Ever After at Sweetheart Ranch (16 page)

Mario ate a piece of buttered bread, looking from one lady to the next with interest.

“Oh, really,” Mrs. Thalberg said.

“She regretted that it seemed as if she didn't invite you to the cotillion because of your social standing, but she said that wasn't it. It was about a boy, right?” Lyndsay asked, hoping for more information.

Mrs. Ludlow waved a hand. “We knew the truth about that. Others believed what they wished, of course.”

Mrs. Thalberg crossed her arms over her chest and regarded Lyndsay impassively. “So she's sorry for that now? Amazing how she hasn't said that directly to me.”

“And very interestin' how she brings it up now,” Mrs. Palmer said, “during an election. She's scared of losin', of course.”

“Did anyone ever find out you were behind
Daisy Won't Tell
?”

“Nope,” said Mrs. Thalberg. “And that's why it's so fun to resurrect our secret writing on your behalf.”

“That's very sweet of you, thanks. But next time, would you mind telling me about it so I don't have a heart attack?”

“Welll,” Mrs. Palmer drew the word out, “we promise to try. But sometimes, inspiration just strikes at the craziest moment!”

Lyndsay prayed to the literary gods that her personal cheerleaders could keep themselves under control for a few more weeks.

When she got home, she stayed up for an hour, grading papers. She was so tired that the equations seemed to run together, but she found herself excited again remembering that tomorrow she'd be meeting with Matias to oversee his science project. It was becoming the bright spot in her school week.

At last she went to bed, but instead of sleeping, she lay awake in the dark and relived the magical hour in the hayloft with Will.

And it had been everything she'd dreamed. He'd made her feel so desired, so needed. He'd known just what to do to make her shake with urgency—­and she'd been able to do the same to him. Some deep part of her had assumed that sex with Will would be . . . just sex. But the exact opposite had happened. It had been both mind-­blowing and far too intimate and special. She felt connected to him now in a way she hadn't imagined, an invisible tether that silently mocked her earlier belief that dating Will would be as easy as “getting him out of her system.” She was beginning to suspect it might not be that easy . . .

And then he sent her a “Sweet dreams” text and her insides seemed to melt.

 

Chapter 14

L
ate Thursday afternoon, Will showed up at Tony's house after Tony's shift at the tavern. Dom and Matt Sweet, Will's cousin, were coming, too, for a guys' pizza and video games night. They'd been rare lately, and Will was still rather amazed they'd all been able to arrange their schedules. He'd put in a long morning moving dams in place of Chris and Daniel, so they'd promised to take his turn tonight.

“Where's Kate?” Will asked, dropping a ­couple boxes of pizza on the kitchen table before putting a six-­pack of beer in the fridge—­a five-­pack now, since he had one in his hand.

“At her parents' for dinner, then a movie,” Tony called from the living room, where he was pulling out the game controllers.

“And Ethan?” Will asked, leaning in the doorway between both rooms.

Tony's face went a little impassive. “His new job at Carmina's Cucina.”

“Aah,” Will said. “At the competition.”

“At his grandparents'. I know it's a better atmosphere than a tavern for a fourteen-­year-­old kid, but . . . I wish he could hang out with me.”

“Most parents want to get rid of their kid for a night.”

Tony shrugged. “Guess all those years of not seeing him on the weekends when Kate and I used to share custody, well, they make a man feel like he missed too much. Speaking of kids,” he said as Will came in and sank onto the couch, “how did the 4-­H meeting go?”

“What'd Ethan say?”

“You were fine, according to him. But what did
you
think?”

Will shrugged. “Lyndsay caught a problem I totally missed with a ­couple kids. It's sure harder than it seems to deal with a group rather than just one or two. Or maybe Ethan is just way too easy to deal with.”

Tony glowed with quiet pride. “Thanks. So he didn't bug you about the helicopter?”

Will rolled his eyes. “Not him. But I don't give rides. It's a ranch tool, not for joyriding.” And it was his brief time of peace and reconnecting to the past—­but he'd wanted Lyndsay to share it, he remembered uncomfortably.

“Really, a ranch tool?” Tony asked with skepticism. “I seem to remember you buzzing Deke Hutcheson's cattle and causing a stampede that tore down a ­couple fences and stopped traffic for an hour or two.”

Will grimaced. “I was still learning how to fly. I didn't mean to go so low. Deke still thinks I'm a reckless fool. He had me repairing fence for days—­which was well deserved, I know.” He glanced at the clock on his phone. “So where are Dom and Matt?”

“Late. Dom was getting back into town today, and Matt had a long day overseeing the planting of annuals at the inn. Relax while I go warm up the pizza. My tablet's right there, if you're bored.”

