Rory studied me for a second. Then she gave the smallest nod.
Jace didn’t say anything. But his gaze held on me just long enough to make me aware of the dust on my boots, the camera strap across my chest, and the strange, unsettled pull in my stomach.
He looked away first. “Come on, Rory. We still need to check the west gate before we leave.”
She rolled her eyes, but there wasn’t much heat in it. “I know.”
They started down the rail together, still not touching.
I watched them go until the light shifted and the shot was gone for good.
Then I turned toward my SUV with my camera quiet at my side and the uncomfortable certainty that the best story in Mustang Mountain wasn’t happening in the arena at all.
CHAPTER 3
JACE
The photos Bella Robbins had been taking started showing up on social media on Wednesday. By then, she’d gone back to wherever she came from, but come Friday, Slade had fielded calls from three travel publications, a podcast that covered rural tourism, and some lifestyle blog out of Denver that wanted to do a feature on “authentic cowboy towns.”
Ruby had put a handwritten sign in the window of the Merc that said, “As Featured in Western Dust” and sold out of huckleberry muffins before nine.
I'd been expecting quiet. Hell, I'd been counting on it. Instead, I got a phone call from Slade telling me Western Dust had extended Bella's assignment through the end of June, that she'd need to stay on somewhere local, and that Ruby had already volunteered the apartment above my barn.
“She can’t do that,” I said.
Slade chuckled. “She already has. You know how Ruby is.”
I did. That was the problem.
The apartment hadn’t been used in over four years. Not since I’d moved out of the house to live over the barn while Rory’s mom packed up her shit and took off to live with the man she’d been seeing behind my back.
The space wasn’t much, but it would work, and it had an exterior staircase with its own entry so Bella wouldn’t have to walk through the barn to get in or out. That meant less of a chance of us running into each other.
I didn’t have a good reason to say no. Slade knew it, and Ruby had known it before him, which was why neither of them had called me first to see if I’d mind having a gorgeous, curvy photographer living too close to ignore.
Bella moved in the following Saturday morning. In addition to a giant duffel, I hauled in two camera bags and a box of supplies. She emptied the rest of her SUV, including a cactus in a terracotta pot that she carried like it required handling instructions.
As I showed her around, I went over some guidelines. “The apartment is yours. The outside stairs, the east side of the barn, and the access lane from the main road are all fair game. But inside the barn, the equipment storage, the horse paddock, and the back field are mine.”
“Sounds like you’ve given this some serious thought.” Her boots kicked up dirt as she followed me from the outside ring toward the barn.
I stopped just outside the door. “My place, my rules. If you want to take pictures of anything else, it’s fine as long as you don’t go into the rings with the horses. And don’t distract Rory from her chores.”
My daughter had already been disappointed by one woman who’d filled her head with unrealistic dreams. I wouldn’t let Bella Robbins do the same.
Bella cocked a hip and stared up at me through long, dark lashes. “And if I need to photograph something on your side of the line?”
“You ask.”
“And you'll say no.”
“I'll say whether I'm saying no or not when you ask.”
She nodded like she didn’t quite agree with me but picked up the last bag and headed up the exterior stairs without another word.
I didn’t want to watch her go, but somehow my eyes tracked her retreating backside. The way that woman filled out a pair of jeans should have been illegal. I dragged my gaze away and rubbed at my chest, pissed at myself for noticing.
Everything was fine for a few days. She was good about the rules. Better than I'd expected, which turned out to be its own problem.
