Her Knight, Her Protector: a western romance (Rodeo Knights Book 1) Read online

  “Who?”

  She shook her head. For the past day she’d been mulling it over. Breeding bulls for rodeo was an expensive undertaking. Duggan Stock Company ran like a well-oiled machine thanks to her father. But there were always other companies that vied for the contracts the bigger stock companies enjoyed with the WRC.

  “As far-fetched as it seems, it could be one of any number of them. It’s not really the who that’s important.”

  “Like hell it isn’t im—”

  “What’s important is protecting the integrity of the ranch and protecting my animals,” she said above his objection. “I have no idea where my bulls were exposed to these toxins that made them sick. It could have been while on the road, but more likely it was right here on this ranch. I’d like to keep it here.”

  “I’m not sure I follow you.”

  “I don’t want word getting out about the bulls. I certainly don’t want word getting out without having all the facts. Melanie will do some testing to find out if her conclusion is the same as Barry Cunningham’s. We’ll watch the bulls and beef up security on the ranch.” She took a deep breath, astonished at how calmly she could say the words given the seriousness of the situation. “I asked you here because I want your honest opinion out of earshot from others.”

  He looked confused. But not as confused as she felt.

  “My opinion is you need to get law enforcement involved immediately,” he said. “I don’t understand your hesitation. If what happened out there proves anything, it proves that your bulls weren’t poisoned by simply ingesting something they ate. It takes a lot to bring down an animal the size of Lightning Strikes. Someone intentionally gave that bull something they knew would make it sick.”

  “I know.”

  He blinked and then shook his head. “Am I missing something? Are you not understanding what’s happening right here on your ranch?”

  “I understand perfectly. Someone is out to get me. Or at least sabotage my business. I don’t know which.”

  “All the more reason law enforcement should be involved.”

  “Maybe so. But what I do know for sure is that what you saw here today can never leave this ranch. If word gets out on the circuit, specifically to Daryl Buchanan, the man from the WRC who chooses bulls for competition, my bulls will be banned from competing and I’ll lose my contracts. Rumors have a way of growing legs and making what could be a simple issue into something ominous.”

  “I’d say the poisoning of your bulls is pretty ominous.”

  “I agree. And despite what you may think, I am taking it seriously. I’m… sick about Lighting Strikes. I’ve grown up running around livestock my entire life. I love these animals. But I need to find out who is doing this first without the world knowing about it. It could turn a case of accidental poisoning of a bull into something worse, like a rumor of a viral or bacterial infection on my ranch. I can’t have that.”

  “What are you suggesting?”

  “I need your help, Mr. Knight. You were a military police officer, so I’m assuming you have experience investigating crime.”

  “I do.”

  “The fact that you were suspicious enough to want to check this out in the first place tells me you were probably good at what you did.”

  “I was.”

  She liked his confidence. She liked that he didn’t back down from her and that he was still listening. They could work together. “You can help me find out who is attacking this ranch.”

  He whistled low. “Do you have any idea what an undertaking that is alone? That will require my being here twenty-four/seven.”

  “I understand.”

  His eyes widened.

  “You’ll be compensated for it,” she said quickly. “Unless of course you have another job that will prevent you from taking this on.”

  His expression tightened. “I’m in between careers at the moment.”

  “Really? Convenient.”

  His eyebrows lifted quickly as he smiled. “That wasn’t the reaction I was expecting.”

  “Then we’re even.”

  “Was this a contest?”

  A smile tugged at her lips. “Hardly. I was merely stating that you’ve surprised me as much as I apparently surprised you.”

  “How did I surprise you?”

  “You’re still here.”

  He stared at her for a long moment. She held his gaze longer than it felt comfortable. She couldn’t help but think of how beautiful his hazel eyes were. How intense they made him appear when he was serious.

  “When do you want me to move in?”

  #

  Chapter Four

  It had been just about a week of having Jesse Knight living on her ranch, working and laughing among the rest of the ranch hands in the bunkhouse. So far, he seemed to bond with them, but Carly wasn’t sure if they truly trusted his being here. His arrival was so abrupt, that she was sure it looked suspicious.

  But no one had asked her about it. Even Colin, who would have been more vocal about bringing on a new ranch hand without his input.

  She and Jesse had chosen to keep his real reason for being here quiet. What bothered her more was that Jesse Knight had been on her ranch for a week and they’d yet to discover anything new. That may be a good thing. She didn’t want to borrow trouble. She already had enough. But today she didn’t want to sit in her office and wonder. She wanted to do something.

  Carly woke up earlier than usual and headed to the barn. Thad was already inside mucking out the stalls. He was a hard worker and he’d learned a lot over the past year. It was too bad he hadn’t had the opportunity to work with her father. She knew her father would have liked him.

  “Are Bitsy and Dobey in the paddock?” she asked.

  He stopped his task of scooping piles of manure into the wheelbarrow and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. “Rod put them out into the pasture a little while ago so I could clean up in here.”

  “Would you mind getting them into the paddock and saddling them up when you’re finished here?”

  “Both?”

