“Come on, Dame. Let’s see about this fence line.”
He mounted up and started to the southern pasture. It was about fifteen acres of high ground with mature spring grass. Perfect for the cattle to dry their feet and get more nutrients in their bodies. He rode Dame around the outer parameter of the barbed-wire fence and found three sections of weak fencing and one where the line had completely snapped. But none of it looked cut like the line down in the northern pasture.
He knew there weren’t any fencing supplies in the barn. He’d have to get those from the feed store too. The dollar signs were adding up and he’d only been in charge of Timber Bear Ranch for forty-five minutes.
Leland had been managing a ranch in Texas since he got back from serving in the war seven years ago. No matter what his brothers thought of his decision, Leland didn’t feel he’d had a choice. He and his dad had been butting heads for years before the war and after they all got back, it had gotten even worse. He’d been offered a job in Texas as the lead cowboy at one of the biggest old ranches in the country. It was a hard job to pass up.
He’d enjoyed his work, and he’d learned an awful lot from his time there. Unlike at home, he’d had total control of the herd. He’d been able to really be himself working in Texas.
His dad making him Alpha of the ranch had come as a major surprise. He couldn’t even believe it at first. Part of him didn’t feel he deserved the ranch. It had been his family’s home for the last five generations, and the opportunity to run his own land again was impossible to pass up. He loved his home and he’d sincerely missed his brothers. Sometimes. Well, most of the time, if truth be told. He’d even missed his father, the stubborn old coot.
He still couldn’t believe his dad died. The man was a rock, and had been a legend among bears. Leland gripped his own heart as he rode Dame toward the herd.
He might not be able to get the cattle into the southern pasture, but he could get them into the barn paddocks. They could stay there until he got the fences fixed and it would give him an opportunity to give them the shots they’d need to heal. He herded the cattle up to the paddocks and threw them a few dozen bales of hay to tide them over.
Back in the barn, he took off Dame’s saddle and gave her a rub down before heading out to his truck. He hadn’t even unpacked the things he’d brought with him from Texas. Now, he was in charge of Timber Bear Ranch.
It wasn’t a minute too soon.
Chapter 4
After a long day of mending fences, injecting the herd with medicine, and moving them into another pasture, Leland built a fire in the fireplace in the front parlor.
He’d called the ranch in Texas at midday and given them the bad news: he wouldn’t be coming back. There was no going back now. He was the new Alpha of the ranch and had to start acting like it.
As he sat by the fire, drinking a glass of old whiskey, he dug through his father’s paperwork, looking for records and documents. The more he dug, the worse he felt. Everything was disorganized. It was all so unlike the meticulous man Leland remembered as a child. He’d known his dad had gone downhill since the war, but he’d never expected this.
His dad’s books were a mess and full of holes. His bills were past due. But that wasn’t the worst of it. He soon realized his father hadn’t filed taxes in years.
His heart sank into the pit of his stomach. It was becoming more and more clear that the ranch was in a tremendous amount of debt. Where it had come from was a question he couldn’t answer.
Leland rubbed his temples and shook his head before taking another sip of whiskey. If Buck wanted to wade into this mess, maybe Leland should let him. The job of Alpha of the Kincaid clan had just become a million times more difficult. It was one thing to come onto a ranch where the herd had been standing in mud, but it was another thing entirely to find that the ranch itself was deep in debt and in danger of going under at any moment.
As the manager of a ranch, Leland was well acquainted with the business side of things. But the nightmare of this financial rabbit hole his father seemed to be dug into was beyond his comprehension. He didn’t know if he could unravel the mess himself. He simply didn’t have that level of expertise. He was sure the entire estate was close to bankruptcy, and he sincerely wondered if either of his brothers even knew.
After a few hours of research and a growing sense of fatigue, Leland decided to go to bed. That’s when he realized he had no idea what room to sleep in. Buck had built his own house a long time ago and Jessie stayed with him now. The main old farmhouse was empty. Leland stood and made his way up the stairs to the second floor where the bedrooms were located. He peered through the door into the room his parents had shared when he was a boy and found it almost exactly the same.
The thought that they were both gone now hit him hard, like a tree falling in a windstorm. He gripped his chest as he turned out the light and closed the door. He wouldn’t be staying in that room for now.
Leland went down the hallway to the room that used to be his and found that it was full of storage. Random boxes of old clothing, dirty boots, and a mixture of books, horse tackle, and junk mail. He shook his head and turned out the light in that room, continuing down the hallway to the room that his mother had designated as a guest room. He looked inside and found it still decorated with her soft feminine style. There was an oil painting of a horse on the wall, and a patchwork quilt made by his grandmother spread over the bed. He let out a long sigh, knowing he had finally found a place to rest his head for the night.
It was hard for him to believe that he had just arrived that morning. So much had taken place already. He’d only spent a few minutes speaking with his brothers before he had gotten down to business, but he knew that if he wanted to make this work, he’d have to spend a lot more time with them. Buck was understandably irritated and Jessie was his same old self, never really wanting to take responsibility for anything.
