She faced her father in shock. “Pop, why!”
“Why? Because he’s going to knock up my daughter.”
Mal stomped her foot, getting just as mad as her pop was. “No, Pop. No! I love him!”
“Bullshit! You’re too young to know what love is. This is lust. Braydon Daniels is just a bull looking for a cow in heat. Don’t be a heifer. Now get in the house.” When she hesitated, he yelled, “Now! If you know what’s good for you. And don’t you dare even think about back talking me.”
With a sob, she climbed down the ladder and ran out of the barn. She deserved every prick from the dry hay stuck to her clothes on the way to the house.
She never looked back toward the barn. She knew her Dairy Prince was long gone.
Chapter 2
Present Day
Mal brushed a lone tear away from her cheek. The man lying in repose before her sure looked like her pop but was now only a pretty shell. His protective spirit had fled his body. And her pop sure had been protective, too much so. Mal always hated it, fought against it. Now, as she reached forward to stroke the cold, still hand crossed over his chest, she finally realized how much she appreciated it. He kept her on a successful path, had chased her away from the dairy farm she grew up on. He wanted her to make something of herself, rather than be a poor farmer.
Not that her pop had been poor. He was one of the more successful dairy farmers in the county, hell, the region. But even so, he wanted her to be better, have more.
His idea of better wasn’t quite the same as hers.
A hand landed on her right shoulder and she started. She shouldn’t be surprised since people were already starting to file in and take seats for the service.
The mystery hand’s broad, long fingers with a sprinkling of dark hair between the knuckles gave her a gentle squeeze. She turned her head toward the owner. And she started again as she looked up.
Holy shit…
Braydon Daniels.
This was not the boy she had been in love with fourteen years ago. No. He matured and filled out into one spectacular vision before her. She swallowed hard and tried to find her voice.
“Bray…” His name came out as a breath.
“Mal,” he said, his voice a couple octaves lower than what she remembered. He steered her around by her shoulder and then gathered her into his arms. She could feel the muscles under his dress shirt tighten as he squeezed her close.
His breath tickled the hair by her ear as he inhaled her scent. “Lord, I’ve missed you, Princess,” he murmured.
Princess. An endearment he gave her a long time ago. He always considered her his true Dairy Princess and not Kaitlyn.
Mal shivered down to the tip of her toes. I’ve missed you too. You don’t know just how much. Her arms crept around his lower back and she did a little inhaling herself. He smelled of farm animals and antiseptic. She scrunched her nose and pushed away with a face.
“Sorry, I had to change quickly after an emergency calving. A breach birth. I didn’t have time to shower.”
Ah, that’s right, he now worked as the local livestock vet. Her pop mentioned it once a few years back. The one time he’d answered her questions about Bray.
“Well, you smell country.”
He shrugged. “When in Rome…” He chuckled, his eyes crinkling at the corners. His beautiful golden-green hazel eyes still sparkled, though not as brightly as she remembered.
She thought about those stolen moments they had in the barn when he’d study every inch of her as she laid naked in a pile of hay or on a spread-out horse blanket. The memory shot lightning through her. It landed in her core, heating her inside.
He stepped back to a respectable distance since they stood at the front of the parlor. In front of what now Mal noticed was an almost full audience.
“Sorry about your pop.”
For the few moments in his arms, she almost forgot why she was here. And the only reason Bray would be here. Right?
“Thanks. It’s not like it was unexpected, but it still hurts.”
He nodded, his eyes never leaving her face. When had he grown up to be such a mature, handsome man? Her stomach flip-flopped.
A man cleared his throat nearby and she noticed the short, older gentleman who ran the funeral home wringing his hands. “Mrs. Marshall, we need to start now.”
Mal cringed at the name he used. “Please, call me Ms. King.”
“Sorry, ma’am. Ms. King.”
She flattened her lips and turned back to Bray. “We can talk after.”
With a slight nod, he said in a low voice, “I’d like that.”
Bray wandered down the aisle to take an empty seat towards the back, while Mal settled in the front row. An elderly neighbor, Emma Haskins, leaned over to pat Mal’s knee with her crepe-like, age-spotted hands. The gnarled knuckles and the thin skin reminded her of her pop’s. She bit back a sob and managed to smile shakily over at Emma, conveying her thanks.
Then the service to say a final goodbye to her pop began.
* * *
Mal picked at her black pencil skirt, pulling the scratchy fabric away from her skin. She was anxious to get back to the house and change into an old, comfortable pair of jeans. She wished she still fit into the worn pairs she found in a box at the bottom of the closet in her childhood bedroom. But like Braydon, she had also matured. Which meant having curves that no longer fit into junior skinny jeans.
As she walked down the ramp from the funeral home, it surprised her to find a car other than hers still left in the parking lot. She figured she would be the last one leaving, especially after staying to make arrangements with the funeral director for her pop’s cremation.
She stumbled and caught herself by grabbing the metal rail running alongside the concrete incline.
He looked good.
Shit. Good was a gross understatement. That was like saying a sundae full of ooey, gooey hot fudge, wet walnuts, colorful sprinkles, a pile of real whipped cream, and a cherry on top tasted only good.
