The Best Catch in Texas

by Stella Bagwell

  “Before we walk down to the barn, let’s go in and I’ll introduce you to Mother,” she told him. “Cook has a thermos and a light lunch packed for our saddlebags. So we need to pick up those things from the kitchen.”

  As the two of them walked to the house, Ridge looked around him with appreciation. “This is beautiful, Nicci. The house is nice without being ostentatious. Everything looks like people actually live here. I even see some brown spots on the lawn, and there are two dogs on the front porch.”

  Surprised by his comment, she laughed. “People do live here and we like to be comfortable. In fact, at one time, two families lived in this one house. Along with my brother and my parents, there were also my aunt and uncle, plus my cousins Matt and Lucita. That was before my sister, Mercedes, and my cousin Cordero were born.”

  “Sounds like a lot of togetherness,” he said as they walked across the porch to the double wooden doors that served as the main entrance of the house.

  Nicolette smiled with fond remembrance. “It was nice,” she said. “Sometimes I miss the closeness of those days.”

  Ridge followed her into a small foyer. A hall tree held several old cowboy hats with bent brims and sweat-stained crowns. Along one wall sat an antique deacon’s bench and an equally old buggy wheel made of wooden spokes. The remaining space was filled with a large assortment of huge, potted succulents, one of which was a prickly pear covered with bright yellow blooms.

  “Where do your cousins live now?” he asked curiously. “Here on the ranch?”

  She nodded. “There’s another house just down the road from here. When we start out on the horses I’ll show you.”

  Nicolette led him into a large living area and had just dropped her hold on his hand when a silver-haired woman appeared from a door on the left side of the room.

  She was a tall, thin woman with a handsome face and an erect carriage that told him she was still very active. Like her daughter, she was dressed in jeans, and her long hair was pulled into a clasp at her nape.

  “Mother,” Nicolette called to her. “Come and meet Dr. Garroway.”

  Smiling warmly, the woman approached him with an extended hand. “Hello, Dr. Garroway. I’m Geraldine Saddler, Nicci’s mother. Welcome to the Sandbur.”

  Ridge shook her hand. She was the total opposite of his own mother. One glance at Geraldine’s face was all it took for him to see she was a woman of strong character. He very much doubted she’d ever shirked from any unpleasant task she’d been faced with down through the years.

  “It’s a pleasure to be here. And Nicci didn’t have to tell me that you were a lovely woman. I had already suspected you would be, and now I can see for myself that I was right.”

  Geraldine laughed with pleasure. “Dr. Garroway, in this house flattery will get you everything.”

  Smiling, he released her hand. “Call me Ridge,” he invited. “I leave the doctor part at the clinic.”

  Her green eyes sparkled as she glanced from him to her daughter and back to him again. “Only if you’ll call me Geraldine,” she insisted, then motioned for the two of them to follow her. “Let’s go to the kitchen and I’ll help Cook gather up your lunches. Ridge, would you like something to drink before the two of you leave on your ride? Coffee, a soda or beer?”

  “Thank you, but I’m fine. I drank a cup of coffee on my drive out here.”

  The three of them left the great room and entered a long hallway. Every few feet there were doors leading off to the left and the right. With some of the entrances open, Ridge could see glimpses of the rooms beyond. Surprisingly everything looked comfortable, homey and used. Unlike the many rooms in his parents home where, as a child, he’d been forbidden to enter.

  By the time he’d grown into his teenage years, he’d narrowed his living space down to two rooms in the massive house. The kitchen and his bedroom had been the only places he’d felt comfortable. In his bedroom he’d been able to shut himself away from the constant bickering between his parents and the phony adoration they had displayed with each other when guests were visiting. Whenever Ridge had felt the need to talk to someone other than his peers, he’d sat in the kitchen with the cook and her helper, two women who’d displayed three times more common sense than his mother ever had.

  As for his father, Richard Garroway had rarely had time for his son and whenever he’d made time, he’d used it to preach to Ridge about the importance of a man making a success of himself. According to his father, a man’s wealth was determined by the sum of his bank account.

