“I’m not a kid, but I am from Seattle. My name is Kittie O’Donnell...uh, that is, I prefer Caitlin. Who are you?” She smiled shyly.
“Reid Weston. You’ll scare the horses in that getup,” he said.
He walked away and Jacob realized Reid Weston wasn’t a troubled teen—he was a cocky, underage cowboy. Kittie’s devastated expression showed he’d flattened her ego with a single comment. And what was that bit about Kittie wanting to be called Caitlin? It was the first he’d heard of it.
“Reid and his family own the ranch,” Burt explained, as if nothing had happened. “You’ll be seeing a lot of them.” He motioned them toward the hillside studded with tents.
The tents were utilitarian at best, with mattresses laid out on each side of a canvas partition, along with lanterns, a small bedside table and sturdy army-green footlockers.
“We don’t recommend keeping food in here.” Burt tossed a sleeping bag onto the mattresses. “We have the usual critters who’ll want to share it, but if you do have any snacks, be sure to put them in your locker and fasten it tight. Better yet, store all food in your car.”
“Hear that, Kittie?” Jacob asked his daughter. Kittie had a thing for red licorice. He’d bet a thousand bucks she’d filled her duffel bag with the revolting stuff.
She just stuck out her chin.
“The lanterns are rechargeable,” Burt went on. “Bring them to the mess tent in the morning if they need a charge, otherwise you’ll be taking care of business in the dark. No candles—it isn’t safe. Flashlights are okay if you’ve got ’em. The bathrooms and laundry and other facilities are in the buildings to the left, and the mess tent is over there.” He pointed to a large tent with smoke rising behind it. “Folks are mostly gathered for supper already—we start serving in thirty minutes.”
“Thanks, we’ll be there.”
“No hurry,” Burt said. “Take your time and get comfortable. We don’t stand on formality.” With a short nod, he ambled toward the ranch house.
Jacob shot a look at Kittie. She’d assumed her defiant attitude, apparently having recovered from Reid Weston’s snubbing remark.
“I’m not shoveling any horse poop,” she announced and disappeared into her side of the tent.
* * *
MARIAH WESTON STALKED into the ranch house and slammed the door. She leaned against it and took several deep breaths.
“Problems, dear?” asked her grandmother.
“Nothing a two-by-four making contact with a certain cowboy’s privates wouldn’t fix. Hurt a guy where he lives and maybe you’ll get his attention.”
Dr. Elizabeth Grant Weston smiled resignedly. “Lincoln must have broken another heart.”
“Yes. We have yet another departing guest who hoped Lincoln had fallen in love with her and wanted to get married. For crying out loud, Linc keeps a supply of condoms in his shirt pocket! It’s pretty obvious what his intentions are. Did she really think he was going to change his ways and decide that wearing a wedding ring is better than being a carefree bachelor?”
“It’s been known to happen.”
“Cowboys don’t change—they just get older and stop having luck with the opposite sex.”
“Goodness, you’re in a mood today.”
“Can you blame me? I found Ms. Bingham smoking in one of the barns, so upset she almost set fire to the place.”
Elizabeth frowned. “Oh, dear. We don’t allow smoking. I wish we could extend the ban to chewing tobacco, but the ranch hands practically mutinied on the no-smoking rule.”
“I reminded her about the rules when I grabbed the cigarette and doused the smoldering hay. She apologized and the whole story spilled out in a hysterical swoop. Lucky me. I guess she just needed to tell someone. Linc always breaks things off at the last minute, but the women usually don’t take it this hard. Why are people so blind?”
“Patience, dear,” her grandmother urged.
Mariah rubbed her aching temples.
Patience wasn’t one of her strongest qualities. She did well with animals, not so great with people. Animals were straightforward; their emotions weren’t illogical. She felt sorry for Diane Bingham, but she honestly wondered how the woman could have imagined things working out with a cowboy. Diane was a born-and-bred city dweller with a taste for fast cars, sushi bars and nightclubs. She’d come to Montana on a whim and nearly gone crazy with the quiet before getting hot and heavy with Linc.
