by Liz Isaacson
“Baby goats?”
“Well, you can’t have a fifty-pound adult goat jumping on people.”
“The goats jump on people?” Her eyes widened, and she shook her head a little. “Adele….”
“No, really.” Adele held up one hand like she needed more time to explain, which she did. “I have a whole folder of information on it. The babies only weigh about fifteen pounds or so, and they are so smart. I’ve been training them with graham crackers, and they let me pick them up. They jump on my back when I’m doing my poses. They’re awesome. And—and.” She took a deep breath. “We could charge $25 per person for an hour of yoga with the goats. Put up to thirty people in that enclosure we’ve got out there next to the pens. I’ve been leveling it and with straw down, it’s perfect. The babies are used to being in there, and if we could get the mats, we’d be set to go. Sort of.”
Scarlett looked like Adele had hit her with a brick. It was a lot of information, and Adele had been absorbing it, making plans, drawing diagrams, and researching programs for weeks now.
“Sort of?” Scarlett asked.
“Well, I need someone to help me run the program. Maybe a couple of people.”
“To do what?”
“While I’m teaching yoga, I’d need at least one person to tend to the goats. Make sure they jump up on every person, circle them through the people. Stuff like that.”
Scarlett’s smiled widened, but it looked more like the Cheshire Cat than anything else. Adele didn’t like that. Not one little bit.
“You know who you can have, right?” she asked.
Adele shook her head, horror cascading through her. “No. Scarlett, come on. Give me Hudson.”
Scarlett started laughing. “No way. I’ve already got him making signs. Not only that, but I just assigned him to Horse Heaven, and he still has to fix all those cars.” She pushed her flyaways back and sighed. “Jewel Nightingale called a couple of nights ago, and this place has to be perfect when she comes. Hudson’s helping me with all of that.”
“Oh, I bet he is.” Adele grinned and lifted her eyebrows.
Scarlett shrugged. “And maybe I like him a little bit.”
Adele stared at Scarlett, though she’d suspected her friend and Hudson would end up together. “I thought we weren’t doing boyfriends on the ranch.”
“Oh, we’re not,” Scarlett said. “I mean, you hate Carson. So you’re safe. We aren’t doing anything.” She moved down the steps, her two questions answered. “Anyway, I stopped by to ask you if you’d talk to Carson about taking over in LlamaLand and Piggy Paradise.” At the bottom of the stairs, she turned back and smiled up at her friend. “And now goat yoga too. It sounds like it could really bring in some cash.”
“Yeah, about that.” Adele skipped down the steps, her heartbeat stumbling over itself too. “I, uh, want half the money. The other half can go to the ranch.” She forced herself not to twist her hands, not to blink too much, not to shuffle her feet.
Scarlett cocked her head to the side. “How often are we doing goat yoga?”
“I was thinking every morning and every evening,” Adele said. “We’re not that far up the canyon, and we might get people who come every day.”
“Not for twenty-five dollars a class,” Scarlett said.
“So we offer them a monthly fee, the way a gym membership does.”
“I’m sure you have all those details in your folder,” Scarlett said.
“I’m still working on it,” Adele said.
“Talk to Carson,” Scarlett said. “And I’d love to see this goat yoga going before Jewel comes out to the ranch. Let’s talk again tonight, and I want to see times for the sessions. I’ll try to schedule her to come while one is running.”
Adele rejoiced inwardly. If she could get goat yoga up and running, she’d have a third income stream, something she desperately needed. “Thanks, Scarlett,” she said, keeping her voice as calm and even as possible. “And one more thing.”
Scarlett turned back, a flash of impatience on her face. “Yeah?”
“Could you ask Hudson about fixing my car? It has a starter problem.”
She grinned and nodded. “That’s an easy one. I’ll talk to him.” She started across the lawn, and Adele waited until she was a good, healthy distance away before she went back up to the door and slipped inside.
