Silver River Romeo (Western Cowboy Romance) (Rancher Romance Series #1) (4 page)

              “Emma Carson. She’s Hank Carson’s granddaughter. She’s gonna take over Raven Branch,” Marshall offered.

              “All of three of ya’ll are showing her around then?” Jake gave them all a wide grin. “Gonna be a tough decision, I guess.”

             
“Yeah,” Cole said with a nod; he didn’t want to tell Jake that he’d pretty much removed himself from the competition very early in the game. “So, am I getting a ticket or not?”

              Jake rubbed his chin thoughtfully and then sighed. “Cole, I don’t want to do it, but I think I’m gonna have to.”

              When Cole sighed in annoyance and frustration, Jake’s tone hardened.

“Now, don’t give me any attitude” Jake lectured Cole. “I’ve let you slide a few times lately.”

              “Lately? I haven’t even been down here in a month!” Cole defended himself.

              “Don’t make this harder than it has to be,” Jake said firmly as he took the drivers license Cole grudgingly handed over before walking back to his squad car to write up the ticket.

              “Pretentious, ego-inflated jackass,” Cole muttered.

              “Jake’s just doing his job,” Marshall insisted. When Cole glared at him, Marshall went on. “Well, you
were
speeding, and if you had been paying attention to your driving instead of chewing me out over Emma, this wouldn’t have happened.”

              “Yeah, thanks for pointing that out,” Cole muttered. “Why can’t you be more like Darrell? He hasn’t said a word in ten years.”

              Darrell snorted. “Said at least five things just today.”

              “A new record.”  A few minutes passed before Cole reached out and took the ticket Jake handed him and then sat quietly and politely through the obligatory lecture on safe driving before pulling back onto the road and moving exaggeratedly slowly.  With Cole doing the exact speed limit, it took a little longer than usual to get to the diner.

              “Feeling better now?” Marshall asked as they got out of the truck and watched Emma park her huge vehicle jerkily.

              “Yeah. I’m feeling just peachy,” Cole lied as he watched Emma walk over to meet them. “I’m going to go get us a table.”

              Darrell gave him a confused look, but he didn’t mention the fact that the Feedin’ Trough was never too full to seat people. The building was huge and the town was small. It didn’t matter. He hoped that separating himself and doing something constructive might give him the opportunity to burn off some of his bad mood.

Cole strode into the restaurant and walked up the counter. All of the waitresses were bustling around serving and cleaning off tabletops. One of them, Margie, an older lady and one of his favorites, gave him a smile and called, “I’ll be right over, hon!”

              “I wouldn’t dream of leaving without seeing you,” Cole drawled back with a grin of his own. Some of the bad mood was starting to slide off his shoulders. He took a deep breath of the scents of coffee, fried eggs, and bacon. It could still be a good day. Maybe he could even work up an apology to Emma over the right breakfast.

              He turned in surprise when he felt a small, feminine touch on his left shoulder accompanied by the words, “Well, if it isn’t just the man I’d been thinking about.”

              “Trish,” he said flatly as he turned to face his ex-girlfriend.

              “The one and only.” She gave him a dazzling grin and stood on tiptoe to press her lips to his cheek.

              It was only habit that brought his hands to the small of her back, but it made her snuggle closer. She still wore the same perfume. She still smelled delicious. Good God, he needed to get it together. He and Trish had such a tumultuous on-again, off-again relationship, he was aware that Darrell and Marshall had a bet going that it still wasn’t over. It was the unbearable thought of Marshall winning the bet that made Cole straighten up and untangle himself from her enthusiastic embrace.

              “So, what are you doing here?” he asked casually, trying to will the waitress over with the power of his mind. Apparently, telepathy wasn’t a talent he possessed because Margie only went on talking to a man at the table in the corner.

              “Barrel racing,” she said with a laugh. “What does it look like?”

              “I just didn’t know if you’d already eaten or if you were just coming in,” Cole clarified and then wished he hadn’t. Now, if she had just come in, it would sound like he was asking her to eat with him.

              “I just got done,” she admitted. “But it’s just been so long this time that I had to stop and talk to you.”

             
This time?
Cole thought with an inward shake of his head. What the hell had she expected?

              “I do seem to recall you throwing my phone into the river and screaming that if I knew what was good for me I wouldn’t ever call you again,” he reminded her.

              She did at least have the good grace to look ashamed of herself. “I really am sorry about that, Cole. I should have called you.”

              “I’m sure you and the river would have had a nice conversation,” he said agreeably.

              “You didn’t get a new phone?” Trish asked in surprise.

              “Yeah,” Cole said with a nod of his head. “Different number, though.”

              “Oh.” She looked momentarily flustered. “Well, I guess I see then.”

