Chapter One
Rowan
“Do not tell your parents I brought you here,” I sign to my niece, Olivia. She may be ten, but her father doesn’t think she needs to frequent the livestock auctions or anything that might get him into hot water with Liv’s mother. It’s better for everyone if we keep this our little secret.
Olivia grins as we’re looking for seats. “Brought me where? You would never take me somewhere I am not allowed, Uncle Rowan.”
I love this kid. And much to my brother’s dismay, she likes me best. I wink at her and point to two open seats.
Olivia is seriously the best kid in the world. She’s so much like me at her age in a lot of ways. We fish together at least once a month, and she enjoys working on the farm with me. What I love most is that she lets nothing stand in her way. She never lets being deaf define her—it’s just a part of who she is, and we don’t treat her any different than other kids her age.
“Can I hold the paddle?” she asks with bright eyes.
“No.”
Her brows furrow. “Why?”
“Because you’ll cost me a fortune.”
Olivia shakes her head and then opens the auction booklet.
I seriously hope Asher or Olivia’s overprotective mother doesn’t have some tracking device on her phone because he really will kick my ass—well, try to—if he finds out we’re here. While the auction isn’t a bad place necessarily, there have been a few fights when things got heated, and since he’s a cop, he’s had to break them up.
Plus, some of the ranch hands who attend drink too much and the rancher’s daughters . . . well, they like ranch hands and dress for that—if you know what I mean. It can get rowdy.
Speaking of one of those daughters, there’s one across the way who’s smiling rather alluringly at me.
She waves.
I wave back, aware that I have my niece with me because I would definitely like to take her home tonight.
Olivia nudges me to get my attention. “Are you bidding on anything?”
“Maybe.”
Honestly, I only came to the auction because my ranch manager, Micah, said the last two auctions had great bull options and I needed to see what the competition was buying. With the capital I just put up to buy a couple of extra pastures, I’m a little tight on cash. However, opportunity is priceless and my goal is to grow my farm and replenish my coffers, so to speak.
“You need a better bull,” she signs.
“There’s nothing wrong with the bull I have now.”
Olivia shakes her head. “He is old, and Micah said he is not as good as he was.”
“Are you a cow expert now?” I ask her with a smirk.
She shrugs and then goes back to reading the list of animals to be auctioned off. Then she taps my leg and points to one that’ll be coming up.
It could be a good one, but it also could end up as a dud, but that’s part of owning a farm, I guess.
Olivia glances down at her phone for the hundredth time, and I nudge her. “Your dad and Phoebe are fine.”
Asher and Phoebe had to go to the doctor and needed someone to stay with Olivia. Normally, my sister would have the honor, since the two of them are “besties” or whatever crap they say. If not her, then the next logical choice is Grady, but since he’s flying today, that went out the window, which leaves me. I am always the last choice, but I’m Liv’s favorite.
“I know.”
She doesn’t, but it’s okay.
“If you say so,” I sign back to her.
Olivia goes back to reading, circling another bull. Clearly, she’s not going to give this up or she just really wants to use the paddle.
I turn my attention back to the group of beautiful women over in the corner who keep looking my way. I wink at one, who smiles and then dips her head a little.
From behind me, I hear a voice that instantly makes me want to leave. “If it isn’t the bane of my existence.”
I turn, coming face to face with the one woman in Sugarloaf I can’t stand. “If it isn’t Charlotte Sullivan. My favorite person in the whole world.”
Olivia shifts as well, smiling and waving energetically at her.
Charlotte waves back. “Will you interpret for me?”
I nod. “Can’t promise I won’t ad-lib.”
The sigh that comes from her says she expects that from me. I am the villain in her story. At least she knows that Olivia can read lips and, if I do sign something mean, she has a chance of knowing the truth. “Hi, Olivia, are you having fun?” Charlotte asks.
I translate. Olivia nods.
“She said yes,” I say to Charlotte, who rolls her eyes.
“Tell her I really love her hair.”
I translate incorrectly. “She said you took her chair.”