The timer on the oven went off only a moment later, and she hurried to get her cinnamon rolls out of the oven before they got too brown.
“What do you think, Rocky?” She held out her fingers for the little brown, white, and black goat, who came trotting over for the treat. Several others followed—Cotton Candy, Cookie Dough, Neapolitan, Praline—but she didn’t give out any more graham crackers. The goats would follow anyone with crackers, and surely Carson could put some crumbs in his pocket and circulate the goats through the yoga attendees while she taught.
“Of course he can do it,” she told the herd of baby goats. “I just….” She didn’t know how to finish that sentence. She didn’t want him in her space, with her goats. She’d been working with them since she arrived, the idea for goat yoga coming almost the moment she’d stepped foot into the Goat Grounds.
She’d asked Scarlett for the goats, and her friend had been so consumed with the rest of the problems on the ranch that she’d said yes immediately. She sighed at the thought of sharing her goats with anyone, least of all Carson Chatworth.
But she couldn’t resist his good looks and cowboy charm if they started working together. She knew she couldn’t.
She also knew there was no one else on the ranch to help. So she drew in a big breath, said, “All right, guys. Wish me luck,” and sighed heavily. She tossed the graham cracker crumbs around the arena and faced the Community, hoping she wouldn’t have to traipse all over the ranch to find Carson.
Chapter 6
Carson pulled the pizza out of the oven amidst a huge plume of smoke. He coughed and practically threw the baking sheet on top of the stove. A slam got the oven shut, and he flipped the knob back to zero.
Someone knocked on the front door. He spun toward it, his heart already bouncing around near the back of his throat. Maybe it had been the oven. Or the baking sheet cooling and unwarping.
Because another look at it, and it was definitely not flat anymore. He’d made frozen pizza before—he wasn’t completely unable to feed himself—but he’d never had smoke come out of the oven after only ten minutes.
He coughed again, sure his lungs were getting infected by some sort of toxic fumes. That oven was unusable. He didn’t dare open it, but once it cooled, he’d see if a vat of sludge had spilled inside.
“Carson,” a woman called, and he strode toward the door to open it. Ted and Tony escaped outside, leaving Carson to face their visitor. Adele stood there, looking glorious and glamorous in a pair of skin-tight jeans, a white blouse that looked like it had fallen into a washing machine full of bleach, and a black vest.
His mouth went dry.
“Everything okay in there?” She waved her hand in front of her face.
“So my oven has something spilled inside it,” he said, easing out onto the porch with her. “And I just tried to make pizza. So it’s a little smoky.”
“A little smoky?” She half-choked, half-coughed. “I’m dying.”
“Let’s go to lunch,” he said, seizing the opportunity.
“Very funny,” she said. “I just came by because Scarlett asked me to let you know your ranch assignments.”
Finally, he thought but kept buried under his tongue. He might be new to the dating scene, but he understood female friendships. And Adele and Scarlett were obviously very close. He wiped his hands down the front of his jeans, surprised to find Adele staring at his legs after he finished.
“All right,” he said, jerking her attention back to him.
“All right,” she repeated, those clear, blue eyes soaking him up. He wasn’t sure if he should smile or just stand there. He chose to stare b
ack, if only to give her some of her own medicine. “Are you going to tell me my ranch assignments, or am I supposed to read your mind?”
She blinked, the fire coming back into her gaze a moment later. He wasn’t sure which he liked better—the softer version of her or the don’t-mess-with-me blonde he’d met a couple of days ago in a parking lot.
“She wants you in LlamaLand and Piggy Paradise.” She cleared her throat and fell back a step. “And the goal grinds.” She practically whispered the last few words, and Carson didn’t understand her.
“And what?” He squinted at her. “The goal grinds. What’s that?” Coal? Was there coal on this ranch?
Sparks flew from Adele’s eyes, but they only served to fuel the flame of desire already burning in Carson’s chest. “The Goat. Grounds.” She enunciated each word clearly this time, in a loud voice.
