The Rancher and the Baby

  WRANGLIN’ WITH THE RANCHER?

  Cassidy McCullough can’t remember a time when rancher Will Laredo wasn’t a huge (albeit handsome) pain in her backside. In this small Texan town, their bickering is almost legendary. When they rescue a baby during a flash flood, however, Will and Cassidy suddenly find themselves temporary guardians of a child…together.

  Will has a hard time holstering his temper around Cassidy. Now they’re both responsible for a lost baby, and darned if they can’t stop arguing. The only way to make it through is to declare a cease-fire. And Lord help them both if that happens…because then Will might just discover he’s falling for his enemy.

  “Stop being so agreeable… That’s not like you.”

  That damn sexy smile of Will’s was back.

  “Maybe it is,” he contradicted.

  She didn’t like these new rules. “You’re just messing with my mind,” Cassidy accused.

  Will inclined his head. “If you say so.”

  She clenched her hands in her lap, curling her fingernails into her palms. She was doing what she could in order to ground herself.

  His smile told her that he was enjoying this, enjoying getting under her skin, getting in the last word, because, she reminded herself, that was the way Will Laredo was built. You can’t change the spots on a leopard, she insisted. Even a leopard with a very sexy smile.

  Especially a leopard with a very sexy smile.

  Dear Reader,

  This is the second installment of the McCullough siblings and it’s Cassidy’s story. The youngest McCullough was a scrappy tomboy growing up, determined to not just keep up with her brothers but to outdo them whenever she could.

  At the heart of this story is the rivalry between Cassidy and her brothers’ best friend, Will Laredo. Unlike the McCulloughs, Will had no siblings, nor was there anything like a loving unit in his family. His mother left when he was very young and his father was a hard, demanding man who drank whenever he wasn’t out working his ranch. Will gravitated toward the McCulloughs and their warmth, and they became his family. Connor, Cody and Cole were the brothers he’d always wanted and Cassidy fulfilled the role of the pesky little sister. But Cassidy always gave as good as she got and their verbal battles went on for years until Will, unable to put up with his father’s belittling ways and vile temper, finally left town.

  A letter from Cassidy, acting as the clerk for the town’s only law firm, telling him he’s inherited his father’s ranch, brings Will back after four years—and the fighting picks up where it left off. Add a baby caught up in a flash flood and you have the beginnings of a very strange romance. I hope you’ll stick around to find out how it ends.

  As always, I’d like to thank you for taking the time to read one of my books, and from the bottom of my heart, I wish you someone to love who loves you back.

  All the best,

  THE RANCHER

  AND THE BABY

  Marie Ferrarella

  Marie Ferrarella is a USA TODAY bestselling and RITA® Award–winning author who has written more than two hundred and fifty books for Harlequin, some under the name Marie Nicole. Her romances are beloved by fans worldwide. Visit her website, marieferrarella.com.

  Books by Marie Ferrarella

  Harlequin Western Romance

  Forever, Texas

  The Sheriff’s Christmas Surprise

  Ramona and the Renegade

  The Doctor’s Forever Family

  Lassoing the Deputy

  A Baby on the Ranch

  A Forever Christmas

  His Forever Valentine

  A Small Town Thanksgiving

  The Cowboy’s Christmas Surprise

  Her Forever Cowboy

  Cowboy for Hire

  The Cowboy and the Lady

  Her Mistletoe Cowboy

  The Cowboy and the Baby

  Visit the Author Profile page at Harlequin.com for more titles.

  To

  Michael & Mark,

  who were once my

  younger brothers,

  but through the

  miracle of creative math,

  are now my

  older brothers

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Epilogue

  Excerpt from A Montana Christmas Reunion by Roz Denny Fox

  Prologue

  “Mind if I cut in?”

  Instantly pulled out of her mental wanderings—a defense mechanism she employed when whoever she was with was boring her out of her mind—Cassidy McCullough looked up, focusing on the man who had just tapped her dance partner’s shoulder.

  Not that she really needed to.

  Despite the fact that he had been absent from Forever for the better part of four years, she would have recognized that voice anywhere.

  It popped up in her nightmares.

  Will Laredo.

  Will had been her brothers’ friend for as far back as she could remember—until his estrangement with his father had taken him to parts unknown, simultaneously bringing peace to her own corner of the world.

  As she looked back, it felt as if her peace had been far too short-lived. Especially since, for reasons that were beyond her understanding, all three of her brothers liked this six-foot-one-inch, dirty-blond-haired irritant on two legs—which was why Cody had not only invited him to his wedding, he’d made Will one of his groomsmen.

  To her surprise, Ron Jenkins, her fawning partner on the dance floor, seemed all too ready to acquiesce to Laredo’s casual query. Under normal circumstances, she would have celebrated getting a different partner—but not this time.

