Kitabı oku: «Courtship, Montana Style», sayfa 3
Chapter Three
Elizabeth knew the instant Walker entered the living room. It was as though he radiated a magnetic force that drew every eye in the room, most especially hers. She suspected he’d get the same reaction at a fancy charity ball in San Francisco as he did here, every woman drawn to him.
There was no sign of Speed, who she assumed must have gone to the bunkhouse after the kitchen cleanup. Or maybe even into town, such as it was with a business district no more than two blocks long.
Bean Pole, who was sitting awkwardly on a foot-stool in front of Scotty and the baby, complained, “Scotty won’t let me and Fridge hold Susie-Q.”
“She’s asleep. You don’t want to wake her, do you?” Scotty insisted, speaking softly but with an air of superiority as the resident expert on babies.
Deciding she needed to regain control of the parenting duties, Elizabeth rose from the couch. She felt Walker’s appraising gaze and wondered what he was thinking. Men often found her attractive; she recognized the look. But she saw something else in Walker’s eyes that didn’t bode well for her scheme—the shadow of suspicion.
“Let’s put Susie-Q back in the car seat,” she said to the boys. “She’ll nap for a while and then will want to play again before she goes down for the night.” She carried the car seat to a quiet corner of the room out of the bright light, signaling Scotty to bring the baby. “When she’s ready for her last feeding, Fridge can give her a bottle.”
“Doesn’t she eat any real food?” Bean Pole asked.
“Not yet. In another month I’ll start her on cereal and some vegetables.”
The three adolescents formed a protective semicircle around the baby, watching as though she were the most fascinating thing in the world. Elizabeth agreed with that assessment, of course. In the past three months, she’d spent a good many hours observing Suzanne in every situation imaginable. But to have teenage boys find her baby equally intriguing surprised her.
Lazily Walker strolled the rest of the way into the room. “A watched pot never boils, boys.”
Scotty glanced over his shoulder. “Huh?”
“I mean, you might as well relax and let the baby sleep.”
“Maybe there’s wrestling on TV,” Fridge suggested, glancing at the twenty-four-inch set strategically placed on a bookshelf near the fireplace.
Scotty gave him a thumbs-down on that idea. “The noise would wake her up.”
“No, it wouldn’t,” Fridge argued.
“You always start yelling ’n’ stuff,” Bean Pole said.
“You’re the one who—”
Elizabeth winced as the bickering rose in volume. Insults were hurled. One shove became two, and she suddenly worried the wrestling match would take place right in the middle of the living room, putting Suzanne at risk of becoming an innocent victim.
But before she could take action, Walker intervened.
“That’s it, boys.” He didn’t shout or react in anger. Even so, the adolescents responded instantly, freezing in midmotion, their mouths slamming shut. “Settle down or take it outside where it belongs.”
Her admiration for Walker’s ability to handle rambunctious teenagers kicked up a notch. Raised as she had been in a family where decorum reigned as gospel, she could barely imagine the day-to-day physicality of living with three adolescent boys. Yet Walker hadn’t flinched. He was every inch a match for the three of them combined.
That thought gave her a little shiver of apprehension. Walker was so big, so strong, a woman would have no choice but to yield to his strength if he demanded it.
Yet, like the boys, she sensed an inner gentleness in Walker. A woman would have no reason to fear him, at least physically.
Protecting her heart would be a different matter.
SEVERAL HOURS LATER, arms folded across his chest, Walker leaned against the doorjamb of the sewing room watching Lizzie as she tucked the baby in for the night. A mighty pretty picture she created bending over the playpen but a puzzling one.
A woman with a wedding gown who wore no rings and acted like a debutante not a housekeeper.
The house was quiet now. The boys had gone back to the bunkhouse after lavishing attention on both Lizzie and the baby, hanging around the house until Fridge had his chance to give the ten o’clock bottle.
But the time had come for Walker to get down to business. He couldn’t put off asking his questions any longer.
“The boys sure have taken a liking to you and the baby, Slick,” he said.
Her head came up as though she’d forgotten he was there. “They’re sweet. All of them.”
“I usually describe them as ornery, rebellious and stubborn. Typical teenagers with pasts that haven’t been easy.”
She gave him a faint smile. “It’s obvious you’re doing a good job with them.”
About twenty times a day he questioned both his sanity and whether he was doing right by the youngsters. Still, he did the best he could. He couldn’t ask more than that of anyone.
