Total pages in book: 51
Estimated words: 47222 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 236(@200wpm)___ 189(@250wpm)___ 157(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 47222 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 236(@200wpm)___ 189(@250wpm)___ 157(@300wpm)
You’re a dirt bag, Rock McLaughlin. What the hell is wrong with you? You’re Darcy’s enemy, or so she thinks.
After all, my sweet hostess has no idea that my name’s not Ranger McLeod at all. In fact, I’m a scion of the very family that she hates so much: the McLaughlins.
For good reason too. The Lazy M has taken over every farm in the surrounding area, and the Fields property is the last one on the list to complete the monopoly. This tiny homestead is literally surrounded on all sides by McLaughlin land, like a landlocked island.
Plus, my brothers weren’t exactly subtle or generous when pressuring other landowners to sell. Let’s just say their way of ‘handling it’ was despicable, and likely downright criminal, not to mention amoral. But when I confronted them about their dirty tactics, they told me to mind my business, city slicker, and let them handle it. Thank fuck I wasn’t around to see it because the name “McLaughlin” makes my skin crawl these days.
Yet now, I’m a part of their plan and it’s no coincidence that I stumbled into Darcy’s barn that rainy night. Being thrown off my horse was an accident, but my target was the Fields property all along. After countless threats, my brothers have dispatched me to convince Darcy to give up the only home she’s ever known.
I turn off the lamp by the bed and lay back on my pillow, thinking about how the hell I got to this point.
I’d been living in the city still when news had reached me that old man Fields had finally kicked the can. I still remember the call with my father like it was yesterday.
“Rock,” my dad said, “Jacob Fields is dead. It’s not common knowledge and we need to act carefully. I need you to come home and deal with it.”
I’d protested, telling my dad that my brothers could handle it, that I was busy with our business dealings and that I didn’t want to go back to the middle of nowhere for some tiny plot of land.
That’s when my father told me about an incident with my three brothers. How one of them had stalked Darcy and watched her mend fences while the other two went to the house and held Jacob Fields at gunpoint, demanding he sell or they’d kill him and do worse to his daughter.
“When did this happen?” I demanded, incensed at my brothers’ violent behavior. “Does she know? If she knows you did that to her father, then she’ll never sell.”
My dad grunted.
“About a year ago, and no, I don’t think old man Fields ever told his daughter. He was as stubborn as a mule, the old fool. Now that he’s passed, your brothers have offered to go ‘take care’ of the girl. That’s why I’m calling you, Rock. Homicide is unacceptable, you know that.” My father, usually a distant and curt man, sounded downright panicked when telling me this. It took no further convincing from my father that I should be the one to handle the Fields girl and her property.
I clench my fists at the memory. My brothers are savages, full stop, and I had no idea it was this bad. After all, I left home in my teens and have rarely visited since, so my interaction with them are limited. But Darcy needs me help now, and the situation’s a lot more complicated than I’d expected.
She surprises me every day.
As we work side by side or eat together, I sometimes hint at how difficult farm life is, or how the crop may fail, or that the farm could be worth some real money, but all to no avail. The woman is determined to keep the place going, working her fingers to the bone.
She’s a lot tougher than any of us McLaughlins give her credit for, I admit to myself. It’s also, I acknowledge, probably because I haven’t let my brothers interact with her.
Neither had her father. I knew for a fact that the old man never reported the gun incident to the cops. My asshole brothers scared the living daylights out of him and straight into silence. And when word had gotten around that the old man was sick, my family opted to wait it out until he died, figuring the daughter would be more amenable to our offers.
Feeling my blood to start to boil again, I turn my attention elsewhere, to Darcy herself.
So where does this leave us, Rock? I ask myself.
Darcy is beautiful, sweet, and tough as nails.
I… like her. I respect her. I want her to be happy. I rub my face with my hands, my jaw scruffy from a few days without a proper shave.
Happy? What are you, the happiness police? I groan. But she’s young and naïve. She likes you too, that much is obvious. But only because she doesn’t have a clue who you are.