I was seething as I got into my car, so angry that I squeezed the steering wheel, my knuckles white as I drove home. I knew that I shouldn’t be surprised about Dirk’s scheme to get me to sell my share, but I was caught off-guard by how far he was willing to go. I was caught off-guard, too, by the girl’s willingness to go along with the plan no matter how repugnant it was. It repulsed and annoyed me, especially since I had been having a hard time taking my mind off of those curves and those lips. I had seen her in passing a couple of times in the office, and each time she had decidedly ignored me. It didn’t stop me from looking her over, though, admiring the way her wide hips and curvy waist fit into her dress.

I continued to rage over what I had overheard as I packed my things that night. Part of me wanted to put an end to it and refuse to take her, but another part of me, an angrier part, had decided to let her come along. I had a plan—I would let her think that she had convinced me to sell the share, and at the last moment, I would refuse. I was curious about her plan, how she would go about doing it, and I knew it would be satisfying to pull the rug out from under her feet at the very last moment. It was spiteful, I knew, but I felt betrayed by Violet, not because I felt like I knew her but because the plan was a deceitful, cruel thing to do.

The next morning, I stood at the airport, looking at my watch. Violet had texted me, agreeing to meet me at six. It was 6:15 and she still wasn’t there. I waited in annoyance, catching her eye the moment she came through the rotating door.

“I’m sorry,” she breathed, her cheeks pink from the cold. The look was endearing, and for some reason I found myself tempted to touch her soft skin despite my dislike for her. I pushed the thought away quickly, not wanting to go there.

“Let’s go,” I said to her sharply. She rolled her eyes and I had to force myself not to smile. We made our way up the escalator to security, both of us in tense silence. I felt lucky that we had booked first-class tickets—it meant that we wouldn’t have to sit crammed together. The silence would be less uncomfortable if we weren’t touching, especially since I got the feeling that touching her would be more than a little distracting.

We boarded the plane, taking our seats in first class, unfortunately seated right next to each other. I had hoped we would be across the aisle so that we wouldn’t be forced to make awkward conversation or worse, forced through an awkward, tense silence for hours. Despite the fact that we were in first class, once I sat down, I still felt like we were crowded. Our legs brushed together at the slightest shifting of our bodies, making me uncomfortably aware of her body next to mine. I met her eye after a moment as she sat there frozen, staring at me.

“This is going to be fun, isn’t it?” I asked her.

“Sure,” she said, a small smile on her lips. Her eyes met mine, an innocent look on her face. She was already trying to be charming. I grinned at her, playing along, as I would for the whole trip until the very end.

“What are you looking forward to most?” I asked.

“Oh, I’m excited to see the business branch,” she said. “I want to see how things are run.”

“You want to see how I run things,” I said. She nodded.

“I’m supposed to find out what it’s like when you’re in charge,” she said. I raised my eyebrows at her.

“You’re going to let me be in charge?”

“Depends,” she said, that same small smile on her full, luxurious lips. “On what your management style is like.”

“Some people think I’m a hard man,” I said. “But I’d like to think of myself as simply having a firm hand.”

“Oh,” she said softly, a heated look passing through her eye. “Are you very hands-on?”

I took a deep breath, trying to remind myself what she was doing, not really caring.

“Very,” I said to her.

“I never thought you’d be the type to take any interest in your employees,” she said.

“Why is that?”

“Because you’re never around. You don’t seem to care—”

“You don’t even know me, Ms. Ingrid,” I said to her, a slight irritation creeping up within me.

She stared at me for a moment, looking as if she was going to argue, but then she calmed herself.

“You’re right,” she said. “I don’t know you.”

“You’re going to get to know me,” I said to her. She smiled again. Even though I knew it wasn’t genuine, it was still pretty, distracting in a way that made me ignore my anger towards her.

“I’m going back to sleep,” she said suddenly, after a moment of holding my eye. It was a heated moment, slightly hungry, one that confused me as much as it stirred something inside me.

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll wake you up when we land.”

She turned her back to me then, curling up in her seat as best as she could.

We landed in Texas a few hours later, and I said her name to wake her up. She didn’t stir at all, totally knocked out. I touched her shoulder, shaking her lightly, and her eyelids fluttered open to stare at me. Her lips were parted as she met my eye, looking up at my face with interest.

“Hi,” she said softly. I smiled at her.

“We’re here,” I said to her, charmed by her sleepy eyes, her hair that had been mussed by leaning her head against the seat. She got up then, unbuckling her seatbelt and following me up the aisle to climb off of the plane. She stretched as soon as we were off, her shirt lifting slightly to reveal the soft skin of her lower back. I kept my eyes decidedly off of her as we walked up the terminal, making our way to the front of the airport.

“Are you staying at the Hilton, too?” she asked. “Dirk said he made reservations—”

“No reservations,” I said. “No hotel. I have more than enough room on my ranch for both of us.”

“A ranch?” she asked, a hesitant tone in her voice. “Like a farm?”

“Kind of,” I said to her. “Why? You a city girl?”

She tilted her chin up. “I never lived in the country, but—”

“Great,” I said in a teasing tone. “So you’ll be no use.”

She stifled a smile as we climbed into the car we had rented, starting the hour-long journey to my ranch outside of town.

“I didn’t know you owned a ranch,” she said. “I thought you grew up in the city.”

“Nope,” I said. “Country boy through and through. I grew up here. The ranch has been in my family since the land was bought over a century ago.”

She laughed and I looked over at her, one eyebrow raised.

“What’s so funny?” I asked her.

“You’re a cowboy,” she said. “A good old Texas cowboy.”

“You’re right,” I said, grinning.

“Are there any other surprises waiting for me at this ranch?” she asked, her voice sounding wary. I could tell that she was uncomfortable with the idea of staying out in the country already, and decided to use that to my advantage. Violet obviously wasn’t the kind of girl used to working hard, but I wasn’t going to let her get away with being charming and cute without having to put in any of the work.

“My family lives there. You’ll get to meet them.”

“Oh,” she said reluctantly. “Okay.”

It was my turn to laugh.

“You nervous?”

“Depends,” she said. “What are they like?”

“Country people. Rich, but they don’t act like it. My ma’s always been cheap. My brothers and sisters live on the ranch, too, in their own places. My father built them all from the ground up.”

“How many siblings did you have?”

“Three brothers, two sisters,” I said to her.

“And you’re the baby,” she said. I looked over at her.

“How’d you know?”

She shrugged. “You’re a spoiled brat.”

I snorted at her, laughing. “You’re one to talk, darlin’. You’re a brat if I ever met one.”

“That’s just because you’re on my bad side,” she said.

“So how do I get on your good side?” I asked her. “I want to see that.”

“You can’t,” she said simply, but when I looked at her, there was a smile on her face again. I had to look away from her when she met my eye, unwilling to allow that spark to light within me, the one that burned every time we made eye contact. I reminded myself over and over that she was just playing a game with me, one that I wasn’t going to let end well for her.