by Zoe York
Maybe.
The rain started coming down harder, and Jennifer slowed down even more, inching along as she switched her wipers into top speed, hunching forward and peering through the front windshield. She was gripping the steering wheel for all she was worth, praying that she wouldn’t end up in the ditch on the way out to the farm. That’s all this audit needed – her car having to be towed out of a ditch.
Cursing a blue streak, she pulled up in front of the Miller farmhouse, the clock on her dashboard blinking 8:09. She was late. If it wasn’t for the rain…
But as Greg always said, people wanted results, not excuses. And this morning, all she had was excuses.
She peered through the sheets of rain coming down to spot Mr. Miller on the covered front porch, watching her, coffee cup in hand. Dammmmmmiiittttttt. She’d been hoping she’d be able to sneak inside and he wouldn’t notice her tardiness.
Well, no hope for that now. With a huge sigh, she grabbed her laptop bag and swung out of the Honda, planting her feet firmly in a giant puddle, water splashing up her legs and filling up the soles of her high heels.
Of course it did.
She wanted nothing more in that moment than to swing her feet back inside the car, put it in drive, and go back to Boise. Forget this whole thing had ever happened.
Hmmmm…scratch that. She wanted coffee slightly more than that.
Which…Carmelita was her closest source of the stuff, dammit all, so if for no other reason than the pursuit of caffeine, Jennifer made herself get out of her car, sling her bag over her shoulder, and stride up to the front porch as if nothing were wrong. As if her shoes weren’t squelching with water and mud with every step, with more rain pouring down on her as she went.
Under the cover of the porch stood a dry and smirking Mr. Miller, holding his coffee cup that proudly proclaimed “This Ain’t My First Rodeo” in one hand, while holding his other arm up in front of his face to ostentatiously check his watch.
“You almost made it,” he said as he lowered the cup. Was there a hint of…amusement in his voice? He was probably laughing at her stepping into a puddle so large, the federal government was – at this very moment – making plans to put it into new maps for the area as a place to go fishing.
“Yeah, well, I tried,” Jennifer grumbled as she clomped up the porch steps. She shifted from foot to foot, miserable and cold and wet. This was not how she’d envisioned the morning going.
He shrugged. “This place isn’t exactly built for Honda Civics. I suppose I can overlook it just this once.”
Jennifer swallowed hard – he was trying to be nice, but on the other hand, she didn’t really appreciate his condescending attitude in deigning to overlook her faults just this one time.
She swallowed her pride, nodded her acceptance, and headed inside, kicking her high heels off at the front door. She was pretty sure Carmelita wouldn’t want her tracking mud through the house, although her pantyhose was only marginally cleaner than her shoes.
Speaking of…Carmelita came bustling in, and with one look at her sodden appearance, clucked her tongue in sympathy. “Let me find a towel for you. Do not move.”
She headed back into the bowels of the house, talking to herself as she went, as Mr. Miller came inside. Trying to get out of the way, Jennifer stepped to the side, but she misjudged which direction he was going and they collided instead. Jennifer flushed a deep red as she tried to scurry out of his way yet again. He stood there for a moment, just staring at her, and she finally burst out, “What?! I’ll get to the audit in just a minute, I promise. I know I’m late. Carmelita wants me to wait—”
“No, it isn’t that,” he interrupted, holding up a hand and stopping her. “It’s just that I want to get to the coat closet behind you.” He pointed over her shoulder at the alcove of coats that she’d been inadvertently guarding.
“Oh. Right.” She sent him a weak smile as she moved out of his way yet again.
This was going to be the longest two weeks of her life, no doubt about it.
Chapter 10
Stetson
So, he was kinda an asshole.
He knew it, and wasn’t surprised by it. He owned that title and ran with it…most of the time.
He’d intentionally taken his coffee outside that morning, ostensibly to enjoy the patter of rain on the covered porch and look out over his family’s farm, but in reality, because he wanted to see if the thief really would show up on time. He wanted to rub it in her face when she didn’t.
