Courting the Cowboy

by Liz Isaacson

  “This is about the only way I’ll eat vegetables,” he said, lifting his fajita. “Your tortilla is killer light and airy, May.” He took a bite, the snap on the veggies just right and that marinade simply one of the best things he’d ever put in his mouth. As he ate, he couldn’t help glancing around his cabin. Everything seemed to have changed with May’s presence.

  His walls didn’t feel so close. The air didn’t feel so stuffy. He didn’t even care about the huge mess in the kitchen. He was just so glad she was here.

  “So I was thinking of doing a sweet peach iced tea,” he said. “It’s not technically part of the requirements, but every good Texas meal should have sweet tea.”

  “Truth.” She smiled at him, her dark eyes blazing with happiness. She’d eaten two fajitas and all of her soup and now she leaned her elbows on his table. The casual gesture didn’t seem to fit her designer sweater or her air of sophistication, but at the same time, it did.

  No matter what, Kurt was wondering how in the world he’d gotten someone as refined and educated as her to come out to his simple cowboy cabin and cook Texan dishes with him. Luck, probably.

  “So peach sweet tea,” she said. “I live by a peach orchard. I could get those fresh I bet.”

  “My friend Levi owns one too.”

  “Levi Rhodes?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” He watched her carefully, hoping she wasn’t one of Levi’s exes. She didn’t seem to be. “He’s a member of my congregation. He’d probably donate them.”

  “So you think we can do this?”

  Feeling brave and bold and a billion other things he really wasn’t, Kurt reached across the table and took both her hands in his. “May, I think we can do this together. I had a lot of fun cooking with you tonight.”

  She didn’t want to sit and talk his ear off, and he liked that. She had good recipes and quick hands. Though he’d known she worked in the kitchen at Sotheby’s, he wasn’t sure if her pastry skills would translate to main dishes. But they had.

  She squeezed his fingers, her face turning a delicious shade of pink. “Tortilla soup.” She surveyed their dishes. “Fajitas with homemade tortillas, salsa, and guacamole.” She lifted her gaze to his. “Is that big enough for a main dish?”

  “What else would we serve?”

  “I don’t know. A pot of pinto beans?”

  “Not a bad idea….” He cocked his head as he thought. “We’ll have to practice with the timing. Because we only have two hours to present the meal, and we haven’t even done dessert yet.”

  “We should do pecan tarts for the dessert,” she said. “My grandmother’s recipe is beautiful, and it’s totally Texan.”

  Kurt pulled his hands back and smiled. “Great idea.” He pushed away from the table and stood. “Want to walk around the ranch a little?”

  Hesitation crossed her face, and he caught her glancing at her phone to check the time. But she said, “Sure,” and he swept his hand under his hat to flatten his hair and then inhaled. He choked a little, his headache surging from the action.

  This time, when he opened the front door and stood on his porch, May slipped her hand into his, and everything in Kurt’s vision turned white for one glorious second. So she liked him too.

  The following morning found him on his porch as usual, his coffee steaming in the colder air, Patches at his feet. He normally thought about the sunrise and how grateful he was to be able to experience another one, but today, his thoughts seemed stuck on May Sotheby.

  She’d stayed until almost nine-thirty, and Kurt had held her hand for a good hour as they visited his horses and walked all the way down the dirt lane to the paved road she’d take back to town.

  He’d kept his phone off after she’d gone, unwilling to ruin the perfection that had been cooking with her with a chat. Sure, he liked the dating app. It had changed everything about how he met and interacted with women, but he found himself craving the more traditional methods of getting to know a woman, especially with May.

  She broadcast so much in her expressions that he found himself dissatisfied with just a text from her. He wanted to see her gorgeous face, look into those glorious eyes, fantasize about touching more than her hand.

  He pulled on the reins of his stampeding thoughts, left his coffee mug on the table, and stood up. “Better get to work, bud.” He scratched Patches and together, they set out for the horse barn. Kurt got to work feeding the animals and cleaning out their stalls. He took care of the chickens and headed over to the hay storage to get the transfer done before lunch.