Giving the baby a final caress, she stepped away from the playpen.
“Will she sleep through the night?” he asked.
“I hope so. But with so much excitement and being in a new place, it’s hard to say.”
He moved away from the door, and she followed him into the hallway where a low-wattage lightbulb cast muted shadows up and down the corridor, disguising the worn wallpaper and carpeting.
In contrast, Lizzie glowed with quiet vitality, her silver-blond hair shiny even in the dim light and her cheeks blooming with a trace of color. There hadn’t been a woman living in this house in more than thirty years. Suddenly that felt wrong, almost as though the house had been incomplete all these years and no one had noticed.
Aware his thoughts were leading him in an unwanted direction, he cleared his throat. “You and I need to talk.”
“It’s been a long day and it’s late. Would you mind if we waited until tomorrow? If Suzanne wakes up—”
“Tonight would be better. I don’t want the boys interrupting us.”
Her gazed flicked to his face for a moment, then she glanced back over her shoulder at the sleeping baby.
“Susie-Q will be fine,” he said. “If she wakes up you’ll be able to hear her downstairs.”
“I wish you had a baby monitor.”
“We’ve never had any need. Teenage boys can yell pretty loud.”
She hesitated again. “Yes, I suppose so.”
“We can talk in your bedroom, if you’d rather. Or mine.”
With a quick shake of her head, Elizabeth rejected both of those options. If she was going to be grilled by a sexy cowboy she didn’t want to be anywhere near a bed. She was already far too aware of Walker’s elemental maleness and the fact that they were alone in the house. She wasn’t about to tempt fate.
She turned on her heel. “Downstairs will be fine.” Her sandals slapped on the worn carpeting as she strode ahead of him. Now was the time to stay calm so she could keep her story straight. This was a perfect place to hide out. Except for the hum of tension she felt whenever Walker was near, the solitude of the ranch and the wide-open range were ideal for serious thinking.
And for learning how to be the woman she wanted to become.
Even the presence of the boys provided a sense of normalcy that would help her focus on what she wanted for her daughter’s future and her own. Help her find the strength she needed to stand up to her family.
Walker was the only fly in the ointment. He was simply too unsettling for a woman’s peace of mind.
She walked into the living room that was still strewn with baby equipment—Suzanne’s car seat, a receiving blanket, the diaper bag—all of which she’d have to take upstairs. She started to gather them up.
“Speed tells me there’s a wedding gown in the trunk of your car.”
Her head snapped up. Damn! She’d forgotten all about the dress.
“Is that a problem?” she asked, faking a bland expression.
“Not unless a groom shows up here toting a shotgun.”
“That’s not likely to happen on my account.”
“Why? Because there isn’t a groom? Or he doesn’t know where you are?”
Heat crept up her neck. Despite the current situation, she wasn’t used to lying. It made her ill to her stomach. The pork chop she’d eaten for dinner did a roll in her midsection and threatened to do worse if she didn’t come clean. Which she didn’t dare. “What makes you think it’s my gown?”
He eyed her skeptically. “Is it?”
“I was taking it to the cleaners’ for my sister,” she blurted out.
“Try again, Miss Thomas. People who are telling the truth don’t blush.”
The heat on her cheeks grew even more intense. “People who are being grilled by a great big lummox of a cowboy might do a lot of blushing.”
He lifted his dark brows, etching his forehead with a double row of creases.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to insult you,” she said. Wherever had her manners flown? Ever since she’d been able to walk and talk, her parents had drilled politeness into her head. Doing what was expected of her. Behaving properly. In the past three days she’d forgotten every lesson they’d taught her. Or more to the point, at the ripe old age of twenty-five, she’d finally decided to rebel against everything she’d ever known. To take charge of her own life—for Suzanne’s sake as well as her own.
His lips quirked ever so slightly. “No insult taken. What I’m after is the truth.”
Which was exactly what she couldn’t tell him. Not yet. She didn’t trust him enough for that. “If you’d like, you could call the Merry Maids corporate office to check my references.”
“No one’s likely to be around the office at eleven o’clock on a Saturday night.”
“I suppose that’s true.”
Purposefully he walked over to the big native-rock fireplace, picked up the poker and jabbed at a charred log left over from the last fire. “I’d like to know what’s going on now so I don’t have to start making phone calls on Monday morning.”
At least he wasn’t threatening to call the police. So far.
