Accounting for Love - A Long Valley Romance: Country Western Romance Novel

by Wright, Erin

  “You have been rude enough for one day. I try to respect your feelings earlier today even if you were rude when you say them to me,” Carmelita said furiously. “Now there is young woman on the porch who needs warm and shelter of your home. I do not care who she is or where she comes from, mi chio, you will be rude no more.”

  Carmelita’s English, usually better than his, worsened the angrier she was. Based on the speech she just gave, she was pissed.

  “Come in and I will find you a towel,” Stetson said in a voice so low, it was barely audible.

  Stetson turned and walked past Carmelita, his head still bent low.

  “Come in, child,” he heard the elderly woman say.

  Returning with the towel he’d found, Jennifer was telling Carmelita about spinning off the road as Carmelita was squeezing the water out of Jennifer’s hair. Her jacket was hanging on a hook next to the door, dripping harmlessly on the tile entryway. The jacket was all for show and had obviously become soaked quickly, offering very little protection during her journey from wherever the hell she’d crashed the car.

  Her white blouse was just as wet as the jacket. The thin white material was clinging to her lace bra.

  For just a second, Stetson forgot to be angry.

  Blinking, trying to wipe the image from his mind, Stetson retrieved a raincoat from the hooks beside the door and handed it to her. Jennifer stared at him, resigned and disappointed.

  He tugged on his boots and grabbed a second coat from the row of hooks.

  Carmelita was still fussing over her, grabbing the towel from Stetson’s hand and rubbing Jennifer’s hair with it.

  “I will find you dry clothes. I do not know what we have here so the clothes most likely not fit, but they will be dry. I will wash these and…”

  “Before you get too dry, let’s go,” Stetson interrupted.

  “Stetson Byron Miller!!” Carmelita hollered.

  “I need her to go back to the car with me,” Stetson interrupted before she could get on a roll, “and steer while I pull it out of the ditch with the truck. I don’t much see the point of getting her into dry clothes, only so she can get wet again.”

  “You’d do that for me?” Jennifer asked astonished.

  “Carmelita says that I’ve been rude to everybody today, and I probably have been. Some of the people I have been rude to did not deserve it,” he said, looking pointedly at Carmelita before turning back to look at Jennifer. “Some of those people probably did deserve it,” he looked even more pointedly at Jennifer, “but I’m not going to leave you stuck on the side of the road in the rain overnight, even if I don’t like why you’re here.”

  Stetson looked at the drenched woman. She seemed so small in that moment. Trails of water traced down her cheeks. He desperately hoped that it was rainwater. Crying always made him very uncomfortable.

  Very, very uncomfortable.

  Dammit, I think those are tears…

  Chapter 12

  The giant truck slipped and slid on the soft, muddy road. The slightly out-of-control trip back to her car made Jennifer feel better. If this behemoth of a machine was having difficulty staying on the road, her car had had very little chance of making it to the main road, even if she hadn’t been distracted.

  When the rear end of her car appeared between the swipes of the wipers, she realized how close she was to making it to the pavement. Another 50 yards, and she would’ve been long gone from the Miller farm.

  Stetson hadn’t said a word during the drive. She wanted to say something to break the uncomfortable silence but didn’t want to take his focus away from keeping the truck on the road. As he brought the vehicle to a stop just a few feet short of where the car was resting in the ditch, the urge to talk to him became overwhelming.

  “I’m going to have to pull you out backward,” Stetson said flatly. There was no emotion in his voice, as if he were reading a grocery list to a brick wall. “There’s really no point of driving up to the road and turning around because you’re going to have to do the same thing once we pull you out, so we might as well both do that once your car is back on the road.”

  “Okay.”

  “You stay here outta the rain while I get everything hooked up and then you can get in your car and steer while I pull.”

  “Stetson?” Jennifer’s voice sounded soft and scared in her ears.

  “Yes?” Flat. Distant. He stared straight ahead, refusing to make eye contact.

