The Charmer in Chaps

by Julia London

  “Right where I tossed it,” his grandmother had said, and tapped her highball glass, indicating Luca’s mother should pour a little more bourbon into it. “I figure we have enough landscapes hanging around this gaudy hacienda. This place used to look like a ranch house, you know. Now it looks like some antebellum mansion straight out of Gone with the Wind.”

  “Luca, honey?” his mother had said sweetly, as she’d swiped up her own highball of bourbon. “I’m going to walk down to the horse tank and hang myself. Tell your father,” she’d said, as she sashayed from the room.

  “You don’t have to tell him,” his grandmother had whispered conspiratorially. “She’ll start to smell after a couple of days and he’ll find her.”

  Luca hadn’t paid either woman any attention. Their bickering was standard operating procedure around the house, and besides, he’d been too enthralled with his find. Even at his young age, he knew precisely the spot of Prince land his great-great uncle Leroy had captured. The painting depicted a natural spring, surrounded by natural grass, with bluebonnets and Indian blanket and Mexican hat and pink evening primrose wildflowers. A jackrabbit sat up on its hind legs and looked over a rusting plow at a pair of horses grazing in the distance. The sky was a splash of orange and yellow giving way to the pale pink and dusty gray-blue of dusk. In the distance were dark hills, dotted with cedar and oak, and on the top of one hill, so tiny that you had to squint to see it, a campfire.

  He’d asked the family’s majordomo, Martin, to hang it in his room, and there the painting had remained for nearly twenty years.

  As the years passed, that painting had begun to represent an ideal to Luca, the way the land was supposed to look, the way God intended it to be. That was his goal—to convince his father to turn back some of the land the Princes had overused to its natural state. Not all of it—he liked money as much as the next guy—but enough that the wildlife would come back, and the wildflowers would grow, and the birds would nest. He could create a slice of heaven. He could do something meaningful, something he truly cared about.

  But he had to learn it first.

  No one but his twin knew about his reading lessons. Luca intended to surprise his family when he could finally read from this book. He intended to make a strong case for his vision, and he had just the place to do it. Brandon, who had become an environmental lawyer, had bought five hundred acres of parched ranchland out near China Grove. It was all used up, even sporting a couple of capped oil wells. It wasn’t perfect for an ambitious environmental project—it was too small and really too far off the beaten path to get people out there to work. But it was all they had, and they were determined. They’d been talking about hosting a fund-raiser to ask for donations that would fund the equipment and manpower they needed to clear out invasive species and the cedars that suffocated everything green around them. To repopulate creeks and lakes, to clear out the silt and runoff that was choking the natural spring. To bring students and environmentalists in to study the effects of ranching and farming practices on the land.

  It wasn’t sexy, but it was the thing that made Luca want to get up in the morning. No matter how embarrassing it was to read like a first grader, he was going to conquer this hill.

  Chapter Three

  Ella pulled into the parking lot of Timmons Tire and Body Shop on the edge of Three Rivers and at the end of the unimproved county road that led to her house. She’d become quite friendly with her old classmate Lyle Timmons over the last few weeks, given the crap status of her stupid car.

  As she climbed out of her car, the door between the garage and convenience store swung open and Lyle Timmons sauntered out, wiping his hands on a towel. No matter how hard Lyle wiped his hands with that towel, his fingers remained a peculiar shade of gray. He was wearing the greasy shop overalls he wore every day. He sported a ball cap on his head, the bill pointing backward, and a long ZZ Top–like beard cascaded down his front.

  Funny how the people you least expected to change after high school did all the changing. Lyle had sat behind her in English class. He never uttered a word, had a military-cut hairstyle, and perfect penmanship. Now he looked like someone’s fun uncle who carried Jolly Ranchers in one pocket, weed in the other, and played in a heavy metal band on the weekends.

  “It’s you again,” he said. “If you don’t cut this out, I’m going to have to start a customer rewards program.”

  Ella grinned. “It’s so hard to stay away from all this rubber and chrome.”

