Taming A Texas Heartbreaker (Bad Boy Ranch Book 4) Page 12

  “What are you doing? That’s my book.”

  “No, it’s my book.” He walked out the door.

  He should leave. Not just the boardinghouse, but Texas too. He had thought Simple would be much less distracting than New York, but he couldn’t have been more wrong.

  Unfortunately, he couldn’t leave. There was still the problem of Sam Sweeney to deal with and he couldn’t run off and leave it to the other boys when he’d promised Linc that he’d do some investigating. But he didn’t have to stay here. He could move back into the Double Diamond ranch. Reba would probably be thankful to be rid of him.

  He headed to his room to pack when once again he saw a flash of white just ahead of him. Since he’d just left Reba, he knew it couldn’t be her. Now he had to wonder if it had been her before. There was no way she could’ve changed so quickly.

  Intrigued, he hurried to catch up. When he came around the corner of a hedge, he ran right into the young kid who had come in late for supper. The young man stumbled back and grabbed his head. Curiously, his jeans and t-shirt were dark blue, not white.

  “Damn, I’m never drinking in the afternoon again,” he said with a groan. “You think it’s bad waking up early with a hangover. It’s nothing compared to waking up in the middle of the night with one.” He lifted his head and looked at Val. “You aren’t gonna hit me like you did that other guy, are you?”

  “Not unless you’re disrespectful to Miss Reba.”

  “Not a chance.” He grinned and held out a hand. “Tyson Cooper. But you can call me Ty.”

  “Val Sterling.” Val shook his hand.

  “Nice to meet ya.” Ty tentatively sat on the hammock that was strung up between two trees and reclined back on it, tucking his hands behind his head. “So how long have you been here?”

  “A little over a month.”

  “Damn. You got a good head start then.”

  “A head start on what?”

  “On winning Miss Reba’s hand in marriage.”

  “I’m not after Miss Reba’s hand,” he said. Which didn’t explain why he’d held it for so long tonight.

  “Well, that’s good. It will give me a better chance of getting it.” Ty looked up at the night sky and smiled. “A fine-looking, hardworking woman and a nice hotel with a pretty garden. A man can’t do much better than that.”

  Val had been wrong.

  He might just have to punch Ty.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Reba had never had a more uncomfortable breakfast in her life. Mr. Daniels, who had asked her to please call him Mike, sat on one side of her and Mr. Cooper, who went by Ty, sat on the other side. Both men seemed to be vying for her attention. Which was weird in itself, because she thought they would’ve hightailed it out of there like Mr. Peterman had after finding out about Aunt Gertie’s scheme. But there they were, preening and posing like a couple of roosters in a henhouse. Obviously, half-interest in the boardinghouse was a dangled carrot they couldn’t resist.

  What made things even worse was that Valentine sat across from her watching the entire thing with a slight smirk on his lips. She was still so mad at him that she couldn’t look at him without grinding her teeth. How dare he tell her that all the work she’d done trying to make the boardinghouse a success had been fruitless? She hadn’t wasted all these years working herself ragged for nothing. She would succeed.

  Even if just to spite Valentine Sterling.

  “This sure is a awesome breakfast, Miss Reba,” Ty said. He was a handsome young man, but his exuberant personality reminded her of a hyperactive puppy. At times, she felt like reaching out and scratching him behind the ears to calm him down. “In fact, these are the best cinnamon rolls I’ve ever tasted in my life.”

  Aunt Gertie, who sat next to Valentine, snorted. “If you like your cinnamon rolls tough as a piece of sun-baked leather.”

  “Thanks, Aunt Gertie,” Reba grumbled.

  “I’m sure they’re delicious.” Mike Daniels took a big bite of his cinnamon roll and chewed . . . and chewed . . . and chewed as Valentine’s smile got bigger and bigger and bigger. It was all Reba could do not to pick up a cinnamon roll and chuck it at Val’s head.

  “I thought you would be leaving after our . . . discussion last night, Mr. Sterling,” she said.

  “I thought about it, Ms. Dixon, but then changed my mind. A deal is a deal.” He looked at Mike. “You okay there? You need some water to get that down?”