And even though she had been late, when she’d stepped out of her car and right into that giant puddle, he’d been entertained instead of pissed. He should’ve been mad that she was wasting time – not treating his case with the respect that it deserved. Instead…
Well, it was hard to be mad at a drowned rat, and especially a drowned rat in a very nice skirt.
Muttering curses he didn’t dare say within Carmelita’s hearing, Stetson headed to the barn. The hired hands had vaccinated the calves yesterday under the direction of Christian, everyone was fed, and with this rain pouring down, it wasn’t a terrific day to be outside anyway. He needed to replace that section of fence out in the triangle pasture before some cow figured out that she could push her way through, but…
Not today.
He found himself in front of Grandpa’s tractor, staring at it contemplatively. If he just did a full tune-up and replaced the valve cover gaskets, he could probably have it running by the end of the day. He looked at the tires, worn and beat up, but still holding together. They could probably stand to be replaced, but who had money to spend on nostalgia? He’d make do with the old tires for a while. See what happened with this audit, then decide.
The audit…
Stetson wrenched at a bolt a little too hard, the screech of abused, rusty metal giving way echoing in the barn’s rafters, but he couldn’t make himself care. No matter how cute the thief was and how adorable she looked, her soaked hair hanging in her eyes, she was still the enemy, and he would do well to remember that.
Chapter 11
Jennifer
She poured over the documents in front of her, trying to piece the complex business together. Mr. Miller seemed to be quite unusual compared to the other farmers that Intermountain Bank lent to, in that he didn’t seem to focus on one or two crops or animals, but rather was doing All of the Above.
Hay, cows, corn, wheat…most farmers were monolithic in their approach to farming, choosing to do one or two things really, really well, rather than trying to do a lot of things mostly well. It meant the risks were higher – if it was a bad potato year and that’s all the farmer had planted, well, they were shit out of luck – but it was also easier to maintain and keep up on. Less specialized machinery, less moving parts to keep track of, less complexity overall.
Which made Mr. Miller’s choice to do it all fairly unusual.
She wondered for a moment why Mr. Miller was choosing this particular path to go down, and even contemplated finding him to ask him just that, when she heard a soft knock at the office door. She stood up and turned around rather than risk trying to rotate in the Fainting Goat Chair – as she’d come to call it in her mind – when she saw Carmelita at the door.
“I thought you could use some coffee,” she said in her light Hispanic accent, holding a rose-patterned mug out to Jennifer.
“Oh yes, please!” Jennifer said delightedly, taking the cup into her hands and breathing in deep. “Thank you. The coffeemaker was broken in the motel room this morning, so I honestly haven’t been able to properly wake up yet.” She took a deep sip of the rich, dark brown ambrosia and heaved a sigh of pure pleasure.
“Did you eat breakfast?” the housekeeper asked, her brow wrinkling with worry. “You are too skinny – you must eat more.”
As if on cue, her stomach let out a loud rumble. Jennifer didn’t tend to eat a lot in the mornings, but dinner last night had left a lot to be desired, and apparently, her stomach was in full revolt over
that fact. She grimaced and Carmelita laughed.
“You come eat. I will make you breakfast.” She turned and headed back down the hallway without waiting for a response. Jennifer hurried after her, coffee cup in hand.
“But Mr. Miller will be upset,” she protested, even as her stomach let out another rumble. Shut up. It was not helping matters. “He said lunch only.”
“My Stetson does not tell me who I will feed in my kitchen,” the housekeeper said as they got to the kitchen and she began pulling out bowls and ingredients, setting to work on making enough food for a small army. “If he wants me to cook for him, then he will allow me to cook for others, too. He likes my tamales too much to tell me no.” She winked at Jennifer as she put some sausages in the pan to fry.
Jennifer laughed a little at that, taking another sip of her coffee as she tried to wake up. “How long have you worked for the Millers?”
