Picking Up Cowboys Read Online Free Page A

understand why she wasn’t going for the high figure.  He’d just have to find out what her price was.  Everyone had a price, if you searched long enough.  The ranch would be his again.
    Gage carried his plate to the slightly scarred, oak table and sat down.  He sunk his fork into the feathery lightness of the omelet and chewed deliberately as he re-assessed his situation.
    He had too many plans to back away now.  He’d put too much time and energy into the prospect of regaining his legacy.  His eyes narrowed on Catherine as she ate the ice cream straight out of the carton.  He would just have to figure out what her game was, and then learn to play it. 
    She pulled her massive tumble of honey-blonde hair over one shoulder, exposing the long length of her slender neck on the side that faced him.  He wondered if she would start shaking if he positioned himself behind her and nibbled it.
    She had a delectable little body but she was still a con artist.  He didn’t want her, couldn’t want her, refused to want her.  She was the enemy and he would be crazy to get involved with her in any way.  It was out of the question.  Although, since his money hadn’t interested her, maybe he could seduce her into selling him the ranch.
    Catherine returned to the still steaming cocoa and slowly lifted the cup to her mouth.  After a tentative sip, she puckered her full lips and blew on the steamy concoction, trying to cool it. Never would he have credited drinking chocolate as a turn-on, but Ms. Catherine Claiborne had just proven it to be so.  When her tongue darted out to capture a stray droplet, his blood pressure soared off the chart.  He shoved back from the table and bolted to his feet.  The chair clattered noisily as it hit the hard floor.  A shower.  He needed a shower.  A cold one.
    “I’d like to take a shower and make an early night of it, if you don’t mind.”  He kept his voice polite.
    “Upstairs, first door on the left.”  Catherine blew on the cocoa again.
    Gage’s voice came out sharper than he intended.  “I know.”
    Catherine blinked her long, dark lashes in surprise and Gage thought how dark they seemed compared to her fair coloring and pale hair.  “How would you know that?”
    Because I used to live here .  Gage kept the thought to himself and offered her a noncommittal shrug. 
    Catherine gazed at him for a long, curious moment.  Then she seemed to make up her mind about something and her expression changed.  “I’ll make up the guest bedroom for you while you’re in the shower.”
    Gage took the wooden stairs two at a time, stopping on the third down from the top when its familiar creak echoed down the upstairs hallway.  An unexpected and unwanted lump of emotion clogged his throat and made his eyes moist.
    When he was a boy, every night his mother would hit the squeaky stair when she checked on him.  He would usually be reading with a flashlight under the covers.  That stair saved him many times because it gave him the time to shut off the light and compose himself into angelic mock-sleep. 
    The Claibornes would pay for what they’d done to his family.  Gage would see to it.  Mustang had taken away everything he held dear and Gage intended to have it restored, and Mustang’s beautiful, stubborn daughter was not going to stop him.
     
    * * *
     
    Catherine heard the pipes warble and rumble as Gage turned on the taps.  She jogged up the stairs and paused at the linen closet in the hallway to gather some sheets and blankets.  The sound of the clanky pipes being shifted to shower mode made her throat go suddenly dry.
    No more than twenty feet away, separated by a pathetic wood door was a lean, sexy cowboy.  Catherine swallowed several times.  A naked cowboy.  Warmth started in the tip of her big toe and worked itself up her body.
    Stop it, Catherine!   The man was taking a shower.  It wasn’t right to feel this way about a perfect stranger; she’d never been one