Contracted Cowboy (Quinn Valley Ranch Book 5)

by Liz Isaacson

  “So no skiing or sledding or anything.”

  She laughed and reached over to take his hand in hers. “I’m not sure if you know how old I am, Logan. No way I can get up and down on an inner tube and slide down a mountain. That’s called insanity, and that’s why little children do it.” She giggled again, and Logan couldn’t help joining in.

  “Point taken.”

  “What about you? You enjoy winter sports?”

  “Not really,” he said. “It makes for a muddy construction site and not many jobs in the ranching world.”

  “And yet, we live in Idaho, where it snows for like, half the year.” She shook her head, still chuckling.

  “And we think children are insane,” he said. “But I’d go ice skating with you.”

  “Yeah?” She glanced at him again. “I think I’d like that.”

  The rest of the drive was filled with easy talk about the family tree cutting ceremony, which he would be attending, of course. The Customer Appreciation event at the hot springs in December, where he volunteered every year. And how she really wanted a dog of her own.

  Then they walked around a teeny tiny cookie store and put bag after bag of gingerbread men in their cart. Then a few more bags of sandwich cookies with chocolate in the middle. Some with mint. They probably had fifty bags of cookies by the time she declared they were done.

  “What do we do with all of these?” he asked. He realized he’d said “we” as if he was part of her family holiday traditions, but the truth couldn’t be more different.

  “These are for the tree cutting,” she said. “We serve tea, coffee, and hot chocolate with the cookies once we get back to the ranch. Then we all decorate the tree in the homestead, and go over to my grandparent’s place, and decorate a smaller one there.”

  “That sounds nice,” he said.

  “It is nice,” she agreed.

  “So maybe you don’t hate your family traditions.”

  “No,” she said slowly as she started loading the cookies up onto the check-out counter. “I guess I don’t.”

  “At least you have them,” he said, helping her put the bags up where the cashier could see them.

  “You don’t have family traditions?” she asked.

  “I mean, one or two. Stuff like putting up the tree the day after Thanksgiving. And opening a pair of pajamas on Christmas Eve. Of course, my family is much smaller than yours.”

  “Well, everyone’s is,” she said with a smile. She didn’t seem like she cared that he was tradition-less, but Logan felt like he hadn’t really started experiencing life until he’d met Georgia.

  Another week passed, and Logan couldn’t wait to see Georgia again. He’d kissed her outside his house again before she’d taken herself, her car, and all those cookies back to the ranch. But he hadn’t seen her that week at all, because he’d been working on a construction crew that started at dawn and worked until dusk.

  He was tired and muddy by the time he got home, and all he could do was throw the ball for the dogs a few times before hurrying in out of the cold and stumbling into the shower.

  The force of texting was strong between them, but he wanted to see her. Hold her hand. Kiss her, kiss her, kiss her.

  This Saturday, though, she was baking pies with her sisters, aunts, and cousins, and no one else was bringing a boyfriend. Or a male at all. So he’d been uninvited from the all-female pie baking marathon, but he could still show up at the ranch.

  Knox would be out there working in the stables, and Logan had decided to tag along. He tossed his ice skates in the back of Knox’s truck and climbed in the passenger side.

  “Ready?” he asked.

  “Yep.”

  Knox was one of those slow drivers, so it took almost a half an hour to get out to the ranch. He kept the radio on the country station, which satisfied Logan, and he hadn’t said anything about Georgia or the paid boyfriend gig in over a week.

  “Seeing Georgia today?” he asked as he pulled under the Quinn Valley Ranch sign.

  “Yes,” Logan said. “And you should know that she’s not paying me anymore.”

  “Yeah, I figured,” he said. “You ripped up those other checks, and I might have seen you kiss her last weekend.”

  Logan’s pulse jumped over itself, but he wasn’t embarrassed. “For the record, she kissed me first.”

  “So that wasn’t the first time.” Knox chuckled. “Nice, Logan.”

  “What? It’s a mutual thing. She likes me, hard as that might be to believe.”

