Short-Order Sheriff (River's End Ranch Book 1)

by Kirsten Osbourne

She shrugged. “Let’s just go. Less chance of running into any of my family members that way.”

  “I heard that!” Kelsi turned, immediately recognizing Will’s voice. “Must you always be difficult?”

  “See any signs of Bigfoot?” Will asked.

  “We did! There were several perfect impressions of his foot! It was amazing!” Kelsi’s voice was filled with excitement.

  “Really?” Will asked, wide-eyed. “How do you know it was him?”

  “Because even your feet aren’t that big!” Kelsi told him. “And your feet need to be chopped off at the toes to be considered normal-sized!”

  Will shook his head. “Not all of us can be teeny-tiny little creatures who would do well working to build toys for Santa.”

  Kelsi wrinkled her nose. “I’m not an elf, I’m just the perfect size. Ask Shane.”

  “Everything about her is perfect from what I can see,” Shane answered honestly. “I wouldn’t change a single thing about her.”

  “There are days when you make me want to vomit, Sheriff. This is one of them.” Will winked at his sister and walked away.

  Kelsi unlocked the door to her truck and climbed up via the little step Will had installed when she bought it, laughing at her the whole while. “Where are we going?” she asked, hoping Shane wanted to go further than Riston. She would only run into people she knew there, and she was tired of her every move being reported back to her mother.

  “Let’s go to Post Falls. I want something different.”

  Kelsi grinned, feeling like he could read her mind at times. She pulled out of the parking lot and onto the drive that led to the highway. “I love driving!”

  “I know. I remember having to pull you over a couple of times when you were still a teenager because of your lead foot.”

  “You’re not supposed to remember that. You’re supposed to see me and only think of how wonderful I am…not about the way I drove when I was a teenager.” She pulled out onto the highway, heading toward Post Falls. “Where do you want to eat?”

  “I dunno. They have that steak place there. That sound good?”

  “Sure, why not?” They’d been driving for about ten minutes when her phone rang, and she frowned. “Answer that and put it on speaker for me, please.” She pulled it from her pocket and gave it to him.

  “It’s your mom.”

  “Oh, yay. I haven’t heard from her about how I need to marry Bobby yet today.”

  He frowned, hating the idea of her being pressured to marry someone else. He wanted her to be pressured to marry him. Swiping his finger across the screen, he tapped the speaker phone button.

  “Hello?” Kelsi said.

  “Hi. I heard you spent all day with the sheriff again. When are you going to get over your need to find Bigfoot?”

  “Hi, Mom, I love you too! You’re on speaker phone, and I’m still with Shane.”

  “Hi, Sheriff. I hope you know that you’re not the right man for my daughter. You’ll have to stop dating her in about ten days when Bobby gets back to Idaho.”

  “I’m not going to date Bobby, Mom.”

  “Are you still holding a grudge against him for the reptile-thing?” her mother asked. “It’s about time you forgot about that.”

  “It’s not the reptile-thing. It’s the I-don’t-know-him-thing. And I kind of have a ‘thing’ for the sheriff.” She stopped at a four-way stop, and reached over to squeeze his hand before driving again.

  “You just started dating the sheriff. I’m sure you’re not that attached yet.”

  “What if I’m that attached to her, Mrs. Weston? What about my heart breaking into a million tiny little pieces because Bobby is coming back to town?” Shane couldn’t stay silent for another minute. If Kelsi was receiving similar calls every day, no wonder she was confused.

  “You’ll get over her. She’s practically engaged to Bobby.”

  “Mom, I’m not ‘practically engaged to Bobby.’ I have feelings for Shane.” What those feelings were was something she had yet to explore, but there was something there.

  “Feelings and being in love are two different things. Can either of you honestly say you love the other?”

  Kelsi felt put on the spot, and she frowned. “I can’t tell you I love him before I tell him,” she finally said, needing an escape from the question.

