“Wait, what did you help him with on the ranch?”
Meera told Priya the whole story about the fire and ensuing cleanup. When she was done, Priya whistled and sat down on the bench. She motioned to a sales clerk and showed him the shoes she wanted him to bring her.
“No wonder you haven’t had time to call Raj. You’ve been too busy playing little woman on the prairie.”
“Priya!”
“It’s all right, get it out of your system, be one with the earth and all that. I know you’ll never want to live that way.”
Meera bristled. “Why do you say that?”
Priya scoffed. “You? Come on! You love designer shoes—which, by the way, you can’t wear at that ranch. I ruined my heels yesterday. You’re a patron of the arts—you love the opera—and you’re halfway to being this world-class researcher.” She paused as the clerk brought her the Via Spigas. She held out her feet so he could put them on her, rewarding him with a flirtatious smile. Meera watched the salesman literally swoon.
“You’re not going to give all that up to be some country bumpkin. You’re a princess, and you were meant to live as one.”
Meera’s mouth went dry. She wanted to get out of the store and get some fresh air. She wasn’t a princess. She was a poor orphan who had won the lottery.
Priya stood and walked up and down the store, admiring the shoes in the mirror. She took them off and put on another pair. Meera sighed and wandered to the shelf where a pair of strappy sandals caught her eye. She turned the shoe and looked at the bottom. The price was printed discreetly on a small label. She owned a number of similarly priced shoes. She thought about Kelly, how she hadn’t bought health insurance even after finding out she had angina because she couldn’t afford it. And Lily...the young woman was nine months pregnant and spent all day on her feet waitressing to make a fraction of what these shoes cost.
“You didn’t find anything to try?”
She put the shoe back and shook her head.
Priya held up a pair of sandals. “Check these out, they will go perfectly with your engagement dress. By the way, what’re you going to do about your wedding dress?”
The dress! Meera sat down wearily. “Haven’t you heard?”
“That you flaked on Sienna Simone? Yes, your mother was massively upset. She called my mother and got her riled up, and then I had to deal with her over a two-hour lunch.”
“My mother talked Sienna’s assistant into mailing it to England and asked her tailor there to be ready to make adjustments when I come back.” Meera’s mother still refused to speak to her. All she would do was exchange perfunctory emails and texts with Meera on necessary wedding details. She knew she should feel bad, but she couldn’t stop thinking about how wasteful that dress was. It cost more than what Dr. Harper made in several months of treating the people of Hell’s Bells. She knew because he’d made her an offer this morning to take over his practice while he cared for his sick wife. For what it cost her mother to have Sienna make that exclusive dress, Dr. Harper treated the entire town of Hell’s Bells, including a lot of people who paid him in fresh eggs and meat.
Priya’s eyes widened. She dropped the shoe she was holding and grabbed Meera by the shoulders. “Are you crazy? Your wedding is little more than six weeks away. What if it isn’t right? The whole point was to have Sienna fit you. Your mother pulled a lot of strings to make that happen.”
Meera rubbed her temples. “I know, but there’s nothing to be done now.”
Priya picked up the shoes she had tried earlier. “I’m paying for these, then we’re getting out of here. I think I saw a Carolina Herrera store when we drove in.”
They spent the next few hours trying on all kinds of dresses. Their arms were full of bags.
“I’m pretty sure these are all mine,” Priya observed. “You haven’t bought a single thing.”
Meera shrugged. “I really haven’t liked anything enough.”
“Meera, you need to buy honeymoon clothes, maybe something sexy for your wedding night?” Priya wiggled her eyebrows.
Meera felt nauseous. “I’m not in the mood, Priya.”
Priya shook her head disapprovingly. “You shouldn’t have taken this trip so close to the wedding.”
It was the argument Meera had been having with her mother for the past several months. Mum had wanted her to wait until after the wedding. Meera had argued that she wanted to get the rotation done so she would have her research degree finished. What she hadn’t done was acknowledge to herself that a big part of why she wanted to do it before the wedding was to have space from her parents and Raj.
Priya took the bags from Meera’s hands and handed her a dress. “Try this on, just for me.”
Meera nodded wearily. It was easier to comply than to argue, so she changed into the dress and stepped out to show Priya.
“She’ll take it,” Priya said to a sales clerk hovering nearby.
Meera shook her head; she had seen the price tag in the dressing room. It cost more than a CT scan. “No, I won’t, but thank you for your help.”
Priya let out a cry of frustration. “What’s wrong with you? It’s beautiful and fits you perfectly.”
“It just doesn’t feel right, Priya.”
“Is it that the dress isn’t right, or is it that Raj isn’t right anymore?”
Meera rubbed her temples. “You’re being difficult, Priya. I don’t understand why Raj has anything to do with this. I just don’t like the dress.”
Priya narrowed her eyes. She started to say something but apparently thought better of it. “Let’s just go back to Hell’s Bells. You don’t seem to be into this today.”
They drove in silence back to the ranch.
