Her Rodeo Rancher

by M. K. Stelmack

  Bridget and Jack had a routine that even the presence of her and Mara on their weekly Thursday night meetup didn’t alter. First, the kiss. Then the exchange of comments on how good or tired or hungry the other might be. Next asking after their adopted daughters, Sofia and Isabella, who had gone to bed a half hour ago. And only then would they open the conversation up to anyone else in their presence.

  Bridget brought Jack up to speed. “Krista was about to tell us four ways she’s fallen for Will Claverley.”

  “I know Will,” Jack said, dropping into the last deck chair as he cracked the tab on a beer. “He donated their dance space for a charity event I did with Penny, years ago.” Penny was not only the deceased aunt of the Montgomery sisters but also the biological mother of Jack. “Nice guy but isn’t he big into rodeos, horses, the outdoor life?”

  “Exactly,” Krista said. “Nice guy but we’ve got nothing in common.”

  “Here, let’s flip it around,” Bridget said. “Show me four ways that Will has fallen for you.”

  “Same answer. None, because he hasn’t.”

  “I’ll start,” Bridget said. “He submits to one of your pedicures even though he doesn’t like them.”

  “I’d like one,” Jack said. “Why haven’t you given me one?”

  “I will, when you pay for it. Which Will did.”

  “Why would he pay for something he doesn’t want?”

  “It was part of a package for his mother. I didn’t want to rip him off, so I persuaded him to give it a try.”

  “One,” Bridget repeated.

  Krista turned to Jack. “Okay, a man’s perspective here. What do you think?”

  He raised his gaze to the porch ceiling. “All you’ll get is my opinion, because every man is as unique as a snowflake and needs to be respected for their individuality.”

  “You’re trying to get out of this.”

  “Yep.”

  “Just be honest.”

  “Three words a man absolutely should not believe a woman means.”

  “I promise I will not disown you,” Krista said.

  “Your first time together and you talked him into putting on pajamas. I’d say you got some pull with him.”

  “That’s not—”

  “He did an extra one-on-one practice session with Krista to teach her dance moves for the wedding,” Bridget told Jack.

  Jack seesawed his head. “Cutting her from the pack. Happens in bars all the time.”

  Bridget held up two fingers. “Then on the wedding day, he drives her into town to pick up shoes because she ruined the first pair, even though Krista had told him she could take from Laura’s closet.”

  “Using every opportunity to be alone with her.” Jack smiled at Bridget. “Best seven minutes of the day.”

  He and Bridget kissed, even as she raised three fingers to Krista.

  “And four—” Mara joined the take-down of Krista “—he agrees to break up with a girl he’s not even dating because Krista asked him to.”

  Jack broke off his kiss. “That sounds messed up, Krista. How does that work?”

  Krista glared at Mara. “For a therapist, you should know better than to twist the facts. I suggested to Will to be honest with someone he doesn’t want to date but who clearly has feelings for him.”

  “I get where Mara is coming from,” Bridget said. “Will’s also giving the all-clear signal that he’s open to a relationship.”

  “That pretty much wraps it up,” Jack said. “He’s into you.”

  “Except he told me he wasn’t. We have an understanding from way back.”

  Jack frowned in confusion. “Later,” Bridget said.

  “Wait,” Mara said. “Isn’t this the same guy that you accused of not being honest because he hadn’t been clear with Alyssa about his feelings for her?”

  Mara was leaning forward. Too much like a detective grilling a prime suspect. “Yes,” Krista said cautiously.

  “Then if you agree that he isn’t always honest about the things he doesn’t say, isn’t it also possible that he isn’t being entirely honest about the things he does say?”

  Three “gotcha” smiles surrounded Krista. “If you saw me and Will together,” she said desperately, “you’d get how mismatched we are.”

  “Invite him to our Canada Day barbecue, then, and we’ll see for ourselves,” Bridget said. “Deidre will be there, too. Time she weighed in.”

