Read No Strings Attached (Last Hope Ranch Book 1) Online

Authors: Amanda McIntyre

Tags: #Romance, #Contemporary, #Western, #Westerns

No Strings Attached (Last Hope Ranch Book 1) (10 page)

BOOK: No Strings Attached (Last Hope Ranch Book 1)
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“Goodnight all. I’ll see you later in the week at Betty’s,” Liberty called as Rein ushered her out the door.

“Rebecca, let me help with the dishes,” Sally offered.

Michael and Wyatt stood to help.

“I’ll get this. You all go relax. Tell Aimee to put her feet up.” She hadn’t the nerve to look at Clay, though a few times during the evening, she’d sensed him looking at her.

“Well, early day tomorrow. Think I’ll turn in.” Clay stood. “Thank you, Rebecca. As always, your meals are amazing.” He smiled and waved at the small group beginning to settle in front of the fire. It was then that he tossed Sally a quick nod. “Miss Andersen.” He grabbed his ball cap from the deer antler hat rack in the foyer and was gone.

Sally collected the leftover food and carried it to the kitchen. Starting the search for containers to put them in. Lost in the task, she looked up and met Rebecca’s gaze across the kitchen table.

Emilee, who’d finished with bringing in the plates for her grandmother, giggled as she trotted out of the room to play with Sadie.

“Do I look odd?” Sally asked the woman whom she’d known as a second mother most of her young life.

Rebecca went about the work of loading the dishwasher. “No, why do you ask?” She glanced over her shoulder with a motherly smile.

“Maybe because you and your grand-daughter keep looking at me like you’re seeing something I don’t.” Sally snapped the lid on the container and tucked it in the refrigerator. Secured with flower-shaped magnets to the front door of the appliance were pictures taken over the past year—Wyatt riding with Aimee his new bride into the sunset, a photo of the Kinnisons around a massive Christmas tree, a tradition that had been absent far too many years in the house until Aimee came along. There was a picture of Dalton, Rein, Hank, and Clay at the old hunting cabin on a fall weekend fishing trip. Her gaze lingered on Clay, grinning with a fishing pole in one hand, a beer in the other. “Anything you care to share with me?” Sally asked turning to Rebecca. “Anything I should know?” She crossed her arms over her chest and waited.

The older woman was the picture of aging with grace. She’d always possessed an air of wisdom. Her dark eyes shone even now with it. “Seers aren’t astrologists, Sally. Sometimes things remain shadowed until they are meant to be seen.”

Sally had seen both Rebecca and her granddaughter’s skills at work in other people’s lives, but they’d never before been directed toward her. While she had great respect for the gift and for the vessels, she wasn’t sure yet that she believed—or even wanted to, now that the cosmic light seemed to be shining down on her.

“Well, you let me know if something becomes clear.” Sally crooked her fingers for emphasis. This had been the single strangest week of her adult life, and what had happened tonight in the barn was icing on that crazy cake. “I’m going to scoot on down to my cabin, if you don’t need me up here for anything. Thank you and please, I’d love to get your pot roast recipe from you sometime.”

“All you really need is a good slow-cooker,” Rebecca smiled as she resumed her task.

“All right, then. Good night.” Sally got as far as the kitchen door.

“Sally?”

She looked over her shoulder.

“He’s not like the others.” Rebecca regarded her for a moment, then went back to her dishes.

And with that, Sally headed to her cabin and a sleepless night of trying to decipher between that kiss and what Rebecca’s insight meant.

***

It’d taken him a few minutes to compose himself before he could show up at dinner after that kiss. Not just from the painful tightening in his jeans, but emotionally. And that night—thinking about it maybe a hundred or so times, in conjunction with a lusty fantasy of what might have happened had they found a dark corner on a soft bed of clean straw—well, let’s just say his dick hadn’t seen that kind of action in a very long time.

Clay, was in many ways, relieved when renovations were finally complete and Sally was able to return home. Delighted with her joy at the remodel, Rein had tried to wave off her paying for the labor, but she fought him, insisting on paying him what they’d agreed on.

Clay was just glad not to have her a few yards away, seeing her every morning, and forced to pretend as though nothing had happened between them each time their paths crossed.

