The Cowboy and the Girl Next Door: (A Clean, Enemies to Lovers Romance) Wyle Away Ranch Book 1

by Janette Rallison

  Kate said the same thing when she showed them the bathroom. She’d cleaned it after the Gunthers left but had forgotten to put away the bottle of toilet bowl cleaner and the Windex. They sat in the middle of the counter like a tacky centerpiece.

  It was obvious she hadn’t planned on showing anyone these places and the women were probably wondering why she had.

  “Any questions?” Kate asked brightly.

  Both women shook their heads. “Again, thanks for the tour.” Mrs. Coleman and her daughter strolled toward the front door. Not nearly enough time had passed to unload cattle and get rid of the trailer.

  Kate followed after them. “Would you like valet parking for your guests?”

  “I’m not sure.” Mrs. Coleman was still walking, but at least she’d slowed her pace. “Do you have a staff for that sort of thing or would the valets be a group of teenage boys? I wouldn’t want to turn over my friends’ cars to a bunch of high schoolers.”

  Kate had planned on hiring some ranch hands to do it. “Not teenagers,” she said. “You’ll find everyone at Coyote Glen is respectful and professional. I only want top-notch employees working for me.” The ranch hands could rope running bulls. They could handle parking a Volvo.

  Mrs. Coleman opened the front door and the women stepped out onto the patio. “Why are police cars here?” Cassie asked.

  “What?” Kate hurriedly joined them. Police cars were indeed parked on either side of the barn. Worse, an officer stood pressed against the wall near the barn door, gun out, waiting. Two more officers had positioned themselves on either side of the barn. All were decked out in full gear. They looked like a SWAT operation.

  No, no, no. Not this. Not now.

  Mrs. Coleman took a step backward as though about to retreat inside for cover. “What’s going on over there?”

  “I don’t know,” Kate lied. She was pretty certain the police had connected Gary to the theft and they’d come for him.

  Before she could say anything else, Gary sprinted out the barn door, arms pumping. He didn’t get far. Two steps past the officer, Gary arched, screamed, and dropped to the ground, writhing. Tazed.

  Both women gasped. Mrs. Coleman put her hand to her throat.

  The police converged on Gary, a sea of dark blue uniforms. They cuffed him, hauled him to his feet, and barked out his Miranda rights.

  Mrs. Coleman’s chest heaved in alarm. “You have fugitives hiding in your barn?”

  “Uh, no,” Kate said. “That’s my foreman.” Karma had picked the worst moment possible to catch up with him. “Ex-foreman now,” she clarified.

  Gary dug his heels into the ground. “You can’t do this!” he screamed. “I have a lawyer!”

  Yes, and if Gary’s divorce lawyer doubled as criminal council, it was no wonder he was expensive. A police officer dragged Gary, who was still threatening the use of his lawyer, to the back of a squad car.

  Kate cleared her throat. “I’m as shocked as you are.” Even as she said the words, she knew she didn’t sound shocked. She sounded like someone overacting in a bad play. “But don’t worry. I’ll hire someone new by the time you have your wedding. Someone really respectable.”

  The women turned and stared at her, mouths slightly gaping. Which meant the Colemans wouldn’t be booking. Kate smiled awkwardly anyway. “So, um, just let me know.”

  “We will.” To Mrs. Colemans’ credit, she almost didn’t sound horrified. “Come, Cassie.” She grabbed her daughter’s arm and pulled her off the patio. The two nearly raced to their Beemer. By that time, most of the officers were heading to their squad cars, so the women sat in their BMW and waited for them to leave first. Mrs. Coleman talked excitedly on her phone, her eyes wide and scandalized. Cassie had her phone out too, recording the police cars.

  This was definitely not what Kate had in mind when she asked for publicity.

  Finally, most of the squad cars and the women left. Officer Kahale strode over to the patio to speak with Kate. He told her the police needed to search Gary’s house and then gave her an update on the case. Jake had turned state’s evidence on Gary and named him as the ringleader behind the thefts. The police had also found Gary’s prints on the trailer. They were able to match them because Gary not only had a DUI but also a felony charge five years ago for stealing and selling a tractor.