  “Ridge? Is anything wrong?” Nicolette’s hand lightly touched his. He pulled himself out of his thoughts to glance over at her. She was studying him with a look of concern.

  “No,” he answered. “Why do you ask?”

  She paused in the hallway, leaving Geraldine to go on ahead of them. “The look on your face,” she said to him. “Are you…feeling uncomfortable here in my home?”

  Uncomfortable? Not here, not with her, not ever, Ridge realized.

  Smiling with an ease he’d never felt before, he curled his arm around her shoulders and urged her forward. “Believe me, Nicci, I’ve never felt more at home.”

  Chapter Five

  Moments later the three of them reached the end of the hallway, and Geraldine pushed her way through two louvered swinging doors. Ridge followed behind Nicci as they entered a kitchen equipped with old, industrial-size appliances and a long pine worktable flanked by wooden benches.

  A tall, bony woman who looked to be in her seventies was occupied at a large wooden cutting board. She was busily plucking fresh shrimp from a huge mound and pinching the heads off. As he and the two women trouped into the room, she looked up from her work and wiped her hands on the tail of her apron.

  “Cook, this is Dr. Ridge Garroway,” Geraldine said. “Ridge, this is our devoted Hattie—but everyone calls her Cook. She’s been with us for over forty years, so she’s family.”

  Cook’s red lips pursed with sarcastic humor at Geraldine. “Why did you have to tell him how long I’ve been around here? Now he’ll know how old I am!”

  She extended her hand to Ridge and he noticed her fingernails were painted the same color as her lips. Her black hair had only threads of gray, and in spite of her advanced years, she was a comely woman.

  “Nice to meet you, Cook. I hope my being here for supper hasn’t caused you a lot of extra work.”

  The older woman let out a mocking laugh as she eyed Ridge with open appreciation. “Geraldine has made a menu longer than my arm. I’ll be working my rear off all day.”

  “Cook!” Nicolette scolded with embarrassment.

  Ignoring Nicolette’s dismay, Cook continued to chuckle. “Well, it’s a big deal for Nicci to be bringing a man to the ranch. We haven’t seen her with one in years, you know, so we’ve planned a feast.”

  With one raised brow, he turned a speculative grin on Nicolette. “No man at all. Really?” he asked.

  “There’s no need for you to answer that question, Cook,” Nicci firmly inserted.

  Casting an impish look at Ridge, Cook said, “Well, I’d better not go into that. I don’t want to get my doctor mad at me.” Her black eyes swept up and down the length of him. “I haven’t seen a man as good-looking as you since Neil Rankin swept in here from New Mexico and married our little Raine. What kind of doctoring do you do, Ridge?”

  Enjoying her thoroughly, Ridge raised her hand to his lips and kissed the back of it. “I’m a heart doctor, Miss Hattie. You don’t have any heart problems, do you?”

  Cook laughed and blushed as he finally dropped her hand. “The only heart problem I have is a lack of a love life. Can you do anything about that, doc?”

  Ridge laughed with her. “I’m not sure. I guess I could introduce you to some of my single patients.”

  Exchanging a conspiratorial wink with Ridge, Nicci said to the woman, “Ridge is the doctor who got Dan back on his feet, Cook. So you might want to thank him for that.”

  Wi
th a quick snort, Cook waved a dismissive hand at both Ridge and Nicci. “That old codger! He’s not romance material. I just sent him that box of cookies because I felt sorry for him.”

  “I thought it was because you were a little sweet on the old wrangler,” Nicci suggested.

  With a loud groan of protest, Cook turned and headed back to the cutting board. “Keep that up, girl, and you won’t get any lunch, much less supper,” she warned.

  The bantering between the women kept up for ten more minutes while Cook finished putting their lunches together.

  When Ridge and Nicolette finally exited the kitchen through a back door, he was carrying a pair of stuffed saddlebags and two canteens of cold water. From the edge of the patio, Cook and Geraldine were smiling broadly and waving them off as if they were headed out on a great expedition.

