True Love at Silver Creek Ranch

Chapter Four

Late the next afternoon, Adam had his head under the kitchen sink, reinstalling the garbage disposal after the sink had clogged, when he saw his grandma’s legs as she walked slowly toward him with the aid of her cane. She was wearing a dress, striped in bright orange, and he knew she hadn’t been wearing that earlier. He would have remembered it. Ducking his head out from beneath the kitchen sink, he squinted up at her. She wore a matching orange bow in her blond wig.

“Going out for dinner?” he asked.

She smiled gently. “And so are you. The Thalbergs are celebratin’ Sandy’s discharge from the hospital, and they also want to thank you for helpin’ Brooke rescue the horses.”

Adam frowned. “Brooke already thanked me.”

“Her parents didn’t.” She raised a hand that faintly trembled. “And I didn’t tell you because I knew you’d holler. Rosemary’s already gone, and I need a ride. So shower and let’s go.”

“I wouldn’t holler,” he insisted as he rose to his feet. “And I’m bothered you think I wouldn’t take you to the Thalbergs.”

“Oh, I knew you’d take me,” she said, smiling. “But I needed you to stay.” Her hand was still quivering where she rested it on the cane.

“Of course I’ll stay, Grandma. Anything you’d like.”

“My, you’re so accommodatin’.” She batted her wrinkled eyelids at him.

It was hard to smother a grin. “I’ll shower quick.”

At the Silver Creek Ranch, Adam parked his truck outside the front door. As he helped his grandma up the stairs, the door opened, spilling a shaft of yellow light through the gently falling snow.

A man strode out onto the porch, and Adam recognized Doug Thalberg.

Mr. Thalberg reached out a hand. “Adam, good to see you.”

Adam took his hand in a firm grip. “Mr. Thalberg, sir, thank you for the invitation.”

“We’re not all that formal,” Mr. Thalberg said, stepping aside to usher them in. “Your grandma is practically family, and that makes you the same.”

Which made Adam uncomfortable, but he had nothing to say. He glanced toward where he knew the ruins of the barn were.

“The burned smell still makes the cattle uneasy,” Mr. Thalberg said. “I’ll never get used to the change myself. I’ve spent my life lookin’ at that barn. But not much we can do to clean it up until winter is over.”

Adam escorted his grandma inside, noticing the massive stone hearth that must have been part of the original ranch before they’d expanded the house. Bookcases were built along each side, a modern touch. The furniture was dark, the rugs and pillow in greens and reds. It seemed like a man’s room but one a woman would be comfortable in.

And through an open doorway, he saw Brooke bending over to pull a pan out of the oven. And immediately, his mind was focused on the curve of her hips in her dark pants and the way her blue sweater clung. He made himself look away.

Mrs. Thalberg wheeled her way toward him, and when she reached up, he took her hand. “Thank you for the invitation, ma’am.”

“Oh, please, Adam, the pleasure is all ours,” she said, her smile bright but a little tired at the edges.

“You didn’t have to go to so much trouble for me.”

“It was mostly for my mom,” Nate Thalberg said, smiling as he reached to shake Adam’s hand.

“Good.”

“But we’re grateful to you, too.”

Adam nodded, even as he felt Nate studying him. That was smart. Never assume you knew what anyone was thinking—or how they’d changed over the years.

Josh came forward next and held out his hand. “Good to see you again, Adam.”

Josh was a couple years younger than Nate, and when he wasn’t snowboarding, he’d stuck to the cowboy sports of bronc busting and steer wrestling. It hadn’t brought them together much, so by Josh’s grin, he figured the youngest Thalberg had a pretty open opinion of him.

Mr. Thalberg clapped him on the back. “We felt it only right to thank you proper for your help the other day.”

“That’s good of you, sir. I’m sorry about your barn.”

He shrugged. “Insurance will help. I’m just grateful no one was hurt. Not sure you should have risked yourself like that.”

Brooke came into the room, setting a selection of cheese, crackers, and fruit on the coffee table.

Adam gestured toward her with his chin. “As if she weren’t going to do it herself?”

Brooke frowned, Josh grinned, and Nate rolled his eyes.

“How about if we stuff ourselves with cheese and not talk about this anymore?” Brooke asked.

Adam couldn’t agree more. He helped his grandma to sit in a rocker near the fireplace, where she’d be warm. She wasn’t exactly skinny, thank goodness. The elder Mrs. Thalberg came out of the kitchen and joined them. But he couldn’t help glancing again at Brooke near her mom, her face glowing, earrings dangling, the hair around her face bobby-pinned back. She was all made up for the evening, looking very different from the jeans-clad cowgirl of the other day.

He started to fix his grandma a small plate of appetizers when she took it out of his hands.

“Go talk to the young people, Adam,” she said, shaking her head. “Rosemary and I will keep each other company.”