  He found Shane and Gabe there, and they shut up quick when they saw him. “What’re y’all talkin’ about?” he asked, not one to beat around the bush.

  “Nothin’,” Shane said.

  “Right.” Kurt shook his head. “My birthday isn’t until August.”

  Shane rolled his eyes. “You’re so nosy.”

  “I’m the foreman. It’s my job to be nosy.” He glanced around at what Shane and Gabe had been doing. Their gloves sat on a discarded bale of hay several feet away. “Besides, you’re not gettin’ anything done by talking about ‘nothing’.”

  “Just talkin’.” Shane moved to pick up his gloves. “How are you feeling?”

  A diversionary tactic, but Kurt let it slide. “Hey, you guys want to come for lunch at my place? May and I made fajitas last night, and there are tons left over.”

  “I do,” Dwayne said, coming up behind them. “Gabe, can I talk to you for sec?”

  The other cowboy exchanged a glance with his brother before stepping past Kurt and going with Dwayne. Kurt watched them and then looked back at Shane.

  “Seriously, what’s goin’ on?”

  “Oh, Gabe’s got himself a girl.” Shane grinned. “And he missed work yesterday since Dwayne was gone too, and well, the boss didn’t look happy, did he?”

  Kurt hadn’t really had time to look at Dwayne, so he shrugged. “He doesn’t like it when you miss work.”

  “Especially since the two of you were gone.” Shane heaved a hay bale off the conveyor. “So let’s get this done so we can go eat fajitas.”

  The week passed quickly, with more work on the ranch than man hours to get it all done. Kurt went back to texting May, because he couldn’t drag himself off the ranch in the evenings, and she had to work early mornings most days. Sometimes she went in at six o’clock in the morning, went home for a few hours, and went back at night.

  He marveled at her tenacity, her work ethic. He liked their early-morning chats and their late-night chats, even when they woke him up. So on Friday, after she’d closed the restaurant, when his phone chimed like high-pitched bubbles, he swiped it off the nightstand to see her face inside the TexasFaithful heart.

  Still awake?

  i am now

  Fifteen minutes?

  starting now

  May started typing, and Kurt let the phone fall to his chest. He really would cut her off after fifteen minutes and power down his phone. They’d talked about it on Monday night while they walked under the peaceful ranch sky, hand-in-hand. She didn’t seem to have a problem with it.

  His phone vibrated and he lifted it to look at it. Want to get together tomorrow or Sunday? I have Sunday off, and it might be fun to go for a drive, or you could come to my place and meet Char, we could try making the pecan pie….

  Kurt very much wanted to do all of that. There was only one thing that settled him more that driving under the huge Texas sky, and that was prayer. He’d been saying plenty of those this week too, and he felt really good about his relationship with May.

  give me a sec

  He opened his calendar app and checked what he’d been scheduled to do on Sunday. He scheduled everyone, but he didn’t remember as he did it two weeks out. He’d given himself the evening chores, probably hoping for one morning to sleep in.

  Like that would happen. Even when he tried, Kurt couldn’t stay in bed past five-thirty. He’d assigned the morning chores to Gabe, and he quickly texted th
e other cowboy to find out if they could switch.

  Yeah, sure, Gabe replied. Dwayne’s got me on ranch arrest anyway.

  thanks Kurt sent. who did you sneak off to see?

  He switched back over to the chatbox and typed, i’m free Sunday after church.

  Great! May sent a heart icon, and Kurt’s real heart thumped wildly against the front and back of his ribcage. Maybe we could go to church together too.

  He stared at the words, sure he hadn’t read them right. His momma had taught him that he didn’t take a woman to church until things were way serious. Like diamond serious. And he’d “met” May a week ago.

  Of course, his momma would probably roll her eyes and lift her rolling pin as she enunciated her words while she lectured him about the dangers of online dating too. He hadn’t exactly told her where he’d met Alicia. He hadn’t needed to.