* * *
THE NEXT DAY, Meera took Priya to the airport with a sense of relief. Priya usually came to London a few times a year, and her weeklong trips always seemed too short. This was the first time Priya had shortened her trip and Meera hadn’t enjoyed her company.
She gave her cousin a final goodbye hug, and Priya held on to her. “I love you, Meera, and I would never betray you. What I’m about to say is just between us.”
She stepped back and fixed Meera with a look. Tears welled in her eyes.
“Even though you don’t see it, you’ve got a crazy thing for Jake. That story you told me about the fire? You wouldn’t have gotten down and dirty for someone you didn’t care about. You have two weeks left—don’t squander them. Go have fun, spend every second with him. Fill your heart with the kind of free love you may never experience again.”
Tears spilled onto Meera’s cheeks. Priya really was as close to a sister as she’d ever had. She squeezed Meera’s shoulders. “But then go home and marry Raj. I know he’s not the hero of a romance novel, but he can give you the life you want, the life you’ve worked so hard for. Jake will never be able to give you anything more than a dirty old ranch.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
“YOU LOOK AS bad as I feel.”
Jake walked to the kitchen sink and turned on the tap. He washed his hands, then splashed water on his face. He turned the faucet off and stood there, bracing himself against the copper edge. He closed his eyes and hung his head.
Meera got up from the chair. She had been sitting for a better part of an hour drinking tea and waiting for Jake to show up. The sun had set several hours ago, and the kitchen was lit with the soft glow of a single bulb. The other lights in the chandelier were out. She had to talk to Jake, to figure out what this thing was between them. Priya’s words reverberated in her head. She had a little more than two weeks left. Two weeks to figure out whether she could even consider giving up everything she had ever cared about for what she and Jake had. And if he would meet her halfway.
She went to his side.
“Is everything okay?”
>
He shook his head.
“Is it Kelly?”
He shook his head again. “Well, partly. She told me about the angina, and that she needs surgery. She’s quitting her job here so she can become poor enough to qualify for medical assistance. She’s the most experienced person I have, and she’s leaving. I don’t know how I’m gonna do this without her.”
Meera rubbed his arm. “I’m sorry, I’m the one who advised her to quit. I found out about the medical assistance program at the hospital. They said she makes too much money to qualify now, but if she didn’t have this job, she would get full health insurance and they would pay her hospital bill. Besides which, she can’t be lifting heavy objects anymore. I would have advised her to find another job either way.”
“You did the right thing for her, but...” He slammed his hand against the sink. “Aaarrghh!” The cry was primal, and his pain ripped through her. She stood aside to let him vent his anger. He put a fist on the sink and dropped his forehead on it.
She rubbed his back. “Hey, I’m here,” she said softly. “Tell me what it is. Maybe we can figure it out together.”
He groaned. “I can’t seem to make anything right.”
He turned toward her, and she let him take her in his arms. She rested her head on his chest, her arms cuddled underneath his. She could hear the fast beating of his heart, the heave of his chest as he took in a deep breath. She buried her nose in his shirt, inhaling the scent that defined him.
He held her for several minutes. When he spoke, it was so softly that she had to lift her head to hear him.
“I just ran the ranch out of business.”
Her eyes widened. “What happened?”
Shadows danced across his face in the soft light. “We have a couple of sick cows we’ve been treating. I thought I had it under control, but when Kelly and I came back from the hospital, ten more were sick, and they aren’t doing well. We’re gonna have to put them down. The problem is they were scattered all over, which means more of them will be sick soon.”
He dropped his arms, and she moved out of his embrace, staying within touching distance.
“You’re afraid you might lose too many animals?”
He nodded. “There’s a good chance we’re gonna lose a lot. When they’re this sick, we have to put them down and we can’t sell the meat.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Please tell me, Jake, I want to know.”
“The ranch is mortgaged to the max. If we don’t have anything to sell in the fall, I won’t be able to pay the bank or any of the bills for the rest of the year, and I won’t have calves to raise for next year.” He closed his eyes, brows furrowed.
Meera twined her hands with his, and he squeezed them. She wished she knew how to make it better.
“Perhaps things look worse than they really are. Have you talked with your accountant?”
“I am the accountant, and I know the numbers. The balance sheets are in my head.”
“How much do you have in reserves?” He rattled off a number down to the cent. Meera raised an eyebrow.
“I know, I’m dorky like that. I couldn’t focus in school long enough, so I got good at just memorizing things.”
He bent his head and put his forehead to hers. “I’m gonna lose the ranch, Meera. If I have to sell it, all the hands will lose their jobs. What’ll they do? There aren’t other jobs in Hell’s Bells, and they don’t have the skills to do anything else. My dad was right—I couldn’t handle it. I shouldn’t have tried, and now I’ve made a real mess of things.”
Meera’s heart ached for him. She had worked herself to the bone all her life to avoid disappointing her parents. “This is not your fault, Jake, and if you hadn’t taken over the ranch, it wouldn’t have stood for all these years that your dad’s been in the nursing home.”