Will picked up the tablet, opened the cover, and the screen turned on. But instead of a desktop with icons, he was looking at a Word document. He was about to minimize it, thinking it was something for Kate's law firm, when he caught the sentence “She felt her eyes tear up at the thoughtfulness of the gesture.”

That wasn't a law brief. Someone was reading—­or writing—­a story. So he kept reading, drawn into the romantic scene where the sandy-­haired hero with hazel eyes surprised his girlfriend by taking her grandmother's earrings and making them into a pendant. He felt an uncomfortable twist deep in his stomach the more he read. Cody was a cowboy, and he was wearing a hat with a tooled band around it made by his friend . . .

The twist became a prickle of unease that chased down his spine. The guy sort of reminded him of . . . himself. And that scene, where he'd remade antique jewelry for his girlfriend—­Will had done that long ago for Brittany. He'd made no secret of it back then; all of his friends and family had known. But had someone deliberately incorporated it into a story—­okay, instead of a ring it was earrings—­but a story with a hero who was . . . him?

He closed the tablet and set it carefully onto the coffee table, as if it were a snake. No guy would write that—­was this Kate's tablet, Kate's story? And was she writing it about
him
?

He could see Tony through the kitchen doorway. The poor guy—­Will couldn't tell him. He and Kate were only just getting back together. They seemed so happy. But if she was writing about Will, how
could
she be happy? And why had she used such a personal part of his life?

None of it made sense. All he knew was that he should probably find a way to talk to Kate about it.

But what was he supposed to say?
Hey, are you writing fantasies about me?

He ran a hand down his face.

“Something wrong?” Tony asked, walking in, holding a beer.

“Just tired. It's a long hard day, being a cowboy.”

“Whine, whine.”

Will suddenly remembered the flyers about a local author—­could the author be Kate? Was she hiding her book because of her profession? He couldn't believe she'd publish a story about a hero that so closely resembled him, when he was a good friend of her future husband.

When someone knocked at the front door, Tony called, “Come on in!”

Dom and Matt walked through the door, carrying chips and dip and even more beer.

“I've got this Iberico ham you need to try,” Dom said. “Convinced one of my stores to import it from Spain.”

Dom owned a food brokerage catering to high-­end grocery stores. He traveled the world searching for unique and rare food items—­and that was a challenge for the jaded Aspen market.

Matt collapsed in a chair, head back, eyes closed.

“You look exhausted,” Will told his cousin. “And it's obvious you spent your day outside, because you're almost as dark as Dom.”

Dom grinned, white teeth gleaming in black skin. “Not a bad thing to be at all.”

Matt let out a sigh. “Grandma is a perfectionist. Do you know I have to have all my ­people use a ruler and measure how far apart the geraniums have to go?”

Will chuckled. “It looks good when you're done.”

“Hmm,” Matt said, but he appeared pleased at the compliment.

Soon they were eating pizza, drinking beer, talking about their jobs and their dates, but always, in the back of Will's mind, was his bewilderment over what to do about Kate and her book.

O
n her brief lunch break Friday, Lyndsay read a text from Will. He said he wanted to see her that evening but couldn't get away from the ranch. Did she want to come spend some time as a cowgirl?

Did she ever. She was touched that he wanted her to see such an important part of his life. And she was dying to see him in his element, of course. She anticipated riding a horse up into the mountains to check on the cattle, or maybe she'd learn how to groom a horse as he tested next week's 4-­H lesson on her.

When she arrived, they weren't alone, but she paused a moment just to look at him. She hadn't seen him since they'd slept together, and watching him heft a roll of canvas from his shoulder into the pickup truck gave her a delicious shiver with the memory of what he could do with his very physical, fit body. Sadly, she couldn't burrow into his embrace and kiss him, like she wanted to. Chris and Daniel were hanging around near the storage trailer, smirking, as Will brought forth a set of hip boots and a shovel.

“This is the irrigator's uniform,” Will said, smiling at her.

She felt her own smile fade a bit as she regarded the hip boots. “So . . . we're going to get wet?”

“Not with these babies. Muddy, maybe . . .”

She chuckled, shaking her head. “So much for the romance of the old west.”

“The romance of the old west always included hard, dirty work. Gotta feed the cattle during the winter, which is the reason we grow hay. Up here in the mountains, we can only harvest one crop a summer, so it's critical we don't have mistakes. And since we're such an arid state, we have to irrigate. Wild hay can be under water a week or so, but not alfalfa—­twenty-­four hours max. Which is why we move dams every twelve hours or so. There's a real art to being able to find the water's best path through a field. You ready to help?”

She nodded, letting him sling the heavy hip boots over her shoulder. Then she grabbed her shovel and followed him toward the truck. Chris and Daniel waved to her happily.

“And what are you two going to do with all your free time?” Lyndsay called.

