“No one knows much about Jensen,” Eva said. “Other than he’s rich and I heard he’s a workaholic. He’s in town working a deal, I think.”
“Well, sometimes a gal needs a donut and some eye candy, and I got both, so I’m good for a while,” Mikayla said. “I’m not looking for anything. I have great new friends and a great place to live. I’m set.”
Eva squeezed Mikayla’s hand. “It’s so nice having another woman at Sunshine Farm. I’m so glad you’re living in the house with us.”
Eva Armstrong Stockton was so kind and generous. She and her husband were thinking about officially starting a guesthouse at the ranch. There wasn’t much in terms of places to stay in Rust Creek Falls. There was a boardinghouse and a high-end hotel that was more Jensen Jones’s speed. Mikayla knew that the Stocktons hoped to turn the cabins on their property into little guesthouses, the kind of place that people could come to when they needed somewhere to go, somewhere like home. People like Amy, who’d reconnected with her first love in Rust Creek Falls. And people just like Mikayla.
She was temporarily in flux. The Stocktons had told her she was welcome to stay in their ranch house as long as she liked, even when she had her baby, who was sure to wake everyone up a few times a night. She’d have friends and support and community. She knew she was lucky.
So was it wrong that she couldn’t stop thinking about that tiny spark of something wonderful that had ignited between her and Jensen Jones? She’d have to fill her nights somehow, so fantasizing about him was really quite smart.
* * *
Walker and Hudson were belly-laughing so hard in the lobby of Maverick Manor that Hudson actually had to stand up and catch his breath.
What was so hilarious, apparently, was the idea of their parents coming to Rust Creek Falls for a surprise fortieth anniversary party.
“A planned party wouldn’t get them here,” Walker said, running a hand through his blond hair. “God, I needed that laugh. Thanks, Jensen.”
“They hate this town,” Hudson said, sitting back down in his club chair, an expanse of Montana wilderness visible through the floor-to-ceiling window behind him. He picked up his beer and took a drink. “They showed up for our weddings, then turned around and flew home, grumbling all the way about Jones-stealing women and Rust Creek Falls not even being on the map.”
“Those Jones-stealing women are their daughters-in-law. Jeez,” Jensen said, sipping his scotch. “You’d think Mom especially would like some women in the family after five sons.”
Walker popped a walnut from the dish on the table into his mouth. “I tried—hard. I talked to Dad about how much I like Rust Creek Falls, that we can easily work from the Jones Holding satellite building we built in town, that we’re—wait for it—happy, and he just doesn’t get it. Or want to hear it.”
“Lost cause,” Hudson said, shaking his head. “I’m over it. You have to be. It’s the only way to move on.”
Family couldn’t be a lost cause, though. If you gave up, that was it. You accepted defeat. Jensen knew Hudson had always had a hard time dealing with the Jones patriarch; he was the cowboy in the family, the one who’d always gone his own way.
He knew his father had to be proud of the way the Jones brothers had forged their own identities and paths. And to bring this family together, Jensen would do whatever it took.
“Forty years is a big deal,” Jensen said. “That has to mean something.”
Walker shrugged. “Look, you want to plan some big shindig, I’m in. But I remember you getting disappointed more than a time or two, Jensen. Mom and Dad don’t care about anniversaries and family get-togethers. They never will.”
“I’m in, too,” Hudson said. “And I’m sure Autry will fly in from Paris with his family and that Gideon, who’s traveling on company business, will make an appearance. But it will end up being just us celebrating our parents’ anniversary. I seriously doubt Mom and Dad will show up.”
Jensen grumbled to himself, staring hard at the trees and woodlands out the window. Why was everything he wanted—woman, land, anniversary party—not going his way? Maybe whatever was in the water in Rust Creek Falls had a negative effect just on him. “I’ll figure something out,” Jensen said, taking another sip of his scotch.
Except he couldn’t figure anything out right now. Because from the moment he’d left Daisy’s Donuts this morning, feeling like the biggest jerk who ever lived, his mind had been a scramble. Why couldn’t he stop thinking about Mikayla Brown? Yes, she was lovely to look at and there was some kind of instantaneous chemical reaction between them that rarely happened—to him, at least. But the woman was very, very pregnant! About to have a baby.
