In the next instant, he let go of his T-shirt and turned back to the wheelbarrow. The spell broke, and Sabrina blinked. The moment had taken her by complete surprise, and she was unsure what it might bode for the future. She had never had to battle her admiration for a client before. She had never had to battle any client as fiercely as she did Trevor.

  “You want to watch it with those,” he mentioned offhandedly.

  Sabrina blinked again. “Huh?”

  Trevor gestured toward her earrings, a pair of sterling silver hoops shaped like horseshoes, which Sabrina had designed herself and was extremely proud of. “Your jewelry. You want to watch it, especially if you insist on sitting on the stall door like that. All it takes is one tug from a curious horse coming in from the pasture to put you over the side.”

  It’s not the horses I’m worried about, she thought mutinously. As if she wouldn’t notice a horse clopping up behind her! She fingered her earlobe and scowled. She may or may not have picked out her earrings hoping Trevor would like them, but clearly, she could not win his approval.

  “I’m not interested in your opinions on my fashion choices, Mr. Wild.”

  “Really?” he asked as he turned back to his work. “Because I have a lot of them, and they aren’t just opinions. I would make you a list of everything you’ve worn already that isn’t ranch-appropriate or poses a safety hazard, but I’m not certain you’d have anything left to wear.”

  “I’m sure you’d love to make that list,” Sabrina fired back. “But I’m a professional woman. I know how to dress myself, and what I choose to wear isn’t up for discussion. What I would really like to hear from you is some constructive feedback on the ideas I’ve been pitching to you all morning.” She rapped the clipboard with her pen to emphasize her point. “Every brainstorm I’ve come up with, you’ve shot down like a…like a can of beans on a fence post!”

  Trevor groaned at the simile. “I’m not trying to shoot your ideas down, Miss Hearthstone.” Sabrina scoffed at this, and Trevor shot her a look that conveyed his dwindling patience. “Forgive me if I don’t think our guests are going to want to muck out stalls after their bubble baths,” he muttered as he levered the wheelbarrow up and moved it to the next stall.

  A sudden lightbulb went on in Sabrina’s head. Her pen paused in its tapping, and she looked up at Trevor. “Mr. Wild, you may not look it, but you’re a genius,” she said.

  “You city folks sure love to pair an insult with a compliment,” he said. Still, he paused again in his work to lean against the stall and consider her, his dark eyes thoughtful. “What brilliant thing did I say, and why do I have a feeling I’m going to regret ever mentioning it?”

  Sabrina dropped her clipboard onto the footstool beneath her and hopped down after it. “I think this idea is best expressed through a demonstration,” she said. “And since you were the inspiration for it, Mr. Wild, I think it’s only fitting that you be my assistant.”

  4

  TREVOR

  “I still can’t believe I let you talk me into this,” Trevor muttered a half hour later.

  They stood together in the aisle with the barn door flung open. Peggy, one of the older, gentler mares in the Wildhorse herd, stood placidly between them, shifting her weight every few minutes and aiming a swish of her tail at the occasional fly.

  Sabrina ducked beneath the lead rope and grinned, taking one hand from Peggy’s neck to give him a thumbs-up. She had taken her ridiculous earrings out, at least, and pulled her hair into a silky blonde ponytail. Peggy took it upon herself to investigate whether the woman’s unfamiliar hairstyle was as delectable as it looked. Sabrina laughed and pushed her away.

  “Relax,” she assured him. “I can already tell this girl is a real sweetheart. This is going to be a piece of cake!”

  “Have you ever bathed a horse before?” Trevor asked, raising an eyebrow in disbelief. Sabrina’s instincts around horses and the easy way she carried herself around Peggy had surprised him more than he cared to admit. She had more experience than he had anticipated, and a dim curiosity kindled in him every time he looked at her. What was her history? Where had she come from? Was there more to Sabrina than her doomed attempts to glamorize a lifestyle he had assumed she knew nothing about?

  “How hard can it be?” Sabrina rolled her sleeves up and dropped to a squat beside the big metal wash bucket. “I mean, I’ve bathed dogs. Horses aren’t that different. And trust me, our glampers are going to love this.” She popped open the bottle of scented bath soap she had retrieved from her bunkhouse and let a little more spill into the swirling tub.