  “Can I tell you something, and will you just listen?” she asked, her stomach dropping as she spoke. This was so terrifying.

  Taking his hand off the door handle, he turned toward her. His hard features were cast only in the light of the dashboard. She took a deep breath. She had to just get through this.

  “I know what you heard today sounded bad.”

  “Yeah, it sounded pretty damn bad.”

  “I know you’re not in the mood to believe me, but I need you to know that I don’t want to take your farm away. My job is to come out here, look at your books, and see if there’s a way for you to get caught up with the bank. That’s what I’m trying to do. I haven’t had enough time to go through everything so I don’t know if that’s possible, but I am looking.”

  “I don’t know who you were talking to today, but it sounded a lot like you’ve made up your mind,” he said bitterly.

  “I was talking to my boss, Greg,” she said, not taking offense at his anger. She needed him to listen, and snarling back wouldn’t get her anywhere. “He wanted a status report and was pushing me to finish it quickly.”

  Jennifer paused, trying figure out a way forward without telling Stetson that her boss was acting strangely, even for him. He was usually pushy and demanding, but not like this. She was certain that bit of information would just serve to make their conversation harder though. The last thing she needed was for Stetson to get even angrier.

  “Greg and I don’t agree on a lot of things, and he can be a bit of a micromanager so he gets repetitive at times. He just was reminding me to look at all of the options,” she said, knowing the statement was confusing, but hoping Stetson would let it pass.

  “That doesn’t make much sense,” Stetson said blandly.

  “I don’t like recommending foreclosure. I hate seeing people lose the things they’ve worked so hard for because of a bad twist of fate,” she said trying to find a way to explain. “Sometimes, foreclosure is the only option, but I look at everything else first. Greg doesn’t do field audits, so he thinks foreclosure is the easiest and fastest option, and it annoys him that I look at all the other options first. When he talks to me about these things, he feels he has to remind me so I don’t overlook foreclosure. He says I am too nice.”

  Greg didn’t have to look the farmers in the eye and meet their families and pet their dogs and watch the children play in the front yard. Greg was removed from the…humanity of it all. These people simply became numbers on a spreadsheet for him. Jennifer didn’t have that luxury.

  “So you’re looking for a way for me to keep my farm?”

  “Yes,” she said with conviction.

  “Okay,” Stetson said, slapping the steering wheel lightly. “Let’s get your car out of the mud.”

  Jennifer sat there, stunned, as she watched him hop out of the truck into the rain. Did he believe her? Was he just trying to get through this so he could send her away?

  What the hell does “okay” mean? Argh! I will never understand men.

  Chapter 13

  Jennifer was laughing as she burst through the front door of the farmhouse, shaking and stamping the water off onto the tile. Carmelita came hurrying to see what the commotion was all about.

  “Did you get your car out of the mud?”

  Still unable to control her giggles as she shucked the raincoat off her shoulders, Jennifer looked at the housekeeper.

  “No, it’s still stuck.”

  “Where is Stetson?”

  “He went ‘round the back of the house. He s
aid you’d be mad if he came through the front door.” Jennifer barely got the words out before another round of giggles overtook her.

  Carmelita was completely confused.

  “What is so funny about going out in the rain? And why would I care what door he comes in?”

  “Because of the mess,” Stetson said, emerging from the back of the house.

  Carmelita turned and Jennifer’s laughing stopped abruptly. Stetson was wearing just a pair of jeans. Jennifer’s mouth instantly went dry.

  “Why are you half naked? Nobody wants to see you like that,” Carmelita said.

  Speak for yourself, lady.

  He was even better looking without a shirt than Jennifer would’ve guessed. He wasn’t sculpted in the traditional way, but his chest and abs were well defined and the muscles of his arms were outlined perfectly. He had the same lines as the men in the fashion magazines, but compared to Stetson, the models would look soft.

