by Liz Isaacson
“I’ll be back later,” Clay said, picking up his keys and heading outside to his truck. He’d started the ignition and buckled his seatbelt when his phone rang. Rhodes.
He tapped on the infotainment screen. “Hey, boss,” Clay said easily, able to drive and talk, as his phone connected to his truck’s Bluetooth.
“Can I talk to you after the fireside tonight?” Rhodes asked.
Clay frowned, his stomach swooping for some reason. “Sure,” he said, his voice maybe a bit strained. “What about?”
“We’ve got a cake house out on the ranch I want to move for the new irrigation system. I’m going to use it to house the machinery, and I need your help coordinating the move.”
Relief flowed through Clay. He should’ve known Rhodes would call about work. He’d been better since starting a romance with Capri, but the man still worked a ton. Clay would too, if he owned a ranch like Quinn Valley.
Maybe that’s why your brothers don’t have time for you, he thought, unsure of why his brothers had been on his mind so much lately. Perhaps he should reach out, touch base with them, find out how they were doing.
“Yeah, sure,” Clay said. “I didn’t know we had a cake house on the ranch.”
“Yeah, Gramps actually built it,” Rhodes said. “I want to involve him too, because it’s obviously special to him.”
“No problem. We’ll be back, oh, I don’t know. Probably by nine or so.”
“Great, I’ll take a nap now.” Rhodes laughed, and Clay couldn’t help smiling too. He stifled his own yawn as the call ended and he pulled up to the homestead. He took a moment to admire the new landscaping, the impressive home the Quinn’s had built and maintained.
Would Cami want to be with someone who didn’t have a ranch of their own? He knew Logan Locke had bought his own ranch and would whisk her sister away to it once they were married. Flynn had bought his old family farm where he’d been raised. Knox had a place in town and jobs all over the county, as he was the premier farrier in these parts.
And of course, Rhodes was set to take over the ranch—both physically and on paper—by the New Year. He’d move into the homestead in January, and marry Capri in April.
So where did that leave Cami?
She came out the front door, and Clay jumped out of the truck. “Sorry,” he said as he approached her. She wore a pretty white dress with bright splashes of flowers on it. “I got lost inside my head for a second.”
Cami smiled and giggled, running the last few steps to him. He caught her in his arms, laughing with her. “What were you thinking about?” she asked.
“You,” he said, leaning down to touch his lips to hers in a sweet kiss. “And where you’re going to live once Rhodes takes over.” He swayed with her, watching that pretty smile fade slightly.
“I’m staying in the basement,” she said. “Rhodes said he doesn’t need the whole house right away.”
Clay sobered too, hoping his questions didn’t ruin their evening. “And you’d be…satisfied with a cowboy like me?”
“Like you?” She threaded her fingers through his and tugged him toward the truck.
“Yeah,” he said, going with her. “You know, a cowboy without a place of his own. I’m not sure those cabins out on the east end are meant for families.” He opened the passenger door and looked at her, eyebrows cocked.
“Oh,” she said, their eyes meeting for a long, charged moment. “I guess I hadn’t thought about it.”
“Hmm,” he said, smiling. “I don’t think that’s true.” He waited for her to climb up and then he closed the door and went around to his side. “Do you want kids?”
“Yeah, sure,” she said. “In time. I’m still pretty young.” She looked at him. “Do you?”
“I don’t know,” he said honestly, leveling his gaze at her again. “What if the answer is no? Is that a deal-breaker for you?”
“I don’t know,” she responded, looking thoughtful now. She focused out the windshield. “I think the only deal-breaker for me is dishonesty. I’ve had a lot of…issues with that with my previous boyfriends.”
“Oh, is that what I am?” Clay teased, because he needed to get this conversation onto something lighter.
“Yeah,” Cami said with a light laugh. She slid across the seat and sat next to him. “That’s what you are.”
