Choose Me, Cowboy

by Barbara Ankrum

  He grinned and took another sip of beer. “And I’m a bull rider, not a lawyer...a skill I wish I had right now.”

  “You’re going to win, Finn.”

  He shrugged. “You learn fortune telling since we saw each other last?”

  She made a face. “Women’s intuition?”

  With a nod, he leaned against the wooden back of the benched swing. “What does that intuition tell you about us?”

  She slid a look at him. “Us?”

  “Yeah. You and me. The bull-riding rancher and the nanny.”

  “Maybe that beer was a bad idea.”

  “No. It’s a simple question, Kate.”

  Staring back out over his pasture she said, “You know the ground rules. Don’t try to change them now.”

  “You can’t still hate me. At least, it sure didn’t feel that way when I kissed you.”

  She sighed. “Do I seem the same to you, Finn? As the girl you gave that ring to six years ago?”

  He frowned. “The same? No, but then, neither am I. That doesn’t mean—”

  “Because I’m not. I’m not that girl at all anymore. I agreed to help you because of what we had once. Because you needed help. Because, okay, I don’t hate you. And I would help any old friend who needed my help. But I don’t do ‘relationships’ anymore. I’m not a long-term kinda girl. Maybe I never was.” She stared down at the long neck of her beer bottle and rubbed her thumb across the top. “I probably would have screwed everything up anyway. Probably the smartest thing you ever did was walk away from me.”

  A creaking sound from somewhere above them drew their gazes and a moment later, Kate shrieked as the porch swing ripped from its moorings and crashed to the porch floor. The two of them sprawled together in the broken remains of the swing, with Kate half-lying atop him. Laughter bubbled up between them as she tried to crawl off his chest.

  He stopped her with a hand and tugged her closer. “You okay?”

  She nodded with another laugh and held up her beer. “She falls! She recovers! You?”

  His was still safe in his hand as well. “Yup.” Brushing the hair off her face, he glanced at the wreckage around him and said, “Well, I guess I’ll have to fix that, too.”

  Her heart thudded against the wall his chest, her fingers curled in the fabric of his shirt. He went instantly hard as her gaze settled on his mouth for a long consideration before those green eyes of hers lifted to his with something like...apology or regret. He moved his head fractionally toward her, to which she leaned an equal distance back.

  “Lemme ask you a question,” he said softly, relenting. “You more afraid that you can’t fall in love with me again, or that you might?”

  She exhaled a breath. “I’m not afraid at all, in case you hadn’t noticed. Maybe it’s you who should be.”

  She pushed off his chest and got to her feet. “G’night.”

  “Night.” As she disappeared into the house, he took a long swig of beer, laid his head back amidst the ruins of the swing, and watched another dying star shoot across the sky.

  ***

  Their first week passed by in a blur, with the kids going back and forth to school, Finn disappearing for most of the day, fixing broken fences, with new posts and barbed wire, all of which left Kate feeling at loose ends and alone in his house.

  She and lonely loose ends were not friends. So instead of her kneejerk solution to this problem—namely finding a short term man to fill a long term problem—she looked around Finn’s new home for something to keep her busy.

  Though he had never been one to complain about gift horses, the ranch house he’d inherited was a monument to the seventies, with tile countertops in the kitchen and funky paint on every wall. The bad shag carpeting harbored God knew what and the bathtubs had rust stains. Nothing that a little elbow grease, paint and a few extra dollars wouldn’t fix.

  What this place didn’t feel like was a home for Finn and the twins. Not with boxes still stacked, unpacked, in nearly every corner and the twins sleeping in a room that had green shag carpeting and dark blue walls that worked on her gag reflex.

  Kate figured that while the kids were in school and Finn was in the fields, in the time she had here, at least she could make a dent in some of what needed to be done.

  She tackled the boxes first and emptied them to the best of her ability, finding places for most everything.

  A prowl through the garage the next day turned up the paint and supplies he had already purchased to paint every wall in the house. Every gallon white.