Her stomach growled. She wasn’t sure if it was due to the fact she found herself now hungry for a sundae, or the sight of Braydon Daniels leaning his ass against the side of a pickup truck, his arms and ankles crossed as he watched her approach.
She looked down at her blouse. Yep, her nipples had hardened into two mountain peaks. She sighed. Way to be so obvious, Mal.
Though she could kill two birds with one stone: Eat the sticky sundae right off his—what she could only imagine—firm stomach. She bet his six-pack had indentations where the melted ice cream and fudge would pool until she licked away all traces of the sweet goodness.
Mal faltered and had to take a deep breath before closing the gap between them.
“I figured that was your car.”
She wasn’t used to his deep voice yet. The voice of a man, not a teenager. He was parked only two spaces away from her bright red Audi R8 convertible. With the upgraded 5.2 L V10 and manual transmission, the pretty little sports car had set her back a cool $166,000. Five-hundred fifty horses weren’t cheap. Though a beauty and hell of a lot of fun to drive, out here in Bum-fuck, Kansas, the car was nothing but a joke.
Oh, it impressed her colleagues back home in New York, but here a manure spreader was more useful. Suddenly, she realized she mistakenly thought of New York City as “home.”
“How’d you guess?” she asked, trying not to be too apparent when her gaze skimmed every inch of him.
He laughed, shaking his head, and glanced down at the pavement for a moment. When he looked back up, he pinned her with his greenish-gold eyes.
She did her best not to squirm.
With all seriousness, he reminded her, “You said we could talk after.”
And with all honesty, she hadn’t meant right after the service. But sometime after.
She studied his facial features. Out in the natural light, he looked even better. Deeply tanned. Rugged. A little more weathered than he should be at thirty-two years old
. But a life full of hard work would do that to you, she supposed.
She frowned at the dark, full beard he sported. Even though it wasn’t wild, she hated it on him. She brushed her fingers along his jaw, then tugged on the short, wiry hairs. “Why?” she simply asked.
He reached for her hand but she let it drop to her side. He shrugged and tilted his head, studying her. “Because my ex hates it.”
“Ex?” Her eyebrows rose to her hairline. Mal wasn’t even aware he had married, much less divorced. She stepped back, putting a little distance between them.
He had married somebody else. Someone other than her.
At eighteen, she had wanted to become his wife, to be his forever. The thought that she could be replaced by someone else hurt. And it wasn’t just a little sting. No, this was a deep bone-aching hurt.
She shook herself mentally. She had no right to think like that. He hadn’t been the only one to marry someone else. She unconsciously looked at her left ring finger. Though it no longer showed evidence of her own failed marriage, she still hadn’t put it all behind her.
She wondered who he married.
“I’d ask you out for a cup of coffee, but I need to get back to work. Massey Campbell has a few sick sows I need to go check on.”
She hadn’t heard the word sow in a long time. Sow, boar, heifer. Terms she hadn’t used since she left all those years ago. Since her pop sent her far away. The closest thing she heard her co-workers and friends in the city say was bullshit. In fact, the word was used quite frequently.
Mal nodded, her eyes roaming over his body, unable to resist. Once again, she noticed how he’d filled out from being a lean teenager.
Bray cleared his throat.
Mal looked up at his amused expression. “What?”
“I asked if I could stop out at the farm tonight.”
Oh. Her cheeks flamed. She placed her cool hand against one. “Uh… I guess so.”
He straightened up, took a step forward, uncrossed his arms, then slid his hand up her neck into her hair, cradling her head to pull her within a hair’s breadth of his lips. “It might be late, depending if I get any emergency calls.”
Mal couldn’t think with him this close. She desperately wanted to close the gap to kiss him. She wanted to feel his lips against hers. It had been a while since she’d had any intimacy and she missed it.
But even more, now that her Cow-Boy stood within an inch of her, she realized how much she missed him. How much she missed them.
The Cow-Boy and his Princess.
“Well?” he murmured.
“Well what?” she whispered back.
Bray closed the slight gap between them and he kissed her, taking control of her lips. His tongue parted them to explore the inside of her mouth. He tasted like a mixture of mint and coffee. He tilted his head to seal his lips tighter over hers and she groaned. Wrapping an arm around her back, he pulled her tightly against him. His hard arousal pressed against her belly.
The desire between them still existed as if she’d never left. As if fourteen years hadn’t passed, and they were back sneaking around in barn lofts. But that was silly. They were adults now. Both had married others. Proof they had both let go of their teenage crush.
He broke the kiss and leaned back, his breath slightly ragged as he stared at her in silence. He blinked once, twice, and then she wrapped her arms around his neck and tugged him close once again. She leaned her face against his chest, the rapid thumping of his heart pounding under her cheek.
Tears stung her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. She had done enough crying today over her pop. Being back in Bray’s arms was not a sad occasion, but a happy reunion.
Maybe it wouldn’t go any farther than this parking lot kiss. They had both changed in fourteen years. They didn’t even know each other anymore.
