Beau knew he shouldn’t leave the discussion for later, but he did not push the subject, because he liked kissing her. Once they had the talk there would be no more kissing. So, he could grant her wish and put it off for a while. Truth be told, he was enjoying this interlude of attraction a lot. If there were any way they could make it work, that would be amazing. It never could, but for right now—today—he would let it ride. Plenty of time left to get on the right track. For now, a little meandering felt too good.

He followed her into the house and wanted to start singing. Maybe he could get his old guitar down and write a couple verses of a song. He hadn’t done anything like that in years, but for some reason it seemed like a good idea to him. They hit the kitchen and he loaded up on breakfast. She took a few nibbles of food as she sat with him.

“Aren’t you going to eat more than that?”

She smiled at him and his whole body went on alert. “I had a bagel earlier and I have a granola bar for later, so this is plenty. Wouldn’t want to get fat.”

He looked at her body and saw no hint of that happening any time soon. “No worries there darlin’; you are beautiful.”

She flushed a delightful shade of pink. “Now, stop that.”

“Stop what? Looking at you? Noticing you’re beautiful? Or saying it out loud instead of just thinking it?”

“I don’t know, all of it. Do you really think I’m beautiful?”

He shrugged and pointed at her with his fork. “Of course. Do you not have a mirror? I thought you were beautiful the first moment I saw you all dressed up in your city slicker duds.”

She frowned at him. “No, you didn’t. You were so mean to me.”

He rubbed a hand across the back of his neck. Time to come clean. “I was jealous.”

“Of whom exactly? You were mean before I ever set eyes on anyone else.”

“I thought you’d come for a riding lesson—that you were Drake Carlson’s new girlfriend.”

“The sheriff? He’s older than my father! That’s ridiculous. Did you think I was some kind of gold digger or trophy girlfriend?”

Beau could feel his face heating and looked down at his breakfast.

“You did. Well, I don’t know whether to be amused or pissed off that you would think that about me.”

“I didn’t know anything about you. I was supposed to be giving a riding lesson to Drake’s new girlfriend, and you drove in. What was I supposed to think?”

“Maybe you were supposed to listen to my name and think I was the intern. I even said I was the intern.” She wagged her finger at him.

“I didn’t hear anything. I was so caught up in anger and desire I couldn’t concentrate.”

That stopped her in her tracks. “Desire? For me?”

“Well, yes. Who the hell else would I have been lusting over? You took one step out of that car and I was gone.”

She sat back and a slow smile slid across her face. “Hmm, I think I like that. At least it tells me why you were such a dick the first few hours I was here. I couldn’t figure out how you could go from being so mean to such a good guy.”

“Yeah, I am sorry about all that, but it didn’t take you too long to put me in my place.”

Alyssa laughed and the sound slid through him, igniting every nerve ending. “That was a convenient turn in the conversation. I just took advantage of it to let you know that even at eight years old, I knew better than to wear my city slicker duds to a working ranch.”

He got up and put their plates in the sink, then he tugged on her hand and pulled her up to stand next to him. He slowly backed her up against the counter as he covered his mouth with hers. His hands were on her hips and drawing her in as his mouth played with hers. She put her hands in his hair and clutched. He might end up bald, but he had no intention of stopping her.

They fit together like puzzle pieces, his hardness to her softness. She wriggled, getting closer, and he lifted her up for an even better fit. She sighed, and he was gone. He could spend a week supping from her sweet lips, her soft body wrapped in his. He was lost in a haze of longing and sensuality.

“I guess that seals the bet. Neither one of us get her—big brother does,” Chase said.

“Damn, too slow, too late for us,” Cade answered.

Beau pulled back from heaven and turned his head toward his two grinning brothers. He looked back at Alyssa as she slowly opened her eyes and blinked. Then she lowered her forehead to his chest and whispered, “Are they gone yet?”

He looked back at his idiot brothers. “Nope, still there.”

“Hey, we came for breakfast. Not our fault you’re making out in the kitchen,” Cade whined.

Alyssa sighed. “I guess they do have a point, and we are supposed to be out checking on the herd.”

“I suppose, if you’re going to get all practical.” Beau teased. He put her down and took her hand and without even acknowledging his brothers, they walked out the door to get to work.