  As the two of them walked in the direction of the barn, Ridge said, “I think your mother and Cook liked me.”

  Nicolette laughed. “I’m sorry to bust your bubble, Ridge, but I think they would like any male I brought home.”

  “Oh,” he said with wry amusement. “And I thought it was my dazzling personality.”

  She glanced over at him and smiled. She’d not expected him to be so friendly and down-to-earth with her family, especially with Cook. Bill had believed he was above mixing and mingling with the hired help, which had always irked Nicolette, who considered Cook and the other hands on the Sandbur family. Her ex-husband’s superior attitude had made their visits home very awkward, until she’d finally started leaving Bill to his own pursuits and making the trips down from San Antonio by herself. No doubt he’d used those times alone to entertain his women, she thought bitterly. But that was in the past, and she needed to heed her mother’s advice and forget the hurt and betrayal.

  “I’m only kidding, Ridge. Mother and Cook do like you. But you’ll have to wait until tonight to see if my cousins cotton to you,” she teased.

  “What about your brother, won’t he be here?”

  She shook her head. “Lex had to go to Florida to see a potential cattle buyer.”

  “Oh. That’s too bad,” Ridge replied. “If he’s anything like your mother, I know I’d like him.”

  It was on the tip of Nicolette’s tongue to tell Ridge he could meet Lex the next time he visited. But then she’d sworn to herself that this one invitation was all she was going to give him. Yet as she walked along with him, she realized that idea was a dour one. She was enjoying having him here, enjoying being at his side and seeing the lighthearted smiles on his face. He made her feel young and alive. Did she really never want to experience this again?

  “Uh, speaking of your family,” his voice broke into her thoughts, “I’m curious about Cook. Does she not have any relatives of her own?”

  “She has a sister and a niece and nephew that live up near Cuero, but she doesn’t have any children of her own. Her husband, Herbert, was killed in the Vietnam War in 1965. He was a lieutenant in the Marine Corp so he was pretty much in the thick of battle. Cook had already been working here on the Sandbur for several years when it happened, and Mother said the whole ranch was devastated by the news. She and Herbert had been young and very much in love when he went to war. Afterwards, well, she never married again.”

  “Hmm,” Ridge mused aloud. “I wonder why? She was obviously a very beautiful woman in her day.”

  Warm color filled Nicolette’s cheeks. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d discussed such romantic things with a man, and it left her feeling a little embarrassed. Especially when she kept trying to think of Ridge as a friend instead of a suitor.

  “Cook says a woman only has one real love in her life—anything after that is just for laughs.”

  “Is that the way you think, Nicci?”

  Nicolette didn’t know whether it was his question or a rock on the path that caused her to stumble. Either way, the moment the toe of her boot tripped, Ridge’s strong hand caught her elbow and steadied her.

  As they paused on the beaten trail, Nicolette looked up at his warm brown eyes, until the breathless feeling in her chest became too much for her. She looked away, toward the barn where their horses were waiting.

  “I, uh, don’t think about those things anymore, Ridge,” she answered, then quickly strode ahead of him.

  By the time he caught up to her they were only a short distance from the barn, and Ridge decided the moment for him to press her about her opinions on love had passed. Which was probably for the best. The morning had been far more pleasant than he’d ever expected and he didn’t want to ruin the rest of the day.

  “Are those the horses we’ll be riding?” he asked, pointing to the pair of saddled mounts tethered to a scraggily mesquite tree.

  “No. Ours are over there.”

  She pointed to a holding pen that was attached to the east end of a huge barn made of corrugated steel. In one corner of the pen, two horses, a sorrel and a gray, were tethered to a wooden hitching post.

  Pickup trucks, most of them sporting scratches and dents from heavy ranch use, were parked here and there among the outbuildings and cattle pens. Cowboys were milling about, some spreading feed in long troughs for a herd of gray Brahmans, while others were loading molasses licks on the back of a flatbed truck.

  Before they made their way over to the horses, Nicolette introduced him to several of the busy wranglers, then pointed out a few of the nearest outbuildings and explained their use.

