More Than a Rancher

by Claire McEwen

  “That’s not fair!” Paul argued. “I’ve told you, I don’t want to wait. This is what I want. You got to cook! Why can’t I dance?”

  “Because there’s a price,” Sandro said heavily. His initial ire seemed to have dissipated and now he just looked depressed. He picked up a bag of produce and shoved it in Paul’s arms. “Go load these. And wait for me in the car.”

  Paul didn’t move.

  “Is there a way that Paul could get to a dance school?” Jenna asked. “I know there’s nothing in Benson, but in Carson City, maybe?”

  “It’s too far,” Sandro answered shortly.

  “Sandro, come on!” Paul rested the bag of produce on the counter. “What about those cooking classes in San Francisco you’re gonna do? On the weekends. I could go with you and take classes with Jenna.”

  “You’re teaching cooking in San Francisco?” Jenna looked at Sandro in surprise.

  “A weekend gig.” He glared at his little brother. “It’s temporary.”

  Jenna couldn’t believe there was such a clear solution right in front of them. “It’s a good idea. I teach classes for teenagers on the weekends. It’s a sliding-scale fee—people pay what they can. It would be perfect!”

  “No, it wouldn’t. Paul needs to help on the ranch on the weekends.”

  “I’ll do extra chores during the week,” Paul countered.

  Sandro opened the refrigerator with a little more force than necessary. He pulled out leftover ingredients and dropped them in the chest cooler. “I think we’re done talking about this.”

  “Sandro, this is nuts!” Jenna exclaimed. “Why can’t Paul have the same chance you did to follow your dreams?”

  “He can. When he’s older.” Sandro shoved the lid onto the full cooler and picked it up, signaling that the conversation was over.

  Paul glared at his brother. “This is why I didn’t tell you about meeting her today! Because I knew you’d get all upset.” He looked at Jenna over the groceries. His eyes were sad, his mouth typical-teenager sullen. “Thanks, Jenna,” he told her. “For the dance, for the advice, everything.” He pushed his way out, the back door slamming behind him.

  Sandro watched him go and then looked at Jenna. He must have seen the outrage in her eyes because he set the cooler on the counter and sighed. He looked away, running his fingers through his unruly hair in a gesture of frustration. “You must think I’m a jerk.”

  “Pretty much,” Jenna answered truthfully.

  “I’ve got my reasons.” He looked almost as sullen as Paul.

  “I’m sure you think you do. But I wasn’t kidding when I told you he’s got talent. He’s a natural. Why won’t you let him pursue it?”

  Sandro shook his head. “You wouldn’t get it, Jenna. You grew up in San Francisco, right? With Mommy and Daddy signing you up for your ballet classes and clapping at your recitals?”

  She nodded. It had been true, once.

  “It’s different out here,” Sandro told her. He picked the chest cooler up again.

  “Wait.” Jenna stopped him. Her heart ached for Paul. She knew what it was like to want, more than anything, to dance. “I’ll be right back.”

  Jenna went back to the hall for her purse, found her wallet and took out a business card. On the back of it she scribbled her cell phone number and her weekend class schedule. She returned to the kitchen, relieved to see that Sandro had waited. She pressed the card into his hand. “Take this,” she ordered, “in case you change your mind.”

  Sandro studied the card for a moment. When he looked up, he was half smiling. “There’s glitter on your business card.”

  “It’s ballroom dance. We’re way into our glitter. And sequins.” She tried not to sound defensive.

  “Well, thanks, but I won’t be calling,” he told her, shoving the card into his back pocket, the hint of humor vanishing.

  “Why not?” This was all so mysterious. Clearly she wasn’t going to win this argument, and she wanted to understand why.

  He must have seen it in her face, because the steel in him softened just a little. “Because I can see down the road for Paul and it isn’t pretty. I wanted to cook and my family and my friends gave me nonstop grief for being different. I handled it, but it made me a lonely, angry kid. Eventually it made me a runaway. I don’t want that for my little brother.”

