Mary Sullivan - Rodeo Rancher

He sounded defensive. Maybe he thought she was judging him.

Samantha had noted how messy the place was. Maybe she was judging. If so, she needed to back off. She didn’t know a thing about this man’s life.

There didn’t seem to be a woman here. Where was Lily’s mother? He hadn’t said anything when she’d mentioned his wife, but the man had not looked happy.

Something had happened.

None of your business, Sammy. Keep your concerns and your opinions to yourself.

If his wife wasn’t here, Samantha suspected the guy was probably run off his feet managing this ranch and taking care of two children.

As a way to thank him for letting them stay, she said, “I can put it all away if Lily will show me where it belongs.”

He frowned at her use of the word belongs, as though she’d been criticizing him. She hadn’t, but she could see how she might have appeared to. She was going to have to walk on eggshells with him.

“Here.” Lily patted the unmade bed against the near wall. “I sleep here.”

“Thank you, Lily. I figured you did. You would drown—” she gestured to the clothing “—in this stuff.”

She tickled Lily’s tummy and the child giggled. Lily turned to her father and wrapped her arms around his leg. So shy. Maybe she wasn’t used to getting a lot of attention.

Lily lifted the scruffy doll by the hair and said, “This is Puff.” She hugged her close.

Puff was an untidy, poor-looking doll, but Samantha oohed and aahed over her.

Michael smiled, but it looked grim. Samantha couldn’t get a grip on who he was.

“Boys,” she said, “go get your knapsacks and take them to Michael’s room.”

He gestured down the hallway. “Back here.”

Jason and Colt returned with their knapsacks and dropped them where Mick told them.

“This is Dad’s bed,” Mick said a little too loudly. He looked like a small version of his father, with adorable dark eyes framed with long lashes and brown hair curling over his collar and onto his forehead.

The boys tossed their bags onto the bed without concern. For them, a bed was a bed was a bed. For Samantha, it was different. This was the rancher’s bed. She didn’t know him, probably wouldn’t be here long, and yet the intimacy of using his bed felt strange.

When he said, “I’ll get fresh sheets,” she breathed a sigh. Yes. That would make her feel better, help cut through this surreal sense of intimacy.

“Come see my room,” Mick yelled to the boys and they ran out.

“Mick,” Michael started, but the boys were already gone. “Sorry. Mick doesn’t moderate his voice level very well.”

“He yells a lot,” Lily said.

She followed her father to a cupboard down the hallway. They returned with clean sheets, pillowcases and pillows.

Samantha helped Michael strip the bed even though he told her not to. She needed to help. Now that she was here, she realized how much she was putting him out.

Michael shook the clean fitted sheet over the bed just as Lily threw herself onto the mattress. It fluttered down on top of her.

“Lily—” he started, but Samantha cut him off with a smile and wave of her hand.

She smoothed the sheet over the girl and said, “Mr. Moreno, I appreciate that you’re letting us use your bed, but we can’t possibly sleep here. There’s a terrible lump!”

A tiny giggle emerged from beneath the sheet.

“Help! It moves,” Samantha squealed. “Your bed has a moving bump!”

Lily giggled a bit more.

“It’s a beautiful big bed,” Samantha went on, “but I’ll squish this wriggling bump flat if I lie on top of it.”

Lily giggled loudly now.

Samantha laughed and looked up at Michael to share the joke, only to see a look of pain cross his face.

What was he thinking? What had Samantha set in motion with her joke?

She didn’t like sadness, hated what it brought up in her. She couldn’t get away from it quickly enough.

Grasping at any distraction, she picked up Lily and set her on the floor. “We’d better get this bed made.”

She and Michael finished making the bed and lined the headboard with three pillows.

Michael carried his pillow and an extra quilt to the sofa in the living room.

Samantha dropped her purse onto the bed. It was all she’d brought in with her. Her suitcase had been too heavy to drag through the snow.

She joined the boys in Mick’s room. He had bunk beds and a spare single bed across the room. It was a lot of sleeping space.

“This is a great room for having sleepovers. Do you do it often?”

She felt Michael’s presence behind her in the doorway.

Mick looked past her toward his dad. He wrinkled his small brow. Another lock of hair fell onto his forehead. “Dad, have I had friends for sleepovers?”

“No.” The single word was as curt as his tone, effectively cutting off the conversation.

What had she been thinking? Mick was still small, quite young for sleepovers. She kept making mistakes here left, right and center. Though why else would he have so many beds in his room?

Michael reached for something on the blue bedside table. “C’mere, Mick. You forgot again.”

“Aw, Dad, do I hafta?”

“What do you think?”

Mick pouted but stood still while his father fitted what looked like hearing aids into his ears.

“How’s the level? Good?”

Mick nodded and said, “You guys want to see the playroom?”

They all ran out of the room with little Lily trailing behind, still dragging her unfortunate doll by the hair.

Sammy stared after them.

Once she was alone in the room with Michael, the silence stretched. Strange, she could usually talk to anyone, but this taciturn man intimidated her with his silence.

She rushed to fill it. “How old are your children?”

“Mick is five and Lily’s four. Yours?”

“Jason is nine.” He nodded as though he’d already figured that out. “Colt is five.”

Silence fell.

“Mick has hearing issues?”

“Yeah. It’s why he yells. He forgets to put his aids in every morning unless I remind him. He doesn’t like them. He’s just being stubborn, I think.”

She nodded.

The silence between them stretched. Sammy’s inner neurotic raised her head again. No. Nope. Not saying anything this time. When she rushed to fill the void, she ended up saying the most inane things. People tended to take her less seriously than they should because of it.

Words clogged her throat, begging to be released.

“Why do the rooms have so many beds if they don’t have friends over?”

“We—I thought maybe they’d want to someday. It just hasn’t happened yet.”

We? He and the children’s mother?

She tried to gloss over the awkwardness of the moment. “Maybe after they start school.”

“Maybe,” Michael said, and changed the subject.

“We’d better take a look at the food situation,” he said.

Oh, yes, food. “We’re putting you out a lot, aren’t we? I’ll make sure the boys don’t eat too much.”

He waved a hand. “I have plenty of food in the freezer.”

“Why?” she blurted before realizing it was an impertinent question. She tended to shop for fresh food every day.

“This is the third bad storm in two months. Meteorologists predicted a bad winter this year, and they were right. I like to be prepared.”

He left the room and headed for the kitchen. She followed, interested in what he might have. She’d sensed his disapproval of her vegetarianism.

“Earlier in the week when I heard we were likely to be snowed in again, I put in an extra supply of stores. Wasn’t expecting company, though.”

Her hackles rose. “I’m sorry. If I could have stopped at a motel I would have.”