  “I can say it honestly. I love Kelsi. I’ve had my eye on her for years and I’m glad she and Donn The Disgusting finally broke up.”

  Kelsi felt her lips quirk at the new name for Donn. “See, Mom? You have to quit pushing Bobby at me.”

  “Fine. I won’t say anything else about it right now.”

  Kelsi sighed, knowing she’d hear a lot more about it later. “Okay, Mom.”

  “Have a good time with the sheriff. You two should do something fun so you can have some memories together before you split up.”

  “Mom, you said you’d stop!”

  When there was no response, Shane looked at her phone. “She ended the call.”

  “Of course she did. She makes me crazy sometimes!” Kelsi shook her head. “Don’t listen to her. I can date whoever I want, when I want.”

  Shane frowned. “She’s not going to let up, is she?”

  “Not unless I break up with you and date Bobby, but that’s not happening.” Break up? Had they ever decided they were exclusive? The idea of him dating someone else wasn’t a pleasant one.

  “So let’s get married instead. I think that’s where we’re headed. Why waste time? Especially if your mom is going to be like that. I think it makes sense for us to just get it over with.”

  “Did you just ask me to marry you with the words ‘get it over with’ involved? Because that’s not quite as romantic as I would like a proposal to be.”

  He groaned. “I guess I did. What a jerk I am. I’ll do better next time.”

  “Next time?” She pulled into the parking lot of the restaurant he’d suggested and shut off the truck. “There’s going to be a next time?”

  “I’m going to keep asking over and over until you agree to marry me. I haven’t made that clear yet?”

  She sighed. “You’re going to make this difficult, aren’t you?”

  He shrugged. “Not if you say yes. Just think, your mom would never suggest you divorce me to marry Bobby. She’d be off your back, and he’d never be a problem again.” His voice was intense. He wasn’t offering to keep her from being with Bobby. He really wanted to marry her.

  “I can’t marry you to avoid Bobby Blakely!”

  “You could. You just won’t.” Shane shook his head. He’d find another way. He knew he could. He had to.

  Chapter Five

  Kelsi frowned as she watched Shane study his menu. He ignored her until he’d decided what he wanted to eat, and then he put the menu down on the table between them. “Yes?” She didn’t usually openly stare the way she was.

  “Why do you think you want to marry me?”

  “I know I want to marry you.”

  Kelsi sighed. “But why?”

  “I didn’t really know the difference between you and your sister until about four years ago. I knew one of you had shorter, darker hair, and that was about it. You were just ‘the Weston girls’ in my head. I went to the café for lunch just about every day, but I didn’t know which of you was serving me. I honestly didn’t care much.” He shrugged. “So one day when I got there, there was a waitress in tears. The place was busy, hopping with people, and someone had said something rude to her.”

  “People tend to be rude to waitresses. They think that we’re too stupid to do anything but wait tables. I get a little more respect, because I’m the manager of the café, but it can be really bad.” She hated that people didn’t seem to understand that all jobs were needed in the world. If there was no one to scrub toilets, the world would fall apart faster than if there was no one to discover a new medical breakthrough.

  “You had heard the whole thing, and you marched straight over to the table,
put your arm around the waitress’s shoulders, and told him he could treat people with respect or he could get out. You went on to tell him that his waitress was special. She was working her way through school with no help from her parents. She was one of the most intelligent people you’d ever met.” He shook his head. “Most people I know would have just told her to shake it off and brushed it under the rug for fear of losing a customer. Not you. I was really impressed with that, and I asked one of the other diners which twin you were.”

  “And you’ve known who I am every day since then? Interesting. Doesn’t tell me why you think you want to marry me, though.” Kelsi couldn’t figure him out. He was a good-looking sheriff in a tiny little town. She saw the way the groups of women who came in looked at him. He never paid a bit of attention to anyone, other than in a professional way of course. Why her?

  “Because you’re special. I don’t think you know how special.” He shook his head. “I can’t explain it, but you’re not only beautiful, and smart, but you care about people. More than you care about money. That’s important to me.”