Linc had grown up on a horse, had never lived in a town with more than five hundred residents, probably thought sushi had something to do with sex and drove a decrepit truck from the 1970s that couldn’t reach fifty on a paved road.
The difference between ranchers and cowhands and most people was just too big. You might have a casual vacation affair, but you never expected it to become permanent. Mariah had learned that when she was fifteen and discovered that summer promises were too easily shattered...along with hearts.
Elizabeth patted her arm. “I’ll have your grandfather speak with Linc.”
“No, it’s okay, Ms. Bingham admitted Linc didn’t make any promises. But from now on he’s only working with family groups. We’ll keep him so busy that his sorry ass is too tired to do more than crawl into bed.”
“That’s usually where the trouble starts,” Elizabeth said drily.
“Don’t remind me. And they say country dwellers are naive. Is Reid in the office?”
“I think so. I just got home myself.”
Mariah headed to the back of the house, weary though it was only the beginning of the season and she ought to be brimming with energy. Ranching wasn’t easy. There were droughts, floods, lightning storms, disease, harsh winters, ornery cattle, unstable beef prices and a wealth of other problems to juggle. Yet those problems seemed minor compared to managing a bunch of greenhorn visitors and cowboy wranglers.
“Hey, Reid,” she said, stepping into the office. Their parents had converted a storage room into work space when they’d started the ranch vacation business. Originally they’d needed only a phone, a desk and a file cabinet, but the business had changed over the years, as had technology. Now the office was cramped with the newest equipment.
“Hey,” her brother said absently. He was bent over a book, reading intently.
“Studying?”
“Not exactly.” He looked up and pushed back from the old desk. “The travel agency phoned while you were out. Amy is waiting for the computer repair service to arrive, so I cross-checked the reservations that came in this week to be sure they were confirmed.”
“I appreciate your doing that, but I could have taken care of it later and let her know,” Mariah murmured. “Amy works evenings.”
Amy Lindstrom was a neighbor and ran her agency from home, largely through the internet. Initially it had stung Mariah to be charged for a job she could have kept handling herself, but Amy had significantly increased the U-2’s bookings.
“Yeah, well, you can’t do it all. By the way, I saw that new kid you said was coming,” Reid said. “She’s a real piece of work, and her dad is wearing a fancy suit and tie. I’ll bet his clothes cost more than a prize horse and wouldn’t last an hour riding fence lines.”
“I talked to Burt and he mentioned you’d met the O’Donnells. Just do your best and remember they won’t be here forever,” Mariah said, the same way she’d told him for years. The thing was, Reid was sixteen going on forty. He didn’t appreciate city people wanting a taste of Western living, except those city people were the difference between the U-2 turning a profit or going deeper into debt each year.
The U-2 was a working ranch, owned and operated by the Weston family for six generations. Paying guests worked along with everyone else—not as hard as a ranch hand, and always under the care of a wrangler, but they worked. It was all about the romance of the West and
being part of it for a while.
“Sis, they’re from Seattle.” Reid knotted his fists.
Mariah’s heart ached, recalling the boy who’d stood by his parents’ graves, furious with everyone and everything for taking away his mom and dad. They went through this each summer, the first time guests arrived from Washington State. Their mother and father had died because a vacationing Seattle investment banker was driving too fast and lost control of his car. His blood alcohol level was primarily responsible for the accident, but Reid also blamed the entire state.
“Okay, they’re from Seattle,” she said, carefully avoiding any mention of their parents. “Don’t go near them if it’s easier.”
He rolled his eyes. “That kid will want to hang around. I can tell.”
That “kid” was only two years younger than him, but Mariah understood why Reid felt older. Life and death were a daily part of their world.
It made you older.
“I’ve assigned wranglers to the O’Donnells,” she assured him. “You won’t have to spend time with them. Anyhow, you have classes and finals coming up. You need the grades to get into a good school, and the ones with pre-vet programs are terribly competitive.”
