“You haven’t even met her, so don’t judge her,” Mason said.
“Well, we can damn sure fix that. I’ll be having dinner with you today at noon in the house. You can call her and tell her or surprise her. Your choice,” Skip said.
Mason shook his head. “Come right on but, Skip, you’re wrong. She’s not got a fake bone in her body.”
“Time to get to work.” Skip snuffed out his cigarette on the heel of his boot. “And I’ll save any more comments until I meet her. Wish I could take her down to Nash’s place. Ain’t nobody in the world can fool that old fart. He’s the best judge of people I ever knew.”
“That’s fine by me,” Mason said. “And any day you want to take her to meet your grandpa, all you have to do is ask her. I bet Nash likes her.”
On the way to the barn, Mason pulled out his cell phone and called Annie to tell her that he was bringing his foreman, Skip, home for dinner, and that the other hired hands wanted to meet her. “So after dinner, could you plan a trip with me down to the bunkhouse?”
“I can do that,” she said.
***
She’d only planned on throwing together a Mexican casserole for dinner, but with a three-hour notice, she quickly changed the menu plans. She’d make steaks, baked potatoes, and a cucumber, tomato, and onion salad with her mother’s special dressing. And cupcakes would be a fine thing to take to the bunkhouse for the guys when she met them. Four dozen should be enough. Too bad the girls had chores and couldn’t help her decorate them.
When it was almost time for Mason and Skip to stop for noon, she took a few minutes to take her blond hair down from the ponytail and put on fresh makeup, change into a sundress and sandals, and spray a little perfume on her wrists. She should be a person that Mason was pleased to introduce to his foreman, not a harried woman who’d chased after little girls and cleaned all day.
A tall, lanky cowboy with a mop of gray hair, a gray mustache, and a long, lean face arrived right at twelve o’clock and went straight for the sink to wash up. The girls wasted no time in starting a constant chatter.
“Uncle Skip, we haven’t seen you in more than a week. Where have you been? Have you seen your grandpa Nash? When can we go see him? I bet he’s got new kittens and he’s always got cookies and we get to ride the four-wheelers when we go to see him. And I know he misses us something horrible. Tell Daddy to take us today. Did you know that Daddy punished us for taking Mama’s jewelry today, and I had to pull weeds? I broke a fingernail too, and Mama-Nanny didn’t even feel sorry for me. I told Granny about it when she called me this morning,” Lily said.
“Well, ain’t that just so sad,” Gabby smarted off. “I broke three fingernails cleaning that dirty old tack room and Mama-Nanny didn’t feel sorry for me, neither. And Granny said that we had to mind Daddy and he was right. I thought she’d feel sorry for us.”
“I checked their work and it’s good,” Annie Rose told Mason.
He smiled at her, but there was a veil over his eyes, as if he was worried or angry. She knew that look well, and although she didn’t fear for her life, she wondered what had happened that morning.
Skip answered their questions while he dried his hands and then said, “In all the melee, no one has introduced us.”
“Annie Rose, this is Skip. He’s been foreman on the ranch since before I was born. I’m not sure it could run without him. He’s third generation in his family to be the foreman of Bois D’Arc Bend. Skip, this is Annie Rose. She’s…” Mason stopped.
Annie Rose stuck out her hand and smiled up at Skip. “I’m the new nanny.”
“I heard that you showed up on the porch on the twins’ birthday. I missed the party. I raise some rodeo stock and had to take them down south of Dallas that weekend. Couldn’t make it back in time for the party.”
His shake was firm, but Annie Rose could see the doubt in his body language. He was as stiff and formal with her as he was happy and carefree with the girls.
“Dinner smells good,” he said.
“You guys best get after these steaks before they get cold. I hope you like yours medium well, Skip,” she said.
“Only way to eat a good steak,” he said.
“We could have helped cook dinner if we didn’t have to do chores.” Lily shot a look across the table toward her father.
“And many more of those eye rolls and looks, and you’ll be doing more,” Mason said.