  Mike shook his head, but continued to chew. Reba glared at Valentine and refilled Mike’s water glass. After he took a few swallows, he could finally speak. “Yes sirree, delicious.” But Reba noticed that he didn’t pick the cinnamon roll back up.

  Ty, on the other hand, finished all of his, but it didn’t look like he chewed as much as just swallowed his bites whole. She wanted to pat his head and say “Good boy.”

  “What are your plans today, Miss Reba?” Ty asked. “What say we go on a picnic? I brought my fishing pole and we could spread out a blanket beneath a shady tree and enjoy the sunshine.”

  “Bad idea.” Valentine glanced out the window. “It looks like rain.”

  Reba followed his gaze. “No it doesn’t. There’s not a cloud in the sky.” She smiled at Ty. “Thank you for the offer. But I’m afraid I don’t have time for a picnic. I have too much to do.”

  “I could help you,” Mike said.

  “I couldn’t ask you to do that. You’re a guest.”

  “No he’s not,” Aunt Gertie said. “He’s an applicant. They both are. And as applicants, they need to show me that they know how to work.”

  Reba sent her aunt a stern look. “I thought we cleared this up last night, Aunt Gertie.”

  “You cleared it up. I still think it’s a good idea. And since it’s my share of the boardinghouse I’m giving them, you don’t have a say.” She pointed a finger at Mike. “You can paint the front porch railing.” She pointed a finger at Ty. “And you can rake up the leaves in the front. You’ll find the tools and paint in the shed.”

  Before Reba could veto her aunt’s orders, both men jumped up from the table and tried to beat each other out of the room. Valentine chuckled.

  “I don’t know what you’re laughin’ at.” Aunt Gertie said. “That means you’re stuck doing the dishes.”

  Reba expected Valentine to explain that he wasn’t part of her aunt’s crazy scheme. Instead, he stood and started clearing the table. “Yes, ma’am.”

  Once he’d walked out with a stack of dishes, Reba looked at her aunt. “This isn’t funny anymore, Aunt Gertie. Why are you doing this?”

  “Because I want you to be happy.”

  “I am happy.”

  “No you’re not. You’re just too busy to realize it.”

  “Why do you think a man will make me happy? Lucas Diamond didn’t make you happy.” She hadn’t intended to bring up Lucas to her aunt. She didn’t want to cause her any unnecessary pain. But Reba was just so frustrated she couldn’t help it.

  Aunt Gertie stared at her. “Who told you about me and Lucas?”

  “I saw the letter from him up in your room.”

  Aunt Gertie sent her an annoyed look. “Well, I guess that’s what I get for leaving my private things out for my snoopy niece to find.”

  “I wasn’t snooping. It was right there on your dresser for anyone to see. I thought you hated Lucas Diamond.”

  “There’s a fine line between love and hate.”

  “So you loved him?”

  Aunt Gertie released a long sigh and stared out the window as if conjuring up images from her past. “What women wouldn’t fall for a handsome rodeo star with a devilish smile that made her knees feel like mashed potatoes? He was young and vibrant. And I had just turned forty and was suddenly feeling like the old maid everyone said I was. But Lucas didn’t seem to care about our age difference. He courted me with an intensity that swept me off my feet.” A sad look entered her eyes. “But as it turned out, the rodeo was his first love. And a woman just c
an’t compete with wild horses.”

  Reba got up and moved around the table to sit next to her aunt and take her hand. “So he broke your heart.”

  “Yes. And I broke his too by not being the type of woman to wait around for him to come back.”

  “I’m sorry, Aunt Gertie.”

  “Don’t be. I had a choice. He asked me to marry him. I was the one who chose not to. I was the one who made the decision to stay here and make sure my beloved boardinghouse survived.”

  “Did you ever regret it?”

  “No. I reminisce occasionally, but I know I made the right choice. That’s what I want for you, Reba Gertrude. I want you to have the choice—to know what it’s like to be loved and to decide whether you want to take it or whether you want to leave it.”