  Ron might be willing, Cassidy thought, but she damn well wasn’t.

  “He might not mind,” Cassidy retorted defiantly, “but I do.”

  Rather than taking his cue and backing away, Will remained exactly where he was. Not only that, but his mouth curved in that annoying, smug way of his that she had always hated.

  “Your brothers seemed to think I should dance with you.”

  “Maybe you should dance with one of them since they all seem to be so keen on the subject of dancing,” Cassidy informed him.

  Looking increasingly more uncomfortable, Ron seemed ready to fade into the shadows. “No, really, it’s all right,” he assured both her and Will nervously. A slight man, he appeared more than ready to surrender his claim to her.

  Cassidy’s eyes narrowed as she froze her partner in place. “You stop dancing with me, Ron Jenkins,” she warned the man, “and it’ll be the last thing you’ll ever remember doing.”

  Rather than slow down, Cassidy sped up her tempo.

  Instead of being annoyed or embarrassed at this obvious rejection, Will laughed. “You’d better do as she says, Ron. Most men around here would sooner cross an angry rattlesnake than Cassidy. I hear that her bite is a lot more deadly.”

  Struggling to hold on to her temper, Cassidy tossed her head. Several blond strands came loo
se and cascaded to her shoulders. She ignored them.

  “If I were you, Laredo, I’d keep that in mind the next time you think about cutting in,” she informed him, her eyes blazing.

  Will inclined his head, the same amused smile slowly curving his lips. “There’s not going to be a next time,” he assured her.

  Cassidy turned her face up to her partner’s and said in a voice intentionally loud enough for Will to overhear, “Dance me by the champagne table, Ron. Now I’ve got something else to celebrate besides my brother Cody’s wedding.”

  “I would,” Ron told her dryly, “if you’d let me lead for a change.”

  Cassidy could have sworn she heard Will laughing in the background.

  She wasn’t going to cause a scene, she promised herself. Not here. This was the first wedding in the family, and it was Cody’s day. But the moment it was over, she was going to find out which of her three brothers had put Will Laredo up to this, and they were going to pay dearly for it. They knew how she felt about him.

  She’d been incensed when she found out that Cody had gotten in contact with Will and asked if he would come and be in his wedding party. When he’d told her about it, she’d almost withdrawn herself, but Connor had talked her out of it, appealing to her sense of family.

  “Cassidy,” Ron said, raising his voice.

  She realized by the look on the man’s face that this was not the first time that Ron had tried to get her attention.

  “What?” she snapped, then cleared her throat and repeated the word in a more subdued tone—silently damning Laredo. The man had the ability of messing with her mind and ruining any moment just by his being there. “What? Am I leading again?”

  “I don’t care about that,” Ron said, which told her that she was guilty of doing just that. Again.

  “Then what?” she asked.

  “You’re crushing my hand.” He looked positively pained.

  Embarrassed, as well as annoyed, Cassidy released Jenkins’s hand. A more accurate description would have been that she threw it aside and out of her grasp.

  To the casual observer from across the floor, had Ron’s hand been detached, it would have most likely bounced on the floor and gotten wedged somewhere.

  “Man up,” she ordered Ron through gritted teeth and then walked away from him just as the band began to play another song.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Laredo shaking his head. He made no effort to hide the fact that he was observing her. She felt herself growing angry. Had they not been at her brother’s wedding, she would have marched right up to him and demanded to know just what he thought he was shaking his head at.

  But they were at Cody’s wedding, so she couldn’t cause a scene, couldn’t hold Will accountable or wipe that smug look off his pretty-boy face. It wouldn’t look right for the maid of honor to deck one of the groomsmen at her own brother’s wedding.

  That didn’t change the fact that she really wanted to.

  Cassidy squared her shoulders and went to get a glass of punch.

  Hang in there, she told herself. Come tomorrow, Will Laredo was leaving Forever, going back to wherever it was that he disappeared to when he’d initially left. And then life would go back to being bearable again.

  Twelve more hours, she thought. Just twelve more hours.

  It felt like an eternity.

  Chapter One

  Noise had never been a distraction for Olivia Blayne Santiago. She had learned how to effectively tune it out long before her law school days.

  Rain, however, was another matter.

  While noise, from whatever source, had always been an ongoing part of her day-to-day life and as such could be filed away in the recesses of her mind and matched later to an entire catalog of different sounds, rain demanded immediate attention.

  Because rain in this part of Texas could sometimes come under the heading of being a life-or-death matter.

  As the first lawyer to open a practice in Forever, Texas—a practice she now ran jointly with Cash Taylor with an eye out for further expansion—Olivia put in rather long hours. This despite the fact that she was married to the town sheriff and had a young, growing family. Between them, she and Cash handled all the legal concerns for the residents of Forever, be those concerns large or small. For the most part, Olivia could do that in her sleep.

