Curvy Girls: Claimed By The Cowboy (The BBW and the Billionaire Rancher)

by Georgette St. Clair

  Becky looked across the street. “Who is that? She looks like she should be on a movie set.”

  “Isn’t that your sister-in-law, Cuntzilla?” Carlotta asked.

  “Carlotta! Seriously!” Becky gasped, smacking Carlotta’s hand. “Your children will come out of the womb cursing!”

  “Oh my God, that would make an awesome Youtube video! It would totally go viral!” Carlotta smiled at the thought.

  “Doesn’t it bother your husband that you swear like a sailor?”

  “He calls me up while he’s out on the road and tells me to talk dirty to him so he can spank the monkey in the middle of his shift. Does that answer your question?”

  “Yes, but it raises another question. Where did the expression spank the monkey even come from? How exactly is spanking a monkey related to masturbation?” Becky’s forehead wrinkled in thought.

  “Word nerd,” Carlotta snorted.

  “Sewer mouth,” Becky said, with no real animosity.

  Abigail glanced across the street at Ludmilla, who was wearing a figure-hugging red halter dress and red espadrilles. She stood out among the tourist families like a strange exotic beast, gliding gracefully down the boardwalk.

  Ludmilla glanced at a woman walking by holding her little girl’s hand, with an odd expression on her face, staring after them as they went into a clothing store.

  “I bet she hates kids,” Betsy said.

  “Can you imagine her ruining that figure getting pregnant? Ha,” Carlotta snorted.

  Ludmilla looked around cautiously, then disappeared down a narrow alleyway between two buildings.

  Curious, Abigail stood up. “What is she up to? I’ll be right back.”

  She crossed the street quickly, only to see Ludmilla stuffing her cell phone in her purse and striding back out of the alley, blinking back tears.

  Odd.

  “Who were you calling?” Abigail asked.

  Ludmilla started, then backed away from her. “I wasn’t calling anyone.”

  “Oh. Okay.” Abigail paused for a minute. “Just for the record, if you have a lover, if you’re cheating on Clayton...nobody on the planet would blame you.”

  Ludmilla stared at her for a second, her beautiful face a mask of misery, and then turned and walked away without saying a word.

  After lunch, Abigail limped back to the newspaper to work on her column.

  “What exactly happened to you?” Dylan asked.

  “I tripped over a gopher hole and turned my ankle,” Abigail said with dignity. Becky, whose cubicle was spitting distance from them, swallowed her coffee wrong and had a coughing fit which sounded suspiciously like hysterical laughter, and Abigail shot her a dirty look and turned back to her computer so she could finish editing the pictures she’d taken of the hot sulphur springs on the Jackson ranch.

  The Jackson ranch. But she was a Jackson now. So it was her ranch too.

  No matter how hard she tried, it was a real struggle for her to think of herself as Ty’s wife. She frequently felt like she was living in a dream world, and she’d wake up back in the house she’d grown up in, with no-one by her side.

  “Hey, I’m supposed to ask you…any news on the trustees decision?”Becky called out when she stopped wheezing.

  “No, but I think that it’s got to be pretty obvious to Winston that Ty and I are legitimately married.” She hoped that was the case, anyway. She did her best to be as physically affectionate with Ty as possible whenever Winston was around, and if there was one thing that she knew that neither she nor Ty were faking, it was their intense attraction to each other.

  As for Ty’s feelings for her, and her feelings for him…she was still struggling with that. Struggling to find the truth, to trust him. And herself.

  “Developers are still sniffing around, talking to the building inspector. They seem to think they’re going to get the go-ahead.”

  “No way, Jose,” Abigail said firmly.

  She turned back to Dylan. “Everything okay with you? You’re awfully quiet these days.”

  He shrugged, concentrating on the screen in front of him. “I’m fine. Cheyenne and I decided to hang out just as friends. Movie buddies. Coffeeshop buddies. That kind of thing. We go on hikes. She knows a lot of good spots for taking bird pictures.”

  “So, how’s that working out?”

  “Sucks. But what can you do? I guess she’s going to marry Franklin and move to Connecticut with him,” Dylan said glumly.

  “I’m sorry. She’s picking the wrong guy.”

