Читать книгу Her Cowboy Boss - Patricia Johns - Страница 11

Chapter Two

Hank led the way to Avery’s room, located at the far end of the bunkhouse. The building was empty, their footsteps echoing, and Avery could only assume that was because the other employees were working at this hour. The hallways smelled male—like socks and stale cigarettes.

Avery stood back as Hank unlocked a door at the end of the hallway and swung it open. He held out the key, and when she took it, her fingers brushed over his calloused fingertips. There wasn’t much room in the doorway, and as she moved past him, she could feel his body heat.

“This is where you’ll sleep,” he said. “You have your own bathroom through there.”

Avery glanced around. There was a bed topped with a patchwork quilt, an outdated dresser, a wobbly wardrobe and a small but private bathroom with a tub large enough to actually take a bath. Thanks to a cracked-open window, her room smelled fresh and clean. When she peeked outside, she had a magnificent view of pasture and the main barn. That was something. And if she counted the blessing that she wouldn’t have to share facilities like the ranch hands did, she couldn’t complain. Even settling in wouldn’t be difficult. Her suitcase was in the trunk of her car, so that would be easy enough. But as she stood in the center of the room, a giggle bubbled up inside her.

If her mother were still living, she’d find this hilarious, too. Well, maybe not the fact that Avery was in Hope, looking for details about her mother’s past... Winona wouldn’t have liked that at all. But the outrageousness of being hired as a ranch cook—that would have tickled her funny bone. Winona used to tell her, Men expect a pretty girl to be able to cook. And you’re pretty, sweetheart. So you’d better learn how to cook, or learn how to let ’em down easy. Avery hadn’t learned.

Winona Southerly was a strong woman with her own idea of how things should be. She raised Avery to go to church every week, rain or shine. Winona’s Wilderness, the flower shop her mother opened when Avery was in the second grade, had been closed Sunday mornings, opening at 2:00 p.m. No exceptions. She’d been strict that way. When Avery complained that she didn’t want to go to Sunday school, her mother would retort, So the store is closed for nothing then? I’m losing business as we speak. We’re going to church. You could use a few positive influences, my girl. And heaven help them if they were late. But she’d had a sense of humor, too. Every time she lost something—a pair of scissors, an umbrella—she declared it had been raptured and the Lord needed it more than I did, I suppose. Church people never knew exactly how seriously to take her on that—whether she needed a theological tune-up, or if they should just laugh along. She liked pushing the envelope, keeping people guessing. Those were the memories that made Avery’s heart ache with loneliness. Life wasn’t going to be the same without Mom.

“Will it do?” Hank asked behind her.

Avery turned and nodded. “It’ll be just fine.”

He nodded, then his direct blue gaze met hers and she felt heat rise in her cheeks. This ranch manager was just so...male. She kept noticing things like the stubble on his jawline, or the latent strength in those large hands of his. She couldn’t do anything about it, though. She was here for a reason, and this cowboy didn’t factor into that.

“So what is Mr. Harmon like?” she asked.

Hank shrugged. “A decent guy. He doesn’t cut corners. He pays on time.”

That wasn’t exactly what she was looking for, but then, she was only supposed to be an employee.

“Does he have a family?” she asked. “Here at the ranch, I mean.”

“He’s a widower, but he has two kids, Olivia and Owen. They’re twins. You’ll see them around.”

He had kids... That meant she had siblings. The thought was surprising and pleasing. She’d wanted a brother or sister growing up, but that hadn’t happened. So siblings—someone else in the world she shared genes with—she liked that. And twins ran in the family... That might be good to know for future reference.

“How old are they?” she asked.

“They’re in...” Hank paused. “I want to say tenth grade. Maybe eleventh? High school students, though.”

She had a brother and a sister...and a father. While the thought of having more family was pleasing, it was also more intimidating. Those kids might not find her existence quite as comforting as she found theirs, especially at their age. They’d be territorial, and understandably.

“What happened to their mom?” she asked.

“She passed away a couple of years ago,” he said. “Riding accident. Some workers hadn’t locked a gate. The wind pushed it open, the horse spooked and she fell. Quick as that.”

“That’s too bad.” She wondered what Louis’s wife had been like. Perhaps a little bit like her mother in some way? She’d come to the conclusion that Louis’s relationship with her mother hadn’t been long or meaningful, or Louis would have shown some sort of reaction at her last name, if nothing else. She’d been sure her last name would spark some memories about her mother, but nothing? Had Winona been that forgettable for him?