  “I’ve been in love, Aunt Gertie. I’d just as soon leave it.”

  “Are you talking about that idiot Billy Bob? That wasn’t love. You didn’t shed one tear over that man.”

  “I’m not a big crier, but I was upset.”

  “Only because you had already started planning your wedding. You’ve been dreaming about a big weddin’ since you were knee-high to a grasshopper and using my old petticoats as your weddin’ gowns.”

  “I was a kid. All little girls play bride.”

  “Not all. I never did.” Aunt Gertie squeezed her hand and looked her right in the eyes. “I’m ninety-two years old and I have no regrets in my life. I want the same for you. I want you to at least get the offer to walk down the aisle in a fancy dress. Then the choice is up to you.” She grabbed her walker and got to her feet. “Now you better get in the kitchen and make sure that man isn’t putting my grandmother’s china in the dishwasher.”

  Reba stood and gave her aunt a hug. As ornery as her aunt was, she knew Gertie loved her. The crazy scheme was a perfect example. “I understand now why you did what you did, Aunt Gertie. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to choose to marry some man you had to bribe to get here.”

  “Why not?” Aunt Gertie drew back. “As long as they end up loving you like you deserve to be loved, it doesn’t matter how they got here. Even if you don’t fall in love with one of them, we can still get a few weeks’ work out of them.” She cackled as she wheeled her walker around and shuffled out of the dining room.

  Once her aunt was gone, Reba finished clearing the table and carried the loaded tray into the kitchen. Valentine was standing at the sink rinsing the plates. Today he wore his casual clothes: a pair of faded jeans that hugged his butt and a blue western shirt with a tear along the stitching in the back. She was still mad at him. When he leaned over to stick the plate in the dishwasher, she couldn’t help snapping.

  “You can’t put that china in the dishwasher. You have to wash it by hand.”

  He glanced at her and straightened. “Then why use it?”

  “Because it’s tradition. Something you obviously know nothing about.”

  “I know people don’t care if they eat on dishwasher-safe dishes or hand-wash-only china that will add more time to the list of chores you already have to do. But I guess that won’t be a problem now that you have two new servants.” He turned back to the sink and picked up the scouring brush.

  Reba set the tray of dishes on the counter. “I don’t have two new servants. But it appears my aunt does.”

  “So she’s going through with her plan.”

  “She’s stubborn as the day is long.”

  “She’s not the only one,” he said under his breath, but she still heard him.

  “Yes, we all know how stubborn you think I am. You made that perfectly clear last night when you told me no matter what I do, I’m going to fail.”

  “I didn’t say that. I just said working yourself to death wasn’t going to guarantee success.”

  “Oh, that’s so much better.” She took the bowls off the tray and set them on the counter next to him with a little too much force.

  The annoying smile returned. “Be careful. I hear the owners uses authentic traditional china.”

  She glared at him. “You know you can leave. You’re not part of my aunt’s harebrained scheme.”

  He continued to scrub the plates and set them in the other sink to be rinsed. “My mama taught me to respect my elders, and if someone is nice enough to cook for me I should be grateful enough to help with the dishes—even if the cinnamon roll dough was overworked.”

  “Excuse me?”

  He continued to wash. “You overworked the dough. That’s why it was tough.”

  She moved to the other side of him and turned on the faucet to start rinsing the plates. “I’d like to know what makes a man who never eats carbs an expert on baking.”

  “My mother writes cookbooks.” He glanced at the shelf above her desk. “In fact, she wrote that one right there. Southern Delectable Desserts by Sharon Valentine. I was her taste tester. Which is why I was an overweight kid.”

  She really wanted to have a great comeback, but she had nothing. “Oh.” She set the plates in the drainer and took the washed bowl from his hand. “Does your mother still write cookbooks?”

  “No, she’s retired and living in Florida. Now she only bakes for my dad. And I get a box of baked goods from her every month.”

  “You throw them out, I’m guessing.”

  “Actually, I share them with my neighbors. I’ve very popular in my apartment building.” He paused in the middle of washing a bowl and turned to her. “Look, I’m sorry about last night. I shouldn’t have butted my nose into your business. I’m sure you can make a success of this place.”