  As his mother neared eighty, Kurt knew she just wanted him to be happy. She’d still have plenty to say about his methods of finding a wife, though.

  A second wife, he thought out of nowhere. He hadn’t thought about his first wife in a long, long time, and he wondered why she was making a mental appearance now.

  Kurt? May’s message blipped up on his screen. You still there?

  still here

  Church on Sunday. Pastor Clark is great.

  yeah, i can come to church with you

  Kurt had always gone to the comfy church on Elberta Street, because that was where Dwayne went. But if he had to pick who he wanted to sit next to at church, Kurt would choose May over Dwayne any day of the week.

  It’s the red brick building on Freestone Avenue, May texted. We start at ten-thirty.

  i’ll meet you there?

  Or you can come pick me up.

  Kurt pecked out all right and hit send. Picking her up for church made it into a date, at least in Kurt’s traditional book. But May was pearls and cardigans and heels, and if Kurt wanted to spend time with her, he’d pick her up. He rolled over, typed out gotta go sweetheart talk tomorrow and powered down his phone without checking to see who Gabe had gotten in trouble for sneaking off the ranch to meet.

  Chapter Seven

  Okay, so no barking when the cowboy comes over.” May picked up Char and touched her nose to the poodle’s. “I know I said I wasn’t going to date any more cowboys, but this one’s actually nice.”

  So she was a little frustrated with not being able to see Kurt very often. They both had busy, demanding jobs that they couldn’t just walk away from when they wanted to. And though he’d denied it more than once over the course of the past week, he did seem like inhaling all that smoke had taken something out of him.

  May didn’t know what, because she’d barely known him before the fire. But she could still tell. Woman’s intuition. Or something.

  She set the little dog down and paused in front of the mirror hanging over the sideboard in the dining room. Her matte pink lipstick looked great, and she’d taken extra time to make her lashes dark and thick. She wore a little black dress with thick shoulder straps, and she swiped the leather jacket off the back of the couch and shrugged into it.

  “Sleek,” she said to her reflection. “Classic. Sophisticated.” Those were May’s favorite looks, and she always tried to appear cool, professional, calm, and polite whenever she went out in public. After all, as a Sotheby, she had a reputation to uphold.

  She cocked her head and imagined Kurt at her side. He stood at least six inches taller than her, and he wasn’t more interested in his phone than he was in having a conversation.

  “You’ve got it bad for him already,” she muttered to herself. Char yipped, and May’s heart pumped into overdrive. She’d been nervous before dates, sure. Mostly because she wasn’t sure what she was going to get, and the unexpected was always a little nerve-wracking.

  But when she opened the door this time, she knew what she’d find on the other side. Tall, dark, and handsome Kurt Pemberton. She still couldn’t believe she’d touched his hair and called him handsome right to his face. He’d taken it well, and there hadn’t been any weirdness between them.

  But May had been holding her emotions tight to the vest ever since. Not seeing him helped. She imagined his penetrating blue eyes, that delicious black cowboy hat, his large, warm hands. She wondered if he owned a pair of slacks and would wear them to church or if he was the blue jeans with a tie type of man.

  She honestly didn’t know which to hope for, and then the doorbell rang and she was out of time to fantasize about him. Her heels clicked as she crossed the tile, and she inhaled deeply to try to clear her nerves.

  The extra oxygen didn’t really work, but she opened the door anyway, her smile pinned in place until she saw him. Then it curved naturally, because he was just so darn attractive.

  He wore the cowboy hat, yes. A white shirt that was so bright May wondered if he’d just bought it. A pale blue tie with delicate yellow and white paisleys stitched in made his darker blue eyes feel like the depth of the ocean.

  And slacks. He wore black slacks and a pair of shiny loafers, no cowboy boots in sight.

  She realized she was staring—her mouth open even—when he whistled. “Well, look who looks amazing in leather.” He eased into her like they hugged every time they saw one another and drew his arm around her waist.

