Cody’s jaw dropped. “You hired the thief who stole your car? Haven’t you ever heard of jail time? If any of us had stolen a car and gone joyriding, you’d have helped the sheriff turn the lock on the cell.”

“It didn’t seem like the thing to do with a thirteen-year-old girl,” Harlan said mildly. “Seemed to me this was a better way to teach her a lesson.”

Cody fell silent, clearly chewing over the concept of a teenage girl as his newest ranch hand. “What the hell am I supposed to have her doing?” he asked finally.

“You’re not her boss,” Harlan said, amused by the relief that instantly spread across Cody’s face. “I am. I just wanted you to know she’d be around. Her name’s Jenny Runningbear.”

“Runningbear? Is her mother...?”

“The new lawyer in town,” Harlan supplied, watching as curiosity rose in Cody’s eyes.

“Did you meet her?” Cody asked.

“I did.” He decided then and there that he’d better be stingy with information about that meeting. His son had the look of a man about to make a romantic mountain out of a platonic molehill.

“And?”

“And, what?”

“What did you think of her?”

“She seemed nice,” Harlan offered blandly, even as he conjured up some fairly steamy images of the raven-haired beauty who’d struck him as a fascinating blend of strength and vulnerability. Nice was far too tame a description for that delicate, exotic face, those long, long legs, and eyes so dark a man could lose himself in them.

“Really?” Cody said, skepticism written all over his face. “Nice?”

Harlan didn’t like the way Cody was studying him. “That’s what I said, isn’t it?” he replied irritably.

“Just seemed sort of namby-pamby to me,” Cody retorted. “I might have described her as hot. I believe Jordan said something similar after he spotted her.”

Harlan bit back a sharp rebuke. His gaze narrowed. “Exactly how well do you and your brother know the woman?”

“Not well enough to say more than hello when we pass on the street. Never even been introduced. Of course, if we both weren’t happily married, we’d probably be brawling over first dibs on meeting her.”

“See that you remember that you are married,” he advised his son.

“Interesting,” Cody observed, his eyes suddenly sparkling with pure mischief.

“What’s interesting?”

“The way you’re getting all protective about the mother of a teenage car thief. What time are they getting here in the morning?”

“That’s nothing you need to concern yourself about.” He stood, glanced at his watch pointedly as he anticipated his housekeeper’s imminent announcement that dinner was on the table. “I’d invite you to dinner, but I told Maritza I’d be eating alone. It’s time you got home to your wife and those grandbabies of mine anyway.”