Beau (Remington Ranch Book 4) (13 page)

Mrs. Remington smiled back. “We don’t have to do this, if you’re not comfortable.”

For a moment she hesitated. She wanted to take Ruby, go home and close the door behind them. Keep the two of them safe in their own little world and not let anyone else in. She looked at Ruby. She was happily rolling dough. It made her understand that it was herself she was trying to protect, not her daughter. She smiled. “This is wonderful, thank you. I guess I’m just not used it, that’s all.”

Mrs. Remington gave her a kind smile. “I know, but I think it might do you good to get used to it.” She looked at Beau. “At least I hope so.”

“See you later, Mommy!” called Ruby.

Corinne laughed. “I guess that’s me dismissed.” She went and kissed Ruby’s cheek. “You be good. I’ll see you later.”

“Bye.”

Ruby looked at Beau expectantly and Corinne exchanged a smile with Mrs. Remington when he, too, went and kissed her cheek. “See you later.”

Beau looked at her as she climbed into his truck. “Are you okay with this?”

“Yeah. It just caught me off guard.”

“Sorry, it did me too. Mom suggested I should bring you both over and said she’d love to play with Ruby. I thought it would be a good chance to…”

She raised an eyebrow at him.

He laughed. “I know. It all seems kind of premeditated and weird, doesn’t it?”

She nodded, relieved he felt that way, too. “It does.”

“So what do you want to do?”

“I don’t know. What are you thinking?” They finally had some time alone together, but he was right; it did feel weird to think that they would just go back to her place and jump into bed together.

“I think you know what I was thinking. But how about we go up to town? I can show you around. If you’re hungry we can get some lunch at the Mustang.”

“I’d like that.” That felt much more comfortable and natural.

He started up the truck. “Let’s go then.”

When they got to town Beau pulled up outside the Mustang. “If you’re hungry we can eat now and then go for a walk. It’s a neat little town really, there’s a lot to see.”

“That sounds great,” said Corinne. “I haven’t had a chance to look around yet, and I am hungry, if you are.”

“Yep, that works for me. I didn’t get breakfast this morning and it can get busy in here if we leave it too late.”

Beau held the door for her and followed her inside. As the hostess showed them to their table he wondered if this hadn’t been a bad idea—a really bad idea. It seemed the whole town had decided to come out for lunch. Angie shot him an evil glance as they passed the table where she was sitting with her friend, Katie. And shit, shit, shit! Wanda! She was sitting in a corner booth with her husband, Terry, and what looked like their whole clan. At least she hadn’t seen him—yet. And as they reached their table he spotted Guy Preston sitting with one of his drinking buddies. He hadn’t realized that lowlife like him ventured out in daylight hours. He sighed as he took his seat. Hopefully they would be able to ignore their fellow diners and just enjoy lunch.

“Are you okay?”

He nodded. “I’m fine. Sorry. Just a few too many familiar faces in here for my liking.”

“Do you want to leave?”

He smiled. “No. It’s all good. I wanted you all to myself. I can just forget they’re here.”

“Beau Remington!” The sound of Wanda’s not so dulcet tones echoing across the restaurant proved him wrong about that as soon as the words were out of his mouth.

He gave Corinne a rueful smile. “Okay, so maybe not. You’re about to meet my assistant, Wanda. I can’t tell you what to expect, she’s a law unto herself.”

Corinne looked scared to death as Wanda bore down on them.

“Well, hello, hello and how are you?”

Beau smiled. “I was doing just great, enjoying my Sunday, until I heard my name being bellowed across the room.”

Corinne’s eyes widened, but Wanda laughed. “Don’t mind him, hon. He loves me really, he’s just got a funny way of showing it.” She thrust her hand out. “I’m Wanda. I work for him, and you must be Corinne.”

Corinne nodded and smiled. “Nice to meet you.”

“I’m sure you don’t think it is right now.” Wanda smiled warmly at her. “And I’m sorry for that, I don’t mean to spoil your lunch, but I just couldn’t resist the temptation to come over and make him squirm.”

Corinne laughed.

Beau narrowed his eyes at Wanda. “Okay, well you succeeded. You can go and sit back down now.”