Finishing up for the evening on a project at Rein’s house, Clay decided to stop in at Betty’s and grab a burger to go. He was too tired to fix anything and just wanted to get back to a hot shower and his unmade bed.

The minute he walked into Betty’s to pick up his dinner, he realized what day it was. There, in a separate room used for special parties sat Sally and her Buckle Ball entourage. Laughter filtered out over the scant number of visitors on the chilly Tuesday evening. From what he could tell, it appeared they were having a great time.

“Hey, Clay. How are you this evening?” Betty met him at the register located at the end of the old soda fountain counter with its eight chrome-and-red leather ice cream stools. “Jerry’s just about got your order ready. Why don’t you take a load off, and I’ll get you a cup of fresh coffee while you wait?”

“Thanks, Betty.” Clay sat down on the first stool nearest the door. He had no desire to see Sally. He’d had a hard enough time trying to put behind the lingering smoke of that fiery kiss they’d shared.

Betty set a cup in front of him. She glanced toward the room. “Those girls have been laughing like that since they sat down. Like a bunch of schoolgirls.” She smiled. “Like to hear laughter like that once in a while—does a heart good, you know?” She eyed the group. “Still, can’t help wanting to be a fly on the wall to cause such a ruckus.”

Clay nodded and took a sip of his coffee. Nope, he had no desire to know what they might be talking about. He peered over his cup at Jerry standing at the stove in the kitchen. They’d never put a door between the kitchen and customers. Jerry wanted folks to feel at home, wanted the smell of food to lure people in. He was busy at work, putting together the café’s famous special cheeseburger with bacon and cheese that he’d ordered.

“What have you been up to?” Betty asked, swiping vintage malt glasses with a dry towel and setting them in her special display cabinet above the malt machine.

“Got in a few more horses at the ranch this morning. Sent one out to live with a good family. We’ll check on them, make sure things are going well. But it looked really promising.” He sighed and rubbed one eye. “I’ve been helping Rein up at his place, helping him finish that basement project.”

“Oh, yes, Liberty mentioned you boys were working on that tonight,” Betty said over her shoulder. “Making it into a family room?”

Clay nodded. “Family room, guest room that walks out to the patio. They wanted to get it ready for times when they have family and friends over.”

Betty smiled. “Those boys have been through a lot, and Liberty, too, for that matter. Rein losing his parents when he was just a kid, and poor Liberty.” She tossed down her hand towel. “I’m just glad she had the good sense to get away from that poor excuse of a father.”

“You got any kids, Betty?” Clay had never seen any pictures behind the counter. Never heard her talk about her own kids, always somebody else’s kids.

She cleared her throat and after a moment looked at him, her eyes shimmered with unshed tears. “Nope, wasn’t able to carry them to term. A glitch in my body, I guess. But my sis has got seven kids. We’re real close to all seven, God-parents to the oldest four.”

Clay smiled at the vivacious, friendly woman that seemed a mother figure to almost everyone in town. “You’ve got a heart as big as Texas, Betty, and I should know since I was raised there.”

“No kidding? Jerry and I once drove all the way down there to compete in a chili-cooking contest. Winner received ten-thousand dollars toward his restaurant and the recipe in some fancy cookbook.”

“Really? Did you win?”

Betty laughed. “Heck, no. but we had a great time sampling the food between here and there.”

“Clay!”

He turned to see Aimee waving him over. “Come here and give us your opinion.”

Clay grinned and held up his hand. “I’m no good at decorations.”

“Yes, but you are one of our esteemed bachelors for the auction and since this will be displayed around the stage, that makes your thoughts valuable.”

Clay glanced at Betty, who nudged him to go with a nod.

“I’ll bring out your food when its ready.”

“Evenin’ ladies,” he might have let his southern drawl slip out in the greeting. He stood in the wide arched entrance to the room.  Liberty, Ellie, Aimee, Angelique, Kaylee, and Sally sat around the large farmhouse table. Rainbow colored squares of tissue paper littered the surface.