But she was willing to see him again, no matter what. “I’ll be there,” she said.
“I’ll call the house if I’m going to be too late.”
She nodded and turned toward her car.
“Princess,” he called out as he reached his pickup truck door.
She looked over her shoulder.
“I’m glad you’re home.”
So am I.
Chapter 3
Mal strode quickly through the dark on the way from the barn to the house. She had done a last check of the dairy cows before turning in for the night. She looked at her watch. Nine p.m. and still no sign of Bray. When she got to the house she would check the old answering machine to see if he’d canceled.
The beam from headlights swept around the curve of the dirt lane, blinding her. She lifted her hand to protect her eyes from the glare.
Speak of the devil.
He pulled up next to her, stone crunching under the tires, and powered down his driver’s side window. “Hey.”
“Hey, yourself.”
“Sorry I’m late, I—”
She rolled her eyes. “I know, I know. You had some sort of livestock emergency.”
He chuckled softly. “And I went home to change and shower so I wouldn’t offend your senses.”
“Well, aren’t I a lucky girl? I’ll meet you on the porch.”
He parked closer to the house and waited by his truck. He drove one of those pickups with the truck bed insert a mobile vet would have, which made sense since it was most likely full of medicine and tools of the trade. She imagined he couldn’t be without it in case of an emergency call. The thing about being the only livestock vet in the county, you kept busy.
He followed her up the porch steps and into the house. “Wow,” he said, looking around. “I haven’t been in here in a long time. In fact, I’d say it’s been fourteen years.”
She remembered the last time he’d been in the house—the morning after her father caught them in the loft. He brought her a gift, what he called a promise necklace, similar to a promise ring. Inside the black box had been a necklace on a delicate chain, and the charm hanging from the gold chain spelled out Princess. But before she could put it on, her father came storming into the house to chase him off.
Mal had been afraid her pop was going to get his shotgun. But Bray dropped to his knees at his feet and begged Pop to let her marry him. Pleading to her stubborn father that she was “the one,” he promised to take care of her for the rest of his life.
Pop didn’t want to hear it. His face turned as red as it had the night before in the barn and he yelled about how he wanted something better for his daughter than for her to become a dairy farmer’s wife. He didn’t want her to wear an apron, pop out babies, and always have dirt under her fingernails and cow shit on her shoes.
She never forgot the way Bray’s face fell. It seriously broke her heart. She loved him and wanted nothing more than to become his wife.
“So, what happened here?” Bray asked as he entered what would have been called the parlor in the old days.
His question knocked her back into the present. This man was not the same boy who stumbled to his feet, tears in his eyes, as her father ran him out of the house.
Mal studied him in his well-worn Levi’s and flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up past his elbows. He kept his shirt neatly tucked in, and a wide leather belt cinched around his waist. And, of course, cowboy boots covered his feet. Because what else would he wear? At least one thing hadn’t changed.
“That’s all my stuff from my apartment. The movers delivered everything yesterday. I’m not sure what I’m going to do with it all.”
Boxes and the furniture she wanted to keep from her NYC loft filled the parlor from floor to ceiling.
He turned to face her, his face showing shock. “So wait… You’re back for good?”
“Uh huh.” She moved towards the tired-looking kitchen and he followed on her heels.
“What about your career?”
She heard that question one too many times. All her colleagues asked her the same. They meant well, mostly, but some thought her crazy to give up her
high-paying salary to go home to live on a dairy farm in Bum-fuck.
But she’d had enough. The city had been fun for a while. However, after a few years, it ended up wearing on her. As a stock broker, she had been in a cut-throat business. She worked long hours, ate like shit, and always had to be “on” to schmooze clients. She grew tired of the inequality of women in the business, as well as the constant sexual harassment. And sometimes, instead of going out for drinks with people she really didn’t want to hang out with, or sometimes didn’t even like, she wanted to go home and put on a worn flannel shirt, like Bray currently wore, to cuddle in bed and read a steamy romance.
Unfortunately, most times exhaustion prevented her from doing even that.
“I gave it up.”
“What are you going to do out here?”
“Run the farm.” Mal couldn’t miss the struggle on his face as he fought the shock of her decision.
“By yourself.” His tone clearly made it known that he didn’t believe she could do it.
“I’ve got the farm hands,” she reminded him.
His arms raised and dropped in frustration. “Maleen, one of them is a hundred years old!”
“Please don’t call me that. Willie isn’t a hundred, he’s only like seventy.”
“What the fuck, Mal. He might as well be a century old in the shape he’s in.”
“He just looks old. He’s in good shape for his age because he keeps active. He said he’ll curl up and die if he stops working.”
“Mal—”
She raised a hand, halting his words. “I’ve made my decision.”
He snagged her hand out of the air and held it gently. “Did you think this through?”
“You think I don’t know how much work is involved in running this farm?”
His lips flattened into a grim line. “Of course, you do. But—”
“But nothing.” She tugged her hand out of his hold and leaned back against the old Formica counter that badly needed replacing.
Made Maleen: A Modern Twist on a Fairy Tale Page 2
