Diana Palmer - Rough Diamonds - Wyoming Tough / Diamond in the Rough

“We’ll show her,” Morie said.

There was a chuckle. “Okay. I’m game. What’s next?”

MORIE SPENT A VERY ENJOYABLE hour of her free time laying out a menu for Mavie and diagramming the placement of the silver and crystal on the tablecloth. She advised buying and using a transparent plastic cover over the antique tablecloth to preserve it from spills of red wine, which, the housekeeper groaned, the brothers preferred.

“They’ll never let me do that.” She sighed.

“Well, I suppose not,” Morie replied, trying to imagine her mother, that superhostess, putting plastic on her own priceless imported linen. “And I suppose we can find a dry cleaner who can get out stains if they’re fresh.”

“I don’t guess I can wear sweats to serve at table,” Mavie groaned.

“You could hire a caterer” came the suggestion.

“Nearest caterer I know of is in Jackson, ninety miles away,” the housekeeper said. “Think they’ll spring to fly him and his staff down here?”

Morie chuckled. No, not in the current economic environment. “Guess not.”

“Then we’ll have to manage.” She frowned. “I do have one passable dress. I guess it will still fit. And I can get a couple of the cowboys’ wives to come and help. But I don’t know how to serve anything.”

“I do,” Morie said gently. “I’ll coach you and the wives who help.”

Mavie cocked her head. Her blue eyes narrowed. “You’re not quite what you seem, are you?”

Morie tried to look innocent. “I just cooked for a big ranch,” she replied.

The housekeeper pursed her lips. “Okay. If you say so.”

Morie grinned. “I do. So, let’s talk about entrées!”

MALLORY CAME IN WHILE Morie was sipping a cup of coffee with Mavie after their preparations.

Morie looked up, disturbed, when Mallory stared at her pointedly.

“It’s my afternoon off,” she blurted.

His thick eyebrows lifted. “Did I say anything?”

“You were thinking it,” she shot back.

“Hard worker and reads minds.” Mallory nodded. “Nice combination.”

“She gave me some tips on canapés for that high-society party you’re making me cook for,” Mavie grumbled, glaring at him. “Never cooked for any darn politicians. I don’t like politicians.” She frowned. “I wonder what hemlock looks like…?”

“You stop that,” Mallory said at once. “We’re feeding them so we can push some agendas their way. We need a sympathetic ear in Washington for the cattlemen’s lobby.”

“They should keep buffalo in the park where they belong instead of letting them wander onto private land and infect cattle with brucellosis,” Morie muttered. “And people who don’t live here shouldn’t make policy for people who do. They’re trying to force out all the independent ranchers and farmers, it seems to me.”

Mallory pulled up a chair and sat down. “Exactly,” he said. “Mavie, can I have coffee, please?”

“Sure thing, boss.” She jumped up to make more.

“Another thing is this biofuel,” Mallory said. “Sure, it’s good tech. It will make the environment better. We’re already using wind and sun for power, even methane from animal waste. But we’re growing so much corn for fuel that we’re risking precious food stores. We’ve gone to natural, native grasses to feed our cattle because corn prices are killing our budget.”

“Grass fed is better,” Morie replied. “Especially for consumers who want lean cuts of beef.”

He glowered at her. “We don’t run beef cattle.”

“You run herd bulls,” she pointed out. “Same end result. You want a bull who breeds leaner beef calves.”

Mallory shifted uncomfortably. “We don’t raise veal.”

“Neither do—” She stopped abruptly. She was about to say “we,” because her father wouldn’t raise it, either. “Neither do a lot of ranchers. You must have a good model for your breeding program.”

“We do. I studied animal husbandry in school,” he said. “I learned how to tweak the genetics of cattle to breed for certain traits.”

“Like lower birth weight in calves and leaner conformation.”

“Yes. And enlarged…” He stopped in midsentence and seemed uncomfortable. “Well, for larger, uh, seed storage in herd bulls.”

She had to bite her tongue to keep from bursting out laughing. It was a common reference among cattlemen, but he was uncomfortable using the term with her. He was very old-world. She didn’t laugh. He was protecting her, in a sense. She shouldn’t like it. But she did.

He was studying her with open curiosity. “You know a lot about the cattle business.”

“I pick up a lot, working ranches,” she said. “I always listened when the boss talked about improving his herd.”

“Was he a good boss?”

“Oh, yes,” she said. Her dad had a very low turnover in his employees. He was fair to them, made sure they had insurance and every other benefit he could give them.

“Why did you leave, then?” he asked.

She shifted. Had to walk a careful line on this one, she thought. “I had a little trouble with an admirer,” she said finally. It was true. The man hadn’t been a ranch hand, but she insinuated that he was.

Mallory’s eyes narrowed. “That won’t ever happen here. You have problems with any of the cowboys, you just tell me. I’ll handle it.”

She beamed. “Thanks.”

“No problem. Thanks, Mavie,” he added when the housekeeper put a cup of black coffee with just a little cream at his hand. “You make the best coffee in Wyoming.”

“You’re only saying that because you want an apple pie for supper.”

His eyebrows shot up. “Hell, am I that obvious?”

“Absolutely,” she declared.

He shrugged. “I love apple pie.”

“I noticed. I suppose I can peel apples and listen while you two talk cattle,” she said, and got up to retrieve fresh apples from the counter along with a big bowl and a paring knife.

“Uh, about men,” Morie said, looking for an opening.

He scowled. “You are having problems here!”

“No!” She swallowed. “No, I’m not. There’s this nice man in town who wants to go out with me. His father runs the local tractor store—”

“No!”

She gaped at him.

“Clark Edmondson has a bad reputation locally,” he continued curtly. “He took out one of Jack Corrie’s daughters and deserted her at a country bar when she wouldn’t make out with him in his car. He was pretty drunk at the time.”

“We’re not going to a bar,” she stammered uncharacteristically, “just to a movie in town.”

He cocked his head. “What movie?”

“That cartoon one, about the chameleon. The lizard Western.”

“Actually, that one’s pretty good. I would have thought he’d prefer the werewolf movie, though.”

She shifted in her chair. “That’s the first one he suggested. I don’t like gore. The reviewers said it had some in it, and it got bad reviews.”

“You believe reviewers know what they’re talking about?” he queried with a twinkle in his eyes. “They don’t buy books or movie tickets, you know. They’re just average people with average opinions. One opinion doesn’t make or break a sale in the entertainment business.”

“I never thought of it like that.”

“I don’t read reviews. I look at what a book is about, or a movie, and make up my own mind whether to read it or see it in a theater. In fact, the werewolf movie had exquisite cinematography and some of the best CGI I’ve seen in a long time. I liked it, especially that gorgeous blonde girl in that red, red cape in the white, snowy background,” he recalled. “Film reviewers. What do they know?” he scoffed.

“Opinionated, is what he is,” Mavie said from beside them, where she sat peeling apples. “And it was Bill Duvall who told you about the Corrie girl. He’s sweet on her and she doesn’t like Clark, so you take that into account when you hear the story.” She looked down at her hands working on an apple. “Nothing wrong with Clark, except he’s flighty. You don’t understand flighty, because all three of you are rock-solid sort of people, full of opinions and attitude.”