  Krista had to actually unpack her mother’s suitcase to stop her from flying east to tear a strip off Phillip. “Definitely not. It’ll send the wrong message. She’ll grill him as if we’re dating. And we’re not. We’re just friends, okay?”

  They smiled indulgently, like when the kids said something cute and naive.

  “Now look,” Jack said, “at who’s not being honest with their feelings.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  IT BECAME CLEAR to Krista after Laura’s wedding that she needed to get back in the social media game. Three of the six clients she’d booked from the wedding had asked how they and their friends could follow her. Ringing silence on her website suggested that Phillip had grown bored.

  Still, when she set up a Facebook page for the spa, she put it under Bridget’s personal profile. She posted artsy shots of the shop with a “hello” discount for a manicure or pedicure to first-time clients. After texting her clients for their permission to post pictures of their finished hands and feet, she watched her follower list grow, her likes uptick and her discounts “loved.”

  Then she had a sneaky, buzzing thought. What if she were to check up on her Down East peeps? No, bad idea. She was setting herself up to be hurt, and this time it would be totally her fault. But she couldn’t shake the impulse, even after she closed down her computer and mopped the floor. It was the ice cream cake for the dieter, the whiskey for the alcoholic. The Facebook search for the trolled victim.

  She rationalized her craving. She could prove to herself that she was healed. That she could face her greatest fear and move on. In fact, she wouldn’t be able to move on if she didn’t. Mara would agree, if asked.

  In case things went sideways, she closed the curtains of the spa, flipped the sign to Closed and moved the tissues closer. She started small, calling up the profile of a friend of a friend. Krista scrolled through pictures of the other woman’s vacation in New York, the Summer Concert Series in Toronto. One photo included a friend who Krista often had drinks with. Krista clicked on the tag and was bounced over to that friend’s page. Nothing much there...same shots of the Summer Concert Series, snaps in clothes the friend had designed until...there, Phillip. He was shown with his arms around a different girl than the one he’d rebounded off Krista with. Another blue-eyed blonde. He clearly had a type. He’d moved on, well on.

  Krista checked in with her emotions as Mara had instructed her to do. A few licks of shame, but she felt ready to rip off the bandage. She typed in his name and tapped Search.

  There he was. With a new profile pic of himself and his latest cutie-pie, temples touching as he’d done with Krista.

  Little emotional waves rose and then crashed, but nothing breached Krista’s peace. Like how she withstood memories of her father who’d passed from a stroke five years ago, and her aunt who’d died in a car accident last fall. It hurt, but time had padded the blow. She’d moved on before and she could again.

  For kicks and giggles, she typed in Laura’s name. Wedding pics bloomed all over her timeline, including a big one of her and Ryan for her cover image. Wasn’t she on her honeymoon, too busy to be updating her profile? Krista settled into scanning through the pics. She’d have to show them to her sisters. The picture of her on Silver, riding barefoot, the dreamy ones of Laura and Ryan caught off guard, so much in love.

  And then...one of her and Will.

  She’d been trying to dismount from Silver after
the photo shoot. Will had guided Silver into place for her time and again during the shoot. She had hoped to at least get off on her own but because of her tight skirt, she ran the risk of flashing everyone.

  “Don’t even think of it,” Will had said, striding over. “You can’t hop off like the horse is a fence.”

  He’d held up his arms. “Ease yourself off and I’ll take you the rest of the way.”

  “No,” she said, and then whispered through her plastered smile, “My skirt will ride up.”

  He grinned. “You mean even farther?”

  She’d instinctively clamped her knees together which made her appear even sillier.

  “C’mon. Hands on my shoulders. If Silver’s like her owner, she’s had enough of today’s nonsense.”

  Krista had smiled down at him and that was the moment the camera had captured. Her hands on his shoulders, his hands on her waist, lifting her down and the two of them laughing about what a horse might be thinking.

  Except in the image they appeared to be two people madly in love. Which they weren’t.

