Once Upon a Cowboy by Maggie McGinnis Read Free Book Online

walked back to the guests, loading the picnic gear into the saddlebagsas he pointed toward the falls and gave his oft-recited spiel about the Native American lore surrounding the rocky outcroppings above, and the iridescent water of the pools below.
    His mouth was saying the right words and his hands were pointing in the right directions, but his eyes weren’t on the falls at all. Instead, they were firmly glued to Jess, who had walked back to her horse and was leaningquietly against her flank, murmuring words Cole couldn’t hear.
    He blinked hard and rocked his attention back to the guests. They had eight relative novices on horseback, and as soon as they remounted, they’d be heading for the rocky part of the trail just north of the falls. His mind needed to be focused on guests and horses.
    Guests and horses.
    But God, what he wouldn’t give to have Jess leaningon
him
that way, to have Jess’s soft, mesmerizing voice in
his
ear.
    —
    “Okay, here we go. Promise you’ll love it?” Kyla paused her hand on the doorknob of the someday-spa that afternoon.
    Jess rolled her eyes. “It’s gorgeous, fabulous, and perfect. I can tell already.”
    Kyla laughed. “Okay, good. You may now enter.”
    She pushed open the door, and Jess felt her own eyes go wide as she steppedinto the big open space. “Oh my God, Kyla.”
    “You like it?”
    Jess stepped slowly into the middle of the room, breathing deeply. To her left, a wall of windows looked out on a glorious stand of firs outlined against the deep blue sky. To her right, a matching set looked out toward Whisper Creek’s rolling meadows and the northern Rockies in the distance. The afternoon sun slanted through the western-facingwindows, making the hardwood floor practically glow.
    She slipped off her shoes, curling her toes against the warm, polished wood as she spun in a slow circle and breathed in the mixed scent of fresh lumber and drywall. From every spot in the huge room, you could see calming forest, big sky, and the majestic mountains in the distance. It was an unbelievable spot, and she’d never seen anythinglike it before.
    “So?” Kyla’s voice sounded concerned. “You’re not speaking. Is that a good thing? Or a bad thing? What do you think?”
    Jess stopped turning. “It’s magical.”
    “I knew you’d love it!”
    “It’s beyond words, Kyla. The light, the views, the fresh air—if I didn’t know better, I’d think I’d died and landed in heaven’s version of—well, heaven.”
    Kyla walked over to a pile of lumber andset down the notebook she seemed to carry with her everywhere these days. “I made Cole stop working on it until you could get out here. I wanted you to see the space like this, with no walls, so you could give us your ideas about how we should best configure the space.”
    Jess spun around again. “Do there
need
to be walls?”
    “Unless we want toilets right there against the back, yes, I think we’regoing to need some walls.”
    “Good point.”
    “So I have an assignment for you.”
    “You have an assignment for
everybody
these days.”
    “You’ll like it. Promise.” Kyla swung her hand in a circle. “You do the yoga thing, the spa thing. You know how this stuff works. I totally don’t. So I need your expertise. I want to know what
you
would do with the space, if it were going to be your spa.”
    Jess sighed.“You know, this vacation is turning out to be
such
a challenge. First I’m supposed to ride my favorite horse for half the day, while hanging out with the most gorgeous man on the planet, and now? Now I have to spend time here in this glorious, heavenly space that I already never want to leave?”
    “So the ride went well this morning?”
    “The ride was—good. Really good.” She couldn’t help but smileas she thought back to Cole playing knight in shining leather when Ben had started flirting with her. The way he’d stalked over like he was some version of Prince Charming protecting her from evil