A Ballad for Her Cowboys by Luxie Ryder Read Free Book Online

the ranch hands discuss how strange it was that the pair were doing such menial jobs hadn’t surprised Misty. It was strange. The last time she spoken to them, they were the owners of a struggling, yet still vibrant, ranch. What happened?
    Misty skidded to a halt and jumped back out of sight when she rounded the corner of a barn and found them standing far closer to her than she’d been prepared for. Couldn’t a girl have a moment to pull herself together? She peeked back around at them, hiding behind the building in case they saw her. Aiden had his hat on and shirt off. His face and torso streaked with a mixture of dust and sweat and his jeans torn at the knee. Seth still wore his shirt, albeit open. His hat sat low over his brow, keeping his face in the shade. With his fair hair and light complexion, Misty guessed he couldn’t risk exposing his skin to the sun as much as Aiden did.
    A pulse beat harder in Misty’s throat, and she allowed her gaze to roam over Aiden’s taut back when he turned away—from the dimples she could see just above the waistband of his jeans to the bicep muscles stretched taut around the bale of he carried. Seth looked no less tempting. His bare chest gleamed with sweat, the golden hairs curling down his torso catching the sunlight when he sucked in a breath.
    A commotion behind her as other people approached forced her to make a snap decision about what would be worse—being caught staring at hot, half-naked cowboys or facing those hot half-naked cowboys before she was quite ready. Quickly jumping forward before the others caught her acting weird, Misty ran round the corner.
    If Aiden and Seth heard her walking toward them, they didn’t let on. Misty got right up to the fence of the corral, stood in plain view for almost a minute before Aiden raised his eyes from his task and looked in her direction. His head jerked up and he pushed his hat back off his brow, squinting at her while he wiped the sweat from his face. A low whistle, not meant for her but intended to get his friend’s attention, forced Seth to look up at Aiden and then follow his gaze to where Misty stood.
    Misty cleared her throat when her voice failed her and succeeded in squeezing out a greeting the second time she tried. ‘Hi.’
    Aiden nodded and turned back to his task. Okay, he wasn’t going to make it easy for her. Misty expected no less from him. She turned to Seth, in the hope he was still the easygoing guy he seemed the first time they met. Misty let go of the breath she held when he smiled and made his way over to her.
    ‘Hi, Misty, what brings you out here?’
    When he got closer, she saw a tension in him that twisted the knot of guilt inside her a little tighter. She really offended him, maybe both of them. Aiden’s reluctance to come near to or even look at her made it clear she got under his skin too. The intensity of their reactions confused her—after all, she hadn’t seen them in five years—but she couldn’t deny the fact they seemed genuinely wary of her now.
    ‘I wanted to talk to you. Both of you.’
    Aiden took his time doing so, but finally, he looked her way again. The strain in his eyes matched that in Seth’s. Again, she asked herself why her actions bothered them so much. Maybe she’d find out.
    ‘Hi,’ Aiden said as he came toward her and his friend.
    The pair of them stood only inches apart, separated from her by a high wooden fence almost as tall as she was. They were head and shoulders above it so she doubted they realized how the way they leaned on the rails and looked down at her made her feel like a kid in a playpen.
    ‘I guess I owe you an apology.’ She blurted out the words before her nerves got the better of her and she ran like her brain was screaming at her to do.
    Aiden’s sharp intake of breath surprised her enough, but when Seth’s eyes went a stormy green, she realized she fucked up again.
    ‘You ‘guess’, huh? Forget it. You don’t owe us a damned