  She nodded. “Jesse and I are going to be taking a ride out to the high pasture after breakfast to check for wild vegetation in the pastures.”

  “Sure thing, Boss. But Rod and Jesse just did that yesterday.”

  “They did?”

  She must have looked shocked because Thad’s shoulders sagged just a bit. “Yeah. There was some barbed wire fencing that needed to be fixed so Jesse said he was going to check things out.”

  “Oh, well good. I’d like to have a look myself anyway. So I’ll let you know when to get the horses ready, okay?”

  “Will do, Boss.”

  She smiled as she walked back to the house. Thad was the only one of the ranch hands who called her boss. Everyone else had been here long enough to either call her Carly or Miss Duggan.”

  When she reached the house, she was pulled into the kitchen by the scent of bacon and fresh baked muffins. She found Doris working at the stove making a big batch of scrambled eggs.

  “That’s an awful lot of scrambled eggs you’re making this morning?”

  “Yes, it is. I have some pancakes too. I even have some wild blueberries I picked myself to put in them.”

  “Blueberries, huh? You’re spoiling me, Doris.”

  Doris glanced over her shoulder and smiled. “I always do.”

  Carly chuckled and said, “I’ll be in my office when Jesse comes in.”

  “He already has, sweetie. He’s had two cups of coffee and then went back out the door to invite Colin and the boys in for breakfast.”

  She stopped short. “He did?”

  “You weren’t up. I told him you probably wouldn’t mind since your father used to invite the hands in for breakfast sometimes.”

  “Oh. Yes, you’re right. Thank you, Doris.”

  She headed to the side door and heard laughter outside. She waited a few seconds and then watched a line of men stream into the house and head
to the breakfast table.

  She pasted on a smile, feeling out of place in her own home for not being the one to think of this. “Good morning, everyone.”

  “Jesse invited us in for breakfast. I wasn’t going to pass Doris’s pancakes up,” Colin said, smiling.

  “It’s a good thing she’s cooked enough for an army,” she said.

  It wasn’t unheard of for the men to have breakfast in the house. Carly had grown up sharing meals at the kitchen table with many a ranch hand over the years. They shared meals together on the road when they took the bulls to competition. And when they were working all day out on the ranch, she and Doris would bring lunch up to the hands so they wouldn’t have to take time to come back to the house to eat. But it had been a while since they’d all shared breakfast together at the main house.

  Carly thought back to the last time she could remember and felt a bit of shame. She couldn’t remember. Had she really been so caught up in taking charge of the ranch’s business after her father’s death that she’d forgotten to invite the hands into her home?

  Her father had always made a point to make the men feel his home was their home. They knew he was the authority on the ranch. They respected him. But he was quick to remind them that he had been in their shoes once too. He may have been born a Duggan, but when he was a young man, he had to work the ranch with all the other ranch hands when her grandfather had been in charge of the Duggan Stock Company. He learned everything about raising and caring for bulls that way.

  Maybe that’s why the hands didn’t treat her quite like they treated Zebb Duggan. They knew her father was really one of them, even though he was the boss. He wasn’t a man to give an order unless he was willing to do the job, and had done the job, himself.

  The men took turns cleaning up using the sink in the bathroom off the mudroom. They all knew Doris wouldn’t let them sit at the breakfast table unless they’d cleaned up. Carly headed into the kitchen and walked to the long kitchen table by a long line of windows that looked over the ranch. The benches on both sides of the table filled up with the ranch hands. The only seats left were the ones at either end of the table.

  Jesse stood by the table and waited for her to take a seat. She glanced at the head of the table and at the chair where her father always sat. Doris put the platters of scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, home fries and pancakes on the table.

  Carly turned to Doris. “You’re going to join us, aren’t you?”

  “Look at the table. There’s no room!” she said with a wink. “I’ve already nibbled on some breakfast. You all can dig in. I’m going to get those muffins out of the oven before they burn.”

  “After you,” Jesse said, extending his hand.

  Carly took the seat at the head of the table and sat down. The rest of the men waited for Jesse to sit down at the other end of the table. When no one reached for the food. They just sat there with than hands in their laps.

  “I know you’re all hungry,” she said. “If you’re waiting for me to take the first spoonful, I’m not going to be shy. I’m taking some pancakes before you men eat them all.”

  She reached for the platter of blueberry pancakes and the rest of the men started dishing food onto their plates. Once everyone had some food on their plate, the table grew quiet except for the occasional request to pass a platter of food or to fight over the last sausage or muffin. When breakfast was complete, Carly thanked them all for sharing a meal with her, just as she remembered her father doing.

  “Thad, do you mind getting those horses ready in about a half hour?” she asked as the men started to leave.

  “Sure thing, Boss. I’ll be in the barn.”

  “Thanks.” She turned to Jesse. “Let’s go to my office for a bit, okay?”

  A smile split his face. Every time Jesse looked in her direction it was like he saw right through her. It was unnerving. And she was sure it was evident to everyone around them.

  She ignored the eyes on her back as she walked down the hall to her office. There had been a lot of looks lately, something she wanted to discuss with Jesse in private. None of the ranch hands knew about the death threats she’d received. She’d decided to keep that information to herself. It may be time for a change of plans.