Gabby changed the subject. “When are we going to see Nash, Uncle Skip?”
“Anytime your daddy wants to get the four-wheelers out. Mason tells me that you were raised up on a ranch, Annie Rose.”
His tone said that he doubted her story, not that she could blame him. It was a damn crazy tale and sounded like a scam in the making. “Yes, I was. It wasn’t nearly this big, but a ranch is a ranch and you run them about the same way. Raise cattle, make hay. Put in a vegetable garden in the spring. Do some cannin’ and freezin’ to get ready for winter.”
“Can we have a garden next spring?” Lily asked.
“Only if you want to work even harder than you do now,” Annie Rose said.
Mason’s hand slipped under the tablecloth and rested on her knee and then it moved higher and higher, inch by fiery hot inch, until she thought she’d either have to drag him to the bedroom right that minute or shoot him. The decision was leaning toward the latter when his hand stopped short of the elastic in the legs of her underpants and started back down to her knee, this time barely half an inch at a time.
“I’ll work,” Gabby said. “Can we grow yellow squash? I like it real good with cheese on it.”
“That grows very well, so we could plant it for sure,” Annie Rose said, but her mind was on the heat growing rapidly in her body.
Looking at his face, no one would guess that he was driving her right up the kitchen walls. When both his hands were back on the table and he was busy cutting another bite of steak, she returned the favor, only she started a lot higher than his knee and didn’t stop until she could feel a bulge behind his zipper.
“So are we putting in a garden?” Skip asked Mason.
“If Annie Rose wants to mess with it,” he said hoarsely.
“Please, Mama-Nanny,” Lily begged.
“It’s a long time until spring. We’ll see.” She moved her hand back down to his knee and gave a gentle squeeze before she pushed back.
“Don’t rush with your dinner. I’m going to put this on the table so it will be ready when you are,” she said.
She had to put some space between her and Mason so she could catch her breath. Skip already didn’t believe that she was genuine. If he caught the vibes flowing from her right then, he’d for sure think she was up to no good.
“I thought we were having cupcakes,” Lily said. “I saw them in a box out on the washing machine.”
“No, those are for the guys in the bunkhouse,” Annie Rose said.
***
Skip laid a hand on Mason’s shoulder when they were outside. “Son, I’m still not convinced she’s real, but she puts on a real fine dinner. I reckon if she’s pulling the wool over your eyes, that you ain’t the first cowboy to fall for them blue eyes. Just promise me you’ll be real careful and take things slow.”
“I’m not rushing into anything,” Mason said.
Gabby skipped across the lawn and threw her arms around Mason’s waist. “Mama-Nanny says that we can pass the cupcakes out since we didn’t get to help decorate them. Can we ride in the back of the truck, Daddy? You can drive real slow.”
Lily made it a three-way hug. “Please, Daddy.”
“Only if me and Mama-Nanny can ride back there with you and Uncle Skip will drive,” he answered.
“I haven’t ridden in the back of a truck in years. Can I sit with you girls?” Annie Rose said.
“Yes!” Both girls yelled at the same ti
me as they climbed up over the fender and sat down with their backs to the cab.
Mason put his hands on Annie Rose’s small waist and lifted her into the bed of the truck in one fluid movement, then put a hand on the fender and hopped inside to sit beside her.
“This is like the old wagon train days,” Gabby said.
“Wagons-ho!” Skip yelled from the open window and drove at five miles an hour all the way down the path to the bunkhouse.
“And now it’s time to meet the rest of the bunkhouse crew,” Mason said.
“I’m ready, but don’t expect me to remember all their names,” Annie Rose told him.
“We’ll help you, Mama-Nanny. We remember them every one, and you can always use your How to Remember book. It worked last time,” Lily said.
***
Mason introduced her to cowboys with names like Ryder, Johnny, Jack, Laramie, and Paul. She shook hands with each of them, knowing full well that even the booklet the girls made her wouldn’t help that much.