By all rights, Buck should be Alpha. Leland had left the family years ago, and he knew, in the back of his mind, that he didn’t really deserve to be their leader. How could he possibly ask his brothers for loyalty when he himself had not been loyal to the family?
He kicked off his boots and rested his back against the headboard of the bed, thinking about the mistakes he had made in the past. The Kincaid brothers were typical men. They liked to drink and fight and swear with the best of them, but Leland knew he would have to make things right with his brothers.
He had missed them all much more than he had previously admitted to himself. Now that his dad had made him Alpha, Leland wanted to prove to his brothers that he deserved to be their leader. As different as they could be, Leland had a deep respect for all of them. Cyrus with his independent streak. Buck and his constant loyalty. Jessie with that free-spirited aggression.
They were all good men, and a good Alpha could bring out the best in the bears who followed him. Leland didn’t know it until right that very minute, but being the kind of bear who deserved the title of Alpha and the respect of his brothers was everything he had ever wanted out of life. Except for maybe a mate, but that was another thing entirely.
Working full time as the manager of a cattle ranch in Texas had kept him busy. He didn’t have time for love and often didn’t even have time for friendship. While a lot of the other cowboys on the ranch were settling down, Leland had never found a woman of his own. No matter how much he wanted to see the light in his mate’s eyes when he provided for her every need and made her feel like the most beautiful lady on the planet, he couldn’t possibly do that until he found the one.
As he drifted off to sleep, Leland imagined the kind of girl who would be his one and only. He’d imagined her face as he had before many times, as he drifted off to sleep at night. He would think about the delicious curves of her body and the way she would smile at him when she felt proud of him. He let out a deep, rumbling growl at the same time as the grizzly inside his mind, before turning on his side and pulling the quilt up over his shoulder.
&nbs
p; Usually, the idea of his mate was soothing to him, but tonight it was just making him more agitated. Leland was used to responsibility, but what had fallen on his shoulders today was beyond anything he had ever taken on before. He had a herd of sick cows and a ranch that was in trouble of going under. The worst part was he couldn’t make heads or tails of his dad’s financial situation. That made him incredibly uncomfortable. Not even the idea of his beautiful bride could soothe the discomfort.
He tried to clear his mind as the grizzly inside him curled up and grumbled behind his eyes. He needed a good night’s sleep if he was going to get a fresh start tomorrow morning. He had to dig deeper into his father’s financial mess and come up with a workable solution.
He also planned to talk to his brothers and try to make peace with Buck. Leland needed Buck on his side more than anything, since his brother was currently running the most profitable aspect of the ranch from what he could tell so far. Leland knew he could depend on Buck. He knew Jessie would always be around to help here and there, but Buck was the one Leland needed on his side, now more than ever. Unfortunately, Buck did not seem very open to rekindling their former brotherly relationship.
Leland drifted off into a fitful sleep and woke the next morning feeling cranky and hung over, even though he’d only had a few drinks the night before. He climbed out of bed, his inner bear demanding coffee. He grumbled as he trudged down the hallway, blurry eyed and scratching his behind underneath his boxer shorts. Down in the kitchen, he found a ten-pound sack of coffee in the pantry and proceeded to make a pot in the coffee maker. It was going to be a long damn day. He already dreaded diving back into his dad’s paperwork and considered hiring a lawyer or a financial consultant to go through it for him.
As he was taking the first sips of his morning coffee and staring out the kitchen window at the slope that looked out on the northern pasture down to the river, the landline phone rang in the kitchen. He grabbed the phone and greeted whoever was on the other side.
“Hello?”
“Mr. Kincaid?” said the male voice on the other side.
“This is Leland Kincaid.”
“Hello, my name is Jim Huffman. I’m an auditor.”
Oh boy, here it comes.
“Yes? What is this regarding?”
“Leland Kincaid,” Jim continued. “You are the son of Hank Kincaid, and the new majority shareholder in Timber Bear Ranch, correct?”
“That is correct, as of yesterday,” Leland said, taking another sip of coffee.
These people moved fast.
“We’re freezing all of your father’s assets as of this morning.”
“You can’t just do that without warning,” Leland objected, not sure his father even had any assets.
“You are lucky we don’t freeze yours as well. Your father’s debt now belongs to you as the executor of his estate and majority shareholder of his corporation. We are sending an auditor to the ranch to determine exactly what you owe.”
Chapter 5
Sylvia prepared herself for work Monday morning and dropped a red lipstick into her purse before leaving the house. She doubted it would have made a difference on her previous date, but at least next time she would be prepared for her own sake. When she made it to the office, she grabbed a cup of coffee from the break room and sat at her desk. Sliding her horn-rimmed glasses up the bridge of her nose, Sylvia jiggled her mouse and woke up her computer. She checked her schedule, and for notices from her supervisors.
She had just completed a difficult audit the week before and hadn’t been assigned any new cases. As difficult and heart-wrenching as her job could often be, she was still good at it.
Before her father had died, he had been nothing but encouraging to her, always telling her that she could do anything she set her mind to. She’d wanted to make him proud and repay his sacrifice in sending her to college. He had worked two jobs, just to make sure that she wasn’t overburdened during her time in school. After his death, she and her mother both lived comfortably on what he’d prepared for them.