He fixed a plate for himself and went to the bookshelves, turning his head to scan them. He couldn’t miss how the younger Mrs. Thalberg nudged Brooke toward him. He felt an anticipation he hadn’t felt in a long time. Her legs looked long and lean, and her breasts bounced gently as she moved toward him.

“Glad you could come,” she said, handing him a cold bottle of beer.

He accepted it, surprised to feel the touch of her fingers. “Thanks for the invitation.”

Brooke kept to herself that she hadn’t even known about it until an hour ago. Her mom had acted all excited, like it was a big surprise, and maybe it had been. Grandma Thalberg and Mrs. Palmer must have cooked something up together, she thought, trying to hide a smile. That’s what grandmas did when their offspring were unattached.

“How’s your mom?” Adam asked.

Brooke glanced at her, able to tell that she was tired already. “It was hard to keep her out of the kitchen today even though the celebration was for her. She needs a lot more rest.”

“When was she diagnosed?”

“She’s known since Nate was a toddler. Her first husband left her when he found out.”

Adam frowned, his eyes taking on the coldness of winter. “Scum.”

“Yeah. I can’t even imagine dealing with that kind of betrayal. But it had a good outcome. She met my dad, and they fell in love. Dad adopted Nate, and they had me, then Josh. I can’t complain about that.”

“I guess you can’t,” he said, his expression pleasant but not quite smiling. “Will she be in a wheelchair for long?”

“The symptoms come and go. She usually uses a cane, and I’m hoping she can get back to that again.” Her voice trailed off, and she couldn’t help glancing at her mom again. Taking a deep breath, she changed the subject. “I hear you got out of the boardinghouse at last.”

When he focused on her, dark brown eyes intent, she felt again that rush of nervous anticipation. He was wearing jeans and a forest green crewneck sweater that looked really good on him. He’d left the wound on his cheek bare, its long, thin scab healing well.

He smiled faintly. “I’d forgotten how fast news travels around here.”

She shrugged. “People talk about newcomers. It’s even more interesting when someone they know comes home after a long time. So many people leave for the bigger towns and cities.”

“If so, you’d never know it. Valentine looks good, spruced up.”

“A lot of that has to do with our grandmothers. They like to preserve historic buildings and keep out bad businesses—and by that I mean chain stores, nothing else.”

He arched a brow.

“They’re worried about some big department store coming in and forcing La Belle Femme or the Mystic Connection to close.”

“I’m not sure I know what those stores are.”

“A clothing store and a new age store. Your grandma is a major customer of the latter. Haven’t you seen her room yet?”

“I replaced a cracked windowpane. She has so many crystals hanging in the sun, it’s only a matter of time before another breeze blows them around.”

“She’s very motivated to keep those little businesses open—for the tourists, of course,” she added innocently. “Surely you’ve seen the widows working over their papers.”

“Heard them late into the night, too. The Valentine Valley Preservation Fund committee,” he said, as if reciting something he’d had to memorize.

Brooke grinned, and his smile widened. She realized she hadn’t seen that on his face, and that was probably a good thing, considering how flushed it made her. “There are other committee members, of course, but the widows do most of the work. My grandma handles the paperwork, the behind-the-scenes stuff about the grants themselves. Mrs. Ludlow is the legal eagle, sitting in on town-council meetings, press conferences, the investors’ corporate board meetings.”

“If you’re wondering, Mrs. Ludlow is visiting her grandchildren tonight.” He took a sip of his beer.

“I was wondering, thanks.”

Adam glanced at Mrs. Palmer, who was chatting with Grandma Thalberg. “And my grandma? What’s her role on the committee?”

Brooke eyed the old woman, hiding her interest in what Mrs. Palmer was up to regarding her grandson. “She’s the public face, helping at grand openings, the one who deals with the businesses applying for grants. That’s usually fun, but when she has to deliver bad news . . . well, she knows how to handle that, too.”

Adam nodded. “She’s always been good with people. Seems like a sedate hobby for elderly ladies.”

Brooke’s mouth dropped open. “Sedate? I can’t believe you’re applying that adjective to our grandmas. Maybe Mrs. Ludlow, but that’s about it.”

“What don’t I know?”

“Surely you remember when they chained themselves to the old house that had been a mining-town brothel?”

She saw the memory dawn in his eyes.

He shook his head. “How could I have forgotten?”

“Maybe you’ve been a bit busy these last few years,” she said, her voice softening with compassion.

He ignored that. “Women’s history,” he said, snapping his fingers. “Now I remember. The story of Chinese immigrant prostitutes. They’re not still doing that stuff.”

Smiling, she tilted her head as she turned to walk away. “You go on thinking that, soldier.”

He caught her arm, and she stopped in surprise, feeling the strength of him. Their eyes met, held, and he let her go.