  “What an operation,” he exclaimed as he watched the busy comings and goings. “I can’t imagine the job it takes to keep all this running smoothly. Obviously, the work doesn’t stop even though it’s the weekend.”

  She nodded. “Unfortunately the livestock don’t care if it’s Saturday or Sunday. But Matt tries to rotate all the men’s hours so that they have equal time off. And Sunday mornings are always free for church. Even if some of the men are camped out on the ranch for roundup, one of the cowboys in the group will read scripture to the others.”

  His eyes were full of approval as he turned his gaze on hers. “Sounds like you all work as one big family.”

  The two of them were standing in the shade of the mesquite, but now Nicolette turned in the direction of the pen where their horses were waiting. “That’s a tradition here on the Sandbur. I suppose that’s why once a cowboy hires on, he’s here for years.”

  “So you don’t have trouble keeping good workers?”

  “Oh, once in a while a bad apple comes along, but for the most part we have dedicated men. I suppose it’s just the same as hospitals and clinics. There are some committed doctors and nurses and some just working to draw their money.”

  His brows arched warily as he glanced her way. “Hmm. I’m afraid to ask which bunch you put me in.”

  He watched a smile hesitate at the corners of her lips before it eventually spread across her face.

  “Okay,” she said, “I’ll admit I had preconceived notions about you. But now—let’s just say I’m willing to give you the benefit of the doubt.”

  He chuckled. “What kind of preconceived notion? Or should I not ask?”

  By now they had reached a wide metal gate that opened into the holding pen. While Ridge unfastened the latch, Nicci stood to one side and waited for him to swing the gate open.

  She said, “I’m sorry, but I thought you’d be one of those rich doctors in the business for the prestige and the money. And I guess I thought you were too young to be that serious about your job.”

  He followed her into the pen and carefully shut the gate behind them. “Being young isn’t a crime,” he told her. “And as for the money, I don’t need it. If I never worked another day in my life, I have enough to comfortably survive. But then, my wants are simple, Nicci.”

  One delicate brow arched with skepticism, but she didn’t make any comment. Instead, she gestured for him to follow her over to the tethered horses.

  Rebel, the heavily muscled gray, was Ridge’s horse for the day, and he caref
ully made friends with the animal before he tied on the saddlebags and slung a canteen over the horn.

  In a few short minutes they were both mounted and riding west along a well-beaten trail through stands of mesquite trees and tall wesatch. Prickly pear was rampant and in some spots grew as tall as Rebel. Even so, grasses were abundant and they quickly came upon herds of gray Brahmans grazing on the more tender forage. For the most part the cattle were docile and content to simply raise their heads and watch the horses until they passed by.

  Nicolette rode abreast of Ridge and he continually found his gaze drifting over to the beautiful picture she made. She sat a horse as though she’d been born there, which probably wasn’t far from the truth. Her posture was straight without being stiff and because she rode a lengthy stirrup, her long legs were barely bent at the knee. More often than not, she had only one finger on the rein, which told Ridge she trusted her mount completely. He wondered what it would be like to have her absolute trust, to have her believe in him as a man, a doctor, a lover. No doubt her trust would empower a man and make him feel as though he could climb mountains.

  “You ride really well, Ridge. When did you become familiar with horses?”

  Ridge shook away his intimate thoughts as he answered her.

  “I was probably about ten years old when I got on my first horse.”

  She looked surprised. “Your folks owned horses?”

  His curt laugh was full of sarcasm. “No. My parents aren’t outdoor people. My father’s connection to the outdoors is to play a little golf and sit around the pool at the clubhouse. And my mother thinks the outdoors is strictly for insects and animals.”

  Beneath the brim of her hat, Nicci’s brows pulled together in a thoughtful frown. “That’s odd,” she said, then glancing his way, she flicked a hand in his direction. “I mean, you ride a horse as well as any of our wranglers who’ve done it all their lives. You own cattle and horses, and yet you weren’t brought up in this sort of lifestyle. You’ve made me curious now.”