Porcupine Ranch

Silence ensued as the men looked at each other.

“No problem, man,” Bob mumbled.

“You got it, boss,” Mugger agreed.

He hadn’t intended to snap at them even before they’d done anything. On the other hand, better before than after. Hannah’s big brown eyes were bottomless pools of innocence. If one of the men did anything to destroy that innocence, he’d do worse than break the guy’s face.

“Ms. Lindsay is, um, different,” he said.

“You already told us that,” Bear growled.

“I said she was different from Mrs. Grogan. Now I’m saying she’s different from everybody.”

“You mean she’s not right in the head?”

Clayton flinched at the brutal description. Hannah wasn’t crazy. At least, he didn’t think so.

“She’s different,” he concluded obscurely. “Let’s go get some lunch.”

“All right!”

The men followed him up to the house and into the dining room where the table was set with his mother’s dishes with their elaborate floral design. His fault. He should have told her to use the plain brown ones he’d bought after his mother moved out. Well, it wouldn’t hurt the men to eat off pink and purple flowers. They probably wouldn’t even notice in their excitement over their first hot meal in two days.

“Where’s the food?” Bear demanded.

“Sit down. She’ll be out in a minute,” Clayton said confidently. But he didn’t feel all that confident. No tempting odors drifted from the kitchen the way they did when Mrs. Grogan cooked.

Hannah appeared in the kitchen door carrying a serving bowl with a spoon sprouting from it. Her hair looked even wilder than usual, and her eyes had a glassy look. She hesitated, her gaze taking in the ruffians who were talking and laughing as they settled into the chairs at the table. Her entrance froze them in place, Cruiser and Dub already poised over their chairs.

“Ms. Hannah Lindsay, this skinny guy here is Dub. The big, fierce one, with so much grizzled hair and beard all you can see is the tip of his nose, is Bear. The one with the trim little gambler’s mustache is Mugger. The long drink of water is Cruiser, and the redhead’s Bob.”

Hannah’s gaze went from one person to the next, all around the table, her expression getting wilder with each cowboy. When she came to Clayton, a bright red spot appeared on each smooth cheek. “Lunch,” she blurted, holding the bowl before her.

Cruiser ran to take it. “Let me help you, ma’am.”

Hannah’s face relaxed enough to allow a tentative smile as she surrendered the bowl. Yes, she definitely had a nice smile. “Thank you,” she said in a relatively normal voice.

Dub stumbled from his half-sitting position and pulled out her chair at the end of the table nearest the kitchen.

“Thank you,” she said again, looking and sounding a little more confident. She was communicating coherently, and the blood was redistributing itself from her cheeks to the rest of her body. That was an improvement.

Cruiser scooped out a large spoonful of food from the bowl and plopped it onto his plate. Macaroni mixed with bits of black, green and red sprawled among the painted flowers. Nobody said a word as all attention turned to the concoction.

“What is it?” Cruiser finally asked.

“Pasta salad.” Her voice was again strained as she dipped her head, letting her hair fall over her face.

“Pasta salad,” Clayton repeated before any of the men could say something to upset her more. “Great. This should give us a chance to cool down. Pass that bowl over here.”

Knowing the others would be watching him and following his example, he scooped out a generous serving. “Looks terrific.”

He took a bite of the stuff. The pasta was way past al dente. In fact, it was more like al mushe.

He looked down to the other end of the table. Hannah was watching him expectantly, her heart in her eyes.

“Good,” he said, thankful he’d had a new lightning rod installed last year. That kind of a lie could bring down divine retribution. “Needs a little salt. Maybe a little picante sauce.” Texas picante sauce could cover a multitude of bad flavors, or in this case, no flavor.

The men poured on the picante sauce and ate without grumbling, but he was sure he’d hear about it later.

They’d just have to cut her a little slack. She hadn’t had a lot of time to cook today, and maybe her last employer liked overcooked pasta salad for lunch. She’d never worked on a ranch before. He’d have to explain to her that they preferred heartier meals.