Hank led the way back out of the room. Avery locked the door behind them and followed him down the long hall and out into the sunlight. She paused, looking around. The main house was visible on the crest of a hill a couple of miles off, and the horses shone bronze as they grazed in the field next to it. From their vantage point, slightly higher than the rest of the ranch, she could make out a wider view of the patchwork effect of adjacent fields. Early afternoon sunlight splashed over the distant barn that was visible from her bedroom window, and a tractor towing a trailer filled with hay crept along a gravel road, clouds of dust billowing up behind it. The canteen, which hunched next to the bunkhouse, was a low wooden building with a hitching post out front.

Hank didn’t seem like he’d say much else, and she wondered if she’d overdone it. But her time here was limited, and if she were going to take this job in order to find out a little more about her father, then she’d have to ask questions.

“How long have you worked here?” she asked, changing tack.

“Twelve years,” he replied, then turned toward her just before they reached the door to the canteen. “Long enough to know the boss really well. He’s been good to me, and I’m not about to gossip about his personal business. I’ve told you all I’m going to tell you.”

Heat suffused Avery’s cheeks. “Didn’t mean to offend.”

“If you want to talk, let’s talk about you,” Hank said, pulling open the door and letting her go inside first. The canteen was cool and dark, and it took a moment for Avery’s eyes to adjust.

“This way.” Hank moved past her. She stood there for a moment, glad for the darkness that could hide the color she knew was in her face. She didn’t like being chastised. Maybe this cowboy thought of her as some youngster compared to him, but she was far from naive, and far from being meek. Avery moved forward and her shin connected with something solid she couldn’t make out in the dim light.

“Ouch!” She closed her eyes in a grimace, and then opened them to find she could see a little better now. It had been a bench in her way, and Hank now stood in front of her. He was a big man, but his presence was even larger than his physical size. He always seemed to be inspecting her when he looked at her like that, and she found it irritating.

“You okay?” His voice was rough but gentle, and in the dim light his closeness made her feel slightly flustered. He obviously didn’t trust her, but he wasn’t being a complete jerk, either.

“Fine,” she said. “I can see better now.”

“That’s good.” He walked away from her again, and she followed in his wake, moving around tables and chairs toward the swinging kitchen door ahead. He flicked the switch as they went inside, and the room buzzed with florescent light.

“So how long are you here for?” Hank asked. He opened a drawer and tossed her a white apron.

“It won’t be long-term. I just needed a job while passing through,” she said cautiously. Obviously, they’d need to plan for the future around here, and she felt a pang of guilt. “Look, truthfully, I need to be back in Salina by June twenty-fourth. So I’ll be here for a couple of weeks. You’ll definitely want to keep looking for a cook.”

“Ah.” He paused, eyed her for a moment. “Thanks for letting me know.”

She shrugged, but felt like a fraud—could he sense that?

“You have someone waiting for you back in Salina?” he asked.

She eyed the kitchen appliances—two stoves, a large industrial fridge, a massive mixer on one counter.

“Someone?” She smiled wryly. “No. But I’m reopening my mom’s flower shop when I get back. I was pretty much raised in that shop. I went there every day after school and did my homework at the front counter.”

That store was more of a home than their little apartment had been, and when her mother died, it was the only stability she had left.

“So you’re a florist,” he said, shooting her an odd look.

“My mom was a florist,” Avery corrected him. “I worked at the bank, but when mom passed away and her life insurance came through, I quit so I could concentrate on her business.”

In college, she’d changed her major so many times that when she finally did graduate, it was with a generic arts degree. She’d never quite known what she wanted do with herself, what she wanted to be, and she realized after her mother had passed away that she’d relied on Winona for her identity. She was her mother’s daughter—but now?

“Don’t like counting other people’s money?” he asked with a small smile.

“It was just a job.” She shrugged. “But my mom’s store is home in a lot of ways, and having it just empty out and shut down...” She sighed. “It was too heartbreaking.”

“So what are you doing here?” he pressed.

She eyed him for a moment. She wondered if he were a distrustful man in general, or if he was just concerned about the stability of his staff. Possibly a bit of both, but she found herself mildly intrigued by him, too. He was older than she was—old enough that she’d call him sir if she trampled his foot in the street—but she was also very aware of him, of his movement, of the way he looked at her. She ran her hand over a countertop.

“I’m trying to learn about my mom,” she said. “She didn’t say much about her childhood, and now that she’s gone, I want to figure out that side of her that she kept hidden.”

“Would she want you to?”