  None of it was really a surprise. Just horribly bad news. Gary had no reason to restock her cattle now. And maybe his promises had been nothing but smoke anyway. She’d wanted to believe him in the hope that she wouldn’t lose the ranch.

  A prospect that seemed slimmer every moment.

  After Officer Kahale left, Kate took out her phone and, with shaking hands, called her parents. To her own ears, she sounded surprising calm relaying the news. She wasn’t calm, though. She was numb.

  Her father said, “I’ll talk to Gary’s lawyer. Maybe he can beat a conviction.”

  That’s what her family had come to. Her parents were rooting for the man they knew had stolen their cattle so the insurance company would cover their losses.

  Her mother said, “I’ll call the insurance agent first thing in the morning. It can’t be legal for them to refuse to pay the claim.”

  “We haven’t lost yet,” her father said.

  We. Kate didn’t bother to correct him. She was having a hard time believing that it mattered. She thanked them for their help and hung up.

  The arrest made the evening news. She knew this because Mrs. Pieroni, the pastor’s wife, called Kate to ask if she was all right. Mrs. Pieroni had always been one of the friendlier people at church, someone who at least smiled and said a brief hello before she turned her attention to the other members of the congregation.

  Still, Kate didn’t admit the dire straits she was in. She didn’t want to be the subject of hushed gossip or worse—rejoicing. As it was, Kate didn’t think she’d be able to attend church on Sunday and face everyone. People would ask her questions, like why she’d hired a known felon.

  She thanked Mrs. Pieroni for calling, insisted she was fine, and mumbled something about soldiering on.

  Landon texted, Are you all right?

  She hoped he was asking because he cared about her, and not because he was checking his chances of inheriting. She texted back, I guess time will tell. Two more months to be specific. If she wasn’t out of the red by then, the ranch would automatically go to Landon.

  She’d have to hire a new foreman soon, especially since it was the beginning of March. Calving season was about to start. No one would take the job with the condition of half salary now and perhaps-a-bonus later. Not when her chances of keeping the ranch were so slim.

  She couldn’t admit to herself that her chances were zero. Not yet. Not when she hadn’t even heard from the insurance company. They might reimburse her. Everything might turn out okay. She’d said she would soldier on, and that’s what she had to do.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  The next afternoon as Kate was mucking the stables, a large cattle truck pulled up.

  She leaned her pitchfork against the barn, took off her gloves, and began to hope. Apparently Gary really had found some cattle for her. Maybe he had some convictions that weren’t of the illegal sort. Maybe—but she wasn’t going to rejoice too soon. The question now was had he paid for the animals before his incarceration or would she be stuck with a bill she couldn’t afford?

  The truck parked in front of the barn and a couple of men climbed from the cab. The driver was a middle-aged man in a Metallica T-shirt. The other man had a bushy, unkempt beard and more than his share of tattoos. A cigarette dangled from his mouth.

  The driver glanced at his clipboard. “I’m looking for Gary Wilson.”

  “Turns out, so were the police.” Kate wiped bits of straw off her arm. “You got here a day too late. Are you delivering cattle he ordered?”

  “Yep.” The driver took a pen from the clipboard, unfazed by news of Gary’s incarceration. “You Kate Benton?”

  “Ye
s.”

  The moos coming from inside the truck were definitely calves, not cows, but every animal helped her count.

  The driver handed her the clipboard and pen. “You’ll need to sign here.”

  “Did Gary already pay for them?”

  “I’m just delivering them,” the man said. “But I don’t reckon they would have sent them if he hadn’t.”

  Kate still didn’t sign. “That’s a really important detail.”

  The man sighed, took the clipboard back, and scanned the paperwork. He pointed to a place that read Balance. A zero sat next to it. “Says you don’t owe nothing.”

  “Good.” Kate signed the form. At least Gary had done something to rebuild her stock. All was not lost.