She’s not going to make it, a little voice nagged in the back of his mind. You knew that from the minute she walked in here. Roses bloom in town, along the river. Prickly pear cactus is the only flower that thrives out here.

He knew that little voice was probably right, but he ordered it to shut up anyway.

“All right, boys. Back to work.” He folded his napkin and laid it on the table. “I’ll be down to the corral in a few minutes.” He slid back his chair.

Hannah watched the other cowboys push away from the table. They’d been every bit as gracious as any of her mother’s guests, but she knew they were disappointed.

She grabbed an armload of dishes and ran into the kitchen, away from the censure that was in the air if not actually spoken.

She’d blown it again.

She’d wanted to run out of the room the minute Clayton had looked up with a pained expression and declared her meal to be “good.” But she’d had to sit at the table while everyone poured on enough picante sauce to drown any noodles that had survived her excessive boiling, then choked down the horrible mess.

She couldn’t go through that much stress again. She had to work up the courage to talk to Clayton about his grandfather then escape before dinner.

How did some people manage to cook three of those things a day?

Clayton came through the kitchen door carrying the empty serving bowl.

“Have you got a minute?” he asked, setting the dish on the counter. “We need to talk about something.”

Hannah couldn’t remember any good conversations that began with that statement. Here it came. He was going to fire her. She wouldn’t be able to help Samuel.

But what really clenched her stomach into hard little knots was knowing Clayton viewed her as a failure.

Damn it, why did she care what he thought of her?

She braced herself, straightening her back and looking him in the eye. “Yes?”

Clayton stood for a moment gazing at her, his eyelids drifting to half-closed. He lifted one hand and pushed her hair back from the side of her face, his fingers barely stroking her cheek.

Her breath caught in her throat. The touch set off little sparks, and she wanted him to continue doing it.

When his hand fell away, her belligerent hair sprang right back as if his fingers had never been there. But the skin he’d stroked remembered. Something inside her remembered exactly the way his touch had felt.

“You smell like roses,” he said softly, his lips forming the words as though caressing them, and she wondered how those lips would feel if they replaced his fingers on her skin.

“My grandfather loved roses,” she whispered, trying to force her thoughts away from such fanciful thoughts. “He—”

She couldn’t remember what she’d been about to say. The expression on Clayton’s face took her words away. Took her breath away for that matter. He looked like one of those men in the movies just before they kissed the girl.

She was fantasizing again! Why would Clayton want to kiss her?

But what if he did and found out that she could no more kiss than she could sing, dance, play piano or make small talk at parties? She’d die of embarrassment if that happened!

“What?” she croaked.

He blinked. “Huh? What?”

“You wanted to talk to me.”

“Oh. Yeah. I did.” He drew a hand over his own cheek and chin—the same hand he’d touched her hair and cheek with. “I wanted to talk to you about…oh, yeah. About lunch. I know this is a big change for you from your last job.” That was the quintessential understatement! “But there’s a little difference between cooking for a retired man and cooking for a bunch of cowboys. We do a lot of physical labor, and we like our meals to be hearty. Roasts, chicken, meatloafs, bacon and eggs for breakfast, things like that. Protein. Food for energy.”

Of course he hadn’t been thinking about kissing her. He’d only been thinking about criticizing her. Clayton sounded just like Hannah’s dance teacher after she’d broken her toe in class, like her voice teacher when he told her he’d had to buy ear plugs and hide the crystal, like her parents who’d finally given up on her and let her go her own way.

Well, she thought, thrusting her jaw forward and clenching her fists, she’d left all that behind her. She wasn’t going to give in to it again. Her own way hadn’t been so bad.

“We usually eat around seven. Can you get something together by then?” he asked.

“Of course I can,” she blurted, surprising herself with her bravado. “And I won’t break my toe doing it, either!”