Bending over, she scooped up Suzanne’s blanket and stuffed it in the diaper bag, frantically trying to come up with a story Walker would buy. It’s not like she had a whole lot of experience lying, a serious omission in her liberal-arts education, she now realized.
“Have you ever heard of the witness-protection program?” she ventured.
He stared at her with narrowed eyes but he didn’t immediately dismiss her latest ruse. “Are you saying you witnessed a crime and are hiding out from the criminals?”
Perhaps with enough practice, she’d get prevarication down to a credible art form. “I’m not at liberty to discuss the details.” And she really, truly didn’t want to risk her family finding her just yet.
It was bad enough her hasty departure might place her family’s ambition to see her brother Robert successfully launched in a political career in jeopardy without Vernon’s support. She didn’t want to deal with her guilt on that subject.
Sliding the poker back into its holder, Walker closed the fireplace screen and considered Lizzie’s latest story. Assuming she really was from Nevada as her license plates suggested, he wouldn’t be surprised if she’d come across a criminal element. Hadn’t he heard about the mafia taking over Las Vegas? But he’d thought the state had cleaned up its act. Not that he paid much attention to any news that didn’t involve the weather or the price of beef.
Maybe she had witnessed a crime. Or maybe she’d been scheduled to marry some mafia hit man and had run away at the last minute with her gown in the trunk.
But the way she still couldn’t meet his gaze told him she’d lied to him again.
He walked over to the couch and picked up a cloth diaper she’d used for a spit-up rag, handing it to her.
“Have you broken the law?”
“Oh, no,” she gasped. “Nothing like that.”
For the first time, he believed her. Her response had been too quick, too insistent, to be a lie. He exhaled, surprised by the sense of relief he experienced.
“How ’bout Susie-Q? Is she really your baby?”
“Oh, my God! Did you think—of course she’s my baby!”
He nodded. “I don’t doubt it. She’s got your smile.”
“Don’t you like babies?”
“I like ’em fine, I guess. But it seems to me, being a housekeeper and taking care of your baby at the same time wouldn’t be easy.” With each of her answers, he had new questions.
“I’m sure a lot of stay-at-home moms would agree with you.”
“How about Susie’s father?”
“He…he died.” Her throat worked as though she were trying to tamp down her emotions. “About a year ago.”
“I’m sorry. But are you telling me you’ve been driving around for a year with your wedding gown in the trunk of your car.”
“No. I was going to marry someone else. It was a mistake and I…”
“You’re not really a housekeeper, are you?”
She shook her head. “Not really. But I can learn, I’m sure of it.” As though his interrogation had been too tiring, she sat down at the end of the couch and leaned back, closing her eyes in a gesture of defeat. “Are you going to send us away?”
A part of him knew that’s exactly what he ought to do. If she really was in the witness protection system—which he didn’t believe—the government should have been responsible for putting her in a safe place.
But whatever was happening, she was in some sort of trouble. A woman didn’t run away with her baby on a whim, bridal gown or not. From what he’d seen of her, Lizzie was a good, loving mother. He gave her points for that.
But the fact that a groom had been left at the altar was troubling to say the least.
Even so, the irrational part of his brain argued that she should stay on the Double O for reasons that had nothing to do with the wedding gown, a groom or her baby—or any real or imagined witness-protection program—but simply because he wanted her here. Wanted the sultry scent of her to linger in a room after she left. Wanted to see the quick flash of her smile, even when it wasn’t directed at him. Wanted to hope she wouldn’t always be sleeping in the bed across the hall.
Damn it, he was getting ahead of himself. Sure, he lusted after her. She was a beautiful woman. But the truth of the matter was she and that little baby brought out his protective instincts. He couldn’t turn away a person in trouble or in need. He had an idea she was both.
In frustration, he shoved his fingers through his hair. “You and Susie-Q can stay for now. But if you bring trouble down on the Double O, you’re outta here. Is that understood?”
She lifted her head, her eyes a deep navy-blue and glistening with unshed tears. Slowly she pursed her lips then licked them. “Thank you,” she whispered. “I promise you won’t be sorry.”
He already was sorry, but mostly because he didn’t have the right to carry her upstairs and do with her what his libido had been demanding since she showed up in his driveway with her classy BMW, sophisticated airs and a chubby baby girl a man would be proud to call his own.
“Lizzie—”
“Yes?”
“Most of the boys who come here lie to me about one thing or another at first. Eventually they learn they can trust me. I hope you will, too.”
