Harlequin American Romance May 2014 Bundle: One Night in Texas\The Cowboy's Destiny\A Baby for the Doctor\The Bull Rider's Family (61 page)

“I’m sorry,” she said, grabbing a mug. “I won’t let it happen again.” She tugged her hair out from underneath the back of her T-shirt.

“Where is everyone?” she asked. Though they were alone in the room, the last thing she needed was for Colt to walk through the door and accuse her of slacking off.

“Oh, they’re all busy. Garrett and Colt are checking the fence lines between us and Ol’ Man Tompkins’s place.” Doris hefted her coffee mug to the west. “Always a problem there.” She took a sip. “Randy and Royce took Tim and Chris with ’em to work on the little house. Ty and Sarah dropped Jimmy off to play with his friend at the Gillmores’. I think Sarah’s upstairs packing. Ty’s wrapping up things in the office. The others are out doing whatever they have to do to keep body and soul together.”

It sounded as if everyone had a job and, except for her, they were hard at work doing it. Emma tugged her jeans a bit higher on her hips and wished she’d thought to put on a belt. “What can I do to help out?”

“Nothin’ right now. Supper’s taken care of. Stacy Gillmore sent Ty and Sarah back with enough beef stew to feed an army. There’s still plenty of rolls and salads left over from yesterday.”

A shadow passed over Doris’s face. She pinched the edge from one of the coffee cakes, and placed it on her plate but didn’t eat it. Before Emma could ask if she was all right, the older woman found her bearings and continued. “The men eat sandwiches for lunch—I usually pack them the night before so’s all they have to do is grab ’em and go. Peanut butter and jelly, mostly. You never know where they’ll be working. Might not have access to a fridge.”

Emma nodded. Bagged lunches sounded easy enough and put her concerns about the lunch service to rest. She crossed from the cupboard to the coffeepot and poured herself a cup. “Sounds like we have a few things to go over,” she suggested. She cautioned herself to proceed slowly. For weeks after Jack’s funeral, she’d drifted through life in a fog. Just because Doris had rolled out of bed at her usual time and skipped the widow’s weeds, that didn’t mean she was operating at full steam.

“I have a few things left to stash in my suitcase.” Doris drained the last of her cup. “Let me do that, and we can get started.”

“Great. We’ll get washed up—” Emma nodded toward Bree’s milky mouth “—and be right back down.” She topped off her mug and held out a hand to her daughter. “Come on, sweetie. Let’s go get dressed.”

The little girl scrambled down from her chair. “Will we see horses today, Mommy? Can I ride one?”

The thought of her child sitting astride a big horse was enough to send concern shivering down Emma’s spine.

“On a ranch like the Circle P, everybody has to be able to handle a horse,” Doris said quietly. “It’s practically in the job description.”

Maybe, but Emma waved a hand toward a sink full of dirty dishes. “For now, I think I’d better concentrate on all this.”

Minutes later, while she brushed the sleep tangles from Bree’s hair, Emma used the time to impress on her four-year-old the importance of following the rules.

“Remember how, in the city, you weren’t allowed to cross the street without holding my hand?”

Bree nodded solemnly. “Always watch for the blinking man. He’ll tell you when it’s safe. Look both ways. And hold Mommy’s hand or the cars will knock me down.” She tipped her head up at Emma. “But, Mommy, there aren’t any cars here. Just cowboys.”

“On a ranch, we have different things to watch out for. Horses weigh a lot. If one of them stepped on your foot, it’d hurt. Cows—you saw those sharp horns. A little girl like you could get poked.” She prodded Bree’s ribs and listened to her daughter laugh. She took a breath. “So never wander off on your own.”

Making a rule for her four-year-old was one thing. Trusting her daughter to obey it was something else. While she brushed her own hair into a no-nonsense ponytail, Emma wondered if she’d done the right thing by moving them to a place where she hardly knew what was safe for herself, much less for her child.

She blinked slowly. New York had a lot to offer, but she’d been hemmed in by tall buildings, crowds and traffic. In a city known for its five-star restaurants, the chance to run her own kitchen had been at least ten years in her future. Worse, her twelve-and fourteen-hour days began at noon and stretched into the wee hours of the morning. Which meant, other than on her days off, she rarely caught more than a glimpse of her daughter.

Was that the kind of future she wanted?