“You can’t leave me hanging,” he insisted, then added, “About the widows.”

Brooke glanced around the living room. Nate and Josh were talking to their dad, beers in their hands. Sandy had joined the widows near the appetizers and was accepting a glass of wine from her mother-in-law. No one seemed to be paying any attention to them even though Adam had touched her. It was just on her arm, but she felt it reverberate right up her spine. It had been a while since she’d felt that with a man. The shared awareness made it feel like they were alone in the room.

“Tell me more about the widows’ antics.”

She sighed as if she were put out, but it was no hardship to keep talking to him. “You do know she dresses up like a pioneer woman on the Fourth of July.”

His eyes lightened, even if he didn’t grin. It made Brooke feel good to elicit some kind of amusement from him. She had a sense he didn’t see life’s humor much anymore.

“There’s an old silver mine in the mountains up above us,” she continued, “and they got it into their heads that we needed a mining museum, like they have in Leadville or Creede. On the first warm spring day, they held a picnic up there, with lemonade stands and cookies and stuff for sale, all to lure investors. Did I mention the first warm day of spring? Seems the snakes that now live in the mine decided to come out after the winter. In a group.”

Adam chuckled. “No one was bitten, I hope.”

“Nope, lots of running around, and the state eventually declared it environmentally protected. Shall I tell you about the séance to drive away the ghosts in one of the B&Bs?”

He held up both hands. “Nope, spare me. The tarot cards are wacky enough. She keeps trying to give me a reading. To show me how it’s done, she read them about you.”

Brooke blinked up at him in surprise. “Me? Do I want to know my future?”

He paused, and their eyes met and held, until she forced a laugh.

He cleared his throat. “Nothing bad. You’re strong and independent. To me, that means you like to get your own way.”

“ ’Cause it’s the right way,” she answered sweetly.

Oh now she was flirting—in front of her whole family. That didn’t feel right. They’d start asking questions she couldn’t answer because even she didn’t know what was going on.

“So you like strong women now, but maybe not in high school. You did break up with Monica Shaw all those years ago.”

Brooke could almost see the wheels of memory turning in his head—how many women’s faces did he have to go through to find the right one?

“Monica Shaw,” he echoed, nodding. “She still live here in town?”

“I just had dinner with her a couple nights ago. She remembers you.”

“I bet. I was pretty preoccupied with . . . football back then.”

Now it was her turn to chuckle. “You tell yourself that, soldier.”

“You gonna keep calling me that?”

Though he spoke good-naturedly, something about the question intrigued Brooke. “I might. You have a problem with it?”

He paused, then shook his head.

She excused herself to return to the kitchen, where the prime rib awaited slicing on the stove. Again, she wondered if he was watching her, thinking about her, because she certainly couldn’t forget about him.

Grandma Thalberg joined her and worked on the mashed potatoes. “Adam seems like a nice young man.”

“Yep,” Brooke said, concentrating on the task at hand—and hoping to dissuade her grandma.

“You two had a lot to talk about.”

“We were talking about our grandmothers’ exploits, nothing more. We’re polite, Grandma, but we might as well be strangers.”

“You don’t have to be.”

“We do. Let’s just leave it at: It’s nice to talk to someone new.” Nothing more complicated than that, she reminded herself. Something was going on inside her, a new question about her plans for her life, and she needed to focus on that, not a relationship.

The dining-room table was big and rough-hewn, a legacy from Brooke’s great-grandparents. It seated the eight of them comfortably, and she found herself sitting opposite Adam, her brothers next to her, the widows next to him.

As they ate strawberry and walnut salad, the conversation ranged from the burned barn, to Thanksgiving, to the harsh early-winter conditions that might complicate calving season come January. Her dad, a veteran of Vietnam, brought up the current war, and though Adam did say he had sometimes visited the NATO base at Kandahar, he added little else. In fact, though he looked politely around the table as people spoke, he didn’t contribute much. He made her quiet brother Josh look talkative. For a man who once boasted about his football receiving records, he had nothing to say about his service with the Marines. She found herself full of sympathy; she couldn’t image what he’d experienced, what he’d seen.

Her father chewed a slice of prime rib, swallowed, then glanced at Adam speculatively. Brooke found herself tensing, even though she knew her father wasn’t the sort to pry.

“So are you plannin’ to stick around for a while, Adam?” Doug asked.

“A while,” Adam responded.

Mrs. Palmer beamed. Brooke noticed that she hadn’t touched much of her food except to push it around on her plate. She was a hearty woman, full of passion for life and people—and food. Sandy met Brooke’s gaze curiously after noticing Mrs. Palmer’s lack of appetite, and all Brooke could do was give a tiny shrug. She didn’t know what was going on, but it certainly had something to do with Adam.

“You ride a horse, if I remember,” Doug continued.