She didn’t answer. Instead she turned away, diaper bag in hand, and headed up the stairs.
He watched her go. Having Lizzie in the house was going to make changes in his life.
Including a hell of a lot of cold showers.
Chapter Four
Elizabeth snapped Suzanne into a clean jumper outfit and lifted the baby to her shoulder. She really could use a changing table. A proper crib, too, for that matter.
“Come on, Susie-Q. We’re going to make breakfast for the boys.” Surely, even blurry eyed from being up with her daughter three times during the night, Elizabeth would be able to pull together scrambled eggs and toast for a bunch of hungry cowboys. How hard could it be? And she wanted to start as soon as possible making herself useful around the house lest Walker think of an excuse to send her away.
Besides, if she intended to be an independent woman, she needed to start now by learning to do for herself and her baby. A housekeeping job—albeit an unpaid one—was a perfect opportunity.
She slipped Suzanne into the Snugli carrier she’d purchased in Reno, adjusting it so the baby was comfortable against her chest and her own hands were free to get some work done.
At a few minutes past six, she hurried downstairs and found the kitchen empty, the only sign of life the coffeemaker with a freshly brewed pot on the warmer. Someone was up, probably Walker. And since the boys apparently hadn’t arrived for breakfast yet, she’d have time to feed Suzanne, a task she dearly loved.
She quickly fixed a bottle, poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down at the table.
The kitchen was as big as the one in her parents’ home, the appliances almost as new. But the old wooden table, scarred by use, gave it a homey feel missing in the glass and chrome version she’d grown up with.
Humming while Suzanne drank her formula and she sipped her coffee, a feeling of contentment swept over Elizabeth, more satisfying than she had felt in a long while. The months of wedding plans, not to mention her pregnancy and paralyzing grief over Steven’s death, had taken its toll. The tension that had been plaguing her, making her shoulders ache and keeping her teeth on edge, eased away.
She sighed with relief.
The back door banged open, and she jumped at the sight of a stranger standing there. Tall and rangy with midnight-black hair, he had the distinctive features of a Native American.
“Well, now, looks like my brother has been keeping secrets from me.” The smallest hint of a smile teased at the corners of his lips.
Her jaw went slack. Walker’s brother? Except that both men were tall, there wasn’t an iota of family resemblance.
When she continued to sit there mute, he strolled into the kitchen as if he owned the place. He tipped his hat to the back of his head. “I’m Rory, and you must be…” He left the question dangling, waiting for a response.
“I’m Eliz—ah, Lizzie Thomas. Walker’s new housekeeper.”
“His housekeeper?” He sputtered in surprise. “And your young friend?”
Elizabeth looked down at her daughter, who was dozing against her breast. She slipped the empty bottle from the baby’s mouth and glanced up again at the stranger. “Suzanne. Walker calls her Susie-Q.”
“He would. Can’t seem to keep a person’s name straight.” With easy familiarity, he went to the cupboard, took down a mug and poured himself some coffee. “What does he call you? Besides Lizzie, I mean.”
“Slick,” she admitted.
He eyed her with intensely dark eyes. “My people named me Swift Eagle, so most of the time when we were kids, Walker called me Bird Brain.”
She sputtered a laugh. “You’re really brothers?”
“Yep. Me and Walker and another white-eyes named Eric were foster brats. Oliver Oakes adopted us.”
She had no idea Walker had been in foster care, although that did explain his willingness to take in troubled youngsters now. “If you’re looking for Walker, I’m not quite sure where—”
“He’s out at the corral with the boys working a green horse.”
“The boys are already up? It’s only six-thirty.”
“Oh, I imagine they’ve all been up since five. Walker runs a tight ship. I just came in for a cup of coffee. He has a couple of heifers with pinkeye he wanted me to check out.”
So much for her grand plan to make herself useful. “They’ve probably already had breakfast, then.” Which she had slept through.
“No doubt.” Pulling out the chair next to her, he lifted a booted foot to the seat and rested a forearm across his thigh, mug still in hand. He leaned toward her. “Now tell me, Miss Lizzie Thomas, how does it happen my brother has all the luck when it comes to having a beautiful woman as a housekeeper?”
Despite the flush of pleasure his compliment brought, she suppressed a smile. “I’m not sure he sees me in that same light.”
“I’ve always said he’s somewhere between dumb and dumbest when it comes to women.”