  Only more proof that social media twisted the truth.

  On impulse, she searched Will’s name. There were loads of recent pictures, but the text running with them didn’t sound a bit like him. Here I am at my sister’s wedding. Isn’t she beautiful? A good enough photo of Will and Laura smiling together, but no way would Will ask that question. He wouldn’t care what other people thought; he knew his sister was beautiful.

  In a separate post was one of Alyssa and Will. He stood, hands on hips, but Alyssa had squeezed herself tight against him. Krista could make out dancing couples behind them—and from the angle, it appeared Alyssa herself had taken the picture. A good friend and I two-stepping to “Nobody but You”. Good times, great company!

  “Oh, gag me,” Krista said aloud. Alyssa had posted that. Alyssa, queen of social media and organizer of the Claverley Rodeo, had appointed herself his social media manager. Ten to one, Will hadn’t even seen this post.

  Alyssa would’ve needed Will’s permission to take control of his account, but he’d probably handed it over ages ago and gone back to his bloated cow or fence posts.

  Krista felt a rush of annoyance with Will. He was tied to Alyssa deeper than probably even he realized. She was tempted to call him but she’d already done her bit. Time for Will to do his.

  * * *

  WILL DIDN’T SEE the photo of Alyssa and him until Dana showed it on her phone. She’d driven up in her truck with the posts they’d need to finish the fence. Hopefully before the day got too much hotter.

  “I thought you weren’t interested in Alyssa,” Dana said accusingly.

  “I’m not. Alyssa must’ve posted it herself.”

  “What are you going to do about it?”

  Will hauled the post through the tangle of open wire, ignoring the twinge in his shoulder. He’d begun to think that he’d have to ignore it for the rest of his life. “Not much I can do now that it’s up.”

  “You could ask her to delete it.” Dana pocketed her phone and dragged a fence post from her pickup. “You can tell her that the picture gives the impression you two are dating, which you’re not. You can tell her to leave you alone. You can take back control of your Facebook page. Why did you give it to her in the first place?”

  Will relieved Dana of the wood. “Branding. She wanted the same look for my personal page as the Claverley Rodeo, or for them not to clash, or something like that. Made sense at the time.”

  Dana reached for a second post. “Will. This crosses the line. Krista’s right. Alyssa has got to go.”

  Will shoveled loose dirt from the posthole. “Krista talked to you about Alyssa and me?”

  “At the wedding. She’s worried for you.”

  That was supposed to be a private conversation between Krista and him.

  “Don’t pout,” Dana said. “I’m the one who brought up the subject. She figured out my stupid feelings for Keith, and I was trying to distract her. She has a way of getting you to say things you hadn’t intended.”

  Or doing. It’d taken her less than a quarter hour to get him in pajamas and soaking his feet in a tub of salted water. “Tell me about it.”

  Dana held the post while he tamped dirt around the base. Each drive sent shocks straight to his shoulder. He needed to refill his painkiller prescription.

  “She saw us together and asked me about my relationship with Keith. I can’t lie to save my soul, so the next thing I know we’re best buddies.”

  “Krista replaces you as my fake girlfriend and me as your best friend.”

  “She keeps it up and she’ll replace Laura as your mom’s daughter.”

  “That I gotta see,” Will said. On the wedding day, he’d caught his mother looking at him and Krista with a worried expression. Even after Silver was back safely in the barn.

  “It might if you don’t watch yourself.” One hand steadying the post, Dana held up another photo. The glare from the sun blackened the screen so Will shaded it with his hat. And a good thing his face was hidden from Dana as he took in the sight of him lifting Krista from Silver. She was laughing, her head bent to him. And the emotion on his face...well, it was exactly what the photographer had tried to capture between Laura and Ryan. Way better than him and Alyssa.

  He handed Dana’s phone back and picked up the ten-pound maul. “Good photo.”

  “Hardly seems as if you’re faking it at all.”

