A Ranch Between Them, page 8
And honestly? She didn’t want Katie to leave, either.
Maybe she was selfish, but so be it. She’d toss out the offer she’d been turning over in her brain during the past several days and see what Katie thought.
“I don’t know if Brady can ride a horse like he used to.” Katie removed the cozy from the teapot and divided the last of the Earl Grey between their cups. “By the way, what’s the deal with him and the McGuires?”
Rosalie added sugar to her tea, took a sip. “Ancient history,” she said softly. “Brady should be the one to fill you in.”
“Yeah, right.” Katie tilted her head, giving Rosalie a rather direct look. “Can you tell me a little? Enough to keep me from getting into trouble? You know, by putting my foot in my mouth?”
“Will was a talented bronc rider in his day. He mentored Brady’s father, Colton, and did the same for Brady. The only problem was that Will tried to exert a little too much control over Brady, fearing he’d follow the same path as his father, and took it personally when Brady rebelled.” Rosalie gripped her teacup a little tighter. “I don’t know much more.” And she didn’t want to talk about Will McGuire. There was something about the man that made it impossible to relax around him. She hadn’t noticed it until a few months ago when they ran into one another at Hardwick’s—and literally bumped grocery carts. He’d gruffly apologized and moved on, but there was something about the encounter that had stuck with her. Something she couldn’t put her finger on.
“Ah.” Katie turned her teacup in her hand, her expression thoughtful. “That explains why Will was pretty sharp with him when he helped with the four-wheeler.”
“Will helped with the four-wheeler? How serious was this little mishap?”
Katie gave a small shrug. “It was no big deal. We simply needed muscle to get the thing righted, and Will was close. But I promise, if there’s anything you should know, you will.”
“I’ll hold you to that, young lady.”
Katie’s dimple appeared—the one that had charmed the socks off everyone since the time she was a toddler—but it wasn’t going to work today.
“I’m serious, Katie.”
“Grandma, you moved to town to run a shop, start a life off the ranch. You have a competent manager. Let him handle things.” Katie’s smile faded. “Which brings me to Mellie Taylor.”
Rosalie set down her cup at the mention of her nemesis’s granddaughter. “What about her?”
“Her family and fiancé are trying to buy your house?”
Rosalie lifted her cup again and took a bracing sip of tea before beginning her explanation. The neighbors were the only downside of owning one of Gavin’s Grand Ladies, but at least she now knew what had been bugging Katie.
“The Taylors bought the houses on either side of ours this summer. They want our house so that they can turn the block into some kind of a corporate retreat or bed-and-breakfast complex... I’m not certain of the details, but they could have bought our house when it came on the market. They didn’t. We did.” She sipped again, then set the cup down. “Granted, our house come on the market months earlier than the others and Gloria might have snapped it up before the sale became common knowledge...” Which only told Rosalie it was meant to be.
“But they’re not getting the house. Right?”
“Nope.” Neither she nor Gloria had the slightest interest in selling. Where else would they find a perfect house in an area zoned for both business and residency so close to downtown?
“Is there anything going on? I mean, are the Taylors getting pushy?”
The last thing Rosalie wanted was for her family to worry about her, when she was perfectly capable of fighting her own battles. She met Katie’s gaze dead-on. “Gloria and I can handle matters, Katie. But if I find that I need more muscle, I will ask. I promise.”
“Why do I feel like things would have to be pretty desperate before you asked for said ‘muscle’?”
“I guess it’s because I’m old enough to know what I’m doing.” She made a small gesture with her teacup and deliberately changed the subject. “We didn’t have time to talk at the shop yesterday. What are your plans now that you’re home? Will you start looking for a job immediately? Or are you going to take time to assess possibilities?”
The second option, please.
She was usually better at sounding neutral, but she did not want to see Katie head back into the fray just yet.
“I want to rebuild the greenhouse, grow herbs and maybe get some chickens.”
Rosalie set her cup down a little too abruptly, making the saucer clatter. “I... That wasn’t what I was expecting.” Katie had always loved plants and pottering around in the greenhouse before it’d become storage central for the ranch. When the grandchildren had become teens, Rosalie had simply been too busy to use the greenhouse.
“Neither was I.” Katie set down her own cup more gently. “I assumed I’d come home, take a breather, then dive into the job hunt.”
“What happened?”
Katie gave a half laugh. “I feel good being here.”
Rosalie’s eyebrows rose. “You haven’t been feeling ‘good’?” She’d sensed that in their conversations over the past year, but Katie had been adamant about everything being fine in her life. Just fine.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Katie said with a wry half smile. “If you’d asked me how I felt a few weeks ago, I would have said, ‘Just fine,’ and believed it. But now...” Katie turned her cup in her hands before continuing with a faint frown. “I counseled people on burnout, but never listened to my own advice.”
“Because you were fine.”
Katie bit her lip, but the rueful smile broke through. “I wasn’t. Looking back, I totally see why I burned out. I finished a double college major, then went to work within a week of graduating and, until I got my pink slip, I haven’t slowed down. I haven’t read books, or knit a sweater, or done any of the stuff I used to like to do.”