“Don’t you work with the goats?”
“Yes.” She folded her arms and leaned in. “How did you know that?”
“Besides you practically running me over the other night? Sawyer told me.”
She had nothing to say to that, and he really wanted to ask her if she’d gotten his card. Instead, he stood there, his stomach growling and his lungs continually breathing in and out. Adele didn’t say anything or move to leave. He had no idea what kind of game this was, but he liked playing it with her.
After one particularly loud grumble from his stomach, she said, “I have some leftovers you can have for lunch.”
Shock hit him hard, almost physically knocking him backward. “Really, Adele? That would be great. Thanks.”
She put her hand flat against his chest and pushed. The warmth from her hand seeped into his skin, and shivers erupted up and down his arms. He held very, very still so she wouldn’t know how strongly she affected him.
“You can not come inside my house. It’s non-negotiable.”
“Okay,” he said when he really wanted to ask, Why not? “Is there a dead body in there?” he joked.
“Yes,” she said without so much as a twitch of her lips. “Yours, if you even attempt to come inside. I will go in and get you something to eat. You can wait on the porch. The end. Those are the terms.”
“Terms?” Carson scoffed, realizing a half a second too late that it was the entirely wrong thing to do. “Yes, fine. I agree to the terms.” If he could spend ten minutes walking with her back to her cabin, Carson though he might sign away a kidney.
“Fine, let’s go. I’ll fill you in on the goats on the way.” She turned and started down the steps.
Carson hurried to follow her, whistling for his dogs. “Just a sec. I gotta put Tony and Ted back in the house.”
“Oh, they can come,” she said. “I love dogs.”
“Will you let them inside the house?” he asked.
“No,” she said.
“Does Gramps get to go inside your house?”
“No.”
“Scarlett?”
She sighed, stopped walking, and faced him. “No, Carson. No one goes inside my house.” She started striding forward again, and for someone who was several inches shorter than him, she sure could move fast.
“I know a little bit about goats,” he said when he caught up to her again. “We had five or six on the ranch in Montana.”
“These goats are completely different.”
“How do you know?”
“I just do. We have miniature Norwegian goats, and I need your help with the goat yoga program I’m starting, not in caring for them.”
Carson frowned, trying to put her words into an order that made sense. “Goat…yoga?”
“Yes.”
“I’m afraid I am unfamiliar with that.”
She cut him a look out of the corner of her eye, and he thought he saw a smile. It was there for a moment, maybe a breath, maybe a step, and then gone. “Most people are. Don’t worry, I have a folder of information I can give you. And we’ll head over to the arena when we’re done with lunch.”
Carson wanted details now, from her mouth, if only to keep her talking to him in such a civilized manner. He liked the sound of her voice, and walking next to her, and the scent of cinnamon and sugar that swirled around her.
But he kept his mouth shut, because he sure did like the sound of we coming from her as well. They reached the end of the road with all the cabins, and he asked, “Are you going to eat with me?”
“Believe it or not, I eat lunch too,” she said.
“Well, yeah, of course. I just wondered if…I can’t come inside, will you stay outside and eat with me?”
Another look out of the side of her eye. Another almost-smile. How had this woman wrangled his heart so quickly? And without even being nice to him.
“Depends,” she said.
“On what?”
“How much you annoy me between now and my place. And I gotta say, cowboy, you’re already at about a seven.”
“Out of what?” Wow, he liked hearing her call him a cowboy.
“Seven.” She laughed then, and he wondered if this was flirting.
“All right, all right,” he said. “Shutting up now.”
“You don’t have to shut up,” she said. “You just have to say things that don’t irritate me.”
“Like what?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Siblings?”
“Yeah, well, those annoy me,” he said darkly. “Pass. What else?” He caught a look of interest from her, but he really wasn’t up for explaining about his brother and his online poker addiction. Nor his sister-in-law, if Tammy could even be called that. She only came out to the ranch when she wanted…favors from Terry, and their marriage was only on paper.