  Good thing Krista wasn’t on social media. He didn’t want her...misinterpreting. “We weren’t. I mean, we were just having fun.”

  “Will. You were all over her, all day. You want to date her for real?”

  No. His intention going into his next relationship was to make it a forever one, if possible. He and Krista were entirely incompatible. That was why they could be so free and easy with each other, because they didn’t take each other seriously as romantic partners.

  “Being with Krista is like being with you, Dana.”

  She waved her phone in his face. “You and I have never been like this.”

  “That’s because you know how to get off a horse.”

  Dana’s voice lowered. “Is that all it is?”

  Will got a lump in his gut. Similar to when he’d told her she couldn’t break sixteen seconds on the barrel race and she’d let fly with a 15:87 posting. He was about to lose.

  She tapped on her phone and shaded it with her own hat this time, probably so he couldn’t hide his reaction. The ten-pound maul nearly slipped from his grip. It was another picture of him and Krista. Dana had taken the shot. Krista was smiling at the camera. Will was turned to Krista and he looked as if he thought himself the luckiest guy in the world.

  “You didn’t post that pic, did you?” he said. If Keith or his mom saw it, there’d be no living it down.

  “What should it matter if you two are faking it?”

  Because everybody who knew him would take one glance at that image and understand that he wasn’t faking a thing. One posted photo could be passed off as a fluke. He could tell a funny story about how the city girl had been about to fall off the horse. Krista would back him up. But a second one? Where he looked dead serious except for that little smile, the same one his dad wore in the photo of him and Will’s mom at their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary.

  “Thanks for keeping it between us,” he muttered. “No chance you’d delete it?”

  “Not a one.” She slid her phone once again into her back pocket. “Never know when I need ammunition.”

  “I thought we’re friends.”

  Dana picked up a string of wire to reattach to the new post. “Not the way you and Krista are.”

  No use arguing more. She was determined to think what she wanted. Even if it was absolutely dead wrong.

  * * *

  THE NEXT EVENING when Aly
ssa came into Penny’s to meet Will, he wished he were anywhere else. Alyssa wore a short dress and heels, her hair all curly around her face.

  Decked out for a date. He’d come in clean skin and a clean shirt. Maybe he shouldn’t have chosen Penny’s. Open in the evening on a limited menu, mostly drinks and desserts, he’d chosen the place because it was more conducive for close conversation than the commercial buzz of the chain restaurants. But now he realized Penny’s was far too quiet and...intimate. Besides which, their server was Jack, Krista’s brother-in-law. Will didn’t want Krista to get wind of how this went down. He wasn’t even sure if Jack knew about the fake arrangement.

  They could’ve gone out riding, but that’s what his parents did together, what you did with someone you were dead serious about.

  At least he’d selected the same table he’d had with Dana instead of a cozy booth. Alyssa took the chair opposite. Her lips were a glaring barn red. “I see you’ve ordered already.”

  “A coffee,” he said. “What can I get you?”

  “A glass of red, please.”

  Like a discreet five-star waiter, Jack presented the wine and took their dessert orders. Apple crisp with double vanilla ice cream for him and the lemon cheesecake for Alyssa. He bet Krista would’ve gone for the mint chocolate crème brûlée. Fresh and cool and sweet.

  He and Alyssa made small talk. At least, Alyssa made talk, while he kept to the small as he found himself in the exact position he’d been in with Dana a month ago—trying to figure out how to bring up what he really wanted to say. Alyssa wondered if he wouldn’t mind posing with Jacob for pictures to post on social media. Will liked her nephew and agreed. Then she asked if he had any pictures of himself from his days when he was Jacob’s age to give it a human touch, to appeal to the older crowd. He couldn’t quite see the connection, but he gave Alyssa the benefit of the doubt and said he’d ask his mom what was in their albums.

  But it was when she suggested a photo shoot of him and Jacob on horseback with Alyssa joining in as the aunt that he put the brakes on.