Page 35 of The Rancher Who Swore Off Love
“I got an early start.” Jonah winced when she pressed on a spot above his ear. “Ow. Gracie, I’m fine. Quit pokin’ at me.”
“You’rebleedin’.”
“Your husband hits like a mule, so yeah, I reckon I might be.”
Logan stood up. Dirt covered him from collar to knee, and the spot on his jaw where Jonah had connected throbbed in time with his pulse. Behind him, on the porch, Pa, Mason, and Thomas formed a line, and Pa held the rifle.
“So.” Logan brushed dust off his sleeves, his trousers, then off his sleeves again, as the dirt had gotten into everything. “Your brother.”
Grace helped Jonah to his feet. “My brother.”
Jonah straightened his coat and stuck out a hand. “Pleased to meet you, Mr. Foster.”
Logan looked at the hand.
Back in the kitchen, Miriam started crying. Of course she did.
A morning that’d started with a plan had turned into a brawl in the front yard before the sun cleared the ridge, and this baby had some kind of supernatural instinct for picking the exact worst second to demand attention.
“Mason.” Logan jerked his chin to the house without taking his eyes off Jonah. “Go see to Miriam.”
Mason glanced between Logan, Grace, and Jonah and then ducked inside.
Jonah’s hand hung in the air for another beat before he let it drop.
“Anyway, uh, I was wonderin’ if you needed a ranch hand? I ain’t lazy about the work, and I’d love to stay close to—”
“No.”
“Logan.” Grace frowned at him before looking back at Jonah. “Of course, you can work.”
“Grace. I don’t know this man.”
“Iknow him. He’smyfamily.”
“And this ismyproperty.”
That landed crooked between them, setting a hard line between them, and Logan registered it the second it left his mouth. But the words had already hit the air, and he couldn’t pull them back any more than he could un-throw a punch.
Jonah looked at his sister. Then at Logan. Then back at his sister.
“Gracie, if it ain’t a good time—”
“It’s fine, Jonah.” She kept her eyes on Logan. “We just need a moment to discuss this.”
“Seriously, I can come back another time.” Jonah touched the spot on his forehead where a bruise had started to purple. “Or not at all, I—”
“Jonah, hush.” Grace stepped closer to Logan. “He’s my family.”
“He’s a stranger who showed up on my property without warnin’ at the crack of dawn.”
Grace flinched.
Somewhere in the back of Logan’s head, in the part that catalogued things and filed them for later, he noted that flinch. Noted, too, that he didn’t like it. Not the flinch itself but the way his chest did something stupid and small in response, some reflex he hadn’t agreed to. Filed it. Moved on because the rest of his head still ran hot from the surprise of the fight and the fundamental problem of an uninvited man standing in his yard acting like the world owed him a seat at the breakfast table.
“Logan.” Grace put a hand on his shoulder. “You said yourself the herd needs more hands come autumn—”
“I said that toyou. In private. About hirin’ men I’d vet and choose myself.”
