Page 35 of The Devil in Blue Jeans
“Looks like it,” Willow replied. “He has 1.5 million followers on Instagram.”
“Impressive,” Charly remarked.
Willow showed them photos from past concerts in stadiums as well as recent shots of him with the ranch and cowboys.
“Why is he at the ranch now?” Aubrey asked Charly. “He’s not singing anymore?”
She shrugged. “Jaxon said that he came home for a break and to work on some new music.”
“What about Eli?” asked Willow curiously. “What’s his story?”
“I’m not quite sure about him,” Charly responded, adding panties to her bag. Even put in plain cottons ones to remind herself the next days were not about sexiness. “Jaxon said Eli’s story was a little more complicated and he’d tell me later.”
“Sounds mysterious,” Aubrey said.
Charly had been thinking this same thought all day long. “Honestly, I have a feeling there’s something rather mysterious about all three of those cowboys.” Before her thoughts ran away with her, she added firmly, “Which doesn’t matter, because the only reason I’m there is to find out how to make the locals at the bar happy and to learn more about life here in Timber Falls.”
Aubrey rolled her eyes. “Sure, Charly, keep telling yourself that.”
“I will,” she told Aubrey, and herself.
Jaxon was lounging on the porch railing in a wooden chair with his ankles resting on the railing as Charly drove up with a trail of dust bellowing behind her car. The sun had just begun to set, and the sky was glowing pink, promising a beautiful day to come tomorrow. Last year’s roundup had taken place during a torrential downpour and he knew Charly couldn’t have endured it. Even he and the ranch’s cowboys had been miserable and barely made it through.
Charly parked her car next to his truck and got out, retrieving her suitcase from the back seat.
“Are you all set?” he asked, jumping up and trotting down the steps to take her bag from her.
“Yep, I’m good.” She looked around the ranch before focusing on him again, then walked up the porch steps. “Where has everyone else gone?”
“Home for the night,” he said. He let his gaze roam over her—she was just so damn beautiful. “It’s only you and me now, Kitten. Think you can handle that without ravishing me?”
She laughed softly, raising her chin. “Please. I can restrain myself. You don’t have to worry about that.”
He smiled at her, and loved when her focus went to his lips. Did she remember how hot their kissing had been too? How mind-blowing it had been to touch her? “Do you want something to drink? A beer?”
“Sure, why not,” she replied.
He headed inside the house, leaving her bag just inside the door, and grabbed her a beer from the fridge. He cracked it open on his way back outside and handed it to her as she sat in the chair next to him.
“Thank you,” she said after taking a long sip from the bottle. “Is no one else living on this property?”
“Just me,” he answered with a tilt of his head. “You seem surprised by that?”
“I guess I am a little bit,” she said. “I thought all cowboys on ranches lived on them too, just like they do in movies or TV shows.”
He chuckled. “Nothing’s like it is on TV.”
“I guess that’s true,” she said, tearing her gaze away to look out at the view around her.
He knew why she was so mesmerized by the horses grazing in the paddocks. There was a certain peace here that simply couldn’t be found anywhere else. “My dad believed that those who worked for him deserved a place of their own—somewhere that belonged to only them, ahome. He said it made his cowboys happier people, and I think he was right.”
He couldn’t quite tell what she was thinking when she met his gaze again, and asked, “So, your father really took good care of his employees then, huh?”
“Always did.” He picked up his beer bottle from the porch floor and held it between two fingers.
Part of him felt like he shouldn’t touch on her past life, but the other part of him wanted to unravel all her secrets. “Did your ex run your business like that?”
She finished her sip of her beer and stared back out at the horses. “No, Marcel didn’t have that same view. He believed every worker was replaceable.” She gave a dry laugh before shaking her head sadly. “Including his fiancée.”