  “Is she?” Dylan sighed, leaning back in his chair. “It’s hard to compete with an Ivy League trust fund brat with a classic Porsche.”

  “Which he hardly ever takes her anywhere in. I don’t like him.”

  “Me either. And all of my pictures suck,” Dylan grumbled, turning off the computer. “I’m going to go take a walk. Want to join me?”

  Abigail considered her sore, throbbing butt. “Maybe some other time,” she said, and hearing Becky choke back a laugh, shot her friend another dirty look before adding “But let’s get some good bird shots this Saturday. I know a spot where you can get the best view of a bald eagle nest. You can come out to the ranch for lunch and we’ll go riding.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Sergio Graniti sat on the back porch with Clayton and Ludmilla and Winston, leaning back on his rocking chair and admiring the stunning tableau of nature in front of him. Cowboys on horses trotting across endless miles of rolling green hills, a sky as blue and clear as the ocean, and not a cell phone tower or utility pole in sight.

  He’d flown out to get a first hand look at the ranch, and to find out what was holding up the plans for development. Clayton was boiling with frustration; Ty’s attempts to get in his way were ridiculous. And so was the notion that he actually really cared about Abigail…even if he was putting on a good act for Winston.

  Sergio was a big man, an Italian from New York with rumored mob connections. He wore a pin-striped suit with a folded silk handkerchief in the pocket, and a Rolex watch on this thick wrist. His wavy black hair, shot through with gray, was carefully gelled into place.

  “Look at that view,” Sergio said, shaking his head in admiration. “You don’t get views like that in New York.”

  Yes, because it’s New York, you idiot, Clayton thought irritably, but kept his thoughts to himself. He needed Graniti on his side.

  “It sure would be a shame to ruin that view with buildings and electric poles and asphalt, wouldn’t it?”

  Clayton started. Abigail had walked up behind him, carrying plates of hot apple pie with scoops of ice cream sprinkled with cinnamon.

  “My mother made this,” she added, setting a plate on the round wooden table by Clayton and Graniti and Winston. “Ice cream’s homemade, too.”

  She didn’t bother offering any to Ludmilla, who was ignoring the small bowl of apple slices next to her, and taking small, delicate sips of mineral water with an expression of bored indifference.

  Sergio’s face lit up and he grabbed the plate.

  “Homemade apple pie and ice cream? Now there’s some good old fashioned Western hospitality, eh, Clayton?” His New York accent was thick enough to slice with a knife.

  “What did you do, season it with cyanide?” Clayton asked Abigail sullenly. No matter how much he and Ludmilla tried to needle her, she refused to take the bait, and it was really starting to piss him off.

  “You don’t want yours? I’ll take it,” Graniti said, pulling Clayton’s plate closer to him. “You got some coffee to go with that?”

  “Of course. I forgot my manners,” Abigail smiled winningly. “Cream and sugar?”

  “That’d be great, thanks,” Graniti said, digging in enthusiastically.

  “I’ll help you carry it. That’s some good ice cream; your mother should open a franchise,” Winston said, pushing his chair back. His lean frame was starting to fill out, Abigail realized. Her mother’s cooking would do that to anybody.

 
Graniti watched Abigail walk away, his gaze sweeping approvingly over her full figure. “Now there’s a real woman. She’s got child-bearing hips. Knows how to cook. Not all skin and bones. Too bad she’s already spoken for. My ma would love her.”

  “She’s not already taken. I told you, it’s a fake marriage, and I’m going to prove it,” Clayton snapped.

  “Naaahhh.” Graniti and Clayton watched as Ty walked through the kitchen, flung his arms around Abigail, and planted a passionate, lingering kiss on her mouth. When Abigail walked away, he swatted her generously-sized rear end affectionately.

  “There’s no fakin’ that,” Graniti said, a note of real envy in his voice.

  Clayton leaned back in his chair and groaned quietly. Whose side was Graniti on, anyway?

  Ludmilla shot him a look of sympathy, but he ignored her, turning his chair to face Graniti, and forced a smile on his face.

  “Let’s go over those plans again,” he said, through clenched teeth.

  * * *

  Two weeks later…

  Cheyenne was getting antsy about when Franklin would pop the question but she thought maybe he was waiting until the ring was designed. That had to be it.