His question was unexpected, and she felt a twang of annoyance. What did he know about her relationship with her mother, or what Winona would have wanted?

“Probably not,” she admitted, tears misting her eyes. “But she’s gone, so...”

Dying had been the worst thing her mother had ever done, because Avery still needed her. She might be a grown woman, but she wasn’t finished being mothered yet. Her mom had never wanted her to meet her dad, or to even know his name, but since she’d gone and heartlessly died, Avery would have to make these choices on her own. Wherever Winona was—raptured with the scissors?—Avery hoped her mother could forgive her, because she had come to town in search of the very answers Winona had kept hidden all these years. And perhaps while she learned who her mother used to be, she could figure out who she was without her mother in her life.

Hank opened the fridge and pulled out three large, cellophane-wrapped packages of cubed steak and tossed them onto the stainless steel center table with a bang.

“The last cook suggested beef stew.”

Avery glanced around the kitchen, taking in the large pots, the hanging spatulas, the knives in neat rows held along magnetic strips on the wall. Beef stew. It sounded simple enough. Beef, carrots, potatoes, broth. Onions—couldn’t forget those. Yes, this was under control.

Hank’s cell phone rang, and he picked up the call. “Yeah?...Okay...No, that’s a priority...Okay, I’ll meet you there.” He hung up the phone.

“Is there a problem?” she asked.

“A water pipe leak affecting the water pressure for some sprinklers. I’ve got to look into it.” He paused. “So will you be okay here?”

“I can do this,” she said, her confidence returning.

“Yeah?” He looked a little wary, but she was armed with YouTube and a massive pot. What could possibly go wrong?

“You’re cooking for thirty-five,” he said, nodding toward the stove. “That pot should be full.”

“Dinner’s at five?” she asked.

“Five sharp.” He turned toward the door, and she pulled out her phone. She knew she’d find online videos and recipes and cooking tips galore. Stew was within the realm of possibility. Hank paused at the door and pulled out a little pad of paper, scratched a number on it and placed it on the center table. “Call me if you get into trouble.”

Nice to say, but she highly doubted that kitchen woes would trump anything else he had going in the rest of the ranch. She’d sort things out on her own.

* * *

THAT DAY THE work in the field took longer than Hank anticipated. The water pressure was down to a dribble out there, and the fix was more complicated than they’d originally thought. He and the men didn’t ride back to the canteen until ten past five, and they’d have to head back out after they ate for another go at it. Hank was both hungry and nervous. There were thirty-five hungry workers needing a decent meal, and he’d left a woman they didn’t know in charge of the kitchen, hoping for the best.

Hank bounced along the gravel road that meandered back up toward the barracks and the canteen. The radio was on low, a country song filling up the space between the roar of the engine and the rattle of equipment in the back. He’d been thinking about Avery the entire time he was searching for that blasted leak, telling himself repeatedly he was just worried about the food. But it was less noble than that. He’d never thought of himself as a guy with a type, but if he had one, she was it. Slender, cute, fair. Maybe it was just the fact that there weren’t a lot of other women around here.

Hank parked his truck in front of the building, hopped out and slammed the door with a satisfying bang. The canteen had two large, old-fashioned wagon wheels on either side of the double doors, which were already propped open. Some of the men had arrived ahead of him, their truck already parked in a spot in front. His stomach rumbled. Beef stew would hit the spot tonight. It had been a long day, but the job wasn’t yet done, and he needed a solid meal.

As Hank stepped inside, he was met with the murmur of voices, some laughter, the clink of cutlery—all normal. The smell, though... It wasn’t just the press of sweaty bodies, it was something else he couldn’t quite identify...

“Hey, Hank.” Bernie, one of the ranch hands sat in front of a bowl of stew, two dinner rolls next to it. “Have you seen the new cook?”

“Yeah, I showed her around,” Hank replied.

“Well, thank you for hiring that one,” he said with a grin. “She’s hot.”

There was a chorus of laughter and a few crude comments. Hank shot them a flat stare. Hot or not—and he wasn’t arguing how good-looking she was—she wasn’t here to be ogled. She was here to cook. There were workplace rules about sexual harassment and about fraternizing with the staff, rules he was following, too. When Louis’s wife, Carla, had died in that riding accident, it had been because a couple of workers were literally having a roll in the hay. Her death was preventable, and while those workers had been fired, Louis set up an ironclad rule about workplace dalliances.

“How’s the food?” Hank asked. He leaned closer to the bowl and discovered the source of the “off” smell. “Oh, man...”