  The younger man ground out his cigarette, went to the back of the truck, and pulled out a ramp to offload the animals. The driver took a manila envelope from the back of the clipboard. “These are their records. You want calves in your barn?”

  “Yes. It’s open. Use the stalls at the front.” Those ones were empty.

  He went to unload the cattle.

  She slowly followed him, pulling the records out. That was when dread first hit her. The first record had almost no information. Just breed, sex, and…that date couldn’t be right. The animal was born three days ago. She flipped to the next page. It held information on two calves, each only days old.

  Bottle calves.

  Calves that needed to be hand fed for months. They were born on feedlots to mothers who were being fattened for slaughter or were from dairy herds who didn’t want calves taking their mother’s milk. Kate had never considered buying such labor-intensive and death-prone babies.

  She rounded the side of the truck. The men pulled two bawling animals from the back. They were so small they looked like black and white spotted dogs. A pair of Holsteins. What was she supposed to do with dairy cattle?

  “Wait,” Kate said. “Gary wasn’t supposed to buy bottle calves.”

  The driver marched by her without any concern. “Take that up with him. We’re just delivering what he ordered.”

  She gripped the records tighter. “Have they had any vaccines? Were their mothers vaccinated?”

  The driver glanced over his shoulder. “I gave you their records.”

  Then, no, they hadn’t, and the bull calves wouldn’t be castrated either. Kate peered into the back of the truck. Dozens of bawling calves gaped fearfully at her. “How many are mine?”

  The noise from the calves was so loud, the driver didn’t hear her. Or at least he didn’t answer.

  Certainly, Gary wouldn’t have been foolish enough to order more than a half a dozen.

  She flipped through the records. Each page contained at least one record, some two or three. After she’d flipped through the first few pages, she stopped reading details and just counted the calves. With each page she turned, the ball of dread in her stomach spun and grew. Thirty-eight, thirty-nine, forty. Forty. The enormity of the number made it hard to breathe. What had Gary been thinking? He couldn’t have assumed that buying this many bottle calves would somehow fulfil his debt.

  The ball of dread continued to spin. She didn’t have room in the barn for forty calves, but if she put them outside, they’d be vulnerable to coyotes, wolves, and mountain lions. She didn’t have time to feed and check forty calves multiple times a day. A large amount would get sick, and her vet bills would be huge.

  The men returned to the truck and hauled out the next unwilling creatures. Two more Holsteins.

  “Look,” Kate said, “is there a way to exchange these for older calves? I understand I wouldn’t get nearly as many, but—”

  “Nope,” the man cut her off. “We can’t take them back. Travel stresses them out too much. I guarantee a bunch of them will get diarrhea just from this trip.”

  Well, that was encouraging news. Kate trailed the men into the barn. “But I don’t have the facilities to—”

  The men deposited the second set of calves into the stall with the first. “They’re probably hungry,” the driver said. “You should mix up milk replacement for them soon.”

  Her grandfather had kept some milk replacement around in case he had a calf who wouldn’t nurse, but not a lot. She certainly didn’t have forty bottles.

  The men strode out of the barn, clomped up the ramp, and picked up two more calves. The creatures mooed in protest.

  “Who is your manager?” she asked. “I really need to talk to someone about this.”

  The driver scoffed at the request. “They came from the sale barn. The number is on the paperwork.”

  She flipped through the records again, this time looking more closely at the animals’ information. She needed to know exactly what she had before she spoke to someone about it.

  The group consisted mostly Holsteins and Jerseys with some Hereford and Angus thrown into the mix. Twenty-four bull calves and sixteen heifers. None older than a week.

  While she searched for the sale barn’s number, the younger man paused on his way to the truck. “Won’t do you no good to call. All sales are final. If you don’t want them, your best bet is to feed them for a few months and sell them.”

  “I don’t know how to take care of bottle calves,” she protested. “They’ll end up dying.”

  The driver only shrugged. “Lots do. That’s why they’re so cheap. Gary only paid about a hundred dollars a head. You won’t be out much.”

