Christmas With the Kings, Kings of Montana Bonus Book

by Vanessa Bartal

  Chapter 2

  Thankfully Ethan remembered Chrissy a split second after he forgot her, and hopefully before she realized she had been forgotten. With a slight shake of his head, he grabbed her bags and waited for her to stand, but she didn’t stand. She remained frozen to her seat, staring at the newcomer in dismay.

  “Who is she?” Chrissy hissed.

  “I have no idea,” Ethan returned, also in a whisper. “But she’s offering to get us out of here.” And she’s lovely, he added to himself. Even now his eyes strayed to the woman whose stride didn’t slow until she reached the doors. That’s when she glanced back and realized there was no one behind her. With a sigh of impatience, she returned to Ethan and Chrissy, picked up their two remaining bags, and threw them over her shoulders like a pack mule.

  “Coming?” she asked, giving Chrissy a pointed glance, as if she knew she was the reason for their delay.

  “Who are you?” Chrissy blurted.

  “I’m PJ,” the girl said.

  Chrissy looked to Ethan for an explanation, but he shrugged. In all the talk about the ranch, he had never heard of a PJ.

  The woman, PJ, sighed again. “I work for the Kings sometimes. They had an emergency. They asked me to pick you up. Coming?” Wistfully, her eyes darted toward the exit again.

  “What type of emergency?” Ethan asked worriedly. After so many years working for Belle, she felt like family. By now he had met all the Kings, and he liked them. He hated the thought of anything happening to them. He held out his hand for Chrissy, and she took it as she trooped beside him.

  “Ivy went into labor,” PJ threw over her shoulder.

  “Isn’t that a bit early?” Ethan asked. He wasn’t an expert on such matters, but he seemed to remember hearing that Ivy’s baby wasn’t due until the spring.

  PJ nodded. “Very early. She’s been in the hospital, and the rest of the family went with her. They brought her home today and she’s going to be on bed rest until the end of her pregnancy.”

  “Oh,” Ethan said, frowning. He hoped their visit wouldn’t cause any more undue stress on the Kings, although he knew Ivy and Coy had their own house and he and Chrissy wouldn’t be staying there.

  They followed PJ to a beat-up red pickup truck. She tossed their bags unceremoniously into the truck bed, and Ethan did the same, retaining his grip on the bag that held his laptop.

  Chrissy bit her lip and stared worriedly at the truck. Ethan was almost positive it was her first time being near such a vehicle. Manhattan wasn’t exactly a Mecca for pickups.

  “Are we sure this is safe?” Chrissy whispered.

  “We won’t know until we try.” He tried to say it cheerfully with a wink and a smile as he lifted Chrissy up. But inside he was equally uncertain. He was no expert on cars, but he was pretty sure the old Ford had been built sometime during the fifties. How could such a beast still function?

  His doubts increased when PJ tried to crank the machine, only to growl in frustration when it coughed and sputtered before dying. Without a word to the truck’s occupants, she grabbed a tool box from under the seat and hopped out of the cab. Ethan sat uncertainly in his seat for a moment, at war with himself. On the one hand, he was the man and this was Montana. Shouldn’t he be the one to do something? On the other hand, he had only a passing acquaintance with automobile repair. Unless the oil needed checked or a tire needed changed, he would be over his head.

  Nonetheless, he felt like a useless heel waiting in the car, so he hopped out and strode to the front of the truck where PJ had already popped the hood and was now bent.

  “Anything I can do to help?” he asked.

  PJ looked up at him in surprise. “It’s just dust in the spark plug.” She worked as she spoke and within a moment she had pulled out a spark plug. Ethan watched as she held it up to the light to inspect it.

  “It must be hard to find parts for an antique,” he said, giving the truck a loving pat.

  A smile lit PJ’s face. “It really is.”

  Movement in the truck caught Ethan’s attention. Chrissy’s face was a mask of horror as she watched PJ place the spark plug against her lips and blow. When she removed the plug, a line of grease ringed her mouth. PJ wiped it away with the back of her hand, reinstalled the plug, and slammed the hood.

  “Where did you learn about engine repair?” Ethan asked.

  “Trial and error,” PJ said. She swiped her hands on a rag before dropping it in her toolbox and then turned toward the truck. Ethan waited until they were back inside the truck before he spoke again.

  “Is that what you do for the Kings? Are you their mechanic?”

  PJ shook her head. “Not since I was a kid.”

  “You were a mechanic when you were a kid?” This came from Chrissy whose tone was more derisive than curious.

  PJ’s answering smile was tender. “No, I was a tagalong with my dad who went to the ranch every few weeks on business.” She didn’t add that she had thought becoming an expert mechanic might get her into the King brothers’ good graces. Back then, she had been a lonely tomboy, but she had also been discerning. She hadn’t wanted to be friends with just anyone, but the Kings were good people and she had liked them. Their acceptance had been important to her.

  Her silence made Ethan all the more curious. Who was this woman? Granted, she was very pretty in the exotic Indian princess sort of way he had first noted, but why else did he find her so intriguing? Chrissy was pretty, beautiful, even. What made PJ so captivating?

  “The roads look pretty bad,” Chrissy commented. Her hands were white where they clutched the edge of the seat.

  “Do they?” PJ asked, sounding moderately bored. “They look pretty normal to me. Doesn’t it snow in New York?”

  “It snows, but the street crews clean it up as soon as it falls. Any significant snow on the roads would cause gridlock,” Ethan explained.

  “Gridlock,” PJ repeated, and this time her smile was wry, though why Ethan should take note of her differing smiles was beyond him. She smiled a lot for a seemingly serious person. “Gridlock here would entail a whole bunch of cattle standing still, something that never happens.”