Rosalie stared at her, her heart sinking. “I thought Cassie was my problem child in that regard.” Katie had been driven like her siblings, but Rosalie had no idea that she’d been this driven.
“No,” Katie said on a sigh. “I’m pretty much the same. I grew up feeling like a slacker because Nick and Cassie were so good at everything, so I never let myself stop working. But on the bright side, because of that, I have no encumberments. No car payment or house payment. No student loans. I didn’t save much in SF, but I saved some.”
Katie fell silent, and when she showed no sign of going on, Rosalie said, “You haven’t knit a sweater?”
“Or a mitten or a scarf. Nothing.”
“What did you do with your free time?”
“I took classes toward a master’s degree.”
“Katie Lynn Callahan.”
“Am I going to get into trouble for not knitting?”
Rosalie just shook her head. “I think you should get some chickens.”
“I’ve always secretly envied people who majored in things they loved, even if their chances of getting jobs in their field of study were close to nil.”
“We all do.”
“There’s money to be made in herbs, but starting a new business is always a risk.”
“Preaching to the choir,” Rosalie murmured, thinking of all the work she and Gloria had already put into the Daisy Petal hoping that in a few years the business would turn a profit. But would it? “There are no guarantees.”
“Are you glad you’re making the leap?” Katie leaned forward as she spoke.
“I have some nerves, but yes. I’m glad I’m starting the business. It’s...energizing.”
Katie leaned back again, a rueful expression on her face. “I wish I would have been brave enough to take that chance earlier. Look at Nick. He majored in engineering and ended up being a contractor.”
“He’s happy as a contractor.”
“I know. He did things his way. Your shop is kind of the same, isn’t it? A chance to do your own thing.”
“I loved working the ranch with your grandfather.”
“I know.” There was something in the way Katie spoke that told Rosalie that despite her efforts to hide the truth, at the very least her youngest granddaughter had clued into the fact that she wasn’t really cut out for rural life. She’d made the best of it and knew how blessed she was living with a man like Carl for nearly fifty years.
Rosalie reached out to cover Katie’s hand with her own. “I came here with the idea of trying to talk you into staying for a few months to help me around the shop. I really don’t need help around the shop...but I wanted you to stay for a while.” Because she’d suspected that Katie wasn’t as happy as she’d insisted she was.
The corner of Katie’s mouth quivered ever so slightly, and Rosalie felt her own do the same. “I’m going to stay awhile, Grandma. Find a new dream to chase.” Her voice came close to cracking, and then she regained control and worked up a half smile while turning her hand over to squeeze Rosalie’s fingers.
“Perfect, because I want you here. Maybe when Nick comes and Brady leaves, you can move into Ed’s house, so that you can have some privacy and a little peace and quiet to run your business. And yes—” she guessed what her granddaughter was going to say next “—you can pay rent then if it makes you happy.”
An odd expression crossed Katie’s face before she squeezed Rosalie’s hand again. “That would be lovely, Grandma. Exactly what I’d hoped for.”
* * *
THE FOUR-WHEELER HAD come out of the ditch with little more than a scratch on the gas tank. Brady wished he could say the same for himself, but while it might hurt to move, he could move. He wasn’t stuck in a hospital bed mourning the end of his career. He had his second chance and he wasn’t going to waste it whining about bad luck—not when he’d also had his share of good luck.
After fixing a broken strand of wire on the boundary fence, Brady rode the four-wheeler to the top of a hill and looked out over the Hayden Valley on the back side of the Callahan Ranch, where his new home would be once the purchase was finalized. Even though his driveway would be miles from that of the Callahan Ranch, they would still be neighbors.
Most of Hayden Valley belonged to the Larson Stock Company, the owner of which had died while Brady was in the hospital. There were issues with the will, but once the legalities were settled—and it appeared that would happen soon—the heirs intended to break the land into parcels to sell. As soon as he heard the rumors about the land sale, Brady had approached the family and was able to make a deal to buy the parcel with the decrepit homestead house and barn. The price was fair, considering the current state of the Montana real estate market, due to the difficulties accessing the place, and more importantly, Abe Larson Jr., had agreed to carry the loan for a higher than usual interest rate. Injured rodeo riders weren’t prime candidates for loans and mortgages, but Brady had grown up with a slew of Larson kids and his former rodeo coach, Stan, was a distant cousin who worked in the Larson land office and had helped broker the deal. Now all Brady had to do was to get healthy enough to get a full-time job so that he could make payments. This property was the springboard to his future, and he was going to hang on to it come hell or high water.
Brady popped the four-wheeler back into gear and headed down the mountain. When he got within sight of the main house, he noted that Rosalie’s pickup was no longer parked next to Katie’s.
She’d stopped by the manager’s house earlier to make certain he was okay with Katie staying on the ranch and he, of course, had assured her he was fine with it. Like he would say anything else to the woman who’d helped him out when he so desperately needed it. And now that he and Katie had spent time together, he decided he was fine with it. He could deal with the situation just as he had back when he’d fancied himself falling for her. Besides, he had a strong feeling that Katie intended to stay for at least as long as he’d be there, and he really had no option but to deal with it.
