Small-Town Cinderella (The Pirelli Brothers)

by Stacy Connelly

  Her mother recoiled for an instant, then straightened. “You don’t have a choice.”

  “No.” Sara’s spine stiffened. “I didn’t have a choice when I was eight and begged you not to take me on another round of auditions. I didn’t have a choice when I was thirteen and I wanted to quit the show after the assistant director came on to me. I didn’t have a choice at seventeen when you checked me into rehab for exhaustion because the publicity would help the fans see me as an adult.”

  “If you’d taken my advice, you wouldn’t be in the position you are now. I had your best interest at heart. Always.”

  Sara laughed. Actually laughed out loud in her mother’s face. The statement was that absurd. “You tell yourself whatever you need to make it through the day. We both know the truth. Here’s the kicker. Right now I do have a choice.” She gripped the keys hard in her fist. “Stay away from me, Mother. Stay off of my property or I’ll have you hauled off to the local pokey.”

  “You wouldn’t—”

  Sara met her angry gaze. “Try me.”

  She flicked a gaze at Jason Crenshaw, who’d returned to the office’s lobby. “I’ll be in touch,” she said and took the piece of paper he handed her. Without another glance at Rose, she reached for the door, but a large hand on her arm stopped her.

  “You’re making a big mistake here, missy,” the aging Marlboro man told her, his voice a harsh rasp.

  She shrugged out of his grasp. She’d been intimidated by far scarier men than this old coot. “What’s new?” she asked, and pushed out into the too-clean mountain air.

  * * *

  Josh Travers took a deep breath, letting the fresh air clear his muddled head. He’d been doing trail maintenance on the hiking path behind the main house for over three hours, moving logs to reinforce the bridge across a stream that ran between the two properties. His knee had begun throbbing about forty-five minutes into the job. Now it felt like someone had lit a match to his leg. Josh could tolerate the physical pain. What almost killed him was the way the ache radiated into his brain, making him remember why he was stuck here working himself to the point of exhaustion on a cool spring morning.

  What he’d lost and left behind. Voices whispering he’d never get it back. The pain was a constant reminder of his monumental fall—both literal and figurative.

  He turned toward the house and, for the first time, noticed a silver sedan parked out front. He didn’t recognize the car as any of the locals. He squinted and could just make out California plates.

  Damn.

  He thought of his daughter, Claire, alone in her bedroom, furiously texting friends from New York.

  Double damn.

  If his leg could have managed it, he’d have run. Instead, he walked as fast as his knee would allow, trying to hide his limp—just in case someone was watching. It was all he could do not to groan with every step.

  By the time he burst through the back door, he was panting and could feel sweat beading on his forehead. He stopped to catch his breath and heard the unfamiliar sound of laughter in the house. Claire’s laughter.

  He closed his eyes for a moment and let it wash over him, imagining that she was laughing at one of the lame jokes he regularly told to elicit a reaction. One he never got.

  He stopped short in the doorway between the back hall and the kitchen. Claire’s dark head bent forward into the refrigerator.

  “How about cheese?” she asked. “Or yogurt?”

  “Really, we’re fine” a voice answered, and Josh’s gaze switched like radar to the two women sitting on stools at the large island at the edge of the kitchen. One looked in her late thirties, two thick braids grazing her shoulders. She wore no makeup and might have a decent figure, but who could tell with the enormous tie-dye dress enveloping most of her body. She smiled at Claire and something about her made Josh relax a fraction.

  His attention shifted to the other woman, and he sucked in another breath. She tapped painted black fingernails on the counter as her eyes darted around the room. Her long blond hair was pulled back in a high ponytail; streaks of—was that really fire-engine red?—framed her face. The same blazing color coated her mouth, making her lips look as plump as an overripe strawberry. He had a sudden urge to smear her perfect pout with his own mouth, as if the most important thing in the world was for him to know if it tasted as delicious as it looked.

  His body tightened, and he realized with a start that his knee had company in the throbbing department.

  No way.

  Her lips parted, and he forced his gaze to her eyes. She stared back at him with an expression that said she knew just what he was thinking.

  No how.

  Her eyes were pale blue, a color made almost silver by the heavy liner that rimmed them. Her skin was unnaturally pale, and he wondered for a moment if she was into that vampire-zombie junk Claire had told him about. He wouldn’t put anything past one of those Hollywood types.

  “Josh, look who’s here. Can you believe it?” Claire gushed. He studied his daughter, who’d spoken in primarily monotone grunts since she’d arrived at the ranch a month earlier, but now thrummed with excitement.