  “It’s not hard to believe,” Knox said, looking at him and not the road. “Why would that be hard for me to believe?”

  “Nothing,” Logan said, though his answer didn’t really fit the question. His twin had always had more success with the girls, and Logan had always felt overshadowed. He’d never told Knox that—never told anyone—and he wasn’t going to start now.

  “I’ve got my eye on someone,” Knox said.

  “Oh, boy,” Logan said with a grin. “Is that all I get?”

  “Yes, because you’ll mess it up for me.”

  Logan watched his brother, who suddenly needed to study the parking spaces like there weren’t a dozen in front of the stables where he’d be working. “Where could you possibly have met a woman?” he asked. Knox worked on ranches, and they were primarily staffed by men. The brothers went to church together, but they’d never had any success with converting a woman there into a girlfriend.

  So who had caught his eye?

  He parked and got out of the truck—a little too quickly in Logan’s opinion—and went into the stable without waiting for his brother. All at once, Logan knew who it had to be.

  One of Georgia’s sisters. There were three of them out here, all single. So which one was it?

  He didn’t ask but tried to be as helpful as possible while Knox worked on the shoes for the horses in several of the stables. Hours later, Georgia finally joined them, a hint of cinnamon about her.

  “Hey, there,” he said with a smile. He drew her into his arms and faced his brother. “I’m going to go, okay?”

  “Yeah, go,” Knox said, hardly looking up. Logan couldn’t be sure, but he thought his twin’s face was a bit flushed, but that could’ve been from all the hammering.

  A dry snow fell outside, and Logan stopped by Knox’s truck to grab his skates. “How far is this pond?”

  “Oh, we’re not walking,” she said, nodding toward the ATV parked beside the truck. “It’s not far, but there’s way too much snow for that.”

  It had been dumping on Quinn Valley, and it was especially deep out here at the ranch, because they were higher in the hills.

  She got behind the wheel of the ATV, and Logan sat in the front seat this time. It almost seemed too cold to be outside, but they arrived at the pond and put on their skates. As soon as he got moving around a bit, his muscles warmed up.

  Georgia could skate much better than he could, and he fumbled around like it was the first time he’d put on blades. They laughed, the snow fell, and Logan wondered if he was falling in love with her the same way the flakes drifted to the ground.

  She glided toward him and grabbed onto his shoulders, giggling. “You’re not bad, cowboy.”

  “Are you kidding?” he asked with a chuckle. “I’m terrible.” But he sure did like holding her in his arms, their bodies creating a bubble of heat in the chilly atmosphere. He gazed down at her, tilting his head down to kiss her. He’d never been happier to have answered a help wanted ad.

  He hadn’t seen any weird Quinn family drama yet, but the biggest activities were still to come. Logan decided he didn’t care. If he had the opportunity to kiss Georgia, he could deal with a little drama.

  Chapter 9

  Georgia left the kitchen to Granny and Betsy, where they had a dozen other hands to help them get the Thanksgiving meal on the table.

  Or rather, tables, as the homestead didn’t have a big enough space for a single table that would seat every Quinn comi
ng to dinner. There were thirty people just with Granny and Gramps’s kids and grandkids, and the family was expanding seemingly every moment. Some Quinns had kids, like her cousin Heather, who hadn’t been seen in the Valley for years. Georgia had heard she was back, but she hadn’t seen her yet, and she didn’t think Heather would be at the meal that afternoon.

  She worked with Alyssa and Robyn, setting up tables in the dining room, the living room, and all the way to the piano near the front door. Then came the chairs, the silverware, the napkins, and all the glasses. It was seriously a lot of work to get ready to feed over forty people.

  “Now we head to Granny’s,” she said. They didn’t really go to Granny and Gramps’s, but to the last cabin in the row of four. Georgia had put tables there a couple of days ago, and now they just needed to be unfolded. “You’re okay to come, Alyssa?”

  “Yeah, Jeremiah’s out tossing that turkey around.” She rolled her eyes like the turkey toss was a bit dumb, and Georgia couldn’t agree more. They headed down the road to the cabin and she and her cousins started setting up the tables.