              He didn’t want to, but he felt bad. She must have seen it in his expression because she said, “I’ve missed you, Cole. Are you seeing anyone now?”

              Another question he wished he had a better answer to. It had been six months. He
should
be seeing someone by now. For a second, he was half-tempted to make up a story, to invent a girlfriend so he didn’t look like such a lonesome loser. But Cole McKenna had had it drilled into him since he was old enough to understand it, that lying was wrong so he sighed and admitted the truth.

              “No, I’m not seeing anybody right now.”
Or at all since we split up the last time,
he finished silently. He saw no need to give away all his secrets.

              “Me, neither,” Trish said, running her index finger up the inside of his arm. “It just didn’t feel the same with anyone else.”

              “Yeah, no one throws things at me quite the way you do,” he acknowledged.

              “Oh Cole, you’re not going to hold that against me, are you?” she asked with a slight pout.

              “Now why would I do a thing like that?” he asked dryly. Finally, in an answer to his desperate prayers, Margie stepped behind the counter.

              “Just you, Cole?” she asked pleasantly.

              “Nope, me plus three,” he answered.

              “Is the booth in the corner good for you?” she asked as she gathered napkin wrapped silverware and gestured to a sunny little booth at their right.

              “Wherever you want to put me, sweetheart,” Cole teased. “I know better than to argue with beautiful women.”

              “Charmer.” She swatted him lightly on the shoulder with the dishcloth she was carrying and then said, “Go on and get settled. I’ll start up some coffee for you and get some cups.”

              Cole turned to Trish, expecting and hoping like hell, that she was going to leave now. Margie had obviously known Trish had already eaten but from the look she swept them with, it was also obvious that she’d wanted to hurry her out the door. Trish had a little bit of a reputation around this town. Nothing too sordid or too unseemly, but Margie had never really approved of Cole getting tangled up with her. Looking back on it, he figured he could have saved himself a lot of heartache if he’d just listened to the older waitress in the first place.

              “I’m going to go to the ladies room,” Trish informed Cole. “I’ll swing back by to say goodbye.”

              Cole nodded while forcing a partial smile and walked over to the booth. Darrell came in a few moments later and surveyed the contents of the restaurant before Cole waved him over.

              “What took ya’ll so long?” he asked as his brother sat down across from him.

              “Sorry. Talking,” Darrell answered.

              “To who?”

              “Emma.”

              “About what?” Cole demanded.

              Darrell only shrugged and Cole sighed. Marshall walked in, but he didn’t stop at the table.

              “Where’s he going?” Cole demanded

.

              “Bathroom,” Darrell answered.

              “Is Emma coming in?”  Cole asked, sporting mixed feelings as to whether she had somehow changed her mind.

              “Yeah.”

              “You know, it wouldn’t hurt you to give a little more than a one word answer to any given question, Darrell.”

              “She’s right there,” Darrell said as she walked in the door. “Three words. Better?”

              Before Cole could come up with a suitably sarcastic reply, Emma dropped into the seat next to him and shock took care of his ability to form sentences for a second or two.

              “I may have been too hard on you,” she said stiffly. “I’ve been talking to your brothers and they say you really aren’t the chauvinistic jerk you seemed to be this morning.”

              He looked across at Darrell, who was keeping his face impassive. Emma waited to resume the conversation until coffee and the cups to go along with it had been distributed. Margie did a double take at Emma sitting beside Cole, and her eyes sparkled with held-back questions. Cole only shrugged. Margie might think they were cute together, but forgiveness, if that was what was happening here, was only the start.

              “So we can start with a clean slate as far as I’m concerned,” she said, fiddling with a few packs of sugar with a nervous gesture he found surprisingly endearing.

              “Sure,” he answered as he poured five packs of sugar into his own coffee and stirred it. “That works for me, I guess.” He wondered if she was forgiving him because she liked him, or because she liked Marshall and didn’t want a strained relationship with Marshall’s little brother.

              “So,” Emma said, trying to be friendly and change gears on the conversation. “What do you do?”

              “What do you mean?” Cole asked in confusion.

              “Well,” Emma hesitated slightly, as if searching for the right words. “Darrell rides in the rodeos and Marshall runs the ranch. What do you do?”

              “Marshall doesn’t run Silver River!” Cole wished his tone hadn’t been quite so harsh when Emma practically flinched. “We all own the ranch in equal shares.”

              “Oh.” Emma wrapped her hands around her coffee mug as if she was trying to warm them up. “I didn’t know that.”

              “Trust me,” Cole said flatly. “I do just as much as anybody else on that ranch.”

              “More than me,” Darrell offered, clearly trying to smooth the situation over.

              It worked, just not in the way that he’d been going for. Emma took the opportunity to change the subject.

              “Is the rodeo a lot of work?”  Emma wondered.

              Darrell nodded.