A Cowboy Firefighter For Christmas (Smokin' Hot Cowboys 1) (3 page)

“How kind,” Misty said. “But I’m used to taking care of myself.”

“Wouldn’t have our ladies any other way.” Kent tipped his hat. “I’ll check out the damage.” He gave Trey a nod before he walked toward the fence.

“I’ll stop by the station and report,” Trey called to his cousin’s retreating back.

Kent raised a hand in reply.

“Intense guy,” Misty said.

“You
like
him?” Trey turned toward her.

“He’s your cousin, not mine.” She shrugged. “No opinion one way or another.”

And it dawned on him. He was acting jealous as all get-out. Item #1 on his Christmas list was getting way out of hand. If he was as smart as the average bear, he’d be able to control his reaction. ’Course, he might already be up a tree and reaching for honey that was way out his of reach. That thought made him grumpy.

“Let’s get out of here.”

As Misty drove toward Wildcat Bluff, she wanted to ask Trey a million questions, business and personal. She might never have a better opportunity than with him in her passenger seat. However, Texans didn’t take kindly to questions, particularly ones from strangers. Invasive questions were considered rude, at the very least.

Cindi Lou was a proud member of the Daughters of the Republic of Texas, and she insisted the cautious trait of Texans harkened back to the old days when people arrived in the Republic from all over. Many were on the run from the law, creditors, or family. Others simply wanted a fresh start. In any case, folks quickly learned—often at the wrong end of a six-shooter—not to ask name, former location, or business.

With that in mind, Misty couldn’t afford to become known as a “Nosy Nellie” or she’d never complete her job. If she were in Dallas, she’d have an easier time of it. Folks with lots of different backgrounds were moving into the Lone Star State for jobs and many of them didn’t mind answering questions. Southern Californians were only too happy to talk, even to giving their last therapy session in detail. But she was going to a small Texas town where everybody knew everything about each other. She’d have to slide in sideways to get answers.

But that’s what she did best. She wasn’t there for a hard investigation—nuts and bolts or forensic accounting. She’d been hired for a soft investigation—ferreting out secrets or concealed facts. To do that, she needed to make friends, elicit trust, and conduct research. She liked people, so this type of troubleshooting came naturally to her.

If it weren’t for Cindi Lou, she probably wouldn’t even be a troubleshooter. When she’d met Cindi Lou, Misty had been a hardworking gal from North Dallas with a master’s degree in library science, but with college debts and three jobs, she was still losing ground because she couldn’t find local work in her field. Cindi Lou had advertised for a librarian to organize her family’s library in their mansion on Turtle Creek in Highland Park. When Misty had applied for the part-time job, Cindi Lou had hired her on the spot.

Turned out Cindi Lou was the descendent of big oil money. Her great-granddaddy had been a wildcatter in East Texas in the 1930s and struck it rich with black gold. That meant Cindi Lou was a Hockaday, SMU, and Neiman Marcus graduate, but she always said she was in recovery because she’d inherited her great-granddaddy’s wildcatter streak.

Cindi Lou sat at the hub of an information network, rubbing elbows with everyone from street folks to movers and shakers. She saw patterns in life, so she put together folks who had problems with folks who had solutions. Right away, she’d suggested Misty become an independent troubleshooter because she had the research skills and personality traits to be helpful to those in need.

Five years later, Misty was glad she’d taken the suggestion and changed her life. She’d helped many individuals and businesses. Cindi Lou had built on her calling, too. She’d expanded her network into a quirky hexagonal 1950s Midcentury Modern one-story office building in Dallas. She’d named herself Hub Mistress when she’d set up her office in the center of the building. Misty had her office there, along with several other young women whom Cindi Lou had befriended and encouraged to take chances in cutting-edge or thinking-out-of-the-box work. And Cindi Lou efficiently managed all their businesses.

Even though Misty’s background was different than Cindi Lou’s, they had a lot of other things in common. Cindi Lou hadn’t felt as if she’d belonged with her family once her beloved great-granddaddy had passed away. Misty had no family, not since she’d lost her wonderful aunt who’d raised her in a warm and loving home in Dallas. Friendships were important to them both, but Cindi Lou was pushing Misty to reach out and experience more of life.

Aunt Camilla, who was Misty’s father’s sister, had always encouraged Misty to do the same thing. She’d bought season tickets to the Dallas Summer Musicals for them every year. Misty had loved going to the big old theater in Fair Park, where they’d also gone to the Texas State Fair. That was where Misty had first really noticed the differences in architecture. She’d asked her aunt about the beautiful buildings and learned they were Art Deco style. At that time, it had seemed to Misty that Aunt Cami knew everything because she taught history in high school and took Misty on driving tours and to museums, libraries, and parks.