  “So, you and Logan seem to be getting along,” Alyssa said as she flipped out the legs on one folding table.

  “Yeah,” Georgia said with a smile, glad she didn’t have to pretend to like him, or worry about what she might not know about him.

  “I heard he didn’t date,” Robyn said.

  Georgia wasn’t sure what to say. “Well, he obviously does.”

  “After his last girlfriend—what was her name?” Robyn and Alyssa exchanged a look, and since they worked together so much, with many of Quinn Valley’s residents, they probably heard a lot more gossip around town than Georgia did.

  “Carol?” Alyssa guessed.

  “Caroline?” Robyn tried.

  “Something like that.” Alyssa helped lift the table, and Georgia had the strangest urge to toss it at her. “Anyway, I’d heard that when she left town, she took Logan’s heart with her. He hasn’t dated since, and it’s been years.”

  That didn’t really mesh with what he’d told her, but Georgia couldn’t let it bother her. Gossip was just that, and she’d rather rely on firsthand knowledge than what her cousins had heard years ago.

  Sure, it bothered her, but she focused on getting the gingerbread tables set up, the papers for names and numbers by the door, and that she’d make it back to the homestead before the turkey toss ended.

  Logan had come out for the festivities, and she wanted to be there when he came in. The men were still in the yard when she pulled up to the homestead, and relief ran through her. The homestead was warm inside—almost too warm—and she took a moment beside the front door to just breathe.

  The different branches of the family had already started to congregate in specific locations, and she saw a face she’d seen only once. The dark-haired woman sat next to Georgia’s cousin, Andrew, and Gramps, and she must be Andrew’s girlfriend. Georgia searched for the woman’s name in her memory, and finally just edged closer to the group until she heard Rachel.

  Rachel. Not that her cousin, Andrew, had mentioned his girlfriend’s name when she and Logan had bumped into them coming out of Fresh Brew. But now he’d brought her to a big family party. Good for him.

  Before she could go into the kitchen to see what Betsy needed from her, the front door banged open and all the men came in, including the youngest little man in the Quinn family, Alyssa’s son Jeremiah. The noise level doubled, and Georgia made a mental note of another thing she disliked about these huge family gatherings. Logan joined her, and she leaned into his touch, though it was absolutely freezing and her shiver had everything to do with temperature.

  Logan seemed to thrive on the noise in the homestead, and he grinned around at everyone. She wanted to ask him about his ex-girlfriend, and if it was true he’d given her his heart. Because if so, maybe he didn’t have it in him to love someone else.

  Georgia couldn’t believe she was even thinking about falling in love.

  She shook her head and focused on Jessie, who had started singing in her high soprano voice. Ivy, another Quinn cousin who worked at the downtown restaurant as a server and part-time entertainer, stepped beside her and added her voice to Jessie’s.

  The impromptu concert caught everyone’s attention, and even Georgia found herself smiling. “I bet your family isn’t crazy like this,” she said to Logan.

  “Georgia, this is so much better than what’s going on at my parents’.”

  “Really?”

  He looked at her. “I suppose you should come meet them. Then you’ll see. Thanksgiving is about eight people, because my uncle drives over from Lewiston. Sometimes we go there. He has one daughter, and once she got married, she only comes sometimes. So it’s a bunch of men sitting around, talking about potatoes and potato farming, while my mother and my aunt put together a few dishes.”

  He watched as a huge, flat pan of mashed potatoes went by. “This is great.”

  As Georgia looked around at her family, she felt the spirit of them. Experienced the love they had for each other, even if they didn’t always get along perfectly. The homestead was full of people, sure. Full of noise. Full of laughter, and love, and a touching spirit of goodness.

  Georgia put her arm around Logan’s waist and just held onto him, glad he’d helped her see what she’d been missing all this time.

  “Time to eat,” Betsy yelled, and Rhodes added an ear-splitting whistle to get everyone’s attention. He nodded at Betsy, who smiled back at him. “Welcome to the ranch,” she said. “Gramps wants to say something.”