“Mm.” Clay pressed his lips to her temple and got the truck rolling toward town. Neither of them spoke, and Clay let his thoughts wander wherever they wanted to go. He’d never felt a strong calling toward fatherhood, because he didn’t want to be the kind of dad his had been. All he could do was be honest with Cami—and hope that if he came to the conclusion that kids weren’t in his future, that she wouldn’t end things with him because of it.
Chapter 9
Cami’s thoughts barely seemed to stay in her mind long enough to think them. Boyfriend. Kids. A cowboy like me.
She hadn’t expected any serious questions like those until much later in their relationship. Of course, she’d never really kissed a man as quickly as she had Clay either. Never felt as comfortable with one as fast as she had him. Never felt like she could be who she truly was so readily.
She wasn’t sure if that was because she’d known him for three years. Or because Jessie and Rhodes both spoke so highly of him. Or if he was her soulmate. The romantic in her wanted it to be the last one, and she curled her fingers around his and squeezed.
“What are you thinking about?” he asked.
“Too much.” She took a deep breath. “What do you think Pastor Dahl will talk about tonight?”
“I have no idea.”
“I wanted to be a pastor once,” she said, smiling out the front window as Clay turned into the parking lot of the one and only Italian restaurant in town. How she’d missed the twenty-five-minute drive to town, she wasn’t sure.
Lost in thought.
“Really?” Clay asked, surprise right there in the syllables.
“Yeah.” She giggled. “It’s a far cry from accounting, right?”
“Like, opposite sides of a canyon.” After parking, he twisted to face her. “So why did you choose accounting?”
“Numbers make sense,” she said matter-of-factly. “They line up. They don’t lie.”
“And religion doesn’t make sense or line up? It lies?”
“No,” she said quickly. “But there are gray areas. Things I don’t understand. Things I believe, but don’t know.” She looked at him, almost desperate for him to agree with him. “Don’t you think?”
His eyes softened, and he nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “Sometimes we just have to take a step into the dark. That’s what my mom always said.”
The moment felt heavy for one, two, three breaths, and then they seemed to breathe in together. “Okay,” he said, his voice bright now. “Let’s go eat. I believe you said pasta was one of your favorite foods.”
“And Caprese salad,” she said. “With a lot of balsamic vinegar.”
“Yes.” He grinned at her and got out of the truck, turning back to help her down. She let her palms slide up his arms and across his chest before her feet hit the ground. “You look amazing, by the way,” he said, leaning down and kissing her again.
This time, it wasn’t just a chaste touch of his lips against hers. But a kiss, the way he’d captured her mouth on the lane that ran in front of his house, dead-ending near a stand of trees and that field with long grass.
“I sure do like you, Miss Cami,” he murmured, and Cami kept her eyes closed as she smiled, her forehead pressed against his. The other cowboys she’d dated didn’t normally say such things to her, and it was just one more reminder that Clay Martin wasn’t like the other cowboys she’d dated.
“I like you too, Clay,” she whispered, because she was afraid if she gave too much voice to the words, the true strength of her feelings would come out. And they were stronger than she wanted to admit right now, at least out loud.
“Let’s go eat,” he said. “I’
m starving, and we don’t want to be late for the fireside.”
“No, we don’t,” she said. “Otherwise, I might have to sit by another cowboy who has a whole row to himself.”
Clay laughed, slung his arm around her waist, and pulled her into his side as they walked toward the entrance. “That was just serendipity,” he said. “Or dumb luck.”
“Fate,” she said. “I don’t know how Granny got the time wrong for the fireside.”
“She didn’t,” Clay said. “The pastor just started early. He said he wanted to hear the choir do a few numbers. You didn’t really miss much.”
Oh, Cami had missed something, but she honestly didn’t care. They’d gotten a seat, and she’d gotten a new boyfriend. It wasn’t the first fall fireside service where she’d left with the hope of a new man in her life, but as she sat across the table from Clay, that handsome face and broad shoulders and beautiful spirit beaming back at her, she actually wanted it to be the last time.
