Laredo tried not to act like a total imbecile as he unloaded the horses from the trailer in sort of the reverse of what Cal had done earlier that morning. He handed them off to Aria outside, and she in turn tied them to the metal loops on the exterior of the trailer.

“Nice stock,” Aria commented once the black had been tied up near his companions. “Have you ridden any of them?”

“Uh. No.” Laredo sighed. He was really going to do this. It had been ages since he’d been on a horse. “You want to get on now?” he asked Aria hopefully.

She leaned around a dark red gelding’s shoulder and raised an eyebrow at Laredo. “There are four here. I have lessons starting in about an hour. Why don’t you just pick one and climb on for a few minutes to see what you think? Then you can come out tomorrow and ride the rest and decide what you want to do.”

Laredo could decide what he wanted to do? He rubbed the back of his neck. “I was thinking that you were going to ride them and tell me what you thought.”

“Why?” Two lines appeared between her eyebrows. She came a little closer. He could smell the tang of leather and horses mixed with her light feminine scent. It was strangely alluring. Then she looked up at him from underneath the brim of her baseball cap, and he felt the power of her dark brown gaze. “You’re perfectly capable of deciding which of these critters you think has potential. And I’ll be honest, I don’t have the time to ride them all for you. I suggest you ride them and then pick one to compete. Any more than that would be pushing it.”

Laredo sighed. He glanced over her shoulder to see one of her grooms approaching with the little palomino mare that Paul Weatherby had worked over so horribly. The animal looked skittish as hell.

“I need to ride poor Nugget,” Aria told him. “Pick one of yours and saddle up. Even if we just walk around inside the ring, it will tell us both what we need to know.”

She didn’t say anything else. He didn’t need her to. Or maybe he did. Laredo wasn’t sure anymore. Being this close to Aria was scrambling his brains. He kept thinking about Cal’s comments earlier that morning. Was he having thoughts—romantic thoughts—about Aria?

She tilted her head to one side, and Laredo found himself leaning toward her face. He wanted to kiss her. There was something unbelievably inviting about her lips. He loved the way they looked. They formed a perfect little bow. The pink color of them was a startling contrast to her deeply tanned skin. He wanted to know if they were as soft and pliant as they looked. He wanted to feel them move beneath his. And yet there was a part of his brain that kept screaming at him that this would be very wrong.

“Laredo?” she whispered.

He swallowed. “Yes?”

“We really need to get moving.”

“Right.”

The spell was abruptly broken. She moved away, and Laredo was left to stare at the black horse and wonder if Cal and put tack in the trailer. Laredo hadn’t actually owned his own saddle in decades. What an odd thought. Bella had begged him at certain points in the past to buy her cowboy boots and saddles and pretty pink cowgirl hats and Western shirts with flowers and stars on them. He’d never given in, and over the years, his own collection of riding items had dwindled away to nothing.

A quick peek in the tack compartment of the trailer showed that it was stuffed full. That was fortunate. Except Laredo didn’t feel like it was fortunate. He felt like the lack of any tools to actually ride the horse would have been a stay of execution. But since there was no rescue in sight, Laredo had no choice but to methodically pull out his equestrian skills and saddle up that black horse.

It was surprisingly less awkward than he’d expected. The animal was well-behaved. Laredo only took a few extra minutes to double and then triple check that the cinch was as tight as he could get it. Then he fumbled a bridle onto the animal’s head.

He could not help but feel like the horse gave him a little bit of a sideways look of annoyance when the bit clicked against its teeth as Laredo put the bridle on. But then the black horse was saddled and Laredo was ready to ride. Sort of. Mostly.

Aria was already on the palomino horse inside the riding ring. Laredo didn’t want to try mounting the horse inside the ring with Aria watching. He wanted this first moment to be private. So, right there beside the trailer, Laredo put his reins in his left hand, his left foot in the stirrup, and hauled his butt into the saddle for the first time in years.

The world did not end. He was sort of surprised since he’d actually expected something to happen. Fanfare. Gong of doom. Something. But there was nothing. Just the flick of an ear as the black horse stood patiently and waited for Laredo to settle himself in the tack.