  Typical man.

  So she drove a couple of gallons to the Big Z Hardware store in town and had Paul Zabrinski mix up some color into them.

  Her stepmother, Jaycee, had been the painter in their family and practically a pro. When you have to depend solely on yourself to get things done, she’d told them early, you figure out a way. So she’d put a paintbrush in all three sisters’ hands and taught them how to paint walls.

  That day Kate had ripped out the nasty carpeting in the twins’ room and found beautiful hardwood floors below. Then the next day, she primed and washed the bedroom walls and ceiling with a soft blue and trimmed the room in a creamy white. Just that much utterly transformed the room. But she had other ideas, as well.

  She slid the twins’ mattresses on the floor in her room for the night and locked away the surprise of their room until she was finished.

  From the sidelines, Finn watched quietly and said nothing about her efforts, except to wonder with his children what she was up to in there. He seemed to have taken her words to heart the other night and deliberately kept his distance. When he wasn’t working, putting the ramshackle ranch back together, he was spending time with the twins, even working after dinner on the treehouse until the moon began to rise and bedtime arrived. Soon after, he would disappear into his own room as well. And the next day, the dance would all begin again.

  When their paths crossed, longing would blindside her. Often, that kiss they’d shared at his door that night, or the one at the courthouse, would come flooding back. And dampness would spread between her legs, as she imagined the slide of his tongue against hers, or the smooth curve of his muscled arms beneath her hands.

  At night, she’d lie, exhausted, in her lonely bed and stare at the ceiling, wondering what, exactly, she’d managed to get herself into? Was he already regretting their arrangement? Had she been wrong to push him away?

  No. Staying apart was in both of their best interests, but having him actually distance himself from her stung more than she could have imagined. She’d meant it, hadn’t she? All of her rules? While her head said, “Yes!” every other part of her sighed, “Let me think about this again.”

  Then, something out of the blue would happen, like the morning she checked her email and found a serious teaching job offer from a school up in Missoula, starting October fifth. The job was for the rest of the school year and possibly, a continuing contract for the next year. The position wasn’t even one she’d applied for, but, according to the email, the principal of that school was friends with Judy Elsworth, the principal of Marietta Elementary, where Kate had worked for the last two years and who’d recommended Kate for the job.

  Missoula. October fifth. Less than a month away and two hundred and something miles away from here. Still, she reasoned, after Finn’s court date. The opportunity couldn’t be more timely.

  But the email caused her to begin to hyperventilate and she quickly shut her laptop. They needed an answer within the week and she felt incapable of responding right then. She’d only just gotten here and already, she was planning her exit strategy? Of course she was. That was her M.O., wasn’t it?

  Sitting alone in Finn’s kitchen, Kate closed her eyes and decided to wait to answer that email. No rush. She had time.

  But she walked over to a kitchen drawer, took out one of the twins’ brown paper lunch sacks and cupped it around her mouth, breathing in and slowly out, until she stopped feeling dizzy—telling h
erself she’d think about Missoula later.

  After putting the finishing touches on the room on the fourth day, she decided to wait until nighttime to reveal it. So, she managed to keep the children occupied, helping with dinner chores. Both were hungry for time spent with Kate and working together in the kitchen was a glorious mess.

  Kate chopped up strawberries and let Caylee stir them into a bowl of whipped cream, as Cutter pilfered pieces of the graham cracker crust he’d helped make for a special pie.

  “Why don’t you have any children, Miss Candy?” Caylee asked Kate as she stirred.

  The question caught her off guard. Almost thirty and still on my own. That certainly didn’t fit the picture she’d had for herself ten years ago. Or even six. Once, she’d imagined a big family for herself, but that dream had, somehow, faded away with the disappearance of that other girl she used to be.

  How the hell had she allowed things to go so awry? She’d hardly noticed it, in fact, until Eve and Olivia smacked her down for it. Perhaps that wasn’t precisely true. Perhaps denying that person she’d become was easier if she didn’t look too closely.