Here, she’d barely stepped on the premises before she’d been handed the chance to be her own boss. True, the hours were long, and she still hadn’t seen the little house they kept saying would be hers and Bree’s, but even in the middle of a funeral, everyone had gone out of their way to give her and her daughter a warm welcome.

She stared out the immense picture window overlooking the front yard. Beyond the barn, flat land stretched for more miles than she could cover in a day’s walk. There were trees for Bree to climb, grassy lawns to play on and room for an active four-year-old to romp.

The only fly in the ointment was Colt. The altercation with the tall rancher still rankled. She was certain their problems were far from over. And, once Doris and the Parkers left, there’d be no one to run interference for her with the handsome man who oh so obviously didn’t want her on his ranch.

Chapter Three

Sunlight filtered through the kitchen’s screened door. Declaring the oasis the perfect spot, Bree dumped an armload of doll clothes in the puddle of sunshine.

“Mrs. Wickles and me are gonna watch for cowboys.” She pressed her nose against the wire mesh. “I want them to come to my tea party.”

“Stay inside.” Emma placed her own supplies on the kitchen table. “Ms. Doris said everybody went to work early this morning. They won’t be back again till dinner.”

Though she doubted Bree would wander off—not so soon after their talk—Emma reached past her daughter to hook the latch. Beyond the patio, an old dog lounged in the shade beneath the oak tree. A black bird larger than any crow she’d ever seen pecked at the grass. A distant pond glistened, and she wondered if it held fish. Fresh-caught and grilled to perfection, almost any kind of seafood made a nice meal. She crossed to the table, where she added a note to a list she’d started while looking through the Circle P’s treasured cookbook the night before.

Mission accomplished, she tugged on the hem of the simple floral blouse she’d chosen instead of her chef’s whites. With Bree playing quietly, Emma plunged a sticky pan into an immense copper sink that made her fears of rusty appliances and warped counters seem silly. There were changes to make, of course. Storing dishes in the cabinet opposite the fridge meant having to cross the kitchen every time she reached for a glass. The battered thirty-cup percolator was older than she was. It would have to go. The bread box sat too close to the stove. But, all in all, things were in far better shape than she’d expected.

She finished washing the pan and set it aside to drain. Deciding the best way to preserve her job was to avoid another run-in with Colt, she vowed to keep her distance from the imposing cowboy. Besides, she had other, more pressing, problems. Last night, she’d scratched her head over the oldest recipes in the Circle P’s cookbook. Some of them were little more than a list of ingredients. She supposed niceties like temperatures and cooking times had been handed down from one generation to another. While she loved the idea of being part of that tradition, those other cooks had worked together for years. She needed to learn all they’d absorbed in just one day.

One day.
How was she ever going to do it?

When Doris returned just as she was drying the last of the dishes, Emma opened her laptop and found her notes.

“Okay, so biscuits.” Her fingers poised over the keyboard. “From all accounts, they’re your specialty. Several former guests even mentioned them on the website.” She squeezed her eyes closed and swallowed. “I have to admit, that’s something I’ve never quite mastered.”

Doris sipped from an ever-present cup of coffee. “The secret to a good biscuit is a light touch. I mix up all the dry ingredients and keep them over there.” She motioned toward a large ceramic bowl on the dry sink. “There’s oil in the cupboard overhead. Add it and the milk at the same time. Don’t stir any more than you have to. Pat out the dough. Don’t roll it.”

Emma typed furiously, stopping only when Doris pushed her coffee aside and stood.

“Or you can do what I’ve done the past ten years.” She crossed to the big Sub-Zero and pulled open the lowest storage bin. “You can use these.” She held up a popular brand of canned biscuits.

Stunned, Emma sat back in her chair. “You’re kidding, right?”

Doris pointed to an age-lined face. “Do I look like I’m joking?”

Emma searched the woman’s blue eyes for a hint of humor and found none.

“But—” she protested. “But what about the traditions Colt said were so important?”

“Honey, Colt’s just like you—brand-new to the job and eager to make an impression. My advice? Don’t waste time on the small stuff. I’ve been serving store-bought at the house for the better part of a decade, and nobody’s been the wiser.” She gazed through the window over the sink. “I’d do it on the trail rides, but the cans are a mite harder to hide out there.”

Emma blew out a long, slow breath. Learning the older cook had a few ready-made tricks up her sleeves took some of the stress off her shoulders. Her confidence bolstered, she returned to the task at hand.

“Okay,” she said, “what’s next?”

