I stare at the wooden ceiling, the marks in the grain twisting and taking on new shapes. The first gray notes of morning enter the room, and on the other side of the ranch the roosters are crowing.

That girl.

I shouldn’t even be thinking about her. Not with a dozen other worries on my mind. I have a ranch to run, a team to lead . . . I have . . .

The most rock-hard boner I’ve had in months. Shit, years.

“Fuck,” I hiss. Difficult as it is, I force myself out of bed and into the shower. I need to take care of this problem so I can haul my ass out of the cabin and up the hill to work.

Turning the shower on hot as I can take it, I turn my back to the spray and let it hit my neck. The sore muscles there soak the heat up, releasing tension as beads of water roll down my back.

My dick twitches, shaft and balls engorged with a kind of need I haven’t felt in years. Eyes sealed shut, I seize it at the base and lethargically stroke it. I don’t want to think about her, shouldn’t be thinking about her.

One, she’s a little too young for me.

Two, she’s my foreman’s niece.

Three, she’s leaving soon.

Four, she has a stuck-up, know-it-all attitude. She’s probably classist beyond help. Probably wore leggings every day back at Bexley and counted down the days every year till pumpkin spice lattes returned. She probably posts comments like “Can’t we all just get along?” whenever someone shares a politically charged post on social media. She probably . . .

Has a pussy that tastes like candy.

I groan, my palm pumping around my shaft. That firm ass. Those fierce eyes. They’re all I see. Hot pleasure builds, each stroke of my hand doubling the heat.

Without warning, I explode with a thick gasp. Cum flies from me faster than the shower’s spray and hits the tiles.

“Shit,” I hiss, dropping my chin to my chest. Here’s hoping I never finish that fast in front of any girl.

After washing myself off, I step out of the shower and hustle to get up to the main house. Breakfast is already ending by the time I enter, half the hands out in the fields and barns.

Daniel is just leaving, dropping his napkin on his plate as I enter.

“I was thinking about the north field,” I begin. “That irrigation trench needs to be deeper. It’s gonna—”

“I have it,” he interrupts. “You go on and teach Sloane to ride. She’s waiting in the stable for you.”

I stare at him. “I thought you were joking about me teaching her.”

“Why would I joke about that?”

He’s out the door and gone, not waiting for an answer. I take in a long breath, working on quelling my anger. It’s typical Daniel, making plans and assumptions without checking with me first. He might be the best foreman in the world, but he can be real hardheaded sometimes.

With real work to be done, I don’t have time to teach a spoiled Hollywood brat how not to fall out of a saddle.

Snatching up a biscuit, I wolf it down as I make my way to the stable. I’ll just tell Sloane the riding lesson is off. She can go and pick wildflowers all day or something—whatever it is she thought she’d be spending her summer doing.

At the stable, though, I stop. The words won’t come. She’s at Sweetpea’s stall, cooing gently as she pets the horse. The shorts she sports are so tiny the pockets hang out the bottom of them. And though her shirt is oversized and tied into a knot, it still rides up just enough to expose an inch of midriff.

Lord, help me.

“That’s not the horse we’re using.”

She frowns at me. “Good morning to you, too.”

I don’t respond. Opening Crumpet’s stall, I lead the thoroughbred out and start saddling him up. “You’ll ride Crumpet today.”

“Crumpet, huh?”

She’s talking to the horse, not to me, coming up to reach out and pet him. I hold back the smirk, waiting for Crumpet to snort and stomp a hoof.

But he doesn’t.

“Can I take him out?” Sloane takes the reins from me and starts slowly walking for the yard. I stare after the two of them.

“No,” I whisper.

What just happened doesn’t make sense. Crumpet has a reputation around the farm—and not a good one. He’s the orneriest horse we’ve ever had. He was supposed to teach Sloane a lesson about the dangers of touching animals you don’t know. I didn’t want him to hurt her, of course, just spook her a little.

But he didn’t even do that.

If Sloane Gentry ends up being a damn horse whisperer I’m going to lose my shit.

In the yard, she’s finally uncertain, twisting her lips as she studies the saddle. I keep at a distance, watching and waiting for her to ask for my help.

“Okay.” She blows out a quick breath. “So I just put my foot there and pull myself up?”

“Kind of.”

I can’t stop myself. I’m moving to help her, placing my hands on her waist and helping her lift herself into the saddle. Electricity ripples through me, shock after shock making the hair on my arms stand on end.

Seated in the saddle, Sloane smiles like a little kid. “This is awesome.”

“Take hold of the reins.”

“Okay.”

She does as I tell her to, and for a few minutes all of the animosity between us seems to disappear. Something out of my control is happening—and damn it if I don’t like it.