Now that Misty thought about it, maybe she’d turned to library science as a way of cataloging all that knowledge stuffed into her head at an early age. She smiled warmly at the thought. Aunt Cami had also stuffed her with tasty treats. She still smelled gingerbread and brownies when she thought of her aunt. She sighed. Cancer had taken her way too soon—just like all her family had been lost to her too soon.

Now that she was older, she appreciated her aunt even more. Misty’s parents had died on Christmas morning when Misty was just twelve. She’d been consumed with grief when Aunt Cami had taken her home. Her aunt had been a single parent on a teacher’s limited salary, but she’d raised Misty and helped her through college. In all those years, they’d never celebrated Christmas. Neither wanted to remember or relive that terrible Christmas that had changed their lives forever. And Misty had lost or intentionally stuffed away most of her cherished memories so she could go forward in life and not live in the past. Instead of Christmas, Aunt Cami and Misty had given each other gifts and goodies on Winter Solstice.

Misty had always been cautious after losing her parents, so Aunt Camilla had encouraged her to experience more of life. Now Cindi Lou was doing the same thing. Maybe they were both right.

She glanced sideways at Trey. The big, handsome, shirtless cowboy firefighter sat there in her front seat, filling the air with enough testosterone to make a gal feel giddy. He was certainly full of life. But she needed answers, not a hunky guy. There were lots of ways to make small talk to learn important facts. Weather and locale were good ways to start.

She’d like to trust Trey, but trust wasn’t something she could afford in Wildcat Bluff County. Fire had destroyed a Texas Timber Christmas tree farm before the harvest. Another fire on an adjacent tree farm had been caught and extinguished before too much damage was done. Heat and drought could be a factor, but arson was the main consideration. Fortunately, the Christmas cutting and hauling season was over, but that still left other Texas Timber tree farms in various stages of growth.

Normally, she didn’t get calls or referrals during the holidays, but Texas Timber had been insistent that they needed a troubleshooter in Wildcat Bluff County now. She’d get a bonus if she could find the culprit or figure out what was causing the fires by Christmas. She wanted to be away from the holiday madness in Dallas anyway, so she took the job.

Only she sure hadn’t counted on a cowboy firefighter upping her own internal heat. She quickly turned the AC higher.

“Think you may never get cool again?”

Not with him so close. But she didn’t say that. “Temperature on my gauge reads eighty-nine outside. Will winter ever get here?”

“Heat lets up at night.”

“I wonder if the B&B lures many people into the warm spring right now.”

“It’s a good way to ease sore muscles.” He chuckled, a low, intimate sound. “Lots of ways to get those. Some better than others.”

“I’d just like some sweater weather.” She decided his voice ought to be outlawed as unfair to the state of a woman’s thoughts. She could almost feel vibrations from his deep, resonant voice twining deeper inside her mind.

“With this weather, it doesn’t seem much like the holidays, does it?”

“Not hardly.”

“On the plus side, I bet Ruby’d want us to use the spring after we saved the town with our heroics.” He leaned toward her. “What do you say? Beer and barbeque later out at the pool?”

“It’s a tempting offer.” She kept her eyes steady on the road, not about to give in to the impulse to ogle him again. “But I haven’t even checked in yet and—”

“I’ll bring the fixings over after the sun goes down.”

“But—”

“Least I can do after your help today.”

Obviously he wasn’t a man to take no lightly, or any other way. She didn’t want to make any waves, at least not yet. Plus, he had to be a font of information. She’d just take advantage of that fact.

“I don’t know much about this area of Texas.” She had in mind what her Aunt Cami had taught her and what she’d researched online for updated facts before she left Dallas, but a local’s viewpoint was bound to be different and more beneficial.

“You want me to be your tour guide?”

“Please, would you?”

“Sure thing. We get enough tourists around here that we’ve all got our spiel down pretty good.”

“Perfect.”

“This highway was once Wildcat Trail. It leads to Wildcat Bluff, where the town looks out over the Red River Valley. The Bluff was originally founded as a ferry terminus so folks could cross the Red River between Texas and Indian Territory, or Oklahoma now. Delaware Bend and Preston Bend were wild ferry towns, too, but they got flooded to make Lake Texoma.”

“That’s a huge, popular lake. Too bad towns had to be lost to create it.”