“I told you, I don’t want to go to college and I don’t want to be a vet.”
“Even if that’s true right now, you might change your mind. We have to talk—”
“There’s nothing to talk about.” Reid cut her off. “Don’t worry, sis, I’ll get the grades.” He went out the door with a mulish expression.
As brother and sister, they were close in many ways, yet a wall rose between them when certain subjects were raised...like the future.
Stomach tight, Mariah went to the desk and saw Reid had been reading one of her books on equine diseases—she would never be a vet now, but that didn’t prevent her from staying current on veterinary medicine. As for Reid, though he claimed he wasn’t interested in going to veterinary school, she doubted it. He was bright, talented and set to graduate high school a year early the way she had done...and he spent all of his free minutes studying animal care.
Worry and a feeling of helplessness nagged at her. Reid shouldn’t have such tough decisions to make at his age, but there didn’t seem to be anything she could do to fix it. Maybe if their father hadn’t given up after the accident, if he’d tried to survive his own injuries, things might be...
No.
Mariah shook her head guiltily.
She still struggled with the memory of her big, strong dad turning his face to the hospital wall when he learned that his wife of twenty-four years had died instantly in the collision, the light in his eyes vanishing until he was almost unrecognizable. The doctors had thought he would pull through, yet a day later he was gone, too, and she’d been so angry with him for wanting to die more than he wanted to live for the rest of his family. For her and Reid.
Nobody discussed it; after the funeral, Granddad had said that Reid didn’t need to hear loose chatter. He was suffering enough. That was fine with her—admitting how she felt was the last thing she’d wanted.
Sighing, Mariah walked down to the mess tent. It didn’t make sense to be angry with someone who was dead, and it wasn’t as if Sam Weston had committed suicide. He’d just...given up.
“Good afternoon, everyone,” she called, forcing a smile.
The cooks waved. The guests, in varying degrees of fatigue from working on the range, waved, as well.
“Oh, my God,” said the new bride of one of their annual visitors. She sat, wincing as she made contact with the bench. “My fanny hasn’t ever hurt this much. Who’d have known that riding a horse would be so painful?”
Mariah nodded with perfunctory sympathy—it was a complaint she’d heard dozens of times over the summers. “You’ll get used to it. We have a dispensary if you want aspirin or liniment.”
“It isn’t that bad, but I can’t believe this is my honeymoon. Whatever happened to rose petals, silk sheets and chocolate-dipped strawberries?”
“If it helps, Chad says you’re being a real sport about the whole thing.”
The other woman grinned; she was as open and uncomplicated as her groom. “Actually, I’m having a ball. We’ll be back every year, but I won’t object to an occasional weekend in the Bahamas.”
Mariah tried not to laugh...though groaning was a distinct possibility, as well. She’d already moved the newlyweds due to the noise they were making at night. It was fortunate the U-2 didn’t have more children visiting at the moment, or some parents would be explaining things they weren’t quite prepared to explain.
“Whoa, there’s something you don’t see every day,” Susan said, staring at the rear of the tent.
Mariah turned and saw a tall, well-built man standing next to a sullen teenager. The girl’s hair looked as if it had been trimmed by a weed whacker and it was a peculiar shade of streaky black, ending in purple tips. Apparently she was going through a Goth phase because she also wore black from head to toe, including her lipstick. Her T-shirt was ablaze with silver studs in the shape of a skull and raggedly cut to display her midriff...which seemed to have a spiderweb tattooed over it.
A tattoo?
Distaste filled Mariah, but it wasn’t for the teenager—it was for the father who’d allowed his daughter to do something so permanent to her body when she was still a child. Echoes of her grandmother’s urging to be patient rang in her ears and Mariah squared her shoulders. Fine, she shouldn’t make snap judgments. She wasn’t doing a stellar job of parenting Reid, either.
