Page 1 of Ranch Rules

Chapter One

From the time she wasseven years old, Natalie Winthrop had wanted to be a lawyer when she grew up. At twenty-nine, she liked to imagine that her childhood self was proud of the woman she had become. She was a lawyer, and a damn good one. She had been made junior partner at her firm Briggs & Spric two years earlier and knew that full partnership was in her distant future.

Before she walked out the door each morning, she knew the image she presented to anyone who would cross her path. She was polished, put together, sure of herself. And why wouldn’t she be? She was successful, doing what she loved, and young. What else could anyone ask for? But she didn’t get down on her knees and thank her lucky stars—she had earned this. She had created it for herself.

There was no official uniform at Briggs & Spric, but Natalie always wore a dress suit—freshly pressed, of course. And her black tresses were wound into a tight bun, never a hair out of place. She took pride in her position at the prestigious law firm, and she wanted her appearance to reflect that.

It was a busy day, per the usual. She had just told her assistant, Michael, that she would take her lunch break when her boss, Mr. Dawson, burst into her office without so much as a knock to announce his presence. If it had been anyone else, she would have been offended, but Mr. Dawson didn’t believe in doors and had his own taken off the hinges ages ago.

“Yes, sir?” she asked, setting her apple down on the desk.

As usual, his hair was wild, his eyes roving and never settling on one place for too long. “Natalie, have you spoken to Mr. Felton yet?”

“Not yet. I—”

“Well, when were you planning to? We need to get him on the phone about those contracts.”

“Yes, sir. It’s the next thing on my to-do list.”

His bushy gray brows furrowed together as he cast a reproving look at her half-eaten apple. “Fine. You’re entitled to a lunch hour. Just see that it gets done.”

Natalie coughed to cover up a laugh. She hadn’t taken a lunch hour in the last five years, and he knew it. He wouldn’t have made her junior partner if she had. At Briggs & Spric every hour was billable and her boss would have preferred that the ten minutes it took to eat a piece of fruit was used charging a client. He cared more about those numbers than her or any employee’s peace of mind. It used to bother her, but not anymore. Once upon a time, she would have railed at the unfairness of it all, but now she was a robot, like all the rest of them.

Mr. Dawson was a man always on the go with an arm-long to-do list running through his mind, so it struck her as strange when he continued to hover in the doorway. “Was that all, sir?”

“Ah, well, actually...”

She forced herself to be patient as he shifted from foot to foot. Out of habit her eyes had gone to the clock and it was with a sinking heart that she saw she only had twenty minutes left. She depended on her lunch break to refocus and shake off any negative encounters that had happened earlier in the day. It looked like she would have to make do without it today.

“I wanted to... well, all the partners, really...”

“Yes?” she prompted, forcing her voice to remain respectful.

“Do you mind if I sit?”

She did a double-take before she could stop herself. Mr. Dawson never sat. But she nodded, gesturing to the stately but comfortable chair across from her.

“Nice desk,” Mr. Dawson commented, tapping the top.

She smiled. Her parents had bought it for her when she had graduated in the top five percent of her class from law school. It was an antique, beautifully maintained with lovely brass fixtures. She kept the surface shining, each of her files in nice, neat piles.

“Alphabetized,” her boss muttered approvingly.

“Just like you taught me, sir.”

He grinned at her. “You learn fast. Always have. Which makes it all the more... unfortunate...”

Her earlier irritation vanished at the single word. “Unfortunate, sir?”

“Erm, well...” He shifted in the chair.

Natalie’s brow furrowed as she surveyed his odd behavior. “What is unfortunate?”

“Uh, perhaps I should wait... what I came in here to say is that, ah, I would—well, not just me, all the partners, actually, would like to have a... a meeting. Later.”

The furrow in her brow deepened. “What kind of meeting?”

“Well... perhaps I... I mean...”

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