  But rain was something that always made Olivia pause, especially when it seemed to give no indication of stopping. What that meant was that a downpour could turn into a flash flood—often without any warning.

  Olivia had learned to be leery of the sound of rain on her roof. It had been raining since early morning and gave no sign of stopping.

  “This storm looks like it’s going to be a bad one,” she commented, looking at Cassidy.

  Cassidy McCullough had been interning at the law firm for close to four months now, and she saw a great deal of herself in the young woman. Granted she was the firstborn in her family while Cassidy was the last, but Cassidy possessed a spark, a drive to become someone. She wasn’t one to just allow herself to float along through life, enjoying each day but never having any sort of an ultimate game plan other than making it through to the end of another week. A go-getter, Cassidy was working for her as an intern even as she was taking online courses at night to complete her postgraduate degree.

  They had instantly hit it off, and Olivia had taken an interest in Cassidy from the first day she had walked into the law office.

  Since Cassidy hadn’t said anything in response to her comment, Olivia raised her voice to get the young woman’s attention. “Why don’t you call it a day and go home?” she suggested.

  Stationed at a small desk in the corner of Olivia’s office—a desk that was piled high with stacks of paper—Cassidy glanced up from the report she’d been compiling since she’d come in that morning.

  Her brow furrowed slightly as she replayed Olivia’s words in her head.

  “I can’t leave now. I’m not anywhere near finished with this.” It wasn’t something she would have normally advertised since she took pride in being fast as well as thorough, but if Olivia was considering sending her home, it was something the lawyer needed to know.

  Olivia listened again to the rain as it hit the windows. Was it her imagination, or had the rain gotten even more pronounced in the last five minutes? If it got any worse, she wondered if the windows could withstand it.

  “If you don’t leave now,” Olivia warned her, “you may have to sleep on that desk, and I promise that you won’t find it very comfortable.”

  “Why?” Cassidy asked, puzzled. “I mean, I can see why the desk wouldn’t be comfortable, but why would I have to sleep on it if I went on working?” She glanced at her watch. “It’s not late.”

  “It’s later than you think,” Olivia responded, then looked at the younger woman seriously. “Don’t you hear that?”

  “Hear what?” Cassidy asked uncertainly, scanning the room.

  “That.” Olivia pointed toward the window when she saw she wasn’t getting through to her intern. “The rain,” she added for good measure just in case she wasn’t making herself clear.

  Enlightened, Cassidy nodded. “Oh, that. Of course I hear the rain,” she acknowledged. As far as she was concerned, a storm was no big deal. There was always going to be another one. “It was raining when I came in this morning.”

  “Not like this,” Olivia insisted. “This sounds like it’s only going to get worse, and you know what that could mean.”

  Cassidy nodded. “Yeah. Connor’s going to be stomping around the ranch house, muttering that he can’t do any of his work because it’s raining too hard.”

  Olivia shook her head. Her intern was misreading the situation. “I think you should go home,” she said.

  Cassidy still saw no need for
her evacuation. “To watch Connor stomping around?”

  “No, to keep from being washed away,” Olivia insisted. “You should know better than I do just how quick these flash floods can hit.”

  “I know,” Cassidy agreed, “but there hasn’t been one in a couple of years and even that one was over before it practically started.” She waved away what she felt was Olivia’s needless concern. “Besides, I can take care of myself.”

  Olivia sighed as she rolled her eyes. “Lord, did you ever pick the right profession. Someday, you are going to make one hell of a lawyer, but in order to do that, Cassidy, you’re going to need to stay alive. Now, I might not be a native to this area, but I’ve seen what a flash flood can do—”

  “I can swim,” Cassidy insisted stubbornly.

  “All well and good,” Olivia replied patiently as she began to pack up some things on her desk, “but your truck can’t. Now, I’m not going to spend the next hour arguing with you. I’m your boss and what I say goes. So now hear this—go home.”

  Cassidy retired her pen and the stack of papers she’d been going through with a sigh. “Okay, like you said, you’re the boss.”

  Olivia smiled at her. “Yes, and I’ve been arguing a lot longer than you have. Although, given what your brother said to me at the wedding a few weeks ago, you were born arguing.”

  Cassidy paused to give her boss a penetrating look. “Which brother was that?” she asked conversationally.

  Olivia wasn’t being taken in for a moment. Finished packing her briefcase, she snapped the locks into place. Behind her, the wind and rain were rattling the window. “I never reveal my sources.”

  “Isn’t that what a journalist usually says?”

  “Where do you think they got it from?” Olivia asked with a smug smile. Packed, she rose from her chair. “I’m not sure if my kids can recognize me in the daylight. Although...” She glanced out the window again. The world outside the small, one-story building that housed her law firm had suddenly become shrouded in darkness. “There’s not all that much daylight to be had, and it’s getting scarcer by the minute.”