The Cowboy's Family

by Brenda Minton

  Which was just fine.

  “Good, Violet. The girls are coloring pictures and we’re getting ready to eat lunch.” He glanced at his watch and winced. It was past time for lunch.

  “Isn’t it a little late for lunch?” She never missed a thing. He smiled.

  “A little, but we ate a late breakfast.” That probably didn’t sound better, but he wasn’t going to lie to her.

  “Right. Well, I thought I’d come up this week, just to…”

  “Check up on us?”

  “Of course not. Wyatt, you know we love you and the girls. I miss…”

  Broken sentences. He held back the sigh. In the last eighteen months they’d talked in broken sentences, half-finished thoughts and unspoken accusations.

  “I miss her, too.” He finished the sentence for her.

  “So, about this week?”

  It wasn’t a good week for a visit. He leaned back in his chair and stared out the window at the overgrown lawn. He needed to hire a lawn service. “Sure, Violet, I’ll be here.”

  The vacuum cleaner stopped.

  “What’s that noise?” Violet asked.

  “Ryder hired a housekeeper.”

  “Oh. Well, that’s good.”

  “I guess it is.”

  “And a cook?”

  Of course it came back to cooking. He smiled a little. “I don’t need a cook.”

  She didn’t respond for a minute. “Okay, Wyatt. Well, I’ll call and let you know what day I’ll be up.”

  No, she wouldn’t. He slipped the phone back in his pocket knowing full well she’d launch a sneak attack when he least expected it.

  He leaned to kiss Molly on the top of her head. “You girls stay here for a second. I’m going to talk to Miss Rachel and then we’ll blow up our balloons. Later we’ll go to town.”

  To the store for groceries and a cookbook for dummies. Maybe he could learn to cook before Violet showed up.

  Molly shot him a narrow-eyed look. Kat ignored him. The girls were like night and day. Molly was her mother all over, but she looked like him. Kat looked like Wendy. They both had dark hair, but Kat’s was a little lighter and she had Wendy’s light brown eyes. It was getting easier to stare into eyes that reminded him of his wife.

  He hurried up the stairs and met Rachel in the hallway. She picked up her bucket of cleaning supplies and then smiled at him. Perspiration glistened on her brow and her hair was a little damp. But the upstairs smelled clean for the first time in a long time.

  The windows gleamed at either end of the hall and there were no cobwebs clinging to the ceiling. Maybe a housekeeper wasn’t such a bad idea. It might be a great idea. But he didn’t know if Rachel Waters was the one he wanted. She wore faded jeans and had the tiniest butterfly at the small of her back. Shouldn’t a housekeeper wear something more…housekeeperish?

  He pictured Alice from The Brady Bunch. Or the robot maid from The Jetsons. Yeah, that’s what a housekeeper should look like. A housekeeper should make PB and J sandwiches and smell like joint cream, not wildflowers.

  “Is there anything else I need to do?” She stood in the center of the hallway, the bucket in her hand, and he’d lost it for a minute.

  “No, nothing else.” He glanced around. “It looks great, though.”

  “I’m glad you approve. Listen, I know this isn’t what you wanted, but if you ever need me to come over again, just call. I can even watch the girls if you need time away.”

  Time away from his girls. He needed that less than anything. He needed them with him, all the time. He didn’t ever want them to be alone and afraid again. She didn’t know that, though. There were details that no one knew but Wyatt, Andie and a few others. He’d left Florida to escape those memories. Florida, where he and Wendy had been in youth ministry after college.

  “Thanks, I appreciate that. I don’t usually leave them, other than in the church nursery. But I do have to head out in a few minutes and I wanted to make sure Ryder paid you enough.”

  “He did.” She brushed strands of damp hair back from her face. “Are you sure you don’t want me to stay with the girls?”

  “No, I’ll take them. I’m just going to the store.”

  Because he had separation anxiety and so did they. It was about the least manly statement he could think of to make, so he didn’t. He glanced out the window, which gleamed and the fingerprints the girls had put on the glass were gone.

  She smiled. “Okay, but the offer stands.”

