Ruth Herne - Her Cowboy Reunion

“Okay!”

Zeke scrambled into his booster seat, adjusted his belt, then got down to the important matters of the day. “What’s for supper?”

“Whatever Cookie came up with, but I thought I smelled beef and potatoes cooking.”

“Stew?” Eyes wide, the boy wriggled in excitement. “I love stew, Dad! And cake. And ice cream. And sometimes hot dogs.”

“A well-balanced diet is a boy’s best friend,” Heath teased as he drew closer to the main house again.

“And I get to have supper with our new company!” Zeke aimed a heart-melting grin at him through the rearview mirror. “That will be the most fun of all!”

From the boy’s vantage point, maybe. Heath held a different view, but that was his problem. Not Zeke’s.

“You sure do.” He pulled the car around to the back parking area, and climbed out. He was just about to remind Zeke about the basic rules of behavior around women...simple things, like wiping your face, washing your hands, no barreling through the house like a young elephant, and flushing the toilet, thank you very much...

But Zeke had spotted Lizzie coming their way across the square of grass. He raced toward her like a flash. “Hey! Hey!” He skidded to a stop along the dirt walk, spattering her jeans with fine brown dust. “Oops. Sorry!”

“I’ve been dirty before. I expect it will happen again, my friend.”

That voice. The drawl. Softened by years of education, but still enough to draw a man in, which meant he’d have to watch his step because the drawl and the beautiful woman were far too familiar.

She’d bent to talk to Zeke at his level, then looked up at Heath, smiling.

The smile gut-punched him. Was that his fault? Or hers?

She turned those rusty brown eyes on him and all he wanted was to go on listening as she spoke. Meet her gaze above that pretty smile. Since those were the last things he could do, he put the trip down memory lane on hold.

The kitchen gong sounded, the perfect segue into something else. Anything else. Anything that didn’t remind him of old losses and broken hearts. He’d made a grievous mistake by taking things too far. Yes, they’d been young. And in love.

But he should have known better.

“There’s my young helper.” Cookie grinned when they walked into the kitchen, and the hulking Latino’s face lit up a room when he smiled. “Where you been, little fellow? Usually you’re in here, pestering me for cookies we don’t mention to your father when it gets this close to supper time.”

“He is a bottomless pit these days,” Heath acknowledged. “And you’re mighty good to him, Cookie.”

“We’re good to each other,” the cook teased. Then he spotted Lizzie coming through the door and his grin widened. “And this young woman might have come to help with horses, but she brought reinforcements which only endears her to me more.” His grin indicated Lizzie had won his heart as well. “A man can deal with a whole lotta crazy on a spread like this, but some extra help in the kitchen is appreciated. And Miz Corrie mentioned something about Kentucky ribs that made me even happier,” Cookie added. “We’re gonna try those right soon.”

“The best way to survive on a ranch is by being nice to the cook.” Lizzie gave Cookie one of those utterly sincere smiles she’d practiced on Heath years before, but this time he noticed a difference in the smile. It was older. Wiser. Not jaded, and that was a surprise. But he’d be blind not to see the touch of sadness in her gaze, which made him wonder what had put it there.

She turned toward Cookie. “Do you mind if I take a plate out back? I don’t want to offend, but I want to study some things while I eat.”

“We like ambition in these parts,” the cook assured her. “Miz Corrie told me the same thing. And don’t you be worrying about cooking for yourself in those empty rooms.” He pointed a fork toward the premier horse stables. “You grab food here as needed. It don’t much matter where you lay your head, the food bag’s on for all.”

“Thank you.” Sincerity marked her voice and her gaze. “Corrie and I will appreciate that a lot. I’ll go get her now.” She went up the front stairs just before Jace and four other hungry stockmen strode in.

“Hey, guys!” Zeke high-fived each one, walking down the row of men with a mighty cute swagger.

“You goin’ to the front of the line, little man?” asked Ben, one of the older hands. “No one here minds if you do.”

“Naw.” Zeke faced him, chin up. “Front of the line’s for workers. My dad told me that.”

“Your dad’s a good man. I respect that.” Ben shifted his attention to Heath. “You know I’ll take your place and guide that last group into the northwest hills. I’ve got enough gumption in me yet.”

One of the younger cowboys snort-laughed, making them all grin, but Heath focused on the older man. “It’s not that you can’t do it, Ben. It’s that I should.”

“Ain’t no law sayin’ that, Heath,” Ben reminded him. “Things changed back in March.”

March was when they’d scattered the ashes of Sean Fitzgerald across the land he’d nurtured and loved for over three decades.

“And you should be here, keeping watch. There’s a lot at stake with that next clutch of sheep ready to drop. We’ve got to pick our battles. If we need to divide and conquer when the odds are against us, then that’s what we do.”

Heath started to reply as Corrie and Lizzie came down the stairs. He paused because the sight of two women in the main house lassoed the men’s collective attention, and Heath was pretty sure they wouldn’t hear a word he said until the shock wore off. “Guys, this is Sean’s niece, Elizabeth Fitzgerald. She’s here to take over the equine operation.”

Two of the men looked from him to Lizzie and back, surprised. Jace gave a nod of approval, Wick snapped his fingers the way old guys do, and Ben Fister moved forward. “You’ve got the look of your uncle about you, lass.”

His term inspired Lizzie’s smile. “My grandfather called me that. My mother’s father,” she added. “Not the Fitzgerald side.”

Heath knew that firsthand.

Ian Fitzgerald had never been good with children. He’d expected blue-ribbon equestrianship and top-notch grades from the girls. Other than that, the man had barely acknowledged his granddaughters during Heath’s years at Claremorris. He hadn’t thought much of it then. The older man was bent on building an empire, and did just that, and Heath had been a little awestruck by him.

Now Heath was a father. He saw things differently, which might be why the current state of the ranch hit him hard. He wanted Pine Ridge to succeed, and he appreciated Sean’s bequest, but everything had changed at the worst possible time... Could he be the father he needed to be and keep the ranch in the black when they were short on help?

“I knew Ralph Crawford, back in the day.” Appreciation marked Ben’s voice. “Before Sean moved north. He was a good man that never let the thought of money go to his head. A rare breed. Sean might have gotten his business savvy from Ian but his heart was all Crawford.”

“Not a bad combination,” said Corrie, and Heath put a hand on her shoulder.

“And this is a family friend, Cora Lee Satterly.”

“I’m Wick.” The man leaned forward and shook hands with both women. “Wick Williams, that is. I knowed Sean from the get-go, when he just got here and put money down on a chunk of land before anyone thought too much of it. He done all right for himself in these hills, ladies. I hope you will, too. And I’d like to say I’m sorry for your loss even though not much was said back and forth through the years.”

“To have built up such an amazing business with sheep is surprising, isn’t it?” Corrie asked. “It seems Sean was in the right place at the right time and everything fell into place.”