Penny Richards - Wolf Creek Father

“Well, we’ll let you get back to work now,” he said, placing a big hand on each child’s shoulder. “We’ll talk...later.”

Allison nodded. She would need to tell him this new insight into the situation. Surely it was something she could use to her advantage with changing Cilla’s attitude.

* * *

Colt was hardly aware of walking back home. His mind was still trying to come to terms with the picture of Allison Grainger without her prim-and-proper teacher persona in place.

He hoped he hadn’t made her uncomfortable with his staring, but wearing a simple skirt with a minimum of petticoats and an unadorned shirt, she looked nothing like her usual self.

He hadn’t been prepared for the pale perfection of her throat and shoulders or the soft contours of her bare arms, all spattered with freckles, as if someone had taken a paintbrush laden with gold dust and splashed it with carefree abandon over her creamy skin.

And her hair! Freed from the tight confines of her habitual knot and tied back with a scarf, the curly mass cascaded halfway down her back. Sunshine had given it a fiery, breathtaking radiance. He doubted she was aware how tempting the unassuming disarray was. And then there were the little spiral curls around her face that clung to her damp cheeks and forehead, just begging a man to brush them back....

Whoa! He caught his thoughts up short. What on earth was he doing, looking at the prudish teacher as a woman? Well, of course she was a woman, but she wasn’t the kind of woman he was interested in. He’d never been overly fond of redheads, except maybe for Ellie, and her hair was more auburn than red, and she was off bounds, so she didn’t count. Miss Grainger was his enemy, his nemesis. Well, maybe nothing so strong as that, but at the very least she’d been a constant irritant since he’d moved to Wolf Creek.

“What are you muttering about, Pa?” Brady asked, as Colt stomped up onto the porch.

“Nothing,” he snapped.

Cilla looked at her brother with raised eyebrows and preceded the men into the house. Colt gave them milk and sandwiches for supper. He helped them clean up the kitchen and told them to go to the store before it closed to see what Gabe might have for them to do to pay off their debt.

“What’s wrong with him?” Brady asked as they made their way down Antioch Street.

“I don’t know,” Cilla said, “but he sure is crabby.”

Colt was still crabby when he went to bed. He fell asleep along toward morning and dreamed of pressing his lips to each and every one of the freckles adorning Allison Grainger’s straight little nose.

When he woke the next morning, he was crankier than ever.

Chapter Three

Allison didn’t fall asleep until late for worrying about her future. She prided herself on being a good person and a good teacher, and in general felt she was. Since she’d reached her teen years and realized she would never be the beauty her sisters were, she had tied her self-esteem to her teaching skills. Now even that was in jeopardy.

Perhaps it was time to give up teaching and find another career. She’d fallen asleep thinking that it was too bad that she couldn’t just find a husband to take care of her, but even as she’d thought it, she wondered if she would be happy with that solution.

* * *

Allison was barely out of bed the next morning when someone knocked on her door. Tightening the sash of her seersucker wrapper and pushing back a lock of hair that had sprung free from her nightly braid, she opened the door to find Danny Stone—no, Danny Gentry now that his parents had been reunited—standing there, a serious expression on his face.

“Mornin’, Miss Grainger,” he said in a self-important tone. “Mayor Talbot sent me to tell you that he wants to see you in his office at nine sharp.”

A sick feeling settled in the pit of her stomach. Time for a reckoning. Time to see whether or not she would have a job come the start of the school year.

“Thank you, Danny,” she said. “How is your mother?”

“She’s fine, Miss Grainger. She and my dad are real happy.”

“That’s wonderful. Give them my best.” Allie meant every word, even though the news left a hollow feeling inside her she was beginning to think might never be filled.

“Yes, ma’am, I will. ’Bye.”

“Goodbye, Danny.”

She closed the door and leaned against it, tears of self-pity burning beneath her eyelids. She reconsidered her thoughts about finding a husband from the night before. Even if she did consider that as a solution, the major drawback about living in a town the size of Wolf Creek was that unattached men were scarce, and of those who were eligible, few were considered decent husband material. Even fewer wanted a nearsighted, middle-aged spinster with freckles and a few too many pounds. She saw no husband or children of her own on her horizon.

Finding another career was not possible, either—not at this point in her life. What else could a single woman do to support herself besides, perhaps, nursing? She gave a little shudder. God bless the people who could take care of the sick. That was not for her. Though she did not faint at the sight of blood, she did tend to panic in emergencies.

She sighed. There was nothing for her but years of teaching other people’s children, wiping their runny noses, cleaning up after them when they got sick and kissing their bumps and bruises. The best she could hope for was contentment, a pleasant place to live and a job that gave her satisfaction.

Job. She glanced at the mantel clock and saw that it was already 8:00 a.m. Muttering beneath her breath about Colt Garrett and his unruly children, she shoved away from the door and headed for the bedroom to get ready. She only hoped that after the meeting with Homer, she had a job.

* * *

When Allison stepped through the mayor’s door, she saw that Colt was already seated in one of the chairs in front of the desk. Even without her glasses, there was no hiding the scowl on his attractive face. As she neared the empty chair beside him, she noticed that his cheeks still bore yesterday’s stubble, as if he, too, had been given short notice of the meeting and hadn’t had time to shave. Combined with the unyielding expression in his unusual tawny eyes, he looked a tad dangerous and 100 percent handsome male. Somehow, she was not in the least surprised that he was already angry, or at the very least irritated.

Her heart fluttered in a sudden burst of awareness that sent her heart racing beneath the wide flounce that made a V from her waistband up and over her shoulders.

Knowing it was futile to have any physical response to him, no matter how attractive he might be, and desperate to control her runaway emotions, she forced her gaze to Homer, smiled and murmured a polite “Good morning, gentlemen.”

The mayor and the sheriff muttered their replies almost in tandem.

“Have a seat, Miss Grainger,” Homer said, indicating the empty chair. “This shouldn’t take long.”

As Allison stepped between the two chairs, she drew her skirts aside to keep them from brushing against the sheriff’s long denim-clad legs. Unnerved by his nearness—indeed, by everything about him—and wondering what had happened to make him so surly since they’d talked the previous day, she dropped into the chair next to his with a decidedly ungraceful and unladylike plop.

Her cheeks burned with mortification. What was it about the man that caused her to lose her professional demeanor and behave with uncharacteristic gaucheness? Sinking her teeth into her lower lip, she kept her gaze on the mayor.

“I was up half the night considering the situation,” Homer began, “and after consulting with the members of the town council, two of whom are on the school board, I think I have a clear picture of the situation.”