“Our turn to have dates,” Chris said. “We'll treat our women to some fine dining and dancing.”

“
Not
ditchwork,” Daniel added. “Didn't think our brother could get more romantic than the time he took a date to watch a calf being born and got blood all over her.”

“Okay, okay, let's not scare the poor woman,” Will said. “She's about to see the beauty of the ranch.”

“Or a lot of mud,” Daniel said dryly.

She saw a lot of rolled-­up canvas, bright orange in the bed of the pickup truck, poles sticking out the ends.

“Canvas dams?” she asked, hopping into the truck. “That seems fragile.”

“The ditches aren't more than a ­couple feet deep. And the dams aren't canvas anymore, though they're still called that. They're of a really strong synthetic waterproof material. We have some new ones to put in to replace damaged ones. Otherwise, we move the ones that are already there.”

With the windows down and the breeze rearranging their hair, they drove across the ranch, through acres of pastureland full of green plants. Cottonwoods grew in clusters in the distance, and east and west of them, mountains rose in jagged peaks, earthy tops rising above the tree line dusted with the last of winter's snow.

“It's a beautiful ranch,” Lyndsay said, lifting her hand to feel the rush of wind.

Will smiled at her. “Thanks. You can see why this is the only life I want.”

“I'll reserve my opinion on your sanity until I see what you want me to do.”

He laughed.

Ten minutes later, they reached a large field surrounded by fence. Will parked at the far corner, nearer the foothills. She started to open the door, but he caught her shoulder.

“Not so fast,” he said.

And then he kissed her, and everything fell away beneath the desire that rushed through her body like a flame to burn her. She caressed his shoulders and back, felt the urgency of his hands on her breasts and hips. They suddenly broke apart and stared at each other, breathing hard.

“Whoa, that was intense.” His voice was hoarse with strain.

She gave a shaky smile. “Just the way we like it.”

He looked around. “We're alone. Maybe we could—­”

“Hold your horses, buddy. We almost got caught the other night. Let's do the job and see what happens later.”

He slumped behind the wheel. “I hate when you're the voice of reason.”

“Someone has to be.” She leaned against him, hand on his thigh, until he froze. Then she gently bit his earlobe, smiled, and got out of the pickup.

A few minutes later, as she put her hip boots on, she watched him struggle with a headgate, where boards were settled into carved grooves. At last he got them up, and water flooded down a long earthen ditch.

Will opened the bed of the pickup and pulled out the first rolled-­up dam. “Let's go!”

He was as patient with her as he'd been with the 4-­H kids, showing her how to stretch the poles across the water-­filled ditch, then gradually lower the dam, holding it in place with large rocks. Eventually, she was able to rest her arms on her shovel, panting, sweaty, and watch the water run through the nearest field. She got mud on her face, and a splotch of it in her hair, while Will looked as pristine as a cowboy model in a magazine, with only a little sexy perspiration dotting his forehead.

And even that made her think of hot, sweaty sex in the hayloft . . .

They spent another hour putting in a ­couple new dams and moving others. Will even rescued a fox caught in a broken fence wire. He was so gentle and careful. When the fox ran off, she did the “awww” face until Will reddened. She felt, briefly, like a cowgirl, and she was pretty proud of herself—­if exhausted.

“We need a rest,” Will said. “You did a great job—­I had no idea how strong you are.”

“You couldn't tell the other day in the hayloft?”

His glance shimmied down her chest, leaving little ripples of desire in its wake.

“Oh believe me, I could tell. And don't start me thinking about it, or I won't be able to feed you. It was my turn to bring a picnic, after all. Want some?”

“I'm ravenous,” she said solemnly.

Soon, the damp, clammy hip boots were off her, and she wiped the mud off the rest of her as best she could with help from Will, who pointed out all the flecks she missed. Instead of a basket, he had a square cooler in his pickup. He brought out chicken he'd grilled himself, along with cut-­up fruit and a ­couple bottles of Coke, and they sat on a blanket.

For a while they talked about the other dirty jobs she hadn't known about on a ranch, and then they settled into a peaceful silence, lying side by side, holding hands, looking up at the clouds. At last he came up on his elbow, and her heartbeat got a little faster in anticipation. But instead of kissing her, he traced a finger down her arm and appeared hesitant.

“Is something wrong, Will?”

“I have something I want to ask you, and it'll seem like none of my business, but really, I have a reason.”

“Wow, you're rambling, and that's not like you.”

“Except when I'm talking to teenagers,” he said dryly.

She reached up to cup his face. “You're too hard on yourself. Did you know it takes a teacher a ­couple years before they really feel in control of a classroom?”

“Did it take you that long?”

“Oh, no, I was an incredible teacher instantaneously.”