  Their grandfather shuffled through the crowd until he stood beside the island, which was probably groaning under the weight of all the food piled on it. “Gingerbread houses must be in place by midnight tonight. The food is ready, and Gertie and I are so grateful for each of you in our family.”

  He paused, his throat working against his emotion. Georgia felt that same spirit from earlier, and she found her own feelings swirling and storming through her.

  “Thank you for coming. I’ve asked Bob to say grace.” He nodded at Georgia’s uncle, who stepped forward. After the prayer, the noise level exploded again, this time mostly with Betsy calling out the names of all the foods on the counter.

  She and Logan edged through the line behind Cami, and they all sat together. Alyssa, Jeremiah, and Robyn sat across from them at the table closest to the door, and Rhodes and a couple of cowboys who didn’t have family in the area took up the end of the table.

  “Where’s Knox?” Rhodes asked Logan, who’d just taken a bite of his turkey drumstick.

  He chewed and swallowed, then said, “He’s at my parent’s today.”

  “Oh, that’s too bad. Betsy was asking about him.”

  Logan whipped his head back toward the kitchen, and when he reached back to rub his neck, Georgia wasn’t surprised. “What?” she asked.

  Logan bent his head toward her and whispered that his brother had said someone had caught his eye. “It has to be her, right?” he asked.

  Georgia’s chest fluttered a little. “Maybe. I’ll see what I can covertly find out.”

  The next morning, Georgia stood in front of the tables and tables of gingerbread houses. Robyn’s was absolutely perfect, of course. She even had wispy marshmallow smoke coming out of the chimney, which poked out of a rooftop that looked like real shingles. Georgia even wanted to pluck off one of the candies and make sure it was, indeed, edible.

  Because that was a rule. Every piece of the display had to be edible, except the board the house sat on. Even that was practically perfect on Robyn’s display.

  “She’s winning again,” she said, sighing as she turned away from the houses. She was quite proud of hers, as she’d made the entire thing out of gingerbread men cookies. The house, the roof, even the trees in the yard. She’d broken them, filed them into the right shapes, and used perfectly white royal frosting to put it all together.

  She couldn’t vote for her own—anoth
er rule—but she wouldn’t vote for Robyn either. Or maybe she would. She wasn’t sure, and she didn’t have to decide right now.

  No, right now, she needed to be up at the homestead, getting the cookies onto platters for when they all returned from their trip into the forest to find two Christmas trees. She stepped out onto the porch of the cabin just as Logan’s red pickup rumbled up the snow packed road, and she tried to wave him down.

  But the man drove fast, and he didn’t see her. He’d said nothing about the ranches he’d looked up, and it had been weeks. She’d sensed it was a sensitive subject, and she’d told herself to let him bring it up.

  She’d been thinking more and more long-term, though she’d tried to stop herself. After all, she didn’t need to be making a commitment to another man who didn’t want to commit to her.

  But her mind did its own thing sometimes, and she’d been thinking about where she and Logan might live should they get married. He currently lived with Knox, and she had a bedroom in a homestead she didn’t own. Could they even afford their own place?

  Could she keep working for the ranch? Would he keep moving from temp job to temp job? If he bought a ranch, she could see their future as clearly as anything. They’d run it together and be happy on their little patch of land in Idaho.

  She shivered, her body’s way of telling her to get out of the cold to daydream, and she hurried down the steps to her car. She followed Logan’s pickup to the homestead and found him coming back down the steps.

  “There you are.” He kissed her hello, and she loved that such an action was so easy now, and still so wonderful. “Where is everyone? The house is empty.”

  “We meet at my parents’ cottage. Come on.” She led him up the steps, through the house, and out the back door. “They live back here.” The sidewalk between the two dwellings was always kept clear, something Cami did religiously in the winter.

  Sure enough, as soon as Georgia opened the door, she found her siblings and parents. Everyone wore their thick winter coats, hats, scarves, and gloves, completely ready to head out into the snowy wilderness.