  Jenna studied the stern lines of his face, new sympathy filtering through the irritation and frustration. Sandro might be misguided, but his motives were pure—he was protecting the brother he loved.

  But poor Paul was going to have some long, bitter teenage years ahead if he wasn’t allowed to dance until he left home. She couldn’t do much more for him, but she had to try. “I’m sorry that happened to you, and I admire you for wanting to protect your brother. But don’t you think that if you forbid it, he’ll just want it more?”

  There was a bag of groceries on the floor and Sandro was nudging it with his foot. Fidgeting, but possibly listening.

  Jenna played her last card. “Maybe you should just let him try it. Dance training is hard. It’s difficult, repetitive and sometimes even boring. Most people end up quitting. Paul will probably lose interest when he gets to know the reality of it.” It was true that most people quit, but Jenna was pretty sure Paul wouldn’t. She could recognize a fellow fanatic when she saw one. Paul would make dancing his life—but Sandro didn’t need to know that right now.

  He was watching her speculatively. For an instant she thought he’d say yes, but the moment passed and the wall was back between them. “I think I know what’s best.”

  “Maybe.” Anger rose again. Her voice was sharper than she meant it to be. “I suggest you think a little more carefully before you squash his dreams.” She turned on her heel and left the room, sad for Paul and, oddly, sad for Sandro, too.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “WHAT DO YOU mean you’ll be in San Francisco?” Joe shoved the fence post deeper into the hole they’d just dug and gave it a kick with his work boot to make sure it was solid. Sandro glanced at his brother, all six-plus solid feet of him. Joe was a year younger than Sandro, but people always assumed he was older. With his light brown hair and broad face, he took after their father in more ways than just looks. Joe loved the ranch, had never questioned that his future lay there. He was the oldest son in every way but birthright.

  Sandro poured the quick-setting cement into the battered wheelbarrow. Paul brought the hose over and let the water spurt over the dry powder. Grabbing a shovel, Sandro started mixing. “I’m teaching classes at a cooking school. It’s a great gig. It’ll pretty much pay for all the new appliances in the restaurant.”

  “Oh, yeah. The restaurant.” Joe said the word as though it tasted bad in his mouth. “It’s a big weekend, Sandro. Pops wants all hands on deck to move the sheep.”

  “Well, Joe, Pops has to understand that the sheep aren’t my first priority. I’m trying to help out with the ranch as much as possible, but I came back here to start my own business.”

  “Okay,” Joe said reluctantly. “I get it.” He bent down with a level to straighten the post. “But why take Paul with you?”

  Sandro started shoveling the concrete into the hole and Paul picked up his shovel to help. They were careful not to look at each other. “I’ll need extra help. My class is completely full. If I don’t have an assistant, there’s no way I can pull it off.” He glared at Paul, silently cursing his brother’s endless arguing, two weeks of it, that had finally worn him down.

  He hated to admit it, but Jenna had been right. The more he’d said no, the more Paul had insisted he had to take her dance classes. Sandro could only hope she was right about the other part, that Paul would change his tune once he realized how hard the training really was. He jabbed Paul in the ribs with his elbow. “Besides, he’s a whippersnapper. Not much
use to you out there anyways.”

  Paul stood up at this and punched Sandro in the shoulder.

  “Easy there, little brother.” Sandro grinned. “You don’t want to mess with the big guns.” He set aside his shovel and flexed his biceps a few times while Paul cracked up.

  “Will you two stop clowning around so we can get this done?” Joe grumbled. “In case you hadn’t noticed, we have a truckload of these to set in the next couple days. Besides—” he held out his own arm, enormous muscles bulging “—I wouldn’t go showing off those biceps around here, Sandro. You may be the oldest but you’re a scrawny bastard. Comes from spending your life in a kitchen instead of doing man’s work.”

  “Well, it’s a pity we can’t all be muscle-bound meatheads like you, Joe. But given the choice, I’ll take my brains over your muscle any day.” He ducked as Joe’s giant fist came at him in a mock swing. “So it’s a done deal. I’m taking Paul to San Francisco and the rest of you mindless country boys can follow the sheep up the hills.”