Chapter Four

Clayton got out of the house as fast as he could, climbed onto his horse and rode toward the corral at a gallop.

He’d almost kissed Hannah Lindsay. What the hell had he been thinking?

He hadn’t been thinking. That was the whole problem. Something about Hannah Lindsay scattered his brains the way the west wind scattered the dust.

He’d better maintain a little more control in the future. That was the last thing he needed right now— to get involved with a delicate, sweet-smelling flower, inhale her scent, touch her butterfly soft lips—

His self-reprimand wasn’t going too good. He’d better rephrase it.

He didn’t need to get involved with a woman who’d turn his brain to mush, distract him from the ranch that required all his attention, especially now. A woman who, like his mother, would soon wilt in the scorching Texas sun.

If he’d needed proof of her fragility, he’d gotten it when he’d criticized her luncheon fiasco. She’d lifted her head bravely which only added to her look of vulnerability, emphasizing the hurt in her dark eyes.

But even as he’d seen that hurt and felt guilty for causing it, he’d also seen her lips, slightly parted, full and tempting. He’d had to fight the urge to pull her into his arms, comfort her, kiss away the pain, replace it with desire. Her hair had been soft when he’d touched it, and she’d made a barely audible sound that was somewhere between a gasp and a moan.

Every emotion showed on Hannah’s open face. As clearly as he’d seen the pain, he saw that she’d wanted him to kiss her. And, heaven help him, he would have if she hadn’t been the one to interrupt.

He had an uneasy feeling that Hannah Lindsay was going to cause him some real problems. Or maybe that uneasiness just came from the pasta salad with picante sauce that was crouching in his stomach like a spicy, soggy rock.

He reined in at the corral.

Dub looked up, pulled his hat brim low over his face and tugged on the reins to turn his horse to ride away.

“Didn’t hire that one for her cooking, did you?” Bear guffawed as he plunged a vaccination needle into a big Simmental’s rump.

Clayton scowled. “One more comment like that, and you’re all out of here.” In shock and disbelief he listened to the words coming from his own mouth. Had he really said that? What would he do if even one of the men walked? Every able-bodied man in the area was already working on one of the various ranches.

Dub halted and thumbed his hat back from his face. “I been seeing signs of a porcupine around here,” he drawled. “Looks like he’s been trying to eat these tough old mesquites and live oaks. After he’s been on an awful diet like that, I’d sure hate to run into the prickly critter.”

Clayton shifted in his saddle, aware of the implied comparison. “Sorry, fellas. I didn’t mean to snap.”

Hannah was causing problems, and she wasn’t even around.

Except in his thoughts.

Mugger rode up. “We got a break in one of the irrigation lines down in the hay field.”

“Damn! Okay, let’s go take a look.” Clayton turned his horse in that direction, surprisingly relieved at having a crisis to handle. Even though they couldn’t spare the precious water draining away, a broken irrigation line would be a simple, straightforward problem compared to Hannah.

She had to make dinner. Hannah didn’t see any way around it. She found some chicken breasts in the freezer and a recipe for chicken Kiev in her cook-book. It was a short recipe, and a dish she’d always enjoyed eating. Surely Clayton and the other cowboys would like it.

With the chicken thawing, she looked around in bewilderment. What was she supposed to do now? Without her computer, she felt lost.

She tried to recall what her housekeeper did. Sweep, mop, dust, vacuum. But the details were sketchy. While Mrs. Henson cleaned, Hannah worked, completely involved in her computer, with the rest of the world tuned out.

She wandered into the living room and drew a finger across the smooth surface of one of the multitude of small tables. Even in the dim light, she could see the mark. However, she’d always felt that being able to write your name in the dust didn’t count—it was only when the sides of the letters collapsed.

Nevertheless, she could probably dust. She went upstairs to the linen closet and got a washcloth. That should work.

As she was starting back, she noticed the dark outline of a computer screen through the half-open door down the hall. She hesitated, then decided that was as good a place as any to start dusting.

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