Page 8 of Wild Rivals

“No. I think it’s fantastic. You’ve outlined not only what having this land will do for the ranch, but what it will do for Coldwater. It’s a smart business move, Peanut.” He looks down at the folder before returning his attention to me. “It’s one I’d be making if I were leading the charge on this.”

“I had a good teacher,” I reply, grinning at him as I cross back to my seat. “Right now”—I drop into the chair—“you need to eat one of these muffins, or I’ll have to tell Oscar, and you don’t want to deal with his mood.”

He shakes his head, his grin contagious as he picks one up. “We can’t have you breaking that man’s heart any more than you already have.”

We spend the rest of the afternoon talking over the upcoming events at the ranch, as we eat nearly all the muffins. I ignore the fact that now I have Daddy’s approval, I will most likely see more of Wyatt than I already do, given he overheard mine and Rhett’s conversation. I wouldn’t put it past him to challenge our bid.

6

WYATT

My chair squeaks under my weight as I lean back in it. The high-pitched sound echoes around the room and collides with the sound of Grayson typing out an email. We’re in his office today, waiting for Kade to arrive for our weekly catch-up. He’s running late, which has become the norm for him in the last year because of his fiancée, Chloe. They’re sickeningly in love and he’s been late to almost everything since they started dating last year.

I tap my fingers on my thigh, humming a song that played on the radio as I drove to the office this morning. We converted one of the old ranch buildings on our property into a working office a few years ago so that we could have a place to work that was separate from where we live.

Besides Gray’s house, which is the main ranch house, my siblings and I all have homes on the ranch. You would think that would mean we see each other all the time, but with the amount of land we own, we rarely run into each other.

When the door opens behind me, I keep my focus on the picture-perfect mountains in the distance. I’d do anything to protect this land. Even if that means putting in a proposal for land we don’t need. If it stops the Harts from expanding their business and bringing in even more tourists to ruin Coldwater, then we have to step up. I just hope my brothers see it that way too.

“Sorry I’m late,” Kade announces, sinking into his seat. His hair is a mess, like he didn’t bother to run a comb through it.

I roll my eyes and shift my focus to him, pressing my lips together to hide my smirk when I spot a mark on his neck.

Rolling my tongue around my mouth, I slide my palm over my stubble-covered jaw. “You’ve got something on your neck.” I snigger, pointing to the same spot on my neck.

Kade scrubs at the mark, but there isn’t any chance of that being wiped away. “What is it? Is it gone?” he asks, his brows drawing low as he rubs harder at the skin.

It’s comical watching the panic on his face as his neck grows red.

Unable to hold back, I break out into laughter, the sound loud and punctuating the quiet of the room. God, it’s so much fun to tease him. Much like Grayson, Kade can be a little too serious at times. Although he has mellowed out a lot since we all found out his secret about riding in the rodeo.

Kade scowls at me. “Can you get it off?” He huffs, his gaze jumping between me and Grayson as he angles his neck at us both.

From his position behind his desk, Gray shakes his head, exhaling heavily through his nose. “You’ve got a hickey, Kade. Wyatt, stop being a dick,” he admonishes.

With a scowl, Kade reaches across the space between us, thumping me in the arm. Hard. “I can’t believe I fell for that. Asshole.”

Holding on to the spot he hit and leaning away from him, I grin, ignoring the pulsating in my arm. “Hey, I didn’t know what it was. You’d never catch a woman leaving her mark on me like”—I point at Kade’s neck—“that.”

“That’s because you don’t let a woman get close enough.” Kade stares at me as he fixes the collar of his lightweight shirt, a brow raised. “You probably don’t even let them kiss you.”

He’s not wrong about not letting women get close, so I won’t even try to argue with him. Instead, I shudder and reply, “When there’s a pool of women at my fingertips, why do I need ‘lasting connections’?”

Kade and Gray shake their heads in unison because they know I’m right. Or at least that’s what I tell myself, given that they’re both in fully committed relationships.

Personally, I don’t want or need the “love bug” to catch me. The thought of settling down makes me nauseous. I have everything I could ever want right now. An endless list of women vying for my attention and willing to do anything for it.

The image of a feisty brunette fills my mind, but I don’t let it linger. Maddie Hart is an annoyance, not a desire. Even if I’ve been feeling a lot more desire than annoyance toward her lately. It’s just something in the air. I refuse to let it become anything more than that.

Instead, I focus on how, not too long ago, my brothers were the same as me, content with being single. Or so I thought. Okay, maybe Grayson wasn’t. He spent a good chunk of his life pining after his high-school sweetheart, Avery. But Kade was right by my side on every night out, at least until sometime last year.

How times have changed.

Shaking my head, I turn my attention back to the matter at hand and pick up the pile of documents that I’d printed out before the meeting. I hand a copy to Grayson and another to Kade for them to read through. We’ve got more important things to discuss than how I choose to live my life.

Ever since I overheard Maddie and Rhett talking about the Evergreen land, I’ve been working on a proposal to put forward for consideration. This is how we make our decisions; no matter what it is, it gets put to a vote. If the decision isn’t unanimous, then it doesn’t go ahead.

Grayson, Kade and I are equal partners in the ranch with our sister, Gracie. Over the years, Gracie has stepped back, giving up her right to vote because she’d much rather work on planning the local events that we host at the ranch, such as our town summer BBQ and cattle sale as well as the town’s fall festival to name a few.