And even if Jensen could overlook that one detail—one big detail—there was no way Mikayla was in the market for a casual weekend fling.
Yet he couldn’t shake the thought of seeing her for the first time sitting there and biting into that custard donut. The deep brown of her intelligent, kind eyes. The melodic sound of her laughter. Her calm voice. What the heck was her story? No wedding ring. Unmarried and pregnant in a small town like Rust Creek Falls.
“Since you’re so family oriented,” Hudson said, shaking him out of his thoughts, “you’re invited to the Stockton triplets’ party tomorrow afternoon. It’s not their birthday, but Auntie Bella can’t resist throwing a party for her brother’s adorable kids, so we’re celebrating the fact that all three triplets are potty trained.”
“A potty-trained party?” Jensen couldn’t help but laugh. “Should I bring superhero underwear as a gift?”
“Actually, yes,” Hudson said. “Two boys and a girl, if you forgot. And Katie is nuts about Wonder Woman,” he added with a smile. “Listen, Bella would love to see you and catch up, so I hope you can make it.”
Triplets. That had to be a handful. Three handfuls.
Made one baby seem not quite as...scary.
Which made him think of Mikayla again. For all he knew she was having quintuplets, though. So forget her, man, he told himself. She’s off-limits. She’s not looking for a good time. And that’s all you can take on these days. A good time. No commitments. No future. No hurt feelings.
“I’ll be there,” Jensen said. Which was what he wanted to hear his parents say when he made up some ruse to get them to their own party. Their own surprise party. He wanted to surprise them, wanted them to know their sons cared, even if they themselves had forgotten to show how much they did. And his parents did care, somewhere deep down where their feelings were buried—Jensen was sure.
He glanced at his watch. Guthrie Barnes had agreed to meet with him face-to-face to discuss the land deal. He had to be over there on the outskirts of town in fifteen minutes. He stood up and slapped down a fifty. “Drinks on me. See you tomorrow at the party.”
Walker raised an eyebrow. “This is Rust Creek Falls, Jensen. And Maverick Manor may be the most upscale place to get a drink in town, but two good scotches and a beer still won’t run you even close to fifty bucks.”
“For the till, then, for the owner to stock up,” he said, tipping the Stetson he’d bought specifically to make himself look more like a land guy than a businessman to Barnes.
In ten minutes, he’d parked the shiny black pickup he’d rented in front of the Barnes ranch house. He got out and surveyed the land, which stretched as far as he could see. The access road to the highway was two minutes away—perfect. And the location on the outskirts of town would allow convoys through and choppers to land out here without clogging up traffic in the center of town.
These hundred acres would be perfect for the crisis distribution center he was planning on. The man who’d been like a second father to him had died in a flash flood while volunteering not too far from here, and Jensen wanted to honor his memory, as did his brothers, in a way that would help the area and community. Davison Parkwell had been a very close friend of his father�
��s once, but the two had had a falling-out and his father had refused to talk to him, let alone about him, in the past five years. Walker the Second hadn’t even gone to Davison’s funeral. But Davison had been there for Jensen in ways his father hadn’t been, as a Boy Scout leader, a coach of his baseball team, a mentor. His dad had always been too busy, but Davison and his wife, who’d died years before him, hadn’t had children and they’d doted on the Jones boys, particularly Jensen and Gideon, the two youngest, in any way they could. Not with money, which they’d all had in truckloads, but with time. Whenever Jensen had had a problem, his heart and mind all messed up over a girl or a coach making him feel like dung or because he’d learned that all the Jones money couldn’t buy what really mattered in life, he’d sought out Davison Parkwell, who’d listened and comforted and had taught him that riding out in the country could soothe a lot of ailments. He’d been right. Saddling up and taking off always managed to clear Jensen’s head.
Maybe he’d go for a ride once he’d squared things away with Barnes. Anything to get his mind off Mikayla Brown, her brown eyes and her very pregnant belly.