  “Wow, I missed you.” He swept his lips across her temple and stepped back, every movement so natural that May wondered if she’d missed part of their relationship.

  “Y’all look nice,” she said, her eyes sliding from his cowboy hat to his shoes and back one final time. She picked up the clutch from its spot on the side table and tucked it under her arm. “I’m ready.” She nudged Char back with her toe. “Go on, now, Char.”

  “Good, because you live about as far out as the ranch.”

  “I do not,” she said. “It’s a mile, tops.”

  He offered her his arm, and she gladly took it. “You like livin’ out here?” he asked.

  “Yeah,” she said. “It’s quiet. I like it.”

  “What if you get in trouble?”

  “I have a phone,” she said. “And a dog.”

  “That little thing?” He laughed as she pulled the door closed behind them. “I think that poodle is more afraid of her shadow than anything else.”

  May liked the sound of his laugh, liked the strength in his arm, liked that she’d be walking into church with him this morning. “Char’s definitely not a guard dog.”

  “It’s a nice house,” he said.

  “Thank you.” It was entirely too big for one woman, but May loved every inch of it. “I’ll give you a tour after church.”

  “Oh, I brought some peaches,” he said. “For the sweet tea.” He dropped her arm and hurried toward his truck. “Can I leave ‘em in your house?”

  “Sure, ‘course.”

  He pulled a bushel of peaches from the bed of his truck and approached her. “It’s not locked, is it?”

  “No, sir.”

  He cocked one eyebrow at her as he passed, causing her to giggle. He didn’t go all the way inside, but just opened the door and put the peaches on the floor inside. “Char won’t eat them, will she?”

  “Char likes a lot of people food,” May said. “But she’s kinda like you. I have to force her to eat her fruits and vegetables.”

  “I’ve never been compared to a dog before,” he said as he joined her and they moved toward his truck together.

  “She’s a cute dog.”

  “And a girl dog who can’t weigh more than fifteen pounds.”

  “She’s sixteen pounds, actually.”

  Kurt rolled his eyes as they arrived at the passenger door. “Still not a great comparison.”

  “I’ll work on a different one,” May teased as he opened the door and waited for her to climb in. She looked up at him, and everything in her world collided and then slow, slow, slowed until all the pieces were floating.

  How had she missed this man in Grape Seed Falls
for the past fifteen years? Okay, she hadn’t been in town for some of that as she finished pastry school. But still. She’d been back for just over a decade and never once dreamed that someone like him could exist in the town she’d grown up in.

  He reached out and brushed his fingers along her cheek, catching her hair between his last two fingers. “Miss May,” he said, his voice barely more than air.

  She let her eyes drift close. “Hmm?”

  He didn’t speak, and with her eyes closed May felt like the whole world was swaying. The breeze rustled in the trees that lined her property. Kurt drew in a breath.

  And then his lips touched hers. May’s eyes flew open, the intimate touch unexpected—and absolutely wonderful.

  “Sorry,” he murmured, backpedaling as fast as he could. “I—sorry.” He spun and stuffed his hat back on his head before walking around the front of the truck. May mourned the loss of him beside her. Desired nothing more than to wrap her arms around his neck and hold onto him while he kissed her.

  That had been hardly a kiss. A whisper of what could be. A taste of the magic she would experience when he kissed her like he meant it. She turned robotically and got in the truck, where he already sat.

  He started the engine but didn’t put the truck in gear. “I’m real sorry, Miss May. I have no idea what came over me.”

  “I’m not sorry,” she said, employing her confidence as much as possible. She turned her head to look at him. “Well, I am a little bit.”

  His eyebrows went up but he said nothing.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t get to kiss you back.” Her stomach stormed while she waited for him to say something, do something, anything. When he didn’t, May slid across the seat—quite the feat in her little black dress—and slipped her hand up to cradle his face.

  He couldn’t seem to look away from her, and she didn’t want him to. She felt drawn to him like he was magnetic and she metal. With her other hand, she reached up and took off the cowboy hat, having had to navigate such obstacles before.