  * * *

  Jesse followed Carly into her office and waited until she closed the door before saying anything.

  Carly motioned to the two chairs in front of the fireplace. “Please. Have a seat.”

  They sat down and Jesse couldn’t help but notice how incredibly lost Carly looked.

  “Doris has been with you for a while?”

  Carly glanced at the doorway that Doris had just walked through. “Since my mother passed away when I was eleven.”

  “You were young to lose your mother.”

  “You’re always too young to lose a mother. It doesn’t matter how old you are.”

  He nodded his agreement. “You two seem very close.”

  “In many ways, Doris is so much more than a housekeeper. She’s been a surrogate mother of sorts for me. My father hired her on as a nanny, housekeeper, and cook. But he didn’t know how to do the teenage thing and her duties as nanny outweighed the rest for a while. My father knew bulls, not teenage girls. Doris was always there when I needed someone. She never tried to fill my mother’s shoes. Just fill in the gap that needed filling when I needed it.”

  “Am I here for a status report?” Jesse asked.

  “Do you have one? I was hoping you were able to find out if the ranch hands knew anything more. Perhaps remembering someone coming to the ranch around the time Lightning Strikes was poisoned.”

  “Sorry to disappoint you. These things can take time. Either the men really don’t know anything, or someone is very good at keeping a secret.”

  “Secret? I wasn’t implying someone here was intentionally holding back.”

  “I know. But I also know that in a situation as this, everyone is suspect.”

  “Even me?”

  Jesse shook his head. She was as suspicious as he was. “Unless you have a strong desire for attention, which doesn’t seem likely since I’ve hardly seen your face in the last week, you weren’t even on the list.”

  “I wasn’t hiding.”

  He gave her a crooked grin. “Weren’t you?”

  Her cheeks flamed.

  “Is that why you invited the hands to breakfast this morning?”

  He frowned. “Did that bother you?”

  “No. It embarrassed me. But not for the reason you might think. It should have been me who extended the invitation. Thank you for reminding me of that.”

  She took a deep breath and tapped the small area of wood on the arm of the seat she was sitting in with the tips of her fingers.

  “Thad told me that you took a ride up to the high pasture with Rod yesterday. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  He shrugged. “There was nothing to tell. Besides, the reason for going up there was to fix a fence that an animal broke through.”

  “You didn’t see any suspicious overgrowth?”

  “No. But then, with Rod there, I didn’t want to appear overly interested. I’d like to have a closer look. If we find anything we can bring a tractor up and clear the vegetation along the fence line.”

  She nodded. “It might be a good idea to do it anyway. It’ll take some time, but it might be worth it. Once we’re done here, I’d like us both to take a ride up to the pasture where Lightning Strikes grazed before he was brought down to the lower pasture. I’ve been doing some reading. Sometimes these plants can take hours to show signs of poison in an animal. And small amounts over days could—”

  “You’re reaching,” he said, interrupting her. “The levels of toxin found in Lighting Strikes was too high. In fact, there were multiple toxins that came up in Melanie’s report.”

  “I saw that.”

  “I’ve seen no Larkspur or Hemlock up along the fence lines and yet Lightning Strikes had a cocktail of these toxins in his blood. And
hardly any in his stomach.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “It wasn’t just ingested.”

  “How could you possibly know that?” she asked.

  He braced himself for what he knew was coming next. “Because Sean was here. He not only looked at Melanie’s report, but he took samples for himself to double-check.”

  #

  Chapter Five

  “Your brother was here? On my ranch. After I told you that I wanted this to stay between us?” Carly asked, rising to her feet quickly.

  He already knew she hated being one-upped by her ranch hands. But Jesse would risk Carly’s wrath before trusting anyone on this ranch who may have had a hand at Lightning Strikes death. Despite not hearing a suspicious word from any of them, he wasn’t convinced.

  He remained seated. “You know the answer to that. Sean is a vet.”

  “A WRC veterinarian. He travels with the rodeo! You had no right to call him. This is exactly what I was trying to avoid!” Her lips thinned. “Why would you do that? Barry Cunningham already examined Lightning Strikes. Melanie took samples. If word gets out about—”

  “Nothing is going to leave this ranch without you wanting it to.”

  “It already has.”

  “Sean is a damned good veterinarian. He’s seen just about everything that can happen to a bull. When Melanie’s findings were so strange, it only made sense to bring him in. The rest of the bulls on the ranch are healthy.”

  “He examined them?”

  “Yes.”

  “You had no right to keep something like this from me.”

  “You would have said no.”

  “You’re damned right I would have.” She shook her head. “I know your brother is a good veterinarian, but you’ll forgive me if I don’t share your confidence.”

  “I don’t really care if you do or if you don’t.”

  Carly reached up as if she were about to grab her cowboy hat, as if she needed a place for the steam building up inside her to vent. But in frustration, she pulled her hand back when she realized the hat was sitting on her desk and not her head. “Now you wait just a minute, Jesse. I was the one who called you to quietly investigate—”