  “Let me see that,” said Trevor.

  Sabrina handed it over. “All organic,” she said. “Nothing that’ll hurt her.”

  Trevor squinted at the bottle. “Scented with coconut oil. That’s packed full of calories.”

  “Well, she’s not going to drink it.” Sabrina reclaimed her soap. “Now, back to my point: not only will our glampers get the chance to bond with individual horses and actively participate in their care, but you’ll get clean, shiny ponies at the end of the day. Everyone ends up happy and fulfilled. It’s a win-win proposition!”

  In the face of such blinding optimism, Trevor didn’t know how to fight back, not that he could have even if he tried, with the distraction of Sabrina’s slender neck unobstructed by hair.

  The suds started bubbling up in the tub, and a rich coconut aroma rose into the air. He imagined this must be what a spa in the Caribbean smelled like. He shot a paranoid look over his shoulder, but there was no one in the immediate vicinity to witness his folly. He was certain that if his brother stumbled upon them now, he would never hear the end of it.

  “There!” Sabrina said brightly. She rose and capped the bottle. Peggy’s ears twitched forward, and the horse pawed the ground expectantly. Sabrina laughed. “See? She likes it already! At least someone thinks my ideas are good.”

  “I don’t think your ideas are bad,” Trevor muttered. Sabrina glanced up in surprise from caressing Peggy’s nose, and he felt a little hot under the collar all of a sudden. He hadn’t expected her to take his carping to heart. He’d been halfway teasing, shooting down her ideas. Playing curmudgeon to watch her fight back. “Not all of them, anyway,” he amended.

  “Well, isn’t he generous?” Sabrina gave Peggy a pat.

  Trevor moved a little closer, laying his broad, bare hand on the mare’s nose. Peggy snorted and nodded, evidently pleased with all the attention she was receiving. “I appreciate that you’re trying to marry every harebrained idea you have with what’s best for the horses, Miss Hearthstone.”

  “Please,” she said. “If your brother can call me ‘Sabrina,’ then so can you.” She grinned. “Besides, it will look good in front of the guests if we already have a rapport established. It will make it seem like we’re on the same page…even if that isn’t always the case.”

  Trevor crooked a smile and shifted his weight. “Well then, Sabrina, you’re going to want to take that top off.” He indicated her pink checkered shirt with a sweep of his hand and was amused when he saw her cheeks darken to a similar hue. The subtext of his unexpected comment wasn’t lost on him. “Peggy’s a doll, but she isn’t a Barbie doll,” he continued. “You think the idea of a bath gets her excited now, just wait till the hose comes out again and the suds start flying. Things’ll go a lot easier the less heavy clothes you’re wearing.”

  “Good point,” Sabrina said thoughtfully. “Now that you mention it…”

  Trevor watched as Sabrina moved back to strip her outer layer off her shoulders, revealing that the smooth, bare skin of her collar bone was as freckle-dusted as her nose. Trevor swallowed and kept his expression carefully neutral even as she turned from him to toss her shirt over the stable door. Something as simple as an unexpected smattering of freckles shouldn’t come as a revelation to him, but he couldn’t deny the appeal—especially on a woman already as effortlessly lovely as Sabrina. She obviously wasn’t afraid to let the summer sun come out and kiss that porcelain complexion of hers.

  “There.” She fluffed her ponytail to fullness and turned back to Trevor. “Is this better?” She stood before him now clad in a white T-shirt and jeans.

  “Gonna guess I can’t convince you to get out of those,” he said, gesturing with the end of Peggy’s lead rope to Sabrina’s skinny jeans.

  Sabrina grinned. “Not unless you want to turn this into a bikini horse wash.”

  “I’ll just bet you have a bikini packed away in your suitcase somewhere,” he muttered.

  “That’s for me to know and you to never find out,” Sabrina teased. “Well, unless you have a Jacuzzi hidden around here somewhere that I don’t know about.”