Olivia jerks back. “I’m sorry.”
This is really fucking fun. I look to Charlotte. “She said she’s sorry.”
Now it’s time to see the confusion on her face. “Oh. Okay.”
I fill her in. “I might have told her you said something else. Might.”
Charlotte’s green eyes narrow and she lets out a heavy breath through her nose. “God, you’re so immature.”
I lift my hands to sign to Olivia. “God, I love the smell of manure.”
Liv looks to Charlotte, then to me, and then back to Charlotte before shrugging.
“She’s not sure she agrees,” I tell Charlotte.
“Thanks, genius.”
I turn to Liv. “She thinks I’m a genius.”
Olivia’s shoulders shake with laughter. “She does not.”
“She does.”
“She didn’t mean it. We all know Charlotte doesn’t like you.”
“What did she say?” Charlotte asks.
I sign and speak aloud so they both know my answer. “Olivia said she doesn’t like you because you’re mean to me.”
Olivia shakes her head quickly. “That’s not what I said.”
“Fine,” I say to them both. “She didn’t say that. She said that she knows you don’t like me.”
“She would be correct,” Charlotte says slowly.
Olivia taps my leg. “Why don’t you tell her how great you are?”
“Because she’s stupid and hates me for no reason.”
My niece side eyes me with a smirk. “I heard it’s because you cheated on her sister.”
“What is she saying?” Charlotte butts in again, but I ignore her.
“Where did you hear that?”
Olivia shrugs. “Everyone knows.”
Everyone knows, my ass. No one knows because it’s not fucking true. Sure, two years ago I was sleeping with Aurora. We had a fling. One where I made it crystal fucking clear that it was just that—a fling. There were no feelings, no dating. I couldn’t have cheated on her because we weren’t even together. However, I didn’t sleep with anyone else when we were having our sexfest, so it’s bullshit, regardless.
“It’s a lie,” I tell Olivia.
“I know, the Whitlocks don’t like cheaters.”
No, we do not. And there’s a sound reason for it. All of us watched our mother’s husband number three destroy her world when he cheated on her. It was me, the youngest son, who picked up her pieces and tried to be there for her as she cried at night. I remember how broken she was, devastated that he could do that to her when she gave up everything for him.
I would never, ever cheat on a woman.
However, Aurora didn’t like it when I told her I didn’t want more and so she spread her rumors far and wide.
Charlotte groans. “Do you know how rude you’re being?”
I turn to her, my brows raised. “Coming from you who spends hours doing nothing but talking shit about me? Get over it, sweetheart.”
“Don’t call me sweetheart.”
“Sour-heart? How about no-heart? Or maybe blackheart? I think that’s the most appropriate.”
Charlotte chuckles and lets out a deep sigh. “Please, we all know who the blackheart is here. Spoiler alert.” She leans in. “It ain’t me.”
I turn to Liv and sign. “See? There’s nothing good at the auction.”
Olivia laughs silently and points a finger at me. “Tell her the truth about what I sign.”
I nod.
“Promise?”
“Yes, I promise,” I assure her.
Charlotte groans. “Why are you such an ass? I swear, if you weren’t with your niece, I would not be this nice to you.”
“Yeah, you’re a ray of sunshine now.” I lift my hands to sign. “Olivia wants to tell you something, and I was promising her that I wouldn’t . . . interpret the words differently. That’s what we just said. The stuff before is between us Whitlocks.”
My niece looks to the she-devil behind me, and I speak as Olivia signs. “I understand sometimes why you think Uncle Rowan is stupid. Sometimes he is, but he is not a bad guy. If he was, I wouldn’t love him so much.”
Charlotte gives her a soft smile. “He really is stupid.”
I roll my eyes but sign it correctly.
Olivia’s grin grows. “Aunt Brynn says all boys are.”
I’m going to have to talk to my sister about that comment. I sign to Olivia and say it so Charlotte isn’t excluded. See, I can be nice. “All boys your age are idiots. Don’t ever talk to them.”