  “Yeah, well, say the word, and I’ll marry you and give you all the chrome and rubber you like.”

  “I wish!” she said brightly. “But my mom would have to live with us when she gets out of prison. Plus, I want at least six kids. Have I mentioned that?”

  Lyle chuckled. “Well, I don’t know if that shack out back would be big enough for your mom, but I’m willing to give it a shot if you are. And kids? Really, Ella? My sister has three, and they’re a mess, into everything. I don’t know why you don’t settle for a pack of dogs. It’d be a damn sight easier. You can start with him.” He pointed behind her.

  Ella looked over her shoulder. The black-and-white dog that followed her everywhere was sitting patiently behind her on the asphalt, his big soulful eyes fixed on her, his tail swishing around enough to kick up dust. “Not again!” she groaned to the dog, and to Lyle, “He’s not mine. He came with the house.”

  A couple of days after she’d moved in, she’d come home, gotten out of her car with her arms full of groceries, and had been startled by a black-and-white dog loping toward her from the back of the house. She’d stilled. The dog stopped a few feet from her, tail high, alert, and Ella had prepared herself to be attacked. They’d stared at each other for a few moments until Ella said, “No one said anything about a dog.”

  The dog suddenly rushed forward, and Ella cried out, crashing back against her car but managing to hang on to her bags. The dog tossed himself onto his back, presenting his belly for a scratch.

  “Oh. Oh,” she’d said, her heart pounding. “It’s like that.” She’d obliged the dog. She’d put the bags on the hood and then knelt down to rub his belly. He had burrs in his fur and something that looked like grease streaked across his back.

  Her belly rub must have been the best ever, because the dog never left after that. He’d joined the ranks of the abandoned pig that wandered around rooting for food, a cat that eventually sauntered out from under the barn as if he’d been there the whole time, then perched on the roof of her car to cast judgmental looks at the rest of them, and the three loose horses that appeared at the back fence in the mornings hoping for a handout. “Probably dumped there or left there by the last tenants,” Lyle had opined once.

  Paul Feingold was the attorney who had tracked Ella down to tell her about this house. He’d shown up at the Magnolia where she worked part-time, handed her a manila envelope, and then asked for a menu. Inside the envelope was the news that she’d inherited the house from her grandmother, free and clear. Mr. Feingold explained that her grandmother’s paltry estate had been rented out by a distant cousin to pay for her care in the Alzheimer’s facility, and that the house and the patch of land it sat on was the only thing that remained after her death, and that her grandmother had left it to Ella. He’d explained everything in great detail—but he’d not mentioned a menagerie.

  Ella frowned at the dog. His tail swished harder. “I have explained to him that he can’t ride around with me, that I have to go to work. But he keeps getting in through the window and crawling in the back to sleep.”

  “Roll the window up if you don’t want him in there,” Lyle said, as if that very obvious solution had not occurred to her.

  She gave him a look.

  “Let me guess—broken?”

  “Possibly. Probably. Definitely,” she said.

  Lyle squatted down and held out his hand to the dog. It obediently trotted forward wit
h one ear cocked up, one down, and had a thorough sniff of his hand. “Have you named him yet?”

  “No,” Ella said, watching the dog wiggle around Lyle with undiluted pleasure once he’d passed the smell test. “He’s probably passing through. Probably resting up before he moves on to find his master.”

  “That’s one theory,” Lyle said. “You feeding him?”

  “Well, I don’t want to be rude,” Ella said.

  Lyle gave her an accusatory glare. “Is he sleeping in your bed, Ella?”

  She sighed heavily, as if he were trying her patience. “Maybe.”

  “Yeah, this canine ain’t going nowhere. Give him a name. How about Rover?”

  “How about fix my car?” Ella asked. “It’s making that sound again.”

  Lyle clucked his tongue and stood up. “First your battery, then the transmission leak, and now the mysterious rattle. How much did you pay for the clunker again?”