“I’m pleased to meet you all, and maybe in a few weeks I’ll have names and faces all sorted out,” she apologized.
“Hey, there’s one of you and twenty of us. You’ll get us straightened out by the end of summer,” Ryder—or was it Paul—said. “And, honey, you can call me anything if you’ll bring these cupcakes down here every so often.”
“Deal,” Annie Rose said. “Now I reckon us girls can walk back to the house, and you guys can get on back to your work. It’s after one and I know you are making hay today.”
That evening when Mason came home, she handed him a cold beer and led him outside to the patio. “Tempers were a little warm this afternoon. Arguments followed the chores they had to do. Water is cool, and we’re eating out here. Want to take a dip with them before you eat?”
“No, ma’am, but if you offered to skinny-dip with me, I might change my mind.” His eyes roved down over her body so seductively that she envisioned shucking her clothing and romping in the water, both of them buck naked.
“Right now?” she teased.
He stretched out on a lounge and kicked off his dusty boots. “I could find a sitter real quick. Natalie is always offering to keep them. They love Josh.”
“Hi, Daddy. You ready to eat?” Lily crawled out of the pool and tugged the top of her bathing suit up to its rightful place.
Gabby followed her sister. “Daddy, I did a swan dive off the board. You should have seen it.”
Annie Rose slung her legs over the side of the lounge. “Who’s hungry?”
All three of them raised their hands. The girls rushed over to the table, with Annie Rose right behind them. Brown paper bags and a Crock-Pot sat on the table. She pulled a canned soda pop out of a cooler for each of them and then ladled soup into four disposable bowls before removing the top of a plastic container containing cheese slices, crackers, and pickles.
“I love paper bag picnics.” Lily dug into her bag to find a chicken salad sandwich and a bag of chips.
“Me, too. Mama-Nanny is the best mama in the whole world. Daddy, you should marry her tomorrow if y’all didn’t really get married when she wore the wedding dress,” Lily said before biting into her sandwich.
“Yes, only this time we get to sing at the wedding,” Gabby said.
“Well, you’re not singing RaeLynn’s song,” Lily declared.
“Nope, I’m singing ‘I Cross My Heart.’”
“That’s a boy’s song.”
“Well, I’ll make it a girl’s song, because it says what I want Mama-Nanny and Daddy to say when they get married.”
“You were right.” Mason winked at Annie Rose.
He was back to his old self and that worried Annie Rose, even it if was the reverse of what Nicky had been. He’d been all sweet and honey-pie lovely in public and then treated her like shit when they got home. What in the hell was going on anyway?
Chapter 15
Annie Rose set the frosting bowl to the side of the double-layer chocolate cake she’d iced when she heard the squeak of the front door. Lily and Gabby had gone to their rooms to play and Mason wasn’t due to come home for the noon meal for another hour. Strange female voices floated from the front door and the tone was coated with icicles right there in the hot Texas summertime.
“If he didn’t pay so damn well, I wouldn’t even do this job. Those two little heathens…”
“I know, but he does pay well, and it’s only half a day once a week. Just think of what the nanny must face when she has to deal with them every day.”
“Hello. Can I help you?” Annie Rose poked her head into the foyer to see two women wearing jeans and knit shirts.
“Oh, my! You must be the new nanny. How long have you been working? I’m Janie, and this is my daughter, Martha. We’re the housekeepers who usually clean once a week, but we weren’t here last week,” the older of the two said.
“Mason didn’t tell me there were housekeepers. I’ve been cleaning the house, but y’all do whatever you are accustomed to doing,” Annie Rose answered.
Janie was a tall, lanky woman with gray streaks in her light brown ponytail. Martha was a younger version of the same but without the gray hair.
Martha crossed the kitchen in a few long strides and went straight to the utility room. “We’ll get on with our work. Some nannies clean. Some don’t. One thing for sure, they never last too long around here.”
“Mama-Nanny, can I have some milk? I don’t feel so good,” Lily said on the way into the kitchen.