And she had no idea what to do with that idea. It flitted away from her before she could seize onto it and examine it. She let it go, because there would be plenty of time to analyze everything once the date ended.
After all, she didn’t need to sleep.
“So remember, surround yourself with people who can help you see what you cannot…yet.” The preacher smiled out at the congregation, and Cami marveled at how he seemed to have everything figured out.
Of course, he didn’t. But he’d told some great stories about how he’d come to his own personal testimony of God. Cami was only half his age, and he’d already warned against expecting to have everything figured out while she was yet young.
Clay seemed as invested in the sermon as she was, and Pastor Dahl finished a few minutes later.
“Short,” Clay whispered, and Cami nodded as the choir got up. They proceeded to sing several numbers, so by the time the entire service ended, it hadn’t been any shorter than the others in the series.
The congregation was invited to sing the closing hymn with the choir, and Cami mouthed the words so she could listen to Clay’s beautiful singing voice. No sooner had amen been said when he turned to her. “You didn’t sing.”
“You have such a great voice,” she said, smiling up at him. “I like listening to you.”
“My grandmother always said that.” He beamed down at her and then turned to leave the pew. Cami caught his hand so they wouldn’t get separated in the crowd, and she turned when someone else touched her other hand.
“Cami,” a woman said, and Cami turned to see her cousin Riley standing there. Of course, she’d be here. Her husband was one of the preachers.
“Oh, hi, Riley.” Cami glanced back at Clay, but there wasn’t room for them to walk side-by-side. Maybe she could escape introducing him to Riley, though he’d probably met her at one of the regular Quinn family functions.
“Is he your new boyfriend?” Riley whispered, though Cami felt like she’d pulled out a microphone and shouted into it.
“Yes,” Cami said.
“You seem to have a lot of those.”
Cami’s eyes cut over to her cousin, but she had no idea what to say. Riley didn’t seem to have realized that she’d pushed a button—and she definitely hadn’t meant to make Cami’s heart thump quite so hard. At least Cami had never known Riley to be anything but kind. Maybe a bit blunt. But not unkind.
Cami supposed she did date a lot of men. She liked having her options open, and she hadn’t really thought about settling down until the last couple of months. She’d been in the dating pool long enough to know what she liked now, and what she didn’t like.
But seeing her siblings and a vast majority of her cousins find the perfect match for them had helped her see she wanted that too. Her perfect match. And if she had to date a lot of men to find that person, she would.
“Anyway, he looks nice,” Riley said, peeling off after they reached the lobby. They probably had dinner set up for the preachers somewhere, and Cami stepped over to Clay.
“Who was that?” Clay asked. “I feel like I’ve seen her around.”
“Yeah, one of my cousins,” Cami said, Riley’s words moving through her like an infection. She pushed the words out of her mind, because she didn’t want them to taint her time with Clay.
She caught him yawning, and she pulled back on the idea to stop and grab a treat somewhere. He didn’t suggest it either, which meant he was tired and needed to get to bed. They talked about the sermon on the way back to the ranch, and Clay finally said, “I think I need to talk to my brothers.”
Shock lifted Cami’s eyebrows. “Oh. What—why?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “I’ve been thinking about them a lot lately, and the fireside just now had a good message.”
“About surrounding yourself with people who can influence you for the best,” she said. “I thought….” She wasn’t sure what she thought. She only knew one side of the story with him and his family—and it was his.
“Maybe they’ll have something that can help me.” He shrugged, and Cami watched the indecision roll across his face. “I don’t know.”
“What are you hoping for help with?”
“I don’t know,” he said, but Cami was sure he did. “They have ranches and wives and families.” He left his statement there, and Cami let the silence into the truck with them. She thought it would be awkward, but it wasn’t, and Cami realized that another difference between Clay and the other cowboys she’d dated existed.