  The truth was, Sandro liked moving the sheep. Riding into the mountains on horseback, making sure the flock got up to the summer meadows, was a hell of a lot more relaxing than teaching a bunch of pretentious San Francisco foodies how to make a decent paella. And the route to the pastures was beautiful, too. But the cash he’d make from these classes was way too tempting. And if it meant that Paul would finally stop making his life miserable and get a dose of reality to cool his dancing obsession, that would compensate for missing the ride. Hell, he’d missed it for the past decade anyway—what was one more year?

  Sandro gave Paul a wink to acknowledge the success of their ruse and picked up his tools to head to the next posthole. As his spade hit the rocky ground, he used all the force he could to tame his unruly mind. Because all week his mind had been on Jenna Stevens.

  And he had no business thinking about her. His life was in Benson now, not with some woman from the city. She was everything he needed to avoid—gorgeous, funny and flirty. Distracting. He’d made a choice to leave women like her behind in New York and he wasn’t going to choose differently, no matter how much he might want to.

  So far work had been his solution. When thoughts of Jenna’s bright blue eyes heated his mind, he worked. When haunted by the vision of her stalking away after dinner that night, all righteous and fiery, he worked even harder. Since he’d been thinking of her almost nonstop, it had been a very productive couple of weeks.

  But the endless work didn’t get rid of the shame he felt, and it irritated him. Jenna was kind, and he’d been hostile to her when all she’d been doing was trying to help Paul. Sure, he didn’t want Paul to dance, but that was no reason to be rude to her about it. There was only one logical explanation for his behavior—one which Sandro was loath to admit. When he’d walked into the kitchen and seen Jenna dancing in his brother’s arms, he’d been jealous. Jealous of the fun his brother was having with her, making her laugh as she turned so easily across the floor. He’d been jealous of a fifteen-year-old kid, and that was downright pathetic.

  Even more pathetic, he’d spilled his guts to Jenna about his past. And he never talked about that. Outside of his family and a few folks in Benson, no one knew he’d run away from home. He wasn’t even sure how he’d ended up telling her. She’d seemed to genuinely want to know why he didn’t want Paul to dance. And her compassion had somehow gotten him talking about his crappy teen years and how he’d run off. She must think he was a pretty sorry case. He wished he didn’t care so much about what she thought.

  He was just like Paul, he realized, as he jammed the posthole digger farther into the earth. Wanting something simply because he couldn’t have it. Maybe he should just try to sleep with Jenna and get her out of his system. His stomach coiled at the thought, some uneasy combination of lust and anxiety. That was certainly what he would have done a few months ago.

  But that was just one more reason why he wasn’t going to do it now. He wasn’t willing to go down that path again. He was different now. So he’d just keep his head down and his hands busy until his interest in her passed.

  Maybe the upside of taking Paul to these lessons was that he’d see her at work with a bunch of teenagers. Hopefully, she’d look like every one of Sandro’s high school teachers did—tired and hassled. Maybe just like Paul, he needed a good hard dose of reality—though he had a bad feeling it would take more than that to rid him of his thoughts about Jenna.

  * * *

  JENNA WATCHED HER mother pour herself another glass of white wine. If she was counting correctly, it was her third, and that was on top of the cocktails her mom had insisted on before dinner. She hadn’t seen her mother drink quite like this since, well, since Dad’s affair came to light a few years ago. But she knew her mom drank when she was alone. Jenna got enough late-night drunken phone calls from her to know she was hitting the bottle solo on a fairly regular basis.

  She looked down the gleaming mahogany table. Daniel, her older brother, was nodding off over his plate. He’d worked at the hospital last night and he was having coffee with his dinner instead of wine. Shelley, her older sister and a rising star at the San Francisco district attorney’s office, was speaking animatedly with her father about a high-profile case she was working on. Her father actually looked relaxed and happy as he listened, asking all kinds of questions about Shelley’s progress.