* * *

Alyssa followed Beau, but just before they cleared the door she turned back to the twins who were watching them leave, and gave them a wink and sly grin. Delight lit their faces and they both gave her two thumbs up.

Her heart was as light as air—like champagne was running through her veins. Maybe this was only temporary, but she was going to enjoy it while she could. She was long overdue a nice guy and a few kisses. She’d been working so hard at her degree, she’d pushed relationships to the far bottom of the list of things to do. There had been a couple of guys that had asked her out, but she had let them know, up front, she wasn’t interested in dating. Study partners? Maybe. Friends to eat with? Sure. Guys to date? Nope, not going there. But she wasn’t studying every second now and wasn’t trying to memorize tons of information and pass tests and write papers, so she had time to indulge—at least a little.

Beau asked, “Pasture or barn?”

Alyssa looked at the bright blue sky and decided she wanted to enjoy the pretty morning. “Pasture. We can trade off after lunch.”

“Sounds good to me. I’ll see you later.”

“Beau?” He turned back, and she went up on her tiptoes to give him a soft warm kiss. “Think of me?”

“Hell, I’m going to have to fight to think of anything else.”

She got in the truck and headed out to the pasture. A couple of the hired hands were out there keeping an eye on things. She would be joining them for any medical issues that came up. Roving to look for issues. When she got out to the pasture, she found the two guys working to weigh and tag several calves that looked like they’d all been born at the same time. She rolled down her window. “Need some help?”

Cliff yelled back, “No, we’re good, but we haven’t made it out to the far corner yet because we’ve been busy here—would you mind?”

“Happy to. Holler if you need me.”

“Will do.”

Alyssa waved and drove off in the direction they had pointed. It was such a beautiful day. A little chilly, but not extreme for this time of year. When she got out to the farthest corner she was glad she’d come out. There were two heifers that had wandered off from the herd and both seemed to be giving birth at the same time. They didn’t appear to be having any trouble, so she just sat back and watched carefully as the cows labored. One finished giving birth so she weighed and tagged the calf. Then noticed the second dam was having a bit more difficulty, so she thought maybe she should see if she could help the process along.

She could do a little manual pulling—nothing too invasive, just help the little guy come out quicker. She checked to make sure the calf wasn’t caught up in the cord. That didn’t seem to be the case. It looked like the mother was kind of small. She checked the tag to see which heifer this was and thought back to the birthing records she’d been studying. She remembered they had used a bull that produced a bit larger calves and realized this dam had gone a little longer than she should have—just a few days, but that could make a difference in calf size. So, maybe the calf was a little too large. She thought about calling Beau, but decided she could handle it alone.

She hunkered down to help pull gently on the calf to help it come out easier. It looked like that was going to work, so every time the mother had a contraction she pulled gently on the calf. It took some time, but the little guy was finally born. She weighed it and realized it was a little larger than was optimum, for this breed of heifer to birth without assistance. She would need to tell Beau about it.

She finally got ready to leave and realized a storm front had come in while she was focused on the birth, and there was light snow falling. She pulled out her phone to check the time and noticed it was later than she thought. She decided to text Beau to let him know where she was, and that she would be heading in when the mother she’d been helping head butted her. Her phone flew out of her hands and landed with a crash, face down on a rock. Dammit, she hoped it wasn’t broken, but it was. The screen was shattered and the whole thing had shut down and wasn’t turning back on.

She climbed in the truck to head back to the ranch and realized she didn’t have her GPS to guide her, and the spring storm was not going to help. In the few minutes it took to break her phone, the storm had dropped down and it was snowing hard. Visibility was nearly non-existent and she couldn’t see any familiar landmarks. Well hell, now what? She didn’t want to just sit there and wait—no one knew exactly where she was. The hired hands would have a general idea—if they even noticed she had not returned. But should she be driving in near-blizzard conditions? How long would a spring snow storm last in the Colorado mountains? She laughed a little hysterically thinking she could Google it if her phone hadn’t been destroyed. The truck had plenty of gas, so she could just wait it out—providing it was only a couple of hours. Better than driving into a ditch or a beaver dam or the flippin’ river. She decided to stay right where she was, at least for now.