulled into the yard at a much slower speed, and no intention of dusting the house up. The boys wouldn’t appreciate that, and neither would Eve. A few battered trucks, including Trav’s old one, were packed by the house that looked just the way I remembered it. A wrap around veranda framed a high peaked roof. Generations of Beaumont history sat right there in front of me watched over by the pensive mountain that never shifted its unerring gaze.
Cassie clung to my hand. “Wow,” she whispered. “I know you said… but I didn’t think it would be this big.”
“It’s pretty huge,” I muttered. “The first time I turned up here, I didn’t think I’d ever be worthy to step foot in the yard, let alone the big house. But we eat there every night, all of us. Eve opens the house up, cooks for everyone. We do things differently here.”
She shifted in her seat, tearing her eyes away from the house and the mountain, and I knew the effort that cost because on my first time around, my eyes were goggling out of my head. “This really is your family, isn’t it?” She shivered, pulling her hand free and wrapped her arms around herself in a one person hug.
All thought of the fire departed my mind. I reached for her, tugging her close. Neither of us had bothered with seatbelts once we were on the drive and off the black top, making it that much easier to haul her across the bench seat and into my arms.
“You don’t need to be scared here, Cass,” I murmured, doing what I wanted before and pushing my fingers through her dirty blonde hair to tuck it behind her ear. My fingers continued their trail across her curved cheek, over her jaw, tipping her face up to mine until my mouth covered hers. She sighed, sinking into me.
It had been too long since I kissed her. Hours, maybe. We’d kept things above board since we left the rodeo. It had been rushed there, a bit of hell since her brother took a dislike to me and tried to beat me into the ground with the only thing that worked on him—his fists, since his brain didn’t do the job so well. And since we’d only kissed before, that's how we kept it all week, light touches, falling asleep together.
It didn't help that I was still recovering from a dislocated shoulder from the same assholic incident and maybe a bull that threw me the same night. But hell, all that also threw me into the path of the girl in my arms, so who was I to complain?
Soft lips yielded beneath mine. I traced my tongue along hers, then, when she sighed softly for me, delved deeper, squeezing her waist as she leaned into me. Christ, why had we waited again? Something about chivalry came to mind, but every time I kissed her, those thoughts disappeared in lieu of something else. Her hands wound around the back of my neck, tugging me closer until she surrounded me in a swirl of strawberry lip gloss and caramel coffee we picked up in White Cap on our way in.
A bang on the driver’s door told me our time was officially up.