“Oh, too many years to count,” Carmelita said with a laugh. “Stetson’s grandfather hired me when I was just a girl – only 19 – and I have been here ever since. The boys joke that I am an inheritance – passed down from father to son – but then I tell them that I am the best thing they could inherit.” She chuckled. “Stetson was only a boy when his momma died, so I love him the most, but do not tell the others I said that. Like a good mother hen, I must pretend I love them all equally.”
Jennifer let out a bark of laughter at that, and then a sigh of joy when Carmelita slid a plate of waffles, eggs, and sausage in front of her. It looked like enough food for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but she doubted Carmelita would listen to her protests, so she just dug in instead. “How old was Stetson when Mrs. Miller passed away?”
“Only twelve. Just a baby, really. Wyatt had already left the house and Declan, too. It was just Stetson’s mom, dad, Stetson, and me here. To lose Mrs. Miller…it was very hard for everyone.”
Jennifer nodded slowly, trying to wrap her mind around the idea of a skinny, pre-teen fumbling around, a little lost in the world and not sure where to turn to. His anger began to make sense, even if Jennifer didn’t appreciate it being directed at her.
“So, do you have any family of your own?” Jennifer asked, wanting to change the subject. Contemplating a prepubescent boy without a mother made Mr. Miller too likable. Too human. It was easier to keep him at a distance instead.
Carmelita laughed and shook her head. “I have a few sisters but they are married with children of their own. I had a man propose once, but I did not want to leave the Miller Farm, and he would not move here. So, it was not meant to be.” She shrugged practically as she cleaned up from breakfast. “I am not so sad about this. The Millers are my family in my heart. I just wish that…”
“Wish what?” Mr. Miller asked in his deep voice, and Jennifer froze. She hadn’t heard him coming in. How had she missed his cowboy boots on the hardwood floors? She whipped around in her chair and stared up at him, her fork still on its way to her mouth. Realizing how ridiculous she looked, she quickly put it down, wanting to follow it and hide underneath the table.
Maybe Carmelita was okay with breaking his rules, but Jennifer wasn’t so sure she was.
“That all of my boys could get along,” Carmelita said, staring him in the eye as she did so.
Jennifer had to give her kudos – she had one hell of a backbone. A muscle twitched in Mr. Miller’s jaw but Carmelita didn’t seem to notice, or more to the point, didn’t seem to care. She simply stared back evenly, the ticking of the clock on the wall the only sound.
Now she really wanted to hide under the table. Family drama…this was not what Jennifer had signed up for. Balance bank statements. Track funding. Figure out if there was anything that could be sold to pay the debt to the bank. That was her job.
This…this was way outside of her comfort zone.
“I will get along with Wyatt,” Mr. Miller growled, “as soon as he quits blaming the world for his wife and child’s death. Until then, I can’t help him.”
He turned on his heel and headed out the front door, the windows rattling as he slammed it shut behind him. Carmelita turned back towards Jennifer, tutting as she did. “Sometimes, it is possible to be right and wrong at the same time. My Stetson is very good at that. Here, let me clean up your plate, and then I must go to the store. I do not like to drive in the rain, but I am almost out of chiles and you cannot make salsa without chiles.”
Apparently unfazed by Mr. Miller’s anger, the housekeeper took Jennifer’s plate – which Jennifer realized with a start was pretty much cleaned off; she must’ve been hungrier than she realized – and turned to the sink to wash up.
Jennifer grabbed her mug of coffee and headed back down to the office to get back to work. Maybe the housekeeper wasn’t intimidated by an overgrown, angry-at-everyone-and-everything Mr. Miller, but Jenn was. He could be angry at the world without her having to be a part of it.
The sooner she could finish this audit and get out of here, the better.
Chapter 12
Stetson
Stetson stormed back to the barn, cursing with every step. First, he’d realized that he’d forgotten to bring rags out to the barn that morning to refill his stockpile, and then when he went inside to grab some, he’d caught Carmelita telling that banker all about the Miller family history, and then he’d stormed back outside…without any rags.