“He would’ve sold it to someone who could keep it going.” He tapped his forehead against hers. “What am I gonna do?”
Meera bit her lip. He sounded weary. The easy answer to both their problems was right in front of her. If he sold the ranch, they would have so many more options. He wouldn’t be tied to Hell’s Bells, he could come to London with her. Maybe...
That wouldn’t be fair to him, though. How many times had he told her his life was on the ranch? And she wasn’t ready to tell Raj their engagement was off. Not yet.
“Is there anything you can do to raise money? Sell something?”
“I can sell some land, and that’s what I’m thinking I’ll do for now. But that’ll help me get through a year. Maybe even buy some calves. But what if this happens again next year? We need other revenue sources to be sustainable, and I just don’t know how to do that.”
“Well, I can help you there.”
He raised his head in surprise.
“I don’t know anything about ranching...”
“That’s an understatement.”
“But I do know about diversifying revenue and how to research business practices. I’ve helped my father set up several new clinics.”
“How’s that...”
“You can’t be the only rancher who’s having this problem. So we research what the others are doing about it and figure out how they’re making money. The principles of revenue diversification are the same no matter the business.”
He studied at her. “And how do we figure all this out?”
She picked up her phone from the table and waved it at him. “You would be amazed at how much information is available on the internet. I can go get my laptop. Do you have one?”
He shook his head. “But I have a computer in the library. We can go in there.”
Her eyes were shining.
He smiled. “How do you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Make me feel like I can rule the world?”
She stepped close to him, stood on her tiptoes and placed a light kiss on his cheek, then smiled playfully. “In my eyes, you’re the King of America.”
He caught her hand just as she started to walk away. His eyes pierced hers. “Meera, is there any scenario where I could make you my Queen?”
His look burned through her. She started to say something, but this wasn’t the time to have the conversation she’d planned. They had work to do. She smiled shyly at him, then pulled her hand away. “I’ll go get my laptop. Put on a pot of tea.”
* * *
“YOU COULD HOST cock fights. Apparently, there’s big money to be made.”
He pretended to choke himself, and she dissolved into giggles.
They had been at it for hours, poring over the ranch’s books and reviewing the websites of hundreds of ranches as well as reports from agricultural societies. She should be tired, especially after the emotionally exhausting time with Priya. But she was positively giddy, sitting in the dusty old room with Jake, bantering back and forth. He had an amazing mind; he could recall numbers and facts from websites she could barely remember reading at all.
“Think about it—we’ll buy you gold chains to hang around your neck, you can take bets, calculate the odds in your head, put Kelly at the gate to be the bouncer.” She started laughing at the image.
“And I’ll have Billy John park cars—it’ll be valet service. He can wear gold-plated cowboy boots. High-class all the way.”
That brought on a new volley of laughter.
“I’ll turn the house into a fancy chicken coop, charge people to board their chicks in the finest surroundings,” Jake continued.
“Stop, my insides are hurting.”
“I can just see the chickens in here, clucking about, complaining that the ceilings are too low.”
She looked up and noticed the white molding inlayed with gold in intricate patterns. Surprised by the elegance, she glanced ar
ound the room with fresh eyes, trying to see past the mud-streaked floors, the dusty surfaces and papers piled everywhere. The library was quite beautiful, with a high ceiling and built-in dark wood bookcases along two of the walls.
She stood and pulled the sheet off a large desk. Jake had set up a functional table for his computer. Most of the furniture in the room was covered with sheets. She gasped. The desk was beautiful, a large oak table with finely detailed carvings.
She turned to Jake. “Where did this come from?”
He shrugged. “My grandfather was a senior diplomat. His staff ran the ranch and he turned the house into a retreat for dignitaries. They held grand parties and hosted foreign heads of State here. It was a place where they could make foreign policy away from the prying eyes in Washington.”
Meera’s eyes widened.
“Are all the rooms here like this?”
He clicked another link on his screen. “I guess.”
Meera took his hand and tugged.
“Show me the house.”
He raised his eyebrow and stood up reluctantly, stretching as he did. “Okay, you wanna tell me what this is about?”
She shook her head. “I think I have an idea, but show me the house first.”
He showed her the living room, which was enormous. It had also been used as a dance hall. Ornate mirrors lined the walls, surrounded by beautiful blue-and-silver wallpaper. He led her upstairs, and she let her hand slide over the dented banister, ignoring the fluttering of her nerves.
He showed her the unused bedrooms first. They were all furnished, mostly with wooden four-poster beds that were covered in sheets. There were seven unused bedrooms and an eighth doorway down the hall.
“Would you like to see my room?”
Her heart was beating so loudly she was sure he could hear it. He took her hand and walked slowly to his door. He stepped aside and let her enter first. It didn’t look like any of the other rooms. Floor-to-ceiling windows covered an entire wall, and she noted a door that led onto a balcony. He had a king-size sleigh bed covered with a simple blue-and-white quilt that appeared to be homemade. She touched the fabric.
First Comes Marriage Page 15