Carson wanted so much more than that, and his hand twitched toward Adele’s like he might hold it. Nope, he commanded himself. She would not like that, as evidenced by how she’d reacted when he’d grabbed her arm the other day.
“How do you like California?” she asked.
“It’s great,” he said. “The climate is so much more mild than Montana.” He wanted to kick a hole in the ground and bury himself. The weather? Was he really talking about the weather with this gorgeous woman?
He swallowed and reminded himself that he’d had girlfriends before. Sure, only a few, and not one for a couple of years. But still. He had money, and knowledge, and a good work ethic. There was no reason Adele couldn’t like him.
“Have you always lived here?” he asked.
“In California, yes,” she said. “I grew up in Crystal Cove.”
“Oh,” he said. “Nice.”
“You’ve never been there, have you?”
“No, ma’am. But the list of places I’ve never been is quite long.” Carson didn’t feel bad saying it. He was full of country, and he didn’t mind that he’d lived in Montana for his whole life.
“Well, maybe now that you’re rich, you should travel the world.”
Carson almost tripped over the tips of his boots. “Now that I’m rich?” He tried to watch her and the ground simultaneously, because he didn’t want to miss her reaction to his question, but he really didn’t want to trip and fall flat on his face either.
“I mean—”
“How do you know I’m rich?”
She didn’t speak for a few seconds, and she strategically kept her face turned away from him, as if watching hay grow was the most fascinating thing on the planet.
“Your jeans are never dirty,” she said.
Confusion riddled his mind. “What?”
“Cowboys should have dirty jeans. Unless they’re cowboy billionaires. Then they have so much money, they can buy three hundred and sixty-five pairs of jeans and always have a clean pair.”
Carson opened his mouth to say something, but honestly, nothing came to mind. Not a single thing. Much like she didn’t want anyone in her house, he didn’t want to discuss his finances with a single soul.
He said, “Well, at least now I know what your qualifications are for a billionaire.”
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nbsp; She made a noise kind of like a scoff or a choke, and Carson looked at her again. “Are you laughing?” he asked.
She shook her head, but the smile stayed on her face, and the rusty laughing kept spilling from between those full lips. They crossed the lawn, and she went up the steps of the middle cabin.
Carson stayed on the grass and looked up at her from beneath the brim of his cowboy hat. “I’ll stay right here.”
“I’m not a savage,” she said. “You can sit on the steps after I go in.” She flashed another quick smile and turned to open the door. “Wait.” She turned back. “What do you want? Soup? Casserole? Chicken breast?”
“You’ve got all of that as leftovers?”
“I make dinner every night,” she said, a hint of something false in her voice. So Adele Woodruff wasn’t a great liar.
“I don’t care,” he said. “Surprise me.” He was already past surprised she’d offered him lunch. That she’d laughed. And she’d obviously looked him up somehow, because his jeans weren’t brand new.
She went inside, and he glanced down at his jeans. They were definitely dirty from his morning in the stables and pastures, and if she couldn’t see that, maybe she needed an eye exam. He sat down on the top step and faced the homestead, a sense of peace descending on him. He’d felt like this at Cobble Creek too, and he loved the sound of silence in the country, the distant hum of a machine working somewhere on the ranch, and the far-away barking of dogs.
Dogs.
His adrenaline spiked when he remembered Ted and Tony, and he whistled, loud and long. His black labs came running from the hay fields, and they came right up on the steps with him.
“Hey, fellas,” he said, rubbing each one with one of his hands. “What are you doin’ out there in the hay, huh? You leave that alone.”
The door behind him opened, and he turned to see Adele carrying a serving platter the way butlers did in movies. “Let me help,” he said, shoving his dogs away and getting to his feet while she was still trying to balance the tray and close the door.