Cowboy Trouble (The McCord Brothers 1.5) by Delores Fossen

CHAPTER ONE
    C OWBOY BUTTS .
    Not what Rico Callahan wanted to see when he came out of one of the barn stalls. Yet there they were.
    Four Wrangler jeans faced him like some kind of stock picture that got posted on the internet. And none of those jeans-covered butts were moving, something that darn sure should be happening since there was more manure that needed shoveling and fences that should be checked.
    “Is there a reason I’m the only one on bullshit detail?” Rico snarled.
    No answer. All four ranch hands just stood there gawking. So help them if they were ogling Anna McCord sunbathing again in the backyard, he was going to kick some of those butts. One of Anna’s brothers, Logan, was Rico’s boss and the head of the McCord Ranch, but Rico thought of her like a kid sister, too.
    Using the hay strewn on the barn floor, Rico wiped off some of the muck from his boots and made his way to the others. Along the way, he stopped by the tack room and snagged a bottle of water from the fridge. He drank half and poured the other half over his head. The water snaked down his face and back.
    It didn’t help.
    “Hey, Rico, you’ll wanna take a look at this,” Shane called out. He was butt number two from the left in the line of gawkers.
    When Rico reached them, he followed their gazes. Not to a sunbathing Anna. Or even to another livestock delivery they were expecting any minute now. They were staring at a sleek silver sports car, as expensive as they came. And it was parked on the side of the McCord house.
    The driver’s door of the car was already open, but thanks to the tinted window and the door itself, the only thing he saw of their visitor was a foot. Not just any old foot, though. One wearing a four-inch sexy heel that was almost the same color as the car. That heel and the accompanying shapely ankle grabbed Rico’s attention.
    It was like watching a striptease. A delicate hand slid over the top of the driver’s-side window and door. Perfectly manicured nails—the color of ripe raspberries—gripped the glass and metal. The other foot touched down on the ground. Graceful. Like a dancer getting ready to strut her stuff.
    Rico felt like fanning himself, and it wasn’t all a result of the July heat. It’d been a while since he’d taken the time to appreciate a good-looking woman. A reminder that he needed a life outside the ranch and shit-shoveling.
    Inch by inch the top of their visitor’s head came into view as she rose from the seat. Honey-blond hair. It looked touchable, and he could almost feel his fingers sliding through it. It’d probably be like silk.
    She had a well-shaped forehead. Sleek sunglasses that curved just above her high cheekbones. Blush-touched cheeks, and he was willing to bet it didn’t totally come from a bottle or a tube.
    But then the striptease came to a kick-to-the-nuts halt.
    Rico’s gaze landed on her mouth. A full, sensual mouth covered with just enough gloss to make it noticeable. And notice it he did. It was a mouth he hadn’t seen in twelve years, and it belonged to the last person on earth he wanted to see.
    Natalie Landon.
    His ex-wife.
    Shane and the others cursed, obviously realizing that their fantasies had been ill-placed, as well. They all knew Natalie, of course, even though she no longer lived around here. Everybody knew everybody in Spring Hill, both past and present residents, and the gossips soon filled in the newcomers with all the delicious details.
    Gossipy details about Rico and their visitor.
    Like the fact that Natalie had been slumming twelve years ago when she’d married Rico, the ranch hand. The fact that she’d dumped the ranch hand, too, when her daddy hadn’t approved. And the final fact was that most folks thought Rico hadn’t gotten over her.
    They were dead wrong about that.
    Probably.
    With seemingly no effort, she used her elbow to push the car door shut, eased off her sunglasses and started toward the barn. No hurried footsteps for her. Just