“It’s—” Bernie shrugged. “It’s served by the pretty redhead. I’ll have seconds.”

The man across the table from them, Ivan, was chewing a piece of beef, his jaw moving in slow rotations. Hank paused and watched him chew for another ten seconds.

“You gonna swallow that?” Hank asked.

Ivan slowly shook his head. “It’s like leather,” he said past the meat in his mouth. “I can’t get it down.”

There didn’t seem to be any open complaining, interestingly enough. Had a man served that meal, there’d have been a riot. Avery stood across the room, bending down to offer more bread to one of the ranch hands, whose eyes were fixed on her cleavage. Her red hair tumbled down in front of her shoulders—no hairnet, apparently—and her smile was bright. This was a rough bunch of guys, and Avery probably had no idea what she was getting herself into here. He headed toward her, and when Avery saw him, she shot him a smile.

“Hi,” he said, clapping a hand onto the shoulder of the ranch hand who had been ogling Avery’s chest. The man dropped his gaze to his bowl immediately.

“Served on time,” she said, looking quite satisfied with herself. “And everyone seems to love it.”

“Mmm. Delicious,” the ranch hand said on cue, and Hank suppressed the urge to roll his eyes. Yeah, they all seemed to be willing to compliment the meal, if only to get a little of the cook’s personal attention. And for that, Hank couldn’t blame them entirely. There wasn’t a whole lot of female contact out here, and they had to wait until they went into Hope on their days off for a beer at the Honky Tonk in order to get a woman to look at them straight. He’d have to have a word with Avery in private.

“You must be starving,” Avery said. “Let me get you a bowl.”

“Sure,” he said. “In the kitchen.”

She shot him a quizzical look, but complied and they headed through the swinging door into relative privacy. The kitchen was hot from cooking, and the pot was still on the stove. She stepped onto a stool next to the stove so she could reach inside and she scooped him up a big bowl of stew. He grabbed a bun and took a bite of the crusty roll, holding the proffered bowl of stew in the other hand for the time being.

“You, too,” he said, nodding to the pot. “I couldn’t possibly try this before you do.”

Avery bent back over the pot to fill her own bowl, and he watched her move. She was feminine—an odd thing to notice about a woman. Weren’t all women feminine? But there was something soft and lithe about her, something that should smell like flowers—even though he couldn’t smell anything but that stew right now.

“It wasn’t so bad,” Avery said, picking up a spoon from the counter. “I was a little worried at first—” She dipped the spoon into the bowl and blew on it a couple of times before she took a bite. Her expression changed as she pulled the spoon from her mouth, and she chewed slowly.

“Well?” he asked.

“It’s, um...” She swallowed. “I think something went wrong.”

“Yeah?” he asked. “What did you do to it?”

“I followed the directions!” She shot him an annoyed look. “To the T, might I add. Beef stew. I have no idea what went wrong. Except there wasn’t any red wine.”

“Yeah, we don’t tend to cook with red wine out here,” he said wryly.

“I may have replaced the red wine with red wine vinegar.”

He grimaced. Vinegar in beef stew? What had she been thinking? But she looked so let down. Avery ran her hand through her hair, tugging those loose waves away from her face. It was the disappointment in those green-flecked eyes. She’d actually thought she’d done well, and the other guys had let her believe it. He normally wouldn’t make much effort for a cook’s feelings...

“Pass me some salt,” he said with a sigh.

“You’re going to eat it?” she asked. “I’m sure I can rummage up something else for you.”

“It’s what’s for dinner,” he replied. “I’ll eat what my men are eating.”

And he wasn’t pleased about that. He was hungry—as were all the guys out there. They’d worked a long day, and they needed a decent meal at the end of that. He was grumpy, he was hungry and the glop in his bowl was possibly the worst stew he’d eaten in his life. And that included cattle drives where the one who drew the shortest straw had to cook.

“Breakfast will be better,” she said. “Eggs, bacon, corn bread...that’s hard to ruin.”

He’d thought the same thing about the stew.

“Tell you what,” he said. “I’ll meet you here at 4:00 a.m., and we’ll work on it together. We’ll have to make the pack lunches, too. At least that way, if the guys don’t like the grub, they can blame me, too.”

And at the very least, they’d get an edible lunch.

“But they seem to like it...” She looked toward the swinging door, her pale brows knitted. Had she really not figured out how gorgeous she was and what that did to the common male?

“Yeah...” He shot her a wry look. “They seem to.”

She wasn’t going to be sticking around Hope for long, but while she was here, maybe they could manage to get some decent grub.