  “Nope, no children,” she told Caylee. “And why don’t we dispense with the ‘Miss Candy’ thing. You can just call me Kate. All right?”

  “Kate,” Cutter said, without missing a beat while licking whipped cream off his entire palm, “have you ever been to the rodeo?”

  “I have. Have you?”

  “No, but Daddy rides in the rodeo sometimes. He says maybe he’ll let us come sometime, but he never does. Do you think you can make him bring us next time?”

  “Well, now. That’s up to your dad. But I can put in a good word with him for you.”

  “Put in a good word with who?” Finn’s voice came from behind her as he walked in the door.

  He looked exhausted, wearing half the dust from the pasture on him and, as he hung his hat on the old peg near the door, he took in the little scene in his kitchen with a look she couldn’t begin to decipher.

  “Well, with you, of course,” Kate answered. “Cutter was just asking if he could come along to watch one of your rodeos sometime.” She lifted her eyebrows at him with a secret signal. “I said I’d ask you.”

  “Snip, you don’t need to go through Miss Canaday. You can come to me direct.”

  “I already did,” he whined, “and you said—”

  “Soon. That’s what I said.” He moved to the sink to wash his hands and splash water on his face.

  Cutter grumbled to himself. “And she told us to say Kate. Not Miss Candy.”

  Finn slid a look at Kate, who affirmed Cutter’s words.

  “Is everything okay?” she asked, moving up beside him.

  He braced his hands on the sink and hung his head down wearily between them. “You mean besides the pond needing a good dredge, the automatic pellet feeder being rusted through in two places and the hay barn needing a new roof and, oh, yeah. A roofer? Yeah. Everything’s great.” He ran his damp hands through his hair and made a stab at starting over. “Sorry. None of that’s your problem.”

  “Doesn’t mean I don’t care.”

  His hazel eyes met hers and softened. “I’ll manage.” The delicious scent of her gooey homemade lasagna wafted from the oven. “Something smells good.”

  “We both helped. And we made a pie!” Caylee said proudly.

  For the first time since he’d walked in the door, Finn smiled. “Well, that looks good enough to eat. Is it all for me? Or do I have to share?”

  “Ohhh, Daddy. We all get some.”

  “The pie needs to chill awhile.” Relieved to see the tension broken, Kate stuck the pie in the fridge and pulled the lasagna out of the oven. “First we eat dinner.”

  “Then we see the surprise!” Cutter said.

  Finn stared over the heads of his children at Kate in a way that made her flutter inside. Was it because of the snapshot of domesticity that she and his children made in his kitchen? Or was it because, maybe for the first time in their short lives, they were doing the things other children simply took for granted? She couldn’t deny she had enjoyed herself immensely these past few days, too, or that working on the house had not been a chore, but a secret joy.

  Now, after a day of allowing herself to almost forget who she was and what they were doing, alarm bells went off in her head at his look, warning her of getting too comfortable with all this. This wasn’t her life, her home, or even her man. She was a substitute for the real thing. A temporary substitute. As long as she remembered that, they would all be fine.

  ***

  “Close your eyes,” Kate told the children, later, as they stood outside their bedroom door. “No peeking.”

  Finn felt a prickle of anticipation rush across him at the excitement in his children’s eyes. She’d been working on something in secret all week. It had been a long time since he’d seen them this happy, as if this was Christmas morning. Kate, herself, looked like the cat who’d gotten into the cream as she guided the kids into the freshly painted room. When they opened their eyes, they both squealed.

  He had to admit, she’d worked a mini-miracle with the room, turning the ceiling into a piece of Montana sky with washes of white clouds spilling across the ceiling and down the walls. She’d even repainted the old chest that stood in the center of one wall and put coordinating coverlets and throw pillows on each of their beds and a striped throw rug on the floor between.

  The twins raced to their beds and flopped down to stare up at their painted sky.