  “Twelve hundred cash,” she said proudly. Proud of the cash part—it took a lot of willpower and missed opportunities at shoe sales to save that much cold, hard cash. She was not so proud of the car, however. It was a very old SUV and the beige paint was faded to an uglier beige. It served its purpose, but the back seat had a mysterious hole in the upholstery, the back passenger window wouldn’t roll up, and she could not get rid of that mildew smell no matter how many Christmas trees she hung from the rearview.

  “Twelve hundred for this death trap?” Lyle exclaimed. “If we did the math, you’d discover you’re paying a whole lot more than twelve hundred,” he said, and popped the hood of the car.

  “Then let’s not do the math,” Ella suggested.

  Lyle bent over the engine. “Here’s your problem right here,” he said, pointing at something. “Come over here. I’m going to show you how to stop that rattle when you hear it.”

  She followed Lyle, and the dog followed the scent of something around the corner of the convenience store. Five minutes later, Ella had learned how to tighten the clamp Lyle had put on a tube-looking thing. He tried to explain what the parts were for, but Ella waved him off. “No details, I beg of you. Just stop the rattle, please.”

  Lyle sighed and wiped his hands again. “You could stand to learn a thing or two about cars if you’re going to drive this. I don’t need you breaking down on the highway, because I don’t run a search and rescue department here. You seriously need to think about getting something a little more reliable now that you’re out in the country. It’s not like you can call a cab, right? I can work a little magic on this piece of crap, but I’m not a full-fledged magician.”

  “What would you suggest I get?” she asked curiously.

  “Well, now, the Princes have that fancy new Sombra dealership. I’m sure they could set you up in a nice little electric car and you’d be the first in Cimarron County to own one.”

  She and Lyle simultaneously burst into laughter at the ridiculous impracticality of a car like that in the country.

  “Let’s take a look at your window,” he said.

  They walked around to the other side of the car to examine the problem. They had their heads stuck through the open window looking at the inside handle when someone behind them said, “Hey.”

  Lyle and Ella jerked up at the same moment, both of them cracking their head on the top of the window frame. They spotted Luca Prince at the same time, standing in front of a car that Ella assumed was a Sombra.

  “Dude, you scared us,” Lyle said, rubbing his head.

  “Sorry,” Luca said, and jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Electric car.”

  “Try a horn tap, man,” Lyle complained. “My heart’s lodged near my eyeballs.”

  Ella hadn’t eked out a word. His voice had startled her, and here he was again, all tall, delicious cowboy, wearing jeans, a Henley T-shirt beneath a denim jacket, and a knit hat that covered his dark hair. He’d tamed the start of a beard with a neat shave. She would seriously appreciate it if he would stop looking so damn sexy every time she saw him. Which was a lot.

  She suddenly remembered her teenage self in English class, doodling his name entwined with hers. Aaand now her palms were slightly sweaty.

  “How are you, Lyle?” Luca asked.

  “Great,” Lyle said.

  Luca turned a smile to her, and Ella couldn’t help it. She smiled back.

  “Emma, right?” he said.

  Emma! Her smile disappeared. She wished that she could waltz right past him, but she couldn’t seem to move. She was mad at herself—she was a grown-ass woman and she shouldn’t care if Luca Prince remembered her or not. So what if he’d kissed her once? She didn’t remember every guy she’d ever kissed either.

  Except that yes, she did. She remembered every single one.

  Still, she was no longer a hormonal teenager, and there was no reason she should act like one every time she saw him. But come on, seriously? He couldn’t remember her name even from a couple of weeks ago? Could he possibly make her feel any less significant?

  Lyle took exception on her behalf. “It’s Ella, man.”

  “Ella,” Luca said with a wince. “Sorry.”

  “Ella Kendall!” Lyle said loudly, as if he were shouting at an elderly person. “You went to high school with her, dude.”