“Hello, Lily. Where’s Gabby?” Martha asked. “You’ve got a sunburn, child.”
“I want ice water,” Gabby said right behind her sister.
Annie Rose motioned for the girls to come closer and touched their foreheads. “That’s not sunburn. That’s a fever.”
“Don’t call Doc Emerson, please. We’ll get well without shots. Promise, Mama-Nanny, please promise. And don’t tell Daddy or he’ll make you call Doc and he’ll say we need a shot,” Gabby whined.
“Mama-Nanny?” Janie’s eyebrows shot up.
“She’s our new mama. Daddy got her for our birthday present and left her on the porch swing for us to find,” Lily said. “Can I have some milk?”
“No, but you can have some apple juice over ice.” Annie Rose opened the freezer and filled two glasses with ice.
“We’ll be well by the time Daddy gets home for dinner, won’t we, Lily?” Gabby declared.
Lily nodded. “I already feel better. I don’t even need the juice.”
“Don’t try to con me, kiddo. Up to bed with both of you. You’ve most likely got sore throats from allergies, because you were sneezing when you came home from Kenna’s on Sunday. I’ll bring medicine up. You carry your juice and go slow so you don’t spill it,” Annie Rose said.
Gabby shook her head emphatically. “Mine ain’t sore.”
Lily touched her throat. “Mine ain’t sore, either.”
Annie Rose pointed and they obeyed.
“How long have you been here?” Janie asked.
“Little more than a week.” Annie Rose found fever reducer in the cabinet above the utility-room sink, along with a coffee cup holding a digital thermometer, tongue depressors, and alcohol swaps.
“That’s amazing,” Janie said.
“What?” Annie Rose picked up the whole thing, along with liquid medicine.
“That they mind you,” Martha answered. “You might last longer than the rest have.”
“I hope so,” Annie Rose said.
She found them both sitting on the side of Gabby’s bed, sipping juice.
“Put on your cotton nightshirts and cover up with only a cool sheet. No blankets or fluffy throws that will make you hotter. Open your mouth, Lily, and let me look at your throat.” She set the supplies on the bedside table and tore the paper from one of the tongue d
epressors.
“Say ahhhh,” she said. “Tell me the truth, girls. How long have you had a sore throat?”
Lily glanced over at her sister and shook her head.
Gabby snapped her mouth shut.
“Truth, or I tell Doc that we’re coming in to see him. You choose,” Annie Rose said.
“In church Sunday,” Lily spit out.
Gabby glared at her.
“You need antibiotics, but I bet Doc will call them in for us,” Annie Rose said.
Gabby latched onto her hand and squeezed.
Tears welled up in Lily’s eyes. “Don’t let him come out here and give us shots. Please, Mama-Nanny.”
“Hey, are you the same girls who pierced a tomcat’s ear?” she asked.
Lily stiffened her upper lip and wiped away the tears. “But that didn’t hurt like a shot in the heinie.”
Fear did have its advantages. Any other time Lily would have spit out ass.
She drew them both close to her side. “Let’s call before we panic.”
***
Mason couldn’t keep the smile off his face all morning. Tonight he was breaking out a bottle of wine, thawing out a cheesecake, and if he had time after work, he was making a run into town for roses. Annie Rose was an amazing woman and she deserved to be courted properly. He whistled as he kicked off his boots at the back door and headed to the sink to wash up for dinner.
“Well, hello.” Martha folded sheets in the utility room.
“Oh, I forgot this was cleaning day. How are things going?” He turned on the water and picked up the soap.
“You got sick kids. The new nanny is upstairs with them. She left a note on the countertop about your dinner,” she said.
Mason quickly washed his hands, didn’t even stop to read the note but took the stairs two at a time. He burst into Lily’s room to find the twins propped up in bed with a tray in front of each of them and Annie Rose sitting in a rocking chair right beside the bed.
“Hi, Daddy, we’re sick,” Lily said.
How to Marry a Cowboy (Cowboys & Brides) Page 16