  She shrugged. She’d never needed to care about money too much, because her family had always had it. It was Wade’s job to make sure the ranch was making money overall, and the café was such a small piece of it. “I guess that makes sense. And you still think I’m smart? Even though you know I go Bigfoot hunting every chance I get?”

  He grinned. “I think Bigfoot hunting makes you even more special. You believe in something almost magical, and you refuse to let others convince you it can’t be. You take your brother’s jokes in stride.” He joined hands with her in the middle of the table. “You even kept dating Donn The Dimwit.”

  “Why is dating Donn points in my favor?” she asked, truly curious and a bit impressed that he kept finding D-word insults for her ex. She wondered if he was poring over the dictionary for new ones every night, or if they just came to him like magic words, raining down from the heavens?

  “Because even though you knew you weren’t in love with him, you never gave up. If you were married, you’d never ever give up on the relationship. You’d just keep trying. Don’t you think that’s a good quality in a spouse?”

  Kelsi tilted her head to one side, considering. “Yeah, it probably is.” She looked down at their joined hands on top of the table. “I can’t marry someone I’ve been dating less than a week.” As much as she wanted to please him, it just didn’t make sense. Sure, she’d known him for years, but she’d only kissed him for the first time a few days before. It had been an incredible kiss, but she still wasn’t convinced.

  “Why not? Your mom wants you to marry someone you haven’t seen in over ten years. Marry me instead. I promise, I will make you happy!” He felt like time was running out for him with Bobby on the way. Maybe he was being over-dramatic, but her mother was a force to be reckoned with, and he’d rather make her wish impossible before she ever got home to ruin it all.

  “You can’t guarantee happiness.” Kelsi shook her head. “I’ve watched my parents and grandparents over the years. When Grandma Kelsey died, Granddad Wilfred only lasted a month without her. It was like he no longer cared to live for another minute after she was gone from his life. He became old overnight. That’s what I want in a marriage. I want a man who will still be bringing me flowers after fifty years because he knows they make me smile.” And who will still put his hand on the side of my face like he treasures me whenever he kisses me. I want him to not be able to survive without me.

  “I would do that, you know.”

  She sighed. “Maybe you would, but how can I know that? How can I know exactly what you’re like when we’ve only dated for five days?”

  “Think about it. What did you do the last time I didn’t come to the café for lunch?”

  “I called the sheriff’s office to make sure you were still alive. I was sure you’d been in some kind of shoot-out and had died or something!” It had been a scary day when his favorite booth had remained empty. Even the guests told each other to keep that booth open for the sheriff.

  “So you called the sheriff’s office, and when you heard I was out sick with the flu, you had a delivery of chicken soup sent to my house every single day until I came into the café again. You didn’t even know where I lived, and you made that happen for me!”

  “Everyone else knew where you lived. What does my doing that say about you, though? How does that tell me you’ll bring me flowers?”

  “Kelsi, I’m there in the café every single day to see you. I could make my own lunch. I could even take leftovers of what I cooked the night before like all my men do. Instead, I’m at the café every day so I can watch you. So I can talk to you. Do you know the other waitresses have been ignoring me for years? I walk in and they don’t bother to even greet me. They all know you’re supposed to do that.”

  “But—I never told them to do that!” She was baffled and already planning to have a talk with her staff. They shouldn’t be ignoring any of the customers who came in there to eat. Ever.

  “Of course, you didn’t. They told each other. They saw the way I watched you, and they wanted to see you with a man who was worthy of you, and not that idiot who just left the most amazing woman in the world behind so he could go and make cotton candy for people walking around with mouse ears on their heads!”

  “Hey! I happen to like wearing mouse ears on my head!” Was he insulting Disney? Because if he was, they’d have to have a talk.

  “Then we’ll wear bride and groom mouse ears for our wedding. I don’t care!” Shane took a deep breath, wishing he could explain how he was feeling better. “I will be true to you every day of our lives. I want to marry you and have children with you and grow old with you.”