He was back where he started, having accomplished nothing but getting pissy at the world. Which he wouldn’t exactly consider to be progress.
He grabbed a 3/4-inch wrench and set about removing the tractor weights off his grandfather’s tractor so he could get to the engine. He would restore the antique and then he would tell Jennifer the Thief to leave his farm and then he would wake up and realize that this was all a bad dream.
That totally seemed like a valid plan. He especially liked the part where he woke up to find it was a bad dream. He’d been trying to implement that part of the plan for months now, but it never did seem to actually happen.
Which really was too damn bad.
“I…will not…let some female…steal my…farm!” he shouted between grunts as he pushed on the wrench. “She can just…go back…to Boise! I–argh!” His hand slipped off the wrench and smashed against the grille of the tractor, slicing his knuckles open. “Shit!” he bellowed, dropping the wrench and clasping his bloody hand against his chest. He grabbed the last mostly clean rag off the bench and wrapped it around his hand, watching as it turned a brilliant red within moments. “Dammit, dammit, dammit!” he hollered.
Just what he needed – an ER bill on top of everything else.
He slogged back through the mud and rain towards the house as quickly as he could. If he could get Carmelita to clean the wound and bandage it up tight, he could avoid a huge medical bill. Maybe.
He could always hope, although he’d be the first one to admit that luck hadn’t exactly been on his side lately.
Chapter 13
Jennifer
With a sigh, Jennifer pulled another drawer open. It seemed like they were endless, even though she knew intellectually that she’d made it through half of them. It just didn’t feel like it. Because of how many different projects were being tackled here on the farm, this had to be the most complex audit Jennifer had ever been assigned, which Greg was not going to be happy about. He wanted answers…
Oh shit! Jennifer jumped up, rummaging through her laptop bag quickly, trying to find her phone. Dammit, dammit. She was supposed to call him at noon today to give an update, and it was now…she looked up at the bugling elk up on the wall…after two. As if he needed an excuse to be pissed off.
She finally latched onto her phone – buried in the bottom, like always – and hurried out into the hallway. She had to go outside and stand on the front porch to get enough reception to talk to Greg, but at least it was an enclosed porch so she wouldn’t have to get soaked while doing it. She wasn’t sure if she could endure that insult to injury. She’d barely dried all the way through
from her dousing that morning.
Just as she got to the end of the hallway, the front door opened and Mr. Miller came through, bellowing at the top of his lungs, “Carmelita! Where’s the damn first aid kit?”
He was clutching his right hand, a dark and bloodied rag wrapped around it. “She’s gone to the store,” Jennifer gasped, even as she was hurrying to his side, dropping her phone on the entryway table as she went. “What happened?” She took his hand into hers, peeling the rag away and watching the knuckles refill with blood.
“Tractor. It got me.”
She tugged him towards the kitchen. “C’mon, let’s get you over the sink before you drip blood everywhere. Something tells me that Carmelita wouldn’t appreciate coming home to that.”
He chuckled and followed her obediently. “You know her already,” he said dryly as he held his hand over the sink.
She looked up at him and grinned. “She’s not that hard to figure out. I’m not sure if she cleans the house so much as just terrifies the dust to the point that it wouldn’t dare to stray in here.” He let out a loud laugh at that, his straight white teeth flashing against his chiseled jaw. She swallowed hard. Focus, Jennifer. “Now, where would the bandages be? The bathroom? The pantry?”
“The pantry? I think?”
He’s such a guy sometimes. She rolled her eyes to herself. If Carmelita wasn’t here to keep him in line, the whole house would be as disastrous as his office. And that was not a pretty thing to contemplate.
She was heading for the walk-in pantry at the end of the kitchen counter to start the search there when he hollered, “Hold on! Why are you helping me?” It was as if the situation had just registered in his mind.