“Oh, no. My fun is just getting started.” She winked at Corinne and leaned her hip on the edge of the table. “I think I should let Corinne here know what she’s in for.”

Beau rolled his eyes. Wanda was fun, but she really did have him squirming in his seat wondering what she might be about to say. “And what, in your not-so-humble opinion, is she in for?” He caught Corinne’s eye, she was enjoying this.

Wanda bent down and lowered her voice. “Well, Corinne, honey. Our Beau has quite a reputation in this town.”

Corinne looked more wary than amused now and Beau had to wonder where Wanda was going with this.

“You see,” she continued, “people think he can be an asshole, and he does nothing to disabuse them of that belief.” She grinned at him. “And I just can’t understand why. Because when you get to know him, when you get past the tough outer shell, he’s an absolute sweetheart underneath. So give him a chance, and if he seems like an idiot sometimes, just remember he can’t help it, he’s a man, they all are.”

Corinne burst out laughing. “Good to know. Thank you.”

Wanda nodded. “I also wanted to say thank you. You bring out the best in him. He’s been a different guy since he met you. And I think, if you give him a bit of time to get used to it, I think he’ll do great with your daughter, as well.” She looked back to where her family was sitting. “And if your daughter needs some playmates, get Beau here to give me a shout. I’ve got a whole herd of grandkids she can come play with.”

“Don’t you think you should be getting back to them?” asked Beau.

She laughed. “You mean would I please go away and stop embarrassing you now? Sure. I can do that. I’ll see you in the office tomorrow.” She looked at Corinne. “If I still have a job! It was a pleasure to meet you.”

“You too.”

Corinne smiled as she watched her go. Beau was glad for a moment to recover and to try to figure out what he could say to explain Wanda.

“She’s awesome! I bet she keeps you in your place.”

He laughed. “She gives me enough shit, I can tell you that. I don’t know why I keep her around.”

“Because she adores you.”

“You reckon?”

Corinne laughed. “She does and you know it. And if you weren’t trying to keep up that tough shell she was just talking about you’d admit that you adore her, too!”

“Adore her? More like I endure her. She’s good at her job, but she’s a pain in the ass.”

Corinne shook her head. “Is it that you won’t admit it or that you can’t see it? That woman is like a second mother to you and you love it!”

Beau chuckled. “I suppose, but my mom would never talk to me like that.”

“It’s my guess that no one talks to you like that, and that’s why Wanda gets away with it, and also why you love her for it.”

He nodded. “I guess so. You’re pretty good at figuring people out, aren’t you?”

“Yep, I have to be. I’m not as good as Ruby though.”

“I noticed that last night. She seemed to have these instincts, she lights up around good people and shuts down around assholes. And she just instantly knew who was which. It was amazing, people who it took me years to figure out, she just knew and she was spot on every time.”

Corinne smiled. “She does seem to have a sixth sense, and…” She kept on smiling but didn’t finish her sentence.

“And what?”

“And she likes you. She more than likes you. You’ve been her favorite ever since she came up here with Carly and James.”

Beau thought about the first few times he’d met her. She’d seemed like a bossy, demanding little creature, but thinking about it with the perspective he had now, she’d just been craving his attention. “I don’t think she liked me the first few times she met me.”

“No?”

“No. I remember seeing her with Summer and Carter when we were going to look at houses. She didn’t want to go with me. She wanted to stay with Summer. Summer had to convince her I was her friend before she’d even consider it.”

“Ah, but that’s different. Summer is her idol; she wouldn’t want to leave Summer to go with me.”

“I suppose.”

“And you can’t argue that she adores you now. And anyway, why are we talking about Ruby again? I thought this afternoon was about the two of us.”

He nodded. “It is. And hopefully, now the intrusions are over with, and we can enjoy it.” He thought about it. “But I don’t think there’s anything wrong with us talking about Ruby. She’s important.”

The way she smiled at him told him how much his words meant to her. He hadn’t said them for her sake though, it was just that he was figuring out how important she really was.

They managed to get through lunch without any further interruptions. Beau was shocked when he called for the check and looked at his watch. They’d been sitting there chatting and laughing for two hours.

“Do you want to go take a walk?”

She nodded. “I’d love to, and if we sit here much longer, we’ll end up having to go straight back.”