“I gather you and your brother have a loving relationship.”
“Blood brothers. I bloodied his nose and he bloodied mine.”
She couldn’t help herself. She laughed out loud, startling Suzanne awake.
The back door opened again, admitting Walker in a rush of dry summer air. His Stetson was tipped back on his head, and he had the sleeves of his blue denim shirt rolled up as though the day had already turned warm.
“I’m sure glad I’m not paying you by the hour,” he complained before coming to a complete halt. The rush of jealousy that whipped through his gut caught him entirely off guard. Why the hell was Rory laughing with Slick, happily on the receiving end of one of her most radiant smiles.
To top it off, she’d done something different with her hair. It was still pulled back, this time in a ponytail she’d double looped through an elastic scrunchy the same shade of blue as her eyes—a decorative addition he had an irritating urge to tug free in order that her hair would hang loose around her shoulders.
“In case you haven’t noticed, big brother, you’re not paying me at all. But if you’d like to, I’d be happy to send you an invoice.”
“In your dreams,” he muttered. To Lizzie he said, “I gather you’ve met Grass Valley’s leading—and only, I might add—veterinarian.”
“Yes. He tells me you’re brothers. I must say, the family resemblance is…uncanny.”
Walker scowled at his brother. They didn’t look a damn bit alike.
“She’s pulling your leg, boss man. I’ve been telling you for years, you’ve got to work on your sense of humor.”
Ignoring his brother’s remark, as he usually did, Walker centered his attention on Lizzie. “I’m glad you got to sleep late. I heard you up with the baby a couple of times. Restless night, huh?”
“I meant to be up in time to fix you and the boys breakfast. I’m sorry—”
“You don’t have to do that,” he said.
Swinging the chair back into its original position, Rory chuckled. “If you were my housekeeper, Miss Lizzie, trust me, I would have brought you breakfast in bed. As a welcome present.”
“Yeah, and if I know you, it would have been dog chow,” Walker countered. “Besides, don’t you have something else to do instead of hanging around here?”
“You’re right.” Apparently unconcerned by his brother’s jibes, Rory placed his mug on the counter. “They’ve got ringworm over at Riley’s place. I’d best be going.”
“It was nice to meet you, Rory,” Lizzie said.
“My pleasure.” He touched two fingers to the brim of his Stetson like some damn movie cowboy. “You let me know if this guy isn’t behaving himself, all right? I’d always be happy to have company at my place.”
Walker glared at his brother in a way meant to communicate Rory was trespassing on his territory. Which was ridiculous. Walker had no proprietary rights to Lizzie. She was a woman in trouble. He was simply helping out. Temporarily. If she wanted to hang around Rory’s veterinary clinic, it was fine by him.
Or so he told himself.
When the outer door slammed shut behind Rory, Lizzie said, “I am sorry I didn’t get up in time to help with breakfast.”
“There was no need. We’re pretty self-sufficient around here.”
Holding Susie-Q in her lap, she patted the baby’s back. Drool edged out of the corners of her mouth. “I do want to be helpful while I’m here.”
Which Walker didn’t imagine would be long. He didn’t run a dude ranch and there wasn’t a decent mall in a hundred miles, much less a place to get her siren-red nails fixed if she broke one.
“The boys are on their own to rustle up their own lunches. But they’d probably enjoy a woman’s cooking for supper, if you’re willing.”
“I could probably put together a nice salad for dinner, if you have the fixings. I always lose my appetite in hot weather, don’t you?”
He narrowed his eyes. “Slick, remember we’re talkin’ about boys with hollow legs. It takes something solid to fill them up.”
“Yes, of course, I wasn’t thinking—”
“They like fried chicken. You think you could handle that?”
“I, well, fried chicken sounds fine.” Elizabeth glanced around the kitchen in the desperate hope of spotting a cookbook. Surely in one of the cupboards she’d find—
“When you’re finished with breakfast, come on out. I’ll give you a tour of the place.”
“I’d like that, thank you.”
He gave her an odd look she couldn’t interpret, then went out the back way, leaving her wondering why he’d come in the house at all. And why he’d acted so funny toward his brother, Rory.
“Miss Susie-Q.” She lifted the baby up in the air. “We have our work cut out for us if we’re going to persuade Mr. Walker Oakes that he hasn’t made a mistake by letting us stay.”