  He was staring, not at the room, but at her.

  “Wait for it,” she told them, then flipped the light switch. Glow in the dark stars lit the darkened ceiling like the Milky Way and a three dimensional moon glowed over the closet door.

  Cutter was laughing and Caylee couldn’t stop staring with a silly smile on her face.

  “Look at the Big Dropper!” Cutter said to Caylee.

  “That’s ‘Dipper,’ Snip and what do you say to Miss—to Kate?” Finn said, still not taking his eyes off her. He watched a flush of color creep to her cheeks, and she kept her gaze on the kids, as if she feared in meeting his eye, she might reveal something she had no intention of revealing.

  They rushed over to give her a hug and thank her. In the years since the birth of his twins, he’d learned about the pure generosity of children with their affections. His children’s anyway. They did not edit, complicate or hold back their feelings. You always knew exactly where you stood. The good news was—they liked Kate. The bad news? They liked her a lot.

  He’d tried like hell to keep his distance from her this week. Kept himself too busy to think about her. That had been the plan at least. Failed miserably. The harder he pushed back, the worse he felt.

  After putting the kids to bed, he took a quick shower, then walked outside to look for her. The squeaky spring on the screen door gave him away. He spotted her sitting up in his half-built treehouse, sipping wine as the fireflies began to light up the night sky, and staring at the crazy swarm of stars that illuminated the black dome. The sight took his breath away for a moment—Kate bathed in starlight, smiling down at him.

  Chapter Seven

  “Could there be a more perfect place to look at the stars?” she asked, as he walked toward her perch. She patted the freshly cut wood. “I have wine and I’ll share. Join me?”

  Something tightened inside him at the thought. Hell yes, he would.

  He climbed the makeshift ladder he’d nailed into the tree and she made room for him as he sat down beside her. The treehouse still lacked a roof and was basically only a platform and two walls. But directly above the platform was an opening in the tree, a view unfettered by branches where he planned to put a skylight for this very purpose when all was said and done.

  There was nothing like a night sky in Montana. Nothing that could compare to how small that huge black, star-scattered expanse made one feel. Sitting out here at night seemed to put everything in perspective. His perspective felt
a little at odd angles at the moment. He thought of the twins staring up at the miniature version she’d designed on their ceiling as they drifted off tonight, happy as puppies in grass.

  “They asleep?” she asked.

  “Like someone turned off a switch. Hey...thank you,” he said simply.

  She glanced back at him again, flashing a grin that stirred him up inside. He’d spent a good part of the last week trying to put that smile out of his mind, but he’d be damned if he’d managed to do it. And now, that smile made him want to drag her up against him and kiss her until she relinquished that misplaced control of hers. But, he did none of those things. Instead he sat beside her under the moonlight and coached himself in restraint.

  “It was just a little whipped cream and strawberries,” she said.

  He chuckled and took a sip of wine straight from the bottle. “Yeah, thanks for the pie, too. But especially for the room. That was a lot of work that doesn’t, in any way, fall under the nanny job description.”

  “My job description here is fuzzy at best, but you should know by now I pay no attention to the fine print.” She reached for her neck and rubbed it. “And yeah, those little bitty stars nearly had me calling ‘Uncle,’ but fixing that room was for fun and for free. Besides, I need to keep busy or I get a little stir-crazy.”

  He moved her hand aside and took over the neck rub for her. For a moment she stiffened, but then turned her back to give him access. As his hands dug into the knotted flesh of her shoulders and neck, he felt her relax.

  “Ohhhh,” she moaned. “That...that is...thank you.”

  My pleasure. “You’re welcome.”

  “I should be giving you the neck rub after the day you had. I’m sorry it’s not going well.”

  The repairs around the ranch were sucking more dollars than he’d expected. His money issues simply meant he’d need to win a few more rodeos to get the stake he needed for that bull he wanted. But he could do that. Hell, yes, he could. “It’ll be all right. I’ll figure things out.”