  “Thanks.”

  Rachel headed down the stairs with the bucket. He followed. Her shirt stayed carefully in place. He kind of hoped…and then again, he didn’t. He shook his head and worked hard to pull it together.

  She stopped at the bottom of the stairs. The girls ran out of the office, pigtails and sunshine. His sunshine. He hugged them both close. But they broke out of his arms and ran to Rachel. She didn’t hesitate, just pulled them close and hugged them as she kissed the tops of their heads.

  His phone rang again, not a moment too soon because he needed the distraction from the scene in front of him. Rachel walked away with his girls. He watched them as he raised the phone to his ear.

  “Wyatt, how did you like your surprise?” Ryder laughed from five hundred miles away.

  “Thanks.”

  “Is she done cleaning?”

  “Yeah, the house looks great. I’m going to think of a nice surprise for you when you get back.”

  “You should be more appreciative. You have a clean house and a pretty woman to clean it.”

  “I wouldn’t talk like that in front of my wife if I was you.”

  “She knows I only have eyes for her. But you, on the other hand…”

  “Ever heard of the word subtle, little brother?”

  Ryder laughed, louder, longer. Wyatt held the phone away from his ear.

  “I guess subtle has never been my thing,” Ryder admitted.

  “Listen, I have to go shopping. Remind me that I owe you for this. And the payback won’t be pleasant.”

  Rachel walked toward him, the laughter gone from her dark eyes and he didn’t even know why. He couldn’t let that be his problem. He had enough girl problems. One was two and the other was almost four. They were more than enough to keep him busy and keep him guessing.

  “I’m going now.” She stared straight at him, her gaze unwavering. She had a few freckles on suntanned cheeks.

  “Okay, well, thank you.” He didn’t have time for this. “Look, I appreciate what you did. The place looks great. I just…”

  “Don’t need a housekeeper?”

  He shrugged off the sarcasm in her tone. They both knew that he needed a housekeeper. What he didn’t need was that little smile of hers making him feel as if he needed a housekeeper and an intervention.

  “Yeah, I don’t need a housekeeper.” It hadn’t been what he’d planned to say, but it worked.

  What he really didn’t need was someone who smelled like spring and who reminded him of everything he’d lost.

  Chapter Two

  Rachel drove away from the Johnson ranch and she was pretty glad to see it in her rearview mirror. She wanted to be a good distance away before the girls released the balloons with messages to their mother. It wouldn’t have done anyone any good to have Rachel crying by their side.

  She really should have known that she wouldn’t be able to do this, spend more time with them, and stay detached. After years of considering herself a real pro at detachment, two little girls and a cowboy were going to be her downfall. The signs had been pretty obvious. The girls had been in the nursery and her preschool Sunday school class for six months and it had been way easy to fall in love with them.

  Of course Wyatt wasn’t included in those emotions. She felt sorry for him, nothing else. After hearing his conversation with Ryder, she knew he felt about the same for her.

  It shouldn’t matter to her what he thought. At twenty-nine, when she finally knew who she was and what she wanted out of life,
Wyatt Johnson’s opinion shouldn’t matter. But old feelings of inadequacy didn’t care what she thought of herself now. Those old emotions had a way of pushing to the surface when she least needed them.

  So what? She would never be homecoming queen and guys like Wyatt Johnson always laughed behind her back.

  It didn’t matter anymore. She wasn’t the fat girl in school or the rebel in the back of a police car trying to prove to people that she wasn’t the good little preacher’s kid.

  She knew who she was, and who God wanted her to be. She worked in children’s ministry, helped when her mother’s lupus flared, and she loved her life in Dawson.

  All of those pretty sermons to herself didn’t take away a sudden desire for a big, fat chocolate bar. Or brownies with ice cream. She reached for her purse and dug her hand through the side pocket for a pack of gum. As she drove she managed to get a stick of peppermint gum out of the package.

  She shoved the gum in her mouth and chewed, trying to pretend it helped the way chocolate helped. It didn’t.