  That is the definition of “work-hardened.”

  “I got a little muddy,” Stetson said casually. “I went around back to change in the laundry room so I didn’t track mud through the house. The only clothes back there were these jeans.” There were still streaks of mud on him where his careless swipes with a towel had missed. There were also drying chunks of mud in his hair, along with one large chunk on his chiseled cheekbone.

  Jennifer’s giggles returned. His truncated explanation didn’t exactly tell the whole story and she wasn’t about to let him get away with that.

  “He fell,” Jennifer managed to choke out through her laughter.

  “Yes, I fell and slid down the side of the road,” he admitted. “My jeans, coat, and even my shirt are covered in mud. You should see the inside of my truck,” Stetson said and then the craziness of the situation hit him as well, and he began to laugh.

  Jennifer had been horrified when his feet had lost traction, and he’d slid down the side of the road on his ass, landing with a splash in the water running down the ditch.

  But when he’d struggled to his feet and began trying to make his way back up the short incline, she’d begun to laugh. He’d been reduced to crawling on all fours up the rain-softened ditch bank that kept giving way under his weight. By the time he’d gotten back up on the road, he was completely covered in mud from head to toe, back and front. He looked like some bizarre mud monster. She’d laughed until she couldn’t breathe.

  “I am happy you did not cover my clean floor in mud. Now go put some clothes on while I find something for her to wear while I wash her clothes,” Carmelita said.

  The older woman went in search of dry clothing, but not before turning to look at Jennifer; she was smiling.

  Jennifer began twisting her hair, squeezing out a small stream of water. Lifting her head, she froze. Stetson had crossed the room to stand in front of her and she realized they were alone. Her, him, and his very delicious chest. She had a hard time tearing her eyes away from his abs. She wanted to run her fingers up his chest and…

  Her face grew red and she snapped her eyes up to his. She had to keep eye contact with him.

  Don’t look down, don’t look down, don’t look down…

  “We’ll get your car out tomorrow. I might have to use a tractor. I don’t know what Carmelita is making for dinner, but I am sure there will be enough for an army. You okay with staying here tonight?”

  She couldn’t speak.

  Her eyes locked onto his lips. They looked soft. She focused on the small wrinkles and the line of his upper lip that rose and fell. His mouth reminded her of the outline of the distant mountain range outside.

  The chunk of mud on his cheek was driving her crazy. She wanted to reach up and pluck it off but she didn’t dare cross that line.

  And spend the night under the same roof as this gorgeous man? Her tongue darted out to wet her lips. She was pretty sure it was going to be a sleepless night of staring at the ceiling for her.

  Finally, she managed to nod her head.

  “Good. I’m gonna go take a shower - I’m sure I missed some mud somewhere. Carmelita won’t let me near the table like this,” he said and walked away.

  She let visions of being the one to wash the mud from his hair and cheek play through her mind as he disappeared up the stairs.

  I wonder how literal he was being when he said the jeans were the only clothing in the laundry room.

  She felt her face warm in spite of the cold rain water that still covered her.

  * * *

  Growing up in the city, Jennifer had gotten used to a certain set of standards and this was not how a first date should go. Not, of course, that he’d asked her out on a date. This was more of a “Invite the refugee in out of the rain for the night out of the goodness of your heart” sort of overnight stay. But then again, even if it was unusual, it was a step closer to what she wanted.

  Where the hell had that come from?? For this to be what I want, I have to know what I want. Of course…I had decided to just go with the flow for a while, and this seems to be where the flow is going, so maybe this is what I want??

  That was a pathetic line of reasoning, and she knew it.

  Carmelita found a faded green t-shirt with a peeling logo of the local high school on the front. Apparently, it was a shirt Stetson got in junior high. It was still too big for her, but a quickly tied knot just over her hip took care of the problem and gave her a momentary thrill of feeling like a cheerleader, a status she hadn’t been cool enough to achieve in high school.

