Barbara Dunlop - Seduction And The Ceo

“Can’t blame a girl for trying.”

“Yes, I can.” But Jared glanced over his shoulder one last time as they moved away. Manure fork balanced in the crook of her elbow, the woman named Melissa was wriggling her fingers into the pair of stiff leather gloves. The fork slipped and banged to the wooden floor. The sound startled a horse. The horse startled the woman. She tripped on the fork and landed with a thud on her backside.

Their gazes met once more, his amused, hers annoyed.

He turned away, but the flash of emerald stayed with him as he followed Stephanie to the hitching rail in front of the house.

By the end of the day, the bruise on Melissa’s left butt cheek had settled to a dull ache.

While she swept the last of the straw from the stable floor, a late-model Bentley rumbled its way to the front of the farmhouse. The glossy black exterior might be dusty, but it was still one impressive automobile. And the chauffeur who jumped out of the driver’s seat was crisp in his uniform.

She moved into the oversize doorway, leaning on the end of the broom handle while she waited to see who would emerge from the backseat.

It was an older man, distinguished in a Savile Row suit. He was tall, with a head of thick silver hair. He nodded politely to the chauffeur, then headed up the stairs to the wraparound porch, where both Stephanie and Jared appeared to greet him and usher him inside.

The chauffeur shut the car door. He glanced curiously around the ranch yard before moving to open the trunk. Melissa peered at the house, but there was no way to guess what was going on inside. The man might be a friend, or perhaps he was a business associate.

Jared’s sister’s house seemed like an odd location for a business meeting. Unless, of course, somebody wanted to keep the meeting a secret. Now that was an interesting possibility. Was there something clandestine in the works for Ryder International?

As the chauffeur had before her, Melissa glanced curiously around the yard. Several young riders were practicing jumps in the main ring, their grooms and trainers watching. A group of stable hands were loading hay into a pickup truck beside the biggest barn, and three cowboys were urging a small herd of horses across the river with a pair of border collies lending a hand. Nobody was paying the slightest bit of attention to the Bentley.

Then another vehicle appeared and pulled up to the house. This one was an SUV, larger but no less luxurious than the Bentley.

A thirtysomething man with dark glasses and curly dark hair stepped out of the driver’s seat. He looked Mediterranean, and he was definitely not a chauffeur. He wore loafers, well-cut blue jeans, an open white dress shirt and a dark jacket. He also offered a polite greeting to the Bentley driver before striding up the stairs of the porch.

Melissa’s journalistic curiosity all but ordered her to investigate. She leaned her broom up against the stable wall and started across the yard. She told herself she’d put in a good eight hours today. It was close to dinnertime, and the Bentley was at least vaguely in the direction of the cookhouse. She’d have a plausible excuse if anyone questioned her.

Ironically she’d been disappointed not to get a job down at the main ranch. The foreman there had all but sent her packing this morning when she’d told him she was a stranded traveler. Luckily Stephanie Ryder had been there at the time. The younger woman had taken pity on Melissa and offered her a job at the Ryder Equestrian Center. Melissa had been plotting ways to get back to the main ranch when Jared and his horse had wandered into the yard. Talk about good luck.

Now she was looking for more luck. She smiled brightly at the chauffeur, smudging her palms along the sides of her thighs, wishing she wasn’t covered in dust and sweat, and was wearing something other than blue jeans and a grime-streaked shirt. She wasn’t the greatest flirt in the world, but in the right party dress, she could usually hold a man’s attention.

“Very nice car,” she ventured in a friendly voice as she approached.

The man pushed the trunk closed and gazed critically at the Bentley. “I suppose dust is better than mud.”

She guessed he was about her own age, maybe twenty-five or twenty-six. He was attractive, in a farmboy-fresh kind of way, with blond hair, a straight nose and a narrow chin. He was clean-shaven, and his hair was neatly trimmed.

She slowed her steps, taking in the Montana license plate and committing the number to memory. “Did you have a long drive in?” she asked pleasantly.

“Couple of hours from Helena.”

Helena. Good. That was a start. “So you work in Helena?”

“Three years now.”

She stayed silent for a moment, hoping he’d elaborate on his job or the company. She scanned both his uniform and the car for a logo.

“Your first time at Ryder Ranch?” She tried another approach.

He nodded at that. “Heard about it, of course. Everybody in the state knows about the Ryders.”

“I’m from Indiana,” she supplied.

“Grew up south of Butte myself.” He gave the dust on the car another critical gaze. “There a hose around here someplace?”

She had no idea. “I guess you meet interesting people in your job?” She struggled to keep the conversation focused on his employment.

“I do some.” He glanced around the ranch yard while a horse whinnied in the distance, and a tractor engine roared to life. Unfortunately he didn’t pick up the conversational thread.

But Melissa wasn’t giving up, not by a long shot. She moved in a step closer, tossing back her hair, hoping it looked disheveled, instead of unruly.

Her actions caught his attention, and he glanced at the ground.

She lowered her voice as she gave him her brightest smile. “I’m a little embarrassed,” she cooed. “But should I know the man you dropped off?”

The chauffeur looked back up. He didn’t answer. Instead, he swallowed hard, and his neck flushed beneath the collar of his uniform.

“I only ask,” she continued, tilting her head to one side, surprised it took so little to rattle him, “because I don’t want…”

He worked his jaw.

She paused, waiting for him, but he didn’t make a sound.

She suddenly realized his gaze wasn’t fixed on her. He was focused on a spot behind her left shoulder. Her scalp prickled.

Uh-oh. She twisted her head and came face-to-face with Jared Ryder.

