Fortune's Second-Chance Cowboy

She saw no reason not to do that, as long as she could hear the baby if she started crying again. She was fairly confident that there had to be a baby monitor in Sydney’s room.

Feeling a sense of relief that she’d at least be away from Chance for a minute or two—enough time to break whatever spell he’d seemed to cast over her—Chloe happily fell into step behind Sasha’s uncle.

“Guess I might as well come, too,” Chance said to them. “No sense in standing around, talking to myself.”

Oh, joy. Just what she needed. More of the handsome cowboy.

Chapter Three (#ulink_8cc9e412-fc7e-5232-a49a-e9af14fd74be)

Chloe eased the baby ever so slowly into the crib. She held her breath the entire time until she was able to successfully withdraw her hands from around the baby’s little body.

Sydney made a little noise, then sighed before settling back to sleep.

Success! Chloe silently congratulated herself.

She took a step back and almost gasped as she bumped up right against Chance.

“Oh, sorry,” he whispered, immediately moving aside. He wasn’t sure if he was apologizing for being in her way or for feeling that sudden zip of electricity surging through his body when it made contact with hers. Granted the contact wasn’t of the intimate variety that he was normally accustomed to, but there was still just enough to get him going.

Chloe instantly turned around and nearly caused another, far more dead-on collision between them. At the very last minute, because Chance had moved back so quickly, the one-on-one collision between their two bodies was avoided.

She wasn’t really sure if she was relieved—or perhaps just a little disappointed.

Again? What is the matter with you? she silently demanded.

Yes, the man was attractive, she acknowledged, but lots of men were attractive and she hadn’t been drawn to them. So why was this man, this cowboy, different from the others?

He’s not. Get a grip, Chloe, she ordered herself angrily.

“Um, that’s okay.” She flushed, absolving him of any guilt in what had just transpired. “I shouldn’t have moved so suddenly.” She looked down at the sleeping infant. “I just didn’t want to take a chance on saying something too loud and waking up the baby.”

Since the room was relatively small, Roger had kept back, standing almost out in the hallway. He peered in now at the sleeping infant.

“She sure is a pretty little thing, ain’t she?” The whispered rhetorical question was steeped in complete admiration. And then he looked from Chance to Chloe. “You got any kids?” he asked Chance.

The cowboy looked surprised by the question. “No.”

“You already told me that you don’t have any,” Roger said to Chloe. And then he laughed to himself, as if he knew something they weren’t privy to yet. “Well, you two are young yet. You’ve got time.”

Time—that was what Donnie had thought. They had time. Time to be together, time to enjoy one another before they took that step to become parents. Again she wished with all her heart she had insisted on getting pregnant before he had left for overseas. At least she would have had Donnie’s child to hold in her arms instead of all that emptiness that he left behind.

“But once you’ve got ’em,” Roger was saying, “there’s just nothing like it in the world. Makes you realize just what you were put down here on earth for, what makes everything else all worthwhile.” Rousing himself, he beckoned them out into the hallway. “C’mon, we’d better slip out before I forget myself and start talking loud again.”

Roger put a hand on each of their shoulders—he had to stretch in order to reach Chance’s—and he guided them both out ahead of him.

The hallway was too narrow to accommodate all three of them. Roger fell behind them again.

As she and Chance fell in step beside each other, he glanced her way. “You want kids?” he asked her out of the blue as they made their way back down the stairs ahead of their unofficial escort.

“Right now, I just want a job,” she told him honestly. The next second, she realized that he might think she was trying to guilt him out of competing for the position he was here for. “I mean, if I turn out to be more qualified for it. But if it turns out that you are, well then, I’ll just have to keep on looking for something,” she concluded.

Chance caught himself studying her. Something just wasn’t adding up for him.

“Just how much do you know about ranching?” he finally asked her.

Reaching the bottom of the stairs, she stared at him, confused. Why would he ask her such a strange question? “Not much. Why?”

Something’s really not adding up, Chance told himself. “Well, because that’s the job I’m here about. The one I’m interviewing for. Graham wanted someone to run the ranch. Someone who was good with horses,” he finally said when she just kept looking at him.

“Run the ranch?” Chloe repeated, confused. She’d gotten the impression from Graham that she and Chance were here about the same job. She looked at him now. “You’re here about ranching?”

“Funny, I thought I just said that,” Chance answered. Judging by the expression on her face, she wasn’t here to apply for that job the way she’d made it sound earlier. “What are you here about?”

“Why, counseling, of course,” Chloe replied in no uncertain terms.

“Counseling what?” Chance asked, clearly surprised by her answer. And then it suddenly occurred to him what the sexy-looking blonde was saying. He had to admit that what he’d just asked made him feel like an idiot. “You mean the boys?”

Her smile was a natural reflex. “I kind of have to. Horses don’t listen to me.”

Chloe’s sense of humor tickled him and he laughed. Now it all made sense. They were here about two different positions. “I could teach you how to make them listen to you.”

“You’re talking about the horses, right?” she asked, a hint of mischief dancing in her eyes.

He found himself being pulled in and mesmerized by those deep pools of blue. It took effort to tear his gaze away. “Right,” he finally replied. “I’ve got no trouble getting horses to listen to me. Most people, though, just ignore me like I wasn’t there.”

“I don’t believe that for a minute,” she told him with feeling. How could anyone, male or female—especially female—not notice this man? His presence seemed to just fill up the very space around him. Heaven knew he certainly did that for her.

The way he was looking at her right now made her feel like nervously shifting from foot to foot. The butterflies in her stomach were multiplying at a phenomenal rate. It was hard to gather her thoughts together to answer him.

“For one thing, you’re really tall.” She knew that wasn’t much of an answer, so she searched for a better one. “And you have this commanding air about you. If you were a counselor, I’m sure that the boys here would listen to whatever you had to say.”

“Good thing we won’t have to put that to the test,” Chance answered, then confessed, “I’m not much when it comes to giving orders. I had enough of that when I was over in Afghanistan.”

The mention of the place that had seen Donnie die had her quietly saying, “At least you got to come back.”

The words slipped out before she could think to stop them. Any hope that Chance might not have heard her died the second she looked up into his eyes. He’d heard. There was curiosity mingled with a touch of pity in his blue orbs.

The moment grew more uncomfortable for her.

“Did you lose someone?” Chance asked kindly.

Her first impulse was to deny his assumption. But that would be like denying Donnie had ever existed, and she couldn’t bring herself to do that.

So after a couple of beats had gone by, she answered him. “Yes.”

“Brother? Father? Husband?” Chance kept guessing when she made no acknowledgment that he had guessed correctly. By the time he’d reached the word husband, with no visible response from her, Chance shook his head. “No, never mind. Don’t tell me. It’s none of my business. Sorry I asked,” he apologized. “It’s just that sometimes it feels like some kind of exclusive veterans club—the kind you really don’t want membership to,” he added ruefully.

“Does that mean you wish you hadn’t gone?” she asked, curious.