A Cowboy Family Christmas

by Judy Duarte

  Lainie continued her work, putting away leftovers and wiping down countertops, but she couldn’t help wondering what Drew was up to. For the past few evenings, he’d interviewed the retired cowboys in the kitchen, a routine she’d come to look forward to.

  She glanced out the kitchen window. The lights were off in his cabin, so he hadn’t turned in for the night. She’d just placed the detergent in the dishwasher when the back door swung open and clicked shut. She turned to see Drew striding through the mudroom on his way back inside.

  His smile, as dazzling as it’d ever been, lit his eyes, and her pulse rate kicked up a notch.

  “Got a minute?” he asked.

  “Sure. What’s up?”

  He pulled out a chair from the table for her. “I thought you might like an update.”

  She sat down, and he took a seat next to her. “I did a little research, and Kidville, that children’s home, appears to be everything Brad said it was and more. So I made an appointment for us to take a tour on Friday at two. Can you slip off for an hour or so?”

  “I’d really like to, but I’m not sure. I’m usually busy with the meal prep for dinner at that time.”

  “I’ve got you covered. Brad’s mother will be here by then, and a few minutes ago, when I mentioned what I had in mind, he called her. She said she’d be happy to cook dinner—or do anything else to help out. She’s coming to stay that day anyway, so she’s going to arrive a few hours early. You’ll have plenty of time to show her around the kitchen.”

  “You’ve thought of everything.”

  “I try to cover all my bases.” His wink turned her heart inside out.

  They’d not only become teammates, but it seemed as if they were well on the road to being friends.

  She liked the thought of that.

  “Did you know that Kidville has a small orchard and a good-size vegetable garden?” Drew asked. “They’re going to grow most of their produce, and they’re raising chickens.”

  A niggle of concern crept over her, stealing her smile. “I know the kids will have chores, but I hope they won’t be expected to do all the work.”

  “Jim Hoffman and his wife believe children should be given age-appropriate responsibilities, and I see the reasoning behind that.”

  “Me, too. I just hope this doesn’t turn out to be a farm run by child labor.” Lainie’s thoughts drifted to the time she’d lived with the Bakers, the memory taking her back to a place and foster family she’d hoped to forget.

  “You have a faraway look in your eyes,” Drew said, drawing her back to the here and now.

  “I’m sorry. My mind wandered for a moment.”

  “To a bad personal experience?”

  Lainie didn’t usually talk about her early years—at least, not in detail. But she’d grown close to Drew in the past few days, and if they’d truly become friends, she should be up front with him. “I told you that I grew up in foster care. For the most part it wasn’t too bad. If I’d been able to stay with the first family...” Tears filled her eyes, and she blinked them away. So much for the candor of friendship.

  “I’m sorry that you had such a crappy childhood,” he said.

  “It wasn’t all bad.” She swiped at her lower lashes, stopping the overflow. “Most of the families I lived with were decent. In fact, I actually liked Mama Kate, the first foster mother my sister and I had. She was an older, dark-skinned woman who had an easy laugh and a loving heart as big as her lap. She never turned down a kid needing a placement, so there were a lot of us. Yet she managed to find special time for each of us. My sister and I counted ourselves lucky to live with her.”

  “Why’d you have to leave?” Drew asked.

  “One night, about six months after we moved in, Mama Kate had a stroke and had to give us all up.”

  “That’s too bad. Where did you go next?”

  Lainie bit back a quick response. She wasn’t sure she wanted to be that up front. She and Rickie had moved to a receiving home, where her heart condition was finally diagnosed. She endured several back-to-back hospitalizations, which was when she and her sister were separated. After her surgery and a long inpatient recuperation period, she learned that Rickie had been adopted. Sadly, they’d never had a chance to say goodbye to each other.

  But Lainie wasn’t going to share that.

  She reached for her collar, fingered the top button then skimmed the next three before dropping her hand to her lap. “Next stop was to the Bakers’ house. Talk about all work and no play.”

  “So that’s why you’re worried about the children and their chores at Kidville,” Drew said.

  “The Bakers seemed to think that I was there to cook, clean the house and do the laundry.”

  “An unpaid servant, huh?”

  “Pretty much. At least, as far as my foster mother was concerned.” Lainie tilted her hand and flicked her fingers at a crumb she’d neglected to wipe off the table. “Her name was Glenda, which always reminded me of the good witch, only spelled differently. But she wasn’t very good—or nice. She once called my fifth grade teacher to complain about the amount of homework I was assigned. She told Mrs. Fleming that I wouldn’t be allowed to do any of it, especially the reading, until after my household chores were done. But by then, I was exhausted.”

  Drew reached across the table and covered her hand with his, warming it. He brushed his thumb across the top of her wrist. She suspected he meant to have a comforting effect, a calming one. But his touch spiked her pulse, arousing her senses instead.

  “I’m sorry, Lainie. That must have been very difficult for you.”

  “It was.” Her voice came out a notch above a whisper, and when she met his gaze, she spotted sympathy in his eyes.