  Forget Wyatt, she had other things to do. She was supposed to work for Etta Forrester that afternoon. Etta designed and sewed a line of tie-dye clothing that she sold to specialty boutiques around the country. Etta made sundresses, skirts, pants, tops and even purses. Rachel worked for her a couple of days a week, more if Etta needed. With Etta’s granddaughter, Andie, married to Ryder Johnson and Andie’s twin, Alyson, married to Jason Bradshaw, Etta had more need for help these days.

  She drove down the road and pulled into Etta’s driveway. The bright yellow Victorian with the lavender wicker furniture on the wide porch managed to lift Rachel’s spirits. Etta stood on the porch with a watering can in her hand and a floppy hat covering her lavender-gray hair. She waved as she poured water on the flowers. Last week she’d made a trip to Grove and she’d come home with a truck load of plants for the baskets and flower gardens.

  Rachel parked under the shade of an oak tree and stepped out of her car. As she walked up the wide steps of the porch, Etta put down the watering can and pulled off her gardening gloves. Her nails were long, painted purple and never chipped. It was a mystery how Etta could take care of this farm, make her clothing and always be perfectly manicured.

  The one time Rachel asked how she did it, Etta laughed and said, “Oh, honey, life teaches those little skills.”

  Rachel doubted it. She always felt about as together as a pair of old shoes falling apart at the seams. She couldn’t paint her nails without smudging at least one. And her hair. The only good thing that had ever happened to her hair was a ponytail holder.

  “Good to see you, honey.” Etta slipped an arm around Rachel’s shoulders. “I thought we’d have tea out here before we get started on those T-shirts.”

  “Tea sounds wonderful.”

  “You look about wrung out. Did you clean Wyatt’s house today?”

  Rachel nodded and picked dead blooms off the petunias.

  Etta lifted her sunglasses and stared hard. “Well, tell me how it went.”

  “The place was definitely a mess.” She shrugged and kept plucking blooms, tossing them over the rail into the yard. “And so is Wyatt.”

  “Oh, he isn’t such a mess. He just needs a little time.” Etta lifted the little watch she wore on a chain around her neck. “Goodness, speaking of time. I’m going to keep watering. Do you want to bring the tea out?”

  “I can do that.”

  Etta had lowered the sunglasses. The big rhinestone encrusted frames covered half her face. “And try not to look so down in the mouth, honey. You’re going to depress me and you know I don’t depress easily.”

  Rachel smiled. “Is that better?”

  “Not much.” Etta laughed and went back to watering.

  “I’ll be back in a few.”

  “I’ll be here.”

  The dog that had been sleeping under a tree started barking as Rachel fixed the tea tray. She picked up the wooden tray and headed down the hallway to the front door. The door was open and a breeze lifted the curtains in the parlor. Voices carried on that breeze.

  “So you think you’re going to learn to cook something more than canned spaghetti and hamburgers?” Etta laughed and said something else that Rachel didn’t hear.

  She stopped at the screen door and looked out. Etta was standing on the sidewalk and Wyatt stood next to her. Etta’s skirt flapped in the breeze. Wyatt had taken off his hat and held it behind his back. They were both facing the opposite direction and didn’t see Rachel.

  “It can’t be that hard to learn, Etta. I’ve got to show Violet that I’m capable.”

  “Of course you’re capable.” Etta turned and waved when she saw Rachel. “There’s Rachel with my tea. Well, have a seat and while you have tea, I’ll look for a cookbook.”

  “I appreciate it, Etta, but I don’t have time for tea. The girls are waiting in the truck. We’re going grocery shopping.”

  Etta argued, of course she did. “Well, get the girls out.”

  Wyatt laughed, white teeth flashing in a kind of hot smile. He shook his head. “I’m not getting them out of the truck. If I do, I’ll never round them up and get them back in the truck. I just thought rather than taking my chance with any old cookbook I found in the store, I’d see if you had one that spelled it all out.”

  Etta held the rail and walked up the steps, Wyatt following. “I’ll see what I have. Something with casseroles would be best.”

  “If I can throw the whole meal in one pan, I guess that would be the best thing.”