Sylvia had graduated from her MBA program with high honors and had quickly found a job working for the government. It was a steady income and she had a nice lifestyle. If you didn’t count making people cry consistently, her life couldn’t be happier. She took a cooking class every Thursday evening. That’s where she’d gotten the chocolate fudge brownie recipe. On the weekends, she participated in spin class and regional nature hikes.
Sylvia knew that she was in touch with her feminine side, but over the years of working so hard to achieve, maybe she had let go of a little too much. She couldn’t even remember the last time she had worn a dress that wasn’t part of a suit in either black, navy, or beige. She had the kind of curves that men always said they liked, but her job required her to keep them covered up in the most conservative way possible.
A severe hairstyle and a dour look were what worked when performing her job as an auditor. There was simply no way around it. She learned a long time ago that if she wanted to be taken seriously, she had to look serious.
She continued checking her emails, contemplating looking for another job. The regional manager, Oswald Stands, came to her desk with a big stack of paperwork and set them down beside her. She looked up at him and blinked, giving him a fake smile.
“What’s this?” she asked.
“It’s your next case,” he said, his lips curling back in a slick smile. “Jim Huffman was on it, but his wife went into labor a month early. I had to take him off the case.”
Sylvia took the first folder off the stack and started to read the contents.
“This is for Timber Bear Ranch and the owner Hank Kincaid. The ranch is years behind in income and property taxes and the owner hasn’t been making his payments on his previous agreement. The debt is racking up to obscene proportions. His liquid assets have already been seized,” Mr. Stands said.
“The ranch is located on Fate Mountain,” Sylvia said, going through the paperwork. “The last assessment had it valued at three point two million dollars.”
“It’s over a thousand acres of prime Oregon ranch and timber. Not to mention there is currently two fully functional homes, outbuildings and barns.”
“Did Jim do anything but freeze their assets?”
“The executor of Mr. Kincaid’s will has already been informed that an auditor will be arriving Tuesday morning. You can keep that same appointment.”
“If my appointment is first thing Tuesday morning, then I should drive up there tonight.”
“Good luck on this case, Sylvia. You’re one of our best.”
Sylvia watched her boss walk away and felt the swell of pride in her chest at his belief in her. She knew she was good at her job. Accounting came easily to her, being a rational left brained kind of person. But the other side of her, the softer side, found it difficult to do what she did.
When it was some multinational corporation, with offshore bank accounts, who didn’t pay their payroll taxes, she felt she was doing a public service. The case at the Timber Bear Ranch on the other hand, was a bit different.
She bit her lip and started reading the paperwork, going over the returns filed for Hank Kincaid and the Timber Bear Ranch Corporation. It was a terrible, terrible mess. And frankly she couldn’t believe that they hadn’t been audited before. But Hank Kincaid had just passed away, and a whole heap of other debt had been piled on top of the already existing debt.
She squeezed her eyes closed and rubbed her temples, imagining all the things she had to do tomorrow morning. She quickly fired off an email to Mr. Stands letting him know that she was leaving early for the day to get ready to drive up to Fate Mountain.
Sylvia threw the stacks of files into her briefcase and started home. When she got there, she found Charlie waiting for her at the front door, meowing his demands for cuddles and affection.
“I’m going to have to leave you here for a few days Charlie,” she said, leaning down to scratch his chin.
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nbsp; She had a pet service that took care of Charlie while she was out of town. They even came to her apartment to change his litter box and make sure his food bowl was full. She’d rather leave him at home than put him in a kennel. She walked into the bedroom and pulled her suitcase out of the closet.
She plopped her suitcase on the bed and unzipped it. She looked at her clothes in her closet. Everything was black, gray, navy, and beige. No colors. No flowers. No life. She groaned at herself and ran her hand over the top of her head until it hit the severe bun that she wore at the nape of her neck.
Maybe what she needed was a new hairstyle. Unless she wanted to cut it short, keeping it tied back was the most professional way to wear it. She pulled the hairpins out and let it tumble down her back, where it fell right above the curve of her behind. She turned and looked in the mirror on the wall of the closet, putting her hand on her waist and looking at her curves.
She knew she was an attractive woman. As a person who constantly made technical assessments, she knew she was technically good-looking. If only she could find a man who could see through her tough exterior down to the warm, gooey core where she kept her softness.
She grabbed several suits, and put them all in her suitcase. She packed a pair of pumps, slippers, and grabbed her rain boots from the back of the closet. She would be on a ranch so it was important that she go prepared. She also grabbed some all-weather outerwear and threw in a few pairs of jeans and T-shirts.
When she packed up all her toiletries and underthings she had everything she needed for an out-of-town business trip. When she had confirmation from the pet sitting service, she gave Charlie one last scratch behind the ears and started her journey up to Fate Mountain.
On the way out of town, she listened to her favorite radio station and sang along with the music. It always made her feel more lighthearted when she sang, even though her mother had always told her she was tone deaf. That didn’t matter to Sylvia, she wanted to sing at the top of her lungs anyway.