There. I can impart my unclely advice where needed. Olivia is too young to even think about boys, let alone date. Not that I think Asher would ever let her near a boy, sometimes a father needs backup, which is where I can come in.
The auctioneer announces that they are calling forward the bull we were interested in. I nudge Olivia and point to the bull she has circled eleven times. She pulls out the paddle and I sigh. Looks like I’m buying a cow today.
Charlotte clears her throat. “You’re looking at that bull?”
I turn my head to see hers right there, reading over my shoulder. Great. “Maybe, why?”
She shakes her head and shifts back in her seat. “No reason.”
The hair on the back of my neck stands. She wants that bull. She wants it, and I want nothing else but to thwart whatever she wants. Like buying the land I just did. While I wanted to expand the farm, I wasn’t planning on moving on it right now.
When that plot came up for sale, I went back and forth, until I heard Charlotte put an offer in as it’s between both our farms. Another plot like that wouldn’t come up until who knows when. My farm is smaller than most in Sugarloaf. I do all right, but we’re not a major operation at this point.
I brought Micah on as manager last year, and since then, we’ve increased revenue month over month and he convinced me I should start thinking of adding more land so we can increase our cattle.
“Are you planning to bid on that bull?” I ask.
“Not sure.”
Yeah she is.
Olivia looks to me with curiosity on her face.
“You can make the first bid when I tell you, then I need the paddle.”
“Why?”
I smile. “Because Uncle Rowan is going to kick Charlotte’s ass. Don’t tell your dad I said ass—twice.”
Olivia nods and then holds on to the paddle like a lifeline. Even if I don’t win, which I will, it’s fun seeing Liv happy.
The bidding begins as paddles are lifted and Olivia is watching me, waiting. I’ve learned that, when it comes to the auction, patience is key. I need to see who else is bidding and use a strategy to not let the bidding get out of control.
I turn back to Charlotte, who is sitting with her back straight. Her hand lifts and then drops. She’s totally going after this bull.
I go to give Liv the signal, but Charlotte bids before me. As soon as the auctioneer goes around again, I give Liv the thumbs-up.
She throws the paddle up in the air with a lot of enthusiasm and beams when he points to her.
Charlotte groans, and I turn to see her green eyes filled with frustration. “Ugh, you.”
God, this is fun. I lift my baseball hat in a howdy gesture, knowing it’ll further irritate her.
She raises her paddle, taking the high bid again. Charlotte is the opposite of her sister in every way. You’d never know they were related based on their looks. Aurora is tall, skinny, blonde with brown eyes. She’s pretty, but she’s got nothing on Charlotte.
Charlotte is stunning, arresting, fucking breathtaking. Until she opens her mouth and the hate for me falls from those pouty lips.
She’s short—maybe comes up to my pecs—and is dark haired with green eyes. She’s a spitfire and no one can banter like her.
Another person enters the bidding, probably because the two of us are bidding, so they either want to drive up the price for fun or they think that, since we’re both going after it, this bull is worth something.
I lift the paddle, feeling something in my gut that there’s something special about this bull.
And then Charlotte does.
Of course she’s going to make this painful. Even if she doesn’t want this bull, she’ll enjoy making me pay higher than he’s probably worth.
I bid again.
She does too.
Back and forth we go until I’m at the point where I’m not going any higher.
Olivia’s eyes are wide as she watches this go on, bouncing in her seat.
I’m holding as the winner, the announcer says going once, twice, and I wait for her to take her shot, but she doesn’t, and it’s over.
I turn to Olivia. “We won.”
“Good job.”
I nod, not really agreeing since I’m paying about three hundred dollars more than it’s worth, but I won.
Charlotte stands and I turn to face her, and the normal hostility when she looks at me seems muted. Then she gives me a slow, evil smile. “I didn’t want him anyway, congrats on spending way more than he’s worth.” She looks to Liv. “Bye, Olivia.”
Then I watch her walk away, wanting to scream.
We hope you are enjoying the book so far. To continue reading...
Copyright © 2024 All Rights Reserved
Please log in to recommend or discuss...