  Something flickered in Luca’s lovely eyes—a tiny pinprick of recognition. “Oh God,” he said as that pinprick grew to full-fledged realization. He at least had the decency to look mortified. “Of course—Ella,” he said, and took a step forward, but the dog appeared from nowhere to sniff him and, thankfully, blocked Luca’s path. Luca put his hand down and scratched the dog behind the ears without taking his eyes from Ella. “Ella, I am so sorry. I can’t believe—I don’t know what is the matter with me,” he said as the dog trotted off to smell something else.

  “Don’t worry about it!” she said with false cheer. “It was a long time ago.”

  “It wasn’t that long ago,” Lyle said as the dog loped away. “I mean, she sat right next to you in algebra, remember?”

  “I don’t . . . I don’t remember class so much,” Luca said.

  “Me either,” Ella said with a flick of her wrist. In truth, the only classes she remembered clearly were the ones she’d had with Luca. God, she was pathetic.

  She looked at her watch. “I’ve got to run. Don’t want to be late.” That’s right, she didn’t want to be late to the gallon of ice cream she was going to shove her totally forgettable head into. “Lyle, thanks loads for fixing that rattle,” she said, and started to back away.

  “But what about the window?” Lyle asked, gesturing to their joint project.

  “Ooh, I’ll have to come back for that one.” She gave him a little wave of her fingers and avoided Luca’s gaze altogether, even though he was staring at her with his hands on his hips now, which gave off the vibe that he was miffed she was leaving now that he’d finally, finally remembered her. Well, one thing had changed since high school—she wasn’t willing to lick his boots and stick around. No, sir. You had your chance, cowboy. You ridiculously handsome, insulting cowboy.

  “Come back any time, Ella,” Lyle said. “Like I told you the other day, just say the word and I’ll go down to Candy’s Corner Café and fish the engagement ring out of the claw crane arcade box.”

  “You’re such a charmer!” she called over her shoulder, hoping she sounded airy and carefree and so unconcerned about Luca Prince. She dove into her car, cranked it up, uttered a silent thanks to the universe that her engine didn’t choose that moment to fall out, and got the hell out of there.

  Emma!

  She’d intended to go by the hardware store, but she didn’t want to risk running into Luca again, so she took the long way around town.

  That took all of five minutes.

  Ella had forgotten how small Three Rivers was, even though she’d lived in thi
s postage stamp of a town most of her life.

  Just before she’d moved out to the farm, she’d been living in a bedroom community that had shot up on the outskirts of San Antonio, in a nondescript apartment with a guitar enthusiast overhead. She never saw anyone she knew in that subdivision, but in Three Rivers, as she’d gone around town trying to drum up a few clients for the accounting-slash-bookkeeping business she hoped to launch, she seemed constantly to bump into someone she’d once known. Even people who’d known her grandmother. And one person who, much to her horror, remembered her mother.

  Three Rivers was so small that she had to wonder why Luca Prince was still here. She assumed people like him went on to bigger and better things. Shouldn’t he be off skiing or doing whatever it was rich people did in the winter? She was pretty sure they didn’t drive around little towns in electric cars.

  Maybe they did if their family was the town. That was one thing that had changed since high school—the Prince family shadow had grown. The Saddlebush Land and Cattle Company, the mother ship of the Prince family business, had shiny, modern offices on the town square. Three Rivers Ranch Lumber was expanding. Prince Tool and Die cranked up every morning at seven o’clock sharp. She wouldn’t be surprised if someone told her that the Magnolia Bar and Grill, which sat at the junction of River Road and the main highway, was owned by a Prince.

  As she turned onto the county road that would take her home, she noticed the Sombra still sitting outside Timmons Tire and Body.

  She could imagine Lyle filling Luca in right now. Ella Kendall. Foster care. You remember, that green house on the edge of town with all those kids. The cops were there all the time, man!

  Was she going to have to see him every time she came to town? Maybe her friends had been right after all—maybe giving up her apartment and moving out here hadn’t been such a great idea. Then again, she’d lucked into a house. How was she supposed to say no to that? Her friends said it sounded dodgy when she told them about her good fortune. But it will be fun, she’d said. I’ll always have a home, she’d said.