Laredo wiggled a little back and forth. He half turned. Then he finally put his hand on the pommel of the saddle. That was when he felt the little letters carved into the leather.

“I’ll be damned,” Laredo whispered.

Cal had never been known for doing what he was asked to do. But this was the first time that Laredo actually felt glad that his older brother was an independent ass who did his own thing. When Laredo was only twenty, he had decided never to ride again. He’d told Cal to sell his rig and use the money for something useful. Apparently, Cal had just stuck the saddle in the back of the tack room with the thought that Laredo would eventually change his mind. As usual, Cal was right.

“Hey!” Aria shouted from the ring. “You going to come in here?”

Laredo picked up his reins and felt the black horse’s immediate response. “I’ll be right there,” he called back to Aria.

Laredo steered the horse back toward the ring. He leaned down out of the saddle and unfastened the gate. The black waited patiently until he was asked to move through the gate, and then he stood quiet on the other side to allow Laredo to refasten the gate.

“Wow.” Aria’s voice came from behind him. “Neat trick. Apparently, he’s got some good training.”

“Cal.” Laredo thought about his brother. “Cal starts all of the young horses at the ranch. He’s the one who can have them eating out of his hand in no time.”

She rode around him, turning in her saddle to flash him a beautiful smile. “Looks like you’re not so bad with that yourself. Come on, then. Let’s see what you can do.”

“What I can do?” A wave of nervous energy pulsed through his body.

The black began to walk. His head bobbed and his body moved with a decided rhythm that was so familiar that it was almost impossible for Laredo to stay tense. Muscle memory took over, and he was suddenly using his legs to guide the horse and letting his reins stay nice and relaxed.

He looked around the ring and found Aria. It was impossible to stop watching her. She was absolutely beautiful on a horse. Her long legs wrapped around the animal and kept her body perfectly balanced. There was a gentle confidence in the way she moved that the animal seemed to appreciate. The mare had gone from tense to calm. They executed turns, stopped on a dime, and spun circles as though they were chasing a wily cow back to the herd. And the entire time, Aria moved with the animal as though it were the most natural thing to her next to breathing.

Laredo asked his horse to trot. The black was smooth as silk. It felt as though he had an expensive set of shocks that kept his body from moving much at all as he trotted around the ring. Laredo stayed relaxed. He had expected to tense up from the bouncing, but there was no need. He let himself flow with the movement and rhythm of the animal. Soon he was asking for more speed. The black immediately picked up a ground-eating lope that was as unhurried as anyone could want in a horse.

Then the two of them were both walking. Aria moved her mare into step beside Laredo’s mount, and he realized that he hadn’t felt this at ease in—well, in years. The sun was warm on his back. He felt a trickle of sweat slipping down the back of his neck from under his hat. There was a slight breeze tugging at the brim of his cowboy hat. It touched his face and caused him to close his eyes.

Without sight, he could feel the movement of the horse even more intensely. Each footfall, each step, and every single breath the animal took. Beside him, he heard Aria’s mare’s lighter steps. He heard the creak of leather as her saddle moved on the mare’s back. It was earthy and primal, and as he thought about the way she sat astride that animal with such poise and confidence, he realized that there was something incredibly arousing about it as well.

“You’re smiling.”

Her words were backed by a smile. He could hear it. Laredo turned his head and looked down at her. His horse was just a shade taller, and he was most definitely taller than she was. It was an interesting perspective.

Aria sighed and reached down to stroke her horse’s neck. “I haven’t seen you smile in years.”

“I don’t have a lot of reasons to smile.” He could not stop watching her hand. The way her strong fingers gently massaged the mare’s neck gave him decadent ideas of what it might be like to feel her hands on his flesh.

“And now?” There was something almost childlike about her expression. “You look like you’re enjoying yourself right now.”

“I am.” He winked at her. “The company is pretty nice.”

“Oh, really?” She tilted her head to one side and laughed. “That’s flattery plain and simple. It won’t get you anywhere.”