  She was glad for the connection they’d made, for his understanding, but she didn’t want his pity. She had the urge to jerk her hand away from his and to reach for the collar of her blouse. But she couldn’t seem to move.

  As her heart pounded a strong, steady cadence, an unfamiliar emotion rose up inside, one that stirred her senses and reminded her just how inexperienced she was. Especially when it came to things like openhearted discussions, honest emotion and a friendship drifting toward romance.

  She was at a complete loss. Should she pull her hand away from him now?

  Or should she leave it in his grip forever?

  Drew made the decision for her when he turned her hand over, palm side up, and clasped her fingers in his. He squeezed gently, relaying compassion and reassurance. Yet at the same time, it triggered a blood-swirling feeling she’d rather not ponder or put a name to.

  “I don’t think you need to worry about the Hoffmans,” he said. “I have a good feeling about them. And if we all work together, I think we can boost financial support for both the Rocking Chair Ranch and Kidville.”

  Lainie withdrew her hand from his, albeit reluctantly. “Are you talking about the Christmas party?”

  “Yes, but why stop there? What about an Easter egg decorating party, pumpkin carving... I could go on and on.”

  “Wow. That’s creative,” she said.

  “Just doing my job,” he said, shrugging off her compliment. Then he brightened. “You know, something tells me this is going to be a successful venture. We should celebrate.”

  “That’s a little premature, don’t you think? We haven’t even toured the children’s home or met the people in charge.”

  “Okay, then we can toast our new venture.” His playful, boyish expression made it difficult to tell him no.

  So Lainie returned his smile. “With a glass of milk and cookies?”

  “Do you have anything better suited for adults?”

  “Coffee?”

  He lifted an eyebrow. “How about something stronger than caffeine?”

  The wine
stash. Lainie hesitated.

  Oh, why not. Joy had told her to help herself.

  “As a matter of fact,” she said, “I do. You have your choice of merlot or chardonnay.”

  “Either works for me. You pick. I’ll find a corkscrew.”

  Lainie watched Drew head for the kitchen drawer and realized this wasn’t going to be a celebration. It was more of a christening, like breaking a bottle of bubbly on the bow of a ship ready to set sail for the very first time.

  As she went to the cabinet and selected the merlot, she hoped that if she and Drew were about to launch a romance, it wouldn’t end up a disaster of Titanic proportions.

  Chapter Six

  Lainie handed Drew the bottle of merlot, and he pulled the cork, releasing the scent of oak and blackberries.

  She’d been right. It was too early to actually celebrate anything, but he’d had another motive to consider tonight a special occasion. He wanted to get to know her better, to spend some time with her, and he hadn’t been able to come up with a better reason to stick around in the kitchen this evening.

  She removed two wineglasses from the small hutch and set them on the table, allowing him to fill them halfway.

  Then he lifted his glass in a toast. “Here’s to helping the young and old alike.”

  “To cowboys and children.” She clinked her glass against his, then took a sip.

  He did the same, yet it wasn’t their team effort to encourage charitable contributions for both ranches that he was thinking about. He actually liked the idea of working closely with Lainie. He liked it a lot.

  “Are you looking forward to visiting Kidville?” he asked her. “Or...” He paused, realizing that her time spent in foster care might make a visit to a children’s home, even one as unique as that one appeared to be, stir up bad memories. And he didn’t want to open a Pandora’s box of emotion.

  “I’d like to take that tour,” she said softly. “Thanks for including me. Besides, it’ll be good for the blog, right?”

  “Yes, that’s true. At this rate, we’ll have enough blog content for months.” He studied her face, those big brown eyes, the soft, plump lips. Her high cheekbones, like those of a top model, bore a slight blush.

  Once again, it struck him that he’d seen her somewhere before. In his dreams, most likely. But in those nocturnal musings, she hadn’t been dressed in baggy denim or blouses buttoned to the throat. She’d worn sexy silk panties, which she kept hidden from sight and only revealed to her lover.

  “Have you started the blog yet?” she asked.

  Not really. When it came to sitting down in front of his laptop and actually opening up a Word document, he’d been dragging his feet.

  “I’m still conducting the interviews,” he said. “I plan to talk to the younger men, too. Nate has an interesting story.”

  “Does he?” Lainie ran the tip of her tongue across her top lip, licking a drop of wine.

  Drew sucked in a breath. For a moment, he lost his train of thought. So he focused on his wineglass. Anything but that mouth, those lips and that tongue.

  “I’d heard that Nate got married recently,” she said, “but not to the mother of his baby.”

  Oh, yeah. They’d been talking about Nate.

  “You heard right,” Drew said. “A few months back, a woman he’d once dated showed up here at the ranch, pregnant and battered by her new husband. She was looking for Nate and claimed the baby was his.”

  “How tragic.” She did that thing with her tongue on her lip again, and he nearly forgot what they were talking about.

  Nate and the baby. Right.

  “Because of that beating, she went into premature labor,” Drew said, “she gave birth to little Jessie, then died from a brain bleed.”

  Lainie cupped her hands around the stem of her goblet and scrunched her brow. “That poor woman. How sad.”