  Chrissy peered nervously out the windows. “I don’t see any cows.”

  “They don’t stand by the highway. The big ranches, like the Kings’ ranch, are farther away from town.”

  Now Chrissy turned to look behind them. “That was a town?”

  “That was the big city,” PJ informed them.

  “Where do you shop? Where do you eat?” Chrissy asked.

  “I don’t shop. I eat what I cook.”

  Chrissy blinked as if the words made no sense to her. “What do you do for fun?”

  “I…” PJ started, then faded away. She tapped her window. “If you look to the left, you can just see the edge of Lewis and Clark National Forest.”

  “There are trees everywhere. How are those any different?”

  “Because you go to jail if you cut them down,” PJ said. Ethan laughed. Chrissy frowned at him. PJ’s smile faded as she took in Chrissy’s frown. “You must be tired; it’s a long drive, why don’t you nap?”

  “I can’t sleep in the middle,” Chrissy grumbled. “I want to lean against the window.”

  Ethan slid her across his lap as he simultaneously scooted to her spot. She wadded up her coat and rested her head against the window, closing her eyes. Ethan stared through the front windshield, blinking to focus through the driving snow.

  “You’re a good driver,” he commented softly.

  PJ’s hands tightened slightly on the wheel. “Thanks.”

  Their thighs brushed and Ethan jumped slightly and moved away, surprised by his awareness of her. On his other side, Chrissy was tightly pressed to his leg, but the feeling was nothing like touching PJ.

  Not good, Ethan, he thought. Not good at all. This trip was supposed to be about relaxing and getting closer to Chrissy, not meeting a stranger in Montana and having a fling. What was wrong with
him? Just when things were finally going well in his personal life, why did he have to go and mess it up? Was he secretly bent on self-sabotage?

  “How long have you worked for the Kings?” Ethan asked, trying desperately to focus on something mundane.

  “Since I was seventeen,” PJ replied.

  “How long ago was that?” he asked.

  She brushed a stray hair away from her face, trying vainly to tuck it in her ponytail. “Four years.”

  Twenty one. She was twenty one, eight years younger than his twenty nine, and one more reason not to be attracted to her. However, that knowledge did nothing to quell his curiosity about her. “Have you always lived in Montana?”

  “Always. I’ve only left once.” Her mouth turned grim and her hands tightened on the steering wheel.

  Where had she gone? And why did the memory make her sad?

  “You’re Belle’s secretary,” she stated.

  Now it was his turn to grimace slightly. “Executive assistant.”

  The wry smile was back on PJ’s face. Ethan couldn’t contain his curiosity any longer. “What’s funny?”

  “You’re sensitive about your job because it’s primarily a girl’s job. I have the same problem in reverse.”

  “What do you do?” he asked.

  “I’m a farrier.”

  “I have no idea what that is,” he said.

  “I trim horse’s hooves and shoe them.”

  “That job still exists?”

  “Horses still exist. Until they make a computer than can shoe a horse, I guess my profession is safe.”

  “How did you learn to be a farrier?” he asked. On his right, Chrissy began snoring softly.

  “My dad taught me everything I know.”

  “Do you work with him?”

  She shook her head. “He died.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said sincerely.

  She nodded. He used the opportunity to stare at her. Tears shimmered in her obsidian eyes, lingering on her long lashes until she blinked them away. Her skin was the color of russet, and her hair was long and charcoal black.

  “What does PJ stand for?” he asked.

  “Not telling,” she said, flashing him a grin before returning her attention to the road.

  “A woman of mystery,” he said. He heard the flirtation in his tone and his smile fled. No flirting; she’s a kid, and your girlfriend is sitting four inches away.

  He wondered if PJ was having the same thought because she turned the conversation to Chrissy. “What does your girlfriend do?”

  “She’s a journalist.”

  “Really?” PJ asked. She peered around Ethan to glance at Chrissy. “She doesn’t seem the type.”

  “What’s the type?” Ethan asked.

  “More serious, less…fluffy.”

  He chortled a laugh and cleared his throat. “I’m going to tell her you called her fluffy,” he threatened.

  PJ smiled, an altogether different smile than any he had seen before. This one looked amused. “Go ahead. I’m pretty sure I could take her in a fight.”

  “You’ve never seen her at a sale at Sak’s,” he said.

  “I’m going to tell her you said that,” she threatened.

  “Please don’t,” he said. “You might be able to take her, but I’m not sure I could.”

  PJ punched his arm, hard. He winced and rubbed the spot. “Ouch. What was that for?”

  “You insulted me.”

  “I did?” he asked. “How?”

  “You said I could take your girlfriend in a fight.”

  “I was just repeating what you said,” he said, exasperated.

  “You’re not supposed to. You made me sound manly.”

  “You’re not manly,” he assured her. “Crazy, maybe, but not manly.” He rubbed his arm again.

  “That’s better,” PJ said, satisfied.

  “So, just for the record, I can say you’re crazy, but I can’t cast doubt on your femininity,” he said.

  “Pretty much,” she agreed.

  “You’re crazy,” he said.

  She punched him again, harder this time.

  He rubbed the spot again and shot her an indignant look. “What was that for?”

  She shrugged. “Doesn’t have to be for anything. Apparently I’m crazy.”

  Despite the pain in his aching arm, he was smiling at her. His smile grew when she turned to him and winked. On his other side, Chrissy snorted softly and his smile faded. Yep, I’m in a whole lot of trouble here, was Ethan’s final thought before the truck started to spin.