Almost Fired by the Cowboy - Natalie Dean Page 0,9

that it was noon, that usually meant that Solomon was in his office or in the city with that French girl and Silas was doing some sort of dumb manual repair somewhere, so that meant the only brother he even could find would be Sterling, fresh up from his second sleep and most likely rooting around in the kitchen for a dorky picnic lunch to take to his irritating girlfriend.

And sure enough, as Sal stormed into the house, he caught sight of Sterling bent half into the fridge, rummaging around for food. It irked Sal that Elizabeth was not only being paid well over the market average, but she also was constantly being fed from their kitchen. In fact, all of the ladies ate from their kitchen fairly often. He thought that they’d be more grateful considering all that was provided to them courtesy of the Miller family, but nooo, they were evil corporate overlords.

Sal rolled his eyes and went straight to his brother, clearing his throat when he was just behind the younger twin. Sterling jumped, whirling around with a shout.

“Whoa, Sal, some personal space, would ya? You startled me.”

But Sal didn’t even bother with a reply, going straight into his diatribe.

“You need to get control of your woman and have her fire that girl she just hired.”

“What are you talking about?”

Sterling blinked at him, like Salvatore was speaking another language, and that just made Sal’s irritation rise that much further.

“I said—”

“No, I know what you said, I was just giving you a chance to turn that sentence around if you wanted me to actually give a red cent about what you’re saying.” Sterling shook his head, a dismissive expression crossing his face.

That was the opposite of what Sal had wanted, which of course made his temper burn that much hotter. He worked so hard; why did none of his brothers respect him?

Sterling continued, “My woman? Really? You’re lucky Elizabeth’s not around to hear you call her that because I don’t think I’d be able to stop her from laying you out.”

Sal felt his chest swell. As if she could. “That’s the thing! Her employee, that girl she hired, tackled me!”

“Wait, the new tech? The one with an accent and a knee brace?”

Wait, she’d had an accent? Sal had been so blindsided, so caught up in his anger that he hadn’t even noticed. “Yes, the one with a leg brace! How many techs is she hiring?!”

“Whoa, you need to take it down about three notches, brother. You’ve got, what, a hundred pounds on that girl. I’m sure you’re fine.”

Sal couldn’t believe it. “It’s not about being fine! It’s about respect to the company—”

“What were you doing?”

“Pardon?”

“Look, you’re a mountain of muscle and bigger than all of the rest of us. A young lady in a knee brace isn’t just going to dive tackle you for no reason. What happened? Did you scare her? You two just run into each other around a corner?”

“No, we did not just run into each other around a corner. I was about to kill a snake when she completely blindsided me and I slid on the gravel! I had a shovel; we both could have been hurt!”

“Wait, why were you trying to kill a snake?”

“Because snakes are dangerous. They kill chickens and scare horses and—”

“Did it look like a copperhead or a rattlesnake?”

Sal just blinked at his brother right back. The conversation was not going how he had envisioned it. “No, it wasn’t a rattlesnake and I don’t remember how a copperhead looks.”

“Huh, maybe you should look that up then. Some of the snakes around here are actually pretty good for the ranch’s ecosystems. They keep the rat population down, but also end up being food for some of the wild birds who also keep the rat population down. All in all, better to not go around killin’ animals for just being animals.”

“Are you being serious right now?”

“Yeah, Sal. I mean, did the snake rattle at you? Or hiss? Or even strike? Or was it trying to run away… ”

“I… I don’t know. I just saw it and reacted.”

“Look, I know you spend most of your time inside or working on the more person-to-person parts of the business, but maybe it would help you to familiarize yourself with the native critters around here. Anyway, I’m gonna be late to lunch if I don’t hurry.”

“So you’re not gonna fire the girl? Even though she laid hands on your brother?”

“No, I don’t think I’m too keen