It was clear he was annoyed. He was also taller than she’d realized, and intimidating, with that strong chin and those deep blue eyes. He wore a fitted, Western-cut shirt and snug blue jeans. His shoulders were broad, his chest deep, and his sleeves were rolled halfway up his forearms, revealing a deep tan and obvious muscle definition.

“Don’t want to what?” he asked Melissa, his tone a low rumbling challenge.

She didn’t have a quick answer for that, and his deep blue gaze flicked to the silent chauffeur. “There’s coffee in the cookhouse.” He gave the man a nod in the appropriate direction.

The chauffeur immediately took his cue and hustled away.

Jared’s tone turned to steel, the power of his irritation settling fully on Melissa. “I’d sure appreciate it if you could flirt on your own time.”

“I…” What could she tell him? That she wasn’t flirting? That, in fact, she was spying?

Better to go with flirting.

“I’m sorry,” she told him, offering no excuses.

He gave a curt nod of acknowledgment, followed by a long assessing gaze that made her glad she was only pretending to be his employee.

“I don’t know why Stephanie hired you,” he finally stated.

Melissa wasn’t sure how to answer that, or even if he expected an answer. The only thing she did know was that she was determined to take advantage of the opportunity to talk to him alone.

“You’re Stephanie’s brother?” she asked, pretending she hadn’t been poring over his press coverage on the Internet.

“She tells me you grew up around horses,” he countered, instead of answering the question.

“I did.” Melissa nodded. Technically it was true. She gestured to the northern paddocks. “You obviously grew up around a lot of them.”

“My qualifications aren’t at issue.”

“Stephanie seemed fine with mine.” Melissa valiantly battled the nerves bubbling in her stomach. “I saw the main house yesterday. The one your grandparents built. Were you born on the Ryder Ranch?”

A muscle ticked in his left cheek. “Since you’re obviously not busy with anything else, I need you to move my horse to the riverside pen. The one with the red gate.”

“Sure.” The brave word jumped out before she had a chance to censor it.

“Name’s Tango.” Jared pointed to a paddock on the other side of the driveway turnaround where a black horse pranced and bucked his way around the fence line. Its head was up, ears pointed, and it was tossing his mane proudly for the three horses in the neighboring pen.

Melissa’s bravado instantly evaporated.

“You can tack him up if you like,” Jared continued. “Or he’s fine bareback.”

Bareback? She swallowed. Not that a saddle would help.

“Melissa?”

Okay. New plan. Forget the interview, it was time for a quick exit.

“I…just…” she stammered. “I…uh…just remembered, I’m off shift.”

His brows twitched upward. “We have shifts?”

“I mean…” She blinked up at him. What? What? What the hell did she say?

She rubbed the bruise on her left butt cheek, making a show of wincing. “My fall. Earlier. I’m a little stiff and sore.”

“Too stiff to sit on a horse?” He clearly found the excuse preposterous.

“I’m also a little rusty.” She attempted to look contrite and embarrassed. “I haven’t ridden for a while.”

He cocked his head, studying her all over again. “It’s like riding a bike.”

She was sure it was.

“Tack’s on the third stand. Don’t let him hold his breath when you cinch the saddle.”

As far as she was concerned, Tango could do any old thing he pleased. She wasn’t going to stop him from holding his breath. Quite frankly she’d rather chase lions around Lincoln Park.

“I really can’t-”

“We fire people who can’t get the job done,” Jared flatly warned her.

The threat stopped Melissa cold. If she got fired, she’d be thrown off the property. She could kiss the article and her promotion goodbye. And if Seth found out she’d been here, she could probably kiss her job at the Bizz goodbye, too.

“I hope you won’t,” she said in all sincerity.

Jared searched her expression for a long moment. His voice went low, and the space between them grew smaller. “Give me one reason why I shouldn’t.”

“I’ve been working really hard,” she told him without hesitation.

“Not at the moment,” he pointed out.

“It’s six o’clock.”

“We’re not nine to five on Ryder Ranch.”

“I’m prepared for that.”

He edged almost imperceptibly closer, revealing tiny laugh lines beside his eyes and a slight growth of beard along his tanned square jaw. “Are you?”

She ignored the tug of attraction to his rugged masculinity. “Yes.”

“You’ll pull your own weight?”

“I will.”

“You can’t depend on your looks around here.”

Melissa drew back in surprise.

“If I catch you batting those big green eyes-”

“I never-”

He leaned closer still and she shut her mouth. “You mess with my cowboys, and your pretty little butt will be off the property in a heartbeat.”

A rush of heat prickled her cheeks. “I have no intention of messing with your cowboys.”

A cloud rolled over the setting sun, and a chill dampened the charged air between them.

Jared’s nostrils flared, and his eyes darkened to indigo in the shifting light. He stared at her for a lengthening moment, then his head canted to one side.

How his kiss might feel bloomed unbidden in her mind. It would be light, then firm, then harder still as he pulled her body flush against his own. A flash of heat stirred her body as the wind gusted between them, forming tiny dust devils on the driveway and rustling the tall, summer grass.

The ranch hands still shouted to one another. Hooves still thudded against the packed dirt. And the diesel engines still rumbled in the distance.

“See that you don’t,” he finally murmured. “And move my damn horse.”

“Fine,” she ground out, quashing the stupid hormonal reaction. She’d move the damn horse or die trying.

Later that evening, in Stephanie’s dining room, Jared struggled to put Melissa out of his mind. His sister had obviously hired the woman out of pity. Then Jared had kept her on for the same reason. He wasn’t sure who’d made the bigger mistake.