Mariah approached the mismatched pair. The man was in his mid-to-late thirties and attractive in an uptight sort of way, with brown hair and eyes. He was intense, focused and had a rock-square jaw. As for the girl, she might be pretty beneath her clothes and I-don’t-give-a-damn-what-you-think air. It was hard to be sure. Together they were the most unlikely twosome she’d ever seen going on a ranch vacation.
“Hi, you must be Jacob and Kittie, but Burt Parsons tells me you want to be called Caitlin,” she said to the teenager, trying to ignore her bizarre appearance. “I’m Mariah Weston. Welcome to the U-2 Ranch. I hear you’ve met my brother, Reid.”
“Yeah. He says I’ll scare the horses,” Caitlin said resentfully.
Reid could be right, only it wasn’t diplomatic to agree. Mariah sat on the edge of the table. “He helped birth a lot of those horses, so he’s very protective. A horse doesn’t understand why someone looks or smells different than they’re used to, and he worries how new people will affect them.”
“Oh.” Something flickered in Caitlin’s eyes, a blend of powerful emotions that seemed to go beyond normal teen angst. “Birth them...you mean, like, clean the babies up?”
“We do whatever they need. If we’re lucky, we mostly get to just watch. It’s incredible seeing a horse being born.”
Caitlin shifted her feet.
“I can loan you some outfits if you don’t have any ranch clothes,” Mariah offered. “Things that might be better for working with animals. We keep extras on hand in case they’re needed by our guests.”
“I don’t... Whatever.” Caitlin spun and marched from the tent as if the short conversation had exhausted her supply of civility.
Mariah stood, unsure of what to expect from Jacob O’Donnell, though his corporate attire and unbending stance weren’t the best signs. Up close she saw lines around his mouth from stress or frequent smiling or both. Right now he wasn’t smiling.
“As I was saying, welcome to the ranch,” she repeated. “You may want to borrow suitable clothes yourself to use while you’re—”
“I know Kittie can be trying, but your brother could have been friendlier to her,” he interrupted. “We’re paying good money to be here.”
Mariah’s temper, frayed by dealing with a distraught guest and a randy ranch ha
nd, threatened to flare again. “My brother feels responsible for the horses—both for their well-being and for our guests’ safety. He gave his honest opinion. I’m sorry it upset Caitlin.” Reid took on too much responsibility for a boy of sixteen, but it was one of the realities of growing up on a ranch. She wouldn’t add to it by asking him to pamper their guests as if they were staying at a fancy resort.
“Your parents should speak to him.”
“I’m Reid’s legal guardian.”
Jacob O’Donnell regarded her narrowly, but she couldn’t read anything in his remote gaze. “You’re what, twenty at the most? You can’t be old enough to take charge of a teenager.”
Mariah shrugged. “I’m twenty-seven and I’ve been his guardian for four years.”
“I see. I suppose you have a degree in child psychology to run this kind of place?”
“What kind of place?”
“A place for teenagers with...issues. Like my daughter.” The words seemed forced from Jacob O’Donnell’s chest. His pride was clearly on the line.
Through the entrance Mariah could see Kittie sitting on a small knob of ground, curled in a defensive posture. “We should talk privately, Mr. O’Donnell.”
He followed her with a frown. Mariah headed away from the mess tent and out of sight of Kittie before stopping.
“I think we have a misunderstanding,” she said. “This is a working ranch. Guests can remain in their tents if that’s what they choose to do, but we don’t have activity directors, swimming pools, tennis courts or other entertainments to keep them occupied—basically, none of the luxuries or frills that some folks are used to having. Our visitors come to the U-2 to experience ranching. Plain and simple.”
“I know it’s a working ranch.”
“You also seem to think we’re a facility for troubled children. We’re not, so if you require that, or feel we should put everything aside to wait on you the way they do at an exclusive spa, I’m afraid you’ll be disappointed.”
A muscle twitched in Jacob’s cheek. “I have friends who said it helped bringing their son here.”
The Ranch Solution Page 2