For hours, they pored over the cookbook while Bree chatted with Mrs. Wickles and played with her dolls.

“I’ll never get all this right,” Emma mused when they finally took a break.

Menus at the Circle P were at once simple and challenging. According to Doris, oven-fried chicken and mashed potatoes were nearly as popular as swamp cabbage, a dish Emma had never heard of, much less prepared. Apparently, it involved harvesting the hearts from palm trees.

How was she supposed to do that, she wondered.

“You’re gonna make mistakes. Everybody does,” Doris soothed. “The first time I fixed meat loaf, I was so proud of it. When I took it out of the oven, the bacon and tomato crust on top was perfect. The edges, dark and crispy. Seth said it was so pretty, it set his mouth watering. That was before I sliced into it.”

She slapped the table, tears and laughter sparkling in her eyes. “It literally poured out of the pan. Seth ladled it over his mashed potatoes and said it was the best gravy he’d ever tasted.”

Her laughter faded and she wiped her eyes with the edge of her apron. “I’m sure gonna miss that old man.”

“I’m not sure Colt would think a ruined meal was something to laugh at,” Emma mumbled. For the life of her, she couldn’t picture the big man smiling about...anything.

“My boys—they all have their moments—but I couldn’t ask for better sons.” Doris slanted her head to the side. “You can tell a lot about a man by the way he treats his mother. Take my Seth, for example.” The older woman’s face crinkled. “Oh, that man. I was a sales clerk at the five-and-dime in town when he came in to buy a birthday present. For his mother, as it turned out.”

Emma smiled at Doris’s meaningful glance.

“One look at him, and I just knew I’d found the one I’d spend the rest of my life with.” She sipped her coffee. “You’ll see. It’ll happen for you, too.”

Emma shook her head. The kind of love Doris and Seth had shared sounded like something straight out of a fairy tale. She doubted whether a modern-day Prince Charming existed. Certainly not one for her. Colt, with his piercing blue eyes and all that gorgeous thick black hair might look the part, but true heroes didn’t have his temper.

And wasn’t she done with angry men?

From her dad to Jack, she’d had enough. As for the chefs in the kitchens where she’d worked, if she’d had any idea how much they threw their weight around, she’d have chosen another line of work entirely.

Here on the Circle P, things would be different. The ranch hands, from the little she’d seen of them, stuck to themselves or had families of their own. Soon, all the Judd brothers except Colt would leave. He’d only be here until his younger brothers took over. Knowing the man was another in a line of Mr. Wrongs, she’d keep her distance. Something that should be easy enough to do as long as she put dinner on the table at six and provided a hearty breakfast for the ranchers before their day started.

“So,” Doris asked at last, “do you think you’re up to the job? I hate to dump all this on you the minute you show up. But it sounds as if Garrett and Arlene could use my help.” She wiped her eyes. “It’ll be good for me to get away for a while.”

Emma’s eyes swept the immaculate kitchen. She drummed her fingers on the cookbook.

“Yes,” she answered with far more certainty than she’d felt at the start of the day.

Alone with Bree a short time later, Emma flipped through recipes until she came to a cobbler that, according to her notes, was one of Doris’s favorites. It sounded like just the thing to prepare as a thank-you gift. She ducked into the pantry. As she searched the shelves for key ingredients, she tilted her head at an odd noise.

“Bree, is someone knocking at the door?” she called.

In the breathless pause before her daughter answered, Emma considered stepping into the kitchen for a look.

“No, Mommy. No one’s here,” Bree said at last.

Emma twisted a can to read the label. “Are you playing?”

“I’m looking outside.”

“Try not to jiggle the door, honey.” She pictured the four-year-old, her nose pressed against the screen, the door rattling against the latch. Adding jars of sliced apples to her pile, she gathered the items for the cobbler in her arms. Before she’d taken two steps into the kitchen, Emma froze. Sunshine poured in through the screened door, illuminating the vacant space where, minutes earlier, she’d left her daughter.

Her heart in her throat for the second time that day, Emma gasped.

“Bree!”

* * *

“Y
OU
SURE
YOU
know how to fix it?” Colt leaned over his saddle horn to give his brother a doubtful look. The air-conditioning unit in the little house had spewed nothing but dust when Randy and Royce tested it this morning. It was broken, they’d insisted. It needed to be replaced.

Colt slapped one hand against his jeans. A big bill would not get his stint as manager off to a good start. Especially since he was already going to owe the vet for a house call.