  She and Carlotta still weren’t speaking. Betsy was trying to play peacemaker between the two of them, with no luck.

  Dylan was depressed and moping around the office, but hanging in there and playing the part of a good friend to Cheyenne.

  Ruby was up and around on crutches, and they were in an apple orchard near the house, gathering apples.

  It was 90 degrees out, and Ty had taken a break to meet them at the apple orchard. He’d had spent the last several days working with the ranch hands, mending fences, tuning up the hay baling and swathing equipment, getting ready for the first cut of hay. He came back to the house every night dirty and tired and sweaty, and Abigail had never seen him happier. He was exactly where he belonged, and so was she.

  Graniti, tired of waiting for a decision on the development project, had flown back to New York and taken his team with him. Clayton and Ludmilla spent most of their days in town, or taking day trips to Denver and returning with shopping bags full of clothing and shoes and purses. They ate dinner separately from Abigail and Ty and did everything possible to ignore them.

  Abigail turned to Winston, who was holding a half filled basket of apples. “Winston, you said you were going to report back to the trustees in a few weeks. I think it’s pretty clear now that Ty and I are legitimately married, and there’s no question that we married first. A lot of people in town keep asking about the development, and I’d like to be able to put their mind at rest.”

  “Oh,” Winston said, surprised, wiping sweat from his forehead with the sleeve of his arm. “You’re right. Fair enough. I’ve known pretty early on that you and Ty were the real thing; I guess I just liked being here. Gets lonely on the farm by myself, you know.” His eyes strayed to Ruby, holding an apple up in the sunlight, inspecting it critically, and then setting it in her basket.

  “You like what here, exactly?” Abigail asked, the light suddenly dawning. Her mother had actually looked happy in recent days. Peaceful. The haunted look that glazed her eyes since the death of Abigail’s father was gone. She smiled easily and laughed freely, usually at something that Winston had said to her.

  “You know, my wife made the best apple pies,” Winston said, a faraway look in his eyes. “When she died, I never thought I’d enjoy a homemade apple pie again.”

  “Are we talking about apple pie?” Ty asked, an amused smile twitching his mouth.

  “Are we talking about my mother?” Abigail gasped, mortified. “I am going back to the house to fetch us some lemonade. If you’ll excuse me.” She turned and stomped off, but then she glanced back at Winston.

  “We enjoy having you here, Winston. Stay as long as you like,” she called out, and headed back to the house, desperately trying to scrub images of Winston and her mother from her brain. Ewwww! They were both in their sixties! Was that even legal? Was that even physically possible? Good God, her friends were going to have a field day with this when they found out.

  As if sensing her thoughts, her cell phone rang with the ring tone she’d set for Carlotta, and she grabbed it from her pocket.

  “Houston, we have a problem. Come meet me at the Daily Grind immediately,” Carlotta said.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Becky and Carlotta were waiting for Abigail outside the Daily Grind when she pulled up.

  Carlotta’s arms were folded, resting on the growing planet of her stomach, and she was clearly furious.

  “What’s up?” Abigail demanded.

  “That fucking douchebag. I’d like to rip his balls off,” Carlotta hissed. For once, Becky didn’t look mortified at Carlotta’s language; she actually nodded in agreement, and alarm bells went off in Abigail’s head.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Well, Becky called Cheyenne and asked her to go out to lunch with us so we could clear the air. She’s supposed to come out and meet us out here. I mean, I guess we could call and cancel, we could tell her we’ll just eat lunch with her inside the Saloon so she doesn’t have to come out here and see this…”

  “See what?” Dylan rushed up, out of breath. “What’s the emergency?’

  Cheyenne walked out of the Dry Gulch Saloon, in animated conversation with Edna Vale. Edna wore a pink velour track suit and neon pink running shoes, and walked with a cane, which meant her arthritis was bothering her. Cheyenne looked like she should be posing for the cover of Hot Cowgirls Monthly, in her denim halter top, jeans and black cowboy boots with white inlays. Her blonde hair was pulled back in a messy ponytail, and her sparkly blue eyeshadow echoed the blue of her eyes.

  “Connecticut? Really, dear? That’s a big step.” Edna leaned on her cane and pushed her glasses up higher on her nose, looking concerned.