  “It sure was. Her husband is now in prison for murder.” Drew reached for the bottle and replenished his wine. “More?”

  She shook her head and placed her hand over the top of her glass. “What happened next?”

  “Nate took custody of the baby and hooked up with Anna, the hospital social worker who’d been assigned to his case.” Drew took a sip of wine. He wondered if Lainie liked the merlot. She wasn’t drinking much.

  She fingered the stem of the glass, her brow slightly furrowed. “Nate fell in love with his social worker?”

  “Do you find that odd?”

  Lainie smiled. “I can’t imagine a handsome young cowboy falling for any of the ones I had as a child.”

  “Then Nate was lucky. Anna’s both pretty and loving. But for a while, he was afraid she’d find him lacking as a father, and that he’d lose custody of the baby as a result. But he was wrong, and now they’re married.”

  “You were right. That’s an interesting story. But I have a question. You said the baby’s mother ‘claimed’ Nate was the father. Was he?”

  “At first, Nate wasn’t sure. He told me that DNA didn’t make a man a daddy. And that you don’t have to be born into a family to belong to one.”

  “That’s true,” Lainie said, brightening. “It’s an interesting take—and a good piece of advice. I’ll have to keep it in mind.”

  “Advice? I’m not following you.”

  She blinked a couple times, then let out a little giggle and shrugged her shoulders. “I’m sorry. I was just thinking out loud.”

  And probably ruing the fact that she didn’t have a family of her own. Drew was about to comment, then realized he’d be wading into a slew of emotion he didn’t want to deal with. He had enough of that with Kara Lee, which had been made worse by maternal hormones. So he let it go.

  He looked at Lainie’s left hand, the one he’d once touched, once held. She wasn’t wearing a ring, so he concluded she wasn’t involved with someone.

  For a man who never mixed business with pleasure, he was tempted to make an exception this time.

  “Is there a special man in your life?” he asked.

  “No, not anymore. Actually, there really never was. Not one who was special.”

  Drew sat up straighter, pumped by what sounded like good news. “That’s a little surprising.”

  “What is?” She lifted her glass, studied the burgundy color in the kitchen light, then took a drink. “That I’m not engaged or seeing someone right now? Actually, the few men I thought were decent ended up disappointing me. I can ferret out the heart of a story, but apparently, I’m not very good at judging a man’s heart and character.”

  “Sounds like you’re recovering from a painful breakup.”

  Her shoulder twitched. Not quite a shrug, but a tell just the same. One that told him she’d been hurt in the past and possibly betrayed.

  “I was too trusting,” she said. “But I’ll be a lot more careful in the future.”

  Drew couldn’t say he blamed her. He’d built a few walls of his own, although that didn’t mean he hadn’t found the time for a casual but intimate relationship every now and then. And when he did, he was pretty selective.

  The truth was, he found Lainie to be both attractive and completely acceptable in that regard. Would she feel the same way about him? To be blunt, would she be interested in having a short-term affair while they were both on the Rocking C?

  Oh, hell. That was a crazy thought.

  Lainie was the type of woman who was probably looking for a husband and kids—just like Kara Lee, who’d been on the prowl for Mr. Right and thought she’d found him in Craig Baxter.

  And look how that had turned out. No, Drew didn’t have any misperceptions about love and living happily ever after.

  So who was he to mess with Lainie’s heart?

  He threw down the last of his merlot and said, “I’d better t
urn in for the night. Thanks for talking to me. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “I’ll be ready.”

  He returned the cork to the nearly empty bottle and placed it in the fridge. But before turning to go, a thought overtook him. “Do you have anything other than jeans or overalls to wear?”

  Her brow furrowed. “Yes, why?”

  “I realize we’re just going to a ranch, but I told the Hoffmans you were my associate. So I thought you might want to... You know, dress the part?”

  She looked down at her jeans and baggy blouse, then rolled her eyes. “Don’t worry. I know how to dress professionally.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you. In fact, you have understated class and look great no matter what you wear. Forget I said anything.”

  “You’re forgiven.” Her smile was pretty convincing. “Would business casual be acceptable?”

  “That’d be perfect.” He lobbed her an appreciative grin, then headed outside.

  By the time he’d shut the back door, his lips had quirked into a full-on smile. Now he had something to look forward to.

  And so did his nocturnal musings.

  * * *

  At nine o’clock on Friday morning, Brad’s mother, Molly Jamison, arrived at the Rocking C Ranch driving a white Ford Taurus that had seen better days—or make that years. Lainie had been looking forward to meeting her, so she went outside to greet her in the yard.

  But when a petite redhead in her midthirties climbed out of the car and pulled out a suitcase that was nearly as big as she was, Lainie’s steps slowed.

  Brad had to be close to twenty, so Lainie had imagined his mother to be in her forties or fifties. But she must have been a teenager when she’d given birth.

  Not that it mattered. Tamping down her surprise, Lainie crossed the yard, introduced herself and reached out her hand in greeting. “It’s nice to meet you. Do you need help with your luggage?”