  “You ought to know how to cook, Wyatt. It isn’t like you’re a kid.”

  “I never thought much about it, Etta.” His neck turned a little red. “I guess I always thought…”

  Etta’s eyes misted and she patted his arm. “I’ll be right back. I’ll pick you out a couple and you’ll be cooking us dinner in no time.”

  After Etta walked away, Rachel didn’t know what to say. She hadn’t been at a loss for words in years. Probably about twenty-eight of them. Her mom liked to tell people that she was talking in complete sentences when she was two and that she’d been talking ever since.

  But at that moment she was pretty near speechless and so was Wyatt Johnson.

  “My mother-in-law is coming to visit.” He had placed the cowboy hat back on his head. He leaned against the rail of the porch, tall and confident. His boots were scuffed and his jeans were faded and worn in spots.

  How many people would guess that the Johnson brothers had part ownership of a bank in Tulsa and subdivisions named after their family? She only knew those things because Andie, Wyatt’s sister-in-law and Etta’s granddaughter, had told her. Andie had married Ryder Johnson before Christmas and their twin babies were due in a month or so.

  “I see.” She nearly offered to help, and then she didn’t. She’d already told him she’d clean or watch the girls. He’d rejected both offers.

  “She’s worried that I’m not coping.” His smile lifted one corner of his mouth and he shrugged. “I guess it won’t hurt me or the girls to have a home-cooked meal once in a while.”

  “I imagine it won’t.” Rachel poured her tea. “Do you want a cup?”

  “No, thanks. I like my tea on ice and out of a glass that holds more than a swallow.”

  She smiled and listened for Etta’s footsteps. Etta would give him a long lecture if she heard him demean her afternoon tea ritual.

  It was a few minutes before Etta appeared, her arms holding more than a few cookbooks. “Here’s a few to get you started.”

  “That’s a half dozen, Etta, not a few.”

  “Well, you can find what you really like this way.”

  He took the books from her arms. “Thanks, Etta. Rachel, see you at church.”

  He nodded to each of them and walked down the steps.

  The truck was pulling down the driveway when Etta laughed a little and whistled. “That’s tension you could cut with a knife.”

  “What?” Rachel nearly pou
red Etta’s tea on the table.

  “The two of you, circling like a couple of barn cats. I’m no expert, but I think it’s called chemistry.”

  “I think it’s called, Wyatt knows that everyone, including his brother, is trying to push me off on him.”

  “And would that be such a bad thing?” Etta sat down on the lavender wicker settee.

  “I’m not sure, but I think he believes it probably would be.”

  “What about you?”

  Rachel sipped her tea and ignored the question. Etta smiled and her brows shot up, but Rachel didn’t bite. No way, no how was she chasing after Wyatt Johnson or any other man, for that matter. She’d done her chasing, she’d had her share of fix-ups, and she’d learned that it worked better to let things happen the way they were supposed to happen.

  Or not. But she had decided a long time ago that being alone was better than pushing her way into the life of the wrong person.

  It had been two days since Rachel cleaned and his house still looked pretty decent. Wyatt stood in the kitchen with its dark cabinets, black granite countertops and stainless steel appliances. A chef’s kitchen for a guy who had to borrow cookbooks because he couldn’t make mac and cheese. That was pretty bad.

  He hadn’t planned it, but Rachel was front and center in his mind again. She was a strange one. First glance and he would have thought she had all the confidence in the world. But the other day on Etta’s porch, there had been something soft and kind of lost in her expression, in those dark eyes of hers.

  Not that it was any of his concern.

  He dropped bread into the toaster and started the coffeemaker. Excited voices and little feet pattering overhead meant the girls were up. His day was about to start.

  At least he’d had fifteen minutes to himself. That didn’t happen often these days. It hadn’t happened much in the last eighteen months. Since Wendy left him.

  He stopped in front of the kitchen window and looked out. For a minute he closed his eyes and remembered that he used to pray. He used to believe that with Wendy he could build a life far from this ranch and the chaos of his childhood. He opened his eyes and shook his head. Prayer these days was abbreviated. It went something like: God, get me through another day.