“I used to, sir,” Adam answered.

Brooke looked between them, uncertainty making her frown. Where was her father going with this?

“If you’re going to be here through the holidays, I could offer you some work as a ranch hand. I’ve been thinkin’ about pullin’ back some, maybe even be what they call semiretired.” He grinned at Sandy, who looked surprised but not displeased.

Brooke shouldn’t be surprised that her dad was pulling back from his ranch duties to concentrate on her mom. Nate was in charge of the business side of the ranch and their investments, and she and Josh handled the day-to-day ranch operations. But semiretirement? She was bemused that he hadn’t brought it up before now.

Her brothers each had their work passions—Nate for the business, Josh for his leather tooling. Hell, he’d begun to sell his products in town. The ranch was her love. She was a cowgirl, a barrel-racing champion, a rancher—like her dad. But was that all she was?

Adam exchanged a glance with his hopeful grandma. His face was impassive, and Brooke wondered what emotion he was feeling as he next met her gaze. And then she realized she’d be his boss, and all of these hot and achy feelings of desire that she’d just begun to acknowledge would have to be ignored. How would it look to her family if she proved herself so unprofessional as to chase after an employee? Doug was all business about the ranch. Distractions got cattle killed. Every head lost was money out of their pockets. She’d grown up with these words constantly ringing in her ears. And yes, things were better financially since Nate had begun expanding their investments, but that didn’t mean the day-to-day job was any easier.

“Sir, I appreciate the offer,” Adam began at last, “but I can’t mislead you. I’ve never worked on a ranch.”

“But you ride a horse,” Doug said. “You visited when your father hired on occasionally with us. Brooke and Josh can teach you what you need to know.”

“Or,” Mrs. Palmer began, “I could always use an assistant in my tarot business.”

Brooke pressed her lips together to keep from laughing at her obvious ploy. She wondered what else was a ploy.

“Business?” Adam echoed dubiously.

“I didn’t tell you about my plans, my dear boy? But of course, if you’re workin’ for Doug here, I’d understand.”

“I don’t think you have much of a choice, Adam,” Josh said dryly. He glanced at Brooke. “Training a greenhorn. Think we can handle it?”

“We’ll work him hard,” Brooke said, finally looking at Adam and offering a polite smile. “But then, I’m sure he’s used to hard work after being in the Marines. Now, if you’ll excuse me, Grandma baked a cake that needs to be served.”

As she rose, Doug slapped the table, his smile satisfied. “Then it’s settled.”

Though Brooke retreated to the kitchen, she could still hear his voice.

“We do work hard on the ranch, son,” he said. “Ranchers don’t take vacations, after all. But there was one time Sandy and I wanted to go down to Denver to see a show for the weekend—”

“And a Broncos game,” Sandy interrupted dryly.

Brooke heard the chuckles as she picked up the chocolate-cake pan.

Doug continued, “So, Adam, we hired your dad to be here over the weekend to work alongside Nate, who was still in high school.”

Brooke arrived back in the dining room in time to see Adam nod, but there was a tension in his shoulders that hadn’t been there before. She knew his mom had been an alcoholic, but all she knew of his dad was that he seldom held down a job for long. Obviously taking care of his family wasn’t that important to the man.

“So who’d like cake?” she asked from the buffet, where she began to cut slices and put them on small plates.

“Wait a sec, Cookie,” her dad said.

With her back to the room, she closed her eyes and winced. She loved that nickname, but hearing it right after she found out she was to be Adam’s boss in what many would consider to be a man’s world . . .

“So, Adam, your dad and Nate had a trailer-load of cattle and got a flat tire. While your dad was fixin’ it”—Doug started to laugh, along with Nate—“the steers seemed to line up and”—he could barely get the words out now—“take turns pissin’ on his head!”

It was a famous story in their house, and Mr. Desantis wasn’t the only one it had ever happened to. But she was watching Adam’s face, and although he forced a smile, it was obvious he had no good feelings for his dad.

Brooke set a plate of cake in front of Doug. “Okay, guys, shut up and eat.”

Her dad was actually wiping away tears. But Sandy was watching her curiously, and Brooke went back to serving the cake.

“Okay, okay, I’m done,” Doug said, his voice almost hoarse. “Adam, we’ll feed you lunch every day, so no worries about that. You’ll even have as much steak as you want for cookin’ on your own. Get here at dawn tomorrow and work hard, that’s all I ask. Come over to the business office first thing, and we’ll fill out the papers.”

“Yes, sir,” Adam answered. “Thank you, sir.” He started to eat his cake.

Brooke had to stop looking at him, had to stop caring about his feelings. He might be in a world of hurt the next few days as he adjusted to life on the ranch, and it wasn’t her job to sympathize. Her job was to get a good day’s work out of him.

And stop thinking about him except as an employee.