  Kelsi bit her lip. “I don’t know what I feel. And I’m a wreck in relationships. Why would you marry me knowing I might get bored of you in a week?” She didn’t think she could ever get bored of a man like him, but if she did, it would ruin both of their lives if they were already married.

  “Because I won’t let you get bored of me. It doesn’t matter if you love me now. I know you’ll love me eventually, because I won’t let you do anything else.”

  “Confident in yourself, aren’t you?”

  “Confident in the fact that we’re meant to be together. I want to be married to you before Bobby gets here. You don’t need to have that kind of pressure from your mother. You need to be my wife instead.”

  She blinked. “So you not only want to get married, you want to get married before next week?”

  “Saturday would be good.” He leaned forward, his mouth close to her ear. “I’ll even order the mouse ears for the wedding tomorrow.”

  She smiled at that. “What if I don’t want mouse ears? What if I want you to dress up as the Beast, while I dress up as Belle? What if I don’t want just any other Disney wedding, and instead I want a Beauty and the Beast wedding? She is my favorite princess, you know!”

  He frowned but nodded. “Then I’ll dress up as the Beast. I don’t care what either of us wear. I want to marry you.”

  “Let me think about it. Maybe Mom will back off, and then we can take the time to get to know each other like normal people, instead of acting like we’re in a bad romance novel!”

  “Okay. You think. Let me know when you’ve thought long enough.”

  “I will!”

  The waitress came by to take their orders, and Kelsi watched Shane’s face. She’d always loved how open and attentive he’d been when she’d taken his orders. It was always obvious she was more than just someone bringing a meal to him. He saw her as a person.

  The look was there with this waitress, but it wasn’t the same. He wasn’t as friendly or open with her. He was still attentive, seeing the waitress as a real human being, but he wasn’t as—caring, maybe? She didn’t have the right word for what was missing, but she wished she did.

  After the waitress walked off, she toyed with Shane's hand still holding hers. “Tell me s
omething. You were always the most attentive customer in the café. You asked me how my day was. If I sat down in the booth across from you, it was not unusual. You invited me to do it. I saw a bit of that on your face with the waitress just now, but not as much as you've ever showed me.”

  He nodded. “Yeah, that’s because she’s a person, and I will treat everyone equally, always. What she’s not, is you. I knew four years ago that I wanted to marry you. The whole town knew I wanted to marry you. That’s what you were seeing.”

  She frowned, looking down at their joined hands. “And you don’t hate me for not realizing?”

  “Why would I hate you for that? You were too engrossed in your relationship with Donald Duck to notice me.”

  “Donald Duck? Did you run out of Donn The D-word names?” she asked, giggling despite herself.

  He shrugged. “I can’t use all of the good names for him so quick. I’ll run out, and where will that leave me?”

  As they ate, he noticed she pulled out a small can of Cajun seasoning to sprinkle on her food. “You really do carry a can of that stuff!”

  “I told you I did,” she said, taking a bite of the potato she’d just heavily sprinkled the seasoning on. “Did you think I was lying?”

  “I guess not…I was just surprised. I thought you were joking.”

  “I never joke about spicy foods. Never. You need to learn that now if our relationship is going to go anywhere, Sheriff.”

  “I’ll never question your loyalty to spice again.”

  “See that you don’t!”

  Before dinner was over, she’d ignored phone calls from two of her brothers and her cousin, Jess. As soon as they stepped outside, she pulled her phone from her pocket, chilly from the evening air. “I have to figure out why everyone is calling me,” she told Shane.

  She called Will back, knowing her brother wouldn’t have called her while she was on a date unless he considered it important. The others probably knew she was out with Shane, but Will definitely did. “What’s going on? Someone sick?”

  “I called to warn you. Mom is determined you’re going to marry little Bobby Blakely. She called me to make sure that I encourage you to date Bobby and not the sheriff. She thinks the sheriff is too old for you and has bad breath.”