“They were already pretty much ghost towns.”

“Wildcat Bluff got lucky, didn’t it?”

“We’ve got more than luck going for us.” He gestured toward the front window with a pointed finger. “Wildcat Bluff County is special. We’re situated in the Cross Timbers.”

“I’ve heard the Timbers are mostly gone.”

“Not here. We’ve got thousands of acres we’ve been riding herd on since the eighteen hundreds.”

“Your family?” She was learning more than he realized he was telling her. He was proud of this land and the fact that they’d saved this section of the Cross Timbers. She admired him and those who’d had the foresight to save a unique land. Aunt Cami would’ve loved knowing about this, too.

“Several clans. Plus, newcomers.”

“I don’t see the Cross Timbers.”

“Over there.” He pointed again. “We’re driving up the north-south corridor of prairie. Up here it’s about ten miles wide. Other places it can be as narrow as three miles or as wide as thirty miles. It’s bordered on both sides by dense trees and shrubs.”

“I see the line on the east side. What is all that growth?”

“Post oak, cedar elm, bois d’arc, dogwood, Virginia creeper, blackberry, and a bunch of other stuff.”

She nodded, taking in as much as she could while she drove. She’d never seen this section of the Cross Timbers before.

“In the old days, there’d be a brush fire every year, and the tree line grew back so dense nobody could ride through it. The Comanche used the Cross Timbers as a secret route through
Numunuu
Sookobitu
.”

“You speak Comanche?” She glanced at him in surprise.

“Most folks around here know a little bit.”

“What does that mean?” she asked, beginning to enjoy herself, as if she really was on vacation. Trey was a good tour guide. He seemed to know a lot.

“Comanche Earth.” He looked over at her. “Comancheria is another name for the Comanche Empire that stretched from Central Kansas all the way down to Mexico.”

“Are you a history buff in addition to all your other pursuits?”

He grinned. “I guess you could call me that. I like to read about this area and listen to tales from the old-timers. I can’t get too excited about the kings of England or European royalty.”

Misty laughed. “I like history, too. But give me the Alamo any day.” She liked Trey even more now that she knew he had so much in common with her and Aunt Cami. Only her aunt would’ve brought him up to speed on British, Scottish, German, and other history, too. And she’d have taught him to like it.

“Right.” He pointed toward the prairie. “See over there? That’s a handy trail between the two lines of dense growth. Nobody could see the warriors or get to them through the timber. But we keep the wild fires under control now so it doesn’t grow as thick.”

A twist of trees marched down the east side of the road, but Misty saw only plains on the west side. Yet she could imagine a long line of colorful Comanche warriors on horseback wearing breechclouts and carrying bows and arrows as they rode down the prairie to protect their people and homeland. She blinked, chasing away shadows of the past. No shadows. No ghosts. No sign of fire.

“Beautiful country,” she murmured, but her mind had fixated on the Comanche. Now that she thought about it, Trey had the high cheekbones, bronzed skin, and unusual eyes that could mean he was part Native American. Plus, his family had been here a long time, maybe from the beginning. Now he was even more exotic, more exciting to her. She wanted to ask him directly about his heritage, but that wouldn’t do. Still, she was learning a lot.

“We’re situated between the dry West and the wet East, so we get the best of both worlds. And our timber keeps rainwater deep in the soil.”

“Are there buffalo?”

“I run a small herd out on the prairie.” He chuckled as he tapped his fingertips on the dashboard. “More for pleasure than anything else.”

“What do you mean?”

“I like having them on the ranch. I like looking at them. And I like knowing they’re safe.”

She nodded, understanding him more all the time. “You really love this land, don’t you?”

“Can’t imagine living anywhere else.”

“I feel that way about Dallas. So much to do and so much fun.”

“City born and bred?”

“You know it.” She laughed. “And when there’s a fire, a big screaming truck full of hoses and firefighters comes to the rescue, not some stray motorist with towels.”

He chuckled. “Don’t count us out here. We’ve got rigs and firefighters that fit the bill.”

She smiled even as she acknowledged that they were worlds apart. Country guy versus city gal. They were too different to ever bridge the gap. Still, she could enjoy the beauty of North Texas. And her cowboy firefighter.

As she followed the road, golden prairie dotted with black and red cattle spread out around her. Clumps of trees—mostly green live oak—provided shade for animals. A couple of pickups passed them, drivers raising a forefinger in acknowledgment. Soon she saw the bluff up ahead, an imposing chunk that dominated the land below it.