  “Not a lot of Jacuzzis out in this part of the country. I think this is as close as you’re going to get,” he replied. “All right. First things first.” He picked up a curry comb and passed it across Peggy’s back to Sabrina. “Go down her side and work the dirt and dust out of her coat. Then take the body brush, there,” he said, pointing to the next brush arrayed on the bench, “and go over her a second time to make sure she’s clean. You start in with the suds first, and you’re going to wind up with a mud-caked horse that smells like a damn cupcake.”

  “You hear that? He likes that smell,” Sabrina confided in Peggy. “Maybe I shouldn’t tell him it’s my bodywash we’re using.”

  The thought had already crossed his mind, of course, and he had just as quickly banished the mental image that went along with it. He didn’t need to know that Sabrina Hearthstone smelled as good as she looked. But he also hadn’t told her where to find the soap he normally used on the horses.

  They worked down the length of the mare in relative silence, communicating their progress through little puffs of dust that erupted into the air above their brushes. “Good,” Trevor said after a while. “See how relaxed she is? If you want to pursue this crazy idea of yours to have visitors clean the horses, you’re going to want to encourage trust between horse and camper.”

  “You mean ‘horse and glamper.’”

  Trevor didn’t dignify that with a response. “We brush them down like this twice a day, so it’s something they’re used to already. It makes them feel good and signals to them that they’re in capable hands. They’ll be more likely to trust you with whatever potions you want to throw at them after a good rubdown.”

  “May I give her a sugar cube?” Sabrina inquired. Trevor nodded and watched as she plucked two from the box on the bench: one for Peggy, and one for herself. She held his eyes as she popped the second one mischievously into her mouth. Trevor experienced an immediate, impulsive desire to reclaim it—preferably with his own mouth, his tongue dancing with hers.

  He shook his head to clear the thought. Sabrina watched him, tonguing the cube around behind her perfect teeth, and crunching down with a grin. She was teasing him, but the angelic quality of her smile told him she had no idea how well it was working.

  “Comb out her mane next,” he said gruffly. “Use the curry comb if you want. I’ll get her tail—you’ll want to be careful with that. Don’t let your campers walk around behind her. That’s a good way to get kicked, and our insurance is steep enough already.”

  “Yes, sir,” Sabrina said as she moved to the front of the mare. Once they’d groomed Peggy from tip to tail, they reconvened by the suds bucket. Trevor passed Sabrina a sponge and a jelly scrubber.

  “I’ll let you lead on this,” he said.

  To his surprise, Sabrina’s expression turned uncertain. “I…Well, you’re doing a great job directing me so far,” she admitted. “If you give me instructions, I’ll feel more confident relaying them to our guests—knowing they came from you.”

  Trevor said nothing in response. As Sabrina rose from wetting her sponge, he quietly assumed a position behind her to keep up his instructions. The crown of her head barely came up to his chin. When she turned to look back at him, she seemed taken by surprise at their height difference. Her eyebrows rose as she glanced up and into his eyes. She gave her head a little shake and turned back to the horse.

  “Start here?” she suggested. She began to soap Peggy’s neck in slow rotations. The horse whickered.

  “Right,” Trevor agreed. “Start back up at the head. She trusts you now, but she’s still less comfortable with the sponge, soap, and water than the brush. Give her time to adjust and see what you’re doing.”

  “How about you?” Sabrina inquired offhand. “Have you had enough time to…adjust…to me yet? Or do you still not trust me?”

  “I trust you.” His response came automatically, and he wondered if he should have thought it through first. “Your heart’s in the right place.”

  “But you don’t think my ideas are sound,” she argued. “You might think my heart is in the right place, Mr. Wild, but you also think my head’s in the clouds. To you I’m all blonde hair, fun earrings, and coconut-scented oils and bubbles, but I’m as hard a worker as you are. I just have different goals. I want to help people who devote their lives to unglamorous chores, like you do, feel special. I want to help them relax.”

  “Relax,” Trevor echoed. His hands found her shoulders and she paused in her work. “Peggy can feel that you’re tense.”

  “Am I?” Sabrina’s voice wavered a little. “I hadn’t noticed.”