With Malcolm, she’d had to stuff every second with sound. With Gideon, he didn’t like silence, and he’d fill it with music and lyrics. With Connor, only awkwardness would accompany them if they weren’t talking. Cami didn’t want to have to carry a conversation or have one that didn’t need to be had.
Clay turned onto the road that led to the homestead, easing to a stop in front of Rhodes’s cabin. “I need to talk to your brother for a few minutes,” he said. “Do you want me to drop you off first?”
“Is it a privileged conversation?”
Clay chuckled and turned into the driveway. “Hardly. He wants to give me more work to do.”
“Well, you are the second,” Cami teased, thinking maybe he would have a place right here on this ranch for a while to come.
He scoffed. “I’m not sure I want to be the second,” he said. “Foreman. Whatever.”
“Are you just saying that?” Cami asked as he turned off the truck. “Because it’s okay to love your job.”
Clay met Cami’s gaze, and something stormed in his eyes. “Yeah, okay. I do love this job, and this ranch.”
She grinned at him. It was okay to be who he was. And okay that she was who she was, even if she did date a lot of men.
“I’ve been out with a lot of cowboys,” she said, unsure of where she was going with this new topic.
Clay blinked, obviously as unsure as her. “I know, Cami,” he said, and the sound of her name in that voice was absolute magic. “I have eyes.” He grinned at her and opened the door. “Let’s go see if Rhodes has anything good to eat. He’s always bragging about eating ice cream every night.”
Cami laughed, determined not to spend another moment worrying about what Riley had said. No, she needed her mental energy for much more important things—like how to keep a good cowboy like Clay interested for longer than a couple of days.
He didn’t seem like the type to disappear when the shiny exterior of a project wore off, and she could only hope that was true with women too.
Chapter 10
Clay woke the next morning and didn’t immediately go to work in the stables. It felt odd and foreign to report to the shop instead, where Rhodes, Gil, Wyatt, and Gramps had already congregated.
“Am I late?” he asked, glancing around.
“Just got here,” Rhodes said. “But we’re set. Should we head out?”
“Yep,” Gil said, pulling a pair of work gloves on before he headed for the backhoe.
“We need heavy mac
hinery?” Clay asked. His meeting with Rhodes the night before had lasted fifteen minutes, and most of that had been because he’d taken forever to scoop the pistachio ice cream.
He’d just wanted Clay to meet at the shop at seven, and they’d be driving out on the ranch to the cake house where they’d pick it up and move it. The forklift had been taken out last night, Rhodes had said. So Clay wasn’t aware they needed a backhoe.
“There are poles around the building,” Rhodes said.
“Poles? Why would you put poles around a building?” Clay asked.
“Keeps the wind from blowin’ it down,” Gramps said. “Set them poles myself.”
Clay grinned at the older man, and he followed Rhodes and Gramps to Rhodes’s brand-new pickup truck. It was bright red, sported a king cab, air conditioned and heated seats, and the best shocks Rhodes could get on a vehicle.
Clay had ridden in it a couple of times, and it was a nice ride. He helped Gramps into the passenger seat of the truck, and he said, “I can’t wait until we get back. Betsy is making that cherry limeade I like.”
Clay’s own mouth watered at the thought. “I forgot Betsy was making this move into an event.”
“Pineapple upside down cake,” Rhodes added. “Steak and eggs. All of Gramps’s favorites.”
And Clay’s, and his stomach grumbled at him for only drinking coffee before he left his cabin. With him in the back seat, Rhodes started out onto the ranch. The drive was long and bumpy, and by the time they arrived at the cake house—traditionally used to store meat—Clay was ready to get the job done and get back to his regular ranch life.
They set about hooking up the poles to the backhoe, removing them from the stubborn earth one at a time. Gramps told stories of driving to town when he was only twelve years old to get ice cream and candy at the general store.
Gramps had a story for everything, and Clay found himself basking in the tradition and history of the ranch. Suddenly, the day became about much more than just getting a job done. Clay liked the feeling at this ranch, and he wanted to stay here for a good long while.