  “Call me Dad. Not Josh,” he told her.

  “Whatever.” She gave him one of her patented eye rolls. “It’s Serena Wellens.” Claire shot a glance at the women. “I mean Sara Wells. But you know who she is, right? A real-life star here in our kitchen.”

  “A real-life star?” Josh didn’t subscribe to Entertainment Weekly, but he was pretty sure Sara Wells hadn’t been considered a “real star” for close to a decade now. Josh eyed Sara, who wore a faded Led Zeppelin T-shirt and capri sweatpants that hugged her hips like…nope. That was not where he needed his thoughts to go.

  Sara pushed back from the counter. “Your kitchen?” she asked, raising a brow. “That’s not what Mr. Crapshoot told me.”

  “You saw Jason Crenshaw.”

  “Yep.” She jangled a set of keys in front of her. “Looks like you’ve got a little ’splaining to do, Daddy-O.”

  Maybe he shouldn’t have questioned the “star” bit. What did he know about Hollywood and celebrities? If a former child actor who hadn’t had a decent job in years wanted to consider herself a star, it was no business of his. He knew guys who hadn’t gotten onto the back of a bull for decades, but their identity was still wrapped up in being a bull rider.

  Not Josh, though.

  He’d had his years in the ring. Made a pretty good living at it. Broken some records. Truth be told, it had been his whole life. The only thing he’d ever been a success at was bull riding. But the moment they’d wheeled him out of that last event in Amarillo, his kneecap smashed into a zillion bits, he’d known he was done. His world would never be the same. He walked away and never looked back. Hung up his Stetson and traded the Wranglers for a pair of Carhartts.

  People had told him he had options. He could try announcing. Get hired on with a breeding operation. Coach young riders. That last one was the biggest laugh. Just the smell of the arena made Josh’s fingers itch to wrap around a piece of leather. He could no sooner have a career on the periphery of riding than a drunk could tend bar night after night. Being that close to the action and not able to participate would kill him.

  A couple of times in the hospital and during rehab, he’d almost wished the accident had done the job. His gaze flicked to Claire, who looked between Sara and him with a mix of confusion and worry on her delicate features. She looked like her mother. Both a blessing and a curse, if you asked him.

  At the end of the day, she was the reason he’d made it this far after the accident. He wasn’t going to let some two-bit tabloid diva mess with his plans.

  He forced a smile and turned his attention back to Sara. “About that,” he began.

  He watched her sense the change in him and stiffen. Charm,
buddy. The groupies thought you had it. Let’s see what you’ve still got.

  He stepped forward and held out a hand. “I’m Josh Travers.”

  She eyed his outstretched palm like he’d offered her a snake. “Why are you living in my house?”

  “Her house?” Claire asked.

  Josh turned to his daughter. “Maybe you could head up to your room for a bit?”

  “You must be joking.” Claire crossed her arms over her chest. “And miss this?”

  He made his tone all business. “Now, Claire.”

  His daughter made a face. “Bite me, Josh. I’m not leaving.”

  He heard Sara muffle a laugh as he stared down the beautiful, belligerent thirteen-year-old who had every right to hate him as much as she did. He’d been a lousy dad. Almost as bad as his own father, which was quite an accomplishment. He didn’t know how to deal with her anger or attitude. Did he play bad cop or go soft? He barely knew his daughter, and in the weeks she’d been living at the ranch, he hadn’t made much progress on repairing their relationship. One of the laundry list of things he should feel guilty about.

  “Fine.” He turned to Sara, who smiled at him. At his expense. “Trudy and I were partners.”

  “Is that so?” She wiggled her eyebrows. “Very The Graduate, although you don’t strike me as much of a Dustin Hoffman. And from what I remember, Gran was no Anne Bancroft.”

  Josh shook his head and glanced at the hippie lady. “What is she talking about?”

  She gave him a sympathetic smile. “Sara likes movie analogies. Ignore it.”

  He wished he could ignore this entire situation.

  “Dad, is this our house or what?” Claire asked.

  He sighed. “Technically, it belonged to Trudy.”

  Sara jingled the keys again.

  “And now to you,” he admitted.

  “Oh. My. God.” Claire let out a muffled cry. “I have no home. Again.” She whirled on Josh. “You told me we were going to stay here. I could paint my room. Are you going to send me off like Mom did? Who else is left to take me?”

  “No, honey. We are going to stay here. I’ll work it out. I’m not sending you anywhere.”

