The Front Runner (Gold Rush Ranch, #3)

by Elsie Silver

She’s a challenge. And I love a challenge.

And Patrick Cassel is a dead man walking.

she’s walking away with the last word. I hate not getting the last word.

My stomach flips at the sight of her, like it always does. I must be a glutton for punishment because getting turned down by her has become one of my favorite pastimes.

All is not fair in love and war where she’s concerned.

I feel like I could cry. I haven’t cried in years.

might not describe myself as a “good man,” but I’m not morally corrupt enough to actually hurt someone. Plus, I’m not finished with him.

My feet root to the ground as I watch her work, misty rain falling around us as the sun comes up over the Cascades, casting a blue glow across the valley. It’s eerie and beautiful all at once, and suddenly I feel just as tired as Mira accused me of looking.

to. I sound like a spoiled, rich kid with mommy issues even though I’m thirty-four years old. Adorable.

I should have thanked her. She helped me. In the dark. In the rain. And I acted like a sullen little prick. Her friends call me Dalca the Dick, but right now is the first time I’ve actually felt like one.

I’m not a hold-your-hair-back-while-you-barf kind of friend. I didn’t get the nursing gene.

“Better fix your attitude, Billie. Dalca the Dick just became your best shot at saving that colt.”

Everyone else sees Stefan all polished in an expensive suit at the track and thinks that’s his go-to look, but they miss the version of him doing the dirty work at his farm.

“Well, I have a couple of conditions.” Yup. There it is. Wiley bastard.

“You let me take you on a date.” Motherfucker. He scratches his chin thoughtfully. “Actually, three dates.” Mother. Fucker.

“That’s rich coming from the woman who brought me a coffee, spent hours helping me, and tried to hit me with her best damsel-in-distress face to get what she wants.”

I definitely wish my stomach wasn’t fluttering over why Stefan Dalca wants to take me on a date so badly. I am a smart girl who is about to do something very stupid.

“I just can’t fall in love with you, right?” I chuckle as I twist the doorknob to leave. “Oh, Stefan. I think you already are.”

She’s trying to be strong, but this is killing her inside. She feels so deeply—loves so thoroughly. She’s got this boisterous exterior, but she’s incredibly sensitive.

Love billie

I’ve never been big on loads of friends or the whole girl-tribe thing. But these two just sort of claimed me and haven’t let me go, and I’m not complaining.

sigh in relief. Sister. Hallelujah.

“Why?” “Because you might fall in love with me if you stare for too long.”

I’m usually comfortable with morally gray business decisions, but this time I just feel like a dick. Mira saves lives for a living, and I leveraged that passion for my own gain.

She’s an equation I’d love to solve. Or maybe the broken little boy in me just wants her to treat me the way she does a horse. With love.

She acts like a siren, but the mere mention of a boner, and she can’t get away fast enough.

I should try harder to keep things professional and not let my curiosity about Dr. Mira Thorne take over my brain. I shouldn’t think with the wrong head.

At twenty-seven-years old, I’m more educated and more accomplished than anyone else in my family career-wise, and yet none of them seem to want to celebrate my achievement.

I’m aware I come off a bit cool sometimes. I’d like to say I don’t mean to… but I think I do. I don’t like people meddling in my business. I’m not a spew-my-personal-issues type of girl. I’ve been told I’m intensely private.

could have just asked him the favor straight out, but he looked so downtrodden. And I’m a sucker for a wounded animal.

“Trust me, Dr. Thorne, if I had you up against a wall, you’d be the meal.”

His responding chuckle is dark and sensuous. It feels like hot wax on bare skin. I want to hate it, but my tongue darts out over my bottom lip.

It’s surrounded by floor-to-ceiling windows that slide open onto the patio overlooking the small lake out front. The living room and dining room all blend into the big open space with vaulted ceilings. Warm cream tones play off dark stained wood and exposed stones.

Love

don’t love easily, but when I do it’s fiercely.

Whatever you do, don’t let her see that patriarchal assholes behaving poorly don’t face consequences.” Her words land like lead in my gut. But the fierce spark in her eye makes my heart race.

I give up on trying not to check him out. Never mind porn—he looks more like my unfulfilled professor fantasies. The black rims of his glasses contrast perfectly against the bronze glow of his hair. The turtleneck makes him look uptight and proper, but I know better, and it just adds to his allure.

He oozes class and control. Looking like a dreamboat professor out for a glass of wine at some fancy lounge after a long day of fending off the advances of his overeager students. I can’t help but giggle at the path my thoughts have taken after single-handedly drinking what equates to a full bottle of wine. “Well,

I smile, but it’s watery and uncertain. The man has me completely off-balance. My pulse beats in my stomach. Nice Stefan threw me for a loop, but Doting Stefan, who cooks and cleans and loves his little sister, is straight crushing my ovaries. Any man could do those things and you’d find it attractive,

“Good morning, Dr. Thorne.” Stefan’s voice used to make me roll my eyes. But now it just feels like someone is sliding silk around my neck. Probably to make a noose, which is what thinking about Stefan this way is going to get me.

“Hey, Mira?” he calls out right as I reach for the door handle. “Yeah?” I toss back into the echoey barn, continuing my forward motion. “You owe me a carton of eggs.” Well, shit.

perfectly qualified and natural choice. She doesn’t act like she’s going out of her way to help my sister. To help me. She doesn’t prance around acting like she’s doing us a favor or extending some great kindness.

And it made my chest pinch then too. I conned a life-saving, sister-helping, horse-kissing angel into going on dates with me just because I could. I feel like dirt, and there’s a part of me wondering why it’s taken me this long to get to this point.

She laughs, a soft chuckle. A noise I want to take and suck into my mouth. I want to swallow her whole. Devour her. I don’t deserve her, but goddamnit, I’m not sure I’ve ever wanted another woman more.

There’s something about a woman who wields her brain like a weapon and her tongue like a whip that makes me want to worship at her feet.

“Bet I can make you come harder too.” She laughs, a girlish laugh. Not her usual throaty husk. “I’d like to see you try.” Challenge accepted.

He’s driving me to distraction.

And everything he’s shared over the last several days about his mom, his dad, his upbringing… it’s got a stranglehold on my savior complex. He really is like an injured rat. He grosses everyone out. And I’m drawn in. I want to swoop in and bandage up his broken parts. Watch them heal.

We love a broken man

shouldn’t want to fill my cup with Stefan. But I do.

“Oh, Mira. All the best things in my life have come as an absolute surprise. Didn’t expect an eighteen-year-old girl to show up on my doorstep demanding I give her a job, but I’m glad I did. Billie is the daughter I never got to have. Didn’t expect my best friend to scandalize the racing world and then die of a heart attack. But here I am, helping his grandsons run his farm.” He shakes his head thoughtfully. “I mean, shit, I didn’t even expect to have the job I do now. I used to bartend here, did you know that?”

“Sometimes unexpected surprises change the course of our life in the most irrevocable of ways. In the best ways. Life is one big adventure,

“Mira. I’m not a big, tough man. I’m just a dick. Remember?”