  The cost wasn’t the point. They were living creatures—babies who’d just lost their mothers—they deserved proper care. She was without help, and she didn’t have the knowledge or the time to take care of them.

  As the driver passed by, he said, “I’ll put the rest in the barn and let you decide where you want them.” Meaning, he knew she didn’t have enough stalls, but that wasn’t his problem.

  Kate’s phone rang. For a wild, optimistic moment, she hoped someone was calling to tell her Gary’s order was a mistake.

  But no, her insurance agent’s number lit her screen. Even then hope didn’t completely flee. Her parents might have convinced the insurance company that her claim had merit.

  She answered with much more cheer than she felt.

  “I wish I had good news for you,” the agent said. “I spoke with your folks this morning and really wish I could help. Unfortunately, after reviewing your case, our adjusters have denied the claim.”

  Her head went light, and she had to lean against the barn door. She’d expected this news, so it shouldn’t have been so painful to hear. Somehow it still was. That one sentence was the negation of every hour she’d worked here, every callus she’d formed, every morning she’d dragged herself out of bed at the crack of dawn. This moment felt like proof that she wasn’t good enough, that she was a failure.

  The agent said more, but she hardly heard it. None of it mattered. At some point he stopped talking, said he was sorry, and hung up.

  She stood there holding the phone, numbly staring at the men as they loaded more calves into the barn. She didn’t want to talk to them anymore. Her throat felt tight, and she was afraid she would cry.

  Finally, she revived enough to go search for the milk replacer. She sorted through things in the storage room. She found six bottles, four buckets, an electric stirring stick, and several Ziplock bags full of powder that her grandfather had labeled: calves’ milk. No instructions. No expiration date.

  One of the men yelled, “That’s all of them!”

  The barn door clanged shut. Soon after, the truck engine started and the hum of wheels announced the truck’s departure.

  She hauled the supplies out of the storage room and set them by the sink. Calves wandered around the barn, bawling. The driver’s prediction about the animals having diarrhea had already proven true. She couldn’t tell which one had been sick because several had trekked through the mess.

  Panic was growing in her chest, pushing its way through her. This was all too much. She couldn’t do it. She was going to hyperventilate, whi
ch was a bad thing to do in a barn that smelled like diarrhea.

  Something brushed against her leg. A little spotted calve nibbled on the knee of her jeans. A black one licked her hand and tried to suck on her fingers. The poor babies. Regardless of everything else, she couldn’t just stand around and let them suffer because her life was spiraling out of control.

  She checked internet videos to see where other ranchers kept their bottle calves. Most put them in individual pens or kept them on leashes inside the barn. She wasn’t sure if the animals were separated to keep track of feedings or to keep disease from spreading.

  Or, she thought as she spied a calf trying to nurse on its neighbor, maybe they had behavioral problems when together.

  Kate tried to think logically about what to do first. The stalls needed straw for bedding, but she’d have to herd more of the calves together first. Otherwise when she opened the barn door to bring in straw, some would escape.

  The rest of her chores would have to wait. She had to get more food in town. And buy a lot of rope. And also bottles, vaccines, and probably a bunch of other things she didn’t know about yet. Her father would know. He’d taken care of calves.

  On the way to her truck, she called him. He didn’t pick up. She left a rushed message, then considered calling Landon. But he’d already told her he wouldn’t help with any cattle problems. It wouldn’t be fair of her to ignore that dictate.

  She’d have to do this on her own. She sped all the way to the feed store. It carried milk bars which were large plastic tubs, sectioned into six parts, each with its own drinking nozzle. Although, maybe they were just for feeding calves once they’d passed quarantine and weren’t going to pass illness to their neighbors.

  When Kate asked the sales clerk if milk bars could be used on bottle calves straight from the sales barn, the clerk hemmed and hawed and told her she should use her best judgment. So was that a yes, a no, or an I’m-not-going-to-help-you-because-you’re-the-golf-course-lady?