So deal he would.
* * *
KATIE PULLED OPEN the door of the old chicken house and made a face as she stepped back. The small building was chock-full of wire—and not the friendly kind. Loose rolls of barbed wire filled most of the interior. She planned to move ahead with her greenhouse plan, but she was also considering other ventures—like hobby chickens. There’d always been chickens and fresh eggs on the ranch while she was growing up, and if she was going to stay, she wanted to indulge in things she hadn’t been able to indulge in while in the city.
Chickens qualified.
But if she was going to get chickens, she had some work ahead of her. The roof wasn’t exactly watertight, judging from the condition of the floorboards, so she’d have to research how to repair it. Or ask Nick.
“You’re a smart girl. You’ll figure it out.” The muttered words were barely out of her mouth when the sound of a door opening caught her attention. She turned to see Brady emerging from the grain shed and hoped he hadn’t heard her talking to herself. He ambled closer, coming to a stop a good ten feet away from her.
“Looking for wire?”
“More like wishing there wasn’t so much here.” He frowned, and she explained, “I’m thinking chickens in the spring.”
“I can help you clean this out if you want.”
She blinked at him. “First dinner and now this?”
“I’m here to help with the ranch. That’s what Rosalie hired me to do.”
“Still a bit of a shift from our first meeting.” She didn’t know why she was pushing for an answer for his change in attitude, why she couldn’t just accept it, but she made no effort to tamp down her curiosity.
“I was feeling raw when you arrived.”
“I wonder why, pinned to the ground by a ton of machinery.”
“Less than a half ton.”
“I stand corrected.”
He gripped his buckle, which, interestingly, was one he’d won in high school rather than one of the many he must have won during his professional rodeo career, and rocked on his heels. “I didn’t feel ready for company, even when I wasn’t pinned under the machine.”
“Now you do.”
“No.” The word came out easily. “But I’m picking my battles.”
Her eyebrows lifted. “Okay.”
She thought he might have been on the edge of a smile, and the thought of him smiling at her—really smiling at her—sent a tingle through her. Hello, old friend. She’d felt that tingle so often back in the day when Brady was near. “I’m not going to treat you like Ed. That was a dumb plan.”
“Agreed.”
Which left the question of how she was going to treat him. “You two do share some common characteristics, however.”
“Such as?”
“You can both be surly and distant.” There was no sting to her words, and Katie bit the inside of her cheek as she waited for his response. They were once again in comfortable territory, with her gently baiting him while he attempted to keep his cool.
“I have my reasons.”
“I know.”
His expression started to blank out and Katie made a stab at saving the situation. She hated it when he withdrew. “You aren’t your parents.”
Big mistake bringing up his parents. His half-closed-off expression became totally closed off. Well, Katie wasn’t having it.
“Brady...loosen up. Your big secret isn’t such a secret. There was a reason you lived with us more than you lived at home.”
He glanced past her toward the open fields, where she imagined he wanted to escape to, and his throat moved. Oh, yeah. The parental wounds cut deeply even after years of being on his own.
“I suppose Nick talked to you?” he said as he looked back at her.
She shook her head. “I heard the two of you talking more than once, and it was pretty obvious that your parents let you run wild because, well—” Katie swallowed, then went with the hard truth as she saw it “—they didn’t want to concern themselves.”
“I’m too much like my dad. My real dad. I don’t think my mom could handle it.”
And he might have been hard to handle because of it. Probably easier to let him run.
Katie stayed silent, knowing Brady wouldn’t appreciate platitudes after letting loose with some actual information about himself. Finally he blew out a breath, then pressed his lips together as he studied his boots. When he raised his gaze again, his expression was matter-of-fact.
“I had some rough times. But those times are gone.”
“Replaced by new rough times.” And she had a feeling the physical injuries were easier to deal with.
“Yeah.”
He started to move back, and Katie reached out to put her hand on his arm, stopping him. She wasn’t done. For a moment they both stared at her hand as it lay on his sleeve, then once again he raised that clear green gaze of his.
“Don’t feel sorry for me, Katie. I’m good.”
“Are you?” Without conscious thought, she lifted her hand from his sleeve and pressed it to his cheek, her nerves tingling at the sensation of warm, beard-roughened skin beneath her palm. Brady went still, so still that she wondered if he was even breathing. She seemed to be having trouble in that department herself.
Somehow, she found her voice, and it sounded remarkably normal as she said, “Don’t you feel sorry for me, either. I’m also good.”
Or rather, she’d been good until she touched him and had been unexpectedly warmed from the inside out. Now she felt wildly off-kilter.
Time to retreat, before one of them had a heart attack. She let her hand drop and took half a step back, giving Brady the breathing room he needed. An expression she couldn’t read chased across his features before he also stepped back, putting a decent amount of space between them as he slid his thumbs into his front pockets.