“While you were busy earning a gold buckle on the rodeo circuit, I was fixing air conditioners part-time to pay my way through college. Remember?” Palmetto rustled as Garrett guided his mare off the main trail, headed for the house that had been sitting vacant for the better part of two years.

“Just don’t spend any more money than necessary,” Colt cautioned. He was all for making the place habitable. No more, no less. Not for a cook who probably wouldn’t stay on the ranch through the heat of summer.

His stomach rumbled, a reminder that he’d missed breakfast. That
she’d
missed breakfast. He tipped his hat back to swipe his forehead with a damp sleeve and caught a glimpse of the sun on the wrong side of noon. His first day on the job, and he was already falling behind. Temporary repairs to the fence the Circle P shared with Ol’ Man Tompkins had taken longer than he wanted to spend on them. A permanent fix was in order and, with Garrett tied up at the little house, it was looking more and more like he’d have to take care of it himself.

Tack jangled and leather creaked as he urged Star into a trot that would take them home for more supplies. Nearing the barn, he reined the horse to a walk when he spied one of the ranch hands lounging in the shade. His nose in a book, the boy gave every indication that there was nothing better to do on the busy ranch than stand there all day chewing on a piece of straw. Colt urged Star toward the young man who, according to Ty, tended to slack off whenever he could.

“Josh, I need you to grab a couple of posts and some wire. Head on over to the spot where the creek runs between our land and Tompkins’s. There’s two places where his cows have broken through our fence again.”

Josh barely looked up from his reading material. He shifted a strand of hay from one side of his mouth to the other. “Sure thing, Colt. I’ll get to it soon as I’m finished here.”

Colt blinked slowly. “That’s
boss
to you.” Recalling how his dad had dealt with ornery ranch hands, he let his vowels stretch out, emphasizing his drawl to show he meant business. “I think that barn can stand on its own without your help. Unless you want to spend all night roundin’ up strays, you’d best get a move on.”

Thpt.
A tiny divot appeared in the gray sand at Josh’s feet.

“I’m helpin’ the vet right now.”

Excuse me?
He’d expected the older hands on the ranch to test him. Not a young kid like Josh.

Behind his sunglasses, Colt’s vision narrowed in on Jim Jacobs’s truck parked near the holding pen.

“That the vet?” His voice deceptively mild, he inclined his head toward the man who sat in the front seat, his phone pressed against one ear.

“Yep. That’s him.”

“Seems to me, he doesn’t need your help this minute.” Squaring his shoulders, Colt pulled himself erect atop Star. Clearly, it was going to take a firmer hand than he’d expected to keep things on an even keel on the Circle P. “Now, I’ve told you what needs to be done. The choice is up to you. Get movin’ or start packin’.” He glared at the young man, daring him to argue.

Josh faced him for a long second before he shoved his book into a back pocket. He started toward the shed where they stored fencing materials. Watching him go, Colt let out a slow whistle. He patted Star’s long neck and wished everyone who worked on the ranch was as easy to handle as his horse.

“Come on, boy.” He gave the reins a tug. “Let’s go say hello.”

The man who stepped from the vet’s truck a few minutes later had put on thirty pounds and lost his swagger, but Colt easily recognized the former rodeo competitor. After their first season on the circuit together, Jim Jacobs had chosen vet school over bronco bustin’ and calf tying. Now he peered up from beneath a baseball cap, sorrow showing on a face that had aged since they’d last seen each other.

“Sorry I wasn’t able to make it to the funeral. I got stuck at the Carson place. That big bay of theirs ran through an electric fence and got himself all cut up. What a mess.”

“We had a good turnout.” Colt concentrated on combing his free hand through Star’s mane. He’d been in such a fog during the service and the gathering at the house afterward, he wasn’t sure who’d shown up and who hadn’t.

Jim stood with his hands on his hips. “Everybody around here’s gonna miss Seth. I heard one of you boys was gonna take his place. Who drew the short straw?”

“News travels fast.” The privilege of running the Circle P was one he had asked for. Colt grimaced, his gut tightening. “It’s gonna be tough, but I’ll manage.” He added an aw-shucks grin to let his old friend know he was up to the job.

Jim mulled over the news and then, with a grunt and a nod, he grabbed his bag from the front seat. “You’ve been around horses and cattle all your life. You’ll do just fine.” He crossed to the holding pen where an enormous bull stood, docilely chewing his cud. “Now, let’s see about this bad boy.”