  She sniffled and Josh turned to Sara. “Your grandmother and I were opening a guest ranch. She owns the house, but I have the twenty-five acres surrounding it. We back up onto the National Forest so it’s the perfect location for running tours. I’ve been here since the fall working on renovations and booking clients. Guests start arriving in a couple of weeks.”

  Sara looked from Claire to Josh, her gaze almost accusatory. “Does it make money?”

  He tried to look confident. “It will. I’ve sunk everything I have into the place.” Everything I had left after medical bills, he added silently. “Trudy was going to help for the first season. I planned to buy her out with my half of the profits.”

  “But now the house is mine.”

  Josh nodded. “I don’t expect you to hang around. I’ll cover the mortgage. At the end of the summer, I can take the whole place off your hands.”

  “Why can’t you buy it from me now?” Her gaze traveled around the large room.

  “The bank wants to see that it’s a viable business before they’ll approve my loan. Trust me, it’s a good plan. Trudy and I worked it out.”

  She looked him up and down. “Trudy isn’t here anymore.”

  “I know,” he agreed, feeling the familiar ache in his chest as he thought of the woman who’d been more of a mother to him than his own. He wondered how difficult Sara was going to make this for him. He’d known Trudy’s granddaughter had inherited the house. Josh had gone directly from the funeral service to the bank to see if he had any options. He didn’t. He needed time and a bang-up summer to make this work. Otherwise, he might as well burn his savings in a bonfire out back. There was no Plan B.

  “What if I want to sell now?”

  His gut tightened. “Rose got to you already.”

  “How do you know my mother?”

  “She and her land-developer boyfriend have been here a couple of times. The guy wants to tear down the house and build luxury condos on the property. Make Crimson a suburb of Aspen. What an idiot.”

  Claire took a step forward. “Are you going to let us stay or should I start packing?” She eyed both Sara and Josh as she bit her lip. “Because all my stuff is folded and in drawers where I want it.”

  He heard the desperation in her voice, knew that despite her smart mouth, his daughter was hanging on by a short thread these days. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, they had that much in common. He’d promised to take care of her, make up for his past mistakes. The ones he made with her and those he’d buried deeper than that. He needed this summer to do it.

  “Claire, I told you—”

  “I know what it’s like to want a place to call home,” Sara said quietly, her attention focused completely on Claire. Her eyes had gentled in a way that made his heartbeat race. For a moment, he wished she’d look at him with that soft gaze.

  Claire blew out a pent-up breath and gave Sara a shy smile, not the sarcastic sneer she typically bestowed on him. His heart melted at both her innocence and how much she reminded him of another girl he’d once tried to protect.

  Sara returned the smile and his pulse leaped to a full gallop. Don’t go there, he reminded himself. Not with that one.

  “Can you give your dad and me time to talk?” Sara asked. “To work things out? Maybe you could show April around.” She pulled her friend forward. “She’s into nature and stuff.”

  “Come on,” April said. “Can we walk to the pond I saw on the way in?”

  Claire nodded. “It’s quicker to go out the back.”

  As she passed, Josh moved to give his daughter a hug. She shrugged away from his grasp. One step at a time. He’d seen her smile, even if it wasn’t at him.

  “Thanks,” he said when the back door clicked. “I’m sure we can—”

  “Cut the bull.”

  So much for the soft gaze.

  She folded her arms across her chest. Josh forced himself to keep his eyes on her face.

  “I don’t want to hurt your kid, but I don’t have time to play Swiss Family Robinson for the summer. I need money and I need it now. If you want to make a deal, what do you have to offer?”

  His adrenaline from a moment ago turned to anger and frustration. “I put everything I had into buying the land and fixing up the place. I’ve paid for marketing, a website, direct mail. We’ve got a real chance of making this work.” He raked his hands through his hair. “It has to work.”

  “I’m not about to…” She stopped and cocked her head.

  “What? Not about to what?”

  “Do you hear that?”

  A sudden sound of pounding filled the air.

  “That sounds like—”

  He turned as Buster, his oversize bloodhound, charged down the hall, galloping toward the kitchen.

  “Buster, sit.” The dog slid across the hardwood floor and ran smack into Josh’s legs, all enormous paws and wiggly bottom.

  “Buster’s harmless.”

  He looked back at Sara, now crouched on the butcher-block counter with wide eyes. “Keep that thing away from me.”

  He felt a momentary pang of sympathy for her obvious fear, then glanced at Buster and smiled. “Looks like I’ve got you right where I want you, Hollywood Barbie.”

  Copyright © 2014 by Michelle Major

  ISBN-13: 9781460336960

  SMALL-TOWN CINDERELLA

  Copyright © 2014 by Stacy Cornell

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