  Last night, she had been fighting mad when he told her the boardinghouse would probably fail no matter what she did. But now that he was apologizing and telling her what she wanted to hear, she felt even angrier.

  “Don’t patronize me. That’s even worse than belittling me.”

  He stared at her. “There is no winning with you, is there? Men are damned if they do and damned if we don’t.” He threw up his hands, causing soap bubbles to fly in the air. “Fine. I won’t patronize you. I won’t say anything to you. I’ll leave you completely alone. Because that’s what you really want, isn’t it, Reba? You want men to leave you completely alone so you don’t ever have to feel inadequate or like the ugly fat girl.”

  She tossed the towel down. “How dare you call me an ugly fat girl?”

  “I didn’t call you that. The only one who thinks you’re an ugly fat girl is you.” He pointed a finger at the door. “Do you think those two guys outside would stay if they didn’t find you attractive? Believe me, part ownership in a small-town boardinghouse that is barely scraping by wouldn’t be worth it to any man if he was stuck with a woman he thought was ugly. They’re staying because they both see an opportunity to have a pretty nice life with a beautiful, hardworking woman. But go ahead, continue to see yourself through the lens of some jackass’s narrow view and push every man who comes near you away. Stay in your tower, Rapunzel.”

  “I am not Rapunzel!”

  “You’re right. She eventually let down her hair and allowed a man to climb up to her. You’ve cut yours off completely to spite your heart—cut it off so you will never be tempted by some prince calling up at you from the ground.”

  It wasn’t fair fighting with a writer who had all the words. It wasn’t fair at all. Especially when she didn’t have one to yell back. So she just stood there sizzling with anger before she whirled and headed out the door and into the garden. She did what she always did when she was upset. She worked. She brutally snapped deadheads from the flowers and jerked out weeds and fixed a broken fountain and sprayed dirt off the pathway. As she worked, Valentine’s words went around and around in her head.

  She was not Rapunzel. She did not hide away in her tower.

  Instead, she hid away in her boardinghouse.

  She released the weed she’d just plucked and let it drop to the ground as the truth of Val’s words hit her. She had been hiding away. She had tried to tell herself tha
t she had been working her butt off to make the boardinghouse a success. But the truth was that she had been using work as an excuse to never have to deal with life outside. And not just life, but any man who might see her as she saw herself.

  For so long, she had acted like she was a confident woman who made no excuses for her weight or who she was. But the truth was she wasn’t a confident woman at all. She was an insecure chicken. A chicken who was too scared to face the dating world because men might make her feel like an ugly fat girl who was only good enough for a tumble in the back seat of a car.

  No one could deny that she’d had her fair share of men who wanted nothing more than a tumble. Especially in high school. But there had been other men who had asked her out after Billy Bob. Nice men who had stopped by the boardinghouse and asked her to dinner or dancing at Cotton-Eyed Joe’s. She had always refused, using the excuse she was just too busy. Those men had gone on to date and marry other girls in town. And most of those girls hadn’t been skinny beauty queens. They’d been women like Reba with abundant curves. But those curves hadn’t made them any less beautiful when they walked down the aisle on their wedding day.

  Reba’s knees suddenly gave out and she flopped down right in the flowerbed she’d been weeding. As she sat there stunned, she felt a soft brush on her hand. She glanced down to see Roo staring up at her.

  “You don’t want to be around me, Roo. I’m a big ol’ hot mess.”

  “Now I don’t believe that for one second.”

  Reba started and turned to see Ty standing behind her, leaning on a rake and grinning.

  She pushed to her feet and dusted the dirt off her butt. “Did you need some help getting the leaves bagged, Ty?”

  “Nope, I think I can handle a few leaves. But there is something else you can do for me.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Come dancing with me tonight.”

  “I’m not much of a dancer.”

  “I’ll teach you. And there’s a mechanical bull-riding contest I want to enter and you can cheer me on. Come on, Miss Reba.” He pleaded with his puppy dog eyes. “It will be fun.”