The Wrangler

She was backlit, her short brown hair blond around the edges. “I usually ride English,” she said with a wide I-know-that-might-sound-strange smile. “The truth is, I can count on one hand how many times I’ve ridden western.”

He dropped the strap, rested his arm on the chestnut horse’s withers and met his grandmother’s gaze. “You hear that, Gigi? The woman wants to ride in an English saddle.”

His grandmother just shook her head. It was cool inside the barn, a gentle breeze blowing up the aisle. Gigi had tossed a tan jacket over her white blouse and jeans.

“Just finish saddling that horse, Clint. If she’s been riding English, a western saddle ought to be a piece of cake.”

Clint shrugged. “Suit yourself,” he said, and went back to girthing up the horse, wrapping the strap in and out of the metal loop before giving it a final tug. He’d hung the left stirrup over the saddle horn to keep it out of his way while he worked, but he released it quickly—too quickly—the thing slapping against Red’s wide body. The horse pinned his ears.

“Maybe I can send for my own saddle if things work out,” she told his grandmother, smiling sheepishly.

Only if she managed to control the horse beneath this saddle. But he found himself snorting nonetheless. The ranch hands would laugh themselves silly if they caught sight of someone riding one of his cow ponies in an English saddle.

Over his dead body.

“Excuse me,” he said, eyeing the tack room behind her. “I need to get Red’s bridle.”

“Oh,” she said, taking a step back.

But it wasn’t enough.

He brushed past her, Samantha’s gaze darting to his body like a foam bullet from a Nerf gun. “Sorry,” she said.

He paused for a heartbeat. Their arms had touched. That was all. It wasn’t as if his crotch had accidentally crossed one of her no-fly zones. Yet it felt as if that’s exactly what happened. Worse, he felt a familiar buzz in that same region.

Crap.

He didn’t look at her, but he couldn’t deny that he fought the urge to glance back as he stepped into the tack room. The smell of leather filled his nostrils, it was such a familiar scent that it instantly soothed him.

“Just been without a woman too long,” he muttered to himself. “Nothing to it.”

He grabbed the bridle from the rack, turned.

Gigi stood there.

“What was that you were saying?” she asked. The look on her face was the same one he recognized from years of stepping in cow patties—and then entering her house afterward.

“I said it’s been too long since I’ve cleaned this bridle.”

That’s not what you said, his grandmother silently told him.

That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it, he told her right back on his way out.

The snaffle bit was the only piece of English tack he owned. Thing was, old Red wasn’t very responsive to the jointed piece of metal. But if she knew how to ride…

Red stood still as he slipped the leather halter off his head, the big horse opening his mouth obediently. The metal mouthpiece clinked against his teeth, but it didn’t bug the sorrel gelding. They were used to that kind of thing, just as they were used to the leather headstall being tugged over their ears. Once he buckled the throatlatch, he stepped back.

“He’s all yours,” he said with a smile as false as their ancient ranch hand Elliot’s fake teeth.

“Thanks,” she said, reaching for the reins. She stepped up to Red’s left side, the correct side to lead a horse from, but not something a greenhorn would know. Clint had his first inkling that she might know a thing or two.

“I saw an arena out behind the barn. Should I take him there?”

“Sure,” Gigi said.

Clint glanced at his grandmother, who shot Clint an I-told-you-so grin. This time it was Clint who shook his head.

There was at least an inch of water on the ground, the horse’s hooves sucking at the earth in rhythmic plop-plop-plops. But it was still cool outside and that might present a problem, too. Cool weather was like a drug to horses—uppers. They could be slightly rambunctious after a cooldown like they’d just had.

But Samantha Davies opened the arena gate without the slightest hesitation, yet another clue that she knew her way around a ranch. Most gates were made with the same type of latch. Someone who wasn’t familiar with them wouldn’t know how they worked, but she flipped the latch and then slid it loose with an expert turn of the wrist.

Maybe he should have come up with another test. Like trick riding or calf roping or something.

She closed the gate behind her as easily as she opened it. There was no fear on her face as she turned to Red, just obvious determination as she lifted her foot into the stirrup. Her jeans pulled tight across her bottom, and Clint found himself staring at the shape of her rear until Gigi nudged him in the side.

“What?” he asked as Samantha Davies expertly pulled herself into the saddle.

“I think you really have been without a woman for too long,” Gigi said with a wicked smile, and then—God help him—a wink.

“WHERE TO?” SAMANTHA ASKED, picking up the slack on the reins and turning Red toward the rail. “You want me to do some figure eights or something?”

Eugenia Bear had a grin on her face about as wide as the snow-capped mountains behind her. “Can you do a reining pattern?” she asked.

“Gigi,” her grandson said. “She said she rides English. She doesn’t know what a reining pattern is.”

“Actually, I do,” Sam said, trying to keep the wattage of her grin down. “I’ve watched more than my fair share at horse shows. I bet if you ran some of those cows over there into the arena, I could do some cutting for you, too.”

Eugenia’s pleasure appeared to grow—if possible. “There,” she said to Clinton, “you see? She’s an expert.”

“So she claims,” he said. “But I’d like to actually see her do the pattern before we move on to cows—if we move on to cows.”

“Well, I don’t know the pattern, exactly,” Sam said, “but I have a pretty clear idea what to do. Let’s see what I can get this little cow pony to do.”

“Little?” she heard Clint huff.

“Most of the horses I ride are closer to seventeen hands,” she said. “They breed them big on the quarter horse circuit.”

She pulled Red away before she could gauge Clint’s reaction. A reigning pattern was meant to showcase a rider’s ability to control a horse. Those patterns were always performed in a western saddle, but that wouldn’t matter. Patterns had been a big part of her training, and that gave her confidence as she guided Red toward the rail.

“Come on,” she told the horse. “You gotta make me look good.”

But Red didn’t like to go. That became apparent the instant she tried to squeeze him into a canter—or a lope—as the western people labeled it. He didn’t even want to trot, much less jog—or God forbid—gallop. But she hadn’t ridden over fences for nothing. Holding on over three-foot obstacles, sometimes higher, had given her the legs of a linebacker. She ground her heels into Red and made him behave.

He did.

Sam sighed. There was nothing, absolutely nothing, like riding a horse. She hadn’t ridden much in the past few months—doctor’s orders—but it was a lot like roller skating. Once you knew how, you never forgot.

“Okay,” she called out, trying to ignore the saddle horn as she squeezed Red. English saddles didn’t have horns and so she was somewhat distracted by its presence. “Here I go.”