But right now, Jensen was going to pay it back and pay it forward—just the way Davison would want. Victims of natural disasters, such as the Great Flood in Rust Creek Falls a few years ago, wouldn’t have to wait for supplies and food and fresh water or shelter; they’d have a place to go right here.
Jensen glanced at the run-down farmhouse at the edge of the land. Peeling paint. Rotting posts. A barn that looked like it might collapse any day. What the hell? Why wouldn’t Guthrie Barnes, clearly having financial issues, sell the land? Jensen was offering a small fortune. The old-timer had hung up on his assistant twice and told Jensen no on the phone once already.
Two old dogs with graying muzzles ran up to Jensen, and he gave them both a pat, waiting a beat for Barnes to come out. He didn’t. Jensen walked up the three porch steps, the middle of which was half-gone, and knocked on the front door. He was surprised he didn’t punch a hole right through it.
Barnes opened the door but didn’t step out or invite Jensen in. “I had you come out here face-to-face so I could make myself clearer than my previous noes have been. Obviously, you rich city types don’t care what people like me have to say. You just keep coming, run roughshod. Well, you’re not going to bulldoze me, Jones. My answer is no. Now go back to New York or wherever it is you come from.”
With that, he slammed the door in Jensen’s face. A piece of rotting wood fell off and landed on Jensen’s boot.
“Well, guys,” he said to the dogs, “that didn’t go well.” He peered in the window, but the old man shoved the curtains closed. He took another look at the falling-down house and shook his head. Stubborn old coot.
Jensen got back into the truck. This was the perfect land for the crisis distribution center and shelter. The perfect site. And his assistant had made clear to Barnes what Jensen’s plans for the land were. The man had not been moved.
Frustrated, Jensen drove back to Walker’s house, surprised, as he always was every time he saw the place, how magnificent it was—a luxury log cabin nestled in the woods. I could live here, he thought, breathing in the pine and listening to the blissful quiet, broken only by the sound of a wise owl, a coyote or crickets.
His brother and his wife weren’t home, and as Jensen walked around, he was drawn to a photo on the gorgeous river-rock mantel over the huge stone fireplace in the living room, a picture of the Jones family at his brother’s wedding last year. I’m gonna get you people together in two weeks for the party whether you like it or not, he thought, tapping on the frame.
He moved down the mantel, looking at the many pictures. Happy family after happy family: his brother Hudson and his wife, Bella. Bella’s brother Jamie Stockton, his wife, Fallon O’Reilly Stockton, and their triplets—the ones having the party tomorrow. His brother Walker and Lindsay. His brother Autry with Marissa and their three little girls in front of the Eiffel Tower. A shot of Gideon with a girlfriend, though they’d probably broken up by now. And then there was a picture of Jensen, alone. As usual, these days.
Something twisted in his gut, and he turned away from the mantel. Sometimes, usually late at night when he couldn’t sleep, he’d get the unsettling feeling that life was moving on without him. His brothers were getting married, settling down. Then there was him, the bachelor without the plus-one, since he was afraid that even asking the women he dated to accompany him to events made them think things were more serious than they were. He wasn’t interested in serious. Might never be again.
From the time he was knee-high, his parents had drummed it into his head that people would try to take advantage of him because of his money and family name. He’d vowed he would never be fooled. He could remember Davison dismissing that kind of talk with a wave of his hand and saying, “It’s better to have loved and lost,” and all that. But was it? What the hell did Jensen have to show for loving Adrienne? A million-dollar loss. His trust stolen. His heart broken.
He didn’t trust women anymore. Stupid and sad of him, maybe, but it was true.
A beautiful brunette with soulful brown eyes and a very pregnant belly came to mind again. Dammit. Why couldn’t he shake the thought of her? He didn’t know a thing about Mikayla Brown, what her situation was, if she had the support of family, if she had a significant other. Was she on her own? Why did he even care?
All he knew was that he couldn’t get her off his damned mind. Which was why he’d steer clear of town and Mikayla Brown until he got Barnes to agree to the land deal, then hightail it out of Rust Creek Falls.
