Joanna Sims - The Maverick's Wedding Wager

“He’s ready to go back to his stall.” She unhooked Big Blue from the cross ties.

Knox had been so lost in thought that he hadn’t even noticed that she had finished. Those moments when he had been brooding about the conflict he was having with the father had raced by without him noticing.

“He’s already done?” He pushed away from the wall. “That was quick.”

“Quick and competent.” She handed him the lead rope with a smile. “Bring me my next victim, please.”

Knox led Big Blue back to his stall before he grabbed a dun mare with a black mane and tail and a tan body his father had just purchased for breeding.

“Who’s this beauty?” Genevieve’s face lit up at the sight of the new addition to the stable.

“Honey.”

Genevieve rubbed the mare between the eyes, and the mare, who had been head shy and skittish around most of the ranch hands at the Ambling A, lowered her head and nuzzled the farrier’s hand.

“And, you’re sweet like honey, aren’t you?”

After her standard body and leg check of the mare, Genevieve went to work. The first order of business was pulling the mare’s shoes; Genevieve had a reputation of being one of the best “barefoot” farriers and could often get a horse sound without shoes. Some horses required shoes, but it was best for the horse if they could have their hooves natural like God made them.

“Walk her forward for me so I can see her walk,” Genevieve instructed once she pulled the last shoe off the mare. “Let’s see how she does.”

After a couple of cautious steps where the mare was trying to get used to the odd sensation of walking without metal attached to her hooves, she began to walk naturally without any signs of lameness.

With a pleased smile, Genevieve waved her hand. “Bring her on back. She’s going to do just fine without shoes.”

It didn’t seem like any time at all that Genevieve handed the new mare off to him as she prepared for the third horse of the day. She was halfway done and he had wasted their time together lost in his own thoughts.

“I’m sorry I haven’t been much company today.” He didn’t know why he felt like he owed her some sort of explanation. Most visits they had a lot to say to each other. But today he couldn’t seem to get out of his own head.

Genevieve, in keeping with her easygoing manner, said, “Don’t worry about it. There’re plenty of days I don’t feel like talking, trust me.”

That was just the thing—he wanted to talk to somebody about his situation with his father. In fact, he felt like he needed to talk to somebody about it. It was eating him inside out keeping it all bottled up. Lately, he swung like an erratic pendulum from furious to just plain fed up and he was always thinking about a way to show his father, once and for all, that he couldn’t meddle in his life. He was a full-grown man and he was dog tired of his father thinking that he could control him like a puppet on a string.

Knox had chafed under his father’s rule for most of his life. Even as a kid he had wanted to set his own course, to make his own decisions. Max ruled the family with a proverbial iron fist—he was the boss and his word was first, last and final. There had been plenty of times when Knox thought to take a different path in life and leave the family business behind but one of his brothers would always reel him back in to the fold. In fact, his decision to move to Montana in the first place was touch and go. This move would have been the perfect excuse to start a new chapter in his life without having to always bend to his father’s will. Yet, here he was, in Montana, once again, doing it Maximilian’s way.

And, perhaps that would have been okay for him. The Ambling A had plenty of elbow room and he had his own cabin. The town of Rust Creek Falls was nice enough and the women sure were pretty. But, then his father dishonored him, and his brothers, by offering to pay a local matchmaker, Vivian Shuster, a million bucks to find brides for his sons. Knox felt humiliated and the wound was deeper because the source of that humiliation was his own father. More than any time in his life, Knox wanted to send his father a message: stop meddling in my life!

In no time at all, Genevieve was finished with the third horse and ready for the last one. Perhaps it was the fact that their visit was about to be over—or perhaps it was because he had grown so comfortable with this woman. Either way, when Knox placed the last horse in the cross ties for Genevieve, he broached a subject with her that he had sworn he’d never broach with anyone other than family.

“I suppose you’ve heard all about the million-dollar deal my dad made with Viv Shuster.” Knox had his arms crossed in front of his body and he watched Genevieve’s face carefully.

She was about to kneel down and begin working, but his words must have caught her off guard. Genevieve looked up at him with what could only be read as embarrassment—not for her, but for him . Of course the pretty farrier had heard all about the million-dollar deal Max had made to marry off his six sons. Of course she had.

* * *

Genevieve had hoped that the subject of the Viv Shuster deal would never come up between Knox and her. Everyone in Rust Creek Falls had heard about Maximilian’s quest to marry off his six eligible bachelor sons. It was the talk of the town! Most of the townsfolk were rooting for Viv so she could keep her sagging wedding business afloat. And there was a good chance Viv could pull it off. There were a lot of single women in town who wanted in on the Crawford action. Because Knox had become a friend of sorts, Genevieve never wanted to bring up what might be a sore subject for him. After all, she knew too well what it was like to have an overbearing father determined to control the lives of his adult children.

“I heard,” she said simply, not wanting to sugarcoat it. Knox didn’t seem like the type to want things sugarcoated for him. She took a moment to look directly into his intense, deep brown eyes so he would know that she was sincere when she said, “And I’m sorry.”

His heavy brown brows lifted slightly at her words. “Thank you.”

She nodded her head. Perhaps she was the first to say that to him. Instead of starting right away on the last horse, Genevieve opened up to Knox in a way she hadn’t before. “You know, I do understand how you feel. My dad’s been trying to marry me off for years. He thinks that my profession is unladylike.” She made quotation marks with her fingers when she said unladylike . “He thinks my expiration date for making babies is looming like an end-of-the-world scenario. As if that’s the only thing I’m good for.” She frowned at the thought. “I’ve gone out with every darn made-in-Montana cowboy within a fifty-mile radius—”

“You haven’t gone out with me,” the rancher interjected.

The way those words slipped past Knox’s lips, like a lover’s whisper full of promise of good things to come, made Genevieve’s stomach tighten in the most annoying way. She did not need to get involved with anyone in Rust Creek Falls. That was not the plan.

Wanting to laugh off the suggestion in his words, she smiled. “Well, that’s because you are a made-in-Texas cowboy. That doesn’t count.”

Knox took a step closer, his eyes pinned on her face in a way that had never happened before. This new line of conversation had seemed to open something up between them, and Genevieve wasn’t all too sure that she shouldn’t slam the lid shut real quick on what might turn out to be a giant Pandora’s box.

“Well,” the rancher said, his voice lowered in a way that sent a tingle right down her spine. “You know what people say about things from Texas—”