“Where is it you think I’m trying to get?” He wondered what she thought he was really after. Did he know what he wanted out of this association?

“I don’t know.” She bit her lip, and he wanted badly to lean down and kiss her. “I keep thinking that I’m going to turn around and someone is going to tell me that this is all a big joke. That Paul Weatherby did not show up threatening me because I’m associating with you. That you aren’t even here and that you have no interest in me or my ranch or trying to compete these horses.” She looked up at him and her dark eyes grew wide. “That Laredo Hernandez is not sitting on a horse beside me smiling while he teases me and acts like a regular human being.”

Ah. There was that. Laredo felt his body tense. It made the black horse step out even quicker as the animal read his tension and reacted. “I am human, you know?”

Aria laughed. The sound was infectious. She seemed to be unable to stop herself from smiling and giggling at him as though he’d just told the most hilarious joke.

“What?” Laredo knew he sounded a bit growly and maybe even pouty, but it was impossible not to be under the circumstances.

“I’m sorry, sweetie,” she told him in a distinctive drawl. “But you aren’t known for your warm, friendly manner or your pleasant conversation.”

“That’s good to know,” he grouched.

Suddenly, she reached across the distance between them and gave him a shove. Laredo looked over in shock. She was grinning at him, but the touch had been electric. He could still feel the imprint of her hand against his ribs as though she had branded him.

“Lighten up!” Aria urged. “You’re a wealthy man. You’re employed. You have a wonderful daughter. You’ve got a house and a ranch, and you have horses to ride whenever you want. Your life is good! Why can’t you just be happy with it?”

“That’s a valid question.” Laredo realized it was a very valid question. “I don’t think I’ve been happy since…”

“Since Helena?”

It sounded like a guess. They had been circling her riding ring at a steady walk until both horses had been almost lured into a kind of lethargy where their heads were dipping low and their ears were turned sideways and nearly drooping.

Helena. Was that what this was about? Did he miss his wife? Was he jealous that Helena had left him for a man who looked good on a horse? Her new husband was a true cowboy. They lived on a small ranch. He had paid for it. Did he want that with her?

“I don’t want her.” The words came out slowly, as though Laredo weren’t really sure about them. The truth was that he was absolutely sure. He was just feeling the shock of realization as he truly thought about what that meant for the first time in—well, ever.

“You sound like you’re not exactly sure about that.”

“No. I am.” He shook his head. Draping his reins over the pommel of his saddle, he pulled his hat off and ran restless fingers through his hair. “I’ve just never really thought about it before. She was my wife. She was Bella’s mother. She left us. She just up and left one day, and it feels as though I should miss her, and yet I don’t. She wasn’t a nice person. She was a very unhappy person. And it sometimes seems as though those things became the center of our lives.”

“That’s really hard,” Aria said slowly. She pressed her lips into a line. “I was never very fond of Helena. She was what? Two years behind you in school.”

“Yes.”

“So, she was two years ahead of me. She was rude. She was very mean and extremely stuck up. She also couldn’t seem to get a read on what it was she wanted in life.” Aria sounded as though she’d done some thinking on this topic. Why?

Laredo felt as though he were holding his breath. “Why would you say that?”

“Because she had this notion of what she wanted in life, but it wasn’t really healthy. She wanted money and power, and she wanted you to provide that for her. She used to brag about marrying a Hernandez. She made it seem like that came with a whole host of privileges. She was going to leave the ranches and the dirt and cows and smells behind. She was going to the city. She was going to be the toast of Denver.”

“Then she wasn’t happy with what she got,” Laredo murmured.

Aria nodded. Then she reached out and she touched his forearm. The softness of her fingers reached all the way to his heart. “But by then she had taken you so far from your real self that you’ve been lost ever since.”

Laredo stared at Aria and wondered if anyone had ever looked so deeply inside his soul before. How did she do it? Why did she do it? Was this just a game to her? Was it just a friend helping a friend? Or was it more? Could it be more? And did he want it to be more?