  Trevor let his hands slide down the slope of her shoulders. He felt it when some of Sabrina’s tension eased out of her posture, and she relaxed back into him slightly. “Better,” he said. “Remember that horses can sense your emotions. That’s probably something you’ll want to tell our guests.”

  “Our guests?” she repeated as she resumed washing Peggy. “Does that mean you’ll be involved after all?”

  “It’s my ranch,” Trevor reminded her. “I’m involved in everything that goes on here whether I like it or not.”

  “What about Trent? Doesn’t he help you?”

  “Trent has his own life to lead. He has a share in Wildhorse, but that’s about it. I try not to ask more of him,” Trevor said. “He volunteered to help you settle in while I was away.”

  “He’s a good man.” Sabrina hesitated. “You both are. Your grandfather…he’s the one who raised you?”

  “After our dad died in a riding accident. I was seventeen.”

  Sabrina stopped washing at this revelation. Trevor reached along the length of her arm and wove his fingers with hers to encourage her to keep going with the sponge.

  “And your mother…”

  “Before that. She died in childbirth.” Trevor kept his hand steady on hers. “My father remarried. After his death, my stepmother, Pam, moved back to Austin with my half-brother, Charlie. She was a hard-working woman, but never cut out for this life. Her heart wasn’t in it.”

  Trevor fell silent. He hadn’t meant to reveal so much. Something about Sabrina made him want her to get him, to see what made him tick. To see that he wasn’t some ogre hung up on rules—that when he said no to her, he had his reasons. He watched over her shoulder as their joined hands continued to work the lather into Peggy’s coat in slow, relaxing circles.

  “Is he still in Austin?” asked Sabrina.

  “He has his life to lead, same as Trent.” Trevor dodged the question, not wanting to get into Charlie’s exploits. “We still keep in touch and do holidays together.”

  “So this is all on you—the whole ranch. Everything. That’s a lot to take on.” Sabrina tucked a loose strand of hair behind one ear with her free hand as she absorbed his story. Finally, she gave a little laugh. “I can’t believe you of all people just opened up to me like that. This coconut bodywash must be as relaxing as the bottle claims.”

  “I have no problem talking about myself or my life,” Trevor said. “It just isn’t something I do all the time.” Or with just anyone, he thought, but didn’t say.

  “Still, I’m honored,” said Sabrina. “I thought you might keep up the silent treatment the whole time I’m here.”

  Trevor bristled. “The silent treatment? I’ve talked plenty with you. I just didn’t think you were open to hearing what I had to say.”

  “I’m not open to what you have to say?” Sabrina turned halfway around in his arms in astonishment, and Trevor realized for the first time how close they were standing to one another. Guiding Sabrina from behind had felt like harmless flirtation, but having her lips this close to his own felt like a threat to the professionalism they were still fighting to establish.

  “You’re right,” he amended quickly, mostly to get her to turn back around. “You’ve been surprisingly open to compromise. I’ll admit I misjudged you.”

  “Thank you.” Sabrina spun back around to face Peggy, and the moment passed without her having noticed it begin. Trevor stifled a sigh of relief and resumed guiding her hand, ignoring the friction between her back and his chest.

  “You have nice hands,” he said, at the next sweep of the sponge. “They’re soft. If you’re going to follow me around and get in the thick of things, you’re going to want a pair of work gloves to protect them.”

  “I honestly can’t tell if that’s a dig or a compliment.” Sabrina let out a chuckle. “Seems to me a man like you wouldn’t find much to admire in a city girl’s hands. I wish I had more callouses.”

  “Work without gloves and you’ll get there. Give it time.” Trevor thought he could spend a lot of time like this, close enough to Sabrina he could smell her clean sweat. Close enough he could feel when she drew a deep breath. He didn’t pull away until they had finished soaping Peggy’s side together. Sabrina bent to squeeze the sponge out, and shot an amused look over her shoulder.

  “Not bad,” he said, running his eyes over Peggy. He had to admit she looked spotless, and relaxed besides.

  “Does that mean you’re going to let me stick around for a little while, Mr. Wild?”

  “Trevor,” he corrected automatically. “You wanted to establish a rapport, remember? It sounds unequal when I’m the only one on a first-name basis.”