Cowboy's Kiss Read Free Page B

way into a quarter share of this ranch and I don’t appreciate it. I don’t give a damn about anything else that old man left you a part of—spending ten years cozied up with him earned it for you. But Linc and Beth and I paid our dues on this place being worked like dogs by that contrary cuss of a man, and if you think you can sashay in here as if it’s some kind of resort where you can lie around the pool all day long while somebody waits on you, you have another think coming.”
    â€œNow hold on,” Ally said, her voice louder than she’d intended it to be, and just as stern and angry as his. “In the first place, Meggie is not your half sister and I didn’t sleep my way into anything. Your father’s lady friend was my mother and for the last ten years the relationship they shared was nothing as sleazy as you’d like to make it.”
    Jackson Heller merely went on goring her with his cornflower blue eyes.
    Ally wanted to hit him. But instead she just continued. “As for Shag leaving me an equal share of his estate—I concede that you and your brother and sister have every right not to be thrilled by it. I was hoping you all wouldn’t resent it and I’m sorry to find that even one of you does. But Shag’s including me in his will was the kindest, most generous thing anyone has ever done for me and it just happens to have come at a time when I couldn’t have needed it more, so if you think you’re going to scare me into refusing anything, it’s you who can think again.”
    â€œI told you, the only thing I give a damn about is the ranch. You’re welcome to the rest. Hell, you’re even welcome to stay in town if that’s what you want to do—”
    â€œOh, thank you so much for your permission!”
    â€œBut you’re not welcome on my ranch!”
    â€œIt’s our ranch and I don’t have to be welcome to be here.”
    They’d both been shouting and now he stopped. But the quiet, barely suppressed rage in his voice was somehow worse. “I made an offer to buy you out through all those lawyers a few months back. I’ll up it by five thousand dollars right now.”
    â€œI’ll make you the same offer and you can go,” she bluffed.
    He saw it. “Don’t make me think you’re a fool.”
    No, for some reason she didn’t want this man, of all men, to think of her that way. Though she didn’t understand why it should matter. It did, however, change her tone to one more reasonable. “Look, I came here to live for a reason that doesn’t have anything to do with money. I’m not leaving.”
    â€œTen thousand more.”
    â€œA hundred thousand more, a million more—it wouldn’t matter. Meggie and I are staying.”
    Oh, what an ugly look he gave her!
    â€œLet me guess,” he said with a sneer. “You have some damn television idea of what it’s like to live on a ranch and you thought you’d come up here and have a little Western adventure. Or you’ve had a falling out with some desk jockey in Denver and you thought you’d show him, you’d just pack up and move. Or—”
    â€œDon’t make me think you’re a fool to believe drivel like that,” she countered.
    Again their eyes locked in a stare-down.
    â€œFifteen thousand.”
    â€œI’m not going anywhere.”
    Unless of course he picked her up bodily and threw her out, which at that moment Ally thought was a possibility from the look of utter contempt he had on that incredible face of his. But incredible face—and body—or not, he was still the most disagreeable man she’d ever encountered and she didn’t like him any better than he liked her.
    Then, through clenched teeth, he said, “Why would you stay somewhere you’re not wanted?”
    â€œI have my reasons,” she answered just as dourly, having no intention of