Done and Dusted: A Rebel Blue Ranch Novel

In less than two weeks, I almost kissed my best friend’s little sister not once, but twice. I wanted to kiss her so badly it was pathetic.

I tried to tell myself it was just because Emmy was pretty and I hadn’t kissed a woman in a while. I hadn’t wanted to. But I knew that wasn’t true. There was something between us.

And Emmy wasn’t just pretty. She was extraordinary.

Sometime in the last two weeks, Emmy started looking at me like I was worth something, and I was high on the feeling it gave me.

Watching the way her confidence grew with every lap around the corral yesterday had made my jeans tighten. And the way she threw herself at me afterwards?

I was a fucking goner.

The next day, I texted her and told her I had some business at the bar, so I couldn’t ride. It was true. I didn’t usually work at the ranch on Fridays because I spent the day getting The Devil’s Boot ready for the weekend.

I told her I had a busy couple of days, and we would get back to it on Tuesday. That should give me enough time to get my head on straight and stop thinking about what it would be like to touch her…everywhere.

I felt bad bailing on Emmy, but I needed a few days to get my head right where she was concerned. If I saw Emmy while I was feeling the way I was right now, there was no doubt in my mind that I would kiss her. I’d do more than kiss her.

I wanted to make Emmy mine in every single way.

I wanted to know everything about her, including how she’d sound moaning my name.

If I thought we were in dangerous territory before, I didn’t even want to know where we were now.

I sighed and ran my hands down my face. I had a million things to do, and all I could think about was Emmy.

This morning, Joe asked me why I was so distracted, and I didn’t know how to answer. Joe was a good guy. He had worked at The Devil’s Boot longer than I had been alive, and he was the sole reason the bar survived being owned by Jimmy Brooks.

When my dad left the bar to me, I wanted to give fifty percent of it to Joe. He deserved it, but he’d refused. We settled on a forty-five/fifty-five split. That seemed to make him happy, and I got a damn good partner out of it.

It also allowed me to keep helping out at Rebel Blue, and that meant everything to me.

I almost didn’t accept the bar. I didn’t want anything from my dad. When he died a few years ago, I had made it over thirty years without needing anything from him, and hadn’t wanted to start then. But when the bank explained to me it probably meant the end of the bar—the end of something that meant so much to so many people, even if it was just the place where they sang country classics at the top of their lungs—I decided to take it.

I also took the house—a single story bungalow that was nestled in the trees behind the bar, about a thousand yards away. The land I owned was no Rebel Blue, but one hundred acres that had a house and a business wasn’t too shabby for someone like me.

I didn’t quite know how all of this had ended up in Jimmy’s hands, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t grateful.

There was a knock on my office door. I looked up, expecting to see Joe. Instead, I saw Teddy Andersen.

Why was Teddy Andersen at my bar at 10:00 AM on a Friday?

Why had Joe even let her in the front door?

“Are you busy?” she asked. Her hair was pulled up in her signature ponytail, but the look on her face was unfamiliar. She looked mad.

Teddy was one of the last people on the planet I’d want to piss off. Her and Gus were probably tied in that regard. Yesterday, when Emmy told me the story of her first kiss and mentioned Teddy “took care of it,” my first thought was that she probably cut off that guy’s dick and fed it to him.

“What’s up, Teddy?” I asked. Teddy crossed the threshold of my office and shut the door behind her.

“What’s going on between you and Emmy?” She didn’t pull punches, I guess. Fuck.

“What are you talking about?” I responded. I kept my voice neutral. Or tried to, at least.

“Cut the shit, Brooks. She told me about the almost-kiss in her cabin, and now you’re giving her riding lessons? She’s a professional barrel racer. I don’t think she needs any tips from you.”

Emmy told her about the cabin? She wouldn’t tell her best friend unless it meant something to her, right?

That’s not the point, you idiot.

“You can play with any girl you want. Why are you messing with Emmy?” she pressed, clearly not taking my indifference as an answer.

“I’m not messing with her,” I answered honestly. I wasn’t messing with Emmy. If anything, she was messing with me. From the second she walked through the door of my bar a few weeks ago, it was like she had branded herself onto my brain and practically demanded I think about her 24/7.

I wasn’t supposed to get feelings for anyone, let alone my best friend’s little sister. “Emmy and I are friends.”

Teddy didn’t look convinced. Probably because my answer wasn’t convincing. Emmy and I were friends, but only because that was all we could be.

“Friends?” she asked.

“Yeah. I like spending time with her.”

“And the riding lessons?”

“More of a riding refresher, and you’re going to have to ask her about that.” I preoccupied myself with some papers on my desk. It wasn’t my place to tell anyone what Emmy was going through. I just wanted to be there for her.

“Do you have tension-filled almost-kisses with all of your friends?” Tension-filled? Is that how Emmy described it to her?

I tried not to smile. I didn’t think it worked, so I brought one of my hands up to cover my mouth in hopes of hiding what I was feeling from Teddy.

Maybe Emmy was just as affected by whatever was happening between us as I was.

I couldn’t think about that. I couldn’t let my mind wander down that path and think about where we would end up if that were true.

“No,” I responded simply. I’d never had tension-filled anything with anyone. Just Emmy.

“Wipe that stupid smirk off your face, Brooks. Tell me what’s going on.”

“Look, Teddy, I’m not messing around with Emmy. I promise. I would never do anything to hurt her. We’re friends, and I like spending time with her, that’s all. Okay?”

Half of that sentence was true, but it seemed to work.

I watched Teddy think about my words for a minute before her features shifted from mad to amused.

“What?” I asked.

“Nothing. I get it now.” A small smile stretched her mouth.

“Get what?”

“I just get it.” Teddy’s smile was getting bigger. “Thanks for clearing everything up for me.”

“Teddy, what the hell are you talking about?”

“Nothing.” God, she was being annoying. She started toward the door of my office, and as she opened it, she said, “See you around, Brooks.” Before she was completely out of sight, I heard her say, “If you hurt my best friend, I’ll cut your dick off and feed it to you.”

I had a bad feeling, somehow, Teddy knew exactly how I felt about her best friend.