  Jenna felt a pang of envy that was so old and familiar it was almost like a part of her body—an extra organ or limb. It had always been that way—Dad asking about Shelley’s day at school, buying her expensive gifts in honor of her perfect grades, crowing to their friends about her many accomplishments.

  Jenna had worked hard in school, too, clocking far more hours in the library doing homework than Shelley ever did. Yet it never got easier. It was as if her brain had trouble translating the words in the textbook into coherent ideas. So she got Cs and Bs most of the time, and those hard-earned grades were a constant source of disappointment to her father.

  Jenna knew now that she was full of imperfections he simply couldn’t understand. In his eyes, her dancing was an embarrassing hobby that stood in the way of real success. Her curvaceous figure and wild curly red hair held no beauty when contrasted with Shelley’s slender form and straight blond locks.

  “Jenna!” Her father’s voice suddenly boomed down the table. “What were you doing today? Twirling around the ballroom?”

  Jenna winced at the disdain in his voice. “Teaching, practicing, the usual.”

  “And how’s John?”

  “John?”

  “You know, that musician you go out with?”

  “Um...you mean Jeff?” Jenna shook her head in disbelief. She’d dated Jeff for two years, and her father had met him several times.

  “Yeah. That’s right. Jeff. The drummer with the long hair. How’s that going for you?”

  Jenna hated to give him any satisfaction, but she wasn’t going to lie. “We broke up.” Her brother and sister didn’t even bother to disguise their “I told you so” eye rolls.

  “Well, good. You need to stop dating all these guys with no focus, no ambition. Shelley, Daniel, you must know some people from work Jenna could go out with. Or why don’t you let your mother help you find a decent boyfriend?”

  Oh, like she found you? Jenna wanted to say but didn’t. A man who cheats on his wife?

  Shelly cleared her throat. “Look, Jenna, I spoke with Ralph Clark yesterday.”

  “Who?” Jenna turned to her older sister, who was smiling at her benevolently.

  “Ralph Clark—a lawyer at my old firm? He told me that they need an administrative assistant. He’d like to interview you.”

  Jenna stared at Shelley in disbelief. How was it possible they’d grown up in the same house, just a few years apart, and yet Shelley knew so little about her? She took a sip of her wine and suddenly fel
t sympathy for her mother. This family would drive anyone to drink eventually.

  “Jenna? What do you think? Should I send you his email address tomorrow?”

  She sighed. “Thanks for thinking of me, Shel, but I already have a job.”

  “Oh, ballroom dancing? Jenna, that’s not a career—that’s a hobby.” Shelley was a perfect echo of their father.

  “So why do I get paid, then?” Jenna tried to keep her voice calm, but she could hear the edge in it. “It’s not a hobby—it’s my career, and it has been for ten years now. And if you’d been paying attention, you’d know I am really good at it.”

  Her father’s voice was softer than usual in attempted persuasiveness. “Jenna, Shelley is just trying to help you. Just go in for an interview. They’ll pay well. They have great benefits. You know your mom is so worried about you living in that tiny apartment. You could afford something better with a higher salary.”

  “Dad, I like my apartment. I like my job. There’s nothing wrong with my life that you or Shelley or anyone needs to fix!”

  “Honey, we just want you to be successful. Look at your sister. Did you know she’s considering a run for supervisor? She’ll be mayor of San Francisco one day—mark my words. And your brother here is so humble he wouldn’t mention it, but he’s just been promoted to head of surgery.”

  “Congratulations, Daniel,” Jenna said to her brother, raising her glass slightly in his direction. He smiled at her sleepily. “Dad, I’m glad they’re doing so well. But I’m also successful.” She glanced around the table and saw the doubtful look on every face. “Look. I have a competition in two weeks. It’s a big one. If my partner and I win, we’ll be national champions for Latin dance—again. We won it the last two years, as well. Why don’t you come out and see for yourself?” She realized she sounded as if she was pleading with them. Pleading for attention and acceptance.