She’d always worried about what others thought of her. Indeed, she’d made friends easily over the years, largely because she went along with what they wanted. And, of course, her family was influential, which drew people to her, often asking for favors. Few in the business community wanted to cross her father and no woman in the country-club set would think of going up against her mother in a dispute. Growing up, Elizabeth had the protection of her family wrapped around her like a security blanket.
In Montana she was on her own. She’d have to prove her worth to others—and, more importantly, to herself.
Getting up from the table, she braced Suzanne with one arm and started opening cupboard doors. “We’ll do just fine, Susie-Q. Assuming I can find a cookbook.”
“WHAT A GLORIOUS DAY.” Standing at the corral fence, Suzanne snuggled next to her chest, Elizabeth looked up at a clear-blue sky. Not a single cloud dotted the horizon, not even beyond the rolling, tree-covered hills to the west. Although it was still early, the temperature was beginning to climb and would likely reach eighty before long.
“It would be better if we got rain,” Walker mumbled.
“And ruin a perfectly good day at the beach? No way.”
His head snapped around. “The beach is about a thousand miles west, in case you hadn’t noticed.”
“It’s a manner of speaking.” Tossing her head, she strolled along the corral fence until she reached the sorrel the boys had been working. “I bet you’d like to go for a run in the surf, wouldn’t you, sweetie?”
“Careful,” Walker warned. “She’s still green. There’s no predicting—”
“She’s fine, aren’t you, honey bunch?” She stroked the horse’s velvety nose and scratched her cheek with her fingernails. “You’re just a little agitated by all those boys.”
“You know about horses?” Walker seemed as surprised as though she’d announced she were an expert volcanologist.
“I’ve owned several,” she said primly, before realizing she should have bitten her tongue before admitting to any such thing. She didn’t dare give him a clue as to who she really was—a woman who was hiding out from family pressures she couldn’t handle.
“Where?”
“Why does it matter? Horses don’t have a very good sense of geography.” Turning away from the sorrel, she forced herself to meet Walker’s skeptical gaze. “You said you were going to show me around.”
“Not that there’s a whole lot to see that would interest a city slicker.”
“Try me, cowboy.”
A megawatt of electricity zapped between them as they both realized the double meaning of her words.
“I didn’t mean—”
“Of course not.” His lips canted into a grin with fully as many watts as the Grand Coulee Dam produced. “Barns and fields of hay are really exciting.”
Not willing to let him get the upper hand, she said, “With the right tour guide, I’m sure they’ll be fascinating.”
He sputtered. Amazingly his tanned cheeks took on a rosy hue as though he were embarrassed by a little harmless flirtation. “You need a hat on if you’re going to be out here in the sun.”
“I didn’t think to bring one with me.”
“In a hurry to leave home, were you?”
“You could say that.”
He studied her for a moment, his expression again unreadable, then he shouted to one of the boys. “Bean Pole, bring me that straw hat I keep in the barn.”
The young man’s head poked out of the barn. “Comin’!”
Seconds later the youngster appeared, Bandit bounding along beside him. The boy handed her the most bedraggled straw hat Elizabeth had ever seen and gave her a shy smile before running off again. Bandit took time to sniff around her legs before racing after the boy.
Holding the hat in her hand, she eyed Walker skeptically. “I wouldn’t want to deprive your local scarecrow of his crowning glory.”
“In Kansas they’ve got scarecrows. Not here.”
“Then this is—” delicately, she placed the hat on her head “—a fashion statement?”
A potent smile transformed his expression from stern to dynamite sexy. “Montana style.”
ELIZABETH NOTED THE BARN sported a fresher coat of red paint than the white that covered the house, suggesting Walker’s priorities were focused on the workings of the ranch, not his living accommodations.
The barn door mawed open, the shadowed interior revealing a huge tractor far more modern than the one that appeared abandoned beside the barn. Inside were all of the accoutrements for a big operation, from horse stalls and a tack room with a dozen bridles and saddles to tilling disks for the tractor.
“How big a ranch do you have?” she asked, enjoying the rich scents of horses and hay as they brought back fond memories of her youthful equestrian efforts.
He shrugged negligently. “About three thousand acres. Every time some land became available in the valley, my dad snapped it up.”
“Very impressive.”
“The hard part is keeping it all running without going so far in debt that the bank ends up owning it all, lock, stock and tractors.”
“Which can’t be easy with the price of beef slipping.”
He slanted her a surprised look from beneath his Stetson. “How do you know about the price of beef?”
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