Total pages in book: 74
Estimated words: 70264 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 351(@200wpm)___ 281(@250wpm)___ 234(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 70264 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 351(@200wpm)___ 281(@250wpm)___ 234(@300wpm)
Through her eyes, the ranch seems a wild and unpredictable place. If you haven’t grown up in this life, it can be difficult to adapt. The hours are long and hard, and the cycle of life and death is unavoidable.
I manage to fix the twisted, busted parts of the fence, and the cow seems fine. We all troop back to the truck, sliding in to continue the journey to the house.
“Does that happen often?” Taylor asks.
“Yup.” Jesse shakes his head. “Cows are stupid animals.”
“They’re so big. I didn’t realize how big they’d be.”
“Big and stupid.” Jesse has no sense of humor.
Clint clears his throat. “They’re sweet creatures. Generally docile. Only happy in herds.”
“Unlike people.” Taylor makes a soft sound in her throat. She doesn’t realize it yet, but she just summed up Clint. He’s happier with animals than he is with other humans, happier alone than in company, generally brooding and tough. I wonder how she’ll find him as a husband. At least with me and Jesse around, she won’t get lonely.
“Are you an introvert?” I ask her, trying to work out how she’s going to fit in. Jesse grunts like I just cursed in church. I might as well have confessed to believing in horoscopes.
“I don’t know,” she says.
“What do you mean you don’t know?” I turn in my seat and catch her shaking her head as she focuses on the open land, which is ours, as far as the eye can see.
“I guess I like people if they’re good people. And I’d rather be alone if they’re not.”
Clint nods, his perpetual frown lifting. Maybe Jesse will be proven right after all. Taylor and Clint could be a match made in heaven.
Taylor’s eyes widen as we approach the house. With its grand pillared porch and a trellised verandah spanning the whole building, it’s pretty impressive at first sight. I know women like flowers, and this time of year, they’re everywhere.
I wonder what her former home is like. Maybe she’ll tell us when she’s settled in. Maybe we’ll meet her family, although as there was no one to see her off at the auction, maybe not. It hits me that I don’t know who the money is going to. Is it, for her, a kind of dowry? Or did someone else put her up to it?
It’s something else I wanted to know about before we chose who to bid for, but Jesse didn’t take that into consideration.
I help Taylor from the truck, grabbing her bag, and she follows us into the kitchen. I rest it on the large wooden table and wait for Jesse and Clint to wash up before I take a chance to clean my hands of dirt and animal filth.
Jesse retrieves a jug of iced tea from the fridge and pours four glasses, offering Taylor one. She drinks the whole thing gratefully. “Are you hungry?”
She nods, gripping the back of one of the chairs. On the counter, Jesse plates up a tub of shop-bought cookies, indicating that Taylor should sit and eat.
He takes the seat opposite her, and Clint and I flank them. While Taylor nibbles her cookie, Jesse pulls out a piece of paper detailing Taylor’s responsibilities. Is he seriously going to thrust it at her right now? I can’t believe this guy.
The paper is pushed across the polished wood surface before I can snatch it away. My throat makes a strangled noise, which Jesse reacts to with a displeased narrowing of his blue-glass eyes and a deep furrow to his brows.
Taylor focuses on the paper, already reading through the list.
“This is what you’ll be expected to do around here to pull your weight.”
Whoever said romance is dead had definitely met Jesse McGraw, the poster boy for practicality and responsibility.
“Okay.” Taylor takes the paper and wrinkles her brow with concentration. I don’t think a list of household chores deserves so much focus, but then again, I’m not the tidiest person who ever lived, so what do I know?
Clint clears his throat and shifts in his seat. He’s antsy to get outside and Jesse’s forgotten the most important part of what needs to happen today.
The wedding.
“Maybe the chores list can wait until after they jump the broom?” I say, shooting Taylor my most charming, lopsided grin.
“Jump the broom?
“The wedding,” I smile. “Time to make it official, darlin’.”
The color draining from Taylor’s cheeks isn’t a good sign, but nothing about this arrangement can be labeled as positive. She looks around, confused, like she’s expecting a minister and a gathering of people in their Sunday best to appear from around a corner.
“I’m an officiant,” I say. “All you gotta do is sign the marriage license to dot the i’s and cross the t’s.”
“Oh. Okay.”
“Hang on a minute.” Jesse presses his hands to the tabletop to leverage himself to stand. He disappears from the room, returning with a white summer dress on a hanger. Oh, no, he didn’t. “I thought you might want to wear this.”