  Other than the shirt, all Carmelita could find for Jennifer to wear was a pair of Stetson’s basketball shorts; they had a drawstring in the waistband that could be cinched up tight to keep them from falling off her. The housekeeper had demanded that Jennifer give her all of her clothes so she could get them in the washing machine. She seemed to have disappeared for the moment, and Jennifer wondered where she’d run off to.

  Stetson walked into the living room and Jennifer’s breath hitched. God he was handsome.

  “Uh, dinner is served. In the dining room. Are you ready?” he asked awkwardly. She got the impression he was doing his best to impersonate a proper host. She smiled up at him as she stood up.

  “Absolutely. I’m starving.”

  As they moved into formal dining room, she grew increasingly awkward herself. There she was, sitting across the table from him and sharing their first meal together, dressed in his workout clothes, without even a bra or panties on. This outfit was a far cry from her all-black seduction outfit she’d donned that morning. The rain had washed away all of her makeup too. She felt like a little kid dressed in her older brother’s clothes.

  Stetson hadn’t dressed for the occasion either. He was wearing a t-shirt and jeans. His hair was tussled from a rough drying with a towel and no combing. The mud chunk was gone. She sighed her disappointment at not being the one to have removed it.

  Surprisingly, even though it wasn’t a cocktail-dress-and-suit kind of night on the town, she found herself enjoying it. The relaxed atmosphere of a home-cooked meal at the dining room table was…comforting.

  “I wondered where Carmelita has been hiding that shirt. I haven’t seen it in years,” Stetson commented after blatantly staring at her for a very long time.

  “Did you play football?” she asked, looking down at the peeling and cracked vinyl printing.

  “Yeah, right up to my eighth grade season.”

  “What position did you play?”

  “I was the quarterback.”

  “Why did you stop playing?”

  “I had to get serious about working around here,” Stetson said, dropping his gaze to his plate.

  “Your parents made you stop playing football to work on the ranch?” Jennifer asked, astonished by the concept.

  “Oh, you know, Dad would’ve let me keep playing, but I knew it’d be hard on him to do without me during the season, so I decided I’d better change my priorities.”

  Jennifer could tell that he was being intention
ally vague with his answer. Curiosity burning, she didn’t really think before she asked her next question.

  “Why did your dad need so much help? Couldn’t he have hired some help for a couple months so you could play?”

  Stetson took a long time to answer the question. He chased a bite of chicken around his plate for a while before looking up at her.

  “He didn’t deal with my mother’s death well. I played for a couple of seasons after she passed, but it was pretty apparent that Dad was struggling. I was seeing some of the signs by the time I was in eighth grade, but then my brother Wyatt pointed out that Dad had to do extra chores when I was at practice, so after that year, I just didn’t go out for the team anymore.”

  Shit, damn! I forgot about his mother’s death.

  “Stetson, I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have pressed the issue.”

  “Don’t let it bother you. It was a long time ago, and I should be able to talk about it by now,” he said, turning his attention back to his plate.

  Stetson stayed silent for a long time, and Jennifer let him have the mental space. She was surprised at how comfortable that silence was. No need to fill the space with chatter - it was quiet. Comfortable.

  “You know something?” he said, finally looking straight into her eyes. “That felt really nice, thank you.”

  After such a long silence, the comment seemed to come out of left field.

  “What felt nice?” she asked, trying to sound as gentle as she could.

  “You’re the first person outside of my family that I’ve talked to about my mom. It didn’t hurt as much to think about her as I thought it would. It just felt nice to talk to someone about her, just a little bit like that, so…thank you.”

  Jennifer’s heart turned into a puddle at his sudden vulnerability. She looked at him, taking in his long eyelashes, the muscle at the point of his jaw that bounced as he chewed.

  No wonder everything about him is so hard. He’s had a hard life, and his body reflects that.

  “You’re welcome,” she finally answered, not wanting to ruin the moment with too many words.