Mossy Glenn Ranch 3 -Saddles and Memories by Bailey Bradford Page A

Salt nodded as the other two cowboys drew closer. “Hey, Duke, Ramsey. Rocky’s going to put you two on fence repair while we handle some other jobs.”
    Duke nodded easily, but Ramsey frowned.
    Salt didn’t like that at all. “Is this something else you never had to do at your last job?”
    “I did it once,” Ramsey said with a defensive tone to his voice. “It was years ago, so I’ll need a refresher.”
    “I can do that,” Duke offered. He was a plain-looking, easy-going man who carried a little softness around his belly despite how hard he worked. “I don’t mind showing Ramsey the ropes.”
    “Or the barbed wire,” Ramsey joked cringe-worthily. Duke groaned.
    “Keep cracking jokes like that and Duke’s liable to leave you in a gully wearing a string of spiked metal.” Salt at least tried to joke with Ramsey, but as always, there was some weird intensity to Ramsey’s eyes that made Salt think the other man was processing every word he spoke for a mysterious reason.
    Shrugging off such paranoia, Salt waved at the men. “Call me on the two-way if you need anything.”
    “Call Carlos,” Rocky corrected. Salt glanced at her and she grinned. “We have to go to town to pick up a feed order that just came in.”
    “Both of you?” Ramsey asked doubtfully.
    Rocky turned and looked at him. “You got your job to do, we got ours. There’s no need for you to be poking about in what we’re doing.”
    Ramsey turned away and Salt felt a frisson of unease, but he couldn’t pinpoint any reason for him to suspect Ramsey was less than he claimed to be.
    Except that he seems to know about ranch work in a third-party kinda way, like someone told him what he’d be doing instead of him actually ever having done it.
    “You just want to go back to the diner,” Salt teased Rocky a short while later. “You’re the one having raunchy on-the-job fantasies.”
    Rocky started the truck up as she laughed. “Oh, now, there ain’t nothing raunchy about them! I would never think about treating my lady with anything less than the utmost respect and gentleness.”
    Salt just about chuckled himself silly. It took him a couple of attempts at getting a good breath before he could speak while Rocky glowered at him. “Sorry, but you know, Ms Jen looks like a lady, all prim and proper, and it’s been my experience with men, granted, that prissy and perfect hides a tiger in the sack. The tighter they’re wound, the fiercer they come uncoiled for ya.”
    Rocky waggled her eyebrows. “Ohhhh, then I am so gonna work on encouraging her to take a walk on the wild side.”
    “You can’t convert someone—” Salt stopped. Rocky knew it, and it wasn’t like she was going to force herself on the pretty waitress.
    “She might be curious,” Rocky told him while she drove them down the bumpy dirt road towards the main house and road. “Lots of people are, especially when they start getting older and wonder what they’ve missed.”
    Salt tried not to look shocked at that. He knew people were curious, but was Rocky saying she was willing to be used? Salt had to ask. “You’d let her mess around with you and use you?”
    Rocky shrugged, but Salt didn’t miss the pinched look that settled over her profile. “Why not? I keep wanting to jump right into serious with every woman I date. Might as well try something different. You can’t bitch at me about it, either. You told me all you ever had was casual sex. It’s my turn to give it a shot.”
    “Didn’t realise it was a tag-team event,” Salt groused, but he let it go. Rocky was an adult and who knew, maybe a casual fling would be good for her.
    Except when they got to the diner, Salt could tell by the longing in Rocky’s gaze that she was already infatuated with the waitress, Jen. There were, he was certain, emotions involved on Rocky’s part, at least. He’d better start preparing for the coming letdown and misery she was probably going to experience.
    They grabbed a seat at