She was right and he did want to enjoy their time while they could.

They walked down Main toward the park. He wanted to take her down the trail that followed the river. A car honked as it passed them. Beau looked up and waved; it was a couple whose house he’d finally closed the sale on last week.

“Does everyone know everyone around here?”

He smiled. “It feels that way most of the time.”

“That must be weird.”

He shrugged. “You get used to it. You can ignore the ones you don’t want to be involved with.” He reached out and took hold of her hand as they walked. “And you just focus on the ones you are interested in.”

She smiled up at him. “There has to be a lot of women who are interested in you.”

“What makes you say that?” He already thought he knew.

“The girl who gave you a dirty look when we went into the restaurant. The one who kept looking over the whole time.”

“Angie.”

“An old girlfriend?”

“Does it matter?”

She shrugged a little too hurriedly, making it seem that it did. He felt bad, but he liked it. “I just like to know what I’m dealing with. I mean for all I know she could still be a girlfriend.”

He frowned. “She’s not. We went out a couple of times that’s all. I only have one girlfriend at a time, and most of the time I don’t have one at all.”

She looked up into his eyes.

He smiled. “I’d like to say that right now I have one.”

She smiled. “You would?”

He nodded. “What do you say? Do you want to be my girl?” He knew it was a cheesy old line, but it felt right.

She smiled. “We may have a problem there.”

His smile faded. What did she mean?

“You said you only have one girlfriend at a time. If you took me on, you’d have two.”

He laughed. “In your case I could handle two. And besides, it’d be one girlfriend and one pumpkin.”

“Have you seen her face whenever you call her that? She looks like the cat that got the cream!”

“I know. The first time I said that I had no idea where it came from, but seeing the way she reacted I just had to keep going with it. And now it’s our thing.” He shook his head.

“What?”

“Nothing. If you’d have told me, even a week ago, that Ruby and I would have a thing, any kind of thing at all, I would have laughed in your face and told you you were crazy.”

“What changed though? I’ll be honest, it worries me a little that you went so fast from calling her a monster to calling her pumpkin.”

“In part it’s just that I didn’t know her, or want to know her before.” He smiled. “I guess in part I have Wanda to thank, too.”

“How’s that?”

He realized that in order to explain he’d have to admit that he’d talked to Wanda about her and Ruby. Why not though? For once he didn’t want to hide what he’d been thinking, didn’t want to keep his inner processes secret. He wanted her to know and hopefully to understand. “Well, I may have mentioned you to Wanda a time or two.”

She raised an eyebrow. “And?”

“And I may have mentioned that I like you.”

Her smile grew wider.

“And I may also have mentioned that I didn’t know how to handle Ruby.”

She laughed. “Do you mean you might have said that she was a monster?”

“Maybe, but as you noticed just now, Wanda has a way of setting me straight. She made me see Ruby in a different light.”

“How?”

“She told me to think how it must feel for her. That she’s in a new place, she hasn’t had a chance to make any friends yet, and that she doesn’t have a daddy of her own. That it wouldn’t cost me anything to show her some kindness. I don’t know, she made me think of Ruby as someone I could help. That changed everything.”

Corinne didn’t look too thrilled with his explanation.

“Did I say something wrong?”

She shook her head. “No. It’s nice that you feel that way.” She looked up at him. “I just don’t want you to think of Ruby, or me, as an underdog. We don’t need someone to look out for us. We’re not helpless.”

He stopped walking and looked down into her eyes. “That’s not how I think of you. Either of you. I think you’re both strong and perfectly capable of surviving by yourselves. It’s more that I was building Ruby up as the enemy and Wanda made me see how stupid that was.”

She smiled. “Okay. I can see that, but how are we back to talking about Ruby again?”

He didn’t even know. “I guess it’s necessary and natural that she’s going to come up a lot, isn’t it.”

“I suppose so. I just don’t want you to think that everything has to revolve around her.”

“It kind of does though, and I’m okay with that.”

“I am too, as long as we get to be just us sometimes.”

He smiled. They were down by the river now and he started walking again. “So how about we do something that’s just about us right now?”

“What?”

He smiled and tugged her hand to make her walk faster. “It’s a surprise. Do you trust me?”