Chapter Three
Your baby will be soothed to sleep in this must-have bouncer that features gentle vibration and sweet lullabies.
Mikayla’s gaze moved from the description on the box to the price tag. Two hundred ninety-nine dollars and ninety-nine cents. Her heart plummeted. Baby Bonanza, a baby-supplies emporium in Kalispell, was supposed to have reasonable prices, but last week, when she’d driven out here to buy a crib, she’d been shocked by the cost and had to start a layaway account. She certainly couldn’t afford this bouncer. Unless she took the packs of diapers, pajamas and onesies and the infant car seat and snap-in stroller base out of her cart.
Well, she already had a built-in bouncer that featured vibration and sweet lullabies: herself. There was a rocker right in her room at Sunshine Farm, and she’d hold her baby against her chest, gently rock the little one and sing Brahms’s “Lullaby” herself. Who needed a bouncer for three hundred bucks?
I wish I could buy you everything, she said silently to her baby. She didn’t have much in savings, and since her job at the day care had ended in June, she’d been unemployed for a couple months. Trying to get a new job when she was seven months pregnant seemed foolhardy, but she really had no choice. Perhaps she could find a job where she could bring her newborn.
Right. Because every workplace wanted a crying baby interrupting things.
You will figure it out, Mikayla. Trust in yourself.
She reached into her purse for the list of baby must-haves that Baby Bonanza had stacked at the front of the shop.
Crib. Bassinet. Bouncer. Play mat. Bottles. Wipes. Wipes warmer. Diaper master...
Apparently, a diaper master was a special little garbage pail in which you threw out diapers. Wouldn’t a regular old garbage can with a lid work? For a quarter of the price?
“Ooh, I’m definitely getting that deluxe bouncer, Mom,” a very pregnant woman said as she and an older woman walked up behind Mikayla. She was eyeing the model that had given Mikayla sticker shock. “Only the best for my little Arabella,” she added while patting her belly. She looked to be around seven or eight months along.
“That one only vibrates and plays music,” her mother said, reading the description on the side of the box. She pointed at another box on the shelf above. “This double-deluxe model says it v
ibrates and gently massages the baby, a must when cranky. It’s only fifty dollars more. Worth every penny.”
“Oh, definitely that one,” the expectant mom said. Her mother lifted the even more expensive model into the cart, which already had a lot of items.
Only fifty dollars more. Jeez. That’s two weeks’ worth of layaway payments for me.
It was just stuff, she reminded herself. And not what mattered.
An image of her own mother popped into her mind. Widowed when Mikayla was a teenager, Hazel Brown had been a wonderful mother, and Mikayla had lost her just three years ago to a car accident. How she wished her mother was here now, by her side, explaining things, telling her what to expect, telling her everything would be okay. At least she knew her mama was looking down on her, watching over her like a guardian angel.
Chin up, she moved away from the expensive bouncers. The next aisle was filled with baby blankets and crib sheets that were so adorable her heart lifted again. She could afford one package of sheets and a waterproof liner. After all, that was what laundry three times a day was for.
Smiling, she put into her cart a lemon-yellow sheet with tiny pastel animals, along with a waterproof pad, then turned and headed for the checkout, but her gaze was caught by the cradle and crib aisle. Last week she’d put a beautiful white spindle crib on layaway. She stared at the floor model, struck by the fact that in just a couple months, the crib would be in her room at Sunshine Farm, her baby nestled inside on little animal-print sheets. She smiled at the rocking bassinets, one of which she’d also put on layaway, and the toddler beds in the shapes of race cars and butterflies. She couldn’t even imagine her baby walking and talking and sleeping in a big-kid bed. That seemed so far down the road.
“Oh, how adorbs!” another expectant mom said—this time to her doting husband, who was pushing their cart with one arm around his wife. Their gold wedding rings gleamed in the dimly lit aisle.
The Maverick's Baby-In-Waiting (Montana Mavericks: The Lonelyhearts Ranch Book 2) Page 3