Page 18 of Snowed In with the Rancher

Because you know, buying women gifts was the absolute worst thing in the world.

More often than not he hated men. And all the time he hated people in general.

Horses were so much better in every single way.

Nate had taken their dog, Bruno, with him for the company on the drive and Asher sorely missed the Aussie Shepard with the different colored eyes. He wouldn’t be letting Nate take their dog again, that was for sure.

“What’s wrong with me, Macklin?” Triss whispered. “I thought things with Lorne and I were on the right track. That by this time next year we’d be engaged and planning to get married. What does Echo have that I don’t?”

Echo?

He’d boarded a horse named Echo on the ranch for a while. A nippy mare with a big ego if he was being completely honest. Not his favorite horse, but other than Mercy, he rarely hated any horse. Mercy was just a dick, though.

But more importantly, there was a person named Echo?

Or did Triss’s boyfriend leave her for a horse?

He’d heard rumors that Catherine the Great had orchestrated a pulley system so she could have sex with a horse, but he didn’t believe it. And he really doubted that it’d be as fulfilling in reverse for a guy to fuck a horse.

No, her stupid boyfriend left her for a human named Echo.

Dear God, what was this world coming to? Would he hear of a person named Hula-Hoop soon, too?

“And you want to know the worst part about it all, Macklin?” She sniffed. “I’m crying more over the fact that Lorne leaving me just makes me feel like I’ll never find that person, find that soul-shattering love. Not that I lost Lorne. How horrible is that? I’m not upset about losing him, just how losing him makes me feel. Because why would I want somebody who dumps their girlfriend they just moved in with for their old culinary school girlfriend, then get pissed off when I took my own Instant Pot with me? It was my Instant Pot, Macklin. Mine. Why would I leave that for Lorne and Echo to use?”

What was an Instant Pot?

Macklin made a nose in his throat. Her sniffles grew louder.

“You’ve been a really great distraction, Macklin, thank you. Otherwise, I’d be texting Lorne all the mean, immature things that I want to say but shouldn’t.”

Asher’s lip twitched upward.

What kinds of things was she too mature to say?

“Like how his last alfredo sauce tasted burnt to me, and that I make better bread than he does. You don’t know the man, Macklin, but he’s a bread snob and would take that insult like I’d just called his mama fat or something.”

Asher stifled a chuckle. He liked her fire.

He’d never ask her, but he’d been burning with curiosity to know what Hannah had said to her after asking to be taken off speakerphone. Whatever it was, it’d turned Triss’s face to the color of a cherry blossom in April and made her yell into the phone more than once.

If he were to guess, his not-so-subtle niece was telling Triss she should hump Asher, just like she’d texted Asher again today telling him to hump Triss.

He didn’t dare text her back and say he’d been thinking of little else since she knocked on his door.

Her murmurs with Macklin were quieter now and he couldn’t hear them, so wanting to make sure that he announced his presence and gave her time to compose herself, he counted to fifty in his head, then opened the side door and loudly closed it again. “All the chickens are there,” he announced, louder than necessary.

She’d jumped when he slammed the door and he caught her wiping her hands beneath her eyes. But there was no hiding the fact that she’d been crying. Her brown eyes were red-rimmed and watery, but most of all, they were sad.

He cleared his throat. “It’s getting dark.”

Should he acknowledge the fact that she’d been crying? Was that the right thing to do? Or was it better if he acted normal and pretended that he didn’t notice her puffy eyes or the fact that she was sniffling? Allow her to save face.

He had no idea how to handle a crying woman, never had. It was why his relationships didn’t last much longer than a few weeks. When women got sticky and emotional, he ended things. It was just easier. He was emotionally unavailable, and they needed to learn that sooner rather than later. He’d never be the man they wanted or needed him to be, and there was no changing him, either.

“What do we have to do now?” she asked, kissing Macklin’s nose.

“Feed them again, make sure their water troughs are full, but I can do that if you want to head inside.”

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