Chapter Two

      The idea that she would leap from single to married struck Genevieve as laughable.

      “Giant fat chance of that!” She laughed as she swept up the leftover fragments of hoof that were scattered across the red rubber pavers. “Marriage? To a local guy? How would that get me closer to my goal of getting to California?”

      When she finished cleaning up her area and dumping the hoof fragments into a nearby trash can, Knox still hadn’t moved from his spot. Usually, as was their established routine, he would have gone to the office, written her a check, and by the time she was finished packing up her small cache of tools, the check would be in her hand. Genevieve slid her phone out of her back pocket and glanced down at the screen; she had gained a couple of minutes of time and if she left the Ambling A shortly, she would actually be back on schedule for her next client.

      “Well...?” she prompted, hoping the fact that she had her hoof stand in one hand would be a silent signal to Knox that, as enjoyable as his company was, it was time for her to move along.

      As if it just dawned on him that he was holding her up, Knox gave a quick nod of his head. “Let’s go to the office and I’ll write you a check.”

       Fine. We’ll do it this way.

      Genevieve set her hoof stand down on the rubber pavers and followed Knox the short distance to an office space that had been incorporated into one of the tack rooms. Knox opened the door for her and let her walk in first. The room, which had rows of Western saddles and bridles lining the far wall, smelled of leather and soap, along with the sweet smell of hay from the small stack of bales just inside the door. Genevieve walked over to a black saddle with ornate designs carved into the leather and fancy-edged silver conches as accent pieces. From the smoothness of the leather on the seat, along with the craftsmanship, she knew that this was a classic saddle from the 1950s.

      “That’s my dad’s saddle,” Knox said as he closed the door. “Seen a lot of work over the years.”

      At the sound of the door closing, Genevieve’s Cat Woman senses started setting off alarm bells in her brain and she spun around to face the rancher. Knox had a strange look on his classically handsome face. She didn’t like the fact that he was blocking the door and she especially didn’t like it when he reached behind his body and locked them in the tack room.

      “Listen here, Knox Crawford.” Genevieve scowled at him, moving her body into a defensive stance. “I’ve had six weeks of self-defense training when I was in college and if you make so much as one wrong move, cowboy, I will hurt you!”

      Knox lifted his hands as if he were surrendering, a slightly lopsided grin on his face that she hadn’t seen him use before. “I promise you, I only want to talk business.”

      She pointed at the door. “We don’t need a locked door to talk business, Knox. I trim the horses’ hooves and you write me a check. Simple.”

      “The delivery of hay is here,” Knox noted distractedly. Earlier she had heard the piercing sound of squeaking brakes on a large delivery truck backing up to the opening in the hayloft and the sound of deliverymen yelling to one another. But she didn’t understand what the heck that had to do with the fact that Knox wanted her alone in the office.

      “I have a proposal for you and I don’t want us to be overheard or disturbed.”

      Her arms crossed in front of her body, Genevieve’s interest was piqued in spite of herself. Even though he had locked the door, Knox wasn’t giving off any creepy stalker vibes, so her defenses lowered ever so slightly. Knox had always been gentlemanly, kind, consistent and had never come on to her in all the months she had been working with him. It wasn’t beyond reasonable to give him the benefit of the doubt.

      “What proposal is that?”

      Knox took his hat off and tossed it on the nearby desk, his dark brown eyes so serious.

      “Marriage.” He said it so plainly and simply she almost thought she had misunderstood.

      Genevieve’s arms tightened around her body, and her heart, without her permission, began to beat rapidly in her chest. This wasn’t her first marriage proposal, but it certainly was the strangest.

      “Gen.” Hands in his pockets he took a small step toward her. “I want to propose marriage. Let’s get married.”

      Today was the first day he had ever called her by a nickname, and she had to admit it sounded kind of nice when he said it in his raspy baritone voice.

      Genevieve stared up at Knox and he stared right back at her. The only sound was the ambient noise of the scraping and stomping of men’s feet as they moved bales of hay into the hayloft above them.

      After a second or two, her arms fell away from her body as she laughed. “Very funny, Knox. Ha, ha. Yeah—let’s get married. That makes total sense.”

      But Knox wasn’t laughing.

      “You’re right. It does make perfect sense.”

      “You’re serious?” She stopped laughing. “You want us to get married?”

      “Yes.”

      Now she was frowning at him. They had started a friendship over the last several months and she liked him. But what in the world had possessed him to propose marriage out of the blue? He had never even so much as flirted with her!

      “Are you going through some sort of mental crisis, Knox?” she asked seriously. “Because you can get help for that.”

      “I’m perfectly sane.” He wasn’t smiling but there was now a conspiratorial gleam in his eye. “Just hear me out.”

      “No.” She scooted around him, unlocked the door and swung it open. In the open doorway, she held out her hand. “I’ll take my check, please, and then I’ll be on my way.”

      He didn’t move to the desk to write her a check. “What if I told you I had a way for us to help each other get exactly what we want?”

      Now that the door was open and any passing ranch hand could overhear their conversation, Knox had lowered his voice. She had to lean in slightly to hear his next words.

      “You want to move to California.” It was a statement of fact.

      She nodded.

      “How much does a move like that cost?”

      His words touched a raw nerve in her body. From her calculations, to move her and her horse to California and get her business established it was going to take much deeper pockets than she currently had. In truth, as much as she hated admitting it, she was most likely years away from moving out of her parents’ garage apartment.

      “A king’s ransom,” she admitted gloomily.

      “I just happened to know a king.”

      Everyone in town knew that the Texas Crawford cowboys were wealthy; if Knox wanted anything in his life, he just had to go out and buy it. It seemed to her, in this moment, that he was trying to buy himself a bride.

      She wasn’t for sale.

      “Hear me out, Gen. If you don’t like what I have to say—no harm, no foul.” When he used one of her favorite expressions, her eyes moved back to his face. “We’ll never speak of this again.”

      In spite of herself, she just couldn’t say no to at least listening to a plan that could possibly