  Becky inclined her head at the young couple who were walking down the boardwalk towards them.

  Franklin was holding the hand of a slim, refined looking brunette who looked as if she wore a lot of tweed in the winter months. She wore cateye glasses and no makeup at all, and her hair was pulled back in a bun. She had a long elegant nose and a little pink rosebud mouth and tiny pearl stud earrings.

  Franklin stopped dead when he saw Cheyenne and her friends, and tugged on his girlfriend’s hand, trying to lead her away. His girlfriend, irritated, yanked her hand away, turning to stare at the group of people who were staring at her.

  Cheyenne’s jaw dropped.

  Franklin desperately turned to Abigail. “Abby, right?” he said, with a frantic attempt to sound bright and cheerful.

  “That’s Abigail, to you. Only my friends get to call me Abby. Who’s she?” she said stonily, nodding her head at the woman who was with Franklin.

  “This is my girlfriend, Virginia! She flew in to town to surprise me for my birthday. What a great surprise, huh, Abby?” he nodded enthusiastically, his eyes huge.

  “Not for everyone,” Abigail snapped. “Like, say, your other girlfriend. You have anything you want to say to Cheyenne?”

  The brunette took a step back away from him. “Franklin? What is going on here?”

  “Girlfriend? Don’t be ridiculous!” Franklin’s smile was frozen on his face. “I don’t know what they’re talking about. I don’t even know that woman. Let’s get going-“

  “You don’t know me?” Cheyenne’s face was bleak. “How do I know that you’ve got a mole on your right testicle?”

  “Yes, Franklin, how does she know that?” Virginia stepped back further away from him.

  “Okay, fine! I got drunk and had a one night stand with her! It meant nothing! Everyone sleeps with her! She’s the town whore!”

  In a blur of motion, Dylan’s fist shot out and connected with Franklin’s jaw, sending him reeling into a row of bushes.

  Cheyenne’s eyes were bright with tears, and she blinked hard. Abigail felt as if a giant hand was squeezing her heart.
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  Franklin scrambled to his feet, spluttering with rage, and the second he was back on his feet, two things happened.

  His girlfriend hauled off and landed a stinging slap on his cheek, and then Edna Vale lashed out with her cane, tripping him and sending him sprawling again.

  “How dare you use the term ‘whore’? What is this, the 1950s? I am majoring in feminist studies, you…you disgusting sexist pig! I am writing my dissertation on how language is used to objectify and demean women, and you dare use a word like that in front of me?” Virginia hissed, and turned on her heel, walking away.

  “Virginia, wait! I’m having a wedding ring designed for you! I even picked a woman artist! It’s a beautiful ring, it’s as unique as you are…Virginia, I want to marry you!” Franklin wailed, as she stomped off.

  She turned back to skewer him with an icy glare. “You know how I feel about marriage! Marriage is a patriarchal institution designed to oppress women! I can’t believe I ever considered you as a potential lifetime partner!” she snapped, and stalked off.

  Cheyenne, face drained of all color, turned and rushed back into the Dry Gulch saloon, head hung low.

  Franklin tried to follow Virginia, only to find his path blocked by Edna Vale.

  “She may be a tramp, but she’s our tramp. By the way, it’s a shame that you’re getting kicked out of your cabin today. I wonder where you’ll sleep tonight.”

  “I’m not getting kicked out of my cabin, you crazy old bat! I paid for the whole summer!”

  “I’m sure you’ll find a refund on top of the pile of your belongings by the roadside. My great-nephew owns it; believe me, you’re evicted.”

  “Fine,” Franklin said, face flushing with rage. “I’ll stay at the hotel in town.”

  “My aunt and uncle own it. No, you won’t,” Becky said coldly.

  “I’ve got money. I will find a place to stay here.” Franklin snapped.

  “Trust me on this,” Carlotta said, fists clenched. “Once you piss off Edna Vale, you really don’t want to set foot in Crooked Creek again. Her family helped found this town, and she’s related by blood or marriage to more than half the population. You won’t find a merchant that’s going to sell you food. You won’t want to drive a mile over the speed limit. Or a mile under the speed limit. You wouldn’t want to eat a dish that’s been prepared by any restaurant in this town; you won’t know what might have been added to it in the kitchen.”