“Hey, Mr. Spring Buckle Ball bachelor.” Ellie said with a smile. “Say that ten times really quick.” She said, nudging Angelique beside her. “Are you prepared to have hundreds of single women fighting over you—figuratively speaking, of course?” Ellie looked around the table. “This auction thing doesn’t get ugly, does it?”

Aimee shook her head and took another bite of what looked to be a mile-high meringue on a slice of coconut cream pie. She closed her eyes, bliss etched on her face. “This little one loves coconut cream pie. What do you suppose that means?”

Clay hadn’t given much thought to the date aspect of the auction, or who he’d end up with. He’d been focused on too many other things of late. He glanced at Sally, quickly looking away. “Well, I can’t speak for what might happen, but I’m honored to be part of such a good cause.”

Ellie smiled. “You are a darling young man, and if I were younger I’d be saving my pennies to snag you for myself.” She blew him a quick kiss.

“Well, you can bet I’ve been saving
my
pennies,” Kaylee stated, tossing another completed flower into the corner.

Clay hoped that she was saving them for Tyler. Poor guy hadn’t stopped talking about Kaylee since he first saw her. “Ladies, it looks like you’re off to a great start. I’ve got to check on my dinner. Have fun.” He turned, and Betty, her face washed in fear, ran into him, grabbing his arms.

“It’s Jerry, something’s wrong. H-he’s n-not moving.”

Clay moved around her and hurried to the kitchen. Jerry lay on the floor. He was out cold.

Betty followed. “I heard him call my name, and by the time I reached him, he was on his knees, speaking… but I couldn’t understand a word he was saying.”

Clay knelt down and did a quick physical assessment, his combat training kicking in instinctively. He noted the distorted features of one side of the man’s face. A gash, likely from the fall, bled from his forehead. He found a pulse and looked up. “Someone call 911.”

Aimee held up her phone. “Got it.” She stepped away to make the call.

“Sally, get everyone out of here. We need to make room for the paramedics.” The Emergency Medical Unit resided in the firehouse. Only two medics comprised the EMT staff, and they served all the tiny mountain towns in the area. Clay prayed they were close by.

Betty grabbed a wad of hand towels and gently tucked them beneath Jerry’s head.  She looked over her shoulder. “Sally, Liberty, would you girls take care of things out front? Take care of the customers, tell them we need to close early.”

Liberty touched Betty’s shoulder. “We’ll take care of things here. Don’t worry.”

When it was just her and Clay, she looked at him. Her vivid blue eyes, normally alive with joy, were filled with concern.

“What happened?” she asked.

“He has a pulse, Betty, and he’s breathing. It looks like he bumped his head in the fall—maybe the stove handle.” He covered Betty’s hand, resting now on her husband’s chest. He couldn’t be sure, not until the medics had a chance to look at him, but his best guess was that Jerry had suffered a stroke.

The blue and red flashing lights of the Medivac truck flickered through the front windows.

Clay stood and draped his arm around Betty’s shoulders as the medics worked on Jerry. They placed him on oxygen, got him on a gurney and wheeled him outside, choosing instead to go through the alley door. “You go on with Jerry. We’ll lock up.”

Betty grabbed her purse and coat. She looked at Clay and then scanned the kitchen as though unsure whether to leave.

He took her by the shoulders. “Don’t worry. We’ve got this. It’ll be fine.”

She hadn’t shed a single tear. Shock still held her emotions at bay.

Angelique appeared and took Betty’s hand. “Come on, we’ll follow the ambulance to Billings.”

Betty nodded and grabbed Clay’s hand in a fierce grip. “Thank you.”

He stood at the alley door and watched the ambulance take off with Angelique and Betty close behind. It dawned on him that the stove was probably still on and drawing a deep breath to calm his racing heart, he locked the back door and set to the task of shutting down, and cleaning up the kitchen.

In the main room, Sally and Liberty had taken care of the customers, locking the door behind them and were bussing the tables. The rest of the group was busy gathering up the flowers and bagging their completed work.

Sally walked into the kitchen carrying a gray tub full of dirty dishes. “Put these in the dishwasher, wipe down the tables, refill the napkin dispensers, check the salt and pepper shakers.”

BOOK: No Strings Attached (Last Hope Ranch Book 1)
5.09Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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